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| The NSDAP (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei) was not a Socialist party in spite of his glorious name. It was closer to some sort of populist primitivism. Developped from the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (DAP) created in 1918 by a Berlin's locksmith named Anton Drexler, Hitler joined the party in 1919 and brought up the idea of renaming the party "Social Revolutionary Party". However, Rudolf Jung, one of the founders of the DAP, insisted that the party should follow the pattern of Austria's Deutsche Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterpartei. As a consequence, the DAP was shortly renamed the NSDAP on February 24, 1920. |
| Early leaders of the NSDAP then named DAP: Heinz Pernet, Friedrich Weber, Wilhelm Frick, Hermann Kriebel, Erich Ludendorff, Adolf Hitler, Wilhelm Brückner, Ernst Röhm, Robert Wagner |
From genuine Socialists to cynical demagogues
In 1918, Drexler, with Gottfried Feder, Dietrich Eckart who became
rapidly Hitlet's mentor, and Karl Harrer, had created what became a
year later the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (German Workers' Party,
abbreviated DAP). The DAP was itself a sibling of the the Political
Workers Circle of an eccentric guy named Rudolf Freiherr von
Sebotendroff who used the Circle as a cover name for the Thule
Gesselschaft.
The founders of the DAP were authentic Socialist guys who wanted a
more democratic Germany after WWI and the introduction of vast
social reforms. Hitler -who had been in the first place sent to the
party by the Army to spy on it- was seduced by its ideas and joined
freely its ranks as he explained so well in "Mein Kampf" four years
later :"After two days of agonized pondering and reflection, I finally
came to the conviction that I had to take this step. It was the most
decisive resolve of my life. From here there was and could be no
turning back. And so I registered as a member of the German
Workers' Party and received a provisional membership card with the
number 7."
Hitler did not waste any time in propulsing himself at the head of the
party : he became Nazi Party chairman on July 1921, and at once
began a program where the NSDAP was turned into a radical and
revolutionary organization. The Sturmabteilung (SA) was founded that
same year and began a policy of expanding the Nazi Party by way of
fear, intimidation, and violent attacks on other political parties,
especially the Communist party and the Social-Democrat, the "Reds"
that Hitler hated since the end of the war.
In 1918, Drexler, with Gottfried Feder, Dietrich Eckart who became
rapidly Hitlet's mentor, and Karl Harrer, had created what became a
year later the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (German Workers' Party,
abbreviated DAP). The DAP was itself a sibling of the the Political
Workers Circle of an eccentric guy named Rudolf Freiherr von
Sebotendroff who used the Circle as a cover name for the Thule
Gesselschaft.
The founders of the DAP were authentic Socialist guys who wanted a
more democratic Germany after WWI and the introduction of vast
social reforms. Hitler -who had been in the first place sent to the
party by the Army to spy on it- was seduced by its ideas and joined
freely its ranks as he explained so well in "Mein Kampf" four years
later :"After two days of agonized pondering and reflection, I finally
came to the conviction that I had to take this step. It was the most
decisive resolve of my life. From here there was and could be no
turning back. And so I registered as a member of the German
Workers' Party and received a provisional membership card with the
number 7."
Hitler did not waste any time in propulsing himself at the head of the
party : he became Nazi Party chairman on July 1921, and at once
began a program where the NSDAP was turned into a radical and
revolutionary organization. The Sturmabteilung (SA) was founded that
same year and began a policy of expanding the Nazi Party by way of
fear, intimidation, and violent attacks on other political parties,
especially the Communist party and the Social-Democrat, the "Reds"
that Hitler hated since the end of the war.
A medley of good intentions
The Socialism of Hitler was actually a medley of good intentions and vague
statements as they were put forward as soon as Christmas 1919 by Hitler and
Drexler during a brainstorming night in the "25 Points Program" of the NSDAP.
However, taken litterally, the content of this program was probably as "red" as
the Communist program in so far as four of its points were demanding :
* That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be
abolished
* the nationalization of all trusts
* profit-sharing in large industries
* an agrarian reform in accordance with national requirements and the
enactment of a law to expropriate the owners without compensation of any
land needed for the common purpose. The abolition of ground rents, and the
prohibition of all speculation in land.
After finishing the drawing of these 25 points, Hitler said to Drexler that "this
Manifesto would make the 95 Thesis of Wittenberg by Martin Luther look pale."
This program was attractive enough by the way to justify the adhesion to the
Party in 1920 of a young lawer named Hans Frank who became Minister of
Justice in Bavaria in 1933 .
