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FIRST EDITION OF A 1940 NAZI BOOK TO DEBUNK “FOREIGN MISINFORMATION ABOUT GERMANY” WRITTEN BY DR. GOEBBELS’ RIGHT-HAND MAN

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This is a fine First Edition (1-30,000) of Krieg den Kriegshetzern. 8 Wochen politische Zeitungs- und Rundfunkschau with a foreword by Dr. Joseph Goebbels, Reichsminister für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda (State Minister for National Community Clarification and Publicity).

The title of the book translates as War against War Agitators, Looking at Eight Weeks of Political Newspaper and Radio News and refers to anti-German war propaganda broadcast and printed abroad after the start of World War II in September 1939. With selected cartoons the author pokes fun at what he calls the falsehood, lies and propaganda published about the goals and politics of Adolf Hitler in and outside Germany.

Journalist and radio broadcaster Hans Fritzsche is the author of this book. He had several positions in the early days of radio in Germany and became the head of the broadcasting department of the Nazi Propaganda Ministry in May 1933. On shortwave radio he broadcast daily news to listeners in Germany and Germans abroad, and attempted to debunk what he regarded as negative foreign news about Hitler and Nazi Germany. His job also included preparing (“clarifying”) daily news for regular German news outlets.

The first broadcast of Fritzsche’s radio program Politischen Zeitungs- und Rundfunkschau was in 1939. In 1940 this book with the same title was published. The name of the radio program was later changed to Hans Fritzsche Speaking and he became the most recognized voice on the radio in Nazi Germany.

At the end of World War II Fritsche was in the Führerbunker, one of the highest ranking Nazi government officials still in Berlin. He helped identify the bodies of the Goebbels family, became a Soviet POW and was transferred from Berlin to Lubjanka prison in Moscow. Later he was tried by the International Military Tribunal in Nürnberg, as a Hauptverbrecher due to his large role in the NS-Propaganda office and being Goebbels’ substitute (Ersatz für Joseph Goebbels). He was sentenced to 9 years in a labor camp but was released in September 1950. In 1951 he married Hildegard Springer, who had been employed at the Nazi Propagandaministerium in Berlin. He worked in advertising until his death in 1953.

This First Edition example of Krieg den Kriegshetzern, 8 Wochen politische Zeitungs- und Rundfunkschau was published by Brunnen Verlag, Willi Bischoff of Berlin in 1940. It has its original dust jacket designed by Rose Pahl of Berlin, which has a tear of approximately 1 inch on the back side (taped on the inside). This rare and historic 84+ year old Nazi propaganda book is complete and in very nice condition and has no odor.

According to Dr. Joseph Goebbels, this book provides a look into the “office of our spiritual and propaganda warfare”, countering the unfair advantage the much larger foreign press has which seems to “repeat the same old tired lies.” Using modern technology such as radio broadcasts made it possible to respond immediately and provide the German population with the right information, and debunk the lies.

After deployment near Stalingrad from April to September 1942 in a Propagandakompanie, Fritsche became the Ministerial Director of the Radio Department at the Reichsministerium für Volksaufklärung und Propaganda in Berlin, officially in charge of the political content of all radio broadcasts in Greater Germany. With Dr. Goebbels, he was the central voice for German propaganda.

This 5-7/8 x 8-1/8 inch extremely anti-British, anti-Jewish softcover book dissecting eight weeks of political newspaper and radio broadcasts has 160 heavily illustrated pages with black & white cartoons that appeared in German newspapers to try to make fun of foreign war propaganda. They are interspersed in chapters that cover British interference with peace in Poland (“Poland pushes and agitates”, “England throws Oil on the Fire”), England’s War Guilt, Bloody Sunday in the city of Bromberg, the Czech destiny, foreign speculation about a possible German invasion of Belgium, the non-aggression pact between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, how 1939 British naval losses were covered up by the “Ministry of the Coordination of Lies”, Adolf Hitler’s Peace Plan, British press censoring, how the Nazi submarine victory and the sinking of the battleship HMS Royal Oak at Scapa Flow was “disguised” in the British press, etc., etc.