The German Connection
THE PROFITS OF WAR
Posted April 1, 2004 thepeoplesvoice.org

By: Ted Lang

It's not only a rock-solid fact - it is absolutely terrifying!  Previous comparisons to the present-day political environment of the United States of America and that of 1933-1934 pre-war Germany wax similar by the day.  The stark comparisons between competing forms of socialism - National Socialism or Nazism and international socialism, identified as communism - continue to struggle for control of America.

Our nation is indeed gravitating towards socialism, just as was the case with pre-World War II Germany.  In fact, German Dictator Adolf Hitler "campaigned" on and rallied the German people against "Jewish" communism that had taken hold in Soviet Russia via the Bolshevik revolution.  It was Hitler's primary reason for hating the Jews, in precisely the same manner that Czar Nicholas II persecuted the Jews for their formation of labor unions that instigated and organized national work stoppages.  And Hitler made no bones about it - he hated democracy also.

But Russian Dictator Josef Stalin was also a nationalist, and always put mother Russia foremost in his political deal making and international policy machinations.  It was only terminology that classified international socialism as "communism" to distinguish it from "national socialism," or Nazism.  The problem is as always, a continuing and growing consolidation and centralization of power required by the universal support of the populace that makes socialism in any and all of its forms so attractive to brutal dictators.

Whether rallying the populace under the banner of "workers of the world unite," or for the cause securing the Fatherland via "Deutschland über alles," getting people to salute, wave little flags, and mass in order to unify them against a national or international enemy, imagined or real, socialism in any of its forms concentrates and centralizes government, making a nation a pushover for a dictator.

Nazi Germany began its life with the short reign of Jewish communists, who were eventually displaced in the weak Weimar republic by the "right man:" Hitler.  The struggle of a foundering republic and its democratic freedoms, accentuated by National Socialism's competition with communism, is what is so strikingly similar in our country today.  As Santyana warned, those not learning from history are doomed to relive it.  We are reliving it right now, but in a much more ominous fashion than can be imagined.

Hitler used Keynesian debt economics and established a war economy to build a mighty military machine.  Posted on truthout.org was a letter to the editor posted on January 9, 2004, from a reader who experienced occupation by Nazi Germany as a child, and who wrote, "I'm no expert on WWII - but I learned a lot about what happened in Germany - and Europe - back in those days.  I always wondered how the wonderful German people - so honest, decent, hard-working, friendly, and generous - could ever allow such a thing to happen."

The article asks the rhetorical question: "Didn't you see what was happening?  We saw.  There was nothing we could do.  Our military had no modern weapons.  The Nazis had technology and resources - they just invaded and took over - we were overwhelmed by their air power.  They had spies everywhere - the people spying on each other, just to have an 'ace in the hole' in case they [themselves] were accused - and anyone who had a grudge against you could accuse you of something - just an accusation meant you'd disappear.  Nobody dared ask where you had gone - anyone who returned was considered suspicious - what had they said, and whom did they implicate?  It was a climate of fear - there's nothing anyone can do when the government uses fear and imprisonment to intimidate people.  The government was above the law.."

If this scenario seems disturbingly familiar, please keep in mind that the writer did not reside in Germany, but in a nation subjugated and enslaved by the Nazis.  The article poses yet another rhetorical question: "Why didn't the German people stop the Nazis?"  The writer answers, "Life was better, at first, under the Nazis."  Please recall that Marge Schott, the late former owner of the Cincinnati Reds Baseball Team, also publicly offered this truism.

The article continues, "The war machine invigorated the economy - men had jobs again, and enough money to take care of their family.  New building projects were everywhere.  The shops were full again - and people could afford good food, culture and luxuries.  Women could stay home in comfort. Crime was reduced.  Health care improved.  It was a rosy scenario - Hitler brought order and prosperity."

Indeed, the German war machine appeared invincible.  As the writer expressed, the Nazis had "technology and resources."  How did Hitler accomplish all of this?  It wasn't just Keynesian debt economics; there had to be other sources of wealth to bolster the military economy.  There had to be guarantees that debt-dependent policy would result in outcome-based payoffs and profits.

At a war game exercise put on by the Mid-Atlantic Air Museum based in Reading, Pennsylvania last year, in a WW II staged drill simulating combat and pitting American troops against German infantry, I recognized a much-photographed German truck troop carrier.  I was curious - I don't like long-term unanswered questions, so I approached the participant wearing the uniform of a German officer and asked him the make of that particular truck I had seen in so many World War II photographs.  The truck's manufacturer was International Harvester!

In fact, many US companies supported Hitler's war machine efforts; truck and automotive manufacturers, Ford and IBM just to mention a few.  This of course bears out the writer's views as well as the views of Marge Schott and William L. Shirer.  Henry Ford, Joseph Kennedy, Sr. and Charles Lindbergh were all early fans of der Fuehrer.  But returning again to the resources issue, another very curious and disturbingly repetitive dimension presents itself.

