Hitler's Obersalzberg Speech

The Obersalzberg Speech is a speech which Adolf Hitler delivered in the presence of ''Wehrmacht'' commanders at his Obersalzberg home on 22 August 1939, a week before the German invasion of Poland.

Origin of the "Lochner" version of the Obersalzberg speech

In August 1939, American journalist Louis P. Lochner contacted American diplomat Alexander Comstock Kirk and showed him the text, but Kirk was not interested.von Klemperer, Klemens ''The German Resistance Against Hitler: The Search for Allies Abroad, 1938–1945'', Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993 p. 133. Lochner next contacted British diplomat George Ogilvie-Forbes, who indeed transmitted it back to London on 25 August 1939. Canadian historian Michael Marrus wrote that Lochner almost certainly obtained the text from Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, chief of the ''Abwehr'' (German intelligence), who was present at the Obersalzberg Conference.

Three documents were grouped together during the Nuremberg trials that contained Hitler's speech on 22 August 1939 (1014-PS,"Translation of doc 1014-PS"http://library2.lawschool.cornell.edu/donovan/pdf/Batch_2_pdfs/Vol_IV_8_06.pdf 798-PS,"Translation of doc 780-ps"http://library2.lawschool.cornell.edu/donovan/pdf/Batch_2_pdfs/Vol_IV_8_05.pdf and L-3,"L-3 is inside the footnote of the document"http://library.fes.de/library/netzquelle/zwangsmigration/32ansprache.html) and only document L-3 contained Hitler's reference to the Armenian genocide. Documents 1014-PS and 798-PS were seized by U.S. forces inside the headquarters of the ''Oberkommando der Wehrmacht'' (OKW)"One Hundred and Thirty-Second Day Friday, 17 May 1946 page 64 " http://avalon.law.yale.edu/imt/05-17-46.asp but the documents did not contain the Armenian quote. On 16 May 1946, during the Nuremberg trials, counsel for one of the defendants, Dr. Walter Siemers, requested that the court strike document 1014-PS, but his request was rejected.One Hundred and Thirty-First Day Thursday, 16 May 1946 page 47"http://avalon.law.yale.edu/imt/05-16-46.asp Document L-3 was brought to the court by Lochner.

According to Lochner, while he was stationed in Berlin, he received a copy of a speech by Hitler from his informant. Lochner later published the speech (in English translation) in his book ''What About Germany?'' (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1942) as being indicative of Hitler's desire to conquer the world. In 1945, Lochner handed over to the Nuremberg prosecution a transcript of the German document he had received, and it was labeled ''L-3''. Hence it is known as the ''L-3 document''. The speech is also found in a footnote to notes about a speech that Hitler held in Obersalzberg on 22 August 1939 and was published in the German foreign policy documents"IMG Nürnberg 1014-ps" http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/A-Hitler-08-22-1939-at-Obersalzberg-on-planned-attack-on-Poland-and-extermination-of-Poles.pdf"Portrayals of Hitler Project" http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/marcuse/projects/hitler/hitler.htm When later asked at Nuremberg who his source was, Lochner said it was a German named "Herr Maasz" but gave vague information about him.

''The Times'' quoted from Lochner's version in an unattributed article titled "''The War Route of the Nazi Germany''" on 24 November 1945. The article stated that the document had been brought forward by the prosecutor on 23 November 1945 as evidence. However, according to the ''Akten zur deutschen auswärtigen Politik'' (ser. D, vol. 7, 1961), the document was not introduced as evidence before the International Military Tribunal for undisclosed reasons, and is not included in the official publication of the documents in evidence. Two other documents containing minutes of Hitler's Obersalzberg speech(es) had been found among the seized German documents and were introduced as evidence, both omitting the Armenian quote.

In ''Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression'' (colloquially known as "the Red Set"), a collection of documents related to the Nuremberg trials which was compiled by the prosecutorial team, the editors describe the relationship between the relevant documents as follows:

In his book ''What about Germany?'', Lochner offered the following English translation of the third paragraph of the document ''L-3'':

See also

* Anti-Armenian sentiment
* Anti-Polish sentiment
* Anti-Slavic sentiment
* Expulsion of Poles by Germany
* Functionalism–intentionalism debate
* Hitler's Armenian reference, reportedly made during the speech
* Occupation of Poland (1939–1945)
* Total war#Germany
* War of annihilation

Notes

References

{{reflist

External links

Nuremberg Trials, 26 November 1945 session


(in German): "Wer redet heute noch von der Vernichtung der Armenier?''' ''Adolf Hitlers Geheimrede am 22. August 1939: Das historische L-3-Dokument''," in: ''Zeitschrift für Genozidforschung'' 9:1 (2008) (''Zeitschrift des Instituts für Diaspora- und Genozidforschung an der Ruhr-Universität Bochum''), pp. 93–131.

Document forgeries
1930s controversies
Speeches by Adolf Hitler
1939 in Poland
Armenian genocide and the Holocaust
Political quotes
Quotations from military
August 1939 in Europe
1939 in Germany
1939 speeches
1939 quotations
1930s in Bavaria
Berchtesgadener Land