Frank attended with enthusiasm the firts important meeting of the party placed
under the theme "Why we are against the Jews." He will become later
Governor-General of the General Government for the occupied Polish
territories and of the supervision of the first concentration camps. Frank
finished his life on the gallows in 1946, the only Nazi acknowledging his
responsibilities at Nuremberg.
The Socialism of Hitler was actually a medley of good intentions and vague
statements as they were put forward as soon as Christmas 1919 by Hitler and
Drexler during a brainstorming night in the "25 Points Program" of the NSDAP.
However, taken litterally, the content of this program was probably as "red" as
the Communist program in so far as four of its points were demanding :
* That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be
abolished
* the nationalization of all trusts
* profit-sharing in large industries
* an agrarian reform in accordance with national requirements and the
enactment of a law to expropriate the owners without compensation of any
land needed for the common purpose. The abolition of ground rents, and the
prohibition of all speculation in land.
After finishing the drawing of these 25 points, Hitler said to Drexler that "this
Manifesto would make the 95 Thesis of Wittenberg by Martin Luther look pale."
This program was attractive enough by the way to justify the adhesion to the
Party in 1920 of a young lawer named Hans Frank who became Minister of
Justice in Bavaria in 1933 .
Frank attended with enthusiasm the firts important meeting of the party placed
under the theme "Why we are against the Jews." He will become later
Governor-General of the General Government for the occupied Polish
territories and of the supervision of the first concentration camps. Frank
finished his life on the gallows in 1946, the only Nazi acknowledging his
responsibilities at Nuremberg.
| Hans Frank who became Minister of Justice in Bavaria in 1933 attended with enthusiasm the first important meeting of the party placed under the theme "Why we are against the Jews." |
| The blood flag, stupid symbol of a failed putsch, became the ultimate item of Nazi fervor and the epitome of the ridiculous pageantry of the regime |
If this program was not Socialist, nothing was. However Hitler's socialism
was rather a "proletarian primitivism" than a real social doctrine and as
soon as 1919, Hitler had accepted stipends from the industrialist barons
and it is now well known that his attempted "putsch" in Munich in 1923 was
partly supported and financed by Emil Kirdof, President of the Coal Board
Association and a millionaire. As soon as his friend Ernst "Putzi" Hanfstagl
or his mentor the poet Dietrich Eckart introduced him to their Socialite
connections like Helen Bechstein, widow of the millionaire pianos maker,
Adolf flinched : he was dazzled by money and power and flattered by the
appreciation of Frau Bechstein who introduced him to her friends as "the
Germany young Messiah." (sic) So Hitler's socialism was either a decoy or
a superficial display of socialist convictions. However he lured in the scam
a lot of authentic democrats and socialists like Gregor and Otto Strasser or
his economic policy advisor until 1932 Otto Wagener.
Hitler's secret agenda
If Otto Strasser rapidly considered Hitler as a dictator and as alien to any
real socialist preoccupations Gregor, who presided over the destiny of the
NSDAP until December 1932, was convinced that Hitler was a real socialist
but victim of a liberal mafia run by Goring, Goebbels and Hitler's PR, the
germano-american Ernst Hanfstagl. Gregor was an incurable idealist. As
soon as January 1932, Adolf Hitler has had secret meetings in Dusseldorf at
the Industry Club with 35 business moguls and made the following
statements :
* private property is justified
* the NSDAP alone is ready to stem the Red tide
* Germany needs a dictator.
The whole statement was made against the background of an economic
situation of 6 millions unemployed and the moguls applauded. Actually Hitler
cheated a lot of people in his will to become Chancellor and Supreme Fuhrer
of Germany.
In his " Memoirs" published after the war, Otto Wagener -an other idealist
cheated by Hitler- testified of the unumerable discussions he had with Hitler
about "social issues". Wagener, as his book showed, was a naive dreamer
whose conceptions sound argumented and solid but their application would
have probably set more trouble in Germany than the Soviet collectivisation
of the tsarist economy. For instance, Wagener -who always considered
Hitler as a "genius"- proposed in 1931 to Hitler a processus of acquisition
by the workers of their employer's company that would left the latter almost
certainly shareless in twenty years. When presented with those ideas,
Hitler only replied that he had to take a trip to Berlin and that those ideas
would have to be discussed later. Of course they never were. Later,
Wagener admmitted to himself that Hitler had "conflicting feelings" : "he
was a socialist and determined to remain one, he wrote in his "Memoirs",
but his inner attachment to nature led him to acknowledge as a law of
nature the struggle for existence, the struggle to defeat the other." In this
respect only Hitler was certainly not a Socialist but it is more certain that
Wagener was trying to justify with hindsight his own naivety.
