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I Paid Hitler
Friedrich ‘Fritz’ Thyssen was a leading German industrialist. In 1923 General Ludendorff advised Thyssen to attend a speech to be given by Hitler, and Thyssen was very impressed, and primarily due to his strident opposition to the Treaty of Versailles he began to make large donations to the party. His principal motive appears to have been his fear of communism, but he was not initially politically aligned to the Nazis, and remained a member of the German National People's Party until 1932.
The following year he overcame his inhibitions and formally joined Hitler’s National Socialists. In November, 1932 Fritz Thyssen and Hjalmar Schacht were the main organizers of a letter to President von Hindenburg urging him to appoint Hitler as Chancellor. Thyssen also persuaded the Association of German Industrialists to donate three million Reichsmarks to the Party for the March, 1933 Reichstag election. As a reward, he was elected a Nazi member of the Reichstag. He welcomed the suppression of the Communist Party, the Social Democrats and the trade unions and gained enormously by the strict control over workers’ rights. His financing of the Nazis initially proved to be a sound investment. Thyssen accepted the exclusion of Jews from German business and professional life by the Nazis, and dismissed his own Jewish employees. But as a Catholic, he objected to the increasing repression of the Roman Catholic Church, which gathered pace after 1935.
Thereafter he experienced his ‘awakening’ to what was happening and drifted away from Hitler. He was against the violent pogrom against the Jews in November 1938, known as Kristallnacht, which caused him to resign from the Council of State. By 1939 he was also bitterly criticizing the regime's economic policies, which were subordinating everything to rearmament in preparation for war. At the beginning of September 1939, following his son-in-law’s death in Dachau―and knowing that his opposition to Hitler made him a ‘marked man’―he escaped to Switzerland.
In 1940 Thyssen took refuge in France, but was caught up in the German invasion of France and the Low Countries while he was visiting his sick mother in Belgium. He was arrested and sent back to Germany, where he was confined, first in a sanatorium near Berlin, then from 1943 in Sachsenhausen. In February 1945 he was sent to Dachau but survived the war. Prior to his arrest he had dictated his memoirs which he entrusted to an American journalist, Emery Reves, and these memoirs―the subject of this book―was first published in the USA at the end of 1941.
The following year he overcame his inhibitions and formally joined Hitler’s National Socialists. In November, 1932 Fritz Thyssen and Hjalmar Schacht were the main organizers of a letter to President von Hindenburg urging him to appoint Hitler as Chancellor. Thyssen also persuaded the Association of German Industrialists to donate three million Reichsmarks to the Party for the March, 1933 Reichstag election. As a reward, he was elected a Nazi member of the Reichstag. He welcomed the suppression of the Communist Party, the Social Democrats and the trade unions and gained enormously by the strict control over workers’ rights. His financing of the Nazis initially proved to be a sound investment. Thyssen accepted the exclusion of Jews from German business and professional life by the Nazis, and dismissed his own Jewish employees. But as a Catholic, he objected to the increasing repression of the Roman Catholic Church, which gathered pace after 1935.
Thereafter he experienced his ‘awakening’ to what was happening and drifted away from Hitler. He was against the violent pogrom against the Jews in November 1938, known as Kristallnacht, which caused him to resign from the Council of State. By 1939 he was also bitterly criticizing the regime's economic policies, which were subordinating everything to rearmament in preparation for war. At the beginning of September 1939, following his son-in-law’s death in Dachau―and knowing that his opposition to Hitler made him a ‘marked man’―he escaped to Switzerland.
In 1940 Thyssen took refuge in France, but was caught up in the German invasion of France and the Low Countries while he was visiting his sick mother in Belgium. He was arrested and sent back to Germany, where he was confined, first in a sanatorium near Berlin, then from 1943 in Sachsenhausen. In February 1945 he was sent to Dachau but survived the war. Prior to his arrest he had dictated his memoirs which he entrusted to an American journalist, Emery Reves, and these memoirs―the subject of this book―was first published in the USA at the end of 1941.
- GenresHistory
281 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1942
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
January 31, 2015
A hastily written memoir by a major Nazi figure as he was fleeing Hitler in 1939. Ultimately Thyssen was captured by the Nazis in France and ended the war as a prisoner at Dachau. The memoir, published in 1941, may have served Thyssen's purpose as, after the war, he received only minor penalties for his large role in the Nazi rearmament of the 1930s.
The book reads as a self-serving document and thus cannot be believed as history. Some of Thyssen's observations, however, can be regarded as his views of other Nazis. For instance, he is highly critical of what he characterizes as Hitler's disastrous economic program, saying Hitler had no understanding in this area and could not even comprehend what his advisers were telling him. His description of Nazi corruption, especially Goering, is entertaining and disgusting.
The book reads as a self-serving document and thus cannot be believed as history. Some of Thyssen's observations, however, can be regarded as his views of other Nazis. For instance, he is highly critical of what he characterizes as Hitler's disastrous economic program, saying Hitler had no understanding in this area and could not even comprehend what his advisers were telling him. His description of Nazi corruption, especially Goering, is entertaining and disgusting.
