German Defense Minister Peter Struck said on Wednesday he was sure that anti-Jewish views endorsed by a top general were not widespread in the army and stressed all soldiers were taught in-depth about the Nazi past.
Struck fired the commander of the elite KSK special forces, Reinhard Guenzel, on Tuesday after the brigadier-general wrote a letter of support, on army notepaper, to a lawmaker who sparked outrage with comments widely seen as belittling the Holocaust.
Struck said soldiers receive extensive training about Germany's "terrible past." Regular studies of the attitudes of conscripts and professional soldiers, from privates to generals, are made to ensure the Bundeswehr remains anchored in democracy.
"I am completely convinced that members of the armed forces, and especially the KSK, are firmly rooted in democracy," Struck told a news conference. "I have no reason to assume the general's views are shared -- quite the contrary."
Struck sacked Guenzel almost instantly after learning about a letter he wrote in support of Martin Hohmann, a conservative member of parliament under pressure to resign for saying that Jews, like Germans, could be seen as "perpetrators."
Struck said Guenzel's comments were "warped" and he would study the 59-year-old's files for signs of extremist views.
Guenzel told Hohmann, a member of the Christian Democrats, most Germans shared the lawmaker's views.
The comments are embarrassing for Germany, where remarks by public figures critical of Jews or Israel often trigger protest because of the country's Nazi past, when six million Jews were killed in the Holocaust.
A group of 100 past and present officers said in a statement that Guenzel was "not an isolated case."
"The army is not made up of right-wing extremists but there is a considerable number in leadership positions who lack democratic awareness," said Helmuth Pries, head of the group.
Michael Wolffsohn, a historian at the Bundeswehr university in Munich and a leading Jewish voice in Germany, said Guenzel's comments were not representative of the views of soldiers. He praised Struck for firing Guenzel so quickly.
But several conservative members of parliament criticized Struck for firing Guenzel.
"He's not in any way a right-wing extremist," said Hans Raidel, a defense policy expert for the Christian Social Union.
"Admonishing him would have been enough," added Peter Gauweiler, another conservative CSU deputy from Bavaria.
RSS