Jew-Baiting in Vienna UAT K1 *^'"'"' ^'"•- "'C Postwar Freikorps 'Ideology, Propaganda and Ihe Rise of the Nazi , , ""^/^"Nich Bcerhall Putsch
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
INFORMATION olumme XXXIX No. 1, January 1984 £1 (To non-members) Richard Grunberger the Party then capitulated to Hiller over the Ermiichtigungsgesetz such constancy was ultimate ly of little avail. For me the most absorbing theme touched on in this volume is the degree to which anti.>cmitism ^ NAZI ON THE LEFT buttressed the appeal of Nazism. The conclusions are so important that 1 quote them almost verbatim: l>uism was the ideology of the double blulT. It operation with General Schleicher. When Hitler In the transformation from viilki.sch sect to ctalcd the modern world-and used high tech- vetoed this, he resigned all his Party offices and mass party, antiscmitism played no more than a "logy. It dubbed all Jews capitali.sts-and departed the political scene. secondary role. Areas such as Franconia and ^omniunisls. H took power through the ballot- Then, when the Nazis took power a short time Hesse were exceptions. A lengthy tradition of nd the bullet. later, Strasser, the self-proclaimed anti-capitalist, anlLsemitism in such areas had much of its The very term Nationaisozialismus was as self- settled into a well-paid executive position in the source in the dominance of local trade and rural 0 iradictory as dry rain or vegetarian butcher. pharmaceutical industry. He was, however, to credit by a relatively large and widely dispersed ' l^r managed, by and large, to mask the contra- enjoy the lifestyle ofa tycoon for only a little over Jewish population. In most parts of Germany, Mion but in the mid-Twenties some Party mem- a year—ending his life in a hail of SS bullets on however, even where the NSDAP did dispro , , J ,^'' ^' the imbalance between the the Night of the Long Knives (30th June 1934). portionately well at the polls, there was little J.lionalisl and Socialist strands in his Paradoxically the other two most prominent history of outright hostility towards the Jews rotramnie. The point at issue was whether the victims of this bloodbath were his ex-enemy going beyond latent .ircjudicc, and antiscmitism VL mar Republic should pay compensation for Roehm and his ex-ally General Schleicher. was not usually a particularly striking feature of f>"iiscalcd princely estates. Hitler look the side of Dr. Stachura thinks Slrasser's reputation as a Nazi propaganda. Though antiscmitism prob I- princes thus arousing the opposition of some Socialist undeserved, but quotes with approval ex- ably played a more important motivating role 'li'sLclt-lcaning followers, Chanccllor Hriining's statement; 'He was the only for certain more 'ideologically' inclined social "ic best known 'Lcff Nazi was Gregor Stra.s- person in the NSDAP who could have one day groups, such as teachers and students, it came in . suDjcct ofa new biography by Peter Stachura eliminated Hitler and similar figures, and prepared the Depression period to be generally relegated ^ en & Unwin, £12.50). Strasser's career made a party evolution which might have spared to a role as backcloth to appeals made directly ; ,, ;' 'yP'ff' representative of the so-called Old Germany and Europe all that has occurred." I find to economic interest. itmcrs. iJnlikc many of them he had solid little to quarrel with in this conclusion. • ofcssional qualifications (as a pharmacist), but. 1 reacted somewhat more critically to The Nazi '1111 his shaven bullet-head and stentorian voice, Machtergreifung, a collection of essays on sUch .^nonetheless conformed to type. He was a themes as "National Socialism and Women' and Jew-baiting in Vienna UAT K1 *^'"'"' ^'"•- "'C postwar Freikorps 'Ideology, Propaganda and Ihe Rise of the Nazi , , ""^/^"nich bcerhall putsch. While Hitler was Parly". Some of the contributors to this volume Since sophisticated modern polling techniques n l^andsbcrg jail Strasscr expanded the Party into (occasioned by the SOth anniversary of 1933) make cannot be retrospectively applied to 1933. we shall . ucimany; later he led the Na^i group in the it hard for the reader to sec the wood for the trees. never be able to quantify the exact contribution of ,,,'*'«• O'^w-'ld Spengler thought him one of (Ldited by Peter D. Stachura, Allen & Unwin, Hitler's Jew-baiting to his election victory and , Vrr"' ""'" '''-• '^^'^ "^^"^r "let. Top Nazis like £15.) As conscientious, and carccr-niindcd, mass appeal. It is certainly the case that in 1938, as ^' -I'bcls and Roehm intrigued against him. The academics Ihey obviously feel compelled to show can be read in the recollections of Robert Wcitsch suit ol vendettas in the upper Party echelons themselves au fait with everything written on their and George Clare, Bcrliners exhibited less anti- ''lowed predictable lines. Gocbbels alleged that chosen topic—but the display of their apparatus of scmilisni Ihan the population of Viciin;i. >n.issers mother and wife were