In the event, Hitler gave notice through Donati that he would be accompanied the next day not only by Bormann, Goering and Ribbentrop, but also by the Chief of the permanent Wehrmacht mission in Rome, General Albert Weisener, and that any Vatican objection to the general’s presence would lead to the Fuehrer’s immediate return to Berlin.
No objection being made, the Hitler motorcade set off from the Piazza Venezia at 10 a.m. on August 17, traveling through streets packed with cheering Romans and lined from the start of the Corso Vittorio Emanuele to the bridge of the same name by troops from the Italian Piave Division. Officers from Mussolini’s personal 800-strong bodyguard had been attached to the two Leibstandarte companies, one of which remained on guard over the Palazzo, the other being stationed where the Via della Conciliazione met the outer limits of the Vatican City at the entrance to St. Peter’s Square. Mussolini himself remained ensconced in his Roman residence, the Villa Torlonia, and all ambassadors to the Holy See representing countries at war with Italy had been instructed to remain within the walls of the Palazzo Santa Martha during the German leader’s presence in the Vatican. Accredited reporters and photographers from the Italian and foreign press and radio networks were herded into an enclosure near the central Egyptian obelisk of St. Peter’s Square, which had been closed all that morning to the general public.
Wearing—for the first time in ten years, and only at Donati’s insistence—a morning suit and top hat, Hitler was met by the Maestro di Camera, Monsignor Arborio di Sant’ Elia, at the Angelic Gate entrance to the Apostolic Palace. Here he cursorily inspected a detachment of the colorfully dressed Swiss Guard while Hermann Goering, banks of medals glittering in the sunshine, stood twiddling his marshal’s baton and Ribbentrop, in the green ceremonial dress of the Foreign Office, looked on with a barely concealed sneer on his pale and fastidious features.
The one concession to Hitler’s earlier insistence that this was to be a “man-to-man” meeting was the place chosen by Pope Pius XII to receive his guest—his own study rather than either of the throne rooms. And so it was in this spacious study, almost bare of ornamentation, that the sixty-eight-year-old Eugenio Pacelli, tall but frail-looking in his elegant white cassock, rose to greet the fifty-five-year-old Fuehrer of the Greater Reich, while the red-soutaned cardinals ranged behind him came to their feet with a rustle of silk not completely masking an audible creaking of joints. The younger man, with literal power of life and death over 450 million human beings, advanced toward the smiling Pontiff, looking—as Ribbentrop would later recall in bitterness—“like the chief cashier of the Vatican Bank, about to present a rather unsatisfactory half-yearly report.”
Ritual required that Catholics should go down on one knee on entering into the Pope’s presence, then again halfway across the floor, and for a third time as they knelt to kiss the Fisherman’s Ring. Non-Catholic males were expected to make a single deep bow, after which the Pope would motion them to a chair. It had been Hitler’s view, in which Donati had concurred, that although he was nominally a member of the “one true faith” it would be preposterous for the dictator of Europe to kneel before any man and a particularly inappropriate gesture given the circumstances of this encounter. He therefore made his bow, with his companions following suit, and acknowledged with brief nods of the head the introductions to the senior cardinals, all Italians and including, significantly, the Prefect of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith.
He bowed again when the Pope, before resuming his seat, uttered a few words of conventional greeting, welcoming the German Fuehrer to the Holy City and expressing the hope that “We shall have only pleasant memories of his visit.” Hitler then sat down and, after an awkward silence, during which the Pope fixed him with a steady and amiable regard, began to speak.
He started by reminding His Holiness that the Concordat of 1929 between the Vatican and the Kingdom of Italy, recognizing the full and independent sovereignty of the Holy See, had been negotiated with his Axis partner and comrade-in-arms, Benito Mussolini. If, he went on dryly, the Vatican was now a sovereign city-state “with a hundred acres of territory and a population of less than a thousand souls,” it was not only through the good will of the Italian dictator but, in the wider context of an integrated New Order in Europe, through Hitler’s own respect for the institution of the Church. It was with pain and disappointment, therefore, that he had learned of the untimely private audience given to the personal representative of President Roosevelt—a sworn enemy of the Berlin-Rome axis—and he felt he must go on record as stating that any interference in Axis-Vatican relations by the warmongering President of the United States would invite immediate and drastic countermeasures by himself, as Fuehrer of the Reich.
