Why Hitler Won The Nazi Olympics?

Introduction The Nazi Olympics of 1936 provided Adolf Hitler with an unprecedented opportunity to publicly obscure his militarism and racism.
At this time, Hitler submerged his anti-Semitic policies and plans for enlarging Germany in order to exploit the immediate opportunity to portray
Germany as more tolerant and peaceful than it actually was in reality. Despite calls for a boycott of the games, the United States and most Western democracies ignored them. Rather, democracies maintained that Western participation in the games would expose the false nature of Nazi Aryan racist policies and propaganda. Unfortunately, in the wake of the games, Germany returned to and accelerated its expansionist policies and its persecution of the Jewish
people and others that they perceived as state enemies, culminating in World War II and the Holocaust. In this paper, we will examine and compare how the Berlin Olympics of 1936 were described in a variety of primary and secondary sources within a few days of the event. These will include articles from American Jewish newspapers and selections from William Shirer’s diary. This reflected what he witnessed, observed and remembered. It also gives a view of the impact of the Olympics upon him personally.
The View in a Selection of Newspapers The view of A.A. Freedlander in the Jewish Chicago Sentinel was typical of U.S. Jewish newspapers of the time. In an editorial, he expresses the opinion that the performance of black Olympians such as Jesse Owens and Ralph Metcalfe exposed the fallacy of
German racial theories. In his view, the Nazi Olympics were a public relations disaster for Hitler and Germany. In front of Hitler's own eyes, he repeatedly witnessed the defeat of German athletes at the hands of their supposed racial inferiors. In the wake of the black athletic victories,
Hitler decided not to permit the participation of Jewish sprinters Sam Stoller and Marty Glickman in the 400 meter relay. He did this in spite of the fact that they were kept in a training status for ten days and that they had triumphed over their rivals, including 2 of the 4 individuals chosen to replace them. The Amateur Athletic Union and the American Olympic Committee protested the harassment of the Jewish athletes (Freedlander 53). The popular enthusiasm for and influence of the Olympics was widespread. This was documented in an article in the American Jewish Outlook of August 14, 1936 when it noted an incident in Canada. An argument between a Canadian gentile and a Canadian Jew ended up in a court of law in an exchange about the famous refusal of Adolf Hitler to shake the hand of Jesse Owen after the victory of the black runner in the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
Canadian George Roland claimed that Jack Silver, a fellow worker at a watch company had threatened him to stick a knife in his back. In return, Silver told the judge that he had only remarked that there were a lot of black men in the building and that Roland had better be careful or might find himself dead. A magistrate named Murphy dismissed a disorderly conduct charge against Silver ("American Jewish Outlook" 1).
The Berlin Diary of William Shirer According to William Shirer, the Nazi promotion of the games to foreign correspondents began very early. According to an entry for
January 23, 1936, fanatical Nazi careerist Wilfred Bade called him. At that time Bade was the head of the Foreign Press Department in the German Ministry of
Propaganda. He accused Shirer of falsely reporting upon German treatment of Jews and hoped to deflect this by inviting the reporter to the Winter Game headquarters in Garmish-Parten Kirchen. When Shirer protested, Bade hung up. This incident was followed up by a radio report criticizing him personally, calling him a dirty Jew and implying that he was trying to sabotage the winter Olympic Games at Garmisch with false reports about Jewish persecution at the hands of Nazi officials. Additionally, the afternoon papers of that day were full of denunciations of Shirer. The actual content of Shirer's report was the truthful reporting about the Garmisch Nazis pulling down anti-Semitic signs in the town for Jews to get out. By this action, the Nazis hoped to spare the Olympic visitors any signs of mistreatment of the Jews in Germany. The reports about Shirer were so virulent and ridiculous that he protested to Bade, going personally to the Propaganda Ministry when Bade snubbed the reporter for a meeting about the attacks. The indignant Shirer went personally to Ministry, barging into
Bade's office. Sitting in front of the propaganda official, he demanded an apology and a retraction in the German radio and press. The heated exchange climaxed and Shirer left the office with nothing (Shirer, 45-46). In a February diary entry, the reporter noted that the Nazi's accomplished an impressive propaganda display in Garmisch. The foreign visitors were impressed with the smooth, lavish manner in which the Nazis ran the games. They noted the good manners of the Germans which Shirer felt were staged.
