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

484 DER FUEHRERsaid the communique, 'regretted that Herr Hitler did not see himself in aposition to support a national government appointed with the confidenceof the Herr Reichs President, as he had agreed to do before theReichstag elections.' Large parts of the German public had felt formonths that Hindenburg himself had broken faith with Bruning; theexiled Kaiser in his Dutch exile likewise felt deceived and forsaken byhis field marshal. The marshal himself has been convinced since August13, 1932, that Hitler was not a man of his word.The whole interview had taken less than ten minutes.Hitler's almost unerring feeling for the significance of great events inhis life was expressed in the emotion with which he receivedHindenburg's rebuff. The defeat in the presidential elections did notbreak him; the ten minutes' talk with Hindenburg did. Before the eyes ofthe German people, he had mounted the steps of the President's palace,the steps to power; before the eyes of the people, he had slunk downthem. He had thirteen million votes behind him, and he was helplessagainst an old man who had to lean on a stick and was no longer able toconcentrate his thoughts for more than a few minutes. But these fewminutes had been enough to stop a so-called national revolution whichby its own definition was impossible without 'the permission of thePresident.'