Cr HI (Ik
TN By

IN WEST GERMANY

~The embers of fascism

]

By D. N. PRITT
AST month the boss of West
Germany’a secret police,
Hoecherl, got into hot water be-
Cause he revealed some of the
‘Methods being used against Ade-
‘Rauer’s opponents.

Not only had he admitted the
€Xistence of ex-nazis in the sec- '
Tet police, but also the wide-
Spread practice of phone tapping,
letter-opening, etc., which he
Said was directed against ‘‘ Left
€xtremists.’’

Herr Hoecherl has also sug-
Sested that British Intelligence
assisted inthe arrest of members
Of the illegal West German Com-
Munist Party in Schleswig-Hol-
Stein and Hamburg, resulting in

200 criminal cases’’ being
Opened,

Adenauer’s ruthless persecu
ion of the Communist Party and
its allies has, of course, its roots
in the grim history of nazism—
and it is worth noting that 30
years’ ago today the infamous
Reichstag Fire Trial was inpro-
8ress,

It was in February 1933 the
Reichstag, the German Parlia-
Ment building was burnt down; and

September the great leader of

© Bulgarian people, Georgi Di-
Mitroy, and others were tried be-
fore the German Supreme Court
at Leipzig on charges of having

Unt the building.
Just before that trial, an in
- Wiry into the causes ofthe fire—
Often called the ‘counter
~Was held in London.

That was 30 years ago, and me-

Mories are short; indeed most of

. my readers are too young to have

aN of the fire at the time.
h it?
—hat was the essence of it?

A General Election was to be
held on March 5, and the nazis
wanted to win enough votes to be
independent of all other parties.

The working class, divided
alas! into Social-Democrats and
Communists, but together com

manding more votes than the na>

zis, wanted to defeat the nazis
altogether.

In the middle of the election
campaign, in which the nazis
were losing ground, therecamea
sensation. _

On the night of February 27,
the Reichstag building was set on
fire and greatly damaged,

The nazis immediately accus-
ed the Communists, not only of
the fire but of planning an im-
mediate armed revolution, ar
rested them by the thousands and

brought in harsh emergency laws.
* * *

And, by annulling all the 81
seats which the Communists won
‘at the election in spite of all the
propaganda, the nazis secured an
absolute majority—on the basis
of which they ruled Germany for
12 years ofhorror, mass murder,
and world war.

The truth of the matter—scar-
cely now contested by anyone—
was that the nazis deliberately
staged the whole fire with the ob-
ject of getting rid of the Com
munists.

‘Fhey counted on their own
power of propaganda and supres-
sion, on the massive helpthey got
from German finance-capital,
and on the encouragement that
came from such elements in the
west as the Chamberlain Tories.

The latter were, naturally, de-

- Still glowing today

lighted with people who wantedto
destroy working-class parties
and trade unions and prepare for
war against the U.S.S.R.

The German Communists saw
through the swindle at once. They
knew that they had nothing to do
with the crime, which could only
damage their prospects and they
sought to proclaim thetruthfrom
the housetops.

But, under the conditions of the
new nazi terror, there were few
housetops available to them, and
indeed few of them left out of
prison to use them.

The truth was nevertheless es
tablished pretty soon, largely by
the counter-trial.

This unofficial but most ef-
fentive inquiry was held in Lon-
don, just before the Leipzig trial,
before a group of lawyers from
Britain, the U.S. France, Sweden,
Belgium and Denmark, I was one
of them.

We had before us a largenum-
ber of witnesses and a body of
documents, all of which should
properly have been before the
Supreme Court at Leipzig, but
were not.

This evidence did two things:
It presented an overwhelming |
case that neither Dimitrov nor.
his two fellow countrymen, nor
the German deputy Torgler, who _
was tried with them, had anything
to do with the fire.

And — this was far more im-
portant — it presented a very
strong case (made far stronger
by much further evidence emerg-
ing in later years) that the nazis
had themselves staged the fire. ©

Hitler men hold top posts

MINISTRY FOR
ECCNGMIC COOPERATION

Vialon @ f'
QZ

MINISTRY FOR DEFENCE

REPRESENTATIVE IN BERLIN

‘OR MINISTRY FOR *
ministry cor exeewees, || KUN SZean AFFAIRS || FeDERAL PROPERTY
REFUGEES AND WAR VICTIMS | | — . Sy Q
ck | Qualen
AI foreien oFFice /
PRESS AND \HIGH AUTHORITY
INFORMATION OFFICE OF THE ECSC Carstens
Hettlage@ts ;

The Reichstag burned 30 years ago

but it still has lessons today...

