LINGENS v. AUSTRIA JUGDMENT 5 With regard to the then Chancellor, he added: "In truth Mr. Kreisky’s behaviour cannot be criticised on rational grounds but only on irrational grounds: it is immoral, undignified" ("In Wahrheit kann man das, was Kreisky tut, auf rationale Weise nicht widerlegen. Nur irrational: es ist unmoralisch. Würdelos"). It was, moreover, unnecessary because Austrians could reconcile themselves with the past without seeking the favours of the former Nazis, minimising the problem of concentration camps or maligning Mr. Wiesenthal by exploiting anti-Semitism. What was surprising was not that one "still" spoke about these things thirty years later but, on the contrary, that so many people were "already" able to close their eyes to the existence of this mountain of corpses. Finally, Mr. Lingens criticised the lack of tact with which Mr. Kreisky treated the victims of the Nazis. 16. The second section commented on the attitude of Austrian society in general with regard to Nazi crimes and former Nazis. In the author’s opinion, by sheltering behind the philosophic alternative between collective guilt and collective innocence the Austrians had avoided facing up to a real, discernible and assessable guilt. After a long disquisition on various types of responsibility, he stressed that at the time it had in fact been possible to choose between good and evil and gave examples of persons who had refused to collaborate. He concluded that "if Bruno Kreisky had used his personal reputation, in the way he used it to protect Mr. Peter, to reveal this other and better Austria, he would have given this country - thirty years afterwards - what it most needed to come to terms with its past: a greater confidence in itself". 17. The third and fourth sections (which together amounted to a third of the article) also dealt with the need to overcome the consciousness of collective guilt and envisage the determination of real guilt. Under the title "Was it necessary to shoot defenceless people?", Mr. Lingens drew a distinction between the special units and the regular forces in the armies of the Third Reich; he pointed out that no one was forcibly enlisted in the former: one had to volunteer. In the following section he stressed the difference between individuals guilty of criminal offences and persons who, morally speaking, had to be regarded as accomplices; he maintained that if Austria had tried its Nazis earlier, more quickly and more thoroughly, it would have been able to view its past more calmly without complexes and with more confidence. He then set out the reasons why that had not been possible and defended Mr. Wiesenthal from the charge of belonging to a "mafia". Finally, he considered the possibility of showing clemency after so many years and concluded: "It belongs to every society to show mercy but not to maintain an unhealthy relationship with the law by acquitting obvious murderers and concealing, dissembling or denying manifest guilt."