WWW,
2004 (Archived) - Bernhard's funeral will
surely be a get-together for his Bilderberg
friends. It is scheduled to be in Delft on
11th of December 2004. The usual stream of
other Euro royals should come but who knows
if his nature and hunting buddy Prince
Philip will attend??? [thanks to Caveat
Emptor for this] Characters from the shadows
and those we didn't know to be Bernhard's
friends may be there anonymously too.
Successful long lenses will find a publisher
here [Tony G].
Prince Bernhard (1911-2004) was
prince-consort of Queen Juliana of the
Netherlands, but in many ways he acted as
though he was the monarch. Cormac Mac Ruairi
looks at his legacy.
Prince Bernhard was not renowned for his
subtlety, yet he made up for this by
his unstoppable urge to enjoy life to the
full.
But that will to live finally succumbed
to years of mounting health problems on 1
December 2004. Cancerous tumours eventually
got him at the age of 93.
His death heralds the end of the old
royal regime which saw the Netherlands
through the turmoil of the German occupation
during World War II.
The war years and the post-war
reconstruction were in many ways Bernhard's
finest. But some of his many critics
continue to insist the prince wasn't even
sure which side he was on during the
Netherlands' darkest hours.
Others claimed Bernhard was at the
centre of a right-wing conspiracy
by industrialists and politicians to
dominate the world.
Such was his ability to win friends and
offend in equal measure; it will probably
take some time for history to give its final
judgement on Bernhard's legacy.
Upheaval
To begin with, he was German a twist
of fate that helped colour people's views of
him.
He was born in Jena, Germany, in 1911
with a very definite royal spoon in his
mouth. The eldest son of Prince Bernhard von
Lippe and Baroness Armgard von
Sierstorpff-Cramm, his full name was
Bernhard Leopold Friedrich Eberhard Julius
Kurt Karl Gottfried Peter zu
Lippe-Biesterfeld.
At an early age, he learned that few
might have been of blue blood, but the
ravages of war and revolution can take away
some of the privileges of being high-born.
His father lost his municipality and the
revenues it accorded the family after World
War I.
But times were nowhere as bad for his
family as they were for millions of other
Germans who lived through the hunger,
revolution and inflation caused by their
country's defeat in 1918.
The young Bernhard was raised on the
family's new estates in Eastern Prussia and
he was educated at home until the age of 12.
Later, he went to a gymnasium school in
Berlin before studying law in Switzerland
and Berlin.
Daredevil
Although the family had lost its
principality, Bernhard enjoyed the life of a
jet setting prince to the full. He loved
horseback riding, flying, big-game hunting
and fast cars. (On his 87th birthday,
Bernhard gave himself the latest model of
Ferrari.)
He nearly killed himself twice in his
youth once in a boating accident and
later in an airplane crash.
Despite his joie de vivre and constant
striving for new physical challenges, the
young Bernhard also saw himself as a real
entrepreneur and a member of the elite.
He was appointed secretary of the Board
of Directors of German chemical giant IG
Farben. It was a prestigious name at the
time, but given the company's association
with the Nazis and the Holocaust, his choice
of career continued to cloud Bernhard's
reputation for years to come.
Political antenna
Several obituary writers have noted that
Bernhard's political antenna was often his
undoing. As a student in the early days of
the Nazi regime, he and some of his fellow
students joined the SS.
Bernhard claimed years later that he was
totally opposed to the Nazi ideology, but
joining the SS enabled them to continue
their education. In the months before his
death, evidence that Bernhard had also been
a member of Hitler's National Socialist
NSDAP party hit the newspapers.
In the mid-1930s, fears were brewing of a
new war in Europe. The announcement of the
engagement between Bernhard and Crown
Princess Juliana of the Netherlands wasn't
greeted with overwhelming enthusiasm among
the Dutch public.
Bernhard didn't help when he visited
Adolf Hitler, who suggested the marriage was
a sign of an alliance between the two
countries.
Although he was bestowed with Dutch
citizenship for the wedding, the prince
insensitively briefed an SS officer about
the political situation in the Netherlands,
including the Dutch Nazi party, just days
before the nuptials.
But some of his critics insist to this
day that Bernhard knew exactly what he was
doing.
War years
Bernhard appears to have sorted out his
priorities by 10 May 1940 when the Germans
invaded. Armed with a machine gun, Bernhard
helped lead the royal family to safety in
England.
