Hitler is dead: official

PERSONAL COLUMN TIBOR SZAMUELY

I knew Lev Bezymenski fairly well in Moscow about twenty years ago, so the publication here

of his volume called The Death of Adolf Hitler brings back some memories. We both worked on the weekly Novoye Vremya. He was con-

siderably senior to me, not only in years, but also in social and editorial position. His father, Alexander Bezymenski. was one of Stalin's favourite court poets, renowned for his ability

to turn out a neat piece of doggerel acclaiming the execution of some batch of 'enemies of the

people' before the wretched men had even been sentenced. Lev, though, was quite different from his odious father, being intelligent, well-read, pleasant, and openly cynical about what he was doing.

Thanks to his impeccable background and excellent German Lev Bezymenski had had a good war—as Rokossovski's interpreter at Stal- ingrad, where he had officiated at Paulus's sur- render, and later with Zhukov during the battle of Berlin. Our colleagues all regarded hini as a young man of considerable promise. But alas, I see that he is still in the same post he occu-

pied twenty years ago. The reason is fairly ob- vious: Bezymenski is a Jew, and nowadays Jews do not get very far in the USSR, not even able propagandists like Bezymenski.

However, the appearance in the West of The Death of Adolf Hitler, with all its accompany-

ing publicity ballyhoo, represents a great Soviet propaganda coup, which may well bolster Lev's career.

Certainly Michael Joseph, the publishers, pull out all the stops: 'a sensational historical document' which 'ends all speculations' about 'the mystery of Adolf Hitler's death.' Bezy- menski himself speaks of Hitler's death as an 'enigma' regarding which western historians 'have.confused the issue rather than clarifying it.' With all respect, this is utter, unmitigated rubbish. There never has been any mystery about Hitler's death—not, at any rate, since the appearance in 1947 of Professor Hugh Tievor-

Roper's classic Last Days of Hitler (which

Bezymenski, curiously, totally ignores). Indeed, the only country in the world where Hitler's death was for years officially disbelieved and

all published evidence dismissed as falsification was ... the Soviet Union itself. On .6 June 1945

Stalin personally declared to Harry Hopkins

that 'he was sure that Hitler was still alive.' The pretence was kept up as long as Stalin lived.

Since Stalin's death the fact of Hitler's suicide has been disclosed in Russia, but no details were given.

Knowing that his 'sensational revelation' is twenty-three years late, and realising that an explanation is in order, Bezymenski prevari- cates. For such a glib writer the apologia is singularly lame: the forensic report, he con-

fides, was kept secret in case some impostor might try to pass himself off as a miraculously preserved Hitler—and could then be triumph- antly exposed.

However fantastic this line of reasoning may seem to the western reader, a Russian might find it rather convincing. It would certainly fit into one of his nation's most cherished tradi- tions, that of the royal impostor. Whenever some important personage died in mysterious

circumstances (and this happened with great frequency) the country would soon be full of people passing themselves off as the wondrously resurrected 'deceased.' The two false Dmitrys and the false Peter III (Pugachev) are only the most famous of these impostors. Even in the nineteenth century many (if not most) Russians were convinced that Alexander I had not really died, but had gone off to live in Siberia as the `holy man Fyodor Kuzmich.' And the Grand Duchess Anastasia is still with us.

Yet nevertheless Bezymenski's excuses must be rejected. In this case it is a question not of doubting some outside (and therefore hostile) story, but of deliberately suppressing the truth and systematically spreading a known false- hood. Had Stalin really wanted to deter a false Hitler the best way would have been to publish the full autopsy report. The truth is much simpler. By keeping alive the possibility of Hitler's continued existence the Soviet rulers were able to preserve for many years a state of constant war hysteria. I well remember how every fresh news about Hitler's putative emer- gence would cause a new wave of panic in the war-devastated land. Which was just what Stalin wanted.

Well then, one can say, at least Bezymenski has finally laid Hitler's ghost. Ah, but that is

exactly what he has not done: the one country where the autopsy report still cannot be read remains Russia—to the best of my knowledge

the book has not been published there. It is destined exclusively for consumption abroad— where nobody ever doubted Hitler's suicide to begin with.

