Hitler 1936-1945: Nemesis (Allen Lane History)

by Ian Kershaw

  Until 1938, Hitler’s moves in foreign policy had been bold, but not reckless. He had shown shrewd awareness of the weakness of his opponents, a sure instinct for exploiting divisions and uncertainty. His sense of timing had been excellent, his combination of bluff and blackmail effective, his manipulation of propaganda to back his coups masterly. He had gone further and faster than anyone could have expected in revising the terms of Versailles and upturning the post-war diplomatic settlement. From the point of view of the western powers, his methods were, to say the least, unconventional diplomacy – raw, brutal, unpalatable; but his aims were recognizably in accord with traditional German nationalist clamour. Down to and including the Anschluß, Hitler had proved a consummate nationalist politician. During the Sudeten crisis, some sympathy for demands to incorporate the German-speaking areas in the Reich – for another Anschluß of sorts – still existed among those ready to swallow Goebbels’s propaganda about the maltreatment of the Sudeten Germans by the Czechs, or at any rate prepared to accept that a further nationality problem was in need of resolution. It took the crisis and its outcome to expose the realization that Hitler would stop at nothing. Some of the shame felt at the Munich settlement in the western democracies as soon as the elation at the salvation of peace had evaporated was that they had merely bought off Hitler for a time through sacrificing Czechoslovakia. Before that point was reached, there had been increasing incomprehension among western statesmen during the course of the summer about Hitler and his aims. Some of the comments doubting his sanity reflect the sense of British statesmen at the time that they were dealing with someone who had crossed the bounds of rational behaviour in international politics. In the view of the British Ambassador, Nevile Henderson, Hitler had ‘become quite mad’ and, bent on war at all costs, had ‘crossed the borderline of insanity’.183

  They were not far wrong. The spring of 1938 marked the phase in which Hitler’s obsession with accomplishing his ‘mission’ in his own lifetime started to overtake cold political calculation. As Goebbels had put it in the passage already cited, Hitler wanted to experience the ‘Great Germanic Reich’ himself.184 Probably, as we have already noted, his increased health worries and preoccupation with his own mortality played their part in heightening his sense of urgency. A deep-seated hatred of the Czechs – a legacy of his Austrian upbringing (when rabid hostility towards the Czechs had been endemic in the German-speaking part of the Habsburg Empire) – added a further personal dimension to the drive to destroy a Czechoslo-vakian state allied with the arch-enemies of the USSR in the east and France in the west. Prestige – as always – also came into it. He was to feel slighted and embarrassed at the diplomatic outfall from sudden Czech military mobilization in May (generally, though mistakenly, believed to have been in response to initial threatening moves by Germany).185 This at the very least reinforced his decision to act with speed to crush Czechoslovakia by the autumn.186 Finally, the sense of his own infallibility, massively boosted by the triumph of the Anschluß, underscored his increased reliance on his own will, matched by his diminished readiness to listen to countervailing counsel. That he had invariably been proved right in his assessment of the weakness of the western powers in the past, usually in the teeth of the caution of his advisers in the army and Foreign Office, convinced him that his current evaluation was unerringly correct. He had come during 1937 to be dismissive about the strength and will to fight both of Britain, which had spurned his advances, and of France, wracked by internal divisions. Partly prompted, and at any rate greatly amplified, by Ribbentrop, his views had hardened to the point where he felt the western powers would do nothing to defend Czechoslovakia. At the same time, this strengthened his conviction that the Reich’s position relative to the western powers could only worsen as their inevitable build-up of arms began to catch up with that of Germany. To remain inactive – a recurring element in the way he thought – was, he asserted, not an option: it would merely play into the hands of his enemies. Therefore, he characteristically reasoned: act without delay to retain the initiative.

  These various strands of his thinking came together in the conclusion that the time was ripe to strike against Czechoslovakia. Until Czechoslovakia was eliminated – this was the key strategic element in Hitler’s idea – Germany would be incapable of taking action either in the east or in the west. He had moved from a position of a foreign policy supported by Great Britain to one where he was prepared to act without Britain, and, if need be, against Britain. Despite the forebodings of others, war against Czechoslovakia in his view carried few risks. And if the western powers, contrary to expectation, were foolish enough to become involved, Germany would defeat them.

