by Ian Kershaw
At the end of July, while Hitler was in Bayreuth and Berchtesgaden, Göring had a number of opportunities to discuss with him his plans for the economy. On 30 July he obtained Hitler’s agreement to present them with a splash at the coming Reich Party Rally in September. ‘A big speech of the Colonel-General at the Party Congress’ was envisaged, according to a note in Göring’s desk-diary.42 Göring intended to reap the glory. The new economic programme would dominate the Rally. That was what the Luftwaffe chief had in mind. But when it came to propaganda, Hitler, sniffing another chance to enhance his image through the major announcement of a ‘Four-Year Plan’, was unwilling as ever to concede the star-role. He decided to deliver the key speech himself.43
Hitler had meanwhile become increasingly preoccupied with the looming threat, as he saw it, from Bolshevism, and with the prospect that the mounting international turmoil could lead to war in the nearer rather than more distant future.44 Whatever tactical opportunism he deployed, and however much he played on the theme for propaganda purposes, there is no doubt that the coming showdown with Bolshevism remained – as it had been since the mid-1920s at the latest – the lodestar of Hitler’s thinking on foreign policy. In 1936, this future titanic struggle started to come into sharper focus.
At his private meeting with the former British Air Minister Lord Londonderry in February 1936, Hitler had concentrated on what he described as ‘the growing menace to the world of Bolshevism’. He was, he said, destined to play the part of the prophet internationally, as he had done within Germany some fifteen years earlier. He understood the dangers of Bolshevism better than other European statesmen, he went on, since ‘his political career had grown out of a struggle against Bolshevist tendencies’. Continental Europe was unbalanced and unstable, he claimed. Most governments were weak and short-lived. The continent was living ‘from hand to mouth’. The ‘extraordinary development of Soviet power’ had to be seen against this background of ‘decay’. Moreover, he added, playing up the bogey of Bolshevism to his British guest, the Soviet Union was not merely the greatest military power on the continent, but also ‘the embodiment of an idea’. He went on to provide Lord Londonderry with facts and figures on Soviet military and economic might. The admission of Russia to the League of Nations reminded him of the fable of Reynard the Fox – overcoming the suspicion of the other animals, then devouring them one after another. ‘Just in the same way as one does not allow germ-carriers in ordinary life to frequent the society of healthy people, so we must keep Russia at a distance,’ he maintained. But if the decomposition of Europe and the strengthening of the Soviet Union continued, he asked, ‘what will the position be in ten, twenty, or thirty years?’45
Hitler had visualized for Lord Londonderry the prospect of war between the Soviet Union and Japan, with defeat for the Japanese opening the path for Soviet domination also of the Far East. After meeting the Japanese ambassador in Berlin early in June, Hitler repeated his view that deepening conflict was on the way in the Far East, though he now thought that Japan would ‘thrash’ Russia. At that point, ‘this colossus will start to totter (ins Wanken kommen). And then our great hour will have arrived. Then we must supply ourselves with land for 100 years,’ he told Goebbels. ‘Let’s hope we’re ready then,’ the Propaganda Minister added in his diary notes, ‘and that the Führer is still alive. So that action will be taken.’46
Holidaying in Berchtesgaden in mid-July, Hitler told Goebbels that ‘the next Party Rally will again be against the Bolsheviks’.47 A few days later in Bayreuth, where as usual he was attending the Wagner Festival, he warned two of his most ardent English devotees, the good-looking daughters of the British aristocrat Lord Redesdale, Unity Valkyrie Mitford (who said that sitting next to Hitler was ‘like sitting beside the sun’)48 and her sister Diana (divorced from a member of the wealthy Guinness family and on the verge of marrying – in a ceremony attended by Hitler and Goebbels – the leader of the British Union of Fascists, Oswald Mosley), of the ‘Jewish and Bolshevik danger’.49 By this time, events in Spain were also focusing Hitler’s attention on the threat of Bolshevism. Until then, he had scarcely given a thought to Spain. But on the evening of 25 July, following a performance of Siegfried conducted by Wilhelm Furtwängler, his decision – against the advice of the Foreign Office – to send aid to General Franco committed Germany to involvement in what was rapidly to turn into the Spanish Civil War.50
