by Adolf Hitler
Only international Jewry can possess a lively interest in a German foreign policy which by its continual, seemingly irrational, sudden transitions, lacks that clear plan, and which, as its only justification, at best asserts: Indeed, we too naturally don’t know what should be done, but we do something precisely because something must be done. Yes, not seldom can we actually hear that these men are so little convinced of the inner sense of their foreign policy actions that, as highest motivation, they can only inquire whether somebody else may know a better one. This is the foundation on which the statecraft of a Gustav Stresemann rests.
In contrast, precisely today more than ever is it necessary for the German Folk to set itself a foreign policy goal which meets its real inner needs and, conversely, guarantees an unconditional stability to its foreign policy activity for the humanly predictable proximate period of time. For only if our Folk fundamentally determines and persistently fights for its interests in such a way, can it hope to induce this or that State whose interests are not opposed to ours, now at last established, and which indeed may even be parallel, to enter into a closer union with Germany. For the idea of wanting to solve our Folk’s distress through the League Of Nations is exactly as unjustified as it was to let the German question be decided by the Frankfurt Federal Parliament.
The satisfied nations dominate the League Of Nations. Indeed, it is their instrument. To a large measure they have no interest in allowing a change in the territorial distribution of the globe, unless it again appeals to their interests. And while they talk about the rights of small nations, in reality it is only the interests of the largest they have in view.
If Germany again wants to achieve a real freedom so that, under its blessing, she can give the German Folk its daily bread, she must take the measures thereto outside the Parliament Of The League Of Nations in Geneva. But then, for the lack of sufficient strength, it will be necessary that she find allies who can believe that they may also serve their own interests by going along with Germany. Such a situation, however, will never arise if Germany’s real foreign policy aim has not become fully clear to these nations. And, above all, Germany by herself will never acquire the strength and inner force for that persistence necessary, alas, to sweep away the obstacles of world history. For then one will never learn how to have patience in particulars, and also to renounce them if necessary, in order finally to be able to achieve the vitally necessary aim on a large scale. For even among allies, relations will never be completely frictionless. Disturbances of reciprocal relations can arise over and over again to assume threateningly dangerous forms if the strength to overcome these petty unpleasantnesses and obstacles does not lie in the very dimensions of the foreign policy aim ultimately staked out. Here the French national leadership of the pre War decades may serve as an exemplary model. How it lightly passed over small matters, indeed, even remained silent before the most bitter events, so as not to lose the possibility of organising a war of revenge against Germany, in such contrast to our eternally bawling hurrah! — patriots, and, consequently, their frequent barking at the moon.
The staking out of a clear foreign policy aim appears as important, furthermore, for the reason that, otherwise, the representatives of other interests among one’s own Folk will always find it possible to confuse public opinion, and to make, and in part even provoke, petty incidents into a cause for the radical change of opinion on foreign policy. Thus, out of the petty disputes which result from conditions themselves or which are artificially fabricated, France will again and again try to bring about ill feeling, indeed estrangement, among nations which, by the whole nature of their real vital interests, would be dependent upon each other, and which perforce would have to take a stand against France in concert. Such attempts, however, will be successful only if in consequence of the lack of an unshakeable political aim, one’s own political actions do not possess a true stability, and above all, because persistence in the preparation of measures serviceable to the fulfilment of one’s own political aim is also lacking.
The German Folk, which possesses neither a foreign policy tradition nor a foreign policy aim, will by itself rather be inclined to pay homage to Utopian ideals, and thereby neglect its real vital interest. For what has our Folk not raved over in the last hundred years? Now it was Greeks whom we wanted to save from the Turks, then Turks on whom we bestowed our affection against Russians and Italians, after which our Folk again found an enchantment in waxing enthusiastic over Polish freedom fighters, and then in indulging their feelings for the Boers, and so on. But what have all these most stupid soulful gushings, as incompetent politically as they were garrulous, cost our Folk?
Thus the relation to Austria, as was emphasised with special pride, was not one of practical understanding, but a true inner alliance of the heart. If only reason instead of the heart had spoken at this time, and understanding had decided, Germany would be saved today. But for the very reason that we are the kind of a Folk which lets its political actions be determined too little according to the grounds of a really reasonable, rational insight — for which reason we cannot look back on any great political tradition — we must, at least for the future, give our Folk an unshakeable foreign policy aim which seems suitable for making the political measures of the State leadership understandable to the broad masses in their particulars. Only thus will it be ultimately possible that millions with a divining faith will stand behind a government leadership which carries out decisions which in their particulars may have something painful about them. This is a prerequisite for bringing about a mutual understanding between the Folk and the State leadership and, to be sure, also a prerequisite for anchoring the State leadership itself in a certain tradition. It will not do that every German government have its own foreign policy goal. One can quarrel only over the means, one can dispute over them, but the goal itself must be established as unchangeable once and for all. Then politics can become the great art of the possible, that is, it is reserved to the brilliant abilities of the individual government leaders to perceive the possibilities, from instance to instance, of bringing the Folk and the Reich nearer to its foreign policy aim This setting of a foreign policy goal is altogether non existent in presentday Germany. Hence the unguided, wavering and unsure manner of attending to our Folk’s interests becomes understandable, as does also the whole confusion of our public opinion. Hence also the incredible capers of our foreign policy which always end unhappily without the Folk being even at least capable of judging the persons responsible and really calling them to account. No, one does not know what to do.
