H. Keith Thompson Jr.

Charles Harold Keith Thompson Jr., more familiarly known as Keith Thompson, was long a seminal influence on political and historical revisionism. Thompson’s historical revisionism was incidental to his political and ideological outlooks. Thompson sought a revival of Western civilization, and regarded German National Socialism and Italian Fascism as provisional forms of such a revival. In a previous article, I considered Thompson’s work with Francis Parker Yockey in assisting the German war veteran and post-war political leader Major General Otto E. Remer, and in opposing the postwar vengeance regime against Germany.[1] In this article, I will consider Thompson’s background and work further, in part based on the correspondence I had with him, and material he sent to me.[2]

Thompson was born in Orange, New Jersey, on September 17, 1922,[3] of Anglo-Saxon, German and Scottish descent, son of Harold K. Thompson, a printer-publisher widely respected as local Post Commander of the American Legion and active in civic affairs; and grandson of scientist and inventor George K. Thompson.[4] The German branch of the family is called Thomsen. Dr. Hans Thomsen, Keith’s cousin, was the last German chargé d’affaires in Washington prior to World War II. They worked closely together to keep the USA out of the war.[5] Indeed, it seems likely that at this time, Thompson would have been introduced to his life-long friend and mentor George Sylvester Viereck, a major figure in the American literati, who was, according to Coogan, closely involved with Hans Thomsen in campaigning to keep the USA out of the war against Germany.[6]

One of the enigmas that soon emerge about Thompson is that despite his involvement with the German-American Bund and the America First movement, as a college student in 1940 he headed a student committee supporting the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Henry Wallace to the presidency and vice presidency respectively.[7] Roosevelt was anathema to the American Right. Wallace was known for his pro-Soviet views, and would later run for the presidency for the Progressive Party, regarded as a front for the Communist Party USA.

Part of this anti-war campaign involved activities with the Friends of New Germany and the German-American Bund.[8] As a result, presumably helped by his connections with Viereck and with his cousin Dr. Hans Thomsen, Thompson was appointed special agent with the rank of SS Sturmbannfűhrer, in the SD/Overseas Intelligence Unit, on July 27, 1941.[9]

After the war Thompson explained his views as deriving in part from his descent “from a long line of Prussian field marshals,” the Keith family, of Scottish descent, who had emigrated to and served under Frederick the Great. From this he had the feeling of “pride of race,” of the “Prussian spirit,” and of Germany. At the age of 14 he became interested in politics and German history. With the rise of Hitler, he was enthused by the new regime’s “socialism” and the overthrow of the Versailles diktat. The German-American Bund was particularly active around New York and New Jersey, and Thompson joined.[10]

Having a mutual interest in philately, he had gifted a set of American stamps to King Carol II of Romania, received a reply and the two remained in communication until the exiled king’s death in 1953. Thompson toured Germany as a child and got to know Prince August Wilhelm,[11] Brigadier General in Hitler’s SA storm troopers. Thompson also maintained contact with Kaiser Wilhelm II, exiled in the Netherlands.[12] He remained in contact with Prince August until 1949, when August died prematurely as the result of imprisonment by the Allies.

At Drew College and Yale, Thompson expressed his opposition to the USA’s having fought in World War I and becoming involved in another war against Germany. His views were already “well known.”[13]

At Yale, where he was a midshipman commander with the Naval ROTC, Thompson was a member of the Political Union, a front for the American Labor Party, and headed a committee supporting the confirmation of Wallace as Secretary of Commerce. This was in 1944.

Naval Career and Harassments

Having studied naval law at Yale, Thompson held posts in the Navy associated with legal matters. He served as an administration officer of the USS Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1946, then on the USS Mount Olympus as part of the Antarctic expedition of Admiral Richard E. Byrd in 1947, after which he lectured civilian groups on the Antarctic. That year he resigned from the Navy to accept a Marine Corps commission. In 1948 he attended the founding meeting of Wallace’s Progressive Party, and resigned from the Marines to devote himself to working for Wallace.[14] From a dialectal viewpoint, which seems to be how Thompson often operated, he perhaps saw Roosevelt’s controversial nomination of Wallace as Secretary of Commerce and later of Agriculture, as a means of dividing and wrecking the Democratic Party; and his later nomination for the presidency under the Progressive ticket, as a means of dividing the liberal-Democratic vote. Certainly, there does not seem to be any point of commonality between the views of Thompson and Wallace, although Wallace became increasingly conservative from the 1950s.

Thompson alludes to his joining groups of both the “extreme Right and the moderate Left” at this time, but his “dedication to the principles of practical National Socialism” was only strengthened. [15] Appalled by the “war crimes” trials of “honorable soldiers,” “mock trials,” “the first in history,” “cold bloodedly vicious,” instigated primarily by communist and Jewish agents, Thompson began to work on individual cases from 1945, when he was still on active service. These included those of Baron Alexander von Falkenhausen, Reich governor of Belgium; Dönitz, Manstein and Kesselring, and the 1945-1947 Dachau “Flyers Case.”[16]

Thompson was regarded as a communist sympathizer during his days in the Navy and the Marine Corps, being identified by the FBI as a member of the pro-Soviet Progressive Party, and of the National Council of American-Soviet Friendship. An FBI investigation into Thompson in 1952 in regard to the correspondence he had been sending concerning imprisoned German war veteran and Socialist Reich Party leader Major General Otto E. Remer, states that Thompson was an officer in the Navy from 1942 to 1947 and a Marine Corps officer during 1948 to 1950. He was court martialled in June 1950 on charges of misconduct that controversially alleged sexual misconduct of a “deviate” (sic).

Thompson had been noted also as having associations with Communist Party members.[17]. Thompson, during his training at Marine Corps Base Quantico, was in contact with Katherine van Orden, leader of the Progressive Party for the District of Columbia, and a Communist Party functionary.[18] It was further stated that Thompson was a Progressive Party member, and a founding member of the Independent Progressive Party in New Jersey, in 1948, with van Orden.[19]

Thompson vigorously defended his court martial, receiving widespread publicity especially from the American Labor Party’s newspaper The National Guardian, which the FBI described as “Stalinist,”[20] with support from the American Civil Liberties Union. The Guardian contended that there had been widespread wire tapping and pressuring of witnesses. Thompson insisted on, and was granted, a personal hearing before Secretary of the Navy Francis Matthews in October 1950. The guilty verdict of the court martial was upheld. Thompson wrote to Matthews that he had acted contrary to his oath of office, had conspired to oust Thompson from the Navy for political reasons, and that remedies would be sought through civil action.[21] In a two-hour interview with Thompson and his attorney, Secretary Matthews did acknowledge that there were “serious errors” in the court martial.[22] An FBI report outlining his naval career commented that a Navy doctor had examined him in 1948, and found him to be physically and mentally normal, and “never has he shown evidence of a psychopathic personality.”[23] Among Thompson’s associations in the Marines was John E. Rudder, Second Lieutenant and the “only Negro officer stationed at Quantico.” “Both advocated the abolishment of segregation.” Rudder was discharged from the Marine Corps in 1949.[24]

In taking up Thompson’s case, the American Civil Liberties Union issued a press release referring to “uncontested testimony of wire-tapping and coercion of witnesses by the Office of Naval Intelligence,” urging Secretary Matthews to carefully review these matters. The ACLU stated that at least two witnesses had been threatened with jail on spurious charges, if they did not testify against Thompson.[25] The National Guardian[26] took up Thompson’s case as an officer who was being persecuted for his Leftist sympathies and support for Henry Wallace. The National Guardian referred to Thompson’s “spotless six-year record” in the military, and as receiving an award from the Sons of the American Revolution for outstanding leadership qualities.

He had tendered his resignation from the Marines in order to work fulltime for the Progressive Party campaign, but his resignation had been rejected. It was after this that Thompson was accused of “spanking” three subordinates. It had at the time been regarded as a joke. One witness was taken to the camp psychiatric ward, and falsely told that Thompson had admitted having sexual relations with him. The witness was then taken to Bethesda Naval Hospital for two weeks, although not treated for any condition. Rudder, questioned as to whether he shared Thompson’s political views after appearing as a character witness for Thompson, was honorably discharged from the Marines. Another character witness, who exposed the falsity of the morality charges against Thompson, was told that he would be charged with “indecent exposure” before an officer’s wife unless he retracted his testimony. He refused, and was honorably discharged from the Marines.

