Home » Magda Goebbels: heart of darkness [Part I]

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Magda Goebbels: heart of darkness [Part I] — 28 Comments

  1. I ran down the Wikipedia link to find out what happened to her son through the previous marriage. He appears to have done quite well for himself.

    The German businessman that was Magda’s second husband was his father. And he remained on good terms with the Goebbels – to the point where Josef and Magda were married on one of his properties (Adolf Hitler was apparently the best man).

    The son was captured by the Allies in 1944, and survived the war. After the war, he helped his half-brother rebuild their father’s firms, married one of his father’s secretaries, and inherited the company along with his half-brother after their father’s death. He died in a plane crash in 1967, and left his five daughters 1.5 billion deutsche marks.

  2. “In Goebbels, it seems to have been a purely sociopathic nihilism, compounded by enormous narcissist drives. …..To him all human existence was nothing but chaos. He considered himself one of the very few intellects capable of surveying it and mastering it.”

    Who does this remind you of today? 🙁 🙁 🙁

  3. I suspect that it wasn’t that, so much as…

    The Reich was doomed, and it was finally impossible to deny. The Soviets were assaulting Berlin, and Hitler was finally throwing in the towel. Any of her kids that had survived would have become trophies for the Soviets. Because of who their parents were, either the Soviets would have taken their frustrations out on the kids, or they would have used them as some sort of display piece or prop. Either way, it would have likely been a miserable life for the kids. So, in the midst of her despair, she killed them.

    Imagine that Adolph and Eva had a son. And imagine that the kid had survived the war. Think of all the attention – most of it negative – that would have been thrown his way merely because of who his parents were. And the Soviets *hated* the Nazis. 1945 was, for the Soviets, payback for 1941 and 1942. They didn’t need the horrors of the Holocaust to think of the Nazis as pure evil incarnate.

    I can’t say that I agree with her decision. But I also can’t say I don’t understand why she did it.

  4. Bleh…

    My comment was directed at Steve’s comment about Magda killing her kids, and not Mike’s attempt to draw parallels with a certain someone else.

  5. Part II goes into some of the supposed reasons about why she and her husband killed their children.

  6. “Part II goes into some of the supposed reasons about why she and her husband killed their children.”

    Well, what family doesn’t have its problems?

  7. g6loq:

    No, I’d never seen that documentary. When I first wrote the post, YouTube was pretty much just a gleam in its founders’ eyes.

    Fascinating! I just watched the first part and plan to watch the rest. Thanks.

  8. Watched all the U-Tube videos about Magda. It is a cautionary tale. Though I doubt many who long for power over others would recognize it as such.

  9. She seems, to me, to be a typical secular sort. No roots, few cares, unable to keep a man. She seemed to need someone strong, brutal really. He was a typical self-promoter… a political type who knows he has no real worth, so allowed himself to be a hollow vessel.

    I look around today, at the wives of politically powerful men, and at those men, right here in this nation, and I see little difference. I also see why feminism doesn’t attack islam. It isn’t fear, it is because of hope. Hope that something will accept them, own them, even as they are… generally unworthy to typical men. Only brutes would do, for them.

    It is a dark world. I don’t like looking at it too closely, too deeply, or for too long, past, present, or future. Been when called to look… sometimes I do anyway. Could be wrong. Will be rebuked. But that is what I see.

  10. I thought that looked photoshopped!

    In reading stuff on nazi germany, it is sort of amazing how many people were so intimately connected with jews and seemed to have no personal animosity and yet still acted as they did.

    I guess to an extent the same was true of the jim crow south, as many people had employees and associates who were practically family and yet still supported unequal rules, although nothing so drastic as the final solution.

  11. neo writes:
    “In fact, it may be that Goebbels didn’t even particularly hate Jews, at least no more than he hated the entire human race.”

    Reference was also made about the murder of Haim Arlosoroff. That it could be argued that Goebbels might have had him killed. Why? Because he made attempt to reconnect with Magda? And that Goebbels displayed irrational obsession with Magda? Certainly plausible.

    Potential conclusion:
    The holocaust was triggered, in part, by a destructive jealousy harbored by Goebbels for his Magda.

