History of the Holocaust

[Anti-Flag]

"Guh. Silly Euros, innit? All a pack of swots, you ask me."

You know, I'm not sure what I find more threatening; a german accent, or the phrase
"I jus wanna aks u summin innit....."

 

[S.A.M.]

what is that history. any links? what is the root word?

Well lets see. Kuh is Persian for mountain. Hindu Kuh is Persian for Indian mountain, because Hindu is the word used by everyone west of the Indus for Indians, before the British formally partitioned the country into Muslims, Christians and Hindoos [i.e. other unidentifiable stuff that they are not familiar with] around 1829

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=Hindu

Ibn Batuta's travels is the Moroccan Marco Polo who wrote colourful tales of his travels and decided that the Hindu Kush means Hindu Killer, because Indian slaves died there in the cold during transport. His is the only reference that uses this etymology. Not sure how Kush = killer [edit: acc to wiki, apparently old Persian kush = killer, will need to check that]


There is plenty of disinformation in the rest of the saffronised history.

After the Mongols started their trail of destruction in 1205 in China, they progressively moved all the way from both sides through Siberia, Manchuria, Europe, Persia, Mesopotamia, Japan, Vietnam, Java, finally converging in India and meeting up with the Turkic dynasties ruling India at the time [in the form of four successive Delhi sultanates]. Somewhere along the line, probably in Persia, they adopted Islam [at various other times they were Buddhists, Christians and Tengriks]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongol_Empire

The battles were fought between the Mongols and the Mamluks [the Mamluks were descended from Afghan Ghorids "Indian slaves" who became kings], The Mongols and the Khiljis [also an Afghan dynasty], the Mongols and the Tughlaqs [the Tughlaqs were Turkic in origin but allied with the Afghans], which was the war that Timur fought.

Timur weakened the Delhi Sultanate and deputised the Sayyeds in Delhi. The Sayyeds claimed to be descended from the Prophet [they still do, in India]. They hung around for a few decades, then abdicated in favour of the Lodhis the final Delhi Sultanate and a Pashtun dynasty.

The Lodhis were finally defeated by Babur who then established himself in India as the first emperor of the Mongol dynasty that was to rule India for the next 800 years. He was the grandfather of Akbar, the Great. By that time the Mongols had become Persianised and Turkicised

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mughal_Empire

Thats the Hindu holocaust. Muslims fighting Muslims.

Keep in mind that the greatest casualties of the Mongol wars were on the Muslim world. The worst sufferer was Baghdad where every soldier was told to return with two heads and all of them were laid in the center of the city. 20,000 Baghdadis [from the city alone] were massacred. I guess the Iraqis are just lucky like that.

No idea where the other figures in Ulti's link come from, will have to check.

 

[GeoffP]

Uggh.

I used to get "tha knaws" from one of my uncles. No joke.

 

[GeoffP]

Give me a concrete example.

Of?

In the absence of any official paperwork or body counts, what is reasonable evidence?

Well, hard to say. Would you believe anything that didn't come with paperwork? When I discuss, for example, the massacre of Hindus by Sufis in Southern Asia, do you agree with me about the numerical evidence? Which of yours should I accept? I have to judge these things as best one can from what's available.

Witness testimonies like the ones spidergoat linked to? Claims by family members? Claims by the locals? Denials by the offending party? A paper by Lancet? A survey by Opinion Research Business? People questioning the authenticity of population numbers? Independent reporters? Red Cross figures? UN reports?

The Red Cross and UN might be a good start. It ultimately depends on the methodology too, as you've alluded to.

What will convince you of the reality of genocide? And more importantly, why do we need to produce numbers at a level that is sufficient to engage your conscience?

This, and the succeeding, were frankly insulting and absurd. I have no doubt that many innocent people were killed and are being killed in these needless invasions. But to call it a genocide is not presently determined. Why should anyone need to produce numbers for anything? Why is your morality about declaring a genocide accessible only for certain cases depending on your prejudices?

IOW, how many Jews would it take before Nazi Germany was beyond the level that qualified as "advantage in the invasion" according to you and "limited incursion" according to some others, hypothetically speaking?

Haven't the foggiest to what you're referring. When debating me, perhaps it would be better to use my own statements and opinions, rather than those you collect from elsewhere.

Do you think I need to?

Frankly, I'm not completely certain now.

