Goebbels: A Biography

by Peter Longerich

  In January 1930, Wessel was attacked by two communists in his home and sustained a bad gunshot wound.67 The cause of the attack was a dispute over the rent between Wessel and his landlady, who then called on the local “commune” for assistance. As Wessel’s girlfriend was a former prostitute, it was not difficult for communist propaganda to depict the whole affair as a dispute between “pimps.” The weeks in the hospital, as Wessel’s life slowly ebbed away, and the circumstances of the assault stirred Goebbels’s imagination: “Like in a Dostoyevsky novel: the idiot, the workers, the prostitute, the middle-class family, endless pangs of conscience, endless suffering. Such is the life of this 22-year-old visionary idealist.”68

  Wessel died on February 23, and Goebbels decided to make him the martyr figure of the movement.69 He had tried to do the same with Kütemeyer in 1928, but the circumstances surrounding his death remained unclear. Walter Fischer, the second National Socialist fatality in Berlin, had resigned from the SA by the time he was murdered, and was therefore effectively ruled out as a role model. But Goebbels was determined to make Wessel into a heroic legend, despite the murky background of his murder. On March 1 Goebbels spoke at his graveside, while communists and National Socialists clashed outside the cemetery.

  Using the language of religious symbolism, Goebbels did his utmost to create a cult around the late Horst Wessel that immediately took on sacral overtones. He adapted the Catholic hope of resurrection, which he had encountered some months earlier in his father’s church funeral service, to the purposes of National Socialism. Goebbels designated Wessel as a “Christ-socialist,” and just as he had done with his friend Flisges in Michael, he elevated Wessel to the role of “redeemer” who had sacrificed his life for a Germany that would arise in the not-too-distant future: “Someone must set an example by sacrificing himself. […] Through sacrifice to redemption […] through struggle to victory. […] Wherever Germany is, you are there too, Horst Wessel!”70 He proclaimed “Die Fahne hoch,” the song written by Wessel, to be the anthem of the National Socialist movement.71 In a contribution to Der Angriff Goebbels honored Wessel’s life as though summarizing the sufferings of Jesus: He had “drained the chalice of pain to the lees.”72

  A DAILY NEWSPAPER FOR THE BERLIN NSDAP

  Goebbels had been making plans for a daily newspaper in Berlin since early 1929,73 and in the autumn of 1929 it had seemed that the project was in the bag. Goebbels had come to an agreement with Max Amann, head of the Party’s own Eher Verlag publishing house: The paper was to be published by Eher in Berlin; Hitler was to be named the publisher and Goebbels editor in chief.74 Hitler had decided in December that the paper should be printed in Berlin,75 but in January Goebbels learned to his dismay that the printing presses would not be installed until September 1, 1930. “Those buffoons in Munich ruin every big plan we make,” he complained. For the time being, the Völkischer Beobachter would carry a special supplementary page for Berlin.76

  Goebbels was in for another surprise in January 1930: The Strasser brothers’ Kampf-Verlag announced it was starting its own daily newspaper on March 1. Goebbels countered this move by proposing to expand Der Angriff as rapidly as possible into a daily, which could then be merged with the planned new daily newspaper.77 But it took Hitler a long time to make up his mind. Disappointed hardly does justice to Goebbels’s reaction to Hitler’s hesitation (“I’m sick of him!”); once more he considered resigning if the Party leader sided with the Strassers in this newspaper war.78

  Finally, Hitler summoned Goebbels to Munich and decided that the Kampf-Verlag would not be permitted to publish a daily paper. Starting on March 1, he would start up a special Berlin edition of the Völkischer Beobachter instead. Both agreed that Goebbels should take over the Reich propaganda machine as early as the following week—eight months had passed since Hitler first held out the prospect of this appointment.79

  But once again nothing came of it. Not only did the question of the Reich propaganda takeover drag on, but the Kampf-Verlag continued to refer to its forthcoming newspaper. Goebbels thought the reaction of Hitler and the Völkischer Beobachter was bush-league and felt himself “completely let down” by this behavior.80

