Hitler
Page 48
Hitler had a relatively close relationship with Albert Speer, who also established a base on the Obersalzberg and, with his wife Margarete, soon became a member of the so-called Berghof society.35 Speer was sixteen years younger than Hitler and, after Troost’s death, became his favourite architect; they shared a common interest in architecture, town planning, and architectural history. Hitler made a habit of summoning Speer, dropping in on him in his studios in Berchtesgaden or Berlin, viewing his latest plans and discussing building projects with him. It seems that in his many meetings with Speer he had someone with whom he was on the same wavelength to an unusual degree. Being together with Speer diverted, relaxed, and energized him. Hitler evidently saw in Speer his alter ego, someone who was able to have the career as an eminent architect that had been closed to him, someone with whom he could share the architectural fantasies which had preoccupied him since his youth. There are many similarities with his relationship with his adolescent friend Kubizek; but while Kubizek had simply patiently listened to him, Speer could realize Hitler’s megalomaniacal fantasies, or at least present him with plans and models based on his sketches. Thus, for Hitler Speer was his most important link to what he considered his true calling as artist and architect. While Hitler praised Speer as a ‘brilliant architect’36 and told his entourage that he was a ‘soulmate’,37 in retrospect Speer hesitated to call this relationship a friendship. He had rarely met anybody in his life ‘who so seldom revealed his feelings and, when he did so, immediately suppressed them’.38 Speer never clearly described his own feelings. He mainly saw in Hitler ‘my catalyst’, who infused him with exceptional energy and enabled him to have a dazzling career, or, in Speer’s own words ‘an enhanced identity’.39
The Brandts were also welcome guests on the Obersalzberg, moving into a flat close to the Berghof. Anni Brandt, née Rehborn, a German swimming champion, was a famous sportswoman and had known Hitler before the take-over of power. In 1933 she was a guest on the Obersalzberg with her fiancé, a young doctor, Karl Brandt, and in March 1934 Hitler attended their wedding. Shortly afterwards, he appointed Brandt his ‘personal physician’, whose task was to provide him with emergency medical assistance in the event of accidents or assassination attempts during his numerous trips. In addition, he gave advice on medical matters. During the war, this position of special trust led to Brandt receiving special assignments with serious consequences.40
Among the other members of the Obersalzberg circle were Reich Youth Leader Baldur von Schirach and his wife Henriette, like the Speers and the Brandts members of the younger generation, as well as Henriette’s father the ‘Reich Photo Journalist’, Heinrich Hoffmann with his second wife. Hoffmann was regarded as the entertainer and joker of the group; he was a heavy drinker, although Hitler, who was teetotal, overlooked this. Hitler valued Hoffmann above all as a connoisseur of art, whose taste coincided with his own and whose advice he valued. As Eva Braun’s former employer, Hoffmann also discreetly arranged the renting of a flat, later the purchase of a house, in Munich for her.41 In 1935, Unity Mitford, a young Englishwoman living in Munich, joined the circle. Mitford, a fanatical Nazi, whose sister, Diana, married the British Fascist leader, Oswald Mosley, in 1936, remained a member of Hitler’s intimate circle until 1939.42 In despair when Britain declared war on Germany, she attempted suicide, which she survived albeit severely wounded. In the end her family brought her home.
Unlike in Berlin, where the distinction between the two was more clear-cut, in Hitler’s refuge on the Obersalzberg private guests mixed with his personal entourage. The most important of the latter was Martin Bormann, who, apart from his role as chief of staff in the office of the ‘Führer’s’ Deputy, increasingly dealt with Hitler’s personal affairs. Thus, on the Obersalzberg, where he had his own house built, he operated as a kind of major domo and head of construction. In addition, there were Hitler’s personal adjutants, Wilhelm Brückner and Julius Schaub (in later years also the various military adjutants), and his secretaries.
The situation at the Berghof clearly demonstrates that, even after 1933, Hitler showed no inclination to create a private sphere separate from his official position. On the contrary, the people around him were linked to him in such a way that it is impossible to discern any kind of privacy. Hitler’s perception of himself as above all a public figure left no room for that. A private Hitler outside his public role simply did not exist.
