Trudy Gold
Hitler in Munich: The Road to Power

Trudy Gold - Hitler in Munich: The Road to Power

- Well, good afternoon, evening, wherever you are, and welcome to a very dark lecture at a very, very dark time. But I do think, in many ways, the group that we have, we’re very supportive of each other, and I’d like to thank every one of you for everything you’re bringing to it. Now, Hitler came to Munich, as you know, in 1913. Ironically, he lived two blocks away from Lenin, who was later joined by Trotsky, who wrote “Iskra” from there. And of course, it’s from Munich that Hitler joined the army. And he very much felt, as an Austrian German, that he was a German. He joined the army, he was actually promoted to Corporal, and he was awarded the Iron Cross, mainly because his captain, who was a Jew, pushed for it. And he’s the subject of a gassing attack at the end of the war. And at the end of the war, he comes back to Munich, and what kind of city did he find? Now, before we get on to the revolutions in Munich, I’m just going to talk a little bit about the cultural life, because the great Lion Feuchtwanger, the author who wrote , who wrote “The Oppermanns,” he of course had lived in Munich. He was very lucky; when Hitler came to power in 1933, he in fact was in America, and he never went home. And this is what he wrote about his Munich after the war, after the first World War: “Previously, the beautiful, comfortable city attracted the best minds in the Reich.

How could it be that they were now gone? And in their place, everything that was rotten and evil could not make it elsewhere, fled as if by magic drawn to Munich.” And that is his comment on the city that he had once loved so much. So Hitler’s discharge from hospital after this terrible gassing attack on the 18th of November, 1918; and when he comes back to Munich, he comes back to a Munich, as I said, that is already engulfed in revolution. And he finds himself a job. He still works for the Army, and he’s going to be checking on all the extremist movements that are emerging in Bavaria and in the city. And he’s particularly interested in right-wing parties. And it’s all organised by the educational department of the Bavarian army under a man called Captain Karl Mayr, and he sends Hitler to the University of Munich to listen to all sorts of lectures on German nationalism. But what is actually happening in the city at the time? Can we please see the first of our slides, if you don’t mind, Judi? Yeah. Revolution breaks out. Now, it’s fascinating. I want you to try and imagine what it must have been like at the end of the First World War.

The Russian Revolution of course of 1917, the Bolshevik Revolution, the whole dream of Bolshevism is that as the old capitalist system would collapse, remember, “workers of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but your chains,” revolution was spread from country to country to country. The Habsburg Empire has collapsed, the German empire has collapsed, and what we see against the backdrop of misery, it’s almost incalculable to try and understand the impact of the first World War. We’re seeing pictures today that are filling us with absolute horror. Can you imagine that went on for four years? Four bloody years. The cream of a generation destroyed, their dreams destroyed. Liberalism was destroyed. Maybe the enlightenment was destroyed. But anyway, at the end of October, 1918, German soldiers began a series of revolts in Kiel, it spreads to sailors, other naval ports, civil unrest spreads across Germany. And on the 7th of November, 1918, which is the first anniversary of the Russian Revolution, Ludwig III, the heir to the Kaiser, he flees his palace, and Kurt Eisner, a politician of the Social Democratic Party becomes Minister President of the People’s Republic.

And can we please see a picture of Kurt Eisner? Yeah. I’m going to give you a little background some more, because I think it’s important that you begin to understand, really take on just how communism was seen as a Jewish affair. I can stand on one foot until I’m blue in the face and say that if you join the Communist Party, you’ve thrown away your Jewishness. It’s irrelevant to you, but the point is the majority of people who led the revolutions were born Jewish. And for those who are threatened by it, who hate it, the revolution is Jewish. His dates are 1867-1919. He’s born in Galicia to Emanuel Eisner and Hedwig Levenstein; he studied philosophy, he became a journalist, and he was a contributing editor to the Frankfurter Zeitung. He wrote many articles attacking Wilhelm II. As a response, he was sent to prison for nine months. He joined the Socials Workers’ Party in 1898. He was the editor of a very left-wing journal, also editor of the “Fränkische Tagespost,” and afterwards, he’s freelance in Munich. He breaks away and joins an even more leftist group In 1917. He’s convicted of treason in 1918 for inciting a strike at a munition workers factory; nine months in jail, and he’s released in the October of 1918. And after release, he is the man behind the end of Wittelsbach rule in Munich, Remember, he is an artist, he’s a writer; he is the man who leads the first revolution. He was one of the most incredibly unlikely revolutionaries you can ever imagine.

I should mention that Ludwig III, he flees by night, one of the princesses wraps the Munich crown jewels, the Wittelsbachs of course, this is Ludwig of Bavaria, his descendants, she wraps them up in a handkerchief and took a box of cigars and the Wittelsbachs flee, and the family actually had to hire a chauffeur, a car and a chauffeur, because their chauffeur had joined the revolution. They reached safety in Hungary and never went back to Bavaria. So, let’s talk about this totally unlikely revolutionary. Coffee house socialist and anarchist, he’s been called. He was actually delivering a speech at the time of the annual Oktoberfest. Going back to the reign of Ludwig I, when he married, the Oktoberfest becomes one of the great parts of the Munich calendar. And I’ve actually went to the Hofbräuhaus because I just wanted to see what it was like. Imagine a beer hall that can hold 3,000 people, and imagine everyone drinking from steins. It’s actually quite terrifying. So he makes a speech where the city usually hosted the Oktoberfest. He’s so fired up the crowd with his rhetoric that they stormed the stations, the train stations, the newspaper offices, and other places around town. Took over all the main bierkellers and the revolution. The Wittelsbachs have fled, there is now a socialist revolution. And he said, “Isn’t it wonderful that we have a revolution without shedding a drop of blood?” His inaugural celebration of the revolution, the Munich Philharmonic was conducted by Bruno Walter. They played Beethoven’s Leonore Overture.

