Love it :)

There is a reason the doctors who perform euthanasia never undergo the procedure themselves, and it’s not the courtesy of staying behind on this miserable planet to provide their services to their fellow man, it’s that they enjoy power, and they don’t want to have to give up control over life and death.. Following Darwin’s theory, even euthanasia is at least stupid and weak. I auppose the docs don’t want to reflect those traits.

Pardon me, but aren’t there massive—and I do mean massive—differences between Nazism and liberalism?
http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2008/01/liberal-fascism-response.html

Yes.  Your point being what?  That therefore the similarities between the philosophies and rhetoric beloved by the Nazis and the philosophy and rhetoric chronicled in this piece can be safely ignored?  Rather kneejerk of you, doncha think?

Maybe I was being kneejerk.  I didn’t mean to cast aspersions on you, or even on everything that you wrote in this article.  You do raise serious points. 

I was wanting to point out for the readers the existence of massive differences between liberalism and Nazism.  For instance, liberalism has intentions of building tolerant societies that safeguard diversity, even if many steps taken are misguided or seriously wrong.  Nazism espouses the exact opposite of liberal ideals.  I use the present tense because there are plenty neo-fascist parties and neo-nazi skinheads in Europe—they viciously oppose anything remotely liberal.

ian:

I didn’t say anything about liberalism in the piece.  I simply pointed to the fact that many of the philosophical assumptions that lay behind Nazism are being embraced in contemporary culture.  Sometimes they are being embraced by the Thing that Used to be Liberalism, sometimes by the Thing that Used to be Conservatism.  Wasting time pretending that your Fave Rave Tribe “espouses the exact opposite” of Nazi philosophical assumptions while leading members of your tribe are spouting half-baked Darwinian crapola in favor rubbing out the weak and inconvenient is a classic example of the great Marxist aphorism: “Who are you gonna believe?  Me or your own two eyes.”

Liberalism, like conservatism, is a human construct.  It whatever the bulk of its practitioners say it is.  Currently, liberalism is a relativist hedonist consequentialist human philosophy that privileges a particular constituency for votes and power and favors killing another class of human beings (the unborn) for those goods.  It is succumbing to its interior logic and advocating more and more the notion of killing the weak.  The Thing that Used to be Conservatism is another species of relativist hedonist consequentialist human philosophy that privileges another constituency for votes and power and favors killing other classes of human beings for those goods (which is why there’s no big outcry about ESCR or torture).  The key here is “consequentialism”, which is what that Psych Today piece drips with.  Sorry, but you delude yourself if you really think your Fave Rave Tribe has nothing in common with the philosophies that undergirded the Third Reich.  Sure, you are probably not a racial theorist (though liberalism is often suffused with the stubborn insistence that Everything is About Race).  But the reality is that the modern world is suffused with the consequentialism and tendency to reduce the human person to the animal alien Other.  Hence, right wing torture fans tell us that such and so in a brown skin has “forfeited their humanity” if we happen to suspect them of something and liberals routinely struggle (as Peter Singer and the author of that execrable Psych Today piece struggle) to reduce human being to the level of animals, the easier to slaughter them.  Ignore it how you will with protests of our being “the exact opposite” but the fact is, so long as we continue to embrace consequentialism (our absolute favorite moral heresy), we shall be intellectual kissing cousins to the architects of the Third Reich.

Mark . . . dude . . . have you been reading Pat Buchanan?

Nope.

Nicely done as always, Mark.

MARK SHEA, to find out how boring you are, google “Godwin’s Law”.

http://darwin-killed-god.blogspot.com/

Yes Mark you are just so boring. That’s why stalkers like the human ape love to waste their time reading you in order to set you straight.

Sarcastically saying “it’s a good thing we won WW2” and then spending a whole post detailing supposed similarities between things happening in the world today and Nazism ... is ... interesting.

It is an unfortunate achievement of the Nazis that they could create a regime built on atrocities so memorable that the possibility of their reference ever being eliminated from online political conversation would be assigned a probability of zero.  This might be called a corollary of Godwin’s Law.

This is great irony, and it needs to be trumpeted far and wide.

The seeds of nihilism were planted long ago. We thought they were dead, but they sprung up when many of our forebears were sleeping.  There is much work to be done, lovers of life.

First and foremost to my mind, prayer, then action.