* Translators’ note: Betreuung was the word often used by the Nazis to describe their relationship with the German people. It means ‘being responsible for’, but in Nazi terminology had a more than usually authoritarian flavour, hence ‘supervision’.
15
Breaking out of the International System
The series of major events and propaganda campaigns that had begun with the Reich Party Rally in September was intended, amongst other things, to impress international public opinion. A divided nation, despairing and impoverished, appeared overnight to have been united by a charismatic ‘Führer’ and to be determined to restore its national honour. That was the picture propaganda was trying to get across, by displaying Hitler in all his various roles.
In autumn 1933, it was the role of statesman that was most in demand, for in October in Geneva the Disarmament Conference, adjourned in June, began a new round of talks. In foreign policy terms this was a critical moment. Foreign Minister Neurath was still trying to cause the conference to fail. On 13 September, he told a cabinet meeting that after a ‘total collapse of the Disarmament Conference and after the final settlement of the Saar question’ it would also be time to leave the League of Nations.1 However, to begin with, they wanted to demonstrate their peaceful intentions; thus, at Neurath’s suggestion, Hitler sent Goebbels to Geneva so that, at the opening session of the League of Nations on 22 September, he could play the part of a sensible politician for a change.2 The appearance of the internationally notorious Nazi fanatic was not in fact particularly successful. On 24 September, Neurath reported to the Foreign Ministry from Geneva that at the forthcoming Disarmament Conference there would be opposition from both the French and the British to the acquisition by the Reichswehr of the ‘defensive weapons’ that had hitherto been banned ‘and that negotiations would presumably break down over this point’.3
However, Hitler, who had already threatened to leave the Conference and the League of Nations in his May speech, was still trying to save the Disarmament Conference. When, on his return from Geneva, Neurath reported to Hitler, the latter stated that, instead of ‘delaying or breaking off negotiations’, it was definitely desirable ‘to secure a disarmament agreement, even if it does not contain all that we want’.4
A few days later he had changed his mind. On 4 October, he and Defence Minister Blomberg concurred that Germany should withdraw from the Disarmament Conference and leave the League of Nations. Bernhard von Bülow, the state secretary in the Foreign Ministry, was only brought into the discussions at a later stage and then merely informed of the decision; Foreign Minister Neurath was evidently not consulted at all. The decision was prompted by news of a new British initiative, the so-called Simon Plan, according to which Germany should be granted equality of treatment in armaments only after a probationary period lasting several years. Hitler feared that the Conference might impose this compromise solution on Germany, which would have the effect of postponing German rearmament for years. The only way of ‘preventing such a development’ would be for Germany to leave the Conference and the League of Nations and to insist that she would negotiate about disarmament only on the basis of equality of treatment for all European nations.5 On 13 October, Hitler informed the cabinet about the new policy: Germany would withdraw from all international bodies that denied her equality, and that applied specifically to the League of Nations. He said he would announce this decision along with a declaration of peace, and have it confirmed by a plebiscite in the form of new Reichstag elections.6 The following day, the ministers accepted the plans.7
; The idea of having his policies confirmed by such a ‘plebiscite’ was not new. Hitler had already discussed it with Goebbels in July after the issuing of the new Plebiscite Law. As yet there had been no reason for such a plebiscite,8 but now one was provided on 14 October, when the British Foreign Secretary, Sir John Simon, put forward his new disarmament proposals. Foreign Minister Neurath informed the President of the Disarmament Conference that the German Reich would take no further part in the negotiations, since it was evident that they were not planning general disarmament but merely a continuation of discrimination against German armaments.9 On the same day, Hitler made a government statement concerning both this decision and Germany’s departure from the League of Nations; he also announced in a radio broadcast that the German people would be given the opportunity in the form of new elections to the Reichstag and a plebiscite not only to approve his government’s policy, but to ‘solemnly commit themselves to it’.10 He gave detailed reasons for these decisions in a further broadcast on the evening of 14 October. The speech contained an olive branch to France: After the Saar territory had returned to the Reich, as far as Germany was concerned, there would be ‘no more territorial differences’ between the two countries and ‘only a madman’ could still ‘believe in the possibility of war between the two states’.11 At a cabinet meeting on 17 October, Hitler noted that the ‘critical moment has probably passed’.12
For Germany, leaving the League of Nations represented a radical change of direction in foreign policy and began a turbulent period in relations between the European states. The idea of maintaining long-term peace in Europe through a system of collective security, was therefore fatally weakened. A new phase was beginning, with Germany embarking on independent initiatives and surprise coups. International stability became precarious: in future ‘security’ was to be maintained through bilateral relationships, rearmament, and military deterrence. Massive German rearmament killed off the idea of general European disarmament and an armaments race began in which Germany was able to get on equal terms with the other states and in part overtake them. Yet, almost inevitably, this would trigger an international competition in armaments and so in a few years’ time Germany would lose its advantage. Thus, the time frame for a successful German policy of aggression was limited.
