Writing of Klaus Hildebrand's attack on Habermas, Mommsen declared :“ Hildebrand ’ s partisan shots can be easily deflected ; that Habermas is accused of a “ loss of reality and Manichaeanism ”, and that his honesty is denied is witness to the self-consciousness of a self-nominated historian elite, which has set itself the task of tracing the outlines of the seeming badly needed image of history ”.

Writing of Hildebrand's support for Nolte, Mommsen declared that: “ Hildebrand ’ s polemic clearly suggests that he barely considered the consequences of making Nolte ’ s constructs the centrepiece of a modern German conservatism that is very anxious to relativize the National Socialist experience and to find the way back to a putative historically “ normal situation ”.

Mommsen declared that because Germany was an advanced nation, the Holocaust was “ singular ”, and that :" To accept with resignation the acts of screaming injustice and to psychologically repress their social prerequisites by calling attention to similar events elsewhere and putting the blame on the Bolshevist world threat recalls the thought patterns that made it possible to implement genocide ”.

Hildebrand is pleased that Nolte denies the singularity of the Nazi atrocities ” Hans Mommsen defended Habermas against Hildebrand by writing :“ Hildebrand ’ s partisan shots can be easily deflected ; that Habermas is accused of a “ loss of reality and Manichaeanism ”, and that his honesty is denied is witness to the self-consciousness of a self-nominated historian elite, which has set itself the task of tracing the outlines of the seeming badly needed image of history ” Writing of Hildebrand's support for Nolte, Mommsen declared that: “ Hildebrand ’ s polemic clearly suggests that he barely considered the consequences of making Nolte ’ s constructs the centrepiece of a modern German conservatism that is very anxious to relativize the National Socialist experience and to find the way back to a putative historically “ normal situation ” In another essay, Mommsen wrote that Hildebrand was gulity of hypocrisy because Hildebrand had until 1986 always claimed that generic fascism was invalid concept because of the " singularity " of the Holocaust Mommsen wrote that " Klaus Hildebrand explicitly took sides with Nolte's view when he gave his previously stubbornly claimed singularity of National Socialism ( failing to appreciate that was, as is well known, the standard criticism of the comparative fascism theory )" Martin Broszat observed that when Hildebrand organized a conference of right-wing German historians under the auspices of the Schleyer Foundation in West Berlin in September 1986, he did not invite Nolte, whom Broszat observed lived in Berlin.

Jäckel charged that Fest was guilty of diverting attention away from the issues by attacking Habermas's motives in criticizing Nolte, and not with concerning himself with what Habermas had to say Jäckel maintained that the Holocaust was indeed a " singular " historical event and criticized Fest for claiming otherwise Mommsen accused Fest of subordinating history to his right-wing politics in his defence of Nolte Mommsen went on to accuse Fest of simply ignoring the real issues such as the " psychological and institutional mechanisms " that explain why the German people accepted the Holocaust by accepting Nolte's claim of a " causal nexus " between Communism and fascism.

Though Kershaw does not deny the radical anti-Semitism of the Nazis, he favors Mommsen ’ s view of the Holocaust being caused by the “ culminative radicalization ” of the Third Reich caused by the endless bureaucratic power struggles and a turn towards increasingly radical anti-Semitism within the Nazi elite.

In October 1986, Hans Mommsen wrote that Stürmer's assertion that he who controls the past also controls the future, his work as a co-editor with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper which had been publishing articles by Ernst Nolte and Joachim Fest denying the “ singularity ” of the Holocaust, and his work as an advisor to Chancellor Kohl should cause " concern " among historians.

However, Bauer takes issue with Functionalist historians, such as Hans Mommsen, who argue that the lead in the Holocaust was taken entirely by lower level officials with little involvement by the leadership in Berlin.

In the Historikerstreit ( historians ' dispute ), Mommsen took the position that the Holocaust was a uniquely evil event that should not be compared to Stalinist terror in the Soviet Union.

Mommsen argued that Nolte was attempting a " justification " of Nazi crimes and making " inappropriate " comparisons of the Holocaust with other genocides.

Mommsen is a leading expert on Nazi Germany and the Holocaust.

