He saw in Fischer's views a great danger for the international image of Germany. His anger at this cover-up even surfaced in shouting matches he had with his elder colleague, Egmont Zechlin, in the history department of Hamburg before his book was published.Īs a patriot Ritter broke into tears when he discussed Fischer's line of arguments in his lectures in Freiburg. He himself had been a victim of the revisionist attitudes propagated in the 1920s and 1930s. He had also become aware of the immensity of the cover-up of German policies before and after 1914 by historians, archivists, politicians and the military in the inter- war period. He was convinced that he would ultimately prevail because of his strong belief in the evidence of the primary sources. Many would have cracked under the strain of media pressure. The papers presented by the students provided a challenge to the hitherto accepted revisionist outlook and inspired Fischer to delve into the recently opened archives in East Germany and Bonn to find out what had really happened. How did Fischer come to write about the First World War? After he had returned from the United States in 1955, where he had held a Visiting Professorship at Notre Dame University, he ran a research seminar at Hamburg University on the war.
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