One morning an old, gray-haired and clearly anguished military chaplain appeared and spoke with a physician who was busy making patient rounds on one of the large wards. The physician’s haggard expression and uncombed hair reflected the intensity and volume of his work.
“I need permission to talk to your wounded soldiers,” the chaplain said
“Sure, Chaplain, you’ve got my permission,” answered the haggard physician.
The weary chaplain stood at one end of a rectangular ward. After the introduction, he spoke. “I’m here to give you men a sad message. I don’t have to tell you how bad the war is going. You’ve all seen for yourselves. We can’t advance. Our horns lock with our enemies. They keep getting stronger and we get weaker. So far, millions have died and if this keeps up millions more will die. Germany is ruined. The people are begging to end the war. The workers are on strike and the country is paralyzed.” Then he stopped and waited for a moment to announce the final point that said it all, “The Kaiser has left the country. The war is lost.”
The chaplain’s voice trembled as he spoke with an emotionless, but tearful face. The doctor saw the chaplain regain his composure and say, “We are all going to have to trust in the goodness of our conquerors. May God’s blessing be upon all of you.” With those final words, he bent his head, turned, and walked off the ward.
The doctor listened in rapt attention. None of this came as a surprise. He had watched soldiers who had at first been eager to get back to action, but now wished only for safety or to go home. Some resorted to anything that might spare them more combat including self-inflicted wounds. He knew that this progressive decline in morale made the outcome inevitable. He was grateful that he survived the war. Conditions on the home front were deteriorating.
The doctor observed the soldiers as they gradually absorbed the chaplain’s message. Their blank expressions betrayed utter emotional exhaustion. Here, some had propped themselves on their elbows from a reclining position; there, others had turned their wheelchairs to face the pastor. Some were frozen in grotesque postures and could only turn their gaze. Those blinded by gas could only listen. At length the chaplain finished, “May God’s blessing be upon you all.” These words were met with a barely audible sigh of relief. The chaplain bowed his head, turned and walked away.
However, there was one soldier who had a different reaction. The doctor heard a loud moan and turned to see a man with a large mustache moist with tears, sitting in a chair, his straight black hair covering the left side of his forehead. He clenched his forehead with his right hand. Adolph Hitler arose from his chair, walked to his bed sobbing and threw himself face down.
The intensity of the reaction came as a surprise to the doctor who walked to the bedside and picked up the medical chart hanging from the foot of the bed. Turning to the identification page, he read the patients name…Adolph Hitler. The diagnosis page read mustard gas exposure with hysterical blindness. “Why are you crying, soldier? You should be glad because this hell is over and you’re still alive.”
The doctor’s voice silenced Hitler’s sobs, and he turned over and looked for the source of the voice standing at the foot of his bed. He stared at the doctor. “What did you say?” he asked incredulously.
“You survived. Aren’t you happy about that? I wanted to know why you were crying,” answered the surprised physician.
Hitler’s swollen eyes seemed to burst into flame as he screamed, “I cry because I feel what all loyal German soldiers should feel when they see theirs country stabbed in the back by traitors! We have surrendered even though enemy soldiers have not stepped foot on German soil. Why?” he screamed.”
The intensity of this outburst surprised the doctor. He countered, “But even the chaplain said victory was impossible. The Kaiser left the country. How do we fight when the leaders and generals have given up? The country is in chaos.”
“Our country was stabbed in the back,” said Hitler who stood up and stabbed an imaginary knife toward the floor with his right hand.
“Stabbed in the back?” quizzed the doctor.
“If you question what I have said, then you are a traitor too,” screamed the agitated Hitler.
At that statement, the doctor’s own anger erupted. After the agonies of the last four years, labeled a traitor was more than he could tolerate. He confronted the soldier, and pointed his shaking finger in his face saying, “How dare you call me a traitor. I’m a surgeon, and I spent the last four years trying to save lives. That’s been my contribution to the war effort, and I won’t have you belittle what I’ve done.”
Hitler’s facial expression became even more defiant as the exasperated doctor finally issued a thundering tirade of his own. “Who are these traitors you scream about? Your comrades lying here in bed, some near death? The generals? Do you think they’re traitors for not sending a million more men to be slaughtered? I’ve declared enough soldiers dead. No more, thank God!”
As if not hearing or seeing a thing, Hitler stared into the doctor’s eyes with a demonic glance that made the doctor shudder. Hitler screamed, “You ask who these traitors are? I’ll tell you so you’ll know now and forever. There are traitors in the navy who have mutinied and run up the red flag of Communism as we speak. They are the traitors. Communists and Jews, and I speak of them in one breath. You fool. As we talk, this naval mutiny at Kiel goes on. The Communists want to control the country, and behind them lurks the Jew. Yes, the Jew, the filth of the world, the rat that carries the flea that will lead to the plague that will destroy the world. The Jew: usurers, Communists, exploiters, profiteers, foreigners. Whenever we have misfortune we have a Jew in the background.” He paused, took a deep breath and went on. “In the new Germany, Jews will not be tolerated!” Already, history could note the budding fanaticism of Adolph Hitler and his pathological hatred of Jews.
This hate-filled, passionate oratory took the doctor by surprise. A Jew himself, he stifled his emotions. A chill went through his body. He suppressed the urge to respond as he noticed with some anxiety the soldier patients who listened with an oddly keen attention to the words of this zealot. Then he remembered his responsibility to the wounded men under his care. He forced himself to dismiss what he had heard as the ranting of a disturbed soldier who had been shell-shocked and demoralized by defeat. He changed the subject rather than confront him anymore. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes for a few seconds, opened them and said, “How are your eyes?”
Without varying the intensity of his voice, Hitler said, “My eyes don’t burn as much and I can see more now. Didn’t you hear how clear I can see?” he screamed.
The doctor had all he could do to remember his Hippocratic Oath. He thought of holding his wife in his arms. Then without saying a word, he examined the soldier’s eyes, added some soothing drops and said in a calm voice, “There, that should help your eyes. They’ll be fine.” He turned away and as he walked out of the ward, he thought who is this crazy man who so mesmerized the other soldiers?
It would not take long before he would learn…
During the war as one particularly ferocious battle wore down, a wounded and limping German soldier walked into a British soldier’s line of fire. Private Tandy raised his rifle and took aim. The soldier stared at Tandy resigned to the fact that he could be witnessing his own sudden death. But Tandy stated that after he took aim, he decided against shooting a wounded soldier, so he lowered his rifle.
Hitler nodded in thanks and limped off to history. In Hitler’s mind, this was another confirmation of his God-Given future destiny.
CHAPTER 8
Albert and Samuel World War I…1914-18
The tensions of the years of diplomatic and political stalemate in Germany’s relations with neighboring countries suddenly abated when war was declared in 1914. Finally it happened. The consensus was that this will be a short war.
An intense patriotic fervor overcame