- Email: [email protected]
Elite and popular perspective: Thoughts on the 1938 Anschluss
Hisrory Printed
o/European Ideas, Vol in Great Britam
Il.
pp
583-591.
ON-6599/89 $3 OOtO 00 @ 1990 Pergamon Press plc
1989
ELITE AND POPULAR PERSPECTIVE: THOUGHTS THE 1938 ANSCHLUSS
ON
GEORGE V. STRONG* It requires no repeating that on the eve of the First World War, Europe may be viewed as having divided into two camps -and these not only along the usual lines of two hostile power groupings-but according to ‘modern nation-state’ as against ‘politically backward dynastic-state’. The former-a popular political concept by 1900-generally is thought to be an expression of the French Revolution leavened (and sharpened) by the political might of an aggressive class of people, the industrial bourgeoisie. The latter, of course, was a residue of states which evolved during the middle ages out of a concept of personal fealty as this fused with the idea of kingship so as to produce a broad rationale, as well as the means for tying political society together, to bring about order in an era otherwise notable for its endemic political dislocation. The dynastic state, by 1900, of course was a dying idea supported chiefly by what is often described as an ineffectual-even antediluvian-elite typified by members of Europe’s declining aristocracy and a few of its supporters among the intelligentsia. Hence, even a most cursory reading of modern European history reveals the waxing of the nation-state idea-usually under the umbrella of cultural nationalismenshrined in the motto ‘national self-determination’. Indeed, it is at best prosaic if it is pointed out that Anschluss was implicit in the drift of German political thought long before it actually came about.’ In hindsight, the nation-state idea (as against that of the dynastic-state) did reflect what apparently is a more instinctual sense of political identity, and one that seemingly is natural to the human condition when factors of common culture like language and religion operate synergisticly with the possession of territory by a given ethnic group. In its most exaggerated form ‘blood’ too was thought to be a factor and perhaps nowhere was this idea expressed more hyperbolicly than by that German-Austrian who later became the Mephistophelean leader of the German nation. It was Adolf Hitler who hailed what might be called the Nazi perspective on the nation-state as one wherein: . . . The highest purpose of the. . . state is care for the preservation of those primal racial elements which, supplying culture, create the beauty and dignity of a higher humanity. We . . . are therefore only able to imagine a state which safeguards . . . nationality.2 The Nazi perspective, however, was not created either by Adolf Hitler or his National Socialist Party; it cannot be viewed as merely one more manifestation of the so-called Nazi revolution for its existence preceded that revolution. It existed unspoken-locked in the feelings and frustrations of the masses of German *Department U.S.A.
of History,
College
of Wihiam
and Mary, Williamsburg,
VA 23185,
584
George V. Strong
people. It was a vague feeling-a sense of alienation toward established currents of culture that had no outlet. However, as National Socialism grew in the wake of the World War and-by the late twenties-became respectable, it commenced to draw in a broad element of what passed for ‘middle class’ including teachers, writers and artists who then defined, gave shape and form, and eventually tangibility to the cultural attitudes bottled-up within the consciousness of the bulk of what came to be the Nazi rank and file-and indeed, to a great extent this was true even for the Fiihrer himself.’ Adolf I;Iitler however, was that German, drawn out by the force of history from among the masses, to grasp, synthesise and articulate the pent-up frustrations in the language of the fellow-in-the-street thereby creating a mass political movement. It was the renowned psychiatrist, Dr Karl Jung, who observed that Hitler’s political success was due to his being the first: . to tell every German what he has been thinking and feeling all along, especially since the defeat in the World War Hitler’s power [was] not political; it [was] magic.4 Noted historians, like Fritz Stern for example, have demonstrated that those currents that came to be integral in Nazi culture already had flowed as subterranean cultural undercurrents well before 1900. And it has been documented many times over that the alienation which was to surface within the framework of National Socialism initially was one effect of the impact of the industrial revolution-especially due to changes made by advances in technology and the methods of capitalisation-as these impacted upon the rooted ways of traditional life in what had been an overwhelmingly rural Germany. Further, as the industrial nineteenth century wore on, the masses of Germans-both high and low-tended to perceive their lost past not as it really had been-a harsh and unedifying existence for most-but through a bucolic and heroic chimera supplied by neo-Romanticism.S Hitler gave many demonstrations of his neo-Romantic nationalist perspective in the course of his political career. Because it was the setting of his formative years, perhaps no ceremony surrounding the Fiihrer was more revealing of his fundamental outlook than that in March of 1938 marking the successful completion of Anschluss. The celebration took place amidst the backdrop where so many of his early aspirations were formed-in Vienna’s first district. Careful staging-and its artful recording by Hitler’s old friend and official photographer, Heinrich Hoffmann, had him who then passed as Germany’s political Messiah welcomed to the capital of the newly designated Ostmark by an enthusiastic crowd on the Rathausplatz. This square, bisecting the Ringstrasse in the culturalpolitical heart of Vienna, links two of the city’s most evocative buildingsFriedrich von Schmidt’s neo-Gothic city hall and Gottfried Semper’s and Karl von Hasenauer’s neo-Baroque Staatstheater. 6 While the crowd’s enthusiasm required no contrivance, it had to be directed, through the skilled use of liturgy and symbolism, into political channels SO as to demonstrate (and otherwise make tangibie) that which the Nazis perceived had been accomplished in the name of the German nation by Anschluss. For example, Hitler selected the theater as a backdrop for greeting Vienna because of the emotional Alzdeutsch pull which the
Thoughts on the 1938 Anschluss
585
building possessed, not only for his own imagination but, as he well understood, for that of the Viennese; and so it was that Hitler had himself placed-encased by his famous Mercedes touring sedan- before that building and facing the front facade of the similarly evocative Rathhaus. The roadway linking the two buildings was lined with colorful Nazi banners-many of them of a design influenced by Hitler-so as to give tangibility to the fact (and to the feat) that the long separated Austro-Germans at last had been taken-under the auspices of the Thousand Year Reich-into the bosom of their German Vo/k.7 So too did the German Fiihrer demonstrate his broader view (and that of his supporters) of the wider significance of Anschiuss within the framework of his nation’s history. The completed deed represented the righting of wrongs in Germany’s past so as to overcome the consequences of those events of 1848 and 1866 that had territorially divided the German nation so as to abort true German national fulfillment. But in addition, AnschIuss was seen as the long awaited first step toward the creation of a mitteleuroptiische Reich by a Germany resurgent; moreover, she was resurgent because of the reinvigoration of the Volk by National Socialism whereby: true Germanic democracy of free choice produced a leader with the , . obligation fully to take over all responsibility for what he does or does not do. There will be no voting by a majority on single questions but only the decision of the individual who backs it with his life and all he has.8
In short, if Anschluss were something of a shock to those orchestrating foreign policy in London and Paris, it was popularly seen (when viewed from the perspective of Berlin or Vienna) as the long overdue culmination of the logic of German history. And while it may be true that there were a few among the German nation who would have preferred to witness national fulfillment under auspices other than National Socialism, few were really unhappy over the event. So for example, one Viennese lady-in a private memoir written for her grandchildren after the Second World war-maintained: one cannot condemn everything that was done through [Anschlu~~]. . , For example [the new regime] set about completing the Vienna to Salzburg ~utabahn which up until that time had only a single kilometer built. In addition, this project provided much work and wages. With wonderful efficiency and speed Vienna’s electric system was modernized . . . The city government had been working on this project for years but always again and again it had been delayed by ‘insuperable difficulties’. Employment opportunities opened up throughout the land and one of my most unforgettable memories is when my husband told me that one of those who for the longest time had been a regular at my Friday night charity suppers now had employment and no longer would be coming. We had much to learn from the German talent for organization. They came with their dredges and cranes-and with their wonderful Strassenwalzen . . . So [my husband] and I, along with all of Vienna, streamed on foot to the Heldenplatz so as to see our “beloved Fiihrer” . . .9
If the rise of the masses-and with it popular political culture-signified new and (as it turned out) destructive political perceptions, this rise at the same time did not signify the immediate demise of an older elite political culture anymore
586
George V. Strong
than it meant-in the sense of privilege-the demise of the traditional classes. Mass and elite lived side by side-the latter more often focusing around ‘land’ while the former centered upon the city. Indeed, each maintained its separate perspective until well after the First World War because, until that time, each maintained its separate worlds. Moreover, each lived in misunderstanding regarding the view of the other toward the issue of nationhood. For example, in old Austria-within the German speaking as well as within the non-German spheres of what had been the Habsburg realm-the greater part of the (former) aristocracy looked back with Sehnsucht to the ‘Austrian idea’ of nationhood.iO Certainly Anschfuss-that is the detachment of German speaking Austria from Danubia and its joining to the German Reich as loudly demanded by the likes of Georg von Schonerer-had little appeal before the First World War for elite elements living within old Austria. Indeed, the entire context of what came to be meant by ‘national self-determination’ was beyond the ken of many aristocrats. For example, Count Alfons Clary-Aldringen, a true aristocrat of noble lineage within the framework of the former Dual Monarchy, was depressed upon discovering-in 1918-that he was without either fatherland or homeland. The noble Clary, whose entrepreneurial warrior ancestors hailed from South Germany, wrote with pride of his more immediate forebears whom he saw, as not German, but European, aristocratic and Austrian; they were, as he viewed them, synthesizers and creators of Austrian culture. It was his seventeenth century ancestor, Hieronymus Clary who established the family on its great estate in Bohemia by cleverly associating himself with the fortunes of the House of Habsburg. And so it was that during the eighteenth century the Clarys emerged as an important cog in a tightly woven aristocratic socio-political net that held the Habsburgpolitical enterprise together. So too did the Clarys become, beyond men of power, ‘good and cheerful people’ who did not neglect art and music. Chopin and Franz Liszt, for example, often played on the Schloss’ piano at Teplitz. And the dyspeptic Beethoven often visited the family Fideikomiss fruitlessly seeking a cure for his loss of hearing from its local waters. The incomparable Goethe too found hospitality at the Clary castle and, like its owners, took the deepest pleasure in its then still bucolic environs.” Of course opposition to the national perspective of the bourgeoisie did not come exclusively from the aristocracy. Arthur Schnitzler, for example, described the (bourgeois) liberal milieu-one in which he had grown up-as being one where ‘superficial values [and] . . . mediocre qualities [passed] as virtues’.‘* Indeed, in a discussion which the author created on pan-Zionism between two of his characters, Heinrich Bermann and Leo Golowski, Schnitzler attacks the basic concept of the nation-state principle when he has Bermann roundly condemn the idea of re-founding a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Indeed, Bermann ignored Golowski’s being motivated-propelled even-by the spreading virulence of anti-Semitism in Europe by his exclaiming that his ‘instinct’ told him that: my homeland is here, just here, and not in some land which I don’t know, the description of which doesn’t appeal to me the least bit and which certain people want to persuade me IS my fatherland on the strength of the argument that that was the place from which my ancestors some thousand years ago were scattered into the world.13
Thoughts on the 1938 Anschluss
587
Hugo von Hofmannsthal was less combative-more plaintive-over the issue than was Schnitzler. Somewhat resignedly, Hofmannsthal wrote, in 1913, to his friend, Leopold von Andrian, that regarding Austria: we must understand that we have a home (Heirnat), but no fatherland (Vaterland)-as this place [Austria] is only an apparition. It is bitter to contemplate that at least one more time one must give over the blood of his children for this apparition.14 Von Andrian’s response was more optimistic, and he reminded von Hofmannsthal that ‘Austria’ signified an ‘ideal which transcends the simple nation-state’. Andrian went on to write that Austria could be Hofmannsthal’s only homeland for ‘the cooperation and partial blending of the genius of the people . . . only [was] possible within a great realm [Reich]‘.i5 Count Clary recognised, when looking back on the issue, that he failed to realise that beneath Prague’s golden spires lived, not Austrians, but German, Czech and Jew who saw in the Bohemian capital, not home, but only the place where his house was Iocated. The Count failed to see that these people did not view themselves as part and parcel of the high culture of Baroque and Rococo that, in Clary’s mind, signified ‘Austria’. Naturally too, for the likes of Clarys there was no ‘Austria’ to hang on to during the dark days following the First World War for in contrast to these elites, Anschluss was popular among the masses of Germans living in Danubia.16 Implicit even before the First World War, a combination of events occurring during 1917 (by which year it was clear to most that the Central Powers could not win that war) caused the often discussed principle of national self-determination to surface for the first time as a practical goal to be achieved (with regard to Central Europe) within the mainstream political processes of the great powers. It also became increasingly clear that should Austria-Hungary go to the ground, the German speaking components that remained from the wreckage of the Dual Monarchy would be left-given the validity now generally assumed by the principle of ‘self-determination of nations’-to conjoin with the then evolving German republic to the north. Of course, in 1917, few could have foreseen the political generality that was to describe the postwar European world; that the Allies, having paid a heavy human price for victory, could not sanction the emergence of a German state territorially more extensive than had been that of the defeated German Reich out of the pages of the Treaty of Versailles. In short, Anschluss appeared explicit by the close of 1917 and the political-ideological foundations had been laid for the construction of a genuinely united and coherent German nation-state. By the same token, it was for this very reason, given that their perceptions did not reflect the flight of popular political culture into a heady vision of national self-determination, that the likes of the Clarys found themselves bereft of ‘Vaterland und. . . Heirnat’.” This is not to say that the development of perceptions of national selfdetermination by 1917 precisely looked toward the kind ofAnschluss that actually was accomplished for German-Austria in 1938 under National Socialism. It was more that as the modern industrialised state emerged during the nineteenth century, those who actually articulated this new state-the industrial
588
George V. Strong
bourgeoisie-were not well matched to the political style of the dynastic state. This mismatching was because the industrial bourgeoisie was both ‘liberal’ (as against aristocratic or patrician) and Romantically nationalistic. Further, its nationalism had come to insist that the only rational and just state was the nation-state because these sorts of nationalists had come to feel that without the nation-state as a political stage, no truly progressive and democratic society could come into play. ‘* So , for example, Henry Wickham Steed, Huut Bourgeois and a most vocal proponent of the nation-state idea for Danubia, saw it as perfectly natural to introduce Thomas G. Masaryk’s, The Making of a State, by writing that: written . . as an authoritative record of the efforts by which the freedom of Czechoslovakia had been won . . it is a discernmg historical interpretation. . . of the process of Czechoslovak redemption from Habsburg servitude. _. to Masaryk and to the Czechs the name “Austria” meant every device that could kill the soul of a people, corrupt it with a modicum of material well being . . . deprive it of freedom of conscience . . ..I9 It was also perfectly natural to assume that what went for the Austrian Czechs also was true-even to Wickham-Steed’s mind-for the Austrian Germans as well.20 So it was that their defeat in 1918 deprived the masses of Germans of that intangible but nevertheless compelling life-force; that is, the fulfillment of those dreams of national glory which came to be held dear by the German bourgeoisie. More ominous, the German Sehnsucht for national fulfillment took on racial overtones as popular political perception underwent frustration born out of the realisation that the dream of a German dominated Mitteleuropa lay shattered. The realm of the German Habsburgs had disappeared and the bereft Germans viewed themselves now threatened by the inundation of a Slavic sea. Less immediate-but even more dangerous for bourgeois German civilisation-was the economic consequence of war and defeat. By 1924, the Mittelstand-already robbed of its national self-esteem-now lost its social identity in the course of an horrendous inflation. The end result was a mass psychic collapse, and by the same token, a dangerous change of personnel in those who would be the arbitrators of public standards and taste. The very magnitude of the economic collapse therefore sealed the fate of elitist political culture and became a prerequisite for the rise of popular Nazi culture. No longer did the representatives of the traditional elite stand at the top of the nation’s social mix. No longer were the likes of the Clarys able to exert downward social pressure on what might be called the social underside so as to prevent this latter from drifting to the top. And as the von Andrians and Clarys gave way, so too did the Hitlers come into their own.*’ While the Vielvtilkerstaat was to disappear under the press of national selfdetermination, and while Anschluss was to be carried out, none of this was to be done under the auspices of the pre-War liberal bourgeoisie. Rather, the briefly emergent succession states were to be conquered and Anschluss was to be accomplished-but accomplished by that -fervid child of disorder, the Third Reich under the guidance of the popular German-Austrian political
Thoughts
589
on the 1938 Anschluss
Mephistopheles, Adolf Hitler-and German masses.
always with the popular support of the
George V. Strong College of William & Mary, Virginia
NOTES
1.
2. 3.
4. 5.
6. 7. 8. 9. 10.
11. 12. 13.
Carlton J.H. Hayes, Contemporary Europe Since 1879 (New York: 1958), p. 124. See in addition C.J.H. Hayes’, A Generation ofNationalism: 1871-1900 (New York: 1941), especially pp. 15-18 ff. See also, Gordon A. Craig, ‘The Kaiser and the Kritik’, New York Review of Books (18 January 1988). Thomas Garrigue Masaryk wrote, in 1916, that ‘Till recently mankind was divided and organized into states and churches without regard to Nationality. The modern era is characterized by the development of various nationalities, as strong political and state-forming forces. In practice, language, as the medium of common cultural life and effort, is the main test of Nationality. Besides Nationality, in modern times economic development, as well as provident care for the masses-not merely for aristocratic minorities-has become a great political and racial force. . . . The watchword “National-States” sums up the tendency of modern political development. ‘See Robert W. Seton-Watson, Masaryk in England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1943), pp. 117-l 18. Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf(New York: 1940), p. 595. John Lukacs has written (in his review of Die Tagebiicher von Joseph GoebbeZs: Samtliche Fragmente) of I’. . . the need . . . to revise (and dramatically diminish) the economic interpretation of the crisis of German democracy in the years between 1930 and 1933 but to recognize the political savvy of Hitler and his cohorts-and also to recognize that National Socialist propaganda, well before 1932 and 1933, and struck deep chords on the consciousness of increasing numbers of Germans, involving sentiments and inclinations that were powerful and older and deeper than the novel responses to economic need.’ See John Lukacs, ‘In Love with Hitler’, The New York Review, vol. xxv, number 12 (July 1988), 14. Quoted in Fritz Stern, The Politics of Cultural Despair (New York: 1965), p. 83. See, for example, Theodore Hamerow, Revolution, Restoration, Reaction: Economics and Politics in Germany, 1815-1817 (Princeton, 1972); Klaus Epstein, The Genesis of German Conservatism (Princeton: 1975); J. L. Talmon, The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy (London: 1952). See, dsterreich-Ungarische Monarchic In Wort und Bild, 11 volumes (Vienna: 1886), IV, 47; see also, Adolf Hitler, op. cit., pp. 71-72. See Heinrich Hoffmann, Hitler und Seine Heimat (Berlin: 1939), especially p. 10. Adolf Hitler, op. cit., pp. 116-117. Unpublished memior of G.D., 1895-1975: Mein Leben. Eine Zeit-und Famiiiengeschichte. See George V. Strong, ‘The Austrian Idea: An Idea of Nationhood in the Kingdom and Realms of the Emperor Franz Joseph I’, History ofEuropean Ideas 5, (1984), No. 3. Alfons Clary-Aldringen, Geschichten eines alten iisterreichers: Mit einem Viirwort Go10 Mann (Frankfurt am Main: 1977), pp. 18, 142. Arthur Schnitzler, My Youth in Vienna (New York: 1970), p. 4. Arthur Schnitzler, Die Weg ins Freie (Berlin: 1920), pp. 116 ff.
590
George
V. Strong
14. Quoted in Ernst Trost, Franz Joseph I (Vienna: 1980). p. 31. 15. Ibid. 16. Alfons Clary-Aldringen, op. crt., pp. 142-143. See also, R. W. Seton-Watson, op. cit., 127. Here, T. G. Masaryk remarks, ‘but it is of general interest to point to the peculiar position of Bohemian landed properietors (aristocracy). These proprietors, for the most part, are Austrian in sentiment, and perhaps they would form a dangerous element. In their case, Bohemia could follow the English example in Ireland (land purchase).’ 17. Three articles serve to illustrate the obvious: ‘Justus’(Otto Bauer?), ‘Sozialismus und Geographic’, DerKampf(July 1918); Ludo Hartmann,’ Deutschland und Wir’, Ibid. (April 1918); Otto Bauer, ‘Notizen: Ein Nationahtatenprogram der Linken’, Ibid. 18. For an illuminating discussion of the political-economic role of the industrial bourgeoisie in old Austria see, S.A.M. Adshead, ‘The Genesis of the Imperial Mind’, in Mark Francis, ed., The Viennese Enlightenment (New York: 1985) pp. 15-39. See ‘Wirtschaftsfunktion und Soizialistrukture der also, Ehzabeth Lichtenberger, Wiener Ringstrasse’, Renate Wagner-Reiger, Die Wiener Ringstrasse Bdd Emer Epoche, 9 volumes, (Vienna: 1970), V, especially pp. 49 ff. 19. Thomas G. Masaryk, The Making of a State: Memoirs and Observations, 1914-1918 (New York: 1928), pp, V, xiii-xiv. In June of 1917, an individual who signed his name as ‘Your Correspondent Formerly in Austria-Hungary’, wrote a letter (anti-Semitic, anti-Catholic and anti-Socialist in undertone) to ‘the Times’ in which he revealed his zeal for the dismemberment of Austria-Hungary at the expense of the quality of his reportage. Both the tenor of the letter and the implications in the content of the letter reveal the writer as probably being Henry Wickham-Steed. The letter is as follows: Sir: The campaign agamst the “dismemberment” or “partition” of AustriaHungary, which has been carried for some weeks in the British press, deserves attention. It has coincided with similar manifestations in allied and enemy countries. It is an interesting fact that shortly before these movements became noticeable, a number of French bankers whose interests are bound up with those of the Austrian of “international high finance” discussed with representatives bankmg world m Switzerland ways and means of “saving Austria.” The results of their discussion is not known. The fact that they took place is unquestionable. Shortly after this meeting, two German newspapers, whose relations with international finance have always been intimate, the Vossiche Zeitung and the Berliner Tageblatt explained that a federalised Austria would remain a faithful ally of Germany and the Vossiche Zeitung of 23 April m an article that was afterwards officially disseminated by the Austrian Telegraph Agency, hailed the federalising of Austria as likely to prevent her from again becoming the rival of Germany and enabling her to “constitute a (German) bridge between West and East. “In France and Italy the campaign was taken up by pacifists and neutral writers. British pacifists echoed the cry “No dismemberment ofAustria,” which was also heard among the extremist sections of the Russian Council of Workingmen’s and Soldiers’ delegates. It is important that the British public should be under no illusions as to the character of the International forces which are working “to save Austria.” Of all the forces, the less potent is the tendency in some Roman Catholic quarters to desire the preservation of the Habsburg Monarchy as the last Roman Catholic polity of the first rank. More potent is the interests of International finance to promote an inconclusive peace so that the network of Austro-German financial institutions of which Vienna is the main center, should not be destroyed by an
Thoughts on the 1938 Anschluss
591
Allied victory. One of the great “realities ” in the Habsburg Monarchy is the power of a group of banks formed by the Creditanstalt, the Wiener Bankverein, Bodencreditanstalt, the Anglo-Austrian Bank and the Landerbank. . , all these banks are separately and jointly linked up with the big German banks and work in alliance with them throughout the Balkans and the Near East. The collapse of the Austro-Hungarian state and the liberating of the Habsburg peoples would disorganise most of these institutions and ruin some of them. It would also undermine the power of international high finance in Central and Eastern Europe. Those British writers who deprecate ‘the dismemberment of Austria’ ought therefore to be careful least inadvertantly they ally themselves with forces opposed by interests and inclincation to an Allied victory . . . (London Times, June 6, 1917). 20. T.G. Masaryk indicated (in 1916) the possibility of German-Austria becoming apart of the German Reich when-in justifying the creation of an independent Bohemian state-he wrote of Austria that ‘today Germany disposes of the 50 millions of Austria’s population; but after the non-German and non-Magyar nations have been freed, only 10 million of these will be left-always assuming that the German Austrians remained on good terms with Germany, or even became incorporated.’ (R.W. Seton-Watson, op. cit., p. 134.) 21. Albert Speer, Inside the Third Reich (New York: 1977) especially p. 117.
o/European Ideas, Vol in Great Britam
Il.
pp
583-591.
ON-6599/89 $3 OOtO 00 @ 1990 Pergamon Press plc
1989
ELITE AND POPULAR PERSPECTIVE: THOUGHTS THE 1938 ANSCHLUSS
ON
GEORGE V. STRONG* It requires no repeating that on the eve of the First World War, Europe may be viewed as having divided into two camps -and these not only along the usual lines of two hostile power groupings-but according to ‘modern nation-state’ as against ‘politically backward dynastic-state’. The former-a popular political concept by 1900-generally is thought to be an expression of the French Revolution leavened (and sharpened) by the political might of an aggressive class of people, the industrial bourgeoisie. The latter, of course, was a residue of states which evolved during the middle ages out of a concept of personal fealty as this fused with the idea of kingship so as to produce a broad rationale, as well as the means for tying political society together, to bring about order in an era otherwise notable for its endemic political dislocation. The dynastic state, by 1900, of course was a dying idea supported chiefly by what is often described as an ineffectual-even antediluvian-elite typified by members of Europe’s declining aristocracy and a few of its supporters among the intelligentsia. Hence, even a most cursory reading of modern European history reveals the waxing of the nation-state idea-usually under the umbrella of cultural nationalismenshrined in the motto ‘national self-determination’. Indeed, it is at best prosaic if it is pointed out that Anschluss was implicit in the drift of German political thought long before it actually came about.’ In hindsight, the nation-state idea (as against that of the dynastic-state) did reflect what apparently is a more instinctual sense of political identity, and one that seemingly is natural to the human condition when factors of common culture like language and religion operate synergisticly with the possession of territory by a given ethnic group. In its most exaggerated form ‘blood’ too was thought to be a factor and perhaps nowhere was this idea expressed more hyperbolicly than by that German-Austrian who later became the Mephistophelean leader of the German nation. It was Adolf Hitler who hailed what might be called the Nazi perspective on the nation-state as one wherein: . . . The highest purpose of the. . . state is care for the preservation of those primal racial elements which, supplying culture, create the beauty and dignity of a higher humanity. We . . . are therefore only able to imagine a state which safeguards . . . nationality.2 The Nazi perspective, however, was not created either by Adolf Hitler or his National Socialist Party; it cannot be viewed as merely one more manifestation of the so-called Nazi revolution for its existence preceded that revolution. It existed unspoken-locked in the feelings and frustrations of the masses of German *Department U.S.A.
of History,
College
of Wihiam
and Mary, Williamsburg,
VA 23185,
584
George V. Strong
people. It was a vague feeling-a sense of alienation toward established currents of culture that had no outlet. However, as National Socialism grew in the wake of the World War and-by the late twenties-became respectable, it commenced to draw in a broad element of what passed for ‘middle class’ including teachers, writers and artists who then defined, gave shape and form, and eventually tangibility to the cultural attitudes bottled-up within the consciousness of the bulk of what came to be the Nazi rank and file-and indeed, to a great extent this was true even for the Fiihrer himself.’ Adolf I;Iitler however, was that German, drawn out by the force of history from among the masses, to grasp, synthesise and articulate the pent-up frustrations in the language of the fellow-in-the-street thereby creating a mass political movement. It was the renowned psychiatrist, Dr Karl Jung, who observed that Hitler’s political success was due to his being the first: . to tell every German what he has been thinking and feeling all along, especially since the defeat in the World War Hitler’s power [was] not political; it [was] magic.4 Noted historians, like Fritz Stern for example, have demonstrated that those currents that came to be integral in Nazi culture already had flowed as subterranean cultural undercurrents well before 1900. And it has been documented many times over that the alienation which was to surface within the framework of National Socialism initially was one effect of the impact of the industrial revolution-especially due to changes made by advances in technology and the methods of capitalisation-as these impacted upon the rooted ways of traditional life in what had been an overwhelmingly rural Germany. Further, as the industrial nineteenth century wore on, the masses of Germans-both high and low-tended to perceive their lost past not as it really had been-a harsh and unedifying existence for most-but through a bucolic and heroic chimera supplied by neo-Romanticism.S Hitler gave many demonstrations of his neo-Romantic nationalist perspective in the course of his political career. Because it was the setting of his formative years, perhaps no ceremony surrounding the Fiihrer was more revealing of his fundamental outlook than that in March of 1938 marking the successful completion of Anschluss. The celebration took place amidst the backdrop where so many of his early aspirations were formed-in Vienna’s first district. Careful staging-and its artful recording by Hitler’s old friend and official photographer, Heinrich Hoffmann, had him who then passed as Germany’s political Messiah welcomed to the capital of the newly designated Ostmark by an enthusiastic crowd on the Rathausplatz. This square, bisecting the Ringstrasse in the culturalpolitical heart of Vienna, links two of the city’s most evocative buildingsFriedrich von Schmidt’s neo-Gothic city hall and Gottfried Semper’s and Karl von Hasenauer’s neo-Baroque Staatstheater. 6 While the crowd’s enthusiasm required no contrivance, it had to be directed, through the skilled use of liturgy and symbolism, into political channels SO as to demonstrate (and otherwise make tangibie) that which the Nazis perceived had been accomplished in the name of the German nation by Anschluss. For example, Hitler selected the theater as a backdrop for greeting Vienna because of the emotional Alzdeutsch pull which the
Thoughts on the 1938 Anschluss
585
building possessed, not only for his own imagination but, as he well understood, for that of the Viennese; and so it was that Hitler had himself placed-encased by his famous Mercedes touring sedan- before that building and facing the front facade of the similarly evocative Rathhaus. The roadway linking the two buildings was lined with colorful Nazi banners-many of them of a design influenced by Hitler-so as to give tangibility to the fact (and to the feat) that the long separated Austro-Germans at last had been taken-under the auspices of the Thousand Year Reich-into the bosom of their German Vo/k.7 So too did the German Fiihrer demonstrate his broader view (and that of his supporters) of the wider significance of Anschiuss within the framework of his nation’s history. The completed deed represented the righting of wrongs in Germany’s past so as to overcome the consequences of those events of 1848 and 1866 that had territorially divided the German nation so as to abort true German national fulfillment. But in addition, AnschIuss was seen as the long awaited first step toward the creation of a mitteleuroptiische Reich by a Germany resurgent; moreover, she was resurgent because of the reinvigoration of the Volk by National Socialism whereby: true Germanic democracy of free choice produced a leader with the , . obligation fully to take over all responsibility for what he does or does not do. There will be no voting by a majority on single questions but only the decision of the individual who backs it with his life and all he has.8
In short, if Anschluss were something of a shock to those orchestrating foreign policy in London and Paris, it was popularly seen (when viewed from the perspective of Berlin or Vienna) as the long overdue culmination of the logic of German history. And while it may be true that there were a few among the German nation who would have preferred to witness national fulfillment under auspices other than National Socialism, few were really unhappy over the event. So for example, one Viennese lady-in a private memoir written for her grandchildren after the Second World war-maintained: one cannot condemn everything that was done through [Anschlu~~]. . , For example [the new regime] set about completing the Vienna to Salzburg ~utabahn which up until that time had only a single kilometer built. In addition, this project provided much work and wages. With wonderful efficiency and speed Vienna’s electric system was modernized . . . The city government had been working on this project for years but always again and again it had been delayed by ‘insuperable difficulties’. Employment opportunities opened up throughout the land and one of my most unforgettable memories is when my husband told me that one of those who for the longest time had been a regular at my Friday night charity suppers now had employment and no longer would be coming. We had much to learn from the German talent for organization. They came with their dredges and cranes-and with their wonderful Strassenwalzen . . . So [my husband] and I, along with all of Vienna, streamed on foot to the Heldenplatz so as to see our “beloved Fiihrer” . . .9
If the rise of the masses-and with it popular political culture-signified new and (as it turned out) destructive political perceptions, this rise at the same time did not signify the immediate demise of an older elite political culture anymore
586
George V. Strong
than it meant-in the sense of privilege-the demise of the traditional classes. Mass and elite lived side by side-the latter more often focusing around ‘land’ while the former centered upon the city. Indeed, each maintained its separate perspective until well after the First World War because, until that time, each maintained its separate worlds. Moreover, each lived in misunderstanding regarding the view of the other toward the issue of nationhood. For example, in old Austria-within the German speaking as well as within the non-German spheres of what had been the Habsburg realm-the greater part of the (former) aristocracy looked back with Sehnsucht to the ‘Austrian idea’ of nationhood.iO Certainly Anschfuss-that is the detachment of German speaking Austria from Danubia and its joining to the German Reich as loudly demanded by the likes of Georg von Schonerer-had little appeal before the First World War for elite elements living within old Austria. Indeed, the entire context of what came to be meant by ‘national self-determination’ was beyond the ken of many aristocrats. For example, Count Alfons Clary-Aldringen, a true aristocrat of noble lineage within the framework of the former Dual Monarchy, was depressed upon discovering-in 1918-that he was without either fatherland or homeland. The noble Clary, whose entrepreneurial warrior ancestors hailed from South Germany, wrote with pride of his more immediate forebears whom he saw, as not German, but European, aristocratic and Austrian; they were, as he viewed them, synthesizers and creators of Austrian culture. It was his seventeenth century ancestor, Hieronymus Clary who established the family on its great estate in Bohemia by cleverly associating himself with the fortunes of the House of Habsburg. And so it was that during the eighteenth century the Clarys emerged as an important cog in a tightly woven aristocratic socio-political net that held the Habsburgpolitical enterprise together. So too did the Clarys become, beyond men of power, ‘good and cheerful people’ who did not neglect art and music. Chopin and Franz Liszt, for example, often played on the Schloss’ piano at Teplitz. And the dyspeptic Beethoven often visited the family Fideikomiss fruitlessly seeking a cure for his loss of hearing from its local waters. The incomparable Goethe too found hospitality at the Clary castle and, like its owners, took the deepest pleasure in its then still bucolic environs.” Of course opposition to the national perspective of the bourgeoisie did not come exclusively from the aristocracy. Arthur Schnitzler, for example, described the (bourgeois) liberal milieu-one in which he had grown up-as being one where ‘superficial values [and] . . . mediocre qualities [passed] as virtues’.‘* Indeed, in a discussion which the author created on pan-Zionism between two of his characters, Heinrich Bermann and Leo Golowski, Schnitzler attacks the basic concept of the nation-state principle when he has Bermann roundly condemn the idea of re-founding a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Indeed, Bermann ignored Golowski’s being motivated-propelled even-by the spreading virulence of anti-Semitism in Europe by his exclaiming that his ‘instinct’ told him that: my homeland is here, just here, and not in some land which I don’t know, the description of which doesn’t appeal to me the least bit and which certain people want to persuade me IS my fatherland on the strength of the argument that that was the place from which my ancestors some thousand years ago were scattered into the world.13
Thoughts on the 1938 Anschluss
587
Hugo von Hofmannsthal was less combative-more plaintive-over the issue than was Schnitzler. Somewhat resignedly, Hofmannsthal wrote, in 1913, to his friend, Leopold von Andrian, that regarding Austria: we must understand that we have a home (Heirnat), but no fatherland (Vaterland)-as this place [Austria] is only an apparition. It is bitter to contemplate that at least one more time one must give over the blood of his children for this apparition.14 Von Andrian’s response was more optimistic, and he reminded von Hofmannsthal that ‘Austria’ signified an ‘ideal which transcends the simple nation-state’. Andrian went on to write that Austria could be Hofmannsthal’s only homeland for ‘the cooperation and partial blending of the genius of the people . . . only [was] possible within a great realm [Reich]‘.i5 Count Clary recognised, when looking back on the issue, that he failed to realise that beneath Prague’s golden spires lived, not Austrians, but German, Czech and Jew who saw in the Bohemian capital, not home, but only the place where his house was Iocated. The Count failed to see that these people did not view themselves as part and parcel of the high culture of Baroque and Rococo that, in Clary’s mind, signified ‘Austria’. Naturally too, for the likes of Clarys there was no ‘Austria’ to hang on to during the dark days following the First World War for in contrast to these elites, Anschluss was popular among the masses of Germans living in Danubia.16 Implicit even before the First World War, a combination of events occurring during 1917 (by which year it was clear to most that the Central Powers could not win that war) caused the often discussed principle of national self-determination to surface for the first time as a practical goal to be achieved (with regard to Central Europe) within the mainstream political processes of the great powers. It also became increasingly clear that should Austria-Hungary go to the ground, the German speaking components that remained from the wreckage of the Dual Monarchy would be left-given the validity now generally assumed by the principle of ‘self-determination of nations’-to conjoin with the then evolving German republic to the north. Of course, in 1917, few could have foreseen the political generality that was to describe the postwar European world; that the Allies, having paid a heavy human price for victory, could not sanction the emergence of a German state territorially more extensive than had been that of the defeated German Reich out of the pages of the Treaty of Versailles. In short, Anschluss appeared explicit by the close of 1917 and the political-ideological foundations had been laid for the construction of a genuinely united and coherent German nation-state. By the same token, it was for this very reason, given that their perceptions did not reflect the flight of popular political culture into a heady vision of national self-determination, that the likes of the Clarys found themselves bereft of ‘Vaterland und. . . Heirnat’.” This is not to say that the development of perceptions of national selfdetermination by 1917 precisely looked toward the kind ofAnschluss that actually was accomplished for German-Austria in 1938 under National Socialism. It was more that as the modern industrialised state emerged during the nineteenth century, those who actually articulated this new state-the industrial
588
George V. Strong
bourgeoisie-were not well matched to the political style of the dynastic state. This mismatching was because the industrial bourgeoisie was both ‘liberal’ (as against aristocratic or patrician) and Romantically nationalistic. Further, its nationalism had come to insist that the only rational and just state was the nation-state because these sorts of nationalists had come to feel that without the nation-state as a political stage, no truly progressive and democratic society could come into play. ‘* So , for example, Henry Wickham Steed, Huut Bourgeois and a most vocal proponent of the nation-state idea for Danubia, saw it as perfectly natural to introduce Thomas G. Masaryk’s, The Making of a State, by writing that: written . . as an authoritative record of the efforts by which the freedom of Czechoslovakia had been won . . it is a discernmg historical interpretation. . . of the process of Czechoslovak redemption from Habsburg servitude. _. to Masaryk and to the Czechs the name “Austria” meant every device that could kill the soul of a people, corrupt it with a modicum of material well being . . . deprive it of freedom of conscience . . ..I9 It was also perfectly natural to assume that what went for the Austrian Czechs also was true-even to Wickham-Steed’s mind-for the Austrian Germans as well.20 So it was that their defeat in 1918 deprived the masses of Germans of that intangible but nevertheless compelling life-force; that is, the fulfillment of those dreams of national glory which came to be held dear by the German bourgeoisie. More ominous, the German Sehnsucht for national fulfillment took on racial overtones as popular political perception underwent frustration born out of the realisation that the dream of a German dominated Mitteleuropa lay shattered. The realm of the German Habsburgs had disappeared and the bereft Germans viewed themselves now threatened by the inundation of a Slavic sea. Less immediate-but even more dangerous for bourgeois German civilisation-was the economic consequence of war and defeat. By 1924, the Mittelstand-already robbed of its national self-esteem-now lost its social identity in the course of an horrendous inflation. The end result was a mass psychic collapse, and by the same token, a dangerous change of personnel in those who would be the arbitrators of public standards and taste. The very magnitude of the economic collapse therefore sealed the fate of elitist political culture and became a prerequisite for the rise of popular Nazi culture. No longer did the representatives of the traditional elite stand at the top of the nation’s social mix. No longer were the likes of the Clarys able to exert downward social pressure on what might be called the social underside so as to prevent this latter from drifting to the top. And as the von Andrians and Clarys gave way, so too did the Hitlers come into their own.*’ While the Vielvtilkerstaat was to disappear under the press of national selfdetermination, and while Anschluss was to be carried out, none of this was to be done under the auspices of the pre-War liberal bourgeoisie. Rather, the briefly emergent succession states were to be conquered and Anschluss was to be accomplished-but accomplished by that -fervid child of disorder, the Third Reich under the guidance of the popular German-Austrian political
Thoughts
589
on the 1938 Anschluss
Mephistopheles, Adolf Hitler-and German masses.
always with the popular support of the
George V. Strong College of William & Mary, Virginia
NOTES
1.
2. 3.
4. 5.
6. 7. 8. 9. 10.
11. 12. 13.
Carlton J.H. Hayes, Contemporary Europe Since 1879 (New York: 1958), p. 124. See in addition C.J.H. Hayes’, A Generation ofNationalism: 1871-1900 (New York: 1941), especially pp. 15-18 ff. See also, Gordon A. Craig, ‘The Kaiser and the Kritik’, New York Review of Books (18 January 1988). Thomas Garrigue Masaryk wrote, in 1916, that ‘Till recently mankind was divided and organized into states and churches without regard to Nationality. The modern era is characterized by the development of various nationalities, as strong political and state-forming forces. In practice, language, as the medium of common cultural life and effort, is the main test of Nationality. Besides Nationality, in modern times economic development, as well as provident care for the masses-not merely for aristocratic minorities-has become a great political and racial force. . . . The watchword “National-States” sums up the tendency of modern political development. ‘See Robert W. Seton-Watson, Masaryk in England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1943), pp. 117-l 18. Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf(New York: 1940), p. 595. John Lukacs has written (in his review of Die Tagebiicher von Joseph GoebbeZs: Samtliche Fragmente) of I’. . . the need . . . to revise (and dramatically diminish) the economic interpretation of the crisis of German democracy in the years between 1930 and 1933 but to recognize the political savvy of Hitler and his cohorts-and also to recognize that National Socialist propaganda, well before 1932 and 1933, and struck deep chords on the consciousness of increasing numbers of Germans, involving sentiments and inclinations that were powerful and older and deeper than the novel responses to economic need.’ See John Lukacs, ‘In Love with Hitler’, The New York Review, vol. xxv, number 12 (July 1988), 14. Quoted in Fritz Stern, The Politics of Cultural Despair (New York: 1965), p. 83. See, for example, Theodore Hamerow, Revolution, Restoration, Reaction: Economics and Politics in Germany, 1815-1817 (Princeton, 1972); Klaus Epstein, The Genesis of German Conservatism (Princeton: 1975); J. L. Talmon, The Origins of Totalitarian Democracy (London: 1952). See, dsterreich-Ungarische Monarchic In Wort und Bild, 11 volumes (Vienna: 1886), IV, 47; see also, Adolf Hitler, op. cit., pp. 71-72. See Heinrich Hoffmann, Hitler und Seine Heimat (Berlin: 1939), especially p. 10. Adolf Hitler, op. cit., pp. 116-117. Unpublished memior of G.D., 1895-1975: Mein Leben. Eine Zeit-und Famiiiengeschichte. See George V. Strong, ‘The Austrian Idea: An Idea of Nationhood in the Kingdom and Realms of the Emperor Franz Joseph I’, History ofEuropean Ideas 5, (1984), No. 3. Alfons Clary-Aldringen, Geschichten eines alten iisterreichers: Mit einem Viirwort Go10 Mann (Frankfurt am Main: 1977), pp. 18, 142. Arthur Schnitzler, My Youth in Vienna (New York: 1970), p. 4. Arthur Schnitzler, Die Weg ins Freie (Berlin: 1920), pp. 116 ff.
