The concept of union between Austria and Germany, prohibited by the Treaty of Versailles (1919), but with some support in both countries after the collapse of the Habsburg Empire and Austria's diminished status. Hitler, himself an Austrian, pursued the idea once in power. In 1938, after the resignation of Austrian Chancellor Schuschnigg, and under the threat of military force, he brought Austria into Germany as the province of Ostmark. The union of Austria and Germany was formally proclaimed on 13 March 1938. In 1943, the Moscow Declaration of the USA, Britain, and the Soviet Union annulled the Anschluss, recognizing Austria's right to independence; an independent government was set up at the end of World War 2.
The Anschluss (German: connection, or political union), also known as the Anschluss Österreichs, was the 1938 annexation of Austria into Greater Germany by the Nazi regime.
The events of March 12, 1938, marked the culmination of historical cross-national pressures to unify the German populations of Austria and Germany under one nation. Earlier, Hitlerian Germany had provided support for the Austrian National Socialist Party in its bid to seize power from Austria's Austrofascist leadership. Fully devoted to remaining independent but amidst growing pressures, the chancellor of Austria, Kurt Schuschnigg, tried to hold a plebiscite.
Although he expected Austria to vote in favour of maintaining autonomy, a well-planned internal overthrow by the Austrian Nazi Party of Austria's state institutions in Vienna took place on March 11, prior to the vote. With power quickly transferred over to Germany, the Wehrmacht troops entered Austria to enforce the Anschluss. The Allies were, on paper, committed to upholding the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, which specifically prohibited the union of Austria and Germany.
Nevertheless, the Anschluss was among the first major steps in Adolf Hitler's long-desired creation of an empire including German-speaking lands and territories Germany had lost after World War I.
Austria ceased to exist as a fully independent nation until 1955.
Situation before the Anschluss
The idea of grouping all Germans into one state had been the subject of inconclusive debate since the end of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806. Also, due to the multi-ethnic composition of the Austro-Hungarian Empire centralized in Vienna, many rejected this notion and it was unthinkable that Austria would give up her "non-German" territories, let alone submit to Prussia. Nevertheless, a series of wars, including the Austro-Prussian War, led to the expulsion of Austria from German affairs, allowed for the creation of the Norddeutsche Bund (North German Confederation) and consolidated the German states through Prussia, enabling the creation of a German Empire in 1871. When the latter broke up in 1918, many German-speaking Austrians hoped to join with Germany in the realignment of Europe, but the Treaty of Versailles (1919) and the Treaty of Saint-Germain of 1919 explicitly vetoed the inclusion of Austria within a German state, because France and Britain feared the power of a larger Germany, and had already begun to disempower the current one. Also Austrian particularism, especially among the nobility, played a huge role, as Austria was Roman Catholic, while Germany was dominated, especially in government, more by Protestants.
In the early 1930s, popular support for union with Germany remained overwhelming, and the Austrian government looked to a possible customs union with Germany in 1931. Hitler, born in Austria, had promoted an "all-German Reich" from the early beginnings of his leadership in the NSDAP and had publicly stated as early as 1924 in Mein Kampf that he would attempt a union, by force if necessary.
Austria shared the economic turbulence of post-1929 Europe with a high unemployment rate and unstable commerce and industry. The First Republic, dominated from the late 1920s by the Catholic nationalist Christian Social Party (CS), gradually disintegrated from 1933 (dissolution of parliament and ban of the Austrian National Socialists) to 1934 (Austrian Civil War in February and ban of all remaining parties except the CS) and evolved into a pseudo-fascist, corporatist model of one-party government which combined the CS and the paramilitary Heimwehr with absolute state domination of labour relations and no freedom of the press (see Austrofascism and Patriotic Front). The predominance of the Christian Social Party (whose economic policies were based on the papal encyclical Rerum novarum) was an Austrian phenomenon in that Austria's national identity had strong Catholic elements which were incorporated into the movement by way of clerical authoritarian tendencies which are certainly not to be found in Nazism. Both Engelbert Dollfuss and his successor Kurt Schuschnigg turned to Austria's other fascist neighbour, Italy, for inspiration and support.
When Chancellor Dollfuss was assassinated by Austrian Nazis on 25 July 1934 in a failed coup, the second civil war within only one year followed, lasting until August 1934. Afterwards, many leading Austrian Nazis fled to Germany and continued to coordinate their actions from there while the remaining Austrian Nazis started to make use of terrorist attacks against the Austrian governmental institutions (causing a death toll of more than 800 between 1934 and 1938).
