Ok, its time for “guess who said it”:
“Why, of course, the people don’t want war, why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece. Naturally, the common people don’t want war.
That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship.
Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”
Much the same has been said, by Michael Moore, Code Pinko, Harry Reid, MoveOn, etc. etc.
If you are a student of leftist thought, it will hardly surprise you that the person who said this was a vile Nazi murdering thug, Hermann Goering.
From Snopes:
Goering was one of the highest-ranking Nazis who survived to be captured and put on trial for war crimes in the city of Nuremberg by the Allies after the end of World War II. He was found guilty on charges of “war crimes,” “crimes against peace,” and “crimes against humanity” by the Nuremberg tribunal and sentenced to death by hanging. The sentence could not be carried out, however, because Goering committed suicide with smuggled cyanide capsules hours before his execution, scheduled for 15 October 1946.
The quote cited above does not appear in transcripts of the Nuremberg trials because although Goering spoke these words during the course of the proceedings, he did not offer them at his trial. His comments were made privately to Gustave Gilbert, a German-speaking intelligence officer and psychologist who was granted free access by the Allies to all the prisoners held in the Nuremberg jail. Gilbert kept a journal of his observations of the proceedings and his conversations with the prisoners, which he later published in the book Nuremberg Diary. The quote offered above was part of a conversation Gilbert held with a dejected Hermann Goering in his cell on the evening of 18 April 1946, as the trials were halted for a three-day Easter recess:
Sweating in his cell in the evening, Goering was defensive and deflated and not very happy over the turn the trial was taking. He said that he had no control over the actions or the defense of the others, and that he had never been anti-Semitic himself, had not believed these atrocities, and that several Jews had offered to testify in his behalf.
If [Hans] Frank [Governor-General of occupied Poland] had known about atrocities in 1943, he should have come to him and he would have tried to do something about it. He might not have had enough power to change things in 1943, but if somebody had come to him in 1941 or 1942 he could have forced a showdown.
(I still did not have the desire at this point to tell him what [SS General Otto] Ohlendorf had said to this: that Goering had been written off as an effective “moderating” influence, because of his drug addiction and corruption.) I pointed out that with his “temperamental utterances,” such as preferring the killing of 200 Jews to the destruction of property, he had hardly set himself up as champion of minority rights. Goering protested that too much weight was being put on these temperamental utterances. Furthermore, he made it clear that he was not defending or glorifying Hitler.
Now, I’m sure “progressive” pacifists will defend their proclivities towards the thinking of brutal sociopaths like Goering with the claim that “see, the Nazis admit that the tactics of George W. Bush et al are fascist”, when in fact the opposite is true.
The Nazis would like to have the “common man” believe that wars are unnecessary and merely a construct of the powers-that-be, so that they are loath to go to war even in the face of aggression.
“All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”
That’s pretty rich, “all you have to do is tell them they are being attacked” when in fact tanks are rolling in Poland and bombs are dropping on Pearl Harbor. Or our planes are being fired upon in the ‘no-fly zone’ or Shiites and Kurds are being gassed by the 100’s of thousands.
In fact, its in the fascists’ interest to pretend that there is never any reason to go to war with belligerent autocratic powers so that they can make maximum gains while the democracies are hamstrung by their pacifist liberals.
“That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger”
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That in fact is what pacifists like Neville Chamberlain brought upon Britain. Not to say he lacked patriotism, but he did lack the intelligence and fortitude to stand up to tyrants.
Here is some of the distilled pig-headed ignorance and evil that pacifism can provoke:
First of all I must say something to those who have written to my wife or myself in these last weeks to tell us of their gratitude for my efforts and to assure us of their prayers for my success. Most of these letters have come from women — mothers or sisters of our own countrymen. But there are countless others besides — from France, from Belgium, from Italy, even from Germany, and it has been heartbreaking to read of the growing anxiety they reveal and their intense relief when they thought, too soon, that the danger of war was past.
If I felt my responsibility heavy before, to read such letters has made it seem almost overwhelming. How horrible, fantastic, incredible it is that we should be digging trenches and trying on gas masks here because of a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing. It seems still more impossible that a quarrel which has already been settled in principle should be the subject of war.
I can well understand the reasons why the Czech Government have felt unable to accept the terms which have been put before them in the German memorandum. Yet I believe after my talks with Herr Hitler that, if only time were allowed, it ought to be possible for the arrangements for transferring the territory that the Czech Government has agreed to give to Germany to be settled by agreement under conditions which would assure fair treatment to the population concerned. . . .
However much we may sympathize with a small nation confronted by a big and powerful neighbor, we cannot in all circumstances undertake to involve the whole British Empire in war simply on her account. If we have to fight it must be on larger issues than that. I am myself a man of peace to the depths of my soul. Armed conflict between nations is a nightmare to me; but if I were convinced that any nation had made up its mind to dominate the world by fear of its force, I should feel that it must be resisted. Under such a domination life for people who believe in liberty would not be worth living; but war is a fearful thing, and we must be very clear, before we embark upon it, that it is really the great issues that are at stake, and that the call to risk everything in their defense, when all the consequences are weighed, is irresistible.
For the present I ask you to await as calmly as you can the events of the next few days. As long as war has not begun, there is always hope that it may be prevented, and you know that I am going to work for peace to the last moment. Good night. . . .
And 72 million deaths later, I wonder, did Chamberlain come to the conclusion that, indeed, “that it is really the great issues that are at stake, and that the call to risk everything in their defense, when all the consequences are weighed, is irresistible.”
How many may die if the Democrat nominee for president does prevail, and dithers and panders while Iran develops a nuclear bomb which its leaders have said, time and time again, they will use on Israel.
Goering’s Law is being invoked by everyone from Harry Reid to Rosie O’Donnell to try to convince Americans that there is no threat, that those who say there is a threat are merely war-mongering neo-cons, and even in extreme leftist rhetoric, that no cause is worth war.
Thank God the American people, whose country is founded on the principle that liberty is worth war, that life without liberty is not worth living, don’t agree.
I feel war with Iran is inevitable. I hope and pray we engage them and destroy their capacity to hurt us and our allies sooner rather than later, and I do believe President Bush is not a man to leave the problem for his successor. I believe our intelligence shows Iran on the verge of realizing its ambitions, and the situation will soon reach critical mass.
I look for an attack in summer or early fall of ’08, and I welcome it. Contrary to what liberals and Nazis believe, peace is best preserved through strength and sometimes through war.
No country has ever brought on war by being too strong.