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English Language Links and articles on Germany's Siegerjustiz - Victors' Justice - against former East German citizens.   

The Rosenbergs 

Ossining, New York train station on the day of the Rosenbergs' execution

Ethel and Julius Rosenberg (both Jewish) were executed in the Sing Sing electric chair on June 19, 1953. They were members of the U.S. Communist Party who allegedly stole the secrets of the atom bomb for the USSR. Their execution came at the height of the "red menace" hysteria in the 1950s. Since then, evidence strongly suggests that the U.S. Government knew the two weren't guilty, but that the judge and prosecutors fixed the case so they would be electrocuted nevertheless.

THE ROSENBERG TRIAL
Additional pictures taken at the Rosenbergs' execution

Now Germany continues the Cold War (and Nazi) tradition of persecuting communists...

 >>Siegerjustiz<< 

Weasel says: G e r m a n y ! Throw the supporter of the Vietnam war behind bars before you throw DDR people behind bars! Or do you think it's OK to kill millions in the name of anti-communism? If trials are necessary they should be held in an impartial international court of law, but not by these so-called "good innocent Germans simply thirsting for justice". In an international court of law both sides, including the two superpowers would be held responsible for the crimes - massive crimes - committed in the name of their respective ideologies. Millions more than the dead along the Berlin Wall would thus have to be atoned for! Countless crimes were committed by the western side in the name of the West's ideology -- the supposedly innocent not guilty side. Particularly in the third world the West has been the dirtier partner. See for example, the Death squads and German Nazi criminals associated with the (WACL) The World Anti-Communist League. The Vietnam war which West Germany heavily supported and profited from, being for the West Germans, the most notorious example. Even West Germany's former president Richard von Weizsäcker while at a chemical consortium profited from supplying the U.S.A. the chemicals needed for America's chemical warfare against Vietnam. Think about that West German judges before you illegally apply retroactive law on former citizens of a country you absolutely never had any jurisdiction over! And Germany pay the reparations you owe Greek citizens and crack down instead on the firms that profited from forced slave labor during the Nazi's reign of terror. VideoHere a list of the firms that used slave labor:

German Firms That Used Slave Or Forced Labor During the Nazi Era
Prepared by the American Jewish Committee Berlin Office.
December 7, 1999

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Ten Years of German Unification

Col. Gen. Markus Wolf

ABSTRACT

The author discusses the fate of the Foreign Intelligence Department of the GDR, which he headed for over thirty years, and of its colleagues and agents since the reunification of Germany ten years ago. There was no transformation of this service after the implosion of socialism; instead, it was liquidated, and criminal prosecutions followed which continue to this day. The author describes how this is connected to the West German leadership goal of the "de-legitimization" of the GDR. The operations of the western services are described, as well as the actions of their collaborators, who agree to make available, for a price, their knowledge of sources, files, data and other evidence in order for criminal prosecutions to be launched; i.e. the "Rosewood" operation of the CIA, and the decoding of the data carrier "SIRA" and its significance are discussed. The author holds the view that the criminal prosecution of the colleagues and agents of his service violates the internationally recognized legal concept of "equality before the law". Of the approximately 150,000 political indictments initiated since the reunification, 7,099 were for espionage. The article also addresses other subjects, such as the inhumanely high prison sentences in the United States. The author feels that, after ten years, a political gesture should be made which would remove the last vestiges of the Cold War.

Ten Years Later

When German unification became a reality on October 3, 1990, I had already been retired for four years. My first book had been successfully published in 1989 in both German states and I was a writer full of plans. After the appearance of my book in early summer of 1989, at a time when the speedy disintegration of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) could not have been predicted, the West German chief federal prosecutor, Rebman, obtained an arrest warrant against me because of my position as the former director of the Foreign Intelligence Department (HV A) in the Ministry of State Security (Ministerium für Staatssicherheit - hereafter, MfS) of the GDR. I was at that time the only highly decorated individual in the GDR and the only general of the Ministry to which this honor was afforded. Thus, my creative existence as a pensioner came to an end. The first seven years of German unification represented to me years of persecution, as well as years of constant concern about co-workers and agents for whom I was responsible during my time at the Ministry. Although the court decisions, convictions, and probations that the victors of the Cold War brought against me have now, ten years later, been suspended, the moral obligations toward the women and men who performed their duties on the front lines remain.

It is impossible to forget experiences which took place during the Cold War confrontations, and the efforts in the East and West to prevent a nuclear inferno. Now there are new experiences, meetings which earlier would have been inconceivable, with former opponents from "the other side." But concern for former "soldiers" who, unlike the agents of the West, are still subject to prosecution, remains a heavy burden for me. Encounters with other mostly retired colleagues from West and East, however, provide hope. Therefore, I have agreed with pleasure to summarise for "National Security and the Future" some thoughts about my former service and its fate after the German unification.

Disintegration of the German Democratic Republic

The last years of activity of the Foreign Intelligence Department (HV A) of the GDR were shaped by the contradictory developments in the Soviet Union under Gorbachev's leadership, and by the negative attitude of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) leaders towards Perestroika and Glasnost in the USSR. Some of the offices within the Ministry of National Security responsible for the observation of the internal processes in the GDR had difficulties objectively analysing the resulting phenomena, which invariably developed into political crises. These difficulties soon became obvious to the offices of the foreign intelligence service. However, these offices were focused on the possible consequences of Gorbachev's policies for the foreign policies of the GDR, e.g., disintegration of the bloc confrontation; reorientation with regard to the senseless, and for true socialism, economically suicidal arms race; and the vision of a new millennium free of nuclear weapons. Information coming from the HVA could therefore contribute to a better understanding of the western position in Moscow and Berlin, and provide information about opponents of the détente, armament control, and disarmament. Documentary information from NATO-sources, for example, contributed in 1987 to the formulation of a new military doctrine of the Warsaw Treaty. The attitude of many colleagues was hopeful, as they understood the politics of détente, but at the same time they were also in despair over the rigid attitude of the SED leaders, which contradicted verbal assurances of friendship with the Soviet Union. The increasing internal resistance in the GDR against these rigid policies had serious consequences. In spite of efforts to support the expectations and tasks of the political leaders, MfS information on the country's internal situation reflected the internal crises more realistically than in earlier years.

