Carl Diem - Olympics in Berlin

Olympics in Berlin

Carl Diem became the secretary of the all-German sports organization Deutscher Reichsausschuss für Leibesübungen (DRL) the forerunner of the Nationalsozialistischer Reichsbund für Leibesübungen, the Sports Organ of the Third Reich.

In May 1932, again largely due to the reputation and lobbying efforts of Diem and Lewald, Berlin was selected to host the 1936 summer games; Diem was named Secretary General of the Organizing Committee. He attended the 1932 games in Los Angeles, carefully observing the host city's preparations and facilities, committed to meeting or outdoing the American accomplishment in Berlin four years later.

The rise of Adolf Hitler to power in 1933 once again threatened Diem's dream of a Berlin Olympiad: Nazi nationalism did not embrace international sport, and Hitler himself had dismissed the Olympics as a project of "Jews and Freemasons." After Hitler took power, Diem expected him to cancel the Olympics. But Hitler's propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, convinced him that the games would be an excellent showcase for German organization and pride. At a March 1933 meeting, six weeks after taking power, Hitler informed Diem and Levald that he would support the games. Six months later, after touring the construction sites for the sporting arenas, he told Diem that the German state would pay the bills.

The Nazis embraced the Olympic Games not only because they promised to be a unique opportunity to extol the virtues of their "reborn" state; as a celebration of physical prowess, the games also dovetailed neatly with the Nazi idealization of youth, fitness and athleticism. Further, according to Nazi racial theories, their own Aryan "superiorities" were descended from the great achievements of ancient Greece.

Despite the official Nazi support for the games, Diem's position as organizer was at risk, mostly because his Hochschule employed Jewish teachers and Diem's wife, Liselott, came from a Jewish family. He himself was classified, for these reasons, as a "white Jew." Diem managed to hold on to his job and solidify his position with his Nazi patrons. His partner Theodor Lewald, who had been removed by the Nazis from his post as President of the German Sports Body in 1933 because his paternal grandmother was Jewish, was appointed president of the Organizing Committee of the Berlin Olympic Games by the leader of the Nazi Sports Body, Hans von Tschammer und Osten.

Some sources later claimed that during this time Olympic officials threatened to pull the games from Berlin if Jews were excluded and that the protests from the IOC forced the Nazi leadership to reinstate Lewald –although only to the minor post of "adviser" to the games. The Nazi establishment went out of their way to assure the world that "non-Aryan" participants were being allowed to compete –however those assurances were less than truthful. In particular, the American Olympic Association remained skeptical about the Nazis' openness to non-Aryan competitors, and a movement to boycott the Berlin games began to gather steam among U.S. Olympic officials. Diem's old friend Avery Brundage, president of the American Olympic Committee, was dispatched to appraise the facts; in Berlin, Diem convinced Brundage that Jews were not being excluded, though he likely knew otherwise. Brundage returned to the U.S. and, defeating the boycott-supporters, helped to ensure that a full American athletic delegation would attend the games in Berlin.

Carl Diem held high posts in the Third Reich's sports organization (NSRL) even after the Olympics, becoming the leader of the Foreign Department of the Nationalsocialist Sports Office in 1939. As such he was responsible for the issues of German athletes in foreign countries, as well as for the international affairs of the NSRL.