Hitler had a special dialectic
And he concluded by saying to incredulous Wagener that "the closer we
come to normal times (ie end of post-WWI penury) the more we need to
loosen the shackles and restraints that hinder the free play of the natural
struggle."
Incredibly Wagener never saw the real face of Hitler's socialism : tyranny
and populism. And like any other naive individual he kept to the certitude
that Hitler himself was himself a naive leader manipulated by Goering and
Himmler. According to Wagener it is because he was so naive that in the
end Hitler granted some much faith to people who agreed to whatever he
said. A completely wrong analysis in sofar as Hitler once told Wagener that
"intellectualism is nothing else than the atrophy of natural instinct."
Such utterances gravely belied any pretense to a socialist approach of post
WWI-Germany problems but still men like Wagener and Strasser refused to
contemplate the extent of Hitler's turn-around since he wrote Mein Kampf
and published his 25 points program in 1920. In 1931, Goering was already
living lavishly out of the funds provided by the Ruhr barons but Hitler was
still entertaining Wagener with endless discussions about the future of
national-socialist Germany. Poor Wagener, poor Strasser ! Wagener
eventually ended thinking that Hitler did not know what he wanted, a
completely wrong and naive assumption.
| Hitler acclaimed the declaration of WW1; after the war, he was very temporarily socialist before to dump his socialist convictions in favor of the needs of his armament program and territorial ambitions |
A Socialism that lead back to...individuality
Hitler wanted absolute power and fidelity to him and nothing else but
as a good tactician, he was extremely clever at hiding his cards. And
when he was saying to Wagener that "our socialism leads back to
individuality, and with it to the strongest impetus to a personal,
racially defined and altogether universal human evolution", he was
not only warning Wagener that he had no place within the nazis but
sending a very clear message of the most primitive social-darwinism.
Very few people then got the message across but it is now perfectly
clear.
Furthermore Hitler's gut opposition to Bolshevism hindered any
compromise with a real socialist approach always suspected to be a
Red Threat in disguise. Even England, he thought, would better side
with nazi Germany because protecting Germany from the woes of
Bolshevism "can only be achieved with England." Then he concluded
that Germany shoudl travel the road of socialist reorganization of
things in Europe but only after "order had been established." What he
meant by that was simple : absolute control of the German people,
elimination of the parasitic Jews, liquidation of the opponents.
On another hand Hitler often refused to take a definitive stance on
most issues and loved to pretend that he was not always sure
whether his most inner thoughts were clear. He constantly kept a
door cracked in order to embrace the easiest and most opportunistic
solution. "He wanted, eventually wrote Wagener, to refrain from
taking decisions."
A purge to purge the Socialists from the parti
However when a certain type of measures fitted his ambitions Hitler
was not long to adopt it. For instance as soon as 1932 he opted for
the armament of the SA and declared that "the necessity of arming
the SA is our urgent task." But when in 1934 the SA became a threat
to his own power and Roehm's socialist penchants were rising
eyebrows among Hitler's financial supporters, he did not hesitate to
decrete a blood purge that got him rid of any significant opponents or
rivals to the Nazi yoke.
In 1931, Wagener got in touch with Walther Funk (opposite pic
extreme right), editor of the Berliner Borsen Zeitung, who had built up
the best connections with Germany businessmen, especially in the
Ruhr. Funk rapidyl arranged for a meeting between Hitler and some
industrialist barons at the KaiserHof Hotel in Berlin. When Wagener
and Hitler arrived at the meeting they were flabbergasted to be
already expected by none less than Dr Kurt Schmitt, general director
of the Allianz und Stuttgarter Verein Versicherungs AG insurance firm
and by August von Finck, chairman of the supervisoryboard of the
same firm. Hitler spoke for 30 minutes. At the end, Funck saw the two
men off to their car and when he returned he told Hitler that both had
promised to make 5 millions marks available to the NSDAP in the
occurence of a major riot in Germany.
Hitler wanted absolute power and fidelity to him and nothing else but
as a good tactician, he was extremely clever at hiding his cards. And
when he was saying to Wagener that "our socialism leads back to
individuality, and with it to the strongest impetus to a personal,
racially defined and altogether universal human evolution", he was
not only warning Wagener that he had no place within the nazis but
sending a very clear message of the most primitive social-darwinism.
Very few people then got the message across but it is now perfectly
clear.
Furthermore Hitler's gut opposition to Bolshevism hindered any
compromise with a real socialist approach always suspected to be a
Red Threat in disguise. Even England, he thought, would better side
with nazi Germany because protecting Germany from the woes of
Bolshevism "can only be achieved with England." Then he concluded
that Germany shoudl travel the road of socialist reorganization of
things in Europe but only after "order had been established." What he
meant by that was simple : absolute control of the German people,
elimination of the parasitic Jews, liquidation of the opponents.
