They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45

I think one of the biggest problems with this country (0.00 / 0)

is that we know that what we are experiencing now is wrong, but we do nothing about it.  I think that is really the issue here.  It is easy to say that the Germans had their rights chipped away little by little and at the end of the day, they did not understand or care to understand what happened to them.

But I cannot believe that they did not understand that this "chipping away of their rights" was just wrong.  I like to think that starvation and economic ruin gave presented them with the option of choice.  And unfortunately, that great people made the wrong choice.   

 

  

"If we become tolerant of the intolerant, our society no longer has tolerance at all." Tom Lang

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by: Alexander @ Sat Sep 08, 2007 at 11:08:29 AM CDT

It's easy to call it the wrong choice now (5.00 / 1)

But when your country was raped and starved after losing a huge chunk of its population in a war, having all of your honor stripped and your name defiled the worldover...you corner someone and they take extreme measures.  That was a lesson learned and applied following victory in WW2 when we worked to make West Germany a real country rather than kicking them when they were down like Europe did with the treaty of Versailles.

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by: JoeTS @ Sat Sep 08, 2007 at 11:21:23 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

too simplistic (6.00 / 1)

JoeTS, you are right to a degree.  however, a lot of people in germany knew what was happening all along.  some felt too afraid or too powerless to resist.  others preferred to try not to believe it.  why do you think many jews were still available to be shipped off to camps?  for some, it was because they did want to believe what they saw happening around them, and so didn't leave early enough.  the same pattern goes for their gentile neighbors.  never underestimate the capacity of people to shove their heads in the sand.

and p.s. you don't need starvation and defeat to bring out the hate and sheeple in people.  just look at the USA right now!  and look at how successful the christianists have been in recent years in using fear and demonization of gays and independent women to stoke Bush's fires.  show me the rampant starvation in the united states and our loss of massive chunks of the population and the great economic depression we are now in. no.  you can't.  all things considered, most of us still have cars on the road and food on the table.  and yet here we are, acting like pre-war ostriches. 

my thesis is that gluttony breeds submission just as effectively as does famine.  We're too comfortable to fight back too hard.  Bush knows this.  THat is why he encouraged us to go shopping, and why he didnt institute the draft.

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by: Laurel @ Sat Sep 08, 2007 at 11:54:42 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Maybe not keep 'em "fat and happy" (0.00 / 0)

But fat, lazy, and apathetic? Or just spoiled rotten?

It's not just the "Christianists" -- the so-called War on Terror has been billed as "protecting our American way of life." So what exactly does that empty phrase mean? It appears to be more about the "freedom" of gluttony, profit (for a few), and perpetual consumption (for all) than it is about more fundamental freedoms, such as those actually enshrined in the Constitution.

God forbid we actually call into question our 21st century homogenized McAmerican lifestyle -- apparently THAT has become the ideal which must be defended at all costs.

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by: Tim Little @ Sat Sep 08, 2007 at 17:01:10 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Yes, and some other sacred cows (0.00 / 0)

Hmm, some more reflection is called for here.  Part of that American way of life is feminism, abortion, gay rights, genetic engineering, things like that.  Our heads are in the sand because we don't want to call into question those values and how those rub muslims the wrong way, to say the least.  It's that complicity of progressives and neo-conservatives/oil-interests/imperialists that creates the dynamic that forces people to stick their heads in the sand and ignore things we should be dealing with.

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by: they @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 15:43:21 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Shouldn't forget (5.50 / 4)

That Germany had an active left after the war and until the Nazis consolidated power in the early 1930's.  There were even worker's revolutions in some states and cities.  It's much too simple to think there were 'sheeples' and Nazis, and the latter slipped into power through the former's inattention.  There were strongly ideological parties on the left and the right, no effective center, and an inability to form a stable goverment.   I think the lesson of the era isn't that political engagement is important to protect civil rights (although I certainly support that effort), but that building effective center-left coalitions is critical. 

"Perseverance is a great element of success. If you knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody." -Longfellow

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by: Bean in the 'Burbs @ Sat Sep 08, 2007 at 16:45:10 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

I appreciate the post (6.00 / 2)

I spent a good deal of this summer listening to my grandmother's memoirs in which she describes, in German, living in Cologne from 1931 to 1937 and feeling the noose of the Nazi regime tightening all around her. My grandparents and my mother moved to Prague a year before it was invaded and experienced the onslaught of fascism all over again. My mother also wrote her memoirs about a girlhood as a street kid in Prague while her mother was in forced labor before being shipped off to a concentration camp which she thankfully survived. Her father, a non-Jewish leftist, was in a work camp. My mother's grandparents, railroad workers in the coal mining city of Ostrava, took their own lives before being deported. These stories have made for some heavy summer reading.

