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Stephen Norwood on Hitler's American Friends: the Third

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Stephen Norwood on Hitler's American Friends: the Third Bradley W. Hart. Hitler's American Friends: The Third Reich's Supporters in the United States. New York: Thomas Dunne Books, 2018. 296 pp. Illustrations. $28.99, cloth, ISBN 978-1-250-14895-7. Reviewed by Stephen H. Norwood Published on H-Diplo (August, 2019) Commissioned by Seth Offenbach (Bronx Community College, The City University of New York) Bradley W. Hart’s Hitler’s American Friends gressively against US military and economic sup‐ makes a convincing case that during the period port for Britain when it stood alone against Nazi from Adolf Hitler’s assumption of power in Ger‐ Germany’s war machine, which by the end of June many until the US intervention in World War II, 1940 had overrun most of non-Soviet Europe. In groups sympathetic to Nazism attracted much addition, Hart’s work examines how the Hitler more support among Americans than most schol‐ government developed relationships with mem‐ ars acknowledge. Hart focuses on three of the bers of the US Congress and congressional staff, most important of these groups—the German and with American university administrators and American Bund, the Silver Legion, and the Chris‐ some faculty members, to present a favorable im‐ tian Front—that promoted a virulent anti‐ age of the Third Reich in the United States and semitism almost indistinguishable from that of even to conduct espionage. the Nazis. Hart emphasizes the groups’ broad geo‐ The book begins with one of the most famous graphical reach across the country. They drew sig‐ antisemitic speeches given in the United States nificant support from two of the nation’s largest until that time, delivered by aviator hero Charles ethnic groups, German Americans (especially the Lindbergh, the AFC’s “most popular circuit speak‐ Bund) and Irish Americans (the Christian Front). er” (p. 2), in Des Moines, Iowa, on September 11, The Silver Legion’s backing came largely from 1941. The speech was broadcast on radio across Protestants, the Christian Front’s from Catholics. the country to a sizeable mainstream audience. Hart also devotes considerable attention to The nation’s press gave it considerable attention the America First Committee (AFC), the nation’s the next day. Lindbergh accused the Jews of using leading isolationist organization in the years prior their “large ownership and influence in our mo‐ to American entry into World War II, whose esti‐ tion pictures, our press, our radio, and our gov‐ mated membership of eight hundred thousand ernment” to push the United States into a disas‐ was easily the highest of the groups he discusses. trous war. He warned darkly of a pogromist back‐ Primarily a conservative isolationist organization, lash if the United States entered the European the AFC included some liberal and socialist paci‐ conflict: the Jews “will be among the frst to feel fists and many militant antisemites. The AFC was its consequences” (p. 2). Hart quotes New York particularly dangerous to the security of Euro‐ mayor Fiorello La Guardia’s characterization of pean and American Jewry because it lobbied ag‐ H-Net Reviews Lindbergh’s statements as “a carbon copy of a Flannagan declared on the House foor that “he Nazi paper” (p. 3). did not want ‘any Ginsberg’ to lead his son in bat‐ The book includes a chapter on US citizen and tle.”[1] pro-Hitler propagandist George Sylvester Viereck, The book devotes attention to the economic whom Hart identifies as the Nazi government’s assistance many leading American corporations “single most important source of US political intel‐ provided Nazi Germany by establishing sub‐ ligence” (p. 98). Viereck had been a paid propa‐ sidiaries there. These corporations, some of which gandist for the German government during World had already invested considerable funds in Ger‐ War I, both before and after US entry, and had many before Hitler came to power, included Coca backed Hitler since 1923. Shortly after Hitler as‐ Cola, IBM, Woolworth’s, Ford, and General Mo‐ sumed power in 1933, Viereck began working tors, which had taken over the German automo‐ with the German Tourist Information Office to en‐ bile manufacturer Opel in 1929. These corpora‐ courage Americans to vacation in Nazi Germany. tions violated the boycott of German goods and This effort was designed to provide the Hitler gov‐ services, well underway in the United States by ernment with much-needed foreign exchange and the fall of 1933, thereby economically strengthen‐ expose the visitors to Nazi propaganda. Viereck’s ing Nazi Germany as it was rapidly rearming. most important accomplishment was developing Hart details the significant assistance some of relationships with members of the US Congress these corporations provided the German military. and their staffs that allowed him to obtain inside, He notes that Opel trucks “became the German and sometimes very sensitive, information about army’s favorite form of mechanized transporta‐ congressional discussions of affairs of concern to tion” (p. 123). Opel