What Kind of Person Was Hitler?A Look at the Secondary Sources Part III
“If today He descended from Heaven, The Great Warrior who struck the moneychangers You would once again shout ‘crucify!’ And nail Him to the cross that He Himself carried But He would gently laugh at your hatred ‘The truth remains even when your bearers are passed Faith remains, because I give My life…’ And the Fighter of all the world towers on the cross.”
Poem written by alleged “anti-Christian Nazi pagan” Baldur von Schirach Steigmann-Gall, The Holy Reich, p. 143.
What Kind of Person Was Hitler? A Look at the Secondary Sources Part III [Note: Some of these sources are primary]
Hitler according to Sebastian Haffner’s The Meaning of Hitler, Orig. Pub. Date 1978, this edition 1979
One of the greatest misconceptions that continues to rear its ugly head—regarding the life of Adolf Hitler—is this belief that so many people have that he was “the bastard son of a Jew.” Historian Bryan Mark Rigg (2002) addresses the possibility that Hitler may have had a Jewish relative, somewhere in his lineage, but that “the SS report [conducted by Himmler] did not mention any Jewish stain in [Hitler’s] bloodline” (p. 175). As a matter of fact, Himmler had only written to Martin Bormann that “‘It’s rumored that some of the Führer’s relatives live in Graz-St. Peter, some of whom are half-idiots or insane…. The Schicklgruber line seems to have several abnormal people, as demonstrated by the mentally retarded (‘idiotische’) descendents’” (Ibid.). Rigg (2002) asserts that Hitler had probably known about these mental and psychological problems within his family line, as “one cousin had committed suicide,” one “lived in an insane asylum,” and “two others were mentally retarded” (Ibid.). Rigg takes it a step further by arguing that Hitler may have been extraordinarily lenient with regards to Mischlinge clemency, due to the fact that he himself may have believed that he, too, was a Mischling. Although, this is a purely speculative hypothesis, and no such documentation exists to assert this as an indisputable fact. The majority of Hitler historians agree that Hitler had no Jewish blood at all. The Jewish Virtual Library states, “Adolf Hitler was not Jewish” (Jewish Virtual Library, 2006). The truth is that Adolf’s father, Alois Hitler, had been conceived illegitimately; Alois Hitler’s mother was a servant girl (Haffner, p. 3).
Haffner (1979) argues that Hitler never rose above the status of Corporal, because he lacked the leadership skills that were necessary to merit such an increase in rank (p. 3). Actually, Hitler’s lack of German citizenship was more likely the cause for this, as an individual who was as brave, and promptly decorated, as Hitler had been more than likely had many of the qualities of a leader. This argument put forth by Haffner would be equitable to alleging that American Senator John Kerry lacks the qualities of a leader, due to the fact that he undeservingly attained several Purple Hearts. Or, it could be equated to arguing that George Bush, Jr. has the qualities of a leader, because he had served, and been promoted, in the American military, whereas former U.S. President Bill Clinton had not. The point I am trying to make is this: Haffner’s argument is unqualified because he is assuming that Hitler did not rise above the rank of Corporal solely due to the fact that he lacked the qualities of a “leader,” whatever that may be in Haffner’s mind. But, Hitler’s record speaks for itself. He was one of the single most incredible and effective leaders in Western European history, and just because he lost during World War II does not mean that he was a poor leader. In fact, it means that three “Allied” nations had to unite as one to even think about defeating Germany, due to the fact that Hitler was such an incredible leader. I could take this even further by stating that George Bush, Jr. cannot even “win the hearts and minds” of the Iraqis or Afghanis, and yet, he is donned an “effective leader” by many; whereas, Hitler had been able to unite millions upon millions of Europeans, Arabs, Jews, Indians, Gypsies, Russians, Frenchmen, Ukrainians, and even Britons and Americans, during the Second Great War, against the “Allies.”
Hitler joined the fledgling NSDAP at the age of thirty, in the year 1919 (Haffner, p. 3). He was born Adolfus Hitler (nickname “Adi”), on 20 April 1889, and he passed away on 30 April 1945; he lived almost exactly 56 years (Payne, 15, 16; Haffner, p. 3).
