The Rise of the Fourth Reich - ThereAreNoSunglasses

THE STRANGE CASE OF RUDOLF HESS 41Britain, En gland was economically strangled and near defeat. At the timeHitler seemed unstoppable and it was quite easy to envision a Nazi victory.The aristocracy, industrialists, bankers, and even the royal familywere eager for peace. “Hess did not imagine a peace group,” concludedPicknett, Prince, and Prior, “nor was it invented by MI6, but its existenceat such a level [as the royals] would explain why so much about the Hessaffair was—and continues to be—hushed up.”As for Hitler, Germany was preparing to strike Rus sia, and he did notwant a two-front war, the very situation that caused Germany’s defeat inWorld War I. Hitler wanted En gland as an ally against communism.“With En gland alone [as an ally], one’s back being covered, could one beginthe new Germanic invasion [of Rus sia],” Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf.In other words, Hitler needed peace with Britain before undertaking anattack on Russia.Securing peace on the Western Front may have become an urgent priorityfor Hitler. According to former Soviet military intelligence officerVladimir Rezun (writing under the pen name Viktor Suvorov), Hitler wasforced to launch a preemptive assault against the Soviet Union in June1941, to forestall an attack on Western Europe by Stalin in July.Suvorov’s work has been published in eighty-seven editions in eighteenlanguages, yet has received virtually no mention in the U.S. corporate massmedia, despite the fact that his assertions turn conventional history upsidedown. Most people have been taught that Stalin naively trusted Hitlerand was totally surprised by Hitler’s attack.Admiral N. G. Kuznetsov, who in 1941 was the Soviet Navy ministerand a member of the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party,was quoted by Suvorov as stating in his postwar memoirs, “For me there isone thing beyond all argument—J. V. Stalin not only did not exclude thepossibility of war with Hitler’s Germany, on the contrary, he consideredsuch a war . . . inevitable. . . . J. V. Stalin made preparations for war . . . wideand varied preparations—beginning on dates . . . which he himself hadselected. Hitler upset his calculations.” While Suvorov’s conclusions grateagainst the conventional view of Hitler’s attack on Russia, he has provideda compelling argument. Suvorov pointed out that by June 1941, Stalinhad massed vast numbers of troops and equipment along Rus sia’s European