It seems that Thompson’s real crime is that he had been active in exposing illegal punishment of enlisted men, including the use of leg irons, being forced to put garbage in their meal trays, and denied counsel in court martial proceedings. Among those who testified for Thompson were numerous enlisted men and officers, including Rear Admiral Byrd.[27] Prior to the proceedings against Thompson, he had been one of fifty officers recommended for promotion by President Truman and Matthews.[28]

Other associates of Thompson’s at this time, of much interest to the FBI, were David Rein, an organizer of the National Lawyer’s Guild, and his wife Selma, an organizer of the Progressive Party. Details about their Communist affiliations appear in Thompson’s 1952 file.[29] More perplexing however is Thompson’s membership of the American Institute for Marxist Studies.

Something of Thompson’s thinking is shown by his remark to The New York Compass that “everyone should be free to express political views, no matter what their variety.” When asked by the reporter how he squared his civil libertarianism with his support for the “resurgence of authority,” he replied:

“When in Rome, do as the Romans do. [U.S. Secretary of State] Acheson and the rest claim they are for democracy. Let them then be democratic. Let them stop trying to impose themselves on the German people. If the so-called war criminals had been shot by the U.S. it might have been justifiable under the slogan, To the victor belong spoils, but to imprison them and deny them dignity is criminal.”

He continued:[30]

“Understand, I am not fighting for any particular philosophy. I’m fighting for certain people, for justice. We contend that the interests of the U.S. vis-à-vis the international communist movement are best served by a strong Germany. We’ve alienated Germany with the war trials. Now we ask the Germans to build an army to fight for us at the same time that we have under confinement thousands of their soldiers, including the legal Head of the German State, Grand Admiral Dönitz. It was a foul and unspeakable process.”

After the war Thompson had been shocked by the treatment of German former senior officials, and “dedicated himself to the salvation of their civil liberties.” He mentioned the case of Mrs. Himmler, who had only been a loyal wife, yet had her property confiscated and was impoverished. “It is an outrage.” He had studied the transcripts and records of the “war crimes trials” and the de-nazification trials and found that they “were uniformly trumped -up railroad jobs. I deny that any Germans were war criminals.”[31]

While Thompson was engaged in these activities he was also helping ex-Congressman Vito Marcantonio of the American Labor Party, and there was an expectation that Thompson would run for the Labor Party in Marcantonio’s former New York constituency.[32] Thompson wrote “many” of Marcantonio’s speeches.[33] He had remarked at the time to Karl Hess, press editor of Newsweek, that Germans felt they could negotiate better with the USSR than with the USA for their future.

He also maintained a friendship with left-wing Mexican muralist David Alfiero Siquieros. Thompson wrote an article on the case in Leftist publisher Lyle Stuart’s magazine, The Independent, when Siquieros was jailed in Mexico.[34] Thompson also represented Left-wing artist Rockwell Kent, and broke the blacklisting of Kent among publishers, arranging for the publishing of Kent’s Greenland Journal by Ivan Obolensky in New York.

How this dialectic worked is shown by what David McCalden states was the USSR’s release of a “Nazi war criminal” of Thompson’s choice.[35] Thompson told Coogan that his assistance for Siquieros was the return of a favor for the Mexican artist having recommended a safe-house to Yockey in the USA when he was sought by the FBI.[36] Thompson’s assistance to Rockwell Kent opened the way for contacts with Soviet diplomat Valerian Zorin in 1961, and with the Soviet Ministry of Culture. [37]

Major General Remer and the Socialist Reich Party

In 1952 Thompson registered under U.S. law as a foreign agent for the Socialist Reich Party and began a campaign to support the SRP, whichwas being suppressed because of its growing electoral popularity and its neutralist position vis-à-vis the Cold War.[38] For this purpose the Committee for International Justice and the Committee for the Freedom of Major General Remer were formed. Remer, hated for his role in suppressing the July 1944 plot to overthrow Hitler, was a particular target of the Bonn authorities and of organized Jewry, and remained so for the rest of his long life. Thompson wrote to Time magazine on June 23, 1952 protesting an article on those imprisoned at Spandau that also attacked Remer and other German veterans.[39] Counsel for the committees was Edward Fleckenstein, president of the Voters’ Alliance for Americans of German Ancestry.[40] According to a report in the Newark Star-Ledger cited by the FBI, the purpose of the Committee for International Justice was to secure the release of all German military personnel jailed for “war crimes,” who were convicted on “fraudulent evidence,” and Thompson spent all of his spare time soliciting American support for the Socialist Reich Party. “Thompson is quoted as saying that he has appealed to the State Department, the United Nations, and, in fact, to about everybody.” The committees also aimed to provide humanitarian relief “to the families of the 1,045 German soldiers held as war criminals, to work for the overturning of the indictment against Remer, and to pressure the Bonn regime into halting the persecution of minority political parties. Thompson was quoted as stating that he communicated with pre-war British Fascist leader and post-war pan-European leader Sir Oswald Mosley, and with Inga Dönitz, the wife of the interned Grand Admiral and last president of united Germany, and she was a recipient of committee aid. The FBI file states that the Newark Star Ledger article described Thompson as “a mild mannered friendly young man who will patiently explain the ideology of his cause and who does not let himself be provoked into heated discussions.”[41]

The American Jewish Committee, reporting on the “neo-nazi revival” in Germany, stated in a special section on Thompson that he had also registered as American agent for the Munich based publication Die andere Seite (The Other Side), edited by Dr. Rudolf Aschenauer.[ ] The latter was instrumental in getting Senator Joseph McCarthy to investigate American use of torture on the defendants of the Malmedy trials of former SS personnel.[43] The American Jewish Committee commented on how gratified they were at the banning of the SRP, and alluded to the alleged association between the “neo-nazis” and Soviet agents in eastern and western Germany, urging the Bonn government to be vigilant to the likelihood of the SRP re-forming in another guise.[44]

On October 31, 1952 Thompson’s brief registration as a foreign agent ended due to the dissolution of the SRP.[45] However, his committee for justice had made some significant contributions. While the regimen at Spandau Prison had been harsh for the first several years, it had relented and this was partly thanks to Thompson’s efforts, according to Field Marshal Kesselring.[46]

According to the FBI, Fleckenstein stated that both the Committee for International Justice and the Remer committee were “sub-committees” of his voters’ alliance.[47] The committees had been formed in answer to the many requests to the voters’ alliance to offer material assistance to impoverished Germans, and Fleckenstein had turned the responsibility over to Thompson.[48] Fleckenstein and Thompson had been introduced in November 1952 by their mutual friend Viereck.[49] Fleckenstein’s voters’ alliance had been denied its application to incorporate in 1946 by New York State Supreme Court Justice Ernest E. L. Hammer, who considered an association referring to Americans of “German ancestry” to be “inadvisable” given that Germany was still an occupied country, with its leaders being tried as “war criminals” and a peace treaty yet to be negotiated.[50]

The American Jewish Committee sought to publicly expose Thompson as a registered agent for the SRP, which they claimed “constituted another threat to the free world.”[51] Thompson for his part believed that the American Jewish Committee, Anti-Defamation League, Society for the Prevention of World War III[52] and other groups friendly to Israel and antagonistic towards Germany should be required to register as foreign agents.[53]

Fleckenstein had intended to sue the U.S. Government via the Committee for International Justice, on behalf of Americans who had sent several million dollars’ worth of humanitarian aid to Germans, his view being that a conquering nation has a duty towards the vanquished.[54] This was the era when the Morgenthau Plan for the genocidal starvation of Germans had been put into effect as a de facto policy.[55] It was Fleckenstein’s efforts that “paved the way” for the delivery of food parcels to Germany.[56]

Fleckenstein also stated that he intended forming a youth division of the voters’ alliance, with Thompson as leader.[57] In 1953 Fleckenstein visited Germany and spoke out against U.S. policy. He was arrested, jailed, his passport seized by U.S. authorities, and deported, without being charged.[58]

Campaign for Robert Taft

Thompson praised Senators Joseph McCarthy and Robert Taft to The New York Compass as two statesmen who had opposed the post-war trials against the German leadership.[59] He had formed the American Voters Union in 1952 for the purpose of campaigning for the presidential nomination of Robert Taft by the Republican Party.