On another hand Hitler often refused to take a definitive stance on
most issues and loved to pretend that he was not always sure
whether his most inner thoughts were clear. He constantly kept a
door cracked in order to embrace the easiest and most opportunistic
solution. "He wanted, eventually wrote Wagener, to refrain from
taking decisions."
A purge to purge the Socialists from the parti
However when a certain type of measures fitted his ambitions Hitler
was not long to adopt it. For instance as soon as 1932 he opted for
the armament of the SA and declared that "the necessity of arming
the SA is our urgent task." But when in 1934 the SA became a threat
to his own power and Roehm's socialist penchants were rising
eyebrows among Hitler's financial supporters, he did not hesitate to
decrete a blood purge that got him rid of any significant opponents or
rivals to the Nazi yoke.
In 1931, Wagener got in touch with Walther Funk (opposite pic
extreme right), editor of the Berliner Borsen Zeitung, who had built up
the best connections with Germany businessmen, especially in the
Ruhr. Funk rapidyl arranged for a meeting between Hitler and some
industrialist barons at the KaiserHof Hotel in Berlin. When Wagener
and Hitler arrived at the meeting they were flabbergasted to be
already expected by none less than Dr Kurt Schmitt, general director
of the Allianz und Stuttgarter Verein Versicherungs AG insurance firm
and by August von Finck, chairman of the supervisoryboard of the
same firm. Hitler spoke for 30 minutes. At the end, Funck saw the two
men off to their car and when he returned he told Hitler that both had
promised to make 5 millions marks available to the NSDAP in the
occurence of a major riot in Germany.
| Gregor Strasser (pic) was as a committed socialist and social radical as was Ernst Röhm. Strasser saw a need to redistribute wealth in Germany and like Röhm, opposed Hitler's policy of catering to the country's major industrialists such as Emil Kirdorf. Hitler had no sympathies for the working class. This feeling he expressed to Otto Strasser, Gregor's brother and one of his early collaborators in the Nazi movement, in 1930, when he said: "The workers, they want nothing but bread and games. In the great mass they are not worth consideration. We must build a master class from elements of a better race." He had for the working class the contempt of a mediocre petit-bourgeois without education. Which he was. |
Gregor Strasser, convinced
Socialist, was liquidated in
1934 when the Socialist
tendencies of some Nazis like
Roehm and the Strasser
brothers became a problem
for Hitler's financiers. Strasser
was assassinated during the
Blood Purge in June 1934.
Socialist, was liquidated in
1934 when the Socialist
tendencies of some Nazis like
Roehm and the Strasser
brothers became a problem
for Hitler's financiers. Strasser
was assassinated during the
Blood Purge in June 1934.
| Hitler was bought off by the Ruhr barons who promised him to make a generous donation to the NSDAP in case of a major riot in Germany. This promise did not fall in the ear of a deaf man. |
When B.M.W. stood for Batteries and Marks for the War
The next day Funk came back accompanied by the leaders of the managing board of
the potash syndicate, Dr August Diehn and August Rosterg, followed soon after by
Gunther Quandt, the owner of vehicule manufacturer BMW, batteries maker Varta
and potash frim Wintershall. Hitler could not believe he had secured so easily the
financing of his fledgling party but all he had to do now was to organize unrest and fan
some riots to be sure to increase party's funds by 5 millions marks. Hypocritically he
told Wagener that he was happy he had not "asked" for such a sum but had only
"demanded" it in the occurence of social unrest. It was the old story of the french
whore who never asked for money but for "mon petit cadeau".
Ignominously he even went as far as saying that "the future of our government lies
solely in its new socialism.... I have mentioned more than once that in this I see the
revival of Christ's basic idea, the social-community of all people, brotherly love,
tolerance and humility." Hitler was a demagogue paying himself and his listeners the
most atrocious lip service ever concocted since Biblical times. He had no serious
idea to promote brotherhood, tolerance and humility as he had already said to many
of his loyal supporters that "the Party is me and the line of the party is what I say."
But still in those early years of the 30s, men like Strasser and Wagener, authentic
socialist, were being fooled by Hitler's lies and senseless rhetoric.
The next day Funk came back accompanied by the leaders of the managing board of
the potash syndicate, Dr August Diehn and August Rosterg, followed soon after by
Gunther Quandt, the owner of vehicule manufacturer BMW, batteries maker Varta
and potash frim Wintershall. Hitler could not believe he had secured so easily the
financing of his fledgling party but all he had to do now was to organize unrest and fan
some riots to be sure to increase party's funds by 5 millions marks. Hypocritically he
told Wagener that he was happy he had not "asked" for such a sum but had only
"demanded" it in the occurence of social unrest. It was the old story of the french
whore who never asked for money but for "mon petit cadeau".
