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Hitler Assumes Direct Command In Proclamation to the German Army (December 21, 1941)

27
Aug 2012

When the Führer personally took over on Feb. 4, 1938, command over the entire armed forces, this was done out of concern for the then threatening struggle for the freedom of the German people. Reasons of state imperatively demanded coordination of the forces in one hand. Only in this manner could preparations be made for a successful resistance, which, it was known, would lead to total war even more than did the World War of 1914-1918, forced on the German people by the same enemies.

Furthermore, the consciousness of an inner call and the will to take the responsibility that was his were of importance when the statesman Adolf Hitler resolved to be his own supreme military leader. The course of this war has confirmed the correctness of this realization in an increasing degree. However, it asserted itself fully only when, with the campaign in the East, the war acquired dimensions that surpassed all expectations of the past.

The magnitude of the theatres of war, the closely interwoven nature of the operations of the war on land and the political and economic war objectives, as well as the numerical size of the army in comparison with the other services of the armed forces, induced the Führer to influence to the utmost the operations and armament of the army and, following his intuitions, to re-serve for himself personally all essential decisions in this field.

In logical pursuance of his decision of Feb. 4, 1938, the Führer, while fully appreciating the services rendered by the former Commander in Chief of the army, Field Marshal von Brauchitsch, decided to unite in his hands the command of the entire armed forces with the High Command of the army. For this reason he issued the following proclamation to the soldiers of the army and the Elite Guard:

“Soldiers of the army and the armed Elite Guard:

“The struggle for the freedom of our nation, for securing conditions for the future existence of our nation, for eliminating the possibility to make war on us every twenty or twenty-five years under a new pretext-but fundamentally always for the same Jewish capitalistic interests-is nearing its climax and turning point.

“The German Reich and Italy, as well as the States that had allied themselves with us, have had the good fortune of winning, in Japan, a world power as a friend and comrade in arms. With the amazingly rapid annihilation of the American Pacific Fleet and the British forces at Singapore and the occupation of numerous British and American bases in East Asia by the Japanese forces, the war now is entering on a new phase favorable to us. We thus also face decisions of world-wide importance

“After their unforgettable and unprecedented victories against the most dangerous enemy of all time our armies in the East must now change over from mobile warfare to trench warfare because of the sudden arrival of the Russian Winter. Their task will be to hold and defend until the arrival of Spring what they have gained with immeasurable heroism and with heavy sacrifices, fighting as fanatically as before. We expect from the new Eastern Front nothing different from that which German soldiers had to do during four Russian war Winters twenty-five years ago. Every German soldier must set an example to our faithful allies.

“Furthermore, as in the last year, new units will be formed and, above all, new and better arms will be given out. Protection of the front to the west from Kirkenes down to the Spanish border will be increased. The difficulties of organizing connections within this front, which today spans the whole Continent and reaches to North Africa, must be overcome. This also will be achieved.

“Preparations for immediate resumption of offensive fighting in the Spring, until the final destruction of the enemy in the East, must be made immediately. The introduction of other decisive war measures is impending.

“These tasks require that the army and home front be brought to the highest degree of performance in one common effort by all. However, the army is the main pillar in the fight of the armed forces. I have, therefore, resolved today, under these circumstances, to take over myself the leading of the army in my capacity as Supreme Commander of the German armed forces.

“Soldiers, I know war from four years of the gigantic struggle in the West from 1914 to 1918. I lived through the horrors of nearly all the great battles as a common soldier. Twice I was wounded, and I was threatened with becoming blind. Therefore, nothing that is tormenting and troubling you is unknown to me.

“However, after four years of war I did not doubt for a single second the resurrection of my people. After fifteen years of work I have achieved, as a common German soldier and merely with my fanatical will power, the unity of the German nation and have freed it from the death sentence of Versailles.

“My soldiers! You will understand, therefore, that my heart belongs entirely to you, that my will and my work unswervingly are serving the greatness of my and your nation, and that my mind and determination know nothing but annihilation of the enemy-that is to say, victorious termination of the war.

“Whatever I can do for you, my soldiers of the army and Elite Guard, shall be done. What you can and will do for me, I know. You will follow me loyally and obediently until the Reich and our German people are definitely safe. God Almighty will not deny victory to His bravest soldiers.

