In an interview with the British correspondent, Vernon Bartlett, Chancellor Hitler said with regard to the boycott of German goods abroad that the last thing he wanted was that Germany should be isolated, but he declared that no difficulties in the way of German exports would break the German spirit. He explained that Germany had lived on substitutes during the war and, if necessary, would do so again, with still greater success. He said that Germany would be able to make artificial cotton, that oil from coal would be used as a substitute for petrol.
In answer to the correspondent’s question whether Nazism would swing to the Right or to the Left, Hitler answered that it would go straight ahead and that those who did not understand it or failed it would be ruthlessly suppressed.
Then he banged the table with his fist and declared:
“At the risk of appearing to talk nonsense, I will tell you that this movement will go on for a thousand years. They follow me wherever I go and will continue to do so.”
Hitler has become a past master in the art of imposing substitutes on the German people. His Nazism itself is Ersatz Fascism. He himself is a psychopathic substitute for Mussolini. He has been substituting falsehood for truth, bigotry for tolerance, cruelty for justice, hate for love, war-madness for peace, suicidal isolation for friendly cooperation, propaganda for education, Hitler psalms for David’s psalms, paganism for Christianity—barbarism for civilization.
His threats that Germany will be compelled by him to resist world public opinion by living on Nazi substitutes for a thousand years are the unmistakable symptoms of desperation and insanity.
The eyes of the German people are opening. They are beginning to see the horror and the folly of the mad adventure into which they have been drawn.
Hitler is boasting that Nazism will go on for a thousand years. Only a maniac can make such a boast. It would be less nonsensical if he said that he would be remembered a thousand years hence. Even though for a brief period, he did succeed in transforming a nation once proud of its culture into blind followers of an unbalanced bigot and demagogue who attempted to destroy the achievements of civilization.
Hitler will be remembered as Herostratus. Hitler will be remembered as Haman.
HONORING FULD’S MEMORY
The formal dedication of the Felix Fuld Camps for Boys and
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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.