Ignominously he even went as far as saying that "the future of our government lies
solely in its new socialism.... I have mentioned more than once that in this I see the
revival of Christ's basic idea, the social-community of all people, brotherly love,
tolerance and humility." Hitler was a demagogue paying himself and his listeners the
most atrocious lip service ever concocted since Biblical times. He had no serious
idea to promote brotherhood, tolerance and humility as he had already said to many
of his loyal supporters that "the Party is me and the line of the party is what I say."
But still in those early years of the 30s, men like Strasser and Wagener, authentic
socialist, were being fooled by Hitler's lies and senseless rhetoric.
| The ideas of Oswald Spengler influenced a whole generation of Germans : the continued pauperization of the western civilization through its Art, its culture and its music. |
If Hitler has ever been a Socialist it is through some of the ideas that he borrowed and
adapted to his own sauce from a lot of various thinkers, notably people like the philosopher
and mathematician Oswald Spengler (1880-1936) who published in 1918 "Decline of the
West" (Der Untergang des Abendlandes) in which he underlined the continued
pauperization of the western civilization through its Art, its culture and its music. In it, he
also predicted the rising in Germany of a "dictator like Napoleon" but hated Adolf Hitler
whom he deemed to be a "potential Caesar."
Shortly after, he wrote a slender essay titled "Prussianism and Socialism" where he
supported the idea that a tragic misunderstanding of the concepts was at work:
Conservatives and Socialists, instead of being at loggerheads, should united under the
banner of a true socialism. This was not the Marxist-materialist abomination, he said, but
essentially the same thing as Prussianism: a socialism of the German community, based on
its unique work ethic, discipline, and organic rank instead of "money." This Prussian
socialism sharply contrasted both to the capitalistic ethic of England and the "socialism" of
Marx , whose theories amounted to "capitalism for the proletariat."
A bunch of fanatics fascinated with marching bands
In his corporate state proposals Spengler anticipated the Fascists, although he never was
one, and his "socialism" was essentially that of the National Socialists (but without the
folkish racism). However, he never joined the National Socialist party, despite the repeated
entreaties of such luminaries as Gregor Strasser and "Ernst Hanfstängl". He regarded the
Nazis as immature, fascinated with marching bands and patriotic slogans, playing with the
bauble of power but not realizing the philosophical significance and new imperatives of the
age.
Nevertheless Hitler -who liked to think of himself as a superior thinker- picked up some of
his ideas and precised that "our culture had engendered stagnation because European
people have turned their attention to material tasks, to technology, to industy, to hunger for
material possessions, to rapacity and to an economic egocentrism that overwhelms
anything else." Spengler has never said something different : he was convinced that the
people of the Third World (they were then referred to as "colored people") would use our
technology to destroy us. So far he might have been right...
Seventy year later, those words have curious resonances in our current world and do not
fail to evoke the slogans of the anti-mondialist organizations that would feel insulted to be
compared to Hitler's rantings. Nervetheless those utterances and protests do not make
Hitler or themselves socialist and Hitler's "prussian socialism" -if it ever existed in his
mind- ended up being a prussian totalitarism totally alien to Socialism.
adapted to his own sauce from a lot of various thinkers, notably people like the philosopher
and mathematician Oswald Spengler (1880-1936) who published in 1918 "Decline of the
West" (Der Untergang des Abendlandes) in which he underlined the continued
pauperization of the western civilization through its Art, its culture and its music. In it, he
also predicted the rising in Germany of a "dictator like Napoleon" but hated Adolf Hitler
whom he deemed to be a "potential Caesar."
Shortly after, he wrote a slender essay titled "Prussianism and Socialism" where he
supported the idea that a tragic misunderstanding of the concepts was at work:
Conservatives and Socialists, instead of being at loggerheads, should united under the
banner of a true socialism. This was not the Marxist-materialist abomination, he said, but
essentially the same thing as Prussianism: a socialism of the German community, based on
its unique work ethic, discipline, and organic rank instead of "money." This Prussian
socialism sharply contrasted both to the capitalistic ethic of England and the "socialism" of
Marx , whose theories amounted to "capitalism for the proletariat."