To be sure there are not a few people today who fully believe we should do nothing. They boil down their opinion to the effect that Germany today must be clever and reserved, that she engage herself nowhere, that we must keep the development of events well in view but ourselves not take part in them, in order, one day, to assume the role of the laughing third one, who reaps the benefits, while the other two quarrel.
Yes, yes, our present bourgeois statesmen are so clever and wise. A political judgement which is troubled by no knowledge of history. There are not a few proverbs which have become a real curse for our Folk. For example, the wiser one yields, or clothes make the man, or one can get through the whole land with hat in hand, or when two fight, the third rejoices.
In the life of nations, at least, the last proverb applies only in a wholly conditional sense. [And this for the following reason] Namely, if two quarrel hopelessly within a nation, then a third who is outside a nation can win. In the life of nations with one another, however, the ultimate success will be had by States which deliberately engage in disputes because the possibility of increasing their strength lies only in a quarrel. There is no historical event in the world that cannot be judged from two points of view. The neutrals on one side always confront the interventionist on the other. And, in general, the neutrals will always get the worst of it, whereas the interventionists rather can claim the benefits for themselves, insofar, indeed, as th
e party on which they wagered does not lose.
In the life of nations this means the following: If two mighty powers quarrel on this globe, the more or less small or large surrounding States either can take part in this struggle, or keep their distance from it. In one case the possibility of a gain is not excluded, insofar as the participation takes place on the side which carries off the victory. Regardless who wins, however, the neutrals will have no other fate save enmity with the remaining victor State. Up to now none of the globe’s great States has arisen on the basis of neutrality as a principle of political action, but only through struggle. If towering power States as such are on Earth, all that remains for small States to do is either to renounce their future altogether, or to fight with the more favourable coalition and under its protection, and thus increase their own strength. For the role of the laughing third always presupposes that this third already has a power. But whoever is always neutral will never achieve power. For to the extent that a Folk’s power lies in its inner value, the more does it find its ultimate expression in the organisational form of a Folk’s fighting forces on the battlefield, created by the will of this inner value. This form, however, will never rise if it is not put to the test from time to time. Only under the forge hammer of world history do a Folk’s eternal values become the steel and iron with which history is made. But he who avoids battles will never attain the strength to fight battles. And he who never fights battles will never be the heir of those who struggle with each other in a military conflict. For the previous heirs of world history were not, for instance, Folks with cowardly concepts of neutrality, but young Folks with better swords. Neither Antiquity nor the Middle Ages nor modern times knows even a single example of any power States coming into being save in permanent struggle. Up to now, however, the historical heirs have always been power States. In the life of nations, to be sure, even a third can be the heir when two quarrel. But then from the very outset this third is already the power which deliberately lets two other powers quarrel in order to defeat them once and for all later without a great sacrifice on its part.
Thereby neutrality loses the character of passive non participation in events altogether, and instead assumes that of a conscious political operation. Obviously no sagacious State leadership will begin a struggle without weighing the size of its possible stakes and comparing it with the size of the adversary’s stakes. But if it has perceived the impossibility of being able to fight against a certain powers, all the more so will it be forced to try to fight together with this power. For then the strength of the hitherto weaker power can eventually grow out of this common struggle, in order if necessary to fight for is own vital interests also against the latter. Let no one say that then no power would enter into an alliance with a State which some day itself might become a danger.
Alliances do not present policy aims, but only means to the aims. We must make use of them today even if we know a hundred times that the later development can possibly lead to the opposite. There is no alliance that lasts forever. Happy the nations which, in consequence of the complete divergence of their interests, can enter into an alliance relationship for a definite time without being forced to a mutual conflict after the cessation of the same.
But a weak State especially, which wants to achieve power and greatness, must always try to take an active part in the general political events of world history.
When Prussia entered her Silesian War, this too was a relatively secondary phenomenon alongside the violent dispute between England and France, which at that time was already in full swing. Perhaps Frederick The Great can be reproached for having pulled English chestnuts out of the fire. But would the Prussia ever have arisen with which a Bismarck could create a new Reich, if at that time a Hohenzollern prince had sat on the throne who, in the knowledge of the future greater evens of world history, preserved his Prussia in a State of pious neutrality? The three Silesian Wars brought Prussia more than Silesia. On these battlefields grew those Regiments which in the future were to carry the German banners from Weissenburg and Wörth up to Sedan, in order finally to greet the new emperor of the new Reich in the Hall Of Mirrors in the Palace Of Versailles.
Prussia at that time was certainly a small State, unimportant in population and territorial size. But by leaping into the middle of the great actions of world history, this little State had obtained for itself a legitimisation for the founding of the later German Reich.
