New translation of Hitler's May 1944 talk to officers at the Platterhof

Adolf Hitler greets and decorates officers at his Wolfsschanze headquarters in East Prussia in 1943.

INTRODUCTION by Carolyn Yeager

This unrehearsed talk was taken down by stenographers at the time it was given by Adolf Hitler to his top officers. A single typed copy exists in the archives of the Institut für Zeitgeschichte in Munich, Germany. To obtain it, a Munich woman familiar with the Institute had to go there in person and request it, then make a copy on the premises, after which she mailed the copied pages to me for a fee. It consists of 70 typed, double-spaced pages, with some words on every page illegible because of fold marks.

I made 3 sets of copies and mailed them to 3 persons, one of which was Carlos Porter, who agreed to translate it--a really hard job considering the length and the poor quality of the original. I asked Carlos to do the translation in a more or less direct fashion, not concerning himself overmuch with the quality of the prose. I wanted the exact idea of what the Fuehrer said and meant. Since I'm not in the business of selling books for a profit,  the ease of readability for the general public is not my first concern. My first concern is a very clear rendition of the ideas Hitler was expressing to his audience.

And let's remember, he was speaking quite freely and extemporaneously to his military officers about issues he had thought about and dealt with for quite some time. There is nothing new here. He was not speaking to the world, or to the ages, or to anyone beyond these military leaders who were facing a most difficult and challenging time in May 1944. In this talk he wanted to boost their morale by explaining why the course that he had set the nation on was, from the very beginning, the correct one. It had led to success after success, he pointed out, and therefore staying this course was the superior way forward. This speech is NOT about race, German racial make-up, or Germans vs other races or national groups. That part, as it comes up, is a side-excursion into the qualities of the German people, their strengths and from whence these strengths come, and that these strengths should be encouraged to spread more evenly among the German people.

After investing close to $500 and a lot of time into making this translation available, I am not even putting it under copyright, so that it can be freely and widely shared on the Internet and elsewhere, as an alternative to V. Clark's strictly copyrighted books. To those who use any of it, please give the attribution as Hitler's 1944 Platterhof "speech", translated by Carlos Porter, from this website - carolynyeager.net.

VERONICA CLARK'S TRANSLATIONS

This is the talk that Veronica Clark dubs “Hitler's Most Significant Speech” and published as a book of 72 pages in 2009 in an edition of only 100. She described it as “the very first English language translation of Hitler's unknown May 1944 speech to officers and generals at Platterhof." She listed herself and Wilf Heink as translators.

In April 2012 she republished it, together with a 1943 speech by Heinrich Himmler, as “hitler & himmler UNCENSORED”. She lists Wilfried Heink as the translator, and describes the book as:

“Two hitherto unpublished, TOP SECRET speeches by Hitler and Himmler, never before available in English until now! Beginning with an exploration into the theoretical versus operational definitions of Volk, race, Nordic and Aryan, author Veronica K. Clark sets the stage for two of the most important speeches ever delivered by Heinrich Himmler and Adolf Hitler, in 1943 and 1944 respectively. Were Hitler and Himmler really as anti-Slavic and “racist” as historians have made them out to be? When speaking to their innermost circles of supporters and comrades did they advocate “Ueber” racial supremacy, or were they less racist than most of us ever imagined? If you believe Himmler and Hitler were all about “Slavic and Polish genocide” and “Aryan supermen,” think again.”

[Let's remember that Clark has said that she is about 20% Polish (her mother is Polish) and only 5% German. In spite of this, she says she considers herself "German" anyway because she “feels German.” No, she fantasizes about being a Prussian!]

My main reason for wanting to publish this talk (not speech) myself is to counter the dishonesty of V. Clark in her claims about Hitler's “change of mind about race” as “proved” in this “most significant speech.” For example, since Slavs and Poles are never mentioned in this talk, we have no idea from what Hitler says here what his ideas about Slavs and Poles might be. I will be doing some further commentary once I have posted Part 2.

The Führer's talk to Generals and Officers on May 26, 1944 at the Platterhof in Obersaltzberg, Part 1 of 2

The Platterhof Hotel accommodated National Socialist events and visitors, including military officers, of the Fuehrer when he was staying at his private home on the Obersalzberg.

Translated by Carlos Whitlock Porter

The Führer:

Although, gentlemen, it has certainly been talked about, I would like to make clear the purpose of the course I have taken.

An enormous transformation has taken place in the German people. Perhaps the German people, who have all experienced it together, inwardly, are not quite as aware of it as are foreigners who are witnessing the results of this transformation at this precise moment. This transformation remained concealed – because it didn’t take place in the sense of a lightning-like revolution as in 1918, but slowly, as an evolutionary process [two words illegible] – [from those] who did not come into close contact with this transformation, or whose contact with it was limited.