Haffner argues several mainstream points about Hitler that I find faulty. First of all, he claims that Hitler had treated the women in his life “as unimportant,” and that “he did not make them happy” (p. 5). Now, this may be partially true in that Geli Raubal had been a free spirited girl who wanted to be relinquished from Hitler’s mother hen complex; and, Eva Braun had been of an undoubtedly codependent nature. Eva had written on one occasion, “He only needs me for certain purposes. … When he says he loves me, it only means he loves me at that particular instant. Like his promises, which he never keeps. Why does he torment me like this, when he could finish it off at once” (Payne, p. 586). There are numerous diary entries like this one, which clearly reveal Eva Braun as a young girl with low self-esteem and a marked codependency to Hitler. Hitler had told Eva early on that he would not be able to give her the love and fulfillment she deserved, but she refused to leave him. I think the truth is that Hitler did the best he could for her, while trying to rule a country and fulfill all of his many obligations to the German nation and people.
Hoffmann (1958) asserted that Hitler had called Eva on the phone every day (p. 193). Obviously, he could not be there all the time, but I think that any man who reads Eva’s diaries would be able to relate to Hitler’s situation with her. Men do not oftentimes say, “I love you,” but rather, express their love through sexual interaction or by means of gifts, visits, or compliments. It is simply too ludicrous to act as though he was this unloving, hate-filled man who wanted Eva to be miserable and unhappy; that’s just silly. Also, it might be pertinent to mention the fact that Hitler had lost his closest brother, Edmund Hitler, when he was only 7 years old (Payne, pp. 9, 22). In fact, some of the residents of Leonding had been interviewed by journalists after Hitler was elected, and they had said of the young boy Adolf, “[he] was sometimes seen at night sitting on the cemetery wall, gazing up at the stars” (Payne, p. 23). Hitler expressed a marked change in disposition after Edmund passed away (p. 22).
Furthermore, Hitler had lost his father at the age of 13; his mother at the age of 16 (p. 32, 58). His niece, whom he had loved so dearly, had shot herself—probably accidentally—during the early years of his career (Wagener, pp. 222-223; Hoffmann, pp. 151-155). So, with a history like this, is it really any wonder as to why Hitler may have had an extremely difficult time with becoming too close to Eva Braun? It is stunning to find that not a single historian has considered Hitler’s feelings on the matter; not one historian has considered the incredible hurt and pain that he had experienced every time he became very close to someone. All of the people he had really loved had died. Perhaps Hitler felt that if he became too involved emotionally with Eva, then she, too, would somehow exit his life.
Haffner (1979) has stated that “Hitler had no friends” (p. 5). Hitler was very much the “loner” type, as evidenced by his lonely years in Vienna, and during his service in the German military during WWI. But, again, this may also be attributable to his deepest losses so early in his life. Many people who experience so much loss, especially the loss of parents, when they are so young have a very hard time establishing close interpersonal relationships later on. They tend to harbor a lingering fear that if they become close to someone, they will lose them. This is very important to consider when studying Hitler’s personality and his relationships throughout his life. As far as the account of Albert Speer, it would be safe to say that Hitler and Speer were true friends.
According to Haffner, “in January 1933, when Hitler became Reich Chancellor, there were [at least] six million unemployed in Germany. A mere three years later, in 1936, there was full employment. Crying need and mass hardship had generally turned into modest but comfortable prosperity” (pp. 27-28). Hitler had truly ushered in an economic miracle within an unprecedented and limited time frame. Here is a related article. He went on to say, “Germans reacted to that miracle… made vast numbers of German workers switch from the Social Democrats and the Communists to Hitler after 1933” (p. 28). Hitler was able to convince, through his own efforts and accomplishments in both the economic and political realm, a vast number of non-Nazi-Sozis to support him. Imagine how difficult this task must have been in light of modern day difficulties in uniting Democrats and Republicans (in America) on even a single issue? Moreover, try and fathom the greatness of this accomplishment in light of the warring between the Irish Catholics and Protestants, or Sh’ia and Sunni Muslims. This had not been an easy task by any stretch of the imagination.
