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Radio Free Third Reich: Where the Term “Iron Curtain” and the Phrase “Better Dead Than Red” Originated UPDATED ON 10/22/2021

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COMMENT: It is not often that we are able to report good news on this  blog. 

An excep­tion has become man­i­fest: The Bor­mann Broth­er­hood by William Stephen­son has  been re-issued in paper­back!

We emphat­i­cal­ly encour­age lis­ten­ers to pur­chase the book and tell oth­ers about it!

(Mr. Emory gets no mon­ey from this.)

In AFA#1 we not­ed that the term “Iron Cur­tain,” gen­er­al­ly believed to have been mint­ed by Win­ston Churchill in a famous address he gave in Mis­souri, was actu­al­ly pur­loined from a pro­pa­gan­da address giv­en by Hitler finance min­is­ter Lutz Schw­erin von Krosigk dur­ing the twi­light days of the Third Reich.

Von Krosigk’s grand­daugh­ter is a Ger­man par­lia­men­tary rep­re­sen­ta­tive from the AfD, a neo-fas­cist polit­i­cal par­ty in Ger­many. She has been net­work­ing with mem­bers of the Brazil­ian roy­al fam­i­ly, with which she is dis­tant­ly relat­ed.

” . . . . It was uttered by Hitler’s for­mer Finance Min­is­ter, Count [Lutz] Schw­erin von Krosigk, on May 2, 1945, when he was try­ing des­per­ate­ly to win Allied recog­ni­tion for the gov­ern­ment of Admi­ral Doenitz [in which von Krosigk was briefly For­eign Minister—D.E.]. . . . ‘The Iron Cur­tain moves clos­er,’ he declared in a broad­cast. ‘Peo­ple caught in the mighty hands of the Bol­she­viks are being destroyed.’. . . ”

Also in AFA#1 we set forth the fact that the phrase “Bet­ter Than Dead” also orig­i­nat­ed from radio broad­casts in the twi­light days of the Third Reich. 

The Were­wolves were a gueril­la net­work com­posed pri­mar­i­ly of Hitler Youth and the League of Ger­man Maid­ens. Their com­bat role in the clos­ing days of the war was min­i­mal, how­ev­er the pro­pa­gan­da and psy­cho­log­i­cal war­fare impact was con­sid­er­able.

In FTR#894, we not­ed that for­mer Were­wolf for­ma­tions were incor­po­rat­ed into the Ger­man com­po­nent of the “Stay Behind” fas­cist cadres assem­bled by the U.S. and NATO dur­ing the Cold War.

” . . . . It was the sym­bol­ism, as always, that count­ed. Radio Were­wolf ham­mered the theme ‘Rather dead than Red’ (a phrase that lived long after). . . .”

1. The Bor­mann Broth­er­hood by William Steven­son; Sky­horse Pub­lish­ing (SC); Copy­right 1973 by William Steven­son; ISBN 978–1‑5107–2916‑2; pp. 125–126.

. . . . The threat of war between the West­ern Allies and Rus­sia had been pro­mot­ed for years by the Nazis. This vision of ulti­mate con­flict with “bar­bar­ic Bol­she­vism” pro­duced the first ref­er­ence to an Iron Cur­tain.

It was uttered by Hitler’s for­mer Finance Min­is­ter, Count [Lutz] Schw­erin von Krosigk, on May 2, 1945, when he was try­ing des­per­ate­ly to win Allied recog­ni­tion for the gov­ern­ment of Admi­ral Doenitz [in which von Krosigk was briefly For­eign Minister—D.E.]. Schw­erin von Krosigk was an unc­tu­ous fig­ure who had nev­er for­got­ten Hess’s say­ing before his depar­ture that the two Ger­man­ic nations, Britain and Ger­many, were fight­ing each oth­er to the enor­mous sat­is­fac­tion of the Bol­she­viks. The Count, a for­mer Rhodes Schol­ar, who seems to have learned noth­ing about the Eng­lish dur­ing his time at Oxford, cal­cu­lat­ed that Hess had made some impres­sion on his British hosts. “The Iron Cur­tain moves clos­er,” he declared in a broad­cast. “Peo­ple caught in the mighty hands of the Bol­she­viks are being destroyed.”

The term was picked up from the Ger­man broad­cast. Churchill used it when he cabled Pres­i­dent Har­ry Tru­man on May 12: “An Iron Cur­tain is drawn upon their front. We do not know what is going on behind.” He dropped it into a speech in the Unit­ed States. It demon­strates the infec­tious nature of the fears delib­er­ate­ly released by Hitler’s fol­low­ers in order to win West­ern sym­pa­thy. . . .

2. The Bor­mann Broth­er­hood by William Steven­son; Sky­horse Pub­lish­ing (SC); Copy­right 1973 by William Steven­son; ISBN 978–1‑5107–2916‑2; p. 131.

. . . . It was the sym­bol­ism, as always, that count­ed. Radio Were­wolf ham­mered the theme “Rather dead than Red” (a phrase that lived long after). Bol­she­vism was the real ene­my; the Nazis had always resist­ed the Bol­she­viks; there­fore any Ger­man who helped the ene­mies of Nazism was help­ing the Bol­she­viks and was a trai­tor. A cli­mate was being cre­at­ed that would favor the con­ceal­ment of want­ed men. . . .

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