This includes the officer corps in particular. To the extent that the officer corps came from the period between the Reichs [Zwischenreich], it was unable to concern itself with these problems inwardly, or to document such a concern outwardly. During this period [1918-1933], the officer corps was educated according to the slogan that they should be “apolitical”. This concept of being “apolitical” is somewhat contagious in itself, namely, as long as the State is dominated by a lot of political confusion: when 19 parties are struggling against each other in a State, and no one can be sure which party will achieve a majority -- that is, which one will gain control of the legislative body from time to time -- it is a matter of course that such a conflict could not be permitted to spread to the officer corps or armed forces. The armed forces cannot take sides in either direction, or become divided in favour of tendency A,B,C, or D; and for awhile we had 46 parties in Germany.

It is therefore obvious that during this period, the armed forces necessarily had to distance itself from this phenomenon, and that it actually did so. However, I can [verb missing] the armed forces [illegible] of the attitude of the people, from the load-bearing element of the spiritual principles of the spiritual constitution of the people, or from the State constitution in itself.

That means: the armed forces were once profoundly monarchical, at a time when the State, even if already divided in its political leadership, was, in its representation, at least considered a monarchical State. For an officer not to be monarchical at that time was unthinkable; he had to resign as a matter of course; because in the end, he could only fight and commit himself to the ways things were. The monarchy was the given, as the actual condition of this German empire.

Later, therefore, to avoid this conflict, an oath to the Constitution as such was considered the most important thing. But the Constitution is just a hodgepodge of individual provisions. It was not the result of any victory and therefore the representation of the thinking of a single party, but rather the substance [Wesen] of the Weimar Constitution was precisely to stabilise and guarantee the multi-party state.

But for this reason it was quite natural for an officer -- because he was an officer -- to be able to swear an oath to the so-called “Constitution” as something apparently and theoretically “apolitical”, something independent of parties, although that wasn’t quite true!

It was, however, impossible to obligate every individual man to it when the time came to dissolve the professional army in favour of a people’s army, manned by soldiers who enlisted on a yearly basis after being mustered into service. The political influences and attitudes of the day were necessarily brought into the barracks with these men; since one cannot expect a man who has grown up in a certain political environment and has been deliberately educated as an apprentice since the age of ten or twelve and who entered a trade union or a political party at the age of sixteen to abandon his political attitudes on the day he enters the barracks and suddenly become an “apolitical soldier”. That might still work in a State in which service consists of a militia, a very short term of military service. [But] one cannot assume that a man can repress his political convictions over the long term, not even for a year. That is impossible. A conflict would necessarily arise between the officer -- who has sworn an oath to the Constitution, [and] who, therefore, has really only the State in mind, I’d like to say -- and his men, who represent their own particular party point of view, depending on which party they belonged to. The result must necessarily be a discrepancy between the [illegible] of the officer, his influence, and the readiness and ability to accept responsibilities of the soldiers entrusted to him.

The introduction of universal military service would have torn this problem wide open, the way it already was before the war in 1914. At that time, when the monarchy was the representation of the State, according to the Constitution, the practical fulfilment of this more representative form of government was more or less left to the parties. From before the world war in 1914 the situation was that the officer was necessarily drawn into this crisis. We have some dramatic and tragic examples from this period, after all. He was pulled into a crisis which he was unable to master.

It is quite obvious that this problem cannot be solved by the officer, but rather, that he will be the principal sufferer when the time comes to solve this problem; this means that when the State appears in a particular form to which only the officer can be sworn – whether it’s monarchy or a republic – while this same [political] manifestation is itself being subverted, a tragic moment arises for the officer in the sense that he is [illegible] obligated to something which, in itself, no longer represents unity at all. The officer is now compelled to create this unity [himself], which he cannot [of course] do, in addition to all his other responsibilities.

This means he will increasingly evade political responsibility [sich absetzen] and withdraw into or plead the reservation of his so-called constitutional tasks; in other words: he will have increasingly less influence over the men entrusted to him. This may even suffice in normal times. But in times involving the most difficult trials, the pure drill book is enough, since ultimately that’s what the officer’s activity is restricted to: the pure drill book. In the long run, [however] this point of view by itself can no longer hold this body [of men] together.

It was no different under the republic. But this does not prove that this problem has to be this way; rather, it only proves the total untenability of the situation which we have gotten ourselves into, [that is], of proclaiming a State possessing a certain political form; only such a State can be arbitrarily attacked by its citizens, and must allow itself to be subverted, since in this State then 3, 10, 20, 30, 40 parties are fighting [with each other], and, of course, not, for example, fighting over goals of the day, but rather, partly, over problems affecting the essential fundamentals of the State, where one says: I am a Republican, another says: I am a Bolshevik, another: I am a Communist, another [entire line illegible] I am an anarchist, and so on. That is, they are struggling against the existential fundamentals of this State. It is impossible for such a State to exist over the long term, which is already subverted and eaten away on the inside in this way. Whether it is a monarchy or a republic doesn’t matter. This is precisely why the German monarchy had so little resistance, just as little as any other republic today, which are also corroded by the same phenomena in the same way.

