Berlin Diary (5 page)

L
ATER.—
After seven days of almost ceaseless goose-stepping, speech-making, and pageantry, the party rally came to an end tonight. And though dead tired and rapidly developing a bad case of crowd-phobia, I’m glad I came. You have to go through one of these to understand Hitler’s hold on the people, to feel the dynamic in the movement he’s unleashed and the sheer, disciplined strength the Germans possess. And now—as Hitler told the correspondents yesterday in explaining his technique—the half-million men who’ve been here during the week will go back to their towns and villages and preach the new gospel with new fanaticism. Shall sleep late tomorrow and take the night train back to Berlin.

B
ERLIN
,
October
9

We’ve taken a comfortable studio flat in the Tauenzienstrasse. The owner, a Jewish sculptor, says he is getting off for England while the getting is good—probably a wise man. He left us a fine German library, which I hope I will get time to use. We get a little tired of living in flats or houses that other people have furnished, but the migrant life we lead makes it impossible to have our own things. We were lucky to get this place, which is furnished modernly and with good taste. Most of the middle-class homes we’ve seen in Berlin are furnished in atrocious style, littered with junk and knick-knacks.

L
ATER.—
On my eight o’clock call to the Paris office tonight, they told me that the King of Yugoslavia had been assassinated at Marseille this afternoon
and that Louis Barthou, the French Foreign Minister, had been badly wounded. Berlin will not be greatly disappointed, as King Alexander seemed disposed to work more closely with the French bloc against Germany, and Barthou had been doing some good work in strengthening French alliances in eastern Europe and in attempting to bring Russia in on an Eastern Locarno.

B
ERLIN
,
November
15

Not much news these days. Have been covering the fight in the Protestant church. A section of the Protestants seem to be showing more guts in the face of
Gleichschaltung
(co-ordination) than the Socialists or Communists did. But I think Hitler will get them in the end and gradually force on the country a brand of early German paganism which the “intellectuals” like Rosenberg are hatching up. Went tonight to one of Rosenberg’s
Bierabends
which he gives for the diplomats and the foreign correspondents once a month. Rosenberg was one of Hitler’s “spiritual” and “intellectual” mentors, though like most Balts I have met he strikes me as extremely incoherent and his book
Mythus of the Twentieth Century
, which sells second only to
Mein Kampf
in this country, impresses me as a hodge-podge of historical nonsense. Some of his enemies, like Hanfstängl, say he narrowly missed being a good Russian Bolshevist, having been in Moscow as a student during the revolution, but that he ran out on it because the Bolshies mistrusted him and wouldn’t give him a big job. He speaks with a strong Baltic accent which makes his German difficult for me to understand. He had Ambassador Dodd at his table of honour tonight, and the professor looked most unhappy.
Bernhard Rust, the Nazi Minister of Education, was the speaker, but my mind wandered during his speech. Rust is not without ability and is completely Nazifying the schools. This includes new Nazi textbooks falsifying history—sometimes ludicrously.

B
ERLIN
,
November
28

Much talk here that Germany is secretly arming, though it is difficult to get definite dope, and if you did get it and sent it, you’d probably be expelled. Sir Eric Phipps, the British Ambassador, whom I used to see occasionally in Vienna when he was Minister there (he looks like a Hungarian dandy, with a perfect poker face), but whom I have not seen here yet, returned from London yesterday and is reported to have asked the Wilhelmstrasse about it. Went out to a cheap store in the Tauenzienstrasse today and bought a comical-looking ready-made suit of “tails” for our foreign press ball at the Adlon Saturday night. A dinner jacket, I was told, was not enough.

B
ERLIN
,
December
2

The ball all right. Tess had a new dress and looked fine. Goebbels, Sir Eric Phipps, François Poncet, Dodd, and General von Reichenau, the nearest thing to a Nazi general the Reichswehr has and on very good terms with most of the American correspondents, were among those present. Von Neurath was supposed to be there, but there was some talk of his being displeased with the seating arrangements—a problem with the Germans every time you give a party—and I didn’t see him all evening. We danced and wined until about three, ending up with an early breakfast of bacon and eggs in the Adlon bar.

B
ERLIN
,
January
14, 1935

The good Catholics and workers of the Saar voted themselves back into the Reich yesterday. Some ninety per cent voted for reunion—more than we had expected, though no doubt many were afraid that they would be found out and punished unless they cast their ballot for Hitler. Well, at least one cause of European tension disappears. Hitler has said, and repeated in a broadcast yesterday, that the Saar was the last territorial bone of contention with France. We shall see….

B
ERLIN
,
February
25

Diplomatic circles and most of the correspondents are growing optimistic over a general settlement that will ensure peace. Sir John Simon, the British Foreign Minister, is coming to Berlin. A few days ago Laval and Flandin met the British in London. What they offer is to free Germany from the disarmament provisions of the peace treaty (though Hitler secretly is rapidly freeing himself) in return for German promises to respect the independence of Austria and all the other little countries. The French here point out, though, that Hitler has cleverly separated Paris and London by inviting the British to come here for talks, but not the French. And simple Simon has fallen for the bait.

S
AARBRÜCKEN
,
March
1

The Germans formally occupied the Saar today. There has been a pouring rain all day, but it has not dampened the enthusiasm of the local inhabitants.
They
do
have the Nazi bug, badly. But I shall come back here in a couple of years to see how they like it then—the Catholics and the workers, who form the great majority of the population. Hitler strode in this afternoon and reviewed the S.S. and the troops. Before the parade started, I stood in the stand next to Werner von Fritsch, commander-in-chief of the Reichswehr and the brains of the growing German army. I was a little surprised at his talk. He kept up a running fire of very sarcastic remarks—about the S.S., the party, and various party leaders as they appeared. He was full of contempt for them all. When Hitler’s cars arrived, he grunted and went over and took his place just behind the Führer for the review.