The Kindly Ones is simply “Houellebecq does Nazism.”

Well-intentioned friends send me everything they can find about Jonathan Littell, and I am yet again forced to return to the subject. Things are not going well at all. I have just read the account of a speech he gave at a Normale Supérieure school, where he said: “Evil is committed by people like us, people who sleep, who shit, who fuck, and who have the same relationship as we do to the body and to the fear of death, with thought coming afterwards. All killers are like us.”

Fair enough. In fact, I agree completely. Here again is Hannah Arendt’s thesis, and here, again, I cannot deny its truth. But it is a very strange speech to justify his book, precisely because Littell seems to have done his utmost to invent the most singular character possible. Let us recall, for those few unfortunates who have not been able to read The Kindly Ones, that the SS veteran Aue is an intellectual who sleeps with his sister, kills his parents, actively participates in genocide, sucks off Robert Brasillach, survives a bullet in the head, is never separated from his Flaubert, and enjoys rolling in his shit from time to time. For a guy who is just like you and me, that is quite a list!

...

A poster on an Internet forum expresses the opinion that Max Aue [the protagonist in Jonathan Littel's The Kindly ones] “rings true because he is the mirror of his age.” What? No! He rings true (for certain, easily duped readers) because he is the mirror of our age: a postmodern nihilist, essentially. At no moment in the novel is it suggested that this character believes in Nazism. On the contrary, he is often critically detached from National Socialist doctrine — and in that sense, he can hardly be said to reflect the delirious fanaticism prevalent in his time. On the other hand, this detachment, this blasé attitude toward everything, this permanent malaise, this taste for philosophizing, this unspoken amorality, this morose sadism, and this terrible sexual frustration that constantly twists his guts… but of course! How did I not see it before? Suddenly, everything is clear. The Kindly Ones is simply “Houellebecq does Nazism.”

L. Binet, HhhH (2009), tr. S. Taylor (2012), unknown & 204

These both from the pages originally missing from Binet's text - and then put back in. They're here. I couldn't be bothered to re-find the first one, but it accurately reflects my view at the time of Littell's novel - i.e., it completely fails in it's stated purpose by making the protagonist so weird. 

No ball bearings, no war

It's terrible to say," Speer said pensively, "but it's better that they're concentrating on the cities." - "What do you mean, Herr Reichsminister?" - "During the summer, when they attacked the Ruhr, I was terrified. In August, they attacked Schweinfurt, where our entire production of ball bearings is concentrated. Then again in October. Our production fell by sixty-seven percent. You may not realise it, Sturmbannfurher, but no ball bearings, no war. If they concentrate on Schweinfurt, we capitulate in two months, three at the most. Here" - he waved his hand at the fires - "they're killing people, wasting all their resources on our cultural monuments." He gave a dry, harsh laugh: "We were going to rebuild everything anyway. Ha!"

J. Littell, The Kindly Ones (2006) tr. C. Mundell, 714

Necessity, as the Greeks knew already, is not only a blind goddess, but a cruel one too.

There was a lot of talk,after the war, in trying to explain what had happened, about inhumanity. But I am sorry, there is no such thing as inhumanity. There is only humanity and more humanity: and that Doll is a good example [a character who was instructed to shoot German wounded because it was too much effort to bring them home] What else was he, Doll, but a good family man who wanted to feed his children, and who obeyed his government, even though in his innermost being he didn't agree? If he has been born in France or America, he'd have been called a pillar of society and a patriot; but he was born in Germany and so he is a criminal. Necessity, as the Greeks knew already, is not only a blind goddess, but a cruel one too.

J. Littell, The Kindly Ones (2006) tr. C. Mundell, 589

We lost land, cities, men; all that can be replaced. But the Party didn't collapse

"We'll fight  to the last man." - "No doubt, but you'll perish all the same. And Stalingrad will remain as the symbol of your defeat. Wrongly, too. In my opinion, you already lost the war last year, when we stopped you in front of Moscow. We lost land, cities, men; all that can be replaced. But the Party didn't collapse, and that was your only hope,

J. Littell, The Kindly Ones (2006) tr. C. Mundell, 396