Crossref Citations
This article has been cited by the following publications. This list is generated based on data provided by Crossref.
Baranowski, Shelley
2018.
A Companion to Nazi Germany.
p.
63.
Article contents
The Myth of Chancellor von Schleicher's Querfront Strategy
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 November 2008
Extract
In the multitudinous accounts of Adolf Hitler's rise to power, one interpretation dominates with regard to the political strategy of his predecessor as Reich chancellor, General Kurt von Schleicher. Beginning with the pioneering books of the journalist Konrad Heiden in the 1930s and continuing through countless versions down to the most recent scholarly works, Schleicher has, with rare exceptions, been depicted as having sought to thwart Hitler by bringing behind his own cabinet a political bloc extending from a left wing split away from the Nazi Party to trade union elements of the republican Social Democratic Party. Sometimes described as a Gewerkschaftsachse, this putative goal on the part of Schleicher has now usually come to be referred to as his Querfront strategy. Long regarded by most historians as axiomatic, that version of the chancellor's intentions has seldom been subjected to critical analysis. It is, however, fundamentally erroneous and serves to obscure his actually very different aims.
- Type
- Scholarly Note
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Conference Group for Central European History of the American Historical Association 2008
References
1 A list of publications by professional historians that rely on the Querfront myth would require far more space than is available here. Its pervasiveness may, however, be gauged by its invocation in the biographical entries on Schleicher in such reference works as the Dictionary of German Biography (Munich: K. G. Saur, 2001ff.); Klee, Ernst, ed., Das Personenlexikon zum Dritten Reich (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 2003)Google Scholar; Weiss, Hermann, ed., Biographisches Lexikon zum Dritten Reich (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 1998)Google Scholar; Ploetz Lexikon der Deutschen Geschichte (Frankfurt am Main: Komet MA-Service und Verlagsgesellschaft, 1999); Deutsche Biographische Encyklopädia (Munich: K. G. Saur, 1998); and Fröhlich, Michael, ed., Die Weimarer Republik. Portrait einer Epoche in Biographien (Darmstadt: Primus Verlag, 2002)Google Scholar, as well as in both the English and German versions of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia.
2 There is no record of Schleicher's having used either of these terms. Apparently a derivative of Querverbindungen, Querfront seems to have first been applied to the politically heterogeneous group that formed during 1932 around Günter Gereke, an advocate of vigorous governmental job-creation measures who became Reichskommissar für Arbeitsbeschaffung in Schleicher's cabinet; see his memoir, Ich war königlich-preussischer Landrat (East Berlin: Union-Verlag, 1970), 195. The term was subsequently popularized by journalists, among them the anti-democratic, pro-Schleicher editor Hans Zehrer; see his article, “Die Querfront,” Tägliche Rundschau, Feb. 12, 1933; also Harry Schulze-Wilde's 1955 interview of Zehrer: Archiv, Institut für Zeitgeschichte, ZS 1723. Despite its chimerical origins, Querfront has now become a generic political concept, invoked to characterize such convergences of opposites as the recent collaboration of German extremists of left and right in agitation against globalization; see Michael Schlieben, “Der Traum von der Querfront,” Zeit Online, June 30, 2007.
3 See the documents in Jahn, Peter and Brunner, Detlev, eds., Die Gewerkschaften in der Endphase der Republik (Cologne: Bund-Verlag, 1988), 770–74 and 814–18Google Scholar.
4 François-Poncet to Herriot, Nov. 29, in Commission de publication des documents relatifs aux origins de la guerre 1939–1945. Documents Diplomatiques Français 1932–1939 (Paris: Impr. nationale, 1963–86), Série 1, tome 2, 89.
5 That misinterpretation has already been effectively discredited in what remains the best analysis of Schleicher's career during the republic: Hayes, Peter, “‘A Question Mark with Epaulettes?’ Kurt von Schleicher and Weimar Politics,” Journal of Modern History 52 (1980): 55f. and 58CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
6 Diary entries of Dec. 29, 1932, and Jan. 14, 1933, in Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels, ed. Elke Fröhlich, Teil 1, Band 2:3 (Munich: K. G. Saur, 2006), 92, 105.
