Let $\chi$ be a Dirichlet character and $L(1,\chi)$ the associated L-function evaluated at $s=1$. What would be the 'shortest' proof of the non-vanishing of $L(1,\chi)$?
Background: The non-vanishing of $L(1,\chi)$ plays an essential role in the proof of Dirichlet´s theorem on primes in arithmetic progressions. In his "Introduction to analytic number theory" T.M.Apostol gives an elementary proof of the above fact estimating various sums in a few lemmas in the context of a proof of the aforementioned Dirichlet theorem. While his approach has the advantage of being self-contained and not requiring much of a background, it is quite lenghty. In their "Analytic number theory" H.Iwaniec and T.Kowalski remark that in Dirichlet´s original proof the non-vanishing of $L(1,\chi)$ for real Dirichlet characters is a simple consequence of Dirichlet´s class number formula. However, in both approaches it is necessary to distinguish between real and complex Dirichlet characters. Hence my two "sub"-questions:
Is there a proof that avoids the distinction between the complex and real case?
Are there in general other proof strategies for $L(1,\chi)\neq 0$ that can be considered shorter and/or more elegant than the two mentioned above?
