Lies being taught;
Mein Kampf is unintelligible ravings of a
maniac.
Now the Truth; Read and know
CHAPTER XV; THE RIGHT TO SELF-DEFENCE; Part 2;
Just as a hyena will not leave its carrion, a
Marxist will not give up indulging in the betrayal of his country.
“In the spring of 1923, however, anyone who might have thought of
seizing the opportunity of the French invasion of the Ruhr to reconstruct the military
power of Germany would first have had to restore to the nation its moral
weapons, to reinforce its will-power, and to extirpate those who had destroyed
this most valuable element of national strength.
Just as in 1918 we had to pay with our blood for the failure to crush the
Marxist serpent underfoot once and for all in 1914 and 1915, now we have to suffer
retribution for the fact that in the spring of 1923 we did not seize the
opportunity then offered us for finally wiping out the handiwork done by the
Marxists who betrayed their country and were responsible for the murder of our
people.
Any idea of opposing French aggression with an efficacious resistance was
only pure folly as long as the fight had not been taken up against those forces
which, five years previously, had broken the German resistance on the
battlefields by the influences which they exercised at home. Only bourgeois
minds could have arrived at the incredible belief that Marxism had probably
become quite a different thing now and that the CANAILLE of ringleaders in
1918, who callously used the bodies of our two million dead as stepping-stones
on which they climbed into the various Government positions, would now, in the
year 1923, suddenly show themselves ready to pay their tribute to the national
conscience. It was veritably a piece of incredible folly to expect that those
traitors would suddenly appear as the champions of German freedom. They had no intention
of doing it. Just as a hyena will not
leave its carrion, a Marxist will not give up indulging in the betrayal of his
country. It is out of the question to put forward the stupid retort here,
that so many of the workers gave their blood for Germany. German workers, yes,
but not international Marxists. If the
German working class, in 1914, consisted of real Marxists the War would have
ended within three weeks. Germany would have collapsed before the first soldier
had put a foot beyond the frontiers. No. The fact that the German people
carried on the War proved that the Marxist folly had not yet been able to
penetrate deeply. But as the War was prolonged German soldiers and workers gradually
fell back into the hands of the Marxist leaders, and the number of those who
thus relapsed became lost to their country. At the beginning of the War, or
even during the War, if twelve or fifteen thousand of these marxists who were
corrupting the nation had been forced to submit to poison-gas, just as hundreds
of thousands of our best German workers from every social stratum and from
every trade and calling had to face it in the field, then the millions of
sacrifices made at the front would not have been in vain. On the contrary: If
twelve thousand of these malefactors had been eliminated in proper time
probably the lives of a million decent men, who would be of value to Germany in
the future, might have been saved. But it was in accordance with bourgeois 'statesmanship'
to hand over, without the twitch of an eyelid, millions of human beings to be
slaughtered on the battlefields, while they looked upon ten or twelve thousand
public traitors, profiteers, usurers and swindlers, as the dearest and most
sacred national treasure and proclaimed their persons to be inviolable. Indeed
it would be hard to say what is the most outstanding feature of these bourgeois
circles: mental debility, moral weakness and cowardice, or a mere down-at-heel mentality.
It is a class that is certainly doomed to go under but, unhappily, it drags
down the whole nation with it into the abyss.
The situation in 1923 was quite similar to that of 1918. No matter what form of resistance was
decided upon, the first prerequisite for taking action was the elimination of
the Marxist poison from the body of the nation. And I was convinced that the
first task then of a really National Government was to seek and find those
forces that were determined to wage a war of destruction against Marxism and to
give these forces a free hand. It
was their duty not to bow down before the fetish of 'order and tranquillity' at
a moment when the enemy from outside was dealing the Fatherland a death-blow
and when high treason was lurking behind every street corner at home. No. A
really National Government ought then to have welcomed disorder and unrest if
this turmoil would afford an opportunity of finally settling with the Marxists,
who are the mortal enemies of our people. If this precaution were neglected,
then it was sheer folly to think of resisting, no matter what form that
resistance might take.