He personally invited a number of American businessmen to a luncheon to counter this mistaken impression. However, they would not believe him and countered back with their opinions. Additionally, foreign correspondents such as Shirer were angry with a piece in the Völkischer Beobachter that there was nothing military about the games and the correspondents that reported this were inaccurate (ibid., 46-47). In a July 27, 1936 entry in Shirer's diary, he notes that the attention to and the interest in the Berlin Olympics was so intense that it overshadowed coverage of the Spanish Civil War. Interest in Germany concentrated upon the games that opened the following week. According to Shirer, the Nazis outdid themselves to create a favorable impression upon foreign visitors. To this end, they built a huge, impressive sport-field, complete with a stadium that was designed for one hundred thousand people, a swimming stadium for ten thousand individuals and many other facilities (ibid., 64-65). In the wake of the end of the games, Shirer mulls its impression upon himself. He enjoyed the track and field, the rowing and the basket-ball events and noted that they were a headache to cover (ibid.).
Modern Scholarly Reactions to the 1936 Nazi Olympics in Berlin.
Hitler and Göring showed up for end of the games which lasted into the dark of night. Unlike many other journalists residing outside of Germany,
Shirer was of the opinion that the Nazis succeeded in running the games on a lavish scale that had never been experienced before. This appealed favorably to the
Olympic athletes. Also, the Nazis put up a very good facade for the general visiting public, especially among big businessmen. Shirer, Ralph Barnes and a number
Journalist colleagues were asked to an event to meet some of the Americans businessmen. All of them said that they were favorably impressed by the Nazi infrastructure overall for the games. According to the businessmen, they had talked to Hermann Göring who had expressed to them that the American correspondents were unfair to the Nazis. He denied that there was truth in the reports of the persecution of religion (ibid. 65-66).
Conclusion
The question has been discussed many times about whether or not Germany won the 1936 Olympics in the eyes of the public at large.
At first glance, it would seem that African-American athletic runner Jesse Owens had stolen the show at the Nazi Olympics when he won four gold medals. According to this view, this left Hitler outraged and infuriated when he rudely snubbed Owens and refused to acknowledge the athletes' accomplishment. The Owens triumph proved the fallacy of Nazi racial theories and equated to a victory for the United States team over their German counterparts. Unfortunately, this may be more spin than history.
The only real fact in this narrative is that Owens won four gold medals. The reality is much more complicated. When Owens won the first of his gold medals, the public was surprised when personal congratulations were not issued by the fuehrer. The open speculation was that the dictator's motivation for this outright snub was embarrassment and rage for having been embarrassed by the superior performance of a so-called racial inferior on the soil of the fatherland. In some ways, the 1936 Berlin Olympics were a propaganda coup for the Nazis. This was because they placed a great emphasis upon physical
fitness.
They accomplished this in their support for sport and fitness programs for German citizens of all ages in both the workplace and the schools. This policy benefited them overall not only at the time of the games, but also later in drumming up German popular enthusiasm for Hitler's future armed conquests. Outside historians and observers frequently make the mistake of assuming that a nation’s propaganda is all for foreign consumption. Rather, it is just as much for domestic consumption. In a controlled press, things can be manipulated in the regime’s favor. Further, Germany supported their Olympic bound amateur athletes in all aspects by making sure that they had the best access to medical support, the best training and facilities possible. Additionally, they provided the best training possible for athletes. The provided monetary support as well. While many countries honored their athletes, they did not bankroll them. Unlike this, the Nazis perfected this public display of national athletic prowess.
As we have seen in this presentation, this Nazi show provided a powerful influence in all public sectors of the time and to this day. Like it or not, the Nazi Olympics defined racial issues for that generation and influences our perceptions even now.