The implosion of socialism in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union in 1989/90 produced dramatic changes in all affected countries. The special situation of the GDR consisted in the fact that the ever present and influential "rich brother", the Federal Republic of Germany, was always ready to claim its "inheritance". One knows today (even I was late in recognising this) that the GDR was simply a marionette for Gorbachev in a poker game for power with the West, not a partner considered worthy of defending. Ruling circles in the Federal Republic of Germany (hereafter FRG) jumped at this historical opportunity, and consequently exploited it during the leadership of Chancellor Helmut Kohl. In the last year of the GDR's existence, the election campaign teams of the West German parties controlled the field, and the Western advisors of the last GDR government pushed in all areas toward a speedy unification. In regard to foreign policy, there was no resistance (excepting verbal) to the incorporation of the GDR into NATO, and, therefore, the realignment of the German federal armed forces and NATO onto the eastern boundaries of Germany. Instead of initiating a reasonable process for the establishment of a European peace declaration, the agreements in international law at the time (e.g., the so-called 2+4 treaty) were dictated by the "victors". The consequence for the GDR was that it was incorporated into the FRG by means of a crash course, which resulted in large losses for the majority of the GDR population: economic status, loss of cultural specificity's, social standing, and personal biographical characteristics, as well as the persecution of VIPs, political and social discrimination, and disenfranchisement of the GDR elites.

'Victors' manipulation of the intelligence services

In contrast to other eastern and central European countries and the USSR (later GUS states) there was no transformation of the GDR intelligence service, but, rather, its radical liquidation. In other countries, national interests required the preservation of the defence and reconnaissance organs, so they were transformed into agencies befitting the new political structures, which often meant that structures which were relatively ideology-free were taken over unchanged, including official and unofficial employees, continuation of certain operations, and continued use of databases. Espionage, defence from terrorism, and personal protection were included in this process. West Germany's goal from the onset was to destroy all GDR state structures, including the intelligence service. This goal was given impetus by the anger and hatred felt by a substantial proportion of the East German population toward the MfS, a result of the failed national security policies of the SED and unjust repression executed by an oversized security apparatus. A literal "Stasi hysteria" exists to this day, carried forward from the former GDR. The plan to remodel the security organs into democratically-led reconnaissance and constitutional protection agencies proved to be an illusion; the alternative was the complete destruction of the entire MfS, including the Foreign Intelligence Service, which was subsequently realised. This was a logical consequence, considering the way in which the overall integration of the GDR into the FRG had occurred. There was no discussion about transferring highly qualified employees into the services of a united Germany nor interest in drafting a new constitution for the new country which had emerged after the unification. However, a draft of such a constitution had, in fact, been prepared, in agreement with the citizens rights organisation represented at the "Round Table".

But the West German "advisors" in the Ministry of the Interior of the last GDR government had only one interest: to appropriate as much "booty" as possible. This booty would include the names of possible traitors among the MfS workers, documents, databases, and information about sources, structures and modes of operation, material objects and technical equipment, and, above all, evidence which could be used to prosecute citizens of the FRG and employees of the MfS, based on MfS documents. Contrary to these efforts, the citizens movement and government of the GDR succeeded in early 1990 in reaching a decision to dissolve the HVA, but in an orderly fashion. A group of approximately 250 workers was empowered to systematically terminate the HVA activities and to destroy documents on HVA activities, excepting selected documents intended for a central archive. Despite this favourable decision benefiting GDR reconnaissance, intelligence services of the FRG and other NATO countries, especially the USA, succeeded in gaining important information about sources and activities of the HVA. In 1989-90, they exploited the "political climate" to launch substantial intelligence attacks against the MfS of the GDR. Immediately after the fall of the Berlin Wall (November 1989), long before the unification, employees of the BND (West German intelligence service), the Agency for the Protection of the Constitution, and the Secret Services of the United States and Great Britain made substantial attempts to establish contact with employees or agents of the MfS. Using threats, promises of immunity from punishment, and lucrative financial bribes (up to one million dollars), efforts were made to pursued them to provide "voluntary" details concerning former intelligence sources. Often they claimed that these employees' superiors or other co-workers of the former department had already co-operated and were now "driving a Mercedes". Only a few, though some were, unfortunately, high-ranking officers, co-operated as traitors with these western agencies. They revealed many important sources and testified willingly in trials conducted by the prosecution. Particularly spectacular was the 1990 CIA operation "ROSEWOOD", through which the CIA gained highly secret HVA files and microfilm reports. Media reports up to the present day have served to disinform and obscure the details of this operation. Some details from these documents were handed over three years later and, after years of tug-of-war - 10 years after the GDR ceased to exist - censored data about the various personal files collected by the HVA were given to the FRG authorities and other NATO partners. Due to superannuating, these data can only be used for prosecution in a few insignificant cases. But these HVA files still attract German media attention and are continually exploited to incite waves of espionage hysteria.

The "disclosures" about the supposedly recently decoded data carriers SIRA containing information collected by the HVA serve the same purpose. The use or, rather, the misuse of this information has thus far led only to the rehashing of well-known and already concluded criminal processes, which have now become the subject of political manipulation in Germany. Similar use is being made in some western European countries of the information in British Professor Chr. Andrews' book about the ominous Mitrochin Report and the highest officials of the KGB, through further discrimination and open censure, and new waves of lies, slander, and distortions. A proper historical judgement of the security policies of the GDR under the influence of the Cold War and the development of German-German post-war history have thereby been blocked. The ruling circles in the FRG have brutally applied their politically motivated versions of history to the destruction of all GDR structures, including even discrimination and prosecution of its elites. In this regard, the former Minister of Justice (and former president of the foreign intelligence service) Dr. Klaus Kinkel stated on German Judge's Day, September 23, 1991, that: "I know very well that the courts alone cannot do all the work which needs to be done. But a substantial part of it must be done by them. There is no alternative. I am counting on German justice. We must succeed in de-legitimizing the SED regime, which has to the bitter end justified itself by its antifascist orientation, and its dedication to higher values and alleged absolute humanity. Meanwhile, under the guise of Marxist-Leninism, it built a state that was in every sense as horrific as fascist Germany, a state that was defeated and that, rightfully, should never be allowed to exist again."