A group of actors performed from a play by Gerta. The chorus sang from Handel’s Messiah. It even concluded with a hymn that Kurt Eisner, remember, he’s a writer and a poet, he himself had composed, “Hymn to the People.” You can make the case that he is a drama critic staging his own performance. Berlin’s major socialist paper said “The curtain will fall down very quickly and it will be over.” And Ernst Toller, who later, is another revolutionary, “The world must become a meadow of flowers in which everyone can pick up his share.” What happens is that very quickly, you see, unfortunately, there’s huge unrest and he can’t really get anything to work. And also he’s distanced himself from the Bolsheviks, declaring his government would protect property rights. Remember, he’s an extreme socialist. He still believes he wants to hold the people together, and to do that he wants to protect property rights. And because of the absolute collapse of the city, he was unable to provide basic services. And in January, 1919, the Weimar government went to the polls for the first time, the first ever democratic elections in Germany, and in his lender, he only came in sixth place. So he was prepared to give up power. But on the 21st of February, on his way to announce his resignation, he was assassinated by a right-wing nationalist, a man called Anton Graf von Arco auf Valley. It’s lawlessness.

So he’s actually assassinated by a right-winger. Lawlessness really spreads. You can imagine, Munich University is closed down, aristocrats are actually being kidnapped, and then on the 7th of March, there’s a new leader, a man called Hoffman. And by the night of the 7th, he can’t hold, of 1919, the communists and anarchists energised by Béla Kun, they take power with a man called Toller as head of state. Can we see the next slide, please? Ernst Toller. Now Ernst Toller was a writer and a poet, another poet revolutionary, and of course also Jewish. And this is one of the problems, as I said; you’ve had one Jew assassinated, and now you have a rival, a man called Toller who is a communist. Now what had happened, think about Trotsky’s dream of permanent revolution. The Jew Bronstein Trotsky, they believed that once they took the revolution in Russia, with the collapse of all the old empires, all of the countries would fall. And it nearly happened, you know. There was revolution in Saxony, there was revolution in Berlin led by Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg. There was revolution in Hungary led by Béla Kun, who also was Jewish, as was Rosa Luxembourg. So this picture of Jews and communism goes on. So now you have the Bavarian Socialist Republic ruled by Toller, Landauer and Erich Mühsam. Now Toller, he called it the Bavarian Revolution of Love.

It was an absolutely impossibly bad government. Let me give you an example. One of the ministers, Jewish, was appointed Minister of Education in Catholic Bavaria where the schools are run by the church. So, this lasts for six days. It’s total chaos. The services have all gone to pot. There are no trains, nothing’s working. The water supply, nothing’s working. And then there’s another revolution, and this time it is the Communist Party from Russia. A man called Eugene Levine. Can we see Eugene Levine? Yeah. There you have Eugene Levine. He becomes the new head of state. And he has the blessing of Lenin, who at the Mayday Celebration in Red Square said, “The liberating working class is celebrating its anniversary, not only in Soviet Russia, but in Soviet Bavaria.” Now, Levine was a real hardcore communist, and he believed in those very hardcore Soviet reforms, which included forming a Red Army. Just as Trotsky, Commissar of Foreign Affairs, had created the Red Army, he took the men from the factories, workers, he seized cash from the aristocracy, from anyone with wealth, they had their money taken away, he expropriate food, supplies, he expropriate luxury apartments, gave them to the homeless and placed the factories under the control of the workers. And he does it very, very quickly.

One of the main churches in very bourgeois Catholic Munich was taken over and dedicated to the Goddess of Reason. And also his idea was that all workers were to receive military training. He planned to abolish paper money and completely reform the whole situation, the whole education system. He wanted a world where he would harshly take control. But at this stage, they still believed that once they took control and gave the workers a control in the state, but remember, it’s a one party state, then in the end, justice would come to the fore. The tragedy was there were total food shortages. There was no milk, there are children. This is what the government said: “What does it matter? Most of it goes on the children of the bourgeoisie. We are not interested in keeping them alive, they will only grow into enemies of the proletariat.” And basically, president Ebert, he’s broad left, but he is in control of the Weimar Republic, he gives the order that we must suppress this government. And in fact, what happens is a group organised by the Thule Society, and I’ll talk about them in a minute, along with a right-wing combat league organised a counter coup on the 13th of April. But it’s put down by the new Red Army of factory workers and members of the Soldiers and Workers’ Council. The military clash, this is foreboding, was actually at Dachau, which is a very pretty little suburb of Munich, really, it’s about 12 kilometres outside. And later on it’s going to be the site of the first of the Nazi concentration camps. So there are military caches, and a group called Freikorp. These are right-wing army people under the control of right-wing captains who are really working on the initiative of the central government in Weimar.