The Voters Union distributed provocative handbills praising General Douglas MacArthur and Senator Taft, headed “if you enjoy having part of your weekly paycheck withheld to buy some Washington whore a mink coat, don’t bother reading this.” The Union announced its fight for the “principles of Taft and MacArthur,” against the creeping Marxism of “New Deal” type programs, which had infiltrated the Republican Party and was backing Dwight Eisenhower’s candidacy. The handbill ended “Fight the Raw Deal and Fumigate the Ikeroaches,” in reference to ‘Ike’ (Eisenhower). Young Americans were urged to enroll in a support committee for Senator Joseph McCarthy for a planned speech at Yorkville, New York, a mainstay of the German community, and a stronghold for the pre-war Christian Front. Yorkville became the focus of the National Renaissance Party, a flagrantly National Socialist group that endured from its formation in 1949 until the death of its leader, James H. Madole, in 1979. Madole, although gaining minimal support even among the radical Right, was to play a role in the activities of Thompson, Fred Weiss and Yockey, as will be seen.

Senator Joseph McCarthy had agreed to speak at a Voters Union public meeting, called a “German-American Friendship Rally,” but cancelled because of an engagement with the Young Republicans in Wisconsin.[60] However, other notables spoke, including Henry C. Fuerstenwalde, formerly of the U.S. Embassy in Berlin; Professor Austin J. App, from LaSalle College, whose efforts as a writer against anti-German defamation endured for decades; Dr. Ludwig A. Fritsch, Lutheran Minister and author of the hard-hitting Crime of Our Age; and Father Emmanuel J. Reichenberger, expert on the East German expellee problem. Thompson served as moderator of the meeting.

Another handbill of the Voters Union, “Stop Eisenhower,” stated that he had never supported a Republican candidate, and that the Eisenhower campaign for nomination was an “act of sabotage” of the Republican Party. It was claimed that Eisenhower was a close colleague of Alger Hiss, the U.S. State Department luminary accused of Soviet espionage.

Thompson, Fleckenstein, Arthur Koegel, head of the Steuben Society, and others attended the Republican convention in Chicago to lobby for Taft.[61] At the convention they endeavored to promote friendship with Germany among the delegates. They met Senators McCarthy and Dirksen, Congressman Hamilton Fish, (who had been an opponent of U.S. entry into the world war), and conservative columnist Westbrook Pegler. “All were very cordial and made a good impression on us,” wrote Thompson.[62] The leaflets against the “fumigation of Ikeroaches” were so effective that police searched for one of the distributors throughout the convention hall to eject him.

Hiss and the Rosenbergs

Returning from Chicago, Thompson became the subject of a widespread smear campaign started by Time, and he was wire-tapped by a “Jewish defense group.” Thompson obliged by feeding misinformation. Part of Thompson’s reason for writing the “Fascist” series for Expose, and for feeding the FBI information, was to thwart the activities of Sanford Griffith, who supplied information to the Anti-Defamation League. Thompson often pointed out to the FBI their dealings with dubious individuals such as Griffith and showed in the Expose series that Griffith and other “anti-nazi” and ADL agents were funding and encouraging Weiss and Madole while these two were willing to play along. Indeed, Griffith even gave Thompson money for printing, claiming to be a “friendly journalist” intending to give Thompson some good publicity via the Newark Star-Ledger. Thompson stated that he gave Griffith a “completely inaccurate picture,” but apparently sufficiently convincing to warrant further funds from the ADL. Griffith would give Thompson ideas and money when publicity flagged. Thompson then discovered how the ADL operated as agents provocateurs among the Right, and why they are often “the most dependable source of funds.”[63] Griffith had been operating since before the war, and had infiltrated the America First movement. He had been a key state witness against Viereck when the eminent poet and author was accused of being a German agent. Viereck was jailed although his first conviction had been overturned by the Supreme Court.

The same year, Thompson was writing to President Truman asking for clemency for Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, the archetypically Jewish communists, who would be executed for having delivered atomic secrets to the USSR. Thompson contended that the Rosenbergs were being “tried by the newspapers,” and that it would be impossible to secure a fair trial, because “they hold minority and unpopular views.” Here one sees Thompson’s dialectics at work in regard to the Left, as he comments that he opposed the confinement of the Rosenbergs “just as strongly as I oppose the continued confinement of the so-called German ‘war criminals’.”

“Legal proceedings which are conducted in periods of stress and unbalanced hatreds seldom result in just verdicts and findings. If, in fact, it requires ‘communist propaganda’ to urge the American people to a just and humanitarian course, then it is the fault of the American people that there are such glaring faults in their civil processes as to render them open to attack from any quarter.”[64]

Here is a sideswipe at the vengeance against Germany in the name of the Rosenbergs. Thompson remained a champion of civil liberties in the USA, and was also to write offering any assistance he could to Alger Hiss,[65] whom he had previously attacked as part of the Voters Union campaign against Eisenhower. Supporting such generally leftist and liberal causes was an indirect means of also supporting civil liberties for Rightists and German war veterans.

American Committee for the Advancement of Western Culture

In 1953 Thompson began organizing the American Committee for the Advancement of Western Culture (ACAWC). Thompson stated that the aims were (1) to serve as an advisory group for those who oppose internationalism and alien cultures and influences, (2) to be a political action group on U.S. domestic and foreign policies, (3) to safeguard the liberties of Americans regardless of their politics. “Nationalists” would be recruited “from Left, Right, and Center,” including a “high caliber European advisory staff.”[66] It is notable, given Thompson’s seemingly perplexing association with Leftist causes that he refers to working with the whole so-called political spectrum.

The committee that Thompson put together included Dr. A. O. Tittmann, ex-diplomat, author and opponent of the “war crimes trials,” who had founded the Voters Alliance of Americans of German Ancestry in 1947, as honorary chairman; James H. Madole of the National Renaissance Party; Kurt Mertig, a German-American who had been the founder of the National Renaissance Party and a pre-war activist who led the Citizens’ Protective League;[67] Eustace Mullins, regarded as an authority on the Federal Reserve Bank and Jews, but probably best remembered for his biography of his mentor Ezra Pound, and as founder of the Free Ezra Pound Committee;[68] and Thompson’s close colleague Frederick C. F. Weiss, who had served with the German general staff during World War I, had immigrated to the USA during the 1930s, and had been briefly interned in the USA in 1942 as an enemy alien. Weiss is described in FBI files as “the guiding influence behind all of the pro-German, neo-Nazi organizations in the U.S.”[69] The overseas advisory committee included former SRP general secretary Dr. Gerhardt Krueger; Alexander Raven Thompson, leading Mosleyite intellectual and editor of the Union movement’s newspaper Union; Oswald Pirow, former South African minister of defense. Sundry others were drawn from the Right, the most prominent of whom was Thompson’s long-time friend King Carol II of Romania.

Thompson noted the rivalry that existed between individuals on the Right, and the committee was stillborn. Jewish pressure had been intense, Thompson stating that blackmail, economic pressure and false scare stories were used to sow discord among members. Because of its size and dispersion, Thompson states that the committee was “helpless” against infiltration from the ADL and the Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League.[70]

The “committee” obviously had the potential to become something other than a think tank. When the German concert pianist Walter Gieseking was being picketed at Carnegie Hall because, although not a Hitlerite, he had never repudiated his people or the Reich, Thompson and some friends confronted the picketers and attempted to get police to ensure the orderly entrance of patrons. He was “promptly identified” by angry Zionists whispering his name. The Zionists surrounded Thompson’s group, while a Jew threw a German naval ensign at Thompson’s feet and “screamed”: “is this your flag?”[71] With cameramen swarming in, Thompson “reacted explosively.” The media, including television, made the most of the fracas to smear the committee and Thompson’s colleagues, including Viereck, and others not involved with the committee. Thompson stated that he was “hemmed in” by the number of agencies from various organizations keeping him under surveillance. Merely being a social acquaintance of Thompson’s would bring harassment.

