How Can the Germans Be Cured?
Man has always been ill and always will be. In the life of individuals and nations, to be cured means: to become a little less ill. The general ill which afflicts humanity is today more visible than at any other time. But, even in the great hospital of the present some patients suffer from more serious diseases than others. And although many and important things concerning all the patients can be said towards the solution of this problem, it is true, nevertheless, that this problem, the problem of a certain cure, is to be considered and answered in different ways, according to each individual case. Among all the others, the German people seem to be the most seriously ill. It is therefore pertinent to ask oneself: how can the Germans be curedthat is, become a little bit less ill? Out of the many things which can be said, I shall choose only those of the utmost importance.
If confronted with this question one year ago, my first reaction would have been: all the Germans need for their political, moral and spiritual cureon which everything dependsis the realization that their Watch on the Rhine has failed; the realization that their armies have been defeated on the battle-field, not only by the Russians, but, at last, also by the Western democracies whose military strength they so terribly despised. Above all, the collapse of their belief in their superior and unsurpassed military mightso dangerous for others and themselvesshould be brought home to them once and for all. In my opinion, this obviously primary condition is fundamental. As long as the Germans are not deprived of their confidence in their military power by completely and ostentatiously taking it away from them, just as matches and knife are completely and ostentatiously taken away from a naughty child, there can be no question of German cure. For they suffered from this very military power and their confidence in it, for centuries, more than any other nation. But this conditionI am writing this on April 8, 1945is about to be fulfilled and therefore does not necessitate any further emphasis.
A second necessity, which constantly gains in importance, is the following: Today, as larger and larger German territories fall under British, American and French control, all will depend on the way in which the victorsowing to the Russian enigma, I refer only to the Western victorswill exercise their authority in Germany, so that the conduct of their armies, their civil servants and judiciary officials ; the steps taken for the maintenance of order and progressive reestablishment of communications, administration, schools and churches, social and cultural organizations will constitute a practical lesson of that which is understood outside of Germany and especially in the West, under the names democracy, freedom, loyalty, humane conduct, wisdom, fair play, savoir vivre and as human justice and strength. The fact that the great majority of Germans have knownas far back as they can thinkall these only in the form of clumsy German imitation or in the hostile distortion of German propaganda. The moment has come for them to see these things on the impressive background of the military victory of the nations standing for these ideas and to try these things in Germany. Neither the annihilation of the Nazi system and Prussian militarism nor any well-meaning theoretical counter-propaganda could help the Germans and do away with the German danger if the Allied regimes as such, the Allied governing and administrative skill; and if the foreign nations cannot prove beyond doubt that there was and is outside of Germany something better than the politics, the methods, the way of life, the way of thinking and speaking which they considered until now the only possible and healthy ones. The Allies must succeed in the very things in which the Germans never and nowhere succeeded in the territories they occupied. After crushing the Germans, the Allies must succeed in convincing them that the Allied cause is a good one, to make them willing and eager and to stimulate them to proceed on a new path for themselves. Show them how gentlemen behave when they are in power! The Germans, or at least a majority of the people, are now ready to look for something betterthere is no doubt about it, and, for the time being, such a thing can be shown to them only by the victorious foreigners and not by other Germans. But they have to see it at work. I do not know how they can be cured, if the Allies miss this unique opportunity of teaching them this practical lesson.
The third responsibility of the Allies is the following: In the organization of the administration of occupied German territories, the Germans should be made to share responsibility of maintaining order in their public life, as soon as possible. The Germans are used to being ruled in this or in that way, from a central point within a hierarchy and to obey any word or command coming from no matter how far. This is one of the traits because of which they suffered for centuries and which became deadly 12 years agoand from which they must now be freed, whatever the price. Each of them must now learn to think for himself, of community and state in terms of his own political task and duty, instead of waiting for the command of a third person. The fact that individual responsibility for political situations is alien to them explains why it is so difficult to make them understand that they cannot simply be cleared of all charges brought against the Nazi system and all its consequences, but that they must be held responsible for all that has been done to them and to the rest of Europe. The education leading to such an admission can also be achieved only by direct practical teaching; they must be led at last, to take their public affairs soberly into their own hands and shape their future themselves in a common effort, so that all may be made to answer for the result of their enterprise.
There is really no hurry for the election of a German Parliament, nor for the establishment of a Central Government. It does not even matter much whether there will be, in the future, a unified German State, or whether the various states will be given again a relative independence. And it really does not matter much either to what extent German populations and territories will belong, in the future, to other, non-German countries. The idea of national unity within a state came on earth in the 19th century, from Hell rather than Heaven; it does not seem, anyhow, to have suited the Germans at all. The condition sine qua non for the German cure is that the German people, whether under their own sovereignity, or otherwise, be given political freedom; that is, the possibility of learning to be responsible for their own thinking and acting, as it can be done in the small and smallest circles, those small and smallest circles where it is practiced and learned with the best of results. The Allies should impose this task upon the Germans as soon as possible. And I emphasize the word impose. According to their old tradition, the Germans expect to be crushed under the heel of their new masters. And this will have to be so, as long as the reality and danger of National Socialism is not completely wiped out. The most powerful oppression to be inflicted upon the German people would be the one they least expect. It should consist in their being compelled to freedom, in their being called upon to advise and help themselves and to decide upon the men and women most worthy of their confidence and the new forms and essence of their political, social, economic, cultural and church life, in their local and central government, within the framework of legality and on behalf of the occupation forces. They should be given the compelling opportunity of shaping future history as their own history, instead of waiting to be driven by and for some collective power, instead of being carried along by mere chance or of being led anywhere by tradition or by the whims of a ruling class. They should be given the opportunity of becoming citizens, after having been officers or soldiers for so long! But this opportunity should be given to them in a way that would make its refusal impossible! And it should be given to them soon! Everything else can wait or be taken care of in some other way. The conversion to freedom, however, should not suffer any delay! The unliberated German will always be the diseased, the dangerous German. All depends on the Allies recognizing the urgency of this matter.
