Zyklop
08-05-2004, 11:26 AM
Hitler´s reply to the American President (28.4.1939)
Excerpt:
.........
Mr. Roosevelt, I fully understand that the vastness of your nation and the immense wealth of your country allows you to feel responsible for the history of the whole world and for the fate of all peoples. My sphere, Mr. President, is considerably smaller and more modest. You have 130,000,000 people on 9,500,000 square kilometers. You possess a country with enormous riches, all mineral resources, fertile enough to feed half a billion people and to provide them with every necessity.
I took over the leadership of a state which was faced by complete ruin thanks to its trust in the Promises of the outside world and to the evil government of its own democratic regime. In this state there are roughly 140 people to each square kilometer- not 15, as in America. The fertility of our country cannot be compared with that of yours. We lack numerous minerals which nature has bestowed on you in unlimited quantities.
Billions of German savings accumulated in gold and foreign exchange during many years of peace were extorted from us. We lost our colonies. In 1933 1 had in my country 7,000,000 unemployed, a few million part-time workers, millions of impoverished peasants, trade destroyed, commerce ruined; in short, general chaos.
Since then, Mr. Roosevelt, I have only been able to fulfill-one single task. I cannot feel myself responsible for the fate of a world, for this world took no interest in the pitiful fate of my own people.
I have regarded myself as called upon by Providence to serve my own people alone and to deliver them from their frightful misery. Thus, for the past six-and-ahalf years, I have lived day and night for the single task of awakening the powers of my people in face of our desertion by the rest of the world, of developing these powers to the utmost and of utilizing them for the salvation of our community.
I have conquered chaos in Germany, re-established order, immensely increased production in all branches of our national
economy, by strenuous efforts produced substitutes for numerous materials which we lack, prepared the way for new inventions, developed transportation, caused magnificent roads to be built I It and canals to be dug, created gigantic new factories. I have striven no less to translate into practice the ideal behind the thought "community" and. to promote the education and culture of my people.
I have succeeded in finding useful work once more for all the 7,000.000 unemployed who are so close to our hearts; in keeping the .German peasant on his soil in spite of all difficulties and in saving it for him; in causing German trade to flourish once again; and in promoting transportation to the utmost.
To protect them against the threats of the outside world, I have not only united the German people politically but also rearmed them, I have likewise endeavored to rid them of that treaty, page by page, which in its 448 articles contains the vilest oppression which has ever been inflicted on men and nations.
I have brought back to the Reich the provinces stolen from us in 1919; 1 have led back to their native country millions of Germans who were torn away from us and were in abject misery; I have reunited the territories that have been German throughout a thousand years of history-and, Mr. Roosevelt, I have endeavored to attain all this without bloodshed and without bringing to my people and so to others, the misery of war.
This I have done, Mr. Roosevelt, though 21 years ago, I was an unknown worker and soldier of my people, by my own energy and can therefore claim a place in history among those men who have done the utmost that can be fairly and justly demanded from a single individual.
You, Mr. Roosevelt, have an immeasurably easier task in comparison. You became President of the United States in 1933 when I became Chancellor of the Reich. Thus, from the very outset, you became head of one of the largest and wealthiest states in the world.
It is your good fortune to have to sustain scarcely 15 people per square kilometer in your country. At your disposal are the most. abundant natural resources in the world. Your country is so vast and your fields so fertile, that you can insure for each individual American at least ten times more of the good things of life than is possible in Germany. Nature at least has given you the opportunity to do this.
Although the population of your country is scarcely one-third larger than that of Greater Germany, you have more than fifteen times as much room. And so you have time and leisure – on the same huge scale as you have everything else – to devote your attention to universal problems. Consequently the world is undoubtedly so small for you that you perhaps believe that your intervention can be valuable anti effective everywhere. In this way, therefore, your concern and your suggestions cover a much larger and wider field than mine.
For my world, Mr. President, is the one to which Providence has assigned me and for which it is my duty to work. Its area is much smaller. It comprises my people alone. But I believe I can thus best serve that which is in the hearts of all of us – justice, well-being, progress and peace for the whole community of mankind.
