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HITLER SPEAKS BEFORE THE REICHSTAG
IN BERLIN - JANUARY 1939
The Jewish Question
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Adolf Hitler.
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Hitler's Jewish Question speech.
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original German transcript of the
speech.
It follows the English translation of a partial text transcript of
Adolf Hitler's The Jewish Question speech, delivered at
Berlin, Germany - January 30, 1939.
 |
Deputies! Men of the
German Reichstag! |
When, six years
ago this evening, tens of thousands of National
Socialist fighters marched through the
Brandenburg Gate to the light of their torches
to express to me, who had just been appointed
Chancellor of the Reich, their feeling of
overwhelming joy and their vows as faithful
followers countless anxious eyes all over
Germany and in Berlin gazed upon the beginning
of a development, the end of which still seemed
unknown and unpredictable.
About 13 million
Nazi voters were then behind me. A huge number -
but only just over one third of all votes cast.
Of course, the other 20 million was distributed
and fragmented to approximately 35 other parties
and factions. The only thing connecting them was
common hatred against our young movement.
It united - as
elsewhere still today - priests of the center
and communist atheists, socialist demolishers of
property and capitalist suitors of the stock
market, monarchist advocates for the throne, and
republican destroyers of the Reich.
They all had found
each other in the long struggle of the national
socialism for the leadership to defend their
interests and were in cahoots with Jewry. The
politicizing bishops of the various churches
spread their blessing hands over it.
Opposite this only
in the negative bonding fragmentation of the
nation stood that third of faithful German men
and women, who - against a world of internal and
external opposition - embarked upon the
recreation of the German Volk and
Reich.
The overall
picture of the size of the collapse at that time
is beginning to fade.
But one thing
remains unforgotten: It seemed that only a
miracle in the twelfth hour could save Germany.
We National Socialists believed in this miracle.
Our opponents ridiculed our belief in it. The
idea of redeeming the nation from a decline
extending over fifteen years simply by the power
of a new idea seemed to the non-National
Socialists fantastic nonsense.
To the Jews and the other enemies of the State,
however, it appeared to be the last flicker of
the national power of resistance. And they felt
that when it had disappeared, then they would be
able to destroy not only Germany but all Europe
as well. Had the German Reich sunk into
Bolshevik chaos it would at that very moment
have plunged the whole of Western civilization
into a crisis of inconceivable magnitude. Only
islanders with the most limited vision can
imagine that the Red plague would have stopped
of its own accord before the sacredness of the
democratic idea or at the boundaries of
disinterested States.
The rescue of Europe began at one end of the
Continent with Mussolini and Fascism. National
Socialism continued this rescue in another part
of Europe and at the present moment we are
witnessing in still a third country the same
drama of a brave triumph over the Jewish
international attempt to destroy European
civilization.
Now, what are six
years in the life of one man? What are they even
in the lives of the peoples? One sees in such a
short span of development little more than the
symptoms of a general stagnation, a regression
or a progress. But looking back, the last six
years in Germany were filled with the most
colossal events in German history.
On January 30,
1933, I moved into the Wilhelm Street filled
with the deepest anxiety for the future of my
people. Today, six years later, I am able to
speak before the first Reichstag of Great
Germany! We are, indeed, perhaps better able
than other generations to realize the full
meaning of those pious words: "What a change by
the grace of God."
Six years is
enough to fulfill the dream of centuries; one
year to bring our people in the pleasure of that
unity which was the unsuccessful aim of many
generations.
As I today see you
assembled before me as the representatives of
our German people from all over the Reich and
know that among you are the newly elected men of
the Ostmark [Austria] and the Sudetenland I am
once more overwhelmed by tremendous impressions
of the events of a year which realized the dream
of centuries.
How much blood has been shed in vain for this
goal! How many million Germans have consciously
or unconsciously trodden the bitter path to
sudden or painful death for the sake of this
ideal! How many others have been condemned to
drag out behind the walls of fortresses and
prisons lives they would gladly have given for
Great Germany! How many hundreds of thousands
have been scattered over the wide world by the
endless stream of German emigration, driven by
misery and want! For many a year they still
think of their unfortunate homeland, but as
generations go by they forget it. And now in a
single year it has been possible to realize this
dream.
Not without a
fight, as unthinking citizens to maintain this
might think. Prior to this year of German
unification we had almost two decades of
struggle for a fanatical political idea.
Hundreds of thousands and millions threw
themselves into it, their physical and economic
existence; they took ridicule just as willing as
years of shameful treatment, pathetic slander,
and unbearable terror. Numerous blood-covered
dead and injured all over Germany are witnesses
of the fight.
Moreover, this success was won through an
immense effort of will and by force of brave and
fanatical endured decisions. I mention this
because there is a chance that precisely those
who had the least practical part in the success
of Germany's unification, cheekily claim the act
of creation of this Reich as their doing. Or
they might view the events of the year 1938 as a
long overdue but unfortunately delayed matter of
course which was finally brought about by
National Socialism.
To these elements I would like assure that the
enforcement of this year took a nerve-force of
which these goblins not even possess a hint!
These are the well known old incorrigible
pessimists, skeptics, or apathetics, which were
always absent as positive elements in all of our
twenty years of struggle, but who now - after
the victory - think they have to deliver their
critical comments as called experts of the
national exaltation.
I will now in a
few sentences give you the facts of the
historical events of the memorable year 1938.
Among the fourteen points which President Wilson
promised Germany in the name of all the Allies
as the basis on which a new world peace was to
be established when Germany laid down her arms
was the fundamental principle of the
self-determination of peoples. The proclamation
of this principle might have been of fundamental
importance. Actually during the following period
the Allied Powers of the day also applied these
theories when they could make them serve their
own selfish purposes. Thus they refuse to return
Germany's colonial possessions, alleging that it
would be wrong to return the native inhabitants
of the colonies to Germany against their will.
But, of course, in 1918 no one took the trouble
to find out what their will was. But while the
Allies thus upheld the right of
self-determination for primitive Negro tribes,
they refused in 1918 to grant to a highly
civilized nation like the Germans the rights of
man which had previously been solemnly promised
to them. All efforts to bring about a change in
the situation to normal methods of reasonable
revision have hitherto failed, and are bound to
fail in the future, in view of the well-known
attitude of the Versailles powers. Indeed, all
the articles dealing with revision in the
Covenant of the League of Nations had only a
platonic significance.
I myself, as a son of the Ostmark, was filled
with a sacred wish to solve this problem and
thus lead my homeland back to the Reich. In
January, 1938, I finally resolved that in the
course of that year, in one way or another, I
would fight for and win the right of
self-determination for the 6,500,000 Germans in
Austria.
1. I invited Herr
Schuschnigg, then Chancellor of Austria, to an
interview at Berchtesgaden and made it clear to
him that the German Reich would no longer
inactively tolerate any further oppression of
these German comrades, and that I would
therefore leave it up to him to come up with a
sensible agreement in order to solve this
problem once and for all. I didn't leave any
doubt about the fact that otherwise the freedom
of these 6,500,000 Germans would be enforced by
other means. The result
was an agreement which permitted me to hope for
a solution of this difficult problem by means of
a general understanding.
2.