Criminalization of former agents and colleagues

At the international negotiations, the representatives of the federal government had no apparent reaction to the warnings of the Soviet negotiating partners not to pursue legal prosecution of the "VIPS" in the GDR. The reunification treaty provided that all complaints against citizens of the FRG would be handled according to the law in the GDR, which was in effect at the time the alleged activity had occurred. In regard to any eventual prosecutions of GDR espionage, massive political and legal doubts were expressed in 1990 by several leading representatives of the federal government as well as respected academics; these activities were categorised as "offences conditional to the division" whose prosecution after unification was considered absurd. Dr. Schauble, at the time Minister of the Interior and head negotiator of the unification treaty stated: "I cannot imagine that in a reunified Germany, we put erstwhile agents of the other side in prison. What I also cannot imagine is that we put collaborators of the GDR in prison and don't do it the other way around. We are talking here about conditional offences that must be declared unprosecutable." Similar statements were made by the former federal president, Richard von Weizsacker: "In cases where there was…clear espionage, we must bear in mind that this was done both on this side and the other side and, therefore, they must be handled in a parallel manner."

Nonetheless, in 1990 and the years following, a strange constellation of political forces, members of the highest circles of the Socialist Party of Germany (SPD) parliamentarians, thwarted a legal regulation prohibiting the prosecution of spy activities for the GDR. Abusing the binding regulations of the reunification treaty concerning the application of GDR law, the federal German courts formulated adventurous reconstruction's - even in their highest judicial decisions - in order to enable massive prosecutions in the area of politics, military, judiciary and secret service of those presumed responsible in the GDR. Often, a simple judicial ruling nullified the international principles of a constitutional state, e.g., regulations on the superannuating of criminal offences.

Due only to widespread domestic and foreign protests, inquiries by the uneasy lower courts to the federal constitutional court resulted, in May 1995 (after almost all the processes against agents and collaborators of the GDR had been completed), in a decision by an outwardly close majority vote taken by this highest Federal German court. In principle, the Constitutional Court prohibited the further prosecution (with a few exceptions) of the head officials of the foreign intelligence services of the GDR, but gave an unrestricted green light to the prosecution of sources of foreign reconnaissance among the citizens of the old FRG.

A final survey by the federal prosecutor's office showed that since 1990, 7,099 cases had been initiated for espionage on behalf of the GDR, of which 4,171 were citizens of the former GDR and 2,928 citizens of the former FRG. According to the data, only 82 complaints against GDR citizens had been finally filed, resulting in 23 convictions and 22 prison sentences (which were partially suspended). These numbers indicate the insubstantiality of the complaints, but neglect to address the torment of those affected and their families during these processes, which lasted for years. 388 complaints were filed against citizens of the former Federal Republic of Germany and 252 sentences were passed. Of those, 51 received sentences longer than two years. In many cases (since 1994 nine), sentences of 9-12 years were given for "treason".
More than 700 cases were partially suspended in lieu of monetary fines up to 100,000 German marks. The prosecuting authorities of the Federal Republic of Germany point to the large number of suspensions of processes due to lack of proof or minimal responsibility; that is, to the relatively high proportion of suspended sentences, in order to prove their "humanitarian stance" toward the prosecution of espionage for the GDR. They are silent, however, about the burdens which resulted for the accused, their family members, and the witnesses who were exposed to police and prosecutorial investigations, and about the social and financial burdens which arose due to court and attorney costs.

The criminal prosecution for intelligence activities on behalf of the GDR is classified with a general group of prosecutions of so-called government and reunification crimes, for which a special prosecutor as well as a special police apparat was formed. Through these special government agencies, more than 100,000 people were processed. The central processing authorities introduced approximately 23,000 such cases and in each of the new federal states, the number of preliminary proceedings was about 20,000 to 30,000; that is, an overall figure for the GDR of at least 150,000 preliminary proceedings. The treatment of MfS employees and agents of the MfS was a significant chapter in the process of incorporation of the GDR the FRG.
The reunification treaty of August 31, 1990 (Document 1, Chapter XIX, Paragraph III, Number 5) contains a regulation for special terminations of employment of individuals in public service. In addition to charges of violating basic human principles and constitutional law, a further and more important justification for special terminations of employees was if "they had been active in respect to the former MfS". If so, "the termination of employment is not unreasonable." Demands for a case by case examination were consistently ignored and a priori every activity for the MfS was used as grounds for termination. This led to thousands of terminations, all the way from employees in transportation services, city sanitation, and landlords, to porters in schools and museums and janitorial workers in health care institutions. A large number of highly qualified colleagues in these subordinate positions of the MfS were terminated, true to the motto of the changing GDR: "Put Stasi to work" (Editor note: Stasi, State Security Services).

Specific forms of isolation and discrimination toward former agents of the Ministry of State Security occurred as a result of the activities of the "Federal Office in Charge of the Documents of the State Security Service of the former GDR" (an agency which was called the Gauck-office, after its director, Hans-Joachim Gauck, a former pastor in Rostock). This agency acted as a tool of war in order to continue the cold war by abusing the files and reservoirs of the Ministry of State Security. The subordination of this agency to the Federal Ministry of the Interior is undemocratic, and violates the will of the last Peoples' Chamber of the GDR, which intended, after motions for the establishment of such an agency were passed, that it be subservient to an organ controlled by Parliament. Meanwhile, this agency grew to over 3,000 employees and a yearly budget of approximately 250 million marks. A particularly critical evaluation must be given to the dubious "professional activities" of the Gauck office, due to its politically motivated "pre-arrangement" of the available documents and the corresponding "judgements" on these materials. These evaluations and judgements were utilised as political instruments within the context of the already cited "de-legitimisation" of the GDR, and affected leading personalities of the left wing parties in Germany, e.g., the fraction chairman of the Party of Democratic Socialism, Dr. Gregor Gysi.

The unrestrained access enjoyed by the wealthy media institutions and some representatives of the former civilian movements to the "Gauck - Office" documents permitted the targeted abuse of selected materials for political purposes. This serves to continually inflame public opinion and leads - as in many other cases - to a reversal of the burden of proof for those affected; after their public defamation, they are then expected to prove their innocence.