Only Goering’s heavy breathing and the rasp of silk soutanes as two or three of the cardinals stirred in their seats relieved the short silence when Hitler paused for the Pontiff’s reply.
Pope Pius XII answered quietly, in his excellent German. “We take notice,” he said, “of the Fuehrer’s remarks, while at the same time reminding him that We are not only sovereign but neutral, taking no sides in this agonizing conflict between nations, but earnestly pleading to God, through Our tears and Our prayers, for a reconciliation of all His children.
“At the same time,” the Pope went on after only a slight hesitation, “We cannot help but take note of the fact that the Concordat of 1933 between the Holy See and Germany has already been breached, unilaterally, in many of its most meaningful provisions, and that for no reason apparent to Us the government of the Reich has now reduced by half the state’s annual grant to the Church in Germany. We have striven in vain to reconcile these facts with the Fuehrer’s professed respect for our religious institutions, not to mention his own baptism and confirmation in the Mother Church.”
The Pope’s aristocratic features had taken on severity toward the end of his statement, and the expression remained as he stopped speaking and folded his pale hands in his lap. Now all eyes in the room were on Adolf Hitler, sitting bolt upright and almost visibly bursting with suppressed rhetoric. For a moment, as his hands tightened on the gilt arms of his chair, it seemed that he was going to spring to his feet and deliver his retort in the customary Hitlerian manner—pacing about the floor, flailing his arms in emphasis, coming to a halt only to spin around, chin up and eyes blazing. Of those present, perhaps only Martin Bormann knew the supreme effort it was costing his Chief to remain seated, to keep his voice under control.
“His Holiness speaks of breaches in the Concordat. To this I reply that the document was never intended to provide a oneway flow of benefits from the state to the Church, but clearly implied, in both letter and spirit, that the Church in Germany would at all times and in all circumstances loyally respect the temporal authority of the Reich. This has not been the case. Time and time again, individual clerics and entire ecclesiastical bodies have deliberately attempted to thwart the realization of National Socialist principles in our German society and to undermine the political and ideological morale of my people. This is no frivolous complaint. It can be supported by a mountain of evidence—of case after case of plots and other activities inimical to the State.
“His Holiness has referred to my own original adherence to the Roman faith, and I welcome this reminder because of the direct connection between my subsequent ‘loss of grace’ and the current failure of the Church in Europe to accept a constructive role in the New Order. It is no secret—certainly not from His Holiness, who is well informed in such matters—that at an early stage in my career I found much of the Church’s teachings to be totally in conflict with the realities of the world I lived in. I never abandoned my faith in God, however, and if His Holiness will permit the liberty, there is abundant—some might say overwhelming—proof that the Almighty has never faltered in His faith in Adolf Hitler, whose mission on this earth, if not inspired and guided by the Supreme Being, must put in serious doubt the very existence of an omnipotent and omnipresent God.”
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Ignoring, or more likely oblivious to, the tightening of the Pontiff’s lips and the outraged murmuring of the cardinals ranged behind him, Hitler sailed right on, his voice rising and falling now with something approaching its normal declamatory vigor. He well understood the immense gravity of the challenge which he was now presenting to His Holiness. He was limiting his proposals to those doctrinal issues that were blatantly irreconcilable with Nazi ideology on the one hand and with certain undisputable findings of modern science on the other. He had come to Rome with a full list of the minimal revisions necessary to a rapprochement between Church and state, and his secretary, Martin Bormann, would present a copy of this document to His Holiness at the conclusion of this audience. It remained only for the Pontiff, who, as the Catechism taught us, was infallible when he defined or redefined a doctrine concerning faith or morals, to take immediate guidance from the Almighty—as Hitler himself had sought guidance in communion with God on the Kehlstein. It was Hitler’s intention, he concluded, to remain in Rome as long as the Holy Father needed him for further interpretation of the proposed new theology.