Of course, such a settlement of accounts with the Marxists as would be of
real historical importance could not be effected along lines laid down by some
secret council or according to some plan concocted by the shriveled mind of
some cabinet minister. It would have to be in accordance with the eternal laws
of life on this Earth which are and will remain those of a ceaseless struggle
for existence. It must always be remembered that in many instances a hardy and
healthy nation has emerged from the ordeal of the most bloody civil wars, while
from peace conditions which had been artificially maintained there often
resulted a state of national putrescence that reeked to the skies. The fate of
a nation cannot be changed in kid gloves. And so in the year 1923 brutal action
should have been taken to stamp out the vipers that battened on the body of the
nation. If this were done, then the first prerequisite for an active opposition
would have been fulfilled.
At that time I often talked myself hoarse in trying to make it clear, at
least to the so-called national circles, what was then at stake and that by
repeating the errors committed in 1914 and the following years we must
necessarily come to the same kind of catastrophe as in 1918. I frequently
implored of them to let Fate have a free hand and to make it possible for our
Movement to settle with the Marxists. But I preached to deaf ears. They all
thought they knew better, including the Chief of the Defence Force, until
finally they found themselves forced to subscribe to the vilest capitulation
that history records.
I then became profoundly convinced that the German bourgeoisie had come to
the end of its mission and was not capable of fulfilling any further function.
And then also I recognized the fact that all the bourgeois parties had been
fighting Marxism merely from the spirit of competition without sincerely
wishing to destroy it. For a long time they had been accustomed to assist in
the destruction of their country, and their one great care was to secure good
seats at the funeral banquet. It was for this alone that they kept on
'fighting'.
At that time--I admit it openly--I conceived a profound admiration for the
great man beyond the Alps, whose ardent love for his people inspired him not to
bargain with Italy's internal enemies but to use all possible ways and means in
an effort to wipe them out. What places Mussolini in the ranks of the world's
great men is his decision not to share Italy with the Marxists but to redeem
his country from Marxism by destroying internationalism.
What miserable pigmies our sham statesmen in Germany appear by comparison
with him. And how nauseating it is to witness the conceit and effrontery of
these nonentities in criticizing a man who is a thousand times greater than
them. And how painful it is to think that this takes place in a country which
could point to a Bismarck as its leader as recently as fifty years ago.
The attitude adopted by the bourgeoisie in 1923 and the way in which they
dealt kindly with Marxism decided from the outset the fate of any attempt at
active resistance in the Ruhr. With that deadly enemy in our own ranks it was
sheer folly to think of fighting France. The most that could then be done was
to stage a sham fight in order to satisfy the German national element to some
extent, to tranquillize the 'boiling state of the public mind', or dope it,
which was what was really intended. Had they really believed in what they did,
they ought to have recognized that the strength of a nation lies, first of all,
not in its arms but in its will, and that before conquering the external enemy
the enemy at home would have to be eliminated. If not, then disaster must result
if victory be not achieved on the very first day of the fight. The shadow of
one defeat is sufficient to break up the resistance of a nation that has not
been liberated from its internal enemies, and give the adversary a decisive
victory.
In the spring of 1923 all this might have been predicted. It is useless to
ask whether it was then possible to count on a military success against France.
For if the result of the German action in regard to the French invasion of the
Ruhr had been only the destruction of Marxism at home, success would have been
on our side. Once liberated from the deadly enemies of her present and future
existence, Germany would possess forces which no power in the world could
strangle again. On the day when Marxism
is broken in Germany the chains that bind Germany will be smashed for ever.
For never in our history have we been
conquered by the strength of our outside enemies but only through our own
failings and the enemy in our own camp.
Since it was not able to decide on such heroic action at that time, the Government
could have chosen the first way: namely, to allow things to take their course
and do nothing at all.
But at that great moment Heaven made Germany a present of a great man. This
was Herr Cuno. He was neither a statesman nor a politician by profession, still
less a politician by birth. But he belonged to that type of politician who is
merely used for liGYMNASIUMating some definite question. Apart from that, he
had business experience. It was a curse for Germany that, in the practice of
politics, this business man looked upon politics also as a business undertaking
and regulated his conduct accordingly.