The take home message for me is that we in the United States have tremendous freedom and the ability to speak out when we see injustice. Unfortunately, too many Americans choose not to use our freedom of speech. Many even castigate those who do. The power of the state is awesome and when even one among us is persecuted we remain silent at our peril.

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by: Speaking Out @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 03:15:11 AM CDT

Joe Kennedy was right. (6.00 / 1)

Joseph P. Kennedy was quoted years ago as saying that the time of democracy had passed.  While that nixed his chances of being President, he had a son that made the office his. 

As I look around at the country today, I think Joe may have been ahead of this time.  "Free Speech Zones" (which means you don't have any outside the zone?), militarization of police, surveillence of citizens, a government that respects only those laws that give it advantage, government control of media (is everybody sick of seeing "Osama" with the Just For Men look), "law" by government fiat, war without end with politicians and businesspeople making fortunes off our dead young, and the list goes on.

While the Republicans now are the authors of the current wave of sin against the people, my own party, The Democratic Party, sits by and watches this go-round, like a tag-team match.  That they have a majority to change this meant nothing.  They're just waiting for their time to reap the benefits of power.  

Why can't the Democratic Party be a party of political reform?   

 

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by: Lief Raaker @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 15:16:32 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

A few observations (0.00 / 0)

Regarding Bean in the 'Burbs @ Sat Sep 08, 2007 at 17:45:10 PM EDT

That Germany had an active left after the war...

I presume you are referring to WWI, not WWII.  The Russians actually tried to sponsor a Communist revolution in Germany in 1923.  It failed, of course.

Regarding JoeTS @ Sat Sep 08, 2007 at 12:21:23 PM EDT

I am actually unable to find a part of this comment to copy, since it is virtually all ahistorical. 

A couple of points.  The pre-victory plan of the Allies was to virtually completely de-industrialize all of Germany, to dismantle its industrial infrastructure, and ship the dismantled infrastructure to the victors in reparations for the war.

That actually started to occur after VE day.  Why didn't it continue?  Because of fears of Russian communist expansion.  After it became clear that Russian communists were expanding into the West, the West (primarily the Americans) determined that the best strategy to stem Russian expansionism was to build up the West German economy, not to destroy it.  And that's what they did.  Recall that the Marshall Plan was not proposed until late 1947, over two years after VE day, and was not implemented until beginning in 1948.  But that strategy to stem Russian expansionism worked quite well.

Actually, the military command in West Germany tried its best to stymie West German economic expansion.  Generous though the Marshall Plan was, the primary incentive that led to the German Wirtschaftswunder was Adenauer's finance minister Erhard's 1948 currency reform (basically floating the Deutsche Mark), which actually was opposed by the US military overseers.  Erhard carried it through, anyway, and it worked quite well to spur the German economy.

BTW, France was not completely cooperative in making West Germany a country.  They did not return their occupied region, the Saarland, to West Germany until 1955.

As a humorous aside, my German mother-in-law, when she was living in the US, continued to address letters to Bavaria using "US-Zone" well into the 1980s.  Bavaria was in the US occupation zone.

Regarding Alexander @ Sat Sep 08, 2007 at 12:08:29 PM EDT

But I cannot believe that they did not understand that this "chipping away of their rights" was just wrong.

The point of the book that I cited was that the "chipping away of their rights" happened so imcrementally, and with such "protectionist" explanations, that the Germans were probably virtually unaware that they were being lulled into a belief that it was OK that their rights be incrementally chipped away.  The most obvious analog in the US in recent years is PATRIOT Act I, PATRIOT Act II, and the most recent act regarding wiretapping.  Incremental withdrawal of rights.  They thought they were free.  You believe that you are, too.

A nit regarding Speaking Out @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 04:15:11 AM EDT

My spouse's father (of whom I have not mentioned--he died in 1981) was a DP (displaced person) from the Ukraine during WWII.  Following the war, he lost his Ukranian citizenship--for a reason that I do not know--and he was "Staatenlos" when he emigrated to the US.  Since citizenship passed patralinearly then, his son--my spouse--was also Staatenlos when he was dragged to the US by the parents.

BTW, my spouse's German grandfather was an inmate at the Dachau concentration camp for opposing the Nazis during WWII.  He was actually scheduled for execution.  Fortunately the camp was liberated before the execution order could be carried out.  There were other resistors who were not so fortunate.  Do a google search for the "white rose society"  They were students and a professor at the Uni in Munich.  There are two squares on the University on opposite sides of the main road through the Uni named in their honor.

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by: raj @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 05:21:12 AM CDT

An observation... (0.00 / 0)

...the linked to portion of They Thought They Were Free (which was written in 1955 by a Jewish man from UniChic, by the way) was not the most chilling portion.  The most chilling portion was his reports of his interviews with his friends in several small towns in Germany who had supported the Nazi party.

No, he did not try to emasculate them.  The author actually did a pretty good job of reporting just how the Nazi party incrementally turned the German people into Sheeple.  I have noted analogies in the US by the Republicans, hence my reference to the Goering quotation.

