Protestant Church Said Eichmann Was 'Kind-Hearted'

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,781619,00.html

08/22/2011

Records Reveal Warm Words for Holocaust Organizer

Protestant church officials in Austria and Germany lobbied the West German government to try to help Adolf Eichmann, one of the main organizers of the Holocaust, after his arrest by Israeli agents in 1960. One church leader described Eichmann as "fundamentally decent" and "kind-hearted."

The German Protestant Church put in a good word for Adolf Eichmann, the chief logistics organizer of the Holocaust, after his arrest in Argentina by Israeli agents in 1960, SPIEGEL has learned.

The Superintendent of the Protestant Church for Upper Austria, Wilhelm Mensing-Braun, based in the Austrian city of Linz were Eichmann was born, wrote a letter to the foreign affairs department of the Evangelical Church in Germany in Frankfurt claiming that the mass murderer "had a fundamentally decent disposition," was "kind-hearted," and was characterized by "great helpfulness."

At that time, Eichmann was about to be put on trial in Jerusalem for crimes against humanity. snip

The intervention didn't work. Eichmann was sentenced to death in 1962 and hanged.

[MADem]

1. He was decent and kind-hearted all right, so long as you weren't Jewish!

How pathetic. I don't know if any 'intervention' might have worked, but trying to pretend that the guy was a pussycat is just not consonant with reality. They would have been better off trying the "forgiveness is a great thing" approach...not that that probably would have worked, either, but at least it doesn't sound as icky as "kind hearted."

[Selatius]

2. Well, Hitler did pander very much to the religious right in Germany at the time.

I guess there were a few hold-outs in the churches after the war.

[malaise]

3. And the churches wonder why all their fancy buildings are

almost empty in Europe. All the fucking feudal goons emperors are naked.

[Kurmudgeon]

4. Because Wilhelm Mensing-Braun, whoever he was, speaks for all churches."

Some individuals in the Protestant Church based in Germany in the 50s may have had different positions than most mainline churches, I would expect.
I did like the feudal goons emperors quip though....

[exboyfil]

10. Bonhoeffer is one example of an evangelical who

stood up to the Nazis.

[Diclotican]

5. NNN0LHI

NNN0LHI

This relevations are not excactly news, as this have been known to exist in Germany long before Eichman was arrsted in 1960.. Some parts of the protestantic Shurch in Germany and Austria was not excactly unsympatic to the NAZI regime in Germany - and after 1938 in Austria too.. And the protestand church as a whole, have had a shecked history when it came to sympaty with the Hitler regime, from 1933, or before as many of the regimes highest leaders was protstantic on paper.. Hitler himself was official catolic, even tho he might not have been specially active..

And it is not excactly not known, that specially the protestanic shurch in germany, was sympatic with a lot of the ideas the new regime in Germany had, and as the regime got their grip on the country, supported and aided the new regime, even when it came to put jews on the train to Auzhwitz.. It was a large segment of anti-semetism in the protestantic Shurch as a whole in Germany in the between wars, and (it still are some segments of anti-semtism, but they dosen't have the power anymore) and it was ideal for the Nazi regime, as the shurch itself was made into a part of the propagandic tools Dr Gobbels used for 12 year..

This is not "news" if you have read your history.. But for many others, it is "news" thats true...

Diclotican

[NNN0LHI]

6. This wasn't covered in any of the history classes I had

And history was my favorite subject so I would have been paying attention and remembered if it had been covered.

Think they are covering this subject in our public grade schools today?

Don

[Diclotican]

11. NNN0LHI

NNN0LHI

It was not excactly covered in my classes in history either - but Im a devil about reading history, and had the posibility to have a more than decent libary when I got to school, both high school and college.. So I was plewing the books, and somewhat mos of it stuck into my tinfool head:P... Its in there, just little difficult to get out somewhre...

I doubt they are covering THAT subject in our public grade school today either.. It's for the speciall interst to know about this things I guess:P

Diclotican

[NNN0LHI]

13. You appear to be very knowledgeable of history so I have a question if you don't mind me asking?

I am not good at beating around the bush and the subject is morbid to me so I am going to be kind of blunt and just ask it straight up.

Does it seem like we are heading toward another world war to you?

Thanks in advance if you care to share your opinion on this subject.

Don

[Diclotican]

15. NNN0LHI

NNN0LHI

To be blunt to you to, I don't know. It is never easy to tell about the future, even if you have knowlegde about the history, but it dosen't look to good for a world without a world war either.. I hope not, becouse the consequenses wil be horrible, but if anything I know about history tell me, is that nothing is sure and written in stone. World war One and Two could have been evaded, if anyone had the currage to stand up and say no.. Or that someone had been able to talk to all parties in WW1 before the war started.. And then posible WW2 would not have happened either, becouse it was not a world war 1...

