alfredlexx60 (Soldat Chvéïk de retour)
Wien, 1. Bezirk, Art of Facades of Vienna, Hofburg (Leopoldinischer Trakt/Heldenplatz) - Heldenplatz (the place of the heros - la paza de los Héroes)
(further pictures and information about Vienna are available at the end of page by copying the corresponding link!)
Annexation 1938
Propaganda for the by Schuschnigg planned plebiscite - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Propaganda for the by Schuschnigg planned plebiscite.
Campaign advertising of Fatherland Front. Departure from Josef place.
10/11 March 1938. Photo: Leo Ernst - Albert Hilscher
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
The "Anschluss" represents itself as a triple assumption of power:
... as massive military threat by the invasion of the Wehrmacht, accompanied by an yet earlier onset of police action by Himmler's Gestapo; as a takeover by local Nazis and sympathizers who were already in lower as well as higher positions of the "corporate state (Ständestaat)"; and as demonstrative takeover "from below" by threatening street demonstrations, open deployment of previously banned party formations and symbolic actions.
Spontaneous victory celebrations of the National Socialists in Vienna - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Spontaneous victory celebrations of the National Socialists in Vienna.
NS-squad on a truck. 11/12 March 1938. Photo: Dietrich
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
The propaganda on this occasion took on a key role. Its effectiveness resulted from the confluence of staging and fascination. Propaganda replaced real power where it not yet could be exercised, intimidated political opponents and raised hopes among supporters. The structure of the necessary propaganda apparatus created simultaneously the foundations for the future party apparatus of the NSDAP as an organization penetrating the society as a whole.
Hitler Youth marched in Vienna. 11/12 March 1938. Photo: Albert Hirscher - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Hitler Youth marched in Vienna. 11/12 March 1938. Photo: Albert Hirscher
from "Hans Petschar; Connection - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Even children were mobilized to support the "Anschluss" propagandistically, they were as bearers of hopes of the new era addressees of Nazi propaganda. National Socialism in Austria also meant a significant change in the school system, which itself unresistingly and quite readily adapted to the new conditions.
Marching in of troops of the German Wehrmacht in Vienna - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Marching in of troops of the German Wehrmacht in Vienna.
An armored car is visited by Wiener youth.
13 March 1938. Photo: Albert Hilscher
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Orientated toward the capturing of the "whole" person, the individual as less as possible should be given individual leeway. Personal decisions about connotations of one's life and insight into overall socio-political correlations were not even allowed to arise. Despite the apparent devotion to the children, was this state-imposed education determined by an inhuman ideology of humiliation (Erniedrigungsideologie), which found its expression in racial anti-Semitism, the doctrine of life unworthy of being lived and the devaluation of everything foreign. Companionable acting in the sense of solidarity with the weak, in this system of education had no place. In its place came the mutual monitoring and disciplining for unscrupulous execution of commands given from "above.
Demonstration of the HJ with Baldur von Schirach at Heldenplatz in Vienna.
13 March 1938. Photo: Dietrich
from "Hans Petschar; Annexation - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Central guideline of the National Socialist policy in the cultural sector was the exclusion of Jewish artists, which was marked out in Germany since 1933 through a series of bureaucratic measures: compulsory membership in the corresponding professional chambers of the Reich Chamber of Culture as an absolute professional requirement, while rejection of "non-Aryans"; total political supervision of the theater of the spoken word and music theater, but also of the literature and publishing industry as well as the film production by the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda headed by Joseph Goebbels.
Hitler in Vienna - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Hitler in Vienna. Driving on the ring road.
