At the same time, the activists could draw on the verbal violence of Party leaders towards the Churches for their encouragement. Goebbels’s orchestrated attacks on the clergy through the staged ‘immorality trials’ of Franciscans in 1937 – following usually trumped-up or grossly exaggerated allegations of sexual impropriety in the religious orders – provided further ammunition.211 And, in turn, however much Hitler on some occasions claimed to want a respite in the conflict, his own inflammatory comments gave his immediate underlings all the licence they needed to turn up the heat in the ‘Church struggle’, confident that they were ‘working towards the Führer’.
Hitler’s impatience with the Churches prompted frequent outbursts of hostility. In early 1937, he was declaring that ‘Christianity was ripe for destruction’ (Untergang), and that the Churches must yield to the ‘primacy of the state’, railing against any compromise with ‘the most horrible institution imaginable’.212 In two conferences he summoned in February to try to end the damaging consequences of the conflict which Church Minister Kerrl had done nothing to solve, he eagerly seized upon Goebbels’s suggestion for new elections – to be publicized as ‘the peace move of the Führer in the Church Question’.213 However, he indicated that at some point in the future Church and state would be separated, the Concordat of 1933 between the Reich and the Vatican dissolved (to provide the regime with a free hand), and the entire force of the Party turned to ‘the destruction of the clerics (Pfaffen)’ For the time being it was necessary to wait, see what the opponents did, and be tactically clever. Everything was a means to an end – ‘the life of the people’. He expected in five or six years’ time ‘a great world showdown (Auseinandersetzung)’. In fifteen years, he would have liquidated the Peace of Westphalia – the treaty of 1648 which had brought religious accord in the German states, ending the Thirty Years War. ‘A grandiose outlook for the future,’ Goebbels called it.214
Addressing the Gauleiter in mid-March, Hitler announced that he wanted ‘no ordinary victory’ over the Churches. Either one should keep quiet about an opponent (totschweigen), or slay him (totschlagen), was how he put it.215 In April, Goebbels reported with satisfaction that the Führer was becoming more radical in the ‘Church Question’, and had approved the start of the ‘immorality trials’ against clergy.216 Goebbels noted Hitler’s verbal attacks on the clergy and his satisfaction with the propaganda campaign on several subsequent occasions over the following few weeks.217 Much of the ranting was probably at Goebbels’s prompting. But Hitler was happy to leave the Propaganda Minister and others to make the running. In as divisive an issue as this, Goebbels himself fully recognized that what must be avoided at all costs was ‘to send the Führer into the field’.218 Hitler was nevertheless again in the glare of world publicity about the persecution of the clergy when, in early July, Pastor Martin Niemöller, the leading voice of the ‘Confessing Church’, was arrested as part of an assault on ‘disloyal’ Protestant churchmen.219 But, if Goebbels’s diary entries are a guide, Hitler’s interest and direct involvement in the ‘Church struggle’ declined during the second half of the year. Other matters were by now occupying his attention.
The ‘Jewish Question’ does not appear to have figured prominently among them. Goebbels, who saw Hitler almost on a daily basis at this time and who noted the topics of many private conversations they had together, recorded no more than a couple of instances where the ‘Jewish Question’ was discussed. On the first day of the Party Rally in Nuremberg, Hitler talked in his hotel to Goebbels about ‘race questions’. ‘There too there’s a lot still to be clarified,’ commented the Propaganda Minister.220 At the end of November, among ‘a thousand things talked about’ over lunch was the ‘Jewish Question’. The discussion appears to have been prompted by Goebbels’s preparations for legislation to ban Jews from attending theatres and cultural events. ‘My new law will soon be ready,’ he wrote.221 ‘But that is not the goal. The Jews must get out of Germany, yes out of the whole of Europe. That will still take some time. But it will and must happen. The Führer is firmly decided on it.’222 It was a statement of belief, not a political decision resting on clearly thought-out strategy. Anti-Jewish policy, as we have seen, had gathered pace since 1933 without frequent or coherent central direction. It was no different in 1937. Hitler’s views, as his comment to Goebbels makes clear, remained unchanged since his first statement on the ‘Jewish Question’ back in September 1919. He gave a clear indication to a gathering of some 800 district leaders (Kreisleiter) in April 1937 of his tactical caution but ideological consistency in the ‘Jewish Question’. Though he made plain to his enemies that he wanted to destroy them, the struggle had to be conducted cleverly, and over a period of time, he told his avid listeners. Skill would help him manoeuvre them into a corner. Then would come the blow to the heart.223 It was in line with these precepts that he now sanctioned, following the prompting in June 1937 of the Reich Doctors’ Leader Gerhard Wagner, measures (eventually coming into effect in 1938) to ban all Jewish doctors from medical practice – a step he had regarded as inopportune when the issue had been raised in late 1933.224
