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The Four Year Plan was a series of
economic An economy is an area of the production, distribution and trade, as well as consumption of goods and services. In general, it is defined as a social domain that emphasize the practices, discourses, and material expressions associated with the ...
measures initiated by
Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
in
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
in 1936. Hitler placed
Hermann Göring Hermann Wilhelm Göring (or Goering; ; 12 January 1893 – 15 October 1946) was a German politician, military leader and convicted war criminal. He was one of the most powerful figures in the Nazi Party, which ruled Germany from 1933 to 1 ...
in charge of these measures, making him a Reich
Plenipotentiary A ''plenipotentiary'' (from the Latin ''plenus'' "full" and ''potens'' "powerful") is a diplomat who has full powers—authorization to sign a treaty or convention on behalf of his or her sovereign. When used as a noun more generally, the wor ...
(Reichsbevollmächtigter) whose jurisdiction cut across the responsibilities of various cabinet ministries, including those of the Minister of Economics, the Defense Minister and the Minister of Agriculture. The Four Year Plan was part of the alternative governmental structure created by Hitler and the
Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...
, which included entities such as
Organisation Todt Organisation Todt (OT; ) was a civil and military engineering organisation in Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945, named for its founder, Fritz Todt, an engineer and senior Nazi. The organisation was responsible for a huge range of engineering pr ...
and the unification of the ''
Schutzstaffel The ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS; also stylized as ''ᛋᛋ'' with Armanen runes; ; "Protection Squadron") was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany, and later throughout German-occupied Europe duri ...
'' (SS) and the German police forces, including the
Gestapo The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one orga ...
, under
Heinrich Himmler Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (; 7 October 1900 – 23 May 1945) was of the (Protection Squadron; SS), and a leading member of the Nazi Party of Germany. Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and a main architect of th ...
. The primary purpose of the Four Year Plan was to provide for the rearmament of Germany, and to prepare the country for self-sufficiency in four years, from 1936 to 1940. Aside from emphasizing the rebuilding of the nation's military defenses, in disregard of the restrictions imposed on Germany by the
Treaty of Versailles The Treaty of Versailles (french: Traité de Versailles; german: Versailler Vertrag, ) was the most important of the peace treaties of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June ...
after the German defeat in
World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, the Four Year Plan sought to reduce unemployment; increase
synthetic fibre Synthetic fibers or synthetic fibres (in British English; see spelling differences) are fibers made by humans through chemical synthesis, as opposed to natural fibers that are directly derived from living organisms, such as plants (like cotton) ...
production, undertake
public works Public works are a broad category of infrastructure projects, financed and constructed by the government, for recreational, employment, and health and safety uses in the greater community. They include public buildings ( municipal buildings, sc ...
projects under the direction of
Fritz Todt Fritz Todt (; 4 September 1891 – 8 February 1942) was a German construction engineer and senior Nazi who rose from the position of Inspector General for German Roadways, in which he directed the construction of the German autobahns (''Reichsa ...
, increase automobile production, initiate numerous building and architectural projects and further develop the
Autobahn The (; German plural ) is the federal controlled-access highway system in Germany. The official German term is (abbreviated ''BAB''), which translates as 'federal motorway'. The literal meaning of the word is 'Federal Auto(mobile) Track' ...
system.


Origins

In 1933, Hitler had laid down his foreign policy priorities as "natural antagonism" towards the Soviet Union. In the autumn of 1935, various business leaders complained to Hitler about the overwhelming costs of the rearmament, only for
Hermann Göring Hermann Wilhelm Göring (or Goering; ; 12 January 1893 – 15 October 1946) was a German politician, military leader and convicted war criminal. He was one of the most powerful figures in the Nazi Party, which ruled Germany from 1933 to 1 ...
to speak about the necessity of preparing for the coming war against the Soviet Union. The outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in July 1936 put Hitler into an apocalyptic mood in the summer of 1936 as he became convinced that a war with the Soviet Union would occur in the near-future. The diary of Josef Goebbels shows that a leitmotiv of Hitler's thinking in 1936 and 1937 was his conviction that Germany would have to take on the forces of "
Judeo-Bolshevism Jewish Bolshevism, also Judeo–Bolshevism, is an anti-communist and antisemitic canard, which alleges that the Jews were the originators of the Russian Revolution in 1917, and that they held primary power among the Bolsheviks who led the r ...
" sooner rather than later. 


