Berlin Diary: The Journal of a Foreign Correspondent 1934-1941

by William L. Shirer

  BERLIN, March 8

  Diplomatic circles buzzing with talk of a secret peace parley in Stockholm to end the Russo-Finnish war. A decree today orders all persons and firms who possess old metal or scrap iron to deliver it to the state. Lack of iron may lose Germany the war.

  BERLIN, March 10

  Today is Memorial Day in Germany, a day to remember the dead who’ve been slain in all the wars. In former years the Germans remembered the two million men slaughtered between 1914 and 1918. Today the Nazis ask the people not to think too much of the World War dead, but to concentrate their thoughts on those who have been done to death or will die in this war. How perverse human beings can be! A front-page editorial in the Lokal Anzeiger says: “This is no time for being sentimental. Men are dying for Germany day and night. One’s personal fate now is unimportant. There is no asking why if one falls or is broken.”

  That’s the trouble. If the Germans asked why, the flower of their youth might not always be condemned to be butchered on the battlefield. General von Rund-stedt, one of the leading military figures in the conquest of Poland, writes in the Völkische Beobachter: “Memorial Day—1940: Certainly we think earnestly of the dead, but we do not mourn.” And this paper bannerlines in red ink across Page one: “OVER THE GRAVES FORWARD!”

  Hitler spoke today in a courtyard in the Zeughaus, the War Museum. There amidst the museum pieces—the arms and weapons Europeans have used to kill one another in all the wars of the past, he orated. His voice was full of hatred, which he might have been expected to avoid on Memorial Day. Has the man no other emotion? He promised his people that the end of this war would give Germany the most glorious military triumph in history. He thinks only of arms. Does he understand the economic role in this war?

  Ribbentrop off to Rome to make sure what Mussolini will do when the German offensive starts and also to see the Pope. Talk of a new concordat. Monsignor Cesare Orsenigo, the Papal Nuncio, has been quietly paying visits to the Wilhelmstrasse for weeks. Germany didn’t observe the last concordat, persecuting the church whenever it pleased. But they will probably sign a new one. It will mean prestige for Hitler at home and abroad.

  All Germans I talk to afraid hell will break loose this month.

  BERLIN, March 11

  A talk today with General von Schell, a wizard who is responsible for oil and automobiles. He claimed he would have enough oil for a ten-year war. He said his factories were now producing only 20 types of trucks as compared with 120 last year.

  Beginning April 20, all German youths between ten and eighteen will be compelled to join the Hitler Youth. Conscription of youth was laid down in a law dated 1936, but only goes into effect now. Boys between seventeen and eighteen will receive preliminary military training.

  BERLIN, March 13

  In Moscow last night peace was made between Russia and Finland. It is a very hard peace for Finland and in Helsinki today, according to the BBC, the flags are at half-mast. Berlin, however, is delighted. For two reasons: (1) It releases Russia from the strain of war, so that she now may be able to furnish some badly needed raw materials to the Reich. (2) It removes the danger of Germany having to fight a war on a long northern front, which she would have had to supply by sea and which would have dispersed her military forces now concentrating in the west for the decisive blow, which may begin any day now.

  I think in the end Norway and Sweden will pay for their refusal to allow Allied troops across their territories to help Finland. To be sure, they were not in a pleasant spot. Baron von Stumm of the F.O. confirmed to me today that Hitler had informed both Oslo and Stockholm that had Allied troops set foot in Scandinavia, Germany immediately would have invaded the north to cut them off. The trouble with the Scandinavians is that a hundred years of peace have made them soft, peace-at-any-pricers. And they have not had the courage to look into the future. By the time they make up their minds to take sides, it will be too late, as it was with Poland. Sandler, Sweden’s Foreign Minister, alone seems to have seen the situation correctly, and he has been forced to resign.

  Finland now is at the mercy of Russia. On any fake pretext the Soviets can henceforth overrun the country, since the Finns must now give up their fortifications, as the Czechs had to do after Munich. (Czecho lasted five and a half months after that.) Have we not reached a stage in history where no small nation is safe any longer, where they all must live on sufferance from the dictators? Gone are those pleasant nineteenth-century days when a country could remain neutral and at peace just by saying it wanted to.

