Hans SCHAFRANEK: Sommerfest mit Preisschießen. Die unbekannte Geschichte des NS-Putsches im Juli 1934. Czernin Verlag, Wien 2006, 356 Seiten (Hardcover). ISBN: 978-3-7076-0081-0. € 24,90
Welche NS-internen Strukturen lagen dem Juliputsch zugrunde? Wer organisierte und initiierte die Aufstandsbewegungen in den Bundesländern? Worauf ist die regionale Ungleichzeitigkeit der einzelnen Erhebungen zurückzuführen? Welche Verbindungen existierten zwischen den Aufständischen und den Exilführungen der österreichischen NSDAP, SA und SS in München? Das vorliegende Buch schließt nicht nur eine zeitgeschichtliche Forschungslücke, es wirft mit bisher unveröffentlichten Dokumenten ein gänzlich neues Licht auf die blutigen Ereignisse um den 25. Juli 1934.
MEDIENECHO
„It took the patient and painstaking research of the Viennese historian Schafranek to shed light on the internecine struggles of a politically still chaotic movement in Austria which less than four years later still needed force and coercion from the outside to accomplish what it so dismally failed to achieve in mid-1934: the violent wrestling of power from a weak and ideologically confused Austrian government, never itself elected by the people. (…) Most of the theses Schafranek puts forth are substantiated and appear to be convincing: the close cooperation of the Styrians with the Viennese insurgents; Reschny’s more or less spontaneous decision to start an insurrection of his own, even though the SA Obergruppe XI, under his leadership, had planned this only for the fall of 1934; and communications difficulties between various SA-units leading to a regional lack of coordination which, in turn, enabled government security forces to deal quickly and effectively with the insurrection. Even Schafranek’s most daring and documentarily more or less unsubstantiated claim has substantial appeal: that by his call to revolutionary action by the Austrian SA under his command, Reschny may ultimately have had in mind to retrench SA influence not only in Austria, but also in the Reich and thereby to nullify the conspiratorial and violent attack on the SA leadership initiated on 30 june 1934 by Hitler himself. This was not to be, but Reschny gave it a serious shot. (…) Schafranek’s book might even merit an English translation.“
Siegfried Beer, „Elementary Event“ as „Summer Festival with Prize-Shooting“: How and Why the Austrian Nazis Blew Their First Take-Over Attempt in Juli 1934. In: Contemporary Austrian Studies, Volume 17, New Perspectives on Austrians and World War II, p. 325-330.
„Mehr kann investigative Geschichtsforschung eigentlich nicht leisten. Eine wichtige Forschungslücke ist geschlossen“.
Kurt Bauer, Falter, Nr. 36/2006, 8.9.2006