In an article authored by John Buchanan and Stacey Michael, writing for The New Hampshire Gazette and dated November 7, 2003, the writers offer: "After the seizures in late 1942 of five U.S. enterprises he managed on behalf of Nazi industrialist Fritz Thyssen, Prescott Bush, the grandfather of President George W. Bush, failed to divest himself of more than a dozen 'enemy national' relationships that continued until as late as 1951, newly-discovered U.S. government documents reveal."  The article, entitled "'Bush - Nazi Dealings Continued Until 1951' - Federal Documents," goes on, "Furthermore, the records show that Bush and his colleagues routinely attempted to conceal their activities from government investigators."

Buchanan and Michael elaborate: "Bush's partners in the secret web of Thyssen-controlled ventures included former New York Governor W. Averell Harriman and his younger brother, E. Roland Harriman.  Their quarter-century of Nazi financial transactions, from 1924-1951, were conducted by the New York private banking firm, Brown Brothers Harriman."  The article continues, "Although the additional seizures under the Trading with the Enemy Act did not take place until after the war, documents from the The National Archives and the Library of Congress confirm that Bush and his partners continued their Nazi dealings unabated.  These activities included a financial relationship with the German city of Hanover and several industrial concerns.  They went undetected by investigators until after World War Two."

The astonishing revelations continue, "At the same time the last Brown Brothers Harriman client assets were seized, Prescott Bush announced his Senate campaign that led to his election in 1952."  Publisher and historian Edward Boswell is quoted in the article as saying that, "'The story of Prescott Bush and Brown Brothers Harriman is an instruction to the real history of our country,' says L.A. art book publisher and historian Edward Boswell.  'It exposes the money-making motives behind our foreign policies dating back a full century.  The ability of Prescott Bush and the Harrimans to bury their checkered pasts also reveals collusion between Wall Street and the media that exists to this day.'"

The article continues, "Sheldon Drobny, a Chcago entrepreneur and philanthropist who will soon launch a liberal talk radio network, says the importance of the new documents is that they prove a long pattern of Bush family war profiteering that continues today via George H. W. Bush's intimate relationship with the Saudi royal family and the bin Ladens, conducted via the super-secret Carlyle Group, whose senior advisors include former U.S. Secretary of State James A. Baker III.  In the post 9-11 world, Drobny finds the Bush-Saudi connection deeply troubling.  'Trading with the enemy is trading with the enemy,' he says."

Also highlighted in the article is the comment from Lawrence Lader, an abortion rights activist and author of more than 40 books, who offers, "'The relevance lies with the fact that the sitting President of the United States would lead the nation to war based on lies and against the wishes of the rest of the world.'  Lader and others draw comparisons between President Bush's invasion of Iraq and Hitler's occupation of Poland in 1939 - the event that sparked World War Two."

The article goes on and offers: "'The discovery of the Bush-Nazi documents raises new questions about the role of Prescott Bush and his influential business partners in the secret emigration of Nazi war criminals, which allowed them to escape justice in Germany,'" says Bob Fertik, yet another activist and writer.  Fertik and others "believe Prescott Bush and the Harrimans should have been tried for treason."

The article's most damaging observation is this: "The records also show that Bush and the Harrimans conducted business after the war with related concerns doing business in or moving assets into Switzerland, Panama, Argentina and Brazil.."  South America has always been notorious as a favorite getaway for fleeing Nazis after WW II.  The article also points out the many Nazi recruits in the CIA early in that agency's beginnings.  It points out Prescott Bush's role in some of the agency's early operations. And of course, we all know about Bush I, former President George H.W. Bush and the fact that he was a former director of the agency.

Created specifically to counter media disinformation and propaganda, the Project for the Old American Century http://www.oldamericancentury.org/bush_crime_family.htm posted an article entitled "The Bush Crime Family Tree."  Referring to Bush I's tour of duty as CIA director, it offers, ".as director of the CIA, [Bush] had funneled enormous amounts of cash to drug runners including Manuel Noriega and helped in the destabilization of Argentina.  Bush utilized his own connections to help fund drug runners from Laos to Panama.  Most shocking was the so-called 'cocaine coup' in Bolivia in June 1980, masterminded by fugitive Nazi Klaus Barbie, 'The Butcher of Lyons.'  Barbie, who had been previously secreted in Latin America by the CIA, began working closely with the Argentines and used drug money to finance a neo-Nazi cabal, one that succeeded in overthrowing the government.  The troops swept through the capital wearing Nazi armbands.."

What is most disturbing about the Bush administration's ties to Hitler and Nazism, may have started out as mere coincidences, generalities in economic and political circumstances that are anything but alarming due to the fact that our nation has never been through the turmoil of a post world war/pre world war Germany.  Our nation was never humiliated and made to suffer from the Versailles Treaty and the Zionist Treaty, the Balfour Declaration, between England and the international bankers headed by the Rothschilds, as Germany had been; and this very closely-knit secret association of international bankers all heavily supported Hitler's war machine and his intentions to form a New World Order.

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© Copyright THEODORE E. LANG 3/30/04 All rights reserved. Ted Lang is a political analyst and a freelance writer.