Paul van Tienen

Paul van Tienen (10 January 1921 – 1995^{[citation needed]} probably in La Manga del Mar Menor, Murcia, Spain) was a Dutch Nazi during World War II and a far-right politician after the war, convicted at least twice for his political activities.

Van Tienen (left) in 1964

Biography

Until 1945

Born in Yogyakarta, Van Tienen joined the Waffen-SS during World War II and became an Untersturmführer.^[1] He was active on the Eastern Front^[2] in a propaganda detachment.^[3]

After the war

After the war, Van Tienen continued his political activism and became involved with the European Social Movement of Per Engdahl, whom he cited as a political ally in 1953. Unlike many of his collaborating colleagues he never lost his right to vote or his Dutch citizenship, since he was a minor when he joined the SS.^[4] A member of the Dutch organization of former collaborators Stichting Oud Politieke Delinquenten ("Foundation of Former Political Delinquents"), he went on to organize a political party associated with that organization, the National European Social Movement,^[1] which was dissolved by the Supreme Court of the Netherlands in 1954^[5]/1955.^[6] His activities with the NESB had led to an arrest in 1953, when he and Jan Wolthuis were sentenced to two months' imprisonment for running an organization considered a successor to the NSB.^[7]

Throughout the 1950s, Van Tienen, a bookseller in Utrecht, published revisionist articles in an irregularly appearing periodical, the Nederlands Archief der Conservatieve Revolutie ("Dutch Archive of the Conservative Revolution"). He also operated a mail-order book-selling business and was arrested and convicted in 1965 of insulting a segment of the population since he sold antisemitic literature.^[8][9] He was sentenced to three months imprisonment and three months of probation. Van Tienen had lost his passport due to his SS involvement and fled to Spain, likely with false papers,^[10] where he operated a penny arcade, and died sometime in 1995.^[2]