  In the middle of the month, when the conflict had still not been resolved,81 he saw “anarchy in the Party”; he blamed Hitler entirely for “not deciding and asserting his authority.”82 In the end Hitler published an appeal in the Völkischer Beobachter,83 writing in favor of Goebbels and against the Kampf-Verlag. When the Strassers then intervened with Hitler, Goebbels immediately feared that he was about to “break his word” yet again.84 Hitler, he declared after meeting him in Nuremberg on February 21, “promises much and delivers little.”85

  Goebbels was slow to grasp Hitler’s strategy in the Strasser crisis. This amounted to avoiding an open breach with the Strasser brothers, which could potentially have divided the Party. So he put up with their waywardness over press policy even at the expense of alienating Goebbels, the ambitious publisher of Der Angriff. He placated Goebbels by complaining vociferously about the Strassers and kept him in check by holding out the promise of a daily newspaper and the position of Reich director of propaganda.

  Heralded for weeks in advance, the first edition of the Kampf-Verlag’s daily newspaper, the Nationaler Sozialist, appeared on March 1. Goebbels’s disappointment was boundless: “Hitler has openly capitulated to these megalomaniac, cunning little Bavarians and their asphalt [i.e., metropolitan] followers. So I’ve sent him an urgent letter demanding that he should openly repudiate this insolent move, failing which I offer my resignation.”86 Hitler was extremely angry, but his overriding concern was to avoid choosing between Goebbels and Strasser. He repeated his promise to take steps internally to deal decisively with the Party publishing company and if necessary remove Strasser from his position as head of the Party organization. As usual, nothing actually happened.87

  By the middle of the month Goebbels had to admit that Der Angriff and the Völkischer Beobachter in Berlin were being “pushed to the wall” by the Kampf-Verlag, while Hitler looked on passively: “For whatever reason—it doesn’t matter why—Hitler has broken his word to me 5 times. […] Hitler stands aside, he makes no decisions, he doesn’t lead, he just lets things drift.” He “no longer believed Hitler at all,” he declared at the end of the month: “What is it going to be like later, when he has to play the dictator in Germany?”88

  At the beginning of March Hitler had once again—“for the umpteenth time”—told him that he was appointing him head of propaganda but had not acted on his promise.89 A few weeks later, when Himmler was urging Goebbels finally to take over the new position of propaganda chief, Goebbels was still waiting for the “call from Munich. If Hitler doesn’t make the first move, then it’s Götz von Berlichingen.”*2, 90 But in spite of all the pressure, the Party leader could not make up his mind to take decisive action against Strasser.91 Goebbels was so worn down by the dispute that at the end of the month he was once more thinking of resigning as Gauleiter.92 But he could not bring himself to make the break with his idol.

  THE END OF THE GRAND COALITION

  The end of March 1930 saw the collapse of the grand coalition—consisting of the Center Party (Zentrum), the socialists (SPD), the German Democratic Party (DDP), and the German People’s Party (DVP) under the Social Democrat chancellor Hermann Müller—following a disagreement among the parties over the question of funding unemployment pay. The background to this dispute was the dramatic rise in the unemployment figures since the winter: The world economic crisis was having a massive impact on Germany. In this situation Hindenburg called on the Center Party’s Heinrich Brüning to form a government, but explicitly told him not to aim at a coalition but rather to resolve any conflicts by using the emergency powers of the president under Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution. There is no doubt that the president’s objective was to permanently exclude the Social Democrats from power, make Parliament redundant, and introduce an authoritarian regime subje
ct to his consent.93

  Early in April, when the SPD confronted the new government—exclusively formed from the bourgeois parties—with a motion for a vote of no confidence, the DNVP was in a position to tip the balance. If it went along with the vote, another election would follow.