  More important even than why Hitler was in such a hurry to destroy Czechoslovakia is why he was by this time in a position to override or ignore weighty objections and to determine that Germany should be taken to the very brink of general European war. Decisive in this was the process, which we have followed, of the expansion of his power, relative to other agencies of power in the regime, to the point where, by spring 1938, it had freed itself from all institutional constraints and had established unchallenged supremacy over all sections of the ‘power cartel’.187 The five years of Hitler’s highly personalized form of rule had eroded all semblance of collective involvement in policy-making. This fragmentation at one and the same time rendered the organization of any opposition within the power-élite almost impossible – not to speak of any attached dangers to life and liberty – and inordinately strengthened Hitler’s own power. The scope for more cautious counsel to apply the brakes had sharply diminished. The constant Hobbesian ‘war of all against all’, the competing power fiefdoms that characterized the National Socialist regime, took place at the level below Hitler, enhancing his extraordinary position as the fount of all authority and dividing both individual and sectional interests of the different power entities (the Movement, the state bureaucracy, the army, big business, the police, and the sub-branches of each). Hitler was, therefore, as the sole linchpin, able internally to deal, as in foreign policy, through bilateral relations – offering his support here, denying it there, remaining the sole arbiter, even when he preferred (or felt compelled) to let matters ride and let his subordinates battle it out among themselves. It was less a planned strategy of ‘divide and rule’ than an inevitable consequence of Führer authority. Without any coordinating bodies to unify policy, each sectional interest in the Third Reich could thrive only with the legitimacy of the Führer’s backing. Each one inevitably, therefore, ‘worked towards the Führer’ in order to gain or sustain that backing, ensuring thereby that his power grew still further and that his own ideological obsessions were promoted.

  The inexorable disintegration of coherent structures of rule was therefore not only a product of the all-pervasive Führer cult reflecting and embellishing Hitler’s absolute supremacy, but at the same time underpinned the myth of the all-seeing, all-knowing infallible Leader, elevating it to the very principle of government itself. Moreover, as we have witnessed throughout, Hitler had in the process swallowed the Führer cult himself, hook, line, and sinker. He was the most ardent believer in his own infallibility and destiny. It was not a good premiss for rational decision-making.

  The compliance of all sections of the regime in the growth of the Führer cult, the exemption made for Hitler himself even by vehement internal critics of the Party or Gestapo, and the full awareness of the immense popularity of the ‘great Leader’, all contributed to making it extraordinarily difficult by summer 1938 – the first time that deep anxieties about the course of his leadership surfaced – now to contemplate withdrawing support, let alone take oppositional action of any kind.

  In any case, the extent of opposition to plans for an assault on Czechoslovakia should not be exaggerated. From within the regime, only the army had the potential to block Hitler. The Blomberg – Fritsch affair had certainly left a legacy of anger, distaste, and distrust among the army leadership. But this was d
irected less at Hitler personally, than at the leadership of the SS and police. Even Beck, by far the most vehement critic of the regime among the top military leadership, went out of his way – and not for tactical reasons – to emphasize that the resistance needed towards the methods of the SS and the corrupt Party ‘bigwigs’ was a ‘fight for the Führer’ and that there should not be even the ‘slightest presumption of anything like a plot’ against him.188

