From this angle, we can better understand the obstinate conservative efforts during the preceding years to retain a limited independence in diplomatic and military affairs. Hitler had partly outwitted such attempts on the part of the Foreign Office by instituting his system of special envoys. On the other hand he had not been able to pry open the far more coherent social bloc of the officer caste. He now saw that this was the next order of business. And as chance had come to his aid so often before, a number of developments now played into his hands. Three months later, he had ousted his top generals and totally reorganized both the diplomatic and the military structure in accord with his program for the future.
The seemingly innocent starting point was Blomberg’s decision to remarry; his first wife had died years before. It was rather awkward that the bride, Fraulein Erna Gruhn, had “a past,” as Blomberg himself admitted. Consequently, she did not meet the strict status requirements of the officer corps. Seeking advice, Blomberg took Göring into his confidence as a fellow officer. Göring strongly urged him to go ahead with the marriage, and even assisted him in getting rid of a rival by paying the man off and arranging his emigration. On January 12, 1938, the wedding took place, in an atmosphere of some secrecy. Hitler and Göring were the witnesses.
Only a few days later, rumors began circulating that the field marshal’s marriage was a mésalliance of interest to the vice squad of the police. A police file soon provided evidence that Blomberg’s newly wedded wife had spent some time as a prostitute and had once been convicted of serving as a model for lewd photographs. Twelve days after the wedding, when Blomberg returned from a brief honeymoon, Göring informed him that he had become unacceptable. The officer corps, too, saw no reason to come to the defense of the field marshal who for so long had been devoted to Hitler with boyish exuberance. Two days later, on the afternoon of January 26, Hitler received him for a farewell visit. “The embarrassment for me and for you was too great,” he declared. “I could no longer wait it out. We must part.”
In a brief discussion about a possible successor, Hitler rejected the presumptive candidate, Fritsch, and Göring as well. The latter, in his greed for posts, had desperately tried to secure the appointment. Apparently Blomberg, still abjectly loyal, proposed what Hitler in any case intended, that he take over the position himself. “When Germany’s hour strikes,” Hitler said at the end of the interview, “I will see you at my side and the whole past will be regarded as wiped out.”
The decision had evidently been taken while Göring was still intriguing to exclude his rival, Fritsch. For now, instigated by Göring and Himmler jointly, a second police file was brought to light, this time on Fritsch, in which he was charged with homosexuality. In a scene out of a third-rate drama, the unsuspecting commander in chief of the army was confronted with a hired witness in the chancellery. The man’s accusations soon proved untenable, but that did not matter. They had served their purpose: providing Hitler with the pretext for the thoroughgoing shakeup of personnel on February 4, 1938. Fritsch, too, found himself dismissed. Hitler took over the post of commander in chief of the armed forces. The War Ministry was dissolved, replaced by the High Command of the Armed Forces (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, abbreviated OKW), headed by General Wilhelm Keitel. For a prize specimen of Hitlerian comedy, we may read General Jodi’s diary note on Keitel’s installation: “At 1 P.M. Keitel is ordered to the Führer in civilian dress. The latter pours out his heart on the difficulties which have descended upon him. He is growing more and more lonely…. He says to K: I am relying on you; you must stick it out with me. You are my confidant and only adviser on defense questions. Unified and coherent leadership of the Armed Forces is sacred and inviolable to me.” Hitler then continued without transition and in the same tone of voice: “I shall take command of them myself with your help.” As successor to Fritsch he appointed General von Brauchitsch, who, like Keitel, seemed the natural candidate for the post because of his servility and weakness of character; he had announced that he was “ready for anything” that was asked of him. In particular, he gave assurances that he would lead the army closer to National Socialism. In the course of these measures sixteen older generals were additionally retired, forty-four transferred. In order to alleviate Göring’s disappointment, Hitler named him a field marshal.