One such target was a college student Donald A. Swan, who was to became an anthropologist and a co-founder of the International Association for the Advancement of Ethnology and Eugenics (IAAEE),[72] an association of prominent social and physical scientists including C. D. Darlington and John R. Baker of Oxford University, Henry E. Garrett, et al. Swan was suspended from Queens College, supposedly for “neo-Nazi,” “anti-Semitic,” activities, but in particular for having associated with Thompson. The “authorities” had described Thompson as a “subversive” to Margaret V. Kiely, a Dean of Queens College, who stated she had heard Thompson’s telephone conversations. That is, the FBI had played tapes to her. This controversy happened at a time when faculty at Queens College were themselves under investigation for Communist affiliations.

It seems that the “youth group that Fleckenstein aimed to create under Thompson’s leadership is likely to have been the group formed by Donald Swan at Queens College, the German-American Youth Cultural Society, which he founded in October 1953. [73] The name suggests influence from the Fleckenstein German-American organization. Thompson had advised Swan to stay clear of radical Rightist groups so that he could proceed with activities without being harassed by the FBI, ADL, American Jewish Committee, and the like. Swan seems to have followed Thompson’s counsel, as the FBI informant stated that the youth group was non-political, although the National Renaissance Bulletin was available at its social gatherings.[74]

Another factor that caused consternation among the FBI was Thompson’s allegations about collusion between the Justice Department and disreputable agents of the NANL and ADL, a matter that Thompson continued to raise with the FBI, which indignantly denied such associations. Thompson remarked that agents on the payroll of the State, ADL and NANL simultaneously, and “selling ‘secrets’” “accounts for much of the baloney which ends up in various files, private and governmental.”[75] Thompson was not above providing the FBI with such “baloney” himself.

In August 1954, Thompson issued a press release that he had dissolved the ACAWC and dissociated himself from those who had been implicated. He had done so primarily to divert attention from his “foreign friends” implicated in an organization that had soon become infiltrated and victimized. One of those who had targeted Thompson was the Armenian-born “John Roy Carlson,” notorious author of Under Cover, which had smeared America First isolationists as German agents and “nazis.”[76] In subsequent legal hearings Judge John P. Barnes described Carlson as “someone who would write anything for a dollar.” He had posed as “George Pagnanelli,” Italo-American, during the 1940s. Now he was posing as “Yusef Nadir,’ writing from Germany, wanting to know about Thompson’s contact with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. Carlson and the ADL described Thompson as the leader of an international Nazi organization. Thompson stated that although there are “nationalist” organizations throughout the world, any type of internationalism is inherently impossible. He was particularly encouraged by developments in Germany, although individuals such as his contacts war veterans Colonel Hans Rudel and Wolfgang Sarg of “Natinform Germany,” were being harassed. Thompson singled out the post-war Union Movement of Sir Oswald Mosley for particular praise. Thompson commented, “even behind the Iron Curtain… we see evidence of resurgent nationalism within a framework of practical socialism.”[77]

In concluding his series for Expose, Thompson outlined his “world-outlook”. It is classically Spenglerian, referring to Bolshevik Russia as the leader of a world race war, augmenting the Marxist class war.[78] However, this was a strategy by the Kremlin for world power, as “old Bolshevism” had been replaced by “an ultra-nationalistic military junta, motivated by Pan-Slavism, and recognizing the Jew, with his ‘foreign’ loyalty, as an internal enemy,” what the New York Times was calling “Russian Imperialism.” The USSR had, according to Jewish media such as Commentary and The New Leader, become “a greater horror than Fascism.” “The Prague trial of the eleven Jewish leaders in 1953 and similar actions in other satellite countries confirmed to the world the fact, long apparent to my friends…,” that the Jewish element had lost power. Public opinion, molded by the press, had gone from being anti-German and pro-Russian to anti-German and anti-Russian. However, it was the regime that runs Washington that had delivered half of Europe to the USSR and it was late for purging the Western World of the “power force” that was responsible. What is required is the renewal of the spirit of the West:[79]

“This Spirit must be opposed to Finance-Liberalism, to any weakening of the State, and to the desecrating misuse of the State for private economic interest; this Spirit must grow out of any fundamental life-forces that still exist in the Western Peoples, that instinct for power and possessions, for possessions as power, for honor, for order, for tradition, for inheritance, fecundity and family.”

The ACAWC had attempted to arouse that Western spirit to a “Common Destiny,” not a mere common set of interests, “in this Hour of Decision,” (citing the title of Spengler’s last book). The committee was “savagely attacked;” and “more savagely attacked” when pointing out that the great Western Culture, welded into a spiritual unit by a thousand years of struggle “only to die if Western Europe is overwhelmed by the hordes from the Asian Steppes…” However, given that Russia had become the main enemy of Jews, Thompson et al. were smeared as “Commu-Nazis” for pointing out that Western Europe would now prefer Russian occupation “because it could be more quickly thrown off,” than the pervasive regime of the U.S. Occupation. Despite the smears that had been sustained, the struggle continued to “sweep the slate clean and prepare to meet our Destiny – or perish in the struggle.”[80]

The theme reflected the ideology that had been developing from Weiss, articulated philosophically by Yockey, and continued into the 1970s by the newspaper Common Sense and the NRP. Indeed, Weiss had stated, according to FBI notes, that German Nationalists were all working for “a united Germany under Soviet domination.”[81] Yockey had gone to the Soviet bloc, probably East Germany, from the USA, where he lived for several years in circumstances that remain unknown. So similar is the terminology and thinking of Weiss, Yockey and Thompson that it can be difficult to distinguish among these authors.[82]

Russia

The theme regarding Russia was developed in detail in mid-1955 by Weiss and Thompson in a four-part series of articles entitled “Russia” published by Weiss’s Le Blanc Publishers and distributed via the National Renaissance Party with Weiss’s funding. The essay was also likely to have had major input from Yockey, as Thompson stated that he “believed” Yockey had been writing Weiss’s articles since December 1952.[83] The series, intended as a book, was printed by Thompson at his father’s company, Cooper Forms, of which he was a manager. The article was regarded by the FBI as pro-Soviet, despite its references to the Russian-Mongolian hordes threatening the West. Indeed, the aim of “Russia” seems to have been to use the prospect of the “Soviet menace” in this Cold War era, as a means of advocating the unity of the Western Culture vis-à-vis an “outer enemy” (to use a Yockey term). While the West was portrayed as weak and collapsing, the USSR was portrayed as one of invincible and united Will, where questions of “democracy” are irrelevant. The Russians had overthrown the Bolshevism that had been implanted by Jews and had restored the Russian soul that sees man’s meaning as part of a collectivity and not as an individual whose government is only concerned with contractual legal rights. For the Russian soul that had been reasserted in the USSR, one would look for understanding to Dostoyevsky rather than to Lenin or Trotsky. The western analysts should look beyond superficial questions about repression and slave labor, and ask rather whether 250,000,000 Russians were working in “syntony” with the State in a common “rhythm,” that was also attracting German genius. The purpose was to understand the “Russian soul,” for in another 25 years of “co-existence” there would remain a soulless Western mass, subservient to a “tremendously powerful array of Eastern forces advanced in scientific, military and industrial development and imbued with unshakeable Unity of Purpose.”[84]

The Russian soul is shaped by the vastness of the plains. This description is pure Spengler.[85] A strong will has been developed by “willingness to suffer” and a tendency to fatalism forged by centuries of conflict and iron rule. An inherent nomadism results in a restlessness and a wandering that has been transformed into “unceasing expansion.” It was under Stalin that the Russian peasantry awoke from centuries of slumber, as rulers from Peter the Great to Lenin and Trotsky had tried to impose foreign thinking. The Russian peasantry had become “the folk of the future” with a destiny “not unlike that dreamed of by Dostoyevsky.” Despite the atheistic propaganda of the early Soviet regime the Russian remained profoundly religious. The New York Times pointed out that twenty Orthodox Churches “were flourishing in Kiev alone.”[86] However, because of the Westernization begun under Peter (Petrinism)[87] there existed “two Russias” fighting for supremacy. A nihilistic tendency in Bolshevism sought to annihilate Petrinism (although the importation of Marxism is a symptom of the Petrine). This type of “Bolshevism” is the mortal enemy of Lenin and Trotsky, which would evolve into “an outspoken, revitalized nationalist movement,” even if it is still meaninglessly called “Communist.” “What’s in a name?” Under the mantle of Communism, the Russian people had resumed their messianic world mission to replace a decadent civilization, as foreseen by Dostoyevsky. The essayists of “Russia” saw a great technical and scientific state arising, and the creation of a Eurasian empire. They believed that India and China would become so dependent on Russia that they could not act on their own initiative, and in particular Russia would use the Chinese. The question was whether a leader of a united West would arise to confront these challenges.