In my Reichstag speech of February 20, I stated
that the Reich could no longer be indifferent to
the fate of the 10,000,000 Germans in Central
Europe who were separated from the motherland
against their will. I stated that further
oppression and mistreatment of these Germans
would lead to the most energetic counter
measures.
A few days later, Herr Schuschnigg decided to
violate in a glaring manner the agreement which
he had entered into at Berchtesgaden. His idea
was by means of a faked plebiscite to destroy
the legal basis of the national right of
self-determination and the will of these
6,500,000 Germans. On the evening of Wednesday,
March 9, I learned of this intention through
Schuschnigg's speech at Innsbruck. That night I
ordered the mobilization of a certain number of
infantry and mechanized divisions with orders to
cross the frontier on Saturday, March 12, at 8
A.M. in order to liberate the Ostmark. On the
morning of Friday, March 11, the mobilization of
these army and SS units was completed. They took
up their positions during the course of the day.
Meanwhile in the afternoon, due to the pressure
of all the events and the rising of the citizens
in the Ostmark, Schuschnigg resigned.
On Friday night I was asked to order the German
troops to march into Austria to prevent grave
internal disorders in that country. Toward 10
P.M. troops were already crossing the frontier
at numerous points. At 6 A.M. the next morning
the main body began to march in. They were
greeted with tremendous enthusiasm by the
population which was thus at last free.
On Sunday, March
13, I ordered in Linz by means of the two laws
with which you are familiar, the integration of
the Ostmark into the German Reich and the
swearing in of the former federal army with me
as the commander in chief. Two days later the
first parades of the troops took place in
Vienna. All this took place very rapidly. The
confidence in the speed and the efficiency of
the new German Wehrmacht was not disappointed
but maybe surpassed. The belief in the great
value of this fine instrument was confirmed
within a few days.
The first election to the Greater German
Reichstag, which took place on April 10,
expressed the overwhelming approval of the
German nation. About 99 of 100 gave their vote
in approval.
A few weeks later,
influenced by the international campaign of hate
carried on by certain newspapers and individual
politicians, Czechoslovakia began an intensified
oppression of the Germans within her borders.
Close upon 3,500,000 of our fellow-countrymen
lived there in self-contained settlements which
for the most part adjoined the boundaries of the
Reich. Together with the Germans who were driven
out during twenty odd years by the Czech reign
of terror, this makes a total of over 4,000,000
persons who were retained in this State against
their will and were ill-treated to a greater or
less degree. No world power with any sense of
honor would have watched such a state of affairs
permanently. The man responsible for this
development which gradually made Czechoslovakia
the exponent of all hostile intentions directed
against the Reich, was Dr. Benes.
Despite a declaration twice given to the
Czechoslovakian President, Dr. Benes, in my
name, that Germany had not mobilized a single
solider, despite the same assurances that it was
possible to make to representatives of foreign
powers, the fiction was maintained and
disseminated that Czechoslovakia for her part
had been forced to mobilize in consequence of
the German mobilization and that Germany had
thus had to countermand her own mobilization and
to renounce her plans. . . .
I resolved to solve, once and for all, and this
radically, the Sudeten German question. On May
28, I ordered:
1. That preparations should be made for military
action against this State by October 2;
2. That the construction of our western defenses
should be greatly extended and speeded up.
For the dispute
with Mr. Benes and in order to protect the Reich
from other influences or even threats the immediate mobilization of ninety-six
divisions was planned to begin with and
arrangements were made whereby these could be
supplemented in a short time by a larger number.
Developments late in the summer and the plight
of the Germans in Czechoslovakia showed that
these preparations were justified. The various
stages of the final settlement of this problem
are a matter of history.
If certain
newspapers and politicians in the rest of the
world now allege that Germany thus threatened
other nations by military blackmail it can only
be as a result of crude distortion of the facts.
Germany restored the rights of
self-determination to 10,000,000 of her
fellow-countrymen in a territory where neither
the British nor any other Western nation have
any business. It has not threaten anyone, it has
only been a defense against the attempted
interference of third parties.
And I need not assure you gentlemen that in the
future as well we shall not tolerate the Western
States' attempting to interfere in certain
matters which concern nobody but ourselves in
order to hinder natural and reasonable solutions
by their intervention.
We were all happy therefore when, thanks to the
initiative of our good friend,
Benito Mussolini,
and thanks also to the highly appreciated
readiness of
Mr. Chamberlain and
M. Daladier, it
became possible to find the elements of an
agreement which not only allowed of the peaceful
settlement of a matter which admitted no further
delay but could moreover be looked upon as an
example of the possibility of a general and
sensible treatment and settlement of certain
vital problems. However, if it weren't for the
resolution to solve this problem either way, the
European powers wouldn't have come together.
[...]
This unique event in the history of our nation
represents for you, gentlemen, a sacred and
everlasting obligation. You are not the deputies
of a district or of a certain side, you are not
the representatives of particular interests, but
you are, first of all, the chosen delegates of
the whole German nation. You are thus guarantors
of that German Reich which National Socialism
has made possible and created. You are therefore
in duty bound to serve with the deepest loyalty
the movement which paved the way for and
realized the miracle of German history in the
year 1938. In you must be incorporated in the
most superlative form the virtues of the
National Socialist party — loyalty, comradeship
and obedience.
[...]
The history of the last thirty years has taught
us all one great lesson, namely, that the
importance of nations in the world is
proportionate to their strength at home. The
number and value of a population determines the
importance of a nation as a whole. The final
decisive part played in the valuation of the
real strength of a nation will always be found
in the state of its internal order; that is, the
organization of its national strength.
The German of today is no different from that of
ten, twenty or thirty years ago. Since then the
number of Germans has not increased to any
considerable extent. The capabilities of genius
and energy cannot be considered more plentiful
than in former times. The one thing which has
changed considerably is the way in which these
values are utilized to the full by the manner of
their organization, and thanks to the formation
of a new method of the selection of the leaders.
[...]
Gentlemen, we are faced with enormous and
stupendous tasks. A new history of the
leadership of our nation must be constructed.
Its composition is dependent on race. It is,
however, just as necessary to demand and make
sure through the system and method of our
education that above all bravery and the
readiness to accept responsibility will be
regarded as essential qualities in those about
to assume public office of any kind.
When appointing men to leading positions in the
State and party, greater value should be placed
on character than on purely academic or
allegedly intellectual suitability. It is not
abstract knowledge which must be considered as a
decisive factor wherever a leader is required
but rather a natural talent for leadership, and
with it a highly developed sense of
responsibility which brings with it
determination, courage and endurance. It must be
recognized on principle that the lack of a sense
of responsibility can never be made up for by a
supposedly first-class academic training, of
which certificates may supply the fruit.
Knowledge and qualities of leadership, which
always imply energy, are not incompatible. But
in doubtful cases knowledge can in no
circumstances be a substitute for integrity,
courage, bravery and determination. These are
the qualities that are more important in a
leader of the people in the State and party.
And I say this to you now, gentlemen, looking
back on the one year in German history which has
shown me more clearly than the whole of my
previous life how vital and essential these very
qualities are; and how in time of crisis one
single energetic man of action outweighs ten
feeble intellectuals. But as a factor in society
this new type, selected as embodying the
qualities of leadership, must also be freed from
numerous prejudices which I can really only
describe as the untruthful and fundamentally
nonsensical code of social morals. There is no
attitude which cannot find its ultimate
justification in the benefit which it brings to
the community as a whole.
