#defence of the reich

[deutschland-im-krieg]

Future 206 victory ace and Ritterkreuz mit Eichenlaub und Schwertern (Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords) holder, Major Hans Philipp. KIA on 8 October 1943 in his Focke-Wulf Fw 190A-5, WNr 530407, during combat with Republic P-47D Thunderbolts and Boeing B-17F Flying Fortresses as Kommandeur of JG 1 'Oesau' near Mūnster, Defence of the Reich. Flew more than 500 combat missions. FIVE HUNDRED. For more, see my Facebook group - Eagles Of The Reich

[eugenedebs1920]

This is an ominous sign. Not since the fall of the third Reich has Germany bolstered its military to this extent.

The U.S. (Trump) abandoning Ukraine and standing with countries such as North Korea, Iran, Belarus, and of course Russia, has left a void in Europe and emboldened dictators across the globe to pursue their worst impulses. Do not kid yourself, this is the beginning of WWIII.

While Donald Trump cozies up to authoritarians he has further abused and neglected our oldest allies, praising Putin while insulting Canada and the European Union.

Open your eyes! Russia Russia Russia was a much a hoax as “signalgate”. Trump is a Russian asset, has long been in the side of the Soviets. It is not hard to see, all you have to do is look.

[whencyclopedia]

Operation Barbarossa

Adolf Hitler (1889-1945), leader of Nazi Germany, attacked the USSR on 22 June 1941 with the largest army ever assembled. The Axis offensive of June-December 1941 was code-named Operation Barbarossa ('Redbeard') after Frederick Barbarossa, Holy Roman Emperor (r. 1155-90). Despite Axis victories, the Red Army, with larger reserves and better supply lines, remained resilient.

The successful defence of Moscow turned the tide as the invaders failed to cope with the harsh winter conditions, but the German-Soviet war continued for four more years until the USSR won total victory in the spring of 1945.

Why Did Hitler Attack the USSR?

From the 1920s, Hitler identified communism as one of the greatest threats to Germany's prosperity. This sentiment was put to one side when Hitler and the leader of the USSR, Joseph Stalin (1878-1953), signed the Nazi-Soviet Pact in August 1939. The agreement included a non-aggression clause that neither state would attack the other since Hitler planned to invade Poland but did not want to face British and French armies in the west at the same time as a Soviet army in the east. Stalin, meanwhile, gained valuable time for rearmament. Secret protocols in the pact allowed Germany and the USSR to attack their neighbours, effectively carving up Central and Eastern Europe between them. The USSR had freedom of action in eastern Poland, Bessarabia, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Germany had western Poland and those states to the south. The agreement included trade, the USSR providing raw materials in exchange for Nazi gold.

For both sides, the Nazi-Soviet pact was a temporary agreement of convenience; war between the two seemed inevitable given their ideological differences, Hitler's territorial ambitions, and Germany's need for raw materials. Hitler had written about these ambitions in his 1925 book, Mein Kampf, where he described the need for Lebensraum ('living space') for the German people, that is, new lands in the east where they could find resources and prosper. Following Hitler's successful invasion of Poland in 1939, Hitler had to deal with Britain and France, who both declared war on Germany. To everyone's surprise, Germany's attacks in the West were remarkably successful. France surrendered in June 1940, and Britain retreated with the Dunkirk Evacuation. Hitler did not win the Battle of Britain in the air (July-October 1940), which meant an invasion against that country could not be launched. Instead, Hitler embarked on a bombing campaign, but when Britain still did not surrender, Hitler turned to the East.

Poland had been split down the line of the River Bug in 1939, with the USSR taking the eastern part and Germany the western side. The USSR made client states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, although Finland stubbornly resisted the Red Army's attacks (a peace treaty was signed in March 1940). One consequence of these land grabs was that the USSR's line of rather neglected defences, the Stalin Line, which protected its western flank, was now far behind what would become the front lines.

Totalitarian Regimes in Europe in 1939

Simeon Netchev (CC BY-NC-ND)

Hitler's code name for the attack on the USSR was Operation Barbarossa. The official justification for the invasion was that the USSR had broken the spirit of the Nazi-Soviet Pact through acts of sabotage in German territory and was massing troops to directly threaten the Third Reich. On the other side, Stalin accused Hitler of breaking the pact by mobilising German troops into Romania and Bulgaria. As the historian W. L. Shirer notes, "The thieves…had begun to quarrel over the spoils" (801).

Continue reading...

[misfitwashere]

ROBERT REICH

JAN 31

Friends,

The following is by Jean Chrétien, who served as prime minister of Canada from 1993 to 2003. It appeared in The Globe and Mail, Canada’s most widely read newspaper, on January 11, 2025. 

Canadians will never give up the best country in the world to join the U.S.

Jean Chrétien

Today is my 91st birthday.

It’s an opportunity to celebrate with family and friends. To look back on the life I’ve had the privilege to lead. And to reflect on how much this country we all love so much has grown and changed over the course of the nine decades I’ve been on this Earth.

This year, I’ve also decided to give myself a birthday present. I’m going to do something in this article that I don’t do very often anymore, and sound off on a big issue affecting the state of the nation and profoundly bothering me and so many other Canadians: The totally unacceptable insults and unprecedented threats to our very sovereignty from U.S. president-elect Donald Trump.

I have two very clear and simple messages.

To Donald Trump, from one old guy to another: Give your head a shake! What could make you think that Canadians would ever give up the best country in the world — and make no mistake, that is what we are — to join the United States?

I can tell you Canadians prize our independence. We love our country. We have built something here that is the envy of the world — when it comes to compassion, understanding, tolerance and finding a way for people of different backgrounds and faiths to live together in harmony.

We’ve also built a strong social safety net — especially with public health care — that we are very proud of. It’s not perfect, but it’s based on the principle that the most vulnerable among us should be protected.

This may not be the “American Way” or “the Trump Way.” But it is the reality I have witnessed and lived my whole long life.

If you think that threatening and insulting us is going to win us over, you really don’t know a thing about us. You don’t know that when it came to fighting in two world wars for freedom, we signed up — both times — years before your country did. We fought and we sacrificed well beyond our numbers.

We also had the guts to say no to your country when it tried to drag us into a completely unjustified and destabilizing war in Iraq.

We built a nation across the most rugged, challenging geography imaginable. And we did it against the odds.

We may look easy-going. Mild-mannered. But make no mistake, we have spine and toughness.

And that leads me to my second message, to all our leaders, federal and provincial, as well as those who are aspiring to lead our country: Start showing that spine and toughness. That’s what Canadians want to see — what they need to see. It’s called leadership. You need to lead. Canadians are ready to follow.

I know the spirit is there. Ever since Mr. Trump’s attacks, every political party is speaking out in favour of Canada. In fact, it is to my great satisfaction that even the Bloc Québécois is defending Canada.