“Führer’s Headquarters, Dec. 19, 1941.

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The Work of Propagandists in the National Socialist State by Hugo Ringler

03
Jun 2012

The 1934 party congress belongs to history. The hundreds of thousands of participants, after a week of powerful experiences, have returned to their homes and jobs. Political leaders received directives for the coming months at the party congress and at numerous special conferences. Every party office, every political leader from the Gau down to the very last local group is now intent on carrying out the plans laid out at Nuremberg, to work for the best of the National Socialist Party and thereby that of the German people. It will be the goal of each participant to meet the goals laid out at Nuremberg not only approximately, but entirely, to further the building of the new state.

The propagandists of the movement of course will follow the general line, particularly as laid out in the proclamation of the Führer. But they will have two further sets of goals as well: those of the major speech by party comrade Dr. Goebbels at the party congress, and those of the special meeting of the Gau and Kreispropaganda leaders held in the Apollo Theater. Dr. Goebbels’ remarks at the party congress to more than 20,000 political leaders are contained in a supplement to this issue. This should be read. Of no less significance and importance for propagandists is the speech the Reichspropagandaleiter [Goebbels] held at the special meeting. It is regrettable that the Appollo Theater is too small to allow all political leaders to hear the speech. The words of Dr. Goebbels are valuable resource for the 1400 Gau and Kreispropaganda leaders and their associates and speakers who were able to attend. A fresh breeze blew through the Appollo Theater. Dr. Goebbels dealt bluntly with objections, and showed how propaganda must be conducted to keep such objections from developing. Here is a brief summary of his remarks.

Everyone must work just as hard today when the National Socialist movement is the ruler of the state as he did in the days when our movement was fighting for power.

That does not mean that propagandists should stop looking for new methods and new ways to improve their work. This is particularly true since some methods and means that were successful during the struggle for power are now outdated or stale. These methods must be replaced by new ones. The Führer in his proclamation set the goal of winning those citizens to the National Socialist world view who were still outside our ranks on 19 August 1934 [the referendum giving Hitler complete power]. We must do everything possible, using new methods and techniques, to win these citizens to our cause.

Those who believe that the movement’s propagandists are less important now, since we now control the state, which in turn controls the various propaganda methods, show only that they understand nothing of the nature and necessities of modern propaganda. Occasionally one encounters a party member or even a political leader who thinks this way. They believe that propaganda is no longer really a task of the party, rather of the state, since it controls the major means of propaganda such as the radio, the press, film, etc. They believe that instead of holding a meeting that reaches perhaps a thousand or ten thousand people, it would be better to broadcast the speech over the radio and reach a much larger audience, or they wonder if mass meetings are even necessary any longer, since the state has the ability to get its message to the people through special editions or articles in the press.

We must vigorously oppose such viewpoints. History has shown us, and our opponents, that using such methods would in the long run guarantee us the fate of our opponents. During our struggle for power, our opponents controlled practically the entirety of the press and radio. Films attacked us as well. Our National Socialist movement had none of these media, only itself and the spoken word; it had to rely on its speakers. Despite that fact, in our fourteen year battle we defeated the enemy. That alone is sufficient proof that all those other methods are not enough. If we combine these means with National Socialist action and National Socialist spirit, we can make them into strong weapons for our worldview. But without a connection to the National Socialist fighting spirit, they will remain ineffective.

From this it is clear that the struggle for the German people and the propaganda for the National Socialist state can never be a task of the state, rather must ever be solely a matter for the party. The movement has the people who are ready and willing to put the National Socialist thinking and will of the state into action. They will use the means of the state. The state cannot carry out the tasks of popular enlightenment and propaganda without the help of the fighters of the National Socialist party. And if the methods were used too often they would lose their effectiveness; even worse, too frequent use would destroy the connection between government and people. The fate of the old parties and the old system demonstrates this. These parties believed that once they had a certain degree of power and a certain number of supporters, they could govern the people from government offices. This erroneous theory, which we knew well how to exploit, is the cause of their collapse. In our fourteen-year struggle for power, we went to the people, we sought to maintain a living connection with the people. The leadership of our party did not hold secret conferences and deliberations, rather everyone from the Führer to the last minor official always strove to stand in the middle of the people, for only in that way could they learn the people’s problems, needs and wishes. Today the National Socialist movement controls the state. No party member with any office at all in the party can neglect to maintain and strengthen this living contact with the people. Were a political leader even in the smallest village to believe that he could neglect this contact, since his party possessed the state, he would quickly find himself and his politics isolated from the people and himself rejected.

