Origins: The Reich (13 page)

“So what happened
next,” Mark asked of Hastelloy to pass the time on the flight to Washington, D.C.  “How did Tomal, Hitler and their Nazi party get around the obstacle that President von Hindenburg posed to their plans?  Did they poison him, or just use a revolver like the common thugs that they were?”

“You of all people should know that eliminating a high profile target is never that simple.  No, I’m afraid Tomal employed a far more elegant and effective means to not only sidestep von Hindenburg, but actually use the German President as a tool for his own benefit,” Hastelloy answered.

**********

Tomal stood at the speaker’s podium with hands clasped behind his back.  Down on the playing field before him stood a sea of youngsters wearing their finest brown uniforms and proudly displaying their red armband and swastika.  Seated behind this class of three thousand ten-year olds in the stadium stands were their parents and siblings, all glowing with pride and excitement as they watched their pride and joy take the Hitler Youth oath and pledge.

First though, the boys and their families needed to hear Tomal’s words of inspiration.  “Our new Germany begins with the young. We older ones are used up.  We are rotten to the marrow by bearing the burden of a humiliating past, and have in our blood the dull recollection of serfdom and servility. But my magnificent youngsters; what material! Look at these young men!  Are there any finer ones in the world?  With you, the Führer can make a new world.”

“When an opponent declares to me, ‘I will not come over to your side’, I say calmly, ‘Your child belongs to us already. What are you? You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing but this new community’.  It is a community that begins with our youth; these young men.”

“What pledge do you take this day?” Tomal prompted and received an immediate response from the Brownshirts in unison.

“I promise to do my duty in love and loyalty to the Führer and our flag.”

“What oath do you take this day?”

“In the presence of this blood banner which represents our Führer, I swear to devote all my energies and my strength to the savior of our country, Adolf Hitler. I am willing and ready to give up my life for him, so help me God.”

In response, Tomal brought his heels together, straightened his spine and raised his right arm up high.  His open palm faced the boys below with a knifelike gesture as he declared, “I salute you, you youth of Germany; our future!”

Applause and happy cheers ensued as the boys and their parents merged on the field in celebration.  Without drawing further notice from the crowd, Tomal stepped away from the podium.  He proceeded down the stage steps to climb into his waiting car and had the driver cart him away without any further pomp and circumstance.  He was content to allow the youths and family members to have their moment because he knew all the rest of their days would belong to him and the will of Adolf Hitler.

The process began innocently enough: weekly meetings, team sporting events, family camping trips.  Amid all that distraction and fun though, Tomal’s finely tuned indoctrination curriculum was hard at work to bring their bodies and minds over to his cause: wholly and completely.

They all started the same.  The boys thought ‘I’ll go along with it for a while.  I can walk away at any moment’.  All the while never thinking about where they were heading or how far they were willing to go.

No one, no matter how simple, would ever turn on their friends or neighbors on day one.  After weeks and months of conditioning though, when their entire social structure and vision of self-worth centered on the program, they would turn in their own parents if they suspected them of disloyalty to the Führer.  It was more or less a certainty.

Tomal pulled himself out of his mind’s reverie when he felt the car come to a stop.  “We’re here,” the driver announced and immediately scrambled out of his seat to open Tomal’s door for him.

“Keep the engine running, I won’t be long,” Tomal ordered on his way out of the car carrying a heavy briefcase with him.  He then walked toward the entrance of a seedy and run down looking bar. 

He opened the front door and stepped into a dimly lit room with a row of wooden booths along the near wall and a long bar with a dozen empty barstools on the opposite side.  The only feature of note to the establishment was a red flag hanging behind the bar with a yellow hammer and sickle in the upper left corner, below a yellow star.

Tomal caught the bartender’s attention and asked, “van der Lubbe?”

The squatty individual had his hands full cleaning a beer mug, but gestured to the far corner with his head.  Following the gesture, Tomal spotted a chubby man in his early twenties in a corner booth wearing a dark blue worker’s coat and a Russian style peasant cap on his head.

Tomal moved that direction and greeted him with arms outstretched to offer a hug.  “Comrade, it is good to see you again.”

“Don’t speak that word, it means nothing to you,” the young man spoke into his beer, not bothering to get up and meet Tomal’s greeting.

“Oh come now, why the long face, Marinus?  Today all your troubles come to an end,” Tomal asked as he took a seat directly across from his companion.

“At what cost?  My honor? My life?”

“Both actually,” Tomal said with a casual shrug, “but what life are you giving up really?  You can barely see now because of that factory accident. You’re hopelessly in debt from the medical bills.  You can’t find work because of your eyes and your criminal record of arson. Your sister kicked you out of her home, and you haven’t spoken to your brother in years.  The only opportunity available to you now is cashing in on that criminal record of yours.  It will end your misery and set your remaining family up financially for life.  There is no more glorious and noble end for a man than that.”

