23 Nov. 45
course, because he stands, he said, "with unswerving loyalty
to the Führer because he fully recognizes the basic ideas of
National Socialism and because at the end, the disturbances, compared
to the great task, can be considered irrelevant."
High-ranking military officers paid tribute to the Defendant
Schacht's contrivances on behalf of the Nazi war machine. In an
article written for the Military Weekly Gazette in January of
1937, it is said:
"The German Defense Force
commemorates Dr. Schacht today as one of the men who have done
imperishable things for it and its development in accordance with the
directions from the Führer and Reich Chancellor. The Defense
Force owes it to Schacht's skill and great ability that, in defiance
of all currency difficulties, it, according to plan, has been able to
grow up to its present strength from an army of 100,000 men."
After the reoccupation of the Rhineland, the Nazi
conspirators re-doubled their efforts to prepare Germany for a major
war. The Four Year Plan, as we have indicated earlier, was proclaimed
by Hitler in his address at the Nuremberg Party convention on the 9th
day of September in 1936, and it was given a statutory foundation by
the decree concerning the execution of the Four Year Plan dated the
18th day of October, 1936, which is found in the
Reichsgesetzblatt of 1936, in the first part, on Page 887. By
this decree the Defendant Göring was put in charge of the plan.
He was authorized to enact any legal and administrative measures
deemed necessary by him for the accomplishment of his task, and to
issue orders and instructions to all Government agencies, including
the highest Reich authorities.
The purpose of the plan was to enable Nazi Germany to attain
complete self-sufficiency in essential raw materials, notably motor
fuel, rubber, textile fiber, and non-ferrous metals, and to intensify
preparations for war. The development of synthetic products was
greatly accelerated despite their high costs.
Apart from the self-sufficiency program, however, the Nazi
conspirators required foreign exchange to finance propaganda and
espionage activities abroad. Thus, in a speech on November 1 of 1937,
before the Wehrmachtakademie, General Thomas stated:
"If you consider that one will
need during the war considerable means in order to organize the
necessary propaganda in order to pay for the espionage service and
for similar purposes, then one should be clear that our internal mark
would be of no use therefore, and that foreign exchange will be
needed."