Lebensraum And Burma

Living Space for the Kalar
(part of The Darkness Visible series)

In Buddhism the Swastika might be a symbol of luck and peace, the Nazi flag however...

Across the world societies have often turned to an ethnocentric version of their collective history by isolating a portion of their community from the rest. This willingness to segregate shows the weaknesses of the society in which they occur. To the outsider it is easy to identify how these chinks in the armor create a fatal flaw. However for those who are bound by the facade of morality these societies uphold this need to hate is almost unrecognizable. 

In many cases these flaws in the makeup of the society can go on for decades without incident. Both the isolated community and the rest of society can almost learn to accept their roles in the overall scheme of things. Little digs at the targeted community can even be tolerated for some time without much friction. Words such as "nigger, kike, and faggot" might even become popular amongst the majority. And given the frequency of the abuse both majority and minority might even become accustom to a situation that outsiders would find intolerable.


Then comes a group of antagonist.

With some effort a group or individual can exploit the rift that floats just beneath the surface. This occurred in Germany with the rise of the Nazis and in Rwanda with daily antagonism on the airwaves. Their persistence in pushing the minute differences between the majority and minority pushed their society to the edge of the abyss. And in the case of genocide... over the edge and into the depths.

Once the ball gets rolling it is nearly impossible to stop the tide.

In the case of the Germans the antagonist started the flow of hatred with the theory of lebensraum. This method exacerbated the differences of both race and religion that cracked the German society. It helped to give purpose to the rise of hatred in ways that even the pogroms had not managed. It justified a sense of hatred that not only isolated the targeted community but dehumanized them.

With Burma the antagonist have long implemented Hitler's old methods in their targeting and attacking of the Rohingya minority. Their use of ghettos mimics the SS in Poland. Their exploitation of "unruly mobs" recreates (over a much longer time scale) the SA's kristallnacht. But it was their pushing of lebensraum that made all that possible.

To understand how Burma pushes the theory of lebensraum we should first look at how it was created in the first place.

Lebensraum was first thought up long before Hitler's hijacking of it. Many historians accredit the social theory of lebensraum to the medieval Ostsiedlung or the spread of German settlements into Eastern Europe. Thus this recreation of past sins was of course founded on the same ideas the first spawned the spread of "German peoples" into foreign lands. These being that the German people were growing faster than their own territory could sustain. Therefore both the medieval and modern fascist came to the same conclusion... attack weaker societies and take from them what you need.

According to Hitler the German people needed "living space" to continue their inevitable growth. However unlike past expansions, Hitler did not believe that the "pure Aryan" should be diluted in his expansion by living with or mixing with the societies already living on the soon to be conquered lands. Slavs, Jews, Roma, and Poles all needed to be cleared along with the Russians and political dissenters. These were all of course threats to the confiscation of much needed territories.

In Burma today it is obvious that the map has already been drawn up. It is inconceivable that Myanmar could or would invade neighboring lands to acquire more territory upon which to build and expand. Yet the government of Burma has a portion within it that believes that the "pure" Burmese need more "living space".

Yet in Burma "pure" doesn't just mean a particular race, though that does play its role. Instead religion and language also play a role that race alone could not fill. With the Rohingya the fact that they are Muslims fills this role almost to its conclusion... forcible removal and extermination.

For decades the word "kalar" has long highlighted the fracture in Rakhine society. It's racial sting not only identifies the Rohingya as darker skinned but "unclean" as well. Unclean for the fact that they are not Buddhist like the Rakhine majority. Unclean because they do not speak, mostly amongst themselves, the same dialect of Burmese as the Rakhine.

In this sense the word "kalar" cracks Burmese society in ways that no other word can. After all, "kalar" is almost a legal definition of the Rohingya withing the Arakan. "Kalar" individuals are often denied standard documentation such as birth certificates and marriage licenses. "Kalar" people can be forced to do labor for the government and military without pay or any compensation. "Kalar" people do not have to be treated with dignity or respect while they are always expected to show it to the rest of society.

During the massive pogroms that occurred in the summer and fall of 2012 the "kalar" were openly targeted while the government offered military protection to the Buddhist majority. This showed the Rohingya that once again they were being targeted for removal from not only their land but the society as a whole. The one word that had separated the Muslims from the Buddhists was now being plastered everywhere like the old "Whites Only" signs in America's dirty south. All the while the Rohingya were being killed and driven out of their homes and villages.