With one blow, without a jot of opposition, Hitler had thus eliminated the last power factor of any significance. He had put across, as it were, a “bloodless June 30.” Contemptuously, he declared that all generals were cowardly. His disdain was increased by the shameless eagerness many generals had shown to occupy the vacated positions. Such behavior made it plain that the unity of the officer corps had at last been shattered and caste solidarity—which had notably failed to put in an appearance in the case of the murders of von Schleicher and von Bredow—no longer existed. Speaking for the benefit of “later historians,” General von Fritsch resignedly recorded his indignation at this “shameful treatment.” To be sure, one group of army officers began to plot some action against the dictator and tried to make contact with Fritsch. Now, and once again six months later, he refused to support them, remarking fatalistically: “This man is Germany’s fate and this fate will go its way to the end.”
Meanwhile, the reshuffling was not limited to the armed forces. At the same cabinet session in which Hitler announced the changes in the top military leadership, he also informed Neurath of his dismissal from the post of Minister of Foreign Affairs. Ribbentrop replaced Neurath. Simultaneously, several important ambassadorships (Rome, Tokyo, Vienna) were changed. The careless way in which Hitler controlled the state is evident from the manner in which he appointed Walter Funk Minister of Economics. Hitler had met him at the opera one night, and during the intermission assigned him the post. Göring, he added, would give him further instructions. At the cabinet session of February 4 he was introduced as Schacht’s successor. That was, incidentally, the last meeting of the cabinet in the history of the regime.
Throughout the crisis Hitler was worried that the events might be viewed abroad as symptoms of hidden struggles for power and therefore as a sign of weakness. He also feared new conflicts if the court-martial investigation of the Fritsch case—which he had had to concede to the generals—brought the intrigue to light and rehabilitated Fritsch. “If the troops find out about that, there’ll be a revolution,” one of the insiders had predicted. Consequently, Hitler decided to cover up the one crisis by another, far more comprehensive one. As early as January 31, Jodi had noted in his diary: “Führer wants to divert the spotlights from the Wehrmacht [the armed forces]. Keep Europe gasping and by replacements in various posts not awaken the impression of an element of weakness but of a concentration of forces. Schuschnigg is not to take heart, but to tremble.”
Thus Hitler resolutely headed into another crisis. Since the July agreement of 1936 he had done nothing to improve German-Austrian relations. Rather, he had used the terms of the agreement solely to pick an endless series of new quarrels, bickering over clauses like a shyster lawyer. With growing concern the Vienna government had observed the ring gradually tightening. The obligations under the agreement, which it had assumed only under intense pressure, limited its freedom of action as much as did the ever closer ties between Rome and Berlin. In addition, the strong Nazi underground movement within Austria, encouraged and funded by the Reich, was stirring up trouble. It had a double basis for its passionate campaign for Anschluss: the ancient German dream of unification, feasible at last with the breakup of the Dual Monarchy in 1919; and Hitler’s Austrian origin. The very idea of unity seemed to be incarnate in the person of Hitler. Nazi propaganda was operating upon a country that still remembered its days as a great power while at present living in a functionless rump state that meant nothing to most of the citizens. Humiliated, spurned by the new nations which had once been part of the shattered monarchy, impoverished, and insultingly kept in a dependent status, the population of Austria craved change. Existing conditions were so
bad that few asked what would follow. With an acute sense of ethnic and historical ties, many Austrians turned their eyes more and more upon a self-assured Germany that seemed utterly transformed and was spreading panic among the arrogant victors of yesterday.
Desperately, Kurt von Schuschnigg, the successor to the assassinated Chancellor Dollfuss, looked around for help. In the spring of 1937 he vainly tried to secure a British declaration guaranteeing Austria’s independence. When that was not forthcoming, his prolonged and tenacious opposition to the Nazis, which he had backed up by bans and persecution, gradually weakened. At the beginning of February, 1938, Papen proposed a meeting between him and the German Chancellor. Reluctantly, Schuschnigg agreed. On the morning of February 12 he arrived in Berchtesgaden. Hitler received him on the steps of the Berghof.
