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historical amnesia — nazi olympics — documentation — leni riefenstahl — ioc — kirsty coventry — jacques rogge — thomas bach — milan-cortina 2026 — war — propaganda — ioc group — joseph goebbels — adolf hitler — the olympic shop — robert mugabe — carl diem — vladimir putin — dmitry kozak — vitaly smirnov — vitaly mutko — shamil tarpishev — naming and shaming — xi jinping — dmitry chernyshenko — ukraine — vladyslav heraskevych — mark adams — torch relay — light dome — russia — sochi 2014 — christophe de kepper — epstein files — casey wasserman — los angeles 2028 — usopc — carl von ossietzky — pierre de coubertin — nobel peace prize — german olympic bid — olympic bidding — olympic protection act — articles — third reich — ludwig hohlwein — agnes keleti — christoph becker — gerhard schröder — otto schily — leipzig 2012

Olympic Heritage: Coventry's failure, the Olympic Shop, the Riefenstahl films, the Nazi Olympics, motorways and German Olympic bids

The reporting on Nazi symbolism in The Olympic Shop deserves some background information and documentation. So here is a story about how the IOC basically blackmailed (German) Olympic bidders and how much money the IOC Group paid for the 1936 Olympic films financed by Joseph Goebbels.

,   and  Jens Weinreich
16 min read
Collage SPORT & POLITICS with photos and illustrations from the Polish Archiwa Państwowe (Hitler & Co.), the Federal Archives (Riefenstahl), The Olympic Shop, and documents from the Federal Chancellery and the Federal Ministry of the Interior.

This newsletter covers a lot of ground: the International Olympic Committee's (IOC) handling of its own history, mass murderers, despots, warmongers, state doping, the so-called Olympic Truce, an athlete who wants to commemorate murdered comrades and is therefore denied Olympic participation; once again, the business practices of the IOC Group in Lausanne and certain ethical and moral principles become clear... let's leave it at this incomplete list.

At the very bottom, you, the paying subscribers, will be rewarded with previously unpublished documents on the sale of the rights to Leni Riefenstahl's Olympic films by the Federal Republic of Germany to the IOC.

Let's start in Milan, where IOC president Kirsty Coventry from Zimbabwe faced some questions on Friday, the day after her much-discussed crocodile tears. Christoph Becker from the FAZ newspaper, one of the few knowledgeable sports politics observers in the world, asked the IOC president a question:

"Do you acknowledge the IOC is giving dictators a propaganda machine that they use in the worst cases to wage war against neighboring states in the world?"

Becker had prepared this question with references to, among other things, Russia's war of annihilation in Ukraine, the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, and the 1936 Nazi Olympics in Berlin and Garmisch-Partenkirchen.

His question could also be translated as:

Ms. Coventry, do you acknowledge historical facts?

Listen to Kirsty Coventry's response.

And pay close attention to how she answers.

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In three and a half decades of intensive IOC reporting, I can't think of any other example of something so appallingly cold, stupid, wrong, and ignorant of history as Coventry's response.

Political failure. Post-factual. Trumpesque. Historical amnesia.

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Memory cannot be banned
vladyslav heraskevych

Memory cannot be banned

Let us forget the Olympic lie of neutrality! There can be no neutrality when a murderous Russian regime is about to destroy another country and threatens World War III. That is why the Ukrainian Vladyslav Heraskevych, like all other Ukrainian athletes and Olympians, deserves our full solidarity.

,   and  Jens Weinreich
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