Der Fuehrer - Hitler's Rise to Power (1944) - Heiden

THE DEATH OF MONEY 129terests (mines, electricity, navigation, hotels, newspapers, book publishing)he exerted an influence on the whole country, financed partiesand politicians, and in all his activities was guided by the feeling thatFate had called him to rebuild Germany. The first step in thisreconstruction was a process of destruction. At the outset the massesmisinterpreted it as nothing more than a scandalous rise in prices; onlylater, under the name of inflation, the process was correctlycomprehended as the downfall of money.While Walter Rathenau was still foreign minister, a group ofAmerican bankers visited Germany to study the causes of the Germaninflation. In some quarters it had been maintained that Germany hopedthe devaluation of her currency would cause her political debts toevaporate. It is doubtful whether anyone ever cherished so naive a hope,and surely it was never realized. In reality the inflation was largelycaused by the efforts of German industry to regain its position in theworld market. Rathenau and Stinnes sat down with the Americans, andStinnes, according to his own report, gave them the following harshexplanation for the German inflation:'I informed the gentlemen that after the lost war Germany had beenobliged to develop regular working habits in the four million men who,in the army, had lost the habit of regular work; for this, I told them, rawmaterials and employment were necessary. In order to obtain rawmaterials and a market for our products, in order to preserve the life ofthe nation, we had been obliged to sacrifice parts of our capital; therewas no other way. For if the masses had remained without employment,Bolshevism would assuredly have seized Germany. . .. I furtherinformed the gentlemen that the weapon of inflation would have to beused further, without regard to the resultant extraordinary losses ofcapital, because this was the only possibility of providing the populationwith the ordered regular activity which was necessary to secure the lifeof the nation.'The specter of Bolshevism overpowered the holiness of property.That money was obsolete could be no more dismally proved than by thissuicide for fear of death. As a defense against Bolshevism, the destroyerof private wealth, private wealth was destroyed. Ger-