1 00:00:27,580 --> 00:00:54,010 O o o o o o o o o. 2 00:00:54,010 --> 00:01:01,900 Good evening, and thank you for joining us this evening. My name is Professor Wes Williams and professor of French, but also director of Torch. 3 00:01:01,900 --> 00:01:05,320 And I'm delighted to introduce you to this evening's live event, 4 00:01:05,320 --> 00:01:10,450 which is part of the Humanities Cultural Programme itself, one of the founding stones for the future. 5 00:01:10,450 --> 00:01:14,880 Stephen A. Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities here in Oxford. 6 00:01:14,880 --> 00:01:23,810 Tonight, we're delighted to host writing and resistance the White Rose pamphlets alive reading. 7 00:01:23,810 --> 00:01:29,900 The White Rose Research Project is a research and public engagement initiative at the University of Oxford, 8 00:01:29,900 --> 00:01:34,790 bringing the story of the white rose resistance to English speaking audiences. 9 00:01:34,790 --> 00:01:40,880 It works in partnership with the Vice Hauser shift on the White Rose Foundation in Munich, 10 00:01:40,880 --> 00:01:44,570 thanks to the Knowledge Exchange Fellowship Scheme here at Torch. 11 00:01:44,570 --> 00:01:50,900 The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities and with the award winning vocal ensemble Sankara, 12 00:01:50,900 --> 00:01:57,490 whom we heard in the opening video and we'll hear again at the close of this night, this evening's event. 13 00:01:57,490 --> 00:02:04,750 The project is led by Dr. Alex Loyd, followed by special election in German Edmund Hall, Oxford. 14 00:02:04,750 --> 00:02:08,080 Alex has published widely on post-war Germany, 15 00:02:08,080 --> 00:02:18,190 most recently in her book Childhood Memory and the Nation Young Lives Under Nazism in Contemporary German Culture, published just last year. 16 00:02:18,190 --> 00:02:21,010 Alex will shortly give an introduction to the white. 17 00:02:21,010 --> 00:02:31,540 Rose will then hear the pamphlets read by current and former students and also academics mirroring the membership of the original resistance group. 18 00:02:31,540 --> 00:02:38,980 Our readers are and they'll come on screen, as I say, their names, I hope so because. 19 00:02:38,980 --> 00:02:46,120 Eve Mason. Adam Rebeck. Elba, Salamanca. 20 00:02:46,120 --> 00:02:55,590 Sam Thompson. Amy Wilkinson. And Jim Reid. 21 00:02:55,590 --> 00:03:03,290 Jim's about to appear. Welcome to then to all our readers this evening. 22 00:03:03,290 --> 00:03:06,800 Kim will appear in a moment I have. 23 00:03:06,800 --> 00:03:15,620 Tonight is a performance, so rather than areas, rather than submitting questions for our speakers, we instead invite you to join the conversation, 24 00:03:15,620 --> 00:03:25,850 which has actually been going on for at least a week now on social media using either at White Rhodes, Oxford and or the hashtag White Rose. 25 00:03:25,850 --> 00:03:30,850 Real time links to these will be shared in the live chat below. 26 00:03:30,850 --> 00:03:35,440 We do, of course, welcome your comments and thoughts this evening via the chat function. 27 00:03:35,440 --> 00:03:38,370 If you wish to add them there. 28 00:03:38,370 --> 00:03:47,070 And now, without further ado, I'd like to thank Alex and all of our speakers once again for joining us this evening and hand over to you, Alex. 29 00:03:47,070 --> 00:03:52,530 Thank you very much indeed. Thanks very much indeed, once. 30 00:03:52,530 --> 00:03:56,760 It's wonderful to be here doing this event this evening. 31 00:03:56,760 --> 00:04:01,170 And thanks very much indeed to torture hosting its. 32 00:04:01,170 --> 00:04:11,370 78 years ago today on Monday, the 22nd of February 1943, at five p.m., three students from the University of Munich were executed. 33 00:04:11,370 --> 00:04:17,100 That crime had been to secretly write, print and distribute anti-Nazi pamphlets, 34 00:04:17,100 --> 00:04:22,650 calling on Germans to resist Hitler and to bring about an end to the Second World War. 35 00:04:22,650 --> 00:04:28,960 In the weeks and months that followed, they were further arrests and further executions. 36 00:04:28,960 --> 00:04:30,100 At his broadest, 37 00:04:30,100 --> 00:04:40,660 the white rose resistant circle included a wide network of individuals at its heart were five students and an academic in Munich Anshul Sophie Scholl, 38 00:04:40,660 --> 00:04:47,380 Christoph Probst, Alexander Smil, Philip Graff and Professor Could Cuba. 39 00:04:47,380 --> 00:04:53,350 This was, in some senses, a very diverse group with different backgrounds and formative experiences. 40 00:04:53,350 --> 00:04:57,730 Yet they shared a number of common interests, views and values. 41 00:04:57,730 --> 00:05:05,740 Amongst these was a love of reading of art and music of nature and a profound interest in religion and philosophy. 42 00:05:05,740 --> 00:05:13,880 In the case of Kurt Huber, these things were also the subject and object of his academic teaching and research. 43 00:05:13,880 --> 00:05:21,800 Just as Marxism was attempting to reduce their worldview, they found new worlds through reading and discussion. 44 00:05:21,800 --> 00:05:28,440 These were individuals in search of more than the political system in which they lived was willing to give them. 45 00:05:28,440 --> 00:05:34,170 These were extraordinary people, but they were not born resistance fighters or heroes. 46 00:05:34,170 --> 00:05:41,010 They were perfectly normal people, perhaps even a little like you or me. 47 00:05:41,010 --> 00:05:50,010 By the spring of 1942, the war was going well for Nazi Germany, with a string of military successes on both the eastern and western fronts. 48 00:05:50,010 --> 00:05:59,090 At the same time, Nazi designs for the elimination of those deemed subhuman were also advancing at an accelerated pace. 49 00:05:59,090 --> 00:06:04,370 Mass deportations were being perpetrated across occupied Europe. 50 00:06:04,370 --> 00:06:10,700 It was at this moment that all six core members of the White Rose Circle found themselves in Munich, 51 00:06:10,700 --> 00:06:16,320 the city Adolf Hitler had dubbed the capital of the Nazi movement. 52 00:06:16,320 --> 00:06:22,470 Hans Scholl had begun his studies in medicine at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich in the summer semester 53 00:06:22,470 --> 00:06:30,900 of 1939 after completing compulsory labour service and training in the Army Medical Corps in October 1940. 54 00:06:30,900 --> 00:06:37,770 He met Alexander Shmuel, who had transferred from Hamburg to Munich and was also studying medicine. 55 00:06:37,770 --> 00:06:46,400 Christoph Probst was a childhood friend of Alexander. They had met at school, and Christophe had also begun studying medicine at Munich. 56 00:06:46,400 --> 00:06:53,800 Kristof, in turn, introduced Telegraph Graph to the group in June 1942 after they met at a concert. 57 00:06:53,800 --> 00:06:59,260 Philip Graff had been studying medicine at the University of Bonn after his preliminary examination. 58 00:06:59,260 --> 00:07:08,910 The university closed and so he transferred to Munich. Professor Kurt Huber taught musicology, philosophy and psychology in Munich. 59 00:07:08,910 --> 00:07:14,080 His lectures were popular with students, including the members of the White Rose. 60 00:07:14,080 --> 00:07:22,840 In May 1942, Sophie Scholl was finally able to begin her studies after enduring several months of National Labour Service. 61 00:07:22,840 --> 00:07:31,830 She arrived in Munich in early May in time to celebrate her 21st birthday on the nights with her brother and his friends. 62 00:07:31,830 --> 00:07:37,950 There were others in the circle, too, including Tata, loved ones you met Han Stroll through Alexander. 63 00:07:37,950 --> 00:07:41,790 She was also studying medicine in Munich. 64 00:07:41,790 --> 00:07:49,740 The student spent two evenings reading, discussing and exchanging views with each other and with older and more experienced individuals, 65 00:07:49,740 --> 00:07:53,160 some of whom became queasy mentors to the group. 66 00:07:53,160 --> 00:08:02,820 This included the writer and translator Taro Hecker, the writer publisher, Komut and Professor, Katoomba How to Love Romance recalled of this time. 67 00:08:02,820 --> 00:08:10,780 One had the sense that there was a network of like minded people, widely cast and finely woven. 68 00:08:10,780 --> 00:08:15,310 On the 17th of June 1942, the students met at the home of Victor Emmanuel, 69 00:08:15,310 --> 00:08:21,070 mettant professor of medicine and his wife, the pianist and singer gets wood mittens. 70 00:08:21,070 --> 00:08:25,120 Kurt Huber was also there in the course of the evening. 71 00:08:25,120 --> 00:08:32,380 A discussion sprang up about how, in the current situation, it might be possible to preserve one's inner values. 