Hitler’s economic miracle occurred in the midst of the worldwide Great Depression [which could more justly be called the First World Depression; or, Western Depression]. As Haffner has put it so succinctly: “[Hitler] was making Germany an island of prosperity” (p. 29). This had required that Hitler isolate the German economy from the increasingly interconnected world economy (Ibid.); a no-no for those who espouse the Jewish Old Testament ethos of “World dominion for Yahweh’s ‘Chosen’.” Haffner insinuates that Hitler could have easily locked up business or company owners who had been conducting unauthorized business with foreigners. Moreover, he insinuates that workers could have also been thrown into camps for demanding higher wages or for serving as strikers (Ibid.). But, the fact of the matter is, Coca-Cola, Ford, General Motors, and Union Banking Corporation (UBC) were just a few of the American-based corporations who had been invited to invest in Hitler’s Germany. Hitler had also refused to completely centralize the German economy, and German workers were overwhelmingly satisfied with their wages, benefits, holidays, and healthcare (see Stanley McClatchie’s Look to Germany for full account). Haffner even argues that Hitler’s remilitarization achievements did not work hand-in-glove with his economic miracle. Haffner has stated, “… it has often been claimed that Hitler’s economic miracle and his military miracle were basically the same thing, that full employment was entirely, or at least predominantly, due to rearmament. That is not so. Certainly conscription removed a few hundreds of thousands of potential unemployed from the streets, and the mass production of tanks, guns and aircraft provided wages and a livelihood for a few hundreds of thousands of metal and engineering workers. But the great bulk of the six million unemployed whom Hitler had inherited found re-employment in entirely normal civilian industries” (p. 30).
Haffner had pointed out another very important achievement of Hitler’s. He had said, “… the enormous detailed work of rearmament had not been Hitler’s job but that of the War Ministry and the General Staff. This statement needs qualification. On one particular point of detail, one that was later to prove of great importance in the war, Hitler personally intervened and laid down the structure of the new Wehrmacht and hence its future manner of operation. He took the decision, against what was then still the overwhelming majority of the military experts, to create integrated, independently operating armored divisions and tank armies. These novel army formations, possessed in 1938 only by the German Army, proved to be the campaign-deciding weapon during the first two years of the war. They were subsequently copied by all other armies” (p. 31). And yet, Haffner had earlier in his work stated that Hitler “had lacked the qualities that make a good leader.” He has contradicted himself within the context of his own thesis agenda, which is okay, as no historian is always going to present a perfect thesis; but, this is a stark contradiction, far too stark to ignore.
Hitler’s progressive ingenuity had proved to be the vital life-blood that was so ardently needed in the revival of his nation. Even though he had refused to throw off the age-old Germanic traditions, he never abandoned his call to progress, ingenuity, and technology. Also, it would not be out of line to argue that Hitler was indeed a farsighted tactical genius, and that his generals’ collective lack of faith in him coupled with his people’s lack of will, may well have paved the way to disaster, far more than Hitler may have done himself, during WWII. It cannot be denied that Hitler was a very stubborn individual, but it also cannot be denied that his generals had always lacked faith in him as a military commander.
Furthermore, it cannot be denied that the Wehrmacht harbored a pervading sentiment of defeatism upon the first setback. This defeatist attitude in the military was the main reason Hitler came to trust and to ultimately rely upon the Waffen SS during the latter half of the War. In fact, according to WWII SS veteran and hero Léon Degrelle (1982), “If the Waffen SS had not existed, Europe would have been overrun entirely by the Soviets by 1944. They would have reached Paris long before the Americans. … Without SS resistance the Soviets would have been in Normandy before [the Jew] Eisenhower. … Not since the great religious orders [Teutonic Knights] of the middle ages had there been such selfless idealism and heroism” (p. 37). Indeed, the Waffen SS will someday be rightly acknowledged and venerated as the single greatest Army of Christ in Western history. For those of you who are of a metaphysical or spiritual inclination with regards to WWII, the day Hitler committed suicide was the day God wept and turned to Islam for solace. The Muslims of today, like the European Christians before them, have answered His call because the West failed to do so in 1945.
Haffner had also stated, “… In 1938, Hitler had succeeded in winning over to himself the great majority of those who in 1933 had still voted against him—perhaps his greatest achievement of all” (p. 32). He went on to say, “… In actual fact, [women’s emancipation] made great leaps forward, especially during the second six-year span of [Hitler’s] regime, during the war, and then with the full approbation and often vigorous support of party and state. Never before had women moved into so many male occupations and male functions as during the Second World War, and this process was no longer reversible—and probably would not have been reversible even if Hitler had survived the [war]” (p. 36). Hitler had actually been very supportive of women’s employment and education, as well as, fighting breast cancer in women, and fighting the prevailing social ills that served to disenfranchise and harm women, both physically and psychologically.
