{"id":206,"date":"2006-05-31T07:04:33","date_gmt":"2006-05-31T11:04:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/munichletters\/letter-from-munich-041\/"},"modified":"2006-05-31T07:04:33","modified_gmt":"2006-05-31T11:04:33","slug":"letter-from-munich-041","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/munichletters\/letter-from-munich-041\/","title":{"rendered":"Letter from Munich – 041"},"content":{"rendered":"

Letter from Munich – the Joseph Affair – 41<\/strong><\/p>\n

EINE DEUTSCHE FASSUNG STEHT WEITER UNTEN.<\/p>\n

19 October 2001 <\/p>\n

Dear Mr. Graf, dear friends,<\/p>\n

Jacqueline was smiling at us as she often does, in her quite stunning, aristocratic fashion. \u201cIn his new biography of John Adams,\u201d she said, \u201chistorian David McCullough tells us of some marginalia that Adams scribbled in a book by Rousseau. \u2018There is no doubt that people are, in the long run, what the government makes out of them,\u2019 Rousseau had written. \u2018The government ought to be what the people make it,\u2019 Adams wrote in response.<\/p>\n

A certain resignation appeared in Jacqueline\u2019s smile. \u201cIn Europe we haven\u2019t quite reached the stage where the government does what the people want. For example, in America it would be almost impossible for a district attorney to yield to political pressure, but not in Europe. Such things happen here \u2013 if not every day \u2013 then much more often than Europeans would admit. For a moment let\u2019s leave aside the role that Kurt Biedenkopf and the government of Saxony played in the Joseph affair. I want to give you some further examples of this kind of influence. Then you may be able to understand a little better what happened to Joseph and to the investigation into his death.\u201d<\/p>\n

She picked up a newspaper from the small mahogany table next to her armchair. \u201cI\u2019d like to read a few sentences from at article that appeared in the Sueddeutsche Zeitung of October 17. It deals with an honest and courageous former district attorney in Germany, whose investigations were hindered and blocked from above: \u2019Never before had the former district attorney from Augsburg, Winfried Maier, spoken out before the Bavarian parliament\u2019s special committee. He spoke about the harassment he suffered and the impediments placed in his way as he probed the affairs of Bavarian weapons dealer Karlheinz Schreiber and the activities of Max Strauss \u2013 son former Bavarian prime minister Franz-Josef Strauss \u2013 and others. . . . \u201cMeaningful and timely investigation of Schreiber and Strauss was no longer possible,\u201d said Maier. Everything became time-consuming, because \u201cevery piece of nonsense\u201d had to be checked by the Munich office. \u201cI was supposed to justify, down to the smallest detail, the precise reasons for every single request I made for various files I wanted to look at, even though I had no idea exactly what the files contained.\u201d He said that in March 2000, when he was ill, he was given only a few hours to prepare a final disposition of the proceedings against Strauss. He was told it was a requirement for his promotion to the Bavarian superior court. \u201cI was supposed to present a story that was devoid of content.\u201d He said what was really wanted was that he should write, \u201cThe whole Strauss thing was really not so bad\u201d.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Jacqueline\u2019s smile was now rather bitter. \u201cYes, maybe the whole Strauss thing was really not so bad,\u201d she said sarcastically, \u201cbut the thing with the corruption in the Bavarian district attorney\u2019s office is. But even worse things have happened in Europe. On October 17 the highly regarded Franco-German television channel ARTE broadcast an astonishing documentary about a massacre that occurred in the streets of Paris, a massacre that has been covered up for the last forty years \u2013 and if the murder of dozens of people can be hidden at the order of the authorities, murder in the French capital, why not the murder of a little boy like Joseph in a village in eastern Germany? That should be child\u2019s play for the government of a German state like Saxoy, shouldn\u2019t it?\u201d<\/p>\n

This letter will be continued next week.<\/p>\n

Sincerely yours,<\/p>\n

Robert John Bennett<\/p>\n

Mauerkircherstrasse 68<\/p>\n

81925 Germany<\/p>\n

Telephone: +49.89.981.0208<\/p>\n

E-Mail: rjbennett@post.harvard.edu<\/p>\n

——————————————————————<\/p>\n

Since many recipients of this letter may read German more easily than they read English, the following is the author\u2019s own translation of the above letter. Please note that word-processing programs outside of German-speaking countries may not display all of the letters of the German alphabet correctly.<\/p>\n

Bitte vergessen Sie nicht, dass der Autor dieses Briefes Autodidakt ist, was die deutsche Sprache betrifft, und er wei\u00df, dass die folgende \u00dcbersetzung viele Fehler enth\u00e4lt. Er hofft aber, man werde diese Fehler \u00fcbersehen, um hinter den Fehlern das sehen zu k\u00f6nnen, was in diesem Schreiben und in dieser Aff\u00e4re von zentraler Bedeutung ist.<\/p>\n

