RE: NS is Socialism | Responding to your counterarguments and Further Explanation 

*PLEASE READ* I’ve replaced my original pinned comments in BOTH videos because people either ignored them completely (pinned comments is where I list my sources, not the description as many of you claimed) or because I wanted to address many of the criticisms that people had about these videos. Since comments can only be so long, I’ve had to split this into sections. So please make sure you check out the comments below this one. Sources will be listed in the following post, as are links to a couple of videos etc. First of all, the National Socialist economy and society in Germany was absolutely not capitalist (no matter how much people scream at me that it is). After crushing imports and exports in 1933-1934 in order to promote Autarky and rearmament, party officials were basically in every shop and business, providing them with goods or foreign currency, and dictating policy etc. On top of this, Autarky crushed imports and exports, causing the end of trade, helping to isolate Germany from the globalized economy. All this caused a massive economic crisis in 1934, but to quote Tooze's Wages of Destruction - "...in practice the Reichsbank and the Reich Ministry of Economic Affairs had no intention of allowing the radical activists of the SA, the shopfloor militants of the Nazi party or Gauleiter commissioners to dictate the course of events. Under the slogan of the 'strong state', the ministerial bureaucracy fashioned a new national structure of economic regulation." - P112 "It would be absurd to deny the reality of this shift. The crisis of corporate capitalism in the course of the Great Depression did permanently alter the balance of power. Never again was big business to influence the course of government in German as directly as it did between the outbreak of World War I in 1914 and the onset of the Depression in 1929. The Reich's economic administration, for its part, accumulated unprecedented powers of national economic control." - P113 And this was 1934. So this was absolutely not capitalism. And if it's heavy state intervention, with a planned centralized economy, without being capitalism, what could it be? A commenter critical of what I was saying (Adrian Mahon) said that my definition of socialism was wrong, and that - "It's about power relationships and shifting these to the workers" Ok, I absolutely agree with what he’s saying there. From an ideological perspective of what was defined by Marx, that's a fair assessment. And I don't disagree - I never have done. But, there's an issue with this definition historically. And people have given other definitions (revolutionary vs non-revolutionary, “seizing the means of production” etc). In fact, socialism doesn’t have “one” definition because as Evans wrote - “When an intellectual historian reads Hobbes’s Leviathan or Marx’s Das Kapital, it is not in order to use their writings to reconstruct something outside them, but in order to construct an interpretation of what they mean or meant. There are indeed many interpretations of these thinkers’ ideas, not least because the systems of thought Hobbes and Marx established were so wide-ranging that they never became completely closed.” - Evans, R. “In Defence of History.” Granta Books, Kindle. So, let’s not pretend that socialism is a fixed definition. Now, some of you also have this concern - "We are seeing a rise of fascism; to 'revise' the meaning of socialism plays to a particular audience that (I'm hoping) you don't want." - Adrian Mahon. I agree, and I absolutely don't want to see a rise in fascism or National Socialism. I cannot stress this enough. I've already said a couple videos back that I'm doing a Holocaust documentary because I'm sick to death of people preaching Holocaust (and Holodomor) denial. It's sickening. So, do not think I'm at all promoting either ideology. Several people claimed I was ‘redefining socialism’ so I could deny the Holocaust. No idea where that came from. And actually, by saying that National Socialism wasn't socialism - this actually plays into the National Socialist and denialist hands. Now, at first you might think - why? Well, let me explain with a bit of history - Hitler genuinely believed in his version of 'socialism', and thought it was a form of 'socialism'. It doesn't matter if you think that it's socialism or not at this point, just run with it. So, when Hitler comes to power in 1933, he 'socialized' the German economy by removing the Jewish influence from government etc and imposes his version of 'socialism'. And this actually caused an economic crisis by 1934 as a result. This was due to Autarky and armaments spending (see the previous quotes in my above comment which are linked to this). With the 'socialization' of the people, he removed Jews from society, and heavily restricted trade, ending capitalism. And he geared up for war. Military spending was less than 1% of the budget in 1933, and was 10% in 1935. This was “- a bigger and quicker increase than ever seen before in peacetime in a capitalist state.” from Rees, L. “The Holocaust: A New History.” Penguin Books, 2017. Page 92. Now, why would he do this? Is it just for military conquest? Or is there some sort of underlying motive? And yes, there's an underlying motive. Going back to Mein Kampf, what he see is his version of Nationalism (which is entwined with his 'socialism'). As a brief explanation - he thought that the species shouldn't mix breeds. And that Aryan peoples built nations. However, the reason he thinks nations collapsed in the past had nothing to do with war etc; it was all because the Aryans interbred with the lesser races. In Hitler's mind, the dilution of Aryan blood would weaken the race, and bring down the nation. Yes, complete lunacy, but there's little doubt he thought this. And he honestly thought that the Jews were the absolute worse race, and the fact they didn't have a nation of their own (at the time) proved his theory right. In Mein Kampf, Hitler says that the Jews were like parasites who would latch onto Aryan nations and dilute Aryan blood with their own blood by interbreeding. Therefore Hitler thought that the Jews had to be removed from society to prevent the Aryan German blood from being diluted, and thus causing the downfall of the German race. However, there's the Marxist problem too. In Hitler's mind, the Jews were championing Marxism. The reason was stated as: if they made everything equal and classless, this would give the Jews the best chance to interbreed with everyone and thus bring about the fall of humanity. Yes, it's ridiculous, but that's where he went with it. So, you can see why he hated Bolshevism so much. He thought that international communism would allow the Jews to destroy the Aryan races. He therefore decided to take action and beat the Jews before they beat the Aryans. This is why he wanted to go East. He viewed the Slavs as slaves owned by the Jews. But if they conquered the Soviet Union, rid the Jews from society, the Slavs would serve the master German Aryans for a 1,000 years. Now, Adrian Mahon said "Can we agree agree on what 'socialist' means (hint: it's not state intervention). It's about power relationships and shifting these to the workers" Ok, but let's look at what Hitler thought for a moment. Hitler thought that 'socialism' was about power relationships too. The difference was that he thought the way to solve the issue wasn't by having the workers rise up. But actually by removing the Jews. (I know this isn't socialism as Marx defined it, but stick with me for a bit longer) If he removed the Jews, then the power relationships wouldn't happen. The Aryan race would all work together as a collective to better the German nation - the elites would help their fellow men, and the workers could rise to the top. Hitler does say that the ladder still exists because individuals should be able to climb up if they're better than others. That would actually help the race because supposedly the better elements of the race would rise upwards. (And you do have quite a bit of social movement in the National Socialist era of Germany, so it's not completely correct to say he was just saying this stuff.) Now, this Hitler-version of 'socialism' is actually mixed with his Nationalism. Hitler redefined this to mean that the state was the absolute embodiment of the race (his 'Nationalism'). However, the two are intermixed. You can't have one without the other. The state/people need to remove the Jews, and the state/people need to work together. Now, if you keep this idea in mind - that the Nationalism and the Socialism element are equal and the same - look what happens when we consider the history of the time: When you think of the trains taking people to the forced labour camps, the concentration camps, the death camps etc, what you have to remember is that, this absolutely wasn't free-market forces doing this. This was a systematic industrial mass-killing, controlled by the state (hence my "intervention in economy and society" bit), and I would absolutely argue that this could not have happened to this extent in a free-market capitalist economy. How would a business market "Murder of Racial Minorities on a Mass Scale" in any capitalist society? It just wouldn't happen to this extent. Yeah, you have persecutions and murder during wartime etc, but not mass-industrial-scale-murder.