Haffner has argued that Hitler had already decided upon war as early as 1938. He cites no source for this hypothesis, and what’s more, provides no bibliography. Perhaps we are to take his word as the word of a primary source? Moving on, Haffner claims that Hitler disclosed this most publicly-concealed secretive information to “the editors-in-chief of the domestic press” (p. 41). Proclamations such as this are quite similar to the alleged “meetings” that Hitler had had with Richard Breiting in 1931—a known Marxist-Communist sympathizer and friend of prominent and wealthy Jews in America and elsewhere (see Richard Breiting’s Secret Conversations with Hitler: The Two Newly-Discovered 1931 Interviews, edited by Edouard Calic for full account). Why would Hitler disclose this kind of secretive information to a handful of news editors? It certainly needs to be qualified before it can be trusted. A more credible argument would rely upon Carr’s Pawns in the Game (1958) as the primary source for this argument. Carr had put forth the notion that Hitler never wanted war, but that he would go to war if the “Allies” willed it to be so. In other words, he was not going to renege on his plans of Anschlüss, the liberation of the occupied Sudeten Germans, the reincorporation of Danzig, or the fight against Jewish-Soviet bolshevism; hence, if war was inevitable, then to war he would go (pp. 164, 167).
Haffner makes one last pertinent observation about Hitler. He essentially argues that Hitler took no interest in the conception of the state; but rather, he took a great interest in the concept of the nation, and as Haffner has stated, with “races, not with states” (p. 86). This is not a wholly accurate assessment though, as Hitler had matured a great deal with time, and by the latter half of WWII, he had stated that his conception of race was flawed. After all of Hitler’s many experiences with many different peoples of a great variety of ethnic and racial backgrounds, he had come to the conclusion that culture and Volk were far more important than race. In fact, he failed to identify the Jews as a race, and used the term “Jewish race” simply as a means of convenience when speaking about Jews. He viewed the Jews as a ‘mixed multitude’ Volk, and as a culture of racial preservationists amidst the Europeans who could be easily seduced and swayed by Jewish cultural corruption, as well as fall victim to Jewish networking (Lukacs, pp. 122-123; Steigmann-Gall, pp. 78-79, 41-46). Lukacs (1998) has also argued that Hitler viewed the state merely as “a means to an end” (p. 117).
Hitler according to Richard Steigmann-Gall’s [Jew] The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919-1945; Pub. Date 2003
Steigmann-Gall (2003) has put forth the accurate statement that “Eckart became something of a mentor to Hitler, introducing him to Munich’s extremist milieu and strengthening his basic beliefs” (p. 17). Hitler had dedicated his book, Mein Kampf, to Dietrich Eckart twenty years later. He had left a tribute to Eckart, which read: “And among [our heroes] I want also to count that man, one of the best, who devoted his life to the awakening of his—our—people, in his writings and his thoughts and finally in his deeds…” (Ibid.). Many historians have painted Eckart as an ardent Satanist or occultist, but that could not be further from the truth. Eckart was an extremely spiritual man—indeed, a free spirit—but he only ever spoke of Christ and His teachings in the most praiseworthy and poetic manner. Eckart clearly viewed himself as a Christian, and other fellow Nazi-Sozis had also considered him to be a Christian; so, this ‘occultist thesis’ is as good as defunct (pp. 17-19). One of Eckart’s greatest, and regretfully unfinished, works was Bolshevism from Moses to Lenin: A Dialogue Between Adolf Hitler and Me. The tract clearly depicts the deeply imbued Christian views of both Eckart and Hitler, and reveals that both of them were committed to infusing Christian ethics, morals, socialism, and precepts into mainstream, secular German society and culture. Eckart had even said of Friedrich Nietzsche, “We Germans who profess through and through our faith in the Christian worldview [ethos], reject this despiser of our religious foundations” (p. 111).
