Gunter Grass Quotes
How did it happen that an enlightened country like Germany was pulled into Nazism? That question has occupied me since 'The Tin Drum,' my first book. The story also shows that we can never know how a person's life will unfold; there is no guarantee that a person will do what is right and avoid what is not right.
Grass, Günter. Interview by Frank Schirrmacher and Hubert Spiegel. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 12 Aug. 2006.
He had abdicated and was serving as the Governor of the Bahamas at the time. While the public was given the reason for has abdication as his love for a divorced woman, his pro Nazi viewpoints which were not publicly known in England, made him unacceptable and his treason a danger to England at war with Nazi Germany.
This new form of patriotism, this encouragement of pregnancy—even outside of marriage—was just too controversial. Himmler withdrew the order. It illustrates that even in a brutal dictatorship, public opinion can influence government.
This quotation is important because there are some who believed that the professional German Soldiers did not respect Hitler and his murderous policies. This quotation shows that at least publicly Donitz had no problem extolling Hitler above all others. After the war Donitz was found guilty of Unrestricted Submarine Warfare and using thousands of slave laborers in his shipyards. He was sentenced to 10 years, one of the lightest sentences if the German War Crimes Trials.
Although a fervent Nazi, he detested Hitler. When Hitler consolidated power, one of the first things he did in 1934 was to order his guards to murder Strasser, just as Strasser had feared.
The coup started with the takeover of a large German Beer Hall where the political leaders of Bavaria were holding a meeting. Hitler and his Brownshirt thugs burst into the Hall. Hitler jumped up on a chair and shouted this statement waving a pistol in the air. Hitler was bluffing however, At the time he did not have the police or army supporting him, although they did soon after. This was the beginning of Hitler’s rise to power, the ruination of Germany, and tragedy for the world.
She, like her husband and many of the America Firsters, believed that Hitler should be allowed to overrun Europe and Russia. See {613688}. The America First group was a pro-fascist organization who supported the axis powers until they declared war on the United States. Even then, there were some Nazi sympathizers who were anti-immigrant, racist and anti-Semitic in addition to being fascists. Both of the Lindberghs were America Firsters
Günter Wilhelm Grass was a German novelist, poet, playwright, illustrator, graphic artist, sculptor, and recipient of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Literature.
