Simon Frame’s comment on the coming marriage in Germany of His Imperial and Royal Highness George Frederick, Prince of Prussia to Sophie, Princess of Isenburg. “Love and Royal Tradition in Germany” on Thursday, 25 August 2011 has created something of a storm on Facebook.
A similar debate followed recent comments here on Russia and the Tsar, and about Sir John Kerr.
About Germany, Simon Frame observed :
“ Outside of Germany, it remains a little known fact that the anti-Nazi resistance fighters of July 1944 who had attempted to assassinate Adolf Hitler and bring down his criminal regime, had intended to create a constitutional monarchy reigning over a democratic government with Louis Ferdinand as Emperor to prevent any soldier, politician or demagogue suborning the interests of the German nation ever again”.
David J Logan challenged this "There is no absolute information stating that any restoration of the monarchy was planned amongst those who planned to overthrow Hitler in 1944".
…Simon Frame replies…
But Simon Frame replied:
“I would highly recommend you read Jack Sweetmans meticulously referenced and sourced work 'The Unforgotten Crowns'. And more recently Hans Mommsen's work 'German Against Hitler', as he visits the subject also. I doub they just their facts up, if their bibliography's are anything to go by they can prove every word they write.
“While you are right to say that someone else was chosen to Head of State, more precisley General Ludwig Beck, his title was to be 'Reichsverweser' which means Regent.
“The decision to make Germany a constitutional monarchy, which was to be confirmed in a plebiscite by German people, was agreed upon by the five major players in the German Resistance movement: Beck, von Stauffenberg, Goerdeler, von Moltke and von Witzleben. That’s historical fact.”
No doubt the debate will continue.
Incidentally, opinion polls in 1969 showed a strong support for Prince Louis Ferdinand, known for his strong disapproval of the Hitler regime, to become German Bundespräsident.
…Churchill…
Winston Churchill believed that the history of the world would have been different had the central powers’ monarchies survived the First World War. On 26th April 1946 he said:
“If the Allies at the peace table at Versailles had allowed a Hohenzollern, a Wittelsbach and a Habsburg to return to their thrones, there would have been no Hitler. A democratic basis of society might have been preserved by a crowned Weimar in contact with the victorious Allies.”
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