British Empire, Central Europe & WW2

Was there any truth, to the claim by Charles Lindbergh and the America First Committee. That some of the poverty of Central Europe, was caused
by the British Empire and this in some part, was reason for the rise of Hitler and Nazi Germany? Great Britain I think was doing better, at the time. But England and Scotland, also had their own problems, of unemployment during the Depression. So, I really don't see it. Before WW1, Germany was doing very well, perhaps even better than Great Britain. WW1 was the event, that hurt Europe so much, in my thinking anyway.

 

Well, the poverty in Central Europe would have been exacerbated by the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire as much as anything, and that was already on its last legs well before 1918. Few European countries were as industrialised as Britain, France etc; peasant-based economies are very vulnerable to economic downturns because they have few alternative means of production, and you're not going to ignore your own farmers and import someone elses produce.
Lindbergh also claimed the Jews and the US administration were colluding with the British to drag America into the European war-

"Lindbergh & the America First Committee
[SIZE=-2]Click to enlarge [/SIZE]

[SIZE=-2]Charles Lindbergh speaking at an American First Rally [/SIZE]"If any one of these groups--the British, the Jewish, or the administration--stops agitating for war, I believe there will be little danger of our involvement."
Charles Lindbergh- September 11, 1941
On September 11, 1941, Charles Lindbergh appeared in Des Moines, Iowa, to speak on behalf of the isolationist America First Committee. The famous aviator criticized the groups he perceived were leading America into war for acting against the country's interests. He expressed doubt that the U.S. military would achieve victory in a war against Germany, which he said had "armies stronger than our own." The Des Moines speech was met with outrage in many quarters, and Lindbergh was denounced as an anti-Semite. In his hometown of Little Falls, Minnesota, his name was even removed from the town's water tower.
Six years earlier, Lindbergh had moved to England with his wife to escape the publicity surrounding the kidnapping and murder of their infant son. In 1936, he inspected Germany's military aviation program on behalf of the U.S. government, and in August attended the Summer Olympic Games in Berlin as a guests of Nazi Hermann Goering, the head of the Luftwaffe. Impressed by German industry and society under Adolf Hitler, the Lindberghs considered moving to Berlin.
In 1938, Goering presented Lindbergh with the Service Cross of the German Eagle for his contributions to aviation. Returning to America in 1939, Lindbergh became an advocate of American isolationism, but was criticized for his Nazi sympathies and anti-Semitic beliefs. On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, and debate over U.S. war policy came to an end. Lindbergh, who had resigned his military commission in 1939, asked to be reinstated, but President Franklin D. Roosevelt refused. The middle-aged Lindbergh later made it to the Pacific as an observer, and eventually ended up flying over two dozen combat missions, including one in which he downed a Japanese aircraft. "
Charles Lindbergh's Noninterventionist Efforts & America First Committee

Personally, I think he was just a naive prat, but America didn't have the monopoly on those prewar.

 

I agree. Lindbergh's problem was that he knew a lot more about flying than he did about international finance or politics. My impression was that he was sincere in his beliefs, but hopelessly ignorant of international affairs.

 

How ??
I can't think of anything. Does he give any info on how Britain was supposedly affecting the economy of central Europe ?

 

I don't know how, at least in terms of the group America First was thinking. I would think trade would be part of the equation. But if I
knew how, I would not have asked the question.

 

Wasn't he a Nazi sympathiser?

 

I think he was more of a Luftwaffe and Bf-109 sympathiser -

In case I should be wrong on the Nazi part, I appologize.

Regards
Kruska

 

I don't think that is a fair assesment of Lindbergh. Not pro-Nazi, but anti-European war involvment by the US. Lindbergh had moved his family to England, then France in order to escape the American press and their hounding of them after the kidnapping trial. He stayed in Europe and was "hoodwinked" by Hitler and the Nazis while he was being "shown" their engineering prowess, especially in the air. Remember he was an engineer as well as an accomplished pilot. However, who "hoodwinked" whom is a real question according to this site:

TRUMAN SMITH PAPERS

"In May 1936 Smith (Colonel Truman Smith, US Army attaché in Germany) arranged to have Col. Charles A. Lindbergh inspect the German aircraft industry and the reorganized Luftwaffe. The Germans, who should have been more wary, were delighted and, eventually, Col. Lindbergh was allowed to make five inspection trips. In these visits he toured German aviation factories; inspected the latest aircraft; visited the most recently deployed tactical units of the new German air force; and discussed the evolution of tactical and strategic concepts with Luftwaffe officers. During his October 1938 visit a unique intelligence coup was scored when Lindbergh was permitted to fly the famous Messerschmitt Bf 109, the superb fighter plane which subsequently became the workhorse of the Luftwaffe during the Battle of Britain."

