NFR – FIFA, the DFB (German Football Association) and the subject of corruption

[cebu]

The subject matter required delving into the murky past and was destined to be very long. I trimmed it down a lot, even if you find this hard to believe!
I'd been writing this for a bit and wasn't sure whether to hold it back because of an impending hospital visit, but then I thought it doesn't matter WHEN you become as popular as a f@rt in a space suit.

You learn lots of things when you move to a different country – people don't necessarily see things the way that you and your fellow countrymen do! As I found out in the 32+ years I lived in Germany.

For example, in Germany, England was perceived to have been too SNOOTY to join FIFA until 1946.
In reality England RE-JOINED FIFA in 1946. England and the other British teams withdrew from FIFA in 1920 when Germany joined – there was not much willingness to play sports against countries that had so recently been involved in WW1.  Of course there are other matters, where the British perception will be totally wrong!


So how did things pan out for Germany and FIFA? Initially quietly, but with Hitler gaining power in Germany in 1933, it didn't take long before political influence had got FIFA in line (supportive of fascist ideology) along  with the likes of the IOC which had already firmly written fascism on its flag by awarding the 1936 Olympics to Nazi Germany.

Time passed, WW2 came and went and now was THE time for "reinventing yourself", because fascism was now definitely no longer popular!
"I'm an anti-fascist and ALWAYS HAVE BEEN" was the mantra of FIFA functionaries and of course several hundred thousand former brown shirts and black shirts, which in case you don't get it includes the German Football Association, "DFB".

FIFA functionaries are a small group and the guilty among them didn't have to do too much in order to remain unobserved.  After all everybody was focusing on Germany.

Let's face it, the Allies did a pi$$ poor job at convicting war criminals in the 3 years before handing everything over to the new West German state – just a handful of the b@st@rds really.

The West Germans parked several hundred thousand Nazi files in an archive in Koblenz and proceeded over the next several decades to prosecute virtually nobody. I do believe that Simon Wiesenthal's organization achieved far more success in tracking down Nazi war criminals than anything achieved by the entire German state.

So what happened to all these Nazis?
They survived and flourished by reinventing themselves!
All they needed was a "Persilschein" – I'll explain what that was.

Persil – this is a German detergent product which allegedly WASHES WHITER
Schein – in this context it's a certificate
So "certificate of cleanliness" perhaps?
Once the Allies were out of the way the Persilschein industry (aka falsification of historical documents on a grand scale industry) really took off big time!

You have to understand that under fascism, every aspect of public life – even sport – is controlled by the state. So if you wanted ANY kind of career, you had to join. Well the "joiners" now have a Persilschein, so what do they do next? The answer is that they get most of the good management jobs in the country. The 35-55 year olds substantially controlled the Parliament, the civil service, industry, commerce and let's not forget sporting institutions like ... the DFB! On top of this there were the youngsters who had been, say, 18 to 25 in 1945 and were now being groomed to replace the first generation as they got older. That's somewhere between one and a half and two generations of brown/black shirts basically running the country.

I remember that ridiculous novel "The ODESSA File" by Frederick Forsyth being released in a German language translation. It caused a lot of amusement among older Germans. The idea that the former SS people had this clandestine operation, while in the real world they were out there completely in the open running everything, was very incongruous indeed.

Those two generations substantially set the tone for post WW2 Germany and all its corruption and sleaze. In the 1970s Germany's young film directors like Herzog, Wenders and Fassbinder were basically criticizing all the crass materialism and corruption in German society.

So how did the German free press handle Nazis in post WW2 Germany?
Like porcupines making love – VERY carefully!
Some Nazis were smart enough to keep an extremely low profile, like Speer, who basically avoided mention. Riefenstahl – the worst thing I saw about her was "controversial German film maker".
Wernher von Braun – during his lifetime, "superstar", after his death "SUPERSTAR".
He actually has his own song (in English), which you can listen to here:

Tom Lehrer - Wernher von Braun

What about famous anti-Nazis? My best example is Marlene Dietrich, the actress. She was already in Hollywood when the Nazis failed to persuade her to return to Germany to become a propaganda tool for the party. During WW2 she was extremely active on the anti-Nazism front (and was definitely on Nazi death lists!)

The post WW2 mainstream German press referred to her not once, but continuously as:
"Marlene Dietrich, diese Verräterin an Deutschland, ..."
which translates as:
,,Marlene Dietrich, that traitor to Germany ..."

So you see, being a former brown/black shirt didn't seem to be much of a disadvantage in post WW2 West German society. Did they "form a conspiracy", well clearly not, though I suppose they probably had some kind of informal "old boys network".


What about corruption?

I think Brits and possibly Americans/Canadians/ Australians/ New Zealanders have a similar traditional view of corruption, which is something like this:

Look! Corruption!!

Tut! Tut! Tut! Tut! Tut!

Make the MP resign, make the minister resign, arrest the miscreant and stick him in the pokey!
And traditionally something sort of tended to happen. (It may be different nowadays!)   