Full speech (http://www.adolfhitler.ws/lib/speeches/text/390428.html)
Excerpt:
.........
Mr. Roosevelt, I fully understand that the vastness of your nation and the immense wealth of your country allows you to feel responsible for the history of the whole world and for the fate of all peoples. My sphere, Mr. President, is considerably smaller and more modest. You have 130,000,000 people on 9,500,000 square kilometers. You possess a country with enormous riches, all mineral resources, fertile enough to feed half a billion people and to provide them with every necessity.
I took over the leadership of a state which was faced by complete ruin thanks to its trust in the Promises of the outside world and to the evil government of its own democratic regime. In this state there are roughly 140 people to each square kilometer- not 15, as in America. The fertility of our country cannot be compared with that of yours. We lack numerous minerals which nature has bestowed on you in unlimited quantities.
Billions of German savings accumulated in gold and foreign exchange during many years of peace were extorted from us. We lost our colonies. In 1933 1 had in my country 7,000,000 unemployed, a few million part-time workers, millions of impoverished peasants, trade destroyed, commerce ruined; in short, general chaos.
Since then, Mr. Roosevelt, I have only been able to fulfill-one single task. I cannot feel myself responsible for the fate of a world, for this world took no interest in the pitiful fate of my own people.
I have regarded myself as called upon by Providence to serve my own people alone and to deliver them from their frightful misery. Thus, for the past six-and-ahalf years, I have lived day and night for the single task of awakening the powers of my people in face of our desertion by the rest of the world, of developing these powers to the utmost and of utilizing them for the salvation of our community.
I have conquered chaos in Germany, re-established order, immensely increased production in all branches of our national
economy, by strenuous efforts produced substitutes for numerous materials which we lack, prepared the way for new inventions, developed transportation, caused magnificent roads to be built I It and canals to be dug, created gigantic new factories. I have striven no less to translate into practice the ideal behind the thought "community" and. to promote the education and culture of my people.
I have succeeded in finding useful work once more for all the 7,000.000 unemployed who are so close to our hearts; in keeping the .German peasant on his soil in spite of all difficulties and in saving it for him; in causing German trade to flourish once again; and in promoting transportation to the utmost.
To protect them against the threats of the outside world, I have not only united the German people politically but also rearmed them, I have likewise endeavored to rid them of that treaty, page by page, which in its 448 articles contains the vilest oppression which has ever been inflicted on men and nations.
I have brought back to the Reich the provinces stolen from us in 1919; 1 have led back to their native country millions of Germans who were torn away from us and were in abject misery; I have reunited the territories that have been German throughout a thousand years of history-and, Mr. Roosevelt, I have endeavored to attain all this without bloodshed and without bringing to my people and so to others, the misery of war.
This I have done, Mr. Roosevelt, though 21 years ago, I was an unknown worker and soldier of my people, by my own energy and can therefore claim a place in history among those men who have done the utmost that can be fairly and justly demanded from a single individual.
You, Mr. Roosevelt, have an immeasurably easier task in comparison. You became President of the United States in 1933 when I became Chancellor of the Reich. Thus, from the very outset, you became head of one of the largest and wealthiest states in the world.
It is your good fortune to have to sustain scarcely 15 people per square kilometer in your country. At your disposal are the most. abundant natural resources in the world. Your country is so vast and your fields so fertile, that you can insure for each individual American at least ten times more of the good things of life than is possible in Germany. Nature at least has given you the opportunity to do this.
Although the population of your country is scarcely one-third larger than that of Greater Germany, you have more than fifteen times as much room. And so you have time and leisure – on the same huge scale as you have everything else – to devote your attention to universal problems. Consequently the world is undoubtedly so small for you that you perhaps believe that your intervention can be valuable anti effective everywhere. In this way, therefore, your concern and your suggestions cover a much larger and wider field than mine.
For my world, Mr. President, is the one to which Providence has assigned me and for which it is my duty to work. Its area is much smaller. It comprises my people alone. But I believe I can thus best serve that which is in the hearts of all of us – justice, well-being, progress and peace for the whole community of mankind.
Full speech (http://www.adolfhitler.ws/lib/speeches/text/390428.html)