This, said Hitler, was 'bombastic nonsense hatched out at a debating table, and the worst sort of democratic bunkum. The Führer and the Idea were one, and every National Socialist must obey the orders of the Führer, who embodied the Idea and alone knew its ultimate aim'.

'That, Herr Hitler,' said Otto Strasser quietly, 'is the doctrine of Rome, and both of Papist and of Fascist Rome. For me, the Idea is the vital thing, the Idea of National Socialism, and my conscience decides when a gap appears between Führer and Idea.'

Hitler simply cannot stand this sort of stuff; people who talk like that are for him 'intellectual cranks', and a kindly providence alone prevented the meeting from being ended by a stroke at this point. But he knew the age-old answer to this one: discipline! 'You are talking rank democracy,' he said, 'and this would lead to the break-up of our party, which is based on discipline, and I don't intend to have the party destroyed by a few conceited scribblers. Do you intend to submit yourself to this discipline, as your brother does, or not?'

Thus, at a very early stage in an argument that lasted the best part of two days, Hitler fell back on the age-old retort of 'patriots', of this kidney; 'You have put a question which I am unable to answer. I must remind you of the necessity for discipline. Yours is not to reason why, yours is to do as I tell you in the unquestioning belief that I am always right. Where should we be if you began to wonder whether I am always right. This would be intolerable. You might then want to go in a different direction, even in a better direction, than the one I want you to go. This is pure Bolshevism. Pure, I repeat, Bolshevism. Gad, sir, discipline! Only discipline can bring you where I want to go.'

Here, again, the resemblance to those encounters with the parade-ground buffoons of 1914, whom Otto Strasser so detests, is striking. 'Conceited intellectuals.' 'Conceited scribblers.' 'Piano-players to the left, those who speak French or English to the right. Now then, the conceited intellectuals who speak French or English can go and clean the closets.'

Strasser replied that he knew a deal about discipline from the war, and not discipline, but conscience and a sense of duty alone had carried him and many others like him through the last bitter months. He begged Hitler not to be deluded by the cheap plaudits of the creatures about him ...

Hitler interrupted: 'I forbid such defamation of my collaborators.'

Strasser replied: 'Herr Hitler, we need not try to fool each other. How few of these collaborators are mentally able to form their own opinion, and how few even of these have the spirit to state it, if it differs from yours. Or do you believe that my brother would be so well-disciplined if he were not financially dependent on you, through his deputy's seat?'

Thereupon Hitler invited Strasser to follow his brother's example and offered him the post of Press Chief of the party if he would come to Munich and work under his, Hitler's, supervision. Strasser said he could only do that if they agreed about the fundamental principles of policy -- about the Idea, in fact -- and first an exhaustive discussion of all questions, particularly those of foreign policy and Socialism, would he necessary; to that end he would be ready to come to Munich for four weeks and thrash these matters out with Hitler, and with Alfred Rosenberg, whose enmity, as that of the spiritual prompter of the National Socialist Party, he felt keenly.

Now came the ultimatum, in the same form that it later came in the interviews with Chancellor von Schuschnigg, and President Hacha, and many others. 'Proposals of this sort,' said Hitler, 'are too

late. My patience is exhausted.'

And he threatened, if Otto Strasser did not give an immediate decision about the offer for a Press Chief's post, irrespective of his convictions or the promises of the party, to expel him and all his associates from the party and to sever all connection between the party and the Kampfverlag. Here was the same method which was later to be used in annexing countries. Otto Strasser was threatened with bankruptcy, but he would be spared if he took a bribe. Schuschnigg was threatened with invasion, but would himself have been spared if he had 'legalized' it by appealing for it.

Strasser answered that Hitler undoubtedly had the means to carry out his threats, but in doing this he would confirm Otto Strasser's suspicions, that his real motive was a fundamental antagonism to the Socialist doctrine which the Kampfverlag, in accordance with Hitler's and the party's promises, had preached for five years, and that this was the real reason why Hitler wished to destroy the Kampfverlag, its publications and its influence over the North German group of the National Socialist Party: he wished to he rid of it in order to collaborate with the Right and the reactionaries.

Hitler violently repudiated these insinuations (which were, in fact, the truth). Of course, he was a Socialist, he said, but a different kind of Socialist from Otto Strasser. The whole trouble was, that Otto Strasser did not understand these things. 'I am a far better Socialist, for instance, than your wealthy Count Reventlow' (Count Reventlow, a former naval officer, was at this time a supporter of Strasser's but afterwards seceded to Hitler). 'Even to-day, I cannot bear to see my chauffeur eating anything different from myself.'

This was a curious argument, for very few chauffeurs would be likely to covet what Hitler eats. But it shows what some people understand by Socialism, when they wish to. Hitler continued:

'What you mean by Socialism is rank Marxism. The great bulk of the workers want nothing but bread and circuses; they have no use for "ideals" and we can never count on winning over large numbers of them.'