  Following the changes of February 1938, the army’s own position, in relation to Hitler, had weakened. In the process, the army leadership had, as has been claimed, been transformed from a ‘power-élite’ into a ‘functional élite’ – an adjunct of Hitler’s power rather than the ‘state within the state’ which it had effectively been since Bismarck’s era.189 The Anschluß had then further bolstered Hitler’s supremacy. By the summer of 1938, whatever the anxieties about the risk of war with the western powers, the leadership of the armed forces was divided within itself. Hitler could depend upon unquestioning support from Keitel and Jodl in the Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht. Brauchitsch could be relied upon to keep the army in line, whatever the reservations of some of the generals. Raeder was, as always, fully behind Hitler and already preparing the navy for eventual war with Britain. The head of the Luftwaffe, Göring, fearful of such a war and seeing it as the negation of his own conception of German expansionist policy, nevertheless bowed axiomatically to the Führer’s superior authority at all points where his approach started to diverge from Hitler’s own. When Beck felt compelled to resign as Chief of Staff, therefore, he stirred no broad protest within the army, let alone in the other branches of the Wehrmacht. Instead, he isolated himself and henceforth formed his links with equally isolated and disaffected individuals within the armed forces, the Foreign Office, and other state ministries who began to contemplate ways of removing Hitler. They were well aware that they were swimming against a strong tide. Whatever doubts and worries there might be, they knew that the consensus behind Hitler within the power-elites was unbroken. They were conscious, too, that from the masses, despite mounting anxieties about war, Hitler could still summon immense reserves of fanatical support.190 The prospects of successful resistance were, therefore, not good.

  It was scarcely surprising, then, that there would be overwhelming compliance and no challenge to Hitler’s leadership, or to his dangerous policy, as the crisis unfolded throughout the summer. Despite reservations, all sections of the regime’s power-elite had by this point come to bind themselves to Hitler – whether to flourish or to perish.

  III

  The international constellation also played completely into Hitler’s hands. Czechoslovakia, despite its formal treaties with France and the Soviet Union, was exposed and friendless. France’s vacillation during the summer reflected a desperation to avoid having to fulfil its treaty obligations to Czechoslovakia through military involvement for which there was neither the will nor the preparation. The French were fearful of Czechoslovakia coming under German control. But they were even more fearful of becoming embroiled in a war to defend the Czechs.191 The Soviet Union, in any case preoccupied with its internal upheavals, could only help the defence of Czechoslovakia if its troops were permitted to cross Polish or Romanian soil – a prospect which could be ruled out.192 Poland and Hungary both looked greedily to the possibility of their own revisionist gains at the expense of a dismembered Czechoslovakia. Italy, having conceded to the rapidly emerging senior partner in the Axis over the key issue of Austria, had no obvious interest in propping up Czechoslovakia.193 Great Britain, preoccupied with global commitments and problems in different parts of its Empire, and aware of its military unreadiness for an increasingly likely conflict with Germany, was anxious at all costs to avoid prematurely being drawn into a war over a nationality problem in a central European country to which it was bound by no treaty obligations. The British knew the French were not prepared to help the Czechs.194 The government were still giving Hitler the benefit of the doubt, ready to believe that designs on Sudeten territory did not amount to ‘international power lust’ or mean that he was envisaging a future attack on France and Britain.195 Beyond this, it was accepted in London that the Czechs were indeed oppressing the Sudeten German minority.196 Pressure on the Czechs to comply with Hitler’s demands was an inevitable response – and one backed by the French.

  On top of its increasingly hopeless international position, Czechoslovakia’s internal fragility also greatly assisted Hitler. Not just the clamour of the Sudeten Germans, but the designs of the Slovaks for their own autonomy placed the Czech government in an impossible situation. Undermined from without and within, the only new democracy surviving from the post-war settlement was about to be deserted by its ‘friends’ and devoured by its enemies.

  In the very days before Schuschnigg had prompted the Anschluß crisis, Goebbels had noted, after discussions with Hitler, that Czechoslovakia would ‘be torn to pieces (zerfetzt) one day’.197 Even as Göring was reassuring the Czechs that there was no contemplation of military action against them, he was telling the Hungarians that the turn of Czechoslovakia would certainly come once the Austrian question was settled.198 Hitler himself, according to Jodl, also made similar comments around the same time: ‘Austria would have to be digested first.’199 Within two weeks of the Anschluß, in discussions in Berlin with the Sudeten German leader Konrad Henlein, Hitler was indicating that the Czech question would be solved ‘before long’. He also prescribed the general strategy of stipulating demands which the Prague government could not meet – vital to prevent the Czecho-slovakian government at any stage falling in line with British pressure to accommodate the Sudeten Germans.200 Henlein wasted no time in putting forward his demands, amounting to autonomy for Sudeten Germans, on 24 April at the Congress of the Sudeten German Party at Carlsbad (Karlovy Vary).201 One demand to be kept up Henlein’s sleeve, which Hitler was certain from his knowledge of the Austria-Hungarian multinational state could never be accepted, was for German regiments within the Czechoslo-vakian army.202 In Germany itself, the strategy was to turn up the volume of propaganda at the alleged oppression of the Sudeten Germans by the Czechs. If necessary, incidents to fuel the agitation could be manufactured.203 Militarily, Hitler was hoping to prevent British intervention, and was certain the French would not act alone.204 A key deterrent, in his view, was the building of a 400-mile concrete fortification (planned to include ‘dragon’s teeth’ anti-tank devices and gun emplacements, with over 11,000 bunkers and reinforced dug-outs) along Germany’s western border – the ‘Westwall’ – to provide a significant obstruction to any French invasion. The direct interest which Hitler took in the Westwall and the urgency in completing the fortifications were directly related to the question of timing in any blow aimed at the Czechs.205 At this stage, in late March and April 1938, Hitler evidently had no precise time-scale in mind for the destruction of Czechoslovakia.206

