The same is true of a movement. If a movement has the strength to take over the state, than it has the power to transform the state. I am the last to complain that the Marxists rule us today. As long as we do not have the strength to overcome them, they have the political right to rule us. I am surprised how little they use that right. I would do things differently. That is their tragic misunderstanding of their own worldview. I do not complain that the gentlemen of the Berlin Police use their power against us, only that they call themselves democrats and claim that they allow freedom of thought and of speech. That is nonsense. That is lying hypocrisy, for in truth these gentlemen are dictators.
If a movement has the strength to take over government positions of power, then it has the right to form the government as it wishes. Anyone who disagrees is a foolish theoretician. Politics is governed not by moral principles, but by power. If a movement conquers the state, it has the right to form the state. You can see how these three elements combine ideals and personalities. The idea leads to a worldview, the worldview to the state, the individual becomes a party, the party becomes the nation.
The important thing is not to find people who agree with me about every theoretical jot and tittle, but rather that I find people who are willing to fight with me for a worldview. Winning people over to something that I have recognized as right, that is what we call propaganda. At first there is knowledge; it uses propaganda to find the manpower that will transform knowledge into politics. Propaganda stands between the idea and the worldview, between the worldview and the state, between the individual and the party, between the party and the nation. At the moment at which I recognize something as important and begin speaking about it in the streetcar, I begin making propaganda. At the same moment, I begin looking for other people to join me. Propaganda stands between the one and the many, between the idea and the worldview. Propaganda is nothing other than the forerunner to organization. Once it has done this, it is the forerunner to state control. It is always a means to an end.
Although I must hold unshakably and unalterably to the idea, propaganda adjusts itself to the prevailing conditions. Propaganda is always flexible. It says different things here than it does there. It cannot be polished, laminated and stuffed; rather it must occupy the space between the one and the many. I talk differently on the streetcar with the conductor than I do with a businessman. If I did not, the businessman would think I was crazy and the streetcar conductor would not understand me. That means propaganda cannot be limited. It changes according to whom I am trying to reach. Let me tell a good story about a party member in Berlin who since 1919 has promoted the National Socialist idea. At first, he beat his head bloody against a wall that we want to avoid. He began by distributing the wildest anti-Semitic publications on the street. He knew it was bad stuff, but there was nothing better, so he read these books or newspapers in the subway. Everyone could see that he was a harmless crank, and when he stood up and left his newspapers behind, someone regularly would say: “Sir, take your newspaper along with you.” He would angrily take his paper and leave it with the conductor, saying: “Here, German brother.” And the conductor certainly thought he came from the nuthouse. He gradually realized that the methods that worked with friends and comrades do not work with strangers.
In other words, there is no ABC of propaganda. One can make propaganda, or one cannot. Propaganda is an art. Any reasonably normal person can learn to play the violin to a certain degree, but then his teacher will say: “This is as far as it goes. Only a genius can learn what remains. You are not a genius, so be content with what you have learned.” I can certainly teach any reasonable person the absolute basics of propaganda. But I will soon recognize the limits. One is either a propagandist, or one is not. It is wrong to look down on a propagandist. There are people who say a propagandist is merely a good drummer. This displays a certain envy and lack of ability. They are mostly mediocre philosophers whom the masses ignore. You have seen often enough — no one can deny it — that our movement has good speakers. Since our opponents do not have good speakers, they say: “Well, they are only good drummers.” Hitler was called the “Drummer of National Unity” for five years. When they realized that this drummer had ideas that didn’t fit into their way of thinking, he was suddenly a “crazy politician” who had to be dealt with. It is foolish to look down on propagandists. The propagandist has a certain role within the party. It is good for our young movement that we are young and lacking in really great leaders — though naturally not in comparison to other parties. The great leaders we have cannot stick to a particular area, but must be able to do everything. They must be propagandists, organizers, speakers, writers, etc. They must be able to get along with people, find money, write articles, and a lot more. That is why it is wrong to say that Hitler is merely a drummer. That is what is great about him, and what separates him from everyone else. He is a politician, and also a propagandist, while the leaders of other parties understand neither politics nor propaganda. You can see how propaganda relates to the worldview and to the organization. After we have finished the hard work of moving the idea and the worldview from the individuals to the masses, propaganda has the task of taking the knowledge of the mass and enabling it to take over the state.
Let me give an example.
What good would it do if everything we know to be right stayed in our few heads! The few would doubt the rightness of the idea, since they would see that no one was joining them. And if we did not have the people — from the lowliest S.A. man who distributes newspapers to the best speaker, or the leader of the party, all our lovely knowledge would be useless, for only we would know it. The others would continue their nonsense, and the German people in the end would perish.
Propaganda is absolutely necessary, even if it is only a means to an end. Otherwise, the idea could never take over the state. I must be able to get what I think important across to many people. The task of a gifted propagandist is to take that which many have thought and put it in a way that reaches everyone from the educated to the common man. You will all grant me this, and as further evidence I can recall a Hitler speech in Jena. Half the audience were Marxists, half students and university professors. I had a burning desire to speak with both elements afterwards. I could see that the university professor and the average man had understood what Hitler said. That is the greatness of our movement, that it can use language to reach the broad masses.