But you don’t win a hockey game by only playing defence. We all know that even when we satisfy one demand, Mr. Trump will come back with another, bigger demand. That’s not diplomacy; it’s blackmail.

We need another approach — one that will break this cycle.

Mr. Trump has accomplished one thing: He has unified Canadians more than we have been ever before! All leaders across our country have united in resolve to defend Canadian interests.

When I came into office as prime minister, Canada faced a national unity crisis. The threat of Quebec separation was very real. We took action to deal with this existential threat in a manner that made Canadians, including Quebeckers, stronger, more united and even prouder of Canadian values.

Now there is another existential threat. And we once again need to reduce our vulnerability. That is the challenge for this generation of political leaders.

And you won’t accomplish it by using the same old approaches. Just like we did 30 years ago, we need a Plan B for 2025.

Yes, telling the Americans we are their best friends and closest trading partner is good. So is lobbying hard in Washington and the state capitals, pointing out that tariffs will hurt the American economy too. So are retaliatory tariffs — when you are attacked, you have to defend yourself.

But we also have to play offence. Let’s tell Mr. Trump that we too have border issues with the United States. Canada has tough gun control legislation, but illegal guns are pouring in from the U.S. We need to tell him that we expect the United States to act to reduce the number of guns crossing into Canada.

We also want to protect the Arctic. But the United States refuses to recognize the Northwest Passage, insisting that it is an international waterway, even though it flows through the Canadian Arctic as Canadian waters. We need the United States to recognize the Northwest Passage as being Canadian waters.

We also need to reduce Canada’s vulnerability in the first place. We need to be stronger. There are more trade barriers between provinces than between Canada and the United States. Let’s launch a national project to get rid of those barriers! And let’s strengthen the ties that bind this vast nation together through projects such as real national energy grid.

We also have to understand that Mr. Trump isn’t just threatening us; he’s also targeting a growing list of other countries, as well as the European Union itself, and he is just getting started. 

Canada should quickly convene a meeting of the leaders of Denmark, Panama, Mexico, as well as with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, to formulate a plan for fighting back these threats.

Every time that Mr. Trump opens his mouth, he creates new allies for all of us. So let’s get organized! To fight back against a big, powerful bully, you need strength in numbers.

The whole point is not to wait in dread for Donald Trump’s next blow. It’s to build a country and an international community that can withstand those blows.

Canadians know me. They know I am an optimist. That I am practical. And that I always speak my mind. I made my share of mistakes over a long career, but I never for a moment doubted the decency of my fellow Canadians — or of my political opponents.

The current and future generations of political leaders should remember they are not each other’s enemies — they are opponents. Nobody ever loved the cut-and-thrust of politics more than me, but I always understood that each of us was trying to make a positive contribution to make our community or country a better place.

That spirit is more important now than ever, as we address this new challenge. Our leaders should keep that in mind.

I am 91 today and blessed with good health. I am ready at the ramparts to help defend the independence of our country as I have done all my life.

Vive le Canada!

[pinturas-sgm-aviacion]

1943 09 06 Reich Bf 109G-6 Hermann Graf JG 50 - Iain Wylie

Eastern front Experte (with 202 kills) Major Hermann Graf was appointed to the command of JG(r) 50 in August 1943. This specialist Defence of the Reich unit was tasked with combating US heavy bombers, as well as high- flying RAF reconnaissance aircraft.

For this dual role, the Geschwader equipped its Bf 109G-6s either with underwing rockets (as depicted here) or additional cannon gondolas. On 6 September Graf claimed two B-17s during the Eighth Air Force's costly, and ineffective, mission against Stuttgart, which was frustrated by increasingly cloudy conditions. The bombers ended up attacking 'targets of opportunity' instead, dropping ordnance over wide tracts of Germany and occupied western Europe - the 100th Bomb Group (BG), for example, dropped its bombs south-west of Paris!

In this specially-commissioned artwork by lain Wyllie, Graf's Bf 109G-6 (Wk-Nr 15913) 'Red 1' is seen just seconds after performing a head-on attack on a formation of B-17Fs from the 92nd BG, which has left one Flying Fortress streaming smoke from its outer port engine.

The 92nd lost seven bombers on this day, at least one of which almost certainly fell to Major Graf

[cursedreverie1945]

I tend not to do a whole lot with the high ranking or well known nazis, except Heydrich.

However, I figured I would do Ernst Kaltenbrunner because I don't see a whole lot of him on Tumblr.

Kaltenbrunner, was a coward and a dedicated nazi. I also believe he wasn't the brightest of bulbs.

Anyway, enough of that. Let's get on to this bag.

Ernst Kaltenbrunner was an Austrian, high-ranking SS official during the Nazi era, and major perpetrator of the Holocaust. After the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich in 1942, and a brief period under Heinrich Himmler, Kaltenbrunner was the third Chief of the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA), which included the offices of Gestapo, Kripo and SD, from January 1943 until the end of World War II in Europe.

Kaltenbrunner joined the Nazi Party in 1930 and the SS in 1931, and by 1935 he was considered a leader of the Austrian SS. In 1938, he assisted in the Anschluss and was given command of the SS and police force in Austria. In January 1943, Kaltenbrunner was appointed chief of the RSHA, succeeding Reinhard Heydrich, who was assassinated in May 1942.

A committed antisemite, Kaltenbrunner played a pivotal role in orchestrating the Holocaust and Nazi genocide intensified under his leadership. He oversaw the coordination of security and law enforcement agencies involved in widespread extermination, the suppression of resistance movements in occupied territories, extensive arrests, deportations, and executions. He was the highest-ranking member of the SS to face trial (Himmler having died of suicide in May 1945) at the Nuremberg trials, where he was found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Kaltenbrunner was sentenced to death, and was executed by hanging on 16 October 1946.

It was said that even Himmler feared him, as Kaltenbrunner was an intimidating figure with 1.94m (6'4½") in height, facial scars, and volatile temper. Kaltenbrunner was also a longtime friend of Otto Skorzeny and recommended him for many secret missions, allowing Skorzeny to become one of Hitler's favourite agents.

Kaltenbrunner also allegedly headed Operation Long Jump, an alleged plan to assassinate Stalin, Churchill, and Roosevelt in Tehran in 1943.

However, what made him more interesting was after WWII.

After a standoff and being arrested by US troops, Kaltenbrunner claimed to be a doctor and offered a false name. However, upon their arrival back to town his last mistress, Countess Gisela von Westarp, and the wife (Iris) of his adjutant Arthur Scheidler chanced to spot the men being led away; the ladies called out to both men and embraced them. This action resulted in their identification and arrest by U.S. troops. Oops?

During the initial stages of the Nuremberg trials, Kaltenbrunner was absent because of two episodes of subarachnoid hemorrhage, which required several weeks of recovery time. After his health improved, the tribunal denied his request for pardon.