After the Federal Constitutional Court prohibited criminal prosecution of the head officials of the news service of the GDR for espionage, the Federal Courts were forced to suspend the six-year prison sentence they had already imposed on me in 1993. The seven months long first process conducted against me in Dusseldorf was a complete sham, since it was initiated at a time when other courts had suspended similar trials and when the constitutional courts were investigating their legitimacy. Certain of my defence motions were rejected. So that the criminal prosecution would not have to be abandoned after the forced suspension of the sentence, the case was sent back to the same court wherein the first unconstitutional judgement had been passed. The second trial, which lasted until May of 1997, was a true farce. This time, charges were filed for "deprivation of freedom" in three of the cases which dated back to the 1950s, in order to reach a completely absurd verdict based on GDR laws, by which the valid superannuating could be ignored. These cases were on such slippery ground that even a high official of the Operations Directorate of the Central Intelligence Agency reacted in a letter to me, and I used his quote in my final summation: "The 'kidnapping' charge, as presented by the authorities, is laughable - any of us who were engaged in espionage during the Cold War could be charged with the same ridiculous accusation." The sentence which was brought after the five-month long trial was two years probation, which meant a bitter defeat for the accusers. I could forget this sentence and the years that were robbed from me and my family were it not for the criminal prosecutions and violations of the constitutional principle of "equality before the law" which continue to this day, and for whose discontinuation I argued in my final summary and still argue.

The FRG officials have enthusiastically rehabilitated - claiming unjust political harassment - and provided generous compensations to properly and constitutionally sentenced spies, agents, "handlers", and terrorists - including criminals - who were charged during the 40-year existence of the GDR. The Constitution of the FRG (Article 3, "equality before the law") which is a recognised norm of international law, has thereby been violated in the most profound manner. Criminal prosecutions which are to be found in every sovereign state are now subject to political evaluations (espionage for the West is good and to be valued; espionage for the East is bad and to be punished).

Political gesture needed to remove vestiges of Cold War

Ten years after German state unification, the criminal prosecution of agents of GDR foreign intelligence continues, and there are still instances of social degradation in the area of pensions, chronic unemployment, and clear material penalties. However, this does not apply only to Germany. In the USA and other NATO states, people accused of having had contacts with GDR foreign intelligence are being persecuted. Many of the prime agents of my service are serving inhumanely high sentences in the USA. One example is the Turkish citizen Hussein Yildirim, who was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. He has already served eleven years for an act which countless American agents committed in our state. These American agents of the Cold War are all free. In another case involving a very high sentence, the American secret services illegally kidnapped in 1991 a former member of the US Army, James Carney, who was then living in Germany, returned him to the USA, and sentenced him to a more than thirty-year term of imprisonment. This was a true case of kidnapping, in contrast to the cases attributed to me!

During my time at the head of the service, we were successful in every case in freeing arrested officers and agents through exchange operations. The large number of Western agents arrested in the GDR made this possible. It was in part a very complicated "ring action" in which attorneys, above all from the GDR, FRG and the USA, were involved. We are now deprived of this possibility and, therefore, the only opportunity to rid myself of this moral burden is to appeal to the American colleagues, - we are still bound by mutual respect and with some, even a new friendship has developed - to the American public, and the American President, to close this not yet concluded chapter of the Cold War. The President of the USA would lose nothing by pardoning the 72-year-old Turkish citizen, Yildirim; in fact, he would benefit by making this humanitarian gesture.

The thousands of men and women who have experienced massive violations of basic principles of democracy and constitutionality due to the way they, as former employees of the ministry or agents, have been handled in the FRG, will not easily overcome these violations. This state of affairs also contributes to the ongoing lack of German "inner unity" which the political public deplores.

The former leaders of the Foreign Intelligence Department of the GDR, as well as the former head of the Military Reconnaissance of the National People's Army of the GDR, therefore took the opportunity, on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of German reunification, to send a letter to the German Federal President, Johannes Rau, and once more call attention to the necessity to implement the "equality before the law" regulations of our Constitution in reference to the colleagues and sources of the foreign intelligence services of the GDR. The letter summed up with the following:
"In view of the historical roots of the rivalry between the two Germanys, as well as the cessation of the East West confrontation, could not a political gesture be made which would put an end to the criminal prosecutions and social isolation in order to promote a spirit of reconciliation?

"We ask you, Honorable Mr. President, to use your high offices in the realisation of this gesture."

Such an act by the Federal Republic of Germany could be an incentive for other countries, particularly the USA, to remove the vestiges of the Cold War dating from the time of the bloc confrontation. It would serve at the same time to inhibit the continuation of the Cold War in other forms, so that a more tolerant relationship between the states and peoples can be effected in the future.

Source: http://www.nsf-journal.hr/issues/v1_n2/wolf.htm


Gauck and the "Gauck-Commission"

My battle with Gauck and the "Gauck-Commission"

Gauck Gores The Internet                           

...Alant Jost living in Berlin, who has found a simple method to anger the BStU - thus the official abbreviation of the agency. He registered for himself the internet domain name "Gauck.de", and posted in the internet critical articles and press reports. He also used a graphic of the opening website of the agency to illustrate their choice in pictures, thus depicting the manner and diction of the agency, so he explained to Junge Welt

Here the original German version  

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 

Here an article from a Swiss writer attacking Gauck and the "Gauck-Commission"

Biedermann and Arsonist

No Institution since the annexation of the GDR to the BRD has so sharply been criticized as the "Bureau of the Federal Authority in charge of the Documents of the State Security Service of the Former German Democratic Republic", generally referred to simply as the "Gauck-Commission". Documents forwarded from this agency to officials in the New-States (formerly the East German states) showing a citizen's connection with the Ministry of State Security (MfS) often leads to job termination. 

...It is the intent of the government to distract disillusioned people over the miserable consequences of re-unification by discrediting every aspect of the GDR. But the practices of the agency are not only a pain for those affected, but for all those who had no dealings with the Stasi-apparatus at all, but simply got mentioned in their files...

...Joachim Gauck studied in Rostock theology and was active as a community pastor in Mecklenburg. During the events, leading to unification, he was one of the founders of the "New Forum" and for a few months was part of the last Volkskammer (Peoples Chamber in the GDR). The television-critic Peter Hoff: "This man gives one a chill, Gauck exudes the most horrendous self-righteousness, a feeling of coldness, reminiscent of the few encounters I've had with the powerful elite in East Germany". Behind this smooth manners lies a fanatic...