also provided parts for Luft‐ the Hitler government. Viereck developed particu‐ waffe bombers deployed in the Battle of Britain. larly strong contacts with isolationist senators Henry Ford, America’s most famous antisemite Ernest Lundeen and Burton Wheeler and with and AFC member, opened a plant in Cologne, Representative Hamilton Fish. Viereck had Ger‐ which supplied Hitler’s army with military vehi‐ man officials arrange for, and fund, the distribu‐ cles that it used in occupying Czechoslovakia. Ed‐ tion to the American public of massive numbers sel Ford decided to continue production at the of copies of isolationist and anti-British speeches company’s factory in France after its surrender in by members of Congress. The German embassy in 1940. Hart points out that American corporations Washington, DC, also fnanced Viereck’s purchase with plants in the Third Reich had a “vested inter‐ of Flanders Hall, a book company that he trans‐ est” in preventing US intervention in a European formed into Nazi Germany’s major publishing war, “especially with the Royal Air Force starting house in the United States. to bomb German factories that might soon in‐ Hart should have provided more context in clude their own” (p. 130). this chapter by discussing open expressions of an‐ In a chapter entitled “Students,” Hart sup‐ tisemitism on the foors of Congress. David S. ports the argument I made in The Third Reich in Wyman in his The Abandonment of the Jews the Ivory Tower (2009) that American institutions (1984) quoted US Representative John Rankin’s de‐ of higher learning helped to legitimize the Third nunciation of Jewish journalist Walter Winchell, Reich by forging friendly ties with German uni‐ who repeatedly condemned antisemitism and the versities, despite the Nazification of their curricu‐ Third Reich in his column, as “that little kike.” lum, the discharge of Jewish faculty, and the Leonard Dinnerstein in his Antisemitism in Amer‐ sharp limitation on Jewish enrollment. For exam‐ ica (1994) reported that US Representative John ple, university administrators warmly welcomed 2 H-Net Reviews high-level Nazi Party and government officials diately following World War I. The Bund estab‐ who came to their campuses to present Hitler’s lished a network of camps to indoctrinate German case. American colleges and universities hosted American youths in Nazi ideology and to instill a German exchange students that the Hitler govern‐ martial outlook in boys. Hart does not discuss the ment had trained as Nazi propagandists, while Friends of the New Germany’s and Bund’s aggres‐ sending American students to the Third Reich, sive, often violently enforced boycott of Jewish- where they were subjected to Nazi indoctrination. owned shops in New York City’s heavily German American exchange students often became advo‐ American Yorkville section. The Bund terrorized cates for the Hitler regime upon their return to and physically attacked Yorkville Jews and ruined this country. The chapter also devotes attention to many Jewish businesses.[3] Yet, strangely, Hart the Paul Reveres, allegedly engaged in espionage mistakenly claims at one point that the Bund was for Nazi Germany at colleges and universities, not “openly antisemitic” (p. 66), even as he and to American fascist propagandist Lawrence presents evidence elsewhere contradicting this. Dennis, who received many “high-profile” campus Closely associated with Nazi Germany, the Bund speaking invitations (p. 159). The Hitler govern‐ was unable to survive US entry into World War II. ment provided some funding to Dennis through The similarly pro-Nazi Silver Legion, headed George Viereck. by William Dudley Pelley, was about the same size The book’s frst two chapters provide useful as the Bund—fifteen thousand to the Bund’s twen‐ overviews of the virulently antisemitic German ty thousand, by Hart’s estimate of their peak American Bund and Silver Legion, respectively; membership, with each having an additional hun‐ the third, on “The Religious Right,” is devoted dred thousand sympathizers (p. 239). The Silver mainly to Charles Coughlin and the Christian Legion identified as Christian, and its locals had Front. The third chapter also includes some dis‐ chaplains. It had a paramilitary branch, the Silver cussion of the rabidly antisemitic ministers Ger‐ Rangers, whose “weapon of choice was a scourge ald Winrod and Gerald L. K. Smith, who after whip based on the one Jesus had supposedly used World War II became arguably America’s most to drive money changers from the temple in the prominent antisemite before Louis Farrakhan. Gospels” (p. 55), an image antisemites frequently Hart shows how German Nazi ideology strongly used to contrast Christians’ “spirituality” with influenced all of these groups and individuals. But Jews’ alleged materialism. The Silver Legion he largely overlooks how the Christian Front’s vi‐ claimed that the Jews controlled the United States ciously antisemitic propaganda inspired savage by dominating itsfnancial, industrial, and com‐ violence against Jews, escalating in the late 1930s, munications systems, and its leading politicians.
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