In the rest of the world – and Germany has always been part of the rest of the world – it's slightly different:

Look! Corruption!!

Tut! Tut! Tut! Tut! Tut!




Did you detect the subtle difference?


The reality is that Germany has a classic stuffed brown envelope culture both in politics and business and it's by no means a recent development).
But then so does the rest of the non-English speaking world!

The following is a link to the court case in America where German chemical giant BASF was caught price fixing in the USA and fined $225 million dollars

http://www.quackwatch.com/02ConsumerProtection/rochefine.html

The second link is a reference to a book highlighting the way German law condoned business bribes outside Germany as well as making them tax deductible. It was the above BASF court case that caused the USA to lean so heavily on Germany to change their tax code. Just don't think for one moment that it stopped the whole bribery culture though!

http://hbr.org/product/corruption-in-germany/an/709006-PDF-ENG

I bet your previous image of Germany didn't include the above! By the way, this aspect of German tax law was really well known inside Germany, but probably less so in the UK.



I got my first inkling that the DFB and FIFA were not totally honest during the draw for the 1974 World Cup. We listened up on the radio at work (naughty, I know) at the part-time job I had while at the university in Cologne. The co-workers weren't academics, they were regular human beings!

They were very confident that West Germany would get an easy group. I asked why and they informed me that it ALWAYS happens. I pointed out that it could be different this time! Everybody looked at me like I was a complete idiot (stop agreeing with them!) After W Germany got the easy draw, as expected (and the fancied Dutch got the group of death), what I got from my colleagues was a lot of cynical knowing smiles. They knew the fix was in and it didn't bother them even slightly.

After this experience, I started paying far more attention to W Germany's luck of the draw from there on in. I did get a bit of help from my German future father-in-law (an ex top flight referee btw), who was the one who pointed out that when W Germany inevitably win their soft group, they get to avoid their absolute bogey team, Brazil, until the final – every time. And he continues to be right about that, even though he's long since passed away. The "luck" has continued unabated to the present day and it's frequently been mentioned in the German media over the decades, sometimes at inconvenient moments, e.g.

During the World Cup 1990 on ARD (German national TV), the W German team manager is chatting away with a sports journalist, who unexpectedly throws in the question "What about Germany's excellent luck of the draw over the years"? The studio guest suddenly stops talking and just looks with a blank stare into the distance. Initially you think he's gathering his thoughts, but nothing happens, even after three prompts from the journalist. After quite a long silence, the journalist puts his hand to his ear piece (directions from the studio guys?) and stammers out a different question. The German team manager magically moves back into mouth mode.

During the World Cup 1994 on ZDF (Second German National TV Channel), the German team manager and his captain are chatting away with a sports journalist, who unexpectedly throws in the question "What about Germany's phenomenal luck of the draw over the years"?  The team manager breaks out in a broad grin, turns to face his team captain, who's also grinning and they start giggling at each other, then turn to face the journo/camera still giggling, turn to face each other giggling, then once more face the journo/camera still giggling. The journalist is looking on in obvious amazement but then puts his hand to his ear piece (directions from the studio guys?) and stammers out a different question. The German team manager and his captain magically move back into normal mouth mode.

Since WW2, Germany has been one of the most successful economies word wide and the only one to also be a traditional footballing nation. This has put the DFB in a unique position financially to exert massive influence over FIFA. It isn't a question of "is the tail wagging the dog?" The massive stuffed brown envelope culture ensures that the tail OWNS the dog! The DFB wanted to leap frog South Africa in hosting the 2006 world cup and despite the fact this looked impossible 24 hours before the final vote, the stuffed brown envelopes made the rounds and had the desired effect on the outcome of the vote. We should never forget the golden rule, which states:

The guys with all the gold make all the rules!


Why is fixing the draw so significant?

Major football tournaments are played at the end of what is usually a grueling football season. The host country may be quite hot (not in 1966?), which will add to the stress of playing competitive matches there.

If you get 3 first round opponents, who are fairly weak, you can play 3 matches at more or less practice match intensity and lead your group going into the knock-out stages with all your reserves of stamina intact. This is important because high intensity matches significantly damage the reserves of stamina the individual players have. Play a couple of these high intensity matches early on and your chances of success later on in the tournament are very poor indeed.

Add a little more "luck" in the next round and this will also be a match played at close to practice match intensity.

Now you're already in the quarter finals without having any kind of tough match. You could well be seeded for the next world cup too! Now all you need to do is produce one good high intensity match and you're a semi-finalist. Produce a second one and you're in the finals!  Fixing the draw certainly seems worthwhile, doesn't it?

Of course there are other benefits, such as your rivals having a much more difficult time progressing, having to face each other early on and being forced to play high intensity matches early in the tournament.

Clearly I oppose the activities of the DFB (just as I would oppose any other thoroughly corrupt organization), which distort the competition and steal from every other participating team and every one of their fans – and this on a multi-decade basis.

I'm wondering if anybody else does.