Adolf Hitler's Own Book Mein Kampf (My Battle)/Chapter 4
Chapter IV
Munich
In the spring of 1912 I moved to Munich.
A German town! How different from Vienna! I was sick to think of that racial Babylon.
Here in Munich the dialect reminded me of my youth, and thousands of other things here were, or became, dear to me.
Today I feel more attached to this town than to any other in the world, and this is probably because it is so closely linked with the course of my own development.
Aside from my art work, I was again thrown into the study of current politics, and now especially foreign affairs. Even more than in Vienna I realized the stupidity of the German coalition policy with Austria. Everywhere I found people deluded with the belief that the Hapsburg Monarchy was an ally to be relied upon. It was not realized that this was no longer a German state and that slowly and internally it was collapsing. I knew this Austrian state better than those so-called “diplomats.”
A few years later, when the hour came for things to be proven, how excited these people got when Italy slid out of the Triple Alliance and let these other two “allies” go their way—and even finally fought against them.
The crafty Hapsburgs had used the Alliance in this way: as a friend Germany could not interfere with force in the Hapsburg policy, which within the Austrian Empire was anti-German and pro-Slav.
Beyond this, how could the German in Austria act while the German in the Reich had only praise for the Hapsburg regime? If he resisted, then in German public opinion he was a traitor to his own race!—he who for centuries had martyred himself for his nationality!
And what was the German-Austrian Alliance worth as such now that the Hapsburg Monarchy was Slavic?
The policy of official German diplomacy was not stupid, no—it was maniacal. They had an Alliance, and calmly watched the partner brutally and methodically destroy its very basis, Germanism.
Anyone with the sense to study history would never have believed for a moment that Rome and Vienna would ever fight side by side. Any Italian government attempting to put its people on a battlefield with, not against, the hated Austrian state, would have been overthrown.
- (In the minds of most Italians today, this dislike still exists—now transferred from Vienna to Berlin, despite the Roman-Berlin axis of Mussolini and Hitler).
Italy had but two possibilities in its relationship with Austria: alliance or war. By choosing the first she was able leisurely to prepare for the second.
The
Bursting Point
Why is an alliance formed at all? Certainly only so that Germany could serve her own future better than she could standing alone. Annually Germany’s population increases by almost 900,000. The struggle continually to feed this growing family was—and is—every year more difficult, and some day must end in disaster, unless ways are prepared to avert eventual starvation or strangulation.
Four ways existed in which to avoid such a horrible future:
1. Copy the French. Artificial methods could be used to limit births and block the danger of over-population.
Nature herself limits population, but wisely and ruthlessly. She creates difficulties which kill off the weak and allow only the strong to survive; this strengthens the entire species.
Meanwhile, the Lord’s good little Ape does not see this. No, he artificially limits the number of births, thus stopping the struggle for life and its process of natural selection. He controls the quantity, all right, but he pays no attention to the quality. Every effort is made to preserve not only the weak, but the weakest.
Nature’s law cannot be broken in this way. A stronger race will come to drive out these weak people.
He who argues that the German people should preserve their existence in this way, would rob the German people of their future.
2. Another way is what is today called “domestic colonization.” The productivity of the soil can be vastly increased, but certainly not without end. To attempt in this way to save the German people would be to wage a battle, which would inevitably fail. Famine would eventually strike down the people in years of poor harvests.
One day, of course, all mankind will have mutually to limit the population of the world, when the soil can no longer feed all the peoples—this would concern all nations, but now only the race lacking sufficient soil for itself is the one which will suffer. Nature reserves no soil for any particular race—soil is for those people which have the energy to conquer it and the will to cultivate it.
“It must be a higher honor to be a citizen of the German Reich as a street cleaner, than to be a king in any foreign state.
Compared to the alien the state citizen is a privileged character—he is master of the Reich.”
Mein Kampf—Chapter XV
A nation which attempts to solve this problem by domestic colonization seals its doom, and will suffer while alert nations expand and thrive. The worst of this is that too often it is the culturally superior nation which chooses this method, thus permitting inferior but more ruthless nations unlimited soil. This heralds a time when the inferior nation will be so powerful as to destroy the superior nation and this will mean a world decline.
- (This theorizing is somewhat anti-dated in that chemical discoveries now made, if properly utilized, would enable a nation as large as Germany to feed all its people with food-stuffs produced on a hare hand-full of acres.)