...Considering such degusting practices, who can still wonder, that the granddaddy of contemporary German literature, Stefan Heym, has accused the Gauck-Commission of being "worse" than the "middle aged Inquisition". This reminds the writer Stefan Heym of the persecution of the Jews in the so-called  "Thousand Year Reich"...

Here the original German version  

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PANORAMA: Germany Pays Billions to Nazi War Criminals while (for example) people like former East Germany's United Nations representative Peter Florin have their pensions illegally eliminated or shortened. 

...Billions of Marks from German taxpayers are being paid to Nazi war criminals and are called "victim" pensions. A spokesman for the German Ministry of Labor confirmed that additional assistance money is being spent on war criminals but claimed that nothing could be changed because of constitutional reasons. 

Yet to prosecute and discriminate against former GDR citizens no stone is left unturned. Retroactive law is applied, the statute of limitations is ignored and the principles of the Unification Treaty between East and West Germany are thoroughly disregarded. All of it illegal and unconstitutional, but simply sanctioned, after the fact as proper, by Germany's highest court! However, in addition to hiding behind Germany's constitution when paying former SS Nazi war-criminals generous benefits, when the issue is considering compensation for the victims of forced labor under Hitler's terror state, by concerns such as Degussa AG, Allianz AG and Deutsche Bank AG, these corporations are afforded legal backing by the German Government against the claims of the victims, many of which are filed in American courts. Most recently, in the District court of New Jersey, on behalf of Degussa AG, Germany's "Green" Foreign Minister Joseph Fischer, filed a "Brief of Amicus Curiae" arguing among other things "Industry was forced to meet goals established for the production of material for the war economy and all other goals set by the Nazi regime. The more important economic activity became to the conduct of the war and to the destructive plans of the Nazis the more difficult it became to circumvent the demands made by the State. This applies in particular to the former Degussa which had a monopoly in the area of refining metals."

 

This is part of the material you will find an my site If you feel as I, and many others do, that the West - German anti-communists have an axe to grind and are the wrong people to sit in judgment of their former enemy, then I hope the material below will help you strengthen your arguments against this Siegerjustiz. At one point, feeling particularly cynical about this self-righteous German attitude, I expressed it in the following way: 

It seems to me, that in addition to the general desire to down play the atrocities of the Holocaust by playing them off against the inhumanities of the East German regime, the rationale is clear, either on a conscious, or more ominously, on a subconscious level: mama and papa, or grandma and grandpa, couldn't have been that bad, even if they were Nazis, after all the Nazis fought the communist! Thus, attempting to justify, at least partially the Nazi state, but certainly the massive reintegration of Nazis, many of them high ranking SS criminals, into the new West German state after 1945. How else can one explain the statement by Klaus Kinkel, [the then acting justice minister] that "the state which was established in accordance with the thinking of Marxism-Leninism was as inhuman as Nazi Germany."

I would like to thank in advance everyone who will send me articles, documents, or Links relevant to this topic, which I will be glad to post onto my website. In time I hope this website will develop into a valuable research tool.

 

I do not mean to trivialize the hurt and suffering victims of East Germany have had to endure. But having West-German judges judge East-German citizens is like having Ronald Reagan sit in judgment on former members of the Politburo of the Soviet Union, not only the illegality would be unacceptable. But this is what has happened in Germany. Therefore, these hateful acts of ideologically motivated vengeance against former East Germans (notwithstanding the nevertheless real concern for the victims) have to be researched and publicized (awareness of this "Siegerjustiz" is particularly lacking in the non-German speaking world) as well as the accompanying demeaning acts of slander against former East German citizens trying to integrate themselves into the political system of reunited Germany. Particularly repugnant are the comparisons that have been made comparing the Jewish leader of the PDS, Gregor Gysi, with Nazi criminals such as Joseph Göbbels, Hitler's propaganda minister and Hans Globke, the official commentator to the Nuremberg race laws (in the case of Joseph Göbbels by none other than the then practicing Finance Minister Theo Waigel). Unacceptable is the general desire by most Germans (particularly the German Right) to compare the GDR with Hitler's Third Reich. No amount of often de-humanizing polemics seems to be spared.

Since most research done in Germany on former East Germany tends to be done to confirm a black and white stereotypic view of a "solely benevolent non-aggressive" West German state in a ceaseless 40 year struggle against an "evil totalitarian" East German regime, I will concentrate here exclusively on gathering material that expounds upon a one-sided, vengeful and illegal prosecution/persecution of former East German citizens. Those who want a more official and popular view of the West-German state's (not one judge is from the former East-Germany) prosecution of former East German citizens need only use any of a number of the popular German Internet Search Engines to find, for example, in articles by the Berliner Morgenpost, articles with such telling headlines as "Von Siegerjustiz keine Spur", Victor's Justice - Not a Trace. To the extent that victims of the former East German regime need to be compensated, let the current German regime scrap the wasteful Euro-Fighter and spend the money instead on compensation. Those prosecuted and persecuted in West-Germany in the name of anti-communism would also be pleased to await compensation. West-German courts are the wrong place to work through the history of the Cold War. 

Alant Jost

July 2000

E-mail me at: alantjost@geocities.com

 

November 16th, 1997

An den

Bundesminister des Innern

Bonn

 

The meeting of the All India Anti-Imperialist Forum on the 16th of November 1997 attended by delegates from all over India and also from abroad took serious notice of the growing and dangerous repression affecting people from various political and social strata in Germany.

The participants of the meeting were strongly concerned about the unjustified witch-hunt and illegal prosecution of political and state representatives of the former German Democratic Republic.

The meeting therefore strongly demanded the immidiate and unconditional release from prison of the former GDR Defense Minister Heinz kessler, the former Commander of the GDR Border-Troops Baumgarte, the "Agent for Peace" Rainer Rupp and all political prisoners in German Jails.

The participants of the meeting of the All India Anti-Imperialist Forum

Übersetzung

Die Konferenz des Allindischen Anti-Imperialistischen Forums am 16. November 1997 mit Delegierten aus ganz Indien und auch aus dem Ausland nahm mit Besorgnis Kenntnis von der wachsenden und gefährlichen Repression, von der in Deutschland Menschen verschiedener politischer und sozialer Schichten betroffen sind.