Steigmann-Gall has also rejected the argument that Hitler was a deist, or rational Darwinist. In Mein Kampf, Hitler “referred to a providential and active deity” (p. 26). Moreover, Hitler had claimed, “…Peoples that bastardize themselves, or let themselves be bastardized, sin against the will of eternal Providence” (Ibid.). Recall, too, that when Hitler had said “bastardize” or “racial poisoning,” the notions he had in mind at the time were more along the lines of ‘culture’ and ‘nation,’ as opposed to ‘individuals’ or ‘race.’ This became especially evident with the passage of time and as Hitler’s own thinking materialized in this regard (Lukacs, pp. 120-127). As we have already seen in the evidence presented by John Lukacs (1998), Hitler had admitted that in his earlier days he had been wrong about his conceptions of nation and race (p. 123). This is yet another reason why Hitler biographers ought to be careful relying solely on Mein Kampf as their primary source. Hitler had undergone much personal growth and change—after dictating Mein Kampf—just as all other human beings grow and change over time.
Furthermore, on the topic of God, Hitler had gone so far as to assert that “The folkish-minded man has the sacred duty, each in his own denomination, of making people stop just talking superficially of God’s will, and actually fulfill God’s will, and not let God’s word be desecrated. For God’s will gave men their form, their essence and their abilities. Anyone who destroys His work is declaring war on the Lord’s creation, the divine will” (pp. 26-27). Hitler had espoused a clear-cut Christian worldview, at least as early as 1919. He had committed his innermost private thoughts and ideas regarding religion to notes, which have since been published. He had written that he believed the Bible to be “The Monumental History of Mankind”; and, that there were “Children of God and men” (p. 27). Hitler probably deemed the Germanic peoples as “God’s children,” and had perhaps viewed the Jews and their collaborators as the worldly and materialistic “children of men.” He had also written that he wished to see a “Purification of the Bible,” which might easily be translated to the expunging of the Jewish Torah, as well as, a clear return to Christ, as opposed to a return to the politicized Christian churches (Ibid.). Hitler had always venerated the person of Christ, as well as His teachings on morality and socialism; but, he had—almost from the outset—opposed the politicization of religion and Christianity, and had espoused an ethos of anticlericalism (pp. 27, 164-165).
It might be worth mentioning that Hitler only reluctantly endorsed particular confessions, or religious organizations, one over another. He had really tried very hard to remain aloof of the Church Question, so as to conform to Point 24 of the NSDAP platform (p. 155-166). His personal position had consistently remained “above the confessions” (pp. 59-64), even though he oftentimes intervened on behalf of Protestant churches, leaders, and organizations over those that were Catholic. Again, this was mainly due to the undeniable fact that the Catholic Church, and most of their affiliated organizations, had refused to work cooperatively with Hitler’s government (pp. 63, 140-154). Hitler had given his personal assurances and support to the DC (Deutsche Christen), the BK (Bekennende Kirche), and fellow Christians Ludwig Müller, Hanns Kerrl, and Hans Schemm—just to name a few, on many occasions,—whereas, he had actually helped the opposition against the pagan-oriented DGB (German Faith Movement) with which Alfred Rosenberg, Walther Darré, and Heinrich Himmler had been affiliated (pp. 149-153; 120-123; 129-130).
Steigmann-Gall (2003) has also quoted Hitler as saying, “Through me the Protestant Church could become the established church, as in England” (p. 155). Even the American Christian churchman, Charles Macfarland, had viewed Hitler as a necessary and pro-church moderating force upon the anti-church and anti-Christian elements who were rivaling his power and jurisdiction within Germany (p. 162). David Irving (2002) has argued that Hitler served as a moderating force on both the anti-Jewish and anti-clerical activities of such individuals as Goebbels, Rosenberg, and Bormann, just to name a few (see Hitler’s War for full account). This particular thesis agenda continues to accrue much more credibility as more and more objective and non-Jewish histories of Hitler appear on the scene. A couple of fine and recent examples, include: The Holy Reich, Hitler as Philosophe, The Hitler of History, and Hitler’s Jewish Soldiers. Moreover, Steigmann-Gall has confirmed that “Hitler allowed himself to be convinced by [Wilhelm] Frick of the need for ‘strict neutrality’ in the Church Struggle” (p. 165).
In fact, here is what Hitler had told Otto Wagener (1985), which serves as a pertinent disclosure of his more privately regarded feelings towards the “Christianity” of the church clerics, as opposed to his own conception of what constitutes true Christianity:
“Like Christ, we must preach, “You are all brothers! Love one another (p. 213)! … And this Volk will be the Sword of God (p. 214)! … I am astonished at all that has been made of these teachings of these divinely inspired men, especially Jesus Christ, which are so clear and unique, heightened to religiosity. … But the communities that called themselves Christian churches did not understand it! Or if they did, they denied Christ and betrayed him! For they transformed the holy idea of Christian socialism into its opposite! They killed it, just as, at that time, the Jews nailed Jesus to the cross; they buried it, just as the body of Christ was buried. But they allowed Christ to be resurrected (insinuating through his followers), instigating the belief that his teachings, too, were reborn!
