Although he didn’t have the stomach for brutality, upon Karl’s return his relationship with Frederick didn’t change. There wasn’t a big eureka moment for him after witnessing carnage at the hands of his own government. If there was one realization he should have taken away from his time in Poland, it should have been that he, like his son, was not a bloodthirsty war machine. But the self-reflection never occurred, and Frederick still appeared to Karl as too weak. There wasn’t anything Frederick could have done to gain his father’s interest. Karl still didn’t care about his family beyond providing material necessities. With war declared, instead of spending precious time with his loved ones and making sure they were safe, Karl still spent many nights away to be with his lovers. Weekends, like dinner, were spent as a family of three for the Alberts, not four. Margarete did her best to act as though Karl’s behavior had no impact on her life, though the reality was that she was on her own, married to a narcissist, while the country of her birth began to wreak havoc all over Europe.

Frederick eventually joined the Reichsarbeitsdienst, commonly referred to as RAD, the State Labor Service. Created in July 1934, it was inspired by the many labor organizations that existed in Germany after the country’s staggering defeat in World War I. To combat the devastating economic crisis, toward the end of the 1920s many civic, political, and church groups formed independent work camps across Germany to help provide some form of employment for the many ex-servicemen and the huge numbers of unemployed workers. RAD was mandatory for all Germans between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five for six months, and upon completion, they had to serve for two years in the Wehrmacht. The RAD typically repaired roads, constructed dikes, dug ditches on farms, and performed any service that would help the German military.11

Frederick also marched, completed rigorous fitness drills, and sang the songs of Germany’s superiority and dominance over the world. One of his duties involved working on a farm, and he hated every minute of it. “It was terrible,” said Charlotte. “They had to slaughter a pig. The poor pig was screaming.” Frederick’s other RAD exercises were equally miserable. An initiation of some sort involved him and his fellow comrades going to the seashore, stripping naked, and washing with sand. Frederick saw no point to the exercise except to teach sheer humiliation.12

The simple truth was that Frederick wasn’t drawn to the rugged activities that Aryan men were supposed to embrace. He wasn’t into sports either. If he had to play, he’d choose a position that required the least amount of endurance and physical contact. He didn’t live up to the Third Reich’s ideal image of a German man who was tall, blond, muscular, strong, and, above all else, aggressive and hypernationalistic.