“What about my cause?  This will end the communist party in Germany for sure.”

“True, this is Germany after all.  The Führer is not going anywhere no matter what you do.  You communists will always have Russia though, and this will do nothing to harm Mother Russia, will it?”

“I suppose not,” Marinus conceded, prompting Tomal to reach for his briefcase and set it on the table.  He opened the lid and turned it to face Marinus for him to view the contents, and the sight almost took his breath away.  “That is more money than I have ever seen in my life.”

“Half to your sister and half to your brother upon completion of the task,” Tomal said closing the lid and locking the contents away once more.  “Remember, make it obvious that it was arson.  Make the fire big and, above all else, you are to be caught and confess to the crime as a card-carrying member and leader among the communist party in Germany.  Do all that for me and I will enrich your kin and make sure your execution is swift and painless.”

Marinus threw back the remaining half of his beer, slammed the mug down on the table and offered Tomal a handshake, “Why not, Comrade?”

Later that night, while Tomal entertained Adolf Hitler as a dinner guest at his apartment in Berlin, he got the call.  A little after nine o’clock in the evening the phone rang, and the voice on the other end stated that the Reichstag, Germany’s parliament building, had been set ablaze.  He also received information that the arsonist was captured and that the man declared himself to be a loyal patriot of the communist movement. 

Tomal slammed the phone receiver down and exclaimed, “We’ve got them now.  By God we’ve got them now!”

“It’s done?” Hitler excitedly asked.  “Everything as we planned?”

“Everything,” Tomal confirmed.  “Come, we need to go there and be seen and heard by the papers.”

Tomal and Hitler arrived at the scene in time to see the last of the flames extinguished by the fire department.  The two stepped into the damaged building along with Hermann Göring, the head of their Gestapo secret police force.  Inside, they found the legislative building completely gutted by the fire.

Rudolf Diels, head of the Political Police, followed by a gaggle of newspaper reporters and photographers soon joined them.  Hitler, amid that group, lost his temper as Tomal had never seen him do before.

“This is the work of the Communists.  This act of incendiarism is the most monstrous act of terrorism carried out by Bolshevism in Germany. It is the start of their insurrection and not a moment can be lost,” Hitler bellowed, with his hair tossed about by the violent chopping gestures made by his arms. “Put the SA on alert to maintain order in the face of this rebellion.  They will show no mercy to those responsible.  I want every communist official shot wherever found, and I want it handled this very night.  Make arrest upon arrest and thoroughly root out the Red pest.”

At first Tomal was alarmed that Hitler had overplayed his part.  For a brief moment he thought calling for the mass murder of the communists without a shred of real evidence in front of the media would undo all their hard work.  As he looked upon the faces of the press amid the scorched wreckage of the Reichstag, he knew all was well.  Rather than seeing faces of shock and outrage at Hitler’s diatribe among the reporters, he saw nods of approval and gratitude.  They, a people once considered safe and untouchable, had been attacked and were afraid.  They wanted action, any action no matter how irrational or deplorable, to make them feel safe again.  Hitler proposed to give them that, and they loved him for it.

In the morning
immediately following the Reichstag fire, Tomal stood with Adolf Hitler and Hermann Göring in President Hindenburg’s office.  The eighty-five year old goat sat behind his desk fighting back a coughing fit as Hitler dictated to him the virtues of signing the Reichstag Fire Decree that now sat upon his desk waiting to become law.

“This decree will temporarily impose a state of martial law and allow us to flesh out this attempted uprising,” Hitler explained, but fell into a respectful silence when Hindenburg raised his hand in objection.

In that moment, Tomal admired Adolf all the more for his level of restraint.  President Hindenburg was Hitler’s only superior in government and he detested the man for it.  Yet the President’s profound popularity with the people, and more importantly the army, required Hitler to never give offense.  Hitler went out of his way to show the utmost respect and reverence for the President, both in private and especially in public appearances together. 

Away from the aging goat and behind closed doors though, Tomal had heard Hitler state on many occasion that the old reactionary needed to hurry up and die as soon as possible.  So long as the man lived and held office, he stood as an immovable object that the Nazis had to work around.  This Reichstag Fire Decree was a pivotal component to their efforts in that regard.  Hindenburg needed to sign it into law, but he would not if Hitler gave even the slightest offense or hint at anything less than patriotic intentions.

“This decree will rescind most German civil liberties: the rights of assembly, freedom of the press, the right to refuse unlawful search and seizure,” the aging president protested.  “It will allow the police to detain people indefinitely without charges or court order.”