Of course, the style will vary according to the speaker. It would be a big mistake to expect everyone to treat the idea in the same way, for as great as it is, so different are the individuals who are to be reached by it. You will surely hear some people say that they like one speaker, while others prefer another. It would be a mistake to try to make the soft-spoken speaker into a thundering orator, or a thundering orator into a soft-spoken chap. Neither would accomplish anything. The soft-spoken speaker would never reach the heart no matter how hard he tried, nor would the thundering orator succeed in speaking quietly. Everyone would go home dissatisfied. The bigger our movement gets, the more kinds of people it can house, and each will reflect the movement a little differently. No two things in God’s world are alike. Everything is a little different. Thus one person reflects things differently than another.
As propaganda draws an ever-growing following to the idea, the idea broadens, becomes more flexible. It no longer stays in a few heads, but wants to include everything. At that moment it becomes a comprehensive program. We can happily see that that is the case in our movement. You will never find millions of people willing to die for a book. But millions of people are willing to die for a gospel, and our movement is becoming more and more a gospel. All that we have come to know in our individual lives is joining to form a great faith that lives unshakably in our hearts. Each of us is willing, if necessary, to give his all for it. No one is willing to die for the 8-hour day. But people are willing to die so that Germany will belong to the Germans. What Adolf Hitler prophesied in 1919 is becoming cl
earer every day: “Freedom and Prosperity!” The movement is increasingly freeing itself from the all too human, and becoming a powerful force. The time is coming when people will not ask us what we think about the 8-hour day; but rather when Germany is seized with desperation they will ask: “Can you give us back faith?” If a movement has brought the idea from the individual to a worldview, building in the end a clear gospel for which each is ready to die, that movement is near victory. That does not happen in the study, but rather in battle, in bitter battle each day with the enemy, bringing him to see how he has led the nation down the wrong path. I must say that I learn the most from reading the Berliner Tageblatt.[2] That is a fine example of the Jews at work. From the Jewish standpoint, I’ve never noted a single mistake, whereas the nationalist papers make mistakes all the time.
I now want to outline the essential characteristics of propaganda. We have already agreed that propaganda is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. Its task is to spread the knowledge of National Socialism to the people, or to a part of the people. If propaganda does that, it is good; if not, it is bad. The German Nationalists claimed that Hitler’s propaganda before 9 November 1923 was too loud, too noisy, too popular. Hitler replied: “Munich must become National Socialist. If I achieve that my propaganda will have been good. If I had wanted to make you happy, it would have been bad. But that was not my intention.” You cannot evaluate propaganda in midcourse, but rather you have to wait until it reaches its maker’s goal. You cannot say that our propaganda was wrong because the government banned it. That is false. Under Jewish police officials, our propaganda would be wrong if it were not banned, for that means it would be harmless, The fact that it is banned is the best evidence that we are dangerous. If the ban is lifted, do not come to me and say that the Jew has seen the error of his ways. It will be lifted when the Jew sees that it is not achieving his purpose. You can say what you want. The Jew will put away his dagger only when he sees that it is better not to use it against a propaganda method, or when he sees that the dagger has already done its duty.
Success is the important thing. Propaganda is not a matter for average minds, but rather a matter for practitioners. It is not supposed to be lovely or theoretically correct. I do not care if I give wonderful, aesthetically elegant speeches, or speak so that women cry. The point of a political speech is to persuade people of what we think right. I speak differently in the provinces than I do in Berlin, and when I speak in Bayreuth, I say different things than I say in the Pharus Hall.[3]
That is a matter of practice, not of theory. We do not want to be a movement of a few straw brains, but rather a movement that can conquer the broad masses. Propaganda should be popular, not intellectually pleasing. It is not the task of propaganda to discover intellectual truths. I find them by thinking, or at my desk, anywhere but in a meeting hall. That is where I transmit them. I do not enter the meeting hall to discover intellectual truths, but to persuade others of what I think to be right. I learn methods there that I can use to reach others with what I have found to be right. The speaker or propagandist must first understand the idea. He cannot do that in the middle of making propaganda. He must start with it. Through daily contact with the masses, he learns how to communicate that idea. It is not the task of propaganda to discover knowledge, but to transmit knowledge. It must adjust to those it wishes to reach with that knowledge. The propagandist’s speeches or posters that are aimed at farmers will be different than those aimed at employers; those aimed at doctors will be different than those aimed at patients. He will adjust his propaganda to fit those he is speaking to. You can see that all the critical standards used by other parties to evaluate propaganda miss the point, and that most complaints about the NSDAP’s propaganda result from a false understanding of propaganda. If someone tells me: “Your propaganda has no civilized standards,” I know there is no point in even talking with him.