It’s interesting; why was the government in Weimar? Because Berlin was too unstable. I’m trying to give you an atmosphere of a society that is really, really fractured. Now how do the majority of people actually deal when a society is totally fractured? Now, what happens is the military, the Freikorp close in, but whilst this is all happening, on the 26th of April, the communists invade the headquarters of the Thule Society and arrest one of the aristocrats there, Countess Hella von Westarp and six others, takes them in as hostages. Now, they panic, and three other hostages from the elite aristocrats of Munich, including Prince Gustav of Thurn and Taxis, are actually executed by this left-wing group. The Freikorp break through on the 1st of May, street fighting, at least 600 people were killed, of whom 335 were civilians. Levine was arrested, he’s condemned to death and he’s executed. Of the group that he was with, there were seven of the main leaders; every one of them was born a Jew. Toller was given five years in prison, Mühsam 15 years. Toller of course goes off to America where he becomes a very important writer. He commits suicide in 1939. And on the 14th of August, 1919, the Freikorp clears it up and we have a right-wing government, the most right-wing government in Bavaria in the whole of Germany. Now, this whole period of chaos is known as the road of horror. And now, I want to read you from an eyewitness who was there. Let me just find it, cause it’s very important. This is from an eyewitness, a man called Eugenio Pacelli.

His dates are 1876-1958. Many of you will know who he eventually became. But I’m just going to read what he said first. “The scene was indescribable,” he’s talking about Levine’s government. “The confusion totally chaotic. In the midst of all this, a gang of young women of dubious appearance, Jews like the rest of them hanging around. The boss of this female rabble was Levine’s mistress, a young Russian woman and a Jew and a divorcee, and it was to her that the nunciature was obliged to pay homage in order to proceed. Levine is a young man, also Russian and a Jew. Pale dirty, with drugged eyes, totally repulsive.” Now, of course, that man later became Pius XII. He became, at that time, he was the Papa Monsieur in Bavaria. He’s called back to Rome, and not long after Hitler comes to power, he becomes the Papa Monsieur for Foreign Affairs. He negotiates a treaty with Hitler in July, 1933, a non-aggression treaty. And of course, he is the wartime pope. So he is a witness to what is going on. And he already is a very conservative man. And he developed a terrible fear of communism. And you know, when SS people were interviewed, this took a long time because at first nobody wanted to take testimony from perpetrators. The majority of them gave the reason, I’m talking about the ranking officers, gave the reason for joining was their horror of bolshevism, their horror of communism. And the tragedy was that they saw communism as Jewish. Now that’s the first background I want to set. And now we need to really talk about the growth of the right, because this kind of atmosphere exacerbates the polarisation of politics.

Don’t forget, that it’s the end of a war, the country is in chaos. The Weimar Government, which is a broad left government, and this is important; it’s the first ever fully democratic government elected in Germany’s history. The Constitution was incredibly liberal, it was actually written by another Jew, a man called Hugo Preuss, a brilliant lawyer and a socialist. Bavaria has emerged as the most right-wing of the governments, and there’s chaos. Food shortages, please don’t forget the pandemic at the time. People coming back from the front, like Hitler. And what kind of world is there to take in? So, can we see the next slide, please? Munich. I’m first going to talk briefly about society. I’ve already mentioned to you when I looked at Vienna. The Thule Society was a society. It’s based on the kind of teachings of List and Liebenfels, and it’s named for a mythical northern country in Greek legend. And many of the early members in Munich are characters like Hess, who of course is going to become Hitler’s loyal secretary, Rosenberg, who I’ve already mentioned to you. Rosenberg is going to become, if you like, the idiolog of the Nazi party. Hans Frank, later the governor of Poland, who it becomes an important lawyer in the Nazi party. And a man called Dieter Eckhart. The founder was a man called Rudolf von Sebottendorf. And when you joined, you signed the blood and oath declaration. “To the best of my knowledge, that no Jewish or coloured blood flows in either my or my wife’s veins.” They’d swallowed whole all this notion of Aryan supremacy, blood, all these kind of crazy ideas that were already sweeping around Vienna, and of course was exacerbated by the first World War.

There were 250 members in Munich. 1,500 members in the whole of Bavaria. And of course, it was their headquarters that were raided by the Communists. And they, as I already told you, they took seven of their members, including two important aristocrats. So, “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.” One of the most pernicious, nasty, evil books in the history of the whole of the written word. Now, why am I talking to you about a Russian conspiracy theory that came out of Russia? Why am I talking to you? Because it’s going to become very important in Munich. And in the course of the Russian Civil War, bearing in mind that after the communist takeover, Trotsky’s leading the Red Army, disaffected army officers who still wanted the czar, who wanted that regime back, they were fighting, they’re known as the Whites. And a whole corpus of anti-Semitic legends and forgeries are built up. For example, the idea that the Bolsheviks had received millions of dollars from Jacob Schiff. Why Jacob Schiff? Because in 1905, he had tried to persuade the American government to exert itself, to help the Jews in the pogroms. So he was considered one of the Elders of Zion. The protocols of the Elders of Zion is based on a whole set of conspiracy theories that the leaders of Zion, whoever they are, gather in a graveyard; there are lots of different versions of this, and they plot together, the graveyard is usually in Prague, and they plot together to take over the world.