In the 19th century the liberals were the ones in favor of capitalism. Conservatives were Tories, aristocrats or monarchists - like Disraeli in Britain, or Bismarck in Germany. They were not “leave alone” Capitalists.

National socialism is a collectivist ideology. It is clearly a form of socialism, just not the form of socialism that most socialists want. It is however one of the two inevitable results of centralised control of the economy and collectivisation of the population.

I can’t tell you how refreshing it is to have a historical analysis by a commentator who doesn’t want to argue towards a preformed conclusion

Honestly, try getting rid of this daily debate of 'what the heck is socialism'. THE TOPIC ITSELF is a total mess even within pan-Marxist circle

TiK is doing us all a huge service by stoking discussion and debate on these topics (which he states is the purpose of his channel) whether or not you agree with his assessments. Thank you TiK for being awesome!!!!!!!

Just to let you know. I have subscribed because of your argument about National Socialism being a type of socialism. Thank you. Someone had to say it.

To paraphrase from MK: “Nazis are what the Communists would be if they had the balls to achieve their goals”

Lower, middle, and upper classes aren’t classes in Marxist senses. There’s two opposing classes, the Proletariat, being the industrial workers, and the bourgeoisie, which are the exploiting class, the business owners. Of course there’s also peasants, and petty bourgeois, but the latter two are the main ones.

"Once you've seen it, you can't unsee it." Nailed it!

These weren't the main points of criticism and it feels quite dishonest, to claim those 3 points, reading a lot of well constructed comments on the last video. You also don't seem to understand liberalism, but as you don't define your terms, it s hard to tell, if it is intentional.

Disculpa que no escriba en ingles, entiendo lo que dices, pero te felicito por tu canal y por tu aporte a la historia. Asi como a tu vision y revision de ella. Eres un gran aporte. Espero qe algun dia tengas subtitulos en español porque en mi opinion seria muy enriquecedor poder entender todos tus puntos de vista y argumentos para asi poder analizar tu revisionismo historico y poder compartirlos. Gracias por ejercer tu libertad de expresion y ser un aporte al debate de un periodo historico que hasta el dia de hoy, todavia se ven sus inconclusas consecuencias.

Great video TIK, don´t mind all the self-proclaimed experts in the comments. The problem is so many people don´t think further than racism=right wing. To me the right wing-left wing scale has nothing to do with racism-anti racism, they are two different things.

Thankyou for standing your ground. High respect mate.

I admire how you have tried to simplify such an immensely complicated and intense topic into one video. I think you over generalise a little bit, particularly in regards to conservatism and liberalism, but, considering the sheer scale of the topic, I think you do a good a job as possible. Looking at the comments, I feel sorry for you. How are you supposed to do a historical video explaining Nazism/Socialism when so many people commenting have such obvious political biases? Anyhow, keep up the good work TIK! Your videos always teach me something new and help me refine my own views. :)

Great video ignore the dislikes from the extremists

Awesome videos, just subscribed. I believe you, in this days where everyone gets offended by affiliation, could state the obvious. "Hitler was a Socialist, witch is not the same as "all forms of socialism are racist and inhumane" Nowadays a lot of people feel, like Jon Stewart put some years ago, that if you subscribe to an idea, you subscribe to everything that can derive from that idea when taken to extremes. So, when you associate Hitler with Socialism... and if i agree with a big part of some Democratic Socialist countries ideas... I am like Hitler. Following this line of thought, people get extremely defensive. Keep up the good work.

Your understanding of the 19th Century is just as bad as your understanding of Nazism. To say that conservatives in the 19th Century were in favor of laissez-faire is one of the most laughable and ridiculous things I've ever heard. You clearly have no idea what you're talking about and you really need to spends months or years reading before you make another attempt at stepping outside your area of expertise.

Cave man brain: "Socialism addresses the inequality inherent in Capitalism by transferring the ownership of capital to the workers, thus ending the alienation of labor by synthesizing labor with the capital." Genius brain: "Socialism is when the government does stuff." Galaxy brain: "Socialism is when it has something to do with society."

I feel we have come back full circle back to the age of extremes.