Anything that is obviously unimportant or even
harmful to the existence of the community is not
to be recognized as a moral code on which a
social order can be built up. And most important
of all, the national community is possible only
when laws are recognized which are binding for
all. It will not do to expect or demand that one
man should act in accordance with principles
which in the eyes of the others are absurd or
harmful or even just unimportant. I fail to
appreciate the efforts of social classes, which
are dying out, to cut themselves off from real
life and keep themselves artificially alive
behind a hedge of dry, outlived class laws.
[...]
So long as the idea is only to secure a peaceful
burial place there is no objection. But if this
is an attempt to place a barrier in the way of
life's progressive march then the windstorm of
youth will clear away the whole tangled growth
in its downward sweep. In the German State of
today, the people's State, there are no social
prejudices. And consequently there is no special
social code of morals. This State recognizes
only the laws of life and the necessities at
which man has arrived through reason and
insight. National Socialism recognizes these
laws of necessity and it is one of the concerns
of National Socialism to have them respected.
[...]
Gentlemen, we live in an age when the air is
full of the cries of democratic defenders of
morals and world reformers. Judging from the
statements of these apostles one might almost
conclude that the whole world is only waiting
its chance to redeem the German nation from its
unhappy plight, to lead it back to the blessed
state of cosmopolitan brotherhood and mutual
assistance in international affairs which were
Germans were so thoroughly able to test during
the fifteen years before the National Socialist
assumption of power.
Speeches and newspapers in these democracies
tell us every day about the difficulties we
Germans face. One difference is to be noted
between the speeches of the statesmen and the
leading articles of their journalists. The
statesmen either pity us or else unctuously
praise the tried recipes — which unfortunately,
however, do not seem to be so successful in
their own countries; the journalists on the
other hand give expression to their true
sentiments somewhat more candidly. They inform
us confidently and with a feeling of malicious
pleasure that we are either suffering a famine
or that one is — God wiling — about to descend
upon us, that we are facing ruin as the result
of a financial crisis, or else a production
crisis or — if even that should not come to pass
— a consumption crisis.
The only thing is that the sagacity of these
democratic world economic scholars, of which we
have so much concrete proof, does not always
produce quite uniform diagnosis. During the past
week alone, in view of the increased
concentration of German self-assertiveness, one
could read at the same time:
1. That although Germany had a surplus of
production she would succumb as a result of the
lack of consumption power;
2. Although there was a huge consumers' demand,
the shortage of production goods alone would
bring the country to ruin;
3. That we should certainly collapse under the
terrific burden of our debts;
4. That we wanted no debts, but by National
Socialist policy in this field too we were
acting contrary to the last sacred capitalist
ideas, and consequently — please God — would
ruin ourselves;
5. That the German people were in revolt on
account of the low standard of living;
6. That the State could no longer maintain the
high standard of living of the German people —
and so on.
All these and many similar theses of these
democratic world economic dogmatists had their
forerunners in countless statements made during
the period of the National Socialist struggle
and in particular during the last six years. In
all these laments and prophecies there is only
one sincere strain, and that is the single
honest democratic wish that the German people,
and particularly the National Socialist Germany
of today, should finally perish.
[...]
What is the root cause of all our economic
difficulties? It is the overpopulation of our
territory. And in this connection there is only
one fact and one question which I can hold up to
the Western and the extra-European democracies.
The fact is this: In Germany there are 135
people to the square kilometer, living entirely
without their former reserve; for fifteen years
a prey to all the rest of the world, burdened
with tremendous debts, without colonies, but the
German people are nevertheless fed and clothed,
and, moreover, there are no unemployed among
them.
While the question is this: Which of the
so-called great democracies is capable of
performing the same feat? If we chose particular
methods, the reason was simply that we were
forced intro particular circumstances. And in
fact, our position was so difficult that there
can be no possible comparison with the position
of the other great States. There are countries
in the world where instead of 135 people to the
square kilometer, as there are in Germany, there
are only between five and eleven, where vast
stretches of fertile land lie fallow, where all
imaginable minerals are available. There are
countries which have all this and the natural
wealth of coal, iron and ore and yet are not
even capable of solving their own social
problems, of doing away with unemployment or
overcoming their other difficulties.
And now the representatives of these States
swear by the wonderful qualities of their
democracy. They are quite at liberty to do so as
far as they are concerned. But as long as we
still had an offshoot of this democracy in
Germany we had 7,000,000 unemployed; trade and
industry were faced with absolute ruin in town
and country, and society was on the point of
revolution. Now we have solved these problems in
spite of our difficulties, and for this we have
our regime and our internal organization to
thank. The representatives of foreign
democracies marvel that we now take the liberty
of maintaining that our regime is better than
the former one; above all they marvel that the
German people acquiesce in the present regime
and reject the former.
But, after all, does not a regime which has the
support of 99 per cent of the people represent
quite a different kind of democracy from the
solution which in some countries is possible
only with the help of extremely doubtful methods
of influencing election results? And above all,
what is the meaning of this attempt to foist
something onto us which — insofar as it is a
question of government by the people — we
already possess in a much clearer and better
form? But as for the method that is so much
recommended, it has proved absolutely useless in
our country.
In those other countries it is maintained that
collaboration should be possible between
democracies and what they term dictatorships.
And what might that mean? The question of the
form of government or of the organization of the
national community is not a subject for
international debate at all. It is a matter of
absolute indifference to us in Germany what form
of government other nations have. At the most,
it is a matter of indifference to us whether
National Socialism — which is our copyright,
just as fascism is the Italian one — is exported
or not. We are not in the least interested in
this ourselves! We see no advantage in making
shipments of National Socialism as an idea, nor
do we feel that we have any occasion to make war
on other people because they are democrats.
The assertion that National Socialism in Germany
will soon attack North or South America,
Australia, China, or even the Netherlands,
because different systems of government are in
control in these places, is on the same plane as
the statement that we intend to follow it up
with an immediate occupation of the full moon.
[...]
If certain methods of our economic policy appear
injurious to the rest of the world, it should
recognize that a hatred on the part of the
former victor States, which was irrational and
purposeless from an economic point of view, was
chiefly responsible for making these efforts
necessary. On this occasion again, as so often
before, I wish to make clear in a few words to
you, gentlemen, and thus to the entire German
people, an existing situation which we must
either accept or alter.
Before the war Germany was a flourishing
economic power. She participated in
international trade and observed the economic
laws which had general validity at that time as
well as the methods of that trade. I need say
nothing here with regard to the compulsion to
participate in this trade activity since it is
presumptuous to assume that God created the
world only for one or two peoples. Every people
has the right to ensure its existence on this
earth.
The German people is one of the oldest civilized
peoples of Europe. Its contribution to
civilization is not based on a few phrases of
politicians but on immortal achievements which
have been of positive benefit to the world. It
has exactly the same right as any other people
to share in the opening up and development of
the world. Nevertheless, even in pre-war years,
English circles upheld the idea — which was
utterly childish from an economic point of view
— that the destruction of Germany would
tremendously increase British profits from
trade. In addition, there was the further fact
that even then the Germany of that day was
believed to be in the final analysis a not
entirely amenable factor with regard to the
domination of the world which the Jews were
attempting to establish.