Along the same lines, some think that mass meetings are no longer necessary, or even worse, that meetings in general are no longer effective, since the people no longer want them. Dr. Goebbels rejected this idea energetically, saying that wherever the population displayed such a dislike of meetings, the fault was not with the people, rather with those who were not able to hold meetings that the public liked. Some of our opponents laughed when the NSDAP first began holding mass meetings. They believed that since people refused to attend their old-fashioned and calcified meetings, they would also stay away from the our movement’s meetings, which corresponded to the wishes of the people. Those gentlemen aren’t laughing any longer. We could one day suffer the same fate if we make the same mistake and believe that meetings are no longer necessary or effective. Whenever such a threat surfaces, we must work to see that meetings are conducted effectively and that the people come because they are interested in our meetings. If we prepare our meetings with the same fanatic effort, with the same passion, and the same intensity as during the struggle for power, we will not have to complain about poor attendance or even opposition. But if a local group leader believes he can force people to attend a meeting by a meeting by putting an ad in the local newspaper or by distributing a leaflet threatening that those who do not attend will be seen as traitors or will show that they are uninterested in the party or the new state, who indeed attempts in any way to fill his meeting hall by force, he should not be surprised when he finds uninterested people or even empty seats on the night of the meeting. Such behavior can only be explained as the result of great intellectual weakness. We have always been proud to be a movement of the people. Today, too, we must mobilize the people so that they come to our meetings with enthusiasm and interest in hearing what we have to say. We cannot compel the people who showed on 19. August 1934 how powerfully they supported us to attend our meetings. He who tries to fill his meetings by threats, even if he succeeds, does not advance our idea, rather damages it, for the attendees will conclude that the National Socialist movement is no longer able to attract people to it without the use of force.

It is self-evident that careful preparations must be made for meetings and that the speaker must do his best. No speaker, particularly in the thousands of small meetings that occur every day, may assume that it is not as important as it once was to prepare his speeches carefully. It is impermissible to speak for an hour or an hour and a half in a cold and empty way. During the struggle for power we fought for the soul of every single citizen and gave our full energies to winning supporters for our movement. Today we must fight to strengthen the teachings of our worldview in the souls of the people, to persuade them and make true National Socialists of them.

The core of the Reichspropagandaleiter’s message to those at the special meeting was that speakers “have to look the people in the eyes.” We may not think that the struggle is over since we now possess power, and that our meetings now should have a “higher intellectual level.” We must resolutely reject the claim of those who want us to believe that it is no longer “polite” so speak with the same forceful and clear language of the struggle for power. We must always remember that we succeeded because we spoke in a way that the people understood. In the bible of National Socialism, the Führer’s Mein Kampf, he ironically describes a bourgeois meeting. A certain part of the intellectual class found pleasure in the “well organized and profound knowledge” of the speaker. The overwhelming majority of the German people, and the workers in particular, however, rejected this lukewarm hash. May our meetings never become a kind of “fine arts” gathering. Speakers must avoid being offensive, but they must also avoid weakness. The speaker must speak in a way that the people understand. They must sense that he feels the worries and problems of the people, and that his work serves the good of the people.

If today the same fighting spirit that supported our fourteen year struggle for power fills our meetings, if we conduct our labors in this same spirit, if we never give up on a deep and living relationship to the people, the success of our labors is assured. The same force that once filled our meetings — and only our meetings — will flow in our meetings today as well.

The same spirit necessary for our meetings is required for all other areas of our work for the movement. The key commandment is never to depart from the line that we followed in our fourteen-year struggle for power. In all that we do we must remain what we were when we joined the ranks of the activists of the movement. We must never believe that, just because the means and power of the state are on our side, we may slack off, or conduct our struggle differently than in the way that led us to that power.

