Peace in Our Time - Part 9

There are similarities between Germany’s 1938 annexation of the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia*  and Russia's aggression against Ukraine. Before examining the similarities, it is important to note the differences. While President Putin and Russia may be guilty of war crimes in Ukraine, nothing Russia is doing approaches the genocidal nature of the Hitler regime.

And while Russia may be trying to recreate at least some of the former Soviet Union, its aims are more limited than fascist Germany in the 1930s, which sought domination over most of Europe.

Below we will compare Hitler’s justification for annexing the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia with Putin’s for annexing at least the ‘Russian’ portions of Ukraine. The quotations below are from Hitler’s 9/12/1938 and 9/26/1938 speeches. The Putin quotations are taken from his speeches of 3/18/2014, 7/12/2021, 2/21/2022, and 2/24/2022.

One common theme between the two dictators was the claim that ethnic minorities were being suppressed. In Hitler’s case, he is referring to Germans living in the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia (he calls them ‘Volk’). In Putin’s case, he refers to ethnic Russia’s living in the eastern part of Ukraine or the Donbas region.

The table below contains portions of their speeches where Hitler and Putin make these claims.

Hitler’s Speeches	Putin’s Speeches
“… major part of our Volk is placed at the mercy of impertinent abusers, ostensibly without any means of defending itself… I am speaking of Czecho-Slovakia”	“Time and time again attempts were made to deprive Russians of their historical memory, even of their language and to subject them to forced assimilation.”
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“Amongst the suppressed minorities in this state, there are also three and a half million Germans. These Germans are God’s creatures as well. The Almighty has not created them so that the construction arrived at in Versailles might place them at the mercy of an alien power they hate.”	"And the most despicable thing is that the Russians in Ukraine are being forced not only to deny their roots, generations of their ancestors but also to believe that Russia is their enemy."
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“…these people (referring to the 3.5 million Sudeten Germans) are being ruined methodically and hence are subject to a slow but steady extermination.”	"And the so-called civilized world…prefers not to take note of this…genocide, to which almost 4 million people are subjected…." [referring to ethnic Russians living in Ukraine]
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The misery of the Sudeten Germans defies description…In a humanitarian context, they are being oppressed and humiliated in an unprecedented fashion.	"… for many people in Ukraine, the anti-Russia project is simply unacceptable… They have had their legal opportunity to defend their point of view… taken away from them. They are intimidated, driven underground. Not only are they persecuted for their convictions, for the spoken word, for the open expression of their position, but they are also killed. "
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The Reich will no longer stand for any further oppression and persecution of these three and a half million Germans. And I implore all foreign statesmen not to think this mere rhetoric.	"The killing of civilians, the blockade, the mistreatment of people, including children, women and the elderly [in the Donbas], continues unabated."
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I am simply demanding that the oppression of three and a half million Germans in Czechoslovakia cease and that the inalienable right to self-determination take its place. I demanded clearly that, now twenty years after President Wilson’s pledges, the right to self-determination must become reality for these three and a half million as well.	“…As it declared independence…the Supreme Council of Crimea referred to the United Nations Charter, which speaks of the right of nations to self-determination.”
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…a war has been waged to exterminate the Germans there. Nearly 600,000 Germans were driven from their homes during these years of “peaceful development” in Czechoslovakia.	"…residents of Donetsk and Lugansk took up arms to defend their home, their language, and their lives. Were they left any other choice after the riots that swept through the cities of Ukraine, after the horror and tragedy of 2 May 2014 in Odessa where Ukrainian neo-Nazis burned people alive, making a new Khatyn out of it?"
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“Any territory which is German according to its populace and which wants to come to Germany belongs to Germany.”	"Those people who deem themselves Russians are told to know that they do not belong in Ukraine."

The next post in this series will continue to compare Hitler’s and Putin’s speeches.

.* The Sudetenland refers to the Sudeten mountains in western Czechoslovakia near the German border. After World War I, many Germans lived in this region.