Be Brave, Become Stormer An Analysis of the Experiences of the Members of the Dutch Nationale Jeugdstorm during the Period of German Occupation, 1940-1945 Universiteit van Amsterdam (UvA) Master History: Holocaust and Genocide Studies, 2016-2018 Carmen Moll Mentor: Peter van Dam Second Reader: Jouke Turpijn 1 July, 2018 Content Abbreviations ………………………………………………………………………………... 3 1. Introduction………………………………………………………………………………... 4 1.1 Historiography: The Dichotomy between Right and Wrong…………………….. 5 1.2 The Nationale Jeugdstorm……………………………………………………….. 9 1.3 Research Methods and Methodological Considerations………………………… 16 1.4 Plan of the Analysis……………………………………………………………... 18 2. The Ideological Foundations of the Nationale Jeugdstorm………………………………. 20 2.1 1934-1940: The A-political Character of the Nationale Jeugdstorm……………. 23 2.2 10 May 1940: The Invasion of the Nazis………………………………………... 24 2.3 The Ideological Commitment of the Jeugdstormer……………………………… 30 3. The Communal Identity and Social Relations of the Jeugdstormers……………………... 36 3.1 Social Interaction in Dutch Society: Anti-National Socialist Sentiment………... 37 3.2 Connecting Ideology to Identity: The Formation of a Community…………..… 40 3.3 The Communal Experience of Membership to the Nationale Jeugdstorm……… 44 3.4 The Social Relations of the Jeugdstormers: Interaction or Isolation?.................... 49 4. The Willingness to use Force within the Jeugdstorm Community……………………….. 56 4.1 Some Sort of Military Scouting: Militarization of the Jeugdstorm……………… 58 4.2 Feelings of Enmity within the Jeugdstorm Community………………………… 62 4.3 Enmity in Practice: Were Stormers Willing to Use Violence?.............................. 65 5. Conclusion: The Jeugdstorm as a Community of Experience……………………………. 72 6. Bibliografie...……………………………………………………………………………... 80 7. Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………… 85 2 Abbreviations AJC Arbeiders Jeugd Centrale NIOD Nederlands Instituut Oorlog Documentatie NIVO Nederlandsche Inrichting voor Volkse Opvoeding NJS Nationale Jeugdstorm NJV Nederlandsch Jonglings Verbond NSB Nationaal Socialistische Beweging NSDAP Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei NPV Nederlandsche Padvinders Vereniging 3 1. Introduction On the 14th of December, 1931, the Nationaal Socialistische Beweging (NSB) was called into existence at a founders’ meeting in Utrecht. The first and second men within the party were respectively, Anton Adriaan Mussert (1894-1946) and Cornelis van Geelkerken (1901-1976). In the years that followed, the men would attempt to bring on a large-scale mobilization of the Dutch people, who were in the grip of a devastating financial crisis that terrorized the larger part of Europe. According to NSB’s fascist ideology, the ideal society would be based on a strongly connected national community (saamhorige volksgemeenschap) in which the individual would be subordinated to the collective. With Mussert as the ultimate leader, the NSB strove to restore the glory of the Dutch collective. In its early years the NSB rapidly gained popularity among (mainly) middleclass citizens, who were attracted to Mussert’s powerful rhetorics. In addition, the party’s political constituency was strengthened by relatively young people who were attracted to the strong and populistic course of the NSB. Due to the fact that the NSB hadn’t established a minimum age for the membership application to the party during the first few years of its existence, it was possible for the younger generation to join the so-called “black-shirts”. Within three years, the NSB counted thirteen youth sections nationwide, varying from sport groups to political youth departments. Together these younglings were good for one tenth of the total number of members in 1933.1 In 1934 Mussert made the decision to formally organize the youth of the party, by founding an independent youth section under the leadership of ‘Kees’ van Geelkerken. The official instruction was given on the 1st of May, on a so called Landdag – a member meeting of the NSB – at the Rai in Amsterdam. Van Geelkerken had been known not to interfere in 1 Bart Engelen, “In Godsvertrouwen Alles Voor Het Vaderland: De Radicalisering van de Nationale Jeugdstorm (1934-1945),” Masterthesis, Radboud Universiteit, 1988, 2–10. 