72 00:08:32,380 --> 00:08:38,530 One of those there declared that open resistance was pointless, to which Kurt Huber responded. 73 00:08:38,530 --> 00:08:49,780 Something must be done. And today? The response of Hans Scholl and Alexander Morales to this call to action would become clear in the weeks to come. 74 00:08:49,780 --> 00:08:57,150 The first phase of the white rose resistance was the writing and dissemination of four pamphlets in German Flook letter. 75 00:08:57,150 --> 00:09:07,290 These were produced by Hansel and Alexandra Shmuel over the course of just 16 days between the 27th of June and the 12th of July 1942. 76 00:09:07,290 --> 00:09:14,910 Each text begins with the heading pamphlets of the white rose and a corresponding number suggesting that from the very beginning, 77 00:09:14,910 --> 00:09:18,960 the authors intended to produce a series. 78 00:09:18,960 --> 00:09:29,700 Each pamphlet concluded with a variation on the same message instructions to the reader to make and distribute further copies. 79 00:09:29,700 --> 00:09:34,440 They draughted the pamphlets by hand, wrote them up on a Remington portable typewriter, 80 00:09:34,440 --> 00:09:39,330 made copies on a second hand duplicating machine and despite wartime shortages, 81 00:09:39,330 --> 00:09:46,030 obtained paper envelopes and postage stamps in quantities small enough to be inconspicuous. 82 00:09:46,030 --> 00:09:55,430 They posted copies to writers, academics, head teachers, booksellers, doctors, restaurant owners, grocers and publicans in and around Munich. 83 00:09:55,430 --> 00:10:01,170 Further copies were distributed by hand. A great personal risk. 84 00:10:01,170 --> 00:10:07,570 The pamphlets sought to appeal to readers self-understanding as part of a civilised or cultured nation. 85 00:10:07,570 --> 00:10:13,980 They criticise those Germans that are passively allowed Nazis and take hold and ask readers to take 86 00:10:13,980 --> 00:10:21,930 seriously the idea that the future of the days to come if no one takes action will be bleak indeed. 87 00:10:21,930 --> 00:10:27,630 The denounce, the persecution of European Jews and the slaughter of Poles in the occupied territories. 88 00:10:27,630 --> 00:10:33,090 They advocate passive resistance and sabotage as a way of stalling the war effort. 89 00:10:33,090 --> 00:10:37,800 They mock and attack Adolf Hitler, calling him the Antichrist. 90 00:10:37,800 --> 00:10:42,120 Their language is forceful and it is urgent. 91 00:10:42,120 --> 00:10:48,540 One of the most striking things about the first four pamphlets is the inclusion of quotations from other sources. 92 00:10:48,540 --> 00:10:56,910 These draw on a wide range of philosophical ideas and influences from totemic German writers such as Gerta Shila and Savalas, 93 00:10:56,910 --> 00:11:02,320 as well as Aristotle the Old Testament, an ancient Chinese philosophy. 94 00:11:02,320 --> 00:11:04,990 The body of thought from which the White Rose authors drew, 95 00:11:04,990 --> 00:11:14,990 and which they offered in part as validation of their own position expressed as well a rich and diverse cultural interests. 96 00:11:14,990 --> 00:11:19,880 The fourth pamphlet was completed and distributed in July 1942. 97 00:11:19,880 --> 00:11:27,620 Later that month, Hans Scholl, Alexander Small and really gruff, left Munich for a three month tour of duty at the Russian front. 98 00:11:27,620 --> 00:11:30,050 They were all conscripted medical students, 99 00:11:30,050 --> 00:11:38,150 which meant they could study during the university term and would then be deployed as medical orderlies during the vacations. 100 00:11:38,150 --> 00:11:44,330 These three months in Russia proved profoundly important for these three white rose students. 101 00:11:44,330 --> 00:11:53,240 They spent time with Russian people drinking, singing and talking with them as they tried to learn the Russian language for Alexander Shmuel. 102 00:11:53,240 --> 00:12:01,390 Born to a Russian mother and you spoke Russian fluently, this was a returned to his longed for homeland. 103 00:12:01,390 --> 00:12:09,310 When Hans Alexander and Vili returned to Germany in November 1942, the group presumed the pamphlet campaign. 104 00:12:09,310 --> 00:12:16,480 In December, Hounshell told Kurt Huber about the pamphlets, and at this point he became actively involved. 105 00:12:16,480 --> 00:12:21,130 That same month, Christoph Probst was transferred to a student company in Innsbruck. 106 00:12:21,130 --> 00:12:27,210 However, he travelled back and forth to Munich to participate in the resistance activities. 107 00:12:27,210 --> 00:12:34,830 On the 13th of January, Telegraaf noted in his diary, visited Hanse still there by the evening. 108 00:12:34,830 --> 00:12:41,470 We're really getting started with the work. The ball is starting to roll. 109 00:12:41,470 --> 00:12:49,270 The fifth pamphlets of the White Rose appeared sometime between the 27th and 29th of January 1943. 110 00:12:49,270 --> 00:12:54,740 The text was written by Hansell and edited principally by Clutterbuck. 111 00:12:54,740 --> 00:13:00,710 On the 3rd of February, news arrived of the German Army's defeat at Stalingrad that same night, 112 00:13:00,710 --> 00:13:06,590 Alexander hunts and volley graffitied buildings in the centre of Munich and around the university. 113 00:13:06,590 --> 00:13:11,300 They painted the slogans down with Hitler and freedom. 114 00:13:11,300 --> 00:13:17,720 Following the news of Stalingrad, Kurt Huber wrote the text of the sixth pamphlet at hand shows request. 115 00:13:17,720 --> 00:13:23,330 He even asked him to write it in the voice of the student and indeed the heading of the pamphlet simply reads. 116 00:13:23,330 --> 00:13:36,020 Fellow students. Cuba had edited Hans shows, writing in the fifth pamphlet, and now the students did the same to their academic mentor. 117 00:13:36,020 --> 00:13:44,330 On the morning of the 18th of February 1943, Hanson Sophie Scholl distributed copies of the pamphlets around the atrium at 118 00:13:44,330 --> 00:13:49,970 the entrance of the main university building their clandestine work completed. 119 00:13:49,970 --> 00:13:56,300 They might have succeeded in their plans disappear amongst the many students coming out of their lectures, 120 00:13:56,300 --> 00:14:00,740 but for a seemingly insignificant act, Sophie, 121 00:14:00,740 --> 00:14:07,070 in what she later described in her Gestapo interrogation as the result of either high spirits or foolishness, 122 00:14:07,070 --> 00:14:16,390 pushed one of the piles of pamphlets over the balustrade and the sheets of paper cascaded down into the empty atrium below. 123 00:14:16,390 --> 00:14:22,600 This caught the attention of the university caretaker who raced up the stairs and apprehended the Ixtoc, 124 00:14:22,600 --> 00:14:26,230 I called and they were taken into custody that evening. 125 00:14:26,230 --> 00:14:34,440 Philip Graff and his sister were also arrested. When Hunt's role and his sister were arrested on the 18th of February, 126 00:14:34,440 --> 00:14:41,650 Hants had in his pocket the handwritten draught of a pamphlet that Christoph Probst had written a month earlier. 127 00:14:41,650 --> 00:14:48,010 When he was apprehended, he tried in vain to get rid of the draught that would have incriminated his friend. 128 00:14:48,010 --> 00:14:57,610 But the arresting officers discovered it. As soon as he was identified as the author, Christophe Probe's fate was sealed. 129 00:14:57,610 --> 00:15:04,690 He was arrested on Saturday, the 20th of February, at his barracks in Innsbruck as he was picking up a live permit. 130 00:15:04,690 --> 00:15:11,620 His wife, however, was in hospital following the birth of their third child daughter, and he was planning to visit them. 131 00:15:11,620 --> 00:15:18,880 Meanwhile, Alexander Sowell attempted to flee and Kurt Huber had not yet been connected with the group. 132 00:15:18,880 --> 00:15:27,670 The first white rose trial began on the morning of Monday, the 22nd of February 1943, in the Palace of Justice in Munich. 133 00:15:27,670 --> 00:15:33,690 It concluded after just a few hours and the three defendants received the death sentence. 134 00:15:33,690 --> 00:15:45,840 They were executed that same day, Sophie Scholl at five p.m., Hans Scholl at 5:02pm, Christoph Probst at five 00 five p.m. 135 00:15:45,840 --> 00:15:54,980 That evening, the chief prosecutor sent a telegram to Berlin to report that the day had proceeded without incident. 136 00:15:54,980 --> 00:16:03,690 Alexandra Shmuel and Kurt Huber were subsequently arrested, and they, alongside Vili Groth and others, were tried in April 1943. 137 00:16:03,690 --> 00:16:08,110 Alexandra Shmuel and Katoomba were executed on the 13th of July. 138 00:16:08,110 --> 00:16:12,650 Billy Graff was executed on the 12th of October. 139 00:16:12,650 --> 00:16:19,490 Two students, Hans Michael and Mary Louise Allen, made copies of the six pamphlets and distributed them in Hamburg. 