Author Description

The Resistance in Austria, 1938-1945 was first published in 1984.The Austrians were the first people outside the German Reich to fall under Hitler's rule, and they remained under the Nazi regime longer than any others. For modern Austria -- one of several states created with the collapse of the Habsburg Empire in 1918 -- the interwar years were marked by economic instability and political polarization; the idea of Anschluss -- unification with Germany -- appealed to many Austrians, even though it was expressly forbidden by the 1919 peace treaty. When Anschluss finally happened, in March 1938, it was imposed on Austria by Germany. The change of power went smoothly, and German troops were greeted by cheering crowds. Nazi rule was accepted by those who felt that Austrians were part of the German nation, or that the country's serious economic and social problems could best be solved within a dynamic and prosperous Greater Germany. Only a minority of Austrians clung to pre-Anschluss concepts of national identity, and from their ranks came the even tinier minority that formed the Austrian Resistance.Radomir Luza's Resistance in Austria is the first scholarly treatment of the subject to appear in English. Based largely on primary sources, including interviews with surviving resisters, Luza's book is an objective yet compelling account of the movement's origins and development. The Austrian Resistance was made up of people of conscience who spanned the political spectrum. Luza describes the early Resistance as an array of clandestine movements with a constantly changing cast, as Gestapo arrests eroded the front ranks of activists. In the years between Anschluss and the war's end, nine fairly distinct groups participated in the Resistance, sometimes in concert, sometimes alone, but always with a remarkable sense of solidarity, and at least one motivating factor -- Austrian patriotism -- that overrode ideological differences. These groups ranged from Legitimists, who supporte