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A Quiet Adult: My Candidate for Man of the Century
A Quiet Adult: My Candidate for Man of the Century
by David Brin
It seems our favorite preoccupation this year -- even more riveting than worry about the Y2K bug -- is an obsession with making lists. The 100 best movies of all time. Top musicians of the millennium. And so on, as if we'll somehow better grasp the coming era by tidily summing up the past.
Time Magazine is one beneficiary of this mania, as crowds throng to its web site eagerly voting for who will be named "Person of the Century". Of course the matter won't be decided democratically. Time's editors will select whose face fills the first Year 2000 cover. (And pedants will insist that Time can do it all over again in January 2001, when the next century officially begins.)
Naturally, I have an opinion. But I'm not hopeful that Time's editors will pick my candidate, a man whose name many readers may not recognize, even though they owe him a great deal.
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The poll figures at the Time Magazine web site show, if nothing else, the power of organized write-in campaigns. Heading the list are Yitzhak Rabin, Elvis Presley, and Billy Graham. In slots number six through eight we have Pope John Paul II, Martin Luther King and Gordon B. Hinckley, Chairman of the Mormon Church. People also tend to pick "favorite" figures, hence the prominent appearance in the top 20 of John Lennon, Madonna and Princess Diana.
A large number of rather dour folks seem to have concluded (reluctantly, I hope) that Adolf Hitler was the most significant figure of this century, because he caused the biggest ruckus and slaughtered lots of people. This faction is large enough to win him the number four slot.
Only a handful of the top twenty made a decisively positive difference to world history, instigating profound and universally recognized changes for the better. People like Dr. King, Winston Churchill, Nelson Mandela and Henry Ford certainly deserve mention. But in my opinion, none of the flamboyant top candidates altered the course of human civilization as much as one quiet man who was never an entertainer, religious figure, or chief of state.
His name was George Marshall. Let me explain.
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At the beginning of the Twentieth Century, there were fond hopes for a new era of reason. Some of the world's great intellects spoke of a coming time when nations would abandon the strict command hierarchies of the past, such as monarchy or inherited wealth, in favor of more open systems based on merit. A time when colonialism would give way to equality among peoples and superstition would step aside for of free enquiry. While few contemporary politicians shared these aspirations, there were some exceptions. Theodore Roosevelt and later Woodrow Wilson proclaimed their belief in such a vision, calling for a mature, planet-wide civilization based on pragmatism, mutual respect, local self-determination, universal education, democracy, and international cooperation for peace.
As we all know, events did not go as they wished. After the horrific agonies of World War One, the progressive worldview was rejected both in America and abroad, partly due to narrow minded self-interest, but also because humanity was otherwise preoccupied. Like careening drunks, we commenced a long and horrible infatuation with ideologies -- from communism and fascism to nationalist jingoism and every other "ism" imaginable.
Hitler and Stalin were no more than particularly gruesome manifestations of this fever -- a passion for simplistic visions of utopia, shared with almost hysterical ardor by millions who invested their favorite manifestos with the kind of devotion formerly given to kings and religions. These hypnotic formulas were nearly always based on reducing human beings to formulas or paper caricatures, denying our true complexity.
Today, at the end of this tense century, we might look back on it as a pit that Homo sapiens fell into, then somehow managed to climb out of again, chastened and perhaps even a bit wiser. Though ideology still sings its polyphonic siren call to millions, the trend in human affairs seems now to be gradual movement toward tolerance and pragmatism... along with a healthy dose of suspicion toward all authority. Despite a myriad problems, ours is a better, more hopeful world than it was in 1942, when humanity wallowed in violence, justified by frantic polemics.
How did this change come about?
First and above all, the worst ideologues had to be defeated. For this task, Franklin Delano Roosevelt -- who guided the United States from isolation into the crucial alliance against fascism -- relied utterly upon his most trusted military advisor, George Marshall.
Earlier, Marshall had been responsible for training a generation of American officers in completely new doctrines and tactics that modernized our armed forces, preparing them to face the coming struggle with unprecedented agility. Then, as Chief of Staff, Marshall streamlined the chain of command and personally selected the younger leaders who won great victories.
When offered command over the D-Day invasion of Europe, and the glory that would come with it, Marshall passed that honor to Dwight Eisenhower because FDR confided -- "I don't sleep well when you are away." His value as a wartime diplomat, nurturing a fragile alliance among prickly allies, was immeasurable. In gratitude, Winston Churchill called him 'the noblest Roman.'
Marshall's most difficult work commenced after victory was achieved. Dragged out of retirement in order to serve as U.S. Secretary of State, he worked with fellow titans -- Harry Truman and Dean Acheson -- to counter relentless crises from Finland to Greece and helped midwife the birth of Israel.
Of course he was the guiding force behind the "Marshall Plan", which turned the great wealth of the United States into a river for the war-ravaged peoples of Europe and Asia. In fact, if the Plan had been his sole accomplishment, it would be enough to merit placement on the short list for Man of the Century. That one act of resolve -- achieved over fierce political opposition -- reversed the bellicose tradition of 4,000 years by treating vanquished foes with generosity instead of vindictiveness. Among those who have been honored with the Nobel Peace Prize, few names were ever so universally acclaimed.
While Marshall's name may be unfamiliar today, the respect that mid-century contemporaries held for him was almost unprecedented. President Harry Truman once said of Marshall that "He was a man you could count on to be truthful in every way, and when you find somebody like that, you have to hang on to them."
David McCullough adds to this image, in his biography of Truman. "Like George Washington, with whom he was often compared, Marshall was a figure of such flawless rectitude and self-command (that) he both inspired awe and made description difficult."
Amid the tempests of an angry era, Marshall (again, in cooperation with others) helped ensure that the United Nations was built into something more capable than the old League of Nations and that the principles Woodrow Wilson pleaded for in 1919 would at last become the official standards of world conduct.
Yes, I'll concede the obvious. Adherence to those standards has been spotty, even by the nations who championed them. Nevertheless, we should find it profoundly historic that there is now a widely accepted world moral code, one that even the worst dictators pay lip service to. Today the words that Woodrow Wilson used so long ago cast long shadows across every negotiating table. They have weight whenever oppressed people rise up to denounce the tyrants that kept them down. Without a world conscience to appeal to, how would Ghandi and Mandella have prevailed? Marshall played an important role in putting ideals high on the international agenda.
Alas, ideals aren't enough. Good words often must team up with harsh practicality. Back in the late forties, ideological fevers still raged, both in Moscow and in a Washington D.C. that seemed awash with hysteria and panic. Surrounded by frantic calls for either isolationism or spasmodic war against the Soviets, George Marshall calmly helped forge the Atlantic Alliance. The strategy of containment that he and Acheson devised -- aiming to neither provoke the Communist Empire, nor allow it to run wild -- was the middle road that guided every U.S.administration for 50 years, notwithstanding episodes of naivete and saber-rattling.
In sharp contrast to the spasmodic impulsiveness that used to drive international affairs, Marshall's global plan was sober, far-seeing, patient, prescient, and it held until the Soviet fever finally broke.
Many mistakes -- and even calamities -- happened along the way. Much that is regrettable was done in the name of America and the West. But you have only to ask the people of Prague, Warsaw, and a hundred other places how they feel about the outcome.
Above all, we did not panic and fry this planet.
Wasn't that enough?
Then consider yet another great service, when the administration headed by Truman and Marshall ordered the United States military to end racial segregation and discrimination in its ranks, becoming the first great American institution to show the way. With the armed forces integrated -- passing millions of young men through a rigorous "school for equality" -- the writing was on the wall. There could be no going back. The rest of society must follow.
George Marshall would be the last to claim sole credit for any of these accomplishments. Invariably courteous and imperturbable under pressure -- ('the imperturbability of a good conscience,' George Kennan called it) -- he was, in David McCullough's words "without a trace of petty vanity or self-serving ambition."
Which is my chief point in nominating him. For it is ultimately demeaning to pick one charismatic individual, elevating him to stand, detached in godlike splendor, above all the other billions who lived and labored in this century, making our age unlike any other for its combination of savagery and progress. The great achievements of this era were realized by teams of bright, cooperative people, not megalomaniacs or magnetic orators. In the long run, leaders are only as effective as the citizens they persuade to follow them.
By appointing and encouraging skilled people, demanding the best from them, and then stepping aside when his pupils won acclaim, George Marshall showed us how to guide a modern, confident civilization, not a fervid rabble. This style explains his effectiveness... and the reason why so few of his countrymen now know his name.
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As the Twentieth Century wanes, the notion of arranging society according to some contrived dogma has at long last begun to seem tiresome. Many of us now see that all of the radical and zealous prescriptions were part of the same feverish disease, that only time and patience could cure. Even modern saints like Ghandi -- though properly admired for their principles and moral courage -- are seen to have been limited or foolish in their specific political agendas, from pastoral-socialism to libertarian solipsism. Humanity proved more complex than ideologues ever imagined.
Couldn't the "Man of the Century" somehow reflect this hardwon lesson? Naturally, it should be a person who dramatically affected the course of human events. But how about also picking someone who can serve as a role model?
Many of the most popular candidates displayed courage, brilliance, fortitude, compassion and relentless tenacity -- admirable traits of heroes. Indeed, George Marshall exhibited many of those same qualities.
But he also showed a few that are far more rare. Calmness, quiet competence, adaptability, a genius for detecting and promoting talent, an aversion toward flamboyance, plus a tireless willingness to hear the other guy's point of view.
These traits go beyond mere heroism. They are features of a genuine adult.
That word -- adult -- is one the editors of Time Magazine might do well to ponder when they pick a "Man of the Century." If we humans are going to make something of ourselves in the next hundred years, we should not start by picking our role models from among the last century's passionate prima donnas.
How about instead honoring the millions who are best exemplified by George Marshall. Those who spent their lives in quiet service, showing us how to behave as grownups.
-- David Brin
November 1999
http://www.kithrup.com/brin/
David Brin is a scientist and bestselling novelist. His 1989 thriller Earth foresaw both global warming and the World Wide Web. A movie with Kevin Costner was loosely based on The Postman. Startide Rising is in pre-production at Paramount Pictures. His latest novel, Foundation's Triumph, brings to a grand finale Isaac Asimov's famed Foundation Universe.
Brin's non-fiction book -- The Transparent Society: Will Technology Make Us Choose Between Freedom and Privacy? -- deals with threats to openness and liberty in the new wired-age. http://www.kithrup.com/brin/
Don't they teach history in American schools anymore?
Recently, the TV show Biography named 100 people of the millennium. Bill Gates is ranked 41 if I recall it correctly. Galileo is no. 10, Einstein is 7, Charles Darwin is 4, Isaac Newton is 2, ... and the number one person of the century is : (computer drum roll)
Gutenberg, the inventor of the printing press.
An excellent choice. Gutenberg is the man who, through the spread of books and the power of knowledge, enable people of the century to learn from others, build, add and spread their achievements.
What about Mr. Gates. He has an empire bigger than most countries and has taken a software companies networth more than %11 of all COUNTRIES on the planet. Hell, Mr. Gates could buy france if he really wanted to. But who the hell wants france?
I have to disagree. Think of the condition Britain would in today of it were surrounded by third-world war-torn countries, well it sort is anyway, but imagine it twice as worse as now... Britain is better off that Europe was mostly rebuilt as fast as possible.
Who the Hark is George Marshall!? Yo! I already done tol' yuh, Queen Elizabeth II should be man of the century, baby!
A pet peeve...please don't use the term North American when you mean (I hope) Amurrican or US of A'n. Canada has had no agenda this century defending the interests of the United States in Central or South America.
Oh Criossants, pomme de terre, cafes, Parisians and their car horns.
Oh those wild, wild french women and their french kisses and french knickers, and French whispers.
Yes, I'd take France..ohhhhyessssss I wouldddddd.
Were you a student of British History, or a British student of History?