The refusal of the Spanish Right to accept the narrow victory of the left-wing Popular Front in the elections of February 1936 had left Spain teetering on the brink of civil war. During late spring and early summer, horror stories of terroristic outrages, political murders, violent attacks on clergy, and burning churches had started to pour out of a country rapidly descending into political chaos. Europe was alarmed. For the Spanish Right, there was little difficulty in portraying it as the work of Marxist revolutionaries and evoking the image of a country on the verge of Communist takeover.51 Between May and July, army plans for a coup took shape.52 On 17 July army garrisons in Spanish Morocco rose against the elected government. The Commander-in-Chief of the army in Morocco, General Francisco Franco, put himself next morning at the head of the rebellion. But a mutiny of sailors loyal to the Republic denied him the transport facilities he needed to get his army to the mainland, most of which remained in Republican hands. The few planes he was able to lay hands upon did not amount to much in terms of an airlift.53 In these unpropitious circumstances, Franco turned to Mussolini and Hitler. It took over a week to overcome Mussolini’s initial refusal to help the Spanish rebels. Hitler was persuaded within a matter of hours. Ideological and strategic considerations – the likelihood of Bolshevism triumphing on the Iberian peninsula – were uppermost in his mind. But the potential for gaining access to urgently needed raw materials for the rearmament programme – an aspect emphasized by Göring – also appears to have played its part in the decision.54
Good luck was on Franco’s side in his approach to Germany to send transport planes. His initial request for German aid had been coolly received by the Foreign Office. He decided to make a direct appeal to Hitler. A German businessman, Johannes Bernhardt, the head of an export firm which had close dealings with the Spanish army in Morocco and a member of the Nazi Party Foreign Organization (the Auslandsorganisation, or AO), had offered his help in mediation to Franco. As late as 22 July, Franco had not had a plane at his disposal capable of reaching Germany. But the following day a Lufthansa Junkers Ju-52/3m mail plane, sequestered by the rebels in Las Palmas amid German protests, arrived in Morocco, carrying the rebel General Orgaz. Franco now took up Bernhardt’s offer of help. Carrying a written request from Franco to Hitler – and in all probability a similar one to Göring55 – Bernhardt flew to Berlin, accompanied by the sixty-year-old branch leader of the AO in Tetuán, Adolf Langenheim, arriving on the evening of 24 July at Tempelhof aerodrome.56
Meanwhile, the German Foreign Office had been increasingly worried about the deteriorating situation in Spain. A number of attacks on German citizens by Communists and anarchists led to two warships being dispatched into Spanish coastal waters. Concern grew that a victory of the government forces would pave the way for a Communist takeover. The prospect of Bolshevik dominance also in the south-west of Europe – compounding the victory of the left-wing Popular Front in France earlier in the year – seemed a real one.57 Even so, the Foreign Office thought direct involvement in Spain too risky. Gauleiter Ernst Wilhelm Bohle, the head of the AO, who had advanced the case of Franco’s emissaries, was told in no uncertain terms to take the matter no further.58 Ignoring the warning, however, Bohle telephoned Rudolf Heß, Deputy Head of the Party, who immediately arranged for the emissaries to fly in his personal plane to meet him in Thuringia. After a two-hour discussion, Heß rang Hitler. A meeting with the Führer was fixed for the evening of the following day, 25 July, in Bayreuth.59
It was close to ten o’clock in the evening when Bernhardt and Langenheim were ushered into Hitler’s pre
sence in the Wagner residence, ‘Haus Wahnfried’. Hitler had by then been well briefed on the situation in Spain. He knew the rebels’ position had worsened. The last report from the German Embassy in Madrid that morning had warned that a long civil war was in prospect, and that a Republican victory would have damaging consequences for German interests. The report raised the spectre of a Spanish soviet regime closely bound into the French-Soviet alliance.60 Göring had by this time also had the opportunity to brief Hitler on the economic advantages to be gained from supporting Franco, were the rebel cause to succeed.61