Why, then, has it been published at all? And why the hullabaloo? It enriches the sum of human knowledge with one minute detail, and one only: the 'fact' that Hitler committed suicide not by shooting but by poison. This may be true—and who cares, anyway?—but then again, it may be untrue. Personally, I find the proofs less than satisfactory.

Bezymenski prints the text of Hitler's autopsy report—but, oddly enough, 'in somewhat abbre- viated form,' unlike the autopsies of Eva Braun and of Goebbels and his wife and children, all printed in full. Yet one extraordinary feature

immediately strikes even the layman's eye: the

report mentions in passing that 'part of the cranium is missing,' and then announces that `no visible signs of severe lethal injuries or ill-

nesses could be detected.' Now, I am not a medical man, and for all I know the absence of part of the skull may indicate no more than a

nasty cold—yet I would have thought that the eminent experts might have paid some attention to this interesting lacuna, if only out of pure scientific curiosity. But no, they contentedly packed up their instruments and trooped off.

Besides, as Professor Trevor-Roper has pointed out, the poison version contradicts every single German eye-witness account. Bezy- menski loftily replied to this objection in a re- cent newspaper interview: 'I have a certain mistrust of anyone who surrounded Hitler at this time, whereas our documents were pre- pared by an autopsy commission of five doctors, all of whom have become internationally recog- nised since. And they are bound by the Hippo-

cratic Oath just as much as Western doctors, you know.'

Bezymenski always was a humorous and cynical fellow, but this is going a bit too far. Soviet doctors bound by the Hippocratic Oath? Really! What will he think of next! The his- tory of the USSR presents a long procession of 'internationally recognised' authorities lying their heads off about medical evidence.

Take Katy n. for example. It has now been con- chltively established that 4.000 Polish prisoners of war were murdered in Katyn by the Soviet secret police in early' 1940; yet in 1943 famous Soviet medical experts, flying in the face of all the evidence, signed a report stating that the crime had actually been committed by the Ger- mans in late 1941—which brings me back to Bezymenski. The ultimate authority whom he invokes to prove that Hitler could not have died in any other way except by poison is 'the fore- most Soviet forensic scientist' Professor Smol- yaninov. Bezymenski omits to mention that Smolyaninov had been a member of the Katya commission.

I am not implying that Soviet doctors are all cheats and perjurers. On the contrary, some of my best friends—indeed, both my parents-in- law—were Soviet doctors, upright, hardwork- ing people. I am only saying that when it comes to raison (fetal Soviet doctors are apt to be in- fluenced by factors infinitely stronger than the 'Hippocratic Oath': the threat of a bullet through the head, for example.

What does all this leave us with? Bezymen- ski's book could easily be condensed to four words: 'Hitler is dead: official.' Not much of a thirty-bob's worth. For what purpose, then, was it written? One probable reason is the So-viet obsession with the revival of 'neo- Nazism' in West Germany. Bezymenski clearly wishes to forestall the rise of a Hitler-legend by showing that the Fuehrer was an arrant coward; he endlessly stresses the profound dif- ference between a 'soldier's death' by revolver shot and a 'dog's death' by poison. The old- fashioned, highly romantic Russian mind still attaches great significance to such things.

However, I believe that Bezymenski's main object is somewhat different. It is to foster the legend of the omniscience and omnipotence of the Soviet secret police. The 'glorious Chekists' are the heroes of the book They are every- where; they know everything nothing can escape them; they leave no stone unturned; all the facts are in their files, but they maintain an inscrutable silence until the moment comes to talk—or to strike. Secure in their superior knowledge, KGB officers exchange 'ironical smiles' about the 'entertaining picture' drawn by amateurish and incompetent western investi- gators. On most pages one finds laudatory re- ferences to the state security organs; the dread acronym SMERSH appears no fewer than thirty- four times. In places Bezymenski waxes quite lyrical about the Chekists who had 'devoted their lives to combating the enemies of the Soviet State' (and also to murdering countless millions of their own countrymen).

Bezymenski's opus appears to be part of the concerted propaganda campaign now being conducted in the West on behalf of the KGB. Among other components of this massive opera- tion one might mention the `Lonsdale' and Philby books. As for the Fuehrer, he has now suffered the final indignity his charred body is displayed as an advertisement to the skill and efficiency of the Soviet secret police. `KGB ex- poses best. Reject all inferior brands.'