Comments by "Louis Giokas" (@louisgiokas2206) on "TIKhistory" channel.

  1. Many years ago I was working on a project with some early high-resolution displays with a large color range. We wrote a program to ramp through the color pallet and gauged our reactions. Indeed, when we got to the greens there was a palpable queasiness.
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  2.  @misterbaker9728  I have never seen that stated anywhere. Do you have a reference or is that just your opinion. Ike was insistent that allied troops stop at the Elbe. Considering how many troops the Soviets lost in taking Berlin, this was obviously a good decision. I have heard that Patton wanted to rearm the German troops and then to turn around and attack the Soviets with them fighting alongside the western powers. In hindsight, that might have been the best course of action. Without western material support the Soviets most likely could not have withstood such an attack.
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  3. Very thought provoking, as usual. Keep it up. This is a very interesting and important topic. By the way, after WWII the US continued the arsenal of democracy, as the USSR was the arsenal of communism.
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  4. The point made at about 7:30 is salient to the reasons where socialism/communism was successful. Marx, as I understand him, thought that the revolution would start in the countries with the most developed industrial proletariat. He was thinking of Germany, the UK and the US. Of course, his whole theory of historical and social development was a load of crap. I was going to say flawed, but crap better describes it. For all their complaints, the proletariat understood that they lived better than the peasants. That is why they, or their ancestors, moved to the cities to work in industry in the first place. The first place a Marxist revolution succeeded was Russia, still mostly a peasant society. Then there was China, even more rural and poor. Even Cuba follows the pattern. What happened was that the communist revolutionaries found that the only way they could motivate people was by offering them free stuff. Of course, they had to take that stuff from someone. That was the more successful people in society. This is why we don't see these countries succeed on their own, either while communism is in force (China and Cuba) or after supposedly throwing off communism (Russia). They are still at heart poor peasant societies. The people have been so thoroughly corrupted by communism that they are in no way capable of building a rules based liberal democracy. It looks more and more like Russia and China will devolve into a period of warlordism. This happened to China after the fall of the Qing dynasty. In Cuba, I expect the regime to collapse (soon) and the US, encouraged by the large Cuban American population, to step in. They have the most hopeful situation. By the way, in China, the first nationalist leader, Sun Yat-sen, was a socialist. His goal was to consolidate power, then they would consider democracy. His program was nationalist, not democratic. China has no chance.
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  5. Tik, you are straying into the realm of the history of philosophy. It is not going well. You have lost your way, it seems. This is not standard history and should not be treated as such.
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  6. That people from various faiths around the world invoke God is something that everyone should know. Just as an example, we were talking to one of my neighbors just after her mother had died. She used the phrase "God willing". She is Hindu and often, prior to COVID, would host religious gatherings at her house. This is not uncommon. There are three faiths that worship the "same" God. These are the Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. In all others the concept of God may be different, or even non-existent. I really appreciate your addressing of this topic, and many others (Hitler's Socialism). I have read Chamberlin and several books making the point about the Nazi's being Socialist. Keep up the good work!
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  7. The B-29 was called the Super Fortress. The Flying Fortress was the B-17.
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  8. Thought the quote from Murphy is interesting in light of the current economic situation. You are just a young man. I lived through the last major inflation in the US, in the late 70s and early 80s. This was accompanied by minimal economic growth and the term stagflation was coined. Since the 80s, we have seen countries around the world "print" money through gov't borrowing. most of the largest economies have gov't debt at over 100%. China and Japan are in the 200% range. And yet, we have seen inflation flatline. Most governments around the world are trying to boost it up to 2%, without much luck. So, I am not sure that gold is an answer.
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  9. TIK, I just saw a video on the John Anderson channel where he had a discussion with Stephen Hicks titled "The Nazis & Nietzsche". In it he also mentions Marx and the influence Marx had on their socialism. At about 0:40 Hicks states that Goebbels loved Karl Marx. Just another indication that the Nazis were indeed socialists. Actually, I have read books making this point before discovering your channel. I commend you for pointing this out. In a contemporary context, Putin's Russia is very much a Nazi state.
