03-24-2006, 07:52 AM
<b>What Islamism Shares With Nazism</b>
Forward
11-09-2001
As Americans grapple with the new ideological "evil" of radical Islamic fundamentalism, the old benchmark of ultimate evil, Nazism, has been invoked in the effort to understand the origins and implications of September 11. While President Bush has predicted that radical Islam will soon join Nazism among the "discarded lies" of history, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has controversially compared U.S. coalition building efforts among Arab states to western appeasement of the Nazis in the 1930s. Journalists and pundits have made similar comparisons.
Andrew Sullivan recently wrote in The New York Times Magazine that radical Islam is a more serious threat to the West than Nazism was. Such a comparison is overstated. As the greatest economic and industrial power in Europe of the era, Nazi Germany posed far more of an existential danger to the West than radical Islamic groups do today. Whereas the Nazis possessed both the will and the means to achieve world domination, Islamic fundamentalism, largely based in the underdeveloped world, can at present wreak little more than havoc. Still, despite significant structural differences between both movements, the historical experience of Nazism does in fact provide us with lessons in the struggle to understand and defend against the threat of Islamic fundamentalism.
<b>Both Nazism and Islamic fundamentalism emerged as ideologies opposed to the modern world. Nazism originated in the late 19th century "volkisch" movement's rejection of industrialization, urbanization and capitalism in favor of the ideas of blood, soil and race. Around the same time, Islamic fundamentalism began to emerge as a response to the gradual secularization of the Muslim world. In both cases, the perceived threat of universalizing modern forces generated a vigorous defense of particularistic traditions. </b>
These longstanding cultural resentments against modernity remained largely dormant in both societies until catalyzed by more short-term political events. The economic and political instability resulting from Germany's loss of World War I and the humiliating Treaty of Versailles after 1918 produced new support for the extremist anti-modern ideas of the Nazis. In the Muslim world, the 1967 overwhelming military defeat by Israel was decisive in defeating the dominant secular ideology of pan-Arabism and creating a vaccuum that has since become effectively filled by Islamic fundamentalism. <b>Both movements, finally, identified scapegoats for their societies' perceived ills -- Jews, in the German case, "infidels," in the case of the Muslim world -- and believed that expelling them from their midst would enable the respective creation of purified racial and religious empires. </b>
<b>Beyond the anti-modern origins of their goals, both Nazism and Islamic fundamentalism have paradoxically been willing to use modern means to achieve them.</b> Both have used modern methods of communication to convey their propaganda, employed modern economic practices to finance their agendas and embraced modern weaponry in their assault on their enemies.
Given the ideological similarities between Nazism and radical Islam, the historic response of the West toward the former may provide lessons for our current response to the latter. First, it is important to recognize the deep roots of both ideologies in the cultures from which they emanate. <b>We should be just as suspicious of attempts to exonerate Islam for its fundamentalistic offshoots as we would be of attempts to portray German traditions as guiltless for Nazism. Recognizing both movements' deep roots in tradition is crucial, for it reminds us that many "ordinary" Germans and Muslims have sympathized with the two ideologies' respective goals (if not necessarily the violent means to achieve them)</b>. Also, eliminating figures such as Hitler or Osama bin Laden will do little to eliminate the deep-seated resentments they have so effectively exploited.
Addressing this problem is more challenging. Many have cited the need to address Muslim grievances against the West if the threat of terrorism is ever to be banished for good. There are many reasons to take such recommendations seriously. But addressing grievances has its limits. After all, the Nazis had their own grievances, too. In railing against the Treaty of Versailles, Hitler enjoyed the sympathy not only of Germans but many Europeans and Americans. Western diplomats attempted to deal with these grievances through a policy of appeasement during the 1930s but this did nothing to satisfy the Nazis' more irrational ideological objectives. So, too, with Islamic fundamentalism. Many sympathize with bin Laden's grievances about Palestinian nationhood and sanctions against Iraq. Yet if both problems were solved tomorrow, the larger rebellion of radical Islam against secular modernity would continue.
<b>Ultimately, the experience of Nazism teaches us that certain grievances can only be addressed after the defeat of the uncompromising ideologies that have exploited them</b>. After 1945, the United States embraced a peace that helped to reintegrate Germany back into the western community of nations. Although we may not be able to pursue a policy of unconditional surrender toward terrorism, we might consider an eventual Marshall Plan for the Middle East. Just as democratic elements within Germany needed western support in order to triumph over their extremist compatriots, so too will moderate Muslims need support to have their voices heard above those of militant extremists.
<b>This time, however, it will not be the job merely of America. All the world's great powers -- the European Union, Russia, China and India -- have something to lose by the continuation of terrorism. </b>Ultimately, such a plan for renewal may well offer the only way to broach the yawning gulf between the secularized wealthy nations of the world and those whose poverty and mismanagement drive them into the camp of religious fanaticism.
<i>Mr. Rosenfeld is assistant professor of German history at Fairfield University and author of "Munich and Memory: Architecture, Monuments, and the Legacy of the Third Reich" (University of California Press).