But this was a rare instance of direct involvement around this time. For the most part, he was content to remain for the time being inactive in the ‘Jewish Question’. His tacit approval was all that was required. And no more was needed than his tirade against ‘Jewish Bolshevism’ at the Party Rally in September to act as a green light inviting the new antisemitic wave – even fiercer than that of 1935 – that was to unfold throughout 1938.225
After two relatively quiet years, discrimination against the Jews again intensified. Increasingly radical steps were initiated to eliminate them from the economy, and from more and more spheres of social activity. The Security Service (Sicherheitsdienst, SD), whose ‘Jewish Section’ (Judenreferat) was run by the ambitious Adolf Eichmann, had in fact since the start of the year been advocating renewed pressure on the Jews to force them out of the economy and speed up their emigration from Germany.226 The manufacture of a ‘popular mood hostile to Jews’ and the deployment of illegal ‘excesses’ – mob violence, which was seen as particularly effective – were recommended.227 By autumn, the climate was becoming more hostile than ever for the Jewish population.228 Schacht’s loss of influence, and finally his departure from the Economics Ministry on 27 November, now removed an obstacle to the ‘aryanization’ of the economy. Pressure to fulfil this aspect of the Party’s Programme mounted.229 Göring, by this time in effect in charge of the economy, was more than ready to push forward the ‘aryanization’. The upswing of the economy made big business, losing the uncertainties of the first years of Nazi rule, willing partners, eager to profit from the takeover of Jewish firms at knock-down prices.230 By April 1938 more than 60 percent of Jewish firms had been liquidated or ‘aryanized’.231 From late 1937 onwards, individual Jews also faced an expanding array of discriminatory measures, initiated without central coordination by a variety of ministries and offices – all in their way ‘working towards the Führer’ – which tightened immeasurably the screw of persecution.232 Hitler’s own contribution, as usual, had largely consisted of setting the tone and providing the sanction and legitimation for the actions of others.
In world affairs, events beyond Hitler’s control were causing him to speculate on the timing and circumstances in which the great showdown would occur. By the end of 1937, the signs were that radicalization was gathering pace not just in anti-Jewish policy (and, largely instigated by the Gestapo, in the persecution and repression of other ethnic and social minorities), but also in foreign policy.233
Hitler began the year by expressing his hope to those at his lunch table that he still had six years to prepare for the coming showdown. ‘But, if a very favourable chance comes along,’ commented Goebbels, ‘he also doesn’t want to miss it.’ Hitler stressed Russian strength and warned against underestimating the British because of their weak political leadership. He saw opportunities of winning allies in eastern Eur
ope (particularly Poland) and the Balkans as a consequence of Russia’s drive for world revolution.234 Hitler’s remarks followed a long briefing by Blomberg earlier that morning in the War Ministry about the rapid expansion of rearmament and the Wehrmacht’s preparations for ‘Case X’ – taken to be Germany, together with its fascist allies against Russia, Czechoslovakia, and Lithuania. The question of German occupation was evidently raised. Hitler, Goebbels, and Blomberg discussed the installation of senior Gauleiter as Civilian Commissars. Hitler was satisfied with what he had heard.235
A foretaste of what might be expected from the German leadership in war followed the dropping of two ‘red bombs’ on the battleship Deutschland, stationed off Ibiza, by a Spanish Republican plane on the evening of 29 May, killing twenty-three and injuring over seventy sailors. Admiral Raeder, Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, was dispatched by Blomberg to Munich to bear the brunt of Hitler’s fury. Hitler’s immediate reaction, ‘fuming with rage’, as Goebbels put it, was to bomb Valencia in reprisal. But after a hastily arranged conference with Blomberg, Raeder, Göring, and von Neurath, he ordered instead the cruiser Admiral Scheer to fire on the southern Spanish harbour town of Almería. Hitler, seething but nervous at the outcome, paced up and down his room in the Reich Chancellery until three o’clock in the morning. The shelling of Almería for an hour left twenty-one civilians dead, fifty-three injured, and destroyed thirty-nine houses. Hitler was satisfied. He had seen it as a prestige question. Prestige had now been restored.236
He had by this time lost faith in Spain becoming a genuinely fascist country. He saw Franco as a Spanish variant of General Seeckt (the former ‘strong man’ in the German army in the 1920s) – a military man without any mass movement behind him.237 Despite his worries about Spain, however, he had no regrets about ordering German intervention, and pointed to the many advantages which Germany had drawn from its involvement.238 Goebbels’s diary notes reflect Hitler’s wider perceptions of world affairs during the latter half of 1937, and his watchful eye on opportunities for German expansion. The radicalization in foreign policy which brought the Anschluß with Austria and then the Sudeten crisis in Czechoslovakia in 1938 were foreshadowed in Hitler’s musings on future developments during these months.
