Editing Neo-Nazism (section)

=== Germany and Austria, 1945–1950s ===
Following the defeat of [[Nazi Germany]], the political ideology of the ruling party, Nazism, was in complete disarray. The final leader of the [[Nazi Party|National Socialist German Workers' Party]] (NSDAP) was [[Martin Bormann]]. He died on 2 May 1945 during the [[Battle of Berlin]], but the [[Soviet Union]] did not reveal his death to the rest of the world, and his ultimate fate remained a mystery for many years. [[Conspiracy theories about Adolf Hitler's death|Conspiracy theories emerged about Hitler himself]], that he had secretly survived the war and fled to South America or elsewhere.

The [[Allied Control Council]] officially dissolved the NSDAP on 10 October 1945, marking the end of "Old" Nazism. A process of [[denazification]] began, and the [[Nuremberg trials]] took place, where many major leaders and ideologues were condemned to death by October 1946, others committed suicide.

[[File:Otto Ernst Remer portrait.JPG|thumb|left|upright|[[Otto Ernst Remer]], {{lang|de|[[Wehrmacht]]}} general and leader of the postwar [[Socialist Reich Party]]]]
In both the East and West, surviving ex-party members and military veterans assimilated to the new reality and had no interest in constructing a "neo-Nazism".{{Citation needed|date=December 2017}} However, during the [[West German federal election, 1949|1949 West German elections]] a number of Nazi advocates such as [[Fritz Rössler]] had infiltrated the [[national conservative]] ''[[Deutsche Rechtspartei]]'', which had five members elected. Rössler and others left to found the more radical [[Socialist Reich Party]] (SRP) under [[Otto Ernst Remer]]. At the onset of the [[Cold War]], the SRP favoured the Soviet Union over the United States.{{citation needed|date=June 2020}}

In [[Austria]], national independence had been restored, and the {{lang|de|[[Verbotsgesetz 1947]]}} explicitly criminalised the NSDAP and any attempt at restoration. [[West Germany]] adopted a similar law to target parties it defined as anti-constitutional; Article 21 Paragraph 2 in the [[Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany|Basic Law]], banning the SRP in 1952 for being opposed to [[liberal democracy]].

As a consequence, some members of the nascent movement of German neo-Nazism joined the {{lang|de|Deutsche Reichspartei}} of which [[Hans-Ulrich Rudel]] was the most prominent figure. Younger members founded the {{lang|de|[[Wiking-Jugend]]}} modelled after the [[Hitler Youth]]. The {{lang|de|Deutsche Reichspartei}} stood for elections from 1953 until 1961 fetching around 1% of the vote each time.{{Citation needed|date=December 2017}} Rudel befriended French-born [[Savitri Devi]], who was a proponent of [[Esoteric Nazism]]. In the 1950s she wrote a number of books, such as ''[[Pilgrimage (book)|Pilgrimage]]'' (1958), which concerns prominent [[Third Reich]] sites, and ''[[The Lightning and the Sun]]'' (1958), in which she claims that Adolf Hitler was an avatar of the God [[Vishnu]]. She was not alone in this reorientation of Nazism towards its [[Thule Society|Thulean]]-roots; the {{lang|de|[[Artgemeinschaft]]}}, founded by former SS member Wilhelm Kusserow, attempted to promote a new [[paganism]].{{Citation needed|date=December 2017}}
In the [[German Democratic Republic]] (East Germany) a former member of [[Sturmabteilung|SA]], [[Wilhelm Adam]], founded the [[National Democratic Party of Germany (East Germany)|National Democratic Party of Germany]]. It reached out to those attracted by the Nazi Party before 1945 and provide them with a political outlet, so that they would not be tempted to support the far-right again or turn to the anti-communist Western Allies.{{Citation needed|date=December 2017}} [[Joseph Stalin]] wanted to use them to create a new pro-Soviet and anti-Western strain in German politics.<ref name=":0a">{{Cite book|last=Zubok, V. M. (Vladislav Martinovich)|title=A failed empire: the Soviet Union in the Cold War from Stalin to Gorbachev|date=2007|publisher=University of North Carolina Press|isbn=978-0-8078-3098-7|location=Chapel Hill|pages=89–90|oclc=86090559}}</ref> According to top Soviet diplomat Vladimir Semyonov, Stalin even suggested that they could be allowed to continue publishing their own newspaper, [[Völkischer Beobachter]].<ref name=":0a" /> While in Austria, former SS member Wilhelm Lang founded an esoteric group known as the [[Landig Group|Vienna Lodge]]; he popularised [[Nazism and occultism]] such as the [[Black Sun (occult symbol)|Black Sun]] and ideas of Third Reich survival colonies below the polar ice caps.{{Citation needed|date=December 2017}}