December 2, 2018
Self-serving and suspicious, it is none-the-less insightful into how a disaster like Hitler and the Nazis can befall a republic. Like so many others Thyssen was appalled by Hitler's anti-antisemitism, bureaucratic incompetence, and world conquest views.
However, like so many others in Germany, he supported Hitler, for short-term, tactical, political, and economic reasons, believing his promises, and most of all, believing that someone like Hitler could never really seize total power and commence all the horrible things he's promising. Surely the other forces in the republic will check and restrain those.
Of course, he, and others, were dead wrong resulting in the destruction of Germany. To Thyssen's credit, he does not shirk from his responsibility and offers his poor judgement as a warning to future generations.
The book seemed oddly topical for today.
However, like so many others in Germany, he supported Hitler, for short-term, tactical, political, and economic reasons, believing his promises, and most of all, believing that someone like Hitler could never really seize total power and commence all the horrible things he's promising. Surely the other forces in the republic will check and restrain those.
Of course, he, and others, were dead wrong resulting in the destruction of Germany. To Thyssen's credit, he does not shirk from his responsibility and offers his poor judgement as a warning to future generations.
The book seemed oddly topical for today.
October 14, 2021
A rat fleeing the boat
August 27, 2015
Friedrich "Fritz" Thyssen (9 November 1873 – 8 February 1951) was a German businessman born into one of Germany's leading industrial families.
While Thyssen was imprisoned in Germany, a biography was published in the United States in 1941 under the title ”I Paid Hitler”. The book was written by a journalist named Emery Reves born in Bácsföldvár, Hungary, from Jewish parents and an avid advocate of world federalism, supposedly based on memoirs dictated by Thyssen. This book supports Reves opinion that the German industrialists as a class supported and funded Hitler and where thus responsible for his ascent to power. After the war Thyssen denied authorship of the book by Reves (”Who Financed Adolf Hitler?” by James Pool) something that was also upheld by the postwar denazification tribunal.
In 1933 Reves founded a publishing company called the "Cooperation Publishing Service" known for its strong anti-Nazi stance. In 1937 he became his friend Winston Churchills literary agent. When Churchill was elected Prime Minister, Reves was sent to New York to help build up the British propaganda effort in both North and South America. After the war he purchased the rights to publish Winston Churchill's war memoirs and Churchill's History of the English-Speaking Peoples outside Britain.
Reves was also the author of The Anatomy of Peace, a 1945 book that helped popularize the cause of world federalism. Reves argued that world law was the only way to prevent war, and the fledgling United Nations Security Council would be inadequate to preserve peace because it was an instrument of power, rather than an instrument of law. His book was endorsed by zionist Albert Einstein and numerous other prominent figures.
The cover of The Anatomy of Peace had an "Open Letter to the American People", signed by Owen J. Roberts who led the Roberts Commissions, the first sham investigation of the attack on Pearl Harbor (see Day Of Deceit: The Truth About FDR and Pearl Harbor by Robert B. Stinnett), J.W. Fulbright a Southern Democrat that opposed McCarthyism and the House Un-American Activities Committee and who was later a ”mentor” to Bill Clinton, Claude Pepper, a Democratic Party left-liberal that was part of the shift from pro-Soviet in the 1940s to anti-Communist in the 1950s among american leftists, Elbert D. Thomas a Democratic Party politician from Utah. In April 1943 a confidential analysis of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee by British scholar Isaiah Berlin for the British Foreign Office succinctly characterized Thomas as:
”a Mormon ex-missionary, whose work was mostly done in the Far East. He speaks Japanese fluently, and his attitudes towards post-war problems is coloured principally by his Far Eastern views which are summed up in his statement that "the days of the white man's domination are over and the British Empire is almost certain to be dissolved in that part of the world." He is an out and out internationalist and interventionist, who has voted with the Administration on all foreign measures. He is essentially a free trader but, nevertheless, occasionally votes with the Farm Bloc which is powerful in the agricultural State which he represents. He is an ardent champion of the Jewish army scheme”. (Hachey, Thomas E. (Winter 1973–1974). "American Profiles on Capitol Hill: A Confidential Study for the British Foreign Office in 1943" (PDF). Wisconsin Magazine of History 57 (2): 141–153. JSTOR 4634869)
among other ”dignitaries” which began:
”The first atomic bomb destroyed more than the city of Hiroshima. It also exploded our inherited, outdated political ideas. A few days before the force of Nature was tried out for the first time in history, the San Francisco Charter was ratified in Washington. The dream of a League of Nations, after 26 years, was accepted by the Senate. How long will the United Nations Charter endure? With luck, a generation? A century? There is no one who does not hope for at least that much luck- for the Charter, for himself, for his work, and for his children’s children. But is it enough to have Peace by Luck? Peace by Law is what the peoples of the world, beginning with our selves, can have if they want it. And now is the time to get it.”
