Hitler

by Peter Longerich

  Two weeks after Munich, Chvalkovský now hastened to inform Hitler of the ‘complete change of attitude’ and the ‘180% [sic!] alteration in Czechoslovak policy’ in favour of Germany. Hitler told Chvalkovský that, at that moment, Czechoslovakia had two choices: a settlement with the Reich ‘in a friendly manner’, or the adoption of a hostile attitude, which would inevitably lead to a ‘catastrophe for the country’. He made it clear that he wished to leave the settlement of the future border to further Czech–Hungarian negotiations.5 In his meeting with Darányi he expressed his dissatisfaction with Hungary’s passive attitude during the Sudeten crisis;6 indeed, he and Ribbentrop were to criticize Hungary frequently during the coming months.7 Apart from that, he told his Hungarian guest that he wanted to keep out of the territorial disputes between the two countries. By contrast, during his first meeting with the Slovak Prime Minister, Tiso, Ribbentrop expressed strong German support for Slovak autonomy.8

  After it proved impossible to settle the issue of the border between Hungary and Czechoslovakia in bilateral negotiations, the governments of the two countries decided to submit themselves to the arbitration of the two Axis powers, Italy and Germany. Hitler was unenthusiastic, but suppressed his doubts probably because, at the time, he was trying to get Italy to join a three-power pact. On 2 November, the so-called Vienna Accord was announced, involving the cession of territory that hitherto had been part of Slovakia and Carpatho-Ukraine to Hungary. Hitler left it to Ribbentrop and Ciano to make peace between Slovakia and Hungary in Schloss Belvedere in Vienna.9 When, in the middle of November, Hungary attempted a military occupation of the whole of Carpatho-Ukraine, Hitler forced the Hungarians to call it off. The Hungarian occupation of Carpatho-Ukraine would ‘humiliate the Axis powers . . . whose arbitration Hungary had accepted without reservation three weeks ago’.10

  It appeared at first as if Munich would bring Poland and Germany closer together as beneficiaries of the defeat of Czechoslovakia. The cooperation begun between the two countries in 1934 had borne fruit as far as the Nazi regime was concerned and ought to be intensified. On 24 October, acting on Hitler’s instructions, Ribbentrop had received ambassador Lipski in Berchtesgaden in the presence of Walter Hewel, his liaison with the Reich Chancellery, in order to propose a ‘general settlement’ of German–Polish relations.11 He made the following proposals: Danzig should be returned to the Reich, in compensation for which Poland would receive a series of concessions in the Danzig region; an extra-territorial railway line and autobahn should be built through the Corridor; the two countries should guarantee each other’s borders; the German–Polish treaty of 1934 should be extended; and Poland should join the Anti-Comintern pact. Initially, Lipski responded only to the question of Danzig: an Anschluss with the Reich was ruled out for domestic political reasons alone.12 This was confirmed by the Polish government in their official response, which Lipski passed on to Ribbentrop on 9 November. Instead, the Warsaw government proposed that the League of Nations statute should be replaced by a Polish–German agreement, underpinning the status of Danzig as a free city.13

  Poland’s negative response convinced Hitler of the urgent need to secure a closer alliance with Italy and Japan. Responding to initial Japanese feelers put out in June, Ribbentrop had used the Munich conference to liaise with Ciano in pursuing a German–Italian–Japanese pact, behind the backs of Chamberlain and Daladier. This was intended to represent a firming up and expansion of the Anti-Comintern Pact, of which Italy had been a member since 1937.14 During Ribbentrop’s visit to Rome in October, Mussolini had given his approval in principle to this idea,15 and, at the beginning of January, Ciano indicated that Mussolini was prepared to sign it. While in Rome, Ribbentrop had explained to Ciano that the alliance reflected Hitler’s view that ‘in four to five years’ time armed conflict with the western democracies must be considered to be within the realms of possibility’.16 Ciano concluded that Ribbentrop was heading for a war in three or four years’ time under the cover of his proposed defensive alliance. Originally, the agreement was to be signed in January 1939, but this was prevented by the Japanese, who initially blamed communication problems,17 and then sent a committee of experts to Europe to discuss further details.18

  At the end of November, Hitler had issued detailed directives for ‘Wehrmacht discussions with Italy’. The idea was to prepare the basis for a joint war against France and Britain ‘with the aim of initially crushing France’ – Hitler’s first outline of the later ‘western campaign’. However, when the discussions first got started some months later, Hitler issued new instructions, involving a much more general exchange of information rather than the working out of a common war plan. He wanted to conceal from the Italians that he had no intention of launching a war in three or four years’ time, but rather aimed to do so at the next available opportunity, dragging Italy into this war through another surprise move.

