Peter Huston
The Nazi Occult. By Kenneth Hite. Osprey Publishing, Oxford, UK, 2013. ISBN: 978-1-78096-598-7. 80 pp. Softcover, $17.95.
Osprey is a specialty publishing company aimed primarily at military modelers, wargamers, and other hobbyists. Their products have a well-deserved reputation for packing a great deal of hard-to-find, specialized information in a small number of pages along with many high-quality illustrations, charts, maps, and photographs, despite occasionally spotty citing of sources. In some circles, if one wants a particularly obscure piece of information regarding military uniforms or equipment, e.g., the exact type and shade of socks worn by Napoleon’s various hussar regiments sorted by year and campaign as well as by unit, a relevant publication from Osprey is considered the immediate “go-to” source. I have many of its books and am generally highly pleased with them.
However, Osprey is branching off in new directions, presumably to cater to the market for hobbyists and modelers interested in fantasy subjects. For the record, I don’t have a problem with this. If a hobbyist or wargamer wishes to buy a nicely illustrated, concise publication summarizing the story of Jason and the Argonauts or Norse mythological tales or even zombies—and someone wishes to publish it—I don’t have a problem with that. History is history and fantasy is fantasy, but they can both be fun and they most certainly can make fascinating reading. Each has its place.
Unfortunately, The Nazi Occult blends the two. It is a historical fact that some of the people involved with the Nazi movement had an interest in the occult; some held strange beliefs, and some acted in strange ways due to these beliefs. The exact extent and influence of these beliefs on the Nazi movement and its ideology and actions is highly controversial and has been written about by many people, often with wildly varying accuracy and scholarship. (In fact, I have a shelf of books on this very subject— some good, some not so good.)
I’d been hoping this work would survey such writings and the beliefs and practices they describe and put them in their proper place in an easy-to-read, concise, single volume. Unfortunately, this volume makes no effort to place its topics in context, nor does it discuss the reality of the ideas shared within. Instead it purposely blurs the distinction between fact and fiction. This is dangerous with such a topic.
For example, it seems to be historical fact that Guido von List’s beliefs in runes, Germanic folk beliefs, and “recreated traditions” of perceived Germanic folk beliefs—and his teachings based on these ideas, called “Ariosophy”—did have an influence on Nazi belief in the alleged superiority of the “Aryan race” and “the Volk.” This is described in this volume without footnotes as if it were historical fact.
Also, it seems to be pure nonsense, despite belief in some circles, that the Nazis built UFOs and after the war housed them in a secret base in or under Antarctica. This belief, although silly (see Massimo Polidoro’s column “Hitler’s South Pole Hideaway,” SI, January/February 2013), has been linked with some prominent holocaust deniers, such as Ernst Zundel, who may have been using such a strange belief to “hide in plain sight” so that people would dismiss their holocaust denial activities as the work of “deranged UFO nuts” and therefore not interfere with them. Unfortunately, this subject is also described without footnotes as if it were historical fact. In fact, the work contains a very nice painting of American fighter planes dogfighting with Nazi UFOs over the Antarctic in 1946. Again, the captions describe this battle as if it were a documented historical event. The two ideas are presented as if equally valid.
The author also presents statements about yetis, zombies, lycanthropes, and sorcerers controlling the weather, among other things, as if they were real and had been a part of the events of World War II.
At no point does the work state that this is supposed to be a survey of imaginary beliefs or a work of fiction. My guess is that the author and publisher considered many of these ideas to be so silly that they felt there was no need to do so. Yet the back cover states, “Now, using a combination of photography and artwork reconstructions, the true story of the most secret battles of World War II can finally be told.” Not exactly a disclaimer.
Unfortunately, if there’s one thing I’ve learned in years of watching the fringe, no matter how absurd or stupid an idea is, someone somewhere is going to take it seriously and believe it—especially so if it’s printed by a legitimate publisher of historical works. Doubly so if it is about something like Nazis.
I admit at times I had trouble telling the fact from the fiction. Did the Nazis, as described in this book, use specially trained soldiers, hexensoldat, who searched for landmines with dowsing rods? I have no idea, but I seem to recall somewhere that the U.S. Army, despite there being zero scientific evidence for the validity of dowsing, has experimented with its use to find landmines, so it might be possible.
Did a self-professed medium named Mathilde Ludenhorf really consider the Dalai Lama (of all people!) to be the head of “the worldwide Jewish conspiracy” as claimed on page 39? I decided to dig a little on this one; I found nothing in three respected books, but a properly footnoted Wikipedia page says she did, so it seems to be true. But using the Osprey book alone, one simply cannot tell fact from fiction, and that’s not good.
The recommendations for further reading section includes a mix of legitimate works of scholarship, books written by people whom I consider to be “true believers” and those who, in my opinion, “make stuff up to see their name in print” with no distinction between them. A small selection of games, comics, and movies are also recommended for people with an interest in this subject.
I have nothing against hobbyists, modelers, and wargamers who wish to have fun using fantasy ideas. I recently played in a table-top wargame set in modern times where our side’s goal was to rescue some scientists from telepathically controlled zombies. For a couple hours, with much dice rolling, rule consulting, and even some strategic decision making, we had fun despite the fact that I believe in neither telepathy nor zombies.
I have nothing against hobbyists, modelers, and wargamers who wish to have fun using fantasy ideas. I recently played in a table-top wargame set in modern times where our side’s goal was to rescue some scientists from telepathically controlled zombies. For a couple hours, with much dice rolling, rule consulting, and even some strategic decision making, we had fun despite the fact that I believe in neither telepathy nor zombies.
Peter Huston is an author and educator with a background in Asian Studies and teaching English as a second language. He blogs at http://www.peterhuston. blogspot.com.