FEBRUARY 4TH HATCHLING:

-OBITUARY: Daring Lindbergh Attained the Unattainable With Historic Flight Across Atlantic: Tragedy and Controversy--Son's Murder and Opposition to War--Marked Life (ALDEN WHITMAN, August 27, 1974, NY Times)

The conservative views that Lindbergh later articulated, the remarks about Jews that proved so startling when he was opposing American entry into World War II, his adverse opinion of the Soviet Union, his belief in Western civilization--these were all a reflection of a world view prevalent among his friends, which he absorbed over the years. An engineer and aviator of genius, he was, however, not an intellectual, nor a consistent reader, nor a social analyst.

The assumption of this elitism accounted for his conviction that "America should lead the world in the development of flight," that "a conflict between English and German groups of nations would [be] a fratricidal war," that race was a valid judgmental concept and that to accomplish an objective one should deal with "the top people." It also accounted for what many people thought was his anti-Semitism.

Lindbergh did not regard himself as an anti-Semite. Indeed, he was shocked a couple of years ago when this writer put the question to him. "Good God, no," he responded, citing his fondness for Jews he had known or dealt with. Nor did he condone the Nazi treatment of German Jews, much less Hitler's genocidal policies. On the other hand, he accepted as fact that American Jewish groups were among those promoting United States involvement in World War II.

He voiced these views in a speech in Des Moines, Iowa, on Sept. 11, 1941. After asserting that those groups responsible for seeking American "entanglement in European affairs" were "the British, the Jewish and the Roosevelt Administration," he went on to say:

"It is not difficult to understand why Jewish people desire the overthrow of Nazi Germany. The persecution they suffered in Germany would be sufficient to make bitter enemies of any race. No person with a sense of the dignity of mankind can condone the persecution the Jewish race suffered in Germany.

"But no person of honesty and vision can look on their prowar policy here today without seeing the dangers involved in such a policy, both for us and for them.

"Instead of agitating for war, the Jewish groups in this country should be opposing it in every possible way, for they will be among the first to feel its consequences. Tolerance is a virtue that depends upon peace and strength. A few far-sighted Jewish people realize this and stand opposed to intervention. But the majority still do not. Their greatest danger to their country lies in their large ownership and influence in our motion pictures, our press, our radio and our government."

The speech evoked a nationwide outcry. Lindbergh, it was said, had not only impugned the patriotism of American Jews, but also had used the word "race," a word many Jews considered both pejorative and inaccurate. Lindbergh never withdrew his remarks, which he considered statements of "obvious fact." "The violence of the reaction to my naming these groups was significant and extremely interesting," he said 25 years later. "In hindsight, I would not change my action." [...]

[A]s a distinguished aviator, he was invited to visit airplane factories in France by the French Air Ministry. He was also invited by the German Government to inspect the Luftwaffe and warplane factories in the Reich. He received red-carpet treatment, visited many factories and was told repeatedly that the Nazis were eager "to create an air force second to none." He visited Germany several times before 1938 and was increasingly impressed with the quality of the air force.

It seemed to him all the more fearsome by comparison with the air arm in Britain, France and the Soviet Union. By 1939 he had concluded that the power of the Luftwaffe was overwhelming, and that the air forces of other European countries were comparatively insignificant. In off-the- record conversations with the leaders of these countries, the Soviet Union excepted, he sought to warn them of the perils they were facing.

Neither then nor later did Lindbergh, according to his journals, believe that German air power would be the decisive factor in a war so much as it would be an essential element. And he sought to impress on France, Britain and the United States the need to bestir themselves.

Lindbergh and his family returned to the United States in 1939 shortly before World War II broke out. He felt he ought to do all he could to prevent American involvement. Not a pacifist nor an isolationist, he was a noninterventionist.

"My opposition to World War II resulted from the growing conviction that such a war would probably devastate Europe, kill millions of men and possibly result in the end of Western civilization," he told this writer a few years ago, adding:

"Under the circumstances of prewar Europe, I concluded that Germany could not be defeated without the active intervention of the United States. I doubted that Germany could be defeated even with American intervention.

"Obviously this depended a great deal on the relationship between Germany and Russia. But if Germany were defeated, it seemed to me almost certain that Russia would be the real victor and that a Stalin-dominated Europe would be even worse than a Hitler-dominated Europe.

"I felt that the wisest policy for Western powers would be to arm, stay neutral and let Germany and Russia clash--and thereafter to feel their way according to changing circumstances. I still think this would have been the wisest policy." [...]

With Pearl Harbor, America First collapsed and Lindbergh sought to join the armed forces. "Now that we are at war I want to contribute as best I can to my country's war effort," he wrote. "It is vital for us to carry on this was as intelligently, as constructively, and as successfully as we can, and I want to do my part."

His bid to soldier was rebuffed, however, an action for which he blamed Roosevelt personally. Lindbergh, then 39, joined the Ford Motor Company as a consultant, working at the Willow Run plant in Michigan, which was producing bombers. Later he was a consultant to the United Aircraft Corporation, attached chiefly to its Vought-Sikorsky Division in Stratford, Conn. Vought was producing the Navy Corsair F4U. As part of his job, he traveled to the Pacific war area in 1944 to study the Corsair under service conditions, and, as a civilian, flew 50 missions against the Japanese.

If you've never read them, Lindbergh's own book, The Spirit of St. Louis; A. Scott Berg's biography, Lindbergh; and Anne Morrow Lindbergh's Gift from the Sea are all excellent. Mr. Berg also appeared on Booknotes. And Billy Wilder, Jimmy Stewart and a fly combined for a great movie version of the Trans-Atlantic flight: The Spirit of St. Louis.

Mr. Lindbergh was guilty of using unfortunate language about Jewish influence on the American government, but he was broadly right about the war, which did in fact end up substituting Soviet tyranny for Nazi. Despite his quite public reservations, as soon as Pearl Harbor was bombed and it became obvious we were going to war he did everything he could to get in the fight. One wishes today's isolationists had reacted similarly after 9-11.

More than anything though, he too was a great American explorer, one of the driving forces behind our aerospace industry for decades, and, in a very real sense, the spiritual godfather of the Columbia crew.

Posted by Orrin Judd at February 4, 2003 3:38 PM