Just to be clear, I posted the first two comments under “Brian” but not the third. 

Again, I appreciate the dialogue.  I don’t consider myself a liberal or a conservative, a progressive or a traditionalist—just a Catholic.  I’m just trying to find truth, goodness, and beauty as well as show the breadth and depth of the Gospel.

Mark..Thank You..Great work…! The ONLY reason we are not openly Nazi right now is political. I believe that we are building up to a very BIG moment of truth..and there is ONLY one truth..not a truth for each one of us. But we have that to learn, I suppose, and the lesson may come at great cost.

It is a frightening world we live in. May The Good Lord have mercy on us!

Again and again you show your intellect to be worthy of my admiration Mark.
You once sent me a Chesterton quote about a thing that is said too be bad for one reason, and also too bad for the opposite reason, and that it must be very good. I wish I hadn’t lost the media device on which I had it saved because I’d love to give it back to you now with the eloquence of Chesterton.
I laughed aloud when I read your second response to Brian Cook, and I realized in an instant, that you HADN’T used the term liberal, and that he himself had linked these attributes to his own fellows by his recognition of them as their own.
I know it’s sinful but this has been the very definition of satisfaction to watch him hang his brethren with a few key strokes. PRICELESS!!! What I would give for this exchange to have taken place on prime-time television and to have been able to see his jaw drop in horror as he realized what he had just done. Can’t you just picture the debate moderator shuffling papers and clearing his throat uncomfortably as he tried to move on as though the left had not just been exposed for what it is?

Anyway, the last time I weighed in with my support, if I remember correctly, you were being chastised as a liberal for not hopping into lockstep with the doctrine of justifiable torture, so I thought I’d join you once again in praise for your ability to take on the aggressive idiocy that comes from either side of the middle path. Well done sir, while I try not to bother you too often in the comment section, I am always here enjoying your work.

Mr. Shea’s column points out the similarities between today’s Culture of Death and the Nazi ideals of a super-human race.  The denial of God and His Natural Law is the beginning of the end for Western Civilization.  Thank you, Mr. Shea, for reminding us that the “Nazi” philosophy is alive and well in our society. 

This is the sad ending of the Enlightenment when its principles are carried out.  However, when the above similarities are brought to the attention of the “progressive” thinkers in our culture, their wailing and cries of “not true” are loud and well-publicized.  While this column will go unnoticed.

Wow!  Heavy irony for my Saturday morning, but I LIKE it!  Thanks for the insight and reminders, Mr Shea.  Good work as always.  Your articles often give me something to ponder the rest of the day.  :)

Mark thanks for the well put comments.  Funny though, I have heard the same points raised by Glen Beck.  You two do agree on many things.

Great article. Mark.  For a while there, though, I thought I was reading a Glenn Beck rant!  Peace and blessings.

The problem is that too many people use “fascism” or “Nazism” code-words for anything and everything even remotely liberal or “politically correct”. All I can add at this point is that Nazi rhetoric and propaganda was vehemently reactionary and anti-liberal.  I only meant to point out that MASSIVE differences between liberalism and Nazism exist.  I failed.  I never meant to drag out an argument.  I bow out of this thread.

Good point, Ann!

Reductionist and Nobel Prize winner Albert Szent-Györgyi said, “There’s no difference between a king and a head of cabbage.” 

So, why not make cole slaw out of the king?  The nazis claimed that human remains heaped up in their gardens helped their cabbages grow tall.

Interesting point from the Psychology Today passage: the writers posit that Darwin’s theory undermines the rationality thesis.  Is this to say that Darwinism conflicts with rationality or might in itself be less than fully rational?  It also provides an implicit nod (although certainly not a direct logical connection) to the proposition that the image-of-God thesis just might be rational.

Brilliant piece Mark - keep it coming and God Bless.

“If it’s true that Darwin’s theory undermines the traditional reasons for thinking human life might have infinite value, isn’t it just as true that Darwin’s theory undermines the traditional reasons for thinking human life might have any value if it gets in my way?  If human beings are just one more product of the same mindless process that made that anthill in my front yard, why shouldn’t I treat human beings the way I treat those ants when they get in my way? “

I think it’s how you view Evolution. Sure man is a product of evolution like many other species (well the human body anyway)... still this does not mean we are ‘just another species’. After all we have’many things that animals can NOT have…

—-

“Yes, it’s sure a good thing Hitler lost and his ideas died with him. “

I somewhat disagree with you here Mark… I think secular society is slowly picking up Hitler’s work…

I still say ‘tolerating diversity’ means you put up with
it but you still don’t like it..
does anyone really just want to be tolerated?
How does it make you feel? You know you been there and you
know you didn’t like it!
(I say its more truthful to say I don’t like you to person rather than say I tolerate you and lie the rest of your life. Just makes you ill in mind and soul).