Consequently, from this side all available means
were utilized to incite to an attack upon
Germany. The war in which Germany found herself
involved, purely as a result of a mistaken
interpretation of loyalty to an ally, ended
after over four years with that fantastic
proclamation of the famous American President
Wilson. These fourteen points, which were then
supplemented by four additional ones, represent
the solemn commitments of the Allied powers, on
the basis of which Germany laid down her arms.
After the Armistice these undertakings were
broken in the most infamous manner.
There then began the insane efforts of the
victor States to transform the sufferings of the
war into a permanent state of warfare during
times of peace. For the most part an end has
been put to this condition today. This has not
happened because the democratic statesmen have
displayed insight or even merely a sense of
equity but solely through the strength of the
reawakened German nation.
It is in any case a fact that at the end of the
war any rational considerations would have shown
that no State had visibly profited. The clever
British writers of economic articles, who had
formerly written that destruction of Germany
would increase the wealth of every individual
Englishman and benefit the welfare of their
country, were forced — at least for a certain
period, when reality too clearly showed the
untruth of their statements — to remain silent.
Similar brilliant discoveries have begun to crop
up again in the speeches of British politicians
and the leading articles of the same type of
newspaper writers during the past few months.
What was the war fought for? In order to destroy
German sea power, which then occupied second
place.
[...]
From the banks of the Pacific Ocean in the Far
East to the waters of the North Sea and the
coast of the Mediterranean, other forms of
government are spreading with great rapidity.
Any benefits one can possibly imagine from this
war have been completely canceled, not merely by
the tremendous sacrifices of human lives and
goods but also by the continuing burden on all
production, and above all on the budgets of the
States. This, however, was a fact which was
evident and could be seem immediately after the
war. If it had been taken into consideration,
the peace treaties would certainly have been
drawn up on a different basis.
For example, proof for all time to come of an
extraordinarily limited insight in judging
economic possibilities was furnished by the sums
proposed in the years 1919 and 1920 as possible
reparations payments. They are so far beyond the
bounds of any economic reason that one can only
assume a general desire for world destruction as
the sole intelligible cause for this procedure,
which otherwise can only be characterized as
insanity.
[...]
But this was not all: in order to prevent or
hamper any autarchic activity by Germany, the
Reich was even deprived of its own colonial
possessions which had been acquired by purchases
and treaty. This means that the strongest people
of Central Europe was forced through a series of
truly brilliant maneuvers to work much harder
than before as an exporting nation regardless of
cost. For German exports had to be large enough
not only to satisfy German requirements, but
also to provide additional insanely high
reparations, which, of course, meant that, in
order to pay 1 mark, 3 or 4 marks' worth of
goods had to be exported, since in the long run
these gigantic sums could only be paid from
profits and not from capital. Since Germany was
not in a position to fulfill these obligations
the victor nations by means of loans subsidized
German trade competition on the world market,
after ten or twelve million men had given their
lives on the battlefield to eliminate the trade
enemy from the world market.
I will only mention parenthetically that this
insane procedure finally led to exaggerated
developments and in the end upset all national
economies and caused serious currency crises.
The entire conduct of the so-called victor
powers after the end of the war was completely
irrational and irresponsible. The theft of the
German colonies was morally an injustice.
Economically it was utter insanity! The
political motives advanced were so mean that one
is tempted merely to call them silly.
[...]
In actual fact the problem at the end of the war
had become still more critical than it was
before the war. Quite briefly, the problem was
as follows:
How can a just and sensible share in the world's
wealth be assured to all great nations? For
surely no one can seriously assume that, as in
the case of Germany, a mass of 80,000,000
intelligent persons, can be permanently
condemned as pariahs, or be forced to remain
passive forever by having some ridiculous legal
title, based solely on former acts of force,
held up before them. And this is true not only
of Germany but of all nations in a similar
position, for it is quite clear that: either the
wealth of the world is divided by force, in
which case this division will be corrected from
time to time by force, or else the division is
based on the ground of equity and therefore,
also, of common sense, in which case equity and
common sense must also really serve the cause of
justice and ultimately of expedience.
But to assume that God has permitted some
nations first to acquire a world by force and
then to defend this robbery with moralizing
theories is perhaps comforting and above all
comfortable for the 'haves,' but not for the
'have nots.' It is just as unimportant as it is
uninteresting and lays no obligation upon them.
Nor is the problem solved by the fact that a
most important statesman simply declares with a
scornful grin that there are nations which are
'haves' and that the others on that account must
always be 'have nots.'
[...]
As far as Germany is concerned the situation is
very simple. The Reich has 80,000,000
inhabitants; that means over fifteen persons to
the square kilometer. The great German colonial
possessions, which the Reich once acquired
peacefully by treaties and by paying for them,
have been stolen — contrary indeed to the solemn
assurance given by President Wilson, which was
the basic condition on which Germany laid down
her arms.
The objection that these colonial possessions
are of no importance in any case should only
lead to their being returned to us with an easy
mind. But the objection that this is not
possible because Germany would not know what to
do with them since she did not do anything with
them before is ridiculous. Germany, which was
late in acquiring her colonial possessions, was
able to develop them in a relatively short time
and before the war was not faced by the same
acute needs as today. This objection is
consequently just as foolish as if anybody were
to question a nation's capacity to build a
railway because it had no railway 100 years ago.
The further objection that her colonial
possessions cannot be returned to her because
Germany would thus acquire a strategic position
is a monstrous attempt to deny general rights to
a nation and a people a priori. For this can be
the only answer: Germany was in any case the
only State which set up no colonial army since
she trusted to the terms of the Congo Act which
were afterward broken by the Allies.
Germany does not require her colonial
possessions at all in order to set up armies
there — she has a sufficiently large German
population for this purpose at home — but to
relieve her economic difficulties. But even if
this be not believed, it is wholly immaterial
and in no way affects our rights. Such an
objection would only be justified if the rest of
the world wished to give up its military bases
and were only forced to maintain them if Germany
were to be given back her colonies. The fact
remains that a nation of 80,000,000 will not be
willing permanently to be assessed differently
from other nations.
The fallacy and poverty of these arguments
clearly show that at bottom it is only a
question of power, in which common sense and
justice receive no consideration from the common
standpoint of view. The very reason which could
once be advanced against taking Germany's
colonies from her can be used today for their
return.
As she lacks a sphere of economic development
for herself, Germany is forced to satisfy her
own requirements by an increasing participation
in world trade and in exchanges of goods. For on
one point those very nations must be agreed,
which themselves have immense economic
possibilities at their disposal, either because
they themselves occupy large territories or
because they have great additional colonial
possessions — namely, that the economic
existence of a nation cannot be maintained
without a sufficient supply of foodstuffs or
without independent raw materials. If both are
lacking a nation is forced to participate in
world trade under all circumstances and perhaps
to an extent which may even be undesirable to
other countries. Only a few years ago, when
conditions forced Germany to adopt her Four-Year
Plan, we could to our great astonishment hear
from the lips of British politicians and
statesmen the reproach — which at that time
sounded so sincere — that Germany was
withdrawing from the sphere of international
economics, even from world economic contacts,
and was thus retiring into regrettable
isolation.
