64 Friday, January 29, 1982
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
The Pledge Betrayed' Exposes Western Leaders'
Indifference in Dealing With World War II Crimes
In post-war Germany, try, headed up that bank's
Nazi criminals were foreign department during
reinstated in their insensi- the war. As with other
tive positions in post-war German industrialists,
Germany, and American many of Deutsch Bank's
and British officials failed clients used slave labor in
their factories and mines.
to prosecute the guilty.
DMW drew its slave labor
This charge is substan-
tiated in one of the most re- from the nearby Dachau
vealing books on record concentration camp. I.G.
about World War II in Farben built its synthetic
which .Tom Bower makes rubber plant next to Au-
the accusations in his "The schwitz. Its directors called
Pledge Betrayed" (Double- it "I.G. Auschwitz": At least
50,000 inmates died of star-
day).
Bower charges that of the vation, exhaustion, expo-
150,000 war criminals who sure and torture building
were directly implicated in that factory.
At the same time Abs was
mass murders under
Nazism, only 5,000 were asked by the British to help
ever brought to trial in the rebuild Germany's banking
system after the war,
West.
"The Pledge Betrayed" American war crimes inves-
shows how Gestapo of- tigators were hunting for
ficers were appointed Abs as a suspected war
chiefs of police; how con- criminal.
Karl Blessing, a
centration camp doctors
member
of Himmler's
were allowed to resume
normal general practice Circle and supremo for
and how school teachers Germany's oil industry,
who had enthusiastically became president of the
preached the theories of Federal Bank.
Ludger Westrick, head of
radicalism and anti ,
Semitism continued to Germany's aluminum in-
teach in the same schools. dustry, became secretary of
state in the Federal Chan-
The same pattern re- cellor's office.
Ludwig Erhard, a
peated itself in government
and industry. Herman Abs, member of a secret SS plan-
who became chairman of ning organization and fi-
Deutsch Bank, now the sec- nance and economics ex-
ond largest bank in Europe pert, became chancellor of
with controlling interests in the Federal Republic.
Roosevelt's
one-third of German indus-
Despite
pledge that Nazism would
be eradicated from Ger-
many, "The Pledge Bet-
rayed" proves that Ameri-
can policy was cynically
sabotaged by British offi-
cials in Germany. Govern-
ment documents show that
known German murderers
and notorious Nazi officials
were given sanctuary in the
British zone at the same
time Britain officially sup-
ported U.S. policy.
Previously untold be-
cause the official records
were unavailable and
Nazi and Allied
decision-makers were
unwilling to speak, "The
Pledge Betrayed" now
firmly establishes the
background and harsh
facts of how those who
had made the sacrifice to
remove Nazism were in
fact betrayed once their
hard-fought victory had
been won.
"The Pledge Betrayed" is
exactly what the book's title
asserts, as an indictment of
the Churchill-Roosevelt re-
gimes, as a post-war de-
velopment during which the
horrors of the war itself con-
tinued in the hatred of Jews,
the perpetuation of the
anti-Semitic tactics, the fai-
lures which accounted for
the Holocaust.
Bower, whose book ap-
peared in serialized form in
the London Times, works as
a producer on BBC Televi-
sion's "Panorama" prog-
ram. He produced four
major TV programs on the
failure of the Allied war
crimes and denazification
efforts. They have been
shown on 20 national TV
networks throughout the
world.
Bower researched and ef-
fectively recorded the major
historic events that led to
the betrayals exposed by
him. The Adolf Eichmann
story, the plan promulgated
by Joel Brand in an effort to
exchange trucks for the
lives of Hungarian Jews,
the concentration camp
tragedies and the warnings
of the impending mass
murders in the crematoria
— they are part of the hor-
rifying record and they are
in the Bower account.
The author relates the
warnings by Gerhardt
Riegner, the World
Jewish Congress rep-
resentative, of the Nazi
aim to commence the
mass murder of millions
of Jews and the ignor-
ing of it, a listing of anti-
Semites and the many
anti-Semitic incidents
appear throughout this
volume. The shelving of
the Riegner appeal for
action, which came in
time for rescue but failed
to get a response, retains
the charge of the Western
powers' guilt in the de-
struction of European
Jewry.