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  10. Did a lot of work at the Command and General Staff College at Leavenworth in the late 70s and early 80s and then again in the early 90s. The mantra was Combined Arms Warfare. Mostly because of the things you discuss in your video. Great stuff. Love your work. Don't always agree, but that is rare. Keep it up!
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  11. The blood issue is one that has been around for millennia. Even in the Bible, especially the Old Testament, there is lots of concern with blood. Prohibitions against eating animals with the blood still in them. Sprinkling the altar with the blood of the sacrifice. Then, in the New Testament, we have the sacrament of the Eucharist, the body and blood of Jesus. All of this was, I expect, quite separate from the "philosophical" concepts, and predates them, so it really tends to support your thesis. And, no, not too much information. It is stimulating. It is also YouTube. I can stop and restart any time. Keep it up.
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  12. Assigning numbers to these things in advance is difficult. Look at US experience after WWII. In Vietnam the US lost about 50K troops while the North and the Viet Cong lost about 1M. Yet the US lost the war, abandoning the South. In the 2004 Iraq War, the coalition sent in just over 177K troops, while the Iraqis had over 500K troops and 650K reserves. They Iraqis lost in a matter of weeks. The defining feature in both wars was air power. This was also, at the beginning of the German invasion of the Soviet Union, the case for the Germans as well. It is much more complicated than just numbers. At the time of the VN war, US doctrine said that the defenders needed 3 times as many troops as the attackers. When it was shown that this was not the case, confidence in the prosecution of the war waned in the US. The US was never going to send over that many troops. Another factor is organization. The Germans started out much better than the Soviets, but later in the war this became more equal. There is a lot more to these things than a silly equation. Keep up the good work. I like your stuff, and always compare it to many other sources, and generally I think you get it right.
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  13. TIK, I just noticed that Jordan B. Peterson's latest video is titled, in the thumbnail, "Marxism is a Religion". Great minds think alike.
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  14. You use the case of Henry Ford, but you fail to contrast your statement with his stated goal. That was to make it so that his workers could afford his cars. Of course, if others followed suit, then even more people could afford cars as well. In capital intensive industries, it is mass markets that make one money. This explanation is much more plausible than any conspiracy theory.
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  15. So, TIK, when are you going to write a book? You make a lot of good points. I don't always agree with you, but I do find your approach refreshing. One of the issues with professional historians is, as you point out, they always have biases. To see this, just look at historical works over time. The same events will be presented differently at different times. This just proves the point. The fact that most of these historians do not disclose their political affiliations is a problem.
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  16.  @pax6833  What questions? Your comment does not seem to have relevance here.
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  17. The whole idea of which "race" is going to lead the world comes up time and time again. It is not only in Europe. The Japanese believed they were the master race. They believed they could defeat the US because we were a bunch of mutts, not a pure race. How did that work out? The Chinese today have the same idea. Despite their actual history, they believe that China should have a bigger place in the world. This ignores the fact that their whole recent economic "miracle" (really a facade that is about to come crashing down) was financed by the west. Left to themselves they would be a third world country. They are heading that way.
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  18. Tik, this is a great video. Your laughter added a lot to the tone. Too bad I can't give it a double thumbs up.
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  19. Just saw a video on the SNP's connection with fascism and Nazi Germany. I left a comment there comparing that to the current SNP. The channel is "War Stories with Mark Felton". It is worth a look.
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  20. Those that want to distance Nitzsche from the Nazis should read "Nietzsche and the Nazis" by Stephen Hicks. Oh, and don't forget, Nietzsche was certifiably nuts. I did enjoy reading his books when I was young, though. I especially liked "The Birth of Tragedy", "The Case of Wagner" and "Ecce Homo" most of all, but these were not his overly philosophical and political works.
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  21. What you say at about 4:15 is true. What strikes me is that, when I was at university (decades ago) one of my professors told me that we could find out it all wrong tomorrow. He didn't expect it, but that is always a possibility. And that is a hard science. Actually, over the centuries it has turned out that we were wrong about physics, and new theories came along. So, to expect it for history is the rational stance to take.
