How Goebbels is associated with the history of the Olympic flame, and who in the 30s was called the "bacterium of German sports"

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Probably not everyone knows that the founder of the lighting and movement of the Olympic torch was a representative of the Third Reich. And today the Greeks revered the former colleague of the famous Hitlerite Goebbels as the creator of the Olympic relay. This is a historically proven fact. But since he is associated with a very impartial personality, they try not to remember him.

Goebbels' idea

The Olympic torch, lit from the sacred fire and set off on the road to the site of the next Olympics, has nothing to do with the legacy of the ancient Greeks, as many people think. The idea of lighting it up and holding the marathon belongs entirely to a fascist organization, namely the German propaganda minister Paul Joseph Goebbels, who was responsible for the Olympic Games, which took place in 1936 in the German capital.

In 1936, before the Nazis embarked on their deadly journey through Europe, everyone believed that Goebbels had succeeded in resurrecting the Olympic spirit of the ancient Greeks. Until the first days of the Olympics there was still a whole year, when an article about Goebbels' role in the Olympic torch marathon appeared in the Athens newspaper.

Karl Dima's activities

In our time, representatives of the Olympic Movement of all countries prefer not to associate the name of Hitler's ally with the solemn ceremony of lighting the torch. Moreover, the name of the allegedly real creator of the relay appeared in the person of Karl Dim - another representative of German Olympism, who under the Fuhrer served as director of the Main Institute of Sports in Cologne. The website of the Greek Olympic Committee contains information that the first event dedicated to the ignition and subsequent torch marathon was held in 1936 in the capital of Germany, where sports competitions were held at that moment. The author of the idea was named Dr. Karl Diem - a German professor, as well as a member of the German Olympic Committee. And it was he, and not Paul Joseph Goebbels, who proposed this idea to the organizers of the XI Olympiad, held in Germany. From that moment on, the famous Temple of Hera, which is located in the restored Olympia, was considered the only correct place for lighting the torch.

Racist marathon

Representatives of the Olympic Committee enthusiastically described the holding of the next Olympiad. They described in all colors the first arrival of the sacred fire in the history of sporting events, emphasizing the fact that it made the opening of the Olympics even more beautiful and solemn. At the same time, the organizers of international competitions guaranteed the absence of racial divisions (at that time people with dark skin and Jews were often persecuted).

The propaganda of the upcoming competitions was so powerful that by the time they opened, about three thousand journalists from different countries had arrived in Berlin.

In fact, the torch relay embodied the racist idea of the Olympic movement, the founder of which was the famous racist extremist Pierre da Coubertin. However, historians of that time kept this fact a secret.

Later, the Austrian and German philologist Johannes Lucas wrote that the whole ceremony of lighting and procession of fire at that time was very important for Nazi propagandists who tried to present the eleventh Olympic Games as a military competition. Three thousand of the best athletes took turns carrying a lit torch across Germany, and everywhere they were greeted with applause and glee. According to historians, it was the sport of the Fuhrer himself, in the organization of which the Goebbels service, sports clubs, youth organizations and the SS took part.

You can guess the meaning of the fire, torch, as well as the entire relay race of its movement by reading the lines from a poem by Heinrich Ahnaker, a Nazi author who wrote texts for military marches. He said that the torch is passed from one to another. When the bearer of the flame dies, the torch lifts the nearby one. And so to the bitter end, where the flame will shine with a clear light. And in the dark others are waiting for him …

"Others" are, of course, those who were disliked by the Nazis, such as Jews. It is not necessary to be a guru in history, so that, given that such texts were written for stormtroopers and representatives of Hitler's organizations, to understand why the flame is carried into darkness, and from whom it should cleanse the world. By the way, this tendency is still present in every ceremony of lighting a fire, at which "divine" characters - gods and priestesses - are invariably present. All of this is very similar to the influence of the Nazis on the traditions and ceremonies of the ancient Greeks. Unfortunately, even archeology could not resist this influence.

Hitler said that the foundations of the revived Olympic competition should be found in distant Olympia, which was considered the holy city of the holidays. In commemoration of the XI Olympiad, the Fuhrer decided to start and finish the excavation of ancient Olympia again, calling it his own idea and the common wish of the entire people.

Ends in water

A few years later, archaeological work, begun by order of the Fuhrer, was already carried out not only in Olympia, but also in the rest of the peninsula. To erase this from memory, the committee members concealed the participation of Goebbels in this case, presenting to the people Karl Dim as the inspirer and curator of the 1936 Games. The professor was not included in the lists of the Nazi party in Germany, which played into the hands of the committee members. And exactly Karl Dima is revered today by the Greek Olympians, who consider him not only the creator of the sacred fire, but also the founder of the International Olympic Academy. True, the project was created not by Dim, but by Coubertin, but the building was built after the death of Coubertin under the leadership of Dim and Quitseos.

The Academy building was built in Olympia itself. Here, not far from Pierre de Coubertin's stele, there is a memorial pedestal for Dima with Quitseos. A special place in memory of Dima is also in the Olympic Games Museum, created on the territory of Olympia. Every year, before the start of the meeting of the members of the Academy, flowers are brought to the monument to Dima and Kitseos.

Exposure

After the end of World War II, Karl Dim went over to the side of the victors. However, he failed to hide his Nazi past, and the results of the first investigations appeared four years after the fall of Nazi Germany. In an article that was published in one of the newspapers, Dima was called the bacterium of German sports. Fascist notes in his speeches have long been a subject for discussion by members of the country's parliament. However, the benevolence of the representatives of the Olympic Movement reliably protected Karl Dim all his life. He died in 1962. Dima was buried with honors and even streets and sports facilities were named after him.

At the end of the last century, one of the journalists who knew Dima before, Reinhard Apel, published Karl Dim's appeal to German children who were part of the Hitlerite organization. These children were planned to be thrown on the front lines. Among them was Apel. And Dim told from the rostrum how wonderful it is to die for the Fuhrer. There were three thousand teenagers. Two thousand died on the very first day after being sent to the front. And they were all 13-14 years old.

The journalist's story made an impression on the public. Other "sins" of Dima became known, for example, the promotion of sports racism. He said that only the weakest are afraid to fight with representatives of other races, because true Aryans always win, because they are the best.

The trial in Dima's case is still pending. Gradually, the Germans are renaming the objects that were given his name. There is a gradual restoration of historical justice.

But if the Germans overthrew Dima from the podium, the Greeks still do not cease to honor him. And they do it with such zeal with which Dim served Hitler's fascism.

Well, then, if you act fairly, then a monument to Goebbels should be erected next to Dima's pedestal in Olympia. After all, it was he who realized Dima's idea of transferring fire.