Article copyright Forward Newspaper, L.L.C.</i>
Forward
11-09-2001
As Americans grapple with the new ideological "evil" of radical Islamic fundamentalism, the old benchmark of ultimate evil, Nazism, has been invoked in the effort to understand the origins and implications of September 11. While President Bush has predicted that radical Islam will soon join Nazism among the "discarded lies" of history, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has controversially compared U.S. coalition building efforts among Arab states to western appeasement of the Nazis in the 1930s. Journalists and pundits have made similar comparisons.
Andrew Sullivan recently wrote in The New York Times Magazine that radical Islam is a more serious threat to the West than Nazism was. Such a comparison is overstated. As the greatest economic and industrial power in Europe of the era, Nazi Germany posed far more of an existential danger to the West than radical Islamic groups do today. Whereas the Nazis possessed both the will and the means to achieve world domination, Islamic fundamentalism, largely based in the underdeveloped world, can at present wreak little more than havoc. Still, despite significant structural differences between both movements, the historical experience of Nazism does in fact provide us with lessons in the struggle to understand and defend against the threat of Islamic fundamentalism.
<b>Both Nazism and Islamic fundamentalism emerged as ideologies opposed to the modern world. Nazism originated in the late 19th century "volkisch" movement's rejection of industrialization, urbanization and capitalism in favor of the ideas of blood, soil and race. Around the same time, Islamic fundamentalism began to emerge as a response to the gradual secularization of the Muslim world. In both cases, the perceived threat of universalizing modern forces generated a vigorous defense of particularistic traditions. </b>
These longstanding cultural resentments against modernity remained largely dormant in both societies until catalyzed by more short-term political events. The economic and political instability resulting from Germany's loss of World War I and the humiliating Treaty of Versailles after 1918 produced new support for the extremist anti-modern ideas of the Nazis. In the Muslim world, the 1967 overwhelming military defeat by Israel was decisive in defeating the dominant secular ideology of pan-Arabism and creating a vaccuum that has since become effectively filled by Islamic fundamentalism. <b>Both movements, finally, identified scapegoats for their societies' perceived ills -- Jews, in the German case, "infidels," in the case of the Muslim world -- and believed that expelling them from their midst would enable the respective creation of purified racial and religious empires. </b>
<b>Beyond the anti-modern origins of their goals, both Nazism and Islamic fundamentalism have paradoxically been willing to use modern means to achieve them.</b> Both have used modern methods of communication to convey their propaganda, employed modern economic practices to finance their agendas and embraced modern weaponry in their assault on their enemies.
Given the ideological similarities between Nazism and radical Islam, the historic response of the West toward the former may provide lessons for our current response to the latter. First, it is important to recognize the deep roots of both ideologies in the cultures from which they emanate. <b>We should be just as suspicious of attempts to exonerate Islam for its fundamentalistic offshoots as we would be of attempts to portray German traditions as guiltless for Nazism. Recognizing both movements' deep roots in tradition is crucial, for it reminds us that many "ordinary" Germans and Muslims have sympathized with the two ideologies' respective goals (if not necessarily the violent means to achieve them)</b>. Also, eliminating figures such as Hitler or Osama bin Laden will do little to eliminate the deep-seated resentments they have so effectively exploited.
Addressing this problem is more challenging. Many have cited the need to address Muslim grievances against the West if the threat of terrorism is ever to be banished for good. There are many reasons to take such recommendations seriously. But addressing grievances has its limits. After all, the Nazis had their own grievances, too. In railing against the Treaty of Versailles, Hitler enjoyed the sympathy not only of Germans but many Europeans and Americans. Western diplomats attempted to deal with these grievances through a policy of appeasement during the 1930s but this did nothing to satisfy the Nazis' more irrational ideological objectives. So, too, with Islamic fundamentalism. Many sympathize with bin Laden's grievances about Palestinian nationhood and sanctions against Iraq. Yet if both problems were solved tomorrow, the larger rebellion of radical Islam against secular modernity would continue.
<b>Ultimately, the experience of Nazism teaches us that certain grievances can only be addressed after the defeat of the uncompromising ideologies that have exploited them</b>. After 1945, the United States embraced a peace that helped to reintegrate Germany back into the western community of nations. Although we may not be able to pursue a policy of unconditional surrender toward terrorism, we might consider an eventual Marshall Plan for the Middle East. Just as democratic elements within Germany needed western support in order to triumph over their extremist compatriots, so too will moderate Muslims need support to have their voices heard above those of militant extremists.
<b>This time, however, it will not be the job merely of America. All the world's great powers -- the European Union, Russia, China and India -- have something to lose by the continuation of terrorism. </b>Ultimately, such a plan for renewal may well offer the only way to broach the yawning gulf between the secularized wealthy nations of the world and those whose poverty and mismanagement drive them into the camp of religious fanaticism.
<i>Mr. Rosenfeld is assistant professor of German history at Fairfield University and author of "Munich and Memory: Architecture, Monuments, and the Legacy of the Third Reich" (University of California Press).
Article copyright Forward Newspaper, L.L.C.</i>