They’ve taken over communism, they’ve taken over capitalism, they’ve taken over the press, they’ve taken over everything. And what’s it all about? It’s for them to take over the world. And so that they can destroy, they have kept their blood pure and they are going to take over the whole world. And of course, it’s added to that layer of church antisemitism as well, so it is a very, very dangerous book. Now, by 1919, The Protocols begin their world journey, because when the Germans pull out of the war, don’t forget the Germans sign a peace treaty with the Russians, the Brest-Litovsk. And never forget that it is the Commissar for Foreign Affairs, Bronstein Trotsky, who signs that deal with the high command of the German army. When the German army retreated, many of the Whites went with them. And after the collapse of the White Army, many of them fled. So I want you to imagine capitals like Munich, they’re full of White Russian aristocrats who are mixing with the German aristocrats. And tragically, books like “The Protocols” become absolutely common currency. Can we see the next picture, please? This is Pyotr Nikoloevich Shabelsky Berk. He and his colleague, Vinberg were total fanatics, and they are the ones that are responsible for bringing The Protocol to Munich. His story is very similar to that of many of these right-wing fanatics. He was born in the in 1893. His father was a rich landowner, and his mother was already rich, in which the czar, Nicholas II was in fact the president. And she was the editor of a periodical called “The Black Hundreds.”

She herself was an author of a terribly antisemitic tract, called “The Satanists of the 21st Century.” He joined the union at a very early age. He served as an officer in the Czarist army. And in September, 1918, according to him, he claimed to inquire into the murder of the Imperial family. It was actually discovered that the Empress Alexandra had a copy of The Protocols by her bedside. And of course, the man who gave the order for the murder of the Imperial family was in fact a Jew, Sverdlov. His partner, Vinberg, was a son of a general. So they make it to the west. When the Germans evacuate the Ukraine, they provide trains for them and they come to Germany in the midst of a revolution. And a man called Prince , he raised money, he was one of the German aristocrats who raised money for the dissemination of The Protocols. He raised money actually from the Prussian diet. And it seems that some of the members of the Imperial family also contributed. This is the dedication. “To the princes of Europe, may our avenger arise someday from our bones.” And Prince Albrecht of Prissia gave copies to the staff at any hotel he went to. And the Kaiser, remember, Kaiser Wilhelm II, who by this time is living the life of a gentleman farmer in Holland, he swallowed it whole. When he abdicated, he said it’s because of the communists, the Freemasons and the Jews. Now The Protocols was even reviewed in the London Times.

And the review said, “Have we escaped a Pax Germanica to fall under the sway of a Pax Judaica?” Now, later on, through the work of a Jewish journalist called Lucien Wolf, and an incredible other journalist, a man called Graves, who was the uncle of the Graves, the great writer, it was discovered to be a forgery and the London Times did print a retraction. But this book goes on and on and on. I have three copies of it. One I bought on a civil rights, believe it or not, in New York, an activist civil rights. It’s horrible. I don’t even want to talk about it. A student got me one undercover from the mosque in Regents Park, and another one I bought in a bookshop. So basically, The Protocols, it’s been translated into 120 languages, and it’s still a very, very important document. General Ludendorff, who’s going to become very important in the story, swallowed it whole. He is living in Munich, he’s got an estate just outside Munich. So the feted atmosphere, you have a whole group of right-wingers, the Protocols are spreading, and this is a professional politician, Count Ernst zu Reventlow, who’s a leading member of the Volkisch Bloc. He later on is going to join the German Workers’ Party. He profligated The Protocols in his own newspaper. It’s called “Guardians of the Reich.” And this is what he wrote: “It reveals a plot to destroy Christianity. The great struggle has begun. This book will bring salvation to our people.” So, this is going to be a very, very important part of the story. Now, can we move on, please, with the slides, Judi? Yeah.

What happens is Hitler has already come to Munich, he is now working for the right-wing officer within the German army investigating right-wing parties. This feted atmosphere is spreading. And Hitler goes to investigate one such group, which calls itself the German Workers’ Party. They meet in bierkellers. You need to know that there are hundreds of such groups. Just think of the soldiers coming back from the front. There were over a million wounded soldiers, you know. If you want to try and get the atmosphere through the visual arts, look at the work of Otto Dix, his incredible tryptic. If you think of the Cabaret Life, because against the backdrop to this terrible depression, what do you think is going on? There’s jazz, which was considered degenerate. There was overt sexuality, there was cross-dressing. Just think Weimar. And then you have the poverty, you have the war wounded, you have prostitution, so overt because women can’t keep themselves. Society in inverted commerce is degenerating. And what is it this doing to the right-wing aristocrats? And of course the right-wing generals like General Ludendorff, one of the great war heroes, who never believed that Germany was really defeated. It was all in fact a horrible plot. So, what happens is Hitler goes to investigate the German Workers’ Party. And it’s one of those strange little groups, and it’s a German Workers’ Party. It’s for nationalism and for socialism. It’s a nationalistic party, but it’s a party of the working class, or to try and attract the working classes, I should say. Because don’t forget, that amongst the working class, many of them are extreme left.

