> It's the title of a very good book by... Ernst Nolte? called _Fascism in
> Its Epoch_ in German, the title of which was changed to _Three Faces of
> Fascism_ in the English translation. (As an echo of _Three Faces of
> Eve_?)
>
> The book is great, but largely because the author understands fascism a
> little too well, if you know what I mean... looking into abysses and all
> that...
That book of Nolte still has a good rep. (recently skimmed a bit of an
excellent anthology, "The Fascism Reader, " Edited by Aristotle A. Kallis.
Routledge, London and New York: 2003. Pg. xxiv, 513,
http://www.largeprintreviews.com/kallis.html that had chunks of it), but,
don't forget the huge stink Nolte and a few other hard right historians
provoked in the 80's over the relativization of the Holocaust and "Class
Genocide."
http://www.osborne-conant.org/nolt_comment.htm
> ...Ernst Nolte and Holocaust Revisionism
> ...In June, one of Germany's most prestigious literary prizes went to
> historian, Ernst Nolte, (a Professor at the Free University of Berlin)
> who has sought to partially justify the Holocaust by asserting it was in
> essence a riposte to Bolshevism[1]. He received the Konrad Adenauer Prize
> for literature, causing an uproar that has filled German newspapers with
> invective and divided one of Germany's leading historical institutes.
The prize is awarded by the Munich-based Deutschland Foundation which is conservative, but had not been considered reactionary or revisionist.
Accepting the prize, Mr. Nolte said, ''We should leave behind the view that the opposite of National Socialist goals is always good and right.'' He added that because Nazism was the ''strongest of all counter forces'' to Bolshevism, a movement with wide Jewish support, Hitler may have had ''rational'' reasons for attacking the Jews[2].
...For those interested, historian Benjamin B. Weber, provides a criticism of Nolte's writings in an article entitled "Shades of Revisionism: Holocaust Denial and the Conservative Call to Reinterpret German History[3]." Weber suggests that the appeal of Nolte's writings stems from the desire of some to believe that "the roots of the Holocaust do not lie in German antisemitism, but rather in the Bolshevik revolution," a view that would "shift the blame from the German people to the communist Soviets." Most scholars scoff at Nolte's notion that the revolution of 1917 created a situation in which the German people were locked in a struggle to the death with European Jewry. Weber, however, asks us to imagine the effect Nolte's ideas could have on young Germans today "who have difficulty accepting that their relatives belonged to a flagrantly criminal society[4]." Nolte's distinguished reputation and academic credentials help lull young people into thinking the Holocaust was a defensive action.
...Perhaps this helps explain why Nolte has a following among the far-right in the USA. In an article entitled "Nazifying the Germans," Ralph Raico, a rightist Professor of History at Buffalo State College, reiterates and extols Nolte's work. Raico agrees with Nolte that, "Keeping the Nazi period constantly before our eyes serves the ideological interests of a number of "influential groups" including "Zionists" and "American globalists." Raico also complains that Hitler is used as a case against Americian isolationism [5]. His views are widely represented in the American far-right.
Like many authors, including both Nolte and members of the more moderate- right, Raico feels we are in the "midst of a vast campaign to delegitimize western civilization" (a criticism also often leveled at the "new musicology.") Racio suggests that, "The obsession with the never-ending guilt of the Germans...advances the ends of those who look forward to the extinction of the nation-state and national identity, especially in the West."
Nolte agrees, and provides an even more specific theory. He asserts that radical feminism joins Third World anti-Occidentalism and multiculturalism to "instrumentalize" the Holocaust for political purposes. He feels these groups place the Holocaust in the context of "various genocides by the predatory and conquering West, so that 'homo hitlerensis' ultimately appears as merely a special case of 'homo occidentalis.'" According to Nolte, the purpose of this leftist portrayal of the West as genocidal is to strike at "the cultural and linguistic homogeneity of the national states, achieved over centuries, and open the gates to a massive immigration," so that in the end the nations of the West should cease to exist. The trouble with Nolte's thought seems to be that it trivializes atrocities Western nations have indeed committed.
In the mid 1980s, Jürgen Habermas, a professor of social philosophy at the University of Frankfurt, attacked Nolte's views. A lively public debate evolved in Germany known as the "Historikerstreit" ("The Historian's Conflict.") in which Nolte was represented by the conservative _Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung_ and Habermas by the liberal weekly _Die Zeit_. Habermas suggested that Nolte's revisionism was primarily a political issue stemming from the fact that many Germans born after 1945 are irritated at being held responsible for the crimes of their parents. Habermas criticized the revisionists for attempting to provide Germans with a history that would alleviate their sense of guilt. Rather than providing a more palatable interpretation of the German past, he demanded that historians leave it intact and that Germany face up to the horrors of Nazism. Habermas further suggested that revisionism would ultimately only discredit Germany.
Nolte's writings, however, are widely applauded and represent themes that helped fuel Jorg Haider's rise to power in Austria. As the _New York Times_ notes, "With Haiderism thriving in neighboring Austria, the ground has become fertile in Germany for a nationalist and right-wing intellectual awaking. It is fed by weariness, even anger, at what is seen as Germany's eternal victimization for the Holocaust, and irritation at the multi- cultural message from a Red-Green government[6]."
In any case, Nolte and other members of the German right question the "intellectual tyranny" of the left and demand it recognize rational motivations for the "gray areas" of the Holocaust. Nolte's critics, however, feel he and his followers advocate a dangerous and politically motivated historical revisionism.
William Osborne 100260.243 at compuserve.com (You may forward this post. Please include the endnotes.)
[1] For a full report on the award to Nolte and the controversy surrounding it see Roger Cohen, "Hitler Apologist Wins German Honor, and a Storm Breaks Out" _The New York Times_ (June 21, 2000.) A copy is available on the web at <http://www.osborne-conant.org/nolte.htm> [2] ibid. [3] Benjamin B. Weber, "Shades of Revisionism: Holocaust Denial and the Conservative Call to Reinterpret German History" _History Review_ (vol. 6, December 1994.) The journal is published by the University of Vermont. The article is available on the web at <http://www.uvm.edu/~hag/histreview/vol6/weber.html> [4] ibid. [5] Ralph Raico, "Nazifying the Germans," July10, 2000 <http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/raico1.html> [6] Roger Cohen, "Hitler Apologist Wins German Honor, and a Storm Breaks Out" _The New York Times_ (June 21, 2000.)
-- Michael Pugliese