  With peace in Finland, the talk here is once more of the German offensive. X, a German, keeps telling me it will be frightful; poison gas, bacteria, etc. Like all Germans, though he should know better, he thinks it will be so terrible that it will bring a quick victory for Germany. It never occurs to him that the enemy too has poison gas and bacteria.

  A record: A letter from Carl Brandt posted in New York October 7 last year arrived day before yesterday, March 11. It had been opened by both the British and German censors.

  BERLIN, March 14

  In London last night, one Mohamed Singh Azad shot and killed Sir Michael O’Dwyer. Not Gandhi, but most of the other Indians I know, will feel this is divine retribution. O’Dwyer was once Lieutenant-Governor of the Punjab and bore a share of responsibility in the 1919 Amritsar massacre, in which General Dyer shot fifteen hundred Indians in cold blood. When I was at Amritsar eleven years after, in 1930, the bitterness still stuck in the people there. Goebbels makes the most of the assassination. Nachtausgabe headline tonight: “THE DEED OF AN INDIAN FIGHTER FOR FREEDOM—SHOTS AGAINST THE OPPRESSOR.” This from Germans who are carrying out mass murders in Bohemia and Poland.

  ITEMS: Two more Germans beheaded today for “damaging the people’s interests.” A third sentenced to death; same charge…. The Germans boast that prices here have not risen. Today in the Adlon I paid a dollar for a dish of boiled carrots…. Göring today decrees that the people must give up their copper, bronze, brass, tin, lead, and nickel. How can Germany fight a long war lacking these? In 1938 Germany imported from abroad nearly a million tons of copper, 200,000 tons of lead, 18,000 tons of tin, and 4,000 tons of nickel.

  BERLIN, March 15

  A year ago last night Hitler got Hacha, then President of what was left of Czechoslovakia after Munich and the Nazi-engineered “secession” of Slovakia, into his Chancellery and after threatening until four a.m. that he would destroy Prague and its million people with the Luftwaffe, forced the poor old man to “ask” for German “protection.” (Strange how few Germans know yet of what took place that night.) Today Hitler forces Hacha to send him a “congratulatory” telegram, praising him for having destroyed Czechoslovakia and wishing him victory in this war. Hitler’s cynicism is of rich quality, but millions of Germans believe that today’s exchange of telegrams is perfectly sincere. Hitler replies that he is “deeply moved” by Hacha’s wire and adds: “Germany has no intention of threatening the national existence of the Czechs.” When he has already destroyed it! Neurath, a typical example of the German aristocrats who sacrificed their souls (they had no minds) to Hitler, sends him a slavish telegram thanking him for his “historic deed” and pledging the “unbreakable loyalty of Bohemia and Moravia.” In an interview with the German press Neurath says the Czechs are content with their lot, all except “a few intellectuals and those elements of disturbance which were put down in a manner the sharpness of which was not misunderstood.” He refers to the mass shooting of Czech students last fall.

  My good friend Z, a captain in the navy on duty with the High Command, has not appeared in uniform all week. Today he told me why. “I have no more white shirts. I have not been able to have my laundry done for eight weeks. I have no soap to wash my shirts myself, being in the same position as the laundry. I have only colored shirts left. So I wear civilian clothes.” A nice state for the navy to be in.

  BERLIN, March 17

  Much excitement on this Palm Sunday in official qua
rters over a war communiqué claiming that the Luftwaffe hit and damaged three British battleships in Scapa Flow last night. More important to me was that for the first time the Germans admitted that during the raid their planes also bombed British air bases at Stromness and Kirkwall. In this half-hearted war this is the first time that one side has purposely dropped bombs on the land of the other. It heralds, I suppose, the spring opening of the war in earnest. Editor Kircher of the Frankfurter Zeitung attempts to answer a question this morning that has bothered neutral military minds for a long time. Why haven’t the Germans used their acknowledged air superiority over the Allies? Why are they waiting while the Allies, with American help, catch up? Kircher’s answer is that the Allies have not been catching up, that Germany’s relative superiority has been greatly increased in the last seven months.