As George Marshall was not a seeker of self-glorification, I'm sure he would pass the honor of Person of the Century to someone who really deserves it, the American GI. Where would we be now without the sacrifices made by so few for so many?
it's easy, for me, to choose the man of the century, because he's someone that everyone knows, everyone is aware of, and has profoundly altered society this century
i'm talking about Hitler
no one else is associated with the ultimate horrors of human rights violation, no one else has radically altered the direction of arts, society and humanity in the post-war era, with the establishment of international institutions, and the potential attrocities that can be weilded by power
he's not a man to be venerated in a postive sense, but a man to be looked at as a role model for what _not_ to do; and a society to be looked at a for a way that it should never be allowed to fall to the same conditions ever again
i think, if must agree with me, that no other man has radically shaped the course of this century, and no other man has helped humans learn about the horrors that humanity is capable of
matthew.gream@pobox.com
Everyone always picks some joker who pops into their head first. Its like the moronic media who calls the OJ trial the "Trial of the Centaury" when more likely canidates would be Scopes, Roe v Wade, Brown vs Ohio. Elvis? Man of the centaury!!? All due respect for the King but I would bet on Einstein, Ford, Turing, Churchill etc. No one ever votes for anyone who actually made a real difference :(
Yes, let's nominate the pope and insult about 4/5 of the world's population. I can't think of anything more stupid than choosing a religious leader.
Let's face it, Hitler is just another in a LONG (far, far too long) series of BAD people the human race has managed to gestate. He may well be the worst of this century, though others like Pol Pot have certainly given him a run for his money. But in recorded history, Hitler is nothing unique. People like Marshall are much rarer, sadly. His policies, in conjunction with FDR, launched the latter half of the 20th century. While we've had the Cold War, and a ton of brush wars, I'd assert that the non-retributionist treatment of Germany and Japan after WWII is a prime reason there was hasn't been a WWIII. After all, the obnoxious terms of the Treaty of Versailles after WWI was one of the driving factors that allowed Hitler to come to power, and therefore partly responsible for WWII.
I have come to the conclusion that Brin is a fag.
Last time I checked, America had a general ideology it applied to all people. We have a Democratic Republic which is based upon certain ideals. It was created to deal with the problems of Monarchy, and Pure Democracy. Concepts like Free Will run rampent in our society. Most people would agree that you have Free Will and should be held accountable for your crimes. At the same time scientific evidence demonstrates violence is generally a mixture of how you are raised and genetics. Yet we are unable to give up our view of Free Will and our justice system remains the same. Everyone has some crackheaded ideology for dealing with the world, Stalin and Hitler were just more sucessful at promoting theirs. Marx meant well anyway.
Bwahahahaha. What a funny typo.
Person of the Century should be based on how much that person changed our society. Entertainers like John Lennon and Elvis are obviously out because they may have influenced trends but our lifes would be pretty much the same without them. Military leaders don't ssem to fit because it's aguably the ideologies of the people that start wars not individual leaders. Civil Rights leaders seem like good canidates but they change the lives of mainly one group of people. And again, it is more that one man that brings about change. With this said I would like the suggest Nikola Tesla for Person of The Century.
I'm not sure why, but Nikola Tesla always seems to get over looked. All through high school and a year of electrical engineering and no one has ever even mentioned his name. He changed our lives more than any other individual this century. Imagine your life without:
the telephone repeater: Bell let us talk to the next room, Tesla let us talk around the world.
transmission of alternating-current: Why you have electricity in your house today.
the Tesla coil
FM radio
fluorescent lights
rotating magnetic field principle
the induction motor
countless others...
And don't forget the coolness factor. The legand of Nicola Tesla is even better. He holds the record for the largest man made lightning arc. He is rumored to have worked with wireless transmision of power, which was only shot down because Edison was making money off stringing wires. Not to mention he blew up Siberia by resonating waves of electricity through the earth.
I believe it's time Tesla got some credit.
AC
--if it doesn't look right just sound it out.
Excellent idea. Also, for movie reviews, etc, let's get that gy who reviewed the Star Wars Holiday Special.
Stupid semantics. Recognizing the pope as the Man of the Century is not "irrespective of the achievements", so your argument is entirely academic. My point was that neither the current pope, nor any other pope before him, has done anything that would qualify him for the honors. In fact, some might argue that the one thing common amongst people striving for the role of a religious leader might be the lack of certain character traits that WOULD qualify them for the Man of the Century. This is just a theory, of course.
I think the point is that we have to sacrifice for the things that we know, through the experience of mankind, are the things that have made life worth living. not all is subjective. i was not being so presumptuous as you think. i suppose you think nothing is worth defending on the grounds that all things are only one person's view? and excuse me for not having my handy-dandy tj reference manual around to get the quote right. and like it or not, that quote is meant as i said. jefferson was not talking about making an omelette.
Anything with a nervous system can sense shock from acts of violence. Any sensible human of good will learns that this sucks and begins to examine strategies for coping which don't involve oppression.
Those without good will learn to use the reaction to shock & terror as a tool for their own gratification. Hitler was a small, irrelevant, boring little fsck who got his hands on Marconi's mass media and Nobel's explosives.
In the flow of human history, the remarkable ones are those who overcome this dreary loop and stay disciplined enough to promulgate technologies ( broadly:idea structures, including values ) which produce prosperity and opportunity for all WITHOUT the mayhem, and ratings be damned. Washington, Francis of Assisi and J.S. Mill come to mind; Brin makes an excellent case for Marshall too.
You're like a bumpkin, gaping at a hanging or a house fire. Kill your television and dare yourself to insist on good character, one relationship at a time.
The only thing worse than top-100 lists are people who care what is on them! Find a new hobby!
Albert Einstein.
American eyes, American eyes
View the world from American eyes
Bury the past, rob us blind
And leave nothing behind
Just stare
And live the nightmare.
-RATM
The trend is not toward tolerance so much as apathy. America is trusting it's government to take over all the rights and responsibilities that were given to the citizens at the founding. We are not, as a nation suspicious of authority We trust Clinton even after so many demonstrations that he has NO character and that character really does matter.
And as for the UN, The UN is a vehicle for our loss of personal rights. Treaties supercede law in the US and every time the UN makes us sign another ill conceived treaty we loose some of our rights
A good example of this is the International child rights treaty which if we sign it will make it possible for your child to sue you if you don't let them do whatever they want.
And another the UN is putting together one world government treaty which would take the final decision power away from Our Supreme Court and Congress.
Perhaps people in other countries don't notice these things because they never had these rights but I don't understand why the peaple who do. don't object. yes I think I got a little off topic Oh well Phil Miess
It's very difficult to take any issue with David's selection of George Marshall as a potential Man of the Century - he has hit the nail right on the head. Marshall was indeed a Great Man.
Not just an "American Great Man" but a Great Man from a global perspective.
I would like to point out as an aside though, that our American friends often greatly overestimate their own importance in the defeat of the Nazis. The West did not, as it is so commonly portrayed, save Europe.
The truth of it is that the vast majority of the destruction of the Nazi war machine was carried out by the Soviet Union. The scale of the war on the Eastern Front is almost an order of magnitude greater than that on the Western Front.
For example, there are battles of the Eastern front where entire divisions are ground to hamburger in mere days. By comparision, the Western Front is a mere diversion.
That's not to say that the West's contribution is somehow inconsequential, or that those from the West who died fighting the Nazis wasted their lives. The threat from the west pulled vital units from the Eastern Front, and the damage to Nazi Germany's logistical engine acted as a throttle that prevented any substancial increase in Nazi power while the Soviets were kicking the holy hell out of them. This is all good stuff, and potentially vital. It's not hard to imagine total Nazi success if England had sued for peace after the conquest of France. (In fact, Stalin came very close to surrendering in '41 anyway - imagine how bad things would have been if Hitler could have thrown all his forces at him)
But the view that the US swept across the Atlantic to save Europe isn't just nieve, it's plain wrong.
American influence doesn't really come into play until after the ink is dry on the surrender agreement. Then, it's American diplomacy and American aid that "saves" Europe from being swallowed by the Soviets.
Which, incidently, further re-enforces David's claim on Marshall for Man of the Century.
But anyway, not that the Iron Curtain is down, and the truth is starting to peek out (the Soviets weren't exactly forthcoming with details about their losses at the time) it behooves those of us in the West to provide credit where credit is due.
Stalin and Soviet Communism were opressive, nasty regimes in their own right - but the Soviet infantryman and tanker weren't fighting for politics, they were fighting to defeat Nazism. It is because of their sacrifice that we're able to enjoy the freedom we have today.
Thanks guys.
Say, do we have any ex-Russian Army members reading Slashdot?
Both Ghandi and King derived their philosophy from Thoreau.
I think you should stop posting now, before the damage to your reputation becomes irreversible.
Moderate the above up, it is very relevant and I agree wholeheartedly.
It was a cunning plan to get the US trade for many years after WW2. After that the US had gained such a strong economy and a large stronghold in many areas.
Europe was enslaved to the USA economically. Europe still hasn't recovered from this policy - imagine if most of the industry in the USA was destroyed, your economy was in ruins and you could only get goods from Europe or China. The classic old American trick of monopolising foreign industry. Anyone does anything America doesn't like, then in with the napalm, kill all those people, don't care who they are, its just fun shooting those guns, woo hoo.
Countries were effectively punished for what wasn't their fault.
Maybe the true brilliance in the plan was realising that trade would grow to be a worldwide phenomenon by the mid to late 20th century. But a lot of people could have raslised that.
However, there are some who changed the world so much that the world a thousand years from now will be a LOT different than if they had never lived. I would choose one of these:
Einstein- building blocks for the yet-to-be-found GUT ... well, as with Einstein's work, God only knows where it will lead.
Crick, Watson; whose work may lead to
Of course, the "man" who will have the most profound effect on the future isn't a single person at all. My choice for "man" of the century is the hundred or so who invented the three story tall pocket calculator in the 'forties that led to today's (and tomorrow's) computers.
The computer is the most momentous acheivement since the invention of movable type. Without Hitler there would have been no need for Marshall, and you would likely had never heard of him.
But the computer- now there's an acheivement! Freedom of the press finally has meaning to the common man. A few of us, thanks to it, have landed on the moon; impossible without computers. We are peering at galaxies so far away they are dead before their light reaches us, thanks to Hubble (a computer with a telescope attached). I mentioned Einstein earlier; with computers and without Einstein we would likely be as far in physics as we are, but with Einstein and without computers we would not.
Perhaps "man of the century" should be a man and woman from the previous century, Charles Babbage, who designed the first programmabkle computer (unbuilt untill a decade ago) and its programmer, Ada Lovelace.
steve (left my password at home)
"dave? dave? dave, i'm afraid" -HAL
Maybe you'll have to choose a new nick... like maybe "fanboy" or "The Whiner". How about "Stinky Diver"? That's not original either...
Tell me this is a joke! Please...
Wow! What an ignorant blowhard you are!
Results are at http://cgi.pathfinder.com/cgi-bin/time/osform/gdml 3
he's the only one that's done anything important. He's 80 years old and works his ass off every day trying to help all of you, and he is absoutely penniless, giving all his money to help the world. He's the man of the century. You'd all probably be dead by now if it wasn't for his economical knowledge. www.larouchepub.com
They do teach history, but it isn't very well taught (at least in state run schools).
The famous Jewish writer's last name is "Ha-am" -- his full (assumed) name means "One of the people", a name he chose in order to express his humility.
If rebuilding glibc is as complex as rebuilding Europe, gnulix is in for a world of hurt.
i don't necessarily agree with the previous poster, but please don't try to claim that the united states has 'one of the best records for respecting human rights.' korean war, vietnam war, more recently the gulf war. how can war mongers actually believe they respect human rights? i guess "god and country" are good enough reason to kill millions of people? lets not forget the 2 atomic bombs dropped on hiroshima and nagasaki. that act alone was so depraved, that every american should hang their heads in shame. 200,000 people killed from those initial blasts. almost all civilians, women and children. lets not forget what america did to the philipines and cuba too. as the popular propoganda comic says, "Truth, Justice, and the American Way!"
Theodore Roosevelt was the most weird american president(my opinion). He invaded Cuba and expanded more the territories of the United States and the policy of imperialism(remember the expansion of the USA to the Pacific and Phillipines).
