The Nazi campaign to Hitlorize Europe was begged down badly in one of its most-desired territories, Scandinavia, Joachim Joeston, veteran Danish correspondent of European newspapers, reported in an article in the July issue of Foreign Affairs, published today.
The irony of the failure of Nazi movements to take root in Norway, Sweden and Denmark, Mr. Joesten noted, lies in the fact that the Nazis themselves had pointed to Scandinavia as the cradle of the Nordic race, whose populations represent the purest of the strain.
But, Mr. Joesten said, the Scandinavians are “pacifists to the core” and peace, freedom, progress and democracy are their watchwords.
As a result, he said, Scandinavian Nazi parties either died quickly or “led a sickly existence, almost entirely dependent on Reich subsidies,” torn by feuds and discredited by financial scandals.
“Jew-baiting,” he said, “was doomed to failure in countries where the Israelite population averaged one per thousand, and it did far more harm to its initiators than to its victims.”
“It can now be said with certainty,” Mr. Joesten added, “that all the Scandinavian Nazi parties have proved hopelessly inefficient and that they are quite unable to make any serious bid for power. Except for occasional terroristic acts such as mauling lone Jews and occasional kidnaping of Communists, the daubing of public monuments and statues with Nazi symbols and the methodical disturbance of anti-Nazi lectures and demonstrations, they have never done anything spectacular.
“They failed invariably at all elections and never got as much as a single representative in any Scandinavian parliament.”
More serious, Mr. Joesten said, were the activities of German Nazi organizations operating, partly undercover, among German citizens in Scandinavia. These organizations were held particularly trouble-some to Denmark, because of its position near Germany.
Nevertheless, Mr. Joesten said, “Scandinavia responded to the challenge of Hitlerism by voting Labor every year more massively.”
“Thanks to Horr Hitler,” he said, “Labor now stands as the dominating factor in all the four Nordic countries, including Finland.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
