Post by Max Sinister on Sept 7, 2022 23:11:58 GMT
In the 1990s, or maybe the early 2000s, I discovered the book - must've been after it was translated into German in 1995.
The Dutch original is called "De toekomst van gisteren". It's a strange book: although the author put ten years of work into it, he never finished it - if you take a look at his ideas, you may understand why. It's really not the easiest topic after all. Because as said, Nazi Germany wins WW2.
The rough plot Mulisch thought up works like this: The plot of July 20th seems to have worked, Hitler is dead, leading nazis like Himmler and Heydrich (OK, so we have a PoD in 1942 or earlier, not 1944) are in prison. New president Ludwig Beck contacts the western Allies and not only makes a separate peace with them (so they broke their promise to Stalin not to do that, but maybe Mulisch didn't know about that), but even gets some nukes to fight the Soviet Union so the Anglos won't have to do that.
It both works (the Soviet Union is defeated indeed) and backfires spectacularly: Not too long after the Soviet Union's knocked out, Himmler and Heydrich are broken out and take over Germany. In the resulting chaos, hundreds of thousands of war-weary Allied soldiers become prisoners of war. There's an uprising of British Nazis as well, who hang Churchill at a gas station. Then, there's even a Nazi revolution in THE US, and new führer Himmler sends troops to make sure the US will become his satellite.
Around that time, Himmler dies under suspicious circumstances, and Heydrich becomes third führer, who else. In this situation, a Dutchman tries to assassinate him. It doesn't work and makes things worse: Heydrich survives, only loses his right arm, and the Dutchman is caught. So Heydrich makes two orders: First, the Nazi salute has to be done with the left arm from now on; and second, the Dutch - yes, all of them - are declared untermenschen and have to wear yellow clog stickers.
Some decades pass. The Nazis have murdered millions of Jews, gypsies and Slavs. And Dutch too, as it seems. The original Netherlands are settled by Germans now, Amsterdam was renamed to "Rembrandt-Stadt" e.g. The surviving Dutch were deported to the General Government, which is meanwhile "cleansed" of Poles. Warsaw was renamed "Amsterdam at the Vistula" e.g. And the last Dutch are discussing whether they should try to fully assimilate, giving up their language and culture, to be accepted by the Germans.
In this situation, we learn that Heydrich has died and a Konrad Bayer has become new führer. Who makes a speech promising that not only will the "experiments" on humans not be stopped, but if necessary, even his own body shouldn't be taboo...
Yes, really makes you fear to think what'll happen next in this world.