A wolf has four legs, two eyes and a tail. It's basically a dog. A horse has four legs, two eyes and a tail too. Hence horse is a dog too

The main issue here is that German Socialism, wasnt. MEFO, contract system, private industry, and of course, from the horses mouth: "'Socialist' I define from the word 'social; meaning in the main ‘social equity’. A Socialist is one who serves the common good without giving up his individuality or personality or the product of his personal efficiency. Our adopted term 'Socialist' has nothing to do with Marxian Socialism. Marxism is anti-property; true socialism is not. Marxism places no value on the individual, or individual effort, of efficiency; true Socialism values the individual and encourages him in individual efficiency, at the same time holding that his interests as an individual must be in consonance with those of the community. All great inventions, discoveries, achievements were first the product of an individual brain. It is charged against me that I am against property, that I am an atheist. Both charges are false." - Adolf Hitler Hitler made the "its not true communism" argument. Go watch a Sargon of Akkad video and see how that argument plays out... Socialism to the Nazis, was not an economic or political theory, it was a philosophical ideology about race and nationality. And actually Hitler said classes dont exist. There are no such things as classes: they cannot be. Class means caste and caste means race. Munich - Speech of April 12, 1922 You're wrong my dude. And you even make the arguments that prove that you're wrong. The Aryans are not "seizing the means of production". They already owned the means of production. To get them producing more, the Nazi government created a bond program, and then turned it into a currency, they didnt send in government management. Heres a big tip. People lie. I know, I know its hard to believe....but sometimes, people say theyre liberals, and theyre not. Sometimes people say theyre conservatives, and theyre not. Sometimes people say theyre socialists and theyre not. You look at the objective facts, which you're VERY good at doing in every other video ive ever seen from you....but here, it seems to be based on philosophical and ideological stances, not the ACTUAL objective economic operation of Nazi Germany. And socialism is an ECONOMIC system. Not a political or philosophical system. If you dont actually DO socialist economics, you are NOT socialist, no matter how many times you say you're a socialist. If I say im a Communist, and then open up a business, I am not a communist. Its like when the US says its a free market capitalist nation. No. No it isnt. Hasnt been for over 100 years. If Nazi Germany was actually socialist, it would have fully mobilized its industry before it was already losing. It didnt. America was actually more Socialist in 1942, than Germany was. Look at the ACTUAL objective economic function of each nation in World War two. Not what the leaders said. Peoples actions are a better meter than their rhetoric.

TIK, socialism is defined as the common ownership and operation of the means of production. A regime whose economic policy directly inspired the word "privitization" through its aggressive pro-market and anti-democratic policies cannot be considered socialist! Transforming public assets into autocratic monopolies is one of the most anti-socialist things that a political entity can do!

Thanks for the video and the channel TIK. I love that you challenge my views on history and you have got me to read to books to prove/disprove points of view. So far I have agreed with 80% of what you say but I would love the chance to talk it out and have a proper chat. Keep up the good work. Ben

TWO QUOTES FROM HITLER on socialism; 1) "One must first have experienced need to become a socialist." and 2) "Real socialism is what the state can do to benefit people." Hitler's "National Socialism" is a form of statism or state-socialism. It has also been called Prussian Socialism, after Oswald Spengler's book "Prussianism And Socialism". This kind of socialism is found in Arabia ( the Baath Party for instance ) and in South America ( an example is Peronism ).

So essentially you say that every nation on earth is socialist since Everyone has both private and Public sector?I got it right?Dont want to argue just making it clear

It does not matter in the least whether you put Hitler in the "socialist" or in the "not at all socialist" cardboard box. There is no insight to be had from arguing about categories.

Don't have a habit of commenting, but felt like I needed to here. Listed are my biggest critiques of your video(s), in no particular order: 1) You don't, at all, seem to differentiate between Socialism and social policies. Yes, Hitler enacted social policies, many of them even, as did most, if not all, fascist dictators. They did this to please and appeal to the working class, to get them to support their regimes. But so did the capitalist countries, even the USA. Socialism, however, is more than just social policies. It stems from an internationalist view of the world, where all the workers of the world are united by their struggle against the upper class(es). It seeks to remove social injustice from the world, by focusing on complete economic equality (at least in the long term, it starts with social policies). I will not claim that any self-proclaimed socialist state ever achieved this, or even got close to achieving it, but that is the goal, a brotherhood of all working class people across the world. 2) You also don't mention the roots of fascism or national-socialism properly. It starts out as a reaction to modernism, particularly internationalism and socialism, and to a lesser extent it reacts on the excesses of capitalism. To achieve the first two it is extremely nationalistic and racist in character, yet at the same time it calls for social policies, to achieve 'class reconciliation', and unite the etnic people against the (perceived) external or internal threats (Jews, Poles, communists, refugees, Muslims, whatever they perceive threatening at their respective time and place). 3) Even though the nazis enact social policies, they aren't even really economically socialist, precisely because they outlaw labour unions, therefore outlawing the class struggle in the work place, and instead implementing a corporatist system, where representatives of the labourers and the bosses, in accordance with state representatives, try to figure out the best way to both keep the production going, and keep everyone involved happy. The state could threaten the workers that strikes would result in imprisonment, but they could also keep the bosses in check, by reminding them that if they could not run their business, the state would take over. 4) About the NEP and the marxist view on economy, because I feel you explained that quite poorly. Simply put, in the classical marxist view of economy, you have 4 stages, not 3. The first one is pre- or proto-capitalism. Then you have capitalism, then socialism, finally communism. The NEP was a policy Lenin enacted because he thought that Russia hadn't fully entered the capitalist stage yet. So at first he tried to motivate entrepreneurs to start businesses, fully intent on nationalising those businesses in time, in the socialist stage. 5) This relates back to my first point, but when talking about the political spectrum, although I'm glad you didn't go for the horseshoe, a square grid is far better, although personally I'm a fan of the triangle spectrum, where capitalism, fascism and communism are three opposites, and ideologies of particular nations float towards any of the three. That being said, these kinds of charts never take factors like 'tolerance towards other cultures' into account, which, again, is a very important, yet not at all mentioned difference between socialism, and national-socialism. 6) The night of the long knives is the culmination of the debate whether 'Nationalism' or 'Socialism' was the most important for the NSDAP. Those who thought 'Socialism' was more important were mostly killed or imprisoned, or had, by then, already changed their minds about it (Goebbels). How the SA was relevant in this, I don't know. They were just the fight crews of the party as a whole, often picking fights with communists, anarchists and socialists. The name, Sturm Abteilung, translates to Storm Division, nothing socialist about it. There's probably more, but I feel like these were the major ones. I'm a big fan of your videos, and will keep on following you, but I'm used to some more nuance from your side. That having been said, this is indeed an important conversation to be had. P.S.: Sorry for the bad english, I'm not a native speaker.

