Historical revisionism and the American genocide that never happened

Stefan Scheil belongs to the group of radical right-wing revisionist historians who are on a mission to rewrite 20th history.  In his books and articles Scheit reassigns blame for the outbreak of the Second World War to the treachery of Stalin, the diplomatic blunders of Great Britain and the hegemonist designs of the United States.  Hitler, in Scheit's revisionist history, was fundamentally a man of peace who was forced into a "preventive war" to save the German nation. (See my post Operation Barbarossa and the Miyth of the Preventive War)

Recently, in the pages of the völkisch-national weekly Junge Freiheit, Scheit has written pieces "debunking" the idea that the concept of the Herrenrasse ("Master Race")  was ever promoted in the ideology of the Third Reich.  Or, if it existed at all it was simply borrowed from the Americans.  Sheit's thesis is preposterous to anyone who has read Mein Kampf, or the publications of the notorious anti-Semite Julius Streicher, or to anyone who has researched the Lebensborn Experiment.  

But Scheit goes much further in his indictment of the Americans, basically claiming that the Nuremberg Trials were illegitimate since the American prosecutors had no moral standing to accuse the German defendants of racism.  America had long practiced discrimination, persecution and segregation of African-Americans, therefore it was the height of hypocrisy for Americans to prosecute others - in this case, Germans - for doing the same with a different ethnic group - in this case Jews:   

Der schreiende Widerspruch, die Deutschen als angeblich unverbesserliche Rassisten zur Umerziehung zu verpflichten und dabei Streitkräfte einzusetzen, die selbst rassistisch durchorganisiert waren, hatte den US-Behörden ursprünglich Kopfzerbrechen bereitet. Man lieferte etwaigen deutschen Gegenargumentationen schließlich eine unfreiwillige Steilvorlage. Allein, die Deutschen waren seit dreißig Jahren wechselweise Krieg, Inflation oder Hunger ausgesetzt gewesen und somit zu erschöpft, um so etwas noch zu nutzen.

(The glaring contradcion of forcing the supposedly incorriibly racist Germans into reeducation programs while deploying military forces that were racially segregated was at first a major headache for the US officials. This presented the Germans with a golden opportunity to repudiate the US charges.  But the Germans were too worn out from 30 years of war, inflation and hunger to take advantage. ) 

But the question Scheit should be asking is why did the racially motivated persecution of the Jews lead to a Holocaust in which millions were murdered, whiile discrimination against the African-Americans in the US resulted in the civil rights movement barely a decade later?

The only historian I know of who has systematically compared anti-Semitism in Germany with racism in America is Manfred Henningsen.  In his 2009 book Der Mythos America (see my review here and my interview with the author here) Henningsen has a chapter with the title Der ausgebliebende Genozid ("The Genocide that Never Happened") in which he points out that up until 1933 anti-Semitism in Germany was far less virulent than American anti-black racism, especially in the American South with the epidemic of lynchings.  In fact, there was a far greater probability in 1933 of genocide against African-Americans  than against Jews in Germany.  What tipped the scale in Germany was a political regime following the Nazi seizure or power that legitimized the systematic detention, deportation and finally murder of an entire population.

Ohne die Legitimation durch das Regime hätte der Terrror nicht stattgefunden. Gesellschaften können nicht auf einer Ad-hoc-Basis zwölf Jahre land im gronssen Stil Massenmord und Totschlag veranstalten.

(The terror never would have happened without the legitimation through the regime. Societies can't keep committing murder on a massive scale for twelve years on an ad hoc basis.)

As unsatisfactory as this explanation is, at least Henningsen is thinking about the historical realities instead of rewriting history to fit a right-wing ideology like Stefan Scheit is doing.

Incidentally, the American counterpart to Junge Freiheit, the Webzine Alternative Right, just published a piece advocating "Black Genocide" -the elimination of the black race. So this is where historical revisionism ultimately leads us. 

Comments

[Hattie]

I can't believe this.

[michijo]

The Alternative Right website is so stupid!

Why should it matter if there was a civil rights movement in the USA? Do you think the USA itself caused it because of the American constitution? There was nothing in it that guaranteed civil rights. It was an act of pure rebelliousness against a square-headed society.

The USA still has plenty of racism, like the illegal slaves from Mexico, or the fact that the banks targeted minorities with predatory loans.