I replied to Mr. Eden that this apprehension was
perhaps a little exaggerated and if it was meant
at all sincerely was not admissible. Conditions
today make it quite impossible for Germany to
withdraw from world trade. The simply compel us
by the mere force of necessity to participate in
it under all circumstances even when the form of
our participation perhaps does not suit one
country or another. . . .
If certain countries combat the German system
this is done in the first instance because
through this German method of trading the tricks
of international currency and Bourse
speculations have been abolished in favor of
honest business transactions. Germany, moreover,
does not force her trading methods upon anybody
else, but neither does she let any parliamentary
democrat lecture her on the principles on which
she shall or may act. We are buyers of good
foodstuffs and raw materials and suppliers of
equally good commodities! It is clear that
everything which an economic system cannot
produce in the territory in which its own
currency circulates can only be imported by an
increased turnover in exports. But since, as I
have already emphasized, a nation which has an
insufficient freedom of movement economically is
imperatively forced to import foreign raw
materials and foodstuffs, its economic system by
doing so is acting under the most imperious
force which exists, namely, the force of
necessity!
[...]
If ever need makes humans see clearly it has
made the German people do so. Under the
compulsion of this need we have learned in the
first place to take full account of the most
essential capital of a nation, namely, its
capacity to work. All thoughts of gold reserve
and foreign exchange fade before the industry
and efficiency of well-planned national
productive resources. We can smile today at an
age when economists were seriously of the
opinion that the value of currency was
determined by the reserves in gold and foreign
exchange lying in the vaults of the national
banks and, above all, was guaranteed by them.
Instead of that we have learned to realize that
the value of a currency lies in a nation's power
of production, that an increasing volume of
production sustains a currency, and could
possibly raise its value, whereas a decreasing
production must, sooner or later, lead to a
compulsory devaluation. [...]"
At one point, however, nature sets the limit to
any further intensification of effort. That
means, if some change does not take place, that
German consumption power would find its natural
limitation in the maximum of production of food
supplies. The situation which would then arise
could only be overcome in two ways:
First, by means of additional imports of
foodstuffs and increased exports of German
products, which would necessitate the
importation of at least some of the raw
materials necessary for their manufacture, with
the result that only a proportion of imports
received would be available for the purchase of
foodstuffs, or,
Second, the extension of our nation's living
space so that in our domestic economy the
problem of Germany's food supplies can be
solved.
As the second solution is for the time being not
yet feasible, by reason of the continued
blindness of the one-time victorious powers, we
are forced to occupy ourselves with the first;
in other words, we have to export in order to
buy foodstuffs and, moreover, as these exports
require raw materials, all of which we do not
possess, we are forced to export still more in
order to assure ourselves of these extra raw
materials. This necessity is consequently not of
a capitalistic kind, as perhaps may be the case
in other countries, but arises out of the
uttermost need a nation can meet with, namely,
the need for its daily bread. And when in this
matter statesmen of other countries threaten us
with I do not know what kinds of economic
counter-measures, I can only give the assurance
that in such a case a desperate economic
struggle would ensue, which would be easy for us
to carry out, easier for us than for the
ever-satiated nations because our leading idea
would be a very simple one: the German nation
must live; that means export or die. And I
assure all the international skeptics that the
German nation will not die, least of all for
this reason, but that it will live. If need be
it will place all the production resources of
our new National Socialist community at the
disposal of its leaders to begin such a
struggle, and to see it through.
[...]
In 1933 and 1934 I made one offer after another
to set reasonable limits to armaments. They were
coldly rejected, as was the claim for the return
of the stolen German colonial possessions. If
these gifted statesmen and politicians in the
other countries draw up an account of the net
profits which have accrued to them from the
military and colonial inequality, and therefore
the general legal inequality for which they have
so persistently contended, then they will
perhaps hardly be able to contest that they have
already paid far too much for their supposed
military superiority, and the wonderful colonial
possessions they took from Germany.
Economically it would have been wiser to have
reached a reasonable and prudent agreement with
Germany in regard to the colonies and European
politics, rather than to have taken a course,
which perhaps yields enormous dividends to the
international armament profiteers, but at the
same time forces the gravest burdens on the
nations. I estimate that the 3,000,000 square
kilometers of the German colonial possessions
which have fallen to England and France,
together with the refusal to accept Germany on a
basis of political and military equality, will
in a short time have cost England alone
20,000,000,000 gold marks; and I am afraid that
in the not too distant future this sum will
increase at an even greater rate with the result
that, far from yielding golden profits, the
former German colonies will cost a great deal.
The objection could be raised that this would
also apply to Germany. Granted that it is no
great pleasure for us either, there is one
difference between us: We are struggling for a
vital right, without which we cannot in the long
run live, whereas the others are struggling to
uphold an injustice which is only a burden to
them and yields no profit whatsoever.
Under the present circumstances the only way
open to us is to continue our economic policy of
trying to produce the utmost from the territory
at our disposal. This compels us to intensify
our efforts in all branches, in order to expand
production. This, in turn, forces us to carry
out the Four-Year Plan more resolutely than
ever. This means we must further utilize our
labor resources, and here we are approaching a
new period in Germany's economic policy. [...]"
To this purpose, trade and industry, and finance
must necessarily be more closely concentrated.
In this connection I am resolved to complete the
transformation of the Reichsbank, begun January
30, 1937, changing it from a bank under
international influence to a purely German bank
of issue. If some other countries complain that
thereby another German undertaking would lose
its international features and characteristics,
then we can only reply that we are absolutely
determined that every institution in our
national life shall have primarily German, that
is, National Socialist, features. [...]"
Today, gentlemen, I regard it as the duty of
every German to understand the economic policy
which the Reich Government is pursuing and to
give every possible support thereto. Above all,
to remember, both in town and country, that it
has its foundation not in some financial theory
or other but in a very simple realization of the
function of production; that is, in an
understanding of the fact that it is the amount
of goods produced that is decisive.
The fact that we have other supplementary
problems to face, that we are obliged to employ
a large percentage of our national labor power
for national armaments which are not in
themselves productive, is to be regretted but
cannot be helped. Ultimately the economic
structure of present-day Germany is bound up for
better or for worse with the political security
of the State. It is better to realize this in
good time. Therefore I regard it as the supreme
duty of the National Socialist Government to do
everything within human power to strengthen our
national defenses.
I rely here on their understanding of the German
people and, above all, on its powers of
recollection. For the period in which Germany
was defenseless was not one in which we enjoyed
any particular equality of right, whether
internationally, politically or economically. It
was rather one marked by the most humiliating
treatment ever meted out to a great nation, and
by the direst extortion.
We have no reason to assume that if at any time
in the future Germany were to suffer a second
fit of weakness her fate would be different. On
the contrary, some of those very men who once
hurled the firebrands of war into the world are
still at work today, as driving forces or driven
instruments for the stirring up of the peoples,
endeavoring to keep up enmities and so prepare
the way for a new outbreak of strife.
