{"id":136824,"date":"2018-06-23T16:56:51","date_gmt":"2018-06-23T22:56:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=136824"},"modified":"2018-09-05T18:31:59","modified_gmt":"2018-09-06T00:31:59","slug":"motives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2018\/06\/23\/motives.html","title":{"rendered":"Motives"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>One of my favorite WWII films is actually about the post-war period trying to come to grips with what happened during the war: <i>Judgment at Nuremberg.<\/i> A fictionalized account of the war crimes trials, it grapples in multiple directions with what happened in Germany to turn it into a nation that twisted the rule of law and human decency to commit atrocities against those they considered not worthy.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s in fact fascinating to watch those Germans, those Nazis, seek to defend themselves. Some are boldly proud of what they did (Werner Klemperer, himself a refugee from Nazi Germany, does a remarkable job here). Some play the &#8220;We didn&#8217;t know what was happening&#8221; or &#8220;You had to go along with it&#8221; cards. Some, faced with the horror of what they&#8217;d done, the moral compromises they&#8217;d made, try simply to assert that their motivations were good, even if the results awful.<\/p>\n<p>In the end, all the excuses fail. They were all part of the Nazi state. The motivations don&#8217;t matter so much as the results of the regime they supported, explicitly or implicitly.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s a powerful lesson, and one that we could all use a reminder of now and again.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"sm2wpreshared\">Originally shared by <a href=\"https:\/\/plus.google.com\/101083456815352083930\">+Talina Christine<\/a>:<\/span><\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align: center;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/plus.google.com\/photos\/105501306534614929051\/albums\/6570329325551870001\/6570329325638682162\"><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"max-width: 650px;\" src=\"https:\/\/lh3.googleusercontent.com\/-UoIt_m_NmSI\/Wy5_tegGhjI\/AAAAAAADzS0\/LIXGz17mZrca8lfGikTRqBw9-ifVJzS4QCJoC\/SxwC7Xm.jpg?imgmax=660\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: center;\"><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: small;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/plus.google.com\/+DaveHill47\/posts\/hhhJ3EeyQZn\">Original Post<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of my favorite WWII films is actually about the post-war period trying to come to grips with what happened during the war: Judgment at Nuremberg. A fictionalized account of the war crimes trials, it grapples in multiple directions with what happened in Germany to turn it into a nation that twisted the rule of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2018\/06\/23\/motives.html\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Motives&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":136825,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106,108,41,358],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-136824","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-plusposts","category-history","category-media-movies","category-poor-citizenship"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/SxwC7Xm.jpgimgmax=660.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":17996,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2010\/07\/30\/unblogged-bits-fri-30-jul-10-1401.html","url_meta":{"origin":136824,"position":0},"title":"Unblogged Bits (Fri. 30-Jul-10 1401)","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 30-Jul-10 12:01pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Links (most recent first) that caught my eye, but did not warrant full-blown blog entries .... If Sessions wants to compare, we can compare - GOP obstructionism -- crowed to their supporters, denied to the press -- is a sickness in our body politic. Federal Bureau of Investigation - Freedom\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Potpourri&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Potpourri","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/potpourri"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3788,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/03\/27\/equivalence.html","url_meta":{"origin":136824,"position":1},"title":"Equivalence","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 27-Mar-03 6:26pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I've seen this particular quotation floating around a lot over the past several weeks, for obvious reasons. It's from an interview with Herman Goering during the Nuremberg Trials: Of course...","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Geopolitical Brouhaha&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6728,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/01\/12\/s_by_y.html","url_meta":{"origin":136824,"position":2},"title":"S! by y:(","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 12-Jan-05 7:23am","format":false,"excerpt":"What sort of emoticons and IM abbreviations Civil War soldiers might have used if ... well, if they'd had IM and e-mail. I could actually see using some of these...","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Potpourri&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Potpourri","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/potpourri"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":135515,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/12\/04\/north-korean-hostility-us-not-just-tyranny-lies.html","url_meta":{"origin":136824,"position":3},"title":"North Korean hostility to the US is not just about tyranny and lies","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 4-Dec-17 6:51pm","format":false,"excerpt":"During the Korean \"police action,\" US strategic bombing of the North killed an estimated (by the US) one fifth of the population. One might argue that the populations of Germany, or Japan, or even North Vietnam might have a similar grievance. But there's a crucial difference: the Korean conflict never\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/north-korea-statues.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":133221,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/04\/06\/the-first-american-shots-fired-at-the-germans-in-wwi.html","url_meta":{"origin":136824,"position":4},"title":"The First American Shots Fired at the Germans in WWI","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 6-Apr-17 5:44pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Today is the centennial of the US declaring war on Germany in the First World War, and the excellent YouTube series \"The Great War\" features the first American shots fired -- half-way around the world from France, on an island that would be a lot more famous in the next\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4778,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/01\/06\/the_boys_from_g.html","url_meta":{"origin":136824,"position":5},"title":"The Boys from &#8230; Greenland?","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 6-Jan-04 5:18pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Everyone always thinks of Nazis fleeing Germany for Argentina or Brazil. But it seems, instead, the plan for the top leadership was to flee to Greenland. A German navigator has...","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Potpourri&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Potpourri","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/potpourri"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136824","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136824"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136824\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136945,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136824\/revisions\/136945"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}