So to be honest, I don't know.. My hope is that hope wil prevaile, and that the best abilities we as humans can muster wil manage to win in the end.. But its like looking true a window glass, you know the window you are looking out of, and seeing two cars hit eath other, you know it wil be a collision, but you are not able to stop it before the two cars crash..

It have been like this like GWB got "elected" in 2000, a traintwreck just waiting to happend, and we are not able to stop it before it goes to hell.. I guess, the summer of 1914 and 1939 was some of the same, you know it wil end with a bang, you are just not sure how and when it wil go up in flames..

A modern world war wil be horrible, far worse than we wil ever be able to understand, or try to imagine.. I fear the use of nuclear weapons, even tho the "limit" to use the weapons is high.. But if one of the nuclear powers is in a tight place, I would not be to suprised to se the weapons used.. In the next 15-20 year time I fear the use of Nuclear weapons. But even conventional weapons is horrible and can be used to horrible effect against sivilians.. And I have not even pointed to Chemical and Biological weapons, who are also part of the madness..

Hopefully it wil not be like this.. But it dosen't look to good at the moment, specially as it looks like our world leaders are not able, or willing to work togheter to make the world more safe.. A lot of the work who was been made in the 1970s, and 1980s to make it far more difficult to use nuclear weapons - and therefore also CHemical and Biological weapons, is more or less over, the deals made then, is up to grasp, and no leader is serious about continue the habit about making the horrible weapons a thing of the past..

We humans can be as best as we can, and build fantastic thing than wil be known down the eons.. But we can also destroy all what we have been working for, the last 1000 year in 30-45 min timeframe..

Diclotican

[KamaAina]

14. The poster is Norwegian

Naturally Norwegian (and most European) schools would pay closer attention to WWII than ours, where it's basically presented as a Hollywood-style good-vs/-evil shoot-'em'up.

[Diclotican]

16. KamaAina

KamaAina

World war two is far closer to home in most of Europa, than in US, where most of americans was not even aware that the world was burning before Pearl Habour in 1941.. Then, and just then, wake americans up to the reality, and did the right thing.. Suporting the british, and therefore "the good guys" against Nazi-Germany and Imperial Japan.. But before Pearl Habour, most americans wanted to stick their head in the sand, and hope it never got into their shores..

Diclotican

[Major Hogwash]

7. This is news to me and I have studied Nazi Germany's history for a long time.

History and news are different subjects.
This may have been known to you, as a matter of history, but this is the first I have ever heard of it.
And it is very weird that someone from a church thought they could spare him from the hangman.

[Diclotican]

12. Major Hogwash

Major Hogwash

True, it might not be that a news, but it is maybe news for many, even who have been interesting, in German nazi history for a long time.. I have been fazinied about history as a whole for as long as I could read, and maybe specially the war.. Maybe mostly becouse some in our family was close to the war when it happened.. And even tho they did their best to "sensur" most of it, I got early a understand about what it all was about.. And have reading a lot about this since I mangaged to learn how to read..

But it is not news, that the protestantic church or at least members of that church in Germany, was more than sympatic to nazist, and that they supported the nazi movement from early one.. Many then discovered that the NSDAP was not what they belived it to be, and some of them ended also in prison.. Or in the KZ camps where many of them was killed, often by order of Heinrich Himmler himself, when the war was lost, and it was just a questing of time before they was liberated.. But some of them, survived even tho they was ordered killed, sometimes the allied forces got the upper hand, and managed to get true the lines, before SS could kill them.. Or they survived by pure luck, and some bundling from the SS side..

Eichman had sympatizeres all over the place, in germany as in Urugay and other places.. He would not have suvived as long as he did, if he had not had friends in high places..

Diclotican

[jschurchin]

8. "Kind Hearted"?

I am sorry, but Adolp Eichmann was a fucking murderer and piece of shit who needed a .50 cal to the forehead.

How anyone could think otherwise, is beyond me.

[Warpy]

9. I'm sure he was a real sweetheart who loved kids and dogs and Mom's strudel

and threw a handful of marks into the collection plate every Sunday. He was just too hard on the rest of his fellow citizens to go unpunished.

[truebrit71]

17. Not surprising really....the whole idea that 'ordinary germans' didn't know what was going on is...

...bullshit...

Read 'Hitler's Willing Executioners' for more insight...It has been remorsely attacked by those that have a vested interest in maintaining the popular (and widely taught) view that Hitler and the Nazi's were an anomoly, an abherrence that occurred like a once-in-a-thousand year storm, amd that 'ordinary germans' had nothing to do with the horrors inflicted upon their fellow Jewish citizens and they could not have possibly known, particpated in, or covered up for the holocaust.

The facts say otherwise.

Also, let's not forget the Vatican's role in handing Jews over to the Germans, as well as aiding Nazi escapists after the war...

The fact that organized religion was still acting as an apologist 20 years later should come as no surprise...