Jewish. Strasser scholarship hardly makes for readability. Even so Mention of Vienna, once the medical 'capital' of uu one heller: he attributed Goebbcls' clubfoot the book deals with a number of important issues, F.uropc, brings me to David Irving's biography of jar -Jewish ancestry (Folgc der Ra.s.senvermi- and repays diligent, if selective, study. One such Dr. Morcll, the Fuehrer's court physician. Lntilled •"'«)•. Neither side came lo much harm, for topic is the appeal of Nazism to German women. Adolf Hitler: The Medical Diaries, (Sidgwick & 1 iicr viewed such infighting among his satraps What emerges is that throughout the 1920s Jackson, £10.95) this book seems to have been ' '^^•l -interested Olympian detachment. women voters remained more loyal lo the commissioned on the a.ssumption that any printed ^iHiitiy afterwards the Nazis moved from the clerical/Conservative parlies than men. However mailer wilh Hitler's name in the title will lind |- iphcry 10 the centre of German politics. Their in the elections of the early Thirties, and with the willing buyers. The a.ssumption may be correct, but concurrent deinise of the Proleslanl conservative 1 found reading the thing a mind-numbing chore. iir iss""-''"'^'''"'" '" "''' "^''''y ''^^0' °^«='' '""'='^ 'o Deutsche Volkspartei, Nazism made deep inroads Who wants to wade through 300 pages loaded ^n'lvTi'' ^""^"^ '"* Keichsorgani.sationsleiter of the into the female electorate. In the Catholic constitu iv.rV. , .^'-'^'='">'" the political manoeuvring that with nuggets of information like 'two or three ency the Zentrum managed to retain the loyally of i.v M. I r '*'=""' "^'"°« ol" Weimar, Strasscr times a day 1 inject lOcc of twenty per cent glucose its women voters right up to March 1933, bul since J^vialcd from the Party line by advocating co Continued on page 2 Page 2 AJR INFORMATION JANUARY 1984 Continued from page I and top secret operations were deliberately left BEST NOT TO STAND TRIAL solution and after that lOcc of Septomid. Intra without documentary trace. A Diisseldorf court has finally decided that muscular injections of Vitamultin Calcium have Another revisionary historian who has recently Werner Best, second in command to Reinhard tlone a lot of good. .".> been heard on university campuses is Lenni Heydrich, is not fit to stand trial for his crimes. Now and then, however, my boredom abated Brenner, but with a dilTerent emphasis. A left-wing Best, now 80 years old, is said to be so enfeebled in jind gave way to nausea. One day Hitler had no Jewish civil rights activist, Lenni Brenner develops his memory and mental processes that he could bowel evacuation for five hours, whereupon Dr. a thesis of "Zionist collaboration with the Nazis". not stand the strain of proceedings. This decision Morell administered an enema. Afterwards he sent confirms an earlier pronouncement by the courts ^fecal specimen to Prof Nissel for examination. that no improvement was to be looked for in the I he latter returned his analysis post haste, attach condition of the accused. REHABILITATION OF FORMER NAZIS ing a note full of envy at Dr. Morell's proximity to Best, the German representative in occupied the centre of the action. The PEN Centre of German-Speaking Writers Denmark, was sentenced to death by a Danish Connoisseurs of nausea will also glean from Abroad issued a statement, protesting against a court in 1945 for his acts of terror; the sentence these pages that Morell munched his food like a number of incidents in which former adherents of was commuted, however, and he was released in pig at a trough, closed his eyes from the bottom up the Nazi ideology were rehabilitated by being 1951. The current accusations against him fill a and exuded foul body odours. awarded prizes named after prominent Jews. thousand-page volume and treat of some 8,700 Nor will connoisseurs of David Irving's persona Thus, about five years ago, the Sigmund Freud murders of Jews in Eastern Europe, carried out by i^e disappointed. Irving, it will be remembered, Prize of the "Deutsche Akademie fuer Sprache Einsatzgruppen. tii-sl disputed the authenticity of the Stern- und Dichtung" (Darmstadt) was awarded to Sieg It was stated during the Nuremberg Trials that Promoted Hitler Diaries, but did a volte-face when fried Melchinger; according to the statement, during his term of office in Denmark, Best had allowed access to a forged volume, because the Melchinger had written an enthusiastic review of made the arrest of Jews virtually impossible by nandwnting in it fitted in with Dr. Morell's dia the antisemitic interpretation of Shylock by forbidding police to break open apartment doors. gnosis ol Hitler's Parkinson syndrome. Werner Krauss in 1943. Last year, the Hermann This information was confirmed at his Danish trial It emerges subliminally from Irving's study that Sinsheimer Literary Prize ofthe city of Freinsheim by a former Auswartiges Amt official, who de tne decay of Hitler's body in no way alTected his wasi awarded to Dr.