140 00:16:19,490 --> 00:16:28,870 They also collected money for Hoover's widow, Clara, who had been issued with a bill for wear and tear to the guillotine following his execution. 141 00:16:28,870 --> 00:16:35,650 Hans Leipold, Marie-Louise Ajan and others were tried by the People's Court in October 1944. 142 00:16:35,650 --> 00:16:43,720 John received a 12 year prison sentence. Leipold, who had already suffered at the hands of Nazi race laws as his mother was Jewish, 143 00:16:43,720 --> 00:16:50,160 was sentenced to death and executed a straddle home prison in January 1945. 144 00:16:50,160 --> 00:16:56,490 Thus, even after the six members of the core group had been imprisoned and almost all of them executed, 145 00:16:56,490 --> 00:17:00,900 the pamphlet campaign continued in August 1943. 146 00:17:00,900 --> 00:17:09,240 Clara Huber was called into the Gestapo offices in Munich and told that the allies had dropped thousands of pamphlets over Germany. 147 00:17:09,240 --> 00:17:17,310 She was astonished. It turned out that Kurt Hoover's pamphlet had been smuggled out by Helmut James Gough from Moleskine, 148 00:17:17,310 --> 00:17:24,020 a leading figure in the Kaiser's circle, a group of German dissidents working against the Nazis. 149 00:17:24,020 --> 00:17:33,380 The British political warfare executive reproduced the pamphlet with a new title, a German pamphlet manifesto of the Munich students. 150 00:17:33,380 --> 00:17:41,480 As the families of those who had already been executed were mourning their dead and Vili Graaff was still being held in a prison cell in Munich. 151 00:17:41,480 --> 00:17:49,700 Millions of copies of the pamphlet were dropped by the RAF over northern and central Germany. 152 00:17:49,700 --> 00:17:56,630 In January 1945, a friend of the White Rose, Theodore Hecker, wrote in his diary. 153 00:17:56,630 --> 00:18:02,810 History teaches us that no one feels so disgustingly certain of victory or is so unteachable, 154 00:18:02,810 --> 00:18:12,460 sure and immune to reason as the fanatic, and that no one is so absolutely certain of ultimate defeat. 155 00:18:12,460 --> 00:18:18,550 The individuals at the heart of the White Rose had seen up close the effects of such fanaticism. 156 00:18:18,550 --> 00:18:28,480 I lost friends and comrades. Witness persecution and feared was a Nazi victory might mean not only for Germany, but for Europe and the world. 157 00:18:28,480 --> 00:18:33,700 Their pamphlets were designed to stir up the people confronting them with truths that the 158 00:18:33,700 --> 00:18:39,610 group believed they were deliberately ignoring through fear or obstinacy or ambivalence. 159 00:18:39,610 --> 00:18:46,150 They spoke of freedom, moral duty, corruption, evil and the urgent need for action. 160 00:18:46,150 --> 00:18:54,310 They levelled powerful accusations that their readers. They were angry, idealistic, unwavering and uncompromising. 161 00:18:54,310 --> 00:19:02,860 Even if at times the individuals in the White Rose and their actions appear remote, flawed, incomprehensible, 162 00:19:02,860 --> 00:19:09,550 they are timely and hopeful reminder of the ways in which conscience and moral courage can lead to action. 163 00:19:09,550 --> 00:19:17,440 The challenges injustice you are now going to hear the seven resistance pamphlets of the White Rose. 164 00:19:17,440 --> 00:19:24,780 Our readers are students, former students and academics learning the membership of the original group. 165 00:19:24,780 --> 00:19:34,250 The English translation will be reading was undertaken by students at the University of Oxford between October 2018 and May 2019. 166 00:19:34,250 --> 00:19:37,520 Well, there have been many translations of the pamphlets into English. 167 00:19:37,520 --> 00:19:45,320 The Oxford students had two aims for their new version first, that it should be the result of collaborative work. 168 00:19:45,320 --> 00:19:55,490 And second that it should be undertaken by students around about the same age as the original student authors of the pamphlets. 169 00:19:55,490 --> 00:20:02,920 Those engaged in courses at university working together on tax ideas and issues. 170 00:20:02,920 --> 00:20:11,560 The Oxford student translators were struck by how resonant the White Roses pamphlets are today, how vividly and forcefully they speak of freedom, 171 00:20:11,560 --> 00:20:23,870 injustice, oppression and personal responsibility in ways that are all too necessary in our own times. 172 00:20:23,870 --> 00:20:28,490 The first pamphlet of the White Rose. 173 00:20:28,490 --> 00:20:39,020 Complicity with the governance of an irresponsible clique of rulers driven by their darkest urges and complicity without resistance. 174 00:20:39,020 --> 00:20:48,760 Nothing is more unworthy of a civilised people. Is it not so is it in the present day, every honourable German is ashamed of their government? 175 00:20:48,760 --> 00:20:58,060 And who amongst us can foresee the extent of the infamy that will be on us and on our children when the veil is one day lifted from our eyes? 176 00:20:58,060 --> 00:21:04,800 And the most horrific crimes crimes beyond all measure come to light. 177 00:21:04,800 --> 00:21:11,580 If in their innermost being, the German people have been corrupted and degraded enough to betray the greatest quality, 178 00:21:11,580 --> 00:21:21,030 humanity possesses that quality, which elevates them above all other creatures free will without so much as lifting a finger, 179 00:21:21,030 --> 00:21:25,860 foolishly trusting the dubious notion that history follows its natural course. 180 00:21:25,860 --> 00:21:35,160 If this people can betray the freedom of humankind to intervene in the course of history and to subordinate it to its rational judgement. 181 00:21:35,160 --> 00:21:43,230 If the Germans so utterly devoid of any kind of individuality have already become such a weak and mindless horde, 182 00:21:43,230 --> 00:21:56,010 then yes, they truly deserve their own demise. Gutter speaks of the Germans as a tragic people, much like the Jews or the Greeks. 183 00:21:56,010 --> 00:22:04,380 But these days, they seem more like a shallow, spineless herd of mindless followers whose substance has been sucked out of them from within 184 00:22:04,380 --> 00:22:11,350 and who robbed of their very core allow themselves to be baited into their own demise. 185 00:22:11,350 --> 00:22:17,980 This seems like the truth, but it isn't a slow, deceitful, systematic violation, 186 00:22:17,980 --> 00:22:26,950 has locked every single one of us into a mental cage, and it is only once shackled that we become conscious of our fate. 187 00:22:26,950 --> 00:22:34,980 Very few recognise the impending calamity. And the reward for the heroic warnings was death. 188 00:22:34,980 --> 00:22:43,450 Much remains to be said about the fate of these people. If every one of us waits for someone else to start. 189 00:22:43,450 --> 00:22:49,300 Then the Herald's of Avenging Nemesis will draw ever closer until the last sacrificial 190 00:22:49,300 --> 00:22:55,270 victim is vainly thrown into the jaws of a demon that will never be sated. 191 00:22:55,270 --> 00:23:00,910 Every individual must, therefore, at the 11th hour. 192 00:23:00,910 --> 00:23:05,500 Fight back as much as lies in that power with an awareness of their responsibility as 193 00:23:05,500 --> 00:23:11,770 a member of Christian and Western culture must work against the scourges of humanity, 194 00:23:11,770 --> 00:23:18,450 against fascism and all the systems of dictatorship that resemble it. 195 00:23:18,450 --> 00:23:24,640 Wherever you may be. Mount, passive resistance. 196 00:23:24,640 --> 00:23:32,810 Resistance. Obstruct the progress of this atheistic war machine before it's too late. 197 00:23:32,810 --> 00:23:40,130 Before, like Cologne, the lost cities are left in ruins before the last remaining youths of this nation 198 00:23:40,130 --> 00:23:46,710 bleed to death in some unknown place for the sake of the hubris of a subhuman. 199 00:23:46,710 --> 00:23:56,060 Remember that every people deserves the government it is prepared to tolerate. 200 00:23:56,060 --> 00:24:05,900 From Friedrich Schiller's, the legislation of life surges and solar. 201 00:24:05,900 --> 00:24:14,360 Seen in the light of its chosen ends, light suggests this legislation is a masterpiece of political and human science. 202 00:24:14,360 --> 00:24:21,080 He wanted a state that was powerful, founded upon itself and indestructible. 203 00:24:21,080 --> 00:24:25,970 The aims he set himself were political strength and longevity. 204 00:24:25,970 --> 00:24:32,160 And he achieved these aims as far as was possible under the circumstances he was facing. 205 00:24:32,160 --> 00:24:38,330 But if one confronts the aims of life surges with the aims of mankind. 