Your RDA of Irony

On This Day in 1944…

A number of German officers presented Adolf Hitler with a retirement package…actually it was a briefcase. Of course, Prussian subtlety is an oxymoron, so it never occurred to those Junkers that Adolf might have preferred being coaxed rather than assassinated.

Let’s face it, tyrants are not that easy to fire. (Okay, Mussolini was. The Fascist Board of Directors could have ousted him by simply hiding his Gucci boots.) Hitler would have needed positive reenforcement, pro-active proactivities, and all the other HR gibberish. A Fuhrer wants his perks.

First, to cope with the shock of retirement, Adolf might need counseling. Carl Jung would have been available. (The rest of the psychiatric community seemed to be ethnically incompatible.)

Then, Hitler should have been enticed to take a vacation. Destroying civilization can be exhausting. He might have enjoyed a world cruise in a U-Boat. Charles Lindbergh could have flown him to Argentina, where Juan and Evita were awaiting with open and heiling arms. Joseph Kennedy had a guest cottage at Hyannisport (but he probably would have tried hitting on Eva Braun). Pius XII would have enjoyed the sound of yodeling in the Vatican. There were many places where Adolf could get away from it all.

Finally, a relatively young man like Adolf might want a second career. The man certainly was eminently qualified for any number of positions: celebrity spokesman for Mercedes-Benz, host of the Bayreuth Opera broadcasts, or Dean of Students at Dartmouth.

These offers should have been in Hitler’s retirement package rather than just an insufficient amount of explosives. No wonder he felt snubbed and refused to take a hint. If only the Wehrmacht had been run by MBAs, they would have known the German for “golden parachute.”

Of course, a MBA-run army would have avoided this entire situation by losing the war to Poland in 1939.

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