14 March 1938. Photo: Albert Hilscher
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Politically "unreliable and unsuitable" as communists, socialists, conservatives with an anti-Nazi attitude, religious activists and homosexuals were also "as parasites of culture" eliminated. Simultaneously, the advanced civilization operation should be exploited for the stabilization of leadership (Herrschaftsstablisierung), ultimately no new "essentially German" ("blood and soil") cultural movement being created, but the bourgeois approaches to the classics forced (under exclusion of the heritage of dead and living Jewish artists). The high representatives of the regime were satisfied to document toward the inside and abroad that the apparently revolutionary Nazi regime stood in the succession of civil and monarchical rulers. More intense became the Nazi commitment in the entertainment industry, especially in the film, in which the "Wien-Film" productions full of platitudinous operetta bliss further succeeded. Entertainment was a psychologically skilfully orchestrated attempt to divert attention from political repression and massive racist persecution. Artists (females and males), for the time being - with a few exceptions of resistance - rapidly in the new polictical system fell into line, partly too because the working and production conditions at the moment due to increased government spending were much better than in the times of high unemployment.
Parade in Vienna - © Christian Brandstätter Publishing company mbH
Parade in Vienna. German armored vehicles in University Street;
in the background right, the Votive Church. 03/15/1938
from "Hans Petschar; Connection - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Political instrumentalization mostly only in the private sector and occasionally assistance for persecuted colleagues was opposed. The National Socialist state sought immediately after the "Anschluss" also to win over the women. The propaganda especially the mothers put in the center. This pretended respect of motherhood should serve to encourage women for giving birth as much as possible of "racially valuable" children to counteract the purportedly looming descent of the German people by falling fertility rates.
A symbolic poster.
The men are at the front;
the women produce weapons.
Title page of exhibition catalog to exhibition "Degenerate Music".
Women, preferably, should be restricted to the household or social care professions. However, during the war there was an acute shortage of manpower, so that also mothers as workers were forced in the defense industry. The education of girls was clearly targeted at household and motherhood. In the "mandatory year" young girls had to work unpaid in agriculture, in large families or in homes of high-ranking Nazis. In this way, they should practice their future work as a housewife and mother.
Göring at the Heldenplatz - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Göring at the Heldenplatz. 27 March 1938
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
In political terms, however, women were excluded from any participation, the National Socialist Women's Organization at all levels was subordinated male functionaries. Many women nevertheless found it exciting now being courted propagandistically, and complied with the Nazi standards. Women also participated in acts of persecution and thus became co-participants in the National Socialist crimes. The appreciation but went only to aligned women and corresponding to racist standards. Those who opposed the regime were as ruthlessly persecuted as women who built relationships with Jews, prisoners of war or foreign workers. Despite the threat of persecution, many women offered resistance against Nazism. They were detained in prisons or concentration camps; even young mothers were executed. From Eastern Europe as forced laborers in the German Empire brought women were deprived of all their rights; them it was even forbidden to have children, and with them forced abortions were carried out, if they became pregnant just the same.
In the Nazi propaganda the "national" motives of the "Anschluss" stood in the foreground.
March of the Austrian Legion by the gate Heldentor - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
March of the Austrian Legion by the Heldentor.
01 April 1938. Photo: Albert Hilscher
from "Hans Petschar; Connection - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
But the real reason for the invasion of Austria was another one, 1938 the German armaments industry reached the limit of its capacity. The continuation of the rearmament seemed questioned. Because there was a lack of raw materials, labor force, free industrial capacities and - not least - of foreign exchange for imports of goods essential for armament. Not the highway construction or other job-creation measures had since 1933 reduced unemployment in the German Reich, but the preparation of a new war.
Glue action of HJ - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Glue action of the HJ. March 1938
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
The "blitzkrieg" concept Germany should enable to incorporate one country after another into its sphere of influence and with the so obtained increase in economic power to eliminate the each next opponent. In the framework of the second four-year plan, which in 1936 was elaborated under the leadership of Hermann Göring, in addition to the development of substitutes (eg for rubber and oil), the securing of the access to non-substitutable goods (such as the iron ore from the Styrian Erzberg) had top priority.
It is therefore no coincidence that Austria and the so-called Sudeten German areas of Czechoslovakia with their rich economic resources yet before 1938 were in the field of view of National Socialism and that those countries then were "annexed" the first. Of interest in Austria next to the Erzberg were the unused water forces, the oil deposits in the March field, heavy industry, mechanical engineering and the gold and currency reserves of the Austrian National Bank, which exceeded those of the German Reichsbank in 1938 by a multiple.