So it’s the polarisation of politics. Can we go on with our pictures, please? This is Count Ernst zu Reventlow who is the man who I’ve already mentioned, that he was very much involved in the dissemination of The Protocols, and he’s going to be very important in funding the German Workers’ Party. And can we go on, please? There you see Theodor Fritsch, who I’ve already mentioned to you. If you like, he was also very wealthy. He had built up a huge publishing empire and he is the first man to publish The Protocols and other right-wing papers. Can we go on, please, Jude? Ah, Henry Ford. Now why is he in there? Because Henry Ford, in America, he swallowed The Protocols whole, and he writes his own book, “The Eternal Jew,” and he is going to become very supportive of this particular group. Can we go on, please, Judi? Alfred Rosenberg. Alfred Rosenberg from the Baltic States, a fanatical right-winger, a fanatical nationalist. He came from Riga. He made his first important speech in the Hall of the Blackbirds. These right-wingers, as they see their countries under attack from communism, he comes to Germany, he comes to Munich, and he’s going to become one of the early members of the German Workers’ Party. He is going to become the major theorist of the Nazi Party. The German Workers’ Party is later going to change its name to the Nazi Party. Remember, it’s nationalism and socialism. Just as Houston Stewart Chamberlain had written “The Foundations of the 19th Century,” Alfred Rosenberg writes “The Foundations of the 20th Century,” and it’s all about bloodline. He was a fanatic, he was a Volkisch fanatic.

He was very anti-Christian because Christianity is a leveller. He believed in blood and power and might. And a lot of these characters, the characters in the Thule Society, they were oculists, they believed in this Aryan philosophy. It’s tied up with , it’s a very, very strange group of individuals, all with a huge axe to grind, all feeling completely displaced and dispossessed. And can we go on, please? Here you have Dieter Eckhardt. He was a Bavarian, a poet, and he, in many ways is the godfather of national socialism, and he’s going to mentor the young Adolf Hitler, because Adolf Hitler, when he investigates the party, this is when he’s going to be embraced by all these characters. He was born just outside in Nuremberg. He was the son of quite an upper class family. His father was a royal notary and a lawyer. The family were devout. His mother died young. He was expelled from many schools, when his father died, he was left an awful lot of money. He studied law, then he studied medicine at the University of Munich, he becomes part of the student fraternity, fencing, drinking. He decided on a literary career. He becomes a morphine addict. He moves to Berlin. He becomes a protege of the Prussian Royal Theatre. He writes many, many plays. He’s a hard liver. He’s imprisoned after a duel. Ha adapted “Peer Gynt,” which was a great success, but he never really has another great success, and he always blames the Jews for his lack of success. With “Peer Gynt,” he made it a very nationalistic, antisemitic play. His version of “Peer Gynt,” you have the Germanic heroes strung in against the Jewish and Marxist trolls.

You add a bit of Wagner to this and you can see how the racial cocktail is coming. He blames the Jews for everything. And after a period of real wandering around in Berlin, he returns to Munich, he tries to get into politics. It was he who invents the battle cry, “Germany, awake!” It’s the title of one of his poems, and he is the first poet of the new movement. And in 1919, he becomes the publisher and the writer of the National Socialist Weekly, which attacks the Treaty of Versailles, it attacks profiteers, bolshevism, social democracy. And its early contributors were characters like Alfred Rosenberg. And he helped obtain the funds, which later enables Hitler after he joins the movement and takes it over, to buy the Volkischer Beobachter, which is going to become the official organ of the German Workers’ Party. He had a huge influence on Adolf Hitler, who admired him very much as his teacher, his father figure, and in fact, it was him, along with a man called , who introduces the young Hitler to Munich Society. They improved his social graces, they groomed him. And “Mein Kampf,” when Hitler in prison wrote “Mein Kampf,” he dedicated it to Dieter Eckhardt. He in January, 1919, with a man called Feder and a man called Anton Drexler, he actually founds the German Workers’ Party.

And this is Anton Drexler. But this is what Eckhardt wrote when he first met Hitler. Hitler made a speech for the German Workers’ Party. “I felt myself attracted by his whole way of being, and very soon I realised he was exactly the right man for the movement.” Eckhardt was very much involved with the Fuhrer Society, and they were awaiting the German Messiah. In 1921, just going back a little to Eckhardt, he promised 1,000 marks to anyone who could cite one Jewish family whose sons had served longer than three months at the front. And Rabbi Samuel Freund actually decided to go against him, and he named 20 families and Sued Eckhardt when he refused to pay. And during the trial, the rabbi actually named 50 more families who had actually lost up to three sons in the war. So, by the time of the Putsch though, Eckhart is already seriously ill, his health was actually undermined by drunkenness and morphine addiction. He died of heart disease and he’s buried in Berchtesgaden. But he was very much Hitler’s mentor for a while. And now can we turn to Anton Drexler. No, can we go back to Drexler, please? Thank you. He was a machine fixer, he was the worker; a tool maker, a locksmith. He didn’t serve in World War I because he was unfit for service. He joined the German Fatherland Party, a very short-lived right-wing rabble rousing party. He was very strong in supporting the stab-in-the-back myth, and he defamed those politicians as the November criminals. And in March, 1918, he founded a branch of the Free Workers’ Committee for a Good Peace. He was also on the fringe of the Thule Society.

And they are all part of this Workers Society, and then together, with Eckhart and this other man Gottfried Feder, they created the German Workers’ Party that meets in bierkellers. And it was them that together, when Hitler goes to investigate them, he likes it. And remember, Hitler’s already done a training course at Munich University, which is funded by Karl Mayr. And Feder, the other member was actually the man he listened to and later on became his mentor in finance and economics and inspired his opposition to what Hitler called Jewish Finance Capitalism. Also around the German Workers’ Party was Hess. Later on, it’s going to be, in the very early days, it’s going to be joined by Julius Streicher. It’s going to be joined by Göring, who’s a war ace. And it’s Drexler who actually persuades Hitler to join the party. Hitler checks with his army superiors, he does, and he proves to be the most brilliant orator. And can we please see the next slide, please? Now, this is one of the most peculiar episodes in the whole story of that bizarre, evil story. This is a man called Erik Jan Hanussen. Well, that’s what he claimed to be. He claimed to be a Danish aristocrat. His parents were actors, they were really travelling actors. They travelled Austria, they travelled Italy. After World War I, I’ve told you there’s a lot of feigning for occultism, mind reading, hypnosis; and he becomes incredibly successful, and he performs in Berlin, and that catapults him to stardom.