Given that the USSR imploded, were Thompson and Weiss, and indeed Yockey, incorrect in their analysis? In the longer term they are now starting to be seen as correct in the salient points. With the rise of Putin, the Petrine and Jewish oligarchic interests enjoyed what now seems to have been a very short interregnum under Yeltsin. The Russian soul is remanifesting slowly, and the vision of a Eurasian destiny has become again a mainstay of Russian foreign policy.[88]

The primary point with which I disagree is to regard China as an essential and subordinate part of the Russian destiny. I think China will resume its role as an historical enemy of Russia, and as such will become a major impetus for the assertiveness of Russia as a White bulwark confronting China.[89] How Europe responds depends on whether her spirit can be reasserted, and the question of her liberation from the USA remains the primary question that preoccupied the thinking of Thompson, Weiss, Yockey and Remer.

In 1996, Thompson remarked to me on Russia, then under Yeltsin:[90]

“Change must come in the form of a coup d’etat with the aid of the Communist faction. The U.S. regime would probably not dare to intervene […]. U.S. capital is profiting there while it spreads its ‘democracy venom.’”

Change came in the form of Putin, although perhaps not the final word on Russia, and the reconstituted Communist party under Zyuganov is of the nationalistic type that Thompson, Yockey and Weiss saw emerging.[91]

In 1954, Thompson was appointed U.S. correspondent for Der Weg (The Way), published by German émigrés in Peron’s Argentina. This gave Thompson press accreditation to the United Nations.[92] He wrote to FBI director Hoover offering to make information about Communism and associated “jewish [sic] pressure groups” available personally to him, in the course of his work as a journalist.[93] Thompson, like Weiss, kept his enemies close to him, and offered the FBI a mixture of accurate and inaccurate information, often criticizing the FBI’s willingness to associate with the Anti-Defamation League, and the disreputable actions of FBI agents. FBI agents were cautioned to be circumspect about Thompson and to seek advice when dealing with him.[94] Thompson’s aim seems to have been to act through the FBI against ADL agent Sanford Griffith and others of the type, who operated against the Right, in exchange for information on communists, on whom Thompson had supplied the FBI with 200 documents. Thompson castigated the FBI for both discourtesy in not acknowledging his information, and for its association with Jewish groups.[95]

Of particular concern to the FBI was Thompson’s series of articles in the monthly journal Expose detailing not only his life as an “American Fascist,” but also what he knew of FBI, ADL and Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League activities and the role of the ADL in funding “anti-Semitic” and “neo-nazi” groups, such as the National Renaissance Party.[96] Thompson used the series of articles as an opportunity to show that “anti-Semitism in the United States is in no small measure directed and financed by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and the Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League (NANL). In particular a paid ADL and NANL agent, Mana Truhill, a petty criminal, had attained a leading position in the NRP. Truhill was a Communist who had been instructed at the Communist party’s Jefferson School of Social Science. Thompson regarded the NRP as thoroughly compromised and used by the ADL and others. [97] He made it clear to the FBI that he had a collection of affidavits, obtained for legal purposes in connection with the Expose series, showing the reprehensible actions of certain FBI agents.[98]

The National Renaissance Party

Despite Thompson’s misgivings, the NRP Bulletin served as an a venue for the writings of Weiss and Yockey, and Weiss largely funded Madole.[99]

Thompson met Madole in 1952. He did so at the request of Colonel Rudel and Dr. Johannes von Leers, a former Goebbels ministry official working as an émigré in Peron’s Argentina and later in Nasser’s Egypt. Thompson stated that at the time he was not only “official U.S. representative of the SRP, [but] also represented the leadership cadre of the ‘survivors’ of the Third Reich, scattered throughout the world.” Rudel and von Leers asked Thompson to “evaluate the NRP frankly to see if contact with it was ‘safe’ and to see if it could organizationally contribute to the higher authority,”[100] the higher authority being Remer, Rudel, Skorzeny, von Leers, et al.

Thompson stated that he met Madole at the latter’s New York apartment, and about a dozen times thereafter. Thompson considered Madole as lacking charisma and leadership qualities, although a skillful orator, and a man of “courage.” He had a tendency to speak in monologue rather than exchange ideas. Despite the shortcomings, Thompson considered it “vital to keep Madole afloat since he was certainly in one sense an irritant to the Jews and other non-whites, but, more important, he naturally ‘drew fire,’ taking some of the pressure off other persons and operations which were deemed by my associates as more important to their interests, which were my principal concern.”

Thompson knew “little of Madole after the year 1955.”[101] He wrote:[102]

“Madole, in a sense, was an American nationalist, an ‘America Firster.’ I could understand that, of course, as a practical and useful approach to building an organization. However, I was an ‘America Laster,’ as I regarded then – and more than ever in1995 – the U.S. as the greatest malefactor in the world, proponent of a series of colonialist wars; allies of Soviet Communism, then, when it conflicted with its own interests, organized the ‘Cold War’ against Russia, which it unfortunately won; betrayer of the white race of its founders in favor of polyglot miscegenation, mixed marriages, and total anti-white-male behavior; causer of two World Wars, through policies of Wilson and F. D. Roosevelt; mis-educators of American youth with its ‘equality’ democracy babble; all the time being run exclusively by ‘special interests’ hostile to the policies of the founders of the country. This is over-simplified and just ‘off the cuff’ but it makes a point. The current aim of the swine who run the U.S. is to surrender authority to international organizations, like the U.N., then to tear up the U.S. Constitution and make Americans subject to the laws of the one-worlders. At the moment they are trying to re-institute the concept of the Nuremberg ‘Trials’ – to hang those who resist the policy of the ‘one-worlders.’”

Thompson in 1995 maintained the “Cold War” era attitudes of Remer and the SRP, Common Sense, Yockey and Weiss, all of whom regarded the USA as a more pervasive and lethal enemy to European civilization than the USSR. However, what Thompson seems to have under-appreciated was that it was the same outlook maintained by Madole, whose geopolitical and realpolitikal articles in the NRP Bulletin show a depth of knowledge that had obviously not been well presented during his meetings with Thompson prior to 1955.

Yockey

Thompson introduced Madole to some key individuals, some of whom helped him financially. One notable was Viereck, “one of the highest German agents in the U.S. up to World War II.”[103] Thompson was a literary agent of note, and acted for some extraordinary characters. In this regard he acted for Veireck in having the latter’s books published by the U.S. publisher Lyle Stuart. He also arranged for Viereck to go to Germany in 1955 to meet Dr. Werner Naumann, designated propaganda minister in Hitler’s will, and Inga Dönitz.[104]

Viereck and Thompson were the focus of an intellectual circle that included Harvard alumnus Lawrence Dennis, former Wall Street employee, member of the U.S. Diplomatic Service, author of The Coming American Fascism and The Dynamics of War and Revolution, and a defendant, along with Viereck, at the infamous “Sedition” trials under the Roosevelt administration against critics of the president’s war policy.[105] Others included Dr. Charles Callan Tansill of Georgetown University; Harry Elmer Barnes, and other historians, “when they were passing through town,” and literati including Charles Jackson.[106] Thompson had a particular regard for Dennis, and dined frequently with him at the Harvard Club.[107]

Thompson met Francis Parker Yockey at an expensive, Jewish-owned luncheonette in New York in the company of Weiss, and he was delighted to find that Yockey was as “anti-American” as he was.[108] Given that Yockey was already working with the Socialist Reich Party in Germany in 1951,[109] it seems likely that Yockey and Thompson met via this association. Yockey became what Thompson called his “dearest political friend and companion in many great ventures.”[110] From then on Thompson provided “a steady outflow of money” for Yockey’s “various projects.”[111] One of the first and most significant of these projects would have been Der Feind Europas, published in German in 1953 as a manual of realpolitik for the Socialist Reich Party, but originally written in 1948, the year after Yockey wrote his magnum opus, Imperium. It was intended as the third volume of Imperium. Two hundred copies were printed, intended for the leadership of the SRP, but they were seized by K-16, the German secret service, and destroyed. The manuscript had been sent to the USA however, and was serialized in the Yockeyan magazine Trud, in 1969 from a copy supplied by Maria, Weiss’s widow, and published in English as a book in 1981.