"France occupies the Ruhr. What is there in the Ruhr? Coal. And so France
occupies the Ruhr for the sake of its coal?" What could come more naturally
to the mind of Herr Cuno than the idea of a strike, which would prevent the
French from obtaining any coal? And therefore, in the opinion of Herr Cuno, one
day or other they would certainly have to get out of the Ruhr again if the
occupation did not prove to be a paying business. Such were approximately the
lines along which that OUTSTANDING NATIONAL STATESMAN reasoned. At Stuttgart
and other places he spoke to 'his people' and this people became lost in
admiration for him. Of course they
needed the Marxists for the strike, because the workers would have to be the
first to go on strike. Now, in the brain of a bourgeois statesman such as
Cuno, a Marxist and a worker are one and the same thing. Therefore it was
necessary to bring the worker into line with all the other Germans in a united
front. One should have seen how the countenances of these party politicians
beamed with the light of their moth-eaten bourgeois culture when the great
genius spoke the word of revelation to them. Here was a nationalist and also a
man of genius. At last they had discovered what they had so long sought. For
now the abyss between Marxism and themselves could be bridged over. And thus it
became possible for the pseudo-nationalist to ape the German manner and adopt
nationalist phraseology in reaching out the ingenuous hand of friendship to the
internationalist traitors of their country. The traitor readily grasped that
hand, because, just as Herr Cuno had need of the Marxist chiefs for his 'united
front', the Marxist chiefs needed Herr Cuno's money. So that both parties
mutually benefited by the transaction. Cuno obtained his united front,
constituted of nationalist charlatans and international swindlers. And now,
with the help of the money paid to them by the State, these people were able to
pursue their glorious mission, which was to destroy the national economic
system. It was an immortal thought, that of saving a nation by means of a
general strike in which the strikers were paid by the State. It was a command that
could be enthusiastically obeyed by the most indifferent of loafers.
Everybody knows that prayers will not make a nation free. But that it is
possible to liberate a nation by giving up work has yet to be proved by historical
experience. Instead of promoting a paid general strike at that time, and making
this the basis of his 'united front', if Herr Cuno had demanded two hours more
work from every German, then the swindle of the 'united front' would have been
disposed of within three days. Nations do not obtain their freedom by refusing
to work but by making sacrifices.
Anyhow, the so-called passive resistance could not last long. Nobody but
a man entirely ignorant of war could imagine that an army of occupation might
be frightened and driven out by such ridiculous means. And yet this could have
been the only purpose of an action for which the country had to pay out
milliards and which contributed seriously to devaluate the national currency.
Of course the French were able to make themselves almost at home in the Ruhr
basin the moment they saw that such ridiculous measures were being adopted
against them. They had received the prescription directly from ourselves of the
best way to bring a recalcitrant civil population to a sense of reason if its conduct
implied a serious danger for the officials which the army of occupation had
placed in authority. Nine years previously we wiped out with lightning rapidity
bands of Belgian FRANCS-TIREURS and made the civil population clearly
understand the seriousness of the situation, when the activities of these bands
threatened grave danger for the German army. In like manner if the passive
resistance of the Ruhr became really dangerous for the French, the armies of
occupation would have needed no more than eight days to bring the whole piece
of childish nonsense to a gruesome end. For we must always go back to the
original question in all this business: What were we to do if the passive
resistance came to the point where it really got on the nerves of our opponents
and they proceeded to suppress it with force and bloodshed? Would we still
continue to resist? If so, then, for weal or woe, we would have to submit to a
severe and bloody persecution. And in that case we should be faced with the
same situation as would have faced us in the case of an active resistance. In
other words, we should have to fight. Therefore the so-called passive resistance
would be logical only if supported by the determination to come out and wage an
open fight in case of necessity or adopt a kind of guerilla warfare. Generally
speaking, one undertakes such a struggle when there is a possibility of
success. The moment a besieged fortress is taken by assault there is no
practical alternative left to the defenders except to surrender, if instead of
probable death they are assured that their lives will be spared. Let the
garrison of a citadel which has been completely encircled by the enemy once
lose all hope of being delivered by their friends, then the strength of the
defence collapses totally.
That is why passive resistance in the Ruhr, when one considers the final
consequences which it might and must necessarily have if it were to turn out
really successful, had no practical meaning unless an active front had been
organized to support it. Then one might have demanded immense efforts from our
people. If each of these Westphalians in the Ruhr could have been assured that
the home country had mobilized an army of eighty or a hundred divisions to
support them, the French would have found themselves treading on thorns. Surely
a greater number of courageous men could be found to sacrifice themselves for a
successful enterprise than for an enterprise that was manifestly futile.