Thanks for the video, because it helped me too explicate my own position in this matter by bringing it up as a criticism. So here it is: 1. Equality as all being equal in regards to their race is quite different from socioeconomioc equality and might be better discribed as racial unity or "harmony" (as a Nazi would probably say), because the Nazis actively embraced inequality as a part of that "harmony". Also, the SU and Nazis both had their slave classes which where actually a part of their society, while being made invisible through exclusiin and marginalisation and where in practice extremely hierarchical, which contradicts their supposed equality. 2.Both have heavily relied on state intervention as a tool for economic policy but with different ends in mind. The Sowjets wanted to use it to produce a communist utopia without the economy of state capitalism that was supposed to bring it about, while the Nazis saw economics just as a tool to advance the interests of the nation (according to their own deffinition). 3. Socialism was supposed to ultimately become one global economic model (hence the emphasis in internationalism), bit the Nazis as far as i know did Not want to conquer the whole world, although they would eventually have to impose their ideology on it. 4.The Nazis were economically fascitic, which means a merger of the state with corporate power. The Sowjets were one big centrally controlled totalitarian corporation themselves.

One thing that people seem to be particularly bothered by is the bizarre list of completely irrelevant videos in the description of your video from yesterday, which contain Jordan Peterson, who is controversial to say the least. It looks like you copy and pasted your recommendations feed. Can you elaborate on this? Did you include that by mistake?

I had a similar view of NAZI's a couple weeks ago and just assumed "right wing," until I started reading troll comments. With both left and right accusing the the other side of being NAZI's. There are chest pounding dissertations on this subject. Your explanation is the most logical I found so far. Excellent work, I enjoyed yesterdays video as well. This gives me a lot to think about and at the same time adding to my must read book list. Thank You

excellent. thank you for being brave and honest. Its hard in today's polarised society and media BS for the truth to out. your depth of knowledge on your subject is obvious.

Quick question for you. Do you think some of the confusion regarding “socialism” is a result of the modern misuse and overuse of the word within our present day politics?

if it made click in your head by reading Hirler, then it will literally explode after reading some Marx, Lenin, or even Stalin

I agree with other comments here. These weren't the main criticisms of your last video. Would love if you had actually included some of the most high voted comments and gone through their arguments whilst arguing against them yourself.

People think of socialism only in terms of welfare programs these days. Back then, pure welfare programs weren't even a concept. Everyone was expected to work for their keep, even in socialist countries. Their idea was merely to remove the elements that were hindering people from having any kind of upward mobility. Using the state to accomplish this task is very socialist and to that extent almost every modern country is socialist today. But that's not what people mean when they're arguing for socialism anymore. Now they know that nobody is actually stopping them from having upward mobility so they create fantasies about rich people gaming the system so that they can feel better about doing nothing to help themselves.

I'm so happy to have found this channel... :)

"state intervention makes you socialist.” By that definition, literally anything short of anarchism is socialism...

You're in trouble already with your "Conservatism vs. Liberalism" since you'll find a number of different definitions on Liberalism. How about Free Market ( Adam Smith) vs. Central Planned Economy (Marx) for economic principles and Conservative (keep established institutions) vs. Progressivism (replace the old with untried).National Socialism is socialism while Communism is about uniting the workers of the world to achieve "from each according to his ability to each according to his need" utopian society without out ownership, money or profits.

Have been watching your channel a lot recently, found this and the preceding video fascinating. I am to the Left politically and the thought that Hitler was a Socialist doesn't sit well with me but having now done some reading around the topic he clearly was, I can't deny the evidence. Thank you for making me think, I also think your Battleplan series is superb X

If Hitler calls himself a socialist why would you just take his word for it when his pro-corporate policies clearly say something different?

Your descriptions of conservativism vs liberalism, especially how they were understood in the 19th century, isn't really correct. Historically conservativism referred to efforts to preserve the old social and political order. Generally conservatives would have been monarchist and supporters of the old aristocracies. If you wanted the Bourbons on the throne of France, you were a conservative. Liberals on the other hand supported things like constitutions and the dissolution of power (through things like voting). Many liberals were republicans (in the sense that they supported a republican form of government) but not some simply wanted a more liberal form of the monarchies that they already lived under. A large part of the 19th century centred around the conflict between the old aristocracies (conservatives) and liberal reformers. Differences between economic policy didn't really come into play but when it did, the conservatives generally supported protectionist and mercantilist policies designed to protect entrenched interests (rich nobels) while liberals supported more (what we would today call) free-trade or sometimes even lassez-faire approaches. Mixed up in these 19th century struggles was nationalism, which was also opposed to the old aristocratic conservatism, but for different reasons. The old aristocracy was definitely an international political order. Originally nationalism was strongly entwined with liberalism: The were close to the same thing during the French revolution and they were tied together during the revolutions of 1948 as well. When Bismark took power, he managed to separate nationalism from liberalism and create a new conservative-national state in the form of the new German state. Socialism also came about in the 19th century only becoming a major force decades after both liberalism and nationalism had made major inroads. Socialism originally was a broad term and referred to just about any movement that wanted to change the social order in a way that would benefit poorer people who remained excluded even in the newly liberal societies. Early socialists didn't necessarily want to abolish private property but they did want to establish systems that would benefit the poor and many theorized about entirely new ways of organizing society that would get rid of poverty altogether and abolish all economic distinctions. One of the first socialist programs were the work houses in Paris during the brief Second Republic.

Second point i want to make. Socialists don't divide society into three classes, that is the liberal view of class based off income. Socialists divide society into two classes based on their relationship to the means of production. Primarily those who own the means of production and those who actually work the means and produce what is needed for society.

This reminds me of a time when old Sargon said that he was a centrist and acted like a centrist.

