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Militarism and the Development of Fascist Ideology: The Political Ideas of Colonel Max Bauer, 1916–18

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 December 2008

Martin Kitchen
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Extract

Of all the officers in the German High Command (OHL) during the First World War none played a more active political role than Colonel Max Bauer. Colonel Bauer's papers, which are preserved in the federal archives in Koblenz, contain numerous memoranda on a wide range of topics, which make it possible to present a coherent picture of his views. This paper will analyze Bauer's political thinking during the First World War, but it will not deal with the more complex questions of his political role and influence.

Type
Articles
Information
Central European History , Volume 8 , Issue 3 , September 1975 , pp. 199 - 220
Copyright
Copyright © Conference Group for Central European History of the American Historical Association 1975

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References

1. This I have done elsewhere, in The Silent Dictatorship: The Politics of the German High Command 1916–1918, to be published shortly.

2. Bauer, Max, Der Grosse Krieg in Feld und Heimat: Erinnerungen und Betrachtungen (Tübingen, 1921), p. 26.Google Scholar

3. Feldman, Gerald D., Army, Industry, and Labor in Germany 1914–1918 (Princeton, 1966), p. 150.Google Scholar

4. Hindenburg certainly accepted Bauer's views, and the Crown Prince was equally outspoken. For an interesting view of life at the OHL by a man who was both an aristocrat and an extremist see von Thaer, Albrecht, Generalstabsdienst an der Front und in der OHL (Göttingen, 1958)Google Scholar. The group which had the most difficulty being accepted in the officer corps was those officers with professional degrees in medicine or engineering, but no such men had key positions at the OHL.

5. Puhle, H.-J., Agrarische Interessenpolitik und preussischer Konservatismus im Wilhelminischen Reich (Hanover, 1966)Google Scholar, and Kitchen, Martin, The German Officer Corps 1890–1914 (Oxford, 1968).Google Scholar

6. For a good example of this attitude see Hindenburg to Hertling, Jan 14, 1918, Deutsches Zentralarchiv Abteilung 1, Potsdam, Reichskanzlei, Verkehr des Reichskanzlers mit den Gr. HQ 2403/6. Some of these questions are discussed in Heinz Janssen, Karl, “Der Wechsel in der Obersten Heeresleitung 1916,” Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 7 (1959).Google Scholar

7. See particularly Petzold, Joachim, Die Dolchstosslegende: Eine Geschichtsfälschung im Dienste des deutschen Imperialisms und Militarismus (Berlin, 1963)Google Scholar, and Thimme, Annelise, Flucht in den Mythos: Die Deutschnationale Volkspartei und die Niederlage von 1918 (Göttingen, 1969).Google Scholar

8. Bundesarchiv Koblenz, Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2. Also in Deist, Wilhelm, ed., Militär und Innenpolitik im Weltkrieg 1914–1918 (Düsseldorf, 1970), 1: 421.Google Scholar

9. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2, letter by Bauer, May 5, 1916.

10. Ibid. vol. 16, Mar. 16, 1917; Deist, 1: 570. For the details of the Hindenburg program see Feldman, Army, Industry, and Labor; Schröter, Alfred, Krieg, Staat, Monopol 1914–1918 (Berlin, 1965)Google Scholar; Weber, Hellmuth, Ludendorff und die Monopole (Berlin, 1966)Google Scholar; Armeson, Robert B., Total Warfare and Compulsory Labor (The Hague, 1964).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2; Deist, 2: 1082.

12. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2; Deist, 2: 1239. The memorandum is undated, but obviously written in July 1918.

13. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 13, Bauer to Winterfeldt, Aug. 3, 1918.

14. For the question of electoral reform see Pattemann, R., Der Kampf um die preussische Wahlrechtsreform im Ersten Weltkrieg (Düsseldorf, 1964)Google Scholar; Bergsträsser, L., Die preussische Wahlrechtsfrage im Kriege und die Entstehung der Osterbotschaft 1917 (Tübingen, 1924).Google Scholar

15. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 1e.