The Only Foreign Policy:
Conquest
If we German people adopt this idea of domestic colonization, any really worth while foreign policy would have to be given up, and then the future of the German people could be considered dead and buried.
- (In other words—the only “worth while foreign policy” is one which prepares conquest of foreign soil.)
I emphasize that German domestic colonization can serve primarily only to end social wrongs and particularly to take soil out of the reach of speculation—but domestic colonization can never suffice to assure the future of the nation—the nation needs new territory.
3. Either new soil could be taken year by year on which to place the yearly superfluous millions, or
4. … industry and trade could work toward foreign consumption and the nation could attempt to live on the profits.
The better of these latter two methods was, of course, acquisition of new land; this has countless advantages.
- (Here is another example of the way Hitler warps his reasoning to suit his own ends.)
If our forefathers had based their decisions on the present day pacifist nonsense, we should today hold no more than a third of our present territory.
The territory of many European states is today insanely small in comparison with their colonies, foreign trade, etc. Their apex is in Europe, their base all over the world—quite different from the United States of America whose base is still on its own continent but whose apex touches the rest of the earth. This, and this alone, accounts for the tremendous strength of that nation and the weakness of most of the European colonial powers.
Lessons in Propaganda
“Propaganda appeals forever only to the masses! The business of propaganda is not scientific training of the individual, but instead is the directing of the attention of the masses to certain facts, events, needs, etc.—the purpose is to make things seem important.
The whole art consists in attacking a point so skillfully that a universal belief in its reality is induced, and a righteous faith constructed.
Propaganda must be popularly toned, dropped to the intellectual level of the dullest of those at whom it is directed. Thus the greater the mass which must be influenced, the lower must be the form of the propaganda used.
The less scientific ballast used, the more brilliant will be the success of the propaganda.
The absorbant-capacity of the masses is most limited. Their understanding is small while their forgetfulness is great. Therefore, propaganda must be strictly limited to a very few essential points, and these must be used again and again until the dullest man of all cannot help knowing what is meant. As soon as this principle is abandoned the force of propaganda fades.”
Mein Kampf—Chapter VI
Germany, therefore, had only the possibility of acquiring new soil within the confines of Europe.
In the 19th century such a thing could not be achieved in a peaceful manner—it could only come as the result of a bitter struggle. It could not be launched half-heartedly, but would require the utmost zeal. Only a war could bring victory.
All possible alliances would have been considered only as seen in this light.
And if European soil was to be had, by and large it could be had only at the expense of Russia—and thus, as of old, the Reich would again have to send knights marching out armed with the German sword, to give soil to the German plow and bread to the German people.
There was but a single ally in all Europe for such a policy: England.
Only so could the back be covered so that this new German invasion could be launched. Our right would be no less than the right of our forefathers.
No sacrifice would be too great in order to win England’s favor, for this would mean renunciation of all thought of colonies and sea power, and the avoidance of all competition with British industries.
Attention,
Mr. Chamberlain
The result would have been a momentary restriction that meant creation of a mighty state.
There was a time when England could have been persuaded to do this. England knew that Germany, because of ever-increasing population, needed a way out—a way out that would be fought for with England’s cooperation on the European continent, or else regardless of England, in the wide world. It was probably because of such reasoning that England tried a rapprochement with Germany. Yet some people in Germany thought that now we were only supposed to pull some British chestnuts out of the fire!
Just imagine a wise German foreign policy assuming Japan’s role in 1914—the consequences which would have come to Germany are limitless. There never would have been a World War. The bloodshed of 1904 would have saved ten-fold the bloodshed of 1914-18.
This shows the absurdity of the Alliance with Austria. That mummy of a state allied itself with Germany not to fight a war, but in the service of eternal peace—which meant the certain extermination of the German race in the Austrian Monarchy.
But the leaders of the Reich could not vision the possibility of an alliance with England, of course, so long as they lacked the determination to help the Germans dying away so near at hand in the Austrian Empire. A Reich which would not ruthlessly alter this situation could never see such a daring plan.
Not only this: despite the fact that Austria’s value as an ally required the preservation of the German elements, the Reich leaders looked idly on while the Germans in Austria were slowly oppressed.
Nothing seemed worse than a fight—so as the least opportune hour a fight was forced upon the Reich.
