32. Ibid.: War Powers Law (No. 160); Law concerning the Security Situation regarding the Protection of People and Reich (No. 161); Reich Defence Law (No. 162); National Service Law (No. 164), further the decision to appoint a Reich Defence Council (No. 163).
33. Jost Dülffer, Weimar, Hitler und die Marine. Reichspolitik und Flottenbau 1920–1939 1939 (Düsseldorf, 1973), 229ff.
34. See ibid., 204ff.; VB, 21 October 1932: Hitler opposed the construction of warships unless preceded by discussions with Britain.
35. The naval chief, Raeder, had probably made Hitler aware of this aspect at the beginning of April 1933. See Michael Salewski, ‘Marineleitung und politische Führung 1931–1935’, in MGM 1971/2, 123ff. and 152ff. (facsimile of Raeder’s notes for his presentations); Dülffer, Weimar, 244ff. On early naval rearmament see also the concise overview in Deist, ‘Aufrüstung’, 537ff. At a meeting with the British naval attaché on 29 November Raeder hinted at the possibility of an alliance referring to ideas held by the political leadership. See Salewski, ‘Marineleitung’, 131. On 5 December Hitler told the British ambassador that initially he simply wanted to limit the building programme to the size prescribed by the Versailles Treaty and await the impending naval conference. See ADAP C 2, No. 99.
36. Deist, ‘Aufrüstung’, 540ff.; Dülffer, Weimar, 250ff.; Salewski, ‘Marineleitung’,132ff. The idea of parity based on one-third first appears in the naval files immediately after extensive discussions between Hitler and the military leadership during a joint trip on the battleship ‘Deutschland’. See Dülffer, Weimar, 279. Michael Salewski, Die deutsche Seekriegsleitung 1935–1945, 1 (Frankfurt a. M. and Munich, 1970), 13, quotes the directive of 4 June 1935, according to which the future fleet was to be based on the proportion of 1:3 in comparison with British tonnage. On the naval building plan see Dülffer, Weimar, 566.
37. Deist, ‘Aufrüstung’, 543f: Dülffer, Weimar, 286ff.; Salewski, ‘Marineleitung’, 139f.; ADAP C 3, No. 32. From the note quoted by Salewski from the files of the naval high command it is clear that, as a result of not being invited to the main conference, they felt free from all commitments. See ‘Marineleitung’, 139.
38. Ibid., 140ff. and docs 5 and 6 (the latter was composed retrospectively). See also Dülffer, Weimar, 289ff.
39. ADAP D 3, No. 358.
40. At the time the British considered 35 per cent an inappropriately high figure. See ibid., No. 555.
41. Domarus, 1, 515.
42. On the Anglo–German Naval Treaty see Klaus Hildebrand, Das vergangene Reich. Deutsche Außenpolitik von Bismarck bis Hitler (Berlin, 1999), 600ff.; Wiggershaus, Flottenvertrag, esp. 313ff. See also Ribbentrop, London, 61ff.
43. This is suggested by the half sentence: ‘quite apart from whatever else Germany and Poland had to sort out between themselves’. See the memorandum of 12 May 1934, published in Rosenberg, Tagebuch, 163ff., quote on p. 166. From the entry dated 14 May in this diary it is clear that Hitler immediately read the memo and approved of its contents.
44. Wojciechowski, Beziehungen, 245ff.; see also Kube, Pour le mérite, 105ff.
45. Goebbels TB, 13 May 1935.
46. Domarus, 1, 504.
47. Goebbels TB, 15 (quote) and 13 May 1935.
48. Ibid., 21 May 1935.
49. On the trip see ADAP C 4, No. 97f.; Wojciechowski, Beziehungen, 198f.; significant new information in Kube, Pour le mérite, 111ff.
50. Lipski, Diplomat, Doc. 44. The document is available only in English.
51. Wojciechowski, Beziehungen, 203ff.
The Road to the Nuremberg Laws
1. Goebbels TB, 8 April 1935.
2. The reductions amounted to 3 per cent in the urban and 10 per cent in the rural communities. For details see Ernst Sodeikat, ‘Der Nationalsozialismus und die Danziger Opposition’, in VfZ 14 (1966), 139–74. See also Friedrich Fuchs, Die Beziehungen zwischen der Freien Stadt Danzig und dem Deutschen Reich in der Zeit von 1920 bis 1939. Unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Judenfrage in beiden Staaten (Freiburg i. Breisgau, 1999), 44ff.