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  22.  @mito88  On that you are correct. In WWI and WWII, the early US neutrality was based on the UK being an imperial power. This was the stance of the populace, It was only our leaders that wanted to take sides. Frankly, although we have somewhat different vires, I have enjoyed the discussion. I hope you take it in the same way.
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  23. Now, this is not a fully formed thesis, but the idea of Heraclitus, that everything is struggle, might have some merit in explaining human social evolution. Man went from living in family groups (tribes) to more complex forms of organization. These tribes often struggled against each other. The banding together of several tribes under a leader is likely the origin of society as we know it. This was driven by struggle of one group against another. This then prompted innovation. It is not likely that people just sat around, absent some motivating force, and said let's invent something. It is most likely a combination of wanting to understand existence and a struggle of some kind in the community or between communities. Just a thought.
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  24. at about 23:51 you state that the US has converted itself to a militaristic power, implying a war economy. This is not true. Even during the Vietnam War, our defense spending did not go over about 10% of GDP. Even the latest wars in the Middle East have not seen our Defense budget got that high. We are usually at about 6%. Contrast that with the Soviet Union which was spending 40% on defense throughout the Cold War. This was a major contributing factor in their collapse.
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  25. TIK, why do most people give unemployment in terms of numbers rather than percentages? If we talk about this, the number is significant, but it needs to put into context by using the percentage of the working age population.
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  26. At about 43:00 you are talking about tests on rifles. I have a Soviet era Mosin-Nagant rifle from about 1942 or 1943. This is a rifle that was prob. used in the war, put in an arsenal, and then sold in the west, as were many. I don't think there are any replica rifles of this type, because there was no need. There are millions upon millions that are now in circulation. Ammo to the WWII spec is widely available. I assume your ignorance of this issue us because you live in the UK where your access to firearms is limited. When I lived in the UK one of my friends was an Army Major, who could not even own, privately, a Lee-Enfield. I could, back in the US.
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  27. One of the things that happened when the USSR broke up was that workers got shares of the companies they worked for. Having no experience of this, the people who became the oligarchs swooped in and bought the shares cheap. In China, individuals have limited access to the capital markets. Thus, they put their money into property. When people are not educated on how ownership of companies works, or when their access is limited, they do stupid things. In Russia you have an oligarchy. In China you have a property sector that is too large a part of the economy, and thus a bubble that is now bursting.
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  28. Responding to your comments at about 24:30 I thought back the old song from The Who, "We Won't get Fooled Again". The last lines of the song are "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss". Actually,, I just went back and looked again at the song. The chorus says it all. Just look at it. It is amazing.
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  29. You keep talking about the plan. Are you ignorant? Don't you know the saying that no plan survives first contact with the enemy? Any army command that relies on plans created by higher elements is doomed to failure. Just look at the Russians in Ukraine today. The Russians of today rely on tactics of the Soviets of the WWII era. The Soviets in WWII took many more casualties than they should have. They did not care about their soldiers. In the current conflict they have suffered, as far as we can tell, almost 10 times more deaths.
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  30. While you are quite correct that Fascism and Nazism are not the same thing, they do share a lot of ideology and structure. Look at the US and UK. Both are representative democracies, but there are lots of differences. On the other hand, the UK was an empire. Don't forget that prior to WWI and WWII there were massively popular passivist movements in the US. This is why the US did not get involved until attacked. In fact, after Pearl Harbor, the US did not declare war on Germany, a Japanese ally, but the other way around. One of the reasons for the passivist movements in the US was the reluctance to support European Imperial powers. It was the imperialism that rankled in the US. After WWII the US successfully pressured the UK to wind down its empire. So, while the systems were similar they are not the same, much like Fascism and Nazism. So, while you are correct, harping on that as the reason for the machinations in Austria and Ethiopia had little to do with the differences in the systems and more to do with geopoitics.