When he was released from a military hospital he pleaded not guilty to the charges of the indictment against him. Kaltenbrunner said all decrees and legal documents that bore his signature were "rubber-stamped" and filed by his adjutant(s). He also said Gestapo Chief Heinrich Müller had illegally affixed his signature to numerous documents in question.

I mentioned he was a coward, right? OK, good.

Kaltenbrunner argued in his defence that his position as RSHA chief existed only theoretically and said he was only active in matters of espionage and intelligence. He maintained that Himmler, as his superior, was the person culpable for the atrocities committed during his tenure as chief of the RSHA.

Kaltenbrunner also asserted that he had no knowledge of the Final Solution before 1943 and went on to claim that he protested against the ill-treatment of the Jews to Himmler and Hitler. Further denials from Kaltenbrunner included statements that he knew nothing of the Commissar Order and that he never visited Mauthausen concentration camp, despite documentation of his visit. At one point, Kaltenbrunner went so far as to avow that he was responsible for bringing the Final Solution to an end. In response to his denials, people in the courtroom laughed.

There are pictures of him at one or more of the camps, for the record.

Kaltenbrunner was executed on 16 October 1946, around 1:15 am, in Nuremberg. His body, like those of the other nine executed men and that of Hermann Göring, was cremated at the Eastern Cemetery in Munich and the ashes were scattered in a tributary of the River Isa.

There are a few changing stories about the man, such as the facial scars. I've seen it reported as scars from mensur fencing and others saying it was from a car accident. There is also the combination of the two. Also, that he said it was from fencing but that was a lie and they were from a car accident. Who knows. Like with most history from the 20th century and earlier, there is always a certain part that is somewhat suspect.

You can always tell how committed a person is to their "religion" by how well they stand up for it in the face of defeat. Cowards.

Pictured left Kaltenbrunner before Nuremberg and the right is during the Nuremberg trials. Link below the pics is in English and it's part of Kaltenbrunner's interrogation.

[bruceburgdorf]

Roland Freisler and his part in destroying resistance to the Nazis

Roland Freisler, often referred to as Hitler’s Blood Judge, or Raving Roland, played a key role in perverting the German legal system and allowing the dictatorship of the country to take form. Although not as well remembered as those in Hitler’s inner circle, this baseless man bore responsibility for the death of thousands within Germany.

He had originally been a supporter of Bolshevism which had arisen from his time as a prisoner of war in Russia in the First World War. There he had learned to speak fluent Russian and he would later travel to Russia to study the methods of Soviet court hearings.

In the 1920’s he joined the Nazi Party and became well known for using loopholes in the legal system for the defence of Nazis on trial for political violence. He became known and feared for his verbal dexterity in the courtroom and dramatic conduct of which he often shouted at defendants.

In 1933 he was appointed Secretary of State Reichminister for Justice and the following year he sought to legally justify the murder of the those who were targets for the Party on the Night of the Long Knives.

Hitler had ordered that judges swear an oath to him, saying, “I need men for judges who are deeply convinced that the law ought not to guarantee the interests of the individual against the State, that their duty is to see to it, above all, that Germany does not perish.” Freisler willingly complied, calling himself a political soldier of Hitler. He said, “The courtroom is a battlefield and I am the general.”

During the 1930’s Freisler proposed to reform the law in order to align with Nazi ideology which would segregate those who he considered German and racially valuable from those who were considered racially foreign, racially degenerate, racially incurable or seriously defective juveniles.

Studying the then active Jim Crow Laws in the United States, he looked for ways in which Jewish people could be segregated and discriminated against and how to implement them in German law. He later proposed the Juvenile Felons Decree which would see 72 young persons sentenced to death including Helmuth Hübener who would be executed by guillotine at 17 years old for resistance activities.

In 1941 he was present at the Wannsee Conference where he planned to use his legal knowledge to facilitate the extermination of the European Jews.

Upon his appointment to President of The People’s Court in 1942 which tried civilians for crimes against the state, the term of which under the Nazi Party was broadened to include undermining the war effort and expressing defeatism, Freisler would conclude these offences fell under the charge of undermining defensive capabilities of which amounted to treason and carried the death sentence.

He would use this in the 1943 show trials against the White Rose Movement stating, “The accused have by means of leaflets in a time of war called for the sabotage of the war effort and armaments and for the overthrow of the National Socialist way of life…, have propagated defeatist ideas, and have most vulgarly defamed the Führer, thereby giving aid to the enemy of the Reich and weakening the armed security of the nation.”

During the trial, the parents of Hans and Sophie Scholl were banned from the courtroom. Their father Robert shouted, “One day there will be another kind of justice! One day they will go down in history!” Sophie would say to Freisler “You know the war is lost. Why don’t you have the courage to face it?”

Since the People’s Court was set up in 1934, over 16000 people would be tried and 10000 given sentences in prisons and concentration camps and over 5000 sentenced to death, the vast majority of death sentences were passed down by Freisler himself with the executions taking place within hours of the trials.

Beginning in August 1944, just 3 weeks after Stauffenberg’s failed bomb plot, more than 50 trials would take place of those accused, with Freisler presiding over most of them and resulting in over 110 death sentences.

Like with the trials of The White Rose movement, the court cases would be a propaganda spectacle used to make an example of those who defied the state. The attempt on Hitler’s life would be the last for the German resistance with most of the conspirators and its wider circle now facing trial.

Knowing Hitler had been keen to watch the trials himself, Freisler frequently turned to the cameras when he spoke for dramatic effect and exaggerated his movements more than usual. He would open the first trial proclaiming in his own words that a rabble of criminals with a character of pigs had tried to murder one of the greatest leaders in the history of the world!!

Freisler would refer to his own method of humiliating the accused as “atomising”, breaking them down to dust. Following Hitler’s orders to not give the defendants time for long speeches he bellowed at those who stood before him, comparing them to animals and mocking them for their dishevelled appearance. They had been denied the dignity of false teeth and suspenders and were still showing signs of their recent torture. He reminded the former soldiers that their job had been to, “Obey, triumph and die, without looking left or right!!”

With no jury present or hearing of evidence, almost all of the accused expected to be found guilty however a few would use the courtroom to deliver their final words to call out the crimes of the Nazi party and its destruction of their country referring to Hitler as the Incarnation of Evil. Freisler, being a staunch Nazi, would fly into a rage every time a similar statement was made.

Count Schwerin von Schwanenfeld cited the attitude of the Nazis towards the Poles and the many murders on the Eastern Front he was aware of. To this Freisler cut him and shouted loudly across the courtroom calling Schwerin a “filthy louse” and his words “base allegations”. Later when Count Yorck von Wartenburg had cited the extermination of the Jews and said that the Nazis had eliminated moral obligations towards God, Freisler told him that he believed this was not true and that National Socialism had deepened them.

Like Sophie Scholl and others before them the condemned would deliver scathing final words aimed towards Freisler.

