The Iron Chancellor, the man who created modern Germany, acted imprudently where Jews were concerned.

Bismarck, the German Reich, and the Jews

Alfred Rosenberg

(Völkischer Beobachter, 22 May 1921) Translated by Hadding Scott, 2012

The birthday of the Iron Chancellor was reverently observed in all parts of Germany even in 1921. Now that his work lies in heaps of rubble, having been smashed by criminal hands, perhaps a light begins gradually to dawn, even for the most idiotic democrat of German blood, over the greatness of the still so recent German past. Not to mention the righteous individuals who from the very start were unable, thanks to Professor Preuss from Jerusalem[1], to regard the Republic as a German Reich.

But as we look up respectfully to the image of Bismarck, must we guard ourselves against making this image into an idol. We shall always need the advice of the great chancellor. Many of his principles will be standard even in the more distant future of Germany. At the same time however we shall retain in memory his dictum: “Politics is not an exact science. As the situation that one has before oneself changes, so does the way to make use of it.” Above all however we must often admit that the man who built the German house simultaneously allowed the woodworm to enter into the timbers of this house. This sad fact should not be concealed. Bismarck once entrusted German history to a Jewish banker, allowed him influence in Germany’s foreign policy, and brought his daughter to the Imperial Court, therewith taking a stand against old German tradition.

By sentiment Bismarck was an outspoken anti-Semite. He complained once to a delegation that almost the entire opposition press was in the hands of Jews. About Jewish profiteering he spoke powerful words in the Prussian parliament, and everyone knows his statement that it would be hard for him to fulfill his duties if he had a Jewish superior. It must be considered moreover that Bismarck was faced with a Prussian parliament whose members he fittingly described as “individually rational, collectively stupid,” that in the most important affairs of the nation he found himself alone, and that for the most pressing needs of the state[2] no credits were granted to him. Thus he went to the Jew Bleichroeder[3]. He went not in the manner of a Mediaeval king, who would have taken back from the Jews for state purposes the money profiteered from the people; rather, as the minister of a modern “constitutional government” he contracted a loan with the Jew – and even paid high interest for it. That was the beginning of the conversion of the state into a trust, which today, through the 500 Jewish banks in Germany, has grown into an enormous affair. In foreign policy Bismarck likewise not infrequently intervened for the benefit of the Jews. Emblematic of that were the development of the Jewish Question in Romania and the negotiations over Jewish enfranchisement in the Balkans at the Congress of Berlin (1878).

In Romania, around the middle of the 19th century, the Jewish population had grown enormously. Usury, intermediary commerce, liquor-selling: all these essential symptoms of Jewish penetration through consecutive millennia became ever more palpable. All who loved their homeland and their folk demanded a remedy for this plague of spongers numbering 300,000 heads. Thirty-one delegates made an exemplary proposal to the parliament; disturbances occurred in Iaşi and other cities [in Romania]. The “Alliance israélite” naturally cried bloody murder about “massacres of Jews,” although not a single Hebrew had been killed; they wanted foreign intervention and sent outraged protests to all governments. Bismarck did not set himself against the financiers in Paris and London, but wrote to Mr. Crémieux, president of the Alliance and simultaneously Grand Master of Grand Orient Freemasonry in France: “I have the honor to report to you, as an answer to the letter that you sent me on the 4th of the current month, that the Kaiser’s government has advised its representative in Bucharest to exhaust all his influence to secure for your co-religionists in Romania the position that belongs to them in a country that conducts itself according to the principles of humanity and civilization, etc. Berlin, 2 February 1868, v. Bismarck.”

As however the mood in Romania seemed to become such that the protection-laws against the Jews had a prospect of being enacted, the Berlin Jewish community got involved with a written petition to the Prussian minister-president. And to that came the following answer: “Berlin, 18 April 1868. The king has instructed me to respond to the petition of the Jewish community of the 6th of this month, so as to oppose the approval by one of the Romanian chambers of a law, which had been submitted against the will of Prince Carol, that affects the situation of the Israelites. It does not seem that it will be approved, nor that it will be sanctioned by the government of the prince even if that does happen…. Count v. Bismarck.”

In this document Bismarck did not deal with particular cases and express reservations in another passage just in case; instead he fundamentally acknowledged the principle of gray liberalism, “humanity and civilization,” which he had to battle domestically, as the basis for acknowledgment of Jewish “equal rights.”

Even more illustrative are the negotiations about the Jewish Question at the Berlin Congress. Here the symptoms of the rule of Jewish finance, allied with liberal rhetoric, manifested themselves tangibly.

The Alliance sent three of its members to Berlin: Netter, Kann, and Veneziani. All assembled ambassadors were sent a long memorandum, plus works of Jewish writers about the Jewish Question.

In his history of the Alliance the Jew Leven says: “Before the meeting of the Congress they (our delegates) secured the support of a significant man in Berlin: Bleichroeder, who through his social position had a bond with the plenipotentiaries and enjoyed great prestige with Bismarck.” (Narcisse Leven, Cinquante Ans d’Histoire, Paris 1911, p. 203.)