However, Hitler’s decision to risk a breach with the League of Nations and Germany’s departure from the disarmament process in autumn 1933 were not simply the result of his assessment of the international situation. The plan of having this step confirmed by the German people through a plebiscite fitted in perfectly with the policy of an active ‘leadership of the people’, which the regime had embarked upon in September with its series of major events and propaganda campaigns. By taking this dramatic step in October 1933, Hitler demonstrated his clear-sighted awareness of how extremely effective coordinating foreign policy coups with domestic politics could be. By unilaterally abrogating Germany’s armaments restrictions, he could link the plebiscite campaign, which was intended to demonstrate the nation’s support for his regime, to the causes of ‘freedom to rearm for defence’ and ‘restoration of equality for Germany’. Then, with the aid of the subsequent propaganda campaign, he could demonstrate to foreign powers the German Reich’s self-confidence, thereby establishing a strong position for the bilateral negotiations to come.
Plebiscites as a tool of government
On 22 October, Hitler began the ‘election campaign’ with two speeches outside the Hall of Liberation in Kelheim; on 24 October, he spoke in the Sportpalast in Berlin, and, during the following days, there were speeches in Hanover, Cologne, Stuttgart, and Frankfurt, in November in Weimar, Essen, Breslau, Elbing, and Kiel.13 The campaign tour was interrupted by the commemoration of the 1923 Munich putsch. On the evening of 8 November, Hitler gave the memorial address in the Bürgerbräukeller, where he felt obliged to defend the unsuccessful coup. He was determined to prevent the impression arising that he had suffered a defeat on that occasion. ‘On that evening, here in this hall, and on the following day, the nation heard the voice of our young movement; we opened the eyes of the whole of the German people, and we nurtured in the movement in its infancy the heroism which it later needed.’ Above all, the putsch enabled him later on to maintain the facade of a ‘legal’ movement. ‘If we hadn’t acted then, I could never have founded a revolutionary movement, built it up and maintained it, and still been able to remain legal. People would have rightly said: You’re just like the others; you talk a lot, but like the others you’re never going to act. But that day, that decision, enabled me to get through nine years against all the odds.’14 By openly admitting the pseudo-legality of his tactics in the ‘time of struggle’, he was signalling to the old Party members that his rejection of a continuation of the revolution four months previously might not have been set in stone. The following day, he took part in a commemoration march from the Bürgerbräukeller to the Feldherrnhalle, made another speech there, and then unveiled a bronze memorial plaque.
A gathering of the ‘old fighters’ in the Bürgerbräukeller, a commemoration march, and a memorial ceremony (in later years switched to the Königsplatz) were from now onwards all included in the annual calendar of Nazi rituals. The martyr cult, which was created around the ‘fallen’ of the putsch, and in which the motif of the ‘resurrection’ of these dead heroes clearly played a part, was intended to demonstrate every year to all that the sacrifices of 1923 had not been in vain. The new ceremony concluded on the evening of 9 November with the recruits of the SS Leibstandarte, Hitler’s bodyguard, taking their oath of loyalty outside the Feldherrnhalle. The square became hallowed ground, where young SS men took the oath to Hitler in person, swearing that they would sacrifice their lives for him as the sixteen Hitler supporters had done in November 1923. In this way the death cult had come full circle. The victims of 1923 had been elevated to the status of being the core element of an indissoluble bond of loyalty between Hitler’s supporters and their ‘Führer’. Hitler played a significant part in determining the form of this ritual and never missed it until it was abandoned in 1944. He had found a way of reinterpreting his complete miscalculation of the political situation in autumn 1923 and his actions at the time, which in reality had been dictated by fear of personal disgrace, and fabricating them into a national mythology.