The effect of.all this, plus the
inherent weakness of the prose-
cution case, plus — even more—
the remarkable work of Dimitrov
himself, who conducted his de-
fence in the shape of a counter-
attack, was sensational.

All of the accused, except a
poor, half-witted Dutch dupe of
the nazis, who had been arrested
on the scene of the crime, had
to be acquitted.

There was one further slap in
the face for the nazis.

In the course of the hearing,
when things were seen to be go-
ing badly for them, they brought
in the famous bully Goering as a
witness, in the hope of ‘pulling
things around.’’ : :

The result was that Dimitrov
cross-examined him into a-state
of gibbering rage!

What lessons must we draw?

First, I think, we must realise
the truly brutal and dishonest na-
ture of fascists and fascism.

Then we must be clear as to

the terrible power of propaganda;
for, remember, even after this
great and early slap in the face,
the nazis managed to remain in
power until the whole world was
mobilised against them in the
war.

We must understand the dan-
gers that fascism, under any lab—
el, brings to all of us in every
country, and the need to resist it
early, always, everywhere, all
day and all night.

Never must we thinkthat it will
die down, or that ‘it will not
happen here’’!

More positively, we must bear

in mind that the power of work-
ing-class forces, if they unite, is
stronger than anything that fasc —
ism can ever do.
United, the Social Democrats and
Communists of Germany could
have prevented the nazis ever
reaching power.

Let us fight for our own unity.
To prevent the revival of fascism
and put an end to the capitalist
system which nourishes it.

Hopf @ f°

MINISTRY FOR

FEDERAL CHANCELLERY

Eckardt ®

Dr G/ 0 6K e oS SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH
eae ee Cartellieri @)
we — MINISTRY FOR HEALTH
MINISTRY OF JUSTICE ; Bargatzky® ig
Joel MINISTRY FOR POST
; AND. Nog
. MINISTRY FOR TRANSPORT Herz
Westick a | [eet a8 ese Seiermann Sinn
Muller-Armack() | | Huitenbrauker

Active Proponent of the
Nazi Regime

iS)

The above chart shows the all-powerful cabinet
©! state secretaries in West Germany set up

y the Adenauer regime. Of the 25 permanent
State secretaries, 15 have been definitely
‘Jentified as Nazis. The most powerful of them
'S Dr. Hans Globke, considered as Adenaver's
"ght hand man. In July, 1963, Globke was

\

incriminated in Intellectual
Preparation or in lmpie~
mentation of War Crimes

up.

FAMILY AND YOUTH
Barth

MINISTRY FOR WORK

AND SOCIAL ORDER
Claussen® [’

Participant in Hitlers War
fconomy.andin ,
Economie War Crimes

tried in absentia by the Supreme Court of the
German Democratic Republic and found guilty
of ‘‘war crimes and crimes against humanity.”’
He was also found guilty of drafting the Nazi
laws on which the fascist dictatorship was set

Appeal fascist U.S. law

3 ee U.S. Court of Appeals in
Washington, D.C., will hold a
hearing Oct. 28 on the appeal of
William Albertson of New York
and Roscoe Procter of California

against the ruling of the Subvers-
ive Activities Control Board that
they must register as members of

**Communist - action’ organi-
zation’? as defined in the McCar-
ran Act. :

This case, which concerns the
constitutionality of the registra-
tion provision of the McCarran
Act will immediately affect 25
other individuals — Negro and
white, men and women, from all
parts of the U.S.A. — who have
likewise been cited by Attorney
General Robert Kennedy to the
SACB,
Attorneys John J. Abt and Joseph
Forer will present oral argument
on behalf of Albertson and Proc-
tor.

The brief on which argument
will be based presents basic

questions, including the privilege
against self - incrimination,

abridgement of freedom of belief,

conscience and association, vio-

lation of due process, and wheth-

er the SACB’s orders constitute
a bill of attainder.

The hearing will begin at 10.30
a.m., Oct. 28, at the U.S. Court
of Appeals, Constitution Ave..
Washington.

Two of the individuals cited by
the Attorney General have not
even come before the SACB as
yet. They are James J. Tormey

-and Lionel Libson of New York

City, and their hearings before
the board are scheduled to begin

on Nov, 4.

The McCarran Act is a notor-
iously fascist piece of legislation
(often referred to as ‘‘the
thought-control act’’) which was
once vetoed by Harry Truman.
It has never been proven consti-
tutionally legal.

October 18, 1963—PACIFIC TRIBUNE —Page 5