The dark charisma of Adolf Hitler

SEE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AG4YMNg_viw

 Pic from the Library of C0ngress

Adolf Hitler seemed an unlikely leader – fuelled by anger, incapable of forming normal human relationships and unwilling to debate political issues. Such was the depth of his hatred that he would become a war criminal arguably without precedent in history. Yet this strange character was once loved by millions. How was this possible, and what role did Hitler’s alleged ‘charisma’ play in his success?

Under Scrutiny: FIRE AND STORM reviewed by Sanderatne

Nimal Sanderatne, courtesy of Groundviews … http://groundviews.org/2013/04/17/review-of-fire-and-storm-by-michael-roberts/

     When Michael Roberts left Peradeniya in the late seventies, he was part of an exodus of intellectuals from the University of Ceylon, Peradeniya, arguably one of the best universities at that time. The exodus of academics at that time was compelled by the economic difficulties faced by university dons. It was the second wave of such emigration that diminished the intellectual life of the university and country. The Arts Faculty of the University of Peradeniya never regained its prestigious academic status after that. Today the University of Peradeniya cannot take pride in intellectuals of the eminence of E.F.C. Ludowyck, E.R Sarachchandra, H.A.de S. Gunasekera, Fr. Ignatius Pinto, Ian Van den Driesen and many others.

Kavudha Rajaa! Who is to be King? Mahinda or Prabhaa? Misjudgements that changed the course of history

Somapala Gunadheera, in The Sunday Island, 11 November 2012

Misjudgements are anathema to justice. Nevertheless even they may accidentally ensure ‘the greater good of the greater number’ in very exceptional circumstances. The following judgements made by the Supreme Court since 2005 have turned out to be one such instance.

1. Injunction to prevent the Police from further investigating alleged misappropriation of tsunami funds by Mr. Mahinda Rajapaksa (MR)

2. Ruling that President Kumaratunga (PK), steps down from office one year earlier than stipulated

3. Decision that allowed any “cross over” in Parliament to continue as an elected MP, despite his or her political party’s objections

These decisions have been widely criticized with cogent reasons by legal luminaries. Recently there has even been an implied confession on the tenability of the injunction at 1 above. However, my intention is not to go into the legality of these decisions but to reflect on how they changed the course of history of this island.

Solitude in Jaffna and the silence of a city– Dayapala Thiranagama’s poignant journey home

Dayapala Thiranagama, in The Island, 21 September 2012

Starting a family in Jaffna with Rajani, in the midst of the Tamil community was a life enriching experience. Having two young daughters added happiness and an extra stability for us. However, the apparent tranquillity in Jaffna could not be taken for granted. The subsequent years the situation began to change from bad to worse. We never expected that the life was going to be smooth but we never envisaged what was to follow. The war and its horrors that tore apart so many family lives made a lasting impact on the whole community. Returning to Jaffna again to painfully revisit the past was a difficult experience.

This summer, after 23 years, I drove to Jaffna from Galle with my eldest daughter. We travelled through the heart of Sri Lanka on the A9 road, passing Kandy, Matale, Dambulla and Kekirawa. We drove past areas where I had worked in 1986 as a member of the Vikalpa Kandayama (Alternative Group), laying down an underground political structure. At the time, I had left my academic job in the university to do fulltime political work and was confronted by two great dangers: increasing political repression from the UNP government on the one hand and the JVP’s second insurrection on the other. In my journey from the place of my birth, Galle, to Jaffna in the north, I retraced my own political journey in Sri Lanka to its conclusion, the grave of my wife Rajani.

A projected book on “Paranoid Fantasy and Enemy Creation”

Statement of Purpose:   This book will explore the hypothesis that there is a common dynamic underlying enemy  creation. While cultural contexts and historical situations differ (and are often complex), warfare may arise out of a fundamental template revolving  around the identification  of an enemy perceived to be a threat to one’s nation or ideology. To defend or rescue the sacred ideal, the class of persons designated as enemy must be defeated,  eliminated or destroyed.

World’s Recent HOT SPOTS and Padraig Colman’s “Reconciliation” Series:

Padraig Colman reviews issues of reconciliation after severe conflict in different parts of the world

Reconciliation as a concept = pcolman.wordpress.com/category/reconciliation/

 Reconciliation as a concept = pcolman.wordpress.com/category/reconciliation/

Reconciliation in Chile = pcolman.wordpress.com/2012/04/30/reconciliation-in-chile/

Reconciliation in Rwanda = pcolman.wordpress.com/2012/04/22/reconciliation-in-rwanda

Reconciliation in Argentina = http://www.nation.lk/edition/feature-viewpoint/item/5753-reconciliation-and-retribution-in-argentina.html

 

Reconciliation in Peru =  http://www.nation.lk/edition/feature-viewpoint/item/6020-reconciliation-in-peru.html

Reconciliation as a concept = pcolman.wordpress.com/category/reconciliation/

 

Reconciliation in Chile

P.O.W. – Australian Prisoners of War in Hitler’s Reich

William Charles, reviewing Peter Monteath’s book on Australian POWs under Hitler, for the Adelaide Review, http://www.adelaidereview.com.au/article/867

Imagine yourself a prisoner of war at one of the teeming number of internment facilities spread the length and breadth of Hitler’s Reich. Upon being interrogated, you find the German officer questioning you speaks with a broad Australian accent and has been educated at the University of Adelaide. Truth always turns out stranger than fiction – the person in question being from a German-Australian family turfed out of South Australia during the 1914 – 1918 war and now settled back in the Fatherland. Even back then, it seems, turning immigrants away had unforeseen consequences.

