Der Fuehrer - Hitler's Rise to Power (1944) - Heiden

THE REICHSTAG FIRE 559Court investigated the fire and studied the evidence. Goring'sdocuments were no part of it; they were not mentioned in court. In itsverdict, to be sure, the Reich Court said that it believed the Reichstag tohave been set on fire by Communists, but the court admitted that it hadno proofs of this: 'This can' — can! — 'have been an act only of Leftradical elements, who probably' — probably! — 'promised themselvesan opportunity for overthrowing the government and the constitution,and seizing power.' Then the court did a strange thing: it acquitted thetwo Communist leaders, Torgler and Dimitroff, and their Communistcomrades, Popoff and Taneff. Only the apathetic, evidently insane vander Lubbe, who admitted that he knew none of the four others, butstubbornly insisted on his guilt, was condemned to death, hastilyexecuted, hastily cremated.Today it is as good as proved that the Reichstag fire was not theCommunist crime which the National Socialists made of it. It is notquite so clear who really did set the fire and how. For the work of asingle individual, the preparations were too extensive. It may beassumed that the incendiaries were close to the National Socialists, buttheir identity and methods have remained unknown. The world wasduped with all sorts of 'documents,' a number of them presumablymanufactured by the National Socialists themselves, to create confusion.Supposed confessions of the incendiaries were offered for sale, and theforgeries were not always very competent. The irrefutable document inthe case, however, is that which was not produced: Goring's materialfrom the Karl Liebknecht House.Whether a troop of S.A. men passed into the Reichstag through theunderground passage from Goring's palace; or whether a band ofNational Socialist deputies went about sprinkling benches, cushions,and carpets with inflammable liquids, is still uncertain. At all events, thefire would be the signal for a Saint Bartholomew, for that 'night of thelong knife' which Hitler had at first been obliged to renounce. Now thecabinet, the Reichswehr, the President, would allow him to break hispromise. He wanted — as Goring later publicly admitted — to hang vander Lubbe in front of the Reichstag immediately and without trial, inorder that the people should see how sub-humans are exterminated; hewanted the same