THE WORLD WAR TWO GROUP discussion
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Hitler and Stalin could have quite possibly passed each other in the street in Vienna in 1913
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David A
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Jun 23, 2012 12:47PM

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alway amazed me of that picture of a massive crowd
and someone found a young hitler in it. it's an
often used pic, most have probably seen it.




David A wrote: "And interestingly it was during this stay in Vienna that he wrote the pamphlet "Marxism and the Nationality Question" which advocated national/ethnic autonomy under socialism and for the first time..."
I believe he actually 'stole his thought' on this question from Rosa Luxemburg, who had articulated the ideas a few years before with regard to Poland. Poland posed the most difficult problems for all questions related to nationalism.
FD
p.s. isn't it amazing how good-looking a young man Stalin was? Bizarre. He is the picture of evil later on in life.


That particular Pact was not the first of its kind, as I'm sure you're aware. Nor was it the cause of WWII--it was merely a temporary interlude. The Pact was also flimsier than the paper it was written on; with each side using it simply as a hedge. Neither side trusted the other; (or the Pact itself); it was inherently designed with a short shelf-life. At the time it was drawn up, each side was using the full resources of their intelligence services to find some gain or advantage over the other; it was hardly a bargain with any cooperative spirit imbued in either of the participants. If your concern is for Poland; Poland had been in bad straits before and would continue to be, again. As for the rest of Europe, no pact with Germany was anything but a dupe (as events in Austria & Slovakia had clearly already shown). After the war, the entire continent was to be vassal states of the Reich; which was a dictatorship and a slave-state, rather than any kind of valid socialist entity.
So, why does this very brief episode fascinate you so? Do you think it represented a socialist conspiracy? The two parties involved later went to war with each other, so what does that say to you? Hobgoblins in idealogical cahoots?





Books mentioned in this topic
The Damned Balkans: A Refugee Road Trip (other topics)Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives (other topics)
Hitler's Vienna: A Portrait of the Tyrant as a Young Man (other topics)
Young Stalin (other topics)
Authors mentioned in this topic
Brigitte Hamann (other topics)Simon Sebag Montefiore (other topics)