Hitler’s Second Book

by Adolf Hitler

  For, after all, the German grenadiers really had not shed their blood so that Poles might acquire a State, or so that a German Prince might be set on a plush covered throne.

  Thus in 1918 we stood at the end of a completely senseless and aimless squandering of the most precious German blood.

  Once more had our Folk infinitely staked its heroism, courageous sacrifice, indeed defiance of death and joyousness in responsibility, and nevertheless been forced to leave the battlefields weakened and beaten.

  Victorious in a thousand battles and skirmishes, and in the end nevertheless defeated by those who had been beaten. This was the handwriting on the wall for the German domestic and foreign policy of the pre War time and the four and a half years of the bloody struggle itself.

  Now after the collapse there arose the alarmed question, whether our German Folk had learned anything from this catastrophe, whether those who had deliberately betrayed it up to this time would still determine its fate, whether those who had so pitifully failed until this time would henceforth also dominate the future with their phrases, or whether finally our Folk would be educated to a new way of thinking about domestic and foreign policy and shift its action accordingly.

  For if a miracle does not take place for our Folk, its path will be one of ultimate doom and destruction.

  What is Germany’s present situation? And what are the prospects for her future? And what kind of a future will this be?

  The collapse which the German Folk suffered in 1918 lies, as I want once more to establish here, not in the overthrow of its military organisation, or in the loss of its weapons, but rather in its inner decay which was revealed at that time, and which today increasingly appears. This inner decay lies just as much in respect to the worsening of its racial value as in the loss of all those virtues which condition the greatness of a Folk, guarantee its existence, and promote its future.

  Blood value, the idea of personality, and the instinct for self preservation, slowly threatened to be lost to the German Folk. Internationalism triumphs in its stead and destroys our Folk value, democracy spreads by stifling the idea of personality, and in the end an evil pacifistic liquid manure poisons the mentality favouring bold self preservation. We see the effects of this vice of mankind appear in the whole life of our Folk. Not only does it make itself noticeable in the field of political concerns, no, but also in that of economy, and not least in that of our cultural life, so that, if it is not brought to a halt once and for all, our Folk will be excluded from the number of nations with a future.

  The great domestic task of the future lies in the elimination of these general symptoms of the decay of our Folk.

  This is the mission of the National Socialist Movement. A new nation must arise from this work which overcomes even the worst evils of the present, the cleavage between the classes, for which the bourgeoisie and Marxism are equally guilty.

  The aim of this reform work of a domestic political kind must finally be the regaining of our Folk’s strength for the prosecution of its struggle for existence and thereby the strength to represent its vital interests abroad.

  Our foreign policy is also presented by this with a task that it must fulfil. For the more domestic policy must furnish the Folkish instrument of strength to foreign policy, the more must also foreign policy, through the actions and measures it adopts, promote and support the formation of this instrument.

  If the foreign policy task of the old bourgeois national State had primarily been that of the further unification in Europe of those belonging to the German Nation in order then to work up to a higher territorial policy viewed in Folkish terms, then the foreign policy task of the post War period must at the outset be one that promotes the forging of the internal instrument of power. For the foreign policy aspirations of the pre War period had at their disposal a State that perhaps was not very highly exigent in a Folkish sense, but which had a wonderful Army establishment. Even if Germany of that time had long since ceased to place such an emphasis on the military, as for example Old Prussia, and therefore was outmatched by other States, especially in the extent of the Army organisation, nevertheless the inner quality of the Old Army was incomparably superior to all other similar institutions. At that time this best instrument of the art of war stood at the disposal of a State leadership with a bold foreign policy. In consequence of this instrument as well as of the general high esteem which it enjoyed, the freedom of our Folk was not only a result of our factually proved strength, but rather of the general credit that we possessed in consequence of this remarkable Army instrument, as well as partly in consequence of the rest of the exemplarily clean State apparatus.

  The German Folk no longer possesses this most important instrument for the defence of a nation’s interests, or at least it possesses it to a completely insufficient extent, and very far removed from the foundation which conditioned its former strength.

  The German Folk has acquired a mercenary Army. In Germany, these mercenary troops run the danger of sinking to the level of policemen armed with special technical weapons. The comparison of the German mercenary Army with the English turns out unfavourably to the Germans. The English mercenary army was always the bearer of England’s military defence and aggressive ideas as well as of her military tradition. In her mercenary troops and the militia system peculiar to her, England possessed the Army organisation which, in view of her insular position sufficed, indeed seemed suitable for fighting to the finish for England’s vital interests. The idea of manifesting English power of resistance in such a form in no way sprang from cowardice, in order thereby to be able to spare shedding the blood of the English Folk. On the contrary. England fought with mercenaries as long as they sufficed for the defence of England’s interests. She called for volunteers immediately the struggle required a greater commitment. She introduced general military conscription immediately the needs of the country demanded it. For regardless of how the momentary organisation of the English power of resistance looked, it was always committed in a dauntless struggle for England. And the formal army organisation in England was always only an instrument for the defence of English interests, committed with a will, which did not even shrink, if necessary, from demanding the blood of the whole nation.

