Western European culture/identity is more fitting,
But that’s also not it, since ‘whiteness’ includes a milieu far outside of Western Europe, including people without Western European ancestry. Conversely, those who are steeped in Western European culture and identity are not always recognized as white.
influenced as well by post-WW2 Germany (Operation Paperclip and all of that).
… no, not at all. White identity was not only long-established by then, but the post-WW2 consensus, cultivated in part by the backlash against Nazism, was the beginning of the dismantling of white identity hegemony, a process that laboriously continues to this day.
But that’s also not it, since ‘whiteness’ includes a milieu far outside of Western Europe, including people without Western European ancestry. Conversely, those who are steeped in Western European culture and identity are not always recognized as white.
… no, not at all. White identity was not only long-established by then, but the post-WW2 consensus, cultivated in part by the backlash against Nazism, was the beginning of the dismantling of white identity hegemony, a process that laboriously continues to this day.