Paris Peace Conf. 184.01102/52

Captain Frederick Dellschaft to Professor A. C. Coolidge 3

Subject: Austrian economic situation and bolshevism.

As preface to a personal exposé of the economic situation, Dr. Oskar Reichenauer of the Wirtschafts-Politisches Amt submitted the memorandum of which a translation is attached.4 Dr. Reichenauer called this morning and entered more fully into his views as they relate to bolshevism.

Bolshevism, said Dr. Reichenauer, is not merely a state of mind induced by the conditions due to the war. It is a social movement begun 15 years ago and furthered with an almost religious fanaticism. The Slav peoples who are naturally disposed to vague ideals were most easily its victims; the Latin peoples would be the next to fall, and then the turn of the Germanic nations would inevitably come if drastic measures are not taken at once. The next two months are the most critical, and even the German Austrian who is easygoing and little inclined, as past events have shown, toward violent and subversive measures, would not be able to resist the waves of bolshevism coming through Czecho-Slovakia and Hungary. German-Austria [Page 247] is, so to speak, the bridge-head of western civilization to the Orient; when the bridge-head falls, Italy, Spain and France will be at the mercy of bolshevism almost instantaneously. The culmination of the danger is not a question of months but of weeks. The means to combat the danger utilizable now, that will be useless within a short while, are troops, coal and food. The two latter items would furnish the physical strength to the working classes, the first item, the moral strength to resist. Trustworthy troops to the number of about 30,000 would furnish backbone to the good elements that could be collected in this country. They are needed in the industrial regions such as Vienna, Wiener Neustadt, Muerzzuschlag, Kapfenberg, Bruck, Donawitz, Leoben, Graz, Koeflach, St. Poelten. The main weapon should be a large number of machine-guns and the men should always appear in force. A measure such as this is absolutely necessary to check the tide of bolshevism.

Dr. Reichenauer closed with his ideas on the “Anschluss” as opposed to the Danube Federation. Without its industry German-Austria would not exist, and German-Austria needed the Orient as the Orient needed German-Austria. The latter would always be the cultural leader among the other states into which the Monarchy has been broken up and its influence was needed to prevent the Balkan question from extending westward.

F. Dellschaft
  1. Transmitted to the Commission by Professor Coolidge under covering letter No. 55, January 31.
  2. Not printed.