Great video, it's not often that a person goes online and says I've seen things in a different light, but as we grow older and wiser sometimes things look different, one of the great things about growing old is you get to look back and see how you have grown over the years. If you are willing to accept things in a different light, you will see not everything is so cut and dried. As someone who teaches history, you must have noticed this before, and you will probably notice it more often if your willing to keep an open mind. You have to have an open mind and be willing to learn or see other opinions. The subject you have decided to teach, explore, learn about is one that most people would just accept as unchanging historical fact no matter what new evidence comes up, but you have to know some things are subjective, two people see the same thing yet describe it differently. So I'm sure authors tell a different account of events, but they may be making honest mistakes based on their skill, training, and the current facts at hand, but we all know some facts change like the butterfly effect, change one small thing in the past, and the story changes. Still kinda gotta suck that you thought one way and you realize it could be another. Thanks for the video, please keep them coming.

TRADITIONAL MARXIST THEORY: 2 classes workers and burgoise. Read Marx when you want to talk about marxist theory.

"Socialism is when the government does things, the more things the government does the socialister it is".

Prior to a much better alliterated reason for interest in this fascinating channel, I must acknowledge my appreciation for the thoughtful comments being narrated throughout not only political subjects, but both popular and obscure military history. I have spent decades familiarizing myself with many aspects of World War II, and look forward to further enjoyment of the unique observations and rare details being shared here. Keep up the good work sir.

Thank you for broadening my view on National Socialism. George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia has some interresting points on the various socialist type parties in the Spanish civil war.

Stumbled across this late, can't say I agree with everything you say but it's always good to spread your opinion and argue your points so this was certainly very informative and influential. The beauty of history is that you can argue for and against certain things so long as you have relevant evidence to back it up so good job on actually having a well read opinion rather than most people that just look at the name 'National Socialism' and think that's all the evidence in the world. Great video mate!

"This channel isn't going to always tell you you're right." Certainly makes you feel good when people do that to you, doesn't it? It makes you feel more correct than ever to have a horde of people praising you for your brave stance, huh? Has it ever occurred to you, though, that the reason you have this channel is because you want to bring knowledge to people and, therefore, when a huge number of them blindly agree with you, then it might be a little suspect to trust that feedback in the face of overwhelming criticism? You are always going to get a large cut of people who will praise you and take your side of every fight whether you're right or wrong, not because they know more than you and agree, but because these are people who've come to trust you and refuse to believe you might be telling them wrong information. *That sort of audience is great for emotional comfort, but is utterly worthless as a means of judging if you're correct or not.* If literally hundreds of people are calling you wrong, maybe instead of taking solace in whoever you can find who will agree with you, go back and do more research to make sure you're actually correct. Don't just trust that whatever you've read so far must be correct, and ffs, at bare minimum, do more research specifically on your sources and don't just trust somebody because what they say sounds good.

"There was one thing in common in the ideology of Germany, Italy, and the Soviet Union: opposition to the capitalist democracies. Neither we nor Italy had anything in common with the capitalism of the West. Therefore it would appear to us quite paradoxical if the Soviet Union, as a Socialist state, were to side with the Western democracies" (Secret German memorandum to Soviet leaders, July 27, 1939).

Hey, solid vid. I would still argue that germany sits smack in the awkward zone between being easily classable as capitalist or socialist. But there is deffinetly good food for thought here. Most of all though, I often find these arguments of definitions to be somewhat counter-productive as they always trigger people to assume you mean the worst of whatever thing they aren't intimately familiar with when you call x as being y. Usually in person I try to work around that by just describing state policies and avoiding groupings like that. Still, cheers !

SO you basically didn't interact with the criticisms you received and just doubled down... why? You see hundreds of people saying you don't understand what socialism is, and your response was to just say; "I'm right and you're wrong." Did you even try to research what they were saying? You're saying that this channel isn't here to reinforce the conclusions of its viewers and you're acting like everyone disagreeing with what you've said are only rejecting what you've said because it hurts their feelings. You were told you were wrong, and your response was to say "no u" and to hide within the comments of people supporting what you've said. You are doing the exact same thing as those people who you accused of unsubscribing because their preconceptions were challenged. To the best of my understanding of what your concept of Socialism is; ancient Rome is socialist, as is ancient China, and every monarchy and every republic. I've gotta ask, do you think taxation is socialism? I mean, it is state intervention in the economy. My point being is that the way you define socialism has no purpose, you've widened the term so much it has no meaning. You're getting to Dinesh D'Souza levels of revisionism and flippancy. Conflating the idea of race war with class war, conflating interventionism with socialism, conflating slavery with worker ownership of the means of production. I honestly can't tell if you're purposely trying to muddy the waters or if you're just missing some important parts of political theory. You should look up the term social democracy. It's an example of how your definitions and understanding are flawed. The framework for your message is based on a very limited view of the world and political theory, the world is not comprised of only three economic theories. As you said, everything is a spectrum, but it it far larger than you know. IDK if I can really trust what you say from now on. I mean your basic understanding of politics seems to be extremely off, for instance when you were trying to set the stage and explain the situation of politics in europe, you claimed that the liberals wanted greater intervention and the conservatives wanted no intervention. This is backwards, the liberal parties of Europe where founded on laissez faire ideals and the conservative parties were built on support of the status quo and state interest. You're close in some areas, socialism is a spectrum of different ideologies and inbetweens. But the core is equality of power amongst the classes and proletarian control of the means of production. National socialism's core ideology is built around race and nation. These two ideologies are vastly different in their philosophy and theory to their practices. For example, Nazism is openly spiritualistic and draws from neo-germanic paganism, this is why Nazis talk about will and spirit a lot. Socialism and Communism are based on materialistic analysis of the world. All in all, you should probably research this topic way more than you have before you continue.

Why did you unpin the nazi?

Thank you sir for helping me understand and be able to disprove people that will actually listen to what I have to say about national Socialism.

Well, I enjoy your thought-provoking videos. Keep up the good work!

aaaaannnd some People still downvote bomb- likely without watching. childish. Really cool of you to make this. Things like this show why you're worth listening to- even if (like literally everyone) you're occasionally off on your points. Awesome stuff as always.

