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The German American National Congress (German : Deutsch Amerikanischer National Kongress) (also known as DANK) is a national German-American nonprofit organization in the United States founded in 1959. [1] It was established to unite Americans of Germanic descent, while preserving their heritage and traditions. [2] With over 30 chapters and more than 100 associated members throughout the country, DANK is the largest organization of German-Americans.[ third-party source needed ][ needs update ]
German American National Congress has had relationships with U.S. governmental and civic bodies including the White House, the German Embassy in Washington, D.C., German consulates, and a number of other German organizations, according to its website. [3]
The Holocaust denier Austin App was active with the group, according to the writer Russ Bellant. App died in 1986. [4]
DANK was in the Republican Heritage Groups Council in the early 1970s. [4] The group received some financial support from West Germany. [5] In 1985, its president, Elsbeth Seewald, tried to persuade members of Congress to support President Ronald Reagan's controversial visit to the Bitburg military cemetery, where members of the Nazi Waffen-SS were buried. [5]
In 1987 DANK was involved in the adoption of October 6 as German-American Day, observed nationally. [3]
It launched its website, dank.org, in the late 1990s. [6] [ third-party source needed ]
As of 2013, it had 800 members in the United States, according to Multicultural America. [7]
The German-American Journal is the official newsletter of DANK, published bimonthly. At the start of DANK in 1959 it was six pages, issued every three weeks, and written almost entirely in German. As of 2011, the paper was 16 pages and written primarily in English, with articles in German often accompanied by an English translation or summary. Recurring topics in the Journal include current events, food and entertainment, reviews, and organization news. Members of DANK receive the newspaper as part of membership, and non-members may purchase an annual subscription.[ third-party source needed ]
DANK is made up of chapters throughout the United States, which are divided into three regions: Regions One through Three. Along with its chapters, DANK has its national headquarters (DANK National) at the DANK Haus German American Cultural Center located in Lincoln Square, Chicago, Illinois. On the national and chapter level there are board-member positions which aid in keeping the organization running, and are responsible for organizing events and activities which aim to unite people of German-American descent.[ third-party source needed ]
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party, was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor, the German Workers' Party, existed from 1919 to 1920. The Nazi Party emerged from the extremist German nationalist, racist and populist Freikorps paramilitary culture, which fought against communist uprisings in post–World War I Germany. The party was created to draw workers away from communism and into völkisch nationalism. Initially, Nazi political strategy focused on anti–big business, anti-bourgeois, and anti-capitalist rhetoric; it was later downplayed to gain the support of business leaders. By the 1930s, the party's main focus shifted to antisemitic and anti-Marxist themes. The party had little popular support until the Great Depression, when worsening living standards and widespread unemployment drove Germans into political extremism.
The Institute for Historical Review (IHR) is a United States–based nonprofit organization which promotes Holocaust denial. It is considered by many scholars to be central to the international Holocaust denial movement. Self-described as a "historical revisionist" organization, the IHR promotes antisemitic viewpoints and has links to several neo-Nazi and neo-fascist organizations.
The America First Committee (AFC) was an American isolationist pressure group against the United States' entry into World War II. Launched in September 1940, it surpassed 800,000 members in 450 chapters at its peak. The AFC principally supported isolationism for its own sake, and its varied coalition included Republicans, Democrats, farmers, industrialists, communists, anti-communists, students, and journalists – however, it was controversial for the anti-Semitic and pro-fascist views of some of its most prominent speakers, leaders, and members. The AFC was dissolved on December 11, 1941, four days after the attack on Pearl Harbor brought the United States into the war.
Francis Parker Yockey was an American fascist and pan-Europeanist ideologue. A lawyer, he is known for his neo-Spenglerian book Imperium: The Philosophy of History and Politics, published in 1948 under the pen name Ulick Varange, which called for a neo-Nazi European empire.
