Adolf Hitler - New Year’s Proclamation to the National Socialists

and Party Comrades

January 1, 1940

After mastering its internal divisions, National Socialist Germany has proceeded step by step to cast off its enslavement. A struggle of historically unprecedented proportions and the yearnings of a thousand years have culminated in the consolidation of the German Volk within the boundaries of the Greater German Reich. These measures have not robbed the outside world of anything. They have not done it any injury. They have but accorded the German Volk what all other peoples have long possessed.

Nevertheless, the Jewish-internationalist capitalists in connection with socially reactionary classes in the Western States have successfully roused the world democracies against Germany. Publication of documents on the events preceding the outbreak of the German-Polish conflict prove beyond doubt today that the English warmongers not only desired no peaceful settlement of the problem, they also did everything within their power to promote a conflict with Poland in order to free the way toward either a shaming of Germany or a declaration of war upon Poland. Once the first option failed them, these international warmongers resorted to the second. Poland allowed itself to be deluded into believing that it could realize its unlawful interests by the use of brute force. Within eighteen days,24 its weapons fell silent. The new National Socialist Wehrmacht outperformed even the highest of expectations placed upon it: the Poland concocted by the Diktat of Versailles exists no more! A series of events of enormous import for the history of our Volk characterized the year 1939:

1. The pacification of Central Europe and the security of the German Lebensraum were attained by the integration of the ancient German Reich territories of Bohemia and Moravia as protectorates within the framework of the Greater German Reich. Germans and Czechs shall live and labor peacefully next to one another in the future as they have throughout many a century in the past.

2. The return of the Memel territory to the Reich.

3. The elimination of the Polish State allowed for a restoration of the ancient borders of the Reich.

In all three cases, non-viable structures of the Treaty of Versailles were eradicated.

The Non-Aggression and Mutual Assistance Pact with the Soviet Union constituted the most outstanding feature of the year now past. From the outset, the attempt of the plutocratic statesmen of the West to pit Germany and Russia against each other was foiled; the desired blood-letting in both nations to the advantage of third parties was forestalled; an encirclement of Germany was prevented.

That we were able to successfully bring about this political development is a fact we owe exclusively to the inner reorientation which National Socialism wrought for the German Volk. This educational process undertaken by the National Socialist Movement has begun to bear fruit economically and politically. The military resurrection of the Wehrmacht was successfully complemented by a new economic policy not only making the Reich economically independent of the outside world, but also permitting us to overcome unemployment to a degree not even realized in today’s richest countries of the West.

Domestically organized and consolidated; economically prepared; militarily armed to the teeth; thus we stride forth, entering into the most decisive year in the history of Germany.25 For there is one thing we all know for certain, National Socialists: the Jewish-capitalist enemy of the world facing us knows but one goal-to destroy Germany, to destroy our German Volk! Our foes may strive to disguise their intention beneath phraseology, but this does nothing to deter them from the pursuit of this goal! First, they declared that they wished to help Poland. This would have been easy enough had they not unscrupulously urged Poland into this war. Once Poland had paid the price for this by being mercilessly beaten by the might of our Wehrmacht, the pursuit of a restoration of the Polish state no longer sufficed as a goal in this war. Now they aimed for the elimination of my person, i.e. the extinction of National Socialism. They barely had realized that the German Volk could not be duped by this most stupid fraud, in light of its experiences in 1918, and so it failed to react to it, when they did indeed finally divulge the truth: namely, that they sought to eradicate the German Volk as such and to dissolve and destroy the German Reich. Cowardice led them not only to recruit so-called “neutrals” in this effort; they did not stop short of hiring paid murderers either.26 The German Volk did not want this fight. Up to the very last minute, I offered my hand in friendship to England. Even after Poland was dealt with, I made suggestions regarding a long-term guaranteed pacification of Europe.27 In this, I received the support of Fascist Italy’s Duce above all, who, guided by the spirit of our friendship, labored sincerely to prevent a development which bore no good tidings for anyone in Europe.

However, the reactionary Jewish warmongers in the capitalist democracies were not willing to let this opportunity to destroy Germany pass: too long had they prepared for this. For years they had waited for this hour. These Herren warmongers wanted war: they were to get it.

The first phase of this conflict has shown the following:

1. no one dared to attack the German West Wall, and

2. in those instances in which German soldiers confronted their adversaries, this once more justified the glory of the German soldier and the reputation of our weapons.

May the year 1940 bring about a decision. Whatever the future may hold for us, there is but one outcome possible: our victory! Whatever may be demanded of the individual in sacrifice until then is of no import in comparison to the dedication of the German nation, in comparison to the horrendous fate looming above should power once more fall into the hands of those criminal liars of Versailles. Hence ours is a clearly defined goal in this war: Germany, and Europe moreover, must be liberated from the violating grasp, the persistent threat posed by the England of the present and of the past.

We must make a final stand to tear the weapons from the hands of these warmongers going about declaring war on everyone. We fight not only against the injustice of Versailles, but we also fight against renewed injustice poised to take its place. And in a more positive sense: we fight for the creation of a new Europe! Unlike Mr. Chamberlain, we fail to perceive why this new Europe would do well to be fashioned along the lines dictated by decaying and decrepit world powers, at the hands of so-called statesmen who are not even capable of resolving the most primitive of problems within their own countries. We are persuaded that only those peoples and powers are called upon to refashion Europe whose present comportment and previous accomplishments clearly demonstrate them to be young and virile nations. The future belongs to these young nations and systems! The Jewish-capitalist world will not outlive the twentieth century! National Socialists! German Volksgenossen! In this past year, thanks to the workings of Providence, the Reich of the German Volk was able to accomplish such miraculous and outstanding achievements of historical proportions! At the beginning of this year 1940, let us implore the Lord God to continue to bestow upon us His blessings in this struggle for freedom, independence, and hence for the life and the future of our Volk! With this realization in mind, let us ourselves not tarry in our enterprise; let us not lack the courage to fulfill the task lying before us in this year. By helping ourselves, relying on our own resources, let us implore the Lord Almighty not to deny the German Volk His intervention in the year 1940. For then we must and we will succeed!

Adolf Hitler – address to the Wehrmacht:

January 1, 1940

Soldiers!

The year 1939 afforded the Greater German Wehrmacht the proud opportunity to prove its worth. With the weapons entrusted to you by the German Volk, you have victoriously struggled in this war forced on us. In a mere eighteen days, through the cooperation of all, it was possible to secure the Reich in the East once more and to eradicate the injustice of Versailles.

Suffused with gratitude, we recall at the end of this historic year those of our comrades who have sealed their loyalty to Volk and Reich in blood! For the coming year we wish to implore the Almighty, who in the past has so visibly extended His protection to us, to bestow His blessings on us once again and to strengthen us in the fulfillment of our duties! For before us lies the most difficult of struggles for the existence or non-existence of the German Volk! Filled with pride and confidence, the German Volk and I look to you! For: with such soldiers Germany must win!

Adolf Hitler