Rather than learning pointless lessons which are easily forgotten

[as the popularity of genocide would seem to indicate], wouldn't we be better off asking ourselves why it required a magic number for mass murder to become morally illegitimate?[/QUOTE]

Without a significant density of numbers, is it "mass murder"? Should we abandon the terms altogether and simply report numbers? Or is your approach designed to reduce the claim of genocide to meaninglessness? Without an ethical argument proposed by you, I cannot honestly say.

 

[S.A.M.]

Whats the critical mass at which the Holocaust would be a genocide to you? What is the number below which you would consider it "meaningless"?

 

[Gustav]

Thats the Hindu holocaust. Muslims fighting Muslims.

No idea where the other figures in Ulti's link come from, will have to check.

ok
you might even wanna go back further in time

 

[S.A.M.]

ok
you might even wanna go back further in time

How far back? To where the Afghans and the Turkics were Buddhists and fought in the same region?

Before the Delhi Sultanates, there were just minor border skirmishes, basically due to the shared border with Persia

After the Arab invasion of India's ancient western neighbour Persia, expanding forces in that area were keen to invade India, which was the richest classical civilization, with a flourishing international trade and the only known diamond mines in the world. After resistance for a few centuries by various north Indian kingdoms, short lived Islamic empires (Sultanates) were established and spread across the northern subcontinent over a period of a few centuries. But, prior to Turkic invasions, Muslim trading communities had flourished throughout coastal South India, particularly in Kerala, where they arrived in small numbers, mainly from the Arabian peninsula, through trade links via the Indian Ocean. However, this had marked the introduction of an Abrahamic Middle Eastern religion in Southern India's pre-existing Indian religions, often in puritanical form. Later, the Bahmani Sultanate and Deccan Sultanates flourished in the south.

In the 12th and 13th centuries, Turkics and Pashtuns invaded parts of northern India and established the Delhi Sultanate at the beginning of the 13th century, in the former Rajput holdings.[36] The subsequent Slave dynasty of Delhi managed to conquer large areas of northern India, approximate to the ancient extent of the Guptas, while the Khilji Empire was also able to conquer most of central India, but were ultimately unsuccessful in conquering and uniting most of the subcontinent. The Sultanate ushered in a period of Indian cultural renaissance. The resulting "Indo-Muslim" fusion of cultures left lasting syncretic monuments in architecture, music, literature, religion, and clothing. It is surmised that the language of Urdu (literally meaning "horde" or "camp" in various Turkic dialects) was born during the Delhi Sultanate period as a result of the inter-mingling of the local speakers of Sanskritic prakrits with the Persian, Turkic and Arabic speaking immigrants under the Muslim rulers. The Delhi Sultanate is the only Indo-Islamic empire to stake a claim to enthroning one of the few female rulers in India, Razia Sultan (1236-1240).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_India#The_Islamic_Sultanates

Mahmaud Ghaznavi, a Ghorid Turkic, was probably the first "Islamic" invader

 

[iceaura]

Whats the critical mass at which the Holocaust would be a genocide to you? What is the number below which you would consider it "meaningless"?

It's not a number, it's a proportion and a significance.

The US did not set out to kill all the members of any particular group of related people in Anbar, or the population as a whole. The US did not adopt effective means to accomplish such a goal, nor did the US actually - as collateral damage or anything else - make any significant progress toward such a goal. There is no large area of Anbar province in which no Iraqis of a kind numerous in 2002 can be found now, as a consequence of US actions.

Contrast this with the operations of the Holocaust, in which over large areas of Europe all Jews were eliminated on purpose, using effective means and deliberate planning and focused effort. Contrast this with Rwanda's dark times, in which over large areas all Tutsis or all Hutus were eliminated on purpose, using effective means and deliberate planning and focused efforts. Contrast this with areas of the Americas (N, S, and C), in which over large areas all Reds were eliminated on purpose, using effective means and deliberate planning and focused efforts.

Genocide is not a synonym for very evil, or very large. There are more evils in this world than the one.

 

[S.A.M.]

How did you assess motive ie what they "set out to do"? Whats it based on?

The Anbar has been cleared of its Shia population and is now effectively in the hands of the Awakening, the US allies who also happened to be members of the Baathist group i.e. the local Judenrat.

Contrast this with the operations of the Holocaust, in which over large areas of Europe all Jews were eliminated on purpose, using effective means and deliberate planning and focused effort

Again how did you decipher motive? Does the lack of written documentation make it unnecessary to recognise that its only Muslims being killed? Who would they "seperate out" in these places?