As far as I know, there are multiple statements especially made by Goebbels, that not only prove that he was a socialist, but also prove that he sympathized with the Sovjet Union at first.

Really loving your channel TIK! Your videos are just fantastic. Keep up the great work. ~ What strange creatures humans are ~ Respect! From Cornwall

Nice to see someone actually thinking for themselves - Humans have a tendency to oversimplify because it makes managing ones expectations easier, reality is untidy and complex. Personally I think Mussolini has slightly more relevance today, the currently popular 'corporate socialism' really is just a re-run of what he believed Nice vids - having watched a few I have subscribed

I was one the critical commenters in the other video, and this one left me unimpressed. You are basically not arguing that nazism is socialism... you are just arbritarily redifining what socialism means so that the word also englobes "nazism", based in superficial rethorical similarities. I suggest you to read what the actual academic consensus, by political scientist and economic historians, is in the issue. I am going to sound snobbish, maybe even offensive, but you are a military historian, you are not specialized in XX century political philosophy. Saying that nazism is a branch of marxism is (and im sorry for using this word) just ignorant, and shows that you havent do your research.

Social democracy isn't socialism either.

Really interesting points. I'd like to learn more. I frankly never really had a good internal definition of fascism. With the way it's being constantly thrown around these days, its probably worth while really understanding what the hell it is.

I really enjoy your blogs. You take complicated subjects, and make them easier to understand, and palatable to listen too. So many people here have “BORDERLINE PERSONALITY DISORDER”. All, or nothing. There can be no absolute doctrine. It’s impossible, once you go from paper, to implementation.

Why is it that so many people that disagree with this video or the previous one have either the word bolshevik, Marxist or Leninist in their username? Hmmm... Maybe Nazism doesn't fit cleanly into a definition of socialism but it absolutely had many socialist attributes. This is a very thought-provoking video and I think that's what the majority of us want. If you get angry about an argument that you disagree with or that doesn't fit into your worldview, that's your problem. Maybe you need to open your mind.

Great food for thought, my friend. Keep up the good work! ;^)-

Thanks for your work here and willingness to approaches this contentious subject with an open mind and honesty. I found your video when searching for material that was prepared to challenge the current orthodox view. Have believed for some time that the traditional take simply didn't add up, lacked coherency and consistency. Having read the NSDAP 25 point plan and extracts from Mein Kamp was the catalyst to challenging my own adoption of the traditional take. So found your openness refreshing and courageous. Couple of questions for you. Your take on the 19th two world view, conservatism v liberalism although a fair overarching observation I would throw in some of the social reformers, Shaftesbury, Fry, Wilberforce, Garrison, Tubman Nightingale etc. These folks arguably had a huge impact in bringing social reforms and changes. I think that many of these people were inspired not out political ideologies but by their inner faith. This would certainly add another dimension or facet to some of the changes and longer term implications brought about in the 19th century. Also in my travels I ran across an idea that posited that the NSDAP social and racial solutions were impart influenced and inspired by the eugenics movement and activities of the US. Namely the Democrats. It's another contentious area but when you drill down there does appear to be some validity to the proposition. Was wondering if you had any thoughts or research to add. Again thanks for your thought provoking work will look at your other videos. Thanks in anticipation of a response.

Awesome video once again! I'm always learning something new from this channel!

I am a new subscriber to the "TIK Universe." I am an amateur armchair Historian, and I want to offer my sincere appreciation for TIK exposing himself to abuse by being as honest as he possibly can. TIK would you present a followup video to this one and illustrate the differences by offering examples with illustrations? That would help us on our journey to understanding the politics illustrated in this video. Thank you.

TIK, I do not know nor care enough to express an opinion here and I feel some of the arguments here are partisan in nature or ideological (some, not all!). Will you make a further response or will you go back to the battles and logistics? I do not mind either way, you do as you please, though I will be honest I prefer the other stuff. Do try and see the problems of the r Shitwehraboossay sub reddit with your video. IDK if they are correct and they make the silly mistake to cast a centrist like Jordan Peterson as Alt Right (the alt right hates Jordan with a passion) but it is worth a gander. Cheers.

I've found utility in the view that there is no separate capitalism, socialism, or communism. It is all on the spectrum of the liberty to keep and use your earnings to participate in markets and enterprises to generate wealth for yourself. Infringement on who can exercise this liberty increases as you move from Laissez Faire capitalisms through regulation/licensing into interventionism to the various flavors to socialism to what we call communism, the total bureaucratic control with only "distinguished holders of important offices" able to generate wealth for themselves ( at least until they fall out of favor). Your explanation of the racial/Aryan focus of the National Socialist economy helps me see why Mises called it the Zwangswirtschaft as a "compulsory economy" would need those permitted to hold businesses to be socialized, otherwise direct control would be required. Thanks.

You've been doing interesting and thoughtful work. Thank you for your effort.

Could the fact that Hitler named the party "National Socialist"party perhaps lend a clue?

Subscribed. I like the way of your thinking, your seem very honest and enjoy what you're doing, keep going. Greetings from Ukraine.

Keep up the good work.....these topics are not taught like they should be. This gives rise to myths and false facts. Thank you for your work.

Excellent video and lecture. Love your videos. I am an Amateur military and modern European history geek. Happy to find someone sharing my interest. Thank you.

Well, at least you've achieved left unity - everyone from Marxist-Leninists to demsocs to anarchists to social democrats disagree with you on this one. Hell, you've probably even got the Trots to get on board, and do you have any idea how hard that is?

Yh been a long time fan but I'll be honest not only was the first video disappointing the rebuttals missed out a lot of the points people were making against your arguments.

2:47 - primary schools and schooling in general (as understand in modern terms) was a conservative imperialist idea of Germany that derrived itself from mercentalism. It was Bismarck who created them as "factories of workers learned to obey and construct"

The education system has trained people not to think. A perfect example for all to test for themselves is Newtons law of physics. When dropped together an apple 🍎 and brick do not fall and land at the same time. I would love to see a video that confirms Newtons law.