M\u00fcnchen, den 19. Oktober 2001<\/p>\n

Sehr geehrter Herr Graf, sehr geehrte Freunde,<\/p>\n

Jacquelines L\u00e4cheln war, wie immer, aristokratisch. \u201eIn seinem Bestseller \u00fcber John Adams, zweiten Pr\u00e4sidenten der Vereinigten Staaten\u201c, sagte sie, \u201eerz\u00e4hlt uns der amerikanische Historiker David McCullough von einer Randbemerkungen, die Adams in einem Buch von Rousseau einmal kritzelte. Rousseau hatte geschrieben, ,Es besteht kein Zweifel daran, dass das Volk, langfristig gesehen, das ist, was die Regierung daraus macht\u2019. In Beantwortung schrieb Adams, ,Die Regierung m\u00fcsste das sein, was das Volk daraus macht\u2019\u201c.<\/p>\n

Jacquelines L\u00e4cheln zeigte eine gewisse Resignation. \u201eIn Europa sind wir noch nicht so weit. Die Regierung tut noch nicht das, was das Volk will. Zum Beispiel, in Amerika w\u00e4re es fast unm\u00f6glich, dass eine Staatsanwaltschaft politischem Druck nachgibt, aber nicht in Europa. Hier passiert so etwas, wenn nicht allt\u00e4glich, dann viel h\u00e4ufiger, als die Europ\u00e4er zugeben w\u00fcrden. Sprechen wir ein Moment nicht \u00fcber die Rolle, die Kurt Biedenkopf und die s\u00e4chsische Regierung in dem Fall Joseph spielten. Ich will euch andere Beispiele dieses Ph\u00e4nomens vorlegen. Dann vielleicht werdet ihr den Fall Joseph besser verstehen k\u00f6nnen\u201c.<\/p>\n

Sie nahm eine Zeitung vom kleinen Mahagonitisch, der neben ihrem Sessel stand. \u201eIch m\u00f6chte euch ein paar S\u00e4tze aus einem Artikel vorlesen, der in der S\u00fcddeutsche Zeitung vom 17. Oktober erschien. Es handelt sich um einen ehrenhaften und mutigen ehemaligen Staatsanwalt, dessen Ermittlungsarbeit von oben gehindert wurde: ,So deutlich wie noch nie hat der fr\u00fchere Augsburger Staatsanwalt Winfried Maier im Schreiber- Untersuchungsausschuss des (bayerischen) Landtags \u00fcber Schikanen und Behinderungen bei den Ermittlungen gegen den Waffenh\u00e4ndler Karlheinz Schreiber, den Anwalt Max Strau\u00df und dessen Partner berichtet. . . . >Konsequente, zeitnahe Ermittlungen gegen Schreiber und Strau\u00df waren nicht mehr m\u00f6glichJeder PipifaxIch sollte Punkt f\u00fcr Punkt begr\u00fcnden, zu welchen Tatbestands- Merkmalen ich Akten brauchte, deren Inhalt ich aber gar nicht kannte.Ich sollte hoppla-hopp etwas zum Besten geben, was inhaltsleer war.Das mit Strau\u00df war alles nicht so schlimm.
Jacquelines L\u00e4cheln war jetzt etwas bitter. \u201eJa, vielleicht war das mit Strau\u00df alles nicht so schlimm\u201c, sagte sie sarkastisch, \u201eaber das mit der Korruption der bayerischen Staatsanwaltschaft ist es. Aber noch schlimmere Dinge passieren in Europa. Am 17. Oktober strahlte der hoch geachtete deutsch-franz\u00f6sische Fernsehkanal ARTE einen erstaunlichen Dokumentarfilm aus, \u00fcber ein Massaker, das in den Stra\u00dfen von Paris stattfand, und seit vierzig Jahren vertuscht wird \u2013 und wenn man in Europa vierzig Jahre lang den Mord von Dutzenden von Menschen durch die Regierung, in der franz\u00f6sischen Hauptstadt, vertuschen kann, warum nicht den Mord eines kleinen Kindes wie Joseph in einem Dorf im Osten Deutschlands? Das sollte f\u00fcr eine deutsche Bundesstaatsregierung ein Kinderspiel, oder?\u201c<\/p>\n

Fortsetzung folgt n\u00e4chste Woche.<\/p>\n

Mit freundlichen Gr\u00fc\u00dfen<\/p>\n

Robert John Bennett<\/p>\n

Mauerkircherstrasse 68<\/p>\n

81925 Germany<\/p>\n

Telephone: +49.89.981.0208<\/p>\n

E-Mail: rjbennett@post.harvard.edu<\/p>\n

========================================================<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Letter from Munich – the Joseph Affair – 41 EINE DEUTSCHE FASSUNG STEHT WEITER UNTEN. 19 October 2001 Dear Mr. Graf, dear friends, Jacqueline was smiling at us as she often does, in her quite stunning, aristocratic fashion. \u201cIn his new biography of John Adams,\u201d she said, \u201chistorian David McCullough tells us of some marginalia […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":167,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-206","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/munichletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/munichletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/munichletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/munichletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/167"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/munichletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/munichletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/206\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/munichletters\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}