16. Bundesarchiv Militärarchiv Freiburg, Nachlass Hermann Ritter Mertz von Quirnheim, vol. 23; Deist, 2: 783.

17. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2.

18. Ibid., Hindenburg to Michaelis, draft letter, Oct. 1917. The draft is almost certainly the work of Bauer. Deist, 2: 1082.

19. Bundesarchiv Koblenz, Nachlass Bauer, vol. 12, Bauer to Müldner, Apr. 16, 1918.

20. Ibid., vol. 2, memorandum by Bauer, Apr. 23, 1918.

21. Ibid., vol. 17, memorandum by Bauer, June 1, 1918, for Major Otto von Müller, the adjutant of the Crown Prince, to show to the Crown Prince.

22. Ibid., vol. 2, July 1918.

23. Ibid., memorandum dated Feb. 1918.

24. Ibid., memorandum dated Apr. 23, 1918.

25. There is an extensive literature on the SPD during the war. See particularly Mishark, J. W., The Road to Revolution: German Marxism and World War I (New York, 1967)Google Scholar; Schorske, C. E., German Social Democracy 1905–1917 (Cambridge, Mass., 1955)Google Scholar; Berlau, A. J., The German Social Democratic Party 1914–1921 (New York, 1949)Google Scholar; Herzfeld, H., Die deutsche Sozialdemokratie und die Auflösung der nationalen Einheitsfront im Weltkriege (Leipzig, 1928)Google Scholar; Klein, Fritz, et al. ., Deutschland im ersten Weltkrieg, 3 vols. (Berlin, 1968–1969).Google Scholar

26. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2, draft memorandum to chancellor, Sept. 1916.

27. Ibid., memorandum on Drews's analysis of the domestic political situation, Feb. 1918.

28. Ibid., vol. 12, Bauer to Röckling, Feb. 7, 1918; also the memorandum of Feb. 10, 1918, in the same vol.

29. Ibid., Bauer to Fleischer, Mar. 25, 1918.

30. Ibid., vol. 13, Bauer to Haeften, Aug. 25, 1918.

31. Ibid., vol. 14. Bauer's memorandum for Ludendorff to the minister of the interior. The particular villain in the OHL's eyes was Ledebour, whose name they managed to spell wrong.

32. Ibid., vol. 2.

33. Ibid., memorandum, Apr. 23, 1918. Bauer described the situation as a struggle between die Frau and das Weib, terms which are vague enough in German, and untranslatable into English.

34. Ibid., vol. 14, “Denkschrift der OHL über die deutsche Volks– und Wehrkraft,” undated memorandum, Spring 1918.

35. Bauer had some reservations on this particular point, as there was at least a prophylactic value in certain forms of birth control.

36. Kitchen, The German Officer Corps, chap. 2.

37. Massing, P. W., Vorgeschichte des politischen Antisemitismus (Frankfurt, 1959)Google Scholar; Horkheimer, Max, “Die Juden und Europa,” Zeitschrift für Sozialforschung 7 (1939), nos. 1 and 2;Google Scholar Puhle, Agrarische Interessenpolitik; Rosenberg, H., Grosse Depression und Bismarckzeit (Berlin, 1967)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Nitzsche, M., Die handelspolitische Reaktion in Deutschland (Stuttgart, 1905).Google Scholar

38. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2, memorandum, July 1918.

39. Ibid., Apr. 23, 1918.

40. Ibid., vol. 16, memorandum of Mar. 6, 1917, for the first attitude, and vol. 2, July 1918, for the second.

41. Ibid., vol. 16, Fleischer to Bauer, July 6, 1918. It is interesting to note that Hindenburg thought that Bauer's obsession with Freemasons was “rubbish.” Another of the OHL's arch anti-Semites, Albrecht von Thaer, complained that Ludendorff prided himself on his “German objectivity” and did not share Thaer's virulent anti-Semitism. Ludendorff does not seem to have joined the ranks of the ultra anti-Semites until his second marriage after the war. Thaer complained that the OHL was poisoned by having too many Jews working in the offices, a state of affairs which he felt was “highly dangerous.” Thaer, Generalstabsdienst, diary entries for Apr. 27 and May 2, 1918.

42. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 13. Kraeger was at the university of Düsseldorf. In 1918 he published a book under the somewhat unusual pseudonym for an ultra right-wing anti-Semite of “Heinrich Heine” entitled Preussentum und Demokratie, which was used by the army for its ill-fated “patriotic instruction” periods. Kraeger was removed from his teaching position by the French after the war. His career is otherwise obscure.

43. Deist, 2: 952, n. 2.

44. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 13, Ludendorff to minister of the interior, July 2, 1918.

45. Ibid., vol. 13, Bauer to Fleischer, Sept. 3, 1918.

46. Ibid., vol. 2, memorandum of Spring 1917.

47. Ibid., vol. 2, memorandum for the Crown Prince, Jan. 6, 1918.

48. Ibid., memorandum, July 1918.

49. Ibid., vol. 11, Bauer to Vice Admiral Kraft of the Reichsmarineamt, June 25, 1917.

50. I discuss this matter at some length in “Diktatur des Militärs?” to be published shortly in the Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte.

51. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2, undated memorandum, 1916. See also Schellenberg, Johanna. “Die Herausbildung der Militärdiktatur in den ersten Jahren des Krieges,” in Politik im Krieg 1914–1918, Klein, F., ed. (Berlin, 1964).Google Scholar

52. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2, memorandum of Aug. 20, 1916.

53. Bundesarchiv Militärarchiv Freiburg, Nachlass Mertz, vol. 27, manuscript “Im Grossen Hauptquartier.”

54. Nachlass Bauer, vol. 2, letter to Kraft, Feb. 28, 1918.

55. For further details see Thaer, Generalstabsdienst, p. 211; Hoffmann, Max, Die Aufzeichnungen des Generalmajors Max Hoffmann (Berlin, 1929), 1: 201Google Scholar; Bayern, Rupprecht von, Mein Kriegstagebuch (Berlin, 1929), 2: 420Google Scholar; Bundesarchiv Militärarchiv Freiburg, Nachlass Groener, vol. 32, passim.

56. Marcuse, Herbert, Reason and Revolution (Boston, 1968)Google Scholar; Marcuse, , “The Struggle against Liberalism in the Totalitarian View of the State,” in Negations (Boston, 1968)Google Scholar; Horkheimer, Max, “Egoismus und Freiheitsbewegung,” Zeitschrift für Sozialforschung 5 (1936)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Horkheimer, “Traditionelle und Kritische Theorie,” ibid. 6 (1937); Lukács, Georg, Die Zerstörung der Vernünft (Berlin, 1954)Google Scholar; Neumann, Franz, Behemoth (New York, 1963.)Google Scholar

57. See Kühnl, R., Die nationahozialistische Linke (Meisenheim, 1966)Google Scholar; Bloch, Charles, Die SA und die Krise des NS-Regimes 1934 (Frankfurt, 1970).Google Scholar

58. Fromm, Erich, Escape from Freedom (New York, 1941)Google Scholar; Parsons, Talcott, “Some Sociological Aspects of Fascist Movements,” in Essays in Sociological Theory (Glencoe, 1964)Google Scholar, and “Democracy and Social Structure in Pre-Nazi Germany,” ibid.; Bloch, Ernst, “Ungleichzeitigkeit und Berauschung” and “Ungleichzeitigkeit und Pflicht zu ihrer Dialektik,” in Erbschaft dieser Zeit (Zurich, 1935).Google Scholar

59. Kitchen, German Officer Corps, chap. 6.

60. Engelberg, E., “Zur Entstehung und historischen Stellung des preussisch-deutschen Bonapartismus,” in Klein, F. and Streisand, J., eds., Beiträge zum neuen Geschichtsbild (Berlin, 1956)Google Scholar; for a contrary but unconvincing view see Rein, A., Bonapartismus und Faschismus in der deutschen Geschichte (Göttingen, 1962).Google Scholar

61. It is interesting to note that similar views were held by the British liberal J. A. Hobson. See Imperialism: A Study (London, 1968).