The Pope made his reply without so much as a glance at the cardinals, now frozen into a tableau of hostility behind him. He would not wish to detain the Fuehrer of the Reich unnecessarily in Rome, when so many pressing and—he managed a faint smile—“less fanciful demands” were being made elsewhere on his time. The doctrines of the Holy Catholic Church were not immutable; but, as befitting a faith that had survived two thousand years of heresy and persecution, doctrinal revisions or reinterpretations were never made precipitately. The Fuehrer would appreciate that the recent and grievously lamented death of Cardinal Maglione had imposed many new burdens on the Pontiff’s unworthy shoulders, but in courtesy to the Fuehrer, for whom the Pope had always had the highest personal regard, the document referred to would be studied in due course and a considered reply given by the Holy See, through the good offices of the special papal legate.
Pope Pius then signaled the end of the audience by rising to his feet.
“We understand arrangements have been made for the Fuehrer and his colleagues to inspect the Vatican palaces and museums. We wish you an interesting tour, and may God go with you.” It was the moment for the parting papal blessing, when visitors of any or no denomination might, without loss of dignity, go down on one knee. As the Pope’s hand rose and his lips began to form the words, “Benedictio dei omnipotentis descendat—” Adolf Hitler started to genuflect, corrected himself immediately and made a stiff little bow. Behind him, as if activated by a single string linked to the Fuehrer’s discomfiture, the right arm of Bormann, Goering and Ribbentrop shot forward in the Nazi salute.
As a German-speaking cardinal escorted the Pope’s guests through the seemingly never-ending succession of magnificent rooms, loggias, chapels and museums containing some of the world’s richest collections of paintings, classical sculpture, precious jewelry and priceless documents, Hermann Goering’s broad thin mouth was almost visibly watering. Hitler suffered the tour in an almost complete and brooding silence, opening his lips only once, after he had held up the company to stare intently, for a full minute, at the massive gold and bejeweled reliquary framing the image of Christ’s face.
“Quite obviously Aryan,” he muttered to Bormann, before striding on.
When Giovanni Donati presented himself to the Fuehrer at the Palazzo Venezia two hours later, he found Hitler in a state of intense nervous excitement.
“I’m issuing an ultimatum to that man Pacelli!” he declared. “Frame it any way you like, my dear Donati, but make it clear that I mean business and will not tolerate any more papal procrastination. I want either a decision on my proposals or a further meeting with the Pope within the next twenty-four hours!”
“I can give you the Holy Father’s answer right now,” the Italian prelate said, with a sigh.
“I want it from his own lips. Twenty-four hours—not a minute more!”
At 1:30 p.m. on Friday, August 18, Adolf Hitler began his private war against the Vatican by ordering his air fleet at Ciampino to stand by for an immediate return flight to Berlin. Mussolini, depressed by the last-minute cancellation of his banquet for the Fuehrer and nervous about Hitler’s intentions, could only offer boastful reassurances as he sat beside his German comrade on the drive to the airport.
“We Italians can do without the Vatican. My people go to church only because they know their Duce has never forbidden it. I can tell you, I have only to lift my little finger and all the latent anticlericalism of the Italians will come gushing forth to sweep those reactionary old eunuchs into the Tiber.”
“Don’t underestimate them, Duce,” Hitler muttered morosely. “They’re really convinced they have God on their side. When men believe that, they become the most formidable of opponents.” His hands went to the lapels of his black civilian suit, fingering the lapels. “Have you noticed any change in me over the past month or so?” he asked, staring straight ahead as the Italian dictator blinked quizzically at him.
“M-m-m . . . there is something. It’s difficult to define. An aura of—” Mussolini wagged his great jowls—“but you’ll think I’m being facetious.”
“Say what’s on your mind, Duce,” Hitler snapped. “An aura of what?”
“I was about to say ‘saintliness.’ Not in the conventional sense, of course. It’s more an impression of—well—of intense spiritual and intellectual refinement. Do I make sense, Fuehrer?”
Hitler’s features softened into a wistful little smile. “More than you can possibly imagine, my dear friend . . . But as to saintliness, that quality belongs in overwhelming measure to your countryman, sitting in the car following us.” He shook his head, sadly. “There, beyond any doubt, is the man who should be sitting on the throne of Saint Peter at this grave but historic moment in the Church’s destiny.”
“Giovanni Donati?” Mussolini swallowed hard. “A most worthy man, I agree. Indeed,” he went on, recovering quickly, “if the decision had been ours, instead of the Sacred College of Cardinals’—”
“I’m at war!” Hitler broke in fiercely. “The gauntlet has been thrown down by Pacelli, and I, Adolf Hitler, have picked it up! From now on, I make the decisions—guided as ever by the unerring hand of Providence!”