You in particular, gentlemen, should bear one
thing in mind:
In certain democracies it is apparently one of
the special prerogatives of political-democratic
life to cultivate an artificial hatred of the
so-called totalitarian States. A flood of
reports, partly misrepresentations of fact,
partly pure inventions, are let loose, the aim
being to stir up public opinion against nations
which have done nothing to harm the other
nations and have no desire to harm them, and
which indeed have been for years the victims of
harsh injustice. When we defend ourselves
against such agitators such as Churchill, Duff
Cooper, Eden or Ickes and the rest, our action
is denounced as encroachment on the sacred
rights of the democracies. According to the way
these agitators see things, they are entitled to
attack other nations and their governments, but
no one is entitled to defend himself against
such attacks. I need hardly assure you that as
long as the German Reich continues to be a
sovereign State, no English or American
politician will be able to forbid our Government
to reply to such attacks. And the arms that we
are forging are our guarantee for all time to
come that we shall remain a sovereign State —
our arms and our choice of friends.
Actually the assertion that Germany is planning
an attack on America could be disposed of with a
mere laugh, as one would prefer to pass over in
silence that incessant agitation of certain
British warmongers, but we must not forget this:
First, owing to the political structure of these
democratic States, it is possible that a few
months later these warmongers might themselves
be in the government. We, therefore, owe it to
the security of the Reich to bring home to the
German people in good time the truth about these
men. The German nation has no feeling of hatred
toward England, America or France. All it wants
is peace and quiet.
But these other nations are continually being
stirred up to hatred of Germany and the German
people by Jewish and non-Jewish agitators. And
so, should the warmongers achieve what they are
aiming at, our own people would be landed in a
situation for which they would be
psychologically quite unprepared and which they
would thus fail to grasp. I therefore consider
it necessary that from now on our Propaganda
Ministry and our press should always make a
point of answering these attacks and, above all,
bring them to the notice of the German people.
The German nation must know who the men are who
want to bring about a war by hook or by crook.
It is my conviction that these people are
mistaken in their calculations, for when once
National Socialist Propaganda is devoted to the
answering of attacks, we shall succeed just as
we succeeded inside Germany herself in
overcoming, through the convincing power of our
propaganda, the Jewish world enemy.
The nations will in a short time realize that
National Socialist Germany wants no enmity with
other nations, that all the assertions as to our
intended attacks on other nations are lies —
lies born out of morbid hysteria or of a mania
for self-preservation on the part of certain
politicians; and that in certain States these
lies are being used by unscrupulous profiteers
to salvage their own finances, that, above all,
international Jewry may hope in this way to
satisfy its thirst for revenge and gain, that on
the other hand this is the grossest defamation
that can be brought to bear on a great and
peace-loving nation.
Never, for instance, have German soldiers fought
on American soil unless it was in the cause of
American independence and freedom; but American
soldiers were brought to Europe to help strangle
a great nation that was striving for its
freedom. Germany did not attack America, but
America attacked Germany, as the committee of
investigation of the American Senate concluded,
from purely capitalist motives, without any
other cause. But there is one thing that every
one should realize: These attempts cannot
influence Germany in the slightest in the way in
which she settles her Jewish problem. On the
contrary, in connection with the Jewish
question, I have this to say: It is a shameful
spectacle to see how the whole democratic world
is oozing sympathy for the poor tormented Jewish
people, but remains hard-hearted and obdurate
when it comes to helping them, which is surely,
in view of its attitude, an obvious duty. The
arguments that are brought up as an excuse for
not helping them actually speak for us as
Germans and Italians.
For this is what they say:
First, 'We' — that is, the democracies — 'are
not in a position to take in the Jews.' Yet in
these empires there are not even ten people to
the square kilometer. While Germany with her 140
inhabitants to the square kilometer is supposed
to have room for them!
Second, they assure us: 'We cannot take them
unless Germany is prepared to allow them a
certain amount of capital to bring with them as
immigrants.'
For hundreds of years Germany was good enough to
receive these elements, although they possessed
nothing except infectious political and physical
diseases. What they possess today, they have to
by far the largest extent gained at the cost of
the less astute German nation by the most
reprehensible manipulations.
Today we are merely paying this people what they
deserve. When the German nation was, thanks to
the inflation instigated and carried through by
Jews, deprived of the entire savings that it had
accumulated in years of honest work, when the
rest of the world took away the German nation's
foreign investments, when we were divested of
the whole of our colonial possessions, these
philanthropic considerations evidently carried
little noticeable weight with democratic
statesmen.
Today I can only assure these gentlemen that,
thanks to the brutal education with which the
democracies favored us for fifteen years, we
have completely hardened to all attacks of
sentiment. After more than 800,000 children of
the nation had died of hunger and
undernourishment at the close of the war, we
witnessed almost 1,000,000 head of milking cows
being driven away from us in accordance with the
cruel paragraphs of a dictate that the humane
democratic apostles of the world forced upon us
as a peace treaty.
We witnessed over 1,000,000 German prisoners of
war being retained in confinement for no reason
at all for a whole year after the war was ended.
We witnessed over one and a half million Germans
being torn away from all that they possessed in
the territories lying on our frontiers, and
being whipped out with practically only what
they wore on their backs. We had to endure
having millions of our fellow-countrymen torn
from us without their consent, and without their
being afforded the slightest possibility of
existence. I could supplement these examples
with dozens of the most cruel kind. For this
reason we asked to be spared all sentimental
talk.
The German nation does not wish its interests to
be controlled by any foreign nation. France to
the French, England to the English, America to
the Americans, and Germany to the Germans. We
are resolved to prevent the settlement in our
country of a strange people that was capable of
snatching for itself all the leading positions
in the land, and to oust it. For it is our will
to educate our own nation for these leading
positions. We have hundreds of thousands of very
intelligent children of peasants and of the
working classes. We shall have them educated —
in fact, we have already begun — and we wish
that one day they, and not the representatives
of an alien race, may hold the leading positions
in the State altogether with our educated
classes.
Above all, German culture, as its name alone
shows, is German and not Jewish, and therefore
its management and care will be entrusted to
members of our own nation. If the rest of the
world cries out with a hypocritical mien against
this barbaric expulsion from Germany of such an
irreplaceable and culturally eminently valuable
element, we can only be astonished at this
reaction. For how thankful they must be that we
are releasing apostles of culture and placing
them at the disposal of the rest of the world.
In accordance with their own declarations they
cannot find a single reason to excuse themselves
for refusing to receive this most valuable race
in their own countries. Nor can I see a reason
why the members of this race should be imposed
upon the German nation, while in the States that
are so enthusiastic about these 'splendid
people' their settlement should suddenly be
refused with every imaginable excuse. I think
the sooner this problem is solved the better,
for Europe cannot settle down until the Jewish
question is cleared up. It may very well be
possible that sooner or later an agreement on
this problem may be reached in Europe, even
between those nations that otherwise do not so
easily come together.
The world has sufficient space for settlement,
but we must once and for all get rid of the
opinion that the Jewish race was only created by
God for the purpose of being in a certain
percentage a parasite living on the body and the
productive work of other nations. The Jewish
race will have to adapt itself to sound
constructive activity as other nations do, or
sooner or later it will succumb to a crisis of
an inconceivable magnitude.