It’s funny that people can turn a scientific theory (Darwin’s evolution) into an ideology (Darwinism).

Also, I’d like to correct you on two things:
- Nazis is just one of many evil ideologically-driven socialist parties that have sprung up in history, and, as with most ideologically-driven parties, it’s still around, both in its influence on the world (such as the examples you provided) and in small “communities” (such as the Gnostic Christians and the Neo Nazis).
- However, one must be careful how they compare certain actions to Nazism. First, the ideologies of Nazism were around long before the socialist party was created. Second, the ideologies of Nazism will exist long after Nazism. And third, Nazism is not Nazism without Nazism: I.e., you gotta mean Nazism - the ideologies, the practices, the targets, the plans, the Holocaust - when you talk about Nazism.

I’m not saying you’re calling liberals Nazis, I’m just saying, Be careful how you label things. Nazism is a buzz word in the same way that Babylon was a buzz word in the ancient world: It instills fear, it paints someone as evil, it brings to mind horrific actions. But you don’t need to label anyone as such if they are evil, because evil is sufficiently disgusting. All you need to do is call evil what it is. But if the evil you are pointing out is the same as Nazism, than I suppose invoking Godwin’s Law is out of the question.

And to think that it took two atomic bombs to make all of what was written in the article not happen!  Without Einstein, our world would be just like what you depicted, Mr. Shea!  In my novel, “Satan’s Final Confession”, I posit a World War III to happen in this century, the 21st century, and how it was stopped by a hydrogen bomb.  Afterwards, peace descended upon the world, with no sign of conflict on the horizon.  You can find this book for free and five others here:

http://mysite.verizon.net/vzezunbp/

I really enjoyed this article.  Thank you.

Mark, your article reflected exactly what my thoughts were when I read the heading of the article.  In discussions with friends in Europe, their positions and philosophies are exactly along the lines of relative truth with terms like diversity, “what is normal anyway” etc.  This country (especially the Obama administration and this congress) is moving in the same direction.  The result will be the end of the Democratic Republic as we know it - and maybe the punishment from God will be that we will be overcome by the Islamic Jihadists.  Let us pray that that is not our country’s destiny.

Wunsch:

The *reason* I didn’t mention liberalism specifically is because it is *far* too easy, in our tribal political culture, to say, “I thank God that I am not a sinner like that liberal over there”.  The Right, including the Catholic Right, has done plenty as well in the effort to embrace the consequentialism that lay at the back of much of Nazi philosophy, just as the Left has done.  The Herculean efforts made by Catholics like, fpr example (but certainly not limited to), Marc Theissen and Raymond Arroyo to excuse, justify, laugh off, and celebrate the Right’s embrace of torture, prisoner abuse and even prisoner experimentation, using the methods and language of the Gestapo to make it all palatable, will have a special place in some future history of the United States.  Don’t imagine for one second that we conservative Catholics can get away with blaming it all on the Dems.  All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

Great read Mark. I have been saying for years Hitler was only a taste of things to come! We Catholics in Ireland are now being told to shut up when we object to liberal policies being forced upon us.My country is being destroyed by progressive liberal thinking. Our Bishops were told to butt out of politics by our political leaders when they wrote and distributed a wonderful document called “Why Marriage Matters” as the Civil Partnership Bill was being passed without a free vote! We the Catholics of Ireland are being labeled bigots, homophobics and pedophile protectors.
But as you say It’s a Good Thing We Won World War II God bless you :-)

i find it fascinating that so many people *assume* you are speaking to their political party….and argue how horrible it is that you are comparing them….. when you didnt ever mention them at all.

its like someone saying “people who abuse children” and they immediately say “stop talking about me!” its a tacit admission that THEY think what you said applies to their group.

in any case. yes, very true. the word Eugenics is banned… much of the specific terminology is banned in polite discussion, but under all the euphemisms the doctrine continues.

