To the Editor:
I read Paul Massing’s article, “Is Every German Guilty?” in the May COMMENTARY with a great deal of enthusiasm. I feel it is one of the most incisive, honest, and courageous analyses of a problem of profound significance that I have read. I should like to congratulate you on publishing it.
While I was in Germany, in Military Government, I found myself constantly wondering over the same problem. The fact that almost all Germans disclaim individual responsibility does not, in my opinion, warrant the wholesale criticism that they are incorrigible. I think rather it goes to show, as Mr. Massing points out in his article, that most Germans never individually accepted participation in the crimes of the Nazi “machine,” and that their disclaimer of guilt is prima facie as good evidence as one could wish for that they are not individually morally responsible. Collective guilt is a much more difficult proposition. We are all in part guilty of the crimes against humanity that have been done in the past few years. Collectively the guilt of the German is greater, but it is not of such a different order as to justify a wholesale condemnation of the people, which, as Mr. Massing said, is a kind of totalitarian judgment.
I am inclined to feel that discussions of war guilt are going to prove as fruitless and possibly even as pernicious following World War II as they were after World War I.
Alfred M. Bingham
New York City
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