"As a result of his observations, Lindbergh returned to the United States in 1939 determined to campaign for greater military preparations and American neutrality. In a series of speeches he opposed any revisions of the Neutrality Act of 1937 which would strip the U.S. of its defenses and tend to embroil her in the War. As popular sentiment gradually swung in favor of the Allies, Lindbergh and Smith were denounced in the press as fascists and henchmen of the Third Reich. The accuracy of the Lindbergh-Smith reports were questioned and dismissed as defeatist propaganda. A recent assessment, by intelligence specialist Col. Ivan D. Yeaton, holds that they were "The finest example of intelligence reporting that I have ever seen". (emphasis mine)

For a pretty decent rundown on him goto:

About.com: http://www.lindberghkidnappinghoax.com/mason.html

As to his anti-Semitic views, his were no worse than the rest of the non-Jewish world at large at the time. In fact while making his famous Des Moines speech for the America First Committee, he singles out the British, the Jews, and the Roosevelt administration as being those most responsible for wishing to place America back in a War in Europe.

But, after pointing them out he does something which seems less anti-Semitic than anti European War. Here are the words he uses to close out the section on the "Jews"; "I am not attacking either the British or Jewish people. Both races I admire. But I am saying that the leaders of both the British and the Jewish races, for reasons which are as understandable from their viewpoint as they are inadvisable from ours, for reasons which are not American, wish to involve us in the war."

The America First Committee was not so much pro-Nazi as anti European involvement. Their four founding principles were:

First; the United States must build an impregnable defense for America.

Second; no foreign power, or group of powers can successfully attack a prepared America.

Third; American democracy can only be preserved by staying out of the European war.

Forth; "Aid short of war" weakens national defense at home, and threatens to involve America in war abroad.

The America First Committee made every effort to exclude Fascists, Nazis, anti-Semites, and Klansmen.

A good site for the America First Committee is:

Charles Lindbergh's Noninterventionist Efforts & America First Committee

And for a good giggle at Lindbergh's expense from the wicked humor of T. Giesle, "Dr. Seuse", goto:

Untitled Document

Click on "domestic issues", and then choose "isolationists". The first one is the "Lindbergh quarter" from early '41.

 

I found this on his alleged Nazism-
"Racism and suspected Nazi sympathies
Lindbergh elucidated his beliefs about the white race in an article he published in Reader's Digest in 1939:
"We can have peace and security only so long as we band together to preserve that most priceless possession, our inheritance of European blood, only so long as we guard ourselves against attack by foreign armies and dilution by foreign races."[69]
Because of his trips to Nazi Germany, combined with a belief in eugenics, Lindbergh was suspected of being a Nazi sympathizer.
Lindbergh's reaction to Kristallnacht was entrusted to his diary: "I do not understand these riots on the part of the Germans", he wrote. "It seems so contrary to their sense of order and intelligence. They have undoubtedly had a difficult 'Jewish problem,' but why is it necessary to handle it so unreasonably?"[70]
In his diaries, he wrote: “We must limit to a reasonable amount the Jewish influence...Whenever the Jewish percentage of total population becomes too high, a reaction seems to invariably occur. It is too bad because a few Jews of the right type are, I believe, an asset to any country.”
Lindbergh's anti-communism resonated deeply with many Americans while eugenics and Nordicism enjoyed social acceptance,[60] with enthusiasts such as Theodore Roosevelt,[71] and George S. Patton.[72]
Although Lindbergh considered Hitler a fanatic and avowed a belief in American democracy,[73] he clearly stated elsewhere that he believed the survival of the white race was more important than the survival of democracy in Europe: "Our bond with Europe is one of race and not of political ideology", he declared.[74] He had, however, a relatively positive attitude toward blacks (something that was scheduled to be fully revealed in an undelivered speech interrupted by the events that followed the attack on Pearl Harbor[75]). Critics have noticed an apparent influence of German philosopher Oswald Spengler on Lindbergh.[76] Spengler was a conservative authoritarian and during the interwar era, was widely read throughout Western World, though by this point he had fallen out of favor with the Nazis because he had not wholly subscribed to their theories of racial purity.

Lindbergh with Edsel Ford (left) and Henry Ford in the Ford hangar. Photo: August 1927.