“Yes it will,” Hitler responded with his hands clasped behind his back in a show of respect.  “We are under attack from within.  They have already burned our government building to the ground, and I shudder to think what else they plan to carry out in the coming hours and days.  We do not have the luxury of time for lengthy investigations.  We must cast our net wide to catch anyone we even think may be part of this and get them behind bars.”

Hindenburg looked poised to protest further, but Hitler quickly added, “The decree allows for quick arrests, but it does not provide for summary execution or any measure so drastic.  Once we have locked the danger away, the decree will expire.  Then we will have all the time we need to sort out who is innocent of this plot, and who is not.”

“For now, in this moment of peril, sir, we need to contain this communist threat behind lock and key.  This decree allows us to do precisely that.  Now for the love of God and country, please sign it,” Hitler concluded, falling silent for the old man to make his decision.

President Hindenburg let out a pair of coughs from his cancer-infested lungs while he considered his actions.  At long last, the man picked up a pen, scribbled his name upon the Reichstag Fire Decree and handed the pages back to Hitler.

Tomal had an overwhelming compulsion to turn a cartwheel at that moment, but instead he fell into step behind Hitler and Göring to exit the room without another word spoken.  Hindenburg had just given the Nazis a legal basis to imprison anyone considered an opponent of the party, and they were now free to suppress publications not friendly to their cause.

“Get to work,” Hitler commanded of Tomal as they walked down the long, narrow hallway painted pure white towards a dark, perhaps even black door at the end.

**********

Hanz Burning walked toward his office in the Social Democrats main office in Berlin.  As an elected member of the Reichstag, he was one of the first to learn of the Reichstag Fire Decree.  He grappled with conflicted emotions about the measure.  On the one hand, he felt it was necessary to discover the extent of the terrorist plot and apprehend those responsible.  As a German citizen, it made him feel safer. 

On the other hand, he had a sinking feeling that Hitler and his goon squad dressed in Brownshirts and red arm bands might use this as an opportunity to settle some old scores.  As a prominent member of the Social Democrats, a party that opposed everything that the Nazis stood for, it made him feel exceedingly vulnerable.

“Do I have any mail?” Hanz asked of his secretary positioned outside his second-story office.

“No, sir.  It’s pretty much business as usual today.  They have started the print run of tomorrow’s paper with your article concerning last night’s fire,” she reported.  “The editor decided to keep in that paragraph suggesting the Nazis may have staged the events rather than the Communists.”

Hanz’s eyes widened with surprise.  “I was certain that section would be stripped out since it had no source except my own personal conjecture.  It needed to be said though.”

She simply nodded and went back to her typing as Hanz stepped through the door into his office and began the process of removing his heavy winter coat and hat.

The moment Hanz placed his hat atop the coat rack positioned behind his office door, he heard a colossal crash downstairs followed immediately by shouts and screams.  A loud snap from behind him caused Hanz to turn toward his office window that faced the street.  After a puzzling moment, he saw a fist-sized stone smash against the glass.  It hit without breaking the pane, but all the same, he felt a wave of fear shatter his sense of security.

Without regard for the hurling stones, Hanz stepped to the window and saw dozens of Brownshirts entering the building.  He ran to the door and poked his head out into the hallway in time to hear heavy boots on the stairs precede the appearance of a well-built man with five of his friends close behind at the top of the steps.

Their eyes and faces were red with rage, and Hanz had no clue what these men were capable of doing.  His secretary began screaming at the top of her lungs for help, which drew the leader of the group’s attention.  He pounded his way to stand towering over her desk, but then he paused.  It was as if a moment of moral conflict had gripped him until one of his friends arrived.  Then he seemed to screw up his nerve once more.  He picked up her typewriter, elbowed his way past Hanz into his office, and tossed the piece of machinery through the window.

“Have you lost your mind?” Hanz shouted and moved to assault the brawny young man but he received a shove from behind by the Brownshirt’s accomplice.

It was all Hanz could do to keep from tumbling out the broken window before catching himself.  His frantic gaze fell upon the street below, where a small crowd was gathering.  Among the commotion, two policemen stood chatting among the onlookers.  “Help!  Help, police,” Hanz shouted. 

The two looked up, saw Hanz hanging halfway out the broken window and just laughed.  Now he was beyond enraged, which pushed any fears and thoughts of self-preservation out of the way.  He levered himself back into the office to deliver a punch squarely on the nose of the closest Brownshirt.  He grabbed the dazed man underneath his armpits and tossed him out the window just as the brute had done to his secretary’s typewriter.