For Thompson, Yockey and their contacts in Germany, Soviet affiliations were part of Cold War intrigue between the super-powers. Thompson stated that the party he represented as a registered agent in the USA, the Socialist Reich Party, “had communist affiliations.”

“Almost any right-wing entity in Germany, to get any power and money, had to reach to the East Germans to some extent or other, and there existed funds available to finance right-wing activities in West Germany. The motive of the East Germans being to embarrass and cause difficulties for the west Germans exclusively; they were naturally not interested in promoting fascism in any form – although the East Germany secret police consisted in part measure of many former members of the SS and SD who’d gone to the East Zone and were living there, some of whom I knew. So the idea of taking support where you can find it is one which is very practical. Even today, if the Soviet Union would care to finance any activities of mine, I would rush to the bank with the check and the hope that it was good.”[112]

This association with the Soviet bloc went as far as Yockey serving as a paid courier for Czech intelligence, taking documents between Czechoslovakia and the USA, which Yockey mentioned to Thompson.[113] Thompson’s ongoing interest in the USSR was a matter of concern to the FBI, noting in 1960 that according to a highly confidential source, Thompson had requested to be put on the mailing list of the Soviet Embassy to receive reports and other information about the USSR.[114] The FBI also cited the artist Rockwell Kent, whom Thompson represented when Kent was subjected to a boycott as chairman of the National Council of American-Soviet Friendship.[115]

Dönitz

In 1957 Thompson again became of particular interest to the FBI, which closely monitored his whereabouts and his correspondence. Local postal authorities were asked to relay information on Thompson’s mail to the FBI, and his contacts were checked as to their affiliations. The FBI had two reasons for this renewed interest: (1) Whether Thompson should be registered as a foreign agent again, this time because of his work for the German-Argentine journal Der Weg,[116] and (2) his soliciting of views on the “war crimes trials” and on the fate of Dönitz in particular, from military, legal and other eminent people. The FBI was investigating Thompson for violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act,[117] beginning on November 21, 1956,[118] in regard to his soliciting of letters on behalf of Dönitz and on the “war crimes trials,” although the grounds are not cited in FBI reports and it was concluded that there had been no violation. Some of the recipients of Thompson’s form letters asking for testimonials on Dönitz forwarded the letters to the FBI. This would not have perturbed Thompson, as he had sent such a letter to FBI director J. Edgar Hoover asking for his input. To one recipient, Judge Clark, Thompson wrote:[119]

“Instead of writing silly letters to the New York Times protesting perhaps the first sensible act of a U.S. dominated ‘allied parole commission’ why don’t you participate in the testimonial album described in the enclosure, as many really prominent Americans are doing? I have never understood how a man of your education could fall for such Jewish traps and mouth such fiction as 3,000,000 Jews (murdered). The Jews claim that it was 6,000,000. Were there really any murdered? I think they are all here in New York City. Perhaps we should send some down to Princeton?”

When Dönitz was released from Spandau Prison in 1956, Thompson organized an international campaign that succeeded in getting him his full pension rights. On Dönitz’s release from Spandau, Thompson and Viereck sent him a telegram dated October 1, 1956:[120]

“Telegram to the legitimate president of Germany, Grand admiral Karl Dönitz, on the occasion of his release from eleven years of illegal confinement by the ‘allies’ for ‘war crimes’:

On the day of the triumph of your steeled will over the plans of your vengeful persecutors, your American friends congratulate you and wish you a long, healthy life. Throughout the entire despicable Nuremberg proceedings – brought about by the criminal co-guilt of the USA and world jewry [sic], your soldierly honor shone forth as the sole hope of those who wished to rebuild the collapsing Western World.

Through your personal courage, you have triumphed over the calculated plans of the destroyers of Western Culture, and you stand today as the personification of Honor, Loyalty and Faith. Let no considerations dissuade you from this position. You are unique in History! Today we also greet your courageous wife who has fought for you so valiantly through these difficult years.“

The Society for the Prevention of World War III (SPWWIII) asked Senator Jacob Javitz of New York whether there were any laws that could be used to prosecute Thompson and Viereck for having sent their greetings to Dönitz.[121] What concerned the Society was the possibility of an alliance between a revived Germany and the Soviet bloc. The democracies had fallen out with their wartime ally Stalin soon after the end of hostilities when Stalin rebuked the generous offer to become junior partner in a new world order behind the façade of the United Nations General Assembly, and the “Baruch Plan” for the ostensible “internationalization” of atomic energy, which the USSR regarded as a ruse to place atomic energy under U.S. control. The General Assembly, the USSR perceived, would be readily manipulated as a world parliament by the USA, and hence Stalin insisted instead that power reside with the Security Council, with the right to veto, thus rendering the UN powerless as a world government.[122] The possibility of a united Germany under Soviet auspices, while palatable to sections of the Right in Germany and the USA, was a nightmare scenario for the global wire-pullers. However, most of the radical Right in the USA zealously signed up to prosecute the Cold War against the USSR, while the Stalinists called the “Washington regime” (in Yockey’s parlance) “rootless cosmopolitans”[123] in the same sense that Yockey called them “culture distorters.”

The SPWWIII stated to Javits that while they did not know Dönitz’s attitude on being referred to by Viereck and Thompson as “the legitimate president of Germany,” they pointed out that shortly before Germany’s surrender Dönitz had signed a memorandum in April 1945 stating that Germany’s revival could only be achieved in collaboration with the USSR. The memorandum advocated an alliance to dominate the Eurasian landmass and to “confront the old rotten entrenched power of the West.” The SPWWIII’s Simard and Lipshutz referred Javits to an article for the magazine[124] of the SPWWIII that had been written by Congressman Arthur G. Klein of New York and introduced into the Congressional Record.[125] Here Klein outlined a pro-Russia orientation among German policymakers since Frederick the Great through to Bismarck, and the Weimar era Treaty of Rapallo. From this and the Dönitz memorandum we can appreciate that Yockey, Remer, Thompson, Weiss, et al., so far from representing a heretical strand within the Right, were continuing a tradition of realpolitik that saw a Russo-German alliance as an organic historical development, and none more so than in confronting the victors of the two world wars.

Indeed, what seemed to be collusion between German nationalists and the USSR had caused much consternation, especially with the electoral progress of the SRP, which advocated a “neutralist” line, while informants were claiming that Yockey was calling for a guerrilla army that would assist the USSR in occupying West Germany.

The success of the campaign reflected Thompson’s wide contacts with influential people. The correspondence connected with the campaign was published as a book in 1976, Dönitz at Nuremberg: A Reappraisal.[126] The letters had been presented as an album to Dönitz on his release.

Thompson had sent out form letters to hundreds of eminent persons throughout the world soliciting professional opinions on the war crimes trials, to form “a better historical perspective.” Describing himself on his letterhead as a “journalist and public relations counsel,” and as a literary agent and news analyst, he referred to Dönitz as having been jailed for performing the duty that any military man would be sworn to uphold. Thompson pointed out that the Nuremberg Military Tribunal did not have any legal precedent or authorization, that it was not a genuine “military tribunal,” and that it was in violation of “Anglo-American constitutional principles.” Thompson cited Rear Admiral Daniel V. Gallery, who wrote in Twenty Million Tons under the Sea that the “war crimes trials” were “a libel on the military profession” and that the trial of Dönitz was “barefaced hypocrisy.” He referred to Admiral Nimitz,[127] who testified for the defense at the trial of Dönitz that unrestricted submarine warfare, for which Dönitz had been tried, had also been conducted by U.S. submarines in the Pacific. Thompson stated in the appeal that he had been collecting opinions for more than a year, and stated that “this collection of opinions will represent a milestone in the historical reappraisal of the dangerous precedent set at Nuremberg.” Thompson then provided a three-page list of hundreds of eminent persons who had already contributed their opinions.[128]

The preface of Dönitz at Nuremberg was written by William L. Hart, Justice of the Supreme Court of Ohio, who concluded by stating, “there was no legal justification for the trial, conviction or sentence of the so-called ‘war criminals’ by the Nuremberg Tribunal. We have set a bad precedent. It should not be followed in the future.”[129] There followed opinions against the Nuremberg Trials by hundreds of legal, diplomatic, political and military authorities throughout the world, such as Dwight Eisenhower’s lawyer brother Edgar and in particular by many naval commanders from the Allied states. Hence, the book remains a valuable corpus of authoritative opinions against the mentality of revenge that forms the essence of victories after an increasing number of globalist wars that have resulted in the barbaric treatment of the defeated leaders of Serbia, Iraq, Libya and an eye to vengeance against Syria’s Assad, et al.