After the Munich ceremonies Hitler hurried to Berlin for the high point of the election campaign, where on 10 November, with Goebbels acting as his warm-up, he spoke to workers in the Dynamo Hall of the Siemens works.15
Once again, Hitler portrayed himself as a man of the people: ‘In my youth I was a worker just like you and through hard work and studying and – I can say this as well – by going hungry, I managed slowly to work my way up.’ He wanted ‘once again to provide the German people with work and bread’, but could ‘only do it when there was peace and quiet’. He was not ‘crazy enough . . . to want a war’. After all, he had been in the war. ‘But – and I’m certain of this – none of those people who are now attacking Germany and slandering the German people has heard a single bullet whistle past them.’16
On election day, 12 November, those citizens entitled to vote had a single choice on their ballot paper: the NSDAP list, which also included Papen and Hugenberg, although they were not members of the Party. Their inclusion shows how careful Hitler was being not to break with the original idea of a coalition government. The ballot paper also included the following question: ‘Do you, German man, and you, German woman, agree with this policy of your Reich government, and are you prepared to declare that it expresses your own will and solemnly to commit yourself to it?’ Numerous cases of fraud during the voting procedure have been documented: ballot papers were marked or numbered beforehand; in many polling stations there were no polling booths; locally known members of the opposition were barred from voting; ballot papers were subsequently altered; and, throughout the Reich, the Party organization was careful to ensure that even those who were undecided went to the
polls; invalid votes, which often contained protests, were not counted.17
The official result of the plebiscite broke all records with 95.1 per cent of the votes in favour. In fact, 89.9 per cent of those entitled to vote had voted ‘yes’. However, the ballot paper had not contained the option of a ‘no’ vote. The vote for the NSDAP Reichstag list was given as 92.1 per cent.18
Hitler had linked withdrawal from the Geneva Disarmament Conference with the decision to establish a 300,000-strong army. This superseded the Reichswehr’s existing plans. In response, during November and December 1933, the Defence Ministry introduced the decisive measures required to accelerate rearmament and restructure the army.19
Basically, since Hitler’s take-over of power, the following measures had been taken in the rearmament field. On 1 April 1933, the Reichswehr had begun implementing the second rearmament plan, which had been agreed in 1932 and envisaged, within five years, increasing the 100,000-man army by 40,000 long-service soldiers, and providing short-term training for 85,000 volunteers annually.20 It was intended that, after their training, these volunteers would be integrated into the SA,21 to enable an army of twenty-one divisions to be formed in the event of war. In addition, it was envisaged that, during spring and summer 1933, the Reichswehr22 would train a total of 90,000 men for frontier defence duties, a task which in practice only the SA could carry out. Moreover, in July 1933, Hitler ordered the SA to train 250,000 of their men so ‘that in the event of war they can be placed at the disposal of the Reichswehr’.23
Now these plans were abandoned and the 100,000-strong army with its seven infantry divisions was to be replaced by a peace-time army with twenty-one divisions and 300,000 men (representing half the size of the French army), which in wartime could be expanded to a total of sixty-three divisions. The majority of troops would initially serve for one year; the intention was to introduce conscription from 1 October. It was to provide the basis for recruitment, replacing the old idea of taking a large number of half-trained men from the SA. At the decisive meeting in the Defence Ministry on 20/21 December 1933, Blomberg announced that Hitler agreed with him that ‘apart from pre-military training, the Wehrmacht [was to be] in charge of everything’. This removal of the SA from the Reichswehr’s rearmament plans was a logical consequence of, on the one hand, a professionalization of the army, which now no longer needed to conceal its training, and, on the other, the determination of the Party leadership, Hitler in particular, to prevent as far as possible the restless Party army from increasing its power in the new state.24