Chapter One

Nazi Race-science

Hans Günther; 1931 and 1967

ERNST JÜNGER, the German conservative writer, when discussing how the Nazi Party was able to command a mass following, commented that "the spiritual preparation" for Nazism was "carried out by countless scientific works".⁽⁵⁾ Certainly it is true that many scientists and academics in Germany welcomed Hitler's rise to power. Declarations of support from professors and intellectuals were made even before Hitler assumed the Chancellorship.⁽⁶⁾ In common with their colleagues from other academic disciplines, psychologists were vocal in their support for Nazism.⁽⁷⁾

However, the full force of Jünger's comments does not lie in the fact that large numbers of academics gave their blessing to the new regime, or at best failed to oppose it. Jünger's comment is stronger, implying that the very success of the Nazi movement could be attributed in some part to the activities of German science.

Above all, this can be seen in relation to the central concept of Nazi dogma -- the concept of 'race'. It has been pointed out that Hitler's ideas of race were derived from biological concepts of race which dominated German biology in the early part of the twentieth century.⁽⁸⁾ Many of the ideas to be found in Mein Kampf were commonplace in academic circles. Norman Cohn, discussing the Nazi 'völkisch-racist' outlook in his book Warrant for Genocide, puts the issues clearly: "Irrational, unscientific and demonstrably nonsensical as this outlook was, it was nevertheless the speciality of the educated -- or rather those with a university degree".⁽⁹⁾

The German cultural climate of the 1930s favoured racist assumptions as 'respectable' scientists (principally geneticists, biologists, physical anthropologists and psychologists) contributed to the growth of Rassenkunde (literally 'Race-science'). A firm distinction between the 'respectable' scientists, investigating race often by up-to-date empirical means, and the politically racist theories of the Nazis cannot be drawn.⁽¹⁰⁾ Both fed on the other: race-science became highly politicised both in itself and in the uses which Nazi propaganda made of it. Above all, race-science, as formulated by some of the most eminent scientists in Germany at that time, made it respectable for intelligent people to believe that the fundamental differences between humans were racial.

The unholy union between science and Nazism can be illustrated by the career of one of the most notorious and extreme of the race scientists, Hans F.K. Günther. A prolific writer on a number of subjects, Günther's work revolved around the central theme of the superiority of the Aryan, or Nordic, race. Like other race-scientists, Günther believed that an understanding of 'race' provided the key to understanding history, anthropology, psychology and all other academic disciplines, which take 'man' as their subject matter.⁽¹¹⁾

A recent study has suggested that "if any one book could be said to be the Bible of the Nordic school it would be Günther's Rassenkunde des deutschen Volkes, which was published in 1922 and rapidly gained an immense readership".⁽¹²⁾ In this work, as in his other widely read books like The Racial Elements of European History, Günther outlined his theories about the worth of Nordic racial purity and the perils of Jewish contamination: "The influence of the Jewish spirit, and influence won through economic preponderance, brings with it the very greatest danger for the life of the European peoples and the North American peoples alike".⁽¹³⁾

As well as having a wide popular audience, Günther rose high in academic circles. He was elected to a full professorship at the University of Jena in 1930, and later moved to the University of Berlin. His works were praised by the Rector of Berlin University, Eugen Fischer, an eminent and 'respectable' race-scientist with a world wide reputation, who nevertheless expressed support for Hitler in the earliest days of the Nazi regime.⁽¹⁴⁾

Günther was the deputy editor of an academic journal published in Stuttgart between 1935, two years after Hitler came to power, and 1944. Zeitschrift für Rassenkunde, as its title suggests, specialised in scientific studies of race. Many distinguished German physical anthropologists contributed to the journal and so did a number of foreign academics. Most contributions to Zeitschrift für Rassenkunde were of a technical nature, looking at racial differences using scientific procedures. At the same time Zeitschrift für Rassenkunde regularly reviewed books of an explicitly pro-Nazi stance.⁽¹⁵⁾

Günther himself also used to contribute to Nazi magazines, (for example Neues Volk, published by the Nazi Party's 'Racial Politics Department' and edited by Walter Gross, who like Günther was a professor at Berlin University and a fanatical anti-semite). His work was much admired by leading Nazi politicians, like Alfred Rosenberg, head of Hitler's Foreign Political Office and later Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Regions.