4 the ideological debates that Mussert initiated and instead focused his attention on the pragmatic organization of the material and support the movement needed.2 Mussert looked at him as the ideal future leader of the youth section the party needed so bad. Other youth organizations in the Netherlands were judged to be either too politically coloured, like the Arbeiders Jeugd Centrale (AJC), or too internationally oriented, like the Nederlandsche Padvinders Vereniging (NPV). The national socialistic youth movement wouldn’t be the umpteenth pillar of the verzuilde society, but would strive to unite the entire Dutch youth, independently of political preferences. Therefore, the main goal of the youth organisation would be the education of a nation loving future Dutch generation.3 The precise date on which the organization was installed is subject to historical debate. However, it is clear that the first division, the group Velp, started functioning on June 2nd, 1934. The official installation of this division took place months later on October 3rd. It took until the 27th of September, for the first registration forms to be filled out.4 Irrespective the precise founders date, 1934 had thus brought the Netherlands a new youth organisation and the Nationale Jeugdstorm (NJS) was born.5 In this research the lives and thoughts of the Jeugdstormers who joined the organization in the years that followed will be explored in order to gain insight in the experience of Jeugdstorm membership. 1.1. Historiography: The dichotomy between Right and Wrong When analyzing the to the NSB connected organizations within Dutch society, the connection to the post-war debate on “right” and “wrong” is easily made. The Dutch Historian Lou de Jong wrote one of the most influential surveys on the Netherlands during the German 2 Bart van der Boom, Kees van Geelkerken: De Rechterhand van Mussert (Utrecht/Antwerpen: Veen Uitgevers, 1990), 25–29. 3 Renee Kwak, “De Nationale Jeugdstorm: De Noodlottige Belangenstrijd Om de Jeugd, 1934-1945,” Masterthesis, Erasmusuniversiteit Rotterdam, 1988, 33–34. 4 Idem, 36–38. 5 Engelen, “In Godsvertrouwen Alles Voor Het Vaderland,” 9. 5 occupation named Het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden in de Tweede Wereldoorlog (1969-1994). As a Dutch Jew born in 1914 De Jong himself had experienced the threat the Germans had posed to the Dutch Jewish population and had fled the low countries. Upon his return after the war, De Jong became head of the Nederlands Instituut Oorlogs Documentatie (NIOD) for which he started working on the now still highly valued historical analysis. With fourteen parts and twenty-nine individual books – of which twelve parts are written by De Jong himself – this comprehensive historical overview provides its readers with an extensive history on the totality of the Second World War in the Netherlands. The leading themes in his version of events are oppression, collaboration and resistance. Be it because of the close proximity of the Second World War or be it because of his personal experiences and great losses as a result of the Holocaust, De Jong’s survey leaves little room for doubt: during the war, an individual was either “right” or “wrong”, either for or against the Netherlands, either a resistance fighter or an NSB’er.6 In the years after the war both historians and the general public tended to accept the strict distinctions between those who were deemed “right” and those who were deemed “wrong” in times of the Nazi-empire. The “right” people had fought and resisted the German occupiers and their national socialistic ideology, while the “wrong” people had aligned themselves with the Nazis during the years of war.7 In 1983, the Dutch Historian J.C.H. Blom was one of the first to mention the lack of nuance in the Dutch Holocaust historiography. In his dissertation he asked the question whether, now De Jong’s extensive history on the Second World War was almost finished, there would be any need for further research on account of the occupational period of the Netherlands. He concluded that this would depend on the ability and willingness of academics to break free of the dominant political moral question of “right” and “wrong” which was connected to division between collaboration and 6 J. C. H. Blom, In de Ban van Goed en Fout (Amsterdam: Boom, 2007), 15. 7 Ismee Tames, “Children of Dutch Nazi Collaborators,” European Review of History 22, no. 2 (2015): 223. 6 resistance.8 To accomplish this change of discourse, Blom proposed three new courses for academic research: 1) studies on the mood among the Dutch population during the years of German occupation; 2) international comparisons between the Netherlands and other countries over de course of the Second World War; and 3) studies based on a more broad temporal perspective.9 Despite the difficulty of the tasks ahead, Blom hopefully concluded that these new perspectives would break through the stigma of “right” versus “wrong”.10 Since Blom’s dissertation, a vast number of publications appeared which indeed provided perspectives alternative to that of De Jong’s Het Koninkrijk der Nederlanden in de Tweede Wereldoorlog. Research on the prosecution of the Dutch Jews, the interplay between the occupational and domestic forces during the occupation, the mood among the