7 Otto Braun, the deposed SPD premier of Prussia, reported in his memoir that Schleicher told him soon after his appointment as chancellor that he was planning to use Strasser to split the NSDAP: Braun, Otto, Von Weimar zu Hitler (New York: Europa Verlag, 1940), 431fGoogle Scholar. It seems doubtful, however, that whereas Schleicher disclosed no such plan to his cabinet, he would have confided it to a leader of a party that was irreconcilably opposed to him. Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk, Schleicher's finance minister, gave conflicting versions of the chancellor's intentions regarding the NSDAP in his three memoirs. Although he attended cabinet meetings at which the chancellor spoke of his hopes for parliamentary support from the entire Nazi Reichstag delegation (see notes 14 and 16, below), von Krosigk, Schwerin claimed in his Es geschah in Deutschland (Tübingen: Rainer Wunderlich Verlag, 1951), 117f.Google Scholar, that Schleicher wanted to split the party. In his Staatsbankrott. Die Geschichte der Finanzpolitik des Deutschen Reiches von 1920 bis 1945 (Göttingen: Musterschmidt, 1974), 156, he wrote that the chancellor pursued the “double goal” of bringing the Nazis to accept a share of responsibility and splitting their party. But in his Memoiren (Stuttgart: Seewald, 1977), 154f., he rejected the view that Schleicher sought to split the NSDAP. Hjalmar Schacht reported in his memoir, 76 Jahre meines Lebens (Bad Wörishofen: Kindler und Schiermeyer, 1953), 374, that Schleicher had, as chancellor, confided to him that he placed his “final hope” on a split in the Nazi Party. Doubt is, however, cast on the accuracy of that statement by Schacht's claim in the same paragraph that Schleicher had offered to make him chancellor. It is unlikely that Schleicher would have confided in Schacht, who was known to be in league with Hitler and whom Schleicher suspected of having instigated Papen's covert meeting with the Nazi leader in Cologne on Jan. 4, 1933; see the report by Max Reiner of the Vossische Zeitung on his conversation with Schleicher on Jan. 10, 1933: Schäffer Papers, Archiv, Institut für Zeitgeschichte, ED 93, Bd. 33.
8 von Papen, Franz, Der Wahrheit eine Gasse (Munich: P. List, 1952), 244Google Scholar. In his ground-breaking study, Thilo Vogelsang concluded that Papen's claim that Schleicher had laid out a plan to split the NSDAP at the meeting was dubious. See his Reichswehr, Staat und NSDAP. Beiträge zur deutschen Geschichte 1930–1932 (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1962), 332 and 340, note 1617. In a written statement of Nov. 12, 1957, Papen contested the authenticity of Meissner's Aktennotiz of Dec. 2, 1932, on the meeting on the evening of Dec. 1 with Hindenburg and professed having no memory of the State Secretary's presence at that meeting. See Papen's statement in Vogelsang, Thilo, ed., “Zur Politik Schleichers gegenber der NSDAP 1932,” Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 6 (1958): 112Google Scholar.
9 See Meissners Aktennotiz of Dec. 2 in Vogelsang, ed., “Zur Politik Schleichers,” 105–07. Although Meissner attended the cabinet meeting of Dec. 7 at which Schleicher held out the prospect of support from a parliamentary majority that would include the entire Nazi Reichstag delegation (see note 14, below), he told a German Nationalist politician nine days later that Schleicher “rechne auf Spaltung der Nazi”: Die Deutschnationalen und die Zerstörung der Weimarer Republik. Aus dem Tagebuch von Reinhold Quaatz 1928–1933, ed. Hermann Weiss and Paul Hoser (Munich: R. Oldenbourg Verlag, 1989), 218. In his post-war memoir, Meissner—who would conspire with Papen and Hitler against Schleicher in January 1933—wrote that the chancellor at first sought to use Strasser's influence to bring Hitler to allow Strasser and other moderate Nazis to join the Schleicher cabinet, but that after Hitler blocked that plan, the chancellor resolved to split the NSDAP: Meissner, Otto, Staatssekretär unter Ebert, Hindenburg, Hitler (Hamburg: Hoffmann und Campe, 1950), 251fGoogle Scholar.
10 In his dispatch to Paris of the next day (see note 4, above), the ambassador quoted Schleicher as having said, “Strasser will want Hitler's authorization. But if Hitler doesn't give it, he may go ahead anyway, and that could cause new unrest in the Nazi ranks that could have great importance for the future” (“Strasser voudra recevoir l'autorisation d'Hitler. Mais si Hitler ne la lui donne pas, il est possible qu'il passe outre; et cela jetterait dans les rangs des nazis un trouble nouveau, qui aurait, pour l'avenir, une grande portée”). François-Poncet to Herriot, Nov. 29, 1932.
11 See the anonymous report written immediately afterward by one of the journalists present at the dinner, in the Papen papers located in the Tsentralnyi Gosudartsvennyi Arkhiv, Moscow, folder 5; the full text appears as an appendix in my Hitlers Weg zur Macht. Der Januar 1933 (Munich: Luchterhand Literaturverlag, 1996), 247–54. Afterward, the journalists agreed among themselves that Schleicher's estimate of Strasser's followers was much too high.