206 00:24:38,330 --> 00:24:45,270 The admiration that a first fleeting glance sparked in us must give way to deep disapproval. 207 00:24:45,270 --> 00:24:50,520 One may sacrifice everything for the best of the state without exception. 208 00:24:50,520 --> 00:24:57,190 That's to which the state is only a means. The state in and of itself is never the object. 209 00:24:57,190 --> 00:25:04,470 It is merely the necess-, the necessary condition under which the purpose of mankind may be fulfilled. 210 00:25:04,470 --> 00:25:10,440 And this purpose is none other than the development of a person's abilities to their full extent. 211 00:25:10,440 --> 00:25:19,060 That is to say progress. If a state's constitution hinders the development of all in with powers of mankind. 212 00:25:19,060 --> 00:25:31,810 If it hinders the progress of the Geist. Then it is harmful and reprehensible, however well-thought out, imperfect a work of its kind it may be. 213 00:25:31,810 --> 00:25:36,710 And so its longevity comes to earn it more sensitive than glory. 214 00:25:36,710 --> 00:25:46,290 It becomes a prolonged curse, the longer it lasts, the more harmful it becomes. 215 00:25:46,290 --> 00:25:54,990 Political merit was achieved and the ability to obtain it taught at the extent of every moral sentiment. 216 00:25:54,990 --> 00:26:03,660 There was no marital love in Sparta, no mothers love, no child's love, no friendship. 217 00:26:03,660 --> 00:26:10,350 They were nothing but citizens. Nothing but citizens virtue. 218 00:26:10,350 --> 00:26:16,160 A state law made it a duty for Spartans to treat their slaves inhumanely. 219 00:26:16,160 --> 00:26:23,800 And in these wretched victims of butchery. Humanity was violated and abused. 220 00:26:23,800 --> 00:26:32,270 The sporting code of law itself preached the dangerous principle that people were to be regarded as means and not ends. 221 00:26:32,270 --> 00:26:40,670 Thereby constitutionally obliterating the foundations of natural law and morality. 222 00:26:40,670 --> 00:26:48,260 There is no finer state than that played out in his camp at the gates of Rome by the savage warrior Gaius Martius, 223 00:26:48,260 --> 00:26:56,180 who sacrificed revenge and victory because he could not bear to see his mother's tears. 224 00:26:56,180 --> 00:27:01,630 The state of light suggests, could only subsist under one condition. 225 00:27:01,630 --> 00:27:05,260 Spirits of the nation would have to stand still. 226 00:27:05,260 --> 00:27:17,240 And to ensure its continued existence would therefore mean to neglect the highest and the sole aim of a state. 227 00:27:17,240 --> 00:27:26,700 From Gus's app, Amenities Awakes Act to scene for spirits. 228 00:27:26,700 --> 00:27:34,290 What burst forth bold from the abyss could with a brazen mastery, claim victory of half the globe? 229 00:27:34,290 --> 00:27:43,360 Yet now back to the void, it must. A monstrous fear already looms and all resistance will be in vain. 230 00:27:43,360 --> 00:27:49,870 Ones who still cling on to it will perish with its name. 231 00:27:49,870 --> 00:28:00,100 Hope. And now I'll meet my brave of heart, who gather in the midst of night to share a silence. 232 00:28:00,100 --> 00:28:09,070 Keep awake. They stutter, stammer on and on that fear and chanting word freedom. 233 00:28:09,070 --> 00:28:19,440 Till on our temple, steps are new, so useful and so unfamiliar, we call its name a joyful clamour. 234 00:28:19,440 --> 00:28:25,560 Freedom. Freedom. 235 00:28:25,560 --> 00:28:35,970 Freedom. We urge you to transcribe this pamphlet, make as many copies as you can. 236 00:28:35,970 --> 00:28:51,070 And distribute them. The second pamphlet of the White Rose, National Socialism cannot be confronted intellectually because it is not intellectual. 237 00:28:51,070 --> 00:28:57,430 It is wrong to speak of a national socialist worldview, because if such a thing existed, 238 00:28:57,430 --> 00:29:01,960 it would need to be proven or challenged by intellectual means. 239 00:29:01,960 --> 00:29:07,880 Yet in reality, we have presented with a completely different picture. 240 00:29:07,880 --> 00:29:15,520 Even in its earliest embryonic form, this movement was dependent on deceiving the German people. 241 00:29:15,520 --> 00:29:23,860 Even then, it was rotten to the very core and could only save itself through ceaseless deception. 242 00:29:23,860 --> 00:29:29,950 Even Hitler himself wrote an early edition of his book, A Book, which, 243 00:29:29,950 --> 00:29:34,150 despite having been written in the most appalling German [INAUDIBLE] I've ever read, 244 00:29:34,150 --> 00:29:40,930 has been elevated to biblical status by this nation of poets and philosophers. 245 00:29:40,930 --> 00:29:47,770 You would not believe the extent to which you must deceive the people in order to govern it. 246 00:29:47,770 --> 00:29:56,170 If at first, this cancerous tumour on the German people had not yet made itself all too conspicuous, 247 00:29:56,170 --> 00:30:03,260 this was only because there were still forces for good working effectively enough to hold it back. 248 00:30:03,260 --> 00:30:12,500 Yet as it became bigger and bigger and finally came to power with one last face act of corruption, 249 00:30:12,500 --> 00:30:19,610 the tumour, so to speak, ruptured contaminating the whole body. 250 00:30:19,610 --> 00:30:27,950 The majority of its earlier opponents then went into hiding and the German intelligentsia sought refuge in a cold cellar, 251 00:30:27,950 --> 00:30:35,710 only to gradually suffocate the like nightshade hidden away from daylight and the sun. 252 00:30:35,710 --> 00:30:41,610 Now. We are approaching the end now. 253 00:30:41,610 --> 00:30:50,010 Everything depends on finding one another again on one person enlightening the next always reflecting and 254 00:30:50,010 --> 00:31:00,000 never resting until every last person is convinced of the iron necessity of fighting against this system. 255 00:31:00,000 --> 00:31:06,870 If such a wave of uproar travels through the country, if there is something in the air, 256 00:31:06,870 --> 00:31:15,820 if many people get involved, then the system can be shaken off with one final, tremendous effort. 257 00:31:15,820 --> 00:31:23,490 An end with terror is still better than terror without end. 258 00:31:23,490 --> 00:31:29,280 It is not our place to give a final judgement on the meaning of our history. 259 00:31:29,280 --> 00:31:35,070 But if this catastrophe is to heal us, it will be solely by means of being purified, 260 00:31:35,070 --> 00:31:43,020 by suffering, of yearning for the light in the very deepest darkness, by stirring ourselves. 261 00:31:43,020 --> 00:31:51,550 And finally by playing our part in casting off the yoke which raced around the world. 262 00:31:51,550 --> 00:31:58,750 We do not want to write about the Jewish question in this pamphlet, nor to compose a plea of defence. 263 00:31:58,750 --> 00:32:07,500 No. We want only to briefly point out, by way of example, the fact that since the conquest of Poland, 264 00:32:07,500 --> 00:32:15,330 three hundred thousand Jews have been murdered in that country in the most bestial manner. 265 00:32:15,330 --> 00:32:26,610 Here we see the most horrific crime against human dignity, a crime unparalleled in all of human history. 266 00:32:26,610 --> 00:32:38,110 For Jews, a human beings, to whichever stance one might take on the Jewish question, and it is against human beings that this has been committed. 267 00:32:38,110 --> 00:32:44,900 Some might say that the Jews deserve such a fate. This would be a claim of colossal arrogance. 268 00:32:44,900 --> 00:32:48,830 But assuming that someone did say this, 269 00:32:48,830 --> 00:32:56,450 what stance would they then take towards the fact that the entire use of Poland's aristocracy has been annihilated? 270 00:32:56,450 --> 00:33:04,450 God grant that this is not yet the case. How you ask such a thing occurred? 271 00:33:04,450 --> 00:33:14,240 All the male offspring of aristocratic families between the ages of 15 and 20 were carted off to Germany for forced labour in the concentration camps. 272 00:33:14,240 --> 00:33:21,040 And all the girls of the same age to Norway into the brothels of the SS. 273 00:33:21,040 --> 00:33:25,450 Why are we telling you all this, given that you already know about it? 274 00:33:25,450 --> 00:33:34,050 Or if not about this, then about other equally serious crimes of this appalling sub humanity? 275 00:33:34,050 --> 00:33:42,670 Because it touches on an issue that deeply concerns us all and must give us pause for thought. 276 00:33:42,670 --> 00:33:53,010 Why the German people behave so empathetically in the face of all these most atrocious, most inhumane crimes. 277 00:33:53,010 --> 00:34:00,870 Barely anyone gives it a thought. The fact has accepted as such and filed away. 278 00:34:00,870 --> 00:34:13,170 And again, the German people return to that dull, stupid sleep and give these fascist criminals the courage and the opportunity to go on rampaging. 