Among the individuals writing to Thompson, as noted by the FBI, was Arthur Bliss Lane, former U.S. ambassador to Poland, although the FBI could find no “derogatory information” on him in their files.[130] Although Lane was not a contributor to the Dönitz compendium, his book on the Soviet takeover of Poland, I Saw Poland Betrayed, was a conservative bestseller, published in 1948 and subsequently published by affiliates of the John Birch Society.[131] A prominent individual who did contribute to the Dönitz campaign was Hoffman Nickerson, whom the FBI identified as the scion of a wealthy, prominent family of Oyster Bay, New York. Hoffman was an author and director of Hoffman Publishers, member of the New York County Republican Committee, New York state assemblyman in 1916, member of the AEF General Staff in 1918 and of the Inter-Allied Armistice Commission in Belgium.[132] Nickerson opined to Thompson that the “war crimes trials were an outrage against good morals,” setting a precedent for “legalized lynching.” He stated he was glad Dönitz had been released and hoped all the others would be also.[133] Other contributors included Admiral Paul Hendren,[134] but the FBI had nothing of a dubious character on Hendren or his wife. It was noted that Thompson had written a complimentary letter to the Palestine Arab Refugee Office in New York City.[135] The FBI compiled a list of individuals and organizations from whom Thompson had received mail, including the Christian Educational Association, publisher of the long-running “anti-Semitic” newspaper Common Sense, which was to adopt a pro-Stalinist orientation; Die Europäische Nationale, of Wiesbaden; Chester Bowles, who had served as U.S. delegate to UNESCO, Ambassador to India, Governor of Connecticut, and had, according to the FBI, associations with communist fronts;[136] the pro-Hitler Der Weg; the pro-communist National Guardian; John T. Daly, manager of the coffee department of the East Asiatic Company, on whom the FBI could not find anything “derogatory;” Sanctuary Press, Sir Oswald Mosley’s publishing firm; Ralph A. Bard, former Secretary of the Navy and a trustee of an anti-New Deal organization, “Crusaders,” in 1936, et al.[137] Anyone who sent mail to Thompson at this time was of interest to the FBI.

As a literary agent, Thompson’s clients included General Fulgencio Batista, president of Cuba. He also represented an Argentine-Bolivian combine selling arms to Batista when he was fighting Castro’s hill guerrillas.[138] It can be interjected here that the USA, maintaining a constant policy on such matters, placed an arms embargo on Batista at a crucial time.[139] This was a long-standing U.S. measure that had been enacted against Chiang Kai-shek and against Somoza, president of Nicaragua, when fighting the Sandinistas.[140] It went back to the denial of arms, bought and paid for, to Admiral Kolchak when he was fighting the Red Army in the Russian Far East.[141] Thompson is acknowledged in Batista’s book Respuesta in regard to the Nuremberg trials.[142]

Among Thompson’s associates was the Left-liberal publisher Lyle Stuart, a neighbor. In 1962-63 Stuart was threatened with a slander suit by King Farouk of Egypt because of the publication of a book alleging sexual improprieties with prostitutes in Miami. Through Thompson’s well-placed contacts in Egypt he handed Stuart a dossier on Farouk, and the suit was promptly dropped.[143] It was by this means that in return Stuart’s magazine, Expose, opened its columns to Thompson, where he expounded on Fascist doctrine, and exposed Anti-Defamation League agents who were using “neo-nazis.”

Another interesting client was Marguerite Oswald, mother of Lee Harvey Oswald. Thompson assisted her with opposing the Warren Commission report on the Kennedy assassination, and represented her in negotiations for interviews and the sale of documents. Thompson was himself questioned on the assassination, but asserted 5th amendment rights when interviewed.[144] At the time, it might be recalled, the term “conspiracy theory” came into vogue, and among the theories was a Right-wing assassination prompted by General Edwin Walker or a Communist assassination prompted by Castro. Thompson also auctioned Oswald letters on behalf of Marguerite.[145] Thompson obviously had a special interest in Kennedy. In 1968 he published a book analyzing the late president’s signature.[146]

In the 1970s Thompson served as a mercenary in Rhodesia under the alias Brigadier Paul D. North, travelling on a fake Canadian passport.[147] This latter activity made him a target for a Black militant group called Black Avengers. During the early 1960s, Thompson was threatened by a Mossad agent, who soon afterward disappeared.[148]

World in Flames

In 1960 Thompson had collaborated with Yockey on the latter’s final essay, Yockey dying in a prison cell in San Francisco that year after finally being caught by the FBI. “The World in Flames: An Estimate of the World Situation,” analyzed the Cold War era and the role of the “third world.” Thompson commented that he had persuaded Yockey to add commentary on the neutralist regimes as well as Nasser to reinforce the point “that the world is turning against the USA.” The essay appeared posthumously in 1961, Thompson having seen “that work through from his [Yockey’s] rough manuscript to the printed production.”[149]

In 1961 Thompson wrote to General Friedrich Foertsch, who had been appointed Commander of the Bundeswehr. The letter, in German, was in response to a widely publicized press release from the Embassy of the USSR in Washington condemning Foertsch as “the former Hitler general and war criminal.” As a commander at the siege of Leningrad, after the war Foertsch had been sentenced to 25 years’ internment by the Soviets, but had been released in 1955. Given the Soviet government’s allegation that he had presided over the murder of Russian POWs and was alleged to have committed “capital crimes,” one might wonder whether the Soviet treatment of German “war crimes” was more lenient than that of the West. The Soviet statement, originating with Soviet Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs V. S. Semyonov, condemned the Federal Government for appointing “German war criminals” who had undertaken actions in the USSR as a “direct unfriendly act towards the Soviet Union” and other subjects of German aggression.[150]

The USSR sought to embarrass the Bonn regime by highlighting any Hitler-era official who was appointed to a position of influence under the Federal government to highlight the resurgence of groups such as the Socialist Reich Party, and even to provoke anti-Semitic incidents in the West,[151] giving the impression of a revival of Nazism in Germany and the role of the USSR as the only bulwark against new Prussian aggression. Sections of the German Right did not mind playing their part in the Soviet strategy. The East German government (DDR) did not have any scruples, under Stalin’s direct prompting, in appointing Hitler-era officials to the highest positions in the DDR nor in reconstituting a nationalist political party that served a prominent role in DDR administrations.[152]

Thompson in writing to Foertsch condemned the “spirit of July 20th” (a reference to the abortive coup against Hitler, scotched by Otto Remer) prevalent in the German Federal military. He mentioned to Foertsch the “imperative” need to organize groups in the army that can maintain an independent attitude toward “world developments and to act accordingly.” Thompson was presumably advocating clandestine actions in the military that could mount a coup in the course of an emergency. Thompson mentioned to Foertsch the “ineptitude” of U.S. espionage that had “been placed in the hands of leftist star gazers whom even the Russians regard as ridiculous.” He stated that “these people have the power and the stupidity to start a war” but not the military and scientific know-how to win a war. “The days of the uninvited American meddler are about over.” Thompson asked whether the power vacuum would be filled by the Russians, the Afro-Asians or are there still representatives of the “Prussian spirit” that can assume the role?[153]

Revisionism

After a long period behind the scenes, in September 1982, Thompson addressed at a convention of the Institute for Historical Review an issue that raised former IHR director McCalden’s ire, asking whether this was the direction in which the “Revisionist movement” should proceed. Nonetheless, McCalden conceded that the speech had been “intelligent and pithy.”[154]