Mommsen has forcefully contended that the Holocaust cannot be explained as result of Hitler alone, but was instead a product of the fractured decision making process in Nazi Germany which caused the " cumulative radicalization " which led to the Holocaust.

Furthermore, for Mommsen, Hitler played little or no real role in the development of the Holocaust, instead preferring to let his subordinates take the initiative.

As such, Mommsen has denied that Hitler ever gave any sort of order for the Holocaust, written or unwritten.

Mommsen has argued that Hitler did give the order for the Kommissarbefehl ( Commissar Order ) of 1941, that helped lead to the Holocaust, but was not part of the Holocaust proper.

Mommsen wrote that Hitler was the " ideological and political originator " of the Holocaust, a " utopian objective " that came to life " only in the uncertain light of the Dictator's fanatical propaganda utterances, eagerly seized upon as orders for action by men wishing to prove their diligence, the efficiency of their machinery and their political indispensability ".

Mommsen has argued against the " Master of the Third Reich "/ intentionalist thesis by arguing that the Holocaust can not be explained as the result of Hitler's will and intentions.

Mommsen has argued that historians should not reduce the study of the Nazi period to " the Hitler phenomenon ", but must take a broader look at the factors in German society which allow the Holocaust to occur.

In the Historikerstreit debate, Mommsen argued that the Holocaust was a uniquely evil event which should not be compared with the other horrors of the 20th century.

Mommsen argued that the Historikerstreit was caused because German rightists could no longer “ bracket out ” National Socialism and the Holocaust from German history, thus leading to attempts by Ernst Nolte to “ relativize ” Nazi crimes.

In another essay entitled “ The New Historical Consciousness and the Relativizing of National Socialism ” first published in the October 1986 edition of the Blätter für deutsche und internationale Politik magazine, Mommsen attacked conservative historians such as Klaus Hildebrand who argued that the “ singularity ” of the Holocaust disproved any theory of generic fascism, while at the same time comparing National Socialism to Communism.

Mommsen attacked Fest for in his view subordinating history to his right-wing politics in his defence of Nolte Mommsen accused Fest of simply ignoring the real issues about the Holocaust such as the " psychological and institutional mechanisms " that explain why the German people accepted the Shoah by accepting Nolte's claim of a " casual nexus " between Communism and fascism.

According to Mommsen, the story of his death, ( for which see Plutarch ) looks like an historical version of the abolition of blood-revenge.

Even friends of the Jews, like Mommsen, and advocates of Judaism within the Jewish fold expressed their condemnation of Graetz's passionate language.

In an article entitled " Neither Denial nor Forgetfulness Will Free Us " first published in the Frankfurter Rundschau on December 1, 1986, Mommsen argued that Historikerstreit was a result of the failures of modern society Mommsen argued that in the prosperous 1950s-60s, most Germans were happy to forget about their recent past, and looked forward to a brighter future Starting with the oil shock of the early 1970s and the rise of fundamentalist Islam in the late 1970s, Mommsen argued that the idea of a progressively better future was discredited, leading to a pessimistic public mood, and the a renewed interest in history This had occurred in tandem in a period when German historians had started to make a more critical examination of their recent past As a result at the precise mood when public demanded a past that could make them feel good about being Germans, German historians came under attack for not writing the sort of history the public wanted Mommsen argued that the work of those like Ernst Nolte was intended to provide the sort of history that would allow Germans feel good about being Germans by engaging in “… an explanatory strategy that … will be seen as a justification of National Socialist crimes by all those who are still under the influence of the extreme anti-Soviet propaganda of National Socialism " Mommsen charged that Ernst Nolte was attempting to egregiously whitewash the German past.

Mommsen described the Historikerstreit as :“ What is happening now is much like freeing lines of thought that until then had been repressed because they seemed politically questionable.

Mommsen ended his essay that the historians like Nolte, Fest, Hildebrand, and Stürmer were tying to “ repress ” the memory of Nazi crimes.

Historians such as Theodore Mommsen and Bernard Bavant aruge that all Dalmatia was fully romanized and Latin speaking by the 4th century.