You shouldn't judge Theodore Roosevelt by our "modern" standards, today. Remember, during his presidency (the 1900's), imperialism was the "status quo" amoung world powers. The British Empire was in its prime. France had colonies in Africa, Asia and the Pacific. Germany, the newcomer, and Italy, having lost it's former renaisance glory, were struggling to establish their own empires.
Imperialism and expansion were believed to be the "white man's burden" to bring "civilization" to the "poor" natives in the world. While, today we realize that many of these people would have done just fine, probably even better, without the white man version of "civilization", we shouldn't condemn the leaders at that time who thought they were doing the "right thing" anymore than we should condemn the physicians of the previous century who believed that they were helping by bleeding and leeching their patients. Although their efforts were perhaps misguided, they were not malicious. That said, don't think that I don't know that there were other motivations behind Imperialism. Yes, there were political and economical reasons for expansion. Indeed, establishment of the US as a world power was probably the main reason for US imperialism. Yet, US imperialism was dwarfed by comparison to the European imperialism that dominated international politics at the time. Therefore, while Teddy Roosevelt did promote imperialism, he was no worse than the other leaders of the major world powers at the time.
He loved hunting and guns and often had explosions of rage when his decisions were contested by the Congress.
True, TR was something of a maverick, but such a leader was needed to carry out many of the domestic reforms, necessary at the time (i.e., Trust Busting - breaking up monopolies, establishing the FDA, setting aside national parks, etc...).
In your .sig, change "hear?" to "care?". Now that's funny.
Einstein nautralized as an american.
"It would have been easy to drain the resources of India, Australia, and other countries " I'm not a historian, just an Australian, but I think Australia was an independent nation in 1945, not some kind of British-governed colony. Whatever power the Brits may have had over India in 1945, they couldn't and didn't command the resources of Australia. We may share a [mostly symbolic] monarch with Britain, but we definitely had our own elected and independent government when it came to practical matters, like money.
Speaking as a Canadian, a citizen of a country created as a direct result of the American Civil War and as a means of preventing American expansion to the 49th parallel of lattitude, with a society that takes pride in its differences from the US, I am quite comfortable in stating that the US is the greatest country that has existed to date in nearly any sense: exploration (Apollo, Pioneer, Viking, Voyager, Alvin), discovery (the largest number of Nobel prizes were won by American citizens although many of those were immigrants), military success (WW I and II) and gradual transformation from oligarchy to a plutocratically influenced democracy. However, some of us are willing to advocate a little more cooperation over competition, commonality over individuality and finally security over freedom. We are known as Canadians. Imperial Rome may have been more exciting, but it was probably a little more comfortable in Petra.
time pick a business man, now a military man is picked. what about Joe Hill? Oh yeah, he be a labor man. voice of the working poor. the dead on the beaches of WWII. Let's nominate a business man who's made no money.
LOL, that's what you think you may think your elections work but if you look deep enough into your law docs then you'll clearly see that the british oligarchy has full power over you. Sucks, doesn't it? Yea, they also have power over canada too. I don't remember the section but somebody knows it, if you can remember it then post it here.
one of the big things with the Marshall Plan was the combatting of communism. It was believed that if the US gave money to these countries while the countries were in dire straits, they would be more apt to favor the United States which would make them less-likely to sway towards commmunism. However, the countries in the western areas, especially the victors were not going to be as likely to sway to communism, or so it was thought, because they were major trading partners of ours, and we had helped them out during the war. Therefore more money was spent on the "trouble" areas.
Most people don't know that the "Marshall" Plan was also the idea and work of President Truman. General George Marshall was not the main creator of the plan. Truman worked on it originally and turned it over to Marshall to work out the details, and most importantly, to SELL it to Congress. Truman knew that Marshall commanded the respect and had broader appeal and support in Congress and the public, so he wanted Marshall to take charge of it and therefore he knew that THE PLAN would have had a better chance of being implemented. It was. And the rest is history, ... Marshall's history.
Nitpicking aside, as great as General Marshall was, I wouldn't pick him Man of the Century. I wouldn't have problems picking him AMERICAN Man of the Century.
To me, THE Man of the Century is somebody who has done original work, and who transcended time, cultures, borders, races, fields of endeavors, who had a wide-ranging number of achievements for the good of mankind, whose name is an icon known across cultures and peoples of all background. In the article, among Marshall's achievements was the modernizing the American army. Great for the American army and the U.S.A.
I would never vote for a political figure, military man, world leader, revolutionary, dreamer, anarchist as Man of the Century. These people always work for their country, for their ideals or try to impose their ideals on others. They come and go with the trends. A Man of the Century is somebody whose ideas just got ACCEPTED UNIVERSALLY not IMPOSED no matter how "good" they were.
Scientists and inventors in my opinion are ideal candidates for Man of the Century. Einstein comes to mind.
More importantly, if Brin can be a regular, can they boot Katz? Please god say yes!
My vote for Man of the Century is Albert Einstein. His achievements - and there are many - are original and on a grand scale, not just confined to earthly matters. His achievements has lasting consequences over a long period of time and go beyond his field. He made us see the Universe in a new way and our place in it. He is also kwnown for his humanitarian qualities, quick wit and wisdom. Albert is THE man.
Some of my favorite Einstein's quotes :
1) Imagination is more important than knowledge.
2) After the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshma, he was asked if he think there will be another world war, he replied with words to the effect : "I don't know, but the next one will be fought with sticks and stones."
Anyway, I know there's a lot of ill-will towards the US post-WWII. Especially in light of the US actions towards Israel and Britain with the actions in Egypt, it's interesting that the two nations have remained such close allies.
However, I think, as someone else pointed out, that a lot of the reason the US did that was realizing the mistakes of the Versailles Peace. And after the Soviets "turned" the Marshall Plan into a seeming plan of US-imperialism, it became critical to get the Germany back on its' collective feet to defeat "The Red Menace". Britain, as a fellow victor, wasn't seen as needed the same help.
Yeah, I'm that guy.
I get particularly annoyed by this mistake because this simplistic definition and condemnation tend to be attached to anyone who sees large-scale problems and calls for large-scale solutions. Sometimes the assertion that problems are complex is used to paralyze any kind of action at all, on the grounds that we have to complete our analysis before we do anything even if that takes forever. It's important that over-simplistic thinking be refuted where it's spouted, but I think trying to create a category called "ideology" meaning "analysis of society, its problems and solutions that I don't like" is as meaningless as talking about "pornography" meaning "erotica that I don't like".
There are ills that Hitler and Stalin have in common, but this way of looking at them doesn't capture them.
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Xenu loves you!
To free a slave, you had to post a fairly large bond, and he did not have the money. Also, he thought slavery was dieing out, as it seemed to be, until the invention of the cotton gin.
Plato seems wrong to me today
That quote is from Franklin, but I read a very similar one from Jefferson in a book once. Of course, I can't remember the name of the book, but you are correct(or the author of the book was wrong).
In fact, the quote was so similar when I read it I wondered whether one of those two was guilty of some plagarism.
Possible book canidates: a Carl Sagan book, or "How the Mind Works" by Stephen Pinker. I just can't be sure which, but my money would be on "How the Mind Works".
The Marshall Plan was 'a good thing' but strangely the people of, say, Britain were rather confused about the way the US was so keen to help the vanquished, and yet at the same time, so very unwilling to help the victors.
Bullshit. Here's a link.
Here, have another.
You may want to research this stuff before launching int Yet Another "Ugly American" Tirade.
SoupIsGood Food
According to the history books, Churchill came up with an answer: get help -- American help -- by any means necessary. That's pretty much what happened, modulo Hitler's suicidal stupidity in violating both of Liddel-Hart's two rules of warfare ("never start a war on two fronts" and "never start a land war in asia"). But Roosevelt charged a heavy price, one that most Americans today don't even understand:
He demanded -- and got -- the dismantling of the British empire.
In 1945, Britain was within one week of going bankrupt. It would have been easy to drain the resources of India, Australia, and other countries to support the devastated Imperial hub ... but instead, they quietly and without much fuss shut down the largest empire the world has ever seen (at one point it covered 24.6% of the planet).
Giving Marshall Aid to Britain would have undermined the US State Department's leverage over a British government that wasn't really sure it wanted to definitively relinquish its place as a superpower (which is what the UK was, prior to 1914).
Uh, the Marshall plan alone (the only thing I associated with the man before reading Brins article) would qualify him to win an European "man of the century" award. The Marshall plan wasn't just about giving away money, it was given in forms that forced the European nations to cooperate, in order to prevent a new war. In a way, George Marshall founded the European Union.
I know this is tired, but I figure someone has to say it.
The Marshall Plan was 'a good thing' but strangely the people of, say, Britain were rather confused about the way the US was so keen to help the vanquished, and yet at the same time, so very unwilling to help the victors. Britain's war debt to the US was crippling for years after the end of the war, and the US wasn't all that keen to write it off.
I'm no expert on the history of all this, but more than one person has pointed out that the Marshall Plan, as well as ensuring a sort of peace, also ensured increased power for the US and a nice market to export to.
So, not everyone in Europe sees the Marshall Plan as the most wonderful act of generosity ever conceived....
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Maker of amplifiers for playing hard rock and shred music. Much more significant than some scribbler.
;)
Now THAT'S a writer. Mr. Katz take note.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
I'm sorry, there are plenty of philosopher kings to follow, RMS just isn't the one for me. I've said before the GPL is pure genius for the right applications, like the human genome you mentioned. And it's great that you don't have to pay $1500 for a Unix system anymore, although I think Linus deserves at least as much credit for that. But there are too many people who did too much that affected lives in this century to put him on top. Hell, try Martin Luther King for instance. Or Elvis. Or any good short-order cook.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
You want prescient? My prediction is that in 10 yrs most of the people here now will be lawyers or politicians instead of programmers. I see precious little technical discussion here but tons of legalistic maneuverings about licenses. How's that?
:-)
You want to get into Karl Marx, I think we need a different thread!
The revolution will NOT be televised.
This comment illustrates the supreme self-importance of this "movement". Ok, so Stallman's still pissed that Xerox wouldn't give him the source to a printer driver and obsessed over it the rest of his life. You compare that with putting Europe back together after WWII? Give me a break. That affected REAL lives in serious ways. The effect of Stallman is Unix got cheap for a few guys who want to play with the source. Big fucking deal.
If anyone should get the prize for a "new way to look at information" it'd be Berners-Lee or even Andreesen fer chrissakes. Or yes, Grace Hopper for COBOL! I'm sorry, but technically speaking you're not looking at ANYTHING in a new way, you're just duplicating what was already there - built by PAID programmers working for a BIG CORPORATION. No question putting that in Everyman's hands is a great contribution, but not enough for Man of The Century.
As I recall there was plenty of public domain software around when RMS started the FSF, and you didn't have to buy into his political/social movement to use it, and you could do anything you damn well pleased with it. Now all people do is argue about license terms.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
Slight deviation from the main topic, but a very good (and entertaining) look at the events leading up to Pearl Harbor can be seen in "Tora! Tora! Tora!". Draws a nice picture of some of the behind the scenes work and some of the mistakes/misjudgments made.
--
The Future: Some assembly required; batteries not included.
kind of like blair witch and last broadcast, ay?
-l
Help cure AIDS, cancer, and more. Donate your unused computer time to worldcommunitygrid.org. Join Team Slashdot!
I have to say I agree completely, and in addition would note Marshall's involvment in the McCarthy trials. His brave stand against McCarthy and his acusations delt a serious blow to the Red Scare and sped an end to one of the darkest chapters in American history in this century.
A true American and man of this world indeed.
From the Charlie Rose Show on "Time"'s Person of the Century:
TIM BERNERS-LEE: "That's a very interesting question because of how unimportant it is. The great thing about the web, the great thing about the web of humanity is that we're all important.
"And, in a way, a lot of the things which upset society are when we try to put people in order."
Eternal vigilance only works if you look in every direction.
Hearty agreement here. Churchill's life was rather amazing. The Ottawa Citizen recently ran a couple of articles about Churchill's exploits during the Boer War. He maneuvered to get press credentials from a London newspaper, connived to get near the front lines, was engaged in battle, and made an escape as a prisoner.
