Vergangenheitsaufarbeitung – an omnipresent notion in the German historiographic and public discourse denoting the dealing with the National Socialist (NS) past. Whilst there exist countless German publications on dis-/continuities of NS elites in the judiciary, military, media, and culture, more international perspectives outside of the German context have not yet been integrated in the discussion about how Hitler has been “mastered” (or not) as they should be. This desideratum was addressed by this conference with contributions by international historians.
In his introductory speech, MAGNUS BRECHTKEN (Munich) stressed the importance of the international perspective after providing an overview of current inner-German projects dealing with NS continuities in German institutions (such as the Ministry of Transport or the Federal Bank). Despite these efforts, in his view the public perception is not up to date to historiographical discourse, and when it comes to how the non-allied countries view these questions, this constitutes a veritable gap in inner-German discourse.
The difficulties in negotiating complicity in National Socialist crimes are exemplified by post-war Austria, as outlined in KERSTIN VON LINGEN’s (Vienna) keynote and PETER THALER (Odense). Effectively, the responsibility for these crimes was completely deflected through establishing a narrative of victimhood as foundation of the 2nd republic, wherein National Socialism was framed as “foreign tyranny”. This victimhood-thesis served several functions (as identified by Heidemarie Uhl), mainly as argument against the presence of foreign allied powers on Austrian territory and thus as supporting narrative for independence. Although Simon Wiesenthal had already been challenging this memory myth in the 1960s, the veritable turning point in Austrian memory politics came about with the Waldheim-Affair of 1986, which paved the way for acknowledging the fact that Austrians had mostly been bystanders and/or perpetrators and not victims officially. Notably, the key factors of social transition of reckoning, confrontation, and recognition as they played out in Austria bear many similarities to the development of memory politics in Germany.
The two contributions within the panel on global perspectives might have been the most notable in addressing the aforementioned research gap. VANDANA JOSHI (Delhi) applied Astrid Errl’s concept on how collective memory travels to the case of British-Indian soldiers in German POW-captivity. Her exploration of personal sources consisting in an exchange of letters between a German and Indian soldier serve to explore bigger questions on how to de-center World War II and nationalism in general. In her view, micro-history of Indo-German entanglements can precisely achieve this and yield some interesting conclusions, such as the positive framing and even “myth-making” in Indian collective memory in regards to a perceived kinship to Germany. Conversely, both the GDR and FRG utilized the positive conditions of the prisoner camps for Indian soldiers as an instrument to foster good relations with India, which retained a non-aligned stance. MATÍAS GRINCHPUN (Buenos Aires) delineated the perceptions of post-war Germany in Perónist Argentina through connecting both political and cultural history approaches. Opposed to the myth of Argentina as a sort of haven for Nazis perpetuated in popular culture, his research reveals that the threat of a “new Germany” in South America, as perceived by the US government, existed only briefly.
That dealing with the National Socialist past not only constitutes a “German problem” is apparent when examining the continuity within the careers of functional elites from National Socialist times to post-war Germany, which often played out on an international level. NORMAN DOMEIER (Prague) provided an example for this in his case study of journalist Carl Flicker-Steger, whose biography and career for Associated Press display transnational elements. While having worked as NS-propagandist, his personal networks with and mentorship by internationally successful journalists allowed him to remain undisturbed after 1945 and further promoting his anti-Semitic views.
The Cold War as context of how the German NS past was negotiated and instrumentalized within Communist and non-aligned nations was one main focal point of the conference, exemplified by the manifold contributions from especially the Polish context. MICHAŁ TURSKI (Berlin) provided an overview of how West German “Ostforschung” and the National socialist past of its researchers was observed by the Polish secret service SB based on new sources from Polish archives. These sources revealed how information was gathered on the Ostforschung through Polish exchange students and how data was exchanged with other socialist countries. Similarly, KRZYSZTOF PERSAK (Warsaw) dealt with the SB’s surveillance practices in the case of Thomas Harlan and his research project “The Fourth Reich” on the continuity of NS elites in West Germany. Besides the known fact that Italian editor Giacomo Feltrinelli fincanced this project during the 1960s, Persak’s sighting of Polish sources revealed how surprisingly the Polish Soviet republic was also involved in the project, since it was seen as a chance to politically instrumentalise Harlan’s findings in order to de-legitimise the FRG. Even though the book was never published due to its poor quality (resulting from Harlan’s lacking qualification), Polish money had been invested in it. JACEK TEBINKA (Gdańsk) outlined the career of former SS-Gruppenführer Heinz Reinefarth, who emerged unscathed from the post-war allied criminal trials and pursued a respectable career in West Germany, from the Polish perspective. In fact, it had been Polish military who had found Reinefarth in Sylt and asked for extradition with the aim of judicial prosecution in Poland, which was hindered by the US. Apparently, he was valued by the US as source of valuable information, though the exact reasons for this remain unclear (since US documents have only been released in part). The Polish perspective on a more structural problematic tradition of NS continuity was discussed by JACEK JĘDRYSIAK (Wrocław). Deploying examples of 1960s Bundeswehr army staff with NS past, he showed how this continuity served to justify the need for a strong Polish People’s Army.