The Anschluss of 1938
Hitler's first moves
In early 1938, Hitler had consolidated his power in Germany and was ready to reach out to fulfil his long-planned expansion. After a lengthy period of pressure by Germany, Hitler met Schuschnigg on 12 February 1938 in Berchtesgaden (Bavaria) and instructed him to lift the ban of political parties, reinstate full party freedoms, release all imprisoned members of the Nazi party and let them participate in the government.
Before the February meeting, Schuschnigg was already under considerable pressure from Germany. Jansa and his staff had developed a scenario for Austria's defense against a German attack, a situation Hitler wanted to avoid at all costs.
During the following weeks, Schuschnigg realized that his newly appointed ministers were working to take over his authority. Schuschnigg tried to gather support throughout Austria and inflame patriotism among the people. The communists announced their unconditional support for the Austrian government, understandable in light of Nazi pressure on Austria.
Schuschnigg announces a referendum
On 9 March, as a last resort to preserve Austria's independence, Schuschnigg scheduled a plebiscite on the independence of Austria for 13 March. Holding a referendum was a highly risky gamble for Schuschnigg, and, on the next day, it became apparent that Hitler would not simply stand by while Austria declared its independence by public vote. In addition, the German Ministry of Propaganda issued press reports that riots had broken out in Austria and that large parts of the Austrian population were calling for German troops to restore order.
Hitler sent an ultimatum to Schuschnigg on 11 March, demanding that he hand over all power to the Austrian National Socialists or face an invasion. However, without waiting for an answer, Hitler had already signed the order to send troops into Austria at one o'clock, issuing it to Hermann Göring only hours later.
Schuschnigg desperately sought support for Austrian independence in the hours following the ultimatum, but, realizing that neither France nor the United Kingdom were willing to take steps, he resigned as Chancellor that evening. Meanwhile, Austrian President Wilhelm Miklas refused to appoint Seyss-Inquart Chancellor and asked other Austrian politicians such as Michael Skubl and Sigismund Schilhawsky to assume the office. As Miklas continued to refuse to appoint a Nazi government and Seyss-Inquart still could not send a telegram in the name of the Austrian government demanding German troops to restore order, Hitler became furious. At about 10 PM, well after Hitler had signed and issued the order for the invasion, Göring and Hitler gave up on waiting and published a forged telegram containing a request by the Austrian Government for German troops to enter Austria.
German troops march into Austria
On the morning of 12 March, the 8th Army of the German Wehrmacht crossed the German-Austrian border. The atmosphere was so intense that Göring, in a telephone call that evening, stated: "There is unbelievable jubilation in Austria.
Hitler's further travel through Austria changed into a triumphal tour that climaxed in Vienna, when around 200,000 Austrians gathered on the Heldenplatz (Square of Heroes) to hear Hitler proclaim the Austrian Anschluss (Video: Hitler proclaims Austria's inclusion in the Reich (2MB)). Hitler later commented: "Certain foreign newspapers have said that we fell on Austria with brutal methods. I have in the course of my political struggle won much love from my people, but when I crossed the former frontier (into Austria) there met me such a stream of love as I have never experienced.
The Anschluss was given immediate effect by legislative act on 13 March, subject to ratification by a plebiscite. Austria became the province of Ostmark, and Seyss-Inquart was appointed Governor. Interestingly, in some remote areas of Austria the referendum on the independence of Austria on 13 March was held despite the Wehrmacht's presence in Austria (it took up to 3 days to occupy every part of Austria). For instance, in the village of Innervillgraten a majority of 95% voted for Austria's independence.
Austria remained part of the Third Reich until the end of World War II when a preliminary Austrian Government declared the Anschluss "null und nichtig" (void and null) on April 27, 1945. After the war, then allied-occupied Austria was recognized and treated as a separate country, but was not restored to sovereignty until the Austrian State Treaty and Austrian Declaration of Neutrality, both of 1955, largely due to the rapid development of the Cold War and disputes between the Soviet Union and its former allies over its foreign policy.
Reactions and consequences of the Anschluss
The picture of Austria in the first days of its existence in the Third Reich is one of contradictions: at one and the same time, Hitler's terror regime began to tighten its grip in every area of society, beginning with mass arrests and thousands of Austrians attempting to flee in every direction;
Cardinal Theodor Innitzer (a political figure of the CS) declared as early as 12 March: "The Viennese Catholics should thank the Lord for the bloodless way this great political change has occurred, and they should pray for a great future for Austria. he was made to sign a new statement, issued on behalf of all the Austrian bishops, which provided: “The solemn declaration of the Austrian bishops ...