The Four Year Plan memo

In August 1936, in response to a growing crisis in the German economy caused by the strains of rearmament, Hitler issued the "Four-Year Plan Memorandum" ordering Göring to carry out the Four Year Plan to have the German economy ready for war within the next four years. During the 1936 economic crisis, the German government was divided into two factions with one (the so-called "free market" faction) centering around the ''Reichsbank'' President Hjalmar Schacht and the Price Commissioner Dr.
Carl Friedrich Goerdeler Carl Friedrich Goerdeler (; 31 July 1884 – 2 February 1945) was a monarchist conservative German politician, executive, economist, civil servant and opponent of the Nazi regime. He opposed some anti-Jewish policies while he held office and was ...
calling for decreased military spending and a turn away from
autarkic Autarky is the characteristic of self-sufficiency, usually applied to societies, communities, states, and their economic systems. Autarky as an ideal or method has been embraced by a wide range of political ideologies and movements, especiall ...
policies, and another faction around Göring calling for the opposite. Hitler hesitated for the first half of 1936 before siding with the more radical faction in his "Four Year Plan" memo of August. Historians such as Richard Overy have argued that the importance of the memo, which was written personally by Hitler, can be gauged by the fact that Hitler, who had something of a phobia about writing, hardly ever wrote anything down, which indicates that Hitler had something especially important to say. The "Four-Year Plan Memorandum" predicated an imminent all-out, apocalyptic struggle between "Judeo-Bolshevism" and German National Socialism, which necessitated a total effort at rearmament regardless of the economic costs. The basic premise of the Four Year Plan memo was that "the showdown with Russia is inevitable". In the memo, Hitler wrote:
Since the outbreak of the French Revolution, the world has been moving with ever increasing speed toward a new conflict, the most extreme solution of which is called Bolshevism, whose essence and aim, however, are solely the elimination of those strata of mankind which have hitherto provided the leadership and their replacement by worldwide Jewry. No state will be able to withdraw or even remain at a distance from this historical conflict...It is not the aim of this memorandum to prophesy the time when the untenable situation in Europe will become an open crisis. I only want, in these lines, to set down my conviction that this crisis cannot and will not fail to arrive and that it is Germany's duty to secure her own existence by every means in face of this catastrophe, and to protect herself against it, and that from this compulsion there arises a series of conclusions relating to the most important tasks that our people have ever been set. For a victory of Bolshevism over Germany would not lead to a Versailles treaty, but to the final destruction, indeed the annihilation of the German people...I consider it necessary for the ''Reichstag'' to pass the following two laws: 1) A law providing the death penalty for economic sabotage and 2) A law making the whole of Jewry liable for all damage inflicted by individual specimens of this community of criminals upon the German economy, and thus upon the German people.
Hitler called for Germany to have the world's "first army" in terms of fighting power within the next four years and that "the extent of the military development of our resources ''cannot be too large, nor its pace too swift''" (emphasis in the original) and the role of the economy was simply to support "Germany's self-assertion and the extension of her ''
Lebensraum (, ''living space'') is a German concept of settler colonialism, the philosophy and policies of which were common to German politics from the 1890s to the 1940s. First popularized around 1901, '' lso in:' became a geopolitical goal of Imper ...
''". Hitler went on to write that given the magnitude of the coming struggle that the concerns expressed by members of the "free market" faction like Schacht and Goerdeler that the current level of military spending was bankrupting Germany were irrelevant. Hitler wrote that: "However well balanced the general pattern of a nation's life ought to be, there must at particular times be certain disturbances of the balance at the expense of other less vital tasks. If we do not succeed in bringing the German army as rapidly as possible to the rank of premier army in the world...then Germany will be lost!". Along the same lines, Hitler wrote later in his memo: "The nation does not live for the economy, for economic leaders, or for economic or financial theories; on the contrary, it is finance and the economy, economic leaders and theories, which all owe unqualified service in this struggle for the self-assertion of our nation"."


Role of Göring

Hitler extended to Göring the power to make law simply by publishing decrees, which enabled him to create other plenipotentiaries in overall charge of various industries. Göring constantly expanded the scope of the plan until he became the ''de facto'' master of the German economy, and the Office of the Four Year Plan became, along with his control of the ''
Luftwaffe The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...
'' as an independent armed service, the power base that he had lacked since the weakening of the other government positions that he held. Göring held no significant position in the
Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...
, and his influence before he took on the Four Year Plan had been based primarily on his public popularity as a war hero and his easy access to Hitler. The Reichswerke, an industrial conglomerate aimed at hastening growth in ore mining and steel output of Nazi Germany, a major piece of the Four Year Plan, was established and controlled by Göring. Although the appointment of Göring as head of the plan had short-term benefits to Hitler, in the long term, it was a disaster, as Göring knew next to nothing about economics, a factor that Hitler cited as one of the reasons for the choice.