12 See the cabinet minutes of Nov. 11, 1932, in Minuth, Karl-Heinz, ed., Akten der Reichskanzlei. Weimarer Republik. Kabinett von Papen (Boppard am Rhein: Boldt Verlag, 1989), vol. 2, 903Google Scholar.
13 Minutes of Nov. 25, ibid., vol 2, 1013.
14 At the meeting of Dec. 7, Schleicher said that even if the German Nationals withheld their support from the cabinet, a majority in favor of toleration could be attained with the backing of the Center Party (70 seats), the Bavarian People's Party (20 seats), the so-called Technische Arbeitsgemeinschaft of smaller parties (20 seats), and the NSDAP (196 seats). Such an alignment would have yielded a majority of 306 in the Reichstag of 584. See Golecki, Anton, ed., Akten der Reichskanzlei, Weimarer Republik. Das Kabinett von Schleicher 1932/33 (Boppard am Rhein: Boldt Verlag, 1986), 22–24Google Scholar.
15 Quoted in handwritten notes taken by Gen. Lt. Liebmann at meetings of Schleicher with senior army officers at the Reichswehrministerium, Dec. 13–15, 1932. See the text in Vogelsang, Thilo, ed., “Neue Dokumente zur Geschichte der Reichswehr 1930–1933,” Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 2 (1954): 428Google Scholar.
16 Golecki, , ed., Akten der Reichskanzlei, Weimarer Republik. Das Kabinett von Schleicher, minutes of Jan. 16, 1933, 11:15 a.m., 230–35Google Scholar.
17 Schleicher to Wilhelm Groener, Mar. 25, 1932, in Craig, Gordon A., ed., “Briefe Schleichers an Groener,” Die Welt als Geschichte 11 (1951): 130Google Scholar.
18 See the manuscript of 1946 by Hans-Henning von Holtzendorff, “Die Politik des Generals von Schleicher gegenüber der NSDAP 1930–33,” Archiv, Institut für Zeitgeschichte, ZS/A 36/1.
19 Vogelsang, ed., “Zur Politik Schleichers gegenüber der NSDAP 1932,” 89f. The statement was in the form of a letter to the editor of the Vossische Zeitung, but it was apparently never sent.
20 Vogelsang, ed., “Neue Dokumente zur Geschichte der Reichswehr,” 428.
21 Rumbold to Simon, Dec. 21, 1932, in Great Britain, Foreign Office, Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919–1939, 11 vols. (London: H. M. Stationery Office, 1947–1970), 2nd series, vol. 4, 383–86.
22 Ott, Eugen, “Ein Bild des Generals Kurt von Schleicher,” Politische Studien 10 (1959): 367Google Scholar. In his memoir, Günter Gereke, Reichskommissar für Arbeitsbeschaffung in Schleicher's cabinet, attributed a “Zähmungskonzeption” to the chancellor: Gereke, Ich war königlich-preussischer Landrat, 213.
23 A clipping of this article, which was published in the Berliner Börsen Zeitung on Dec. 14, 1932, is in the files of the Reichskanzlei, R43 I/1504, Bundesarchiv Berlin. Its text is identical to a seven-page typescript entitled “Was will Schleicher?” in the papers of Hans Schäffer of the Ullstein Verlag, who declined to publish it but wrote on it that Schleicher's State Secretary, Erwin Planck, had given it to him but that he, Schäffer, suspected that the chancellor had written it himself: Archiv, Institut für Zeitgeschichte, ED 93, vol. 33.
24 Georg Dertinger, “Informationsbericht vom 14. Januar 1933,” Bundesarchiv Koblenz, Sammlung Brammer, ZSg 101/26, 41.
25 I have dealt with the following in greater detail in my Hitler's Thirty Days to Power (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1996), 79ff.
26 The claim that Schleicher's goal in Jan. 1933 was a “presidential, constitutional democracy” is unconvincing: Pyta, Wolfram, “Konstitutionelle Demokratie statt monarchischer Restauration,” Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 47 (1999): 417–41Google Scholar. The documents presented there in support of that claim contain no evidence that Schleicher ever read, much less endorsed them. The military aide on whom he relied in constitutional matters was, to be sure, in contact with the authors of those documents. But when presented with a defense ministry memorandum that included, as one of several options, the strategy proposed in those documents—continuation of his cabinet in office despite a no-confidence vote by a Reichstag majority incapable of uniting to form a new cabinet—the chancellor rejected it: Golecki, ed., Akten der Reichskanzlei, Weimarer Republik. Das Kabinett von Schleicher, 241–243. As Schleicher correctly pointed out to a group of journalists in mid-January, that course would enable a divided but hostile Reichstag majority to cripple the cabinet's economic policies by joining together to rescind the presidential emergency decrees on which it would be necessary to rely to govern; see the report on his dinner with journalists on Jan. 13, 1933, cited in note 11 above.
- 1
- Cited by