and the new way to get away with it? “the past doesnt matter”
try to mention Planned Parenthood’s founder? “well that doesnt matter…. she is long dead”

those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it… and it seems all these folks perpetuating the Nazi world view, or one close enough to it to be scary, are masters at propaganda saying “ignore our past”

Enjoyed the post.  It is sad that so many practices of the National Socialists of Deutschland have been adopted by political factions of our own day. I am not always sure when in your post you are using sarcasm, and when you are stating an honest opinion.  Certainly the continuance of euthanasia and abortion as means of reducing undesirables in our populations is really NOT a result of the defeat of the Nazis; but these follow-up events do show failure in our culture.  As far as torture, its use goes back thousands of years - sometimes to force compliance, sometimes just to show the power of the person in control, perhaps even enjoying the suffering of another (Sadism).  St Augustine’s notion of Original Sin still serves as explanation for the existence of human-caused evil.
TeaPot562

Posted by Brian on Friday, Jul 2, 2010 3:09 PM (EST):

Sarcastically saying “it’s a good thing we won WW2” and then spending a whole post detailing supposed similarities between things happening in the world today and Nazism ... is ... interesting.

No, Brian.  Actually, it’s spot-on.  Good job, Mark.

“tacit admission” that’s the term I was hunting for. Thank you ma’am.

Mark, you’re right,or perhaps I should use the term correct from now on. I cringe when I hear Mr Arroyo say some of the things he does. Its almost as if I can hear the widespread credibility of one of our major public mediums for dispensing truth audibly.

Cooli piece .... BUT…
Senn from a Continental European point of view, all this is coming from a lot of contribution from late XIX century british cultural by-product digested by and bounced back from US self proclaimed intellectuals.
To say so is also ta say that the intellectual leadership of continental europe ended with Hegel and Marx, but it is fairly true that we have no role anymore in developijng intellectual trends since the rise of british power.
In the end eugenics and darwinism is all british-american stuff.
So I would say that there are several agents of this supposedely european cultural virus acting in the USA in top positions, and the US are not free from this sin….

Just to make my point clearer: in Italy we got legalized abortion after it was legalizedin UK and after it waslegalized in the USA. And there was lots of unconditional support to it BECAUSE it was already legal in the USA. Same goes for the DINK lifestyle or Gay Pride etc. And our socialism has more to do with your New Deal, designed after Keynes economic thought, than with Marx.
Bottom line: you guys won the war and our European cultural debate and legislation is nothing but a distorted echo of your own.

PS: soory for the typing errors.

I think this is a good article. Some of the comments that follow on a cursory reading disturb me as they seem to equate the desire of Conservatives and Liberals in America to defeat the enemies of freedom with the Third Reich. Nothing could be further from the truth. The American Conservatives and Liberals of the previous generation who alike fought side by side to defeat the Axis Powers of WWII obviously deserve our deepest respect and gratitude. Certainly in order to preserve our American freedoms we must be ever vigilant that the evils the cropped up in WWII don’t regain control again on our watch. It is perhaps unpleasant to be reminded that the forces of evil are always at work.

As usual, great piece by Mr. Shea!

Like the Bard said:  The evil that man does lives after him…”

Ok, so I didn’t read the whole of the discussion so ignore me if someone else has already chipped in this quote.

“But the Nietzschean ethic can be accepted only if we are ready to scrap traditional morals as a mere error and then to put ourselves in a position where we can find no ground for any value judgements at all. It is the difference between a man who says to us: ‘You like your vegetables moderately fresh; why not grow your own and have them perfectly fresh?’ and a man who says, ‘Throw away that load and try eating bricks and centipedes instead.’” - C.S. Lewis “The Abolition of Man”

Granted that Nietzsche wasn’t much for Nationalism I think that C.S. Lewis’ point is valid enough in this case.  If you were to scrap all morality there is no foundation on which to base a new one.  Inherent value of human life is replaced by the amount of happiness in a life?  Why should it be a greater amount of happiness and not a greater amount of pain that causes a life to more worth living?  Or the blue-ness of ones eyes?  There can be no rational explanation why one should prefer one to the other unless there is a foundation, a first principle, on which to base it.

