La réécriture de la Deuxième Guerre mondiale, — style GW

La politique américaine est aujourd’hui si complètement fondée sur une appréciation virtualiste de la réalité, que cette réalité soit actuelle autant qu’historique, qu’on en vient à constater que même des analyses fortement marquées par un engagement idéologique donnent une critique qui apparaît comme un modèle d’objectivité et une leçon d’histoire. On fait cette remarque en se référant au texte d’analyse du site trotskiste WSWS.org de ce jour, sur la dénonciation du traité de Yalta par GW Bush (son discours du 8 mai). Cette dénonciation, — parce qu’elle est faite par le gouvernement américain et non d’un historien indépendant comme on l’a déjà vu faire, — représente un acte extrêmement grave.

Se référant à la déclaration de GW Bush («  The agreement at Yalta followed in the unjust tradition of Munich and the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Once again, when powerful governments negotiated, the freedom of small nations was somehow expendable. [...] The captivity of millions in Central and Eastern Europe will be remembered as one of the greatest wrongs of history »), David North, l’auteur de l’analyse du site WSWS.org, remarque: « As it was the US president who made this statement, it represents an unprecedented repudiation and denunciation by the government of the United States of a foreign policy decision made by a previous administration. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt now stands publicly condemned by President Bush as a criminal — for how else can one describe an individual who authored one of history’s “greatest wrongs”? One might ask, to what other “historical wrongs” might the president have been comparing the Yalta agreements? The Holocaust? »

Par ailleurs, l’analyse critique que fait North du discours du président GW Bush rétablit sans aucun doute des réalités historiques incontestables sur la situation militaire et politique en Europe en 1945. Il s’agit bien d’une vision objective, contre une démarche extrêmement partisane et déformant la réalité historique, qui caractérise le discours de GW Bush. Encore une fois, c’est bien le fait que cette analyse vienne de l’autorité suprême du gouvernement américain qui est le plus choquant et donne à cette affaire un caractère réel de gravité.

« But despite these denunciations of Yalta, there existed a consensus within the most influential sections of the American ruling class that Roosevelt had played his cards at Yalta as well as could be expected given the circumstances that he confronted. His acceptance of a dominant Soviet role in Poland and much of Eastern Europe was little more than an acknowledgment of military and political realities. The Soviet army was the most powerful force on the European continent. The destruction of the Nazi war machine had been achieved principally by the Soviet army. The bulk of German forces had been deployed on the eastern front. Without the victories won by the Soviet forces in 1943 and 1944, an Anglo-American invasion of France would have been unthinkable.

» In the course of liberating Eastern Europe from German occupation, the Soviet Union had suffered staggering human and material losses. Roosevelt recognized that the Soviet Union, having been nearly destroyed by Nazi Germany, was not going to withdraw its troops from Eastern Europe and accept passively the reinstallation of hostile governments that might become part of a new invading coalition. As historian Eric Alterman has recently noted, the USSR was no more prepared to accept installation of a pro-American government in Poland than the United States was prepared to accept the establishment of a pro-Soviet government in Mexico (When Presidents Lie, New York: 2004, pp. 37-38).

» The only political conclusion that can be drawn from Bush’s Latvian statement is that he believes the United States should have taken military action to achieve the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Eastern Europe. For this to have been done in 1945 would have required Washington to conclude a separate peace with Nazi Germany and redeploy what remained of the latter’s military forces in a joint German-American campaign against the USSR.

» This was a political scenario which key Nazi leaders, such as SS-leader Heinrich Himmler, and even elements within the American military command, such as General George Patton, hoped to realize. However, this course was never considered a viable option within the most influential sections of the American political establishment. Aside from being militarily impossible, a separate peace with the Nazis and an attack on the Soviet Union would have provoked mutiny within the American army—whose GIs viewed the Soviet troops as comrades-in-arms—and massive political protests among the American people at home. »

Mis en ligne le 12 mai 2005 à 17H15