It’s fascinating to read how everyone always knew the Dutch prince was a Nazi, yet he kept lying about it anyway as if harmful failures were his carefree badge of honor (a common Nazi trait).

Bernhard went to his grave swearing he had never been a paid-up member of Hitler’s party. “I can declare with my hand on the bible: I was never a Nazi,” he said in an interview published (in Dutch) after his death in 2004.

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Flip Maarschalkerweerd says he stumbled on the prince’s NSDAP membership card while carrying out an inventory of the prince’s archives when he died.

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Journalist Jan Tromp, who interviewed the prince in depth over several years, said that the revelation was not a surprise, but it would come as a shock and a betrayal to those who had taken part in the Dutch resistance and had commemorated the liberation with the prince for years afterwards.

It kind of begs the question why he was never held accountable for such obvious lies, let alone lies involving murderous treason.

In the fall of 1944, the immediate future of many people in The Netherlands looked distinctly grim [especially given Prince Barnhard’s efforts to prevent liberation].

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In early September 1944, Queen Wilhelmina had ensured his appointment as commander of the Binnenlandse Strijdkrachten (Domestic Armed Forces), a recent union of several previously separate Dutch resistance groups. Bernhard’s leadership was stained by controversy, as he proved unable to fully control the forces under his command. The Domestic Armed Foreces quickly acquired a bad reputation for unruly behavior and occasionally resorted to pillage and plundering. As Bernhard did not publicly distance himself from unsavory incidents, he suffered some reputational damage as a result.

…rumors about his licentious lifestyle circulated in London. His decision to remain in the British capital in late Spring 1940, when his wife and their baby daughters moved to safety in Canada, had raised a few eyebrows. But then, Queen Wilhelmina had also decided to stay in London and she could use his support. However, it was publicly known in the Dutch community in London that other matters also took up some of the Prince’s time. “Of all the people I know, Prince Bernhard was the only one who enjoyed the war,” King George VI reputedly said.

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On September 6th, when most of France and Belgium had been liberated, the Prince and his staff crossed the English Channel by plane to set up his headquarters in Château Wittouck, a stately home south of Brussels. Formerly the house of the Belgian fascist politician Léon Degrelle, it provided the luxury surroundings that Bernhard had a penchant for, including a well-furnished wine cellar.

One of the regular visitors to Wittouck was Christiaan Lindemans, a member of the Dutch resistance, known for his reckless actions. His heavy built and waddling gait gained him the nickname King Kong, after the giant gorilla of the 1933 American movie. Lindemans managed to gain the trust of the Allies, including Prince Bernhard who offered him a position on his staff. Suddenly, in October 1944, Lindemans was arrested at Wittouck on suspicion of spying for the Nazis. Subsequent investigations proved that King Kong was in fact a double agent, crossing the frontline under cover to convey information to his German handlers.

So the lying, philandering, plundering prince treated the Nazi Holocaust as his joyous playtime. He drank and danced, working for Hitler.

Perhaps Dutch “resistance” was more of a myth than reality, a ruse and cover for collaborators?

How many of the more than 300,000 Dutch killed were victims of the Nazi Prince?

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte [in 2020, twelve years after Bernhard’s death] apologized for the first time on behalf of the government for the war-time persecution of Jews, saying little was done to protect them from the atrocities committed by Nazi Germany. … “Too many civil servants carried out the orders of the occupiers,” said Rutte [without specifying the Prince’s role].

It’s a good reminder that the story of Anne Frank is really about her murderous selfish neighbors, the many Nazi-loving Dutch who thrived from occupation like their always lying, cheating, scoundrel Nazi Prince.

Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands acknowledged a second illegitimate child before his death… Prince Bernhard and the former queen had four daughters including Queen Beatrix, Holland’s reigning monarch. […] He told De Volkskrant: “It doesn’t matter if people think back on me as a nice guy or a philanderer. If the image is that I was a scoundrel now and again, I’ll give people that…”

The image? When Anne Frank was arrested, two Dutch police (Gezinus Gringhuis and Willem Grootendorst) accompanied the Austrian Nazi officer. Here’s the image:

The article that captures the Prince’s hope it “doesn’t matter if people think back” is old, yet still very relevant today. It does matter if we think back. It’s accountability. Some now call it “woke”. Either way it means respect for law and order, the opposite of Nazism.

Bernhard’s daughter Beatrix has long since abdicated the throne to her son, a man widely mocked by Germans as Prinz Pils (Prince of Beer). The carefree Dutch monarch’s lifestyle seems to resemble his grandfather, the infamous and “unusually popular” Nazi card-carrying bible-swearing liar Prince Bernhard.