It should be noted that Churchill's accomplishments didn't end after the war. His speech gave the words "Iron Curtain" to the world, and his two major historical works (The History of the English Speaking Peoples and a four part World War II one) are significant.
I like the idea of Mr Marshall for Adult of the Century. I know europeans might not be keen on that, but he has had a lot of influence on the latter half of the 20th century.
No one person will get loved by everyone as "Carbon Based Life Form of the Century" It is human nature.
Who, btw, was naturalized as an American.
(yes, yes, he retained his Swiss citizenship, but still, by the end of his life he was one of ours thanks to the intellectual freedom and freedom from persecution as a jew he found here)
And if there's any doubt that the 20th century wasn't the American century, you are wholly ignorant of history. There are dozens of other centuries that Euros, Asians, etc can attempt to claim, but for better or worse the 20th is ours.
The question is, though: whose will the 21st be? Or, more interestingly, does our current nation-state model even survive long enough for any one to make that claim? ('The 21st century is the Micro$oft century.. enough to make you want to take up terrorism as a weekend hobby...')
And not that I hate Europe at all, it's just I get very irritated when our friends across the pond start throwing stones and getting all self-righteously preachy, while not realizing they live in a stained-glass cathedral (which, like the Frauenkirche would still be shattered if not for great men like Marshall).. Hell, I could rant for days on the French, but I have christmas presents to buy..
Joyeux Noel!
Your Working Boy,
Jefferson led a very self-contradictory life. While opposed to slavery he owned slaves
So, in other words, he was a fallible human being. Just like you and me. I can live with that. I can still admire the man for the great things he said and by the institutions that he helped build. I can still hold up his genius at self-education as an example that I strive to live up to.
Ironically, Jefferson envisioned a nation of free yeoman landowning farmers exercising educated democracy. I'm sure you could power a small city by hooking up a dynamo to his remains and letting him continue to spin in his grave. Not that I'm saying it's bad that we haven't ended up as an agrarian pasture of a nation, but it does show that good initial standards design (the Constitution, Declaration of Independence, is there an ANSI standard for the Liberty of a System?) should be made flexible to allow modification and extension for impelementation of changing operating parameters..
Your Working Boy,
Where would we be without the theory of Gravity?
Standing on the ceiling of my living room?
Civilly Disobeying Newton's Laws,
Your Working Boy,
problem is, people are too chicken-shit to sacrifice anything to defend the things that make life worth living.
Actually, if this century proves anything, it's that Americans are willing to fight and die for principle, if absolutely necessary. The problem is that lately the people espousing the principle and defining necessity have proven themselves unworthy of the people's trust. I can't imagine that going on much longer without some serious backlash...
Your Working Boy,
I'm surprised General Marshall hasn't popped up earlier (in public, not on /.), but then again, sadly, maybe I'm not.
;)
It's strange how history works, how for the greatest stresses and strains great men (and women) seem to come to the fore. Or at least, if they're not great, they put aside their weaknesses to lead. Turns out we were lucky in getting Marshall, Bradley, Nimitz, Eisenhower, great men and great leaders. The last time a happy accident like that came about in Western Civ was probably the American Revolution..
Hell, I'd compare George Marshall to Agricola as much as to George Washington. Anyone would be infinitely lucky to live in a nation founded on the principles of any of those men.
What has this to do with slashdot, you might ask? Well, if it wasn't for Marshall, you probably wouldn't be at that terminal looking at pixels, you'd probably be a wisp of carbon dancing gently across a pockmarked landscape or starving to death in a still-bombed-out European city. I guess it shows that, on occasion, America can export something a bit more useful to the world than 'Baywatch'. If there's any justice, Marshall stands among the greatest men in all of recorded history. And having an idea of Marshall, he probably would balk when asked to line up with them
Happy holidays!
Your Working Boy,
I'm not too keen on USA from 1945-1960, but Roosevelt was one of the ugliest people imaginable ... he was no better than stalin. A complete brute if there ever was one.
Thanks, David, for choosing a man responsible for spreading america's own brand of imperialsm.
support gun control: take guns from cops
why do americans babble endlessly about freedom while licking the hands that beat them?
... who the fuck gave us that capability in the first place?
Teddy Roosevelt? You've got to be kidding.
You claim that so-and-so "saved us" from nuclear war
Personally I have no repsect for power whatsoever.
support gun control: take guns from cops
No shit. Sounds like you don't know TR from FDR..
Roosevelt was one of the ugliest people imaginable ... he was no better than stalin
Gimme a break! Mind you, the Japanese-American internment was bad (note that Canada also caved into this hysterical nonsense as well), but no American president ever caused atrocities like the gulag system to spring up. Some would say that FDR was the best president the USA had this century (I'd place Truman higher myself)...
As superpowers/empires go, the States historically have one of the best records for respecting human rights. Yes, we have some problems here, but comparing us to Stalin?? Jeezus, read a damn history book already..
Thanks, David, for choosing a man responsible for spreading america's own brand of imperialsm
Considering the other available alternatives after the war -- a Western Europe awash in poverty, starvation and anarchy seems the most likely -- I wouldn't be bitching.
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".sig,
Gutenberg, for the printing press.
Martin Luther, for using the press effectively as a means of mass communication and propaganda (techiniques still used today), and instigating a revolution of sorts that helped to free the world from the supression of the Catholic Church, allowing scientific progress to continue unfettered in the world.
George Washington. As stated in "The American Revolution" (A&E/History Channel), every revolution in history has turned back on itself and left the nation with something worse than what was being revolted against in the first place. Save one : America. George Washington is the only reason for that.
"But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
-- Joe
"I am appalled at the lack of knowledge of history and international politics that the European readers of slashdot are showing. Americans are often criticised for their lack of internationalism; yet the Europeans don't even seem to have a clue about their own history."
That's quite a generalization you're making there...
For the record: I'm European and I think Marshall was indeed a great man. The freedom and stability Western Europe has enjoyed in the second half of the century are largely due to the Marshall Plan. I'm pretty sure my life would be *much* different if it had never existed.
Also, I'm amazed at the fact that most Americans have never heard of Marshall. Every high school in my country (the Netherlands) teaches about the Marshall plan in history class. It's certainly not forgotten.
Most people 'in the streets' would know about Marshall, I think. But, then again, the stupidity and capacity to forget in some people is really astounding. Like those Americans voting for Elvis Presley as the most significant person of the century...
You're right. Tyranny has simply put on new clothes.
Like I said - rational, not logical.
What would you do? Here you are, in command of the US, there's a war raging a continent away that could dramatically alter the power base of the world. Do you sit there, or do you act? We acted, and emerged some 40 odd years later as the last standing superpower in the world.
People are rational.
People try to make the best decisions based on the resources and information available.
People, when in groups, tend to throw morality to the wind.
For geeks, I can illustrate the last point quite vividly by pointing them to the playgrounds of their youth - chastised ... never by one, but by a group. The other two should be self-evident. Combine these together and you have a fairly effective formula for determining what that person will do - they're rational. What would you do in their shoes?
This "man of the century" stuff presupposing that this person is somehow superior to his peers is non-sense. They had, or developed, the character traits needed to survive in that position. Some succeeded brilliantly at the task, others failed miserably. Was it really personality, or was it just good (bad?) timing? I lean towards the ladder - I believe every individual, at any time and in any location, can make a difference. Sorry Time, but you should put a mirror on that page, and let us make a difference in our own private lives. In the final analysis, that's all that matters.
me too!
Han-Wen Nienhuys -- LilyPond
going way out on a limb and staking my whole life's reputation - that they pick the assassinated civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for century person - that ought to grab headlines and sell magazines.
Boojum
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
I think for the "Person of the Millenium," the choice has to be Johan Gutenberg.
The answer is simple: his invention of the low-cost hot-metal movable-type printing press literally changed the face of the world in the space of 75 years. The printing press made it possible to store and spread information on a scale that was just completely unimaginable before his lifetime.
With the printing press, it had two effects: 1) it allowed people to create thousands of copies of books, and boy did that spread information fast; and 2) it began the steps towards standardization of language, since printing "fixed" the spelling and grammar of language.
In fact, as the Second Christian Millenium comes to a close, some day we will look back at two important people that changed the way information is transmitted. The first is Johan Gutenberg for creating the low-cost printed book, and the second is Tim Berners-Lee for creating the means to share and transmit text and graphical data on a worldwide scale (the World Wide Web).
Raymond in Mountain View, CA
Who better than Bill Gates, to be named man of the century. This is a person who be looked upon by future generations as the leader of the most ruthless, cutthroat and monopolistic company of the 20th century..
ahaahahahahahahah##!%!#!$
sometimes I just can't help myself
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Insert Witty Sig Here
I think Mr Brin once again floated on the surface in his analysis. It is somehow similar to the problem when he analyzed SW1TFM. There he blamed solely lucas and skipped the fact that you should not expect reasonable writing from people with under 7000 words worth of vocabulary (the kind lucas has hired - T. Zan and T. Brooks).
;-)
Here I think he followed the lines of Times, namely looking along the lines of people who noisily shaped this century. And, frankly though this century does not have a defined Shakespear, Lermontov, etc there are still people that may be ranked as person of the century.
My opinion is highly subjective, but I would say: How many intelliugent people have not read "The Little Prince?" and put Antoine De Saint-Exupery as the person of the millenium.
Strange? Maybe (Oh well I am not saying I will not agree seeing Hemingway there
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
I thought You could think:
Gandhi There would have been no Ghandi whatsoever if not for Rabindranat Tagor. Though once again this is the indian man of the century.
As mandela is the south african man of the century.
Anyway, they are both politics. They are disposal conumative, greese on the wheels of history, they come and go, Culture (literature, art, architecture) remains.
20th century does not have a diefinitive literature figure. It still has definitive art figures - Picasso and one of the most definitive architecture figures in history - Le Corbusie...
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
We need to ask ourselves: Why do we really need a man (or woman, let's be PC for a minute) of the century? Is it really that important to pick one person and tell everybody that that one is the best/most important/etc.?
All these arguments over who is person of the year, person of the century, Time's poster-boy, whose face goes on the Wheaties box... It's all rather absurd if you stand back and take a look at it! What these magazines and writers should be focusing on is the fact that it took the cooperation (and competition) of LOTS of people to make the world what it is today... not just one or two guys.
________________________________
Come on, RMS came too late too significantly impact this century (outside of our little digital corner of the world). And it's way to early to declare him the man of the next.
Just as the children of Marshall's generation debate over his importance, I'd rather let our children debate RMS.
Something he said seems particularly relevant to this tree of the discussion:
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
I am still struck by the conflict that although he worked for peace, he was a soldier - and soldiers are trained to kill other human beings to forward whatever political agenda is on the table
Maybe bad soldiers, but not good ones. Good soldiers are taught to WIN, not to kill. There's a big difference, and that's one point Brin was making -- that despite being a "killer", Marshall instituted some of the most generously peaceful actions of the century, in hopes that they would PREVENT wars and killing in the future.
Despite the popular characterization of the military, most generals are more likely to be considered "wimps" by barroom standards. They tend to spend a lot of time reading philosophy texts and other boring things like that.
Marshall would have been very familiar with the following notion:
to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting - Sun Tzu
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
I've visited the George Marshall library in Virginia - just because we happened to be driving through and looking for tourist sites. The place left me in awe - he was a truly great and humble man. Personally I would have voted for Gandhi or Einstein, but Marshall definitely deserves a place in the top ten most important individuals of the century.
Energy: time to change the picture.
Why omit the great Rennisance(sp?) thinkers? What about Franklin? Not to mention CmdrTaco....
e to the i pi equals negative one
to hear a voice proclaiming that "Its not what people think of you that matters, but how you act and what you accomplish" Brin's article alone makes me want to read more about him.
Even though I'm not anti-Katz, I do appreciate the opportunity to read a professional writer who isn't concentrating on current hype. Brin's article on TPM was equally thought-provoking, perhaps CmdrTaco and co. can arrange for a more frequent view on Brin's mind?
Please?
e to the i pi equals negative one
As far as shaping the outcome of the 20th century, I have to say that not Marshall himself, but the fellow who gave him his marching orders (to begin with), FDR, was in large part responsible for where we are now.