279 00:34:13,170 --> 00:34:17,820 And that is precisely what they do. 280 00:34:17,820 --> 00:34:26,010 Should this be taken as a sign that the Germans most primitive human emotions have been rendered so brutal that no voice within 281 00:34:26,010 --> 00:34:34,740 them cries out piercingly in the face of such deeds that they have sunk into a deadly sleep from which there is no awakening? 282 00:34:34,740 --> 00:34:44,400 Not ever. This is how it seems. And it certainly will be if Germany does not start up from this apathy. 283 00:34:44,400 --> 00:34:49,970 If she does not protest against this clique of criminals wherever she can. 284 00:34:49,970 --> 00:34:56,370 If she does not feel a collective suffering with these hundreds of thousands of victims. 285 00:34:56,370 --> 00:35:04,040 She must not only feel collective suffering, know much more collective guilt. 286 00:35:04,040 --> 00:35:12,320 Since through her apathetic behaviour, she gifts these dark leaders the opportunity to act in the first place. 287 00:35:12,320 --> 00:35:17,960 She suffers this government, which has burdened itself with such endless guilt. 288 00:35:17,960 --> 00:35:22,980 Yet it is her own fault that it was able to emerge in the first place. 289 00:35:22,980 --> 00:35:26,820 Everyone wants to exonerate themselves from such a collective guilt. 290 00:35:26,820 --> 00:35:33,390 Everyone does so and returns to sleeping soundly with the calmest, clearest conscience. 291 00:35:33,390 --> 00:35:37,770 But no one could exonerate themselves. Everyone is guilty. 292 00:35:37,770 --> 00:35:49,410 Guilty, guilty. Yet it is not too late to rid the world of this most heinous monstrosity of a government. 293 00:35:49,410 --> 00:36:03,070 So we do not further yoke ourselves to guilt. Now, since our eyes have been fully opened over the last few years. 294 00:36:03,070 --> 00:36:11,250 Since we know who we're dealing with, it is high time to exterminate this Brownshirts horde. 295 00:36:11,250 --> 00:36:17,190 Until the outbreak of the war, the vast majority of the German people were blinded. 296 00:36:17,190 --> 00:36:21,890 The National Socialists did not show their true face. 297 00:36:21,890 --> 00:36:28,370 But now, since they have been seen for what they are the highest and only duty, 298 00:36:28,370 --> 00:36:38,290 the most sacred duty even of every German must be to destroy these beasts. 299 00:36:38,290 --> 00:36:42,910 If a regime is unobtrusive, its people are happy. 300 00:36:42,910 --> 00:36:50,830 If the regime is oppressive, the people are broken. Misery, alas, is what happiness is built upon. 301 00:36:50,830 --> 00:36:57,240 Happiness, alas, only Vale's misery. Where does all this lead? 302 00:36:57,240 --> 00:37:08,310 The end is nowhere in sight. Order lapses into disorder, good lapses into evil, the people fall into disarray. 303 00:37:08,310 --> 00:37:16,490 Has this not long been the case day in, day out? Therefore, the wise man is angular, but does not scrape. 304 00:37:16,490 --> 00:37:23,900 He has edges. It does not hurt anyone. He stands strong but without being harsh. 305 00:37:23,900 --> 00:37:30,440 He is bright, but he does not wish to gleam. Lots. 306 00:37:30,440 --> 00:37:35,570 He who sets out to rule over the empire and to shape it as he pleases. 307 00:37:35,570 --> 00:37:42,380 I do not see him achieving his aim. That's all. The Empire is a living organism. 308 00:37:42,380 --> 00:37:49,160 In truth, it cannot be constructed. He who seeks to construct it, corrupts it. 309 00:37:49,160 --> 00:37:56,310 He who seeks to grasps it, loses it. Therefore, some beings go on ahead. 310 00:37:56,310 --> 00:38:00,930 Others follow that. Some have will breath, others cold. Some are strong. 311 00:38:00,930 --> 00:38:06,120 Others weak. Some reached fulfilment. Others are overcome. 312 00:38:06,120 --> 00:38:15,260 The wise man therefore refrains from exaggeration, from extremes and from excess loud say. 313 00:38:15,260 --> 00:38:28,800 Please copy this document and distribute it as widely as possible. 314 00:38:28,800 --> 00:38:36,730 The third pamphlet of the White Rose Seller's public, Suprema Lex. 315 00:38:36,730 --> 00:38:40,600 All ideal forms of state are utopias. 316 00:38:40,600 --> 00:38:50,870 A state cannot be constructed and purely theoretical terms, one must grow and mature in the same way as every individual person. 317 00:38:50,870 --> 00:38:58,250 But we must not forget that an early form of the state was present at the very beginning of every culture. 318 00:38:58,250 --> 00:39:05,690 The family is as old as humanity itself and from its original units of people endowed with reason, 319 00:39:05,690 --> 00:39:13,580 created a state whose foundation was to be justice and whose supreme law was to be the common good. 320 00:39:13,580 --> 00:39:19,310 The state should be analogous to the divine order and the greatest of all utopias. 321 00:39:19,310 --> 00:39:24,530 The Tibetan stay is the ideal that it should ultimately resemble. 322 00:39:24,530 --> 00:39:33,630 We do not want to pass judgement here on the various possible forms of state democracy, constitutional or absolute monarchy. 323 00:39:33,630 --> 00:39:37,950 Only one thing must be made unambiguously clear. 324 00:39:37,950 --> 00:39:45,570 Every single person is entitled to a viable and just government that ensures the freedom of the individual, 325 00:39:45,570 --> 00:39:53,110 as well as the welfare of society as a whole. For each person, should, in accordance with God's will, 326 00:39:53,110 --> 00:40:00,940 freely and independently seek to achieve their natural goal that is their earthly happiness through self-reliance and initiative, 327 00:40:00,940 --> 00:40:08,160 while coexisting and cooperating within the state as a community. 328 00:40:08,160 --> 00:40:14,200 What's our current state is the dictatorship of evil. We know that already. 329 00:40:14,200 --> 00:40:20,100 I hear you object. And we don't need you to approach this threat yet again. 330 00:40:20,100 --> 00:40:26,470 But I ask you, if you know that, then why don't you act? 331 00:40:26,470 --> 00:40:35,810 Why do you tolerate these role as gradually rubbing you in public and in private of one right after another until one day? 332 00:40:35,810 --> 00:40:45,790 Nothing, absolutely nothing remains but the machinery of the state under the command of criminals and drunkards. 333 00:40:45,790 --> 00:40:52,810 Has this violation defeated your spirit to such an extent that you have forgotten that it is not only your right, 334 00:40:52,810 --> 00:40:58,090 but also your moral duty to do away with this system? 335 00:40:58,090 --> 00:41:05,240 But if a person can no longer summon the strength to demand their rights, they will certainly perish. 336 00:41:05,240 --> 00:41:09,200 We deserve to be scattered across the world like just before the wind. 337 00:41:09,200 --> 00:41:19,070 If we do not prepare ourselves for action now at the 11th hour and finally muster the courage which we have thus far lacked. 338 00:41:19,070 --> 00:41:23,390 Do not conceal your cowardice under the cloak of expediency. 339 00:41:23,390 --> 00:41:35,520 But with every day that you continue to hesitate that you do not resist the spawn of [INAUDIBLE], your guilt grows exponentially greater. 340 00:41:35,520 --> 00:41:43,940 Many, perhaps even the majority of those reading these pamphlets have no idea how they should mount resistance. 341 00:41:43,940 --> 00:41:47,590 They cannot see how it is possible. 342 00:41:47,590 --> 00:41:56,410 We aim to show them that each and every one of them is in a position to contribute to the overthrow of this system. 343 00:41:56,410 --> 00:42:02,290 It will not be possible to lay the foundations for the swift downfall of this government or 344 00:42:02,290 --> 00:42:08,870 even to bring about its downfall through individualistic opposition like an embittered hermit. 345 00:42:08,870 --> 00:42:20,270 It is only through the conviction and energy of people acting together, people who are agreed on the means that can be used to achieve that goal. 346 00:42:20,270 --> 00:42:26,440 We do not have a vast range of means at our disposal. We have only one. 347 00:42:26,440 --> 00:42:38,200 Passive resistance. The meaning and purpose of passive resistance is to bring down national socialism and in the struggle, 348 00:42:38,200 --> 00:42:44,530 there is no course, no action that we should fear to take whatever it may be. 349 00:42:44,530 --> 00:42:51,400 National socialism must be a tax at every week point, at every [INAUDIBLE] in its armour. 350 00:42:51,400 --> 00:42:55,640 This false states must be brought to an end as soon as possible. 351 00:42:55,640 --> 00:43:03,680 In this war, a victory for fascist Germany would have dreadful, unimaginable consequences. 