Austria's confrontation with its past

Austria is more mature today than it was before the Waldheim era", Michael Prueller concludes. "But what happened in 1986 can only partially be put down to a conflict between a politician and his opponents, some of whom spread worse lies about Waldheim than he did himself. It was the great hour of the 'terribles simplificateurs', of the terrible oversimplifiers. We can observe this again today, when Waldheim is cast in the role of the 'unwilling examiner' whose 'affair' helped destroy Austria's 'victim myth'. The truth is that back then it wasn't about achieving a more discerning perspective as opposed to the official line of 'invaded Austria', but about the ... attempt to replace the victim myth with a 'perpetrator myth'. This is just as much a distortion of the past."

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