II
THE DRAFT treaty of alliance between the United States of America and the City-State of the Vatican was pushed through a special session of Congress so speedily that—as one embittered Congressman of the dissenting minority put it—“you would think the Constitution had been rewritten by Archbishop Spellman.”
In his message to the Senate, urging its immediate ratification, President Roosevelt described the treaty as “totally devoid of religious significance or commitment, any more than would be a similar defense treaty with some future Zionist state.” The treaty formally recognized the sovereignty and independence of the Vatican State—“no less and no more than was enshrined in the Concordat of 1929 with the Italian Government”—and provided for military and economic sanctions against any nation threatening that sovereignty. But it was something more. It served notice on the dictators of Germany and Italy that the United States, “speaking through this treaty for all nations, inside or beyond the Nazi writ, that share our own Christian civilization and culture, had no intention of standing by and watching the desecration of the one remaining European institution still unravaged by the brown- or black-shirted barbarians of the so-called New Order.”
The news of the treaty, and of its ratification by the Senate, threw Hitler into one of his more spectacular rages. Mussolini was summoned at once to Berlin and ordered not only to denounce the treaty but to instruct his Fascist Grand Council to rush legislation specifically invalidating any such treaty between the Vatican and the United States. The stocky little Italian dictator listened glumly as Hitler’s orders flew at him. He would do as the Fuehrer asked, he said; but he very much doubted if such a law would be acceptable as binding on the Vat
ican State. And he could see little possibility of enforcing it without risking civil war throughout Italy.
“So much for that magical little finger of yours!” Hitler screamed. “You get back to Rome and take care of the legislation! My Waffen SS will take care of your civil war!”
Kurt and Helga were tidying up their desks next evening, when the telephone rang.
“It’s that Italian Rasputin,” she called over to him, cupping the telephone’s mouthpiece. “Wants to know if he can come down and see you in ten minutes’ time.”
“Well, tell him yes, of course.”
She was tight-lipped as she hung up and turned around. “What am I supposed to do—hang around outside till you’re finished or find my own way home?”
“Do as you please. How do I know how long he’ll keep me?”
“Wonderful! So do I make dinner for two at home, or would the Herr Captain prefer that we eat out—at his convenience, of course.”
He had been living in her apartment on the Kurfuerstendamm for nearly two months now, ever since Hitler moved his headquarters back to Berlin, and they had recently begun to snap at each other like an old married couple. It had been a mistake, of course, moving in with her. After an average day closeted together in their airless Chancellery office, they should have been able to take a break from each other, to be free to decide whether or not to sleep together that night. Instead, they had fallen into a routine which, however suited to Helga’s sexual needs—and they were prodigious—was, in most other respects, changing their earlier lover-mistress relationship into something as predictable as it was tacitly contractual, and thereby robbed of delight.
It was a classic-enough situation and it had been further aggravated by extraneous tensions neither of them could do much about. There were the family worries: Walter Armbrecht was still being held incommunicado in Dachau, and there had been no word from Sophie—not even a postcard—since she had left for Madrid. And there was the fact that since Kurt and Donati had drafted the outline of Hitler’s fatuous “new theology,” now circulating among the Party hierarchy, Kurt had been virtually idle. The opening chapter of Mein Sieg, earmarked for the “religious problem,” was now in suspense pending the outcome of Hitler’s challenge to Pius XII, and the rest of the book was still in the first draft, unread as yet by the Fuehrer and therefore not susceptible of rewriting or amendment. On top of all this was the conflict of loyalties now silently eroding the Kurt-Helga relationship. The Fuehrer’s delusions of spiritual grandeur had in no way diminished him in the idolatrous eyes of Helga and her female colleagues of the Secretariat. On the contrary, such reports as had already reached the girls about Hitler’s transcendental “experiences” on the Kehlstein peak had only added to his charisma. As Helga had declared during Hitler’s abortive mission to Rome, “It’s as if Christ himself had come down, to put His own house in order. Let’s hope the Pope has the humility to ask for the Fuehrer’s blessing.”
Hitler Has Won Page 24