June 27, 1944
Introduction to the content:
A notice from a family in Enschede announcing the death of their son prompts Curt Bloch to write an Obituary for SS-Sturmmann Johann Strootmann. While the family members proclaim the hero’s death, Bloch remains unmoved. Those who love Hitler are doomed. He assumes a place in hell for the deceased.
The newspaper report that the British Air Force bombed people at the German beach resort Sinzig arouses Curt Bloch’s Schadenfreude (pleasure at someone else’s misfortune). In the Netherlands, the German occupiers have prevented the Dutch population from going to the beach for years. That is why, despite the summer heat, he thinks it acceptable to use machine guns to prevent the Krauts from swimming.
Not only the front cover of this issue of the OWC deals with the Russian Losses. Curt Bloch covered a whole page with relevant press articles inside. In his eponymous poem, he initially continues these propaganda reports: Stalin sacrifices his troops in the millions. One day it will be “The Soviet forces to the very last,” and Germany could celebrate final victory. However, Bloch considers these reports to be false facts.
The poem The Panic of Aveley also is about false reports, for which Curt Bloch blames the German News Bureau (DNB). The story tells of a clergyman who announces the Allied offensive on the mainland to the residents of his village with a poster. This leads to great fear in the village, as they fear the revenge attacks by the German Airforce. Bloch, on the other hand, believes their fears are unfounded and the report, as described in the newspaper, absurd.
Like many others, Curt Bloch longs for an end to the war. In the poem Everyone is tired of war, he concludes that things can’t go on like this. Everyone wishes for a peaceful life in brotherhood, without fear, manhunts, or wailing sirens. Nobody knows when better times will finally come, but Bloch wants to experience peace “as long as people still have something of it …”
The pop song Antoon Stand Tall refers to Anton Mussert (1894–1946), co-founder and leader of the Dutch National-Socialist Movement. Despite the approaching British troops, he wants to stay in the Netherlands and fight against the Allies in a German Wehrmacht uniform. The news is “for England a noose,” Curt Bloch taunts. With this uncompromising soldier – better than the Atlantic Wall – Germany will be saved. (In fact, after the liberation of the Netherlands, Mussert was arrested, sentenced to death for high treason, and executed.)