To read these words, is to understand the sympathy that Hitler so long enjoyed, indeed until he made that pact with Bolshevy, among the ruling classes in Britain. They, too, admire Socialism, within limits, and Hitler, in this answer, precisely defines these limits.

'We want a hand-picked new ruling class,' said Hitler, 'one not moved, as you are moved, by love-my-fellow- man feelings, but one that clearly realizes that its superior race gives it the right to rule, and one that will ruthlessly maintain and ensure this rule over the masses.'

Otto Strasser, with a tenacity that commands respect, repeatedly sought to bring the conversation back to an intelligible level and to get down to an exchange of clear questions and answers about specific problems.

'Herr Hitler', he said, I am staggered by these views of yours. I hold your racial theories to be entirely false. In my view, the "race" is but the original raw material, and in the case of the German people four or five races contributed to make this. Political, climatic and other influences, together with pressure from without and assimilation within, made of this mixture a people; and the processes of history evolved the third and highest form, that which we call "a nation", which in our case was born in August 1914. Your racial theories would deny that the German people is a nation. They deny that which I hold to be the task and meaning of the coming German revolution.'

Said Hitler: 'What you say is pure Liberalism. There are no other revolutions but racial revolutions. There are no economic, political or social revolutions, there is but the struggle of the racially inferior lower class against the ruling upper race.'

This interesting passage throws a new light on Hitler's theories. Put this way, his ideas would be universally acceptable to exploiters the world over, as much to Jews as to any others. It contains, indeed, no mention whatever of Jews, this utterance of the year 1930 by the arch anti-Semite who so often used Jews as his agents. It is, indeed, an entirely new conception of race, even than that which has currently passed as his conception of it. It is that the poor are not only a lower class but an inferior race; while the rich, are not only predestined to rule, but are also a superior race. This is the best racial theory ever invented, in my recollection, and if only Hitler had made this clear to the world earlier, and had kept that stupid stuff about the Jews out of the argument, he would, in my opinion, be the adored ruler of Europe to-day. Not even the pact with Bolshevy could have shaken him - if he had propounded this fascinating doctrine earlier.

'You, Herr Strasser', roared Hitler further, beating the table with his fists until it danced, 'do not understand these racial matters. Precisely because you lack this knowledge of race, your foreign policy is so wrong. For instance, you have often spoken openly in favour of the so-called Indian freedom movement, although this is obviously nothing but a rebellion of the inferior Indian races against the high-quality English-Nordic race. The Nordic race has a right to rule the world and we must make this right the guiding star of our foreign policy.'

It is really sad that Otto Strasser's book, containing the record of these conversations, did not become widely known years ago, and that Hitler was thus deprived of the honorary memberships of the Simla, Bombay and Calcutta clubs which would inevitably have been conferred on him if these lovely words had reached the outer world. In the next sentence he continued in like vein.

'For these reasons, we can never go together with Soviet Russia, where a Jewish head rests on Slav-Tartar body. I know the Slavs from my own homeland. Earlier, when a Germanic head sat on the Slav body, co-operation with Russia was feasible, and Bismarck did this. To-day it would be simply a crime.'

Otto Strasser replied that he could not understand such views in foreign politics. The only thing that would count with him was, whether this or that line in foreign policy would benefit or harm Germany; in the first case, he held it to be the right line, and the State in question could be as repugnant to him personally as it wished; in the second case, he held it to be the wrong line, without regard to the depth of his personal liking for the State concerned and its people.

Germany's most vital aim in foreign policy was, in his opinion, to throw off the Versailles Treaty, and in the search for powers whose course might lie parallel with hers in that direction, for no matter how short a distance, he found only Italy and Russia. For that reason he held collaboration with Italy to he wise, though the Italians did not attract him, and he even held collaboration with Russia to be theoretically possible, though Bolshevism was as antipathetic to him as Fascism; where the interests of Germany were at stake, M. Stalin and Signor Mussolini, Mr. MacDonald and M. Poincaré were all one to him.

A conversation which had already lasted long and continually threatened on Hitler's side to degenerate into an unintelligible babble then continued with a speech of Hitler's about 'the coming Nordic-Germanic rule in Europe' and Strasser asked for it to be interrupted and continued the next day. Optimist that he is, he also asked that it should then be devoted to the question that particularly interested him - Socialism, as he understood it.

When the two antagonists met the next day, Strasser got his blow in first. He had prepared a lengthy explanation of his Socialist views and of the way to apply them in practice, and delivered himself of this, in order to nail Hitler to a clear statement of intentions.

'Do you agree with me,' said Strasser to Hitler, 'that the overthrow of the existing regime, which we are mutually working for, should be a complete revolution in the political, economic and spiritual fields, a revolution which must be brought about and carried through by all methods? That means, that we must be equally implacable and hostile in our attitude towards capitalism and towards international Marxism. And this is the main question at issue in our conversation to-day - that our campaign should not be confined to the "struggle against Marxism" but should also be conducted as a struggle against Capitalism. But this demands clarity under the head, Private Property. My view is that the principle of "the inviolability of private property" excludes all possibility of German Socialism. It is of course my view that all civilization rests on property. But precisely because the material circumstances of a man govern his possibilities of developing his personality and evolving a manly and upright bearing, precisely because property is thus the basis of independence, is it necessary to give those eight-tenths of the German people who are to-day without property the possibility of acquiring property. In the capitalist system, they lack this possibility.'

'The position to-day,' continued Otto Strasser, 'is like that before the Wars of Liberation. At that time Baron von Stein wisely said: "If the nation is to achieve freedom and honour, it will be necessary to give the oppressed sections of this nation property and the right of co-determination." The oppressed classes were at that time the landless peasant-serfs. Then the need of the day was to carry through the liberation of the peasants; to-day, it is to carry through the liberation of the workers; just as the goal was achieved then by giving the peasants property and the right of co-determination, so must the workers be given property and the right of co-determination now. In agriculture, it was possible to use the method of individually-held property, because the land is capable of being divided into suitably small portions. In our modern industry, that is impossible; a factory cannot be divided into a lot of small undertakings. In this case, therefore, the method of collective-ownership is needed, and the title to this property should be held in a double right - as a member of the nation, and as a member of the working-community in that particular factory. But just as Baron von Stein had to take parts of their land from the big landowners in order to make the peasants property-owners -- for then, as now, nothing was lying about ownerless -- so must we to-day take from the present owners part of their monopoly-property and give it to the workers, or in a wider sense to the nation. The property-owners of that day called Baron von Stein a Jacobin, just as they call us Bolshevists to-day, but the liberation of Prussia would have been just as impossible without this reform as the liberation of Germany is to-day without the liberation of the German workers.'

Hitler interrupted, 'Your comparison is completely false. You cannot compare the complicated industrial mechanism of to-day with the German peasant-liberation. Land can of course be divided up and given to individuals, but not a modern factory.'

Strasser broke in to say that a great difference in matters of method of course existed, but his point was that the peasant-liberation, that unloosed the mighty forces which made the War of Liberation possible, would not have been possible if the principle of 'the inviolability of private property' had remained in force.

Hitler asked Strasser how he envisaged his share-out of property in a modern industrialized State, and Strasser answered that he thought the present owners should retain 49 per cent of the capital and profits of an undertaking, while the State should receive 41 per cent as the representative of the nation, and the workers the remaining 10 per cent; but the management of the concern, as embodied in the Supervisory Board, should be divided into equal shares of one-third each among the present owners, the State, and the workers, in order that the influence of the State in its actual conduct should be reduced.

Thus Otto Strasser, in his opening speech, developed, in broad outline, his theory of a German Socialism, which I shall describe more fully later in this book. It is not, as this quotation will show, that the present owners of property in Germany should be brusquely dispossessed in favour of the unpropertied masses; or that a super-capitalist called The State should be set up in place of the body of individual capitalists of to-day; but that the unpropertied eight-tenths of the German people should be admitted to co-ownership, co-management and co-responsibility.

The result of it all was, inevitably, that Hitler told Strasser. 'What you say is rank Marxism, it is just Bolshevism. You want to introduce the democratic system, which in politics has left us with a heap of ruins, into economic life and destroy it. You would undo the whole progress that has has been made by mankind, which was always due to individual great men, to great inventors.'

It is astounding how this man, whose whole stock-in-trade seems to consist of a few phrases culled from the cheaper press of Viennese back streets, was able to dazzle and dominate his kind; how he was able to answer and annihilate practically any question with one of a dozen words: 'Marxism', Democracy', 'Liberalism', 'Intellectual', 'Scribbler', 'Bolshevism', 'Discipline'. Hardly an intelligible thought is to be found in his discourse, only a few which are comprehensible, but base.

Strasser answered the one about 'the progress of mankind' with the kind of remark that would spring to the lips of any non-cretin in a sane world. He is not a man to be overborne by phrases, but one who looks for the truth behind them, and he replied that he questioned the whole assumption about 'the progress of mankind' and by no means admitted 'that the invention of the water closet was a contribution to civilization'.

Hitler, whose every remark could be foretold by a school child of average intelligence after a six-weeks' correspondence course, answered: 'But you will not deny that mankind has undergone a gigantic development, from the Stone Age to the technical marvels of to-day, and that this entire development would be cut off by your hatched-at-a-writing-desk theories?'