Die Teilnehmer der Konferenz waren sehr beunruhigt über die ungerechtfertigte Hexenjagd auf und illegalen Anklagen gegen politische und staatliche Repräsentanten der früheren Deutschen Demokratischen Republik.

Deshalb verlangte die Konferenz mit Nachdruck die unverzügliche und bedingungslose Freilassung des früheren Verteidigungsministers der DDR Heinz Keßler, des früheren Kommandanten der DDR-Grenztruppen Baumgarte, des "Kundschafters des Friedens" Rainer Rupp aus dem Gefängnis und aller politischen Gefangenen in deutschen Gefängnissen.

Die Teilnehmer der Konferenz des Allindischen Anti-Imperialistsichen Forums

<<

East German leaders jailed

Germany: Appeal to world jurists

Scapegoating GDR Research? A Commentary by Thomas A. Baylis The fall of Communism in eastern Germany, as elsewhere in Eastern Europe, has brought with it a rather ugly outburst of scapegoating. [...]One of the targets of righteous venom has been Western GDR research, particularly that carried on by scholars influenced directly or indirectly by the late Peter Christian Ludz. One of the more visible symbols of the assault on pre- 1989 GDR research has been the demise, at the Free University of Berlin, of the GDR section of the Institute for Social Science Research, once led by Ludz himself, earlier by Ernst Richert, and later by Hartmut Zimmermann, three scholars who arguably contributed more to a subtle and realistic understanding of the GDR than anyone else. A corresponding counter-symbol is the formation of a Forschungsverbund SED-Staat at the Free University with the explicit purpose of discrediting earlier GDR research as well as uncovering evidence of SED penetration of the University... 

Thomas A. Baylis - Past President of the Eastern German Studies Group - Austin, TX. See also: Der »Forschungsverbund SED-Staat« hat sich reichlich bedient - in German


Comments

of the Society for the Protection of Civil Rights and Human Dignity (GBM) on the fourth periodic report of the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany on the implementation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, with special regard to the concluding observations adopted by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights on 2 December 1998, and in view of the Committee´s consideration of the report in August 2001
___________________________________________________________________________

 

DECLARATION: Discrimination and Persecution in the Federal Republic of Germany of former citizens of the German Democratic Republic

Rainer Rupp Political Prisoner in Germany "Open Letter"

Alant Jost's letter to Oskar Lafontaine responding to the "Open Letter"

Alant Jost's Siegerjustiz article - FROM THE HORSES MOUTH!! ...To ignore the security aspects of the border regime, both in terms of military defense where a Third World War fought with nuclear weapons was always a real threat, or in terms of economic security, where the far superior economic resources of the West were systematically used to undermine the economic existence of the East German state in a continual act of economic warfare is to ignore the most fundamental causes for the East German border regime in the first place. In any court of law such factors would at least be considered as "mitigating circumstances"- strafmildernde Umstände. But as can be expected, not so with these West-German judges; instead any such reference is ignored or criticized as an attempt to "hide behind the Cold War" or as "an attempt by the perpetrators to present themselves as the victims"...

 

Letters:

.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................

 
From: Chrns@cs.com Adresse speichern Absender blockieren
To: alantjost@hotmail.com Adresse speichern
Subject: Was the DDR so bad?
Date: Wed, 16 Feb 2000 19:15:44 EST
Antworten Allen antworten Weiterleiten Löschen Vorherige Nächste Schließen

Alan - I am a Jew who has studied the DDR.  (Es tut mir leid, aber mein'
Deutsch ist jetzt sehr schlecht.  Ich kann noch ein bisschen verstehen,
sprechen u. schreiben - leider hab' ich viel vergesst!)

I do not think the DDR or the SED were the monsters made out by the Western
press.  Not only is Gregor Gysi - the PDS leader - a Jew, but so was the
DDR's foreign minister (a short man - sehr dicke! - whose name I cannot
offhand remember).

The DDR was founded by good Germans, who retained the liberal German
traditions, who rejected and fought against Nazism and anti-Semitism.
Whatever Walter Ulbricht's faults were, anti-Semitism was not among them, and
the same can be said of Erich Honecker and certainly of Hans Modrow.  The
DDR's justice against Nazi criminals was certain and swift - especially
compared to the Bundesrepublik, whose "justice" would be laughable if it
weren't so disgusting.

What also troubles me greatly is that the Western media showed the DDR always
in the worst possible manner.  No one troubled to mention that in the DDR,
there was no hunger, no homelessness, no crime, universal health care, superb
education provided by the State, programs for youth - in part through the FDJ
- to develop into good adults, without the corrupting influence of Western
decadence.

A re-examination of the DDR's place in history is long overdue.  I'm glad
you're one of the people brave enough to challenge the conventional wisdom
about it!

Sincerely,

K. Tschirnhaus

 

--------------------------------------------------

>RE: Victor's Justice

>Greetings

>I am a German/Canadian student at the Free University in Berlin. I make no bones about it, I consider the present German judicial proceedings against former
>GDR officials as "Siegerjustiz" - Victor's Justice, and have dedicated a considerable amount of my Homepages to the subject. Thus, I am looking for
>Siegerjustiz articles or links to post onto my Homepages. If you could send me some articles (particularly in English) for my Homepages I would be very
>appreciative.

>Sincerely,

>Alant Jost

I couldn't agree with you more! What are you studying in Berlin. I was a student there myself in the early 70's at the Kunsthochschule Weissensee. I couldn't believe the changes when I visited for the first time last summer. In particular, I couldn't believe that Ossis are paid 80% of Wessis in Berlin and that it is legal.

Check out the page of Spotless Verlag. A good friend of mine, Klaus Huhn, is the publisher and I'm sure at least one of his books will address your theme.

www.spotless.de

Keep up the good work! -- Flora Doehler, Toronto

Spotless Verlag ... Joachim Gauck (from the Federal government assigned top Stasi- ((former East German secret police)) files administrator) plays the role assigned to him splendidly in eager obedience to the Federal government, and without a trace of Christian love. More than anything else the Pastor seems caught up in Old-testament like feelings of vengefulness. Could this have something to do with his own Stasi-file, ...? The suspicion lingers that his own feelings of guilt are so to be compensated. ... [This is indeed a good tip, to bad, but for this little translation, its all in German. Joachim Gauck is also another one of the German officials who loves to compare the GDR with Hitler's Third Reich.]