Sorry, but you have just shown me how little you know on 19th century political developments. Otherwise love your presentations on military history. Please do some reading around what Hitler actually defined as National Socialism. He said that it was completely the antithesis of marxist socialism. In marxist economies, you nationalise the means of production supposedly for the benefit of the people. In the National Socialst economy, you nationalise the people for the benefit of the large companies and the nation. Germany was a capitalist economy through and through during WWII, before and after. Every nationalisation of industries under the NS regime was immediately sold off to other German companies, or at least promised to German companies. You can look at the NS regime as 'capitalism on steriods'. Recommended reading: Adam Tooze 'The Wages of Destruction', James Pool, 'Hitler and his Secret Partners' to name two.

"Start at the bottom and rise to the top" is not a Socialist concept because there is no Top and Bottom. It's a Capitalist concept.

Interesting video. Ive often thought the western powers opposition to nazi Germany was heavily influenced by Hitlers determination for German self reliance, which would clearly have had a huge impact on global capitalism. How much do you think this may have been a factor in the causes of ww2?

I think this video ignores the evolution of the Nazi party between the late 20's and late 30's. In the 20's it was very much a "workers" party. They were not friendly with German industry or finance, seeing them as corrupted by Jewish influence. But as the party gained political power the relationship with German businessmen and industrialists grew. By the time the Nazi's actually get real power, their economic policies are largely centered on re-privatizing certain government owned industries, and also handing out large military/infrastructure contracts to the private sector to restart the economy and lower unemployment. Obviously the Nazi's had their own brand of social policies which they enacted, but in terms of economic policies they were less socialist than the SPD government which they replaced.

If we arent in an age of extreme now, im afraid how much worse it still can get.

Other than the Great War I would add the 1870 Franco-Prussian War and the PARIS COMMUNE of 1871 as central events when talking abotu liberalism/socialism/conservatism. The French Commune was the first big "red scare" in Europe and many countries (Like Bismarks' Prussia) started some social reforms toa void a similar event.

This is exactly the arguement I have had with people for years. So many of today's era candyland Marxists have no idea that Hitler's overarching vision is not only a socialist society but that Hitler's vision and Stalin's vision ended up being almost identical. Gulags are concentration camps anyone who has read Gulag Archipelago can see the similarities there. Difference is that Hitler used the Jews and undesirables as a workforce and a resource for scientific experiments for a long time and documented it all. People forget that Stalin himself was an anti-semite and is the person who is attributed with creating the doctor's plot to foster antisemitic beliefs in the Russian populace. So how many Jews did Stalin put in camps over his reign? It makes one wonder if Stalin did have similar experimentation programs that we are unfamiliar with due to the protection of isolation the Berlin wall offered for decades post war. That makes me think that Hitler and Stalin's "Utopian" visions are not only similar but ultimately identical. Both had governments with layers of bureaucracy, had the party be the replacement of religion essentially, ran things with absolute control of all priperty and the means of production, and had internment camps for undesirables and political opposition. But since the leftists in America in particular all are now something akin to MK Ultra zombies who blindly think socialism is some great solution to things they are blind to the reality of Stalin's horrendous crimes and his admittedly wildly varying body count that often is listed as higher numbers than the holocaust has. I'd guess that any legitimate documentation of all the atrocities of the Stalin era have been carefully curated to avoid anyone drawing the Stalin/Hitler parallel too readily but once one reads a bit and thinks logically its extremely clear that the core ideology that dictated both Nazi society and the USSR are one in the same. But telling people that who support socialism or call themselves Marxists are too vested in the lies they have bought into by identity politics to do anything wallow in denial and cognitive dissonance until they declare you a fascist racist nazi lover requiring them to "bash the fasc" just like a good little programmed fascist would do. Oh the ironies idiots present are comical and tragic simultaneously...

Oh for the love of God. TIK, I love you but you are wrong here. Again, your definition of socialism is *wrong*. Socialism is defined as "the transitionary stage between capitalism and communism, characterised by the workers ownership of the means of production" your thinking of social democracy, which also allows state intervention in the economy, and social welfare programs within the framework of capitalism. Honestly I don't think you've ever taken a politics class in your life, and it shows. Your first video on this wouldnt even get a c at A-level, simply because you failed to define anything you were talking about at the start. Especially socialism and capitalism. It's clear that millitary history is your best field. Stick to it, by all means. You have unbelievable clout behind you, people will take your word as gospel, you have a responsibility to be better than this. What you have done here is redefine both socialism and it's aims. 'socialising the people' is not a substitute for the means of production. Which remained in capitalist hands and ended up perpetuating top down worker-boss relations. Now I'm not a commie or a socialist myself, so for God's sake man. Listen to yourself and ask. Is this really the case? In socialism, capitalism and socialism cannot exist side by side. In the soviet unions case the NeP technically made it state capitalist. But the workers did have ownership of the MoP through 'democratic centralism' in the soviet state. At least in theory. There is a big difference between lazzei faire capitalism, state capitalism, social democracy, socialism, communism and anarchism (which you seemed to not understand the placement of in your last video, putting your political knowledge into even hotter water). Come on man, just listen to yourself, do some more reading and actually read the main arguments against you, and remember. Socialism isn't "free markets+state intervention+private property" and there is an important distinction between personal and private property. One being the MoP and the other being your Toothbrush. Oh and on another note. If you want to facilitate debate In the comments section, or at least have it be a fair place to debate. Please don't 'heart' only comments that agree with you, you had to really dig on the last video to get to some really long, good, thought out essays. You know, the good comments.

