Resistance

GERMAR RUDOLF, RESISTANCE IS OBLIGATORYinstance, be prompted by the critique of his opponents to admit that forhim it is not primarily about the actual war guilt but to prove the concreteorientation of the Tsarist system to conquest and war.Such a profound self-criticism and self-scrutiny, which can very wellbe the transition point to a new self-affirmation, would be the third andhighest step of science, which may be called the level of “reflection.”Exposing one’s own “pre-judgments” can clear the way to overcomethem, but it can also serve to better justify that which distinguishes scientific“pre-judgments” from popular “prejudices.”Although science happens on different levels, its common hallmarkis universality. If not even the “Holy Scriptures” of the religion dominatingthe western world {p. 11} right into the 20th century could bespared from becoming the object of scientific debate and critique, indeedeven from having its “holy” character denied, then it is only consequentialthat nothing exists which could be subjected to prohibitionsof investigation, of scrutiny, and of thought by a scientific debate on allthree levels. The “final solution” can be no exception to this. He whoposits a prohibition of research and debate would thus violate a fundamentalmaxim of both the U.S. and the German constitutions. Only inflammatory,libelous and crudely one-sided statements could be prohibited,none of which could be brought in line with the above expressedrules of scientific nature.But maybe two restricting circumstances are to be considered.With regard to the Weimar Republic, coarsely one-sided allegationsand interpretations do exist and are legitimate. One may claim that thisRepublic ended not on 30 January 1933, but only in 1934 with the dissolutionof the Reichsrats and the merger of the offices of the ReichPresident and the Reich Chancellor, or even that it survived the ThirdReich as a (of course ignored) constitution. But even the most contrastingviews agree insofar as the existence of the Weimar Republic isconsidered self-evident and indisputable. In contrast to this, the existenceof the final solution is denied by some of the radical revisionists.In variation of the medieval maxim “contra principia negantem non estdisputatio” [One cannot argue with someone negating the principles]one could thus state: “Contra existentiam negantem non est disputatio”[One cannot argue with someone negating the existence]. The question{p. 12} is, however, whether both sides mean the same thing under “finalsolution.”268