Bower's revelations indi-
cate also how the anti-
Zionist factor enters into
the discriminatory ele-
ments of the shocking
post-war experiences.
Bower charges:
"Before Pearl Harbor the
pro-German lobby in
America had been a major
factor in limiting support
for Britain's lone fight
against Hitler. Ethnic
German communities were
unwilling to believe stories
about gas chambers in Po-
land. Rather, in 1948, they
were convinced that the
Kirschbaums and the
Pearls (war crimes inves-
tigators during the Nurem-
berg war crimes trial),
Jewish refugees, possibly
with leftist ideas, were
members of the Zionist con-
spiracy still intent on de-
stroying Germany."
One incident of an anti-
Semite who escaped
punishment is that of Her-
bert Hagen, a French-
speaking SS major, who was
sent to Paris to speed the
negotiations for mass ar-
rests and deportations.
Bower reveals that Hagen
was one of the 1,080 Nazis
who were listed for extradi-
tion from France as war
criminals in 1947. Only 156
actually stood for trial.
Bowers notes the follow-
ing about Hagen:
"Intelligent and
sophisticated, Hagen had
joined the SS in 1933 and
was recruited by Dr.
Alfred Six, one of the Nazi
party's chief ideologues
on Jewish affairs, to
write anti-Semitic arti-
cles and books.
"Amongst his prolific
output was: 'World Jewry:
Its Organizations, Its
Power, Its Politics,' ar
`Britain, Hinterland
World Jewry.' He was a fre-
quent lecturer to party offi-
cials on the problems of
Jewry and a critical con-
noisseur of all anti-Semitic
propaganda. Once he com-
mented to Eichmann that
he found that the latest
issue of Der Sturmer lacked
its 'usual objectivity.' "
This and scores of other
references to the anti-
Semites and to the indiffer-
ences in prosecuting them
make the Bower book a sig-
nificant addition to the his-
tory of the era under his re-
view. He has even included
the relevant experiences
contributed to the issue by
McCarthyism. Combined,
"The Pledge Betrayed"
emerges as an inerasable
indictment of indifference
to the war crimes.
—P.S.
Revisionism: Neo-Nazis, Soviets Have Common Target
By REV. FRANKLIN
LITTELL
Special to The Jewish News
JERUSALEM — From
time to time the question of
historical "revisionism"
bobs up in conversation
about Holocaust studies.
Indignant voices arise. How
can such things be? On sec-
ond thought the answer is
clear: like the Communists.
who also deny the facts of
the Holocaust, neo-Nazis
and their pseudo-
intellectual fellow-
travelers also have a politi-
cal agenda that requires
them to attempt to re-write
history.
The agenda of the histori-
cal "revisionists" is not
scholarly: it is political.
Both the Communists
and the Fascists hate the
idea and the fact of a con-
tinuing Jewish people. And
the malice which leads the
Soviets to deny that the vic-
tims at Babi Yar were Jews
has the same quality as the
malice that leads the neo-
Nazis to publish tracts —
some of book size — denying
that 6,000,000 of Hitler's
victims were Jews.
The Russians, tough and
Hatred of a surviving
Jewish people has inten- aggressive, know what they
sifted as a restored Israel want: a bigger empire. The
has demonstrated that a western politicians, cynical
significant sector of the and luxury-loving, serve
Jewish people is no longer those with money to feed
weak or totally dependent their appetites and, like the
upon the tender mercies of a weaklings of the French an-
"civilized" Christendom or cien regime before the Revo-
Islam to make for them the lution, comfort themselves
choice of life or death. with a dying generation's
The Marxist USSR has slogan, "Apres moi la De-
major military treaties luge!"
