Hitler's speech

Martin cranked up the volume on the tiny radio in Hirt's office. Part of a several-month-old Hitler speech was playing, and despite having things to do in the lab, Martin was aching to hear it. He was also desperate to get his mind off the uncomftorable trip home he'd made over the Christmas holidays.

"Es ist, glaube ich etwas sehr seltenes, wenn ein Mann nach rund 20 Jahren vor seine alte Anhängerschaft hintreten kann. (I believe it is very rare that after around 20 years, a man can stand in front of his old followers." Martin scoffed. What followers? Didn't most of the people hate Hitler by now? Those who had lost friends and family? Sure, there were always the die-hard people who would fight until the end, but it was certainly not the same following that Hitler had initially. But then a second thought occurred. Although it might not have been the majority of the Germans, a lot of people did still support him. And that after twenty years! They weren't sick of him yet; they weren't done with his ideology. They were actively enforcing his laws and walking the streets he'd paved for them. And it wasn't a handful of people. They were millions.

He moved on to speak about the German soldiers fighting in the war they'd recently started to rage against the Soviet Union. He explained what they - in his experience, must have noticed.

"Look at our facilities, compare our cities, our colonies, that we built, compare our social facilities with what you saw over there (in the East). Compare the fate and the lot of the German farmer and the Russian one. Compare that, my dear friend, and tell me your opinion: who has done better?... Nobody (no soldier) has returned who could have voiced a different opinion than that if a social state existed anywhere, it could only be (in) Germany." The little pipette slipped from Martin's hands, but he didn't notice. There was some truth to that: Germany was in a better state if you would subtract all the damage done from the bombings than almost any country in the East. It was nothing 'new' to Martin that Stalin's communism had failed, but he hadn't realized how big the difference between the countries would have been back then. Of course, many parts of the UdSSR had been in a worse place than the German cities before either of the revolutions took place, but still. There was no doubt about it. Hitler created a system that promoted and rewarded hard work. But for all the wrong reasons.

"We, the English, have experience in governing. One can only ask: in governing? In exploiting! In plundering!" Hitler's voice crackled over the tiny speaker. Martin snorted. He had a point about the English. Their colonies were a disaster; he'd learned about it in history class, their horror beat maybe only by the Belgian ones. But as almost everything the 'Führer' said, even this was hypocritical. What were the soldiers doing to the cities and towns they conquered in the East? Weren't they also brutally destroying a small world?

"And if this same man (Mr. Eden) says: we have good instincts for

für idealistic and material values...Yes, they do! They destroyed the idealistic values everywhere and stole the material values." Although the humor was dark, it was well-phrased and witty. He could hear the assembly cheer and clap. It was with these words and this speech that Martin, for the first time, realized why people had followed him. He was used to the screaming mad shorts of Hitler - the ones you watched in High School History class. In those cuts, Hitler was never charismatic; he was portrayed as a raging, shouting terror. But hearing one of his speeches in entirety, finally made the boy understand why he even had a following at all. "No, my friends, they can't govern."

"And when...Roosevelt comes and explains: we have to save Europe with American methods. I can only answer: the good sir could and should have saved his own country. Then, he wouldn't have had to go to war. It would have been more useful for him to take care of those 13 million unemployed (in his country) than to tangle the world in war. But he did just that, and he did it because he couldn't take care of the problems in his own country." These words spoken by Hitler on the 8th of November in 1942 were ones that Martin had heard so many times before in slightly different wording. So many leaders of Eastern or Asian countries - even European ones, blamed the USA for meddling in affairs that didn't concern them. Eighty years later, the US still hadn't learned its lesson. Martin wasn't sure what to think. He was proud to be American. He was proud of democracy, of the right to have free media and free will—proud that Lincoln had abolished slavery and that their constitution and rules had been a basis for specific laws for many countries. But he had to agree that the US had overstepped under certain governments and rulers. Had they always meant it for good and honest reasons? He leaned toward no.

He proceeded to lecture a hate speech on Jews—blaming them for wanting to destroy Europe. He then talked about Germany under the Kaiser (Emporer), accusing him of being a coward. "They have an enemy in me who doesn't even think of the word 'surrender.' Even when I was a boy, maybe back then it was a bad habit, but in the main picture, maybe a virtue: my habit of always having the last word." But not the last laugh, Martin thought.

All of a sudden, the radio shut off. Martin looked up into Professor Hirt's angry face. "Franz, I understand that you might want to hear our Führers speech, but we are in the middle of something right now. If you'd like, I can get you a written version: I think it was printed in a newspaper in November."

"I apologize," Martin said, thankfully nodding at Hirt's offer. I'd love to have it in written form. I found it very interesting."

"Alright, I'll see what I can do. Remind me about it when we leave the lab; otherwise, I might forget."

"Of course. Thank you, August."