Reichspropagandaleiter Dr. Goebbels gave a vivid illustration of how to act. There have been cases in which a newspaper editor believed he had to editorialize against National Socialism or against some measure of the new government. The local group leader or the responsible party office responded by sending the editor to a concentration camp, or by threatening to do so. If the offense is not overly serious, if there really is no great need to punish it, if it is a case of minor importance in some provincial paper, or even if it is in a city paper, we should approach it as we did during the struggle for power. During those days tens of thousands of red [socialist] and black [Catholic] pigs spewed their poison against us. We could not ask the state to deal with them. That was probably good, for we were then unable to present these black and red pigs to the public for what they really were. They would have appeared to the public as “martyrs of conscience” or “martyrs to their profession.” In those days we called the people to mass meetings and proved to them the slanderous nature of the accusations. We must do the same today. If a newspaper forgets its duty and wants to return the methods of the past, we should oppose it forcefully with every means at our disposal. We must show the people in a mass meeting who it is who still attempts to interfere with the building of the new Germany. We can be sure that in such a case we act not only in the interests of the movement, but also in the interests of every decent citizen. Those who we oppose in such a manner will most certainly lose interest in any similar experiments in the future. But we will also have given the people proof that National Socialism does not need to depend on state power or require it to carry out its work. Such action will also contribute to winning over that small part of our people that still is not with us. We do not wish to win this small group to our worldview by force or pressure. Rather, where ever and whenever it is possible, and without force or pressure, we want to use the means of education and public pressure on the foes of renewal. If we work in this way, the splendid old fighting spirit that was with us at the very beginning, and which led us onward to our present success, will live on in us and our movement. That will be the best guarantee that the movement will continue to move forward in every way.

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The Battle for Berlin

19
May 2012

Berlin may not be ignored when considering the three cities that have been particularly important in the movement’s history.

Berlin! Capital of the Reich and seat of the Reich government, metropolis, world city, Berlin—an endless sea of buildings with a population larger than that of Switzerland! Berlin at last, the city where during the struggle for power everything came together, where the tread of the proletarian masses was louder and more confident, where the Jew in full confidence of his power was more obvious and insolent than anywhere else.

As the National Socialist movement began to recover after the collapse of 9 November and slowly spread to northern Germany, including Berlin, the conditions were highly unfavorable.

During Adolf Hitler’s imprisonment, internal and personal problems split the völkisch movement, with results that lasted into the party’s re-establishment. The problems were even more evident in an enormous city like Berlin. The asphalt wilderness with its largely proletarian population was fertile ground for political fringe groups of every kind. The result was that the Berlin local group of the NSDAP, despite hard work, was going nowhere, and was a real concern for Munich. It was in the same state as the German Workers’ Party was before Adolf Hitler arrived to give meaning and purpose to its struggle. Berlin too lacked a personality of stature sufficient to win the masses of the working class for National Socialism through the power of his words, to deal with the leaders of other parties, to battle the intellectual currents of the System Era and combat the brutal terror of the political underworld, all the while raising high the Swastika banner in this city of millions.

The party leadership waited for a time, hoping that a leader would grow out of Berlin itself. Only after various attempts had proved unsuccessful did the Führer decide in fall 1926 to entrust Dr. Goebbels with the conquest of Berlin, giving him special authority. Dr. Goebbels has already proved himself as Gauleiter of the Rhineland to be a passionate and exciting speaker to workers in the Ruhr area. Events would show whether or not he was the right man for Gauleiter of the Reich capital. On 30 October 1936, the Führer spoke these moving words of thanks to Dr. Goebbels at the ten year anniversary of the Gau: “Your name symbolizes this ten-year battle for Berlin! It will never fade from German history, from the history of the National Socialist movement, and never from the history of this city.”

In truth, the history of the NSDAP in Berlin begins with the day Dr. Goebbels assumed its leadership. He had to undertake major changes to strengthen the organization, including expelling expelling a large clique of quarreling members. The party headquarters were then in a back courtyard on Potsdamer Street named the “opium den.” This was quickly replaced by clean, dignified offices on Lützow Street, and later on Hedemann Street. He began an organized campaign of propaganda and meetings that gradually spread from Spandau to the entire city.

It is obvious that the Berlin NSDAP needed its own “Hofbräuhaus battle” to prove to its opponents that it could stand up against the bloody deeds of the Reds. On 11 February 1927, Dr. Goebbels spoke in the Pharus Hall, the favorite meeting hall of the Communists in the red Wedding district. “The government is near its end. A new Germany must be forged! White collar workers and blue, the fate of the German people is in your hands.” Those were the words on the big red posters on all the poster pillars.

