1. Standard memberAThousandYoung
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    14 Dec '10 22:47
    This is a quote from the days when colonialism fell and the USA began to rise. Is it a good analysis of world politics at the time?

    Many contemporary European States are like pyramids standing on their
    apexes. The European territory which these States possess is
    ridiculously small when compared with the enormous overhead weight of
    their colonies, foreign trade, etc. It may be said that they have the
    apex in Europe and the base of the pyramid all over the world; quite
    different from the United States of America, which has its base on the
    American Continent and is in contact with the rest of the world only
    through its apex. Out of that situation arises the incomparable inner
    strength of the U.S.A. and the contrary situation is responsible for the
    weakness of most of the colonial European Powers.

    England cannot be suggested as an argument against this assertion,
    though in glancing casually over the map of the British Empire one is
    inclined easily to overlook the existence of a whole Anglo-Saxon world.
    England's position cannot be compared with that of any other State in
    Europe, since it forms a vast community of language and culture together
    with the U.S.A.


    Reveal Hidden Content
    From Mein Kampf
  2. Standard memberBosse de Nage
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    15 Dec '10 09:30
    Originally posted by AThousandYoung
    This is a quote from the days when colonialism fell and the USA began to rise. Is it a good analysis of world politics at the time?

    Many contemporary European States are like pyramids standing on their
    apexes. The European territory which these States possess is
    ridiculously small when compared with the enormous overhead weight of
    their colo ...[text shortened]... unity of language and culture together
    with the U.S.A.


    [hidden]From Mein Kampf[/hidden]
    It makes no sense, there is no community of language and culture between England and the USA.

    The 'incomparable inner strength' thing is also clearly whack. Or was that written before the USA gutted itself economically?
  3. Joined
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    15 Dec '10 10:351 edit
    Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
    The 'incomparable inner strength' thing is also clearly whack. Or was that written before the USA gutted itself economically?
    AThousandYoung said it was written in the days before colonialism fell. So, therefore, yes.
  4. Standard memberbill718
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    15 Dec '10 17:11
    Originally posted by AThousandYoung
    This is a quote from the days when colonialism fell and the USA began to rise. Is it a good analysis of world politics at the time?

    Many contemporary European States are like pyramids standing on their
    apexes. The European territory which these States possess is
    ridiculously small when compared with the enormous overhead weight of
    their colo ...[text shortened]... unity of language and culture together
    with the U.S.A.


    [hidden]From Mein Kampf[/hidden]
    I think there are a few grains of truth to this statement. It must be understood however, in hard economic times there is a natural tendency to over anaylize any economic system. Europe and the United States will pull through this economic downturn just like they have all the rest.
  5. Standard memberIgloo
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    15 Dec '10 17:461 edit
    Mein Kampf was a terrible read. Hitler often mixed different ideas in the same paragraphs and his ideas often were contradictory.

    For e.g. compare England cannot be suggested as an argument against this assertion to England's position cannot be compared with that of any other State in
    Europe
    .

    He says that England isn't an exception, then he says that England is an exception because of relationship between England (and the old Empire) and the USA.

    I battle to understand exactly what he is referring to. He could be alluding to the economic problems at the time (Mein Kampf was produced during the Great Depression).

    Or it could be a comment on how the movement for independence in many of the old colonies was politically destabilising the European states' empires. The Statute of Westminster had been signed, India and the Irish were pushing for full independence and that is only in the English empire. A problem which the USA wouldn't have.

    Or it could just be rambling. I vote for rambling.
  6. Standard memberAThousandYoung
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    15 Dec '10 17:545 edits
    Some other good quotes from that source:

    On the contrary, experience shows that it is the more healthy and more
    vigorous that emigrate, and not the reverse...

    all the empty nonsense about international solidarity was knocked out of the heads
    of the...working classes. A few weeks later, instead of this stupid talk sounding
    in their ears, they heard the noise of American-manufactured shrapnel bursting above
    [their] heads, as a symbol of international comradeship...

    [Early Americans] earned their daily livelihood as trappers and hunters, etc.,
    frequently wandering about in large groups with their women and
    children, their mode of existence very much resembling that of ordinary
    nomads. The moment, however, that they grew more numerous and were able
    to accumulate larger resources, they cleared the land and drove out the
    aborigines, at the same time establishing settlements which rapidly
    increased all over the country.
  7. Standard memberjoneschr
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    15 Dec '10 18:401 edit
    Originally posted by Igloo
    Mein Kampf was a terrible read. Hitler often mixed different ideas in the same paragraphs and his ideas often were contradictory.
    I agree, there are places its hard to really follow his ramblings on race and world politics.

    There are some passages though that are interesting from a historical perspective -- answering the question on how he was able to convert a democracy to his totalitarian toy.


    For these weak minds the State and the authority of the State is nothing
    but an aim in itself, while for us it is an effective weapon in the
    service of the great and eternal struggle for existence, a weapon which
    everyone must adopt, not because it is a mere formal mechanism, but
    because it is the main expression of our common will to exist.

    Against us we have the innumerable army of all those who are lazy-minded
    and indifferent rather than evil, and those whose self-interest leads
    them to uphold the present state of affairs. On the apparent
    hopelessness of our great struggle is based the magnitude of our task
    and the possibilities of success. A battle-cry which from the very start
    will scare off all the petty spirits, or at least discourage them, will
    become the signal for a rally of all those temperaments that are of the
    real fighting metal.
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