Interesting, well-intentioned article, but ignorant.  It’s not as black and white as all that.  There were good Catholics on both sides.  It was more than a war against Germany - Axis countries Hungary, Spain, Italy, Vichy France, Slovakia, etc. were Catholic!  1/3 of German soldiers, probably more, were Catholic.  Hitler was himself a Catholic, maybe not a very good one.  Many famous soldiers on the German side were good Catholics, Leon DeGrelle for example.  WWII was a fratricidal tragedy.  The U.S. should never have gotten involved but lying, backhanded communist sympathizer FDR, who was elected on a promise of no foreign wars, made sure we did.  Wanted, provoked, and had advance notice about Pearl Harbor attack, his ticket into war - common knowledge now.  It was not black and white, but the side of tradition and traditional Christianity was overall with the Axis powers, not the Soviet-loving Allies.  The fruits of the great Allied victory: secular humanism, Zionist control of Western institutions, Third World invasion of Western lands, multiculturalism, cultural communism, erosion of traditional Christian values, Satanic rock music, drug abuse, rampant pornography, etc. I myself am an American (Traditional Catholic) and had relatives that died in WWII, but that is the conclusion I have come to sad to say.  Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Dresden - true war crimes.  May God bless America.  She really needs it.

This piece was excellent. It makes me thing also of the folly of the Civil War. It was a war that need not have been fought because slavery would not have lasted nor would a split have endured forever. Well, hind sight is 20 20 they say and all the deaths that seem required for an issue seem to have been fruitless. Communism is now suppsedly dead in Russia and we are waiting its end in other countries. Now Islam on the other hand..

Hitler was himself a Catholic, maybe not a very good one.

The side of tradition and traditional Christianity was overall with the Axis powers

Scratch a radical traditionalist, find a nutty anti-semite.  No wonder these people despise JPII and Benedict.  I’d love to see you explain to them (or Pius XII, who said Hitler was diabolical) that traditional Christianity was on the side of Hitler.

Sheesh!

Who is “we”? If my history serves me right, the European WWII was won by Russia, with, great assistance and sacrifice, from its allied partners. While honoring the efforts of our own side, we shouldn’t change their role in history.

If memory serves, the Nazis won the war because their ideas won.  They started the war with 2 abhorrent premises: that they were entitled to do whatever it took to “win” and that they would decide who was fit to live, and had the right, even the duty, to eliminate “parasites” on the body politic.  The USA ended the war with Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the last ground zero being the Catholic Cathedral, and abortion on demand is the “law of the land”. I read the whole article by Mark as making the point that the Allies only appeared to win, and in that he is surely correct.

Fred Close.I agree with what you have said…! Every word..!Thank you for some really great thinking..!

Awesome! Scary truth but awesome. The evil spreads and continues to spread. When we humans start to think that we know better than God we allow evil to enter and follow its “enlightenment” and destroy ourselves and our future. Margaret Sanger, the mother of planned parenthood, Rockefeller and others, strongly agreed and believed in Hitler’s ideas and brought them and spread them with an American twist of supposed freedom. They wanted to eliminate blacks and the poor but get them to consent to it by telling them it brought them freedom and a better chance and a lot of other bull. You shall reap what you sow and we are starting to see the effects of the evils started but people won’t admit it. Why is social security tanking? Hello. You’ve only killed off over a third of the possible tax base. There are signs of the sleeping giant awakening to fight this evil but will it be able to or will it be lulled back to sleep by the socialist liberlism that runs rampant through our nation?

Dear Mark,

I agree with you that the march of the culture of death continues at a frighteningly swift pace. However, as you yourself pointed out that things are not as bad as all that, the optimistic side of me says “Hey! There is still good in this land of ours, and likewise good men to defend it! Let not the evil of some discourage the virtuous, or nullify in our minds the value of past sacrifices and bravery against evil.”

Anyway, thanks for the post, Mr. Revere. :-D

Seems like many who take offense with this article miss the point.  It seems to me that it is pointing out: despite the effort expended to defeat the Nazis, many of the ideals of the Nazis are accepted in a “softer” form. 

The question which comes to mind for me is not whether we should have fought then (of course we should have).  Rather the question seems to be: Did we waste the sacrifices of those who fought by turning the modern world into this without the smallest protest from the majority?

First, it is not liberalism.  They’re not liberal.  They’re leftists.  Liberals are for more freedom.  Leftists want to shut down freedom of speech, hurt taxpayers, kill babies, and shut down freedom of religion.  Scratch a leftist, and you’ll find a totalitarian.  “Liberals” are not liberal.

