Binding: Unknown Binding Label: Frederick A. Stokes Company Manufacturer: Frederick A. Stokes Company Number Of Pages: 269 Publication Date: 1938 Publisher: Frederick A. Stokes Company Studio: Frederick A. Stokes Company
Editorial Reviews:
THE LAST FIVE HOURS OF AUSTRIA BY EUGENE LENNHOFF former Editor of the Vienna Telegraph WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY PAUL FRISCHAUER FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY NEW YORK MCMXXXVII1 pj, by LKNNHOFF Alf fights reserved. No part of this work may he reproduced without the written permission of the publishers. Printed in the United State of America INTRODUCTION hy PAUL FRISCHAUER THE ultimatum presented by Herr Hitler to the Federal Republic of Austria on March nth, 1938, and Its Im mediate consequences brought a slow and gradual proc ess of development to a sudden and violent conclusion. The incorporation of Austria in the Third Retch came about inorganically, and it therefore remains an open question whether the last stage in her develop ment would have been the organic union of the little country with Germany would there have been any Anschluss at all without violence It is a fact that, after the Great War, and even before the conclusion of the Peace Treaties of Versailles and t Germain most parties in Austria desired the An- chlu nd her leading statesmen worked for it then and later, though only until the moment when President von Hindenburg allowed the National Socialist party to obtain supreme power in Germany. The clay on which Hitler established a National Socialist dictatorship marks the date on which respon sible statesmen In Austria and her leading representa tives of science and the arts first conceived a definite wish to preserve the independence of their country. The de sire for union with Germans entertained by the ma jority of Austrian, mainly by reason of their common language, was now transformed into a fundamental de v INTRODUCTION sire to retain the border between Austria and Germany, in order thereby to draw a similarly fundamental border line between the ancient culture and civilization of Austria and National Socialist Germany. It was an immediate consequence of this desire that, when, in 1933, the Third Reich claimed a future of a thousand years, the Austrians once again recalled the thousand years of their glorious past. That memory had become obliterated. Plunged by the disaster of the War into hardship and poverty, the Austrian people were torn by party and class conflict and had almost forgotten what patriotism meant. No body encouraged them to be patriotic. It was only Doc tor Dollfuss, Chancellor at the time, who from March, 1933, onwards left no stone unturned to strengthen in the people a love of their country. The watchword which he proclaimed and popularized was the order to awaken the historical conscience of the Austrians. The old uniforms of the Austro-Hungarian army, the wear ing of which had since the War been forbidden, were now brought out from cupboards, and portraits of his torical personages, whose names were honorable in Austrian history, were adorned with fresh laurels. Ex hibitions were held illustrating, in cross-section as it were, important historical events and designed to arouse the national conscience to fight for its future by remind ing it of its past. The Prince Eugene song was sung in chorus, and the police were instructed to tolerate the forbidden Gott erhalte, the old Austrian Imperial hymn, although they were not permitted to sing it themselves. This Austrian renaissance found a following in the vi INTRODUCTION upper classes of the larger towns, but still more among that section of the peasantry which, disliking all change and despite revolution, inflation and social upheaval, had from the beginning favored the restoration of the monarchy. It should therefore have been clear from the outset to the men who were proclaiming the Austrian renaissance that their ideal could only be suc cessfully realized if they also fixed as their goal the res toration of the Hapsburgs, But this they did not do at all clearly. Nor did they pursue a policy of whole hearted democracy, which was an alternative way to keep Austria independent...