Like Hitler, the Rakhine Nationalities Development Party (RNDP) has used the differences between the two groups to further split up the Arakan community. Over emphasizing slurs such as "kalar" helps to further ingrain radical philosophies such as lebensraum. And once the ideals of the party become the default argument of the majority the start of the genocide begins.

There are already signs that the RNDP has succeeded at fully implanting their ideology into the majority of Rakhine society. With support of the religious leaders of the Arakan Buddhist community the RNDP has managed to bring in Rakhine settlers to "resettle" Rohingya villages. The monks have openly supported efforts by the RNDP to tighten the strangling grip of the barricades blocking aid to Rohingya villages and camps. And with support of government authorities the RNDP has been able to arrange launching points for Rohingya ships leaving Burma in an effort to ethnically cleanse the Arakan.

Had the cracks not already been present it is arguable that antagonist like the RNDP could not have pushed such radical beliefs such as the current genocide of the Rohingya. Yet no argument can bring back the dead already lost to this horrific tragedy. No what if this or that sort of debate can end the slaughter.

If the Rohingya are to be saved and the genocide is to be stopped the outside world must first take action and wait to talk after the bleeding has stopped. We can not talk or trade our way to a scenario where Rohingya aren't starving to death or drowning at sea. If Burma is to be stopped the world community has to find more meaningful ways to force Myanmar to a standstill.

Unfortunately that means that the world media must give up its narrative of a "democratic Myanmar" heading for reform and an open society. We all have seen just how much the media has enjoyed this love affair with Burmese leaders such as Suu Kyi and Thein Sein. But if we are going to live with ourselves after this genocide is ended then we must hold both responsible for their actions in this tragedy.

As for economics... well that is the portion of this struggle that is almost like hitting a brick wall. When dealing with genocide it seems that facing the reality of politics and ideology are nothing in comparison to getting governments to back away from easy profit. In the modern age it is nearly impossible to imagine a situation in which China, Russia, the EU, or USA ever back away from profit over stopping a genocidal regime.

How many more Rohingya have to die so that the West can profit off of Burma's need for "living space"?











Source Documents
(note not all sources are listed)

http://myohmyanmar.wordpress.com/2013/01/27/no-dogs-no-blacks-no-irish/
(image and content)

Human Rights Watch
http://www.hrw.org/news/2012/07/31/burma-government-forces-targeting-rohingya-muslims-0

The Nation
http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/columns/04-Feb-2013/no-willing-hosts-for-rohingyas

Manifest Destiny or Lebensraum

Genocide in America

(Wounded Knee Massacre)

In America we tend to think of genocide as a war crime committed by people in Germany or maybe Rwanda. But few people today think of genocide as a part of what built this great nation. It is hard to stomach the thought that genocide played any role in American history let alone the fact that it helped define America's rise from an experiment to a modern nation. 

So for those of you who are still reading let me explain what I mean and how this horrific part of our past can help us stop this sin of our fathers from ever occurring again.

It is little secret that before the Europeans arrived their existed upon this soil cultures that were complex and rich in arts, language, and architecture. These societies rose and fell on their own accord before the first contact with Spanish, Dutch, French, or English. They waged war differently from the whites who came later. They communicated differences in a manner different from the Europeans. And it was this culture that evolved on its own that stood in such contrast to that of Europe that it was shocking to the invaders who first landed in Haiti and the Gulf region of America. 

Prior to the invasion of America the cultures that had developed practiced war in measured degrees. Some wars could last a matter of hours, others might turn bitter and deaths may occur in larger numbers. Yet in all the wars history has been able to record none would have prepared the Native people for the invasion that was about to come.

Upon arrival the first attack on the Natives may not have been intentional. Through initial contact the Native Americans were exposed to diseases that would ravage their populations in plague proportions. Small pox, yellow fever, and cholera were just a few that spread rapidly wherever the Europeans went. Christopher Columbus may have very well been the first European explorer to note this as he often exploited the issue to gain control over what is now Haiti.

The next issue that quickly became apparent to soldiers and settlers alike was that the Native people had not developed weapons on the same scale as their European counterparts. In contrast the Native Americans of North America were often seen at first as using tools of the hunt to fight rather than the weapons of war developed over ages in Europe. Not to say that Native peoples didn't quickly adjust and even become rather ingenuitive in their attempts to fight back. On the contrary the Native peoples willingness to adopt weapons of the Europeans occurred without must hesitance. It was always the lack of understanding on the Native Americans' part of European warfare that left them as the underdogs.