We won World War II?  Too bad we didn’t get all the nazis.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/816232/posts

So basically Mark, you are saying the 25 Million Men and Women who fought in the war and died a terrible death and the Millions of others who survived and lived to tell the tale, Youre saying they all died in vain, they died for nothing. How do you sleep at night, sir? You presume to say that Hitler’s whims and ideals are being passed in today’s world, well what are they are? Does that give you a right to say that 25 million people died for nothing? Well, you’ve just lost a reader forever, I hope God has mercy and patience with you

Johnny Cathoilc, don’t be so oversensitive and assign words and ideas to Mark that he did not convey.

My dad and my father in law fought in WWII, and we won the military battle.

But there is also a CULTURE WAR going on, and I believe that Mark is in large part correct: some of the ghoulish anti-human practices of Nazism have become passe in our culture, ie., aborting a baby because of a cleft palate, Down’s Syndrome, or for any other reason the mother thinks the child is not “perfect.”

We might have won the military war, but we lost sight of family values, working hard, and putting God first in our lives. THAT’s why it’s ironic that much of what we fought against militarily and defeated now comes in and we call it “freedom.”

So what r u saying Johnny Catholic? That WWII ended all evils?
And because millions died u have the right
to use that in an argument to try to shame the other
Person without dealing with the facts at hand?
How Sean Hannitiesh of u

Careful how you argue, folks.

Mark’s correct to point out that the culture of death which arose first in Germany as a result of the impact of (mostly) German philosophers and economists—ideas do have consequences, don’t they?—was not destroyed by defeating Germany.

The ideas themselves need refutation and ostracization in every generation, and Jesus Christ needs to be preached to and obeyed among every generation, until the world is renewed. At no time before the Lord returns will it be safe to consider those ideas defeated, because at no time before then will Satan have been defeated.

It’s just that simple.

So, Mark’s correct.

But be careful how you argue. I see some straw-men developing, here.

On what might be characterized the “right,” we have some folk who replace what I assume to be Mark’s actual point (“we have not defeated the evil ideas, and probably used excessive means, ourselves, in the process of defeating the enemies”) with a straw-man caricature of the same point (“we might just as well have not bothered fighting the war, using nuclear bombs makes us morally identical to Hitler, still having Jews around is overrated, Buchanan for President”).

On the other hand, we have some folk on the left who similarly characterize those on the right caricaturishly, replacing their views with straw man views. A reasonable and reasonably common view on the right might is:

(1.) WWII was necessary and just overall;

(2.) Against such an enemy in such a particularly dire hour, the use of weapons which, in the process of defeating the enemy’s military, cause great damage to non-combatants, is sometimes justified;

(3.) Against such an enemy in such a particularly dire hour, the use of such weapons may still be wrong, still unjustified. But if the situation brings those weapons quite close to being justified, then the moral error of using those weapons is less. Those who err by authorizing them under such circumstances cannot, rationally, be compared to Hitler, who used such weapons on occasions of zero danger or provocation.

(4.) Nobody—or no rational person—ever believed that defeating Hitler would defeat all evil. But it needed to be done in that generation, and (as always) by moral means. When a permanent and complete solution is unavailable, it is by no means wrong to enact a medium-term and ameliorative solution.

Some on the “left” side of this discussion thread are replacing that view by assigning to the “right” the following straw man: “Anything we did or could have done to defeat Hitler or Jihadism is just; anyone who disagrees is a traitor; we fully expected our victory in WWII to usher in a sinless era of light and flowers and cute puppies; and, we should all just Stop Worrying and Learn to Love the Bomb.”

There are those on the right that come dangerously close to the caricature; there are those on the left who come dangerously close to THAT caricature; but until someone makes it perfectly clear that they’re one tassel in the lunatic fringe, it’s better to assume they fall within the rational range of their side of the spectrum.

So, careful how you argue.