When he had screamed at Dr Josef Wirmer that he would, “Soon be roasting in Hell!!” Wirmer’s curt reply was, “I’ll look forward to your Honour’s own imminent arrival!!”

From General Fellgiebel, “Hurry with the hanging, Herr President, otherwise you will hang before we do!!”.

From Cäsar von Hofacker, “Be quiet now, Herr Freisler, because today it’s my neck that’s on the block. In a year it will be yours!!”

Probably the most well remembered is from Field Marshall von Witzleben, “You can hand us over to the hangman. In three months the enraged and tormented people will call you to account, and will drag you alive through the muck in the street!!”

Freislers conduct in the courtroom would prove to be unpopular, the pitch of his screams would cause issues with the microphones and his behaviour towards those on trial would sow seeds of sympathy in the witnesses towards the condemned.

A stenographer in the trials later wrote of Freisler, “He wore a theatrical, brutal, and merciless expression on his face … There was no trace of humanity in this disgusting face with the big, hypocritically shrewd eyes, half hooded by their lids. His voice must have been heard like a trumpet in the surrounding streets, violating all the rules about secrecy.”

The trials continued into 1945 and on 3rd February, while Freisler was holding a court session, American bombers would destroy the courthouse, the collapse of the ceiling of which would crush the Blood Judge to death, still holding the files of conspirators yet to be tried in what was certainly a very fitting way for such a man to die.

The ruins of The People’s Court at Bellevuestraße where Freisler was killed.

[fraumagdagoebbels]

When did Magda move with the children to Schwanenwerder in 1945?

The six children, the governess, and the house personnel, as well as Magda, remained at the Lanke Castle estate until the end of January 1945. From Berlin Joseph ordered the removal of his family from Lanke to Schwanenwerder. All the household personnel went too, and Lanke was abandoned. In the dead of night, with headlamps dimmed, the line of cars forged its way slowly, with difficulty, through the crowds of refugees towards Schwanenwerder on the Havel. According to Käthe Hübner:

"And then we went on the trek. With the cars and a bit of luggage. We drove past people who were already fleeing from the east. So we knew when it was time to leave and everyone was heading straight into the city. The ring road was already under threat. Then we lived in Schwanenwerder until the end, until around April 20. "

No bombs fell on Schwanenwerder; the spring of 1945 seemed lovelier than ever. Gaily coloured crocuses dotted the damp grass, bitterns sang in the reeds around the lake, bushes and trees unfurled their young green shoots. The bright sunshine sparkled on the boathouse. But in the distance the thunder rumbled incessantly. ‘Is that a storm?’ the children asked, because they loved to watch the lightning flash across the water. It was no spring rainstorm, however, but heavy barrage covering the hostile advance towards the capital of the German Reich, hostile artillery battering away at the last defences before Berlin.

[enemymine2000]

People are like: It's only 4 years, we will get through it. And by everything that might be out there and is holy, I hope you are right. But fascism came to power in Germany in 1933 legally, by being elected. Two days later the parliament was dissolved and due process abolished. That's why our current German constitution entails special provisions for that to never happen again - even our government now having imploded doesn't change the fact that we still have one, and will continue to have the very same one until the next election. It is written into our constitution that we have to be a constitutional democracy and that is the one Article that can never be changed. Is it absolutely failsafe? No. But it is something our grandparents (or great-grandparents depending on generation) did not have.

So, I hope you will get the chance to fair and free elections in 4 years. But if you don't you will need to have put in as many democrats as possible everywhere. Because those will be your line of defence in the cities, the town, the villages. Those will lessen the blows that will come from above. My hometown for example had the same fascist people on top as every other during the Third Reich. But below the basis was socialist. Things can not be sugarcoated, it was bad. But the minute the fascist regime was beaten, they were there to take back the reigns. To rebuild. And ever since that day my hometown has been leftist - German leftist, not US American leftist, so socialist. This is the first time since then we don't have a socialist, but a green mayor.

Again, that doesn't mean to sugarcoat anything. But to show you, why it matters that you still express your rights as long as you can. Your voting rights are a voting privilege. Use it!

[deutschland-im-krieg]

Blohm & Voss BV 138MS (Minensuch/mine clearing) being lowered into, or hoisted out of the water, location and date unknown. A few BV 138C-1 Seedrache (Sea Dragon) were converted to minesweepers in 1942/43, the self defence armament was removed and a degaussing device, a hoop with the same diameter as the length of the fuselage and magnetic field-generating equipment, was fitted. These were used to sweep for mines and detonate them. For more, see my Facebook group - Eagles Of The Reich

[dailyanarchistposts]

J.5 What alternative social organisations do anarchists create?

Anarchism is all about “do it yourself”: people helping each other out in order to secure a good society to live within and to protect, extend and enrich their personal freedom. As such anarchists are keenly aware of the importance of building alternatives to both capitalism and the state in the here and now. Only by creating practical alternatives can we show that anarchism is a viable possibility and train ourselves in the techniques and responsibilities of freedom:

“If we put into practice the principles of libertarian communism within our organisations, the more advanced and prepared we will be on that day when we come to adopt it completely.” [C.N.T. member, quoted by Graham Kelsey, Anarchosyndicalism, Libertarian Communism and the State,p. 79]

This idea (to quote the IWW) of “building a new world in the shell of the old” is a long standing one in anarchism. Proudhon during the 1848 revolution “propose[d] that a provisional committee be set up” in Paris and “liaise with similar committees” elsewhere in France. This would be “a body representative of the proletariat …, a state within the state, in opposition to the bourgeois representatives.” He proclaimed to working class people that “a new society be founded in the heart of the old society” for “the government can do nothing for you. But you can do everything for yourselves.” [“Aux Pariotes”, La Représantant du Peuple, No. 33] This was echoed by Bakunin (see section H.2.8) while for revolutionary syndicalists the aim was “to constitute within the bourgeois State a veritable socialist (economic and anarchic) State.” [Fernand Pelloutier, quoted by Jeremy Jennings, Syndicalism in France, p. 22] By so doing we help create the environment within which individuals can manage their own affairs and develop their abilities to do so. In other words, we create “schools of anarchism” which lay the foundations for a better society as well as promoting and supporting social struggle against the current system. Make no mistake, the alternatives we discuss in this section are not an alternative to direct action and the need for social struggle — they are an expression of social struggle and a form of direct action. They are the framework by which social struggle can build and strengthen the anarchist tendencies within capitalist society which will ultimately replace it.