The Reich leaders attempted to out-face fate, and were overwhelmed. They dreamed of world peace and landed in the world war.
And Now
Stalin!
But the Reich leaders never for a moment considered acquisition of new soil, for this was only to be had in the East and it meant a fight. They wanted peace at any price, for the watch-word of their Foreign Policy was no longer preservation of the German nation, by every means, but instead, preservation of world peace by any and all means.
The Reich leaders chose the least suitable answer to their problem: development of industry and world trade, and the coveting of sea power and colonies.
Yet this, too, could only end in fighting. Only children could expect to survive gathering their bananas in “peaceful competition of nations” without ever being compelled lo take up arms.
No: If we chose this way England would then some day be our enemy.
If European territorial policy could be carried out only with England and against Russia, on the other hand colonial and world trade policy was possible only with Russia against England.
Those “Brutal”
British
However, one no more thought of forming an Alliance with Russia against England, than with England against Russia, for in either case the result would have been war. So to prevent this war, the commercial policy was chosen, This talk about “peaceful economic competition of the world” was the greatest madness ever made the guiding point of a state policy.
In England itself the denial of all this was glaringly apparent: no people has ever more brutally prepared with the sword for its economic conquest, or thereafter more ruthlessly defended its prizes, than have the British.
“We Nazis must ever retain our foreign policy aims—to secure for the German people the soil which is due them on this earth.
I bitterly oppose those “racial” writers who claim that such an acquisition of soil “breaks sacred human rights.” These people only create confusion which serves the enemies of our people.”
Mein Kampf—Chapter XXVI
The British make economic gain out of political power and transform every economic advance into political power. How mistaken to believe that England was too cowardly to shed her blood in defense of her economic policy!
But in Germany the schools, the newspapers, and the comics gradually persuaded the people that although the British were smart tradesters, they were actually incredible cowards.
I remember vividly the astonishment on the faces of my comrades when we clashed with the Tommies in Flanders. At this time I formed my first views about propaganda.
Getting back to the Triple Alliance it must be emphasized that an Alliance is weak as soon as it restricts itself to guardianship of the status quo. In an alliance, as everywhere else, strength is in attack, not in defense. It was lucky for Germany that the World War burst by way of Austria, so that the Hapsburg’s were compelled to fight; if the war had begun in any other way, Germany would have stood alone. The Hapsburg state would have been not only unwilling, but unable, to fight in a war caused by Germany.
What later made one so angry with Italy would have occurred even sooner with Austria; Austria would have remained neutral to save herself from immediate revolution.
The great unpopularity of the Austrian Empire in the world brought the Reich enemies through alliance with this hated state; Austria’s enemies became Germany’s enemies.
With a general attack upon Germany, each one of these could expect to win riches at the expense of Austria.
This was just the bait International Jewish World Financiers needed in order to carry cut its long-cherished plot to destroy Germany, which had thus far refused to yield to the general Jewish Super-State control of world finance and economics.
All this time I felt that our unfortunate treaty with a state doomed for disaster could only lead to a ruinous collapse of Germany itself; unless the Alliance was broken in time.
Even when I was at the front fighting in the war, I still maintained my belief that the Alliance would have to be broken to save Germany, and I felt that this would be no sacrifice but would only lessen the number of our enemies.
The State:
What Is It?
A deeper cause making it possible for Germany to hold the absurd belief in “economic conquest” as practical, and the preservation of world peace as a political goal, was the victorious march of German industry and invention and the rising success of German trade. Some came to think of the state only as an economic institution, to be ruled according to economic laws and interests.
Really the state has nothing whatever to do with a particular conception of economics or economic development.
The state is not an assembly of commercial groups and business men. It is the organization of a community of physically and spiritually equal human beings, united for the furtherance of our species. That, and that by itself, is the true purpose and meaning of a State. Economics is only an auxiliary.
The state-forming forces can be summed up thusly—they amount to the individual’s ability and readiness to sacrifice himself for the community. When the World War came the clever British fought for “liberty,” and not only for their own—no, but for that of the small nations.
Meanwhile, we Germans fought for “bread.” Our “statesmen” could not understand that when a man fights for an economic interest he scrupulously avoids death, for death would prevent him forever from enjoying the reward of his struggle.
The following statement may be followed after as an eternal truth:
A state was never founded by peaceful economy, but only and always by the instinct of race preservation, and by heroics, or by cunning.