The FBI took a renewed interest in Thompson in 1984 in regard to his passport status.[155]

Thompson’s opinion of the “American Right” was not high. However, it never had been, nor had Yockey’s. He stated to Keith Stimley:[156]

“As to the American ‘right-wing,’ I had no respect for it from my earlier experience, and I have even less today. I don’t think anything constructive will ever appear from the political right-wing. It is not inconceivable that some day a group of well-intentioned military men may reach a point of frustration, and take this thing over. The military are basically conservative, and I think that they used to, at any rate, possess a realistic view of the forces that work internationally. Now that has been eroded, to some extent by, I’m sure, mis-education in the service academies, along the lines of Holocaust propaganda, anti-German propaganda, racial-tolerance nonsense and the like. But from the military generation that I knew, and these were there people who were in World War I – those senior officers pretty well knew where things were at. They knew that the Nigras were by and large worthless as soldiers unless you had three White men standing behind the back of each Black, to make sure that he conducted himself in a reasonably productive fashion. And they were aware of the Jews, later aware of the American subservience to Israel, etc. General George S. Brown was probably one of the last martyrs to American interests, when he very forcefully pointed out while Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff that Israel was absolutely not only worthless as a military ally, but a great disadvantage to the United States, and he was quickly, of course, shut up and forced out, as was General Singlaub shut up and forced out by Jimmeh [sic] Carter in quite recent years.

It’s not impossible that ultimately a [military] coup will come from the right, and salvage this shit-barge of a country. I don’t think it’s worthy of salvage. I would much prefer it ruled, perhaps, by a Red Chinese field marshal. But what will happen in the future – I don’t know.”

Stimley opined that a coup might only eventuate if there was a major military reversal overseas. Certainly, we now know from occasional leaks and quips that the Pentagon still includes personnel who are not happy with the USA’s subservience to Israeli interests in the Middle East and other globe-trotting expeditions on behalf of U.S. commerce. However, in Thompson’s heyday, there were many military luminaries militantly active in the Right and contemptuous of Zionism such as Lt. Gen. P. A. Del Valle, USMC; and Lt. Gen. George Stratemeyer, USAF; Lt. Gen. Edward M. Almond, and Vice Admiral T. G. W. Settle, to cite four military men who not only contributed to Thompson’s book on Dönitz but who endorsed Colonel John Beatty’s anti-Zionist book The Iron Curtain over America.[157] A decade later (1962), General Edwin Walker was leading what the Kennedy Administration feared was an incipient revolt at the University of Mississippi against desegregation imposed by Federal Troops at bayonet point.

Under Keith Stimley’s editorship, Thompson contributed book reviews to the Journal of Historical Review (JHR), journal of the Institute for Historical Review, and in particular on the two men he esteemed most, Grand Admiral Dönitz and Major General Otto Remer.

Writing of Dönitz as the “last president of a united Germany,” Thompson’s opening lines were that the Third Reich was “the last heroic stand of Western Civilization,” and Hitler was “the last natural leader of Europe.” The Allied victory was a triumph for “the forces of Asiatic Communism and Russian Nationalism on the one hand, and Jewish Bolshevism (as exemplified by the United States, England, France and their multitude of last-minute vassals and hangers-on) on the other.” In the few weeks of April and May 1945 Dönitz unexpectedly became head of state and set up a Cabinet of military and technocratic personnel. He refused to denigrate Hitler, although it would have been opportune to do so, and sought to surrender to the Western allies, a primary concern being the fate of refugees fleeing from the east; a concern not shared by Eisenhower, et al., who refused the offer of a separate surrender without the USSR. Dönitz was sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment by the Nuremberg Tribunal, much to the outrage of many Allied military leaders. Although apolitical, he never forsook his oath to Hitler, a matter noted by co-defendant Albert Speer, who tried to ingratiate himself to the Allies during the Nuremberg proceedings.

During 1952-1953 a commando operation was planned to rescue the internees at Spandau and reconstitute a government-in-exile. Thompson states that those involved included residents of Spain, Portugal and the USA. Here we can conjecture that the operation would probably have been led by Otto Skorzeny, famous for his daring rescue of Mussolini. However, security was compromised and the plan was discarded. Thompson wrote that in the early 1980s he burnt a file on the matter that had long been sought “by at least four intelligence agencies.” When Dönitz was released in 1956 the press noted that his wife, Inga, had maintained contact with German nationalists, and Thompson had kept in communication with her. Thompson always kept the large numbers of letters that he had solicited from eminent figures in support of Dönitz. Although not becoming involved in politics, Dönitz readily spoke before conventions of veterans. In 1980, just a few months before his death, Dönitz wrote to Thompson expressing the hope that they would meet again.[158]

A review for the JHR of a book by Remer relates the circumstances of the 1944 plot against Hitler stymied by Remer’s decisiveness. Thompson wrote that if there is any one word that describes Remer, it is “courage.” Thompson wrote that in 1988 Remer was head of another organization, the German Freedom Movement. Remer’s outlook had not changed since the days of the SRP. He advocated total European union, including Russia, but excluding Britain and the USA. Even in 1988, Thompson still saw Remer as the leader of a new Europe:[159]

“The historical reasons for such a program are eminently understandable. Many geopolitical thinkers, for instance Francis Parker Yockey, were early supporters of this viewpoint. In 1988, few can fail to respect Remer’s courage and honesty in advancing it. It is possible that he can become the inspiring, visionary leader needed by Europe to effect its liberation from the counter-cultural forces which now infest and occupy it, and guide it toward a future free of economic and armed conflicts.”

Thompson wrote other reviews for the JHR during the 1980s. Thompson arranged the appearance of Remer at the Eighth International Revisionist Conference in 1987. When Remer died ten years later, Thompson wrote on “the loss of this old friend, with whom I had so many shared experiences,” and that “we cannot permit either Remer or Yockey to become forgotten as long as we can do something about it.”[160] Towards this, Thompson was supportive of my own small effort in producing that year a collection of mostly hitherto-unpublished Yockey manuscripts along with a biographical essay.[161]

In the last few years before his death on March 3, 2002, Thompson became a notable donor to conservative elements of the Republican Party, including Oliver North, Jesse Helms, David Duke and Patrick Buchanan. He was awarded membership in the party’s Presidential Legion of Merit.

Why the Republican Party? At the time of the Reagan administration there seems to have been an in-house contest for supremacy between what became known as neo-conservatives and paleoconservatives. The “neo-cons,” as we might call them, are neither “new” nor “conservative.” They were in fact Wilsonian-type liberal-Democrats and internationalists, or ex-Trotskyites who came over to the U.S. side during the Cold War in their hatred of Stalinism.[162] The paleoconservatives, a term coined by Professor Paul Gottfried, were traditionalist Republicans of the Taft, America First variety, including President Reagan’s treasury secretary Paul Craig Roberts and Reagan White House communications adviser Patrick Buchanan.

At the time also, an “ethnic outreach” program by the Republican Party recruited from among East European anti-communist émigrés who had fascist associations. The program was headed by Laszlo Pasztor, founding chairman of the Republican Heritage Groups Council who had been a member of the Arrow Cross movement of Hungarian National Socialists. The heritage council included Radi Slavoff, a Bulgarian supporter of German-American campaigner Dr. Austin J. App; Florian Galdau, a veteran of Romania’s Iron Guard; Nicholas Nazarenko, a Cossack Waffen SS veteran; et al.[163] This program campaigned vigorously against the Office of Special Investigations (OSI), established to hound elderly European émigrés with allegations of “war criminals,” many having fought as partisans against Soviet incursions during World War II.

Thompson’s contribution to revisionism is lasting and seminal, particularly through the soliciting of the hundreds of letters from eminent political, military, legal and diplomatic figures critical of the Nuremberg trials. Thompson, through his work with Remer, Yockey and Weiss in particular, established a dialectical method of analysis and action for the “Right,” a return to realpolitik that goes beyond the categorically black-and-white and red-and-blue dichotomies of much of the “Right” during the Cold War era that remains relevant in terms of present-day Russia as well as the Arab world and certain “third world” states.

Notes: