Heil Hitler!

“Heil Hitler!” is a Nazi salute and spoken greeting whose repeated appearances turn a rehearsed political ritual into a measure of allegiance, exclusion, and performance. In the ruins of Berlin, it accompanies a painful triangle among Adrián Gallardo Ortega, Agneta Müller, and Jan Schmitt; later, Manuel Arroyo Benítez explains when a Spanish infiltrator should say it, when he should only raise his arm, and what silence can conceal.## The salute in BerlinThe phrase occurs amid the final days of the Battle of Berlin, where Adrián has taken the identity and position of a dead soldier. After killing the man at the machine gun, he burns his own papers, takes the dead soldier’s documents, and occupies his place. He no longer wants to die. When the narrative returns to him on the morning of 25 April, six men remain in their barricaded shelter, and Adrián is the first to notice Agneta approaching through the devastated city. In this setting, the salute belongs not to an abstract political history but to a life organized around borrowed identities, military obedience, and the immediate possibility of death.## A ritual of partingAt the bunker entrance, Agneta stands erect, raises her right arm, and cries the greeting with all her strength. A soldier who had been crying with her embraces and kisses her forehead. Adrián initially treats the scene as a melodrama, moved by the staged quality of the dry garden and the sickly light, but not by any devotion he can share. When Agneta turns and discovers the men beyond the gate, Jan returns the salute. That small reciprocal gesture reveals to Adrián the bond between them: their eyes meet, and he understands that the connection he had feared is real. His contempt for Jan’s tears gives way to the recognition that the two share a passion beyond his reach.Adrián then imitates their posture and speaks the words he has repeated many times without feeling his heart quicken. He understands that his hatred of communists has driven him across Europe, including Russia, Ukraine, and Estonia, but that he has never fought for love. The salute is therefore both familiar and hollow: he can reproduce its posture and formula, yet the ritual cannot give him the intimacy he sees between Agneta and Jan. His raised arm marks his difference as much as his affiliation. When Agneta instead turns back to him, embraces him, and wipes away his tears, the moment briefly permits him to hope that their relationship is not wholly lost.## The salute as a test of belongingThe phrase appears again in Manuel’s preparations for a gathering at La Granja. During the preceding ten days, Guillermo has attended an accelerated course in Nazism, beginning most nights at four in the morning in a building on Gran Vía. Manuel’s concern is not merely that Guillermo might know too little about the Third Reich; it is that he might say too much. He coaches him in the expected social conduct, the likely guests, and the vocabulary used by the group. Political identity here is managed through speech: the wrong word could betray an outsider who is trying to pass as a fascist sympathizer.Manuel explains that no one raises an arm or says “Heil Hitler!” until one of the guests has become drunk. He will join in because he had volunteered for the SS and sworn loyalty to the Führer, but Guillermo must not go as far. Guillermo may raise his arm without speaking; at most, he should say “Arriba España!” Manuel also warns him not to call the guests Nazis or National Socialists, since they prefer to describe themselves as Europeans and use evasions such as “those times” or “the good times” for the Third Reich. “Führer” is the one term they retain, sometimes replaced by the coded forms “88” or “HH.” The greeting’s function thus depends on who says it, at what point in the evening, and whether the speaker has the history to make the performance credible.## Performance and concealmentAt the gathering, the greeting belongs to a carefully staged social world of exiles and sympathizers. The arrival of Clarita Stauffer and Johannes Bernhardt divides the guests between those eager to greet her and those waiting to shake the powerful SOFINDUS president’s hand. Adrián Gallardo is introduced to Spanish guests who know of his return to the country. Meanwhile, Guillermo has already shouted “Arriba España!” several times, performing the part Manuel prepared for him without using the more compromising Nazi greeting. His role depends on restraint: the lesson was not simply how to imitate the group, but how to stop short of an allegiance that could expose him.Near midnight, Léon Degrelle makes a toast, and the gathering ends in a predictable display: the assembled comrades sing the Horst-Wessel-Lied with arms raised. Clarita does not join the salute. She keeps both arms at her sides while speaking intently with Ante Pavelić, writing occasionally in a small notebook as Pavelić rubs his forehead with visible concern. The contrast is pointed. A public ritual signals collective allegiance around them, while Clarita’s stillness and private conversation make her attention appear directed toward a more urgent, concealed business. When she eventually approaches Guillermo and Manuel, she asks whether they really came by donkey and offers them a lift toward the village on her way back to Madrid.## SignificanceThe phrase binds the Berlin scenes to the later infiltration plot, but its meaning shifts with circumstance. In Berlin, Adrián can speak the greeting fluently and raise his arm, yet discovers that political hatred cannot substitute for love or make him part of the intimacy between Agneta and Jan. At La Granja, Manuel treats the same words as a controlled signal whose timing and use can expose a false identity. The greeting is simultaneously an emblem of ideological loyalty, a learned performance, and a test of how much a person is willing to reveal. The contrast between its shouted use at the bunker, its restrained imitation by Adrián, and Manuel’s precise instructions for Guillermo shows how a ritual can bind a group while also furnishing a disguise for someone who does not belong.