Immediately after the two men had exchanged greetings, the Austrian Chancellor found himself the victim of a tirade. When he remarked on the impressive panorama offered by the grand living room, Hitler brushed the remark aside: “Yes, my ideas mature here. But we haven’t met to talk about the beautiful view and the weather.” Then he worked himself up. Austria’s whole history, he said, was “a continuous betrayal of the people. In the past it was the same as it is today. But this historical contradiction must at last come to its long overdue end. And let me tell you this, Herr Schuschnigg: I am firmly determined to put an end to all of it…. I have a historic mission and I am going to fulfill it because Providence has appointed me to do so…. I have traveled the hardest road that ever a German had to travel, and I have accomplished the greatest things in German history that ever a German was destined to accomplish…. You certainly aren’t going to believe that you can delay me by so much as half an hour? Who knows—perhaps I’ll suddenly turn up in Vienna overnight, like the spring storm. Then you’ll see something!” His patience was exhausted, he continued. Austria had no friends; neither England nor France nor Italy would lift a finger for her sake. He demanded the right for the Austrian National Socialists to agitate freely, the appointment of his follower, Seyss-Inquart, as Austrian Minister of Security and of the Interior, a general amnesty, and accommodation of Austrian foreign and economic policy to that of the Reich.
According to Schuschnigg’s account, when the time came to go to dinner, the man who a moment before had been gesticulating excitedly was transformed into an amiable host. But in the subsequent conversation, when the Austrian Chancellor remarked that because of his country’s constitution he could not give any conclusive assurances, Hitler wrenched open the door, gestured for Schuschnigg to leave, and shouted in an intimidating tone for General Keitel. After Keitel came in, closed the door behind him, and asked for his orders, Hitler said: “None at all. Have a seat.” Shortly afterward, Schuschnigg signed. He refused Hitler’s invitation to sup with him. Accompanied by Papen, he crossed the border to Salzburg. During the entire ride he did not say a word. But Papen chattered on easily: “Yes, that’s the way the Führer can be; now you’ve seen it for yourself. But next time you’ll find a meeting with him a great deal easier. The Führer can be distinctly charming.” The next time Schuschnigg came under guard and on his way to Dachau concentration camp.
The Berchtesgaden conference gave a great boost to the Austrian Nazis. They heralded their impending victory by a series of boastful acts of violence, and all of Schuschnigg’s efforts to stem the tide came too late. In order to offer last-minute opposition to the open disintegration of state power, he decided on the evening of March 8 to call a plebiscite for the following Sunday, March 13. In this way he hoped to refute, before the eyes of the whole world, Hitler’s claim that he had the majority of the Austrian people behind him. But Berlin immediately objected, and he was forced to drop his plan. Urged on by Göring, Hitler decided to take military action against Austria if necessary; for Ribbentrop had reported from London that England was not in the least disposed to fight for this troublesome leftover of the Versailles Treaty. Without England, Hitler knew, France would not intervene.
For a time it seemed that the German grab for Austria was stirring old allergies in Mussolini and forcing Italy toward a rapprochement with England. On March 10, therefore, Hitler sent Prince Philip of Hesse to Rome with a handwritten letter in which he spoke of the Austrian conspiracy against the Reich, the suppression of the nationalistic majority, and the prospect of civil war. As a “son of the Austrian soil” he had finally been unable to look on, inactive, he continued, but had decided to restore law and order in his homeland. “You, too, Your Excellency, could not act differently if the fate of Italy were at stake.” He assured Mussolini of his steadfast sympathy and once again pledged the inviolability of the Brenner Pass as the boundary between Germany and Italy: “This decision will never be amended or altered.” After hours of excited preparation, shortly after midnight he issued Directive No. 1 for Operation Otto:
If other measures do not succeed, I intend to march into Austria with armed forces in order to restore constitutional conditions there and to prevent further outrages against the nationalistic German population. I personally shall command the entire operation…. It is to our interest that the entire operation proceed without the use of force, with our troops marching in peacefully and being hailed by the populace. Therefore every provocation is to be avoided. But if resistance is offered, it must be smashed by force of arms with greatest ruthlessness….