  Spring at last threatens to arrive. Millions of Germans are beginning to thaw out after the worst winter they can remember. For some reason there was no hot water in most apartments today, though it was Sunday. Several friends lined up in my room for a bath.

  BERLIN, March 18

  For two and a half hours this morning while a snowstorm raged, Hitler and Mussolini conferred at the Brenner. We opine Hitler wanted to make sure of the Duce before embarking on his spring plans, whatever they are. The Wilhelmstrasse plant tonight was that Hitler had won over Musso to the idea of joining a tripartite bloc with Germany and Soviet Russia which will establish a new order in Europe. Maybe so.

  BERLIN, March 19

  John Chapman, whom I have not seen since high-school days in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, called. He is foreign editor of Business Week, and has just come up from the Balkans and Italy. He had some good dope. He doubts that Italy will go into the war. So do I. Italy can be blockaded. John said he noticed a lessening of the drive in Fascism. People are more relaxed. Il Duce does not push them so hard. He’s aging, growing fat, and spends much time with his youthful blonde mistress, by whom—John was told in Rome—he has just had a child. John said he saw Pétain in Madrid. The old man said: “I pray that the Germans try to break through the Maginot Line. It can be broken through—at a cost. But let them infiltrate through. I’d like to be in command of the Allied army then.”

  I called on Major X of the X Embassy this afternoon. He sees three possibilities open to Germany now:

  Germany can make peace. He thinks Hitler wants peace. And that he could afford to offer a peace which would sound pretty fair and might be acceptable to all but the English, and which would still consolidate most of his gains. Such a peace, he argued, would be equivalent to a great German victory.

  Germany can continue as at present, keeping Scandinavia and Italy neutral and co-operative economically, and developing southeastern Europe and especially Russia. This would take time, at least three years, but once developed, it would make the Allied blockade comparatively ineffective. The major pointed out that no nation which lost control of the seas had ever in all history won a major war. But he thinks it might be accomplished this time if Germany keeps her northern, southern, and southeastern doors open and develops Russia sufficiently. He regards the Russian tie-up as Hitler’s master stroke, but says it was forced upon him by the German General Staff, which simply told him that war with the West was impossible if Russia joined the Allies, or even remained strictly neutral, but unfriendly to Germany.

  Germany can try to force the issue on the western front. This he regards as improbable. The German General Staff, he says, has a great respect for the Maginot Line and the French army. He admits the Maginot Line might be pierced—at great cost—but that this would not necessarily win the war.

  BERLIN, March 20

  Last night the British answered for the bombing of Scapa Flow by strafing the German seaplane bases on the island of Sylt for nearly seven hours. As usual, the High Command claims no damage was done. The British, according to the BBC, did a lot. At noon the government offered to fly us up to see for ourselves, then called it off. I had written of the offer in good faith in my script; word came of the cancellation while I was speaking, and so I announced it at the end of my talk. Tonight while waiting to go on the air, I turned on the BBC. To my surprise (and embarrassment, because a RRG official was sitting at my side) the British announcer broadcast my entire noon script. He imitated my voice so exactly, especially my closing announcement about the cancellation of our trip to Sylt, that he could only have got it from a recording which the BBC must have made of my talk. I probably will hear more of this.

  All Berlin papers on orders from Goebbels headline the attack on the German base at Sylt: “BRITISH BOMB DENMARK!” It seems that a couple of bombs did fall on Danish territory. But it’s a typical falsification.

  Headline in the 12-Uhr Blatt today over its report of Chamberlain’s speech in the House last night: “HOLIDAY OF LIES IN LOWER HOUSE.—THE PIRATES CONFESS THEIR CRIME AGAINST THE NEUTRALST!”

  BERLIN, March 21

  They took the American correspondents up to Sylt after all today, but I was not invited. They telephoned Berlin tonight that they had not seen much damage at the chief seaplane base at Hoernum, which was the only one they were shown—a fact I pointed out in my broadcast tonight. The Nazi press has been ordered to make a terrific play tomorrow morning of the reports of these American correspondents.