Roosevelt was in the Oval Office for an unprecedented twelve-plus years. Under his leadership, the American military was transformed from something not quite second-rate but really no better than the Europeans or Asians, quietly transformed, into a lean, mean fighting machine capable of kicking Axis booty on three continents and two oceans at once... and that remained so, more or less, until the advent of Bill Clinton. Social Security, the income tax, and the alphabet agencies have transformed our intellectual landscape.... and in some cases (TVA) our physical landscape too. All of these things came about under the careful watching of the dude in the chair with the big cigarette holder. He also had the final say-so on the development of The Bomb (although you have to give credit to Harry for having the guts to use it) and for setting the overall strategy of the war (Germany First) that saved Britain's ass (yes, at the loss of her colonies, but she wouldn't have been able to take care of them anyway, and she did eventually return as a naval superpower, q.v. the Falklands) for us to use as a base from which to squash Hitler.... he was also responsible for not giving Patton his gasoline and allowing the Russians to occupy the Balkans.... oh, how THAT changed things.
And the whole liberal political role model....
Ad infinitum, nauseumque...
For better or for worse, the one man who has had the most far-reaching influence in the years 1900-1999:
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, President of the United States of America 1932-April, 1944.
This paradoxical situation was satirised in the Ealing comedy "The mouse that roared", starring Peter Sellars. In the film, a small European principality which is on the verge of bankruptcy decides to declare a war on the USA with the specific intention of losing and then claiming Marshall aid. As I recall, their "invasion" of the USA goes unnoticed because when the the invasion force - a handful of men - arrives in NY, the whole city is hiding in the cellar from a threatened nuclear attack.
Technology comes and goes but social advances are forever.
You might say that Time is celebrating his vision and foresight, but in truth they're celebrating his bank account.
Here, here.
In the end, its money and power that gets you noticed.
Let the award go to all those people who volunteered for the red cross, the peace corps.. people you'll never hear about.
Today, at the end of this tense century, we might look back on it as a pit that
Homo sapiens fell into, then somehow managed to climb out of again, chastened and
perhaps even a bit wiser.
Quite idealistic, to think that humanity as a whole has managed to change, even if a little, for the good. There are still so many tyrannies and cruelty going on, that its hard for me to believe that humanity have ever learned from the past.
why on earth would anyone in their right mind support a politician from the last century as the greatest anything
Did you even read the essay?
In the first place George Marshall was never elected to any office by the general population. First he was appointed Joint Chief of Staff and ran the war effort. Later he was coaxed out of retirement and appointed Secretary of State.
He is as much a politician as I am a flying pig.
Secondly, you have a overly cynical view of politicians. There are in fact people elected to office in the country on a routine basis that run for office because they want to make a differnce, to really SERVE the nation. Look at post political lives of some of our ex-presidents like Gerry Ford and Jimmy Carter as proof. They are still serving this country well, even in absence of political office.
Certainly there are many who should never have been elected, yet there are in fact noble politicians in the service of this country. Look what has happened in Northern Ireland just this year.
If you ask a REAL historian what his evaluation of the quality of leadership we have had was and is, he will say 'the best in human history'.
Adolf Hitler, while intensely important for a short period did not a particularly large impact outside the second world war. In fact some will argue that the Treaty of Versailles made Hitler inevetable. Hitler did not shape history the way Marshall did; he was in fact the result of failed previous policies, and a failure himself.
Mao to me has had FAR more influence.
Gandhi's character was a prime model not only for Dr. King
Both Ghandi and King derived their philosophy from Thoreau.
American man of the Century? Are you daft? One of the main reasons he is proposed as man of the century here is his profound influence on Europe. Both by providing the means to roll back the Third Reich, but for funding the economic reconstruction, and putting into place the policies that kept Soviet expansionism from overtaking Western Europe. In terms of a purely American figure, somebody like FDR is much more important.
I am appalled at the lack of knowledge of history and international politics that the European readers of slashdot are showing. Americans are often criticised for their lack of internationalism; yet the Europeans don't even seem to have a clue about their own history.
So, while George Marshall was certainly a great man, he was not a man I could nominate for this title as I am European.
Your chauvanism (a French word!) betrays you.
So far the only Europeans we have seen nominated here are Hitler and Stalin. While you may impune the motives of Marshall, I think they stand up pretty well in comparison to Hitler and Stalin.
Do you have a better EUROPEAN candidate?
Jefferson proposed that slavery be outlawed in both his version of the Declaration, and during the Constitutional Convention. He was voted down both times.
Jefferson led a very self-contradictory life. While opposed to slavery he owned slaves. While hating aristocracy he enjoyed living at the Parisian court and owning Monticello.
All in all though, if you look at his life and what he accomplished his lasting influence is undeniable.
I ask you, what influence did Lenin have on Marshall, or Marshall on Mao?
Well, of course Stalin was Lenin's direct successor - who could have had more influence in shaping Stalinism? - in many ways Lenin creates Stalin by establishing the structure that makes Stalin possible. If Marshall is reacting to Stalin, he is also reacting to the Soviet Union independent of Stalin knowing full well that the policies that are being put in place are designed to have an impact for far greater than one ruler's term. Marshall is in effect reacting to the INSTITUTIONS established by Lenin that are represented by Stalin. Stalin did not last long after WWII, however the impact of the Marshall Plan was felt long after the demise of Stalinism.
Mao's influence is important because it represents the expulsion of colonial empires from the largest nation on Earth. China has emerged to be immensely more important than Russia at the end of the 20th century. Mao is influenced by Stalin to some extent - but in reality much more so by Lenin. Stalin was no idealist in the way of either Lenin or Mao.
Stalin is a key figure in 20th century history. But at the end he lies repudiated and deconstructed by even the institutions that created him. Those institutions in turn have failed to survive as well.
The problem with picking Stalin is that by the end of the 20th Century his influence has been eclipsed by the postwar policies known as the Marshall Plan. While Stalin was certainly a major influence, I think he was overshadowed by several figures including Marshall, Mao and Lenin in importance.
There is no question in my mind of the greatness of George Marshall. He is the greatest statesman of the century and the man who is responsible in large part for the success of democracy over tyranny in the second half of the 20th century.
There are very few others that I would place in the same league. Perhaps Zhang Zemin and Teddy Roosevelt.
From the technology field I'd pick Einstein and Fleming. But at this elevated level the competition is so great....
The real question I wonder about is who is the man of the millenium...
My choice is Thomas Jefferson. When John Kennedy gave a state dinner for American Noble Prize winners (about 100 attended) he started off his introduction with... "Never has there been assembled at the White House such talent since Thomas Jefferson dined here... alone".
Its somewhat ironic that after casting him into a light which was that of someone opposed to ideologies, you have suggested that he serve as a role model and as man of the century. Not that I am AGAINST what he's done, but isnt worshipping him somewhat inverse to what you are saying?
its a combination of many many things and who is
to judge it ?
why have a "man of the century" ?
what does it accomplish ?
more bickering over trivial arguments ?
Your sig : Now let us peel back the foreskin of misconception and apply the wire brush of enlightenment" -- Geoff Miller
... who's Geoff Miller?
I came up with "Roll back the foreskin of boredom and let us apply the wire brush of new experience" all by my little self, way back in 1990. I used it on a flyer for my band. There's no way more than 100 people ever saw those flyers...
Any chance Geoff Miller and I independently came up with that phrase? Or, did one precede the other?
Hey, it's almost a holiday.
Moderate as you see fit...
I have discovered a truly remarkable proof which this margin is too small to contain.
He's not saying that having an overarching strategy to solve problems is bad. He's saying that taking one stance on everything is. One viewpoint, and no matter whether it fits or not, shoving the problem through it, is bad. The idea that you can reduce all of the worlds problems and solutions to a set of dogmatic beliefs.
And worse not just adopting the static set of viewpoints for yourself. But making/forcing everyone else in a state/nation/whatever to follow it also. A mature individual is someone who can calmly look at the facts, and come up with a good solution for a problem without trying to let their own biases screw up the process too much. A mature society is very similair. No one is saying you can't have a philosophy/ideology of your own. He's saying one-size-fit's-all is a poor fit for your mind.
Although the Plan carries Marshall's name, it does so primarily because he, as Secretary of State, presented it. The man whose vision created the Marshall Plan, and who is not coincidentally mentioned elsewhere in this piece, was Dean Acheson. I think the two, Marshall and Acheson, were too closely linked to argue that one of them, alone, is the Man of the Century -- even the American Century.
Jeff
In effect, you are saying the Europe got American goods for free. Under most circumstances this would be a calimity for the recipient economies, and certainly this was bad for a few fortunate individuals who might have stood to profit from severe and widespread want. On the other hand given the state of postwar Europe I don't think most Europeans would have been better off wihtout the Marshall plan. And, in the end, you can't exactly call a country like Germany an economic colony of the US.
In my view, the fact that Americann companies benefited enormously makes this a stroke of genius. It was a plan at once mutually beneficial, politically feasible, and humane. Statesmanship simply doesn't get better than this.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
>And as a result, a program that was originally designed to let a particle physics research group transfer graphic data from CERN led to the medium by which you're (hopefully) reading this.
/. via the web? I just get the weekly /. Digest from Andover.net Press. Just think of how many pages of perfectly crafted comments, and the plethora of information I get to cary around in a handcart. Of course - I get the large print edition (8 point font), but you can save paper and get the 4 or 6 point versions, too.
/. Digest is even better than the NYTimes or WSJournal for those... longer visits to the john. Nothing like a good first post to get you going...
You read
The
(Score -1: Inapropriate, and just dumb)
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
Funny how history repeats itself. William Marshall was the chief military advisor to Henry II, as remarkable a king as FDR was a President. (It's after him that the term "Knight Marshall" comes to us.) Like his distant namesake, he was widely reknowned for absolute integrity.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
My choice for the most influential person is that guy who shot the Prince that started WW1.
By the time the Archduke was aassinated, any pretext for a war would have done, the major powers were itching for a battle, anticipating something like the Franco-Prussian war of 1870. Instead they got something much more like the American Civil War.
Another vote would be for Admiral Yamamoto for drawing the US into WWII. If it wasn't for these guys, we'd be living in a wholly different world.
Same answer as above, by the late 30's conflict between Japan's imperial/economic expansionistic tendencies and America's interests was bearly unavoidable.
Forgive the lack of links, but I believe Yamamoto had been in the US, knew Americans, and knew that the attack on Pearl Harbor would be suicide for Japan. He knew Americans weren't cowards dolts afraid of a fight (apparently other Japanese military leaders figured a knockout blow at Pearl would destroy American resolve), but rather people who wanted to avoid a fight, but would give their all when they were sneak attacked. But Yamamoto was a loyal sailor, and followed his orders.
George
With the death of the Soviet Union, the West has missed the golden opportunity to 'Marshallize' the former Soviet Union.
We simply had no leaders willing to do the work needed to look at the big picture. Now, already, we have dozens of cases where there could have been a non-violent result if there was a viable economic system in place.
My vote for years has been General & Secretary of state George Marshall. His legacy will outlast anything Hitler did. Otherwise one pretty much needs to select Ghandi.
That's the problem with military force, and government power in general - it's a vector quantity that can be rotated very rapidily, increased more slowly, and almost never reduced. A powerful military may be pointing in the "protect our people's freedom" direction one month and the "destroy the enemies of the Fatherland" direction the next.
Also note that being opposed to a strong standing military doesn't mean being a pacifist. The authors of the Federalist papers viewed a standing army as one of the greatest threats to freedom, prefering a strong militia to defend the nation from invasion.
But it is an interesting question whether non-violent resistance could have turned the German population away from Hitler with less loss of life than was involved in WWII. Thoreau's civil disobedience was a tactic designed for use against the laws of one's own government, and that's where it has seen its greatest successes - Indian independance, the US civil rights movement, the end of apartheid. I don't know if it could be used against an invading state.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Since "man of the millennium" has been brought up, I nominate Gutenberg; without his invention having been invented, we wouldn't be wondering about all of this on /. After all, the WWW is a logical outgrowth of the invention of the computer network coupled with mass printing.