Netter sent reports about the activities of the Jewish representatives to Paris. Here are some of the most interesting. From 11 June: “If all think about our coreligionists as does Monsieur de Saint-Vallier (the French plenipotentiary) we have it made.” 12 June: “Lord Beaconsfield is in a splendid mood.” 13 June: “Bleichroeder yesterday saw Prince Bismarck; he has best wishes for the Israelites.” 18 June: “Today we visited the Prince of Hohenlohe-Schillingsfuerst. He began his career with the defense of the Jews in Bavaria; he would like to crown it with the defense of them at the Congress.” 21 June: “Bleichroeder spoke with Bismarck yesterday and obtained certainty that the question will be laid before the congress…. He can rest assured.” The reports about a series of other visits with diplomats, representatives of the press, etc., read similarly. (Leven, pp. 213-216).

All Balkan states and their internal constitutions came under discussion. The extent to which negotiations were conducted for the benefit of the Jews becomes obvious just from the fact that the term “Bulgarian subject” was unanimously replaced with “residents of the Bulgarian principate.” That was the theoretical surrender of the principle of patriotism in favor of a nomadic worldview! This change was proposed of course by the puppets of the Alliance, the French. Thus Bulgaria, Serbia, Montenegro, and Romania were forced by liberal Europe into recognition of the “rights” of the Jews. To the honor of Russia, it must be said that her plenipotentiary, Prince Gorchakov, was the only opponent of this disastrous policy. It goes without saying that D’Israeli-Beaconsfield placed the whole weight of Great Britain on the balance for the Jews. He pushed forward Lord Russel and Lord Salisbury as his spokesmen, but he himself said that he considered the granting of equal rights to Jews as the fulfillment of a self-evident fact, without the sanction of which the Congress certainly should not dissolve. Herr von Bülow[4] said to Netter on 28 July that the demand of the Jews in Bulgaria would also be pleaded in regard to Serbia and Romania, and that it was “a question of principle.” Bismarck declared precisely the same. The Jews could be content.

It would be well to note the words of the historian of the Alliance: “The result of the Berlin Congress was significant: it introduced into international law the principles which the French Revolution set down in its Declaration of the Rights of Man. United Europe approved it…. It is accomplished that these principles have become by the will of Europe the basis of public law and of the new states, and the condition of their independence. It was a benefit for all peoples, and for Jewry, an act unique in its history, the official charter of its liberation.” (Leven, p.290.)

The president of the Congress of Berlin was Prince Bismarck.

Perhaps he felt that he was strong enough to keep Germany internally free. In foreign policy he aided Jewry in a disastrous manner instead of allying himself with Gorchakov, putting aside the fact that he and the Russian otherwise faced each other as enemies. But he must have seen that Bleichroeder and Mendelssohn, through the strengthening of Jewry abroad, significantly shored up their position within Germany, and thenceforth wielded more than twice as much monetary clout. When the great chancellor was gone and little men stepped into his place, the affairs having been commenced followed their necessary course: the political and economic guides of the “German” Reich became Bleichroeder, Mendelssohn, Friedländer, Ballin, Warburg, Rathenau, and so on. Thus went Germany from Versailles to … Versailles![5]

One of the most righteous men, Paul de Lagarde, wrote in 1881, still bitter: “There has never been a German state.” Unfortunately he was right. Even Bismarck’s state was still not a German state.

Is it Bismarck’s fault? No one will dare to affirm it. He accomplished something superhuman. He was full of confidence in the strength of Germandom. Should one reproach this man, for whom all small minds made life unpleasant enough, with the fact that he overestimated German national consciousness? That the Germans – let it be plainly said – proved themselves unworthy? Furthermore that they themselves did not lift a hand to assist in building the German house, instead of bickering with slogans or surrendering to the god Mammon? No, certainly not!

We ourselves have been guilty, who were not able to endure a great personality, and either cowered behind him or took pleasure in petty fault-finding. Thus the Jew was able to sow discord unhindered, preach class-struggle, and engage in profiteering. We do not wish to condemn Bismarck, but perhaps to highlight the place where the blueprint of the German Reich had an error in its floorplan. It is up to us to avoid it in the future.

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1. Hugo Preuss, who wrote the constitution of the Weimar Republic, was not literally from Jerusalem, but he was a Jew. Rosenberg is saying that right-thinking people cannot regard the Republic as truly German because a Jew wrote its constitution.

2. The Prussian Parliament never approved a budget in the years 1862 to 1866 because of disagreement over military reforms. The Seven Weeks’ War with Austria came in 1866.

3. Gerson Bleichroeder was a Jewish banker of Berlin with connections to the Rothschilds. He was the second Jew elevated to the Prussian nobility, thus becoming “von Bleichroeder.” The first Jew elevated to the Prussian nobility was also a banker.

4. Bernhard von Bülow was attaché to the German embassy in Paris and served as a secretary at the Congress of Berlin. Later, during the reign of Wilhelm II, he served several years as foreign minister, then as chancellor.

5. This is a reference to the fact that the King Wilhelm I of Prussia was proclaimed Emperor of Germany in the Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles — on French soil — during the Franco-Prussian War, and to the humiliating Treaty of Versailles (called the Dictate of Versailles by German nationalists). Thus a period of German dominance on the European mainland began and ended at Versailles.

Reposted from: National-Socialist Worldview