That, however, was far from a foregone conclusion. Bernhardt reinforced the message that Franco’s struggle against Communism was lost without German aid.62 The talk moved on to the question of payment for the aid. Noticing that Hitler looked ‘somewhat shocked’ when he mentioned purely nominal sums, Bernhardt stressed the ‘rich sources’ to be gained from Andalusia, almost certainly going on to indicate benefits to Germany from increased raw material imports in exchange for armaments.63 Hitler was still hesitant. But once he had turned the audience into another lengthy monologue, in which he praised the idealism of Spanish nationalists and ranted endlessly about the dangers of Bolshevism, the outcome was little in doubt. In contrast to the position of the Foreign Ministry, he had convinced himself that the dangers of being sandwiched between two Bolshevik blocs outweighed the risks of German involvement in the Spanish crisis – even if, as seemed likely, it should turn into full-blown and protracted civil war. War against the Soviet Union – the struggle for Germany’s ‘living space’ – was, in his view, at some point inevitable. The prospect of a Bolshevik Spain was a dangerous complication.64 He decided to provide Franco with the aid requested. It was an indication both of Hitler’s own greatly increased self-confidence and of the weakened position of those who had advised him on international affairs that he took the decision alone. Possibly, knowing the reluctance of the Foreign Office to become involved, and aware that Göring, for all his interest in possible economic gains, shared some of its reservations, Hitler was keen to present doubters with a fait accompli?65 Possibly, too, Hitler was also still under the influence of Wagner’s Siegfried, which he had come from earlier in the evening. At any rate, the operation to assist Franco came to be dubbed ‘Unternehmen Feuerzauber’ (‘Operation Magic Fire’), recalling the heroic music accompanying Siegfried’s passage through the ring of fire to free Brünnhilde.66
Only after Hitler had taken the decision were Göring and Blomberg summoned. Göring, despite his hopes of economic gains from intervention, was initially ‘horrified’ about the risk of international complications through intervention in Spain. But faced with Hitler’s usual intransigence, once he had arrived at a decision, Göring was soon won over.67 Blomberg, his influence – not least after his nervousness over the Rhineland affair – now waning compared with the powerful position he had once held, went along without objection.68 Ribbentrop, too, when he was told on arrival in Bayreuth that Hitler intended to support Franco, initially warned against involvement in Spain. But Hitler was adamant. He had already ordered aircraft to be put at Franco’s disposal. The crucial consideration was ideological: ‘If Spain really goes communist, France in her present situation will also be bolshevised in due course, and then Germany is finished. Wedged between the powerful Soviet bloc in the East and a strong communist Franco-Spanish bloc in the West, we could do hardly anything if Moscow chose to attack us.’69 Hitler brushed aside Ribbentrop’s weak objections – fresh complications with Britain, and the strength of the French bourgeoisie in holding out against Bolshevism – and simply ended the conversation by stating that he had already made his decision.70
Twenty Junkers Ju-52 transport planes – ten more than Franco had asked for – supported by six Heinkel He 51 fighters were to be provided and were soon en route to Spanish Morocco and to Cádiz, in southern Spain, which had rapidly fallen to the insurgents. Subsequent aid was to follow through a barter system of German equipment for Spanish raw materials under cover of two export companies, one German and one Spanish.71 Despite the warnings he had received that Germany could be sucked into a military quagmire, and however strongly ideological considerations weighed with him, Hitler probably intervened only on the assumption that German aid would tip the balance quickly and decisively in Franco’s favour. ‘We’re taking part a bit in Spain. Not clear. Who knows what it’s good for,’ commented Goebbels laconically the day after the decision to help Franco had been taken.72 Short-term gains, not long-term involvement, were the premiss of Hitler’s impulsive decision. Significant military and economic involvement in Spain began only in October.73 By then, Göring – spurred by his role as head of the new Four-Year Plan as well as chief of the Luftwaffe – was the driving-force. Hitler agreed to substantial increases in German military assistance to Spain. Fighters, bombers, and 6,500 military personnel – the future Legion Condor (a mixed Luftwaffe unit assigned to support for the Spanish nationalists) – were dispatched to take part in what was rapidly developing into a rehearsal for a general showdown between the forces of Fascism and Communism.74
The ideological impetus behind Hitler’s readiness to involve Germany in the Spanish maelstrom – his intensified preoccupation with the threat of Bolshevism – was not a cover for the economic considerations that weighed so heavily with Göring.75 This is borne out by his private as well as his public utterances. Publicly, as he had told Goebbels the previous day would be the case, in his opening proclamation to the Reich Party Rally in Nuremberg on 9 September, he announced that the ‘greatest world danger’ of which he warned for so long – the ‘revolutionizing of the continent’ through the work of ‘Bolshevik wire-pullers’ run by ‘an international Jewish revolutionary headquarters in Moscow’ – was becoming reality. Germany’s military rebuilding had been undertaken precisely to prevent what was turning