If it works in theory, try something else in practice.
I like Hiroshima too, another joint US & Japanese production, this one about the events surrounding the end of the war in both countries.
All the creatures will die, And all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai. (Jubai, 1605)
Joint Canadian & Japanese production, but fair to both sides, I thought. (Others, undoubtedly, will disagree.) Reminded me of Tora! Tora! Tora! in structure, though.
All the creatures will die, And all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai. (Jubai, 1605)
Do you have a better EUROPEAN candidate? Winston Churchill, no question. (And I am American) Think about it, without Churchill: 1) England would not have gotten her troops to France in time to help stop the Germans at the Marne in 1914 (When WSC was the First Lord of the Admiralty) 2) The English welfare state would not look the same (WSC was an ally of Lloyd-George in getting the welfare state off of the ground) 3) Of course, England would probably have surrendered in 1940. Hitler would have won, and been able to invade Russia without any distractions.
Irrespective of the achievements of the current Bishop of Rome, your statement's overreaching implications are patently ridiculous. To assume that a man who holds some sort of spiritual position is ipso facto disqualified from temporal recognition is itself the more insulting of the two choices. If a man does great things, it matters not what ice cream flavor he might prefer.
Spain does not hesitate to honor its Christian, Jewish, Moslem, and Roman countrymen. Go to Córdoba; go to Toledo. Observe the statuary and respect. Why should we be any less respectful than they are?
Probably because of my background(I'm a brazilian) I studied the History of the United States without the many myths surrounding it in episodes like the founding of the colonies, the "democratic" american revolution, the civil war and the period of reconstruction.
Theodore Roosevelt was the most weird american president(my opinion). He invaded Cuba and expanded more the territories of the United States and the policy of imperialism(remember the expansion of the USA to the Pacific and Phillipines). He loved hunting and guns and often had explosions of rage when his decisions were contested by the Congress.
And Woodrow Wilson launched the policy of "America for the americans". His discourse is very beautiful, but behind this lied a policy to show, specially to Europe, that all Americas should stay in the sphere of influence of the USA. This speech influenced generations of north american governments until today to use any methods they could to protect american interests in Central and South America.
So I must disagree with the point made by David Brin about these two presidents and their positions concerning democracy.
"Learning, learning, learning - that is the secret of jewish survival" -- Ahad A'Ham
All of this is to say that in spite of this well-written appreciation of George Marshall, there is no right answer.
So keep on arguing.
In the long view, historical events tend to change their meaning, so in some ways "positive" and "negative" impacts of historical figures and events tend to change. Bloodthirsty rebels become saintly freedom fighters, dictators become "statesmen" or "nation-builders", important technological or economic advances become overshadowed, etc. I mean, i haven't seen Charles Lindbergh on any of these lists, at least not that I can remember ...
Not to say that abuses of human rights, genocide, slavery, aren't just plain wrong, but that views of history have a way of ignoring these things when some other aspect of a life or event becomes more relevant to current beliefs and events.
Don't forget that many anti-communist agitators in eastern europe were priests. Several were killed for such activity in Poland alone; the pope himself only barely escaped that sad fate.
That said, anti-communism strikes me as a one-note philosophy, lacking a connection to a larger whole or principle. Which isn't to say that anticommunists are unprincipled, merely that the anti-communist movement as a whole is such an incredibly mixed bag that we can use it as proof of almost nothing - except for anti-communism itself, of course. It spans the breadth of political thought, from die-hard leftist intellectuals (Orwell) to totalitarian dictators of the worst order (Pinochet).
When selecting a man of the century, one should select a man who exemplifies the thought of the century. Should we select a man who exemplifies only a single thought - perhaps a man who only had a single thought? If we are to select a laughingstock, then we should abandon all pretense and seek out the greatest laughingstock available.
If we are to seek out a great man, on the other hand, then someone who thought great thoughts and performed great deeds (that is, someone who wasn't along for the ride of history) is as good a choice as you could possibly make. Marshall is an entirely apt choice in this respect.
--
--
There is no premature anti-fascism. -Ernest Hemingway
I'm actually motivated to read a biography on the life of George Marshall, simply from reading this excellent article.
Thank You, David Brin!
ps. Love yer novels
Dive Gear
--- Think of it as evolution in action ---
Naming Georges Marshall as "Man of the Century" certainly is a good choice, and most of the points you raise excellent. Here are a few remarks of my own:
Well, that certainly isn't true. Most nations at the start of the Twentieth Century thought about expanding their existing empires and bring more people and territories under their domination. Even the USA were involved in colonialism at the time, with its "management" of the Philippines and other territories it won in the US-Spanish war. Most European nations (France, UK, Germany, Belgium, Spain, etc) had huge empires that spanned the globe -- and most of them considered as a "God-given" right the possibility to dominate other people and cultures. Remember: those were deeply racist times and the white people of the earth truly believed they were the ones to bring light, science, education and Christianity to the poor masses of the rest of the world. Democracy was for WASP, or, at the very least for Rich White Men (no women or "colored" accepted, thank you).
Again, this can be disputed: in most of Europe, the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th Century were periods that saw an incredible surge in spiritism, the "New Age Religion" of that time. Many people then (as now) believed in spiritual planes, in angels and so on and so forth. It is true that science was elevated above everything else -- but most people at the time, even in the richest European countries, still lived in poverty and/or in an agrarian lifestyle, lived and die in the place they were born and totally ignored the world beyond the next village.
One may argue that this fascination with ideology came from the same simplistic vision of the future that was commonly accepted at the time: that science was going to solve every problem and allow us to live an abundant life. Communism and Socialism also came about because of the appaling conditions of the "working class" at the time. While that may not excuse the ignoble murders that followed, Marx (a 19th century prophet of doom) had many things to say, and many that ring true today. In particular, some of his visions about the limit of Capitalism still ring true today.
I would say, in general, that the start of the 20th century was an incredibly naive times -- most people truly reduced human beings to paper caricature and refused to see the complexity of both the world and the creatures that inhabit it.
IMHO, we never climbed out of the pit. We are just sinking down a little bit more slowly...
Let's face it: we are not getting any closer to world peace and cooperation. The one difference between now and 1942 is that the most powerful countries in the world are not fighting each other, as they were then.
On that, I totally agree with you. Marshall did not repeat the terrible, repugnant folly of the Treaty of Versailles and probably paved the way for both peace and prosperity... in Western Europe only.
... And many would argue today that he failed. The UN today is nothing more than an a source of interesting world statistics and a soapbox where poor people of the world can plead for help -- often with no result. It is also interesting to note that the USA, who helped create the UN in the first place, are right now one of its most constant enemies (for instance, because they do not pay their due to the UN). Sadly, the United Nations, like the League of Nations before it, as become increasingly irrelevent as large corporations plunder and extort enormous concessions from the smallest and poorest nations of the world.
Money and brute force are the two most effective forces in the world today. This situation has been the same for most of mankind's history, and I am afraid it will stay this way for all of our history.
The key words here are "lip service". There is no "international" moral code. Morality is not recognized as an important factor in International Law. Morality does not exist as far as nations are concerned. Period.
Example? Tibet/China. Tibet has been oppressed by China for 20? 30 years? What have done to change this? Nothing! Why? Because China's power and headcount make most nation weary of confronting them... and most companies just salivate at the prospect of a prosperous China. Does it really matter China is not a democracy? Of course not -- don't be silly. Money talks.
As Dr Evil would say: "Right...". Well, just remember who it was that divided Europe (and most of the world) between them and Uncle "Joe" Stalin. FDR and Churchill. It was quite convenient to turn a blind eye when the tanks rolled in Prague, Warsaw or Budapest. Most of NATO and the USA hardly ever blinked at the time.
People in Eastern Europe may feel great (maybe just OK, actually) right now -- but people in Russia are not! And the quality of life of most people in Eastern Europe is still way below the rest of Western Europe. Not to mention Bulgaria or Romania, where living standards have been (incredibly) tumbling down from their already low position.
Well, "we" did not fry the planet because "they" also had the bomb. And, even then, "we" came awfully close to frying the planet a couple of times, thank you.
Dear Mr Brin, I am afraid that (like many other science-fiction writer) you succumb to the same idealistic vision you so forcefully (and rightfully) denounce at the start of your essay. We are not entering a Golden Age. There is no Golden Age -- just a long, slow crawl from one era of bloodshed to another. Humanity may have learned a lesson or two during the 20th Century, but probably not enough to pass it on to the next generation (or the generation after that). Proof? Neo-Nazi movements are on the rise again, thanks (in part) to the Internet.
Expect more massacres and ideologies in the near future, despite all the good work of Mr Marshall... One sad "feature" (read: bug) of humanity is that lessons are usually not learned very well, and forgotten as soon as another generation appears on the stage to replace the previous one.
Happy New Year!
The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
Look at the religious right in the US, preparing for (or preparing to cause) the end of the world in a week. Look at extremist Islam in Afghanistan, where women are treated worse than animals. Look at Yugoslavia and Rwanda, where people were tortured and killed simply because of their nationality or beliefs.
Even now in the supposedly educated and enlightened West, look at what unbridled corporate power has done to our ability to truly live and speak freely.
Now, I grant that no large-scale movement of the type or scale of fascism or communism has been able to take hold, but we all have our ideologies, and sadly, I don't expect them to go away anytime soon.
--mark
Being as my username is from Startide Rising, I just had to say something. I'm not happy that Startide Rising is going to be made in to a movie, because I choose this name to be obscure and not get in to arguments over it. On topic, while I think Marshall was a great man, the whole idea of making a list is rather pedantic. There are many people that brought us to where we are in this point in history. How can one be more valuable than another. Inventors, scientists, philosophers, military leaders, world leaders and especially mothers and fathers are needed. (ok, so world leaders is debatable). Brin points out that his canditate depended greatly on others, Roosevelt, Churchill, Eisenhower, the soldiers, the people that built the military machines.... The list goes on, everyone was needed in some small way.
It's the 21st Century Do you know what your government is doing
If I may add to this...
(I recently read an article about him in the latest issue of Military History Quarterly.)
During the Depression years, competent staff generals like Marshall languished in out of the way posts while prima donnas like MacArthur were running the Army. What did Marshall do at his lackluster post? He set up work and education (literacy) programs for the local soldiers and civilian population, even though it did little for his career to do so. Seeing what the Depression was doing to those around him, he decided to reach out and help them.
Disliking a person because of their title (race, sex, etc), without trying to get to know who the person is and what they've done, is just the sort of pre-conceived judgement that this world can do without. This century, this millenium, has seen enough of that. Haven't we figured this out yet?
I've noticed that several people are already complaining about the fact that Marshall was a member of the military.
I keep getting this feeling that a lot of you believe that being a member of the military automatically makes you a violent person who likes to kill.
There are very few jobs in this world where the employee enjoys EVERY SINGLE task that they have to perform. The same is true of the military. If you took a poll of military people, and asked them how many look forward to war and killing people, I'll bet less that 1% answer that they want war and death.
Being Pro-military in the USA does not mean you are Pro-war, or even Pro-conflict. It means you are Pro-defense, and often Pro-peace.
Does the bully quit picking picking on the little guy because the little guy 'wants to talk about it'? Not likely. He will quit when someone with equal power and strength, or even less power and strength but more courage, stands up to him.
To say that you could like Marshall, except that he was a 'military man' is just dumb. The fact that he was a high ranking member of the military does not mean he was a murderer, a war-monger, hateful, or violent. It does mean he believed in defending what you believed to be right. The pen is not always mightier than the sword and sometimes physical power is required for defence as a last resort.
"Anyone who can't laugh at himself is not taking life seriously enough." - Larry Wall
George Marshall is a good choice, for sure. However, I am still struck by the conflict that although he worked for peace, he was a soldier - and soldiers are trained to kill other human beings to forward whatever political agenda is on the table.
Quite frankly, I cannot think of a single person who was the *most* important in our century. It is like choosing the most important of equals.
