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

92 DER FUEHRERAnton Drexler: a bespectacled, modest man, by trade a toolmaker, butwithout doubt the intellectual father of the whole movement; for it washe who, in the middle of the war, had been inspired with the idea offounding a nationalist-minded workers' party, which would be 'at thedisposal of the general staff.' The party did not yet bear the nameNational Socialist, the term was still unknown. But the most revealingitem in Hitler's report is that he was surrounded by a body of personalsupporters; that these supporters 'intervened' against interrupters, andthat they had side-arms. In other words, a troop of armed soldiersfounded the National Socialist Party. The employee of the politicalbureau of the Munich District Army Command had come with a squadof Reichswehr soldiers; according to reports from a hostile source, theybelonged to a company of mine-throwers. First he had his politicalopponents driven out with cold steel — this is the meaning of'intervention,' as everyone knows who ever attended a National Socialistmeeting in those years. Then he shouted at the terrorized crowd: Ifanyone else dares, let him speak up against the program. Before themeeting, he was not sure whether he was an orator or not, but he didfeel sure of his side-arms.Later he said aptly: 'When I finally closed the meeting, we were notalone in feeling that a wolf had been born which was destined to breakinto the herd of the swindlers and misleaders of the people.'Thus the National Socialist Movement was born, under the sign of thesword. Its program, which Hitler put forward on that February 24, 1920,consisted of twenty-five points. It was written by Hitler, Anton Drexler,Gottfried Feder, and Dietrich Eckart.The first point is Hitler's. It expresses his revolt against his Austrianfatherland; shows the new National Socialist Movement as a belateddescendant of the great European revolt of nations: 'We demand that allGermans be gathered together in a Greater Germany on the basis of theright of all peoples to self-determination.'This is a demand without end. There are Germans all over the globe— that is, people of German language and descent, for that is how theword is meant. In some places they live densely settled, as in southernRussia, South Africa, southern Brazil; not to mention