THE JEWISH NEWS
Incorporating The Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with issue of July 20, 1951
Member American A56ociation of English—Jewish Newspapers, Michigan Press Association, National Editorial
A .9C elation.
Pugh-hed every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co., 17100 \Vest Seven Mile Road, Detroit, Mich. 48235.
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PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Publisher
CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ
Business Manager
SIDNEY SHMARAK
Advertising Manager
CHARLOTTE HYAMS
City Editor
Sabbath Scriptural Selections.
This Abigail. the thirteenth day of Adar 11. 5727, the following scriptural selections
4,11 be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuch& portions) Lev. 6:1 - 8:36. Deut. 25:17-19. Prophetical portion, I Sam.
1..; 2 - 34.
Purim Tom reading. Sunday: Ex. 17:816. The Book of Esther is read the night
b. fore.-
VOL.
Candle lighting. Friday, March 24. 6:30 p.m.
Li, No. 1
Page Four
•
:March 24, 1967
Challenges and Doubts Over Nazi Threats
The recent neo-Nazi triumphs at the polls
in West Germpny and the election of Dr.
Kurt-Georg Kiesinger as Chancellor inspired
a distinguished group of Americans to mini-
mize the assumption that the developments
represent an emerging new danger.
In the list of the 29 signers of that
statement were Gen. S. L. A. Marshall, Edgar .
Ansel' Mowrer, Joel Carmichael, Prof. Hans
.1. Nlorgenthau. Dr. harry Gideonse and others
of high stature in the political and scholastic
spheres.
Their statement presents in part these
views:
-lic,cnt state elections in West Germany. in
National Democratic Party
polled approximately 7.6 per cent of the vote, coupled
with the election as Chancellor of Dr. Kurt-Georg
Kivioger. a former Nazi Party member, has led
many to wonder if we are not witnessing the rebirth
of Nazism in the Federal Republic. However, a
more careful study of what has happened does not
which the right - wing
fears.
NPD has consistently refused to be-
- While the
come identified with such Nazi doctrines as anti-
Semitisin and also rejects any German share in
nuclear weapons, it calls on Germans to reaffirm
their pride in the Fatherland. Such patriotic
rhetoric is not unnatural under the circumstances,
but it is dangerous in the context of a NATO and
a Europe already weakened by General de Gaulle's
stress on nationalism. The real danger is not a
confirm these
renewal of German aggression but neutralism and
unilateral approaches to Moscow, in the hope of
achieving both reunification and the recovery of
former German territory in the East, at Poland's
expense. A German trend toward neutralism would
tempt the Soviets to continue their tactics of divide
and rule and postpone the reunification of Europe
and a true detente .
•'Aside from the urge to cast a protest vote
against the Establishment by supporting the NPD,
this program has some attraction to young Germans
between the ages of 20 and 30, who do not remem-
ber Hitler and are unwilling to assume the guilt
of their fathers. Some of -them see no reason why
Germany, economically still the strongest nation
in Europe. should not share a decision-making
role in world affairs. . . .
"As for Dr. Kiesinger. his record as a whole
is much more reassuring than the superficial facts
would indicate .
"As one of Germany's most prominent poli-
ticians during the post-war years, Dr. Kiesinger's
record is excellent. He has been a consistent friend
of both the United States and France. From 1955
to 1958 he served as floor leader of the European
Christian Democrats in the Council of Europe, a
post to which he was elected by Christian Demo-
crats from France. Italy, Belgium, Holland and
Luxemburg. etc. Because his position as Minister-
President of Baden - Wuerttemberg removed him
from the hurly-burly of Bonn politics, he was
chosen by both factions of his party .
In the light of these facts, it seems clear that
while the Hesse and Bavarian elections should be
taken as- - a warning, we are in danger of drawing
the wrong lessons from them. If we condemn the
German people as a whole, including the demo-
cratic-minded majority, for the views of a small
minority, we will promote a vicious circle of mis-
understanding and recriminations which can only
help that minority."
We have here a repetition of
-
warnings
not to condemn all Germans for the Nazi
crimes, to differentiate between the young
who did not know Hitler and those who were
of his generation. In a sense the appeal now
is akin to the one after World War I—not
to perpetuate the animosities and the venge-
ance.
The general feeling, however, is that the
optimism inspired by the statement above
is exaggerated.
Contrary to the views just quoted, the
well known German novelist. Guenter Grass,
addressed this open letter to Kurt Kiesinger,
its text having appeared in Die Zeit:
Dear Dr. Kiesinger:
... Wittingly or not, most of the fathers
of my generation assisted in the crimes
committed after 1933. The schism that this
creates has been overcome in many German
families by the fathers' admission of com-
plicity and the son's desire to understand.
As an adult, Mr. Kiesinger, you became a
member of the Nazi Party in 1933, and
only the capitulation of the German forces
terminated your membership.
Permit me to employ a fiction: If you
were my father, I should ask you to explain
your crucial decision of 1933. I should be
able to understand it because the majority
of the fathers of my generation lost their
best years from just such wrong decisions.
But suppose that you, as my father, were
to ask me: "I have the opportunity to be-
come chancellor. I am profoundly interested
in politics. . . . The people support me.
Shall I say yes?" Then I, as your son, would
answer: "Just because you are so deeply
interested in politics, because you aspire
to participate in foreign affairs, you must
say no. Because in that case you should
know that in this country of unresolved
obligations, in this divided land with no
peace treaty, the chancellor cannot be a
man who, once in the past, acted against
reason and served evil, when those who
followed reason and resisted crime per-
ished for their stand. Propriety should
prevent you from calling yourself a resist-
ance fighter this late in the game.