Inspirations: Hero Figures and Hitler in Young Pirapāharan’s Thinking

Michael Roberts, 13 February 2012

In line with my long-standing interest in currents of nationalist thought, the origins of Sri Lankan Tamil nationalism has always been a topic of interest and has led to a number of interventions on my part, invariably written within the shortcomings of a person who cannot speak or read Tamil.[i] An overview can be found in “The Tamil Movement for Eelam” which appeared first by invitation in the online journal E-Bulletin of the International Sociological Association, but has since been printed in Fire and Storm. Essays in Sri Lankan Politics. However, readers should also consult other works, especially the books by Nira Wickremasinghe, Lakshmanan Sabaratnam, Neil de Votta, Gerald Peiris and KM de Silva, besides Narayan Swamy’s three books on the Tigers of Lanka, Inside an Elusive Mind and The Tiger Vanquished (see the bibliography below). There is, needless to say, a burgeoning literature on this topic which continues to generate additional fare.

Since the causal factors and processes for the rise of Tamil nationalism and its militancy are many and complex, social science as a discipline struggles to work out how to attach weightages to the many factors that have come into play, especially when one attends to temporality within this historical process.

Military Training in the German Nazi Mould amidst Internal Dissension in the early LTTE, late 1970s

Ganeshan Iyer, trans by Parames Blacker

PREAMBLE by Michael Roberts: This is chapter 14 in the serialized memoirs in Tamil by Ganeshan Iyer found in http://inioru.com/?p=12399 (whose work has now appeared in book form). The strict translation of this chapter would be “Fighters opposing Prabakaran – My records on the Eelam warfare,” but I have chosen to highlight the central motifs in this segment.

  Pics by Shyam Tekwani 

I also have Gobinath Ponnuthurai;’s translation of this chapter; while Dayan Jayatilleka has provided a somewhat different translation of key sentences in this document relating to Hitler and Mein Kampf. All the versions are broadly in agreement re the threads of content.

Ganeshan Iyer became the Treasurer of the LTTE when it was initially formed in May 1976. Iyer is from the Brahmin caste, a numerically minute body of people in the Jaffna Peninsula who serve as temple priests and are dependent on the Vellālar caste. Nourished in the Vellālar village of Punallaikatuvan, Iyer came to know Pirapāharan when the latter hid there under the auspices of Chinniah Rajeshkumar, alias Rāgavan, in the early-mid 1970s. An atheist and reformer with Leftist leanings, Iyer joined the LTTE’s hard-core guerrilla ranks in the 1970s. When the LTTE divided into two factions Iyer joined the faction led by Uma Maheshwaran that opposed Pirapāharan. This faction later evolved into the militant organisation known as PLOTE. Subsequently Iyer became critical of PLOTE and associated with a dissident faction named Theepory which hived off from PLOTE. Finally he became associated with the NLFT, a faction identical to Naxalites. Thereafter he sought refuge in Europe and seems to have ended up in Germany though other inforamtion indicates that he is in India.

Arun Ambalavanar is the person who first brought Iyer’s writings to my attention and provided the reference to his serialized memoirs in Tamil within Inioru.com. Ambalavanar makes this point emphatically: “though his Marxist thinking is very much evident in his memoirs on the LTTE days, the recollections provide genuine reportage and information on the history of the LTTE.” Michael Roberts. SEE bibliography attached at end.

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Ganeshan Iyer: “Fighters opposing Prabakaran – My records on the Eelam warfare,” Chapter 14 trans by Parames Blacker

 The dream of the Thamil Eelam Tigers was to establish a powerful army. We believed that the basis of this could be started with the making of a disciplined training camp. Prabakaran comes forward with the full plan for this. As planned the training camp was set up in Mankulam. We trained towards this at every opportunity, with small army activities like pistol shooting practices.

Mahinda Rajapaksa: Cakravarti Imagery and Populist Processes

Michael Roberts, courtesy of Groundviews, where a different title was deployed: “Mahinda Rajapaksa as a Modern Mahāvāsala and Font of Clemency? The Roots of Populist Authoritarianism”

On 4^th December 2011 the Sunday Island carried a headline: “Mahinda ready to meet General Fonseka’s family over pardon” — with a picture alongside showing President Mahinda Rajapaksa seated in an armchair perusing an official document – a document in royal red and marked by a recognisable state seal. It is the juxtaposition of the headline and image that drew my interest. In my reading as an analyst attentive to indigenous cultural threads, this combination suggested several interrelated motifs, namely, that

1. President Rajapaksa is the epitome of sovereign power, vested with the rights of clemency on high, just like Sinhalese kings of the past who could be supplicated by condemned subjects who crawled on their knees to the palace gates (mahāvāsala) and begged for pardon for their evil-doings or crimes;[i]
2. President Rajapaksa is akin to a manorial lord of the past, a patrimonial figure who is readily accessible on his verandah to subordinate officials, tenants and other people seeking favours from this font of noblesse oblige;
3. President Rajapaksa is a son of the soil, native to core. After all, what can be more native than a hansi putuva? He is, therefore, as personable as approachable.