Wien, 1. Bezirk, Art of Facades of Vienna, Hofburg (Leopoldinischer Trakt/Heldenplatz) - Heldenplatz (the place of the heros - la paza de los Héroes)
(further pictures and information about Vienna are available at the end of page by copying the corresponding link!)
Annexation 1938
Propaganda for the by Schuschnigg planned plebiscite - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Propaganda for the by Schuschnigg planned plebiscite.
Campaign advertising of Fatherland Front. Departure from Josef place.
10/11 March 1938. Photo: Leo Ernst - Albert Hilscher
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
The "Anschluss" represents itself as a triple assumption of power:
... as massive military threat by the invasion of the Wehrmacht, accompanied by an yet earlier onset of police action by Himmler's Gestapo; as a takeover by local Nazis and sympathizers who were already in lower as well as higher positions of the "corporate state (Ständestaat)"; and as demonstrative takeover "from below" by threatening street demonstrations, open deployment of previously banned party formations and symbolic actions.
Spontaneous victory celebrations of the National Socialists in Vienna - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Spontaneous victory celebrations of the National Socialists in Vienna.
NS-squad on a truck. 11/12 March 1938. Photo: Dietrich
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
The propaganda on this occasion took on a key role. Its effectiveness resulted from the confluence of staging and fascination. Propaganda replaced real power where it not yet could be exercised, intimidated political opponents and raised hopes among supporters. The structure of the necessary propaganda apparatus created simultaneously the foundations for the future party apparatus of the NSDAP as an organization penetrating the society as a whole.
Hitler Youth marched in Vienna. 11/12 March 1938. Photo: Albert Hirscher - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Hitler Youth marched in Vienna. 11/12 March 1938. Photo: Albert Hirscher
from "Hans Petschar; Connection - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Even children were mobilized to support the "Anschluss" propagandistically, they were as bearers of hopes of the new era addressees of Nazi propaganda. National Socialism in Austria also meant a significant change in the school system, which itself unresistingly and quite readily adapted to the new conditions.
Marching in of troops of the German Wehrmacht in Vienna - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Marching in of troops of the German Wehrmacht in Vienna.
An armored car is visited by Wiener youth.
13 March 1938. Photo: Albert Hilscher
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Orientated toward the capturing of the "whole" person, the individual as less as possible should be given individual leeway. Personal decisions about connotations of one's life and insight into overall socio-political correlations were not even allowed to arise. Despite the apparent devotion to the children, was this state-imposed education determined by an inhuman ideology of humiliation (Erniedrigungsideologie), which found its expression in racial anti-Semitism, the doctrine of life unworthy of being lived and the devaluation of everything foreign. Companionable acting in the sense of solidarity with the weak, in this system of education had no place. In its place came the mutual monitoring and disciplining for unscrupulous execution of commands given from "above.
Demonstration of the HJ with Baldur von Schirach at Heldenplatz in Vienna.
13 March 1938. Photo: Dietrich
from "Hans Petschar; Annexation - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Central guideline of the National Socialist policy in the cultural sector was the exclusion of Jewish artists, which was marked out in Germany since 1933 through a series of bureaucratic measures: compulsory membership in the corresponding professional chambers of the Reich Chamber of Culture as an absolute professional requirement, while rejection of "non-Aryans"; total political supervision of the theater of the spoken word and music theater, but also of the literature and publishing industry as well as the film production by the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda headed by Joseph Goebbels.
Hitler in Vienna - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Hitler in Vienna. Driving on the ring road.
14 March 1938. Photo: Albert Hilscher
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Politically "unreliable and unsuitable" as communists, socialists, conservatives with an anti-Nazi attitude, religious activists and homosexuals were also "as parasites of culture" eliminated. Simultaneously, the advanced civilization operation should be exploited for the stabilization of leadership (Herrschaftsstablisierung), ultimately no new "essentially German" ("blood and soil") cultural movement being created, but the bourgeois approaches to the classics forced (under exclusion of the heritage of dead and living Jewish artists). The high representatives of the regime were satisfied to document toward the inside and abroad that the apparently revolutionary Nazi regime stood in the succession of civil and monarchical rulers. More intense became the Nazi commitment in the entertainment industry, especially in the film, in which the "Wien-Film" productions full of platitudinous operetta bliss further succeeded. Entertainment was a psychologically skilfully orchestrated attempt to divert attention from political repression and massive racist persecution. Artists (females and males), for the time being - with a few exceptions of resistance - rapidly in the new polictical system fell into line, partly too because the working and production conditions at the moment due to increased government spending were much better than in the times of high unemployment.