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  31. So, TIK, I generally like your stuff. This video is very informative. One thing that does rankle me is the democracy comments. So, let's see, you are not a fan of democracy. Do you have any idea of the alternatives? I am sure you do. There is monarchy, where the monarch is the government and the head of state. There is dictatorship. There is oligarchy. And of course, there is anarchy. I think that what Churchill said about democracy is correct. From the way you talk, I expect you are an anarchist. I wonder which type. And don't tell me there were humans in a primeval condition before states and hierarchies. There were hierarchies. Thes were based on family ties and were called tribes. Is that where we should go?
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  32. Keep it up. The idea that socialism/communism is a leftist, or liberal, ideology is pure bunk. The Soviet Union and China today are good examples. Even Russia today is a good example. The suppression of individual liberties and the centralization of the economy look exactly like Nazi Germany. The use of patently false propaganda fits right in there with Goebbels' rhetoric. Lavrov was recently laughed at when, at a ministerial conference of the G20, he claimed that Ukraine attacked Russia. I even see reports that the Russians are now idolizing Stalin again. In Russia, the "oligarchs" (they really aren't true oligarchs) simply do the state's bidding. If they don't, they are arrested or fall out of windows of upper floors of buildings. Some analysts claim that to be an oligarch in Russia today you have to give half your wealth to Putin. This does not go to help the state. Again, a parallel with China. It is projected that CCP officials have secreted over $1T (maybe as much as $3T) out of the country. These regimes are based on rampant corruption of the most basic kind. The reason I follow this channel, and many other historical channels, and read lots of history and biography, is that it informs us in understanding current conditions. That and I really enjoy it. So, good work. I don't always agree with you (but more often do), but I always find your content interesting.
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  33. What really strikes me is how Hitler misreads the Old Testament. God is the one who fought on the side of the Israelites. When they displeased God, and he did not fight for him they lost. Victory is often ascribed to God. The number of times God is depicted as having a "strong arm" and of fighting both his and Israel's foes are numerous. Where the God of the Israelite differs most is in his strong emphasis on laws. Something to ponder.
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  34. Tik, early on in the video you quote the 1949 Geneva Convention in discussing the 1944 repatriation. Since you have admitted that forced repatriation is not explicitly forbidden at that time, your argument is invalid. It is a central tenet of law that laws can not be applied retroactively. The 1949 prohibition was probably added because of this situation, but does not apply to it.
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  35. I love the talk about the dialectic. Yes, it is used by the Marxists. I follow events in China (and lots of other countries as well) and when any CCP official, especially Xi, talks it is pure Marxist dialectic. As such, it also sounds rather stupid. I think that is why China is in such a sad state.
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  36. Money has value because it allows one to purchase concrete things. I don't use gold, or bitcoin, to buy thing, I use currency. Gold and bitcoin are considered assets. But guess what, the are valued in how much currency they can be exchanged for. Marx had another saying. He said money is stored up dead labor. That is a wonderful thing. If I couldn't store up the results of labor with some medium of exchange I can use later, we would be back to feudalism. What currency, and money, measure is the productive capacity an economy. Not how much of a commodity it possesses. Even before the US got off the gold standard, there was never enough gold to cover the currency in circulation.
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  37.  @TheImperatorKnight  Actually, prices have not risen, even with massive expansion of the money supply in many countries. Governments still struggle to get the rate up to 2%. In the US, where the gov't does not control prices (and I expect that the UK really can't either), we still have vey low inflation. Even if got up to 3 or 4% after an opening up after COVID, that would be nothing in historical terms. As for inflation of goods, it has been basically nonexistent here in the US for at least 20 years. Big ticket items such as cars, appliances and computers have either come down in price (especially computers), and factoring in features and efficiency, are much cheaper than they were before. For example, my first real laptop (provided by my employer in the mid1990s cost $10K. My most recent cost about $900, and is much, much more powerful. Another way to look at is that the earlier computer cost as much as a mid-range car (say a VW Jetta). How we measure inflation over time is a real issue. I have talked to some very high level financial analysts and they confirm it. Even taking commodities such a gasoline (or if you prefer, petrol) we see this. Petrol got up to over $4 per gallon here a few years ago. In the last 5 years or so, is has gone between $1.9 to recently $2.5 per gallon where I am. i recently replaced a 2002 vehicle, which was top of the vendors line, with a 2015 vehicle, which was in a similar position in a different vendor's line. Like the computer, it has many, many more features, from power to electronics, than the one it replaced, yet if cost the same in nominal dollars. There is something going on here that the current measures do not capture. I am actually working on a theory on this that takes into account the changes in technology. Of course, these were not so prevalent in the periods you were talking about. That being so, you should not project the issues experienced in the early to mid 20th century to situations we are experiencing now. As always, I value your videos and thought. Keep it up.