  After a long discussion with Hindenburg on March 31, this was Hitler’s preferred option, as he told Goebbels the same day. Goebbels was delighted with the news: “New elections will give us about 40 seats. That will be amusing!” It seemed to the National Socialists that the rapidly deteriorating economic situation would give their party the opening they were looking for.94 But in the end the DNVP voted against the no-confidence motion. “The boss is as angry as hell,” noted Goebbels. He did manage to find something positive in this turn of events, namely “our withdrawal from the Reich Committee.” But he was suspicious about the Party leader’s next few maneuvers. “Hitler-Hugenberg talks. Hitler says he’s prepared to hold off the announcement about withdrawing for two weeks. Hugenberg plans to bring the cabinet down by then. I don’t believe it. The boss is on the wrong wavelength.”95

  When Strasser’s Nationaler Sozialist ignored Hitler’s wishes and publicized the NSDAP’s exit from the Reich Committee before the agreed two weeks had elapsed, Goebbels went on the offensive against Hugenberg and the DNVP in Der Angriff: The party was a “superfluous and harmful outfit”; in his last contribution to the Reichstag, the party’s leader had acted out “a tragicomedy about misunderstood leadership.”96 But the DNVP had also reneged on its agreement with Hitler: In the decisive vote on the budget on April 12, their parliamentary party voted for the government bill and thus saved Brüning’s government.97 Goebbels wrote that Hitler, who had come to Berlin, had no doubt “indulged in too many illusions. But on the other hand the party [DNVP] is finished. There’s bound to be a split. All grist to our mill.”98

  TAKING OVER AS HEAD OF PROPAGANDA

  At the end of April Hitler decided to oppose Strasser publicly and hand the long-promised control of Reich propaganda over to Goebbels. Hitler used the NSDAP leaders’ conference, which took place on April 26 and 27 in Munich, to stage a fundamental “settling of accounts” with Gregor Strasser, the Kampf-Verlag, the “drawingroom Bolsheviks,” and other undesirable elements within the Party. After Hitler’s speech Goebbels observed that “Strasser and his circle” were “shattered.” After his tirade, Hitler took the decisive step: As Goebbels tells it, he “gets to his feet again and amid a breathless hush announces my appointment as Reich head of propaganda. It serves the others right. Strasser is as white as a sheet. He stammers out a few sentences at the end, and then it’s all over. We have won all along the line. […] Goebbels triumphans!”99 He seems to have forgotten that it had taken more than a year for the Party leader to confirm his appointment as head of propaganda—which can be traced back ultimately to an agreement between him and Strasser—and that Hitler only did so when it proved useful to demonstrate his power over Gregor Strasser and his brother.

  Goebbels effectively began to run the Munich propaganda operation in May.100 As planned, he now traveled every other week to Munich for a few days, working with Himmler on getting the Party propaganda machine up and running. He hoped to bring it “up to scratch” by the autumn. In this he relied a good deal at first on Himmler, whose praises he sang constantly even as he treated him condescendingly like a kind of servant-pupil.101 The runup to the election in Saxony was to be his first test as head of propaganda, but his view of it was quite relaxed: “Well, if it doesn’t work out, it’s all the Saxons’ fault.”102

  As chief of Reich propaganda, he did not by any means have the whole of the Party’s propaganda operation under his thumb: The Eher-Verlag under Amann remained independent; Strasser’s Reich organization office was responsible for radio, film, and popular education; and Goebbels also had no responsibility for the training of speakers, which duties were under the “Reich propaganda department II.” It was thus inevitable that there would be friction with the “megalomaniac Party comrade Fritz Reinhardt,” who was responsible for this area of operations.103

  “THE SOCIALISTS ARE LEAVING THE NSDAP”—BUT GOEBBELS STAYS ON

  Goebbels’s conviction that he had totally routed the Strassers at the leaders’ meeting in April seemed to be corroborated when Hitler visited Berlin on May 2—Goebbels was proud to receive him in the new and greatly extended Gau office104—and ostentatiously banned the evening edition of the Nationaler Sozialist. Under this pressure, Strasser agreed with Hitler a little later that he would sell his share of the paper to Amann; he finally shut it down on May 20.105 But to Goebbels’s great consternation, the Nationaler Sozialist continued to appear after the stated deadline. Hitler was very critical of Otto Strasser, but he was not prepared to deal with him severely.106

  On May 21 and 22, Hitler had lengthy talks with Otto Strasser, who, as he told Goebbels shortly afterward, made a very bad impression on him. This conversation was an important influence on Strasser’s decision to break with the NSDAP for good. After quitting the Party at the beginning of July, he went on to publish a transcript of the discussion, replete with details embarrassing to Hitler.107