The officer cannot master this problem, that is obvious. For his part, he is no longer in a position to step down off his pedestal. He will always feel obligated to a certain form of government. But if the certain form of government itself is no longer uniformly accepted by the men entrusted to him, then he finds himself confronted by subordinates who are completely disunited, [including] in their opinions as to what the activities of an officer should ultimately consist of.

But it is obvious, now, that, if such a question is to be solved in a reasonable way, then this situation is the most blessed situation which an officer could ever wish for since this problem has been solved in such a manner that State and party life are completely identical. That the State doesn’t represent a certain form which is rejected, affirmed or attacked by the members of the State, then the officer can finally take a position clearly and unambiguously. In assuming an obligation to the State, he is, of course, obligated to everything which motivates the State, supports the State, fulfils the State, and [which] identifies the State with its spiritual background [Geistesgut], as well as with its subordinates at the same time.

That is the situation today. But it is quite normal that a huge movement would be unable to [illegible – perhaps “persuade” or “compel”] every individual, immediately and completely, without further ado, to adopt an apparently metaphysical [anscheinend über allen Dingen] point of view, especially when he [the individual] is in no way professionally or even officially required [to do so]. But, gentlemen, generals and officers, today this question has been decided a long time ago; it has been decided in a couple of States. It has been decided in a Fascist State, [but] not fully implemented there. You can see the consequences of that situation for yourselves: a Fascist State on the one side, [and] a still absolutely communist underclass, thirdly a royalist, decorative figment [Gebilde] [taken] as genuine, a military that no longer knew who it should obey, and, in the end, the total collapse of the State. [Speaking of Italy -cy]

This problem has been totally solved in Bolshevist Russia, [in favour of] clear, unambiguous positions on the part of the officer on all matters affecting the State, its doctrine as a whole, and,at the same time, an unambiguous relationship to subordinates: a totally clear relationship.

In Germany itself, this process was unfortunately too quickly interrupted by war; since you can really believe that the course [we are on] would perhaps never have been needed if the war hadn’t come. Instead, the overall, deliberate, gradual education of the German officer corps would -- exactly like that of all German soldiers -- have taken place prior to their entry into the armed forces. It would have gone step by step, according to the procedures which I have considered correct here, that is, without smashing the crockery, without destroying what is good, but slowly and surely, nevertheless, would have reached the established objective.

There is only one thing one can do in this struggle, therefore, and that is to attempt to make up for what’s been lost [nachholen, was nachgeholt werden kann]. In so doing, in my view, the purpose of this talk is to say things which are not quite appropriate for the general public, because these things express the “therefore” and the “why”, which is very often not necessary in propaganda for the masses. In propaganda for the masses, I can draw conclusions without even having to say in detail why I must take a certain course; I must not say that. But it is important to give [an explanation] to the entire leadership corps of the nation, which includes, first of all, the officer corps.

Insofar as it is only a question of the political leadership corps, it has always been my most important task to [illegible] it more and more [in this direction]. I would like to introduce the recognition of the fundamentals, with the result that today, in the political field, the entire movement actually reacts in a completely uniform manner all over the German Reich. When some political event occurs from time to time, a central directive from myself is hardly [even] required to bring about a completely uniform reaction on the part of the entire political leadership, because it has already been fundamentally [illegible] uniformly educated, [so] that the reactions in the leadership corps are identical almost everywhere, as is the case in any good officer corps from a military-technical point of view -- whether it’s in northern Germany, southern Germany, western Germany or in foreign countries, makes no difference.

We are facing hard trials today

So it is now our task to speak in greater detail of precisely these things, which one cannot write publicly, to the officer corps and its leadership, and, of course, to show practical examples, [of] what the results are now, [and] what they should be. That is particularly important today, since today we are exposed to many hard endurance tests, which [illegible]. Perhaps many of my officers will not often understand why I accept all these endurance tests, these blows of fate, so calmly. It is because of my deepest conviction that [illegible] success stands at the end of this struggle.

This conviction has never ceased to [be mine] on my entire pathway before, and I may briefly address it, because this pathway will perhaps explain why I am more determined than others and why my confidence is completely unbreakable.

It must be so! Since, gentlemen, if I did not possess this confidence, then I would not be sitting before you now, and the
German people as a whole would look very different today.

In a purely superficial analysis, preconditions for my attitude are not there [do not exist]. When I decided to become a politician in 1918, this was a complete transformation of my whole life. The question is sometimes raised – I must answer it quite matter-of-factly here – how did it come about that, today, a man can stand at the head of the German Reich and armed forces who was only a Gefreiter [private first class] in the World War?

Gentlemen, believe me: I didn’t have any ambition to play a military role, not at all. I wanted in my life [illegible] a new [illegible] and I am convinced that, in the event of a German victory, I would have become one of the great architects in German history.

