The Third Reich in Power
Page 1
Table of Contents
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Preface
Part 1 - THE POLICE STATE
‘ NIGHT OF THE LONG KNIVES’
REPRESSION AND RESISTANCE
‘ ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE’
INSTRUMENTS OF TERROR
Part 2 - THE MOBILIZATION OF THE SPIRIT
ENLIGHTENING THE PEOPLE
WRITING FOR GERMANY
PROBLEMS OF PERSPECTIVE
FROM DISCORD TO HARMONY
Part 3 - CONVERTING THE SOUL
MATTERS OF FAITH
CATHOLICS AND PAGANS
WINNING OVER THE YOUNG
‘ STRUGGLE AGAINST THE INTELLECT’
Part 4 - PROSPERITY AND PLUNDER
‘ THE BATTLE FOR WORK’
BUSINESS, POLITICS AND WAR
ARYANIZING THE ECONOMY
DIVISION OF THE SPOILS
Part 5 - BUILDING THE PEOPLE’S COMMUNITY
BLOOD AND SOIL
THE FATE OF THE MIDDLE CLASSES
THE TAMING OF THE PROLETARIAT
SOCIAL PROMISE AND SOCIAL REALITY
Part 6 - TOWARDS THE RACIAL UTOPIA
IN THE SPIRIT OF SCIENCE
THE NUREMBERG LAWS
‘THE JEWS MUST GET OUT OF EUROPE’
THE NIGHT OF BROKEN GLASS
Part 7 - THE ROAD TO WAR
FROM WEAKNESS TO STRENGTH
CREATING GREATER GERMANY
THE RAPE OF CZECHOSLOVAKIA
MARCH INTO THE EAST
Notes
Bibliography
Index
FOR MORE FROM RICHARD J. EVANS, LOOK FOR THE
Praise for The Third Reich in Power
“Heir to a British tradition of dons who write engagingly for a broad public, Evans has done a great service simply in digesting the mountain of recent scholarship on the Nazis for the general reader.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“A wonder of synthesis and acute judgment, this work when completed will be the definitive study for at least a generation . . . [A] magnificent achievement . . . When his game is on, as it usually is, few can rival his ability to write crisply argued history. Evans’s coolly precise, profoundly disquieting history gives the most thorough answer yet to the question that will nag humanity for a thousand years: What accounts for the German people’s support—at times passive, at times fervent—for the vicious and often ridiculous thugs who ruled over them for nearly twelve years?”
—Benjamin Schwartz, The Atlantic Monthly (editor’s choice)
“Evans’ new book is a masterly and exhaustive account . . . a most impressive study.”
—Foreign Affairs
“There seems to be nothing Mr. Evans does not cover. What sets [his trilogy] apart ... is the narrative command Mr. Evans exercises over the innumerable components of the history and the breadth and depth of his synthesis.”
—The Washington Times
“Evans’ masterly account blends narrative with the discussion of important themes. . . . Brilliantly told.”
—The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
“Mr. Evans’ latest book has been lauded as a definitive, authoritative English-language account, blending narrative, description, and analysis.”
—Embassy
“A work drawn from a mountain of scholarship . . . As a readable, compelling synthesis of the period, [The Third Reich in Power] . . . is a major achievement.”
—The Boston Globe
“A major achievement. No other recent synthetic history has quite the range and narrative power of Evans’s work. . . . When complete, Evans’s trilogy will take its place alongside Ian Kershaw’s monumental two-volume biography of Hitler as the standard works in English.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“A superb account of the growth and day-to-day functioning of the Nazi state.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Richard J. Evans is one of the world’s leading historians of modern Germany. He was born in London in 1947. From 1989 to 1998 he was Professor of History at Birkbeck College, University of London. Since 1998 he has been Professor of Modern History at Cambridge University. In 1994 he was awarded the Hamburg Medal for Art and Science for cultural services to the city, and in 2000 he was the principal expert witness in the David Irving libel trial. His books include The Feminist Movement in Germany, 1894-1933, Death in Hamburg (winner of the Wolfson Literary Award for History), In Hitler’s Shadow, Rituals of Retribution (winner of the Fraenkel Prize in Contemporary History), In Defence of History (which has so far been translated into eight languages), Telling Lies About Hitler and The Coming of the Third Reich (shortlisted for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize).
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First published by Allen Lane 2005
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Copyright © Richard J. Evans, 2005
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For Matthew and Nicholas
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AKG, London: pictures 3, 4, 9, 14, 35, 37; Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz: pictures 13, 26, 34, 40, 41; Bundesarchiv, Koblenz: pictures 8, 15, 18, 23, 32; Corbis: pictures 2, 5, 7, 17, 19, 21, 36, 38, 39; Kunstverlag Peda: picture 10; Arno Breker by Marco-VG (Museum Arno Breker, Bonn): picture 11; Staatsarchiv, Munich: picture 28; The Weiner Library, London: picture 16.