3. Morsch, Arbeit, 198ff.; Sopade, 1935, 151ff.
4. Longerich, Politik, 70ff.; Morsch, Arbeit, 321ff.; Kershaw, Hitler-Mythos, 96ff.
5. Longerich, Politik, 53ff.; Michael Wildt, Volksgemeinschaft als Selbstermächtigung. Gewalt gegen Juden in der deutschen Provinz 1919 bis 1939 (Hamburg, 2007).
6. Helmut Heiber (ed.), Akten der Partei-Kanzlei der NSDAP, 1 (Munich, 1983), MF 124 05038, Wiedemann to Bormann, 30 April 1935.
7. Longerich, Politik, 81.
8. Besier, Kirchen, 3 142f.
9. Ibid, 144; ADAP C 33, No. 470; BAB R 43 II/176a, Lammers’s minutes of 9 and 15 February 1935, concerning the presentation of the draft, initialled in 1934, of an agreement with the Vatican. See Regierung Hitler 2, 1069.
10. Besier, Kirchen 3, 144ff.
11. Ibid., 159ff.; Petra Madeleine Rapp, ‘Die Devisenprozesse gegen katholische Ordensangehörige und Geistliche im Dritten Reich. Eine Untersuchung zum Konflikt deutscher Orden und Klöster in wirtschaftlicher Notlage, totalitärer Machtausübung des nationalsozialistischen Regimes und im Kirchenkampf 1935/36’, Dissertation, Bonn, 1981, 42ff., and 69ff.
12. Meier, Kirchenkampf, 2, 21ff.
13. Besier, Kirchen, 3, 61f.
14. Ibid., 67ff.; Meier, Kirchenkampf, 2, 21f.
15. Longerich, Politik, 77. Goebbels returned in the middle of April from a meeting of Reich party leaders convinced that the Stahlhelm had to be dissolved. See Goebbels TB, 13 April 1935. This was a step that Himmler had already announced on 11 February 1935. See Berghahn, Stahlhelm, 271.
16. Longerich, Politik, 612.
17. For details see ibid., 81ff.
18. Albert Fischer, Hjalmar Schacht und Deutschlands ‘Judenfrage’. Der ‘Wirtschaftsdiktator’ und die Vertreibung der Juden aus der deutschen Wirtschaft (Cologne, Weimar, and Vienna, 1995), 152ff. Schacht had presented a memorandum, partly published in Hjalmar Schacht, 76 Jahre meines Lebens (Bad Wörishofen, 1953), 436ff., in which he proposed a legal solution of the Jewish question instead of the so-called individual actions. The Jews should become ‘inhabitants with reduced rights’. At the opening of the Leipzig Spring Fair he warned that ‘Jews should not all be destroyed indiscriminately’, which, despite the brutal language used, represented a criticism of the uncoordinated actions of the Party activists.
19. For details see Longerich, Politik, 83f.
20. On Bell’s activities in Autumn 1934 see Besier, Kirchen, 3, 26ff.
21. Ibid., 86ff., quote 86.
22. Meier, Kirchenkampf, 2, 50.
23. Rapp, Devisenprozesse, 72. At the end of July the trials were restarted. See ibid., 79.
24. Besier, Kirchen, 3, 92f.
25. Morsch, Arbeit, 324ff.; Sopade 1935, 651f., 757ff., 895ff. (according to which the ‘discontent with the regime’ had reached ‘an extent that one would never have imagined possible’), and 1011ff.
26. BAB, R 43 II/318, Frick to Lammers, 24 July 1935, with excerpts from situation reports and the passing on of further reports by Grauert on 2 August 1935.
27. Ibid., Minister of Food and Agriculture to the Reich Chancellery, 31 August 1935.
28. Ibid., Minutes of the trustees’ meeting on 27 August 1935.
29. Ibid., note about the prices, incomes, and supply situation in Germany, 4 September 1935, minuted as ‘submitted to the Führer’. See Kershaw, Hitler, 1, S. 727.