By the end of the Western Roman Empire nearly all of the Maghreb was fully romanized, according to Mommsen in his The Provinces of the Roman Empire and the Roman Africans enjoyed a high level of prosperity.

" The rapidity and self-precision with which the plan was executed prove that it had been long meditated thoroughly and all its parts settled in detail ", Mommsen comments.

According to Mommsen, Caepio was presumably motivated into action by the thought that Maximus might be successful in negotiations and claim all the credit for a successful outcome ; he launched a unilateral attack on the Cimbri camp on October 6.

9, 4 ), since at all periods in the Roman chariot-race only as many chariots competed as there were so-called factions, which were originally only two, the white and the red ( Mommsen, R. H. i. 236, note ).

Mommsen was the first to call Hitler a " weak dictator " when he wrote in a 1966 essay that Hitler was " in all questions which needed the adoption of a fundamental and definitive position, a weak dictator ".

In regards to the debate about foreign policy, Mommsen has argued that German foreign policy did not follow a " programme " during the Nazi era, but was instead " expansion without object " as the foreign policy of the Reich driven by powerful internal forces sought expansion in all directions.

Mommsen argued that by describing Lenin's Red Terror in Russia as an " Asiatic deed " threatening Germany that Nolte was claiming that all actions directed against Communism, no matter how morally repugnant were justified by necessity.

Mommsen argued that all theories of totalitarianism were meant by the right for the “ bracketing out ” of Nazi Germany from German history, and to put down the left.

Mommsen wrote that Michael Stürmer's attempts to create a national consensus on a version of German history that all Germans could take pride in was a reflection that the German rightists could not stomach modern German history, and was now looking to create a version of the German past that German rightists could enjoy.

Mommsen wrote in his opinion that Nolte's use of the Nazi era phrase " Asiatic hordes " to describe Red Army soldiers, and his use of the word " Asia " as a byword for all that is horrible and cruel in the world reflected anti-Asian racism.

In addition to the works cited below, see Mommsen, De Collegiis et Sodaliciis ( 1843 ), which laid the foundation for all subsequent study of the subject ; Marquardt, Staatsverwaltung, iii.

But the great impulse to provincial Roman archaeology in Germany came in 1892, when the Reichs-Limes-Kommission ( the Imperial Commission for the Roman borders ), then chaired by Theodor Mommsen began to research the course of the Limes Germanicus in its entirety, as well as the location of all its forts.

Starting with Fustel de Coullanges and Theodor Mommsen, historical studies began to progress towards a more modern scientific form.

His cheek cupped in his hand, he reread the works he admired out of duty .” Hans Delbrück appears in the professor ’ s thoughts again while contemplating the meaning of the war as American soldiers overtake Berlin: “ The Second World War was already down as a great historical tragedy – a quasi-mythological one – which nether Mommsen, Hans Delbrück, Gobineau, Houston Stewart Chamberlin, Oswald Spengler, or Mein Kampf could elucidate entirely …”

Such misuse of foreign policy, Ferguson notes, " was hardly the invention of the German Right ," in effect repeating the charge made by Mommsen ( see above ) that Fischer neglected the historical context.

Mommsen wrote about Andreas Hillgruber's demands that historians identified with the “ justified ” German defence of the Eastern Front that :“ Andreas Hillgruber recently attempted to accord a relative historical justification to the Wehrmacht campaign in the East and the desperate resistance of the army in the East after the summer of 1944.

The Israeli historian Omer Bartov wrote in 2003 about Mommsen ’ s functionalist understanding of the Third Reich that :" In this reading, ideology is recognized and then dismissed as irrelevant ; the suffering of the victims is readily acknowledged and then omitted as having nothing to tell us about the mechanics of genocide ; and individual perpetrators from Adolf Hitler, Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heyrdrich to the lowliest SS man are shoved out of the historical picture as contemptible, but ultimately unimportant pawns in the larger scheme of a “ polycratic state ” whose predilection for “ cumulative radicalization ” was a function of its structure rather the product of intentional planning or self-proclaimed will ”

Starting in the 1960s, Mommsen was one of a younger generation of West German historians who provide a more critical assessment of Widerstand within German elites, and came to decry the " monumentalization " typical of German historical writing about Widerstand in the 1950s.