Undesirable Christian
Political Movement
Began With 'Vision'

Hypnosis Of Hitler
May Have Affected
History Study
by Jua Nyla Hutcheson

November 20, 1998

Baton Rouge, Louisiana (Reuters) -- Adolf Hitler's belief he was meant to rule the world may have stemmed in part from a hypnotic suggestion given during treatment for hysterical blindness in 1918, a Louisiana psychiatrist said in the November Journal of Forensic Science.

Dr. David Post, a forensic psychiatrist at the state's forensics hospital in Jackson, Louisiana, based his theory on a book he believes used material from a German military hospital where Hitler was treated after he was temporarily blinded in a mustard gas attack in the First World War in October 1918.

Hitler was a corporal at the time, but the hospital records from that period were later destroyed by the Gestapo, although Hitler wrote of his sudden blindness and his resolve to enter politics if he regained his sight.

After Germany's surrender on Nov. 11, 1918, Hitler wrote that he had "a supernatural vision ... A miracle came to pass" and he could see again.

In a book called "Eyewitness" by Ernst Weiss, an exiled German doctor and novelist, a German psychiatrist in a military hospital uses hypnotic suggestion in a still-accepted medical protocol for post-traumatic stress syndrome.

He tells the patient A.H.: "I am a simple doctor. But perhaps you yourself have the rare power, which occurs only occasionally in a thousand years, to work a miracle. Jesus did it. Mohammed. The saints.... An ordinary person with such a condition would be blind for life. But for a person of particular strength and will and spiritual energy, there are no limits."

"You have to have a blind faith in yourself, then you will stop being blind ... You know that Germany needs people who have energy and blind self-confidence. Austria is at an end, but not Germany," the book passage stated. Hitler was born in Austria.

Post believes that passage was based on the German Pasewalk Military Hospital notes and records of Weiss' friend, Dr. Edmund Forster, chief of the Berlin University Nerve Clinic, who treated Hitler at Pasewalk in 1918.

"It was chilling and disturbing to me to read what I believe may have been an account of his hypnotic session," Post told Reuters.

Weiss wrote the book for a literary competition in Paris in 1933. He committed suicide as the German army marched into the city and the book was not published until the 1960s.

Weiss also was on the board of a German exiles newspaper Forster contacted in Paris in 1933, taking copies of his records from Pasewalk. Forster warned the editorial board not to be surprised if he were killed.

Shortly after returning to Germany, Post said, Forster was picked up by the Gestapo on charges of "harboring a subversive attitude toward the new (Hitler's) regime." After 13 days of interrogation, Forster was reported to have killed himself.

The records of Hitler's 29-day stay at Pasewalk later were destroyed by the Gestapo, Post said.

Although Hitler suffered what are now considered classic symptoms of mustard gas poisoning, including depression, he was diagnosed as a "psychopath with hysterical tendencies" by Forster even before the hysterical blindness, Post said.

Post is a faculty member at the Louisiana State University Medical Center in New Orleans and a former fellow in forensic psychiatry at Harvard University Medical School, where he began his research on Hitler.

Post documented connections between Weiss and Forster through interviews with historians, a Hitler biographer, a copy of a 1943 U.S. Naval Intelligence report declassified in 1973, and records of the German exiles' newspaper.

"Because of the deaths and the records' destruction, we'll never be able to prove definitively if Weiss' book is a direct account from Forster's reports or just an incorporation of key passages," Post said. "But I'm convinced the account is true."

Graphic Rule

Undesirable Christian
Political Philosophy
Still Popular

German State
Finds Investor
For Hitler Retreat

November 19, 1998

Munich (Reuters) -- The southern German state of Bavaria said Thursday it had found a private investor to turn the site of Adolf Hitler's Obersalzberg Alpine retreat near the Austrian border into a tourist attraction.

A state finance ministry spokesman said further details of the sale of the 262-acre site overlooking the town of Berchtesgaden and the tourism project would be revealed at a news conference in Munich Friday.

The Bavarian government has said an investment of $18 million would be needed to develop the mountainside retreat. Bavaria is building a historical documentation center on the site and it is due to open in mid-1999.

Obersalzberg was Hitler's official summer residence. Hitler is said to have planned Germany's 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union from the retreat. Allied bombers reduced Hitler's chalet, the Berghof, and the chalets of top Nazis Hermann Goering and Martin Bormann to ruins in the closing days of World War Two.

Each year hordes of neo-Nazis make a pilgrimage to mark Hitler's birthday there on April 20, but other "pilgrims" also come year-round, ranging from gangs of skinheads to elderly English gentlemen, local officials say.

A state-run cafe at the site some 6,000 feet above sea level is in one of a handful of buildings which survived the Allied bombing.

The U.S. army razed the ruins in 1952 and used the surviving buildings and grounds as a leisure complex until they withdrew from the site in 1995. Bavaria has been trying to find private investors for Obersalzberg ever since.

Graphic Rule

Christian Political Figure
Cast in Leading Role

Hitler Potato Chip
Ad Withdrawn

June 4, 1998

Bangkok (Reuters) -- Advertising agency Leo Burnett Bangkok has withdrawn its Thai advertising campaign for a potato chip brand which featured Adolf Hitler in the lead role.

The ad, which featured Hitler in military uniform tasting chips and giving a Nazi salute in front of a swastika flag, has triggered a growing number of public complaints and has been condemned by Israeli officials in Bangkok as "disgusting."

A Leo Burnett official said the agency regretted causing any offense and said the campaign, which was due to run until the end of June, had been withdrawn with the mutual consent of the chip company.

"The agency recognizes Hitler as one of history's most despicable dictators and never intended to suggest otherwise," a company statement added.

The agency initially defended the advertisement which it said was humorous.

The television campaign has already been withdrawn and posters on the back of Bangkok's trademark motorized rickshaws or "tuks-tuks" would be withdrawn by this Sunday, the statement said.

Graphic Rule

'Zeig Heil' Wine Honors
Christian Political Figure
by Chuck Shepherd

July, 1997

The Lundarelli family in Udine, Italy, said that it would not bow to pressure and would thus leave its Fuehrer wine on the market (joining its Guevara, Lenin, and Marx brands).

Fuehrer's label has a photo of Adolf Hitler and comes in two varieties, Zieg Heil and Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Fuehrer ("One People, One Empire, One Ruler").

Graphic Rule