Who is “we”? By “we” I surely hope you mean “The Allies” and not “The U.S. singlehandedly”. The Soviets by far were the most important Allied country. Let’s face it: World War II was won and lost on the Eastern Front. It’s where the vast majority of the German military was concentrated from June 1941 until the end of the war in Europe. Germany knew it had to beat the Soviets or lose the war. Which country broke the back of the German military? That would be the Soviet Union. Eight out of ten German war dead were killed fighting the Soviets on the Eastern Front. The other two out of ten can be divided up between fighting the U.S. and Britain on the Western Front, in Italy, in North Africa and in all the German invasions starting with the invasion of Poland. 80% versus less than 20% for the U.S., no contest. Before anyone says anything about Lend-Lease it had literally no impact on the fighting before the outcome of the war was decided. The defense of Moscow in late 1941 guaranteed that the Germans wouldn’t win the war in 1941. The campaign in the south (Operation: Blue) leading up to the battle of Stalingrad and the battle of Stalingrad itself sealed Germany’s fate, there was no way that it could win the war after its crushing defeat at Stalingrad in which it lost all of 6th Army, part of 4th Panzer Army and a great amount of Rumanian, Hungarian and Italian forces. Stalingrad wrapped up in early February 1943. From that point on Germany couldn’t win the war. It tried a much smaller offensive in summer 1943 to try to pinch off the Kursk salient and got its butt handed to it, losing most of its remaining armored units in the process. After that it was all downhill for Germany.

What was the U.S. doing at the time of Stalingrad and then Kursk? During the Stalingrad battle the best the U.S. could do was to play a junior role next to the British in invading Vichy French Algeria and Morocco. During Kursk? The U.S. was again assigned to play second fiddle to the British in the invasion of Sicily. And what were the Soviets doing when the U.S. and Britain and Canada were trying their best to carve out a little bit larger of a beachhead at Normandy? The Soviets were crushing the German Army Group Center, its biggest concentration of forces and numerically its worst defeat of the war. I say numerically because by that point there was no way Germany could win so it was of much less significance than Stalingrad. The U.S. and Britain would not have even launched their invasion of Normandy if the Soviets hadn’t already broken the back of Germany on the Eastern Front and ensured that it was militarily crippled. D-Day was most certainly not the turning point of the war and its biggest importance was to ensure that the Soviets wouldn’t end up “liberating” France after kicking Germany’s behind. Basically the U.S. and Britain picked away around the margins while the Soviets were in the knock down, drag out fight of their lives to decide the outcome of the war. With the outcome no longer in doubt as Germany had been crippled already the U.S. and Britain then were able to mount an invasion of Normandy. The Soviets would have beaten the Germans entirely without American help but it would have taken longer. The best one can say about the U.S. contribution to the war against Germany was that it helped out somewhat and caused it to end sooner than it would have otherwise but the Soviets by FAR were the deciding factor in actually CAUSING the war to turn out the way it did with Germany losing instead of winning. Read “Slaughterhouse: The Encyclopedia of the Eastern Front”. It is loaded with all kinds of statistics showing just how insignificant the U.S. effort against Germany was compared with that of the Soviets. Anybody who doesn’t realize that the war was decided on the Eastern Front and that everything else was a sideshow by comparison doesn’t know that much about World War II.

As for Japan? Sure, I’ll give the U.S. that one. America was by far the most important country in defeating Japan. But Japan was by far a MUCH lesser threat to the world than Nazi Germany, anyone can see that. And furthermore, it wasn’t the atom bombs that persuaded Japan to surrender but rather the Soviet Union ending its non-aggression treaty with Japan in August 1945 and entering the war, then proceeding to whip the snot out of the Japanese Kwantung Army in Manchuria, Japan’s biggest defeat of the war on land. But being a maritime nation Japan had lost the war at sea already and was just playing for time and hoping to bleed the Allies enough to get a negotiated peace. It counted on the neutral Soviets to mediate that negotiated peace. But when the Soviets entered the war against Japan its government knew that the game was up, that now the whole world was against them, and if they didn’t surrender QUICKLY they could well end up with the Soviets occupying half of their country. But the U.S. was instrumental in defeating Japan in the naval battles that cost it the war so I will give the U.S. that one, it did more to beat Japan than anyone else. But Japan was small potatoes compared to Germany. And remember, the Soviets were fighting all alone on the Eastern Front against the best that Germany, Italy, Rumania, Hungary and puppet state Slovakia could send against them. And they whipped them all. With Germany being overwhelmingly the biggest Axis threat and with the Soviets being the nation that did overwhelmingly more to defeat Germany than everyone else PUT TOGETHER, I’d say it’s a pretty easy conclusion to draw that the Soviets won World War II and that the rest of the Allies merely helped out.