The World Jewish Congress (WJC) is an international federation of Jewish communities and organizations, founded in Geneva, Switzerland in August 1936. According to its mission statement, the World Jewish Congress's main purpose is to act as "the diplomatic arm of the Jewish people". Membership in the WJC is open to all representative Jewish groups or communities, irrespective of the social, political or economic ideology of the community's host country. The World Jewish Congress headquarters are in New York City, and the organization maintains international offices in Brussels, Belgium; Jerusalem; Paris, France; Moscow, Russia; Buenos Aires, Argentina; and Geneva, Switzerland. The WJC has special consultative status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council.
James Harting Madole was an American fascist and leader of the National Renaissance Party in the United States. He is now recognized as a pivotal figure in the development of post-war occult-fascism.
The World League for Freedom and Democracy (WLFD) is an international non-governmental organization of anti-communist politicians and groups. It was founded in 1952 as the World Anti-Communist League (WACL) under the initiative of Chiang Kai-shek, leader of the Republic of China and retired General Charles A. Willoughby. During the Cold War, WACL actively participated in anti-communist and anti-Soviet positions.
The Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists was a Ukrainian nationalist organization established in 1929 in Vienna, uniting the Ukrainian Military Organization with smaller, mainly youth, radical nationalist right-wing groups. The OUN was the largest and one of the most important far-right Ukrainian organizations operating in the interwar period on the territory of the Second Polish Republic. The OUN was mostly active preceding, during, and immediately after the Second World War. Its ideology has been described as having been influenced by the writings of Dmytro Dontsov, from 1929 by Italian fascism, and from 1930 by German Nazism. The OUN pursued a strategy of violence, terrorism, and assassinations with the goal of creating an ethnically homogenous and totalitarian Ukrainian state.
The Nazi Party/Foreign Organization was a branch of the Nazi Party and the 43rd and only non-territorial Gau ("region") of the Party. In German, the organization is referred to as NSDAP/AO, "AO" being the abbreviation of the German compound word Auslands-Organisation. Although Auslands-Organisation would be correctly written as one word, the Nazis chose an obsolete spelling with a hyphen.
The International Association for the Advancement of Ethnology and Eugenics (IAAEE) was an organisation that promoted eugenics and segregation, and the first publisher of Mankind Quarterly.
Austin Joseph App was an American professor of medieval English literature who taught at the University of Scranton and La Salle University. App defended Nazi Germany during World War II. He is known for his work denying the Holocaust, and he has been called the first major American Holocaust denier.
Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations (ABN) was an international anti-communist organization founded as a coordinating center for anti-communist and nationalist émigré political organizations from Soviet and other socialist countries.
John Foster "Chip" Berlet is an American investigative journalist, research analyst, photojournalist, scholar, and activist specializing in the study of extreme right-wing movements in the United States. He also studies the spread of conspiracy theories. Since the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, Berlet has regularly appeared in the media to discuss extremist news stories. He was a senior analyst at Political Research Associates (PRA), a non-profit group that tracks right-wing networks.
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DANK-Haus German American Cultural Center is a cultural organization located in the Lincoln Square, Chicago community area. Founded in Chicago in 1959, it seeks to preserve and promote German and German American culture. The center contains the DANK museum, Scharpenberg art gallery, a library, facilities for social gatherings, and offers German language classes. It is a member organization of the Chicago Cultural Alliance.
Ivor Benson was a journalist, right-wing essayist, anti-communist and racist conspiracy theorist. From 1964 to 1966 he was a Rhodesian government official and censor. He strongly supported apartheid in South Africa. He also wrote frequently about a global Jewish/Communist conspiracy; his main book on the subject, This Worldwide Conspiracy, was supported by the right-wing London Swinton Circle and recommended by the neo-Nazi National Front (UK). Benson blamed the BBC, Wall Street banking interests, the government of the Soviet Union, and the World Council of Churches as drivers of a global conspiracy to wipe out his preferred nationalism.
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Nikolai Grigorievich Nazarenko was a Don Cossack emigre leader who served as president of the World Federation of the Cossack National Liberation Movement of Cossackia and the Cossack American Republican National Federation.
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