It is in this that the monstrous crime of these enemies of Christian socialism lies! With the basest hypocrisy they carry before them the cross—the instrument of that murder which, in their thoughts, they commit over and over—as a new divine sign of Christian awareness, and allow mankind to kneel to it. They even pretend to be preaching the teachings of Christ. But their lives and deeds are a constant blow against these teachings and their Creator and a defamation of God” (p. 140)! [Emphasis added]
Hitler’s anticlerical views were surprisingly similar to the views held by the great Christian American Founding Father, Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson had stated in a letter to Horatio G. Spafford, dated 17 March 1814, that “In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own.”
So, if one was to share Jefferson’s viewpoint in this regard it would be safe to assert that Hitler stood for the true liberation and freedom of the German people, as a whole; that would have qualified as the main platform of contention that he had unintentionally established between himself and the churches. The Nazi-era German churches appear to have been more concerned with political power than with the revival of Germany’s people and the unification process via socialism and nationalism. The truth is that Hitler took better care of the collective German spiritual welfare than did the alleged “Christian” churches. As Steigmann-Gall (2003) has convincingly argued, Hitler had literally transformed the dying doctrine of Jewish-Weimar Germany’s “confessional Christianity” into a Nazi worldview, and “active Christian faith.” In fact, Hitler had actually espoused imbuing secular German society with Christian doctrine and ethical standards, so much so that Germany would ultimately profess a Christian worldview from his life onward (pp. 78-81).
As a pertinent aside, the Germans had all kinds of terms that could be translated as “struggles,” “solutions,” or “problems.” The most recognizable of these terms include: the Church Struggle, the Church Question, the Jewish Question, and the Final Solution. I found a very relevant piece on the Internet and it struck me so much so that I committed myself to using it in an essay. The passage I found reads as follows:
“Captain John Smith of the Virginia colony in the early 1600s referred to our original inhabitants as “subanimals” and “beasts” worthy only of “extermination.” Puritan leader John Endicott of the Massachusetts Bay Colony regularly ordered “death” to the Pequot Indians. Our founding document, the Declaration of Independence, refers to our original inhabitants as “merciless savages” and George Washington termed them “beasts of prey” [Nietzsche had also used this term] to be “destroyed.” European settlers regularly called them “brutes” or “vermin” to be “eliminated.” General William Tecumseh Sherman in the 1870s ordered “extermination” as the ‘final solution’ to the ‘Indian problem’” [Source].
As you can plainly see, Hitler and the National Socialists were not the only ones to have used the phrase “final solution.” It does not in any way refer to the alleged “Holocaust” against Jewry in the above passage. Historically, this phrase was used in reference to many problems way before Hitler ever used it. The Jewish historians oftentimes mislead readers into believing that the Nazis were the only ones to have utilized this phrase and that it specifically referred to the supposed “Holocaust.”
Furthermore, Sherman himself did not accept that “each man is as good as another.” As far back as the year 1862, Sherman had stated that the United States was “swarming with dishonest Jews.” He urged Ulysses Grant, to purge all Jews from his army. As Fellman writes, “On 17 December 1862, Grant . . . , like a medieval monarch . . . expelled ‘The Jews, as a class,’ from his department.” Fellman goes on to say that to Sherman, the Jews were “like niggers” and “like greasers or Indians”… that they were “classes or races permanently inferior to his own.” Sherman is viewed as an American “hero” by the way. Hitler never talked this way about other races, except, perhaps Jewry (see Michael Fellman, Citizen Sherman, p. 153).
Concluding Thoughts
Even the Jew, Karl Marx, had utilized the phrase Jewish Question in some of his own writings. So, the fact that the Nazi-Sozis had utilized phrases such as Final Solution and Jewish Problem does not imply that these phrases had been specially coined by the Nazis as “secret terms” for mass murder or mass gassing. Jewish historians have a lot of people, especially students, thinking that the Nazis were the first people to utilize these terms, but in fact, these were typical German terms and phrases that dated at least as far back as the mid-1800s, as evidenced by Sherman’s usage of similar terms and phrases in the above passages. These terms do not mean mass murder or gassing. This insinuation on the part of Jewish historians must begin to be erased from our collective psyche and WWII lexicon, because Jewry has yet to establish that the alleged “Holocaust” is not based on the logical fallacy of assumption.