[[File:Otto Strasser crop2.jpg|thumb|right|upright|[[Otto Strasser]], leader of the [[German Social Union (West Germany)|German Social Union]], returned from exile to Germany in the mid-1950s.]]
With the onset of the [[Cold War]], the allied forces had lost interest in prosecuting anyone as part of the denazification.<ref name="Evans-2008">{{cite book |last=Evans |first=Richard J. |author-link=Richard J. Evans |year=2008 |title=The Third Reich at War |url=https://archive.org/details/thirdreichatwar00evan_0 |url-access=registration |series=The Third Reich Trilogy |publisher=Penguin Books |pages=[https://archive.org/details/thirdreichatwar00evan_0/page/747 747–48] |isbn=978-0-14-311671-4}}</ref> In the mid-1950s this new political environment allowed [[Otto Strasser]], an NS activist on the left of the NSDAP, who had founded the [[Black Front]] to return from exile. In 1956, Strasser founded the [[German Social Union (West Germany)|German Social Union]] as a Black Front successor, promoting a [[Strasserite]] "nationalist and socialist" policy, which dissolved in 1962 due to lack of support. Other Third Reich associated groups were the [[HIAG]] and [[Stille Hilfe]] dedicated to advancing the interests of [[Waffen-SS]] veterans and rehabilitating them into the new democratic society. However, they did not claim to be attempting to restore Nazism, instead functioning as lobbying organizations for their members before the government and the two main political parties (the conservative [[CDU/CSU]] and the Nazis' one-time archenemies, the [[Social Democratic Party of Germany|Social Democratic Party]])

Many bureaucrats who served under the Third Reich continued to serve in German administration after the war. According to the [[Simon Wiesenthal Center]], many of the more than 90,000 Nazi war criminals recorded in German files were serving in positions of prominence under Chancellor [[Konrad Adenauer]].<ref name="Simon Wiesenthal Center">{{cite web |url=https://www.wiesenthal.com/site/pp.asp?c=lsKWLbPJLnF&b=4441293 |title=About Simon Wiesenthal |author=<!--Staff writer(s); no by-line.--> |year=2013 |website=Simon Wiesenthal Center |access-date=17 November 2013 |at=Section 11 |archive-date=26 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220326215654/https://www.wiesenthal.com/site/pp.asp?c=lsKWLbPJLnF&b=4441293 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Hartmann">{{cite web |url=https://www.sopos.org/aufsaetze/4bdfd55e42f57/1.phtml |title=Der Alibiprozeß |publisher=Ossietzky 9/2010 |work=Den Aufsatz kommentieren |year=2010 |access-date=19 November 2013 |last=Hartmann |first=Ralph |language=de |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131202222254/https://www.sopos.org/aufsaetze/4bdfd55e42f57/1.phtml |archive-date=2 December 2013}}</ref> Not until the 1960s were the former concentration camp personnel prosecuted by [[West Germany]] in the [[Belzec trial]], [[Frankfurt Auschwitz trials]], [[Treblinka trials]], [[Chełmno trials]], and the [[Sobibór trial]].<ref name="Rückerl-1972">{{Cite book |last=Rückerl |first=Adalbert |year=1972 |title=NS-Prozesse |publisher=Verlag C F Muller |location=Karlsruhe, Germany |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=K23zAAAAMAAJ&q=Treblinka |access-date=8 September 2013 |quote=Adalbert Rückerl, head of the Central Bureau for the Prosecution of National Socialist Crimes observed that because of the 1968 Dreher's amendment (§ 50 StGB), 90% of all Nazi war criminals in Germany enjoyed total immunity from prosecution. |page=132 |isbn=978-3788020156 |archive-date=4 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220304125116/https://books.google.com/books?id=K23zAAAAMAAJ |url-status=live }}</ref> However, the government had passed laws prohibiting Nazis from publicly expressing their beliefs.