capitalism that sought to redistribute economic burdens without affecting the structure of the profit system.
The vigorous completion of the movement of social regulation which had begun in the Weimar Republic might have led to some variety of democratic socialism, but this was precluded by the increasing opposition of the industrialists and the Junkers, the crippling effects of the Versailles system, confusion of purpose and timidity on the part of the socialists, and the civil war in the labour movement which the Bolsheviks were waging with ever-growing intensity.
Into this situation, compounded of economic catastrophe and political ineptitude, the Fascists entered, bearing gifts and promises to all sections of the community. Harassed by the burden of social services, taxes, strikes, and the spectacle or miniature civil war on the streets of all large cities, the Hugenburgs, Thyssens, and Hindenburgs welcomed the Fascists so they might restore order “once and for all.” After that was done, so they thought who had seen so many Chancellors and go, the Fascists would either be sobered by the responsibility of rule or cashiered by the same mechanism through which they took over. The Army at any rate would keep them within the bounds of sanity after the country had been “saved from Bolshevism.” Once installed, however, the Fascists smashed the mechanism by which they came into power, politicalized the Army, and harnessed the industrialists as well as their plants into an economy organized for total war.
After Hitler became Chancellor and ruler of Germany, matters moved rapidly toward the solution by force of the economic and political problems of Europe. Just as Hitler’s domestic policy was aided by conservative fear of Bolshevism, so his international policy, which aimed at the destruction of Russia as the first big step in the march toward world power, was aided by conservative and reactionary groups the world over. Conflicting national interests, of course, came into play. As a whole, conservatives in the West were friendlier to the Roman variety of totalitarianism than to the Nazi variety. But as a group they swung enough weight to prevent energetic action against Hitler until the hunted became strong enough to become the hunter.
It is often alleged that the calculated policy of the governing classes in France and England was to encourage Germany to march east at the expense of Poland, the Baltic States, and especially Russia. This thesis is offered in extenuation of the