Therefore it is wrong to think that libertarians are indifferent to making life more bearable, even more enjoyable, under capitalism. A free society will not just appear from nowhere, it will be created be individuals and communities with a long history of social struggle and organisation. For as Wilheim Reich so correctly pointed out:

“Quite obviously, a society that is to consist of ‘free individuals,’ to constitute a ‘free community’ and to administer itself, i.e. to ‘govern itself,’ cannot be suddenly created by decrees. It has to evolve organically.” [The Mass Psychology of Fascism, p. 241]

It is this organic evolution that anarchists promote when they create libertarian alternatives within capitalist society. These alternatives (be they workplace or community unions, co-operatives, mutual banks, and so on) are marked by certain common features such as being self-managed, being based upon equality, decentralised and working with other groups and associations within a confederal network based upon mutual aid and solidarity. In other words, they are anarchist in both spirit and structure and so create a practical bridge between now and the future free society.

Anarchists consider the building of alternatives as a key aspect of their activity under capitalism. This is because they, like all forms of direct action, are “schools of anarchy” and also because they make the transition to a free society easier. “Through the organisations set up for the defence of their interests,” in Malatesta’s words, “the workers develop an awareness of the oppression they suffer and the antagonism that divides them from the bosses and as a result begin to aspire to a better life, become accustomed to collective struggle and solidarity and win those improvements that are possible within the capitalist and state regime.” [The Anarchist Revolution, p. 95] By creating viable examples of

“anarchy in action” we can show that our ideas are practical and convince people that they are not utopian. Therefore this section of the FAQ will indicate the alternatives anarchists support and why we support them.

The approach anarchists take to this activity could be termed “social unionism” — the collective action of groups to change certain aspects (and, ultimately, all aspects) of their lives. This takes many different forms in many different areas (some of which, not all, are discussed here) — but they share the same basic aspects of collective direct action, self-organisation, self-management, solidarity and mutual aid. These are a means “of raising the morale of the workers, accustom them to free initiative and solidarity in a struggle for the good of everyone and render them capable of imagining, desiring and putting into practice an anarchist life.” [Malatesta, Op. Cit., p. 28] Kropotkin summed up the anarchist perspective well when he argued that working class people had “to form their own organisations for a direct struggle against capitalism” and to “take possession of the necessaries for production, and to control production.” [Memiors of a Revolutionist, p. 359] As historian J. Romero Maura correctly summarised, the “anarchist revolution, when it came, would be essentially brought about by the working class. Revolutionaries needed to gather great strength and must beware of underestimating the strength of reaction” and so anarchists “logically decided that revolutionaries had better organise along the lines of labour organisations.” [“The Spanish case”, pp. 60–83, Anarchism Today, D. Apter and J. Joll (eds.), p. 66]

As will quickly become obvious in this discussion (as if it had not been so before!) anarchists are firm supporters of “self-help,” an expression that has been sadly corrupted (like freedom) by the right in recent times. Like freedom, self-help should be saved from the clutches of the right who have no real claim to that expression. Indeed, anarchism was created from and based itself upon working class self-help — for what other interpretation can be gathered from Proudhon’s 1848 statement that “the proletariat must emancipate itself”? [quoted by George Woodcock, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, p. 125] So Anarchists have great faith in the abilities of working class people to work out for themselves what their problems are and act to solve them.

Anarchist support and promotion of alternatives is a key aspect of this process of self-liberation, and so a key aspect of anarchism. While strikes, boycotts, and other forms of high profile direct action may be more “sexy” than the long and hard task of creating and building social alternatives, these are the nuts and bolts of creating a new world as well as the infrastructure which supports the other activities. These alternatives involve both combative organisations (such as community and workplace unions) as well as more defensive and supportive ones (such as co-operatives and mutual banks). Both have their part to play in the class struggle, although the combative ones are the most important in creating the spirit of revolt and the possibility of creating an anarchist society.

We must also stress that anarchists look to organic tendencies within social struggle as the basis of any alternatives we try to create. As Kropotkin put it, anarchism is based “on an analysis of tendencies of an evolution that is already going on in society, and on induction therefrom as to the future.” It is “representative … of the creative, instructive power of the people themselves who aimed at developing institutions of common law in order to protect them from the power-seeking minority.” Anarchism bases itself on those tendencies that are created by the self-activity of working class people and while developing within capitalism are in opposition to it — such tendencies are expressed in organisational form as unions and other forms of workplace struggle, co-operatives (both productive and credit), libertarian schools, and so on. For anarchism was “born among the people — in the struggles of real life and not in the philosopher’s studio” and owes its “origin to the constructive, creative activity of the people … and to a protest — a revolt against the external force which had thrust itself upon” social institutions. [Anarchism, p. 158, p. 147, p. 150 and p. 149] This “creative activity” is expressed in the organisations created in the class struggle by working people, some of which we discuss in this section of the FAQ. Therefore, the alternatives anarchists support should not be viewed in isolation of social struggle and working class resistance to hierarchy — the reverse in fact, as these alternatives are almost always expressions of that struggle.

Lastly, we should note we do not list all the forms of organisation anarchists create. For example, we have ignored solidarity groups (for workers on strike or in defence of struggles in other countries) and organisations which are created to campaign against or for certain issues or reforms. Anarchists are in favour of such organisations and work within them to spread anarchist ideas, tactics and organisational forms. However, these interest groups (while very useful) do not provide a framework for lasting change as do the ones we highlight below (see section J.1.4 for more details on anarchist opinions on such “single issue” campaigns). We have also ignored what have been called “intentional communities.” This is when a group of individuals squat or buy land and other resources within capitalism and create their own anarchist commune in it. Most anarchists reject this idea as capitalism and the state must be fought, not ignored. In addition, due to their small size, they are rarely viable experiments in communal living and nearly always fail after a short time (for a good summary of Kropotkin’s attitude to such communities, which can be taken as typical, see Graham Purchase’s Evolution & Revolution [pp. 122–125]). Dropping out will not stop capitalism and the state and while such communities may try to ignore the system, they will find that the system will not ignore them — they will come under competitive and ecological pressures from capitalism whether they like it or not assuming they avoid direct political interference.

So the alternatives we discuss here are attempts to create anarchist alternatives within capitalism and which aim to change it (either by revolutionary or evolutionary means). They are based upon challenging capitalism and the state, not ignoring them by dropping out. Only by a process of direct action and building alternatives which are relevant to our daily lives can we revolutionise and change both ourselves and society.

[admiralnelsoniii]

Adolf Galland was a German fighter ace general of Fighter Command in France. He flew 705 combat missions, and fought on the Western Front and in the Defence of the Reich. On four occasions, he survived being shot down, and he was credited with 104 aerial victories, all of them against the Western Allies.

I personally feel Galland is truly the top ace of the war for two reasons. First, although his score wasn't as high as the others, he earned every kill against the Western Allies. They were considerably better pilots with much better aircraft. And the second reason is from getting an idea of what sort of man he is from the interviews done on him after the war. Not to mention he was planning, organizing, and then leading those combat missions. He took the best care he could of his men, and fought tooth and nail (within reason considering) to get his squadron the best equipment, aircraft, and supplies possible.

