How could the German people experience the rise of a narcissistic megalomaniac who took over their nation, waged war, separated and deported families, betrayed allies, subverted elections, and brought about the ultimate destruction of their economy and democracy?
That’s one of the questions considered in a rare and powerful book, “Nuremberg and Beyond: The Memoirs of Siegfried Ramler from 20th Century Europe to Hawaii” (Ahuna Press, 2008).
Hitler’s rise and fall is a subject covered in hundreds of other books. This memoir, on the other hand, by a simultaneous interpreter at the Nuremberg trials, focuses on the dozens of enablers and criminals accused of (1) crimes against peace, (2) waging aggressive war, (3) commission of war crimes, and (4) commission of crimes against humanity.
Hitler purged his military of nonbelievers, promoted demented loyalists, and surrounded himself with sycophants and power-hungry yes-men.
Ramler gives us close-up perspectives of Herman Göring, Albert Speer, Rudolf Hess, Martin Bormann, and especially Rudolf Höff as well as the military officers and doctors who carried out Hitler’s crimes. The portrayals are chilling and stomach-turning but also, as Hannah Arendt reported, simply “banal.” Ramler says many of the perpetrators seemed ordinary and normal on the outside.
Then, what power, belief, or other factor motivated the Nazis and their fueled their ability to commit atrocities such as the Holocaust in the name of the German people?
“In the years after the trials, when asked to speak or write about Nuremberg, I responded to this question by extending it beyond Germany and giving it a universal significance.
When checks on governmental power and control do not exist, when a dictatorship disregards and nullifies existing laws and creates its own decrees, when the achievement of a desired end for a nation justifies any means to obtain it, when persecution of segments of a population becomes government policy, and when the world community fails to react to crimes being committed by a dictatorship, the result leads to the abyss into which Germany descended during the Nazi era. In this sense the Nuremberg legacy, as a cornerstone of international law, takes on a universal significance beyond the role of Germany during the Hitler regime.”
Some may ask, how could the German people themselves go along with the rise of the Third Reich in their homeland?
“As for the German man and woman in the street, their support of the Nazi regime must be seen in the context of Germany's struggle for survival during wartime and living under the pressure of a dictatorship where dissent had harsh, even fatal consequences. Nevertheless, isolated and heroic examples exist of German resistance to the Nazis. The failed July 20, 1944 plot to assassinate Hitler, led by Claus von Stauffenberg, stands out as a courageous attempt which, had it succeeded, would have hastened the end of the war and influenced postwar policies and attitudes affecting Germany.
There were other, less well known, stands of defiance.
The question of the average German's knowledge about ongoing deportations, killings, and gassings, let alone shared guilt and complicity, continues to be asked. In his controversial book, Hitler's Willing Executioners, political scientist Daniel Goldhagen draws a strong causal relationship between antiSemitism and the persecution and extermination of Jews, to which many ordinary Germans contributed and supported.
His attribution of collective German guilt, however, fails to take into account the silent segment of the German population unable, and also often unwilling, to raise their voices in an atmosphere of a cruel and punitive dictatorship.
From my perspective, living for several postwar years among Germans, I came to understand this silent segment of the German population, seeing themselves also as victims of the Nazi regime. And I came to appreciate the decency of many of my German neighbors and friends.”
Under the leadership of Supreme Court Justice and U.S. Chief Prosecutor Robert Jackson, the international court set important precedents of accountability on a world scale.
“Nuremberg broke new ground and established a milestone in the practice and implementation of international law,” Ramler writes. “Nuremberg also established the principle that following superior orders cannot excuse the commotion of the crimes charged under the indictment.”
Defendants attempted obfuscation, what-aboutism deflection, and the superiority of their White Nationalism ideals to justify their actions persecuting gypsies and Jews. Even the doctors defended their experiments on people by saying their medical discoveries would help others.
Ramler reflects:
“There is no doubt that the Nuremberg experience had a powerful impact on my life, on my world view, and on my later role as educator and communicator. Facing the former leaders of Nazi Germany, both during pretrial interrogations and in the courtroom, stripped of their position and power, I saw them as ordinary individuals, characterizing what has been described by the philosopher Hannah Arendt as ‘the banality of evil.’ In Nuremberg I learned, through witnesses, testimony, and documents, of man's inhumanity to man on a massive scale and the consequences of a brutal dictatorship.”
Confronting a would-be demented dictator prevents a slide into a abyss of corruption and destruction.
Ramler’s memoir includes stories about a disrupted childhood between Germany and England in WWII and joining the military; going AWOL in order to be part of the Nuremberg team of interpreters; raising a family after the war; and serving in international peace efforts from Hawaii, where he worked as an educator and his wife Pi’ilani worked for the Navy at Pearl Harbor.
His love of reading and books as well as his study of languages prepared him for a life of success.
Later in life, Ramler developed a close professional –– and personal –– tie to Japan. His association with the East-West Center in Hawaii gave him a perspective on the similarities of the rise of fascism in Imperial Japan at the same time war was raged by Germany. Today, a majority of the educated and free populations in both countries respect constitutional law.
Siegfried Ramler
Ramler writes, “On a personal and family level, with the arduous flight of my parents from Austria and the arrest and killing of a grandparent (in a Nazi concentration camp), that inhumanity resonated directly and deeply. The Nuremberg experience, indeed the history of the Nazi era in the 1930s, convinced me of the danger of unchecked power and of the need for a global rule of law.”
In avoiding another “abyss” Ramler concludes, “Im am convinced that in facing 21st century challenges to global peace and survival, education represents the most important element in our quest for a harmonious world.”
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