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From a 21st century vantage point, the moral struggles of the Second World War and the fight against Hitler seem obvious. He was a genocidal madman, all good people joined in opposing him. For those living at the time, it was far from simple. In 1933, Hitler was an authoritarian and eccentric European ruler. Anti-Semitism was mainstream. German-Americans were the single largest European ethnic group. A shifting alliance of native-born American fascist groups like the Silver Shirts, German-American organizations, and outright Nazis spies plotted campaigns of propaganda, terror, murder, and revolutionary violence, to culminate in an American Final Solution. Los Angeles, home to the major movie studios and vital defense installations, was a key target. The police were bought off or complicit, ex-Klansmen who saw the Nazis as allies. The only defense was Leon L. Lewis, a Jewish lawyer and Anti-Defamation League leader who became an amateur spymaster, running teams of agents to monitor and subvert the American Nazis from within.
On one level, the Nazis were really not good at security. Lewis, and his aide Joe Roos, managed to get agents into the inner circles of the Bund and the Silver Shirts again and again. They successfully instigated leadership fights between various figures in the covert organization and German diplomatic corps, and kept tabs on a host of subversive behavior. On the other hand, there were hundreds to thousands of activatable Nazi agents placed all through key industries, as well as corps of hardened SA style street fighters. The Nazis made several plays to get arms for murder and revolution. Whatever their scanty ability to actually carry out their plans, they certainly wanted to kill Jews.
Most bleakly, despite Lewis and Roos' hard work, law enforcement was hardly interested in Nazis up until Pearl Harbor. The police were actively on the side of the Nazis, and the FBI and House-Un-American Activities Committee was more concerned with Communists than Nazis. American Jews had few friends in power, though those friends (include then Colonel George Marshall) did their best. When war was declared, the FBI and military security apparatus used Roos' files to make wholesale arrests, on almost no information.
There's a way in which history repeats. The movie studio bosses were the tech tycoons of their day, the highest paid individuals in America. Many of them were Jewish, and they funded Lewis's efforts. Yet despite their own self-interest, the 'below-the-line' technical work of movie-making was rife with anti-Semiticism, and the Nazi diplomatic corps had a final cut to maintain 'neutrality' in movies. The business of Hollywood was business, not principles. Just like how today's Big Tech hides between 'free speech' while letting neo-Nazi propaganda run wild on their platforms. I'm still unsure how much of a threat Hollywood Nazis really were, but it's indisputable that a few brave men and women ably confounded them.
On one level, the Nazis were really not good at security. Lewis, and his aide Joe Roos, managed to get agents into the inner circles of the Bund and the Silver Shirts again and again. They successfully instigated leadership fights between various figures in the covert organization and German diplomatic corps, and kept tabs on a host of subversive behavior. On the other hand, there were hundreds to thousands of activatable Nazi agents placed all through key industries, as well as corps of hardened SA style street fighters. The Nazis made several plays to get arms for murder and revolution. Whatever their scanty ability to actually carry out their plans, they certainly wanted to kill Jews.
Most bleakly, despite Lewis and Roos' hard work, law enforcement was hardly interested in Nazis up until Pearl Harbor. The police were actively on the side of the Nazis, and the FBI and House-Un-American Activities Committee was more concerned with Communists than Nazis. American Jews had few friends in power, though those friends (include then Colonel George Marshall) did their best. When war was declared, the FBI and military security apparatus used Roos' files to make wholesale arrests, on almost no information.
There's a way in which history repeats. The movie studio bosses were the tech tycoons of their day, the highest paid individuals in America. Many of them were Jewish, and they funded Lewis's efforts. Yet despite their own self-interest, the 'below-the-line' technical work of movie-making was rife with anti-Semiticism, and the Nazi diplomatic corps had a final cut to maintain 'neutrality' in movies. The business of Hollywood was business, not principles. Just like how today's Big Tech hides between 'free speech' while letting neo-Nazi propaganda run wild on their platforms. I'm still unsure how much of a threat Hollywood Nazis really were, but it's indisputable that a few brave men and women ably confounded them.