and his complicity in the Holocaust? This really (from what I know) became an issue once he became or stood to become the President of Austria in 1986. Before that he had been the Sec Gen of the United Nations, a much more high profile post than the essentially ceremonial position. I find it hard to believe that his past was not known, and if he had really any real issues hanging over his head he would not have been elected; twice
From what I can gather, he was an officer on the staff of an Army Group and he never had anything resembling authority on the “Jewish question” in his sector and his duties were of an entirely different area anyway.
That still begs the question; since he was Secretary General of the UNO, he would have been probed by the intel agencies of most of the major powers. It should not have been a secert. Why did it come out so late?
And from what I can read about it including in the link provided above, even in a worst case senario, all he did was know that the Jews of his area were being rounded up and later did not mention it. While not exactly forthcoming, his actions don’t seem to merit him being shunned diplomaticall while serving as President of Austria
Forget all of that junk. I heard a pretty funny joke after the Berlin Wall came down. “What scares me is that since the reunification of Germany, all of a sudden Kurt Waldheim remembers where he was in 1944!”
I liked it.