During and even prior to the period of Hitler's intense collaboration with the Aufbau Vereinigung, organization members Fedor Vinberg, Alfred Rosenberg, and Max von Scheubner- Richter (the last two of whom likewise served as key National Socialist leaders) transmitted anti-Semitic White Russian thought with its apocalyptic and conspiratorial characteristics both to Hitler directly and indirectly through the Fuhrer's early voelkisch mentor Dietrich Eckart. (See also Hitler’s Source, and “Protocols”)
Strengthened by the successful organization and implementation of the Monarchical Congress at Bad Reichenhall in the summer of 1921, the White russian “Aufbau” organization followed a two-pronged strategy of intensified anti-Bolshevik and anti Weimar operations through the means of political terror and secret military organization, all the while expanding its influence over Hitler's fledgling National Socialist movement. In its covert military undertakings, Aufbau forged a "league of the defeated" to overthrow both the prevailing Versailles system in Europe and Bolshevik rule to the East. Building upon the legacy of earlier German/White anti-Bolshevik campaigns, Aufbau raised powerful armed forces intended for operation in the Baltic region.
While most concerned with overthrowing the Soviet Union and establishing favorable political and economic ties between right wing German and "Russian" states, Aufbau also participated in political terror inside Germany in collaboration with Organization C, a conspiratorial far right association under leading Kapp Putsch figure Captain Hermann Ehrhardt that possessed considerable connections with the National Socialist Party. Some Aufbau members killed Walther Rathenau, Germany's Foreign Minister, and a prominent Constitutional Democrat, Vladimir Nabokov.
Scheubner-Richter and Bliskupskii succeeded in arousing right wing interest in Vyshivannyi's bid for an independent Ukraine, helping to secure financing for his cause from Aufbau members and sympathetic Bavarian parties in the area of two million Marks.
The wealthy president of Aufbau. Baron Theodor von Cramer-Kiett, granted Vyshivannyi particularly considerable subsidies, and Aufbaumember Vladimir Kcppen contributed 60.000 Swiss Franks to support Vyshivannyi's undertaking. General Ludendorff (see “The German Kaiser's Confident” on SESN) lent his name to Vyshivannyi's efforts. as did Aufbau's leading Ukrainian representative. Ivan Poltavets-Ostranitsa, who served in Vyshivannyi's Supreme Council in Vienna. (1)
Aufbau supported Vyshivannyi in order to prepare the groundwork for the return of Habsburg rule to Austria. (2)
Vyshivannyi signed an agreement with Scheubner-Richter and Biskupskii in the summer of 1921 according to which he officially commissioned Biskupskii with forming his army on Bavarian soil for ultimate use in the Ukraine. In return, Vyshivannyi granted Biskupskii, Scheubner-Richter, and their wealthy Aufbau associates financial rewards in the form of trading and industrial concessions in the future Ukrainian state. At the beginning of September 1921. Biskupskii sent an agent to Hungary to purchase horses for Vyshivannyi's army in Bavaria. Vyshivannyi established recruiting centers outside of Bavaria, notably in Berlin. His organization paid volunteers for their trip to Bavaria and beyond.
Biskupskil prepared a two-pronged White campaign against the Soviet Union with both northern and southern offensives. As well as overseeing the formation of Vyshivannyi's army that was to operate in the Ukraine, he organized another White intervention in the Baltic region. In this latter endeavor, he collaborated with his old comrade General Ploir Glasenap, who had taken over command of the Russian Northwestern Army In Estonia from General Ludendorff in 1919, and with Piotr Bermondt-Avalov, the leader of the Western Volunteer Army in the Latvian Intervention of 1919. The three White officers organized an interventionary force with German Freikorps (volunteer corps) support intended for Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia that was to engage Soviet troops in the north while Vyshivannyl's army invaded the Ukraine.(3)
Biskupskil's collaboration with Bermondt-Avalov aroused the suspicion of the Reichskommissar fuer die Uberwachung der Offentfichen Ordnung, which asserted in September 1921 that Bermondt-Avalov, with his "adventurous nature" nevertheless was a sincere sponsor of German-Russian rapprochement, he hates the Entente with his entire soul, and he perceives an alliance between Germany and Russia to be the only possibility to overthrow the Bolsheviks and to take revenge together against the Entente. The Weimar Republic's secret political police concluded that he had laudable intentions, which, driven by "morbid vanity," he could not carry out.(4)
At the talks in Budapest, Scheubner-Richter posited that Germany's renewal could only take place after a "Russian" nationalist rebirth, but he stressed that the Ukraine represented the most vital "Russian" region for the struggle against Bolshevism. and he advocated the consolidation of all anti-Bolshevik elements there under Vyshivannyi's leadership. He stressed the need for wide-ranging Ukrainian autonomy, noting that the Russian Empire could not be reconstituted in its old form in any case. To sweeten the prospect of an independent Ukraine under Vyshivannyi, he emphasized that the industrial and financial circles he represented were prepared to guarantee German capital and technology for a variety of projects throughout the former Russian Empire after the overthrow of the Bolsheviks. (5)
