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Beefsteak Nazi[1][2] (Rindersteak-Nazi) or "Roast-beef Nazi" was a term used in Nazi Germany to describe communists and socialists who joined the Nazi Party. Munich-born American historian Konrad Heiden was one of the first to document this phenomenon in his 1936 book Hitler: A Biography, remarking that in the Sturmabteilung (Brownshirts, SA) ranks there were "large numbers of Communists and Social Democrats" and that "many of the storm troops were called 'beefsteaks' – brown outside and red within".[3] The switching of political parties was at times so common that SA men would jest that "[i]n our storm troop there are three Nazis, but we shall soon have spewed them out".[3]
The term was particularly used to designate working class members of the SA who were aligned with Strasserism.[4] The image of these "beefsteak" individuals wearing a brown uniform but having underlying "red" communist and socialist sympathies[5] implied that their allegiance to Nazism was superficial and opportunistic.[6]
After Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany, beefsteak Nazis continued during the suppression of communists and socialists (represented by the Communist Party of Germany and the Social Democratic Party of Germany, respectively) in the 1930s and the term was popular as early as 1933.[6]
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
Küpper_1966was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Cite error: The named reference
Steinberg_1966was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ a b Heiden 1938, p. 390.
- ^ Mitcham 1996, p. 120.
- ^ Green 1996, p. 342.
- ^ a b Goodfellow 1992, pp. 231–258.