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Preface
This book tells the story of the Third Reich, the regim
e created in Germany by Hitler and his National Socialists, from the moment when it completed its seizure of power in the summer of 1933 to the point when it plunged Europe into the Second World War at the beginning of September 1939. It follows an earlier volume, The Coming of the Third Reich, which told the story of the origins of Nazism, analysed the development of its ideas and recounted its rise to power during the years of the ill-fated Weimar Republic. A third volume, The Third Reich at War, will follow in due course, covering the period from September 1939 to May 1945 and exploring the legacy of Nazism in Europe and the world in the rest of the twentieth century and on to the present. The general approach of all three volumes is set out in the Preface to The Coming of the Third Reich and does not need to be repeated in detail here. Those who have already read that book can go straight to the beginning of the first chapter of this one; but some readers might like to be reminded of the central arguments of the earlier volume, and those who have not read it may wish to turn to the Prologue, which sketches the main lines of what happened before the end of June 1933, when the story told in the following pages begins.
The approach adopted in the present book is necessarily thematic, but within each chapter I have tried, as in the previous volume, to mix narrative, description and analysis and to chart the rapidly changing situation as it unfolded over time. The Third Reich was not a static or monolithic dictatorship; it was dynamic and fast-moving, consumed from the outset by visceral hatreds and ambitions. Dominating everything was the drive to war, a war that Hitler and the Nazis saw as leading to the German racial reordering of Central and Eastern Europe and the re-emergence of Germany as the dominant power on the European Continent and beyond that, the world. In each of the following chapters, dealing in turn with policing and repression, culture and propaganda, religion and education, the economy, society and everyday life, racial policy and antisemitism, and foreign policy, the overriding imperative of preparing Germany and its people for a major war emerges clearly as the common thread. But that imperative was neither rational in itself, nor followed in a coherent way. In one area after another, the contradictions and inner irrationalities of the regime emerge; the Nazis’ headlong rush to war contained the seeds of the Third Reich’s eventual destruction. How and why this should be so is one of the major questions that run through this book and bind its separate parts together. So too do many further questions: about the extent to which the Third Reich won over the German people; the manner in which it worked; the degree to which Hitler, rather than broader systematic factors inherent in the structure of the Third Reich as a whole, drove policy onwards; the possibilities of opposition, resistance, dissent or even non-conformity to the dictates of National Socialism under a dictatorship that claimed the total allegiance of all its citizens; the nature of the Third Reich’s relationship with modernity; the ways in which its policies in different areas resembled, or differed from, those pursued elsewhere in Europe and beyond during the 1930s; and much more besides. A narrative thread is provided by the arrangement of the chapters, which move progressively closer to the war as the book moves along.
Inevitably, however, while separating out the many different aspects of the Third Reich into different themes makes it easier to present them coherently, it also comes at a price, since these aspects impinged on each other in a variety of different ways. Foreign policy had an impact on racial policy, racial policy had an impact on educational policy, propaganda went hand-in-hand with repression, and so on. So the treatment of a theme in a particular chapter is necessarily incomplete in itself, and the individual chapters should not be treated as comprehensive accounts of the topics with which they deal. Thus, for example, the removal of the Jews from the economy is dealt with in the chapter on the economy, rather than in the chapter on racial policy; Hitler’s formulation of his war aims in the so-called Hossbach memorandum in 1937 is covered in the section on rearmament rather than in the chapter on foreign policy; and the impact of the German takeover of Austria on antisemitism in the Third Reich is discussed in the final chapter, rather than in the section on antisemitism in 1938. I hope that these decisions about the structure of the book make sense, but their logic will only be clear to those who read the book consecutively, from start to finish. Anyone who wants to use it simply as a work of reference is recommended to turn to the index, where the location of the book’s principal themes, characters and events is laid out in detail.
In the preparation of the present work I have once more benefited from the incomparable resources of Cambridge University Library, the Wiener Library and the German Historical Institute London. The Staatsarchiv der Freien- und Hansestadt Hamburg and the Forschungsstelle für Zeitgeschichte in Hamburg kindly permitted consultation of the unpublished diaries of Luise Solmitz, and Bernhard Fulda generously supplied copies of key issues of German newspapers. The advice and support of many friends and colleagues has been crucial. My agent, Andrew Wylie, and his staff, particularly Christopher Oram and Michal Shavit, gave their time to the project in many ways. Stephanie Chan, Christopher Clark, Bernhard Fulda, Christian Goeschel, Victoria Harris, Robin Holloway, Max Horster, Valeska Huber, Sir Ian Kershaw, Scott Moyers, Jonathan Petropoulos, David Reynolds, Kristin Semmens, Adam Tooze, Nikolaus Wachsmann and Simon Winder read early drafts, saved me from many errors and made many useful suggestions: I am indebted to them for their help. Christian Goeschel also kindly checked the proofs of the Notes and Bibliography. Simon Winder and Scott Moyers have been exemplary editors, and their advice and enthusiasm have been essential throughout. Conversations with, or suggestions from, Norbert Frei, Gavin Stamp, Riccarda Tomani, David Welch and many others have been invaluable. David Watson was an exemplary copy-editor; Alison Hennessy took immense pains over the picture research; and it was extremely instructive to work with András Bereznáy on the maps. Christine L. Corton read the entire manuscript and beyond the application of her professional expertise, her practical support over the years has been indispensable to the whole project. Our sons Matthew and Nicholas, to whom this book, like its predecessor, is dedicated, have provided welcome relief from its grim subject-matter. I am grateful to them all.