Robert Kauer, President of the Protestants in Austria, greeted Hitler on 13 March as "saviour of the 350,000 German Protestants in Austria and liberator from a five-year hardship." The Foreign Secretary saw the German Foreign Minister on the 10th of March and addressed to him a grave warning on the Austrian situation and upon what appeared to be the policy of the German Government in regard to it....
However the speech concluded:
I imagine that according to the temperament of the individual the events which are in our minds to-day will be the cause of regret, of sorrow, perhaps of indignation.
The moderate reaction to the Anschluss was the first major consequence of the strictly followed appeasement British foreign policy strategy.
The precise character of the Anschluss remains a difficulty essential to Austria's understanding of its history and the obligations it entails.
The appeal of Nazism to Austrians
The Anschluss can be misunderstood as simply a military annexation of an unwilling Austria, but this lends itself to confusion with other German military occupations of European countries. Despite the subversion of Austrian political process by Hitler's sympathisers and associates in Austria, Austrian acceptance of direct government by Hitler's Germany is a very different phenomenon from the administration of other collaborationist countries.
With the break-up of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy in 1918, popular opinion was for unification with Germany, in realization of the Grossdeutschland concept--this however was forbidden by the Treaty of St. Germain, to which the newly formed Austrian republic was obliged. This was in stark contrast to the general concept of self-determination which governed the Versailles talks, as was the inclusion of the Sudetenland, a German-populated area of the former Austro-Hungarian province of Bohemia (whose population favoured joining German-speaking Austria), in the newly formed Czechoslovak republic, giving rise to revisionist sentiment. This laid the grounds for the general willingness of the populations of both Austria and the Sudetenland for inclusion into the Third Reich, as well as the relative acceptance of the Western Governments, who made little protest until March 1939, when the irredentist argument lost its value following the annexation of the rest of Czech-speaking Bohemia, as well as Moravia and Czech Silesia.
The small Republic of Austria was seen by many of its citizens as economically nonviable, a feeling that was exacerbated by the Depression of the 1930s. Furthermore, the break-up had thrown Austria into a crisis of identity, and many Austrians, of both the left and the right, felt that Austria should be part of a larger German nation.
Politically, Austria had not had the time to develop a strongly democratic society to resist the onslaught of totalitarianism. In fact, with the end of democracy in 1933 and the establishment of Austrofascism, Austria had already purged its democratic institutions and instituted a dictatorship long before the Anschluss. However, the Nazis' anti-Semitism found fertile soil in Austria.
In addition to the economic appeal of the Anschluss, the popular underpinning of Nazi politics as a total art form (the refinement of film propaganda exemplified by Riefenstahl's Triumph of the Will and mythological aestheticism of a broadly conceived national destiny of the German people within a "Thousand-Year Reich") gave the Nazis a massive advantage in advancing their claims to power. Austria had effectively no alternative view of its historical mission when the choice was upon it.
The Second Republic
The Moscow Declaration
The Moscow Declaration of 1943, signed by the United States, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and the United Kingdom included a "Declaration on Austria," which stated the following:
The governments of the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States of America are agreed that Austria, the first free country to fall a victim to Hitlerite aggression, shall be liberated from German domination.
They regard the annexation imposed on Austria by Germany on 15 March 1938, as null and void. They consider themselves as in no way bound by any charges affected in Austria since that date. They declare that they wish to see re-established a free and independent Austria and thereby to open the way for the Austrian people themselves, as well as those neighbouring States which will be faced with similar problems, to find that political and economic security which is the only basis for lasting peace.
Austria is reminded, however that she has a responsibility, which she cannot evade, for participation in the war at the side of Hitlerite Germany, and that in the final settlement account will inevitably be taken of her own contribution to her liberation.
To judge from the last paragraph and subsequent determinations at the Nuremberg Trial, the Declaration was intended to serve as propaganda aimed at stirring Austrian resistance (although there are Austrians counted as Righteous Among the Nations, there never was an effective Austrian armed resistance of the sort found in other countries under German occupation) more than anything else, although the exact text of the declaration is said to have a somewhat complex drafting history. At Nuremberg Arthur Seyss-Inquart and Franz von Papen, in particular, were both indicted under count one (conspiracy to commit crimes against peace) specifically for their activities in support of the Austrian Nazi Party and the Anschluss, but neither was convicted of this count.
Austrian identity and the "victim theory"
After World War II, many Austrians sought comfort in the myth of Austria as "the Nazis' first victim". Although the Nazi party was promptly banned, Austria did not have the same thorough process of de-Nazification at the top of government which was imposed on Germany for a time.