Spain into ruins from taking place in Germany.76 Out of the public eye, his sentiments were hardly different when he addressed the cabinet for three hours on the foreign-policy situation at the beginning of December. He concentrated on the danger of Bolshevism. Europe was divided into two camps. There was no more going back. He described the tactics of the ‘Reds’. Spain had become the decisive issue. France, ruled by Prime Minister Léon Blum – seen as an ‘agent of the Soviets’, a ‘Zionist and world-destroyer’ – would be the next victim. The victor in Spain would gain great prestige. The consequences for the rest of Europe, and in particular for Germany and for the remnants of Communism in the country, were major ones. This was the reason, he went on, for German aid in armaments to Spain. ‘Germany can only wish that the crisis is deferred until we are ready,’ he declared. ‘When it comes, seize the opportunity (zugreifen). Get into the paternoster lift at the right time. But also get out again at the right time. Rearm. Money can play no role.’77 Only two weeks or so earlier, Goebbels had recorded in his diary: ‘After dinner I talked thoroughly with the Führer alone. He is very content with the situation. Rearmament is proceeding. We’re sticking in fabulous sums. In 1938 we’ll be completely ready. The showdown with Bolshevism is coming. Then we want to be prepared. The army is now completely won over by us. Führer untouchable… Dominance in Europe for us is as good as certain. Just let no chance pass by. Therefore rearm.’78
III
The announcement of the Four-Year Plan at the Nuremberg Party Rally in September had by then pushed rearmament policy on to a new plane. Priorities had been established. They meant in practice that balancing consumer and rearmament spending could only be sustained for a limited period of time through a crash programme which maximized autarkic potential to prepare Germany as rapidly as possible for the confrontation which Hitler deemed inevitable and other leading figures in the regime thought probable, if not highly likely, within the following few years. Through the introduction of the Four-Year Plan, Germany was economically pushed in the direction of expansion and war. Economics and ideology were by now thoroughly interwoven. Even so, the decision to move to the
Four-Year Plan was ultimately an ideological one. Economic options were still open – even if the policies of the previous three years meant they had already narrowed sharply. Schacht, Goerdeler, and others, backed by important sectors of industry, favoured a retreat from an armaments-led economy to a re-entry into international markets. Against this, the powerful IG-Farben lobby, linked to the Luftwaffe, pushed for maximizing production of synthetic fuels. The stalemate persisted throughout the summer. The economic crisis which had dogged Germany during the previous winter and spring was unresolved. With no end to the dispute in sight, Hitler was pressed in late August to take sides. The preoccupation with Bolshevism, which had weighed heavily with him throughout the summer, was decisive in his own inimitable approach to Germany’s economic problems.
The driving-force behind the creation of what came to be known as the Four-Year Plan was not, however, Hitler but Göring. Following their discussions in Berchtesgaden and Bayreuth in July, Hitler had requested reports from Göring on the economic situation, and how the problems were to be overcome. At the beginning of August Göring had in turn demanded memoranda from different branches of the economy to be sent to him as rapidly as possible. The timing was determined by propaganda considerations, not economic criteria: the proximity of the Reich Party Rally in early September was what counted. The complex reports could not be put together as swiftly as Göring had wanted. By the time he travelled to Berchtesgaden at the beginning of the last week in August, he only had a survey from his Raw Materials and Currency staff about the possibilities of synthetic raw-material production within Germany to hand.79 He had meanwhile been encountering powerful opposition to his economic plans from Schacht, who was voicing feelings in some important sectors of business and industry, such as those of one of the most important Ruhr industrialists, Albert Vögler, head of the biggest steel concern in Europe, the Vereinigte Stahlwerke, who had strongly backed a Hitler Chancellorship in the final phase of the Weimar Republic. Carl Goerdeler, too, Lord Mayor of Leipzig, who had served Hitler as Reich Price Commissioner and would eventually become a leading opponent of the regime, joined in the criticism towards the end of the month.80 It was in these circumstances that Hitler was persuaded during the last week of August to dictate a lengthy memorandum on the future direction of the economy – one of the extremely rare occasions in the Third Reich (leaving aside formal laws, decrees, and directives) that he put forward his views in writing.