  Wherever England’s interests were decisively at stake, she at any rate knew how to preserve a hegemony which, considered purely technically, goes as far as the demand for a two power standard. If we compare the infinitely responsible [solicitous] care shown here with the frivolousness with which Germany, and national bourgeois Germany at that, neglected her armaments in the pre War period, we must still today be gripped by a deep sadness. Just as England knew that her future, indeed her existence, depended on the strength of her fleet, so should this bourgeois national Germany have known that the existence and future of the German Reich depended on the strength of our land power. In Europe, Germany should have had to counter the two power standard on land to the two power standard on the seas. And just as England with an iron determination saw a reason for going to war at every violation of this standard, so did Germany have to prevent every attempt in Europe to outflank her army through France and Russia by a military decision, even one which had to be precipitated, and for which more than one favourable opportunity had presented itself. Even here this bourgeoisie misused one of Bismarck’s utterances in a most senseless way. Bismarck’s assertion that he did not intend to wage preventive war was joyfully seized upon by all weak, energyless and also irresponsible armchair politicians as a cover for the disastrous consequences of their anything goes policy. Only thereby they completely forgot that all three wars which Bismarck had conducted were wars which, at least according to the conceptions of these anti preventive war peace philosophers, could have been avoided. Consider, for example, what insults by Napoleon III in 1870 would have to be heaped on the German Republic of today for it to decide to request M. Benedetti to moderate his tone somewhat. Neither Napoleon nor the whole French Folk would ever have been able to
incite the German Republic of today to a Sedan: or does one believe that if Bismarck had not wanted a decision, the war of 1866 could not have been prevented? Now here it can be objected that this was a question of wars with clearly set aims, and not of a kind whose only ground lies in the fear of an attack by the enemy. But in reality this is only word splitting. Because Bismarck was convinced that the struggle with Austria was inevitable, he prepared himself for it and carried it through when the occasion suited Prussia. The reform of the French army by Marshal Niel made clearly perceptible the intention to give French policy and French chauvinism a forceful weapon for an attack against Germany. As a matter of fact, it would doubtless have been possible for Bismarck to bring the conflict to some kind of a peaceful solution in 1870. But it was more expedient for him to fight it out to the finish at a time when the French army organisation had not yet arrived at its full efficiency. Moreover, all these interpretations of Bismarckian utterances suffer from one thing, namely, they confuse Bismarck the diplomat with a republican parliamentarian. How Bismarck himself judged such utterances is best shown in his reply to a questioner before the outbreak of the Prussian Austrian War, who would have very much liked to know whether Bismarck really intended to attack Austria, whereupon the latter, with an impervious expression, replied: No, I have no intention of attacking Austria, but neither would I have the intention of telling them, in case I wanted to attack her.

  Moreover, the hardest war that had ever been fought by Prussia was a preventive war. When Frederick The Great had received final knowledge of the intention of his old enemies, through a scribbler soul, he did not wait until the others attacked, on the grounds of a fundamental rejection of a preventive war, but went immediately over to the attack himself.

  For Germany, any violation of the two power standard of necessity should have been a cause for a preventive war. For what would it have been easier to answer before history: for a preventive war in 1904, which could have defeated France when Russia seemed to be entangled in Eastern Asia, or for the World War which ensued from this neglect, and which required many times the blood, and plunged our Folk into the abyss of defeat?

  England never had such scruples. Her two power standard on the seas seemed to be the prerequisite for the preservation of English independence. As long as she had the strength, she allowed no change to be made in this situation. When, however, this two power standard was given up after the World War, it was then only under the pressure of circumstances which were stronger than any contrary British intention. With the American Union, a new power of such dimensions has come into being as threatens to upset the whole former power and orders of rank of the States.

  At any rate, up to now the English fleet was always the most striking proof, regardless of how the form of the organisation of the land army looked, that decisively determined England’s will to self preservation. This was the reason why the English mercenary army never acquired the bad characteristics of other mercenary troops. It was a fighting military body of wonderful individual training, with excellent weapons, and a conception of service which viewed it as a sport. Thus what endowed this small body of troops with a special importance was the direct contact with the visible manifestations in life of the British world empire. As this mercenary army had fought for England’s greatness in almost all parts of the world, it had thereby in like measure also come to know England’s greatness. The men who now in Southern Africa, now in Egypt, and at times in India, represented England’s interests as the possessors of her military prestige, through this also received an indelible impression of the immense greatness of the British IMPERIVM.

