Hitler's American Friends: The Third Reich's Supporters in the United States by Hart Bradley W

Author:Hart, Bradley W. [Hart, Bradley W.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781250148957
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2018-10-01T21:00:00+00:00

7

AMERICA FIRST!

Almost exactly two years after Fritz Kuhn’s German American Bund disgraced itself by explosively combining the symbols of Americanism with Nazism in Madison Square Garden, another event was held at the same venue. This time, the turnout was even larger than it had been in 1939. the New York Times called it a “capacity crowd” of around twenty-two thousand, with around ten thousand more listening to the proceedings on loudspeakers set up outside. They were flanked by tens of thousands of protestors and a more than thousand New York police officers sent to provide security. Some of the attendees had probably also been there for Fritz Kuhn’s last big hurrah, and some pro-Nazi groups canceled their own meetings that night to encourage attendance. A New York City official hyperbolically claimed 60 percent of the attendees that night were “members of or sympathizers with the German American Bund.” Members of Father Coughlin’s Christian Front were in attendance as well and hawked copies of Social Justice on the street.1 This was a catch-all gathering of Hitler’s American friends.

The event was headlined by two of the biggest names in American politics: aviator-turned-celebrity-political-activist Charles Lindbergh and Montana senator Burton K. Wheeler, the staunch isolationist and Roosevelt opponent. Both men were given a nationwide radio audience that night that numbered in the millions, with Lindbergh’s remarks broadcast live on the Mutual Broadcasting System and Wheeler being carried by NBC and CBS. Both used the platform to denounce the “war makers” they claimed were trying to drag the country into the European war, and told the audience that “America has nothing to fear from foreign invasion, provided it has the right leadership.” Even if Britain were to fall under the boot of German oppression, they continued, America would be “strong and mighty enough not to worry about its defense from any invader.” The crowd uproariously supported these sentiments and loudly booed every mention of the president, members of his cabinet, and the British ambassador. Wheeler told the crowd Roosevelt was being pushed into war by “jingoistic journalists and saber rattling bankers in New York.” Lindbergh received a four-minute standing ovation.2 By any definition, the event seemed to be a massive success.

This was the America First Committee at its political peak the summer before Pearl Harbor. Since its inception the previous September, America First had rapidly become the country’s most vocal and best-known group seemingly articulating the concerns held by millions of Americans about the country’s entry into the European war. With France defeated and occupied by German troops who made a point of parading down the iconic Champs-Élysées in Paris, American involvement was becoming more likely by the day. Or was it? If Wheeler and Lindbergh were to be believed, even if Buckingham Palace ended up flying a swastika flag it would matter little to the average New Yorker or midwestern farmer.

Why should Americans concern themselves about a conflict that was thousands of miles away, expending blood and treasure to save European empires from destroying

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