 

[iceaura]

Again how did you decipher motive?

One way is to observe the declarations of motive by the planners and enacters, record that they matched action to declaration, and label the consequences. That's fairly easy to do in the case of the Armenian genocide,the Rwandan genocide, the Holocaust, and so forth. No "deciphering" is necessary.

The Anbar has been cleared of its Shia population and is now effectively in the hands of the Awakening, the US allies who also happened to be members of the Baathist group

And which were themselves the targets of significant US violence, during this same conflict.

Is there any estimate of the comparative death total of Shia and Sunni in Anbar Province, at the means of the Americans? Are the cleared Shia "eliminated", en masse, using effective and focused means, at the direction and behest of the Americans?

Are you claiming that the Sunni in Anbar - the erstwhile "insurgents" and "terrorists" and "Al Qaida in Iraq" - are the beneficiaries of an American genocide of the Shia?

 

[StrawDog]

What source would you consider satisfactory as evidence of genocide? For any holocaust?

I'm mulling over what I should use here in this thread.

Census before, census after.

 

[S.A.M.]

One way is to observe the declarations of motive by the planners and enacters, record that they matched action to declaration, and label the consequences. That's fairly easy to do in the case of the Armenian genocide,the Rwandan genocide, the Holocaust, and so forth. No "deciphering" is necessary.
And which were themselves the targets of significant US violence, during this same conflict.

Is there any estimate of the comparative death total of Shia and Sunni in Anbar Province, at the means of the Americans? Are the cleared Shia "eliminated", en masse, using effective and focused means, at the direction and behest of the Americans?

Are you claiming that the Sunni in Anbar - the erstwhile "insurgents" and "terrorists" and "Al Qaida in Iraq" - are the beneficiaries of an American genocide of the Shia?

So if the Germans employed the Judenrat to do the dirty work [and note that the ghetto police and the camp workers were all Jews or taken from the population], are the Germans really culpable for the Holocaust?

 

[StrawDog]

So if the Germans employed the Judenrat to do the dirty work [and note that the ghetto police and the camp workers were all Jews or taken from the population], are the Germans really culpable for the Holocaust?

Yes, total culpability. The Nazis were the policy makers and enforcers.

 

[GeoffP]

Whats the critical mass at which the Holocaust would be a genocide to you? What is the number below which you would consider it "meaningless"?

Excuse me: "Meaningless?"

 

[S.A.M.]

Excuse me: "Meaningless?"

I'm attempting to deconstruct "reduce the claim of genocide to meaninglessness? "

Without a significant density of numbers, is it "mass murder"? Should we abandon the terms altogether and simply report numbers? Or is your approach designed to reduce the claim of genocide to meaninglessness? Without an ethical argument proposed by you, I cannot honestly say.

I assume there is a critical mass of Jews below which the imputation of genocide is meaningless.

How many?

 

[iceaura]

I assume there is a critical mass of Jews below which the imputation of genocide is meaningless.

Quit making assumptions like that.

So if the Germans employed the Judenrat to do the dirty work [and note that the ghetto police and the camp workers were all Jews or taken from the population], are the Germans really culpable for the Holocaust?

Yes.

I'm attempting to deconstruct "reduce the claim of genocide to meaninglessness? "

The word "genocide" has a meaning of its own. It is not the same as massacre, murder, evil, slaughter, atrocity, and so forth. You do not need to "deconstruct" anything, merely look things up in a good dictionary (one with usage advice), examine the parts and roots of the word, or attend to the posts here.

 

[GeoffP]

I'm attempting to deconstruct "reduce the claim of genocide to meaninglessness? "

Ah, I see. I was referring to making the term meaningless rather than considering genocide meaningless, which is what your post seemed to imply. As for a number, I would assume it would have to be a significant part of the whole group. Moreover, it would have to be undertaken with the intent of obliterating that group.

 

[S.A.M.]

Ah, I see. I was referring to making the term meaningless rather than considering genocide meaningless, which is what your post seemed to imply. As for a number, I would assume it would have to be a significant part of the whole group. Moreover, it would have to be undertaken with the intent of obliterating that group.

So whats the number? How many would you consider a significant part of the whole group?

