Friday, April 24, 2009

Nazis - A warning from history

It's interesting what you pickup on daytime TV. I caught a little of a program called "Nazis - a warning from history" a BAFTA award winning series by Laurence Rees which is being shown on the Yesterday channel.

When Hitler invaded Poland he created three regions and appointed rulers from his regime to run them as they saw fit. The most notorious was SS Obergruppenfuhrer Arthur Greiser who was appointed to administer Warthegau and did so by systematically enslaving or exterminating those who were non-German including Jews and native Poles. This approach was a decision entirely made by Greiser as other leaders of the annexed states simply re-classified residents as Germans. Griesers tactics shocked some in the Nazi military who had felt that they were in Poland to liberate Germans who had been excluded from their native land following World War I. They complained to Hitler who dismissed their concerns as a sign of weakness with the words "if you want to win a war you cannot fight like the Salvation Army"!

While doing a bit of searching on the internet I discovered more. During the pre-war appeasement attempts by the UK Government, the UK embassador, Sir Eric Phipps raised concerns about the nature of SS (Elite Guard) and SA (Storm Troopers) in 1939. Hitler assured him that they were like these troops were like the Salvation Army! (Story is here).

It would be too trivial to say "make your mind up" but I think Salvationists are not immune to have a confused approach to armed conflict. How do we square our attitudes to our own military with the words of Catherine Baird?
"We shall not lose the fight of faith,
For Jesus is our Lord,
We lay all carnal weapons down
To take his shining sword."



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