One thing I should like to say on this day,
which may be memorable for others as well as for
us Germans: In the course of my life I have very
often been a prophet and have usually been
ridiculed for it. During the time of my struggle
for power, it was in the first instance the
Jewish race that only received my prophecies
with laughter when I said that I would one day
take over the leadership of the State and with
it that of the whole nation and that I would
then, among many other things, settle the Jewish
problem. Their laughter was uproarious, but I
think that for some time now they have been
laughing on the other side of their face. Today
I will once more be a prophet. If the
international Jewish financiers in and outside
Europe should succeed in plunging the nations
once more into a world war, then the result will
not be the bolshevization of the earth, and this
the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of
the Jewish race in Europe! For the time when the
non-Jewish nations had no propaganda is at an
end. National Socialist Germany and fascist
Italy have institutions that enable them when
necessary to enlighten the world about the
nature of a question of which many nations are
instinctively conscious, but which they have not
yet clearly thought out. At the moment Jews in
certain countries may be fomenting hatred under
the protection of a press, of the film, of
wireless propaganda, of the theater, of
literature, etc., all of which they control.
[...]"
The nations are no longer willing to die on the
battlefield that this unstable international
race may profiteer from a war or satisfy its Old
Testament vengeance. The Jewish watchword,
'Workers of the world, unite!' will be conquered
by a higher realization, namely, 'Workers of all
classes and of all nations, recognize your
common enemy!'
Among the outcries against Germany raised today
in the so-called democracies is the assertion
that National Socialist Germany is an
anti-religious State. I therefore wish to make
the following solemn declaration to the whole
German nation:
1. No one in Germany has hitherto been
persecuted for his religious views, nor will any
one be persecuted on that account!
2. The National Socialist State, since January
30, 1933, has, through its State organs, placed
the following sums accruing from public taxes,
at the disposal of both churches:. . . [There
follows a list of grants to the churches.]
It is therefore a piece of impertinence — to put
it mildly — for foreign politicians, of all
people, to talk about hostility to religion in
the Third Reich. If, however, the German
churches really should regard this position as
unbearable, the National Socialist State would
be at any time prepared to make a clear
separation between church and State such as
prevails in France, America and other countries.
I should only like to ask this question: what
sums have France, England or America paid to
their churches through the State within the same
period of time?
3. The National Socialist State has neither
closed any church nor prevented any service from
being held, nor has it ever influenced the form
of a church service. It has neither interfered
with the doctrinal teaching nor with the creed
of any denomination.
But the National Socialist State will ruthlessly
make clear to those clergy who, instead of being
God's ministers, regard it as their mission to
speak insultingly of our present Reich, its
organization or its leaders, that no one will
tolerate a destruction of this State and that a
clergy that places itself beyond the pale of the
law will be called to account before the law
like any other German citizen. Let it be
mentioned, however, that there are tens of
thousands of clergy of all Christian
denominations who fulfill their ecclesiastical
duties just as well or probably better than the
political agitators, without ever coming into
conflict with the laws of the State. The State
considers their protection its task. The
destruction of the enemies of the State is its
duty.
4. The National Socialist State is neither
prudish nor deceitful. There are, however,
certain moral principles adherence to which is
in the interests of the biological health of a
nation, and with which we tolerate no tampering.
Pederasty and sexual offenses against children
are punishable by law in this State, and no
matter who commits such crimes.
When, some five years ago, certain heads of the
National Socialist party were found guilty of
these crimes, they were shot. When other persons
in public or private life, even priests, are
guilty of such offenses, they are, according to
law, sentenced to terms of imprisonment or hard
labor. It is no concern of ours if priests break
their other vows, such as chastity, etc. Not a
single word about that has ever been published
in our press. For the rest, this State has only
once interfered in the inner organization of the
churches. This happened in 1933, when I myself
attempted to unite the hopelessly disrupted
regional churches in Germany into one large and
powerful Reich church. The attempt failed, owing
to the opposition of some of the regional
bishops. In consequence, no further efforts were
made; after all, it is not our task to defend
the Protestant Church or even to strengthen it
by forcible means in face of the opposition of
its own supporters!
There can be only political reasons for other
countries and for certain democratic statesmen
in particular in taking up cudgels on behalf of
individual German clergy, for these same
statesmen were silent when hundreds of thousands
of priests were butchered or burned in Russia;
they were silent when in Spain tens of thousands
of priests and nuns were massacred with bestial
cruelty and burned alive. They could not, and
cannot, deny these facts, that they were silent
and are silent now.
Meanwhile — I must mention this to the
democratic statesmen — it was just because of
such butchery that numerous National Socialist
and fascist volunteers placed themselves at the
disposal of General Franco in order to help him
in his efforts to prevent bolshevist lust for
blood from spreading over Europe and over the
greater part of the civilized world. It was
anxiety for European culture and for real
civilization that compelled Germany to take
sides in the fight carried on in Nationalist
Spain against the bolshevist destroyers. It does
not say much for the mentality predominant in
various countries that cannot conceive of such a
step being taken for purely unselfish reasons.
However, National Socialist Germany sympathized
with General Franco's uprising out of a sincere
desire to see him succeed in delivering his
country from the dangers that at one time had
threatened to engulf Germany herself.
[...]
In view of the dangers that threaten all around
us, I appreciate it as a piece of great good
fortune to have found in Europe and outside it
States that, in the same way as the German
nation, are compelled to carry on a hard
struggle to safeguard their existence. I refer
to Italy and Japan. In the Western World of
today the Italians, as the descendants of the
ancient Romans, as we Germans, as the
descendents of the Germanic peoples of those
times, are the oldest peoples — and our
relations with each other reach farther back
than do those between any other nations. In my
speech in the Palazzo Venezia on the occasion of
my visit to Italy, I pointed out that it was
indeed a calamity that the mightiest civilized
nation of the ancient world and the young nation
of a new world in process of formation should,
owing to the absence of a natural dividing line
and under the influence of many other
circumstances, become involved in centuries of
fruitless conflict.
But out of the contacts of a thousand years
there grew up a sense of community; and this
community must only have its roots in countless
racial ties, but it developed an immeasurable
historical and cultural significance. The debt
that the Germanic peoples owe to the ancient
world as regards the organization of the State
and, consequently, national development, as well
as in the sphere of civilization in general,
cannot be estimated in detail, and is in its sum
total immense. Since then nearly 2,000 years
have passed. And now we, too have made our own
abundant contribution to civilization. But we
have always maintained close spiritual ties with
the Italian people and with its cultural and
historical past.
In the nineteenth century there was a strangely
similar process of unification. The German
peoples became united in the German Reich, and
the Italian States were united in the Kingdom of
Italy. In the same year — 1866 — both nations
were fated to take up arms simultaneously for
the new form that their State was to assume.
Today we are experiencing this parallel
development for the second time. A man of
outstanding historic importance was the first to
bring a new idea to oppose the democratic
notions that had become barren in this people
and to carry this idea to victory within a few
years. It is hard to estimate the significance
of fascism for Italy. What fascism has done for
the preservation of civilization is as yet
incalculable. Who can stroll through Rome or
Florence without being moved at the thought of
the fate that all these unique documents of
human art and civilization would have suffered
if Mussolini and his fascist movement had not
succeeded in saving Italy from bolshevism?
Germany was faced with this same danger.
[...]
Let no one in the world make any mistake as to
the resolve that National Socialist Germany has
made so far as this friend is concerned. It can
only serve the cause of peace if it is quite
clearly understood that a war of rival
ideologies waged against the Italy of today
will, once it is launched and regardless of its
motives, call Germany to the side of her friend.
Above all let no one be ill-advised by those
isolated bourgeois weaklings who vegetate in
every country and who cannot understand that in
the life of nations it is not necessarily
cowardice but also courage and honor that may
prompt wisdom.