352 00:43:03,680 --> 00:43:12,500 The Germans most immediate concern should not be military victory over Bolshevism, but defeating the National Socialists. 353 00:43:12,500 --> 00:43:23,490 This must be our most urgent priority. We will illustrate how pressing this is in one of our next pamphlets. 354 00:43:23,490 --> 00:43:31,170 And now every staunch adversary of National Socialism must ask themselves the question. 355 00:43:31,170 --> 00:43:39,490 How can they fight back against the current government most effectively? How can they inflict the most stinging wounds? 356 00:43:39,490 --> 00:43:44,260 The answer is, without a doubt. Passive resistance. 357 00:43:44,260 --> 00:43:50,560 It is clearly impossible for us to provide every individual with direct instructions. 358 00:43:50,560 --> 00:44:00,290 We can only give general suggestions. Each person must find their own way to put them into practise. 359 00:44:00,290 --> 00:44:08,270 Sabotage of arms factories and other strategic operations, sabotage of all meetings, rallies, 360 00:44:08,270 --> 00:44:15,200 festivities, organisations, everything that the National Socialist Party brought into being. 361 00:44:15,200 --> 00:44:22,610 Any and all hindrance to the smooth operation of the war machine, a machine that is engineered only for war, 362 00:44:22,610 --> 00:44:30,470 a war with the sole purpose of saving and preserving the National Socialist Party and its dictatorship. 363 00:44:30,470 --> 00:44:37,490 Sabotage of all academic and intellectual groups that actively support the continuation of war, 364 00:44:37,490 --> 00:44:45,340 whether they are universities, colleges, laboratories, research institutes or technical firms. 365 00:44:45,340 --> 00:44:52,300 Sabotage of all cultural events that might raise the fascist prestige with the people. 366 00:44:52,300 --> 00:45:00,500 Sabotage of all branches of the arts that have the slightest connexion to national socialism or stand in its service. 367 00:45:00,500 --> 00:45:11,930 Sabotage of all publications, all newspapers that are in pay of the government that propagate its ideas and spreads the brown lie. 368 00:45:11,930 --> 00:45:19,680 Do you not give a single penny to street collections, even if they are carried out some of the pretence of a charitable cause? 369 00:45:19,680 --> 00:45:26,280 This is only a cover. In reality, the Sun will not benefit the Red Cross or the needy. 370 00:45:26,280 --> 00:45:32,070 The government does not need this money. It is not financially dependent on these collections. 371 00:45:32,070 --> 00:45:37,410 The printing presses are running day and nights and can produce all the money they need, 372 00:45:37,410 --> 00:45:43,860 but they have to keep the people in a state of tension held on a tight rein that must never be loosened. 373 00:45:43,860 --> 00:45:49,110 Do not donate any scrap metal, any fabric or anything else. 374 00:45:49,110 --> 00:45:56,190 Do your utmost to convince all your acquaintances from the lower classes to of the senselessness and futility of 375 00:45:56,190 --> 00:46:05,040 continuing this war of the spiritual and economic enslavement of the destruction of all moral and religious values, 376 00:46:05,040 --> 00:46:13,520 which has been brought about by National Socialism and to encourage passive resistance. 377 00:46:13,520 --> 00:46:27,250 Aristotle's politics. A further essential aspect of tyranny is seeking to ensure that nothing any subject says or does remains hidden. 378 00:46:27,250 --> 00:46:31,600 But rather to spy and eavesdrop on him at every turn. 379 00:46:31,600 --> 00:46:37,300 And moreover, to fill the whole world with hatred and to turn friend against friend, 380 00:46:37,300 --> 00:46:43,990 the people against the aristocracy and the wealthy against one another. 381 00:46:43,990 --> 00:46:51,430 Thus, an aspect of tyrannical discipline is making the subjects poor so that the guards can be paid. 382 00:46:51,430 --> 00:47:00,580 And so that they are so concerned about their daily earnings that they have no time or energy to prosecute at all. 383 00:47:00,580 --> 00:47:05,860 Another aspect of tyranny is the plantation of high income taxes, 384 00:47:05,860 --> 00:47:17,120 such as were imposed on Syracuse for after five years and a diagnosis rule, the citizens had happily given up all their wealth in taxes. 385 00:47:17,120 --> 00:47:24,750 And the tyrant also has a constant inclination to provoke war. 386 00:47:24,750 --> 00:47:39,980 Please reproduce this and pass it on. The fourth pamphlets of the White Rose. 387 00:47:39,980 --> 00:47:46,730 There is an old and wise saying which we preach to children. Time and again that he who will not listen. 388 00:47:46,730 --> 00:47:55,640 Must feel. However, clever children will burn their fingers on a hot stove only once. 389 00:47:55,640 --> 00:48:02,210 In the past few weeks, Hitler has claimed successes both in Africa and in Russia. 390 00:48:02,210 --> 00:48:08,360 The consequence of this is that optimism on the one hand and dismay and pessimism on the other 391 00:48:08,360 --> 00:48:15,320 have risen amongst the people with a speed which is wholly unlike the usual German complacency. 392 00:48:15,320 --> 00:48:20,570 Everywhere amongst the opponents of Hitler, that is amongst the better part of the people. 393 00:48:20,570 --> 00:48:28,010 We hear lamentations, words of disappointment and discouragement ending not infrequently with the interjection. 394 00:48:28,010 --> 00:48:36,230 What if Hitler, after all? Meanwhile, the German offensive against Egypt has ground to a halt, 395 00:48:36,230 --> 00:48:43,010 Rahul must remain in a dangerously exposed position, but the advance in the East still precedes. 396 00:48:43,010 --> 00:48:47,510 This apparent success comes at the most hideous cost to human life. 397 00:48:47,510 --> 00:48:52,880 So much so that already it can no longer be claimed as advantageous. 398 00:48:52,880 --> 00:49:02,080 We therefore warn against optimism in any form. Who has counted the days, Hitler or Goebbels? 399 00:49:02,080 --> 00:49:07,510 Neither of them. In truth, thousands fall in Russia every day. 400 00:49:07,510 --> 00:49:13,780 It is harvest time and the Reaper cuts into the right crop with broad strokes. 401 00:49:13,780 --> 00:49:20,460 Grief settles into the country's cottages, and no one is there to drive the mother's tears. 402 00:49:20,460 --> 00:49:29,440 Hitler, however, lies to those whom he is robbed of their most precious possessions and driven to a meaningless death. 403 00:49:29,440 --> 00:49:36,810 Every word that comes out of Hitler's mouth is a lie. When he says peace, he means war. 404 00:49:36,810 --> 00:49:45,700 And when he blasphemous, he invokes the name of the almighty, he means the power of the evil one of the fallen angel of Satan. 405 00:49:45,700 --> 00:49:53,510 His mouth is the stinking more of [INAUDIBLE]. And his power is at its very essence, corrupt. 406 00:49:53,510 --> 00:49:59,630 We must undoubtedly lead a struggle against the national socialist terrorist state by rational means. 407 00:49:59,630 --> 00:50:09,420 But however, today still doubts the genuine existence of demonic powers has woefully failed to grasp the metaphysical background of this war. 408 00:50:09,420 --> 00:50:17,040 Behind the concrete behind that, which is discernible to the sensors behind all factual, logical considerations, 409 00:50:17,040 --> 00:50:25,590 there lies the irrational i.e. the fight against the team, against the messenger of the Antichrist. 410 00:50:25,590 --> 00:50:33,860 Everywhere and always demons have lurked in the darkness, waiting for the day on which mine would become weak. 411 00:50:33,860 --> 00:50:40,580 The day on which he would forsake his position in the divine order, freely ordained for him by God. 412 00:50:40,580 --> 00:50:44,210 The day on which he would surrender to the forces of the evil one, 413 00:50:44,210 --> 00:50:50,840 unbind themselves from the powers of a higher order and having taken the first step of his own volition, 414 00:50:50,840 --> 00:50:58,790 he then driven forcibly towards taking the second and third steps at an ever more furious pace. 415 00:50:58,790 --> 00:51:06,990 In all places and at all times when man has found himself most in need, men have taken a stand. 416 00:51:06,990 --> 00:51:12,240 Prophets and saints who are innocent getting their freedom have pointed towards 417 00:51:12,240 --> 00:51:20,750 the one and only God and with his help beseech the people to reverse their course. 418 00:51:20,750 --> 00:51:28,100 Mine is undoubtedly free, but he is defenceless in the face of evil without the one true God. 419 00:51:28,100 --> 00:51:39,270 He is like a ship without a rudder abandoned to the storm, like a nursing child, without a mother, like a cloud that disperses. 