Richard J. Evans
Cambridge, May 2005
PROLOGUE
I
The Third Reich came to power in the first half of 1933 on the ruins of Germany’s first attempt at democracy, the ill-fated Weimar Republic. By July, the Nazis had created virtually all the fundamental features of the regime that was to govern Germany until its collapse almost twelve years later, in 1945. They had eliminated open opposition at every level, created a one-party state, and co-ordinated all the major institutions of German society with the exceptions of the army and the Churches. Many people have tried to explain how they managed to achieve such a position of total dominance in German politics and society with such speed. One tradition of explanation points to long-term weaknesses in the German national character that made it hostile to democracy, inclined to follow ruthless leaders and susceptible to the appeal of militarists and demagogues. But when one looks at the nineteenth century, one can see very little evidence of such traits. Liberal and democratic movements were no weaker than they were in many other countries. More relevant, perhaps, was the relatively late creation of a German nation-state. After the collapse in 1806 of the Holy Roman Reich created by Charlemagne a millennium before - the famous thousand-year Reich that Hitler sought to emulate - Germany was disunited until the wars engineered by Bismarck between 1864 and 1871, which led to the formation of what was later called the Second Reich, the German Empire ruled by the Kaiser. In many ways this was a modern state: it had a national parliament that, unlike its British counterpart for example, was elected by universal manhood suffrage; elections attracted a voter turnout of over 80 per cent; and political parties were well organized and an accepted part of the political system. The largest of these by 1914, the Social Democratic Party, had over a million members and was committed to democracy, equality, the emancipation
of women and the ending of racial discrimination and prejudice, including antisemitism. Germany’s economy was the most dynamic in the world, rapidly overtaking the British by the turn of the century, and in the most advanced areas like the electrical and chemical industries, rivalling even the Americans. Middle-class values, culture and behaviour were dominant in Germany by the turn of the century. Modern art and culture were beginning to make their mark in the paintings of Expressionists like Max Beckmann and Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, the plays of Frank Wedekind and the novels of Thomas Mann.
Of course, there was a down-side to the Bismarckian Reich. Aristocratic privilege remained entrenched in some areas, the national parliament’s powers were limited and the big industrialists, like their counterparts in the USA, were deeply hostile to unionized labour. Bismarck’s persecution, first, of the Catholics in the 1870s, then of the fledgling Social Democratic Party in the 1880s, got Germans used to the idea that a government could declare whole categories of the population ‘enemies of the Reich’ and drastically curtail their civil liberties. The Catholics responded by trying to integrate more closely into the social and political system, the Social Democrats by sticking rigidly to the law and repudiating the idea of violent resistance or violent revolution; both behavioural traits that were to resurface to disastrous effect in 1933. In the 1890s, too, small extremist political parties and movements emerged, arguing that Bismarck’s work of unification was incomplete because millions of ethnic Germans still lived outside the Reich, especially in Austria but also in many other parts of Eastern Europe. While some politicians began to argue that Germany needed a large overseas Empire like the British already possessed, others began to tap lower-middle-class feelings of being overtaken by big business, the small shopkeeper’s fear of the department store, the male clerk’s resentment of the growing presence in business of the female secretary, the bourgeois sense of disorientation when confronted by Expressionist and abstract art and many other unsettling effects of Germany’s headlong social, economic and cultural modernization. Such groups found an easy target in Germany’s tiny minority of Jews, a mere 1 per cent of the population, who had mostly been remarkably successful in German society and culture since their emancipation from legal restrictions in the course of the nineteenth century. For the antisemites the Jews were a source of all their problems. They argued that the civil liberties of the Jews had to be restricted and their economic activities curtailed. Soon political parties like the Centre Party and the Conservatives were losing votes to these fringe parties of antisemites. They responded by incorporating into their own programmes the promise to reduce what they described as the subversive influence of the Jews in German society and culture. At the same time, in a very different area of society, Social Darwinists and eugenicists were beginning to argue that the German race needed to be strengthened by discarding the traditional Christian respect for life and by sterilizing or even killing the weak, the handicapped, the criminal and the insane.