  A further increase in rearmament

  Immediately after the Munich agreement, Hitler ordered a further exceptional increase in rearmament, a sign of his deep frustration that he had been forced to accept ‘the salvation of peace’. General Georg Thomas, chief of the Wehrmacht rearmament programme, informed his armaments inspectors some time later that, on the same day as Munich, he had received a directive to concentrate all preparations on a war against Britain, ‘Deadline 1942’.19

  On 14 October, Göring announced to a meeting of the General Council of the Four-Year Plan, which coordinated the work of the various ministries involved, that Hitler had directed him ‘to carry out a gigantic programme that will dwarf what has been achieved so far’. He had been assigned ‘by the Führer the task of hugely increasing rearmament, with the main focus on the Luftwaffe. The Luftwaffe had to be quintupled as fast as possible. The navy too had to rearm faster, and the army had rapidly to acquire large quantities of offensive weapons, in particular heavy artillery and heavy tanks’. But priority should also be given to ‘chemical rearmament’, in particular fuels, rubber, gunpowder, and explosives. In addition, there was the need for ‘accelerated road construction, canal improvements and, in particular, railway construction’. Moreover, the Four-Year Plan had to be revised in two ways: ‘1. All building work to do with rearmament should be prioritized, and, 2. Facilities had to be created that really saved foreign exchange’. Göring stated that he was confronted with unexpected difficulties, but, ‘in order to achieve this goal, if necessary he would turn the economy round using the most brutal methods. . . . He would make barbaric use of the general powers the Führer had assigned him.’20

  In the second part of his speech on 14 October, Göring talked about the ‘Jewish problem’. He considered the expropriation of Jewish property as undoubtedly one of the ways of resolving the economic difficulties: ‘The Jewish question had now to be tackled with every means available, for they had to be excluded from the economy’. However, he totally rejected a ‘free-for-all commissar economy’, as had occurred in Austria, where Party members had simply arrogated to themselves the right to take over Jewish property. For ‘Aryanization’ was nothing to do with the Party, but ‘solely a matter for the state. However, he was not in a position to make foreign exchange available for deporting Jews. If necessary, ghettos would have to be established in the larger cities.’

  Hitler’s decision to increase rearmament, as reported by Göring, prompted the propaganda ministry and OKW to launch a major campaign ‘to make the Wehrmacht popular’. Using a combination of media, ‘the people’s confidence in their own strength and in Germany’s military power was to be enhanced’.21

  Hitler combined his directive for a further exceptional increase in rearmament with concrete political goals. During October, he made frequent brief visits to the recently occupied Sudeten territories, in order to receive applause, visit Wehrmacht units, and inspect the Czech fortifications.22 On 21 October, he directed the Wehrmacht to set itself three tasks for the immediate future:

  ‘1. To secure the border
s of the German Reich and provide protection against surprise air attacks.

  2.To liquidate the remainder of Czechoslovakia.

  3. To take over Memel.’

  As far as ‘liquidating the remainder of Czechoslovakia’ was concerned, preparations ‘were to be made already in peacetime and geared to a surprise attack so that Czechia has no opportunity for a planned response’.23

  Pogrom: ‘The Night of Broken Glass’

  Immediately after the signing of the Munich agreement, a strong anti-Semitic mood developed once more among Party activists. It followed on from the anti-Jewish excesses of summer 1938, for which Goebbels’s Berlin campaign had been mainly responsible, but which had been suppressed by the regime during September for diplomatic reasons.

  Now, in October 1938, Party activists evidently intended to find a scapegoat for the mood of depression that had spread throughout the Reich during September as a result of the threat of war. Once again, ‘the Jews’ would have to bear the brunt of the Party members’ frustration. After the conclusion of the Munich agreement diplomatic concerns no longer applied, and so anti-Jewish excesses could begin again: Jewish shops and synagogues were daubed with graffiti and destroyed.24 According to the SD, during October, a real pogrom atmosphere developed among Party activists.25 However, this was by no means a spontaneous unleashing of emotion on the part of radical anti-Semites; it chimed in exactly with the policy the SD itself had been pursuing since the summer of 1938.

