ABSTRACT
The Red Holocaust, Ha Shoah and Japan’s Asian holocaust have common roots in the industrial revolution and Enlightenment; both positive and negative aspects. The industrial revolution drastically altered the global economic and military power balances, destabilizing political orders among winners and losers alike. The Enlightenment spawned democratization, liberalism, socialism, communism and national liberation movements; but the backlash and the industrial revolution fanned the fires of nationalism, chauvinism, colonialism, imperialism, fascism and other despotic forms of modernization. Economics was a core element in all these movements because material productivity conditioned success, and survival often was said to depend on the control of raw materials. Left, right and center, leaders embraced this or that system, and chose predatory or liberal international economic strategies. Imperialists and anti-imperialists could be found in all camps, but attitudes towards economic systems were polarized. Communists hitched their stars to command planning; everyone else to competitive or regulated markets.