Evidently, he was a very well-trained hypnotist. He could read minds. He becomes a serious player in that sort of demimonde world. He was very charismatic. And at the height of his fame, he enjoys the company of the top ranking German military, business leaders. And it’s he who, in Munich, teaches Hitler crowd control techniques and how to use his dramatic power. Now, he also lent money later on to the Nazi elites. The problem was, his real name was Hershmann Chaim Steinschneider. His father, Siegfried, had once been a synagogue caretaker who had married a woman called Antonie Kohn, who was a singer from Vienna. He was later murdered in 1933. Nobody’s quite sure who murdered him. It could have been Goebbels, it could have been Göring, who were both rivals for Hitler’s affections. But that, I think, in many ways is one of the most bizarre parts of the whole extraordinary story. So Hitler joins the German Workers’ Party. He quickly takes it over. He deposes Drexler, he takes over the party, and they come up with their manifesto, the German Workers’ Party, and they change the name to the Nazi party. I haven’t really got time to read you all of the clauses. You can find them online. So may I suggest that you could actually look at them online, because I think it’s quite important that you actually see what this is all about. And remember, at this stage it’s a tiny little party, and Hitler joins as member number 55. And it’s pretty well straightforward. “We demand the union of all Germans to form a greater Germany on the basis of people’s right to self-determination.”

He wants German-Austria to be joined with Germany. They want the Treaty of Versailles and St. Germain to be annulled. They want land and territory. They want their colonies back. Number four, members of the nation may be citizens of the state. Those of German blood can be. Now remember, this is 1920. No Jew may be a member of the nation. “Whoever has no citizenship,” which means Jews, “will be able to live in Germany only as a guest and as regarded as being subject to foreign laws.” Only the people who are citizens can vote. Seven; “We demand the state to be charged first by providing livelihood and way of life for citizens. If it’s impossible to nourish the total population, then the members of foreign nations must be excluded.” “All immigration of non-Germans must be prevented. We demand that all non-Germans who have immigrated to Germany since the 2nd of August, 1914, be required immediately to leave the Reich.” These, of course, are the Austrians, who are fleeing the appalling pogroms in Eastern Europe. Can you go onto the next slide, please, Judi? Land reform. They’re against speculation. “We demand anyone who’s been a war profiteer be punished by death.” Now, although it was never the case, the right-wing fascist believed all the profiteers were Jews. I don’t really know what the next clause means. “We demand German common law in place of Roman Law.” But that of course is the law of the gods. Wagner, Chtho-mania, if you like.

Now this is fascinating, the next clause. “The state is to be responsible for a fundamental reconstruction of our whole education system. Enabling every capable and industrious German to attain higher education. The plan of instruction are to conform to the experiences of practical life. The comprehension of the concept of the state must be striven for by the school as early as the beginning of understanding. Children must be loyal to the state.” This is very important. But, if you are gifted children of poor parents, remember, it’s national socialism. The next clause: “The state is to care for the elevating national health by protecting the mother and child, by outlawing child labour, by the encouragement of physical fitness, by means of the legal establishment of a gymnastics and sports, by the utmost support of all organisations concerned with the physical instruction of the young.” What they want is physically fit and obedient minds who are servants of the state. And of course, this very much ties in with all the Volkisch notion of the love of the beautiful Bavarian countryside; the mountains, the lakes, the fireside chats. Just get your mind into all of this. “We demand the abolition of mercenary troops and the formation of national army.” Don’t forget the Freikorp are going to support Hitler, and out of it will come the SA under Ernst Röhm, who is Freikorp, but this is not the point.

I’m jumping a lot. “The first obligation of every system must be to productively work mentally or physically. The activity of the individual may not clash with the interest of the whole.” So it’s about the state taking total priority over the individual. It’s national socialism. “Abolition of unearned work.” No interest anymore. No stocks and shares. This is anti-capitalist. All war profiteers are finished. “We demand nationalisation of all businesses.” “We demand that profits from the wholesale trade be shared up.” The notion was, you see, not only are all Jews communists, all Jews are capitalists. And certainly what is true, 80% of the department stores in Germany were controlled by Jewish families. Jews are in what we would call the usual professions. “We demand the expansion of a large scale, old age welfare.” It’s not a very good translation, but nevermind, you understand what they’re saying. “A healthy middle class and its conservation. Communization of the great warehouses.” Actually, this should be the great department stores, “and being leased at low cost to small firms, the utmost consideration of all small firms in contract with the state, county or municipality.” We’re going to look after the artisans. We’re going to look after the small, little man as opposed to the big corporations. “We demand legal opposition to known lies and their promulgation through the press.” We are not going to have any fake news anymore. The press is going to be controlled.