The Marxist parties saw the meeting as a declaration of war, and they were right. The NSDAP was about to invade their strongest districts. As Dr. Goebbels entered the hall, it has been closed for an hour by the police and was two-thirds filled with Red fighters. A Red rabble-rouser making provocative remarks in the hall was hauled out of the mob of his fellow believers by several SS men and brought to the stage. That was the sign for the Red mob to attack. What happened next was identical to what had happened more than five years earlier as the first Storm Troop unit earned its fame. Here too a tiny minority of fanatic National Socialists began what seemed a hopeless battle against a brutal Red force that shrank at nothing. They won in the end, enabling the further growth of the movement.

The elements that characterized the National Socialist battle throughout the Reich are evident in concentrated form in the struggle for Berlin. There were governmental problems and difficulties of every variety, periodic speaking bans for the Gauleiter, bans of the S.A. and the whole party, tiring trials, searches, arrests, prison, meeting hall battles, and everywhere murder…

The whole battle transpired during the glorious era of Vice President of Police Isidor Weiss, whose real name was Bernhard instead of Isidor. However, his origins and his nose fully justified the mocking name that Berlin jokesters gave him.

The periods when the party was banned posed major challenges to the party membership. The party maintained a shaky existence under the cover of organizations like savings societies, bowling clubs and swimming clubs. Missing propaganda activities were replaced to some extent by founding the newspaper “Der Angriff.” The diehard slogan “Though banned, we’re not dead” helped the party survive the crisis, which in the end threatened to dishearten even the most devoted members.

Happier times now came, times that justified the heaviest sacrifices. The inroads into the ranks of the Marxists could no longer be stopped. On an election night, the Führer could stand nervously in Munich as the “Doctor” reported to him the number of National Socialist votes from working class districts, numbers that exceeded his expectations.

None of the occasional and inevitable setbacks that sometimes threatened the Berlin NSDAP and even the unity of the entire movement could stop Adolf Hitler. The public defection of Dr. Otto Strasser, who had always been a troublemaker, the S.A. mutiny led by Stennes, the betrayal by Gregor Strasser — all these passed like ghosts.

Much blood was shed in the battle for Berlin. Many a promising Berliner had to give his young life for the struggle, the struggle for Germany. One cannot recall these sacrifices without remembering the immortal one murdered on 23 February 1930. Berlin was where the young student Horst Wessel built a unit of young lads who until then had proudly called themselves proletarians, but now were filled with the fighting spirit that came from National Socialist ideals. And the confidence in coming victory led to the song that made his name immortal.

”Raise high the flag, close the ranks…” That is not only a portrait of the march of the Berlin S.A. through the streets in the east and north of the city. It is a command, an order, an appeal to the conscience of the comrades not to waver or weaken until Hitler’s flag wave over every street. Horst Wessel embodies the young leaders of a new age and his name has become a symbol for the unknown S.A. man.

The Führer spoke often in Berlin, in Clou and the Sport Hall. But only in the decisive year 1932 did he become a regular guest in the Reich capital, staying in the Hotel Kaiserhof. The negotiations for taking over the government took place in Berlin, as did the last political and diplomatic struggles. The last barriers had to be eliminated here until the way was free for the most capable in Germany. Today Berlin has the good fortune to have Adolf Hitler as Führer and Chancellor of the German people in its midst, and to take a greater role than any other city in Germany in his struggle, his work, his plans and concerns.

The transformation of Berlin has begun. This enormous city’s random growth will be tamed by the Führer’s plans. Within a few years, the stony wilderness will have a new face, characterized by great avenues, impressive squares and noble buildings. These too are symbols of those enormous tasks facing Adolf Hitler and the German people: the building of a National Socialist German Reich.

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The City of the Reich Party Rallies

19
May 2012

In the years after the war one could see a man in Northern Bavaria going from place to place, his rucksack filled with anti-Semitic pamphlets. He never tired of meetings in which he told the Franconians about the danger the Jews are to the world. In tough, constant work the teacher Julius Streicher built a following ready to stand by him through thick and thin. They did not desert him when at the end of 1922 he left the German Socialist Party and joined Adolf Hitler’s NSDAP.