In the total picture, the ef-
with Syria, Libya, South
forts
of a few pseudo-
Yemen and Ethiopia, and
to revise the his-
is arming those dictator- historians
ships and others in the torical record of the 20th
Arab League under less Century, the Age of
direct control for one Genocide, seems relatively
purpose: to destroy Is- unimportant. And the task
rael. Israel alone stands the most quixotic of them, a
in the way of Russian retired Roman Catholic
takeover of the world's teacher named Austin App,
has defined for them is truly
major oil fields.
beyond the possible.
App's position is con-
And so-called Christian
nations, capitulating to the sistent and clear. In "The
Six Million Swindle" he
pressure of the oil cartels
and the moral cowardice of wrote: "The truth is that
their politicians, abandon in World War II the Third
the Christians of Lebanon Reich fought for justice,
to the PLO and Syrian in- and the Allies fought to
vaders and vie with the prevent justice . .."
Russians in arming gov- Again: "Allied crimes
ernments at war with Is- were 10 times worse than
those of the Third Reich"
rael.
("History's Most Terrify-
ing Peace"). And again:
"The unhappy mission of
the Revisionists will have
to be to show that we got
unjustly into both World
Wars against Germany
." (The Journal of His-
torical Review).
App's writings show that
he hates Woodrow Wilson
and Franklin D. Roosevelt
with equal passion, and that
he believes the Balfour Dec-
laration and the record of
the Holocaust are both re-
sults of the "Zionist conspi-
racy."
- Although "The Journal of
Historical Review" is the
major continuing effort of
the historical "revisionists"
to deny the historical re-
cord, on its "Editorial Coun-
cil" there are no profes-
sional historians and only
two individuals with aca-
demic positions of any kind.
App, before he retired
some years ago, attained
the rank of associate profes-
sor at LaSalle College in
Philadelphia. Arthur Butz,
whose book "The Hoax of
the Twentieth Century" ex-
cited a flurry of public de-
bate and became a bestsel-
ler in Nazi circles, is an
associate professor of elec-
trical engineering at
Northwestern University.
The other academic is a
professor of chemistry at
the University of Califor-
nia at San Diego.
Serious scholars will not
spend much time on "re-
visionism," except eventu-
ally to assign research pap-
ers and dissertations to
analyze its origins, finan-
cial support and political
purpose. The answer to the
denials of fact and wild
speculations of the histori-
cal "revisionists" was given
by the International Sur-
vivors' Congress in Israel
last June and the Interna-
tional Liberators' Confer-
ence in Washington, D.C.
last October. Scientists do
- debate with members of
-S Flat Earth Society, and
historians do not debate
with members of the histor-
ical "revisionist" group.
Survivors Mark Wannsee Date
VIENNA (JTA) — Mem-
bers of Austrian Inmates of
Auschwitz, an organization
of death camp survivors,
held a press conference to
testify to the reality of the
Holocaust, its origins and
the methodical way it was
carried out. The occasion
was the 40th anniversary of
the meeting in Wannsee, a
suburb of Berlin, where
Reinhard Heydrich, who
was chief of security of the
SS, Adolf Eichmann, and a
number of other Nazi
bureaucrats decided how to
implement the "final solu-
tion."
Herbert Langbein, a
writer and former inmate of
Dachau and Auschwitz, ex-
plained that the press con- neo-Nazi activities increase
ference was organized be- because the victims have
cause there can never be an been silent too long and
end to discussion of Nazi Nazi propaganda finds an
horrors. "We have to speak audience, especially the
out because nowadays there very young, who are open to
is much confusion about all the suggestion that the hor-
this, especially among rors of the Holocaust could
young people," he said. not have happened and,
Langbein added that therefore, did not.
License Ban for Nazi Initials
BONN (JTA) — The city
of Trier has decided to ban
auto license plates bearing
letters alluding to the Nazi
era and organizations
formed by the Nazis.
The mayor of the city,
Felix Zimmerman, said that
in recent months car owners
have demanded plates car-
rying letters such as "HJ"
(Hitler Jugend), "KZ" (the
German abbreviation for
concentration camp), "NS"
(National Socialist Party),
and "SS."
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