  This was still the case when Hitler instructed Keitel, on 21 April, to draw up plans for military action against Czechoslovakia. According to Keitel’s account of the meeting, Hitler mentioned that the problem would have to be solved some time on account of the oppression of the German minority, but especially because of Czechoslovakia’s strategic position, which was of immense danger to the Reich in the event of ‘the great showdown in the east, not only with the Poles but above all with Bolshevism’.207 However, Hitler had indicated that he did not intend to attack Czechoslovakia in the near future unless circumstances within the country or fortuitous international developments offered an opportunity. This would then have to be seized so rapidly – military action would have to prove decisive within four days – that the western powers would realize the pointlessness of intervention.208 Keitel and Jodl were in no hurry to work out the operational plan which, when eventually presented to Hitler in draft on 20 May, still represented what Keitel had taken to be Hitler’s intentions a month earlier. ‘It is not my intention to smash Czechoslovakia by military action within t
he immediate future,’ the draft began.209

  In the interim, Hitler had reacted angrily to a memorandum composed on 5 May by army Chief of Staff General Beck, emphasizing Germany’s military incapacity to win a long war, and warning of the dangers of British intervention in the event of military action against Czechoslovakia that year.210 An indication of the divisions within the leadership of the army itself, let alone of the Wehrmacht as a whole, and its enfeebled relations with the Führer, was the decision by Keitel and Brauchitsch, without consulting Beck, not to place the first parts of the memorandum before Hitler since they knew he would dismiss them out of hand and not even read the third part.211 Hitler was even more scathing when Göring reported to him how little progress had been made on the Westwall (where construction work had been under the direction of Army Group Command 2, headed by General Wilhelm Adam). He accused the General Staff of sabotaging his plans, removed the army’s construction chiefs, and put Fritz Todt – his civil engineering expert who, since 1933, had masterminded the building of the motorways – in charge.212 It was an example of Hitler’s increasingly high-handed way of dealing with the army leadership.213 Hitler still recalled what he saw as the army’s obstructionism as late as 1942.214

  The question of Mussolini’s attitude towards German action over Czechoslovakia had been high on Hitler’s agenda during his state visit to Italy at the beginning of May. Three special trains, carrying around 500 diplomats, officials, party leaders, security men, and journalists had set off for Rome on 2 May.215 The return visit, lavish in the extreme in its arrangements, ran less smoothly than Mussolini’s state visit to Germany had done the previous September. Hitler was irritated by the fact that King Victor Emmanuel III, not Mussolini, was his host. He felt ill at ease and out of place at the court ceremonials. He sensed, too, not without reason, that he was treated with some disdain by the King and Queen and their court circle.216 The low-point for Hitler came when, following a gala performance of Aida in Naples, he found himself, without prior warning, alongside the King (who was dressed in full uniform), still in his evening dress, right arm outstretched, his left pressed against his waistcoat, coat-tails flapping behind him, inspecting a guard of honour while resembling, in the eyes of his adjutant Fritz Wiedemann, a flustered head-waiter in a restaurant.217 A furious Hitler vented his wrath on Ribbentrop, who in turn sought a scapegoat and sacked the head of protocol.218