 

--------------------------------------------------

>RE: Victor's Justice [...]

Alant -- I don't have reference to any articles in particular, but am interested in reviewing your homepages. It is hard to find English articles on the subject in the USA. As far as possible homepage links, the Eastern German Studies Group has several, and Land Sachsen had a page for Stasi Opfer/Joachim Gauck files -- this may give you more links to further your research. Good luck with your project. -- Tom Conlon, St. Paul, Minnesota

Eastern German Studies Group

This website is run by Randall Bytwerk from the Department of Communication Arts and Sciences at Calvin College Grand Rapids, Michigan. The only article related in some way to the subject of "Siegerjustiz" from this (otherwise extensive website) that I could find, was the one listed above Scapegoating GDR Research? A Commentary by Thomas A. Baylis. It deals with the very biased research at the Free University in Berlin. As a student studying political science at the Free University now for more then 5 years, I can say that except for a very few professors, I have to agree with everything Thomas A. Baylis has written in his fine article.

 

--------------------------------------------------

>RE: Victor's Justice [...]

That's not an issue that I've followed very carefully, so nothing comes immediately to mind. I'll file your note and let you know if I see anything. -- Randall Bytwerk

 

As can be surmised from the material above there is hauntingly little research done on the subject of "Siegerjustiz" in the English speaking world. It seems to me, however, that the accusation of "Siegerjustiz" -Victor's Justice, is certainly not without foundation. I am thus grateful for any information (particularly in English) on the subject.

..................................................................................................................................................

 

 

Following are four articles translated by George Pumphrey and one written by George Pumphrey and Klaus Eichner

Markus Wolf's Opening Statement before the Regional Court of Appeals, Düsseldorf, May 4, 1993 (Translated from the original German by George Pumphrey)

Markus Wolf's Final Statement before the Regional Court of Appeals, Düsseldorf, Nov. 24, 1993 (Translation: George Pumphrey)

A Look at the State of German Political Justice As Seen Through the Trial of Markus Wolf: By Klaus Eichner and George Pumphrey "Treason can be committed only by a citizen against his own state. Mr. Wolf was not a citizen of the Federal Republic of Germany." (Buruma, Ian, "The Spymaster in a Kangaroo Court", New York Times, 8.12.93)

"It seems to me bizarre that a fellow who was doing a job for his country as he saw it, should be prosecuted later by his enemies, ... Its revenge because he did such a good job against them." Richard Helms, former CIA Director. (Jackson, James O. "A Spy without a Country", Time, 20.12.93)

The Persecution of Markus Wolf: An Attempt at Rewriting German History: By George Pumphrey Already between 1989 and 1992, 3,888 indictment investigations were initiated under "high treason" related charges...

Under guise of "not allowing the communists to get off as easy as the Nazis" the "book-burners" in the FRG administration are attempting to rehabilitate fascist Germany as not having been more odious, or more barbarous than GDR socialism.

Dear Visitors:

This memorial had been erected and arranged by the communist rulers previous to Perestroika
and the transformation in remembrance of the victims of Nazi criminals. The downfall of the
communist dictatorship and the unification in peace and freedom has rendered it possible to
commemorate also those, who, after 1945 in the resistance to Soviet occupation and the GDR
State of Injustice, sacrificed their freedom, health and their lives. The necessary reorganization
of this memorial is currently in the process of being completed.

THE MEMORIAL'S ADMINISTRATION

A large panel bearing this inscription greets visitors coming to pay respects at the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp Memorial, near Berlin.

Sachsenhausen, Buchenwald, Ravensbrück, just to name the best known Nazi concentration camp memorials in the former GDR, are where the federal and regional governments are engaged in the transformation of anti-fascist memorials to "anti-totalitarian" memorials, placing on a par, the hundreds or possibly thousands, who died from the post-war conditions under the Soviets, with the millions who were deliberately killed under Hitler.

No mention is made of the fact that mainly Germans were kept in these camps - in the West as well - who were believed to have been Nazi criminals! According to the panel in the Sachsenhausen Memorial, they have once again been promoted to "freedom fighters"...

Personal Statement of Dr. Hans Modrow At his Trial before the Third Criminal Chamber of the State Court of Dresden April 1993 (Translation from the original German by George Pumphrey) ... In Freestate Saxony, the majority of the judges, and prosecutors, are also West German jurists. After all, it goes without saying, that one couldn't leave the incriminated SED jurists in office - not like they did before in the West Germany with the Nazi jurists. This is why in Freestate Saxony, hardly a Saxon can be found administering justice. In all of the significant positions in government and administration, in business and media as well as in the political parties - in practically all areas of public life, one finds the same situation. And this is basically the situation to be found - with a minor difference here or there - in Thuringia, Saxony-Anhalt, Mecklenburg-Western Pommerania and also in Brandenburg...

... Even the domestic situation was portrayed with bias in the Berghofer verdict. That the "numerous activities of the small, opposition and human rights groups, mainly active under the aegis of the church" did not have the elimination of the GDR and socialism as their objective was passed over in silence. Stefan Heym, who was certainly to be counted as being one of them, coined the phrase: "'And that,' say those who demonstrated on Berlin's Alexanderplatz for a new democratic order, 'was not what we wanted'." The legally binding verdict states that only Berghofer and myself, considered "reforms inevitable, nevertheless with the objective, of stabilizing that system". The bias in this differentiation is obvious. The Berghofer verdict resets the accents through evaluating the importance of the forces of opposition in the GDR, to the disadvantage of the reform forces inside the SED. The most threatening onslaughts for each of the presiding party leaders, in fact, originated inside the party's own ranks. Names like Paul Merker, Wolfgang Harich, Walter Janka, Herbert Crüger, the Bortfeldt brothers, Rudolf Bahro and others, demonstrate this. The severity of the sentences pronounced against them at their trials are another proof. Anyone interested in learning the truth, can not deliberately ignore the resistance inside the ranks of the SED. The process of coming to terms with history, is doomed to failure if the cold war, the activities of the FRG and its allies in this dispute, and the opposition in the SED remain unconsidered...