30. Jens Reich, Carl Friedrich Goerdeler. Ein Oberbürgermeister gegen den NS-Staat (Cologne, Weimar, and Vienna, 1997), 225ff. See also the correspondence concerning the relevant draft law in BAB, R 43 II/315a; Sabine Gillmann and Hans Mommsen (eds), Politische Schriften und Briefe Carl Friedrich Goerdelers, 1 (Munich, 2003), 236ff.
31. Goebbels TB, 29 April and 9 May 1933 (about meetings with Hitler) also 19 May and 5 June 1935.
32. Longerich, Politik, 85ff.
33. Ibid., 88ff.; Longerich, ‘Davon haben wir nichts gewusst!’ Die Deutschen und die Judenverfolgung 1933–1945 (Munic
h, 2006), 80ff., and the numerous reports in Otto Dov Kulka and Eberhard Jäckel (eds), Die Juden in den geheimen NS-Stimmungsberichten 1933–1945 (Düsseldorf, 2004), for the months July to September 1935.
34. Fischer, Schacht, 158ff. Schacht’s resistance reached its high point in July when he closed the Reichsbank branch in Arnswalde because its head had been publicly pilloried for shopping in Jewish shops.
35. For details see Longerich, Politik, 94. Hitler’s order was distributed in the ‘Führer’s’ deputy’s circular in R 164/35.
36. Ibid., 100f.
37. Besier, Kirchen, 3, 76ff.; Dokumente Kirchenpolitik, 2 No. 21/35 and No. 30/35.
38. Edict concerning the Combining of the Responsibilities of the Reich and Prussia in Church Matters 16 July 1935 (RGBl. 1935 I, 1029).
39. Dokumente Kirchenpolitik, 2, No. 21/35, quote 305. The church functionary referred to was Erwin Noack, the president of the Saxon provincial synod. See ibid., 302.
40. Besier, Kirchen 3. 310; Dokumente Kirchenpolitik 3, No. 15.
41. Goebbels TB, 19 August 1935.
42. Besier, Kirchen 3, 311ff.
43. Law to Secure the German Protestant Church, 24 September 1935. See RGBl. 1935 I, 1178, and for the first decree to implement it dated 3 October 1935 (see ibid., 1225).
44. Akten 2 Nos 231/I and 229/IId.
45. Meissner’s note on the meeting held on the Obersalzburg is published in Volker Berghahn, ‘Das Ende des Stahlhelm’, in VjZ 15 (1965), 446–51. What this future looked like was made clear to readers of the VB report by a further report placed right beneath it, according to which the Gronau branch of the Stahlhelm had been dissolved as a result of ‘activities hostile to the state’. See VB (M), 13 August 1935. See also Berghahn, Stahlhelm, 272f.
46. Goebbels TB, 19 August 1935.
47. Ibid.
48. If Z, 4067-NG. Excerpts of the speech were published in the daily press and distributed by the Reichsbank as a special edition. The draft of the speech in the Reichsbank files dealt much more directly with the ‘individual actions’. See BAB, 2501/6992; see also Fischer, Schacht, 161ff.; Kurt Pätzold, Faschismus, Rassenwahn, Judenverfolgung. Eine Studie zur politischen Strategie und Taktik des faschistischen deutschen Imperialismus (1933–1935) (Berlin, 1975), 234ff.
49. There are three versions of the minutes of the meeting, one by the Reich Interior Ministry (see BAB, R 18/5513, 27 August 1935; see also the handwritten notes by Lösener: If Z, Fb 71/2), one by the Foreign Ministry (see ADAP C 4, No. 268), and one by the Gestapo (see OA Moskau, 500-1-379, 20 August 1935).
50. Domarus, 1, 525ff., quotes 525.
51. Ibid., 527.
52. Ibid., 527ff.
53. Longerich, Politik, 102; Goebbels TB, 9 September 1935.
54. On the occasion of the swearing-in of the first annual cohort of those conscripted into the Wehrmacht under the newly-created Reich War Flag on 7 November 1935 Hitler sent the head of the Stahlhelm, Seldte, a letter. In a few laconic words he let him know that, in view of the Wehrmacht having returned to its role as the ‘bearer of German arms and . . . protector of its tradition’, he considered that the conditions for the continuation of the ‘Stahlhelm’ no longer existed. See Domarus, 1, 549f.
