Sunday, May 04, 2008

Did the Allies really ban the word 'Nazi' during WWII?


Did you know that -- during World War II -- the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) banned the use of the words Nazi, Reich and Führer when describing the enemy?

I'm guessing you never heard of such a thing. Because it never happened.

In today's politically correct environment, however, identifying the enemies of civilization is verboten.

Recent government policy memoranda, circulating through the national counter-terrorism and diplomatic community, establishes a new "speech code" for the lexicon in the war on terror, as reported by the Associated Press and now >available in the public domain .

These new "speech codes" recommended that analysts and policy makers avoid the terms jihad or jihadist or mujhadid or "al-Qaida movement" and replace them with "extremists" and by extension other non-specific terms. 

The use of these "new words" and rejection of the "old words" is ostensibly designed to avoid [legitimizing] al-Qaida and its followers while mollifying the sensitivities of the larger Muslim community.

Meanwhile, the Taliban is marketing its use of young people as martyrs to advance the cause of jihad (there -- I used the word).

In this Taliban video, a 14-year old learns how to detonate a truck-bomb.

The bomb explodes and reportedly kills Americans in the process.

And off he goes: the martyr is on his way to the afterlife and scores of virgins (or raisins, depending upon which interpretation you prefer).

But -- fortunately -- the government won't have to use discriminatory language in describing their foe in the global war on terror.

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