  At the Berlin Gau Day on May 28, Goebbels took a tough line with the Nationaler Sozialist, preventing the Party organization from advertising the paper in any way.108 However, Hitler wanted to postpone a public reckoning—as promised to Goebbels—with the internal opposition until after the Landtag elections in Saxony on June 22. But the deadline came and went, and to Goebbels’s chagrin Hitler took no action.109 All he did was exclude a few minor rebels from the Berlin Party organization.110 Hitler did not dare take on Otto Strasser, but he told Goebbels that Gregor had in the meantime very openly distanced himself from his brother.111 “I don’t trust those crafty Lower Bavarians,” noted Goebbels.112 But in fact Gregor Strasser would go on to relinquish his position as publisher of the Nationaler Sozialist by the end of June.113

  At the general meeting of Party members on June 30 and the Gau Day of July 2, Goebbels once more raked the Nationaler Sozialist group, the “literati clique,” fiercely over the coals.114 The next day, under the headline “The Socialists Are Leaving the N.S.D.A.P,” Otto Strasser and his supporters announced that they were leaving the Party. Goebbels was relieved: “This clears the air.”115 A few days later he proclaimed the end of the crisis: “Otto Strasser has lost out completely.”116

  * * *

  *1 Translators’ note: A Schalmei is a metal wind instrument with multiple trumpet-like “bells” or horns and makes a raucous sound.

  *2 Translators’ note: An allusion to Goethe’s eponymous play containing the famous line “He can lick my arse”!

  CHAPTER 7

  “Dare to Live Dangerously!”

  Goebbels’s Radicalism and Hitler’s Policy of “Legality”

  Credit 7.1

  Goebbels’s public appearances in Berlin were strongly marked by his liking for sensation-loving dramatization and his vain self-presentation. Contemporaries were fully aware of the clownish aspects of his campaigns: “We Berliners are not impressed by Chaplin; we are quite used to other grotesque comedians.” Cartoon inspired by Chaplin’s visit to Berlin, March 1931.

  In mid-July 1930 the Reichstag was close to dissolution: The majority in Parliament rejected Hindenburg’s attempt to use his presidential decree under Article 48 to push through Brüning’s budget proposals in spite of their failure to gain parliamentary approval. For Goebbels personally, one immediate result would be the loss of his parliamentary immunity from the law: “If the Reichstag is dissolved they’ll arrest me right away. It’s shitty.”1

  On July 18 a majority in the Reichstag vetoed Hindenburg’s emergency decree. The president had previously instructed Brüning to announce the dissolution of Parliament in the event of such a block. Goebbels, now a wanted man again, managed to leave the Reichstag building unhindered. He and Göring took the night train to Munich,2 where Hitler held a meeting: Apart from Göring
and Goebbels, the attendees included Alfred Rosenberg, Wilhelm Frick, Gregor Strasser, Konstantin Hierl, and Franz Ritter von Epp. The discussion centered on the distribution of seats in the next Parliament. A tour of the Palais Barlow on the Königsplatz, bought by the Party in May, had been arranged for the occasion. Once the renovation was complete, it would become the site of the new headquarters. Goebbels found the place “ostentatious and spacious.” He took careful note of Hitler’s disparaging remarks about Gregor Strasser.3

  THE ELECTION CAMPAIGN

  At headquarters over the next few days Goebbels adjusted to working with the election campaign machine, but the atmosphere of Munich did not suit him: He could “not work in Munich. It’s disorderly and disorganized.”4 But he had to stick it out for a few more days, since a meeting of Gauleiters was scheduled for July 27, when the basic decisions about the election campaign would be made. Goebbels was officially entrusted with running the central election campaign, and then discussion moved on to the nomination of candidates. Goebbels boasted in the diary that he had thwarted various maneuvers by Strasser, pushed through the candidacies of his Berlin Party comrade Martin Löppelmann and that of his old boss Axel Ripke, and prevented “many another dubious blessing,” though he could do nothing about certain “dead losses.” He had spoken out explicitly against Reventlow, but the latter—like his enemy Münchmeyer—was re-nominated.5