My choice for the most influential person is that guy who shot the Prince that started WW1. Now there is a person who influenced the path of the whole world. Another vote would be for Admiral Yamamoto for drawing the US into WWII. If it wasn't for these guys, we'd be living in a wholly different world.
This post brought to you by your friendly neighborhood MBA.
The point is not that the problems and solutions are complex (though they are); the point is that the responses of individals can neither be predicted nor shaped by ideology. Individuals make decisions. The simple model that you build (based on your ideology) about how and why those individulas make those independent decisions is flawed and will always be flawed.
Brin's analysis is very rich on this point. Practical men craft practical answers to problems without being blinded by ideological blinders. Marshall did that. He labored within the ideological whirlwinds that surrounded him, yet he was able to hold off those forces and championed a practical plan that worked.
His point about ending 4000 years of treating the vanquished badly was one I hadn't thought about much. But in retrospect it is fascinating. Do US citizens of Southern heritage still hate Northerners more than the Germans do? :-)
Never underestimate the power of wishful thinking to filter what the eyes see and what the ears hear
Never underestimate the power of wishful thinking to filter what the eyes see and what the ears hear
--BuSa
Lets get some things straight first. Communism is an economic system, not a political system. It deals with the production and distribution of goods and the allocation of profit (not necessarily money) in a society. Moreover, Communism's application (accd. to Marx) works best in an industrialized economy; his economic philosophy is really a system of urban manufacturing, not rural farming, resource allocation
If you're talking Marxian Communism (which is what most people talk about when they're talking about ideological, rather than applied, communism) then religious orders definitely don't qualify.
There are two reasons why. First, the intent of communism is for purely material benefit, whereas religious institutions (monestaries, etc) are not intended for efficient production and consumption. Second, Marx was very anti-Religious - "Religion is the opiate of the masses." But this wasn't just a personal beef with religion. Marx thought that religion would ruin the pure efficiency of the economy by interrupting the "natural" flow of goods to the people.
Just wanted to say that I love the Uplift saga and would highly recommend it to all comers.
If it wasn't for the military, we would all be living under Hitler -- and he might still be alive today, picking the next racial target to exterminate.
I am genuinely curious what you would have done, as a pacifist, when Hitler started rolling through Europe (I'm assuming you are too young to have been there -- a European pacifist almost by definition would have to be).
And what if you had been Jewish? Would you simply have engaged "passive resistance" as your entire race was wiped out?
---
Besides, what would you have as an alternative to "our glorious democratic system?" Monarchy? Lottery? Celebrity Deathmatch?
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
All the traits that Brin mentions are certainly laudable--politics could gain a lot if more of its practitioners were embarrassed to be caught behaving like children. But he oversimplifies America's actions during the cold war by focusing on the foreign policy Marshall formed and conducted: if only the rest of America's actions had been equally "sober, far-seeing, patient, prescient" and unflappable, the tragedies of at least one war and countless acts of brutality by US-backed dictators could possibly have been avoided.
Brin says "you have only to ask the people of Prague, Warsaw, and a hundred other places how they feel about the outcome." Indeed, the people of Prague might still wonder why nobody came to help them when the Prague Spring (1956?) was crushed by Soviet tanks. Ask the people of Chile, Indonesia, Guatemala, Zaire, Iran (under the Shah), anywhere that the US placed a dictator in power and maintained him there by force against the will of the people, how THEY feel about the outcome. They'll probably ask why we stood in the way for so long. These countries may not be paradise even now, but they certainly were not improved by having their self-determination stifled by American decision-makers acting on fear of communism.
Brin also says "Above all, we did not panic and fry this planet. Wasn't that enough?" If he means 'enough to excuse everything else we did that was contrary to all the ideals Americans voice', I'd say no. The Soviets didn't panic and fry the planet either: will you give them equal credit for showing restraint? I didn't think so. The two superpowers both held back from starting the war that would truly have ended all wars, but largely because they had the horrific example of what happened the only time nuclear weapons were used in war. And I think you can recall what country was responsible for that.
George Marshall was a great man, and for all the reasons Brin gives I agree that he would make a marvelous example as person of the century. But don't ascribe his virtues to the rest of the foreign policy establishment that worked with and later succeeded him. Unfortunately, the rest of them are not worthy of the accolade.
Jenny, modern cynic
Ah, Marshall. An excellent paen to a forgotten hero as well as why the list thing is inane in te first place.
Assuming that you are right Mr. Brin -- and I think you have put together a very persuasive piece -- it is sad to say that Time would never put on the cover a visage and name that would leave 80% of the population under the age of 65 just scratching their heads going, "huh?"
Marshall may win on the fundamentals but I have to give Churchill the win on style points. Sure he was an egotist, but what a life he lived!
Also, gotta thow Gahndi in there. If one is consigering Dr. King, one should go straight to the source. He taught Dr. King everything he knew and made freedom possible for more than half a billion. King is such a navel-gazing, America-centric choice.
"Being Irish, he possessed an abiding sense of tragedy which sustained him through brief episodes of joy." -W. B.
A cookie to you if you know what he is famous for.
I would just like to note for the record:
;) ) but Hitler was
Adolf Hitler is a perfectly correct person to have
listed in the Man of the Century place.
Anyone who has actually READ the Time text, they
specifically state the person who singly had the
greattest effect "GOOD OR BAD". Thus positive
figures are NOT the ONLY allowable figures.
I don't remember who I voted for (may have been
Albert Hoffman, but I forget
quite an amazing figure. The few quotes I have
seen from Mein Kampf, show me that he, if nothing
else, truly understood politics.
I have yet to see another political figure so
charismatic and with such a deep understanding of
his craft. All successful politicans, even today,
even here in the US, use his techniques. (Thats
not to say his ideas were all original, or that
he was the first to practice them...just that he
showed the most deep understanding of them and the
best ability to leverage them.
Don't get me wrong. I am NOT saying Hitler was a
great guy. Im not saying he was warm and fuzzy.
I am not saying he wasn't responsible for the
murder of several million human beings. I am just
saying he was a "Great Man" in the sense that he
was larger than life and occupies a larger page
in history than most men (great meaning large in
this sense).
He certainly has a level of infamy that deserves
note among the likes of others.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
> The Pope has been quite influential, but how did
> he play such a great role in bringing down
> Communism?
I hate to nitpick but...what downfal of communism?
The Downfal of communism in the USSR happend right
at the begining. Lennin and Stalin were the
Downfall of communism. Mostly because, they were
not communists.
Communism is a socialist system. It is a system
where everyone lives in communities, works for
the good of the community and shares in the
productivity of the community. A system without
classes.
Lenin and Stalin didn't want that. They created a
top ruling class for themselves. They were
communist in name only. In fact, I would go as far
as to say that Stalin was more closly fascist than
communist.
There is plenty of "Communism" around. Priests and
brothers in most christian churches I know of live
communisticly. They all live together in dorms,
they share communal vehicls. they take care of
each other.
There are even small communes spread throughout
the US of people who were disdainful of this
capitalistic society and wanted to live together
in peace. They got a bunch of land and set up a
commune.
THAT is communism (well a form of it...however the
Russians NEVER had a form of it)
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
The idea of determining what one single person is the greatest person of a year, decade, century etc. is quite frankly one of the more stupid ideas of the century. The horse-race mentality that has bred the dozens of award shows, list issues, and web polls is an utterly simplistic view of the complexity of human events. But this is North America, and there's always gotta be winners and losers, right?
bun-fhuinneog agam!
If you have a reason you think I'm wrong (I'm just playing here, what is "man of the century" if it's not for fun?) fire away :) but just saying, "nobody can tell the future" isn't all that interesting.
Look at the loophole in the naive "man of the century" rules: a huge swath of humanity spent the better part of this century living in various Marxist experiments, while the rest of the world experimented with ways to eliminate it (except for Stallman! :) But Karl Marx lived in the last century, so he can't be man of this century. But his thinking was significant enough that I think he ought to get man of the something... so, I think anybody who predicted at the end of the last century... you get the point.
Long after people have forgotten about Marshall, simply the administrator in charge of a huge welfare program to rebuild the "Kosovo of 1945" ("Europe", that is, Kosovo on a grander scale), people will instead remember the ones who pioneered a new way to look at information, a way that reshaped the modern economies of the world.
You don't have to buy everything Stallman talks about or even like him, he's a fallible human like everyone else: the "give me liberty or give me death" squad of this age. But he was, early and often, the gazeteer of the movement, the wacky anarchist on the soapbox in the public square. In the next century, when technology is creating many marvelous possibilties and you are thankful that the human genome has been GPLed, you'll come to understand what I'm talking about.
Even modern saints like Ghandi -- though properly admired for their principles and moral courage -- are seen to have been limited or foolish in their specific political agendas, from pastoral-socialism to libertarian solipsism. Humanity proved more complex than ideologues ever imagined.
Its arrogant to call him politically foolish. I mean, he did give birth to the biggest democracy in the world.
For those of you not familliar with the Marshall Plan, it was - reduced to the basics - a plan by which America dumped millions and billions of dollars into wartorn Europe. A wonderful gesture to be sure. But, as the cynical among you would guess, there was catch. This money could only be spent on American goods.
So what did that mean? While it provided devastated Europe with the means to quickly rebuild and jump back into civilization, it economically enslaved them to the US for decades.
Think about it. As a businessman in, say, France, how you do compete with this plan? You sell textiles, and good cheap ones at that. But no matter how cheap and well you make them, it's hard to compete with the essentially free textiles that American firm overseas is putting out. I say essentially free because the textiles are still being bought; they're just being pad for by the American funds dumped into Europe.
So while the Marshall Plan was a Good Thing(tm) on the one hand, it was a Bad Thing(tm) on the other. In essence, George Marshall could (and should IMHO) be the American Person of the Century. When you combine his plan with the fact that the US was a thousand miles away from the bombs and such (hey, us Canucks were too, but we didn't have no steenkin' Marshall Plan!) it's easy to see how he pretty much guranteed the US the economic throne for the rest of the century.
This is good for the US. It is not for the rest of the world. As such, I would humbly submit that he is not a good choice for Man of the Century. [SARCASM]Of course, we already know an American will win that honour, seeing as how America is the greatest nation to ever grace our planet[/SARCASM] :)
Wood Shavings!
- Godai
This article was excellent, mostly well researched with minor exceptions(Gordon B. Hickley's title is President, and Ford who he praised was a well known anti-semite, winning Germanys highest award that could be given to a foreign civilian during Hitlers reign). General of the Army George Marshall was extremely influential, both inside and outside the military and the country. Without the Marshall plan Europe and Japan would not be such close, vital allies. He saw how the Treaty of Versailles, at least in part, caused World War II. And when his time came to help oversea the peace process, he did not repeat his predecessors mistakes. He is truly a great man. I second this nomination. Has it been sent to the Time editors?
The Pope has been quite influential, but how did he play such a great role in bringing down Communism? He has revitalized his church to be sure, and been much better about doing so than previous popes. I'm sure we all remember from history classes the inquistion and the Crusades, the current pope, and hopefully all to follow are above that. Still, how is he more influential than Gen. Marshall? Maybe his influence is more positive, but Marshall would seem to just have had so much more influence period.
Also, despite his accomplishments in more peaceful fields, Marshall is too much of a militarist for me to respect this much, me being a pacifist.
So, while George Marshall was certainly a great man, he was not a man I could nominate for this title as I am European. :)
As he correctly points out, the people who have had the loudest voices or the biggest followings have been quite influential (that is one of the definitions of "influence") on our progress as a civilization. If it weren't for these people shouting their ideas -- even the bad ones -- we wouldn't be where we are now.
However, as we here on Slashdot should realize, the loudest people don't always have the greatest effect on humanity at large. There's always a group of people who are saying, "Forget the publicity, ignore the heckling, let's just get this job done!" We may gripe about clueless management, bad pay, less-than-perfect working conditions, but we stay in and do the work, and we tweak it where we can to make it a little better.
And as a result, a program that was originally designed to let a particle physics research group transfer graphic data from CERN led to the medium by which you're (hopefully) reading this.
Honestly, I think that perhaps, rather than a "Person of the Century," some magazines might want to broaden their view to include some groups like the software development team at CERN that first came up with http.
