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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 the 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. This was later downplayed to gain the support of business leaders, and in the 1930s the party's main focus shifted to antisemitic and anti-Marxist themes.
Neo-Nazism comprises the post–World War II militant, social, and political movements that seek to revive and reinstate Nazi ideology. Neo-Nazis employ their ideology to promote hatred and white supremacy, attack racial and ethnic minorities, and in some cases to create a fascist state.
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.
Francis Parker Yockey was an American fascist and pan-Europeanist. An attorney by profession, 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 calls for a neo-Nazi European empire.
The German American Bund, or the German American Federation, was a German-American Nazi organization which was established in 1936 as a successor to the Friends of New Germany. The organization chose its new name in order to emphasize its American credentials after the press accused it of being unpatriotic. The Bund was allowed to consist only of American citizens of German descent. Its main goal was to promote a favorable view of Nazi Germany.
Liberty Lobby was a United States political advocacy organization founded in 1958 by Willis Carto. Carto was known for his promotion of antisemitic conspiracy theories, white nationalism, and Holocaust denial.
The Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists was a Ukrainian ultranationalist political organization established in 1929 in Vienna. The organization first operated in Eastern Galicia. It emerged as a union between the Ukrainian Military Organization, smaller radical right-wing groups, and right-wing Ukrainian nationalists and intellectuals represented by Dmytro Dontsov, Yevhen Konovalets, Mykola Stsiborskyi, and other figures.
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.
Austin Joseph App was a German-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 organization founded as a coordinating center for anti-communist and nationalist émigré political organizations from Soviet and other socialist countries. The ABN formation dates back to a conference of representatives of non-Russian peoples that took place in November 1943, near Zhytomyr as the Committee of Subjugated Nations/the Anti-Bolshevik Front on the initiative of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists.
Holocaust victims were people targeted by the government of Nazi Germany based on their ethnicity, religion, political beliefs, or sexual orientation. The institutionalized practice by the Nazis of singling out and persecuting people resulted in the Holocaust, which began with legalized social discrimination against specific groups, involuntary hospitalization, euthanasia, and forced sterilization of persons considered physically or mentally unfit for society. The vast majority of the Nazi regime's victims were Jews, Sinti-Roma peoples, and Slavs but victims also encompassed people identified as social outsiders in the Nazi worldview, such as homosexuals, and political enemies. Nazi persecution escalated during World War II and included: non-judicial incarceration, confiscation of property, forced labor, sexual slavery, death through overwork, human experimentation, undernourishment, and execution through a variety of methods. For specified groups like the Jews, genocide was the Nazis' primary goal.
The National Socialist Movement (NSM) is a far-right, Neo-Nazi, and White supremacist organization based in the United States. It is a part of the Nationalist Front. The party claimed to be the "largest and most active" National Socialist organization in the United States. It is classified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Harold Keith Thompson was a New York City-based corporate executive, a Nazi agent, and a figure within American far-right and fascist circles.
The Bulgarian National Front is an anti-communist political movement active amongst emigrant Bulgarian populations. The group, which is active in a number of countries but not in Bulgaria itself, has been characterised as far-right and a continuation of earlier fascist movements.
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 fanatically 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.
Russ Bellant is an American journalist, political activist, and author. He was an Associate of Political Research Associates.
The Right Stuff is a neo-Nazi, Holocaust denial, and white nationalist conspiracy theory media website hosting a blog and discussion forum, as well as podcasts, including The Daily Shoah. Founded by American neo-Nazi and antisemitic conspiracy theorist Mike Peinovich, the blog popularized the use of "echoes", an antisemitic marker which uses triple parentheses around names to identify Jews on social media. Alex McNabb, a co-host of The Daily Shoah, was fired from his job as an Emergency medical technician following violent and racist comments he expressed on the podcast.
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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