And once, even the neutralists triumphed in the Prussian State. This was in the period of Napoleon I. At that time it was believed at first that Prussia could remain neutral, and for this she was later punished with the most terrible defeat. Both conceptions confronted one another sharply even in the year 1812. The one for neutrality, and the other, headed by Baron vom Stein, for intervention. The fact that the neutralists won out in 1812 cost Prussia and Germany infinite blood and brought them infinite suffering. And the fact that at last in 1813 the interventionists broke through saved Prussia.
The World War gave the clearest answer to the opinion that one can achieve political success by preserving a careful neutrality as a third power. What have the neutrals of the World War achieved practically? Were they the laughing third one, for instance? Or does one believe that, in a similar event, Germany would play another role?
And let no one think that the reason for this lies only in the magnitude of the World War. No, in the future, all wars, insofar as they involve great nations, will be Folk’s wars of the most gigantic dimensions. As a neutral State in any other European conflict, Germany, however, would possess no more importance than Holland or Switzerland or Denmark, and so on, in the World War. Does one really think that after the event we would get out of nowhere the strength to play the role against the remaining victor which we did not venture to play in a union with one of the two combatants?
At any rate, the World War has proven one thing explicitly: whoever conducts himself as a neutral in great world historical conflicts, may perhaps at first make a little business, but, in terms of power politics, he will thereby ultimately also be excluded from a codetermination of the world’s fate.
Thus, had the American Union preserved her neutrality in the World War, today she would be regarded as a power of the second rank, regardless of whether England or Germany had emerged as a victor. By entering the War, she raised herself to England’s naval strength, but in international political terms marked herself as a power of decisive importance. Since her entry into the World War the American Union is appraised in a completely different way. It lies in the nature of mankind’s forgetfulness no longer to know [to forget], after only a short time, what the general judgement of a situation had been only a few years before. Just as today we detect a complete disregard of Germany’s former greatness in the speeches of many foreign statesmen, just as little, conversely, can we appraise the extent of the increase in value that the American Union has experienced in our judgement since her entry into the World War.
This is also the most compelling statesmanlike justification for Italy’s entry into the War against her former allies. Had Italy not taken this step, she would now share the role of Spain, no matter how the dice had rolled.
The fact that she carried out the much criticised step to an active participation in the World War brought a rise in her position and a strengthening of the same which has found its ultimate crowning expression in Fascism.
Without her entry into the War, the latter would have been a completely unthinkable phenomenon.
The German can ponder this with or without bitterness. It is important to learn from history, especially if its teachings speak to us in such a compelling way.
Thus the belief that through a prudent, reserved neutrality vis-à-vis the developing conflicts in Europe and elsewhere, one can some day reap the benefits thereof as a laughing third one, is false and idiotic. In general, freedom is preserved neither by begging nor by cheating. And also not by work and industry, but exclusively by struggle, and indeed by
one’s own struggle. Thus it is very easily possible that more weight is attached to the will than to the deed. Not seldom, in the framework of a wise alliance policy, nations have achieved successes unrelated to the success of their arms. But fate does not always measure a nation which boldly stakes its life according to the dimensions of its deeds, but rather, very frequently, according to the dimensions of its will. The history of Italian unification in the nineteenth century is noteworthy for this. But the World War also shows how a whole number of States can achieve extraordinary political successes less through their military accomplishments [successes] than through the foolhardy boldness with which they take sides and the doggedness with which they hold out.
If Germany wants to put an end to her period of enslavement by all, she must under all circumstances actively try to enter into a combination of powers in order to participate in the future shaping of European life in terms of power politics.
The objection that such participation contains a grievous risk is correct. But, after all, does one really believe that we will achieve freedom without taking a risk? Or does one think that there has ever been a deed of world history which was not linked with a risk? Was Frederick The Great’s decision, for instance, to participate in the first Silesian War, not linked with a risk? Or did Germany’s unification by Bismarck entail no dangers? No, a thousand times no! Beginning with man’s birth up to his death, everything is questionable. Only death seems certain. But for this very reason the ultimate commitment is not the worst for the reason that one day, in one way or another, it will be demanded.
Naturally it is a matter of political sagacity to choose the stake in such a way that it yields the highest possible gain. But not to stake anything at all for fear, perhaps, of picking the wrong horse means to renounce a Folk’s future. The objection that such an action may have the character of a risky gamble can most easily be refuted by simple reference to previous historical experience. By a risky gamble we understand a game in which from the outset the chances of winning are subject to the fate of chance. This will never be the case in politics. For the more the ultimate decision lies in the darkness of the future, the more is the conviction of the possibility or impossibility of a success erected on humanly perceptible factors. The task of a nation’s political leadership is to weigh these factors. The result of this examination, then, must also lead to a decision. Thus this decision is consonant with one’s own insight, and is sustained by faith in possible success on the basis of this insight. Hence I can just as little call a politically decisive deed a risky gamble, just because its outcome is not one hundred percent certain, as an operation undertaken by a surgeon the outcome of which likewise will not necessarily be successful. From time immemorial it has always been in keeping with the nature of great men to execute deeds whose success is even doubtful and indefinite with the utmost energy, if the necessity thereof as such lay before them, and if after a mature examination of all conditions this very action alone could be considered.