Parade in Vienna - © Christian Brandstätter Publishing company mbH
Parade in Vienna. German armored vehicles in University Street;
in the background right, the Votive Church. 03/15/1938
from "Hans Petschar; Connection - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Political instrumentalization mostly only in the private sector and occasionally assistance for persecuted colleagues was opposed. The National Socialist state sought immediately after the "Anschluss" also to win over the women. The propaganda especially the mothers put in the center. This pretended respect of motherhood should serve to encourage women for giving birth as much as possible of "racially valuable" children to counteract the purportedly looming descent of the German people by falling fertility rates.
A symbolic poster.
The men are at the front;
the women produce weapons.
Title page of exhibition catalog to exhibition "Degenerate Music".
Women, preferably, should be restricted to the household or social care professions. However, during the war there was an acute shortage of manpower, so that also mothers as workers were forced in the defense industry. The education of girls was clearly targeted at household and motherhood. In the "mandatory year" young girls had to work unpaid in agriculture, in large families or in homes of high-ranking Nazis. In this way, they should practice their future work as a housewife and mother.
Göring at the Heldenplatz - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Göring at the Heldenplatz. 27 March 1938
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
In political terms, however, women were excluded from any participation, the National Socialist Women's Organization at all levels was subordinated male functionaries. Many women nevertheless found it exciting now being courted propagandistically, and complied with the Nazi standards. Women also participated in acts of persecution and thus became co-participants in the National Socialist crimes. The appreciation but went only to aligned women and corresponding to racist standards. Those who opposed the regime were as ruthlessly persecuted as women who built relationships with Jews, prisoners of war or foreign workers. Despite the threat of persecution, many women offered resistance against Nazism. They were detained in prisons or concentration camps; even young mothers were executed. From Eastern Europe as forced laborers in the German Empire brought women were deprived of all their rights; them it was even forbidden to have children, and with them forced abortions were carried out, if they became pregnant just the same.
In the Nazi propaganda the "national" motives of the "Anschluss" stood in the foreground.
March of the Austrian Legion by the gate Heldentor - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
March of the Austrian Legion by the Heldentor.
01 April 1938. Photo: Albert Hilscher
from "Hans Petschar; Connection - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
But the real reason for the invasion of Austria was another one, 1938 the German armaments industry reached the limit of its capacity. The continuation of the rearmament seemed questioned. Because there was a lack of raw materials, labor force, free industrial capacities and - not least - of foreign exchange for imports of goods essential for armament. Not the highway construction or other job-creation measures had since 1933 reduced unemployment in the German Reich, but the preparation of a new war.
Glue action of HJ - © Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
Glue action of the HJ. March 1938
from "Hans Petschar; Anschluss - A Chronology of pictures"
© Christian Brandstätter Verlag Gesellschaft mbH
The "blitzkrieg" concept Germany should enable to incorporate one country after another into its sphere of influence and with the so obtained increase in economic power to eliminate the each next opponent. In the framework of the second four-year plan, which in 1936 was elaborated under the leadership of Hermann Göring, in addition to the development of substitutes (eg for rubber and oil), the securing of the access to non-substitutable goods (such as the iron ore from the Styrian Erzberg) had top priority.
It is therefore no coincidence that Austria and the so-called Sudeten German areas of Czechoslovakia with their rich economic resources yet before 1938 were in the field of view of National Socialism and that those countries then were "annexed" the first. Of interest in Austria next to the Erzberg were the unused water forces, the oil deposits in the March field, heavy industry, mechanical engineering and the gold and currency reserves of the Austrian National Bank, which exceeded those of the German Reichsbank in 1938 by a multiple.