The later Frankenführer was one of the first proclaimers of National Socialism in Franconia. He naturally had as his goal conquering red Nuremberg and turning it into a National Socialist fortress and a center of anti-Semitism. It took hard and bitter struggle, but he succeeded. Nuremberg was soon second only to Munich not only in numbers, but in enthusiasm for the cause. Here more than anywhere else, the Führer could be sure of halls filled to capacity and a public that gave stormy expression to its loving and confident faith in the Führer.

As late as 1922 the Marxists were able to break up the “Artillery Day” with iron bars. But on 1 September of the following year, the impressive German Day was held on the Deutschherrenwiese, to which the German Fighting League owes its origin.

This made it easy for the Führer to decide in spring 1927 to hold the NSDAP’s 3rd Reich Party Rally (the second since its restoration) in the walls of the lovely old Reich city.

Today the Reich Party Rally of the movement is not only a matter of our traditions and styles, but above all a symbol of the unity of the nation. It embodies the Medieval concept of the Reichstag in all its power and glory in a rejuvenated, new and broader form. It also provides the Führer — just as does the Reichstag in Berlin — with a forum in which he can handle political matters of concern to the entire world. Only a part of the larger formations, only a fraction of those whose hearts beat with the millions, can experience the revelations of these days each year. Formerly the party rally was a display to National Socialists as well as to its enemies and those who were indifferent of the powerful and unstoppable growth of the movement. The members received new strength for the coming struggles, the others saw the world’s lies about the presumed decline of the NSDAP shattered.

The Führer consecrated the first four S.A. banners on 28 January 1923 on Munich’s Marsfeld. The young movement was filled with warm courage and a desire for action, wanting to solve the German question by strength. It did not know that a bitter day in November would shatter all its hopes and plans.

Three and a half years later, Adolf Hitler chose the German National Theater in Weimar as the locale for the congress and for the consecration of the banners of National Socialism. Where once the Weimar coalition baptized the ungerman System state [the Weimar Republic], the Führer gave the blood-sanctified flag of 9 November to the loyal hands of his SS. The Weimar Party Rally broke the bonds that had restrained the party since its reestablishment. New courage filled National Socialist hearts, and once more the hope grew strong that the Reich would someday be theirs.

The Reich Party Rally of 1927 in Nuremberg was of a size corresponding to the growth of the party. It was the greatest proclamation of freedom in Germany since the unforgettable days of August 1914. Mass meetings and 13 special sessions on aspects of National Socialist policy and organization were held at various places in the festively decorated city. The large delegates’ conference took place in the main hall of the Kulturvereinshaus. The Luitpoldhain Arena was the ideal place for the S.A. march and the consecration of the banners, even if the masses who came by trucks and trains and on foot and bicycle were not sufficient to fill the arena.

The big event for Nuremberg, however, was the S.A. procession. The population cheered as they marched through the streets to the Hauptmarkt, the present Adolf Hitler Square, where the Führer stood in his car as his followers marched past.

Adolf Hitler personally supervised the preparations, repeatedly traveling to Nuremberg with his aides to work out every detail. Arrivals and departures, housing and provisions, street closings and security, the routes of the masses required the most careful and through preparation if everything was to work out. The movement had to make every effort to ensure that it worked.

The success of the party rally, the attractiveness of the ancient Reich city, and the appropriateness of the area led the Führer to chose Nuremberg for the next party rally, which was to occur from 1-4 August 1929.

The various locations were now determined, but everything was larger and more impressive than before. Over 100,000 people came in 170 special trains and countless trucks to Nuremberg, whose streets carried the stamp of National Socialism.

The party rallies of the period of struggle never could be given full attention. That became clear to the movement and the nation after the victorious National Socialist revolution. Now the Führer had the necessary freedom of action to conduct the Reich Party Rally as his will and spirit wished. The first efforts went into expanding the Luitpoldhain area to the extent necessary for the new conditions. One could also soon see the Führer’s gigantic building projects, with which names like Speer and Ruoff will be associated for all times.

The Führer determined that Nuremberg would forever be the “City of the Reich Party Rallies.” The world reputation of the city, already famous in the Middle Ages, has been restored. Then Albrecht Dürer produced masterpieces of art, Peter Bischer created the noblest sculptures of stone and bronze, and Hans Sachs raised popular literature to the highest level. Outstanding craftsmen in every field were at work and commerce flourished. Nuremberg was a center of German cultural life.