I thought it interesting when he discussed the issue with the Me 262. He argued heavy for making it a dedicated Interceptor instead of the foolish ideas Hitler insisted upon it being a bomber. Because that makes sense, right? You definitely take your highest performance and most heavily armed plane and make it a bomber. Yeah! Idiot 😓. But in the end Hitler gave him like 20 or 30 for the Interceptor role. So, he said, he would have maybe ten operational at any given time to fight. But he was saying that if it he would have given him all the 262s being produced, he could have had up to three hundred one a given day! 300 Me 262s to attack USAAF in day and RAF Bomber Command at night. Now, even he said, that wouldn't have changed the outcome. But it would have been a much tougher fight. And, who knows, could have seen 262s go head to head with Gloster Meteor! That would have been interesting!

[dertaglichedan]

German car giants shake off their Nazi past to prepare for war

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/04/05/german-car-giants-shake-off-nazi-past-to-prepare-for-war/

Berlin’s rearmament drive could see automotive assembly lines retooled to roll out tanks

Ferdinand Porsche became widely known as the brilliant engineer behind the bestselling Volkswagen Beetle and some of Porsche’s first sports cars.

But like his creations, the German industrialist had a dark side that is impossible to separate from his technical achievements.

During the Second World War, Porsche’s manufacturing business, along with many others, became a key pillar of the Third Reich – helping to sustain Adolf Hitler’s war effort by churning out tens of thousands of militarised versions of what would later be renamed the Beetle.

Porsche, who became the Fuhrer’s friend and favourite inventor, also played key roles in tank design, turret production and even a brief spell working on the V2 rocket.

It’s a history that his descendants have tried to leave behind ever since, while Porsche SE – the powerful holding company of the modern Porsche family – has generally avoided military contracting since the 1960s.

Yet amid a new era of European instability, the Porsche clan has revealed it is mulling a return to the defence business as part of a new “core investment” plan.

“The focus is really on defence, because this is what it is all about,” said Lutz Meschke, head of investments at Porsche SE. He did not say how large the investment would be or where it would be targeted, suggesting that the company may also look at infrastructure.

And if the company’s existing core holdings are anything to go by, the investment shift could herald a significant move.

Porsche SE’s main investments today include a 32pc stake in Volkswagen Group (with more than 50pc voting rights) as well as a 12.5pc stake in luxury car maker Porsche AG (which is 75pc owned by VW). In addition to the flagship brands, the company’s automotive empire also spans Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, Škoda and SEAT.

But these have been struggling of late. Meanwhile, a major German rearmament push has taken place, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Donald Trump’s election as US president.

Frederick Merz, Germany’s incoming chancellor, secured support in March for an easing of his country’s long-standing “debt brake”, turning the taps on for €500bn (£425bn) of infrastructure spending and for any defence spending above 1pc of GDP to be exempt from borrowing restrictions.

[misfitwashere]

The Muskrat Goes Global

Why is the richest person on earth with the largest political platform in the world and the next U.S. president in his pocket becoming a global neo-fascist? What can be done to constrain him?

ROBERT REICH

JAN 7

Friends,

Elon Musk repeatedly asserts, without evidence, that British Prime Minister Keir Starmer covered up the abuses of young girls by gangs comprised largely of British Pakistani men, in cases that date back to before 2010 when Starmer was head of Britain’s public prosecutions. 

“Starmer was complicit in the RAPE OF BRITAIN when he was head of Crown Prosecution for 6 years,” Musk posted to the top of his account on Friday. “Starmer must go and he must face charges for his complicity in the worst mass crime in the history of Britain.”

In fact, Starmer, who heads the Labour government, did not cover up abuses. Instead, he brought the first case against an Asian grooming gang and drafted new guidelines for how the Crown Prosecution Service should deal with cases of sexual exploitation of children, including the mandatory reporting of child sex offenses. 

Musk also calls Jess Phillips, the Labour government’s under secretary for safeguarding and violence against women and girls, a “rape genocide apologist” because she pushed back on calls for a national inquiry into child sexual exploitation in Oldham, a town near Manchester. 

In fact, Phillips, who has long campaigned for women’s rights, has called for a local investigation by Oldham authorities rather than the central government. Women’s rights supporters say Musk’s labeling Phillips a “rape genocide apologist” is threatening her safety.

Yesterday, Starmer warned publicly that Musk’s baseless accusations “crossed a line,” adding that “once we lose the anchor that truth matters, in the robust debate that we must have, then we are on a very slippery slope.”

Musk’s global reach

Musk’s lies about the left-wing British government and his support for far-right groups are parts of an emerging pattern. Musk is also: 

boosting the far-right party in Germany with neo-Nazi ties, known as Alternative for Germany (AfD), before elections early next month. Musk signaled his support for AfD in mid-December, writing in a post on X that“only the AfD can save Germany.” He also penned an oped in a German newspaper recently, describing the party as the “last spark of hope” for the country. Musk is planning an online “discussion” on X with the AfD’s leader and candidate for chancellor, Alice Weidel, amplifying the party’s neo-Nazi ideology. 

attacking the Italian judiciary for curbing Italian Prime Giorgia Meloni’s hardline anti-asylum immigration policies. Musk has met regularly with Meloni, who has called him a friend, and appeared at a youth event for Meloni’s party. 

urging support for Britain’s far-right MP Nigel Farage’s anti-immigration Reform U.K. Party. Musk says he might donate upward of 100 million pounds ($127 million) to Farage’s group. 

demanding Britain “free Tommy Robinson,” the far-right founder of the English Defence League — an Islamophobic, nationalist group and anti-immigrant agitator whom, Musk charges, is in jail for “telling the truth.” In fact, Robinson is in jail because he was found to have defamed a teenage Syrian refugee and then defied a British court order by repeating the false claims. (Robinson has been previously jailed for assault, mortgage fraud and traveling on a false passport to the United States, where he has sought to establish ties with right-wing groups.) 

allowing on X inflammatory lies of a kind that incited anti-immigrant riots in Britain last July, following the killing of three girls in a mass stabbing in the town of Southport. After Britain arrested more than 30 people, Musk condemned the government for what he called an attack on free speech.

calling Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau an “insufferable tool” over comments Trudeau made in support of Kamala Harris, and predicted he “won’t be in power for much longer.” (Yesterday, Trudeau announced he will resign.)

Where Musk is getting this power

As the richest person in the world, politicians everywhere now recognize his capacity to pour money into their parties and political campaigns, as he did by investing a quarter of a billion dollars to get Trump elected. 

He also owns X, formerly Twitter, which (as of December 2024) has 619 million monthly active users. He has manipulated X’s algorithm to boost his own posts, which now reach 210 million. 

But Musk’s real power these days comes from his proximity to and presumed influence over Donald Trump, soon to be President of the United States. 

Musk has hardly left Trump’s side since the election, meaning that Musks’s opinions (amplified by his social media platform) cannot be ignored by politicians around the world who are trying to decipher Trump’s opinions. 

