Berlin Games: How the Nazis Stole the Olympic Dream
Guy Walters
Language: English
Pages: 400
ISBN: 0060874139
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
IN 1936, Adolf Hitler welcomed the world to Berlin to attend the Olympic Games. It promised to be not only a magnificent sporting event but also a grand showcase for the rebuilt Germany. No effort was spared to present the Third Reich as the newest global power. But beneath the glittering surface, the Games of the Eleventh Olympiad of the Modern Era came to act as a crucible for the dark political forces that were gathering, foreshadowing the bloody conflict to come.
The 1936 Olympics were nothing less than the most political sporting event of the last century—an epic clash between proponents of barbarism and those of civilization, both of whom tried to use the Games to promote their own values. Berlin Games is the complete history of those fateful two weeks in August. It is a story of the athletes and their accomplishments, an eye-opening account of the Nazi machine's brazen attempt to use the Games as a model of Aryan superiority and fascist efficiency, and a devastating indictment of the manipulative power games of politicians, diplomats, and Olympic officials that would ultimately have profound consequences for the entire world.
most partial commentary in the history of broadcasting. By the end, the former Olympian was screaming into the microphone. Lovelock leads by about four yards, Cunningham fighting hard, Beccali coming up to his shoulder, Lovelock leads…Lovelock…Lovelock…Cunningham second, Beccali third…Come on, Jack! One hundred yards to go…Come on, Jack! By God he’s done it! Jack, come on! Lovelock wins! Five yards, six yards, he wins…he’s won! Hooray! Abrahams was not the only Briton to get carried away.
letter, ‘quite a great number of German Athletic Clubs […] followed since their foundation–40 or 50 years ago–the principle not to accept Jewish members’. Lewald’s tactic paid off, however. On 5 February Aberdare adopted a far more conciliatory tone, and thanked Lewald for taking the trouble to deal with each of the sportsmen in turn. Aberdare said that, as a result he felt sure ‘that my confidential utterance to the B.O. Council has improved the situation enormously’. As the BOA’s minutes no
and Great Britain that are concerned [with the Jews]. In these countries, the Jews are very strong and utilise the might that the Ol. Games carry for their own political purposes.’ This was a refrain from a letter that Edstrøm had written to Brundage the previous December, in which he had said that ‘the day may come when you will have to stop the activities of the Jews. They are intelligent and unscrupulous. Many of my friends are Jews, so you must not think I am against them, but they must be
me’. I shall urge upon my countrymen that they should not participate in the Games in Nazi Germany because it is my opinion that under the domination of the Nazi government the German sports authorities have violated and are continuing to violate every requirement of fair play in the conduct of sports in Germany and in the selection of the German team, and are exploiting the Games for the political and financial profit of the Nazi regime. […] I am convinced, moreover, that to hold the Games
Karl von Halt gave a brief speech and invited his leader to open the Games. ‘I hereby declare’, said Hitler over the loudspeakers, ‘these Fourth Winter Olympic Games of the year 1936, held in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, open.’ The band struck up, and on the side of the mountain the Olympic flame was lit, accompanied by the boom of a field gun. Then the flag-bearers formed a semicircle and the German skier Willi Bogner swore the Olympic oath, but only after he had saluted the swastika flag that he