Regarding this, I studied always, because for me all of life is a complete phenomenon, not one that needs to be resolved. One cannot observe life only in individual phenomena. I therefore studied in innumerable fields. I had no youth like other people, at a time at which other people perhaps go dancing and enjoying themselves, I only learned, learned, learned, and I also had to earn my bread on the side. I can really say: before I was 25 years old, when I entered the army as a volunteer, there was hardly a day that passed, apart from Saturday afternoon, when I permitted myself a free hour. I only read and read, in all fields, not just in the field of architecture, the fine arts and its various styles, and so forth. But rather, in the field of the natural sciences, national economy as well (insofar as anybody was in a position to digest them at all at that time), in the field of politics – I described that in Mein Kampf – and, I don’t know why, in all military fields. And then, in addition to my training as a would-be builder, and occupying myself with [illegible] techniques, I also read a lot. It’s unbelievable how much, but I never had the ambition of becoming anything other than an architect. If this war, the World War, had ended with a German victory, you would have learned my name as one of the greatest German architects, never as a politician, never as the name of a man who pushed himself forward into a governmental position.

Only in those frightful days, when the collapse occurred, did the decision take shape in my mind and stood before my eyes as a possibility over the course of the year 1918.

It was based on the recognition that the German people would be completely unable to rise again unless there was a fundamental change in the leadership of this German people, in the organisation of its society, and, especially, in the cleansing of this German people, in maintaining the purity of this German people. [My underlining--not necessarily racial, or only racial, either, as we shall see. -cy]

That was not an easy decision. I was so wrapped up in my architectural sciences and my pure studies that such a decision was unbelievably difficult. During the war some fellows carried a Bible in their rucksack, others carried something else; I had Schopenhauer in my rucksack throughout the entire war. I was half philosopher and half architect and concerned myself with such problems.

Then I had to enter an entirely different life, which in my life I knew well, though I knew few other people. except for myself; since few people were granted the privilege – I must say it here – to be able to move through all levels of society as I was, throughout my entire pathway of life.

I grew up in a petit bourgeois family, very decent and [illegible]. Because of the death of my father, my parents, I had to earn my own bread. I became a worker and did everything; at the same time I studied , learned and had a great goal before my eyes. I wanted to become a great German architect, continuing in the tradition of Schinkel and [illegible]. That was my goal. I would have achieved that, too, it’s quite certain, on the condition that I obtained a building license [Bauerlaubnis].

This path stood before my eyes. I learned everything on the pathway towards this, better perhaps than any other German. I was a highly cultured man, but I stood with the proletarians in the gutter. I worked on building projects only as a laborer and got to know construction workers!

Like few other people, I became familiar with social problems, not from the party viewpoint, but rather from the most elementary side. I saw this problem from the point of view of the education of this broad mass, in their standard of living, their squalid misery, their insecurity, but also in recognition of their inner toughness, their steadfastness, their solidity, their possible capacity for enthusiasm. I saw all that as a soldier and got to know it a second time.

When the war came to this tragic end for Germany, I had to first say goodbye to my only great passion in this life and I decided, based on my living experience, to undertake the reorganisation of a new German racial corpus [“Volkskörper”, a more or less uniquely National-Socialist word. I am not sure whether “racial corpus” is really a correct translation. – TRANSLATOR’S NOTE]. I say “body of the people”, already something different from what many other German politicians had in mind. The bourgeois politicians only saw the State before their eyes, I saw the people, the substance. For me, the State was nothing more than a purely exterior, even a compulsory form [Zwangsform]. I had then already come to see that that which we call the State is, in reality, the overcoming of the inborn individualistic self-drive in people—that one can’t start anything with the State, especially in reorganising, rather that the “body of the people” was the primary and decisive thing, that the body of the people must therefore be reorganised.

I threw myself into this problem and this struggle began, but now, gentlemen, with what chance of success? And here I must tell you something for the first time: on the day that I appeared before a few followers for the first time, and communicated my thoughts to them, on that day, I was convinced that I could one day become Leader of the German Reich. Since then, I never doubted for a second that I would lead the German State and with it, the entire German nation, one day. No one came to me in the years 1920, 1921 and 1922 and was ever told anything other than: “One day the hour will come in which the flag I carry will be the German flag, in which the principles which I have laid down will be the basic principles of the German State!” That was the prognosis of a man at that time, who had nothing going for him except his own inner faith. I had neither a name nor capital. I had no press, no protection, nothing, I had only enemies, who considered me either mentally ill or a fool or a criminal. The Communists and left-wing radicals called me a criminal, the bourgeois considered me a crazy man. That was how I was judged as a personality.

And despite all this, I had the conviction that at the end of this struggle I would emerge as absolute victor. At this time, many followers came to me as if propelled, many of them are sitting here now, and at this time the Reichs Marshal came too. Though he found himself in a very small framework, he was convinced that our beginning would probably win, because it had to win.

I mention that, gentlemen generals and officers, to make it clear to you that if a man has chosen such a life’s path, defeats of the kind that we are experiencing today cannot bother me at all. That cannot shake me. The only thing that often affects me personally are inner difficulties. Enemies can never crush me, never! In my whole life I never had to do, or could do, anything else, other than swim against a tremendously powerful current. I swam against this current and I was often pulled back again much faster. In the end, however, I was repeatedly able to produce success. And why? Because I was convinced that in the long run a correct, basically correct conviction – put forth fanatically and tenaciously – must lead to success. At the same time I must also stress something else. I place higher value, higher than on so-called understanding of an intellectual kind, higher even than genius, on stubbornness, stubborn tenaciousness, pursuing a cause, once recognised as correct, to the last breath, and never to give way under any circumstances and to shrink from nothing. I consider that the highest human virtue.

When I made this decision in 1918 and looked where I would be able to start, I plunged into the literature of my youth which was not available to me in my war years. I devoured Marxist literature, studied Das Kapital once again, to recall all its weaknesses to memory. I also formed the concept of a new world view for the new movement.

Now, this word “world view” is in the mouths of innumerable people, even then, and will continue to be mentioned. But I must
tell you quite briefly what a “world view” really is. It is a definition which in my view is quite necessary, since, as I said, the word is used too strongly, and in the end no longer meant anything certain or definite. “World view” is nothing other than a way of considering all the problems of this existence according to scientific knowledge, insofar as is available to us today. That means: I judge the problems of life in such a way as scientific knowledge permits us to do today, and whether that is an eternal truth may be left undecided for the moment. But there was a time when men were so far developed in their ability to perceive, that when they recognised that the lights in the firmament were moving lights, they were convinced that everything stood still, the Earth (which already in the ancient age was recognised as a globe by the Greeks) stands and the moving lights meant that the Earth was the centre of the world.

This Ptolomean system was a world view. It was incorrect, but it was an incredible step forward for humanity as compared to the stupid primitive manners of observation, let’s say, that of any Negro tribe living today. Then one day, over the course of centuries, a new, better science gains an insight, and this Ptolomean system of an Aristotle was overthrown by the genius of a Copernicus, wherein a new picture of the world arose.

It no longer places the Earth at the centre of the world, but rather, allows this earth as a planet to travel in a circle. Even this is in the meantime out of date, since even the sun is not a fixed sun, which stands still, but rather it moves, too, within the framework of the Milky Way system; the latter moves as a gigantic fog in some definite direction or other, according to a star system which is understood today, [or at least] one thinks.

Thus, scientific knowledge changes itself. The decisive thing is, for one to make the latest state of scientific knowledge one’s own and observe life’s problems from that point of view. It very often happens that that which men grasp as knowledge had [already] been grasped instinctively by men in prehistory, but over the course of many centuries and often millennia men lose their natural instincts, especially through unnatural racial crossings, and that only afterwards, on the path to a scientific recognition, can the correctness of the earlier instinctive views be re-established.

That is, a consideration of the entire event around us from the point of view of the most recent scientific knowledge! This necessarily leads to the following conclusion: If I recognise a view to be correct, then not only do I have a duty to communicate this perception to my fellow citizens in a State, but also to eliminate contrary perceptions! That may seem intolerant. But, gentlemen officers, all of life is intolerant. This is the lesson of nature. Nature is intolerant against everything that is not correct and therefore weak, in which case weaklings primarily become extinguished by themselves. Nature already eliminates, in the [illegible] struggle the damaged and the weak. Bitches immediately push weak puppies, who want to suck, away from themselves. Why? We do not know. But she allows it to die -- cruelly, as we human beings believe – in reality, however, [such perishing is] full of profound insight.

It is madness to imagine today that political views must be tolerant. Tolerance is only understandable as signs of inner insecurity. The moment that I am completely certain of a problem not only do I have the right to communicate the problem or this attitude, but rather the duty to eliminate the other [attitudes].

I must take a leap here to the point of view of an officer. When I say this as a politician, then I am expressing something which
forms the natural basis of an officer’s whole activity: since an officer can use everything except a “tolerant” point of view. That means that he, too, must recognise a problem, a task, a necessity, and then he has not only the right to obey this necessity, but the duty to ruthlessly eliminate everything else. Every officer will be faced with this task in the course of his leadership.

I might give you an example here: let’s take one problem away from you [wir nehmen Ihnen schon eine Aufgabe ab]. There are innumerable people who say, “We belong to such and such a [religious] sect, this sect forbids us to kill. We’ll become soldiers, but we won’t kill anybody.” That was an earlier problem that an officer had to deal with. On the one hand, based on his acceptance that our life is an eternal struggle, [it is his duty] to train the men entrusted to him for battle. But here, based on purely theoretical [and], for all I care, completely respectable principles, a man comes up to him and says: “I refuse to do that, I won’t kill anybody, [but]I can work in a room somewhere.” Now the officer stands faced with the question of dealing with that man.

But at this point they made the most cowardly decision that you can possibly imagine. They said: “A man who won’t fight, doesn’t want to shoot, we can’t use him”, and as a result the guy isn’t even armed; so he ceases to exist. In other words: we capitulate here in the face of one single guy, so as to avoid resolving a conflict.

Today, the State relieves you of this that is foreign to the State. It takes the view that since life is a struggle, an eternal struggle – a principle which every officer must adopt as his own, otherwise he can’t be an officer – a man who doesn’t want to shoot is unfit to live, is therefore eliminated [beseitigt], ruthlessly eliminated. The officer, despite the pre-selection which on the grounds of our world-view can isolate or destroy the man who refuses to shoot on ideological grounds, can also find himself in the same situation over the course of the struggle. That means a time may come when the coward, like any other ulcer, suddenly begins the inner poisoning of others, and at this point the officer, for his part, finds himself faced with the same problem all over again. You can understand it; one can even understand the individual man. You can say: he hasn't eaten for so long now, he's completely bedraggled, exhausted, hasn't had any sleep. And nevertheless one must find the hardness, in the interests of maintaining the armed forces, even just the company or the platoon, to proceed, and to break the man concerned, unmercifully if necessary, so that the nation may not be broken.

In your profession, it becomes as clear as it can possibly be, that knowledge not only entails a duty to educate, but also, if necessary, a duty to destroy, that is, that officers are also obligated to eliminate those who resist such an education.

There is no tolerance in nature. Nature, if I take tolerance as a human concept, is the most intolerant thing that exists. It destroys everything that is unfit for life. Whatever is not willing to defend itself, or unable to do so, is destroyed, and we are only a speck of dust in this nature, Man is nothing more than a small bacteria or little bacillus on such a planet. When a creature attempts to escape these laws, it doesn’t change the laws, rather, it ends its existence.

I therefore introduced this principle into the political life of Germany; [it’s] not new, since Bolshevism has long possessed these laws. But even Christianity has possessed this knowledge. I must point out to you, gentlemen: it is not an un-Christian principle, that which I represent here. Christendom destroyed other people, who did not wish to think in the prescribed way, just not so simply and quickly, as we do, but more slowly; we do it with a bullet, and there they did it using fire, they burned them. Therefore, that is a principle, which, in itself, was already introduced earlier.

I have recognised that one must also anchor this principle in the reconstruction of a strong German State; good and correct knowledge is not enought as the basis of the new education, but also the willingness to intolerantly destroy those who resist or will not accept it.

I have now begun to experiment in our own movement. This movement has been accused of being completely intolerant. But precisely because of this, because it obeyed a law of nature, it succeeded in achieving total victory in only 15 years, although the point of departure was as unpromising as it could possibly be: at the head, a leader who was completely unknown, poor, without a name, no press available, no good names available, no sympathy on any side, etc. And nevertheless it succeeded in leading this movement to victory, the proof of this is that here as well, the basic belief was correct, and that the implementation of this measure was correct as well.

When the final collapse occurred and I was convinced that the results of the collapse could be eliminated not by forming just one new party along with the others, or giving some bourgeois party a new injection of fighting spirit, I made my decision. Later I was often asked: “Why didn’t you go over to some bourgeois party?” Gentlemen, when a fighting group fails completely today, when it’s completely bad, it makes no sense to try to restore order in that unit, rather, you dissolve the unit, and build something completely new. I was of the same conviction, since followers and leadership must be born out of the same spirit.

Often people have confronted me with: “Why didn’t you join one of the other parties?” After all, the bourgeois parties are against Marxism too, they can use your abilities”. My abilities, yes, but I had no congenial leadership, and it had to be built up. I needed an apparatus capable of reacting to my orders, and the apparatus could only react if it arose from the same spiritual background [Geistesgut] upon which the Leader was building. That meant: they had to understand, [that] in the multi-party State there is nothing more to wish or hope for, as no fundamental reform is possible.

This collapse was not the result of military decay or disintegration, rather it was the result of the disintegration of the body of the German people [Volkskörper], an inner disintegration, which was naturally reflected on the front as well. While armies often collapse under the effects of overwhelmingly superior enemy forces or enemy weapons, but can be brought back into proper order by the hardness of a properly-led homeland, with us, during the World War, it happened the other way around. You couldn’t count on solving the problem with a few minor improvements in one party or another. You needed a new body of the German people, a reorganisation of the body of the people and secondly, at the same time, [you needed] a deliberate “struggle against degeneration!”

At the same time, then, a decision had to be made, namely: was the collapse of 1918 the end of the German nation (this was many peoples’ attitude, wasn’t it?) or was it—and this was my conviction—the beginning of a new body of the people? Didn’t we really need this collapse in order to liquidate a State of affairs which was intolerable in the long run anyway?