It makes no difference if propaganda is at a high level. The question is whether it reached its goal. My first goal when I came to Berlin was to make the city aware of us. They could love us or hate us, as long as they knew who we were. We have reached that goal. We are hated and loved. When someone hears the term National Socialist, he does not ask: “What is that?” Once we have reached the first goal, we can work on turning hate to love and love to hate, but never to indifference. The battle against indifference is the hardest battle. There may be two million people in this city who hate my guts, who persecute and slander me, but I know that I can win over some of them. We know that from experience. Some of those who persecuted us and fought most bitterly against us are today our most determined supporters. You see that the important thing for propaganda is that it reach its goal, and that it is a mistake to apply critical standards that are irrelevant.
Let me give another example. If someone asks me what I think of another person, it is silly for me to say: “I like him, but he cannot play the piano.” The answer will be: “So what? He is a corporate lawyer. Why don’t you see if he is good at what he does?” That is a good answer. And it applies just as well to propaganda.
Our propaganda follows a clear line. Adolf Hitler once told me that it is not necessary to give a programmatic speech to a public meeting. The public meeting requires the most primitive approach. If the fine gentlemen say: “You are only a propagandist,” the answer is this: “Was Christ any different? Did he not make propaganda? Did he write books, or did he preach? Was Mohammed any different? Did he write learned essays, or did he go to the people and say what he wanted to say? Were not Buddha and Zarathustra propagandists?” True, the philosophers of the French Revolution built their intellectual foundations. But who got things moving? Robespierre, Danton, and the others. Did these men write books, or did they speak in popular meetings? Look around today. Is Mussolini more an author or a great speaker? When Lenin took the train from Zurich to Petersburg, did he repair to his study and write a book, or did he speak to thousands? Fascism and Bolshevism were built by great speakers, by masters of the spoken word! There is no difference between the politician and the speaker. History proves that great politicians were always great speakers: Napoleon, Caesar, Alexander, Mussolini, Lenin, name whomever you want. They were all great speakers and great organizers. If a person combines rhetorical talent, organizational ability, and philosophical ability, if he has the ability to transmit knowledge and to gather people under his banner, then he is a brilliant statesman.
If someone tells me today: “You are a demagogue,” I answer him in this way: “Demagogy in the good sense is simply the ability to get the masses to understand what I want them to understand.” Of course, I can adjust to the feelings of the broad masses, which is demagogy in the bad sense. Then I change not only the form of what I want to say, but also the content.
You cannot tell me that things have changed. Formerly, speakers built movements; today we live in the age of the press, and it is the writers who are influential. This theory is obviously false. Of course the press is important. But if you examine well-written editorials, they turn out to be speeches in disguise. The Marxists did not win through their editorials, but rather because each Marxist editorial was a little propaganda speech. They were written by agitators. They sat in their offices or in smoke-filled bars, writing not elegant, intellectual and polished essays, but rather brutal, direct words that the average man understood. That is why the masses devoured the Red press. We must learn from their example. Marxism did not win because it had great prophets — they had none. Marxism won because its nonsense was promoted by agitators of the ability of August Bebel and Lenin. They led Marxism to victory. If the folkish movement had had such agitators at its disposal, its stronger intellectual foundations would surely have led it to victory. Some critics complain: “All you do is criticize! You only complain. You can’t do things any better yourselves!” Others say that “the Angriff[4] is entirely negative. Say something positive for a change.” Well, I am not in a position to say anything positive about Isidor Weiss
.[5] I can only be negative. And there is nothing positive I can say about the Republic. There is nothing positive about it. I can say something positive only when I eliminate the negative. The most brilliant statesman on earth could do nothing with this Republic. And Marxism preached only the negative for sixty years. The result was that it took over the state on 9 November 1918. Hitler once said: “Keep those know-it-alls who always want to do something positive away from me.”
We can do something positive only when we have first gotten rid of the negative. A leader does not emerge from a conference table. He develops from the masses, and the more a true leader rises from the masses, the more he draws the masses to him. The mass is the weak, cowardly, lazy majority of people. One can never entirely win the broad mass. The best elements from the mass must be put in a form where they can be victorious. That is the task of a brilliant mind. We thank fate that it has given us one of these minds, a mind superior to all others, whom we willingly serve. That is the proof that we will win. If others find their wisdom in majority rule, but a movement is led by one person, that movement will win. When it wins is irrelevant. It will win because that is the way things are. Look around as much as you want. You will everywhere see our movement’s intellectual foundations.
The task of the leaders and followers is to drive this knowledge ever deeper into the hearts of our shattered nation. Each must make that clear, each must think things through. Everything we do must be clear. We will never give up. If everything is clear, one does not have to be an outstanding speaker. If he can say it all in a few words, he is a propagandist. If we have an army of such propagandists, from the littlest to the Führer himself, and if each spreads our crystal-clear knowledge to the masses, the day will come which our worldview takes over the state, when our organization seizes the reins of power, when we are no longer members of a slave colony, but rather citizens of a political state that we ourselves have formed.
Europe in the Year 2000:: And Other Essays, including “The Art of Propaganda” Page 2
