freediver wrote on Sep 23^rd, 2008 at 2:14pm:

Never mind the Concordat (the Reichskonkordat) signed by Hitler and Cardinal Pacelli (the future Pope Pius XII) on behalf of the Vatican which granted the Catholic Church (among other things) protection of its property and the right to practise Catholicism within the Reich in return for the Vatican staying out of German politics.

freediver wrote on Sep 25^th, 2008 at 9:22am:

I’ve never read that Hitler thought the Germans fools for electing him. Would that be from 1933 or at the end? Do you have a source for that?

Despite over 70 complaints of concordat violations between 1933 and 39, Hitler largely kept to the bargain as, unfortunately, did the Vatican including silence regarding the Holocaust.

freediver wrote on Sep 25^th, 2008 at 9:58am:

A quote I believe from Mein Kampf which when written he was not referring to himself in power. It's not likely he considered them fools for electing him, he was too convinced of his own messianic destiny. The notion that fools elected him would have threatened his need for an exaggerated sense of self.

he was too convinced of his own messianic destiny

What kind of messiah do you think he really saw himself as?

http://www.simpletoremember.com/vitals/hitler-quotes.htm

"They refer to me as an uneducated barbarian.  Yes, we are barbarians.  We want to be barbarians, it is an honored title to us.  We shall rejuvenate the world.  This world is near its end."

"Providence has ordained that I should be the greatest liberator of humanity.  I am freeing man from the restraints of an intelligence that has taken charge, from the dirty and degrading self-mortification of a false vision called conscience and morality, and from the demands of a freedom and independence which only a very few can bear."

"The Ten Commandments have lost their validity.  Conscience is a Jewish invention, it is a blemish like circumcision."

"The law of selection justifies this incessant struggle, by allowing the survival of the fittest.  Christianity is a rebellion against natural law, a protest against nature.  Taken to its logical extreme, Christianity would mean the systematic cultivation of the human failure."

".. Do you now appreciate the depth of our National Socialist Movement?  Can there be anything greater and more all comprehending?  Those who see in National Socialism nothing more than a political movement know scarcely anything of it.  It is more even than religion; it is the will to create mankind anew."

"The earth continues to go round, whether it's the man who kills the tiger or the tiger who eats the man.  The stronger asserts his will, it's the law of nature.  The world doesn't change; its laws are eternal."

We are the joyous Hitler youth,
We do not need any Christian virtue
Our leader is our savior
The Pope and Rabbi shall be gone
We want to be pagans once again."

- Song sung by Hitler youth


http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1699/was-hitler-a-christian

In addition, Hitler declared Nazism the state religion and the Bible was replaced by Mein Kampf in the schools. You really want confusion? Randy Alley, one of my best WWII history sources, noted that the SS were supposedly forbidden to believe in God--yet the military's belt buckles said "Gott mit uns" ("God is with us")!

According to a press release from Catholic League President, William A. Donohue (2/4/99): "Hitler was a neo-pagan terrorist whose conscience was not informed by Christianity, but by pseudo-scientific racist philosophies. Hitler hated the Catholic Church, made plans to kill the Pope, authorized the murder of thousands of priests and nuns, and did everything he could to suppress the influence of the Church. In 1933, Hitler said, 'It is through the peasantry that we shall really be able to destroy Christianity because there is in them a true religion rooted in nature and blood.'"  The Catholic League also quoted Hitler, in a 4/23/99 Op-Ed ad in the New York Times, as saying, "Antiquity was better than modern times, because it didn't know Christianity and syphilis." Ouch!

That said, we can move on to some other relevant info. Jehuda Bauer, Professor of Holocaust Studies at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, describes the real "god" of Hitler and the Nazis in his article, "The Trauma of the Holocaust: Some Historical Perspectives," by saying: ""They wanted to go back to a pagan world, beautiful, naturalistic, where natural hierarchies based on the supremacy of the strong would be established, because strong equaled good, powerful equaled civilized. The world did have a kind of God, the merciless God of nature, the brutal God of races, the oppressive God of hierarchies." In other words, definitely non-Christian.

It seems Hitler, like many modern-day politicians, spoke out of both sides of his mouth. And when he didn't, his lackeys did. It may have been political pandering, just like many of our current politicians who invoke God's name to gain support.

Also, it seems probable that Hitler, being the great manipulator, knew that he couldn't fight the Christian churches and their members right off the bat. So he made statements to put the church at ease and may have patronized religion as a way to prevent having to fight the Christian-based church.

In fact, Anton Gil notes in his book, An Honourable Defeat: A History of German Resistance to Hitler, 1933-1945: "For his part, Hitler naturally wanted to bring the church into line with everything else in his scheme of things. He knew he dare not simply eradicate it: that would not have been possible with such an international organisation, and he would have lost many Christian supporters had he tried to. His principal aim was to unify the German Evangelical Church under a pro-Nazi banner, and to come to an accommodation with the Catholics."

In other words, while he was certainly evil, he also usually knew which wars he could win (at least until 1941) and only fought those. He knew he could beat the Polish, French, and British armies and he allegedly counseled the Japanese against attacking the U.S.; he also requested that they open up a front against Russia. He couldn't beat the church in open warfare--so he took control and then attacked them piecemeal while making statements to put them at ease. Think about it--how many other times did Hitler break his word or ignore a treaty? He said whatever would make things easiest, and then ignored it later.

I suspect that had he been able to, he would have evenutally appointed himself as a divine leader, in the same manner as earlier European monarchs before the separation of church and state was fully realised. He may have made himself a Christian leader or reformer if that was easier than destroying the church and making himself some kind of atheist/naturalist/pagan prophet. This would not mean he supported the church, but that he saw it more as a tool to cement his grip on power rather than a threat to his power. His quotes indicate to me that he still hadn't made up his mind. I strongly doubt he saw himself as a true Christian or saw any inherent value in Christianity.

Quote:


There is not one sentence there of any substance.  Helian, exactly what are you saying about why Germany lost the Battle of Britain, which was the description given to Hitler's loss of air power over Britain. 

Precisely what is it that you say is "perhaps partly the reason........"

Talk about waffle!

....and what do you mean by this....

Quote:


When was it exposed as a paper tiger?

NorthOfNorth wrote on Sep 25^th, 2008 at 6:02pm:


I'm not gonna bother with the first paragraph.....it is just generalised rubbish.

The second paragraph is insane.

The fall of Singapore had ferk all to do with Britain*, and the War in Europe. 

Helian, it was not the Germans who took Singapore.

*Yeah, the fact that Aussies were taken there, is a direct result of decisions made in London to the detriment of our Diggers.

The British Commonwealth (formerly 'Empire') survives your rants, Helian, and that runs me.

I am a Republican.