Trying to verify an alleged Adolf Hitler quote

[sjc]

@skdo23

“Only one thing could have stopped our movement - if our adversaries had understood its principle” Makes it sound like Hitler was gloating about pulling one over on an unsuspecting populace, and while I’m not an expert on German/Nazi history, I don’t think he would have viewed his rise to power with such cynicism. Rather, based on their own warped view of the world, I think that Hitler and other Nazi leaders genuinely viewed their ascent to power as a moral and ideological victory.

I can’t vouch for the authenticity of the quote, but it does sound like Hitler. Hitler and the other Nazi higher ups did indeed view things in that cynical manner. This isn’t incompatible with them viewing their victory as an ideological one. Their ideology was founded on the idea of some people being better than others and on the idea of a great leader who would lead the nation towards glory and a better future. The reason the Nazis came to power (and not some other right-wing group or cabal) was this amoral and cynical ruthlessness at the heart of their ideology.

Hitler may not have ever said this, but the idea that he wouldn’t have viewed it that way or that if he had he would never have said it out loud (or committed it to paper) is misguided.

[sjc]

@jjjmills

Followup: I have been occasionally poking around the internet for the answer to this question and I believe I have found it today:

Smashing the nucleus | Zuri Zone

Here’s what Hitler actually said:
Only one danger could have jeopardised this development – if our adversaries had understood its principle, established a clear understanding of our ideas, and not offered any resistance. Or, alternatively, if they had from the first day annihilated with the utmost brutality the nucleus of our new movement.

The bolded part is interesting. Did Hitler mean that if their opponents had done nothing Nazism would have failed?

[Kenm]

@jjjmills

So: is this just wishful thinking on the part of militant leftists who wish to “smash with the utmost brutality the nucleus” of modern right-wing movements?

Damned socialists always hating Hitler.

[The_Hamster_King]

@sjc

Did Hitler mean that if their opponents had done nothing Nazism would have failed?

I think he meant that the more moderate elements of Nazism were always in danger of being co-opted by the democratic state that preceded it. Doing so would have taken the wind out of the movement’s sails. But by opposing all aspects of Nazism the moderates created a movement that was unified through shared opposition. And so the most radical elements of Nazism were able to take control of the country.

[Steken]

Here’s the full quote in the original German:

Eine einzige Gefahr konnte es gegen diese Entwicklung geben: Wenn der Gegner das Prinzip erkannte, Klarheit über diese Gedanken erhielt und jeden Widerstand vermied. Oder wenn er mit letzter Brutalität am ersten Tag den ersten Keim der neuen Sammlung vernichtete.

It makes clear that the “principle” Hitler is talking (screaming?) about here is NOT the principle of the Nazi ideology - but the “principle” of the specific development (“Entwicklung”) by which the Nazi party rose to power, i.e. a slow, steady, gradual ascent, over “five or ten or twenty years,” during which he/they built up “a state of authority,” marked by “fanatical devotion and ruthless determination,” within the weak and corrupt “state of democracy”:

Das konnte fünf und zehn oder 20 Jahre dauern, aber allmählich entstand im Staat der Demokratie der Staat der Autorität, im Reich der jammervollen Sinnlosigkeit ein Kern fanatischer Hingebung und rücksichtsloser Entschlossenheit.

Then there’s this:

@The_Hamster_King

I think he meant that the more moderate elements of Nazism were always in danger of being co-opted by the democratic state that preceded it. Doing so would have taken the wind out of the movement’s sails. But by opposing all aspects of Nazism the moderates created a movement that was unified through shared opposition. And so the most radical elements of Nazism were able to take control of the country.

Not quite. Rather than unite the Nazi movement, the rather meek and “bourgeois” resistance and oppression they faced only helped to cleanse it, i.e. of its weakest members - separating the wheat from the chaff, as it were, or the men from the boys, in a way which Hitler considered must “fortunate”:

Indem man an Stelle dessen dise junge Bewegung in bürgerlichem Ausmaß zu tyrannisieren begann, unterstützte man den natürlichen Ausleseprozeß in der glücklichen Weise.

The “bourgeois” oppression did not manage to eradicate the battle-hardened core of the movement, however, which indeed only grew stronger in the process. And so, finally, it was only a question of time before he and the boys would take over the country:

Es war dann nur mehr eine Frage der Zeit, wann diesem gehärtetem Menschenmaterial die Führung der Nation zufiel!

A quick google search indicates that the entire speech can be found in Christan Dube’s Religiöse Sprache in Reden Adolf Hitlers: Analysiert an Hand ausgewählter Reden aus den Jahren 1933-1945, published in 2004, available for a meastly 25 euros from the German (what else?) Amazon.