  Three more Poles sentenced to death at Posen today for allegedly slaying a German during the war. I hear sixteen Polish women are in a Berlin jail waiting to have their heads lopped off, all of them having been sentenced to death.

  BERLIN, March 22

  Induced Irwin, of NBC, also to point out that the American correspondents were not shown all of Sylt. This afternoon the High Command was very angry with me for having mentioned this.

  Good Friday today. The sidewalks thronged. No special Easter joy noticeable in the faces. Long lines the last few days before the candy shops. How patiently Germans will stand for hours in the rain for a tiny ration of holiday candy! Last week’s ration of one egg was increased by two eggs; this week’s by one.

  LATER.—Radio people called up. They will fly Irwin and me to Sylt tomorrow to inspect the northern part of the island.

  BERLIN, March 23

  At midnight last night the RRG phoned to say our trip to Sylt could not be arranged after all. What did the British do on the northern end of the island that the Luftwaffe does not want Irwin and me to see?

  Great goings-on at the radio this noon. An officer of the High Command accused Irwin and me of having sabotaged our newspaper colleagues. He said that after we spoke yesterday no American newspaper would publish the stuff the agencies were putting out about Sylt from their Berlin correspondents. However, the Germans certainly publish what the American newsmen wrote. It makes wonderful propaganda.

  It is announced today that all church bells made of bronze are to come down and be melted up for cannon. Next week begins a nation-wide house-to-house collection of every available scrap of tin, nickel, copper, bronze, and similar metals of which the Germans are so short. Today the army ordered all car-owners whose automobiles are laid up by the war-time ban—which means ninety per cent of them—to surrender their batteries.

  Easter tomorrow. The government tells the people they must remain at home and not try to travel as in other years because there won’t be any extra trains. No private cars will be permitted to circulate tomorrow. It would be pleasant to be home. Last year, too, I was away, speeding through this town from Warsaw to Paris, and Europe jittery about Mussolini’s invasion of Albania and rumours that Hitler would walk into Poland. Long ago, it seems.

  BERLIN, March 24

  Easter Sunday, grey and cold, but the rain has held off. I cancelled my engagements with some German friends for lunch and tea. Couldn’t face a German today, though they are no friends of Hitler. Wanted to be alone. Got up about noon and listened to a broadcast from Vienna. The Philharmonic, and a nice little thing from Haydn.

  In the afternoon, a stroll. Unter den Linden thronged wit
h people. Surely the Germans must be the ugliest-looking people in Europe, individually. Not a decent-looking woman in the whole Linden. Their awful clothes probably contribute to one’s impression. Comparatively few soldiers in the street. Few leaves granted? Meaning? Offensive soon?

  I was surprised to notice how shabby the Kaiser’s Palace at the end of the Linden is. The plaster falling off all over the place. Very dilapidated. The stone railing of the balcony on which Wilhelm II made his famous appearance in 1914 to announce to the delirious mob at his feet the coming of war appeared to be falling to pieces. Well, they were not delirious before Hitler’s balcony when this war started.

  I tried to read in the faces of the thousands what was in their minds this Easter day. But their faces looked blank. Obviously they do not like the war, but they will do what they’re told. Die, for instance.

  BERLIN, March 25

  The DNB today: “At some places along the Upper Rhine front Easter Sunday, there were on the French side demonstrations against the English war, which clearly showed how foolish the French troops consider it to be that Germany and France have become enemies as a result of British connivance.”

  BERLIN, March 28

  Germany cannot stay in the war unless she continues to receive Swedish iron, most of which is shipped from the Norwegian port of Narvik on German vessels which evade the blockade by feeling their way down the Norwegian coast and keeping within the three-mile limit, where they are safe from the British navy. Some of us have wondered why Churchill has never done anything about this. Now it begins to look as if he may. The Wilhelmstrasse says it will watch him. For Germany this is a life-and-death matter. X assures me that if British destroyers go into Norwegian territorial waters Germany will act. But how is not clear. The German navy is no match for the British.