Germar Rudolf, Resistance Is Obligatory (2012; PDF-Datei

GERMAR RUDOLF, RESISTANCE IS OBLIGATORY
People’s Council and in several constitutions of the states of the
eastern zone. If I can restrict every civil right with a law, then it is
worthless to guarantee it by means of the constitution, then it is a
mere declamation and has no effective reality. Restrictions by general
laws devalue the civil right, reduce it to naught.”
Yet exactly that which Carlo Schmid wanted to prevent happened
not even 20 years later, namely the introduction of restrictions to civil
rights by general laws in the course of the Cold War and the thusly justified
enactment of the so-called emergency laws (Notstandsgesetze).
This onslaught against the civil rights was one reason for the formation
of the left-wing extra-parliamentary opposition (APO), and it is tragic
that it was the extremist wing of this APO, of all groups, who, with
their terror in the 1970s under the acronym RAF, gave the authorities a
new pretext to further restrict civil rights in order to facilitate dragnetstyle
police investigations against these very terrorists. And it is at least
as tragic that the very generation which in their youth took to the streets
in protest against this undermining of the civil rights did not reinstate
these civil rights after their “march through the institutions,” but quite
to the contrary undermined them even further.
The next wave of restrictions of civil rights came in the early 1980s
in the course of the battle against organized crime. Critics, however,
emphasized that the problem of fighting organized crime was not a lack
of legal possibilities but inappropriate equipment, staffing and institutional
as well as public support for the police. 140
This pattern of not tackling societal problems at their roots but by
passing declamatory laws, which further restrict civil rights yet merely
cure symptoms superficially, continued in 1983, when in a swift move
the right to demonstrate was restricted as a reaction to the huge demonstrations
against the NATO deployment of middle range nuclear missiles
in Germany, against the erection of new nuclear power plants, and
against various large industrial construction projects like for instance
the new western runway for the Frankfurt airport. After decades of discussions,
the first tightening of penal law against historical dissidents
was passed in 1985, triggered by an increased activity of revisionists
worldwide. 141 In this law, also nicknamed “Lex Engelhardt,” 142 revi-
140
Cf. Dagobert Lindlau, Der Mob. Recherchen zum organisierten Verbrechen, 4th edition, Hoffmann
und Campe, Hamburg 1987.
141
Primarily due to the book by Wilhelm Stäglich, Der Auschwitz-Mythos, Grabert, Tübingen
1979; Engl.: The Auschwitz Myth, IHR, Newport Beach, CA, 1986.
117