As regards National Socialist Germany, she is
well aware of the fate that awaits her if ever
an international power, whatever its motive,
should succeed in overcoming fascist Italy. We
realize the consequences that would follow upon
such an event and face them unflinchingly. The
fate of Prussia in 1805 and 1806 will not be
repeated a second time in German history.
Weaklings like the advisers of the King of
Prussia in 1805 will not be asked their opinion
in the Germany of today. The National Socialist
State realizes the danger and is determined to
take all steps to counteract it.
I know, too, that not only our defense forces
but also Italy's military power, are equal to
the severest military requirements. Just as it
is impossible to judge the present German Army
by the standard of the army of the German Bund
of, say, 1848, so it is likewise impossible for
any evaluation of modern fascist Italy to be
made by the standards of the days when the
Italian State was not yet united. Only a
hysterical, unteachable, tactless and extremely
malicious press can forget in so short a time
that only a few years ago it made a thorough
fool of itself with its prophecies as to the
probable outcome of the Italian campaign in
Abyssinia, and it is not one whit better now in
its judgment of Franco's national forces in the
Spanish campaign.
Men make history. But they also forge the
instruments that are suited to the forming of
history, and, above all, they give them spirit.
Great men, however, are themselves merely the
strongest, most concentrated expression of a
nation.
National Socialist Germany and fascist Italy are
strong enough to safeguard peace against every
one, and to end resolutely and successfully any
conflict that irresponsible elements lightly
start.
This does not mean that we desire war, as is
asserted in the irresponsible press day by day.
It simply means that we take this stand because,
first, we understand that other nations, too,
desire to assure themselves of their share of
the world's riches due them by virtue of their
number, their courage and their worth; and that,
second, in recognition of these rights, we are
determined to give common support to common
interests. Above all, however, that we shall
never under any circumstances yield to any
threats amounting to extortion! Thus our
relationship with Japan is determined by the
recognition of the need to stem, as we are
determined to do, the tide of the threatened
bolshevization of a world gone blind, with all
the resolution at our command.
The anti-Comintern pact will perhaps one day
become the crystallization point of a group of
powers whose ultimate aim is none other than to
eliminate the menace to the peace and culture of
the world instigated by a satanic apparition.
The Japanese nation, which in the last two years
has set us so many examples of glorious heroism,
is undoubtedly fighting in the service of
civilization at the other side of the world. Her
collapse would not benefit the civilized nations
of Europe or of other parts of the world, but
would only lead to the certain triumph of
bolshevism in the Far East. Apart from
international Jewry, which is desirous of this
development, no people in the world can wish to
see this take place.
The tremendous efforts made last year ultimately
attained their end by peaceful means, and we
would add to our thanks to Mussolini our
unreserved expression of gratitude to the two
other statesmen who during the critical hours
attached greater value to peace than to the
preservation of an injustice. Germany has no
territorial demands against England and France
apart from that for the return of our colonies.
While the solution of this question would
contribute greatly to the pacification of the
world, it is in no sense a problem that could
cause a war. If there is any tension in Europe
today, it is primarily due to the irresponsible
activity of an unscrupulous press that scarcely
permits a day to go by without disturbing the
peace of mankind through alarming news that is
as stupid as it is mendacious.
[...]
Announcements by American film companies that
they intend to produce anti-Nazi — that is,
anti-German — films can but induce us to produce
anti-Semitic films in Germany. Here, too, our
opponents should not permit themselves any
delusions as to the effectiveness of what we can
do. There will be very many States and peoples
who will show great understanding for
supplementary instruction of this kind on such
an important subject! We believe that if the
Jewish international campaign of hatred by press
and propaganda could be checked, good
understanding could very quickly be established
between the peoples. It is only such elements
that hope steadfastly for a war. I, however,
believe in a long peace! For in what way do the
interests of England and Germany, for example,
conflict?
I have stated over and over again and again that
there is no German, and, above all, no National
Socialist, who even in his most secret thoughts
has the intention of causing the British Empire
any kind of difficulty. From England, too, the
voices of men who think reasonably and calmly
express a similar attitude with regard to
Germany. It would be a blessing for the whole
world if mutual confidence and cooperation could
be established between the two peoples. The same
is true of our relations with France. We have
just celebrated the fifth anniversary of the
conclusion of our non-aggression pact with
Poland. There can scarcely be any difference of
opinion today among the true friends of peace
with regard to the value of this agreement.
[...]
Our relations with Hungary are based on a long
and well-proven friendship, a common interest
and on traditional mutual esteem. Germany has
gladly undertaken to contribute to the
redressing of the wrongs inflicted on that
country.
Yugoslavia is a State that has increasingly
attracted the attention of our people since the
war. The high regard that the German soldiers
then felt for this brave people has since been
deepened and has developed into genuine
friendship. Our economic relations with this
country are undergoing constant development and
expansion, just as is the case with the friendly
countries of Bulgaria, Greece, Rumania, Turkey,
Switzerland, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Norway,
Sweden, Finland, and the Baltic States.
The essential reason for this is to be found in
the natural conditions that make it possible for
these countries and Germany to complement each
other's economic systems.
Germany is happy today in the possession of
peaceful frontiers in the west, south and north.
Our relations with the western and northern
States become all the more satisfactory with the
increasing tendency in these countries to turn
away from certain articles of the Covenant of
the League of Nations that involve danger of
war.
The addition of Hungary and Manchukuo to the
anti-Comintern pact is a welcome symptom of the
consolidation of world-wide resistance to the
Jewish-International-Bolshevist threat to the
peoples of the world.
The relations of the German Reich with the
countries of South America are satisfactory, and
economic relations with them continue to expand.
Our relations with the United States are
suffering from a campaign of defamation carried
on to serve obvious political and financial
interests, which, under the pretense that
Germany threatens American independence, is
endeavoring to mobilize the hatred of an entire
continent against the European States that are
nationally governed. We all believe, however,
that this does not reflect the will of the
millions of American citizens who, despite all
that is said to the contrary by the gigantic
Jewish-capitalistic propaganda through the
press, the radio and the films, cannot fail to
realize that there is not one word of truth in
all these assertions. Germany wishes to live in
peace and on friendly terms with all countries,
including America. Germany refrains from any
intervention in American affairs and likewise
decisively repudiates any American intervention
in German affairs. The question, for instance,
as to whether Germany maintains economic
relations and does business with the countries
of South and Central America, concerns nobody
but them and ourselves. Germany anyway is a
great and sovereign country and is not subject
to the supervision of American politicians.
Quite apart from that, however, I feel that all
States today have so many domestic problems to
solve that it would be a piece of good fortune
for the nations if responsible statesmen were to
confine their attentions to their own problems.
[...]
We may now regard this process of growth of the
German nation as virtually completed. The
greater German Reich now embodies our people's
entire struggle for existence over 2,000 years.
All streams of German blood flow into the Reich,
and there are united in it all past traditions,
their symbols and standards, and above all the
great men of whom Germans of past periods have
reason to be proud.
[...]
As we include them in this great Reich in
grateful reverence, the wealth of German history
is revealed in all its glory. Let us thank
Almighty God that He has granted to our
generation and to us the great blessing of
experiencing this period of history and this
hour.
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