I must speak of the reasons [for this] very briefly. They lay mainly somewhat deeper than was generally visible. And even these problems are not suitable for discussion before the broad masses [of the German people]. In our country, we have a people that cannot be considered comparable [or equivalent] to a race, [wir haben bei uns ein Volk, das nicht gleichzusetzen ist einer Rasse] something that is perhaps already clear to millions of people: but, gentlemen, when I began my educational process almost 25 years ago, it wasn’t this way, but rather, many bourgeois groups repeatedly criticized me, saying “People and race are the same!” No, people and race aren’t the same. Race is a blood component, it’s the blood-based nucleus, but the people very often consist, not of one race, but of two, three, four or five different racial nuclei. [Nein, Volk und Rasse ist nicht dasselbe. Die Rasse ist ein Blutsbestandteil, ist the blutmä ssige Kern, aber das Volk setzt sich sehr oft nicht aus einer Rasse, sondern aus zwei, drei vier oder funf verschiedenen Rassenkernen zusammanen]. Nevertheless, it is not possible and not desirable to dissolve such a body of the people, but such a solution can occur over the course of political developments.

When one regards the German people from this point of view, as purely biological, then we see a union of peoples with the same language, consolidated through the circuitous route of State-formation – that is perhaps the decisive thing here – but of various racial origins; a Nordic racial nucleus, but Alpine elements are present as well, [also] Mediterranean racial nuclei, with a still-European base race in it all, a pre-historical [prehistoric] race which we are no longer able to identify specifically, but which is there, it was already there among the Greeks; the Helots of the Spartans consisted of them. This racial nucleus lies concealed in our people as well.

So we see a people that consists of various racial nuclei. These racial nuclei, in the individual, possess their special abilities; since the abilities lie, not primarily in the people, rather, they lie primarily in the race. That the German people now possesses many racial nuclei is shown, in the end, by the richness of its abilities, since all these racial nuclei carry certain inclinations in themselves: the Nordic racial nucleus a very coolly-inclined, mathematically proficient factor, the factor which until now generally organised countries on the earth, basically organizational. In addition, other racial nuclei with a strongly artistic gift, with a gift for the purely visual, the pictorial; then again, racial nuclei with a strongly musical gift, as well as racial nuclei with a strong commercial gift. The strongest of these racial nuclei which possessed such a commercial gift without creative activity in the German people long term, would be Jewry. Only with the difference that this Jewry did not arise as a racial nucleus among the German people, but rather that it would have gradually but completely disintegrated the German people.

We have now united this racial nucleus in our people. But it is now decisive for me, [since] the abilities of the German people are so great, to bring forth the leading racial nucleus among the various abilities. That means I must see that in the case of artistic abilities, the racial nucleus that is most artistically gifted in the German people gradually come to take a leading role everywhere.

Now, gentlemen, this won’t occur as the result of a [deliberate] selection, as if I had said: “Who looks artistic?” Rather, at this point the miraculous phenomenon appears, that music [Ton], in the end, finds its representative. That means if I hit a certain note, then the string on the piano which is tuned to that note, makes its appearance: and if I need proof of a certain ability, and allow free development to do its work, the elements who are really tuned for it naturally appear, based on their racial inclinations.

This is decisive, because for the leadership of a people, only the Nordic racial component has any real value. In the overall selection, this will always result in a uniform picture. But one must not assume a uniform picture in nature, since nature shows us here, that in the crossing of two different parents, the talents or abilities of the son must not always come from the father, or, in the case of the daughter, from the mother; rather, on the contrary, cross-connections must appear here, [so] that, if a Nordic man marries an Alpine woman, the child of the same sex need not be Nordic; rather, it can be completely Alpine, [so] that it is also very easily possible in any racial crossing for the organisational talent to be completely pushed into the background in favour of any other [talent].

But if I have an organisation of society based on purely capitalistic development, which has nothing to do with Nordic leadership talents, and it builds up an upper crust, then it can happen that the upper crust gradually represents completely non-Nordic people, [who are] mentally completely unfit for leadership.

That was the tragedy of the old German Reich. Here one could have the following experience, and I have often seen this, stopped on the highway at any construction site, along with two other cars, in one of which sat a rich Saxon industrialist, in the other another rich man, who, one could immediately see at a glance, had, of course, not the slightest Nordic admixture.

And the street worker by his side, let’s say anywhere in North Germany: the fantastic phenomena of this street worker's absolute contempt for the passengers of such a car, complete contempt! This street worker was in himself more fit to lead than the one that’s sitting in the car.

I can observe that politically! Naturally, if I look at it from a purely material point of view, like that of a pharmacist or a twine manufacturer, or from the point of view of a musician or a poet or a painter, then naturally you get a completely different picture.

People have sought out ordinary life in this manner. It is not intended as something to be prescribed for you as by a pharmacist, it’s not something transplanted into an economy; rather, life attracts those who are suited for it. But in political life, it’s different. Those who’ve come into wealth through some economic process have sent their children off to gain higher education. The inclinations of a child are just like those of his parents. Their common temperament is a purely commercial one, but because of his education he now joins the political ruling classes.

Then we have parties composed of people from the bourgeoisie. But this bourgeoisie is not primarily a racial term, but rather, primarily a purely economic concept: this bourgeoisie is composed largely of these elements, and the great danger is that slowly, through upbringing, which gradually becomes a work of art more than real education or better training, now generation after generation grows up and gradually they send representatives of themselves in all sectors as well, including even the officer corps, and in this manner the apparatus comes to be politically and militarily saturated with elements which would not normally be meant for it, who wouldn’t even normally feel suited for it and who invariably fail the first critical stress test. This produces those “umbrella patriots” with their top hats who wish to face off a dangerous crowd!

People who tell me, “Look, you can’t do that by force, you have to do that with the intellect”, that is, the people who possess the least amount of intellect themselves, who were never in a position to solve the problem themselves, capitulate before the slightest hullaballoo. As far as I’m concerned, they forget that there is enough strength in our people to start immediately taking care of such common riff-raff, who combined political with criminal ideology, and drive them off.

In just a few years, I succeeded in driving these people completely off the streets, but only because of a new leadership corps, when I told them: nobody gets into this party just because he’s got a business, or can show that he’s got a certain amount of money or high-class parents. Rather, in this party you rise to leadership if you’re able to lead, nobody cares where you come from, and this leadership ability is in demand and further trained.

But in order to implement this deliberately, gentlemen, officers and generals, I take all elements out of the body of the people who are somehow, let’s say, capable of forming the starting point of a contrary movement. So in my party, I have always made it a duty, since the very beginning, to look whether a man has showed some leadership talent somewhere; and this talent must be immediately drawn up and incorporated into the leadership of the State, to eliminate the “Spartacus” types, namely, the “unrecognised geniuses”, who will then, one day, because they weren’t deliberately inserted into the leadership from above, think they’re capable of leadership by themselves, and get the masses into their hands in no time because of their great “leadership abilities”; since the masses, for their part, understand immediately who’s capable of leadership and who isn’t; any school child understands that. You take a class of ten-year olds, enthusiastic, tough kids, and you put a teacher in that class who isn’t any good. The teacher has no idea how useless he is, but these kids know exactly. And then you give them a real leader, and you’ll see that these kids, who are busy making their teacher’s life miserable -- and that’s a law of nature – and I’ve got to say, they’ve been tormenting him and annoying him [the other one], [but] they’ll not only follow but this other one, but will do anything for him.

That’s an experience that I’ve had all over the country, especially in the armed forces, in which a leader is worshipped and can achieve anything with his soldiers, while another, who can’t keep shop, can’t maintain the slightest discipline. And why? Because this other one [he’s not] [illegible] our leader, not him! They reject him instinctively. If a company is bad, it’s not because the men are bad, but because the leadership is failing in some way. And that’s true for any military unit.

Building up the body of the people in such a way so that the people with real leadership ability get to the top of the political leadership, that’s what counts. To do this, gentlemen, I eliminated every precondition for a subsequent revolution. I’ve done that, of course, in a gigantic way, first, by building up the movement and then the German people. For this reason, you’ve got to look at my program in a different way, not like a purely bourgeois intellectual party leader.

People have often told me: “Why do you use such a radical tone in your program?” “Because I need radical people!” They told me: “Look, if you leave out this one point, then I’ll become a member right away”, and [my answer is] that point is in there, so that you can’t become a member, because I don’t want you!”

[Great applause]

I rejected a lot of people, people I didn’t want. I prevented innumerable people from entering the party, because I saw how they lived – they had never been leaders – because I knew perfectly well what I could expect from them. It’s no good to you, bringing weak people into your leadership, rather, the time will come when even just a few can cause endless trouble.

Of course there have been problems on the other side, too. It’s been that way all my life. The grey hair I’ve got now came from the inner struggle alone. What problems my own men have caused me! They’ve all got rough edges. When you get three of them together and leave them alone for a moment they start stabbing each other in the back; then it starts all over again. Nothing but trouble. I’d like to see things like that in the army. Just problems, just hard men and so on.

But you know: I prefer people who, under normal circumstances, when it thunders a bit outside, they make their own thunder to answer back, because I know: when it starts to thunder, they’ll all stand there firm as blocks of granite. And I’ve been proven right. Everybody’s got to admit that the leadership of this movement is different from the earlier governmental leadership. Just imagine any of the old bourgeois leaderships, instead of the leadership of the German people we’ve got now, and then let them suffer the stresses of the German nation today—you’d be amazed. [Today's leadership] not only got through the World War but repeated it, under ten times worse conditions. And what were the stresses of the World War compared to the stresses we’ve got to endure today? When you get twice as many deaths in a single night in a city like Hamburg, as in a month on all the German fronts put together, and the same city goes almost 100% back to work and all the women come streaming back into the city and everything takes place in perfect order, then that’s proof of the correctness of the way we’ve built up our leadership.

[Enthusiastic applause]

End of Part 1 - Continue to Part 2