55. In 1950 Lösener wrote a report that clearly described the improvised nature of the Nuremberg laws, while downplaying his own role and ignoring the fact that at this point a considerable amount of preparation for these anti-Jewish laws had already been carried out by the ministerial bureaucracy. See Lösener, ‘Als Rassefererent im Reichsministerium des Innern’, in VjZ, 9 (1961), 262–313.
56. On the Nuremberg laws see Cornelia Essner, Die ‘Nürnberger Gesetze’ oder die Verwaltung des Rassenwahns 1933–1945 (Paderborn, 2002). On the immediate period of drafting, 113ff.; Saul Friedländer, Das Dritte Reich und die Juden, 1 (Munich, 2000), 158ff.; Helmut Genschel, Die Verdrängung der Juden aus der Wirtschaft im Dritten Reich (Göttingen, 1966), 114ff.; Longerich, Politik, 102ff.; Pätzold, Faschismus, 259ff.; Hans Christian Jasch, Staatssekretär Wilhelm Stuckart und die Judenpolitik. Der Mythos von der sauberen Verwaltung (Munich, 2012), 197ff.
57. Parteitag der Freiheit von 10.–16. September 1935, Offizieller Bericht über den Verlauf des Reichsparteitages mit sämtlichen Kongressreden (Munich, 1935), 254ff.
58. Domarus, 1, 535ff., quotes 536f.
59. VB (M), 18 September 1935.
60. Domarus, 1, 538f.; Goebbels TB, 19 September 1935.
61. PA 1935, 675f., 713f., and 762.
62. BAB, R 18/5513; see Fischer, Schacht, 184f.
63. Goebbels TB, 25 September 1935. The VB (M) of 25 September commented in a brief note that Hitler had spoken about the directives to implement the Reich Citizenship Law. According to Lösener (‘Rassereferent’, 281), who was present at Hitler’s address, the latter avoided making a decision.
64. Goebbels TB, 1 October 1935.
65. Hitler cancelled a meeting of departmental heads scheduled to discuss this matter at the beginning of November. See Adam, Judenpolitik, 132ff.; Regierung Hitler, 2, 918, note 1. See also Goebbels TB, 7 November 1935.
66. RGBl. 1935 I, 1333. On the background see Adam, Judenpolitik, 134ff.; Lösener, ‘Rassereferent’, 280ff.
67. See below p. 473.
68. Hans-Walter Schmuhl, Rassenhygiene, Nationalsozialismus, Euthanasie. Von der Verhütung zur Vernichtung ‘lebensunwerten Lebens’ 1890–1945 (Göttingen, 1992), 163; Gisela Bock, Zwangssterilisation im Nationalsozialismus. Studien zur Rassenpolitik und Frauenpolitik (Opladen, 1986), 97ff.; BAB, R 43 II/720, Confidential circular by Wagner, 13 September 1935, and Lammers’s minute of 16 October 1934: Hitler had approved the contents of the letter. This issue was finally settled in June 1935 in a law amending the Sterilization Law. See RGBl. 1935 I, 773.
69. BAB, R 43 II/720, Lammers’s minute, 16 July 1935, and the Interior Ministry’s provision of the relevant memorandum on 16 October 1935. Second Law amending the Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring. See RGBl. 1936 I, 773; Schmuhl, Rassenhygiene, 164.
70. BAB, R 43 II/720, Lammers to Reich Interior Minister, 6 December 1935 and 23 January 1936; Bock, Zwangssterilisation, 352f.
71. BAB, R 2/12042, Reich Interior Ministry minute, 26 April 1937; Bock, Zwangssterilisation, 354.
A Foreign Policy Coup
1. See the diary entry for 5 October 1935 in Goebbels TB for Goebbels’s enthusiastic response to the news of the attack. See also Aram Mattioli, Experimentierfeld der Gewalt. Der Abessinienkrieg und seine internationale Bedeutung 1935–1941 (Zurich, 2005), 125ff.
2. Goebbels TB, 19 August 1935.
3. Ibid., 13 October 1935, see also 9, 11, and 17 October 1935. This change of course is, however, only marginally reflected in the press directives. See PA 1935, 665f. and 671f.
4. Goebbels TB, 19 October 1935, about 17 October. Hitler had issued invitations to this meeting on the evening before a cabinet meeting. See Regierung Hitler, 2, No. 246.