A bunch of fanatics fascinated with marching bands
In his corporate state proposals Spengler anticipated the Fascists, although he never was
one, and his "socialism" was essentially that of the National Socialists (but without the
folkish racism). However, he never joined the National Socialist party, despite the repeated
entreaties of such luminaries as Gregor Strasser and "Ernst Hanfstängl". He regarded the
Nazis as immature, fascinated with marching bands and patriotic slogans, playing with the
bauble of power but not realizing the philosophical significance and new imperatives of the
age.
Nevertheless Hitler -who liked to think of himself as a superior thinker- picked up some of
his ideas and precised that "our culture had engendered stagnation because European
people have turned their attention to material tasks, to technology, to industy, to hunger for
material possessions, to rapacity and to an economic egocentrism that overwhelms
anything else." Spengler has never said something different : he was convinced that the
people of the Third World (they were then referred to as "colored people") would use our
technology to destroy us. So far he might have been right...
Seventy year later, those words have curious resonances in our current world and do not
fail to evoke the slogans of the anti-mondialist organizations that would feel insulted to be
compared to Hitler's rantings. Nervetheless those utterances and protests do not make
Hitler or themselves socialist and Hitler's "prussian socialism" -if it ever existed in his
mind- ended up being a prussian totalitarism totally alien to Socialism.
| Spengler, 1880-1936, predicted the end of the Western World and Civilization destroyed by the Third World. Hitler took some of his ideas to justify a policy of anti-materialism. |
Ultimate goal : absolute power
Eventually Otto Wagener eventually succeeded in seeing the light
and started voicing doubts about the purity of Funk's intentions
and of his wealthy industrialist friends. Once more Hitler got angry
and began to reproach Wagener that "he wanted to take him
(Funk) away from me (Hitler)" which was evidently the case.
Wagener was then at a loss. Not only he had taken Funk on the
board of WPD (Economic News Service of the NSDAP) but now the
man was overtly backing off from Wagener and Strasser socialist
ideas and was obviously planning to take over the main editorial
role in favour of a more liberal approach. Wagener complained to
Hitler that Funk was now leaning towards the views of his financial
backers and friends in business who were the enemies of the
NSDAP economic policies.
Hitler had then the same response that he always came with
when confronted with his contant changing of ideas and courses :
"I know what the ultimate objective is. The tactical battles might
seem to be leading me astray. But once they are won, I return
unerringly to the direction that leads to the strategic goal." It was
nothing else than glibish talk from a man who knew too well what
the ultimate goal was : supreme power. All the rest was
nonsensical blabla or sheer demagoguery.
At that point, even an idealist and a naive individual like Wagener
knew that he had reached the breaking point with Hitler. He
eventually acknowledged his defeat against the "reactionnary
business circles" and reckoned that since they thought entirely in
terms of economic liberalism, "there would be no question that
they would veto our socialism."
The Socialism of who ? this still has to be determined. But Gregor
Strasser drew at the same epoch identical conclusions and
returned to his pharmacy business in his native town.
Hitler's double language and hypocrisy
As for Wagener, he resigned from his post of economic adviser in
september of 1932, abandonned his job as editor of the WPD and
in June 1933 went to Munich to officially forgo all his NSDAP
functions into Hitler's hands who was by now Chancellor of the
Reich. The Fuhrer simply said :"We are not saying goodbye to one
another. And yet this moments feels something like a parting."
Indeed it was. During the blood purge of 1934, he was arrested at
the demand of Goering who hated him as he hated anybody who
had or had had any influence on Hitler. He was eventually released
from prison through some friendly channels after having escaped
firing squad by sheer luck. During the war, he fought with the
German army, became major-general and surrendered to the
British on the island of Rhodes in 1945. He remained for seven
years in British and Italian internment and was released in 1952.
He died in 1971 aged 83 after having once more tried to dab in
post-war german politics but unsuccessfully.
As for Gregor Strasser, this other stalwart of aborted German
national-socialism, he was less lucky than Wagener. He was shot
during the Night of the Long Knives after having been beaten
almost dead several times. Hitler's socialism was a mockery or at
best a tool to gain power upon the impoverished masses of the
20s and the 30s but he never had any serious and solid socialist
convictions. The best expression of Hitlerite Socialism was the
Force through Joy Program of the alcoholic Robert Ley who
offered to docile workers a full week of cruising vacation abord
one of the rather luxury liners built with the funds of the unions
which Ley had merged into one centralized and dictatorial labour
organization.
As for Otto Strasser, he entered into open opposition with his
Black Front to Hitler as soon as 1930 with some success, wrote in
1940 an anti-Hitler pamphlet, survived the war and failed in his
post-war attempts to play any political role in Federal Germany.
His nazi past stuck to him in spite of his courageous opposition to
the party. In fact the true name of the NSDAP should have been der
Nationalfaschist Deutsche Arbeiterpartei : NFDAP.