You, Mr. Kiesinger, are not my father,
but I hope you have a son who will thus
oppose your unfortunate decision. . . .
How shall German youth oppose the old
party now coming to life in the NPD if
you burden the office of chancellor with
your past? How shall we hold in memory
the tortured, murdered resistance fighters,
the dead of Auschwitz and Treblinka, if
you, a fellow traveler from the past, dare
to lay down the guidelines for politics
today? How shall history be taught here-
after in our schools? . . . Will the pro-
Stalinist Ulbricht now be able to point his
finger at us? Is there no man in the
SPD/CSU/CDU sufficiently unencumbered
by old deeds to become chancellor? .. .
The responsibility is yours, but we shall
bear the consequences and the shame.
Still respectfully,
Guenter Grass
Many developments and a large variety
of opinions must be taken into considera-
tion in judging the German situation. For
example, Foreign Minister Willy Brandt last
month warned Americans to expect fresh
gains by the extreme NPD. While he called
these successes "protest votes," the new
trend to the right is quite evident.
Even Josef Cardinal Frings, who was in-
volved in a controversy with Rabbi Max
Nusbaum recently, told the Society of Chris-
tian-Jewish Cooperation on March 5 to be
vigilant against an emerging neo-Nazism,
stating: "Vigilance is in fact necessary if
the barbarism of National Socialist dictator-
ship is not to return one day."
Then there is the report that the NPD
has succeeded in establishing student groups
—as part of the National Democratic Univer-
sities Union (BHB) — at Heidelberg, Bonn,
Frankfurt, Mayence, Freiburg and Tuebbin-
OM*
Warburg Evaluates Sinai Drive
of '56, Urges War's De-Escalation
James P. Warburg, author, lecturer and authority on world af-
fairs, who was one of Franklin D. Roosevelt's financial advisers,
believes that the American foreign policies were considerably dis-
torted by an obsessive fear of communism.
In "The United States in the Postwar World," published by
Atheneum (162 E. 38th, NY 16), Warbug poses the questions: "what
have we done, what have we left undone and what we can and must
do." His emphasis is that "we should ask and expect our government
to move simultaneously on two broad fronts: towards ending the arms
race and the creation of a world of law, and toward accelerated world
economic development."
Ile holds the view that "we should at the very least stop our
attacks upon North Vietnam and de-escalate the conflict" and
lie would abandon the "no longer relevant NATO policy."
Touching upon world functioning organizations that are affecting
the peace he makes reference to the Afab 'League as "being com-
mitted to the destruction of Israel."
Considerable attention is given to the policies of John Foster
Dulles and among the late Secretary of State's actions under scrutiny
Warburg discusses the results of the 1956 Sinai Campaign and Dulles'
policies. Warburg writes:
"After weeks of futile negotiations during which Dulles infuriated
Britain and France, Israel suddenly invaded Egypt's Sinai Peninsula
and Britain and France launched an operation to seize the Canal
Zone 'in order to separate the belligerents.' We are not concerned
here with the rights and wrongs of Israel's action nor with the justi-
fication—if any—for the Anglo-French intervention. We are con-
cerned solely with the effects of Dulles' diplomacy; these were more
far-reaching than the unhappy but temporary split in the Western
alliance resulting from American condemnation of the invasion as a
breach of the United Nations Charter.
"Apart from the resentment aroused on both sides of the Atlantic,
the results of the Egyptian fiasco were:
"1. The restoration of the' very conditions which had provoked
the explosion, plus blocking of the Suez Canal for about six months.
"2. The strengthening of Nasser's position in spite of the over-
whelming defeat of his forces.
"3. The destruction of British influence in the Arab world and
the endangering of what remained of 'Britain's preferential position
in Iraq and the Persian Gulf area.
"4. The creation of a serious cleavage within the British Com-
monwealth, the resignation of Eden and the realization on the part
of the British public that Britain was no longer a power capable of
independent action."
Warburg maintains that "Nasser's moves were Soviet-in-
spired," but he adds that "actually, the shrewd Egyptian leader
was already recoiling from the uncomfortably close relations with
Moscow that had resulted from the crisis of 1956."
The Eisenhower - Dulles policies in the Middle East are evaluated
as having fallen into ruins.
Warburg further charges that "neither Truman nor Eisenhower
had shown any understanding of the worldwide revolution of rising
expectations among the underprivileged peoples of the world."
His plea is for a refusal to betray democracy, for free disclosure
of facts, so that there can be mutual trust between government and
people.
Warburg pleads: "The establishment of such a relationship is
not a one-way street. Government cannot do it alone. If we, the citi-
zens of the United States, desire to have a democratic process, deter-
mine our nation's foreign policy, we must consider it our duty to
participate in it. If we want full and honest information, we must
study such information conscientiously and not content ourselves with
a mere scanning of newspaper headlines or a casual listening to news
summaries. If we want alternative courses of action laid before us,
we must be prepared to form reasoned opinions based upon knowl-
edge of background and fact.. Until we stop thinking of our govern-
ment as something apart from ourselves, it will be a thing apart
from ourselves, and we shall continue to be a nation of sheep, re-
gen universities. This is perhaps the worst
news of all—that bigotry can again emanate
from highest institutions of learning.
The tragic experiences with Nazis and
Nazism lean most of the weight in the direc-
tion of Guenter Grass' statement and the
other facts just quoted. Everything that
emerges in the record anew in Germany,
much echoing the past, utters the warning: sponding to the manipulation of our desires, hopes and fears rather
than to an appeal to our reasoned judgments.'?
BEWARE!