Strike while the irony is hot! -- The Freethinker
i didn't realize that the pope was a flamboyant figure. certainly he might be considered more influential more positive than marshall, although i agree with the assessment in general. but the current pope was probably the most influential figure in the downfall of communism, the revitalization of an ailing church and a dialogue among peoples of disparate geographical regions and beliefs.
- "If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything" -Mark Twain
it would seem to me that, in light of modern america's relativism and behavioural pscychological democracy, bill clinton would be the perfect man of the century. he embodies the childish tendencies and hypocrisy that only we americans could elevate to a position of leadership.
- "If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything" -Mark Twain
is this being self-moderated or something? how do such comments get *interesting*? how about funny. or pathetic.
- "If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything" -Mark Twain
Given what we know about politics and what it takes to get ahead in our 'glorious' democratic system, why on earth would anyone in their right mind support a politician from the last century as the greatest anything? Quite seriously, I'd throw my support behind Bill Gates, Rupert Murdoch, or Michael Milken long before I'd support any one of the gaggle of power-mongering idiots that have littered the oval office and congress for the last 100 years. My next door neighbor probably deserves more laurels.
Serbian Nationalist Gavrilo Princip started WWI when he assassinated Archduke Ferdinand in Sarajevo
Shut up, be happy. The conveniences you demanded are now mandatory. -- Jello Biafra
Brin's choice of an unassuming figure is interesting in that it demonstrates that good is done by the cooperation of many; Marshall's good works would have been empty if others had not carried them out or followed through.
The flip side of this is that one person can take advantage of the timidity of others to do great evil. Thus, tyrants are better suited to lists of single-most-influential because to them can be personally ascribed havoc and suffering. After all, geopolitics would be wonderfully boring if world leaders acted like responsible adults.
So, I would nominate Stalin as the most influential man of the century. His actions and legacy influenced, and usually dominated, the foreign policy of virtually every country on Earth from 1924 until 1989. In the 30's, his was the feared regime that helped bring fascists to power in Europe and kept America focused on its own shores. In the 40's, he stepped aside to let Hitler conquer most of Europe, then led the Soviets in halting the Nazi advance well before Normandy, then swallowed up Eastern Europe and supported the rise of Mao in China. From the 50's until '89, from Cuba to Africa to the Middle East to Vietnam to Korea, the conflict between his ideology and the West dominated the world stage.
It's telling that today, the remains of Communism smolder only in his pet revolutionary projects: Cuba, North Korea, and China.
Even Hitler doesn't compare as someone who brought sustained hardship to so many for so long, and his impact outside of Europe was so much less than Stalin's.
Unquestionably, the Evil Bastard of the Century would have to be Stalin.
"You can't get something for nothing." - my grandfather, on the stock market and Reaganomics.
Like I said, and I think you agree, I don't think facism or communism or capitalism or whatever will ever be able to explain a person, much less society. However, we may be able to come out of the 20th century with the knowledge that we need to be wary of anyone who proselytizes the simple solutions that historical ideologies have proffered. We may not need to condemn them (i.e. MLK or Ghandi), but we need to be sure to understand that there is something deeper than their simple solutions.
So, I think what Brin is trying to say is that ideologies, at least by his definition, are just the facade or "front" for deeper issues, whether we understand that at the time or not. As such, they can't address everything coherently. He is not saying that "ideologies are bad because ideologies are bad"...that would be tautological and pretty silly. It seems that he is simply showing how, by his definition of ideologies as "simplistic visions of utopia", ideologies are not the final answer, and that we need to learn that lesson.
I think you're right, though, that we can't let this stifle our search for the answer. Some "ideologies" have been almost inarguably good in their effects, and we've learned a lot from even the bad ones (not that I'd care to repeat some of them!). Hopefully the lesson we take with us will be one of humility, something like "we don't know the answer, we've tried some simple ones that for whatever reason don't work, but we've learned to be more careful and think about things a little more". Who knows. At least people like you and Brin are thinking about it; if everyone looked at it with some criticality, I think we could solve a lot of problems (although that, too, is probably an ideology :).
I know little history, it's not my field, and I paid little attention in high school.
Yet I terribly enjoyed this essay, thanks for sharing it. Marshall reminds me of a Heinlein character, and I can give no higher compliment.
Thanks.
Where would you be without Calculus? (Okay, Liebnitz(sp?), but still...)
Where would we be without the theory of Gravity?
Perhaps Gallileo or Davinci, and Jefferson would be a good candidate as well, but if I had to pick ONE person out of the last 1000 years, I'd go with Newton.
"God does not play dice with the universe." -Albert Einstein
Those who fail to understand communication protocols, are doomed to repeat them over port 80.
Marshall was certainly a good man and a great military leader. Brin, however,
exaggerates his importance. The "Marshall Plan" was principally Truman's idea and
project, but he let Marshall take credit for it, because Marshall's standing as a
"non-partisan" Secretary of State allowed him to sell the plan to a Republican controlled
Congress, which would have reflexively opposed anything associated with Truman.
Even more importantly, however, it must be stressed that W.W.II was not primarily an
American war: the bulk of the Nazi forces were defeated by the Soviet Union. The
United States participated in the ultimate victory in a number of ways, but the assessment
of its involvement must go far beyond the army it built and introduced to the European
and Mediterranean theater starting in late 1942. In fact, for the most important decisions,
one has to look before Pearl Harbor.
In June of 1940, Roosevelt met with his military advisors (including Marshall), who
unanimously recommended that all military goods be immediately embargoed, on the
grounds that they were desperately needed for America's own military buildup, and any
sent to Britain would end up in German hands soon enough. Roosevelt rejected their
advice, and actually stepped up shipments to Britain (and the other, by now minor, powers
still holding out in various parts of the world), on the grounds that it was more important
to keep those countries still in the fight alive, rather than to focus solely on future US
military involvement. Allies were more important than weapons.
This was an extraordinarily courageous decision, and may have decided the outcome of
the war. Aid was extended to all countries fighting Nazi Germany (and later Japan as
well) including the Soviet Union, over considerable public opposition. Shipments of what
became Lend Lease aid had (informally) higher priority than the needs of America's own
military services. The courage to make this happen was FDR's, and if an American is to
be picked for "person of the century", he deserves the selection. Of course, he had the help
of better subordinates than presidents' enjoy today. The military leaders who were
overruled, and repeatedly denied in their requests kept their silence in public, and didn't
leak. if a current president were to do as FDR did, the headlines in the the next day's
papers would read, "Pres. Rejects Unanimous Pentagon Recommendation! Will send
'Vitally Needed' Military Hardware to Brits!", and that would be that.
This is the cornerstone of what give the country it unique and great dynamic. Without the diversity we would be a stale and enclosed society.
I think this is what gave the country such a dynamic that breeds equality among all. A cornerstone.
What a visionary. I whole heartedly agree.
More race stuff in one place,
than any one place on the net.
Compare this with Time's Person Of The Year for 1999, Jeff Bezos. Without saying anything about the personality or character of Mr. Bezos (which I am in no position to judge), consider the reasons for his selection. Is he admired for his principles? Lauded for his courage? You might say that Time is celebrating his vision and foresight, but in truth they're celebrating his bank account.
In fact, Bezos is serving as an iconic representation of the wildly successful e-commerce phenomenon. In considering that phenomena, it's sad to say, the ideas, ideals, and personalities that spring to mind are indeed an antithesis to the quite, calm courage and confidence that Marshall embodied. While I won't say the Internet is the cause, it certainly has highlighted the human propensity for narcissism.
So, as much as I would like to, in looking back on the Century from 1999, I find it difficult to say that Marshall is the person who is most representative of this age. By that criteria I would not consider him to be the Man Of The Century, a title that wouldn't suit him anyway. Instead, I would consider him one of the century's greatest heroes, an honor that perhaps appropriately and characteristically will go unproclaimed.
The Original Celebrated Curiously Strong GHOST (mentha lemures)
There's a small factual error in the text of the original item. Marshall didn't actually suggest the Marshall plan, nor was he its main author. Truman and Acheson were. In fact, I don't think that Marshall should be the man of the century. But I think that the plan which bears his name should certainly be the Plan of the Century, as it was a brilliantly executed combination of Wilsonian generosity with Trumanian grit, smarts, and cunning which almost certainly changed the world.
Marshall took the credit for the plan, even though he didn't want it. The reason was purely political: Truman and Acheson were facing a strongly Republican Congress, and had their names been publically attached to the plan, then it would have become a political football, and it would have failed. Marshall, widely seen as a military hero, was immune to the personal attacks that would have been levelled against the other two. So he was nominated to receive an burden he didn't want -- responsibility for the "Marshall" plan's passage.
And it worked. And, more importantly, the plan worked. It was largely seen as a foreign rebuilding plan, since it spent a lot of money in Central Europe rebuilding economies there. But it was more than that: the Marshall plan was also the formation of NATO, the Breton Woods agreements, and the fomenting of the EU.
Truman, Acheson, and Marshall all saw that the conditions which had spawned Hitler after World War I had been recreated in even larger scale after World War II. Even looking back with half a century's perspective, it still seems overwhelmingly probable that another central European tyrant would have sprung up spouting some form of nationalistic doctrine, rebuilt his country by rebuilding its army, and exploited the disaffection of the poor in his nation.
Unlike the situation before WWI, he'd have been backed by the Soviet Union. He'd have had nuclear weapons, and he'd have marched across Europe in an eyeblink, leaving behind a wasteland. Likely, the rest of the world would have followed.
The Marshall plan was brilliant: by providing artificial stability to Europe, it removed the worst of the conditions under which another German Hitler could arise. It gave the US a way to keep the USSR from buying its way into another world war. In the long run, it created the modern Europe, stable and unified, and able to emerge in its rightful place as a single major power.
And as evidence of this, consider the recent events in the former Yugoslavia. The EU failed miserably and humiliatingly in Bosnia, but contained that conflict to Yugoslavia. It handled the resulting refugee crises in Italy and Austria with relative aplomb. It couldn't handle Yugoslavia's neo-fascist aggression against Kosovo, but through its subset of states common to the EU and to NATO, it could provide a significant armed force to help turn the tide. And it has now finally, fifty years after the end of WWII, decided on framework for a transnational military force in Europe. It can pay for that force, and the European powers understand that they collectively need such a force, but that no one of them needs such a force. This is finally a recipe for stability in the twentieth century's dark continent.
Yes, the plan had limitations, the worst of which was that it really treated Britain badly. No accomodation was made to lift the burdens of lend-lease, and so Great Britain suffered terribly during the fifties and sixties. That's also partly politics, unfortunately: the Republicans have never really quite forgiven FDR for being right about Hitler. They took pleasure in stabbing his memory in the back by refusing to reschedule Britain's lead-lease debt.
Holy non sequiturs, Ari. You've taken the practice of free-association to the next level. I believe the original post merely commented on Brin's ability to spell (non-English surnames sure are tough). Your own spellings are also highly original. Noel
Brin is such a pussy. He mentions Marshals work on the Atlantic Alliance as a great accomplishment. In fact the alliances lack of aggresivness permitted Stalin and his successors to oppress their people for 50 years. It was only when we started USING our ecconomic and military that the USSR colapsed. Brin also has this bullshit notion that in the future we will all be "equal". I say there will always be superior people who make a difference and groups of dregs trying to pull them down. Progress comes from the few fighting against the stupidity of the masses. The notion the Brin would even pick a man of the century is hypocritical. He shoould pick the Committee of the Century. My man of the century is Gen. Patton.
The Marshall Plan is evidence that humanity can learn from history- that, knowing what happened after WWI, we didn't want to repeat it. I agree with David Brin's choice because it would emphasize this fact to all and sundry.
One criticism that is levelled at policy-makers nowadays is that they don't look sufficiently into the future- people say that elected officials don't look further into the future than their own re-election. I'd like to point out that over the centuries, elected officials have gotten REALLY GOOD at looking into the future up until their re-election, which is a wonderful thing- because of this, planners can now look past that point.
There are a million examples where this doesn't happen, of course, but that shouldn't stop us from emphasizing and applauding all decisions which, as Brin states, show adult consideration.