A form of nationalized economy as of 1933
Eventually Otto Wagener eventually succeeded in seeing the light
and started voicing doubts about the purity of Funk's intentions
and of his wealthy industrialist friends. Once more Hitler got angry
and began to reproach Wagener that "he wanted to take him
(Funk) away from me (Hitler)" which was evidently the case.
Wagener was then at a loss. Not only he had taken Funk on the
board of WPD (Economic News Service of the NSDAP) but now the
man was overtly backing off from Wagener and Strasser socialist
ideas and was obviously planning to take over the main editorial
role in favour of a more liberal approach. Wagener complained to
Hitler that Funk was now leaning towards the views of his financial
backers and friends in business who were the enemies of the
NSDAP economic policies.
Hitler had then the same response that he always came with
when confronted with his contant changing of ideas and courses :
"I know what the ultimate objective is. The tactical battles might
seem to be leading me astray. But once they are won, I return
unerringly to the direction that leads to the strategic goal." It was
nothing else than glibish talk from a man who knew too well what
the ultimate goal was : supreme power. All the rest was
nonsensical blabla or sheer demagoguery.
At that point, even an idealist and a naive individual like Wagener
knew that he had reached the breaking point with Hitler. He
eventually acknowledged his defeat against the "reactionnary
business circles" and reckoned that since they thought entirely in
terms of economic liberalism, "there would be no question that
they would veto our socialism."
The Socialism of who ? this still has to be determined. But Gregor
Strasser drew at the same epoch identical conclusions and
returned to his pharmacy business in his native town.
Hitler's double language and hypocrisy
As for Wagener, he resigned from his post of economic adviser in
september of 1932, abandonned his job as editor of the WPD and
in June 1933 went to Munich to officially forgo all his NSDAP
functions into Hitler's hands who was by now Chancellor of the
Reich. The Fuhrer simply said :"We are not saying goodbye to one
another. And yet this moments feels something like a parting."
Indeed it was. During the blood purge of 1934, he was arrested at
the demand of Goering who hated him as he hated anybody who
had or had had any influence on Hitler. He was eventually released
from prison through some friendly channels after having escaped
firing squad by sheer luck. During the war, he fought with the
German army, became major-general and surrendered to the
British on the island of Rhodes in 1945. He remained for seven
years in British and Italian internment and was released in 1952.
He died in 1971 aged 83 after having once more tried to dab in
post-war german politics but unsuccessfully.
As for Gregor Strasser, this other stalwart of aborted German
national-socialism, he was less lucky than Wagener. He was shot
during the Night of the Long Knives after having been beaten
almost dead several times. Hitler's socialism was a mockery or at
best a tool to gain power upon the impoverished masses of the
20s and the 30s but he never had any serious and solid socialist
convictions. The best expression of Hitlerite Socialism was the
Force through Joy Program of the alcoholic Robert Ley who
offered to docile workers a full week of cruising vacation abord
one of the rather luxury liners built with the funds of the unions
which Ley had merged into one centralized and dictatorial labour
organization.
As for Otto Strasser, he entered into open opposition with his
Black Front to Hitler as soon as 1930 with some success, wrote in
1940 an anti-Hitler pamphlet, survived the war and failed in his
post-war attempts to play any political role in Federal Germany.
His nazi past stuck to him in spite of his courageous opposition to
the party. In fact the true name of the NSDAP should have been der
Nationalfaschist Deutsche Arbeiterpartei : NFDAP.
A form of nationalized economy as of 1933
| Otto Wagener believed during a long period of time he was going to achieve great socialist works and reforms with Hitler and the Nazis. Eventually he realized that all their hodgepodge of Socialism was nothing but a scam and a myth and very bitter he resigned from his post. At least, he saved his life not like Gregor Strasser who was assassinated in 1934 during the infamous Night of the long knives. |
| After the blood purge of 1934 and the elimination of all "Bolsheviks" elements form the NSDAP, Viktor Lutze became SA leader in replacement of murdered Ernst Roehm until his death in a car accident in May 1943. He was posthumously awarded the Highest Grade of the German Order by Adolf Hitler. |
| HITLER LEADER OF A POPULIST PARTY |
| The German Social-Democrats hated the Nazis who reciprocated as heartedly but with more electoral success in the end. |
| One day Wagener confronted the genius with the assertion that Hitler was in fact supporting liberal ideas : he got the reply that "there is an intersecting point in the lines of my natural feelings and my logical and historical perception....". Hitler could not have better said that he did not really believe in Socialism. Then he pursued by saying "if we allow our Gauleiters (administrative regional leaders) and speakers to preach pure socialism of the customary order, we would not be doing nothing different from the Bolsheviks." |
| The Thule Society was created in 1918 by Hugo von Sebottendorff, an original, who had been schooled in occultism, Islamic mysticism, alchemy, Rosicrucianism. However the Thule Society became increasingly political, and in 1918 established a political party, and the journalist Karl Harrer was given the job of founding a political "worker circle". The idea was to form a militant Order of initiates, with a military and religious structure. |
However after 1933 State ownership spread rapidly and in the meantime free
disposal of property was made more difficult with the introduction of the
concept of trusteeship. From 1933 to 1943 the assets of state-owned
business doubled to more than 4 billion marks and the number of
state-owned enterprises rose to 531, many of them in the armaments
industry.
The huge Volkswagen plant was state-owned as was the Reichswerke
complex presided over by Hermann Goering that employed 600,00 people
and the business of which was the mining of the low content iron ores which
abound in Germany. In 1937 Hitler said that private enterprise would be
tolerated as long as it conformed with the regime's objectives. Otherwise the
State would step in. The National Socialist economy was not intended to be
run for the benefit of private capitalism.
For the same reason restrictions on the disposal of capital assets were
imposed by the Reich Entailed Farm Law (1934) that forbid farmers to
dispose freely of their estate or by the Dividen Law of the same year that
restricted profits and dividends to no more than 6% and required enterprises
to reinvest or forfeit it to the State. Capital could not be freely transferred
abroad and it use was monitored by the Supervisory Office for Credit Affairs
and was directed to specific national tasks.
So much was the restriction to the free play of traditional capitalism that in
1940, before to flee for Switzerland, Fritz Thyssen wrote "soon Germany will
not be any different from Bolshevik Russia; the heads of the enterprises who
do not fulfil the conditions which the "Plan" prescribes will be accused of
treason against the German people and shot." But the whole system was
more dictatorial than socialist in so far as the Nazis wanted an economy
geared to war and conquest and to this end it had to be closely monitored by
the party and his henchmen.
Thyssen successfully escape to Switzerland but its whole empire industrial
empire and his fortune were seized by the Party that deemed that his flight
was an act of economic sabotage. Later he was arrested in occupied France
and taken back to Germany, where he was confined, first in a sanatorium
near Berlin, then from 1943 in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. In
February 1945 he was sent to Dachau concentration camp. He was
comparatively well-treated, however, and survived to be liberated by Allied
forces in 1945. In 1950, he left Europe for Argentina where he died in 1951
aged 78.
disposal of property was made more difficult with the introduction of the
concept of trusteeship. From 1933 to 1943 the assets of state-owned
business doubled to more than 4 billion marks and the number of
state-owned enterprises rose to 531, many of them in the armaments
industry.
The huge Volkswagen plant was state-owned as was the Reichswerke
complex presided over by Hermann Goering that employed 600,00 people
and the business of which was the mining of the low content iron ores which
abound in Germany. In 1937 Hitler said that private enterprise would be
tolerated as long as it conformed with the regime's objectives. Otherwise the
State would step in. The National Socialist economy was not intended to be
run for the benefit of private capitalism.
For the same reason restrictions on the disposal of capital assets were
imposed by the Reich Entailed Farm Law (1934) that forbid farmers to
dispose freely of their estate or by the Dividen Law of the same year that
restricted profits and dividends to no more than 6% and required enterprises
to reinvest or forfeit it to the State. Capital could not be freely transferred
abroad and it use was monitored by the Supervisory Office for Credit Affairs
and was directed to specific national tasks.
So much was the restriction to the free play of traditional capitalism that in
1940, before to flee for Switzerland, Fritz Thyssen wrote "soon Germany will
not be any different from Bolshevik Russia; the heads of the enterprises who
do not fulfil the conditions which the "Plan" prescribes will be accused of
treason against the German people and shot." But the whole system was
more dictatorial than socialist in so far as the Nazis wanted an economy
geared to war and conquest and to this end it had to be closely monitored by
the party and his henchmen.
Thyssen successfully escape to Switzerland but its whole empire industrial
empire and his fortune were seized by the Party that deemed that his flight
was an act of economic sabotage. Later he was arrested in occupied France
and taken back to Germany, where he was confined, first in a sanatorium
near Berlin, then from 1943 in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. In
February 1945 he was sent to Dachau concentration camp. He was
comparatively well-treated, however, and survived to be liberated by Allied
forces in 1945. In 1950, he left Europe for Argentina where he died in 1951
aged 78.
| Permit to enter and work to the Goering Reichswerke complex issue to Wladislaw Kostrzewas, a Polish POW . |