It is no accident that the Reich Party Rally begins each year with a performance of the “Meistersinger.” What could be better than this immortal masterpiece of Richard Wagner? It recalls the magic of old Nuremberg, and points resoundingly and powerfully to the heroic struggle of Adolf Hitler for the German people.

Outside the old walls and towers that testify to a great past, yet bound to them by a thousand ties, a new Nuremberg is growing according to the Führer’s will. His genius is calling forth enormous buildings, the temples of our faith, our desire, our deeds. They give eternal expression in marble to the National Socialist spirit.

Nuremberg is a concept for us today. The old yet simultaneously young city is a bridge from the time-honored past to the proud present and the glorious future. It is a precious shrine that holds old and newly forged traditions. Its monuments and the annual events tied to its name are manifestations of the new political and cultural style.

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Our Hitler: A Radio Speech to the German People in Honor of the Führer’s Birthday by Joseph Goebbels

18
May 2012

Fellow citizens! Two years ago on 20 April 1933, only three months after Adolf Hitler came to power, I spoke to the German people on the occasion of the Führer’s birthday. It was not my goal then, nor is it now, to read out loud a passionate newspaper article. That I shall leave to better stylists. Nor will I praise Adolf Hitler’s historic work. I intend today, on the Führer’s birthday, the very opposite. I believe it is time to portray to the entire nation the man Hitler, with all the magic of his personality, all the mysterious genius and irresistible power of his personality. There is probably no one left on the planet who does not know him as a statesman and as a remarkable popular leader. Only a few, however, have the pleasure of seeing him as a man each day from close up, to experience him, and as I might add, to come as a result to a deeper understanding and love for him. These few wonder how it is possible that a man who only three years ago was opposed by half of the nation stands today above any doubt and every criticism. Germany has found a unity which will never be shaken. Adolf Hitler is the man of fate, who has the calling to save the nation from terrible internal conflict and shameful foreign disgrace, to lead it to longed-for freedom.

That one man has captured the hearts of the whole nation, despite the sometimes difficult and unpopular decisions he had to make, is perhaps the deepest, most amazing secret of our age. It cannot be explained only by his accomplishments, for it is just those who have had to make the heaviest sacrifices for him and for national reconstruction, indeed who must still bring them, who have sensed his mission in the deepest and most joyful way. They are the ones who have the most honest and passionate love for him as Führer and as a man. That is the result of the magic of his personality and the deep mystery of his pure and honest humanity,

It is of this humanity, which those who are nearest to him see most clearly, of which I speak today.

All genuine humanity is characterized by simplicity and clarity in being and in action. It displays itself in the smallest as well as the greatest matters. The simple clarity that is evident in his political nature is also the dominating principle of his entire life. One cannot imagine him putting on a front. His people would not recognize him were he to do so. His daily meals are the simplest, most modest, imaginable. He dines no differently, whether it is with a small group of friends or at a state banquet. At a recent reception for officials of the Winter Relief program and old party member asked him if he could have an autographed copy of the menu as a souvenir. He paused for a moment and then laughed: “That’s fine. The menu stays the same here; anyone is welcome to look it over.”

Hitler walking down stairs

Adolf Hitler is one of the few state leaders who avoids medals and decorations. He wears only a single high medal that he earned as a simple personal solider displaying the greatest personal bravery. That is proof of modesty, but also of pride. There is no one worthy to decorate him, other then he himself. Any form of ostentation is foreign to him, but when he represents the state and his people, he does so with impressive and appropriate grace. Behind all that he is and does are the words of the great soldier Schlieffen, who wrote: “Be more than you seem!” His industry and determination in reaching his goal far exceed normal human strength. Several days ago I returned to Berlin at 1 a.m. after several hard days and was ready for sleep, but he wanted a report from me. At 2 a.m. he was still alert, still at work all alone in his home. For two hours he listened to a report on the construction of the national highways, a theme that would seem distant from the great international problems with which he had been occupied the entire day from early in the morning to late at night. Before the last Nuremberg rally, I was his guest for a week in Obersalzburg. The light shone from his window each night until 6 or 7 a.m. He was dictating the great speeches he would give a few days later at the rally. His cabinet approves no law that he has not studied to the smallest detail. His military knowledge is comprehensive; he knows the details of each weapon, each machine gun as well as any specialist. When he gives a speech he knows each detail. His working method is entirely clear. Nothing is further from him than nervousness or hysterical tension. He knows better than anyone else that there are a hundred problems to be solved. He chooses the two or three he finds most central and works on them, undistracted by the remaining ones, for he know that if he solves the great problems, the problems of second or third magnitude will solve themselves.

