DEAR MS. DEBORAH BARNHARDT
Richard Earley's response to a letter by Ms. Barnhardt, wherein she protested criticism of famous Holocaust spokesman Elie Wiesel.
Dear Ms. Deborah Barnhardt,
I am not surprised that you are affronted by what you believe are untruths about Elie Wiesel.Yet you must confront unpleasant facts, if you wish to be honest. Mr. Wiesel has a record of embellishing, to use a polite word, his past. Like so many Americans you have been conditioned to believe Jews were the only ones killed in the 20th century.
A recent and most egregious example is that of the Wyman Institute in Philadelphia.They chastised the Chinese for not doing enough to save Jews and complimented the Japanese for permitting 18,000 Jews to live in China during World War II. “Large areas of China were under Japanese military occupation from 1931 until 1945, and immigration to Shanghai was controlled by the Japanese government, not the Chinese. The Japanese permitted thousands of German and Austrian Jews to settle in Shanghai during the 1930s, and allowed Polish Jewish refugees to settle there in 1940-1941. Many of the latter were able to escape Hitler thanks to the courageous efforts of Japan's acting consul-general in Lithuania, Sugihara Chiune (and his close ally, Dutch consul Jan Zwartendijk). Historians estimate that altogether, about 18,000 Jews were saved from the Holocaust because of Japan's -- not China's -- Shanghai policy.” [1]
In 1995 when Japanese Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayamavisited Peking he was met by an accusation in the People's Daily, the newspaper of the Chinese government, that 35 million Chinese died due to brutality of the Japanese. [2] Within days the New York Times had an article written by their Tokyo correspondent and Pulitzer Prize winner which credited only 10 million Chinese dying due to Japanese depredations. [3] Who would want to quibble over 25 million dead Chinese? It must be noted this number was over four times the number of Jews killed by the Nazis and occurred in the period remembered by Jews as the Holocaust to the exclusion of other people dying and by most of the rest of the world as World War II. The Chinese have never forgotten this, and one must assume one day they will make sure the rest of the world does not either.This most certainly must include the United States.
Contrary to what the viewer of American television almost universally believe the greatest expansion during World War II was that of Japan, not the Germany of Hitler.Afterwards the United States kept the greatest criminal, Emperor Hirohito, on his throne for our domestic political reasons.
You must note that for every Jew “rescued” by the Japanese there were almost 2000 Chinese killed by them. Do you feel a lack of proportion or consideration from the Wyman Institute? Movies and television influence our culture much more than books. Books make one think. Much of what we profess to believe is untrue. The press secretary to David Dinkins, the black mayor of New York, maintained that blacks had played an important part in the liberation of the concentration camps. The winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, Elie Wiesel had said he had been freed at Buchenwald by black GIs. [4] The documentary had been nominated for an Academy Award. Yet not one Black came close to concentration camps that were not “freed” as much as deserted. The guards knew what was coming.
Great American humanitarians were in the lead in advocating intervention in Bosnia. These for the most part were ones who advocated American withdrawal from Vietnam.Jewess Susan Sontag during the war in Vietnam had gone to Hanoi in 1968 and had been impressed with an ethical society whose rulers loved their people. She had thought their only defect was that they were not "good enough haters". She professed admiration for their caring treatment of captured American pilots. [5] She told the trade paper for New York intellectuals that one could only be happy about the victory of the communists in Vietnam. [6] Her behavior was identical with the French Communist Party which had worked for the certain defeat of the French army in Vietnam. [7] In the early years of war in Vietnam Ms. Sontag described the white race as the cancer in world history.During the continuing crisis in Bosnia she felt inspired to help those besieged in Sarajevo. She produced plays. She must have felt her presence was such a positive one for morale it warranted importing extra food into that besieged city. One might have wanted to ask if at night she went out with a rifle and shot Serbs.
From Hollywood came an appeal that America must learn what the meaning of "never again" truly meant. To break the siege these late-blooming warmongers insisted Mr. Clinton must act unflinchingly. They demanded air strikes if necessary. These worthies insisted Mr. Clinton did not need Britain, France, Russia or the Pentagon. Their commander-in-chief, Mr. Clinton, must lead the world in decency and righteousness. They did not wish to see the Muslim people of Bosnia destroyed.Among the signatories were cultural heavyweights such as Robert Altman, Jeff Bridges, Robert DeNiro, Michael Douglas, David Geffen, Henry Jaglom, Barry Levinson, and Billy Wilder.
Mr. Jaglom had seen the dedication of the Holocaust Museum and was shaken. He thought an effective way of coping with his trauma was sending a letter from a small group of people who had generally been supportive of Mr. Clinton. [8] This emotional response was prompted by Elie Wiesel, a Nobel peace prize winner, professional concentration camp survivor and untitled leader of the Holocaust industry,who pointed out the slaughter was occurring while the United States was doing nothing.Senator John McCainsympathized with this impulse, but pointed out that as a nation we could not confuse a desire to do good with viable military options. [9]
While reading of the horrors of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and the Warsaw uprising, Mr. Frank Rich, movie critic of the New York Times, contemplated his son's Bar Mitzvah to be held on the anniversary of the Warsaw rebellion. He quoted Elie Wiesel, the Nobel Laureate, who had been to Yugoslavia and had seen the bloodshed. Mr. Wiesel had said he could not sleep after seeing the carnage: "As a Jew I am saying that". According to Mr. Rich, President Clinton had begun to rethink intervention in Yugoslavia after hearing what Mr. Wiesel had said "as a Jew". [10] What was not contemplated by Mr. Rich or Mr. Wiesel was who would have to bear the burden of their consciences. A gut feeling had been they would not have cared.
I have written a book on why Americans remember wars the way we do. I ask that you read it. I would be more than willing if your classroom is somewhere close to Philadelphia to talk at an assembly or other student academic function. I neither like nor support George W. Bush or his presumed opponent. Most of all, I am not the ogre you may think.Malevolent, tough-talking cowards such as “Bring ‘em on” Bush and Dick Cheney are the true villains. Do not kid yourself - they are abetted by American Jewry far more concerned with Israel than the United states.
Respectfully,
Richard Earley
P.S. If you wish to read my article on who has, or, much more pertinently, not done the fighting for the United States, please see:
Remembering American Wars – Occidental Quarterly Summer 2002 theoccidentalquarterly.com
[1] releases.usnewswire.com
[2]. NYT, May 7, 1995, pE3
[3]. NYT, May 21, 1995, p4
[4]. New York Post, p3, Sep 8, 1993
[5]. Wilson Quarterly, p106, Summer 1983
[6]. New York Review of Books, p24, Jun 12, 1975
[7]. NYT, Jul 18, 1952, p1
[8]. New York Post, p6, Apr 30, 1993
[9]. NYT, pA16, May 5, 1993
[10]. NYT Magazine, p94, May 23, 1993
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