This is consistent with the subsequent evolution of international law which is a set of rules that are binding in relations between states and between nations and serves as a framework for international relations. International law differs from state-based legal systems in that it is primarily applicable to countries rather than to private citizens. National law may become international law when treaties delegate national jurisdiction to supranational tribunals such as the European Court of Human Rights or the International Criminal Court. There are numerous international bodies created by treaties adjudicating on legal issues where they may have jurisdiction. The one claiming universal jurisdiction is the United Nations Security Council. Others are: the United Nations International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court (when the Treaty of Rome is applicable) and the Court of Arbitration for Sport. A case can be made for this being a way towards world government by incremental steps and consistent with the NWO agenda.
(This text is largley based on Wikipedia sourses)
While Thyssen was imprisoned in Germany, a biography was published in the United States in 1941 under the title ”I Paid Hitler”. The book was written by a journalist named Emery Reves born in Bácsföldvár, Hungary, from Jewish parents and an avid advocate of world federalism, supposedly based on memoirs dictated by Thyssen. This book supports Reves opinion that the German industrialists as a class supported and funded Hitler and where thus responsible for his ascent to power. After the war Thyssen denied authorship of the book by Reves (”Who Financed Adolf Hitler?” by James Pool) something that was also upheld by the postwar denazification tribunal.
In 1933 Reves founded a publishing company called the "Cooperation Publishing Service" known for its strong anti-Nazi stance. In 1937 he became his friend Winston Churchills literary agent. When Churchill was elected Prime Minister, Reves was sent to New York to help build up the British propaganda effort in both North and South America. After the war he purchased the rights to publish Winston Churchill's war memoirs and Churchill's History of the English-Speaking Peoples outside Britain.
Reves was also the author of The Anatomy of Peace, a 1945 book that helped popularize the cause of world federalism. Reves argued that world law was the only way to prevent war, and the fledgling United Nations Security Council would be inadequate to preserve peace because it was an instrument of power, rather than an instrument of law. His book was endorsed by zionist Albert Einstein and numerous other prominent figures.
The cover of The Anatomy of Peace had an "Open Letter to the American People", signed by Owen J. Roberts who led the Roberts Commissions, the first sham investigation of the attack on Pearl Harbor (see Day Of Deceit: The Truth About FDR and Pearl Harbor by Robert B. Stinnett), J.W. Fulbright a Southern Democrat that opposed McCarthyism and the House Un-American Activities Committee and who was later a ”mentor” to Bill Clinton, Claude Pepper, a Democratic Party left-liberal that was part of the shift from pro-Soviet in the 1940s to anti-Communist in the 1950s among american leftists, Elbert D. Thomas a Democratic Party politician from Utah. In April 1943 a confidential analysis of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee by British scholar Isaiah Berlin for the British Foreign Office succinctly characterized Thomas as:
”a Mormon ex-missionary, whose work was mostly done in the Far East. He speaks Japanese fluently, and his attitudes towards post-war problems is coloured principally by his Far Eastern views which are summed up in his statement that "the days of the white man's domination are over and the British Empire is almost certain to be dissolved in that part of the world." He is an out and out internationalist and interventionist, who has voted with the Administration on all foreign measures. He is essentially a free trader but, nevertheless, occasionally votes with the Farm Bloc which is powerful in the agricultural State which he represents. He is an ardent champion of the Jewish army scheme”. (Hachey, Thomas E. (Winter 1973–1974). "American Profiles on Capitol Hill: A Confidential Study for the British Foreign Office in 1943" (PDF). Wisconsin Magazine of History 57 (2): 141–153. JSTOR 4634869)
among other ”dignitaries” which began:
”The first atomic bomb destroyed more than the city of Hiroshima. It also exploded our inherited, outdated political ideas. A few days before the force of Nature was tried out for the first time in history, the San Francisco Charter was ratified in Washington. The dream of a League of Nations, after 26 years, was accepted by the Senate. How long will the United Nations Charter endure? With luck, a generation? A century? There is no one who does not hope for at least that much luck- for the Charter, for himself, for his work, and for his children’s children. But is it enough to have Peace by Luck? Peace by Law is what the peoples of the world, beginning with our selves, can have if they want it. And now is the time to get it.”
This is consistent with the subsequent evolution of international law which is a set of rules that are binding in relations between states and between nations and serves as a framework for international relations. International law differs from state-based legal systems in that it is primarily applicable to countries rather than to private citizens. National law may become international law when treaties delegate national jurisdiction to supranational tribunals such as the European Court of Human Rights or the International Criminal Court. There are numerous international bodies created by treaties adjudicating on legal issues where they may have jurisdiction. The one claiming universal jurisdiction is the United Nations Security Council. Others are: the United Nations International Court of Justice, and the International Criminal Court (when the Treaty of Rome is applicable) and the Court of Arbitration for Sport. A case can be made for this being a way towards world government by incremental steps and consistent with the NWO agenda.
(This text is largley based on Wikipedia sourses)
September 11, 2017
Written in a rush, not easy to read.
May 18, 2022
The short answer is that mainstream conservatives in 1920s-and-1930s Germany abetted the Nazis because they were scared to death of the Bolshevik menace. They were quite right to be scared of the Bolshevik menace, but they were wrong to abet the Nazis as the way to deal with the Bolshevik menace.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews