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

604 DER FUEHRERforce, raise Germany to the commanding position of the great landblocks, the United States and Russia, or of the rising Asiatic continentalpower to be dominated perhaps by China, perhaps by Japan. The newFascist science of political organization would rise to its greatest heightsif the old world 'culture territories,' hitherto split up into nations, werewelded into such a unit by superior leadership, and their old abilities,trained and stored for centuries, were opposed to the still incompletelyorganized force of the half-empty American and Asiatic continents. Theposition of Germany, a land of industrial surplus, surrounded in a largearc by the Balkans and Russia, lands of agrarian surplus, seemed likethe summons of history to organize this space politically as a'productive unit' with a calculable demand and production potential —to use the terms of the economic age.The economic part of the Versailles system had been buried byHoover's moratorium of 1931, by the American and English protectivetariffs. On December 15, 1932, the French Chamber decided thatFrance, since she was receiving no further German reparations, wouldcease payments on her war debts to the United States. In vain didPremier Edouard Herriot argue with the Chamber, pleading that themost powerful friend France had in the world should not be offended;he resigned; his successor was Edouard Daladier. For the first timeFrance was led by a man who had not been a politician at the time of theWorld War, but merely an officer at the front.The system of Versailles was broken in body and spirit. After 1929,the great world question was no longer: defense of all against a Germanwar of revenge, but the struggle of all, even of the defeated nations,against the common enemy, the crisis; though, to be sure, in theconsciousness of certain groups, the common enemy was identified withthe Communist menace.For world economy to enjoy conditions of peace, armaments wouldhave to be eliminated or at least reduced; for they were devouring theprosperity of nations and their menacing presence deprived the businessworld of all confidence in a peaceable future. If, therefore, Englandgranted Germany equality of armaments in principle, it was notintended that Germany should have more arma-