As genocidal efforts to remove the Native Americans began in the North America it is important to note that the Spanish genocide of Latin America had almost completely destroyed the cultures that existed prior to Spanish occupation. Inca, Mayans, Aztecs... anything that came before the Spanish was now obliterated as the Spanish set out to destroy the Native peoples' languages, way of life, and even their art and architecture. The Spanish took on a way of subjugation that would be repeated under the Young Turks as they forced "Turkification" upon the Armenians, Assyrians, and Pontiac Greeks.

In the British occupied areas, especially the area soon be called the Thirteen colonies, the occupation was hallmarked by the removal of Native peoples and the ethnic cleansing of the region. The only minorities allowed to stay were those cast under the yolk of slavery. And in what is now Florida and Georgia, this did include some Native Americans.

For a period of time the Appalachian Mountains seemed to him-in the European settlers. Though traders and soldiers could be found wandering the rest of North America, for this period of time the use of ethnic cleansing was employed.

Ethnic cleansing in America was not carried out in the same manner as it was in Bosnia, though at times it did mirror later versions of it. In the British controlled areas the use of treaties and the loosely worded promises amongst tribes and Europeans were used to dwindle the populations. Once the targeted community was small enough to annihilate without much loss of European lives they were often removed or killed off. At times other Native American tribes did engage and even help the Europeans in this conquest. Though it does appear that these tribes did so under the impression that this act of appeasement would save them from the same fate. In rarer cases there were tribes that took the opportunity to take revenge upon a competing tribe.

As the American settlers took control of their own destiny the Native Americans lost more control of their own. In the French and Indian War the Native Americans lost the least of to evils as the British and Americans claimed victory over the French. This meant the mild exploitation of the French was not to shift to the all out genocide the British and American forces favored. This turn for the worse would only be highlighted as the Americas broke with Britain. A point at which many of the Native Americans along the Canadian border fled north under the naive assumption that the Canadians would be more humane.

As the United States grew out of its adolescence the political nature of the genocide grew with it. In the years leading up to World War One in Germany a political and social philosophy developed out of the science of the day (eugenics). This idea stated that it was the natural right of a people to spread outward from their cultural nucleus and claim more land as their society grew with them. The need was perceived that a developing society and growing population was constantly in need of new sources of food and natural resources. Thus the more developed a society became the more space it required. Mixing this with Darwin's evolutionary theory many justified this claim by stating that only the most developed societies would survive while the backward societies were forced to assimilate or face extinction. More openly racist views stated that the more developed races would spread their society while the sub-races would be forced into subjugation or mass extinction... a view many Germans of the day were not directly opposed to despite the fact that slavery in Europe was illegal.

We call this theory today Lebensraum. It was the exact theory that drove Germany to commit the first genocide of the 20Th century in Namibia against the Herero and Namaqua. It would also be used to justify the Nazi ambitions of the Final Solution and the conquering of Europe. In America we called this theory Manifest Destiny.

This version of lebensraum was used to justify the Louisiana Purchase. It was then used by the Democrat party to justify expansion beyond the Louisiana territory and into areas that had been left for the Native American tribes whom had been pushed West. And in 1840 the Democrats used it again to go to war with Mexico so as to claim more territory in around the area of Texas (including California). The Democrats again pushed the idea as they forcibly pushed Texas into the Union so as to allow slavery to expand westward with them.

But for the Native Americans still left on the Great Plains this idea of manifest destiny was nothing more than the final nail in their coffin. The whites were already coming west. The land upon which the Native Americans sat was said to be "needed" by the United States to fulfill its destiny. And in the end the Indian Wars would amount to the creation of concentration camps and death squads roaming the west to root out the targeted victims of genocide.

Manifest destiny was never a valid claim to expansion. Even in modern times there are vast sections of America left open and free. The only difference is that the people who used to live on those lands have been assimilated or killed in the largest genocide of recorded history. Modern time has forgotten that this claim by the fledgling United States was nothing less vile than the claim of lebensraum by the founders of the Nazi party. Both were used to lend their moral superiority to the outright slaughter of people deemed unwanted, undeveloped, or less than human.

In America we have a long history with genocide. We committed it, we have covered it up, and at times we have romanticized it. Perhaps it is this love affair with out own genocide that keeps us from recognizing the genocides other cultures have suffered. It has been nearly a hundred years since the Armenians were forced to suffer the horrors of genocide. Yet here we are today unable as a country to admit to it. Both for the Armenians and the Native Americans alike.