  Such an opportunity is completely lacking to the presentday German mercenary troops. Indeed, the more we feel ourselves induced to make concessions to this spirit in the small Army itself, under the pressure of pacifistic parliamentary majorities, which in reality represent traitors to their Folk and country, it gradually ceases to be an instrument of war. Instead it becomes a police corps for the maintenance of peace and order, which means, in reality, of peaceful subjugation. No army with a high intrinsic value can be trained, if the preparation for war is not the aim of its existence. There are no armies for the maintenance of peace, but rather only for the victorious fighting of wars to the end. The more, in short, one tries finally to unhinge the Reich Defence from the tradition of the Old Army, the more will it itself become traditionless. For with troops, the value of a tradition does not lie in a few successful quellings of internal strike revolts, or in preventing the plundering of foodstuffs, but in the glory gained through victorious battles. In reality, however, the German Reich Defence departs from the tradition of this glory in proportion as from year to year it ceases to be a representative of the national idea. The more it finally kills the conscious, national, hence nationalistic spirit in its own ranks, and removes its representatives, in order to give their posts to democrats and altogether ordinary ambitious persons, all the more will it become alien to the Folk. Let the sly gentlemen not fancy that they can make contact with the Folk by concessions to the pacifistic democratic part of our Folk. Any military organisation as such is deeply hated by this part of the German Folk, as long as it is indeed military and not the burglar protection agency of international pacifistic stock exchange interests. The only part to which an army can have an inner relationship in a militarily valuable sense, is that nationally conscious core of our Folk which not only thinks in a soldierly manner out of tradition, but rather, out of national love, is also the only part ready to wear the grey tunic in defence of honour and freedom. It is necessary, however, that a military body maintain intimate relations with those from whom it itself in the hour of need can supplement itself, and not with those who betray it at every opportunity. Hence the present leaders of our so called Reich Defence can act as democratically as they please; nevertheless, they will thereby never attain to a closer bond with the German Folk, because the German Folk for which this is appropriate is not to be found in the democratic camp. Since, however, the former Chief Of The German Reich Defence especially, General von Seeckt, not only did not put up any resistance to the removal of hardened, deliberately national minded Officers, but rather even [himself] advocated it, they themselves finally created the instrument which dropped him with a relatively light heart.

  Since General von Seeckt’s retirement, however, the democratic pacifistic influence has been tirelessly active in order to make out of the Defence Force that which the present rulers of the State have in their minds as the most beautiful ideal: a republican democratic parliamentary guard.

  Obviously a foreign policy cannot be conducted with such an instrument.

  Hence today the first task of German domestic policy ought to be that of giving the German Folk a military organisation suitable to its national strength. Since the forms of the present Defence Force could never suffice for this goal, and, conversely, are determined by foreign policy motives, it is the task of German foreign policy to bring about all the possibilities that could permit the reorganisation of a German National Army. For that must be the immovable aim of any political leadership in Germany, so that one day the mercenary Army will again be replaced by a truly German National Army.

  For just as the purely technical military qualities of the present are superior, so must the general qualities of the German Defence Force deteriorate in their development in the future. The former without doubt is to be credited to General von Seeckt and to the Defence Force’s Officers’ Corps altogether. Thus the German Defence Force could really be the Army framework for the future German National Army. Just as, in general, the task of the Defence Force itself must be, by the educational stress placed on the national fighting task, to train the mass of Officers and Sergeants for the later National Army.

  No true national thinking German can dispute that this aim must be held immovably in sight. Even less can he dispute that its execution is possible only if the nation’s foreign policy leaders assure the general necessary prerequisites.r />
  Thus the first task of German foreign policy is primarily the creation of conditions which make possible the resurrection of a German Army. For only then will our Folk’s vital needs be able to find their practical representation.

  Fundamentally, however, it must be further observed that the political actions which are to guarantee the resurrection of a German Army must lie in the framework of a necessary future development for Germany as such.

  Hence there is no need to stress that a change of the present army organisation, wholly apart from the present internal political situation as well as for reasons of foreign policy, cannot materialise as long as purely German interests and German viewpoints alone speak for such a change.

  It lay in the nature of the World War and in the intention of Germany’s main enemies, to carry out the liquidation of this greatest battle action of the Earth in such a way that as many States as possible would be interested in its perpetuation. This was achieved through a system of distribution of territories, in which even States with otherwise divergent desires and aims were held together in a solid antagonism by the fear that they could in that case suffer losses through a Germany once more become strong.

  For, if ten years after the World War it is still possible, against all the experience of world history, to maintain a kind of coalition of the victor States, the reason lies only in the fact, glorious for Germany, of the recollection of that struggle in which our Fatherland had stood up to twenty six States all together.

  Thus it will also last as long as the fear of suffering losses through a resurrected German power Reich is greater than the difficulties between these States. And it is further obvious that it will last as long as no will exists anywhere to allow the German Folk a rearmament which can be viewed as a threat by these victor States. On the basis of the knowledge that, first, a real representation of German vital interests in the future cannot take place through an inadequate German Defence Force but rather only through a German National Army, that, second, the formation of a German National Army is impossible for as long as the present foreign policy strangulation of Germany does not slacken, third, that a change of foreign policy obstacles to the organisation of a National Army appears possible only if such a new formation is not in general felt as a threat, the following fact emerges with respect to a German foreign policy possible at this time: Under no circumstances must presentday Germany see her foreign policy in terms of a formal border policy.