All writers, employees of newspapers appearing in the German language must be members of the race. “Non-German newspapers be required to have expressed permission of the state to be published. They may not be printed in the German language.” Now, this is important; a Jew cannot be a German. And also, if you look at a clause further down, freedom of religion. “We demand freedom of religion for all religious denominations within the state as long as they do not endanger its existence or oppose it, the moral senses of the German race.” Now, let me say, Hitler is anti-religion. Rosenberg is anti-religion, the theorist of the Nazi party. But the point is he’s going to do deals with everybody. So he’s going to say positive Christianity. But the last part, “It combats the Jewish-materialistic spirit within and around us and has convinced that a lasting recovery of our nation can only succeed within on this framework.” So that’s the German Workers’ Party. I said to you, when I looked at Hitler in Vienna, of course he was antisemitic. When did it become murderous? I think the turnover is in Munich. And of course it’s when he’s in prison for an attempted putsch on Munich. Although he had much support, he didn’t have enough. We’ll talk more about that at another time. And the point is, when he’s in prison, look, he goes on trial, he tries a putsch, he goes on trial for treason. But a very conservative judge gives him five years, it’s commuted to nine months, he’s given freedom of Lindsborg Castle, he’s given a secretary, Hess, he’s visited by Richard Wagner, he’s visited by the singer heiress, he’s visited by , wife. He writes “Mein Kampf,” my struggle.

And at the core is hatred of the Jew. It’s important to remember, Hitler didn’t use antisemitism. Antisemitism is absolutely at the core of his policies. And at this stage, the Nazi party is a little party. But coming out of prison, he decides, and I should also mention, his prison, the fact that Ludendorff was part of the putsch, one of the great war heroes, the foreign press was all over the trial. So little Munich, and for the first time Hitler’s name appears in the foreign press. He becomes famous. Coming out of prison, he decides to go for the ballot box. He’s totally undemocratic, but he’s going to use democracy to take power. And he doesn’t do very well at the beginning, because after 1924, the Americans intervene, the Dawes Plan, and they actually try and bolster up Germany’s finances. When Hitler arrived in Munich, the worst year was actually 1922, 1923; where at the beginning of the year, the dollar bought you, I think it was 18,000 marks. By the end of the year, it was a trillion. So just take that on. So it’s in this collapse of society that extremism comes. And also, remember Hitler with his brilliant demagoguery, he turns out to be this brilliant rabble rouser, what Robert Wistrich called the “Dark Messiah,” but a German Messiah, a Chthonic Messiah, with a sword in his band. So I felt even though we’d been dealing with the Habsburg Empire, I felt that I needed to do one more continuing lecture on this, because it’s important that you don’t think that Hitler swallowed everything in Vienna. It’s the seed bed, but it’s in Munich that it comes together. So, thank you very much. And as ever, Judi, thank you so much for helping with the slides. And let’s have a look at the questions.

Q&A and Comments:

Oh, we’re having some very, very nice thank yous. So thank you very, very much. People who listened to the Jeffrey Veidlinger interview really thought he was wonderful. And he’s agreed to do some sessions when we do Russia. Oh, yes, and the AJC discussion;

Jean is saying it gave a glimmer of hope. Wendy with Lockdown University is doing everything she possibly can to keep us all intellectually and mentally safe.

Q: Arlene, “Was Hitler always crazy or did gassing and his subsequent contribute greatly to his?”

A: Arlene, “Was Hitler a psychopath? Was he a psychotic?” I don’t want to answer that question, frankly, because the answer is, I don’t know. I really don’t know.

Q: “Is history repeating itself? The left getting more and more progressive in the right getting more and more.”

A: What is certainly happening is that politics are polarising again.

Q: “Have we learned nothing?”

A: I cannot answer that question either. I pray that we have.

Q: Oh yes, Ron, “Is it correct that the main Jewish communists had lost their Jewishness?

A: They were not practising Jew.” Of course not; just think of Marx: “Religion is the opium of the masses.” They were international. They’d thrown their Jewishness away. But if you believe in race and blood, they were seen as Jews.

Q: “Is there actually any real connection between Judaism and communism or is it just that the aforementioned communists are Jews?”

A: That is a fascinating question, Tim. I’m going to give you a very quick, glib answer, but it’s a really important answer. And in fact, Dennis Davis will be giving a lecture on a subject, he’s calling it the Non-Jewish Jew, which is a book written by the great Isaac Deutscher, who was a Trotsky. Now the point is, you can certainly say that within Judaism there is a great deal of social justice, but the minute you become a communist, you throw your Judaism away. It’s true that many Jews as double outsiders saw the injustice of the world. And I think believing Judaism, they didn’t feel they could be part of the world that they saw as corrupt. And because they were literate, that’s why they’re so prominent, because in the main communist movements are working class movements.

Q: “Where, why and by whom were The Protocols written?”

A: Martin, I’m going to have to save that question, because when we do Russia, I will be doing a whole session on The Protocols because it’s important. Suffice to say, it came out of Russia at the time of Nicholas II. And it probably first appeared in Paris around the Dreyfus Affair. There’s a brilliant book on The Protocols; there are many books on The Protocols. “Warrant for Genocide” by Norman Cohn. “The Lie That Wouldn’t Die” by professor Itto, Ben oh, what was the name, an Israeli historian. It’s called “The Lie That Wouldn’t Die,” you’ll get it on the net. And also Steve Zipperstein wrote a brilliant book on the Kishinev Pogrom, which was also inspired partly by The Protocols.

Oh, and Susan’s saying they sell them on Amazon. Yes, it’s a filthy book. Yes, I know, The Protocols are taught in many places where the Jews are seen as the enemy. They were actually serialised on Egyptian television.

