"In the meantime, [recently arrived U.S. Ambassador to Germany] Dodd received an invitation from the German foreign office to attend to upcoming [Nazi] party rally in Nuremburg, set to begin in earnest on September 1.
"He had read of the Nazi Party's penchant for staging these elaborate displays of party force and energy, and saw them not as official events sponsored by the state but as party affairs that had nothing to do with international relations. He could not imagine himself attending such a rally any more than he counld envision the German ambassador to America attending a Republican or Democratic convention. Moreover, he feared that Goebbels and his propaganda ministry would seize on the fact of his attendance and portray it as an endorsement of Nazi policies and behavior.
"On Tuesday, August 22, Dodd cabled the State Department to ask for advice. 'I received a noncommittal reply', he wrote in his diary....."
This excellent excerpt from a book about Ambassador Dodd and his family in 1930s Berlin produced gales of laughter from my colleagues at lunch. One wag remarked "The guy in EUR who sent the cable reply still works in the Bureau!"
"He had read of the Nazi Party's penchant for staging these elaborate displays of party force and energy, and saw them not as official events sponsored by the state but as party affairs that had nothing to do with international relations. He could not imagine himself attending such a rally any more than he counld envision the German ambassador to America attending a Republican or Democratic convention. Moreover, he feared that Goebbels and his propaganda ministry would seize on the fact of his attendance and portray it as an endorsement of Nazi policies and behavior.
"On Tuesday, August 22, Dodd cabled the State Department to ask for advice. 'I received a noncommittal reply', he wrote in his diary....."
This excellent excerpt from a book about Ambassador Dodd and his family in 1930s Berlin produced gales of laughter from my colleagues at lunch. One wag remarked "The guy in EUR who sent the cable reply still works in the Bureau!"
plus c'est la même chose: premature antifascist.
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