862.00/2814
The Ambassador in Germany (Sackett) to the Secretary of State
[Received February 23.]
Sir: In continuation of despatch No. 2163 of January 31, 1933, I have the honor to report further on the Hitler Cabinet, with particular reference to the scope of the work of the respective Ministers and the relations between the political groups on which the present Government is based.
The Hitler Cabinet, based on the so-called Harzburg Front, is a strange coalition of political extremists, with strongly divergent views on social, economic, and financial policies. The principal cohesive force is a fanatic chauvinism coupled with a common hatred of democratic government and the parliamentary system. According to the Constitution, Hitler as Chancellor determines the policy of the Government. In reality, however, Hugenberg and von Papen are the guiding spirits in so far as fundamental and vitally important national problems are concerned. A glance at the Cabinet list shows that the Nazis have taken chargé of the purely political and administrative departments of the Government, leaving to others those ministries in which constructive work requires unpopular measures.
With Dr. Frick as Reich Minister of the Interior and Captain Göring in chargé of the Prussian Ministry of the Interior, the Nazis now control the administrative machinery in the Reich and the largest German state. These ministers have promptly installed their party colleagues in [Page 189] prominent and influential positions. In certain cases, where civil service regulations or budgetary restrictions made the appointment of a Nazi official impossible, the Nazi ministers appointed party colleagues as assistants, or special commissioners without pay. In Prussia, even to a greater extent than in the Reich, the Nazis now practically control the civil service, the police, schools, universities, and other educational institutions.
The work of purging the administrative departments of democratic and republican influence set in with an avidity and swiftness unprecedented in German political life. Avowedly republican officials, who escaped dismissal under the Papen régime, are being systematically replaced by registered members of the Nazi Party, and, to a much lesser degree, by Hugenberg Nationalists. This has caused considerable feeling between the Nazis and the Hugenberg Nationalists, who naturally resent a Nazi monopoly of political patronage.
The ministries charged with less popular tasks than the distribution of political plums have been left to the Nationalists, or the so-called specialists, who have administered these departments in preceding cabinets. Baron von Neurath, a career diplomat, has been left in chargé of the Foreign Office, thus relieving the Nazis of direct responsibility for an eventual failure of the Government to achieve a satisfactory solution of the disarmament problem and a revision of the Versailles Treaty, which they promised their followers immediately after accession to power. Count Schwann von Krosigk has retained the Ministry of Finance and thus is directly responsible for the unpopular taxation measures which the Government may have to take in order to put the budget on an even keel.
The greatest responsibility was assumed by Hugenberg, who, as the present election campaign doubtless shows, is still Hitler’s political rival, despite their cooperation in government. The tasks assumed by Hugenberg are gigantic: he is practically economic dictator. He is in chargé of the Reich Ministry of Economics and the Reich Ministry of Agriculture, the Prussian Ministry of Agriculture and the Prussian Ministry of Commerce. He is also Commissioner for Agrarian Relief (Osthilfe). Moreover, through his friend and political collaborator, Minister of Labor Seldte, Hugenberg will doubtless indirectly also shape the policy of that important department. The indications are that in all of these departments Hugenberg rather than Hitler will be the decisive factor.
The Reichswehr, which the Nazis were so anxious to control, is practically the only arm of the executive branch of the Government which they do not control. The Embassy has been informed that, contrary to newspaper reports, General von Blomberg is not politically affiliated [Page 190] with the Nazis and that he has been appointed Reichswehr Minister at the express wish of President von Hindenburg, in order to keep the Reichswehr out of politics.
For the time being, both Hitler and Hugenberg are concentrating their main efforts on the election rather than on the conduct of government affairs. After the election, however, when the Cabinet is faced with the task of doing constructive work, it will become apparent whether or not Hitler’s and Hugenberg’s conflicting views can be reconciled. The only thing certain at present is that both are determined to stay in power regardless of the outcome of the election, and that, with this end in view, both are making strenuous efforts to fortify their own respective positions.
Hitler’s tactics of waging the campaign in a way that would strengthen the position of his own party rather than that of the Cabinet, if necessary at the expense of the Hugenberg group, was viewed by the latter with manifest alarm. Realizing that Nazi gains on March 5 without corresponding gains by his own party might enable the Nazis and the two Catholic parties to form a workable majority in the next Reichstag without his support, Hugenberg had to take prompt and extraordinary steps to meet such a contingency.
The result is that the Nationalist Party has discarded its name—at least for the duration of the present campaign. Its candidates are running on a ticket called “Kampfblock-Schwarz-Weiss-Rot,” headed by Hugenberg, Seldte and von Papen. Seldte’s candidacy is intended to attract the votes of the war veterans, while von Papen is making a strong bid for the Catholic elements of the Right.
At this writing, the consensus is that the parties in power will not succeed in obtaining the desired clear majority in the Reichstag. In that event, the question of Centrist participation in government will again come to the fore. It passes as an open secret, however, that Hitler would prefer to cooperate with the Catholic parties rather than with Hugenberg, but that President von Hindenburg and his principal adviser, von Papen, are opposed to the elimination of Nationalist influence from government.
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Respectfully yours,