420 00:51:39,270 --> 00:51:48,510 And so I ask you, you who proclaim yourself, Christian, do you waver in this struggle for the preservation of your highest goods? 421 00:51:48,510 --> 00:51:56,190 Is there a calculation deferring your decision in the hope that someone else will raise their weapons to defend you? 422 00:51:56,190 --> 00:52:01,860 Did not God himself endow you with the strength and courage to fight. 423 00:52:01,860 --> 00:52:10,880 We must make an assault upon evil where it is strongest and it is strongest in the hands of Hitler. 424 00:52:10,880 --> 00:52:21,090 So I returned and considered all the impressions that I'd done under the sun and behold the tears of such as were oppressed and they had no comforter. 425 00:52:21,090 --> 00:52:27,220 And on the side of their oppressors, there was power, but they had no comfort to. 426 00:52:27,220 --> 00:52:32,920 Therefore, I praise the dead, which are already dead more than the living who are yet alive. 427 00:52:32,920 --> 00:52:40,630 Ecclesiastes. Nevertheless, true anarchy is the generated element of religion. 428 00:52:40,630 --> 00:52:49,160 Out of the annihilation of all that is positive, she raises her glorious head aloft as the new foundries of the world. 429 00:52:49,160 --> 00:52:57,890 Oh, if Europe would you reawaken and the state of states a theory of political science which confront us? 430 00:52:57,890 --> 00:53:02,800 Should hierarchy then be the principal of the Union of States? 431 00:53:02,800 --> 00:53:10,720 Blood will flow over Europe until the nations become aware of the frightful madness which drives them in circles. 432 00:53:10,720 --> 00:53:18,040 Until struck by celestial music and pacified, they approach their former altars as a colourful collective, 433 00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:27,130 compose works of peace and hold a great festival of peace, hot tears falling upon the smouldering battlefields. 434 00:53:27,130 --> 00:53:34,930 Only religion can reawaken Europe, protect the rights of the peoples and swear Christendom into its peacemaking office. 435 00:53:34,930 --> 00:53:46,930 Its new splendour visible on Earth. We want to make clear that the actions of the White Rose are not being done in the service of some foreign power. 436 00:53:46,930 --> 00:53:52,960 Although we know that National Socialism is hold on, power can only be broken through military force. 437 00:53:52,960 --> 00:53:59,240 We are attempting to reawaken the gravely wounded German spirit from within. 438 00:53:59,240 --> 00:54:06,320 This rebirth must, however, be preceded by full recognition of the guilt with which the German people have burdened 439 00:54:06,320 --> 00:54:12,530 themselves by a ruthless battle against Hitler and is all too numerous accomplices, 440 00:54:12,530 --> 00:54:21,190 party members, quislings and so on. The gulf between the better part of society and those who choose to associate 441 00:54:21,190 --> 00:54:26,810 with national socialism must be torn apart with uncompromising brutality. 442 00:54:26,810 --> 00:54:33,330 There is no punishment on this Earth that would do justice to the crimes of Hitler and his inner circle. 443 00:54:33,330 --> 00:54:35,910 But out of love for the coming generations, 444 00:54:35,910 --> 00:54:46,560 an example must be set after the end of the war so that no one will ever feel even the slightest inclination to commit such acts again. 445 00:54:46,560 --> 00:54:54,890 Do not forget the petty villains of this regime, remember their names so that not a single one goes free. 446 00:54:54,890 --> 00:55:04,150 After these atrocities, they should not be allowed to get away with switching sides at the last minute and acting as though nothing had happened. 447 00:55:04,150 --> 00:55:10,780 We would like to add the reassurance that the addresses of white rose readers are nowhere recorded in writing, 448 00:55:10,780 --> 00:55:16,480 the addresses are taken at random from directories. We will not be silent. 449 00:55:16,480 --> 00:55:23,080 We are your bad conscience. The white rose will never leave you in peace. 450 00:55:23,080 --> 00:55:37,710 Please duplicate and redistribute. Pamphlets of the resistance movement in Germany, an appeal to all Germans. 451 00:55:37,710 --> 00:55:40,880 The war is heading towards its sudden end. 452 00:55:40,880 --> 00:55:48,500 Just as in 1918, the German government is trying to channel all attention towards the growing threat of submarines while in the east, 453 00:55:48,500 --> 00:55:54,050 the armies are constantly falling back. And in the West, the invasion is expected. 454 00:55:54,050 --> 00:56:02,630 America's armament has not yet reached its full potential, but even now, it exceeds anything ever seen before in history. 455 00:56:02,630 --> 00:56:09,140 With mathematical certainty, Hitler is leading the German people into the abyss. 456 00:56:09,140 --> 00:56:13,640 Hitler cannot win the war. He can only prolong it. 457 00:56:13,640 --> 00:56:18,890 His guilt and the guilt of his followers continually exceeds all boundaries. 458 00:56:18,890 --> 00:56:25,830 Just punishment is nigh. But what are the Germans doing about it? 459 00:56:25,830 --> 00:56:33,350 They refused to see and they refused to hear blindly, they follow their corruptors into ruin. 460 00:56:33,350 --> 00:56:44,750 Victory at all costs. They wrote on their banner. I will fight until the last man hit, Hitler says meanwhile, the war is already lost. 461 00:56:44,750 --> 00:56:50,870 Germans, do you and your children want to suffer the same fate that befell the Jews? 462 00:56:50,870 --> 00:56:55,820 Do you want to be judged by the same measures as those who have corrupted you? 463 00:56:55,820 --> 00:57:01,010 Shall we be as a hated and shunned by the whole world? No. 464 00:57:01,010 --> 00:57:07,370 So separate yourselves from the subhuman nature of National Socialism Act. 465 00:57:07,370 --> 00:57:13,090 Prove that you think differently. A new fight for liberation is at hand. 466 00:57:13,090 --> 00:57:25,010 The better part of the people is fighting on our side, tear off the cloak of indifference that shrouds your heart, decide before it's too late. 467 00:57:25,010 --> 00:57:31,340 Don't believe the national socialist propaganda that has injected the fear of Bolshevism into your every limb. 468 00:57:31,340 --> 00:57:38,970 Don't believe that Germany's salvation is bound to the victory of National Socialism for better or for worse. 469 00:57:38,970 --> 00:57:49,710 A band of criminals cannot bring about German victory. Break away from everything associated with national socialism before it's too late. 470 00:57:49,710 --> 00:57:59,610 A terrible but a righteous judgement is coming to those who hold themselves up in such a cowardly and passive way. 471 00:57:59,610 --> 00:58:08,000 What does the outcome of this war teach us a war in which it was never our nation that was at stake? 472 00:58:08,000 --> 00:58:16,220 The imperial concept of power, regardless of which side it might come from, needs to be neutralised for all time. 473 00:58:16,220 --> 00:58:22,090 A one sided Prussian militarism should never be allowed to come into power again. 474 00:58:22,090 --> 00:58:30,390 Only through the generous collaboration of the European nations can the foundation be built on which a new development will be possible. 475 00:58:30,390 --> 00:58:39,260 Every centralising force, like the one the Prussian state has tried to exercise in Germany and in Europe, must be nipped in the bud. 476 00:58:39,260 --> 00:58:48,480 The Germany to come. Can only be Federalist. Only a healthy federalism can bring new life to a weakened Europe. 477 00:58:48,480 --> 00:58:55,070 The workers need to be freed from their condition of abject slavery through a level headed socialism. 478 00:58:55,070 --> 00:59:00,300 This delusion of a self-sufficient economy must disappear from Europe. 479 00:59:00,300 --> 00:59:06,760 Every nation, every person has a right to the good of the world. 480 00:59:06,760 --> 00:59:16,930 Freedom of speech, freedom of faith. Protection of the individual citizen from the despotism of criminal and violent states. 481 00:59:16,930 --> 00:59:35,620 These are the foundations of the new Europe. Support the resistance movement, distribute the pamphlets. 482 00:59:35,620 --> 00:59:45,730 Fellow students. People look on deeply shaken at the defeat of our men at Stalingrad. 483 00:59:45,730 --> 00:59:58,460 The ingenious strategy of our Great War corporal has hounded 300000 German men senselessly and irresponsibly to death and ruin. 484 00:59:58,460 --> 01:00:09,520 True. We thank you. Turmoil is fermenting amongst the German people, are we to further entrust the fate of armies to a dilettante? 485 01:00:09,520 --> 01:00:18,270 While we just sacrifice what is left of our German youth to the basest, power grabbing instincts of a party clique? 