This was the classic occasion that induced us National Socialists to take
up a resolute stand against the so-called national word of command. And that is
what we did. During those months I was attacked by people whose patriotism was
a mixture of stupidity and humbug and who took part in the general hue and cry
because of the pleasant sensation they felt at being suddenly enabled to show
themselves as nationalists, without running any danger thereby. In my
estimation, this despicable 'united front' was one of the most ridiculous
things that could be imagined. And events proved that I was right.
As soon as the Trades Unions had nearly filled their treasuries with Cuno's
contributions, and the moment had come when it would be necessary to transform
the passive resistance from a mere inert defence into active aggression, the
Red hyenas suddenly broke out of the national sheepfold and returned to be what
they always had been. Without sounding any drums or trumpets, Herr Cuno
returned to his ships. Germany was richer by one experience and poorer by the
loss of one great hope.
Up to midsummer of that year several officers, who certainly were not the
least brave and honourable of their kind, had not really believed that the
course of things could take a turn that was so humiliating. They had all hoped
that--if not openly, then at least secretly—the necessary measures would be
taken to make this insolent French invasion a turning-point in German history.
In our ranks also there were many who counted at least on the intervention of
the REICHSWEHR. That conviction was so ardent that it decisively influenced the
conduct and especially the training of innumerable young men.
But when the disgraceful collapse set in and the most humiliating kind of
capitulation was made, indignation against such a betrayal of our unhappy
country broke out into a blaze. Millions of German money had been spent in vain
and thousands of young Germans had been sacrificed, who were foolish enough to
trust in the promises made by the rulers of the REICH. Millions of people now
became clearly convinced that Germany could be saved only if the whole
prevailing system were destroyed root and branch.
There never had been a more propitious moment for such a solution. On the
one side an act of high treason had been committed against the country, openly
and shamelessly. On the other side a nation found itself delivered over to die
slowly of hunger. Since the State itself had trodden down all the precepts of
faith and loyalty, made a mockery of the rights of its citizens, rendered the
sacrifices of millions of its most loyal sons fruitless and robbed other
millions of their last penny, such a State could no longer expect anything but
hatred from its subjects. This hatred against those who had ruined the people
and the country was bound to find an outlet in one form or another. In this connection
I shall quote here the concluding sentence of a speech which I delivered at the
great court trial that took place in the spring of 1924.
"The judges of this State may tranquilly condemn us for our conduct
at that time, but History, the goddess of a higher truth and a better legal code,
will smile as she tears up this verdict and will acquit us all of the crime for
which this verdict demands punishment."
But History will then also summon before its own tribunal those who, invested
with power to-day, have trampled on law and justice, condemning our people to
misery and ruin, and who, in the hour of their country's misfortune, took more
account of their own ego than of the life of the community.
Here I shall not relate the course of events which led to November 8th, 1923,
and closed with that date. I shall not do so because I cannot see that this
would serve any beneficial purpose in the future and also because no good could
come of opening old sores that have been just only closed. Moreover, it would
be out of place to talk about the guilt of men who perhaps in the depths of
their hearts have as much love for their people as I myself, and who merely did
not follow the same road as I took or failed to recognize it as the right one
to take.
In the face of the great misfortune which has befallen our fatherland and
affects all us, I must abstain from offending and perhaps disuniting those men
who must at some future date form one great united front which will be made up
of true and loyal Germans and which will have to withstand the common front
presented by the enemy of our people. For I know that a time will come when
those who then treated us as enemies will venerate the men who trod the bitter
way of death for the sake of their people.
I have dedicated the first volume of this book to our eighteen fallen heroes.
Here at the end of this second volume let me again bring those men to the
memory of the adherents and champions of our ideals, as heroes who, in the full
consciousness of what they were doing, sacrificed their lives for us all. We
must never fail to recall those names in order to encourage the weak and
wavering among us when duty calls, that duty which they fulfilled with absolute
faith, even to its extreme consequences. Together with those, and as one of the
best of all, I should like to mention the name of a man who devoted his life to
reawakening his and our people, through his writing and his ideas and finally
through positive action. I mean: Dietrich Eckart.
Adolf Hitler