One prominent member of Germany’s center-left Social Democratic Party is asking that Germany determine “whether [Musk’s] repeated disrespect, defamation and interference in the election campaign were also expressed in the name of the new U.S. government.”

This combination — the richest person in the world, owner and manipulator of the biggest political messaging platform in the world, with direct influence over Trump — puts Musk in the position of being able to move other nations toward the neo-fascist right. 

Why Musk is doing this

Not for money. As it is, he has far more than any human can utilize. 

Partly, it’s ideological. He calls himself a “free speech absolutist,” which puts him at odds with Europe’s and Canada’s aggressive responses to hate speech online. (Britain, Musk says, “is turning into a police state.”)

But the roots of Musk’s neo-fascism probably go deeper. 

I am no psychoanalyst but I imagine that as an immigrant from South Africa, Musk is especially triggered by poor people of color moving into white nations. His father smuggled raw emeralds and had them cut in Johannesburg.

Part of his shift to the radical right also comes from Musk’s transgender child. As Musk told conservative commentator Jordan Peterson, “I lost my son, essentially,” claiming she was “dead, killed by the woke mind virus. I vowed to destroy the woke mind virus after that.” (Musk’s daughter, Vivian Jenna Wilson, now 20, told NBC News that Musk was an absent father who was cruel to her as a child for being queer and feminine.) 

On X, Musk continuously criticizes transgender rights, including medical treatments for trans-identifying minors, and the use of pronouns if they are different from what would be used at birth. He has promoted anti-trans content and called for arresting people who provide trans care to minors. Last July, Musk said he was pulling his businesses out of California to protest a new state law that bars schools from requiring that trans kids be outed to their parents. After Musk bought X, then known as Twitter, in 2022, he rolled back the app’s protections for trans people, including a ban on using birth names (known as “deadnames” for transgender people).

Perhaps the major reason for Musk’s recent effort to push other nations to the neo-fascist right is his newfound thirst for right-wing global politics. After effectively (at least in Musk’s mind) winning the presidency for Trump by spending more than $250 million and unleashing a maelstrom of pro-Trump and anti-Harris lies over X, he now seeks even more of an authoritarian rush. 

It will not be the first time in history that someone is seduced by the thrill of unconstrained power, although it may be the first time that so much of it is concentrated in one unelected megalomaniac. 

What should be done about Musk?

For the time being, particularly under Trump, there is little that we in America can do to constrain Musk except by boycotting Tesla and X. 

Canada and Britain and other European nations, meanwhile, should, at the very least:

enact laws and regulations to prohibit non-citizens (like Musk) from financing activities that could affect their elections.

maintain, if not strengthen, laws and rules against hate speech, and ensure that they are applied to social media companies, such as Musk’s X. 

refuse to contract with Musk’s Space X and its Starlink satellite division, or with Musk’s other corporations (Tesla and the Boring Company).

disengage from any joint ventures or technology transfers involving Musk, including xAI, his artificial intelligence company. 

(If you’ve got other ideas, please include in the comments.)

[pinturas-sgm-aviacion]

1943 08 17 Bf 109 Defence of the Reich Aces - Mark Postlethwaite

On 17 August 1943, over 200 B-17 Flying Fortresses of the Eighth Air Force's 1st Bomb Wing were despatched to attack a vital target - the Reich's major ball-bearing factories at Schweinfurt.

The bomber crews were expecting trouble. Their take-off had been delayed by bad weather, and they were a critical three hours or more behind the B-17s of the 4th Bomb Wing, which were heading for Regensburg. They knew the defending Luftwaffe fighters would be fully alerted and ready for them. And they were right.

At Eupen, a small Belgian town less than ten miles from the German border, the bombers 'short-legged' P-47 Thunderbolt escorts were forced to turn back. The Fortresses pressed on alone into Germany. It was the moment the Luftwaffe fighter pilots had been waiting for.

Among the first to attack were the 12 rocket-armed Bf 109G-6s of 5./JG 11 down from Jever. Oberleutnant Heinz Knoke's 'Black 1' was hit by heavy Browning 0.50-calibre machine gun fire as the Staffel jockeyed into position astern of the bombers. With his port wing damaged and left-hand rocket tube (nicknamed a 'stovepipe' by German fighter pilots) shot away, Knoke launched his remaining missile, but without result. Then the rest of the Staffel bored in.

According to Knoke's subsequent account of the action, both Feldwebel Erich Führmann, illustrated here in his 'Black 9', and Feldwebel Wilhelm Fest scored hits on B-17s which blew up in mid-air. However, post-war research suggests that the two 92nd Bomb Group (BG) Flying Fortresses hit in this engagement suffered only slight damage and later fell victim to conventional fighter attack.

Despite his damaged wing, Heinz Knoke took off again later to attack the bombers returning from Schweinfurt. He is credited with bringing down the 305th BG's flak-damaged B-17F 42-30159 Settin' Bull, which crashed in Belgium, before finally writing-off his own 'Black 1' in a forced landing near Rheinbach

[cursedreverie1945]

I have not been able to verify this as being true or false. Either way, it is an interesting read.

Nuremberg, 10.10.1946

Herr Churchill!

You will now have the satisfaction of outliving me and my comrades in misfortune. I do not hesitate to congratulate you over this personal triumph and the delicacy with which you have brought it about. You and Great Britain have really had to go to great expense for this success. Were I to consider you simple enough to attribute to it more significance than that of a spectacle which you and your friends owe to the peoples whom you manoeuvred into the war against the Greater German Reich and to your Jewish and Bolshevik confederates, then my declaration to you in the penultimate hour of my life would also, in the eyes of posterity, have been wasted on an unworthy man. My pride as a German and as one of the most responsible German leaders in an historic world struggle does the not permit me to waste a single word over the degrading vulgarity procedure employed by the victors in so far at least as it applies to my own person. But, as it is the manifest and declared purpose of this administration of justice to cast the German people themselves into the abysmal depths of being outlawed and, by the removal of the responsible men of the National-Socialist State, to rob them once and for all of all possibilities of future defence. I have, under the judgment which you and your allies have determined in advance, to add a few remarks on the historic subject. I direct these remarks to you because although one of those who knew most about the true background of this war and the possibilities of avoiding it or of ending it in such a stage as would still be tolerable for the future of Europe, nevertheless you refused to your own Tribunal your evidence and your oath. I shall, therefore, not fail to call you in good time before the Tribunal of History and I direct my declaration to you because I know that this Tribunal will, in due course, name you as the man who, with ambition, intelligence and energy cast down the European nations under the wheels of foreign powers.