Once there, he asked to work for British
Intelligence, but lingering doubts about his
loyalties deprived the prince of the James
Bond role he would so dearly have loved.
Instead, he flew for the RAF and helped
his wife run the government-in-exile and was
allowed to work on war planning councils.
But when Operation Market Garden proved a
bridge too far at Arnhem, there were dark
mutterings that Bernhard now commander
of the Dutch forces had betrayed the
plans to the Germans.
Present at the German surrender at
Wageningen in the Netherlands on 5 May 1945,
Bernhard showed his sincere, but insensitive
side when he said he felt sorry for the
general who signed on behalf of the German
forces. The officer was charged with war
crimes.
Big business
If the war provided Bernhard with a
chance to escape the confines of being a
prince-consort, the early post-war years
were heaven for him.
Although the Dutch Constitution did not
provide him with any official role, he was
appointed Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
State and served on councils of all branches
of the military.
He renewed his jet setting lifestyle as
an unofficial ambassador and general Mr Fix
It for the Netherlands. He was never shy of
accepting 17-gun salutes to mark his arrival
in a foreign country and it is said he also
used the time abroad to indulge in
extramarital affairs.
He served on the boards of dozens of
companies, including Dutch plane maker
Fokker and Dutch carrier KLM.
He truly earned a place in the history
books and on the pages of numerous
websites that cater in conspiracy theories
when he helped organise an all-male
meeting of key business and intellectual
figures at a Bilderberg Hotel in the
Netherlands.
Officially, the annual meeting was a
forum to discuss economic issues in Western
Europe and the threat of communism.
Unofficially, the Bilderberg Group, say some
amateur theorists, is a right-wing
conspiracy to dominate the world.
Ironically, Bernhard, the big-game
hunter, also found time to set up the
conservation organisation World Wildlife
Fund.
Plane crash
His high-flying career came crashing down
in 1976, when it emerged that Bernhard
in typical cavalier style seemed to
think it was okay to accept
"commissions" from US plane
manufacturer Lockheed for his help to
influence the purchase of a new fighter jet
for the Netherlands.
It was hardly Bernhard's finest hour. The
scandal allowed the media to take another
look at his SS links as well as his
extramarital affairs and his links to
several dodgy business personalities.
The government was forced to tone down
the final report of the inquiry into the
Lockheed scandal as the then Queen Juliana
threatened to abdicate if Bernhard was
carpeted.
The final report could not find evidence
he accepted a USD 1.5 million bribe from
Lockheed, but it did say he had acted in
such a way as to create the impression he
was open to "doing favours".
The findings were damning enough to
strip Bernhard of his business positions. He
also lost his military titles and was
prevented from wearing a Dutch military
uniform ever again.
This punishment though mild compared
to a lengthy jail sentence hurt Bernhard
deeply.
He constantly harked back to the
camaraderie he experienced during the war
years and made a point of attending
Liberation Day ceremonies and other events
for veterans. He seemed happiest when taking
a salute from old soldiers at the annual 5
May Wageningen Liberation Day celebrations.
Latter years
When his daughter Beatrix became Queen in
1980, Bernhard was firmly relegated to the
sidelines. This didn't stop him writing
letters to the media or even ringing up
editors to outline his view on the big story
of the day.
In the last few years, Bernhard fought a
constant battle against ill health. Though
slowed, he still managed to make headlines
and find himself on the right side of
public opinion when he offered to pay
any fine imposed on two have-a-go
supermarket workers charged with roughing up
a knife-wielding robber.
Some critics in the gossip press
suggested he had less time for his wife,
Juliana, who had Alzheimer's in the last few
years before her death in March 2004.
Yet her death seemed to mark a serious
decline in Bernhard's health. There were
concerns he was too ill to attend the
funeral, but true to form, he was there
looking frail and ill but he was there.
In mid-October, the Government
Information Service RVD announced Bernhard
had an inoperable tumour. For once, Bernhard
seemed to accept that this was one battle he
wasn't going to win. His declared wish was
to die in Soestdijk Palace, the home he had
shared with his late wife of 67 years.
But life doesn't always have a fairy-tale
ending.
In a no doubt well-meaning act, the
prince was rushed to hospital when his
doctors decided he could no longer be
treated at home. When he got there, the
prince took control of his life for one last
time.
He told his doctors not to treat him any
further. Prince Bernhard an important
part of Dutch history passed away at
6.50pm on 1 December 2004.
His body was brought back to Soestdijk at
10pm.
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