Also what is your position when say 300,000 of them are killed, not with the intention of obliteraating the group, but as a demonstration of power? Or because they could?

How do you classify that?

What if it had been just 300 who had been lined up and shot in the back of the head?

 

[Bells]

Quite possibly. Hard to believe, I know, but the holocaust is just another genocide in India, equivalent to

• The Spanish genocide of the Mayans
• The European genocide of the Native Americans
• The French genocide of the Vendeans
• The American genocide of the Vietnamese
• The French genocide of the Algerians
• The Italian genocide of the Libyans
• The Hutu genocide of the Tutsis
• The Serb genocide of the Bosnians
• The British genocide of the Scots and Irish
• The Greek genocide of the Macedonians, Albanians, Turks and Jews
• The Armenian genocide of the Azerbaicanis
• The Russian genocide of the Crimean Turks and Chechens
• The Chinese genocide of the Uygur Turks and Taiwanese
• The British genocide of the Indians
• The Turkish genocide of the Armenians
• The Australian genocide of the Aboriginals and Tasmanians

etc etc

In India, we have a peripheral awareness that there are a people called Jews, who, like other people in history have had their share of genocides. And thats probaby only in the cities, or in places where Israelis come to uwind after their mandatory military tour. Most Indians >90% probably have no idea what Jews are or that there was a Holocasut, we have plenty of other history occupying us [There aren't enough Jews to warrant attention, its Hindu Muslim Sikh Isa'ai for us]. We don't even pay much, or in fact, any attention to the British genocide of Indians [ever hear about it?]

Yes I have (re British genocide of Indians).

As you pointed out yourself, the Holocaust is another genocide amongst many. Does not make it any more or less important than the others.

And yes, the Holocaust is focused mostly around the Jews. We rarely heard of the millions of others who perished alongside them. And for me at least, it was not until I was in my later years of high school, with a peripheral knowledge that there were millions of others who were killed by the Nazis, that it brought to my direct attention when I visited a holocaust centre and one of the Jews who worked there handed out leaflets about the figure and enormity of those who were slaughtered by the Nazis. They had displays dedicated to all groups who were killed by the Nazis. As he commented to us at the time, the Holocaust is viewed as the Jewish Holocaust, which it is because of the sheer number of Jews who were killed, but it was also a Holocaust which encompassed so many different groups of people and that was why in his view, it was "The Holocaust".

In the Middle East, in four or five years, I heard about the US and Iraq but nothing about Jews or even about Israel. Even Palestinians I meet talk about Americans more than they talk about Israel

So, it was only after I came to the US that I found out that the Holocaust [with a capital H, which was not even obvious to me before, I always thought of it as "a holocaust"] was more important to the Americans than any other genocide in history, including the one perpetuated on native Americans and that for some reason, this sentiment also echoed through Europeans.

There could be a simple reason for that. The Holocaust is a genocide on a horrendous scale that occured in the lifetime of millions of people and there were millions of survivors. From that event stemmed the UDHR as one example and it will be important while the repercussions from its aftermath continue to occur in the plight of the Palestinians.

Myself, I never could understand why. I still don't. When I visited the Holocaust Museum in Washington, I expected to see a tribute to victims of other genocides. A mention even, of others who suffered alongside. Nothing. Well how about other victims of WWII? Nothing. Okay, its in Washington DC, how about a brief single image on native Americans? Nada.

Nothing at all about anything but THE HOLOCAUST.

Unfortunately, we concentrate so much on one part of history that we sometimes ignore the rest. Even more unfortunate that the lessons that were learned from that Holocaust has done nothing in trying to prevent other genocides around the world since then.

So if the Germans employed the Judenrat to do the dirty work [and note that the ghetto police and the camp workers were all Jews or taken from the population], are the Germans really culpable for the Holocaust?

Yes.

You made the point yourself. Refer to highlighted word.

 

[S.A.M.]

You made the point yourself. Refer to highlighted word.

I have no doubts on that score. I'm simply comparing it to the Allied forces employing their own Judenrats under similar circumstances and then attempting to deflect responsibility.

And for me at least, it was not until I was in my later years of high school, with a peripheral knowledge that there were millions of others who were killed by the Nazis, that it brought to my direct attention when I visited a holocaust centre and one of the Jews who worked there handed out leaflets about the figure and enormity of those who were slaughtered by the Nazis.

Does Australia have a holocaust center for Aboriginals? Or Tasmanians?