  In response to the massive expulsion of Jews from Germany and, in particular from Austria after the Anschluss, in July 1938, an international refugee conference had been convened in Evian on the initiative of President Roosevelt. However, it had only revealed the unwillingness of participant countries to admit large contingents of Jewish refugees. The sole concrete result had been the creation of an Intergovernmental Committee on Political Refugees, which was supposed to work out future arrangements in consultation with Germany. This enabled Germany to turn the expulsion of Jews from the Reich into a ‘problem’ requiring an international solution.26 Thus, there was an incentive to speed up expulsions in order to put pressure on the Committee to act.

  In the meantime, Adolf Eichmann, the SD’s desk officer for Jewish affairs appointed to deal with Jewish matters in Austria, had developed a scheme for accelerating Jewish expulsion. With the aid of Bürckel, in August he established a ‘Central Agency for Jewish Emigration’, through which the chaotic Jewish persecution in Austria was turned into an ‘orderly’ process for the comprehensive economic plundering and expulsion of the Jews.27 For this procedure to be adopted throughout Germany, however, a new anti-Semitic ‘wave’ was required, a spectacular radicalization of Jewish persecution that would necessitate a Reich-wide reorganization of persecution and expulsion.

  This was already happening at the end of October. On 26 October, Himmler ordered the expulsion of Polish Jews living in Germany. During the coming days, 18,000 people were arrested and driven over the Polish–German border, the first mass deportation of the Nazi era. On 7 November, 17-year-old Herschel Grynszpan shot the German diplomat, Ernst vom Rath, in Paris in revenge for the expulsion of his parents from Germany, thereby offering the regime a welcome pretext for unleashing a pogrom.28

  Figure 8. On 6 November Herschel Grynszpan wrote a final postcard to his parents: ‘Dear parents, I had to do it, may God forgive me. My heart bleeds when I hear of the tragedy you and 12,000 other Jews have suffered. I simply have to protest and make the whole world take notice of my protest, and that’s what I intend to do. Forgive me. Hermann’

  Source: akg-images

  On 7 November, the same day as the assassination attempt, the German propaganda media began a campaign, in which Grynszpan was declared to be the tool of an international Jewish conspiracy. The assassination of Gustloff by Frankfurter in 1936 was naturally portrayed as a prior example.29 During the night of 7/8 November and on the following day, Party activists in the Kassel area (a traditional centre of German anti-Semitism) carried out large-scale attacks on Jewish businesses and synagogues. This campaign was probably launched by the Gau propaganda chief.30 However, for these attacks to be turned into a Reich-wide pogrom against German Jews a central directive was required, and that, as was always the case when the regime’s so-called Jewish policy was to be radicalized, could come only from Hitler.

  Goebbels, one of the most important hard line anti-Semites, made a significant contribution towards preparing the way for this and he had personal reasons for doing so. A serious crisis in his marriage, caused by his affair with the actress Lída Baarová had damaged his relationship with Hitler, and he also wanted the differences of opinion he had had with Hitler over the Sudeten crisis to be forgotten. For Goebbels had not only been among those who wanted to avoid a war at all costs, but had made no secret of his unwillingness to use his propaganda machine to overcome the population’s lack of enthusiasm for war. Now, as Party activists in the provinces once again began large-scale attacks on Jews, Goebbels saw the chance radically to change the image of an all too ‘peace-loving’ German population through a Reich-wide pogrom. And here Goebbels’s desire to rehabilitate himself coincided with the intentions of the Jewish persecutors in the SD and SS, as well as with Hitler’s own. During these weeks, the ‘Führer’ was trying to find an issue that would enable him to bring about a fundamental change in the Third Reich’s public persona, a shift towards maximum solidarity, ideological radicalism, and readiness for war. An open eruption of a hitherto inconceivable degree of anti-Jewish violence would provide him with the platform for this fundamental reorientation. He calculated that this would cause a panic-stricken flight of Jews from Germany, with the international community coming under pressure to take them in. Moreover, the most radical expulsion possible of Jews from Germany would, as with Austria, offer the prospect of rapidly acquiring Jewish property, thereby alleviating the Reich’s precarious foreign exchange and financial position.