  12. Interesting.
    Arlosoroff was one of the architects of the “Transfer Agreement”. His death was a factor in its failure. It’s not so surprising that there are so many connections between socialists of varying types in a small mittel-european country. How different a world we might live in if the agreement had been successful. Not necessarily better but different…
    Link is to a book on the subject.
    http://www.transferagreement.com

  13. As a refresher:

    Adolf SPECIFICALLY attempted to get her to take her kids out of the bunker to safety — when it was likely to be successful, though obviously risky.

    She turned the opportunity down FLAT.

    Instead, she started going bonkers on her fealty to Adolf — not a WORD about her husband and family!

    THIS, with the entire bunker in attendance.

    As for a successful escape:

    The top SS officer — in charge bunker security — walked out — to the west — after the cease fire — and lived to be a VERY old man. He was not alone!

    He was escorting all of Hitler’s secretaries!

    So the idea that her plight was hopeless does not quite stand up.

    Based upon her statements, one has to conclude that she was as spell bound by the monster as anyone there.

    That was some nutty bunker!

  14. blert:

    I address the issue of how the decision came to be made in Part II, which will appear today.

  15. Rufus T. Firefly:

    “Israel” is the traditional Jewish name for the land and has been for several thousand years. Geopolitically, however, the area was called “Palestine” in the 20s, but that is not a Jewish designation. See this.

  16. It is a dark world. I don’t like looking at it too closely, too deeply, or for too long, past, present, or future. Been when called to look… sometimes I do anyway. Could be wrong. Will be rebuked. But that is what I see.

    Interesting insight.

    There is a cost to looking at the Truth, for it is painful and it blinds, much like the sun. Those who have seen the truth ahead of their society, were often cast out or persecuted, because individuals that can go through the pain can also disorder society by Refusing to Obey Authority, or convincing others that Authority is not righteous.

  17. Geopolitically, however, the area was called “Palestine” in the 20s

    One Roman Emperor renamed it from Judea, because of Jewish rebellions. Hadrean I think it was.

  18. She killed her 6 young kids? Putting them out of her misery no doubt. Sick.

    From here

    Magda had confided to her trusted friend, her sister-in-law, Ello Quandt, “In the days to come Joseph will be regarded as one of the greatest criminals Germany has ever produced. The children will hear that daily, people would torment them, despise and humiliate them. We will take them with us, they are too good, too lovely for the world which lies ahead”.

    In this, her perception is probably correct. In light of this perception, one can understand, though not condone, her actions.

    She and her husband’s actions had doomed her children to a life of infamy, and sought, as any mother might, to save them from it.

    Her solution was blatantly wrong, but as a solution, it’s an understandably human, not monstrous, one.

  19. Who does this remind you of today? 🙁 🙁 🙁

    Someone with far, far less talent and competence at it, fortunately.

  20. As Hitler wasn’t married, she was, indeed, “The First Lady of the Third Reich”, and probably knew and saw a lot more than we know, but the idea that she could murder her own kids because she couldn’t bear the thought of them growing up in a world without her beloved Fuhrer shows the true depth and dangers of the Cult of the Personality, not just in Nazism, but in Communism with the likes of Stalin and Mao – something we’ve seen on display in this country in the last 8 years.

    To make excuses for her, and that’s what they are, is exactly what Nuremberg was all about and why many felt then and since the guilt of the “little fish” had to be exposed. As a Catholic, once she knew about what was going on, she had no justification for not speaking out, especially given her position.

    After all, Eichmann contended he wasn’t guilty because he’d never physically killed anyone himself.

    As a counterpoint, consider Henriette von Schirach, wife of the head of the Hitler Youth and daughter of Hitler’s personal photographer. when she personally saw Jews being bundled off in the middle of the night, she personally confronted Hitler.

  21. Pingback:Magda Goebbels: Downfall Beyond Imagination

  22. Excellent article, thanks. I also appreciated Doom’s “It is a dark world…” And Ymarsaker’s response “Truth…is painful and it blinds” and “individuals that can go through pain can also disorder society”. These are very deep insights.

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