Why History is Important

Besides the Book of Proverbs in the Bible, my favorite proverb is one made famous by the Spanish Philosopher George Santayana: “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it." I believe that this is one of the most important lesson anyone can learn in life. It is important in our personal life and in the life of any family, nation, peoples, tribe or group of people. In your personal life, I’m sure that each of us has learned many important lessons just by our experiences; things that we want to repeat and things that we would never repeat. Now, if we fail to learn such lessons, then we will repeat them, whether it’s a relationship, a political philosophy, or a business strategy.

One of the most important lessons in our recent history is the famous meeting between British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and Adolph Hitler in September 1938, which produced the famous “peace in our time” agreement. Chamberlain was an honorable man who had gone through the worst war in world history, World War I, and he did not want another one less than 20 years later. After Hitler invaded the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia, the Europeans were very worried about an all out war with Germany. Determined that he would do whatever he could to avoid war, Chamberlain went to Germany to meet the Führer in September 1938. Hitler signed an agreement with Britain that, in exchange for peace, Czechoslovakia would give up the Sudetenland and Germany would be allowed to keep parts of Poland that they wanted. Chamberlain returned to England and proclaimed that he had achieved “peace in our time.” See this You Tube video of Chamberlain proclaiming“ peace in our time.

In summary, Chamberlain had given Hitler part of Poland and part of Czechoslovakia, the Sudetenland, if he would not make war on the rest of Europe. We refer to this as appeasement, meaning giving in to a bully so that he will leave you alone. As the world well knows, Hitler had no intention of abiding by this agreement, which he had signed. The next year, 1939, he invaded Poland and Russia and World War II exploded. Here is where I go back to the quote from George Santayana mentioned earlier. Have we learned from history or are we repeating the same thing? In politics, for the most part, those who are of the left always argue, “war is not the answer.” They always argue that diplomacy is what we need and it is the only way to solve problems. Now, I agree that diplomacy should be used, but there is a limit to what it can do.

Giving in to bullies never works. Starting from your childhood bully down the street, to a world bully such as Hitler, Saddam Hussein, Kim Jong-il, the North Korean dictator, we’ve learned that you can never appease them. For the last 20 years the United States has tried to appease Kim Jong-il to no avail. The same can be said for the Ayatollahs of Iran, or the tyrants of Palestine, Syria, Cuba or Venezuela.

History is important because it teaches us lessons in life that we can never learn from books, lectures or flowery eloquent rhetoric. There is a saying that children should be allowed to make their own mistakes because that will be the way they learn. If mom and dad tell them they will not learn, but experience will be a better teacher. Again, if we fail to learn from history, we are condemned to repeat it.