This view of the events of 1938 has deep roots in the ten years of Allied occupation and the struggle to regain Austrian sovereignty: The victim theory played an essential role in the negotiations on the Austrian State Treaty with the Soviets, and by pointing to the Moscow Declaration Austrian politicians heavily relied on it to achieve a solution for Austria different from the division into East and West in Germany. The State Treaty, alongside with the subsequent Austrian declaration of permanent neutrality marked important milestones for the solidification of Austria's independent national identity during the following decades.
As Austrian politicians of the left and right attempted to reconcile their differences in order to avoid the violent conflict that had dominated the first republic, discussions of both Austrofascism and Austria's role in Nazism were largely avoided. Still, the Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) has advanced and still sometimes advances the argument that the establishment of the Dollfuss dictatorship was necessary in order to maintain Austrian independence, while the Austrian Social Democratic Party (SPÖ) argues that the dictatorship stripped the country of the democratic resources necessary to repel Hitler.
Political events
For decades, the victim theory established in the Austrian mind remained largely undisputed. Despite the politicians' reactions to international criticism of Waldheim, the Waldheim affair started the first serious major discussion on Austria's past and the Anschluss.
Another main factor for Austria and its coming to terms with the past emerged in the 1980s: Jörg Haider and the rise of the Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ). He was often criticised for tactics such as the völkisch (ethnic) definition of national interest ("Austria for Austrians") and his apologism for Austria's past, notably calling members of the Waffen-SS "men of honour".
But it is not Jörg Haider alone who has made questionable remarks on Austria's past: Jörg Haider's coalition partner the current Chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel in an interview with the Jerusalem Post as late as 2000 stated that Austria was the first victim of Hitler-Germany.
Literature
Tearing into the simplism of the victim theory and the time of the Austrofascism, Thomas Bernhard's last play, Heldenplatz, was highly controversial even before it appeared on stage in 1988, fifty years after Hitler's visit. Kurt Waldheim, who was at that time still Austrian president called the play a crude insult to the Austrian people.
The Historical Commission and outstanding legal issues
In the context of the postwar Federal Republic of Germany, one encounters a Vergangenheitsbewältigung ("struggle to come to terms with the past") that has been partially institutionalised, variably in literary, cultural, political, and educational contexts (its development and difficulties have not been trivial; Austria formed a Historikerkommission ("Historian's Commission" or "Historical Commission") in 1998 with a mandate to review Austria's role in the Nazi expropriation of Jewish property from a scholarly rather than legal perspective, partly in response to continuing criticism of its handling of property claims. Noted Holocaust historian Raul Hilberg refused to participate in the Commission and in an interview stated his strenuous objections in terms both personal and in reference to larger questions about Austrian culpability and liability, comparing what he to be relative inattention to the settlement governing the Swiss bank holdings of those who died or were displaced by the Holocaust:
I personally would like to know why the WJC World Jewish Congress has hardly put any pressure on Austria, even as leading Nazis and SS leaders were Austrians, Hitler included... Immediately after the war, the US wanted to make the Russians withdraw from Austria, and the Russians wanted to keep Austria neutral, therefore there was a common interest to grant Austria victim status. And later Austria could cry poor - though its per capita income is as high as Germany's. Austria has the opera ball, the imperial castle, Mozartkugeln [a chocolate]. In the meantime, they set up a commission in Austria to clarify what happened to Jewish property. My father fought for Austria in the First World War and in 1939 he was kicked out of Austria.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center continues to criticise Austria (as recently as June 2005) for its alleged historical and ongoing unwillingness aggressively to pursue investigations and trials against Nazis for war crimes and crimes against humanity from the seventies onwards. Its 2001 report offered the following characterization:
Given the extensive participation of numerous Austrians, including at the highest levels, in the implementation of the Final Solution and other Nazi crimes, Austria should have been a leader in the prosecution of Holocaust perpetrators over the course of the past four decades, as has been the case in Germany. Unfortunately relatively little has been achieved by the Austrian authorities in this regard and in fact, with the exception of the case of Dr. Heinrich Gross which was suspended this year under highly suspicious circumstances (he claimed to be medically unfit, but outside the court proved to be healthy) not a single Nazi war crimes prosecution has been conducted in Austria since the mid-seventies. Although reports issued shortly thereafter credited Austria for initiating large-scale investigations, there has been one case where criticism of Austrian authorities arose recently: The Center has put 92-year old Croatian Milivoj Asner on its 2005 top ten list. Asner fled to Austria in 2004 after Croatia announced it would start investigations in the case of war crimes he may have been involved in. In response to objections about Asner's continued freedom, Austria's federal government has deferred to either extradition requests from Croatia or prosecutorial actions from Klagenfurt, neither of which appears forthcoming (as of June 2005).
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