In addition to planning military interventions against the Soviet Union that never came to fruition, Aufbau, in league with the National Socialist Party, increasingly engaged in and supported political terrorism on German soil. In May 1921, before the Monarchical Congress at Bad Reichenhall, Biskupskil, in harness with his Aufbau colleague Colonel Karl Bauer in Budapest, received 12 million Hungarian Crowns from Hungarian regent Admiral Nicholas Horthy's regime and used some of this money to place a contract for the assassination of Aleksandr Kerenskii, the former leader of the Provisional Government in Russia before the Bolshevik seizure of power. Whom Biskupskii and other Whites blamed for undermining Imperial Russia.(6)
While Bisicupskii never succeeded in bringing about Kerenskii's death. Aufbau members carried a series of high-profile assassinations, in the Weimar Republic, helping to establish terror as a means of political pressure from the radical night. On March 28, 1922, Shabelskii-Bork, who had transported The Protocols of the Elders of Zion from the Ukraine to Germany and his comrade Sergel Taboritskii traveled from Munich to Berlin with the intention of assassinating Pavel Miliukov, the leader of the Constitutional Democrats. (7) When the critical moment arrived, they shot and killed Vladimir Nabokov, also a Constitutional Democratic leader and the father of the famous novelist, instead. (8) Shabelskil-Bork and Tabon'tskii were eventually sentenced to 12 and 14 years jail time respectively. (9)
Members of Aufbau also had active connections with a conspiratorial body under Captain Hermann Ehrhardt that carried out covert anti Bolshevik and anti-Weimar military preparations, committed terrorist acts, and possessed close links to the NSDAP.(10)
Organization C arose around the same time as the Monarchical Congress of Bad Reichenhall in June 1921. Shortly after the conclusion of the Congress. officers of the disbanded Ehrhardt Brigade who had participated in the Kapp Putsch formed Organisation Consul, commonly known as Organization C. with "Consul" standing for Ehrhardt himself. (11) Organization C became infamous for its attempted and successful assassinations of leftist, often Jewish, leaders in the early years of the Weimar Republic.(12) Aufbau increasingly coordinated its secretive activities with those of Organization C. In a manner similar to Aufbau, the highly nationalistic and conspiratorial Organization C rejected the Treaty of Versailles and the Weimar Constitution and dedicated itself to fighting socialism, Bolshevism, and "Jewry" under the motto of "struggle for Germany's rebirth.”
Section C of Organization C oversaw right wing press and propaganda. Section C stood under the command of Lieutenant-Commander Eberhard Kautter, the only non-White Russian allowed to participate actively in the Monarchical Congress at Bad Reichenhall (perhaps with the exception of Kapp Putsch conspirator and Aufbau member Colonel Karl Bauer, who was rumored to have secretly participated in the proceedings), a fact that further demonstrates significant coordination between White Russian circles and Organization C.
1) MMFT report to the DB from December 24. 1923. RGVA (TKhIDK),fond 7. opis 2. delo 2575, reel 2. 133.
2) DB report from April 9, 1923, RGVA (TKhIDK),fond 7. opis 1. delo 2575. reel 2. 133.
3)PDM report to the BSMA from December 12, 1923, BHSAM. BSMA 36, number 103472. 50.
4) DB report from May 15.1923, RGVA (TKhIDK). fond 7. opis 1. delo 954, reel 1. 55: DB report from May 23, 1923. RGVA (TKhIDK).fond 7, opis 1, delo 876, reel 4. 349: “Erneuerung,” Voelkischer Beobachter, May 4, 1923, 4.
5) FAIAFKK report to the BSMI from May 23, 1923, BHSAM. BSMI 22. number 71625, fiche 2. 60.
6) Bohdan's testimony included in an FA/AFKK report to the BSMI from May 23. 1923. BHSAM, BSMI 22. number 71625, fiche 2, 63.
7) RUo0 report to the RWM from May 15, 1923 presented at the 4. SAUV on October 12. 1927. BHSAM. BSM 36. number 103476/1, 4 1: Nikolai Derezynskii’s testimony included in an FA/AFKK report to the BSMI from May 23. 1923. BHSAM, BSMI 22, number 71625, fiche 2. 66.
8) Friedrich Preitner's testimony included in an F.41AFAW report to the BSMI from May 24, 1923. BHSAM. BSMI 22, number 71625, fiche 2. 68, 69; PDMf report to the BSMI from November 14, 1922, BHSAM, BSMI 22. number 73685, fiche 1, 5.
9)
PDM report to the BSMI from April 11, 1923, BSAM, PDM. number 6707, 16.
P.1 Hitler's Secret "Protocols" P.1
P.2 Hitler's Secret "Protocols" P.2
P.3 Hitler’s Source P.1
P.4 Hitler’s Source P.2
P.5 The German Kaiser's Confident P.1
P.6 The German Kaiser's Confident P.2
P.7 The Ideologists and First Financiers of Hitler P.1
P.8 The Ideologists and First Financiers of Hitler P.2
P.9 Dietrich Eckart, Rosenberg, and White Russian Creators of Nazi Ideology, P.1
P.10 Dietrich Eckart, Rosenberg, and White Russian Creators of Nazi Ideology, P.2
P.11 The "Final" Solution Before WWII, P.1
P.12 The "Final" Solution Before WWII, P.2
P.13 Early Nazis and the Mystical Connection P.1
P.14 Early Nazis and the Mystical Connection P.2
P.15 Early Nazis and the Mystical Connection P.3