References
Breiting R. (1971). Secret Conversations with Hitler: The Two Newly-Discovered 1931 Interviews. (Edouard Calic, Ed.). (Richard Barry, Trans.). New York: John Day Company. (Original work published 1968)
Carr, W. G. (n.d.) Pawns in the Game. Boring, Oregon: CPA Book Publisher. (Original work published circa 1958)
Day, D. (2002). Onward Christian Soldiers. Newport Beach: Noontide Press. (Original work published 1943)
Degrelle, L. (1982). Epic: The Story of the Waffen SS. (Institute for Historical Review, Trans.). Newport Beach: Journal of Historical Review. (Original work recorded live at IHR Conference 1982)
Haffner, S. (1979). The Meaning of Hitler. (Ewald Osers, Trans.). New York: Macmillan. (Original work published 1978)
Hoffmann, H. (1955). Hitler Was My Friend. (Lt.-Col. R.H. Stevens, Trans.). London: Burke Publishing Company, Ltd.
Irving, D. (2002). Hitler’s War. London: Focal Point Publications.
Lukacs, J. (1998). The Hitler of History. New York: Vintage Books.
Payne, R. (1995). The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler. New York: Barnes and Noble Books. (Original work published 1973)
Rigg, B.M. (2002). Hitler’s Jewish Soldiers: The Untold Story of Nazi Racial Laws and Men of Jewish Descent in the German Armed Forces. Kansas: University Press of Kansas.
Speer, A. (1971). Inside the Third Reich: Memoirs by Albert Speer. (Richard & Clara Winston, Trans.). New York: The Macmillan Company. (Original work published 1969)
Steigmann-Gall, R. (2003). The Holy Reich: Nazi Conceptions of Christianity, 1919-1945. United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.
Wagener, O. (1985). Hitler—Memoirs of a Confidant (Henry Ashby Turner, Jr. Ed.). (Ruth Hein, Trans.). London: Yale University Press. (Original work published 1978)
Mass Grave of Massacred Poles Found in Ukraine
A Ukrainian government commission has concluded that thousands of people buried in a mass grave outside Kiev were killed during Stalin's purges, not by Nazi soldiers.
Halyna Pastushuk reports from Kyiv, 12.08.06
The commission's conclusion supports the testimony of elderly witnesses in the nearby village of Bykovnia, who said they saw trucks dripping blood en route to the site in the 1930's, before the Nazis occupied the area.
Unofficial estimates put the number of bodies in the grave at 200,000 to 300,000.
Villagers in Bykovnia broke five decades of silence to accuse Stalin's secret police after the Ukrainian government erected a monument in May 1988 blaming Nazi occupiers for the crime. The villagers in December forced Ukrainian authorities to establish the commission, saying three previous investigations had covered up the truth by blaming Nazi troops.
Dr. Sławomir Kalbarczyk, Chief Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation, said during the international scientific conference “Archeology and Terror” conference that took place in Tallin in November 2005:
It is worth mentioning that the Bykovnia pits did not say their “last world” and may provide still a lot of valuable information, since the Ukrainian authorities plan to carry out further exhumations there. They were to be conducted in August last year, however were postponed til this year. The National Remembrance Institute’s prosecutors have been invited in the capacity of observers.
There were found in Bykovnia numerous objects, belonging undoubtedly to the Polish citizens, among others, the uniforms, military caps, “knee-boots”, Polish coins (including their issue of 1939), and also the objects manufactured in Poland or in the Western Europe. Unfortunately, all those things were separated from the corpses, so they could not be attributed to any concrete persons. One thing is however of a crucial value – it is a driving license belonging to the person who appears on a partial list of the executed civilians, drawn up by the NKVD (those who were murdered in Ukraine).
