862.24/121

The Ambassador in Poland (Cudahy) to President Roosevelt

My Dear Mr. President: I am taking this first opportunity of writing direct, as you requested, after conferring with my colleagues at our diplomatic missions in Bucharest, Belgrade, Budapest, Vienna, Prague, Berlin, and Paris.

I started on my tour of these capitals with a prejudice that Germany was engaged in large-scale war preparations threatening the peace of Europe. This prejudice was entirely dissipated after my visit to that country, my conferences with the Ambassador at Berlin, members of his Staff, and our Military Attaché.84 There is a unity in Germany, an intense feeling of national solidarity and patriotic buoyancy, which strikes one almost immediately. And the allegiance to Hitler borders on fanaticism. But the reports of training large bodies of troops for war, and assembling huge supplies of war materials are, in my opinion, entirely baseless.

These reports have been founded on scraps of information, such as the importation of copper, manganese, zinc, and nickel during the past six to eight months in excess of Germany’s industrial needs. Also the production of airplanes in greater proportion than produced by the factories of England. But as our Military Attaché has so sensibly pointed out there is no marked evidence of an increase in muskets and small arms ammunition, nor of any accumulation of large projectiles and armament which would be impossible of concealment. This does not gainsay the fact that the country is being organized on a military basis. Besides the authorized regular army—the Stahlhelm of 100,000—there are marching clubs—the Brown Shirts (Sturm Abteilung), the Black Shirts (Schutz Staffel) and the Arbeitsdienst—all told nearly 2,000,000 men in uniform. Also the drilling and discipline of youth is proceeding rapidly under the Reich’s Jugend Führung. By January 1, 1934, half the contingent of young men born in 1914 will be inducted in the labor service.

This appears menacing unless one is on the ground to realize that there is nothing essentially belligerent or alarming about these activities. They are really only a manifestation of Germany, affording an outlet for the peculiar social need of a country which loves display and pageantry. Half of the Brown Shirts are unemployed and the organization provides relief and cheap meals for the needy members. These marching clubs are essentially social. The German feels important and distinguished in a uniform, and what has been taken for [Page 351] a blatant display of militarism is merely an expression of the unique German gregarious instinct, accountable on the same grounds that our Elks, Eagles, Woodmen, etc., are accountable.

The present leaders of the government are well aware of the impotent military position of the country, and how success against France enforced [reinforced?] by Poland and The Little Entente would be unthinkable.

This attitude is not inconsistent with Hitler’s ambition to achieve by political methods the Anschluss with Austria. The Anschluss is not a dead issue. The present government of Austria is in the precarious hands of a minority dictator. Probably 40 per cent, of the electorate is Nazi and the Social Democrats control 25 per cent, of the remaining votes, giving the Christian Democrats, the Party of Dollfuss, a striking minority. Upon the death or removal of Dollfuss, Austria might well go Nazi and fall under the domination of Hitler’s strange hypnotic leadership. But instead of being an unsettling influence throughout Europe this should clarify the alignment against Germany by bringing Italy definitely on the side of the nations opposed to further relaxation of the Versailles Treaty in favor of Germany. Dismembered Austria has a population of only 6 million and no capital resources for war. The Anschluss should weaken rather than strengthen Germany’s position in Europe.

The Little Entente—Rumania, Yugoslavia, and Czechoslovakia—with a combined standing army of nearly 1 million men, would unquestionably side with France in the case of hostilities with Germany; although how aggressively would likely depend upon their prospects for material benefits. Poland, regarding Germany as a constant menace to the territory she acquired by the Versailles Treaty, would likely take an aggressive part in case of such a war.

The most disturbing element at the present time is France, which regards the growing power and unity of Germany with mounting fear and distrust. It is France which has inspired in most part this propaganda of German military preparation.

Concretely, the only constructive step to allay this fear and control this agitation is for all the leading powers to concentrate on the formation of a Board of Arms Control to function under the jurisdiction of the League of Nations. Such a Board, dominated by impartial, judicial nations, such as Great Britain, the United States, Switzerland, and the Netherlands, might be a body of effective and far-reaching influence. At least it should be given a trial. It should be far more effective than any international court, for it would go upon the theory of preventing preparation for war, instead of attempting to intervene when hostile countries fully ready are determined upon force.

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There are, Mr. President, other comments I have in mind as a result of my observations and discussions with my colleagues, but I fear already the length of this memorandum has trespassed upon your patience. If, in your opinion, what I have said here is of any weight or moment, I shall write further at a later time.

I am [etc.]

[File copy not signed]
  1. Lt. Col. Jacob W. S. Wuest.