The arch-enemy, the Soviet Union, was in Hitler’s eyes weakened both by its internal turmoils and by Japanese triumphs in the war against China.239 He was puzzled by the Stalinist purges. ‘Stalin is probably sick in the brain (gehirnkrank),’ Goebbels reported him as saying. ‘His bloody regime can otherwise not be explained. But Russia knows nothing other than Bolshevism. That’s the danger we have to smash down some day.’240 A few months later, he was repeating the view that Stalin and his followers were mad. ‘Must be exterminated (Muß ausgerottet werden)’ was his sinister conclusion.241 He was anticipating that the opportunity might arise following a Japanese victory over China. Once China was smashed, he guessed, Tokyo would turn its attention to Moscow. ‘That is then our great hour,’ he predicted.242
Hitler’s belief in an alliance with Britain had by now almost evaporated. His attitude towards Britain had come to resemble that of a lover spurned.243 Contemptuous of the British government, he also saw Britain greatly weakened as a world power.244 Egged on by Ribbentrop, by now aggressively anti-British, and diverging sharply from the more cautious Foreign Office line that looked to a negotiated settlement in time with Britain (involving territorial revision and concession of colonies), his hopes now rested – too strongly for Goebbels’s liking – on his new friend Mussolini.245
Nothing was spared in the preparations for a huge extravaganza with all conceivable pomp and circumstance to make the maximum impact on the Duce during his state visit to Germany between 25 and 29 September. Hitler even had an aeroplane dispatched to fetch ripe pears for the Duce, concerned that there was not a sufficiently wide choice of fruit to offer his guest from southern Europe.246 Not even the torrential rain that drenched the hundreds of thousands assembled at Tempelhof on 28 September to hear speeches from the two dictators, and made it difficult for Mussolini to read his prepared German text, could damage the impression that the visit made on the Duce.247 He took home with him an image of German power and might – together with a growing sense that Italy’s role in the Axis was destined to be that of junior partner. Hitler was also overjoyed at the outcome. There had been agreement on cooperation in Spain, and on attitudes towards the war in the Far East. Hitler was certain that Italian friendship was assured, since Italy had in any case little alternative. Only the ‘Austrian Question’, on which Mussolini would not be drawn, remained open. ‘Well, wait and see,’ commented Goebbels.248
From remarks recorded by Goebbels, it is clear that Hitler was already by summer 1937 beginning to turn his eyes towards Austria and Czechoslovakia, though as yet there was no indication of when and how Germany might move against either state. Nor were ideological or military-strategic motives, however important for Hitler himself, the only ones influencing notions of expansion in central Europe. Continuing economic difficulties, especially in fulfilling the Wehrmacht’s demands for raw materials, had been the main stimulus to increased German pressure on Austria since the successful visit by Göring to Italy in January.249 Gold and foreign-currency reserves, labour supplies, and important raw materials were among the lure of a German takeover of the alpine Republic.250 Not surprisingly, therefore, the office of the Four Year Plan was at the forefront of demands for an Anschluß as soon as possible. The economic significance of the ‘Austrian Question’ was further underlined by Hitler’s appointment in July 1937 of Wilhelm Keppler, who had served before 1933 as an important link with business leaders, to coordinate Party affairs regarding Vienna.251 Further concessions to follow on those of the 1936 agreement – including the ending of censorship on Mein Kampf – were forced on the Austrian government in July. ‘Perhaps we’re again coming a step further,’ mused Goebbels.252 ‘In Austria, the Führer will some time make a tabula rasa,’ the Propaganda Minister noted, after a conversation with Hitler at the beginning of August. ‘Let’s hope