Besides, the Ukrainian soil conceals more secrets. In 1997, the Ukrainian authorities carried out exhumations in the neighborhood of the former NKVD prison in Vladimir in Volhynien in order to check information disclosed by the local population on burial of Stalin’s regime victims at that place. From death-pits there were excavated the remains of 100 persons, whose skulls had bullet holes in their rear part. With the corpses there were many items of the Polish origin: shoulder boards of the Polish military men and policemen, uniform buttons with the image of the White Eagle, etc. Just recently, the Institute of National Remembrance has been informed that one of the investigations, conducted by the Military Prosecutor’s Office in Ukraine brought to discovery in Kiev of the remains of 270 unidentified Polish officers. In cooperation with the Ukrainian party Poles will do their very best to explain this gloomy atrocity which, supposedly, may have a certain link with the Katyn Crime. Such assumptions are justified as a trace of the prisoners murdered in Ukraine breaks off, among others, in the Kiev prison.
Source:
The Katyn Massacre
by Bruce Kennedy CNN Interactive Writer
In 1943, German soldiers discovered a mass grave in the Katyn forest near Smolensk in western Russia. The grave held the bodies of between 4,000 and 5,000 Polish army officers. Hoping to drive a wedge between the Soviet Union and its Western allies, Nazi officials publicized the grave and accused the Soviets of the massacre. Moscow denied the charge and claimed the Germans were attempting to cover up their own atrocity.
Despite evidence that the Kremlin was indeed behind the massacre, Britain and the United States chose to look the other way. London's wartime prime minister, Winston Churchill, opposed a call by the Polish government-in-exile for an investigation by the International Red Cross into the incident.
Following the war, at the Nuremberg war crime tribunals, the issue of Katyn was originally included on the list of crimes attributed to the Nazis. But it was later dropped, apparently out of concern that any revelations about the massacre would embarrass the Soviets.
It wasn't until 1990 that Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev admitted Soviet involvement in the Katyn forest massacre. Two years later, the Russian government handed over to Polish President Lech Walesa previously secret documents showing that Soviet leader Joseph Stalin had directly ordered the killing of the Polish army officers.
Most of the victims in Katyn forest were Polish army reservists—lawyers, doctors, scientists and businessmen—who were called up to active service following the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939. But instead of fighting the Germans, about 15,000 Polish officers found themselves prisoners of the Red Army, which had occupied eastern Poland under the terms of a secret Moscow-Berlin treaty.
In the spring of 1940, about 4,500 of these officers were taken by their Soviet captors to the Katyn forest. Most were then gagged, bound, shot once in the head and buried on the spot. The other Polish POWs were taken to other locations, where many of them were also executed. The mass liquidation killed off much of Poland's intelligentsia and facilitated the Soviet takeover of the nation.
The memory of the massacre was an open wound in Soviet-Polish relations throughout the Cold War, and it continues to strain ties between Warsaw and Moscow.
In 1995, Walesa and relatives of the Katyn forest victims attended a memorial service at the site of the massacre. Boris Yeltsin was invited to take part in the ceremonies but declined. The Polish media denounced the Russian president's decision.
"Boris Yeltsin's absence leaves a deeply unsettling message," said the Zycie Warszawy newspaper. "There has been no apology of the kind that Germany has long since made. This day could have been a symbol of reconciliation between two nations tragically marked by communism. Instead it is a bitter shame, and Katyn forest continues to cast its dark shadow."
Source:
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episodes/01/spotlight/index.html
Katyn Forest is a wooded area near Gneizdovo village, a short distance from Smolensk in Russia where, in 1940 on Stalin's orders, the NKVD shot and buried over 4000 Polish service personnel that had been taken prisoner when the Soviet Union invaded Poland in September 1939 in WW2 in support of the Nazis.
In 1943 the Nazis exhumed the Polish dead and blamed the Soviets. In 1944, having retaken the Katyn area from the Nazis, the Soviets exhumed the Polish dead again and blamed the Nazis. The rest of the world took its usual sides in such arguments.
In 1989, with the collapse of Soviet Power, Gorbachev finally admitted that the Soviet NKVD had executed the Poles, and confirmed two other burial sites similar to the site at Katyn. Stalin's order of March 1940 to execute by shooting some 25,700 Poles, including those found at the three sites, was also disclosed with the collapse of Soviet Power. This particular second world war slaughter of Poles is often referred to as the "Katyn Massacre" or the "Katyn Forest Massacre".
The main purpose of this page is to contact others with an interest in the Katyn Forest Massacre.
There are four of my articles about the Katyn Massacre on this site.
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