Before History I establish you as the man who, indeed, had the capacity to cause the downfall of Adolf Hitler and his political work, but who nevertheless, will not be successful in place of the fallen man in again raising the protecting shield against the Asiatic invasion of Europe. Your ambition it was to maintain your position over Germany by means of Versailles, your fate it will be that you succeeded in this. You personify the hardened obstinacy of your old- Master-people but you personify also the obstinacy of their old age, directed against the last great attempts of the revived Germanic Power to decide the fate of Europe in the steppes of Asia and to safeguard it for the future. Long after my responsibility will have found its objective judge in the further development of events, you will have to assume responsibility for the fact that the late bloody war was not the last one which had to be fought out for the vital interests of the Continent on its own territory. You will have to answer for the fact that the bloodbath of yesterday will be followed by a still greater one and that Europe will have to make its stand for life or death not at the Volga but at the Pyrenees. It is my warm wish that you will at least live to see the day on which the world, and especially the Western nations, will have to learn by bitter experience that it was you and your friend Roosevelt who, for the sake of a cheap triumph over National-Socialist Germany, sold their future to Bolshevism. This day will come more quickly than you like and, in spite of your advanced age, you will thus probably still be active enough to see it dawn blood-red over the British islands also. I am convinced that it will bring you all those terrible surprises which, this time, through the fortune of war or because of the German Command's abhorrence of a complete degeneration of the struggle between our kindred peoples, you have escaped. My knowledge of the nature and extent of the new weapons and projects which, largely due to your military aid, have fallen as booty to the Red Army, empowers me to make this prophecy.

You will, as is your custom, no doubt waste no time in writing good memoirs and you will write them all the better because now none can hinder you in reporting or concealing just what you wish. Nevertheless, you will be powerless against those corrections which the development of events, precipitated by you, will unflinchingly undertake. It will then be your affair to give the peoples the answer to the questions which you have not given to your sham Tribunal and which you have refused to give, not so much to us who wish to have to thank your fairness for nothing, but to historical truth.

You think that you have arranged things cleverly by throwing this historical truth on the dissecting table for the legal sophistries of a handful of ambitious juridical subordinates, and allowing it to be turned into a dialectal treatise of paragraph-quibbling, although you as a Briton and a statesman know all too well that, by such means, the vital problems of the peoples could not in the past be solved or judged, and that they will not be so solved in the future. I have a too-well-founded opinion of your strength and of the cunning of your intelligence for me to think you capable of believing the vulgar catchwords with. which you sustain the war against us and seek to glorify your victory over us in a circus-like spectacle. As one of the highest military, political and economic leaders of the Greater German Reich I herewith declare once more, with all emphasis, that this war was unavoidable only because the policy of Great Britain under your personal influence and that of your adherents was stubbornly. directed in all spheres to blocking the way to the vital interests and the natural development of the German people, and that you, filled with senile ambition to maintain the British hegemony, preferred the second world war to an understanding-sincerely and again and again striven and hoped for on our side-on a basis tolerable for the two most prominent nations of Europe and paying regard to their natural functions and interests. I declare here once more most emphatically that the sole guilt of the German people for the world war, forced on by you, is that it sought finally to make an end of the eternal distress. which you ingeniously maintained and cunningly stirred up. It would be carrying coals to Newcastle were I to speak my mind to you about the causes, necessities and motives which, in the course of war, led to the political and military difficulties which your legal zealots, so certain of their aim, have managed to draw upon so one-sidedly at the cost of the National-Socialist Government of the German people.

The devastated area of European civilization and its historical treasures now lying in ruins still bear witness today in the first place of the desperate bitterness with which a great and proud people yesterday fought with incomparable self-sacrifice for its very existence.

Tomorrow, however, they will bear witness of the unscrupulousness with which alone the superior numbers led on to the field by you could bring about the subjection and deprivation of the rights of this People.

But the day after tomorrow the ruins will bear witness of that betrayal which has surrendered Europe to Red Asia.

The Germany which you have beaten will, through its very collapse, revenge itself on you. For neither have you carried out a better policy than we have, nor have you given evidence of greater efficiency and bravery. You have to thank for your victory, not better qualities or an imaginary superiority of your own strength and skill, but, solely and after six years, the preponderance of your coalition. Do not take it for that which you allege it to be. You and your country will soon harvest the fruits of your political skill. What you, an experienced cynic, would not admit as valid in our case (namely: that our struggle in the East was the highest defense action not only for Germany but acts and also at the same time for Europe and is the actual justification for measures of the German conduct of the war which you, from your side, so plainly and concisely condemn in detail) your present-day ally and friend Stalin will soon prove to you and to the British Empire. You will then experience what it means to fight against this opponent and you will learn that your necessity. also knows no law, and that you cannot oppose him successfully either with lawyers' treatises or with the weight of Great Britain and its European dwarfs. You have advanced the assertion for the German people that for you it was principally a question of the restoration of its democratic form of life. You have, however, not uttered a single word that you are concerned for the restoration of reasonable conditions of life, of which it has now been deprived for a quarter of a century.

Your name stands beneath all the principal documents of this era of British lack of understanding and jealousy of Germany. Your name will also stand beneath the result: that this era of the liquidation of Germany from history challenges the existence of Europe.

My faith in the vital strength of my people is unshakable. This People will be stronger and will live longer than you. But it pains me that it is handed over to you without means of defending itself and that it now also is one of those unhappy victims who, thanks to your success, now face not an age of prosperous work for the accomplishment of those common tasks set by good sense for the peoples of the West, but the greatest common catastrophe of their common history. I spare myself the dispute over excesses with which, rightly or wrongly, you reproach us and which corresponds neither to my points of view nor to that of the German people, and also over those excesses which have been committed on your side and on that of your allies against millions of Germans. For I know that under cover of this pretext, you have made the whole German people the object of collective excesses of an extent never previously found in the whole of world history, and that also without this pretext you would not have acted differently in your treatment of Germany because, since 1914, you have steadfastly and stubbornly envisaged and striven for no other goal than the destruction of the German Reich. This, your historic object in view, denies to you your claim to the office of judge over the avoidable and unavoidable consequences which your cold-blooded and steady pursuit of your aims provoked, or which were welcome to you as subsequent evidence for the justification of your endeavor. I regret today, as mine and the National-Socialist Government's gravest mistake, solely the fateful error to which I and our policy succumbed in our judgment of your power of discernment as a statesman. I regret that I attributed to you the discernment of the world political necessity of a satisfied and prosperous Germany for the existence of the British Empire also. I regret that our strength and our means were not sufficient to wring from you, even in the very last minute, the better knowledge that the liquidation of Germany will be the beginning of the liquidation of the British world-power. We took our places and acted each according to his law. I according to the new law, for which this Europe is already too old; you according to the old law, for which this Europe is no longer important enough to the world.

I shall manage to go my way to the end in the sure consciousness that as a German National-Socialist I was, in spite of everything, also a better European than you. I leave the verdict over this calmly to posterity, where in accordance with my sincere wish you may belong and live as long as possible. Perhaps Fate will then offer you a chance which you have offered me: of leaving behind in the ruin a Verity.

Hermann Göring