Zeitschrift für Rassenkunde

In February 1941, Rosenberg formally honoured Günther presenting him with the 'Goethe Medal'. Rosenberg told Günther: "Your work has been of the utmost importance for the safeguarding and development of the National Socialist Weltanschauung" (reported in the Nazi newspaper Völkischer Beobachter, Feb. 16, 1941).

Günther, together with Eugen Fischer, was a guest of honour at the inaugural conference arranged for Rosenberg's creation, the Frankfurt Institute for Research into the Jewish Question, in March 1941. The proceedings of the conference were uniformly anti-semitic. Günther's colleague at the University of Berlin, Walter Gross, set the tone in his address entitled 'The Racial-Political Premises of Solving the Jewish Question'. His 'solution' was in keeping with the mood of the Führer:

We look upon Jewry as quite a realistic phenomenon which was exceptionally clever in matters of earthly life but which likewise is subject to historical death. And as far as the historical phenomenon of the Jew in Europe is concerned, we believe that this hour of death has come irrevocably.⁽¹⁶⁾

'Pre-war Nordicist publications of Günther'

Rosenberg invited Günther to the International Anti-Jewish Congress in 1944, which was due to be attended by Nazi top brass such as von Ribbentrop and Goebbels. Owing to the war situation, the Congress was cancelled at the last moment and Günther was unable to deliver his paper 'The invasion of the Jews into the cultural life of the nations'.

After the war Günther was stripped of his university posts, in common with a number of the most notorious of the racial theorists. However, he continued writing and expounding his racist views until his death in 1967.

Günther's post-war writings have never achieved anything remotely like the readership of his earlier works. Hoping to escape from his reputation as a Nazi, Günther even adopted the pseudonyms of Heinrich Ackerman and Ludwig Winter.⁽¹⁷⁾

Although Günther's works ceased to attract widespread attention after the war, his theories continued to be circulated amongst small groups of post-war Nazis. The intellectual traditions of Günther and his fellow Nordicists may have been displaced from major German universities, but they did not come to an abrupt end. Instead, they were celebrated by obscure Nazi organisations like The Northern League.

The Northern League was established in 1958 by a British anthropologist, Roger Pearson, in order to foster "the interests, friendship and solidarity of all Teutonic nations".⁽¹⁸⁾ It was intended to be a rallying ground for Nazi intellectuals in the inhospitable post-war climate. Not surprisingly Günther was one of the founder members.

An American journalist, surveying the post-war extreme Right, commented that almost all European Nazi groups are connected in some way or another with the Northern League.⁽¹⁹⁾ Some like the German neo-Nazi group Deutsches Kulterwerk Europäischen Geistes are very closely connected. The Northern League's magazine The Northlander confirms both its international and its Nazi complexion. For instance the magazine (published in English from Amsterdam) regularly recommends its readers American pro-Nazi publications, such as White Power and Christian Vanguard, as well as publications from the openly Nazi group British Movement, based in Cheshire, England. Articles from German neo-Nazi papers, such as Nordische Zeitung, are also frequently reproduced. As The Northlander, Oct/Dec. 1971 proclaimed, the Northern League stands for "the preservation of the identity and values of the North, so that our nations can have in the future also White, Blond and Blue-eyed children."⁽²⁰⁾

It would be comforting to think that the process of denazification has been so successful that the once widespread race-science is now confined to the obscurities of the Northern League.⁽²¹⁾. Unfortunately, however, this is not the case and Günther's heirs have been given an uplift by a new development with Rassenkunde.

To chapter #2