5. Mattioli, Experimentierfeld, 125ff.
6. The figures on this vary: according to Tooze, Ökonomie, 248, expenditure on armaments in 1934 amounted to 4.2 billion RM, in 1935 to 5–6 billion. See also the comparison of the various calculations in Volkmann, ‘NS-Wirtschaft’, 293, according to which armaments expenditure in 1936 exceeded 10 billion RM.
7. Goerdeler, Schriften, 387ff. In the memorandum Goerdeler demanded a reorientation of the economy towards a liberal economic system and Germany’s return to the world market. The trust necessary to achieve this could be secured only by abandoning the repressive policies towards the Jews.
8. IMT 36, 293-EC, 291ff.
9. Ibid.
10. Dietmar Petzina, Autarkiepolitik im Dritten Reich. Der nationalsozialistische Vierjahresplan (Stuttgart, 1968), 30ff.
11. VB (N), 7 October 1935, ‘Wir wollen das Rechte tun und niemanden scheuen’; 11 October 1935, ‘Der Ruf des Führers an das deutsche Volk’.
12. Speech on 3 October 1935 in Halle. See FZ, 5 October
1935; see also the speech at the Wehrmacht Day in Karlshorst, 29 September 1935 in ibid., 30 September 1935.
13. Morsch, Arbeit, 306ff.; Helmut Heiber (ed.), Goebbels Reden 1932–1945, 1 (Bindlach, 1991), No. 29; Johannes Hohlfeld (ed.), Dokumente der deutschen Politik und Geschichte von 1848 bis zur Gegenwart. Ein Quellenwerk für die politische Bildung und staatsbürgerliche Erziehung, 9 vols (Berlin, 1951–56), 4, No. 1. See also Goebbels’s 1935 New Year’s Eve address in Der Angriff, 1 January 1936.
14. Unser Wille und Weg: November 1935, Gerhard Donner, ‘Der Reichsnährstand sichert Deutschlands Ernãhrung’, 372–5; February 1936, Hans Riess, ‘Der erste Abschnitt des Winterfeldzuges 1935/36 – ein voller Erfolg’, 47–51; June 1936, Walter Tiessler (Head of the Reich Ring for NS-Propaganda), ‘Winterfeldzug 1935/36. Wirtschaftspolitische Aufgaben der Propaganda’, 203f.
15. On the relaxation of the food supply situation see Sopade 1936, 320ff.
16. Petzina, Autarkiepolitik, 33.
17. Goebbels TB, 2 February 1936.
18. Morsch, Arbeit, 339ff.
19. Goebbels TB, 6 February 1936.
20. PA 1936, 12; Longerich, ‘Davon’, 101.
21. Domarus, 1, 573ff.
22. Esmonde M. Robertson, ‘Zur Wiederbesetzung des Rheinlands1936’, in VfZ 10 (1962), 178–205; see Petersen, Hitler, 466ff.
23. Goebbels TB, 21 January 1936.
24. On Hitler’s domestic and foreign policy motives see in detail James Thomas Emmerson, The Rhineland Crisis, 7 March 1936: A Study in Multilateral Diplomacy (London, 1977), 72ff.; on the decision-making see ibid., 82ff.; on the whole situation see Weinberg, Foreign Policy, 187ff. The assertion that the military had been informed of the impending step weeks beforehand is an oversimplification of the decision-making process based on hindsight. See Max Braubach, Der Einmarsch deutscher Truppen in die entmilitarisierte Zone am Rhein im März 1936. Ein Beitrag zur Vorgeschichte des Zweiten Weltkrieges (Cologne, 1956), 12ff., who refers in particular to Friedrich Hossbach, Zwischen Wehrmacht und Hitler 1934–1938 (Göttingen, 1965), 83f. According to him Hitler returned to Berlin on 12 February 1936 determined to occupy the Rhineland. However, according to Hassell, a definitive decision had not been taken by mid-February. See Ulrich von Hassell, Die Hassell-Tagebücher 1938–1944. Aufzeichnungen vom Andern Deutschland (Berlin, 1994). According to Hitler’s own account given to a secret meeting of district Party leaders in 1937, he had begun to contemplate the occupation at the end of February 1936. See Hildegard von Kotze and Helmut Krausnick (eds), Es spricht, 123–77, 133.
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