Karl Dietrich Bracher Quotes
I dedicate this book [The German Dictatorship] to the hope that a sober picture of the German dictatorship may help Germany avoid both old and new dangers, primarily the traditional authoritarian concept of the state, but also radical utopianism—both expressions of intolerance and conceit, and moreover, profoundly unpolitical modes of behavior
Dedication in his 1970 book, The German Dictatorship.
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The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms is
Although the Nazis railed against the Communists & Socialists, the potential opposition they feared the most was the middle class. See also {582967}.
With Hitler’s early victories in Europe, the victory of the Spanish fascists in their civil war, and Mussolini in Africa, many people thought that fascism would dominate the world. Ruhle was one.
The Fascists almost fulfilled Spengler’s prediction.
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.
This quotation brought Mises much criticism at the time and has destroyed his moral credibility for the rest of his career. Like many others who supported the wealthy ruling classes, he expressed admiration for Fascism. Worse he claimed that Nazi German and Italian Fascism saved Europe when subsequent events proved that they destroyed Europe along with 30-40 million people killed. However, unlike most of the right wing Fascist enthusiasts of the day, he did—in the last sentence of this quotation which is often omitted by critical quoters—observe that Fascism success would not be permanent or long lived. His lack of moral condemnation of Fascism and Fascists however was clear. Some of his apologists and decuples observe that his philosophy tended to avoid all kinds of moral judgments pro and con about almost everything. It was this lack of a moral / ethical framework that most of his critics point to as a great failing of his. Also, many argue that this is another example of Mises tendency to exaggerate. Mises also took great criticism on what he claimed were “best intentions”; this included virulent racial and religious discrimination, militarism, aggression and expansionism, persecution of the handicapped. Ironically much later, Mises admitted that all of the Nazi evil was clear before it was implemented, {632449}. Some scholars think that Mises who was almost amoral outside the context of economics, began to develop a moral awareness in the reality of the Nazi charnel that much of Europe had become. One problem is that a person like Mises loses much credibility because of his lack of moral sensibilities and moral perception of a way of life and then exaggerates so many of his examples. However, many of his ideas and insights are very important in man’s quest of an economic system that produces substantial increases in standard of living and development and at the same time assure a modicum of subsistence and dignity and a fair opportunity to achieve much more. Mises’s ideas should not be ignored because of the failings of Mises the man.
Soon he had the power of a dictator but he didn’t force his will on the vast majority of the Cubans. His decrees made all the wealthy and the cronies of the dictator Batista outraged and most of them left Cuba. He was a dynamic demagogue and the people handed him dictatorial powers which he did not reject. He was so popular that he was the only leader in the Americas who would give 4 hour speeches and move through the streets without any bodyguards until the United States and dissident expatriates tried to assassinate him. With all that popularity, none the less he would not allow open criticism of his regime and jailed many political opponents. So he indeed became a dictator but never needed the machine gun to maintain power.
The allies—mostly under American Pressure—only tried the highest ranking Nazi war criminals. Many wanted to try the rest, but they did not prevail. Lord Russell, the English prosecutor at Nuremburg resigned in protest as he had case files on over 100,000 Nazi war criminals who were never prosecuted. The main object was to use those officials to establish a strong anti-Communist government in post war Germany.
Karl Dietrich Bracher was a German political scientist and historian of the Weimar Republic and Nazi Germany. Born in Stuttgart, Bracher was awarded a Ph.D. in the classics by the University of Tübingen in 1948 and subsequently studied at Harvard University from 1949 to 1950. During World War II, he served in the Wehrmacht and was captured by the Americans while serving in Tunisia in 1943. Bracher taught at the Free University of Berlin from 1950 to 1958 and at the University of Bonn since 1959. In 1951 Bracher married Dorothee Schleicher, the niece of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. They had two children.
