Hitler and his God

Front Soldiers

No historical context gives a more telling idea of the Jewish dilemma than the extreme situation created by the outbreak of the First World War. The anti-Jewish feeling followed the culminating curve of frantic German nationalism. It was nevertheless at this time that the Jews as a community gave irrefutable proof of their love for Germany to the point of sacrificing their lives for the country. In the midst of all arguments for and against them, and in view of all they had and will have to suffer, their contribution to the First World War remains a monument to what could have been, if the irrational and egocentric attitude of the Germans as a Volk had not been whipped up and given free rein by their Führer.

“When World War I began, the Jews expressed their sense of German nationalism by swarming into the army with an ardour as lemming-like as that of the gentiles. Some 100 000 Jews (one out of every six, including the women and children) entered the German Army. Of these, 80 000 served in frontline trenches, 35 000 were decorated for bravery, and 12 000 were killed. ‘The Jews were pathologically patriotic’, says Rabbi Prinz. ‘My father served in the war, and my grandfather was wounded in 1866, in the war against the Austrians. He was enormously proud of that’ … The Jewish population in Germany was only one half of one percent. The Jewish deaths in the war were three percent’.” 612

In spite of this, the contribution of the Jews to the German national effort was not appreciated; on the contrary, suspicion against them increased. “Because they fought on all sides and yet were still considered one people, the Jews were in the greatest danger. Allied publicists accused them of betraying their liberal principles to fight for autocracy; German publicists accused them of secretly favouring the Allies because they were liberals. In fact, Jewish communities supported the war efforts of their separate nations … German Jews hoped their sacrifice in war would convince all of their patriotism, and indeed, in the name of national unity, German anti-Semitism was muted at first”, writes John Weiss.

However: “Soon German racism surpassed even pre-war intensity, encouraged by the German army. When Jews were accused of slacking, the general staff requested the Ministry of War to conduct a count of Jews at the front. The results were never made public, for they showed that the proportion of Jews who fell in battle was the same as in the German urban population and only slightly less than the population in general; peasants suffered the most. Adjusted to reflect the numbers of those with educational and professional skills needed for tasks behind the lines, there were more Jewish casualties than should have been expected. And almost half the German Jews who served were decorated. In an army famous for treating Jewish soldiers with contempt, the medals must have been doubly earned. Anti-Semitism was so strong at the front that German Jewish officers were often amazed when their orders were obeyed.” 613 (The officer who recommended Corporal Hitler for the Iron Cross 1st Class was Jewish.)

The Marburg professor of philosophy Hermann Cohen wrote in 1916: “As Germans we want to be Jews, and as Jews Germans”, and he thought he saw how in the perspective of history Germans and Jews would fuse into unity. “It was from this angle”, writes Dietrich Bronder, “that the Jews as German soldiers have affirmed themselves on all occasions, even in Hitler’s armies, and that they were second to none of their non-Jewish comrades, even when they were grossly offended as in a slanderous pamphlet distributed in the streets of Berlin in 1919 and which said: ‘They stare you in the face everywhere, but in the trenches nowhere!’”

“When in the First World War an anti-Semitic newspaper printed a provocation, promising an award of 1000 marks to whomever could name a Jewish mother with three sons who had been in the trenches, if only for three weeks, Rabbi Freund-Hannover named twenty mothers of his community alone who fulfilled the condition, and he could name families with seven or eight sons at the front”, writes Dietrich Bronder. Then he mentions the participation of the Jews in past German wars, and the high honours awarded to them. In World War I, 35 000 Jews were decorated, of whom 1000 with the Iron Cross 1st Class and 17 000 with the Iron Cross 2nd Class; 23 000 were promoted, 2000 to the rank of officer. 10 000 Jews entered the army as volunteers. The “National Association of Jewish Front Soldiers”, founded in 1919, counted 35 000 members. “In October 1933, when Hitler already had gathered all power in his hands, they still wanted ‘in true military discipline to stand with their German fatherland to the last’, but were dissolved in 1939. In 1941 Jews were forbidden to wear their war medals. From 1942 onwards no exceptions were made any more for former participants in the First World War – they too were sent to Theresienstadt and Auschwitz.” 614