The World Turns to War by Jay Wertz

Author:Jay Wertz
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: HISTORY / Europe / Western
Publisher: Monroe Publications
Published: 2017-12-19T05:00:00+00:00

German filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl talks to members of the American decathlon team—Glenn Morris, Jack Parker and Robert Clark at the 1936 Berlin Olympics.

The Olympic Torch is carried by Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate on the last leg to the Olympic Stadium, August 1, 1936.

Also descending on Berlin were members of the worldwide press corps and invited guests—diplomats and other well-known personalities whom the Nazi government wanted to impress. The most celebrated American to attend was aviator Charles Lindbergh, who was a guest of the Aviation Ministry. He and his wife admired the city and the Olympic events they attended, though there were few. Lindbergh was in Germany primarily to tour the Luftwaffe’s vast new airfields and other facilities in Germany, and he came away with the sincere belief that the Third Reich’s air arm was the best in the world. Once war began Lindbergh made more specific observations that were useful to the American military. Most other foreign government officials, who were suspicious of the motivation behind the Nazis’ creation of the grand Olympic spectacle, left with the same doubts they came with, especially if they talked to journalists and other foreigners who had been in Germany for some time.

Another arrival in Berlin, timed to reach the city on the day the Games began, was the Olympic Torch. This addition to Olympic tradition and ceremony appeared for the first time at the 1936 Summer Games. The torch was the idea of Carl Diem, who also orchestrated the run—from the lighting of the torch at the ancient stadium at Olympus, Greece, on July 20, 1936, to the segmented journey that took the flame through the countries of southeastern Europe that the Nazi government hoped to influence. The relay ended on July 31 in Berlin, with a large ceremony at the Old Museum just before the torch traveled its final leg into Olympic Stadium.

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