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Article: Dreams and Delusions.
- Article from:
- National Review
- Article date:
- April 15, 1988
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1988 National Review, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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FRITZ STERN is perhaps the most respected representative of the emigre view of German history first popularized by academic refugees from Hitler. This view, briefly stated, assumes political and cultural continuity between earlier German history and the Nazi epoch, with earlier catastrophes leading almost inescapably to the Third Reich.
Though no sensible historian would deny the impact of the past or, as John Lukacs stresses, the historical relevance of national character, the emigre view of German history is remarkably selective. For these historians, the major causes of Hitler's takeover were not crises in the Weimar Republic or Nazi machinations. Rather, ...