590
George
V. Strong
14. Quoted in Ernst Trost, Franz Joseph I (Vienna: 1980). p. 31. 15. Ibid. 16. Alfons Clary-Aldringen, op. crt., pp. 142-143. See also, R. W. Seton-Watson, op. cit., 127. Here, T. G. Masaryk remarks, ‘but it is of general interest to point to the peculiar position of Bohemian landed properietors (aristocracy). These proprietors, for the most part, are Austrian in sentiment, and perhaps they would form a dangerous element. In their case, Bohemia could follow the English example in Ireland (land purchase).’ 17. Three articles serve to illustrate the obvious: ‘Justus’(Otto Bauer?), ‘Sozialismus und Geographic’, DerKampf(July 1918); Ludo Hartmann,’ Deutschland und Wir’, Ibid. (April 1918); Otto Bauer, ‘Notizen: Ein Nationahtatenprogram der Linken’, Ibid. 18. For an illuminating discussion of the political-economic role of the industrial bourgeoisie in old Austria see, S.A.M. Adshead, ‘The Genesis of the Imperial Mind’, in Mark Francis, ed., The Viennese Enlightenment (New York: 1985) pp. 15-39. See ‘Wirtschaftsfunktion und Soizialistrukture der also, Ehzabeth Lichtenberger, Wiener Ringstrasse’, Renate Wagner-Reiger, Die Wiener Ringstrasse Bdd Emer Epoche, 9 volumes, (Vienna: 1970), V, especially pp. 49 ff. 19. Thomas G. Masaryk, The Making of a State: Memoirs and Observations, 1914-1918 (New York: 1928), pp, V, xiii-xiv. In June of 1917, an individual who signed his name as ‘Your Correspondent Formerly in Austria-Hungary’, wrote a letter (anti-Semitic, anti-Catholic and anti-Socialist in undertone) to ‘the Times’ in which he revealed his zeal for the dismemberment of Austria-Hungary at the expense of the quality of his reportage. Both the tenor of the letter and the implications in the content of the letter reveal the writer as probably being Henry Wickham-Steed. The letter is as follows: Sir: The campaign agamst the “dismemberment” or “partition” of AustriaHungary, which has been carried for some weeks in the British press, deserves attention. It has coincided with similar manifestations in allied and enemy countries. It is an interesting fact that shortly before these movements became noticeable, a number of French bankers whose interests are bound up with those of the Austrian of “international high finance” discussed with representatives bankmg world m Switzerland ways and means of “saving Austria.” The results of their discussion is not known. The fact that they took place is unquestionable. Shortly after this meeting, two German newspapers, whose relations with international finance have always been intimate, the Vossiche Zeitung and the Berliner Tageblatt explained that a federalised Austria would remain a faithful ally of Germany and the Vossiche Zeitung of 23 April m an article that was afterwards officially disseminated by the Austrian Telegraph Agency, hailed the federalising of Austria as likely to prevent her from again becoming the rival of Germany and enabling her to “constitute a (German) bridge between West and East. “In France and Italy the campaign was taken up by pacifists and neutral writers. British pacifists echoed the cry “No dismemberment ofAustria,” which was also heard among the extremist sections of the Russian Council of Workingmen’s and Soldiers’ delegates. It is important that the British public should be under no illusions as to the character of the International forces which are working “to save Austria.” Of all the forces, the less potent is the tendency in some Roman Catholic quarters to desire the preservation of the Habsburg Monarchy as the last Roman Catholic polity of the first rank. More potent is the interests of International finance to promote an inconclusive peace so that the network of Austro-German financial institutions of which Vienna is the main center, should not be destroyed by an
Thoughts on the 1938 Anschluss
591
Allied victory. One of the great “realities ” in the Habsburg Monarchy is the power of a group of banks formed by the Creditanstalt, the Wiener Bankverein, Bodencreditanstalt, the Anglo-Austrian Bank and the Landerbank. . , all these banks are separately and jointly linked up with the big German banks and work in alliance with them throughout the Balkans and the Near East. The collapse of the Austro-Hungarian state and the liberating of the Habsburg peoples would disorganise most of these institutions and ruin some of them. It would also undermine the power of international high finance in Central and Eastern Europe. Those British writers who deprecate ‘the dismemberment of Austria’ ought therefore to be careful least inadvertantly they ally themselves with forces opposed by interests and inclincation to an Allied victory . . . (London Times, June 6, 1917). 20. T.G. Masaryk indicated (in 1916) the possibility of German-Austria becoming apart of the German Reich when-in justifying the creation of an independent Bohemian state-he wrote of Austria that ‘today Germany disposes of the 50 millions of Austria’s population; but after the non-German and non-Magyar nations have been freed, only 10 million of these will be left-always assuming that the German Austrians remained on good terms with Germany, or even became incorporated.’ (R.W. Seton-Watson, op. cit., p. 134.) 21. Albert Speer, Inside the Third Reich (New York: 1977) especially p. 117.