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Albert Einstein Autograph Radio Message Twice Signed...
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Albert Einstein Praises the Red Army
Albert Einstein Autograph Radio Message Twice Signed in praise of the Soviet Red Army on its twenty-fifth anniversary. Two pages (verso only), 8" x 11", in German, New York, February 23, 1943. One of the most famous minds in history, Albert Einstein, a German citizen as well as an ethnic Jew, fled Germany in 1933, shortly after Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist Party came to power. Earlier in the year, the Nazis passed a series of laws aimed to suppress the rights of Jews, including one that forbade Jews from holding public office (including teaching positions). During that same year, Einstein's works became fodder for the flames of the Nazi book burnings and he became aware that he carried a $5,000 price on his head as an enemy of the state.Einstein, a champion of civil rights and internationalism, was no stranger to rumors of Communist sympathies and this 1943 speech praising the Red Army only helped to bolster the suspicions of FBI director, J. Edgar Hoover. Hoover believed Einstein to be a dangerous subversive and, beginning with his immigration to America ten years earlier, had his bureau begin the compilation of a dossier that would amount to 1,800 pages and would continue until Einstein's death in 1955.
In his radio address, Einstein hails the Soviets as an ally to all free peoples devoted to "international security." It reads, in full (in translation):
"With admiration and gratitude we remember the Red Army, which was created twenty-five years ago during a period of extreme danger for the new Soviet State. This Red Army is today the strongest defense against the most ruthless attack that civilized humanity was ever exposed to.
"The Red Army was created, not like the German Army, as an instrument for attack, for conquest and suppression, but as an indispensable protection for the peace loving, industrial and cultural constructive work of the new Russian states. The extraordinary achievements of this army bear witness that the Russian people are willing to sacrifice everything for its national organization and its independence. It also shows irrefutably that the underlying economic system is of extraordinary efficiency. It has been shown that the risk of turning over the national resources and production capital to the state, i.e. the general public, has been highly successful. Who would have thought it possible that an economically backward country, exhausted through military defeats, could build within one generation a mighty industrial production system and a strong army, and at the same time lift the intellectual and social level of the whole population? That Russia could do that will convince even the unbelievers, through the military achievements of the Soviet republics and its Red Army.
"At this time of great military success of the Red Army it cannot be stressed enough that the behavior of the Russian states in the last 25 years has shown that Russia's goal is of an economic-social ,and not military, nature. Soviet Russia was among all super powers the most loyal supporter of a policy for international security. It followed this policy as long as there was any possibility for it. I do not doubt that Russia will be willing after this war to participate in a system for international military security if the rest of the world would provide the basis.
"If our children and our children's children on this planet will find a more pleasant and safer life than our generation, they will have to keep the consciousness alive. We would be miserable slaves if the Red Army had not put a halt to the flood of the German criminal hordes."
Directly below the speech, Einstein wrote: "Contributed to the War Bonds Drive of the United States New York April 3rd 1943. A. Einstein."
Lightly stained along the upper edge, two indentions are seen on both pages from being joined with a paper clip. The text is bold and very bright. With a 2.75" x 4" head portrait of Einstein with his pipe.
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