Part of my reading material at the moment includes “The War in the West - A New History: Volume 1: Germany Ascendant 1939-1941 (War in the West a New History)” by James Holland (pub. Transworld Digital, 2015, ISBN 978-1448167029; Penguin, Kobo, Amazon) - I have a strong interest in history, although I am finding the history chapter of Mitch Horowitz’s “Practical Magick: Ancient Tradition and Modern Practice” (pub. Gildan Media LLC, 2025, ISBN 978-1-7225-2781-5; Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Readings, Apple Books, Amazon), both interesting, as it brings in new information, and heavy going, as I have read so much on that topic over the years I have reached a state of being ... overfull ...
From James Holland’s book:
“It was clear to Warlimont that the main purpose of H_t l_r’s speech was to convince his generals of the rightness of his decision, and assure them Britain and France would keep out. The F_h r_r’s confidence was based on a number of factors, not least his experiences back in March when German troops had marched into Czechoslovakia unopposed. He had been braced then for a more dramatic response from the Western democracies, and yet he had got away with it. He had been getting away with it for years”
“The carefully orchestrated parades, the even more carefully managed showreels of German troops and tanks and skies thick with aircraft, were, to a very large extent, a projection of military might rather than representative of the reality. Germany was by no means ready for all-out war. It did not have enough tanks, vehicles or trained soldiers, and certainly not enough natural resources, to carry out anything more than a short, sharp campaign against a massively inferior enemy: Germany possessed little iron ore, no oil, no copper, tungsten, bauxite or rubber, and, crucially, did not have enough land, sufficiently farmed, to fulfil the food requirements of both the population and a massive military.”
I have written previously - on this and my former political blog - about the importance of early and timely intervention (I will add links over the next few days); I have been supportive of the calls for activism against oppression - particularly over the last decade or so, notably in the USA; and I have been aware of the benefits of studying history (I will add a link to an excellent book written by a group of historians on this over the next few days) and of seeing how past disasters could have been averted (especially around World War (part) One) ... but I don’t recall an example which ties all this together so clearly.
James Holland’s book also states that the UK’s and France’s combined militaries were larger/more forceful than Germany’s.
There were critical flaws in the UK and France, but we were so much closer to preventing World War (part) Two than I realised ...
And the lesson for me now, out of all this, is of the importance of being BPM moral/ethical, and taking action against oppression, backwardness/reactionariness, and evil whenever one can.
So ... courage, and do what you can: the enemies of decency may be closer to failure than we realise.
PS - to be clear, I have been very much aware of the dangers of appeasement - for most of life, and of the views about the UK rearming (including John F Kennedy's argument that the UK wasn't sleeping but buying time to rearm), and of the strong preference for peace of the population of the UK - but not at any price; what is new to me is the possibility that war was so close being prevented (or being preventable) in the last few months before it started.
Possible flaws
Where I can, I will try to highlight possible flaws / issues you should consider:
- there may be flawed logical arguments in the above: to find out more about such flaws and thinking generally, I recommend Brendan Myers’ free online course “Clear and Present Thinking”;
- I could be wrong - so keep your thinking caps on, and make up your own minds for yourself.
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Note that I am cutting back on aspects of my posts - see here.
(Gnwmythr is pronounced new-MYTH-ear)
Remember: we generally need to be more human being rather than human doing, to mind our Mӕgan, and to acknowledge that all misgendering is an act of active transphobia/transmisia that puts trans+ lives at risk & accept that all insistence on the use of “trans” as a descriptor comes with commensurate use of “cis” as a descriptor to prevent “othering” (just as binary gendered [men’s and women’s] sporting teams are either both given the gender descriptor, or neither).#PsychicABetterWorld and may all that I do be of value and actively BPM used for and by the nonphysical BPM because #KindnessIsThePoint
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