Book Review: Account Settled
| Author | F. E. Dessauer |
| Published date | 01 March 1951 |
| Date | 01 March 1951 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/002070205100600120 |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
70
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
ACCOUNT
SETTLED.
By
Dr. Hjalmar
Schacht,
tr.
Edward
Fitzgerald.
1949.
(London:
George
Weidenfeld
&
Nicolson.
Toronto:
Saun-
ders.
327
pp.
$3.75,
members
$3.00.)
Dr.
Schacht's
new
book
is
both attack
and
defence.
The
old
man
is
still as
much
of
a
fighter
as he
ever
was,
and
he
is obviously
not ready
for
retirement
from
public affairs.
His latest
publication
is
not
a
source-
book
for
future
historians.
It
is,
however,
an
important
testimony
about
a
man
who
more
than
once
made
history,
and
about
his
strength
as
well
as
his limitations.
It
shows
what
dynamic
politics
can
achieve
when
political customs
have
not
yet
grown
strong.
Dr.
Schacht was
put
on
trial
after
the
victory
of
the
Allied
Powers
for
having participated
in
the
preparation
of
aggressive
war. He
was
acquitted from
this
charge.
However,
having
been
accused
before
the
whole
world,
he
quite understandably
felt
the
need
to
re-establish
his
reputation.
The
newspaper
reports
on
the
trial
had
supported
the
indictment
rather
than
the
acquittal;
the weight
of
which
was
reduced
by
the
dissent
of
one
judge.
The
book
makes it
clear
that
the
legal
guilt
of
Dr.
Schacht
could
never
be
proven.
Moreover,
it
seems
almost
impossible
that
this
man,
in
the given
circumstances,
should
not
have
deserted
Hitler
and
eventually
plotted
against
him, exactly
as
he
had
deserted
the
Weimar
Republic
and
helped
to
destroy
it at
a former
turn
of
his
eventful
life.
In
both
cases
he
must
have
seen
early
the
signs
on
the
wall,
and
he
was
never
the
man
to
postpone
suitable
action.
Of
course,
he
might
claim,
like
Talleyrand,
that
he
deserted
only
men who
had
deserted
their
avowed
principles
before.
He
is,
however,
a
little
naive
regarding
Hitler's
principles
of
1933.
The
Nuremberg
trial
is
one
of
the main
subjects
of
the
book.
Dr.
Schacht
is
clever
enough
not
to
argue
against
the
legal
principles
on
which
the
trial
was based.
He
is
silent
also
about
its
political
results.
What
he
shows,
more
by implication
than
by
methodical
analysis,
are
the
almost
insurmountable
difficulties
of
a
fair
trial,
and
the unsuit-
ability
of
the
judicial
process
for
dealing
with
defeated
enemies.
The
accused do
not understand
the
legal
system
under
which
court
and
prosecution
operate;
court
and
prosecution
do
not understand
the
politi-
cal
system
which
necessarily
affects
the
responsibility
of
the
accused.
Both
speak different languages.
In
such
an
atmosphere
it
is
difficult for
the
one
side
to
achieve
justice, and
for
the
other
to
believe
in such
an
achievement.
Great
political
results
can
hardly
be
expected
from a
procedure
which
has
only
a
limited
chance
of
success
in its proper
field.
Dr.
Schacht
did
not
write
a
good book.
He
is
too resentful
to
be
methodical,
too
vain
to
be
unbiassed,
and
too
disputatious
to
reach
greatness.
The
independence
of
his
mind
does
not
express
itself
in
his
style.
We
learn
few
facts
which
we
did
not
know
before.
There
are
many
omissions and inaccuracies
which
make
the
book
unreliable
and
often
misleading.
The
financial
policies
through
which
Schacht
became
famous
are
treated
only
in
a
rather
superficial
way.
The
book
is
a
plea,
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