For the time being no security measures are to be taken on the German frontiers with other countries.
The terse, self-assured tone of this document almost entirely concealed the mood of hysteria and indecision in which it had come into being. All reports from members of Hitler’s entourage speak of the extraordinary chaos surrounding the decision, the panicky confusion that overtook Hitler on the verge of this first expansionist action of his career. A multitude of overhasty mistaken decisions, choleric outbursts, senseless telephone calls, orders and cancellations of orders, followed in quick succession during the few hours between Schuschnigg’s call for a plebiscite and March 12. Once again, to all appearances, those “damaged nerves” were giving trouble. First, the military leadership was told in great excitement to prepare an operational plan within a few hours. Hitler flared up at Beck and later Brauchitsch for their remonstrances. Then he canceled his marching order, then issued it again. In between came pleas, threats, misunderstandings. Keitel later spoke of the period as a “martyrdom.”
If Göring had not taken the initiative at the moment he did, the public and thus the world would presumably have realized how much psychotic uncertainty and irritation Hitler showed in situations of great pressure. But Göring, who because of his part in the Fritsch affair had every interest in the operation and its obscuring effects, vigorously pressed the vacillating Hitler forward. Years later, Hitler remarked, almost stammering, with the admiration of a high-strung man for another’s phlegmatic, cold-blooded temperament:
The Reich Marshal has gone through a great many crises with me. He’s ice-cold in crises. In times of crisis you cannot have a better adviser than the Reich Marshal. The Reich Marshal is brutal and ice-cold in crises. I’ve always noticed that when it’s a question of facing up to a decision he is ruthless and hard as iron. You’ll get nobody better than him, you couldn’t find anybody better. He’s gone through all the crises with me, the toughest crises, and was ice-cold. Whenever the going was really hard, he turned ice-cold….
On March 11 Göring issued an ultimatum demanding the resignation of Schuschnigg and the appointment of Seyss-Inquart as Austrian Chancellor. Upon instructions from Berlin, the Nazis all over Austria poured into the streets that afternoon. In Vienna they thronged into the chancellery, filled the stairways and corridors, and settled down in the offices until, toward evening, Schuschnigg announced his resignation over the radio and ordered the Austrian army to retreat without offering resistance to the invading German troops. When President Miklas stubbornly refused to appoint Seyss-Inquart as the new Chancellor, Göring, in one of his many telep
hone conversations with Vienna, gave one of his go-betweens characteristic instructions:
Now listen closely: The important thing now is for Inquart to take possession of the entire government, keep the radio and everything else occupied…. Seyss-Inquart is to send the following telegram. Write this down:
“The provisional Austrian Government, which after the resignation of the Schuschnigg Government regards its task as the restoration of peace and order in Austria, addresses to the German Government an urgent appeal to support it in its task and to help it to prevent bloodshed. For this purpose it requests the German Government to dispatch German troops as soon as possible.”
After a brief dialogue, Göring said in conclusion: “Now then, our troops are crossing the frontier today…. And see to it that he sends the telegram as soon as possible…. Present the telegram to him and tell him we are asking—he doesn’t even have to send the telegram, you know; all he needs to say is: Agreed.” And while the Nazis throughout the country began to occupy the public buildings, Hitler at last issued the marching order at 8:45 P.M.—even before Seyss-Inquart had been informed of his own appeal for help. Hitler rejected a later request from Seyss-Inquart to stop the German troops. A bare two hours later, the impatiently awaited word from Rome arrived: at half-past ten Philip of Hesse telephoned, and Hitler’s reaction revealed how much tension he had been under:
Hesse: I have just come back from the Palazzo Venezia. The Duce accepted the whole affair in a very, very friendly manner. He sends you his cordial regards.
Hitler: Then please tell Mussolini I shall never forget him for this.
Hesse: Very well, sir.
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