486 01:00:18,270 --> 01:00:24,350 No more. The day of reckoning has come the reckoning of Germany's youth with the most heinous 487 01:00:24,350 --> 01:00:29,270 tyranny of the top people has ever endured in the name of old German youth. 488 01:00:29,270 --> 01:00:37,940 We demand from Adolf Hitler state the return of our personal freedom that treasure which Germans hold most dear, 489 01:00:37,940 --> 01:00:48,610 which he has cheated us of in the most wretched of ways. We have grown up in a state which ruthlessly gags all freedom of expression. 490 01:00:48,610 --> 01:00:59,350 The Hitler Youth, the essay and the SS have tried to homogenised radicalise and anaesthetise us in the most fruitful of our formative years. 491 01:00:59,350 --> 01:01:07,000 Ideological education is a term they use for their contemptible method of suffocating, 492 01:01:07,000 --> 01:01:14,640 burgeoning, independent thought and self-esteem with a fog of empty rhetoric. 493 01:01:14,640 --> 01:01:22,200 Nazi elite, who would not be any more diabolical or narrow minded groom their future party 494 01:01:22,200 --> 01:01:28,890 bigwigs in the elite schools open all these broken schools to become godless, 495 01:01:28,890 --> 01:01:38,160 shameless, unscrupulous, exploitative, murderous scoundrels, the blind and brainless entourage of the future. 496 01:01:38,160 --> 01:01:43,380 We workers of the mind of the right people to smash this new ruling class. 497 01:01:43,380 --> 01:01:48,540 Student leaders and aspiring go lighters represent front line Scots soldiers like 498 01:01:48,540 --> 01:01:54,960 schoolboys go lighters insult the honour of our female students with lewd jokes. 499 01:01:54,960 --> 01:02:01,440 Women studying at Munich University have given a dignified response to the assault on their honour, 500 01:02:01,440 --> 01:02:07,300 and their male counterparts have come out in support of them and are standing firm. 501 01:02:07,300 --> 01:02:14,260 This is a first step in the fight for free self-determination without which spiritual values cannot be forged. 502 01:02:14,260 --> 01:02:19,670 We are grateful to the brave students who are lighting the way. 503 01:02:19,670 --> 01:02:27,080 For us, there is only one slogan fight against the party. Get out of the party structures which stifle our political expression. 504 01:02:27,080 --> 01:02:32,570 Get out of the lecture halls of the essence senior leaders and party sycophants. 505 01:02:32,570 --> 01:02:37,310 Our goal is true scholarship and real freedom of the mind. 506 01:02:37,310 --> 01:02:42,950 There is no threat that can deter us, not even the closure of our universities. 507 01:02:42,950 --> 01:02:47,120 It is the duty of each and every one of us to fight for our future, 508 01:02:47,120 --> 01:02:53,330 our freedom and honour in a political system conscious of its own moral responsibility. 509 01:02:53,330 --> 01:03:02,340 Freedom and honour. For 10 long years, Hitler and his cronies have trivialised, distorted and bled dry. 510 01:03:02,340 --> 01:03:13,290 These two glorious German words to the point of disgust as only dilettantes know how costing a nation's highest ideals before swine. 511 01:03:13,290 --> 01:03:22,200 They have shown well enough what freedom and Armour mean to them during the 10 years in which they have destroyed all material and spiritual freedom, 512 01:03:22,200 --> 01:03:27,060 all moral substance of the German people. Even the most dull, 513 01:03:27,060 --> 01:03:32,390 which a German has had his eyes open by the terrible bloodshed which in the name of the freedom 514 01:03:32,390 --> 01:03:39,510 and honour of the German nation they have unleashed upon Europe and unleash a new every day. 515 01:03:39,510 --> 01:03:46,770 The German name will remain forever tarnished unless finally the youth of Germany stands up, 516 01:03:46,770 --> 01:03:55,590 pursues both revenge and atonement, smite our tormentors and founds a new intellectual Europe. 517 01:03:55,590 --> 01:04:04,860 Students, the German people look to us, the responsibility is ours, just as the power of the spirit wrote the Napoleonic Terror in 1813. 518 01:04:04,860 --> 01:04:11,760 So too will it break the terror of the National Socialists in 1943 to the East. 519 01:04:11,760 --> 01:04:15,900 But it is enough, and Stalin could have gone up in flames. 520 01:04:15,900 --> 01:04:22,230 The dead of Stalin beseech us, Rise up my people. The beacons are aflame. 521 01:04:22,230 --> 01:04:41,600 People are on the verge of breaking free from national socialism enslavement of Europe in this new spiritual dawn of freedom and. 522 01:04:41,600 --> 01:04:50,630 Stalingrad 200000 German brothers were sacrificed for the prestige of a military fraudster. 523 01:04:50,630 --> 01:04:56,810 The humane terms of surrender offered by the Russians were concealed from the sacrificed soldiers. 524 01:04:56,810 --> 01:05:02,550 General Powerless was awarded the Knights cross with oak leaves for this mass murder. 525 01:05:02,550 --> 01:05:11,570 High ranking officers fled the battle of Stalingrad by plane. Hitler for Babe, the surrounded men from retreating to the rear troops. 526 01:05:11,570 --> 01:05:21,650 Now the blood of 200000 soldiers doomed to die indicts the murderer Hitler Tripoli. 527 01:05:21,650 --> 01:05:27,410 It surrendered unconditionally to the English Eighth Army. And what did the English do? 528 01:05:27,410 --> 01:05:32,210 They left the citizens to continue their lives along the usual tracks. 529 01:05:32,210 --> 01:05:36,200 They even let the police and civil servants keep their posts. 530 01:05:36,200 --> 01:05:45,330 The one thing they did do thoroughly was to purge the largest Italian colonial city of all false ringleaders and subhumans. 531 01:05:45,330 --> 01:05:53,670 With deadly certainty, the annihilating overwhelming superior power is pressing in from all sides. 532 01:05:53,670 --> 01:06:02,730 If Palace was not willing to surrender, then Hitler is hardly likely to, even if there's no escape left for him. 533 01:06:02,730 --> 01:06:08,100 And will you allow yourselves to be deceived like the 200000 men at Stalingrad who 534 01:06:08,100 --> 01:06:16,400 defended their posts in vain to be massacred or sterilised or robbed of your children? 535 01:06:16,400 --> 01:06:24,280 Roosevelt, the most powerful man in the world, said on 26th January 1943 in Casablanca. 536 01:06:24,280 --> 01:06:30,760 We are waging this war of annihilation, not against peoples, but against political systems. 537 01:06:30,760 --> 01:06:35,810 We are fighting until an unconditional surrender is reached. 538 01:06:35,810 --> 01:06:42,060 Do you really need to give it any more thought before you make up your mind? 539 01:06:42,060 --> 01:06:49,090 The lives of millions are now at stake. Must Germany share the same fate as Tripoli? 540 01:06:49,090 --> 01:06:53,960 All of Germany is now surrounded, just as Stalingrad was. 541 01:06:53,960 --> 01:07:03,500 Must every German be sacrificed to the harbinger of hatred and wanton destruction, to the one who tortured the Jews to death, 542 01:07:03,500 --> 01:07:11,040 who exterminated half of Poland and who tried to destroy Russia to the one who took from you your freedom. 543 01:07:11,040 --> 01:07:15,350 Peace, domestic happiness, hope and joy. 544 01:07:15,350 --> 01:07:22,540 And gave you inflated currency in return. That must not that cannot be. 545 01:07:22,540 --> 01:07:28,540 Hitler and his regime must fall so that Germany may live on. 546 01:07:28,540 --> 01:07:37,730 The choice is yours. Stalingrad and ruin or Tripoli and hope for the future. 547 01:07:37,730 --> 01:07:52,900 And once you have chosen. Act. I would like to thank our readers very much indeed. 548 01:07:52,900 --> 01:08:01,180 I'd also like to thank the student translators who worked so hard to produce these wonderful versions of what incredible text? 549 01:08:01,180 --> 01:08:05,110 I'm sure you'll agree. I'd also like to thank our partner organisation. 550 01:08:05,110 --> 01:08:15,440 The visor was often White Rose Foundation in Munich and the incredible team at Torch, who have worked so hard behind the scenes to host this event. 551 01:08:15,440 --> 01:08:24,200 We're going to leave you this evening with a piece performed by the award winning vocal ensemble Samsara, directed by Tom Herring. 552 01:08:24,200 --> 01:08:29,060 This recording was made a year ago today at a concert we organised together. 553 01:08:29,060 --> 01:08:39,040 We called it. Voices of the German Resistance. Sophie Scholl once wrote that music softens the heart, and together with samsara, 554 01:08:39,040 --> 01:08:44,710 we're exploring ways to tell this incredible story through words and music. 555 01:08:44,710 --> 01:08:53,010 This piece by Max Rager is called Natalie Nights On. 556 01:08:53,010 --> 01:09:51,620 Thank you for joining us. Oh. 557 01:09:51,620 --> 01:10:29,180 So. Oh, than. 558 01:10:29,180 --> 01:12:45,001 I. Is.