Hitler. 1936-1945: Nemesis полностью

The ideological dynamic of the Nazi regime was a vital component of the drive for expansion. This was by no means solely a matter of Hitler’s personalized Weltanschauung. In fact, Hitler’s ideological aims had so far played only a subordinate role in his expansionist policy, and would not figure prominently in the Polish crisis during the summer of 1939. The Party and its numerous sub-organizations were, of course, important in sustaining the pressure for ever-new discriminatory measures against ideological target-groups. But little in the way of coherent planning could be expected from the central Party office, under the charge of Rudolf Heß, Hitler’s deputy in Party affairs.¹ The key agency was not the Party, but the SS.

The interest in expansion was self-evident. Buoyed by their successes in Austria and the Sudetenland, Himmler, Heydrich, and the top echelons of the SS were keen to extend — naturally, under Hitler’s aegis — their own empire. Already in August 1938, a decree by Hitler met Himmler’s wish to develop an armed wing of the SS. It provided in effect a fourth branch of the armed forces — far smaller than the others, but envisaged as a body of ideologically motivated ‘political soldiers’ standing at the Führer’s ‘exclusive disposal’.² It was little wonder that Himmler had been one of the hawks during the Sudeten crisis, aligning himself with Ribbentrop, and encouraging Hitler’s aggression.³ The leaders of the SS were now looking to territorial gains to provide them with opportunities for ideological experimentation on the way to the fulfilment of the vision of a racially purified Greater German Reich under the heel of the chosen caste of the SS élite. In a world after Hitler, with ‘final victory’ achieved, the SS were determined to be the masters of Germany and Europe.

They saw their mission as the ruthless eradication of Germany’s ideological enemies, who, in Himmler’s strange vision, were numerous and menacing. He told top SS leaders in early November 1938: ‘We must be clear that in the next ten years we will certainly encounter unheard of critical conflicts. It is not only the struggle of the nations, which in this case are put forward by the opposing side merely as a front, but it is the ideological (weltanschauliche) struggle of the entire Jewry, freemasonry, Marxism, and churches of the world. These forces — of which I presume the Jews to be the driving spirit, the origin of all the negatives — are clear that if Germany and Italy are not annihilated, they will be annihilated (vernichtet werden). That is a simple conclusion. In Germany the Jew cannot hold out. This is a question of years. We will drive them out more and more with an unprecedented ruthlessness…’⁴