Troops stand at attention

His approach to problems shows both the determination necessary to deal with essentials and the flexibility essential in the choice of methods. He has principles and beliefs, but he knows how to reach them by careful selection of methods and approaches. He has never changed his basic goals. He does today what he determined to do in 1919. But he has always been flexible in the methods he used to realize his goals. When he was offered the vice chancellorship in August 1932, he rejected the offer. He had the feeling that the time was not yet ripe and that the ground offered to him was too small to stand on. But when he was offered a wider door to power on 30 January 1933, he walked courageously through it. It was not the full responsibility he wanted, but he knew that the ground he know stood upon was sufficient to begin the fight for full power. The know-it-alls understood neither decision. Today they must reluctantly grant that he was superior not only in his tactics, but also in the strategic use of the principles in ways they short-sightedly failed to see.

Two pictures last summer vividly showed the Führer in all his aloneness. The first showed him greeting the Wehrmacht just after he was forced to bloodily put down the treason and mutiny of 30 June. His face showed the bitterness of the difficult hours he had experienced. The second photograph was of him leaving the house of the dying marshall and Reich president in Neudeck. His expression shows the shadow of pain and sorrow in the face of pitiless death that in a few hours would tear from him his fatherly friend. With almost prophetic foresight to told us in his innermost circle on New Year’s Eve that 1934 would be a dangerous year, one which would likely see the death of Hindenburg. Now the inevitable had happened. One thing was plain in his granite face: the pain of an entire nation, a pain that would not descend to mere complaining.

The entirely nation not only honors him, it loves him deeply and fervently, for it has the feeling that he belongs to them. He is flesh of its flesh and spirit of its spirit. That shows itself in the smallest aspects of everyday life. It is plain in the camaraderie in the Reich Chancellery between the least SS man and the Führer. When he travels, he sleeps in the same hotel and under the same conditions as everyone else. Is it any wonder that the least of those around him are the most loyal?! They have the instinctive feeling that his is no facade, but rather the result of his inner and obvious spiritual nature.

Several weeks ago, 50 young German girls from abroad, who had completed a year of schooling and were now about to return to their suffering home countries, visited the chancellor, hoping to see him for a moment. He invited them all to dinner. For hours they had to tell him of their modest lives. As they were leaving, they suddenly sang the song “If All Become Untrue,” and tears flowed from their eyes. In the midst of them stood the man who has become the incarnation of eternal Germany, giving them friendly and good-hearted consolation to encourage them on their difficult journey.

He came from the people and remains a part of them. He who negotiated for two 15-hour days at a conference with diplomats of mighty England, who mastered arguments and facts on the great questions of Europe, can speak with complete ease to ordinary people, and can with a comradely “Du” restore the confidence of a fellow war veteran who greets him with a nervous heart after perhaps days of wondering how to greet him and what to say. The weakest approach him with confidence, for they sense that he is their friend and protector. The entire nation loves him, because it feels as safe in his arms as a child in the arms of its mother.

This man is a fanatic in his cause. He has sacrificed his personal happiness and private life. He knows nothing other than the work that he does as the truest servant of the Reich.

An artist becomes a statesman, and his historic work reveals his remarkable abilities. He needs no external honors; his greatest honor is the enduring permanence of his labors. But we who have the good fortune to be near him each day receive light from his light and want only to be obedient followers behind his flag. Many times he has told the circle of his oldest fellow fighters and closest friends: “It will be terrible when the first of us dies and there is an empty place here that can no longer be filled.” May a gracious fate ordain that he live the longest, that for many decades the nation will continue under his leadership along the path to new freedom, greatness and power. That is the honest and passionate wish that the entire German nation lays in thankfulness at his feet. Not only we who stand near him, but the last man in the most distant village, join in saying:

“He is now what he always was, and always will be: Our Hitler!”

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