National Socialist past was also (mis-)used in the USSR, as evidenced by JASMIN SÖHNER (Heidelberg). Against the background of a high visibility of NS continuity in the personnel of (West) German judiciary, she delved into the case of Erwin Schüle: The senior prosecutor and head of the ‘Central Office for the Investigation of National Socialist Crimes’ in Ludwigsburg had been defamed through a campaign by the Soviet newspaper Pravda in 1965 for his alleged (and untrue) allegiance to the National Socialist party.
On the question of how neutral, non-aligned nations dealt with Germany’s Nazi past in their foreign policy during the Cold War, NILS ABRAHAM (Cologne) discussed the diplomatic links between the GDR and Sweden. The GDR, presenting itself as anti-fascist, sought to revive historical connections (such as the Baltic trade) through implementing cultural representative institutions in Sweden, all the while presenting the FGR as “sanctuary for neo-Nazis”. Overall, these two talks managed to show how soft power (culture, media discourse) were a central factor in the foreign policy of Communist nations.
The presentations by ANNA G. PIOTROWSKA (Krakow) and KATHERINE QUINLAN-FLATTER (Ettlingen) further expanded on the importance of culture, touching upon the ever-important question of whether one can separate the art from the artist and his (mis-)deeds. Quinlan-Flatter drew from her journalistic experiences in her presentation of sculptors active under National Socialism, whose work is denounced today as being inherently complicit to National Socialist crimes. While she advocated for a more nuanced separation of art and artist, Piotrowska in her examination of film composers’ careers emphasized the importance that artistic expressions such as film music held for National Socialist propaganda. Even though there were differences in the extent to which the several composers she researched actively supported the system, with some displaying ambivalence towards National Socialism, strikingly she concluded that the continuity of their careers in post-war Germany worked under the assumption of artists “remaining above politics”, thus adhering to the widespread “Schlussstrich”-mentality of forgetting and forgiving in order to move on.
VIKTORIYA SUKOVATA (Leipzig) brought to attention the importance of language and reception of philosophical thought being contingent upon political values: She posited that the late translations of works by Victor Klemperer, Hannah Arendt, Theodor Adorno and Walter Benjamin to Russian in the 1990s can serve as indicators for the transformation from totalitarian to democratic mentality in post-Soviet Russia.
Finally, MORITZ SCHRAMM (Odense) provided some fascinating contemporary perspectives on how the German NS past is instrumentalised in Denmark. Being able to draw from his personal family background, in his view the fascination of the Danish public with “Hitler’s Architect” Albert Speer is connected with the political agenda of Danish conservatives/right-wing populists, who connect their anti-immigrant stance with a perception of Germany being constrained by the discourse of guilt. On the other hand, he also sees an instrumentalisation of German history also within the political Left, where Germany serves as positive example. He sees these specifically Danish perspectives developing into a unique understanding of Art, which allows for positive utterances in regards to Fascist imagery and aesthetic such as by director Lars von Trier.
Overall, the conference was successful in broadening an understanding of how the process of “Mastering Hitler” went about not only in different countries, but also on different levels (be it diplomatic, cultural, or individual). Despite the background of most presenters and the location marking the symposium as still quite Euro-centric, a commendable effort was made to incorporate viewpoints from the Global South and allow for theoretical and methodological perspectives beyond classical German historiography. The collegial spirit and collaborative motivation certainly pave the way for furthering these discussions, with follow-up projects being underway.
Conference overview:
Kerstin von Lingen (Vienna): Between “first Victim” and the „Waldheim affair”: Austrian Memory after Hitler
Cold War Contexts
Michał Turski (Berlin): Polish secret police and the west German research on the Eastern Europe during Cold War
Nils Abraham (Cologne): History as an Instrument in the Cold War – The use of the coming to terms with the NS-past in GDR‘s foreign policy towards Sweden
Jasmin Söhner (Heidelberg): An alleged war criminal as head of the specialized war crimes investigation unit? A case of Soviet misunderstanding and instrumentalisation of West German Vergangenheitsbewältigung
Culture in context
Anna G. Piotrowska (Krakow): Film music composers in NS Germany and their after WWII afterlives
Katherine Quinlan-Flatter (Ettlingen): Forbidden Art
Judicial perspectives
Viktoriya Sukovata (Leipzig): Legacy of V. Klemperer and Perceptions of German Political Philosophy in Soviet and post-Soviet times
Krzysztof Persak (Warsaw): “The Fourth Reich”: Thomas Harlan’s pioneering project on former Nazis in the West German elite versus the Communist authorities in Poland
Global perspectives
Vandana Joshi (Delhi): War, Diplomacy and Memory: The Value of British-Indian POWs in Mastering Hitler’s Past
Matías Grinchpun (Buenos Aires): ¿Una nueva Alemania? (Contrasting) Perceptions of postwar Germany in Peronist Argentina, 1945-55
Media and historiography
Norman Domeier (Prague): „Typewriter Perpetrators“. Continuities in the international careers of Nazi journalists after 1945
Peter Thaler (Odense): Externalizing the Past: Postwar Austria and the History of the Third Reich
Moritz Schramm (Odense): “Seduced by the Great Führer”? Reception of Albert Speer and his post-1945 career in Denmark
Individuals & the general perspective
Jacek Tebinka (Gdańsk): The case of SS-Gruppenführer Heinz Reinefarth. From serving the Third Reich to career in West Germany
Jacek Jędrysiak (Wrocław): "All the Nazi Generations" - Commanding Staff of the Bundeswehr in the 1960s in the Light of Documents of the Polish People's Army (based on Materials from Military Districts)