Gerhard Lauck is a tall, flabby man who affects a Hitlerstyle mustache and a fakesounding German accent and changed his first name, which was Gary. Operating from a post-office box in Lincoln, Neb., he sends a steady stream of books, pamphlets and stickers to customers in the United States and abroad (FIGHT CRIME … DEPORT NIGGERS, says one sticker, priced at $3 for 100). It’s illegal to print or distribute such material in Germany. Officials there say Lauck is a leading source of German language Nazi propaganda, smuggled into the country by mail. His wares include tapes of Hitler’s speeches and swastika-adorned stickers that proclaim: DON’T BUY JEWISH! or WE’RE BACK!
The market for such brutish goods seems to be growing, along with right-wing violence in Germany. The American victim was Duncan Kennedy, 25, a member of the U.S. luge team, sledders practicing their sport in Oberhof, a mountain village in eastern Germany. Visiting a bar there on Oct. 29, a black sledder, Robert Pipkins, 20, was beset by a group of skinheads who made monkey noises and shouted “Nigger, out!” When Kennedy stood up for his teammate, he was kicked and punched, suffering cuts and bruises. Three skinheads have been arrested, and prosecutors are seeking the arrest of two others.
Lauck accepts no blame for inciting the attack. “We’re trying to convince people, not trying to kill people,” he says. But he adds: “I’m not putting down the [skinheads] who got in the fight.” Lauck spent four and a half months in a German jail in 1976 after he was caught in possession of 20,000 Nazi stickers. He has never been arrested for Nazi activities in the, United States, where his publications, though repellent, appear to be legal. His plans for the future include a book of supposedly amusing Nazi anecdotes, a sort of “Springtime for Hitler.” It will be called “Fun Under the Swastika.”
