Brad De Long wrote:
>>>I would point out that all of us--no matter what our
>>>nationality--should get down on our knees and thank God daily that
>>>over the twentieth century the decisive shaper of world culture was
>>>not one of the... alternative "mighty states": Russian officials,
>>>Japanese honor-bound authorities, German... ahem.
Doug replied:
>>Millions of Indochinese and Latin Americans might view American
>>hegemony with a bit less cheer than you do.
Brad ripostes:
>And how would they view the hegemony of the mid-twentieth century Germans?
A lot of (right-wing) Latin Americans leaned toward Germany during WW2,
because they followed the fallacious "the enemy of my enemy is my friend"
philosophy and saw Germany as a possible bulwark against US domination. (I
think the quote is from Mao, though it's a sentiment that's been expressed
by many people in many places and times.) BTW, a lot of those Nazi
sympathizers later became allies of the US in the Cold War, formalized by
the US-supported World Anti-Communist League (I think that's the name). The
WACL had all sorts of fascists and full-scale Nazis in its ranks.
Those in Southeast Asia did not do so as much, since they had to deal with
Japanese occupation and Japan was allied with the Nazis. However, some
supported that occupation because of they thought they could gain from the
replacement of European colonialism by the Japanese variety, falling for
Japan's "anti-colonial" rhetoric.
I can't believe, BTW, the fact that Brad uses a version of the "enemy of my
enemy" line in his missive. Are you really following that line (a version
of the lesser-of-two-evils line), Brad? Brad, are you saying that because
US imperialism is "better than" the Nazis, it should be supported? Say it
ain't so, Brad!
Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] & http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~jdevine