  Thus, Hitler launched a pogrom against the Jews from a variety of very different motives and interests. His decision to step up the radicalization of Jewish persecution can be seen – following 30 June 1934, the Nuremberg laws of 1935, the switch to the Four-Year Plan in 1936, and the solution of the Blomberg–Fritsch crisis in 1938 – as one more stage in the history of his dictatorship, one of those situations in which he allowed a complex crisis to come to a head, so that he could then intervene in a spectacular way and apparently reorder it, focusing attention on an issue he could use to dominate the political agenda during the following weeks.

  On the evening of 8 November, participants in the failed 1923 putsch, together with Party bigwigs, gathered in the Bürgerbräukeller, as they did every year, in order to take part in the traditional commemorative march the following day. Meanwhile, the anti-Jewish press campaign was continuing.31 In addition, during the course of the day more reports were coming in of anti-Jewish riots in Kassel and Dessau.32 In the late afternoon of the following day, while staying in his flat in Prinzregentenplatz, Hitler received the news that vom Rath had died of his injuries.33 That evening, the usual celebrations took place in Munich’s old town hall and, on the sidelines, Hitler conferred with Goebbels, who later noted the following in his diary: ‘I explain the matter to the Führer, He decides: “Let the demonstrations continue. Withdraw the police. For once the Jews’ll feel the people’s anger.” That’s as it should be. I immediately give appropriate instructions to the police and the Party. Then I speak briefly along those lines to the Party leadership. Storms of applause. Everyone dashes straight off to telephone. Now the people will act.’34

  Hitler had left the town hall before Goebbels’s speech, but it is clear from Goebbels’s note that it was Hitler who gave the go ahead for the pogrom. However, it was up to Goebbels to inform the Party leadership of the decision in his harangue and, during the next few hours, to take the lead as a hardliner, so that many people considered him responsible for the pogrom. This distribution of roles was fully int
ended by Hitler, who remained very much in the background during the events that followed.

  During the night, high ranking Party functionaries, Gauleiters, SA Gruppenführer, and the like, urged on by Goebbels, unleashed the pogrom in hundreds of towns and cities. Party members and SA men in civilian clothes, who, throughout the Reich, had been meeting to commemorate 9 November, now went about destroying synagogues, setting them on fire, smashing the windows of Jewish businesses, and plundering shops; they gained forced entry to Jewish flats, destroying the furnishings, stealing items of value, mistreating and dragging off their inhabitants.35 Shortly before midnight, the Gestapo received instructions to prepare for the arrest of 20,000 to 30,000 Jews, an order that came directly from Hitler.36 These mass arrests of more than 30,000 people took place on 10 November; the vast majority of victims, over 25,000, were placed in concentration camps, where most of them remained incarcerated for weeks or months while being subjected to cruel mistreatment.37 It is not known how many died from this violence; the official number of dead was given as 91.38 However, there were a considerable number of suicides, as well as hundreds of Jews who, during the following weeks and months, were murdered in concentration camps or were to die from the effects of their imprisonment.39

  While the pogrom was raging in Munich, as in many other cities, Hitler remained in his flat in the Prinzregentenplatz.40 Around midnight, he joined Himmler in attending the annual swearing-in of recruits for the armed SS and the SS Death’s Head units at the Feldherrnhalle, while the city’s synagogues were burning. The fact that Hitler did not refer to these events in his address to the recruits is another example of his attempt to distance himself from the violence.41 At midday on 10 November, Hitler met Goebbels in his favourite Munich restaurant, the Osteria Bavaria in Schellingstrasse. He approved a draft prepared by the propaganda minister for an official announcement that ‘all further demonstrations and acts of retribution against the Jews’ were to cease immediately.42 Clearly, the whole campaign was threatening to get out of control. Hitler informed Goebbels about the next important anti-Semitic measures: ‘They must put their businesses in order themselves. The insurance companies won’t pay them anything. Then the Führer wants gradually to expropriate Jewish businesses and give their proprietors bits of paper that we can devalue at any time.’