Dear TIK I am afraid that this is just rubbish. There is so much here to deal with. First, the nature of 19th century ideological struggle was not between free trade conservatives and socialistic liberals is wrong, wrong, wrong. Conservative theory in the 19th century was not opposed to state intervention and was most definitely opposed to free trade, it was liberal thought that promoted free markets and a minimal state. In the latter 19th century, new liberalism supported aspects of social reform - as did the more socially aware aspects of Disraeli directed conservatism. You miss out the fact that socialist/ Social Democrats develop in the 19th century not after WW1. You also omit one of the most important ideologies of the the 19th century, and this century, that of nationalism, which is key to understanding fascism. You need to grasp this, as the first social security legislation was undertaken by Bismark a conservative nationalist. The thesis you promote originates in the cold war as a way at discrediting socialism, it was then taken up to get the right off the hook for their collaboration with fascism and to rehabilitate very unpleasant political groups. You should look at some more systematic material such as Carl Levy, Fascism, National Socialism and Conservatives in Europe 1914-1945. Contemporary European History Vol 8, 1, 1999. There is a vast literature out there dealing with the subject particularly the corporatism of the NAZI state and the link between industrial interests and fascism.

Good on you TIK for taking on a divisive topic, and moreover making a reply video. I know the internet is not a place known for its constructive arguments and civil discourse/ responses to disagreement (to be fair some academics can be just as bad lol). Keep it up tho! I did my Masters in political science with majors in history and political philosophy and in my experience, I have found using the sides of the French National Assembly people sat on is a poor conceptual framework for understanding the complex relationships between different political ideologies. Additionally, as TIK has said words and categories mean different things to different people at different times. Hitler saw himself as a socialist, and a nationalist. He wanted prosperity for all people within the German nation achieved through collective action and control. That is what the words meant to him. If we still want to take a non-relativistic approach to categorise ideologies would say the following: When we are dealing with words that have a long complex history, such as 'socialism' it is more useful to think of it as using fuzzy concepts such as Lichtenstein's family resemblance. By looking at words by a series of overlapping similarities rather than a single essential element we can escape the issue typified in the comments section here. The best example of this, however, is the problem of defining what is and what is not a game, trying to find the essential essence of 'game' is a nightmare. For me personally, if I have to I would classify myself as a democratic, socialist, liberal. Democratic because I believe the power structure of the state should be organised so it rests o the will of the people. Socialist, because I believe the power of the state should be used to reallocate wealth and resources ( in a mixed system, regulated market), and Liberal because I believe we should try and minimise the role of the state and social cohesion in controlling peoples identifies and beliefs. Now I do not go as far as Hitler or Lenin in how much I think the state should reallocate resources, there is a shit load of room in that, it's very fuzzy and only one element by which all 3 of us would define our use of the word 'socialism' but there is a 'family resemblance'. The resemblance is especially apparent when you take the frame of reference of contrasting the three socialisms to libertarianism. Libertarianism is hyper-individualist rather than collective, the state has no right to reallocate resources on moral grounds. -sorry if the spelling is not the best, its late after work and I am dyslexic.

Haaa!!! Ive jumped ship on most historically based channels because of this channel! Thanks @TIK

"Communists said that we need to overthrow bourgeoisie, Nazis said that we have to get rid of specific nationality, therefore they are both socialists." Do you actually believe that class and nationality is the same thing?

Not that you're necessarily wrong, TIK, but using a random internet self-proclaimed Nazi as a source is pretty sketchy.

As far as I know, liberalism has rather been the ideological current that most traditionally defended the idea of the free market and small government, in the context that we are all equal before the law and we all have individual rights and freedoms, including that of accumulating and invest capital without government intervention. Those were the ideas of John Locke, Adam Smith, Herbert Spencer, Frédéric Bastiat and if we move forward in time, in the framework of neoliberalism we have others like Hayek and Friedman. I believe that in the US the term liberalism has been distorted and what is now understood by it is something more similar to social democracy.

Can you come up with a likely scenario that Germany could have possibly defeated the Soviet Union? Or was it doomed from the start?

It is merely another branch from the tree of socialist thought. It was never much of a question to me once you look at the legislation in place. The ethos was predicated upon the idea of socialist temperance within society. A great video as always TIK.

Finally!! Someone who makes sense! While reading Mein Kamph I couldn't shake the....this guy is a socialist who is trying to explain away his socialism throughout the whole damn book. Bravo Sir...I'm with you 100%

I agree with you I think the problem is the use of the word socialism I use it as synonyms with collectivism which includes everything from anarchism communism conservatism fascism democracy international socialism, national socialism and even classical liberals anyone whom believes that their must be a central authority for the good of society I’d classify these as the left However the people whom are claiming it’s not socialism are doing so cause to them there is only one type of socialism the international type The only ones on the right that is to say individualist is to say liberal in the true sense are libertarians but that’s my opinion

I'm not sure if there is a point in replying to the 2 yr old video seeing that in recommendations there are 2 more long videos on the topic, so you've probably seen all the arguments. But I'm gonna put in my 2 cents regardless. Actually, according to the varying definitions of "class" struggle, NS were socialist while USSR was no at least not after 1928 and first five year plan where it completely transitioned to the state run economy, which is labeled statist/etatist or state-capitalist (although, I think this naming is a bit inaccurate as there were few if any capitalist elements to it). After all, NS did transfer all of the economy to the Aryan people, while USSR until it's end in 90's never finished transition to publicly owned/worker controlled economy (it got stuck in middle-man's/state's hands). Also, one of the oversimplifications that I've noticed you used is equating state owned with publicly owned, which is not the same, at least not in context of socialist run economies, but in practice there were very few examples where the difference was present (see socialist Yugoslavia). And lastly, Communism refers to political system rather than economic system, where all power was to be trickled down from centralised state to local councils, which in practice never happened as conditions were never achieved. This point kind of triggered me to leave a comment as you've put Communism on economic theory spectrum. And lastly, putting economic policies on the left-right spectrum is erroneous in my opinion as it's not as linear division as social or political rights where the separation on left and right comes from. Economics itself is a bit more 3-dimensional. After all, where on the spectrum would feudalism fit? Generally, your assessment was not wrong at least not in case of NS, it's more that you've either misinterpreted some of the elements or just oversimplified them, which to be fair are more part of in-depth political theory rather than history. It was a brave hot take I got to admit and I do understand you've gotten some of the hate, especially with the current state of the affairs where people get triggered by almost anything. I'm willing to elaborate in further detail, but like I said in the first sentence, it's possible you've already seen it all by this time.