SuperKrone: I agree. There are always a number of different reasons/pretexts for any military aggression, or at least different opinions of what the real reason is. Governments always give a patently false official explanation, for the consumption of the masses, and that encourages better-informed people to speculate as to what the real motive is. George H W Bush said emphatically on prime time TV that his invasion of Iraq was "not about oil," but on a Sunday morning talking-head show after he left office he said, "If I had waited for the Congress to act, Saddam woulda been in Riyadh and oil would be 30 dollars a barrel." Of course that was false too, both about the danger to Saudi Arabia and the idea that the reason our government is killing people in oil-rich countries is so we can have cheaper gas for our Hummers. Our government is owned by people who sell oil, and who welcome higher prices. But it was a different story, aimed at a more sophisticated audience.

Michael: The validity and date of your quote does have bearing on Buchanan's idea that the carnage was avoidable. If Hitler said that before Germany was invaded, and if the German public knew he had said it and they accepted him as their leader anyway, that would discredit the idea, as you were trying to do in presenting the quote. But if the Final Solution was devised by the leadership under conditions of war, that supports him.