Lindbergh developed a long-term friendship with the automobile pioneer Henry Ford, who was well-known for his anti-Semitic newspaper The Dearborn Independent. In a famous comment about Lindbergh to Detroit's former FBI field office special agent in charge in July 1940, Ford said: "When Charles comes out here, we only talk about the Jews."[77][78]
Lindbergh considered Russia to be a "semi-Asiatic" country compared to Germany, and he found Communism to be an ideology that would destroy the West's "racial strength" and replace everyone of European descent with "a pressing sea of Yellow, Black, and Brown." He openly stated, if he had to choose, he would rather see America allied with Nazi Germany than Soviet Russia. He preferred Nordics, but he believed, after Soviet Communism was defeated, Russia would be a valuable ally against potential aggression from East Asia.[76][79]
Lindbergh said certain races have "demonstrated superior ability in the design, manufacture, and operation of machines."[80] He further said, "the growth of our western civilization has been closely related to this superiority."[81] Lindbergh admired, "the German genius for science and organization, the English genius for government and commerce, the French genius for living and the understanding of life." He believed, "in America they can be blended to form the greatest genius of all."[citation needed] His message was popular throughout many Northern communities and especially well-received in the Midwest, while the American South was Anglophilic and supported a pro-British foreign policy.[82]
Holocaust researcher and investigative journalist Max Wallace, agrees with Franklin Roosevelt's assessment that Lindbergh was "pro-Nazi" in his book, The American Axis. However, Wallace finds the Roosevelt Administration's accusations of dual loyalty or treason as unsubstantiated. Wallace considers Lindbergh a well-intentioned but bigoted and misguided Nazi sympathizer whose career as the leader of the isolationist movement had a destructive impact on Jewish people.
Lindbergh's Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer, A. Scott Berg, contends Lindbergh was not so much a supporter of the Nazi regime as someone so stubborn in his convictions and relatively inexperienced in political maneuvering that he easily allowed rivals to portray him as one. Lindbergh's receipt of the German medal was approved without objection by the American embassy; the war had not yet begun in Europe. Indeed, the award did not cause controversy until the war began and Lindbergh returned to the United States in 1939 to spread his message of non-intervention. Berg contends Lindbergh's views were commonplace in the United States in the pre-World War II era. Lindbergh's support for the America First Committee was representative of the sentiments of a number of American people.
Yet Berg also notes that "As late as April 1939 – after Germany overtook Czechoslovakia – Lindbergh was willing to make excuses for Hitler. "Much as I disapprove of many things Hitler had done", he wrote in his diary of April 2, 1939: "I believe she (Germany) has pursued the only consistent policy in Europe in recent years. I cannot support her broken promises, but she has only moved a little faster than other nations...in breaking promises. The question of right and wrong is one thing by law and another thing by history." Berg also explains that leading up to the war, in Lindbergh's mind, the great battle would be between the Soviet Union and Germany, not fascism and democracy. In this war, he believed that a German victory was preferable because of Stalin's horrific acts, which, at the time, he believed were far worse than Hitler's.
Berg finds Lindbergh believed in a voluntary rather than compulsory eugenics program.[citation needed]
In Pat Buchanan's book entitled A Republic, Not An Empire: Reclaiming America's Destiny, he portrays Lindbergh and other pre-war isolationists as American patriots who were smeared by interventionists during the months leading up to Pearl Harbor. Buchanan suggests the backlash against Lindbergh highlights "the explosiveness of mixing ethnic politics with foreign policy."[83]
Lindbergh always preached military strength and alertness.[84][85] He believed that a strong defensive war machine, as well as his views about race, would make America an impenetrable fortress and defend the Western Hemisphere from an attack by foreign powers, and that this was the U.S. military's sole purpose.[86]
Many people acknowledge that Lindbergh helped keep American public opinion isolationist until 1941 by advancing the movement to keep America out of the war for as long as possible. At the same time, some praise Lindbergh for his prediction that an Iron Curtain descended upon Europe; many of the predictions which Lindbergh made about the war came before Hitler violated his non-aggression pact with Stalin and launched Operation Barbarossa.[87] Berg reveals that, while the attack on Pearl Harbor came as a shock to Lindbergh, he did predict that America's "wavering policy in the Philippines" would invite a bloody war there, and, in one speech, he warned that "we should either fortify these islands adequately, or get out of them entirely". Cole, Wallace and Buchanan all believe that Lindbergh was highly influential in ensuring that Hitler's war machine would advance toward the Eastern Front and inflict most devastation there."
Charles Lindbergh - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

His views on white supremacism were shared by a hell of a lot of people in those days, who actually believed Caucasians were the end result of evolution and that it was the white man's "duty" to teach non-whites how to be like us.
I still think he was just dangerously naive.

 

Gordon, this is the best discription of the early Lindbergh; "I still think he was just dangerously naive."

To his credit, he quickly altered his opinions when the actual facts of the Axis' treachery was revealed in Dec. of 1941. His long-standing discord with FDR wasn't just reserved to "politics" however. He (and his father-in-law) lost money and income when FDR nationalized the air-mail service, and put it into the control of the USAAC. This made FDR an enemy of his family and their income sources.

 

Cheers Clint.
I think this comment from that About.com article says it graphically-
"Worse, Lindbergh often chose the wrong associates, despite the best of intentions."

 

Well, nothing that comes to mind as the British empire had no signifigant crown colonies in Europe at all, but WW1 did leave most of central europe shattered, physically and financially. I do know that Hitler admired Britain for its Empire; and originally wanted to form an alliance with Us.

 

There's a book coming out in October that you guys might find very interesting if you're still concerned with this topic.

 

Cheers. Looks like it could be an interesting read.

 

I don't think there is any pre-1938 direct link between the British Empire and the countries of Eastern Europe. Charles Lindbergh was a great flyer and a brave man, but when it comes to history and European affairs he is usually running a quart low. The Brits more or less tossed the Czecks and Poles to the wolves in 1938 and 1939, that certainly didn't help their economies, but prior to that, probably not. As has already been pointed out, World War I, the collapse of the Hapsburg Dynasty, and the resulting ethnic tensions did as much as anything to undermine the economies in Eastern Europe.