Methods

The Four Year Plan favoured both the protection of
agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people t ...
and the promotion of
autarky Autarky is the characteristic of self-sufficiency, usually applied to societies, communities, states, and their economic systems. Autarky as an ideal or method has been embraced by a wide range of political ideologies and movements, especiall ...
(economic independence) for Germany. Göring was put in charge of the Four Year Plan at its inception and given plenipotentiary powers. He had complete control over the economy, including the private sector, especially after the Minister of Economics,
Hjalmar Schacht Hjalmar Schacht (born Horace Greeley Hjalmar Schacht; 22 January 1877 – 3 June 1970, ) was a German economist, banker, centre-right politician, and co-founder in 1918 of the German Democratic Party. He served as the Currency Commissioner ...
, had begun to lose favour with Hitler for opposing the growing military expenditures at the expense of civilian economic growth. During the following years, the state, under the industrial conglomerate Reichswerke, began building refineries,
aluminium Aluminium (aluminum in American and Canadian English) is a chemical element with the symbol Al and atomic number 13. Aluminium has a density lower than those of other common metals, at approximately one third that of steel. I ...
plants, and factories for the development of synthetic materials. The Four Year Plan technically expired in 1940, but the "Office of the Four Year Plan", a cabinet-level agency, had grown to such a power base that the plan was extended indefinitely.


Global reaction

Rearmament was in direct violation of the strict terms set by the
allies of World War I The Allies of World War I, Entente (alliance), Entente Powers, or Allied Powers were a coalition of countries led by French Third Republic, France, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom, Russian Empire, Russia, King ...
at the
Treaty of Versailles The Treaty of Versailles (french: Traité de Versailles; german: Versailler Vertrag, ) was the most important of the peace treaties of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June ...
. The German army was to be restricted to 100,000 men, and there were to be no conscription, tanks or heavy artillery or general staff. The German navy was restricted to 15,000 men and no submarines while the fleet was limited to 6 battleships (of less than 10,000 tonnes), 6 cruisers and 12 destroyers. Germany was not permitted an air force. Finally, Germany was explicitly required to retain all enlisted men for 12 years and all officers for 25 years so that only a limited number of men would have military training. Following a tour of the German countryside in 1936, former British Prime Minister
David Lloyd George David Lloyd George, 1st Earl Lloyd-George of Dwyfor, (17 January 1863 – 26 March 1945) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1916 to 1922. He was a Liberal Party politician from Wales, known for leading the United Kingdom during ...
said of the breach of the treaty that he had helped to formulate:
That Germany is rearming cannot be denied. After all the victors in the Great War except Britain disregarded their own disarmament pledges, the Führer abrogated the agreement which bound his own country, thus following the example of the nations who were responsible for the Versailles Treaty. It is today a commonly admitted part of Hitler's policy to develop an army strong enough to resist any attack, regardless of from which side it may come. I believe that he has already reached this point of inviolability.
In a September 1936 speech before the German Labor Front, Hitler explained the plan's focus and drew a comparison between the resources at Germany's disposal and those accessible to the "incapable"
Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
. Some in the American press interpreted the speech as Hitler's call for war with the
Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...
to obtain those resources. The correspondent for ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' put it this way:
There was no expression of a wish to acquire these resources and there was distinctly no threat. Yet when the cheers... had died away one was conscious that a thought had been cast into the pool of German mentality and that the ripples created by it might spread far indeed.Birchall, Frederick T. (September 13, 1936
"Hitler Tells Reich It Would Prosper With Soviet Lands"
''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
''


See also

*
Reichswerke Hermann Göring Reichswerke Hermann Göring was an industrial conglomerate in Nazi Germany from 1937 until 1945. It was established to extract and process domestic iron ores from Salzgitter that were deemed uneconomical by the privately held steel mills. The sta ...
*
Five-year plans for the national economy of the Soviet Union The five-year plans for the development of the national economy of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) ( rus, Пятилетние планы развития народного хозяйства СССР, ''Pyatiletniye plany razvit ...


References

Notes Bibliography * * Bullock, Alan. (1991) '' Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives'' New York: Knopf. * * Further reading * Overy, Richard (1984) ''Goering''. New York: Barnes & Noble.


External links


Extract From a Memorandum by Hitler on the Tasks of the Four-Year Plan, 1936
(
Yad Vashem Yad Vashem ( he, יָד וַשֵׁם; literally, "a memorial and a name") is Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. It is dedicated to preserving the memory of the Jews who were murdered; honoring Jews who fought against th ...
website) {{Authority control Economy of Nazi Germany Economic history of World War II Hermann Göring 1936 establishments in Germany 1940 disestablishments in Germany