Honorary Aryan (German:Ehrenarier[1]) was a semi-official category and expression used inNazi Germany and its territories to justify certain individuals who, according to theNuremberg Laws, were not recognized as being of “German or related blood” (theAryan race), but who were nonetheless spared persecution and granted equal rights, although they continued to be regarded as inferior to the Aryan race.[2]
The bestowal of the status of "Honorary Aryan" upon certain "non-Aryan" people or peoples was typically not well-documented, due to the semi-official nature of the category. Rationales included the services of those individuals or peoples who were deemed valuable to the German economy or war effort, political considerations, andpropaganda value.[3] SomeMischlinge (individuals of mixedEuropean and non-Aryan ancestry) were grantedHonorary Aryan status for their contributions to Germany and loyalty to theNazi Party.
Emil Maurice, Hitler's first personal chauffeur and a very early member of the Nazi-Party, was member no. 2 of theSS, but ran afoul ofHeinrich Himmler's rules, which required SS men to have deep Aryan ancestry. Maurice's great-grandfather was Jewish, and Himmler (SS no. 168) considered him a security-risk. He tried to have him thrown out of the SS, but Hitler stood by his old friend and, in a secret letter dated 31 August 1935, required Himmler to allow Maurice and his brothers to remain in the organization. They were to be considered "Honorary Aryans".[8]
Sophie Lehár (née Paschal), the wife of the composerFranz Lehár, had been Jewish before her conversion toCatholicism upon her marriage. Hitler enjoyed Lehár's music and the Nazis made some propaganda use of it. AfterJoseph Goebbels intervened on Lehár's behalf,[9] Mrs. Lehár was given in 1938 the status of "Honorary Aryan" by marriage.[10] At least one attempt was made to have her deported, but it was thwarted by her special status.
Helene Mayer, a German-born fencer who had been forced to leave Germany in 1935 and resettle in the United States because she was Jewish, took part as an "Honorary Aryan" at the1936 Olympics in Berlin, where she won the silver medal for Germany.
There had been extensive cooperation betweenChina and Germany from 1926, but this became untenable when theSecond Sino-Japanese War broke out and Japan insisted on a cessation. Germany signed theTripartite Pact, along with Japan and Italy, at the end of 1940. In July 1941, Hitler officially recognizedWang Jingwei's puppet government in Nanking. After theattack on Pearl Harbor, China formally joined theAllies and declared war on Nazi Germany on December 9, 1941. This, combined with the earlier restrictions placed on the Chinese by the Nazis, led to thepersecution of the Chinese in Nazi Germany.[16][17]
^A 1st-degree Mischling was someone classified as having two Jewish grandparents
Citations
^HITLER: El Hombre detras del Monstruo (in Spanish) (1st ed.). Spain: Edimat. 2017. p. 26.ISBN978-84-9794-380-2.
^Steiner, John; Freiherr von Cornberg, Jobst (1998).Willkür in der Willkür : Befreiungen von den antisemitischen Nürnberger Gesetzen [Arbitrariness in arbitrariness:Exemptions from the anti-Semitic Nuremberg Laws](PDF) (in German). Institut fûr Zeitgeschichte.Den Begriff „Ehrenarier" gab es offiziell nicht, nur in der Umgangssprache. Er bedeutete wohl, daß ein jüdischer Mischling auf Grund seiner Stellung und Verdienste im Reich wie ein Arier angesehen wurde und keinerlei Anstalten machen mußte, eine Besserstellung oder Gleichstellung durch Hitler zu erreichen.
^"In the Wind",The Nation Vol. 147, Issue 7. August 13, 1938
^Corum, James (1997)The Luftwaffe: Creating the Operational Air War, 1918–1940. Lawrence, Kansas: University Press of Kansas. p.127ISBN978-0-7006-0836-2
^Elke Froehlich (Hrsg.):Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels. Teil I Aufzeichnungen 1923–1945 Band 5. Dez 1937 – Juli 1938. K.G. Saur, München 2000, S. 313.