I will give you another point.  The Nazis had so organized the political structure of Germany (look up "Gauleiter") that resistance was almost impossible.  The residents did not even know who the party members were.  Another little story.  My spouse's grandparents would listen to the BBC over shortwave.  But they would send the family's dog to the garden gate to monitor for Nazis who might be overhearing their listening to the dog.  The Nazis in the community--who were otherwise unknown--poisoned the dog.

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by: raj @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 10:25:40 AM CDT

incrementally (0.00 / 0)

yes, the nazis were masters of incrementalism.  family stories from holland and elsewhere and what i've read about the warsaw ghetto bear this out.  unfortunately one loses credibility in the blog world the moment one compares anything contemporary to the nazi history.  however, bushco is using the same techniques the nazis did: incrementalism, and relentless repetition of the "truths" you want people to believe.  we are accepting incremental reductions in our freedoms, and we seem to be surprised anew at each step (if we even bother to notice).  if only the surprise would accumulate into rage.  but it doesn't.  americans have brainwashed themselves into thinking that americans are somehow immune from or above such deceits.  the paragon of patriotic animals.  few here will allow themselves to believe that any american would ever do something so...wrong.  and so we are incredulous each and every time it happens.  i've stopped counting how many times bush has bested himself at undermining the american government and society.

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by: Laurel @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 10:37:39 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Agree 100%... (0.00 / 0)

BTW, it has been reported here in Germany just yesterday morning that Putin in Russia wants to buy uranium from Australia.  Any idea why?

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by: raj @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 10:45:11 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Well, there are the bomber flights (0.00 / 0)

Putin has reinstituted the "keep the bombers with nuclear weapons in the air" policy, according to the MSM.

Deborah Sirotkin Butler
AmberPaw dot @aol.com

"Failure to plan is planning to fail."
Proverb

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by: AmberPaw @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 13:47:03 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Pavlov, B.F. Skinner (0.00 / 0)

Is it not funny how certain words completely short circuit the American brain.  Had I not accepted that ex-pat assignment I too would still have my Pavlovian dog conditioning intact.  I can only talk about real stuff to my non-American born very diverse work group.

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by: Lasthorseman @ Mon Sep 10, 2007 at 17:19:22 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Re: resistance was almost impossible (0.00 / 0)

Yes, after the Nazis consolidated power, Germany was a police state, and it was too late for resistance.  But I want to stress again that the communist and social democratic parties were vigorous, held large blocs in the Reichstag up until the Nazi takeover, and fought the rightists politically and through paramilitaries until they were banned and brutally suppressed in 1933.  The left fought the Nazis - and they lost.  They lost because they did not form - in fact were uninterested in forming - a stable governing coalition that could compete with and reduce the appeal of fascism.  The communists were dominated by a soviet-influenced marxism that cast social democrats and moderates as sops for capitalist interests.  Instead of working with them and smaller parties to build a coalition capable of governing, the communists followed an ideology that wanted to sharpen the contradictions of capitalism so as to hasten a worker's revolution.  Well, the communists got a revolution - from the right.  The Nazis exploited fears of loss of order and instability and were able to take power based on their strong bloc in the Reichstag and the complicity of traditional conservatives and the military.  I'll say again: the lesson of the era wasn't that it's important to speak up before it's too late (although that's a fine principle), but rather that the left must make common cause and coalitions with the center. 

"Perseverance is a great element of success. If you knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody." -Longfellow

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by: Bean in the 'Burbs @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 17:32:08 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

What you write about... (5.00 / 1)

...the inability of the Left to build a stable coalition is true, but regarding

The Nazis exploited fears of loss of order and instability...

it should be remembered that the Nazis--via their SturmAbteilung (SA, the "Brownshirts") actually fomented much of the disorder in the country.

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by: raj @ Sun Sep 09, 2007 at 20:11:18 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

One more point about the left in Germany.... (0.00 / 0)

...I will presume that you know what the party "die Linke" is.  If you do not, I will let you know what it is the rest of the PDS--the former east German communists--and, unfortunately they are doing fairly well.  The most unfortunate thing is that the neo-Nazi party NPD seems to be doing quite well in the ehemalige DDR, particularly Sachsen.

For a reason that I do not know, the center-left SPD (Social Democrats) doesn't want anything to do with the Linke.

The (traditional European) liberal party is the FDP.  And not just because their chairman is gay.

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by: raj @ Mon Sep 10, 2007 at 03:53:57 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

9/11, Fear, and Politics (0.00 / 0)

Speaking of which, if you missed today's On Point, give a listen; it it's very interesting; it covers some of the psychological ground behind authoritarianism and how that can be used for political purposes.

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by: Tim Little @ Mon Sep 10, 2007 at 19:38:03 PM CDT