“Protocols, referring to this as a forgery implies it’s an unauthorised copy.” It’s a total fabrication. Shall I call it a fabrication, Ron? Yes, I like this. Ron has described it as a fabrication or as an elaborate conspiracy theory. I think that’s better, yes.

Q: Bernard’s asking, “Pavel Krushevan, instigator of the Kishinev Pogrom, was publisher, co-author, possibly so also of The Protocols.”

A: He certainly was responsible for one version, but there was another version by Sergei Nilus. So it’s a complicated question. Yes, The Protocols was plagiarised from a satire by Napoleon III, written by Maurice Joly, that is also true. I’ve given you the three best books.

This is Sonya, “A very conservative local politician in Fort Myers proposed renaming a bridge for Henry Ford who owned a winter’s home here. I emailed the mayor and taught him about Ford’s antisemitism and the funding of The Protocols. Within just a few hours before the city council, the word went out in the Jewish community to attend, the mayor took me aside before the meeting and told me he’d taken off the agenda and that the issue was dead. We need to be vigilant.” Well done, Sonya. That is very, very good news.

Bravo, as Karen said. Yes, Henry Ford was friendly with Thomas Edison. Yes, and Thomas Edison, of course, yes, I’m afraid he was antisemitic. The Edison trust people were, they didn’t want the Jewish film people at all. Yes, Teddy, Henry Ford did serialise The Protocols in his newspaper, “The Dearborn Independent,” which he gave free to his workers. Yes.

“Was Rosenberg Jewish?” No, Elaine, definitely not.

Thank you, Ken, Rosenberg’s book I totally misspelt, it’s “The Myth of the 20th Century.” The reference to the myth was partially inspired by Nietzsche. Hitler rejected the notion because he said, “Our nation of race is not in any way a myth, but a scientific truth.” Thanks very much for Ken. Ken is an absolute expert on all of this.

Ron, “Horrors of war, you referred to what we are seeing in the daily news from Ukraine and asked that we imagine what four years of war must have been like. World War I seems like an abstract to me until I watched the Peter Jackson movie, ‘They Shall Not Grow Old’ a few days ago. Those archived films taken on the front lines in France, digitally restored, colourized with sound, showing the troops in trenches dying en mass as they advanced on German trenches made the horror all too real. Not so easy to watch, but definitely important to see.” Ron, a couple of my friends have told me that they are absolutely extraordinary.

“I noticed that many of the men featured in your presentation never lived to a ripe old age.” Rosenberg was actually executed at Nuremberg, Oscar, that’s why he died young. Yes, Jan Hanussen was murdered, Oscar.

“When is the projected date for the website?” I believe, Judi, it’s the summer, isn’t it?

• [Judi] I believe so, Trudy, they are working on it.

• They’re hoping this summer.

“This is from Rabbi Samuel Freud, who’s my great uncle, and he was the of lower Saxony, based in the enormous synagogue in Hanover. He had a major street and suburb named after him for continual stand against Nazism, and is highly regarded in Hanover today for his courage.” That’s amazing, David. What a group. I keep on saying this, it’s amazing.

No. No, Tim. Number four says, “Whatever the creed may be.” Jews were not considered a creed. Judaism was considered racial. That’s why Karl Marx was, even though he converted, his father had converted him to Christianity when he was eight, and he had no religion, he was racially a Jew. It’s very difficult for logical people to get their heads around this, I agree with you. You see, when we talk about this, and when Ken talked about Weininger, and when we talk about race theory, we’re actually talking about, in my view, balderdash. That’s a polite word. So it’s very difficult to get it over to you who are being logical.

Eisen is saying the German manifesto will be accepted by a large portion of the Republican party.

Q: And Bobby, “When Hitler created the German Workers’ Party manifesto, how much power did he have to implement?”

A: He was one of the creators.

Q: Well, after he took power, he had it, didn’t he?

A: He did it. He had no power of course when he created the manifesto, but in 1933 he became chancellor of Germany.

This is from Ms. Hella, I can’t remember your first name. Please put it up again. “This suggests the beginning of the decline of life in Germany for Jews documented in the heartbreaking book ‘Between Dignity and Despair.’”

This is a sidebar: “My grandfather knew Trotsky when he was in New York.” Oh, that’s amazing. Look, once we’ve got our website up, one of the things we’re going to do is create a chat room. And I want all these memories. Can you just imagine, in 10 years, PhD students can go through all these memories. It’s going to add to our knowledge.

This is from Ruth, “I feel ashamed of how little I knew about this period in Munich since my father lived there until 1938. The two things he told my fifth sister and I about Munich was one: as a child, he was 11 in 1918. He and his brothers were sent to scour the countryside for food. His family were definitely in upper middle class, very comfortably off but starving at the time. The only thing we learned was it’s wonderful art scene, music, theatre, literature. He finally escaped from a hospital bed after losing a kidney by walking to Switzerland by night and hiding by day. That’s all he ever told us. We know he got to Palestine where he had three brothers, but due to terribly ill health, he got to England in 1939. My father never spoke about the destruction of society in Munich in 1933, though he rescued one of his brothers from Dachau with a lot of money. Rosh Hashanah 1933.” Oh, what a story, Ruth.

I think we better stop there actually, Judi, cause it’s nearly a quarter past 6:00. Let me thank you all, and I wish you all safety at this- Jude, and thank you, Judi, and lots of love. All right, bye.

• [Judi] Bye-bye.