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  38. Of course we don't "exist". The "world" is just a simulation. At least that is what modern physicists say. So, the ancient Greeks were correct.
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  39. The idea of people being encouraged to turn in any metal they had at home is very reminiscent of the Great Leap Forward in Communist China in the late1950s and early 1960s. It was a total disaster in China.
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  40.  @brucetucker4847  Oh, I know that. It was just that, if it had happened things would have been different. I am not advocating for that either.
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  41. Racial theory is not a white thing. The fact that whites have been more powerful for a long time is another matter. For example, in WWII, the Japanese saw the Americans as "mutts". They thought they could easily defeat them in battle, one on one. This proved to be untrue. The Germans, of course, saw the Slavs as an inferior race. They paid the price. The Japanese saw the Chinese, another Asian "race", as inferior. Even given superior equipment, the were not able to conquer them. In fact, if there had not been the divisions in China between the Communists and Nationalists, Japan would probably have suffered a massive defeat. Don't forget that until after WWII, racial theory was the main intellectual trend in the world. Even in the US, there was a strong eugenics movement. The issue of the Jews is interesting. They did have, in ancient times, a strong national presence. It was really only after the 70s AD, when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem, that the Jews ceased to have a national presence. Contrast that with the Germans. At the time of the Jews greatest national presence, the Germans were just a bunch of primitive tribes. It took until the 1870s for them to actually form a nation. Just think on that.
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  42. Of course, it is the Jews and Freemasons. Isn't it always?
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  43. Don't confuse the issue of the Native Americans with the status of the Jews in Nazi Germany. Native Americans are full citizens of the US. They also have a self-governing status in their various nations within their treaty borders. The law that set this standard was passed in 1924, about same the time all this eugenics stuff was taking place.
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  44. Making these comments at about 3:30. The US was reluctant to enter both WWI and WWII in Europe because of European, and especially British colonialism. Germany should have thought about that. I believe that Patton was all for rearming the Germans to attack the Soviet Union. So, there was thought about that in the West. Your comments about Roosevelt are correct. This ties in with the general feeling about European colonialism.
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  45. Wonderful as always. What the German people did not understand was that they were fighting the Americans. Look at what happened to our adversaries since WWII. Germany is again the most economically powerful country in Europe. It is the fourth largest economy by GDP. Japan is the third largest economy in the world by GDP. Even Vietnam is being looked at favorably by the US, and would, in all likelihood, be supported by the US in an altercation with China.
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  46. I was in Helsinki in the early 21st century. It was summer. There were three nuclear powered icebreakers in the harbor.
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  47. Tik, could you comment on the WEF, and how it resembles what you are saying about fascism.
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  48. I love it. Everything goes back to the ancient Greeks. I also notice a lot of concepts appearing in the ancient Hebrew texts, ancient Egyptian religion and many others in southwest and south Asia as well as East Asia. These are the seeking of people to understand the world around them. The question is were these truths that are objective (although very muddled) or are they a result of how human brains are wired?
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  49. I watch whatever you put out. I find it very well thought out and stimulating. You have a view that is often different from traditional historians and effectively use your reading of their works to develop your ideas. I voted for the politics, ideology, religion, philosophy option. I have read extensively on these and they are personally interesting to me. But, as I said, I watch it all. Do what you think is best for you. I will be watching. By the way, on the Stalingrad series I sometimes start watching and think this is tedious. But then I always feel compelled to watch to the end.
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  50. The quote from Hitler at 33:18 sounds just like something Putin said during the current Ukraine war (oops, I mean special military operation). I am fairly sure, but not certain, that he said it to a group of mothers of fallen soldiers he was meeting with.
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