... Remaining with Brandt [Willy Brandt --Mayor of West-Berlin from 1957-1966, Foreign Minister from 1966-1969, Chancellor of Germany from 1969-1974, and head of the SPD from 1964-1987] for the moment, he probably "hit the nail on the head" in 1991, when he observed: "I remember how everyone would applaud when the name Gorbachev was mentioned. If I remember right, he was communist, like Modrow. The Hungarian Foreign Minister, Gyula Horn, who was awarded the Karlsprize, was a communist. Modrow did his part to insure that we would make it through the difficult 1989/1990 transition period without bloodshed. In other countries this was honored. Why not in ours?"...

-----------------------------------------------

 

PDS International  Defend people's political and social rights by democratic means
Letter to Former German Federal President Richard von Weizsäcker (August 1998)

... Our contribution to resolving the substantial political and human problems
It has been made difficult for us in the past years. In the name of liberality we have been pushed aside in an illiberal manner. Many of our members and sympathisers, many citizens of East Germany have lost their jobs or had their pensions curtailed under the catch phrase of "closeness to the State" - without any constitutional investigation of individual responsibility and guilt. Thousands of East Germans lost their plots of land and their homes.

WEST'S PURSUIT OF STASI JUDASES IGNORES ITS OWN CULT OF THE INFORMER East Germans are tired of what they regard as a western-led witch-hunt. They see the west asserting a moral prerogative, judging them by harsher criteria than were ever applied to westerners. The ploughing-over of the Stasi past is a way of demonstrating the spiritual poverty of the east and the right to leadership of the west. It is not about a recently united nation coming to terms with itself and its past, but rather a divisive factor. Tom Burghardt (tburghardt@igc.apc.org) Mon, 13 Apr 1998 A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C E


On Germany's foot dragging concerning compensation to slave labor

Entschädigung: Rot-grüne Bundesregierung hintergeht jüdische Opfer and German Firms and the Third Reich and Bundesregierung bestätigt Einflussnahme auf US-Gerichte zu Ungunsten von Zwangsarbeiterinnen und Zwangsarbeitern  and Zwangsarbeit: Neue Verhandlungsgrundlagen nötig and Jüdische NS-Opfer in Osteuropa warten noch and NS-Zwangsarbeit: Degussa heißt Zyklon B und Zahngold and Anmerkungen zu amicus curiae Brief der Bundesregierung. and German Economy Foundation Initiative: "Remembrance, Responsibility and the Future" and What It Was Like To Be A Forced Laborer According to German Negotiators "We don't understand what all of this fuss is about; we fed them, we clothed them, we sheltered them, and the fact that they survived is a testament to how well they were treated." German Delegation - International Conference on Forced Labor - Bonn, Germany - September 1999. and "At least one [worker] described the two years he was forced to work on a German farm as among the best years of his life." Wolfgang Gibowski, - spokesperson for the German Economy Foundation Initiative 


In Berlin, after 36 years, a case goes to trial   The case of East German border guard Reinhold Paul Huhn

December 14, 1998
Web posted at: 2:32 a.m. EST (0732 GMT)
    

BERLIN (CNN) -- The trial of a former East German refugee who shot a border guard while escaping
 to the West in 1962 during the Cold War, begins Monday in this now-united city.

Rudolf Mueller, 67, was a young baker when he fled with his family by tunneling under the then-new Berlin Wall....

Berlin Wall
A portion of the Berlin Wall


DEADLY SHOTS

BERLIN | CONFLICTS | CONTROVERSY | SOCIETY | GERMAN-REUNIFICATION | WAR & PEACE


by Rea Karen & Gernot Steinweg
18th June 1962: the 20 year old East German border guard Reinhold Paul Huhn is shot dead when making a routine control at the Berlin Wall in front of the publishing house of the mighty West-German press tycoon Axel-Springer. Whilst the murderer escapes and is hidden by West-Berlin police and American agents the western media accuse another East German border guard to have fired the deadly shots. A huge propaganda campaign is started, showing effects right to the present day. Ten years after German reunification, and nearly for decades after the crime the case comes up in court. Interviews with the murderer, eye witnesses and experts as well as historical documents reveal the mechanisms of the Cold War beyond the limits of law.

 

 

44min | DigiBeta | German version with English textlist

German title: TÖDLICHE SCHÜSSE

Production:
Picture Pan Production
Gernot Steinweg
Genterstr. 6
D-50672 Cologne
Germany
tel. (+49) 221-952 4771
fax: (+49) 221-952 4772


BOOK LIST

Absolution

Note: I am not trying to justify the repression that took place in the GDR, but it is a.) exaggerated by the West, and by many of the former dissidents of the East and b.) the West's own repression done in the name of anti-communism is rarely, if ever, subject to political or judicial review.

Gauck Links: Gauck.de Gauck.de These won't work anymore (!!!) see instead: http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Lobby/9362/gauck

The attempts by the "Gauck-Officials" to politically assassinate the former GDR citizen and current PDS Jewish politician Greger Gysi by struggling to denounce him as a "Stasi spy" led me to acquire the domain name Gauck.de as a means of documenting the "Gauck-Officials" relentless attempts at destroying him politically. As a result, the German court in Berlin has forbidden me to register or use ANY TOP LEVEL domain with "Gauck" in it. Since, I will not voluntary relent my right to protest in this way, I am forced to carry many thousands of Euros of lawyer's fees, and face penalties from the state and possible imprisonment. The ruling by the court effectively sets a precedent that would allow Hitler (if he were living today) to outlaw a critique of his politics using a domain name such as Hilter.de, Hitler.com, Hitler.org, Hitler.net, Hitler.co.il (domain for Israel), or any possible combination of Hilter.xxx or Adolf-Hitler.xxx. This ruling is not only a violation of my intellectual property rights, but an attempt to curtail dissent and free speech. My struggle against this ruling will continue. See also: http://siegerjustiz.de/gauck_gysi.htm (mostly in German). It should be noted that more people have committed suicide after being humiliated, disgraced and denied job opportunities, due to the defaming tactics (often with little or no concrete incriminating evidence) from the "Gauck Officials", than were ever killed trying to leave East Germany along the Berlin Wall. The mere insinuation of ever having had anything to do, whatsoever, with the former secret services of East Germany is enough to ruin a person's personal and professional life - all transgressions done by the secret services from the western side are of course kept under lock and key.