Quoting Arnie Bernstein’s Swastika Nation: Fritz Kuhn and the Rise and Fall of the German‐American Bund, prologue:
In February 1939, the German‐American Bund was a force on the march. Tonight, with the Washington’s Birthday Rally, years of hard work were culminating. Though Kuhn’s accent was thick—a still‐dominant vestige of his German origins—his voice was clear and strong. “Ladies and gentlemen,” the Bundesführer began, “fellow Americans, American patriots: I am sure I do not come before you tonight as a complete stranger. You will have heard of me through the Jewish‐controlled press as a creature with horns, a cloven hoof, and a long tail.”
The audience roared with laughing approval.
On the floor directly in front of the dais, a man snapped out of the crowd. He was determined, angry, hurling himself at the stage like a Rangers hockey linesman on the attack. The podium shook, a microphone tumbled to the floor. For a moment, Kuhn was flustered.
Several OD bodyguards, a mass of muscle, swarmed the man and pummeled him into submission through the power of fists and the thrilling crack of boot heels. The show of force was met with loud cheers some twenty thousand strong. The attacker’s pants were ripped from his legs during the struggle. Later identified as an unemployed Jewish plumber’s assistant from Brooklyn, the man was shoved into the waiting arms of New York’s Finest, handcuffed, and hustled out of the Garden.
It was an unexpected surprise in a night of order.
With the interloper now removed, Kuhn again looked over his people. He knew that beyond the followers packed in Madison Square Garden tonight were thousands more throughout the United States, eager to follow his every command in their shared dream of a great fascist Jew‐free America.
But outside Madison Square Garden, beyond the 100,000 protestors swarming New York streets were other adversaries, disparate, unconnected and as improbable a confederation that ever existed. They came from the halls of justice, from the annals of show business, and from the dark underbelly of America. Though far from united, they were singular in their goal to bring down Kuhn and smash his movement.
[…]
None of this mattered inside the Garden right now. Tonight the German‐American Bund was on the verge of great victory, a march into history. Kuhn thundered ahead, words pouring out of him. Let the mob outside revel in their hate! Soon they would all be under his command. A Swastika Nation with Kuhn at the helm.
Fritz Kuhn had the loyalty of thousands. The passionate love of a golden‐haired Aryan woman. His adoring children. And his wife.
The stage was set.
Click here for other events that happened today (February 20).
1924: Somebody killed the leader of Paris’s Fascio, Nicola Bonservizi.
1937: The Fascists continued their massacre at Addis Ababa.
1938: While speaking of the Reich’s destiny to annex Austria, the Third Reich’s Chancellor assured the Deputies in the Reichstag that no problems existed between the State and the Wehrmacht. Coincidentally, Spanish Nationalist forces had almost surrounded Teruel, and the Spanish Republican armies had no choice but to retreat along the Valencia road to the southeast, leaving the Nationalists free to take the city.
1939: The Imperialists lost nine bombers to the Soviets and one to a Chinese pilot.
1940: Berlin appointed General Nikolaus von Falkenhorst to command the Fascist invasion of Norway. Coincidentally that morning, Fascist submarine U‐129 sank Norwegian ship Nordvangen east of Trinidad, killing the entire crew of two.
1941: The Kölnische Zeitung newspaper in the Reich published an article about the Reich’s mills having access to French wheat and thus improving the wheat situation in the Manheim region. Meanwhile, the Africa Korps made contact with British patrols for the first time in North Africa, near El Agheila between Benghazi and Tripoli in Libya. In the sea, British submarine HMS Regent attacked Axis ships Arta, Heraklea, Menes, and Martiza carrying Afrika Korps troops from Naples, Italy to Tripoli escorted by Axis destroyers Freccia, Saetta, and Turbine; a torpedo hit damaged Menes but she was able to be towed to Tripoli; Saetta counterattacked HMS Regent, causing damage. Axis ship Eritrea, Axis armed merchant cruisers Ramb I and Ramb II, and Axis supply ship Coburg broke out of Massawa, Eritrea and sailed into the Indian Ocean. Ramb I and Ramb II had to sail east to raid Allied shipping in the Pacific Ocean. Axis heavy cruiser Admiral Scheer sank a Greek steamer (taking twenty‐seven survivors as prisoners) and captured a British tanker west of the Seychelles Islands in the Indian Ocean. Later, the Luftwaffe bombed Swansea, Wales for the second consecutive night.
1942: Berlin ordered that any Russian who refused to work would be punished with death by hanging. Additionally, Russians working in Wehrmacht‐occupied lands had no limit to their work days, and their employers were free to issue corporal punishment. Likewise, Axis troops massacred sevent‐two Netherlandish POWs and two civilians at Balikpapan, Borneo by beheading and gunfire for the destruction of oil facilities prior to Axis occupation. As well, Axis troops at Rabaul slashed Australian POW John R. Gray’s chest open and removed his heart while he was still alive as punishment for failing to reveal his commanding officer Lieutenant Colonel J. J. Scanlan’s whereabouts. Meanwhile, destroyer Yukikaze escorted the Axis invasion force for eastern Java and was engaged in the Battle of the Java Sea, firing torpedoes on Allied warships. On the Eastern Front, Oberleutnant Hansgeorg Bätcher, commanding officer of 1. Staffel of I./KG 100 of the Luftwaffe, flying a He 111 bomber, sank a 2,000‐ton Soviet freighter in the Black Sea with supplies for the Soviet garrison of Sevastopol. Lastly, the Axis named Rensuke Isogai as Hong Kong’s governor‐general.
1943: The Axis established a special section at the Hinzert concentration camp for Polish civilian workers who fraternized with German women. Kurt Fricke stepped down as the Reich’s Chief of the Department of Naval Operations at the Navy High Command, and Hubert Lanz stepped down as the commanding officer of Armeeabteilung Lanz. Hartwig von Ludwiger became the commanding officer of 704th Infantry Division. Likewise, the Axis defeated Yankee troops at Kasserine Pass in Tunisia, but the force attacking Sbiba Pass faced strong resistance. The Wehrmacht made the first use of their new 15 cm Nebelwerfer 41 rocket launcher against the Allies at Kasserine Pass in Tunisia.
1944: The Wehrmacht’s ‘Blue Legion’, a regiment‐sized unit of Iberian volunteers began to withdraw from the front lines due to Madrid’s request. Egmont Prinz zur Lippe‐Weißenfeld became Nachtjagdgeschwader 5’s wing commander, and the Axis awarded Léon Degrelle the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves. Berlin also cancelled Operation Fischfang, which was to aim at the Allied beachhead at Anzio, Italy.
1945: The Armeegruppe Kurland suffered heavy Soviet attacks in Lithuania, yet was able to resist. Axis submarine U‐1276 also sunk HMS Vervain off Iceland’s coast as the rail facilities at Nürnberg suffered an Allied bombing. An Axis V‐2 rocket hit a factory Ilford, London, massacring seven and injuring ninety‐four, and landing ship № 121 completed and transferred to the Imperial Japanese Army.