Who set Hitler against Stalin?. Nikolay Starikov

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СКАЧАТЬ do we come to this funny conclusion? Simply because anyone who has ever seen the programme of Hitler’s party knows that it has nothing whatever to do with separatism! Likewise, any “capitalist” could clearly see in it points which hardly breathed capitalism; say, those about the “irrevocable confiscation of land” and “nationalising industrial concerns”. As it is, the NSDAP stood fast for a solid and integral Germany. The very first clause in the programme can suffice to clear all doubts:

      We demand the integration of all the Germans, based on the right of national self-identification, into Great Germany.

      Let us suppose that the French went the hard way by deciding to read the programme starting from its end. But even in that case it would have been as clear as daylight. The NSDAP programme of April 1, 1920, was known informally as “The Twenty-Five Clauses”, consisting of this many clauses (articles). The last, twenty-fifth, clause reads as follows:

      With the view to achieving all the aforesaid, we demand the formation of a strong centralised imperial government. The indisputable authority of a central political parliament over the entire territory of the Empire and all its organisations – [etc.]

      One might as well accuse of separatism the Russian White Army General Denikin, with his slogan of a “United and Indivisible Russia”, or Minin and Pozharsky’s militia. Does it mean that the French had indeed been too lazy to read the Nazi’s brief programme? Or maybe it means that they had read it, and fully realised who and why they were financing? Why then should they assist those who only fifteen years later would devastate and occupy their homeland? Such things do happen: a man can breed and train a ferocious brute of a dog as protection against his neighbours, when one day the animal, breaking loose from his chain, goes at his master.

      The events that took place in Germany after the First World War require some digression. The payment of the war reparations brought about an unprecedented inflation and pushed the unemployment rate sky-high, which together dropped the living standard to a catastrophic level. Starving war invalids is just one commonly seen picture of the Germany of the 1920-ies. Unheated households, famine-stricken children, a wave of suicides… The weaker ones saw only one way to put an end to the horrors of their life – a gas stove or a well-soaped hemp rope. Sometimes whole families would take that final step.

      Picture to yourself comparatively well-dressed people, whose clothes have not yet worn out since the war began, rummaging in rubbish dumps in search of something to eat. Prostitution is rampant. Paupers, beggars, invalid demonstrations crying out for raising subsidies – subsidies enough to buy a glass of milk, nothing more.

      Those who remember the Perestroika and the collapse of the Soviet Union are familiar with this image of chaos and poverty. But what happened in Russia after Yegor Gaidar’s notorious reforms in the 1990-ies is like living in Paradise when compared to German post-war reality. Germany walked and crawled through a Purgatory, though all the circles of a Dantean hell. The inflation was unspeakable. In the autumn of 1923 one egg cost the price of 30 million eggs in 1913![36] A young American newspaper reporter whose name was Ernest Hemingway retells a touching story he heard from a German waiter who had saved enough money to purchase a hotel. But now he could buy only four bottles of Champaign for the same price. Herr Ernst Hanfstengel (to whom we will return presently), returning home, can’t get milk for his little son. Milk is dispensed only for ration tickets, and those are nearly unavailable. The only solution for him is to order huge amounts of coffee at a five-star hotel and pour out the tiny portions of cream into a bottle for his son[37].

      Those who would like to know more about the life of Germans in the years immediately following the First World War are strongly advised to read the novels of Erich Maria Remark, in particular, The Black Obelisk. This novel has some vivid descriptions of situations when, receiving one’s salary before lunchtime, one would make directly for a nearby shop – there would be another zero added to the price tags after lunch.

      But that’s the life of ordinary German citizens. The Nazi met with many financial hardships, too, at first. The first storm troops were not able to hold parades in winter, for they had no warm boots. But little by little things went better. Higher storm troop officers and party functionaries were now paid in foreign currency[38]. This meant stability and a sustainable, decent life in an inflation-strangled Germany. Like any other party, the NSDAP collected contributions and donations. Storm troopers went about the streets with coin mugs, and one was supposed to buy a ticket to attend one of Hitler’s speeches that gave in circuses, like some actor. All that was there, for sure, but such income was received in the Deutschemark that was continuously losing its value. And the good old ladies also made donations in Deutschemarks. “No party could then live on membership fees paid in Deutschemarks”, as has been characteristically pointed out by historians[39]. And still we are never the wiser about who actually gave US dollars and Swiss francs to Hitler. Let’s try to find an answer ourselves then. By understanding whose interests Hitler and his party suited most nicely we can guess who financed their development and rise to power. How do we know whose game Hitler was going to play, you will ask? Simple enough – we can read his programme book (which the “unfortunate” French spies failed to do). So let’s get down to Mein Kampf.

      As it is, the book has many threads woven together – personal reminiscences of a retired soldier, anti-Semitic statements, all in one heap. But we are interested only in the author’s political views – anything that can throw light on his political plans. Hitler’s sponsors did not enjoy our present position to see into the future and foretell the result of his political career.

      The book opens with an analysis of the causes of Germany’s defeat in the First World War.

      If European territorial policy could be carried out against Russia only with England as an ally, then, on the other hand, colonial and world trade policy was conceivable only against England with the help of Russia. <…> However, one did not at all think of forming an alliance with Russia against England, nor with England against Russia, for in both cases the end would have been war <…>[40].

      This sole statement reveals the plain direction that Hitler’s politics was taking. In order to be able to take something from somebody, Germany must ally with someone else that it was not going to take anything from. The Kaiser’s diplomats had not thought this far, and had got the country embroiled in a war against the whole world.

      Since, however, it was generally not desired to have anything to do with planned war preparation, the acquisition of territory in Europe was abandoned owing to the fact that instead of this there was devotion to colonial and trade policy, and an otherwise possible alliance with England was sacrificed, without, however, logically getting backing from Russia, and finally the government stumbled into the World War, abandoned by all<…>.

      Surely, one can’t win if one struggles against all. That is the first conclusion the author arrives at. Then he proceeds to analyse the strengths and weaknesses of his country’s enemies.

      We must at last become entirely clear about this: the German people’s irreconcilable mortal enemy is and remains France.

      But Germany’s other enemy from the Triple Entente, Britain, is characterised using a completely different modality. It is even vindicated.

      Precisely in order not to allow France’s power to grow too great, participation in her hankerings for loot was England’s sole possible form of action for herself. In reality England did not achieve her war aim.

      The sons of “perfidious Albion” had always attempted to weaken the strongest country on the continent. СКАЧАТЬ