we can all still experience it,’ he went on. ‘He’ll go for it then. (Er geht dann aufs Ganze.) This state is not a state at all. Its people belong to us and will come to us. The Führer’s entry into Vienna will one day be his proudest triumph.’253 At the end of the Nuremberg Rally, a few weeks later, Hitler told Goebbels that the issue of Austria would some time be resolved ‘with force’.254 Before the end of the year, Papen was unfolding to Hitler plans to topple the Austrian Chancellor Schuschnigg.255 Göring and Keppler were by then both convinced that Hitler would tackle the question of Austria during the spring or summer of 1938.256
In the case of Czechoslovakia, too, Hitler’s intentions were unmistakable to Goebbels. ‘Czechia (die Tschechei) is also no state,’ he noted in his diary in August. ‘It will one day be overrun.’257 The refusal by Czech authorities to allow children from the Sudeten area to go for holidays to Germany was used by Goebbels as the pretext to launch the beginning of a vitriolic press campaign against the Czechs.258 Göring had by this time been stressing to the British Ambassador, Nevile Henderson – who gave the air of being more accommodating to German claims than his predecessor Sir Eric Phipps, whom he had replaced in April, had been – Germany’s rights to Austria and the Sudetenland (in due course also to revision of the Polish border). To a long-standing British acquaintance, the former air attaché in Berlin, Group Captain Christie, he went further: Germany must have not simply the Sudetenland, but the whole of Bohemia and Moravia, Göring asserted.259 By mid-October, following the demands of Konrad Henlein, the Sudeten German leader, for autonomy, Goebbels was predicting that Czechoslovakia would in the future ‘have nothing to laugh about’.260
On 5 November 1937 the Propaganda Minister lunched, as usual, with Hitler. The general situation was discussed. The Czech question was to be toned down for the time being because Germany was still not in a position to take any action. The issue of colonies was also to be taken more slowl
y, so as not to awaken false expectations among the population. In the run-up to Christmas, the heat had, too, to be turned down on the ‘Church struggle’. The long-running saga of Schacht was nearing its dénouement. Schacht had to go, it was agreed. But the Führer wanted to wait until after the Party’s ritual Putsch commemoration on 9 November before taking any action. In the afternoon, Goebbels went home to continue work. The Führer, he noted, had ‘General Staff talks’.261
VII
In the gloom of late afternoon, the chiefs of the army, Luftwaffe, and navy, together with War Minister Blomberg, made their way to the Reich Chancellery for a meeting, as they thought, to establish the allocation of steel supplies to the armed forces. The reason for the meeting dated back to late October, when Admiral Raeder, increasingly concerned about Göring’s allocation of steel and the preferential treatment of the Luftwaffe, had posed an ultimatum to Blomberg indicating that no expansion of the navy was possible without additional steel supplies. Raeder was unwilling to make concessions. He thought an immediate decision by the Führer was necessary.262 With the dispute among the branches of the armed forces simmering and the prospect of the arms drive stagnating, Blomberg pressed Hitler for clarification. Eventually, Hitler agreed to the meeting. Blomberg, not Hitler, sent out the invitations to discuss ‘the armaments situation and raw materials demands’ to the chiefs of the three armed forces’ branches.263 The military leaders had a surprise when they reached the Reich Chancellery at 4p.m. to find present, alongside Hitler and his military adjutant, Colonel Hoßbach, also the Foreign Minister von Neurath. Another surprise was waiting for them when, instead of dealing with the issue of raw materials allocation (which was discussed relatively briefly only towards the end of the lengthy meeting), Hitler, speaking from prepared notes, launched into a monologue lasting over two hours on Germany’s need to expand by use of force within the following few years.264