The remaining Brownshirt in the room took a swing that glanced off Hanz’s jaw, which he did not feel amid his adrenaline-fueled rage.  Hanz delivered a crushing blow to the man’s face with his elbow and placed him into a full nelson hold.

Hanz proceeded to walk them both into the hallway where he saw Brownshirts going in and out of offices with impunity.  He marched his captive down the steps and into the street. No one tried to stop him, though a few did fall in line to follow them outside.  Hanz approached the two police officers amid the following Brownshirts chanting, “Smash the Commie rag.”

The officers may have been able to disregard him from a distance, but up close like this with a crowd watching, they would have to act.  “Arrest this man and the others.  They are vandalizing an office of the Liberal Democrats.  We have nothing to do with the Communists or the investigation into the fire last night.”

“Release him please,” said the older of the two officers, and reluctantly Hanz complied.

“Now, what is your name?” the other officer asked.

“Hanz Burning.  I am an elected Reichstag representative and member of the Liberal Democratic Party.”

“Hanz Burning, I am placing you under arrest for interfering with a police investigation,” the older officer declared.

“What?  Don’t be ridiculous.  They’re destroying our office.”

In response, the policeman simply nodded to the Brownshirts standing behind.  “Take him to the station house.”

Hanz resisted at first, but then changed his mind given the futility of his situation.  “This is all illegal.  Every detail of this incident will appear in the next edition of our paper.”

The Brownshirts just laughed as they hauled him away.  “Actually this is all perfectly legal.  As for your commie rag of a paper, there will never be another edition.”

Hanz only spent a few hours behind bars before verification of his status as a Reichstag parliamentary member came through.  He was one of the lucky ones.  Over the course of the next few weeks, nearly four thousand suspected communists found themselves shipped to holding/labor camps without trial amid the ridiculous show trial of Marinus van der Lubbe for his crime of burning the Reichstag building.

The Nazis rode the wave of national gratitude for their swift actions in the crisis to huge electoral gains in the following election.  They commanded fifty-two percent of the votes and Hitler was so confident in his newfound majority that he now proposed his Enabling Act.

It was a preposterous piece of legislation that gave the Chancellor, namely Adolf Hitler, the power to pass laws by decree.  It effectively bypassed both the Reichstag and President Hindenburg himself to give Hitler complete authority over the country. 

These ‘special powers’ were to remain in effect for only four years, but who did they think they were fooling?  The Nazis and their Brownshirts would do their damage and solidify their hold long before that timeframe ran out.

The only saving grace for Hanz was the fact that this Enabling Act was an amendment to the constitution and required a two-thirds majority vote.  This fact allowed him to walk up to the Kroll Opera House with confidence that the measure would be defeated.

Since the fire rendered the Reichstag building unusable, this beautiful building situated on the other side of Königsplatz, opposite the charred Reichstag served as a temporary house of German parliament.  A sense of alarm ran up Hanz’s spine when he saw that every entrance was barred by Brownshirts.  They admitted those in Nazi uniforms without question, but everyone else had to produce credentials.

A tiny boy not even a quarter Hanz’s age looked him up and down with nothing but contempt in his eyes.  Much to the child’s displeasure, the credentials checked out and Hanz received permission to pass.  After gaining entrance, he looked back at his fellow members of parliament still suffering harassment while being ordered about by the Nazi goon squad.  In his fellow representative’s eyes, he saw far more fear than anger; this was blatant, yet extremely effective intimidation.

Hanz walked up to one of his fellow Social Democrats, and they both looked on in dismay.  Hanz asked, “Is this how Hitler plans to pass his legislation, by preventing us from entering the chamber to vote?”

“They can’t exclude everybody who will vote against the measure.  Hitler needs at least 647 voting members present or else the quorum count will not have been met and there cannot be a binding vote,” his companion commented. 

Hanz pointed to a cluster of men wearing dark suits and Russian style fur caps.  Those men were all that remained of the seventeen percent voting bloc controlled by the Communist party, none of whom were allowed to pass through the Brownshirt’s and their checkpoints.

“You’re forgetting that last week Reichstag President Hermann Göring announced that any communist representatives absent because of their imprisonment did not count in the rolls.”

“What, he can’t just do that?” his fellow Social Democrat protested.

“You’re right, it’s illegal, but no one thought much of it at the time,” Hanz replied and did some quick math that all parliament members were accustomed to performing in their heads on the fly.  “That means he now needs 567 votes present to meet quorum.”

“And that means Hitler only needs 378 yes votes for the amendment to pass.  They have it.”

“God help us,” Hanz sighed in defeat upon hearing the conclusion.  “This is how democracy dies in Germany; to an underhanded trick of electoral math.”

And it did.