Strasser, who respects the meaning of words, said he did not believe that mankind had progressed, but rather that mankind had remained unchanged for thousands of years. He asked mildly if Herr Hitler thought that Goethe had been mentally backward because he never travelled in a motor car, or Napoleon because he never listened to the radio?

Hitler answered that these were all 'arm-chair theories, and practical life daily proves the mighty progress of mankind, which receives its impulse from the achievements of individual great men'. (I once played a game, the winner of which was he who could answer the most questions with some fatuous remark in common daily use, such as 'The days are drawing in, aren't they?' Hitler should be a master of this, after a little practice.)

The one about the progress of mankind being the work of individual great men, however, let Otto Strasser in again, and he interjected pointedly that he did not accept this dogma about the part played by great leaders either, for man was neither the maker nor the inventor of historical epochs, but the tool of destiny.

Hitler looked at him with that suspicion-laden gaze born of Vienna back streets and interrupted him sharply.

Even at that time Hitler was a master of every trick of intimidation; I remember how he tried to stare me down and sat staring at me for two or three minutes without opening his lips, when I once went to see him. But in those days he had not the backing which made intimidation so easy later - the biggest army in Europe. Now he asked Strasser, with bulging eyes and thunder-laden brow:

'Do you wish to insinuate that I am not the inventor of National Socialism?'

'Certainly I deny that,' said Strasser. 'I see National Socialism as an idea born of our times and planted by destiny in one form or another in hundreds of thousands of hearts. You have it in an exceptionally sharply defined form, but the simultaneity of its appearance, and the similarity of its form, shows that it is the fruit of a historical process. It is the same with the capitalist system; apart from its merits or demerits, it is "old" now, it is in decline, while the time of Socialism is coming and it will determine the history of the next 150 years'.

'What you call Socialism,' replied Hitler angrily, 'is just Marxism, and your whole ideas are just paper theories which have nothing to do with real life. By what right do the workers demand a part in ownership or even in management? Do you think my publisher here would allow his girl typist to tell him what to do? The employer provides his workers with bread. Our big industrialists are not concerned with making as much money as possible, with living as well as they can; responsibility and power are the things that matter for them. Their brains have brought them to the top, and this process of natural selection, which again proves their superior race, gives them a right to lead.'

It is strange now to think that these words, which would make any armaments-Croesus, sweated-workshop proprietor, brothel-keeper, bottle-party Levantine, company-promoter, dividend-lizard, or war-profiteer purr with pleasure, came from a man who succeeded in making millions of Germans think that he was moved by a burning will to abolish the social evils of our times.

I have quoted only parts of these two immense conversations, but enough to show their nature. At one point Otto Strasser did contrive to transfix Hitler with his pin and hold him down for a moment. 'What would you do, if you came to power in Germany to-morrow?' he said; 'what would you do about Krupps? Would everything remain unchanged in respect of shareholders and workers, ownership, profits and management?'

'Why, of course,' said Hitler contemptuously. 'Do you think I am mad enough to destroy the economic system?'

'Then, Herr Hitler, said Otto Strasser, if you mean to maintain the capitalist system, you should not preach Socialism, for the members of our Party are in the first place Socialists and put their faith in the Party programme, which specifically demands the Socialization of jointly-owned concerns.' (Point No. 13 of the 25 Points.)

'The term Socialism,' said Hitler loftily, 'is bad in itself, but in any case the programme does not mean that such concerns must be Socialized, only that they could be Socialized if they acted in a way contrary to the interests of the nation. If they don't do that, it would be a crime to destroy the economic system.'

The conversations dragged on, but did not progress. Hitler stubbornly rejected all idea of co-ownership and co-management for the workers, and when Otto Strasser recalled the case of a famous lock-out in which, as he said, 'two or three dozen people, who were no better and no worse than their neighbours, had been able to put 250,000 Ruhr workmen on the street', Hitler said, I don't need the co-ownership or co-management of the workers to stop that sort of thing; a strong State can do that.'

The most important thing about these encounters with Hitler is that Otto Strasser did succeed in obtaining a clear negative in the matter that was vital for him - Socialism. More remarkable still, Hitler on this occasion and in this matter spoke the truth, which is very rare. Three years before he came to power, he was already willing, in such a discussion as this, to abandon all pretence in the matter of his Socialist promises and to show himself as a man of no political principle at all.

After these meetings, Otto Strasser's years of service in Hitler's Party quickly approached their end. The gap between 'Idea' and 'Führer' had become clear to see. Otto Strasser realized that his place, as he had told Hitler, was with the Idea, at no matter what cost to himself.

The open breach soon came. Hitler put into practice his threat to destroy Otto Strasser financially, to make him bankrupt, and to cast him out. He ordered Goebbels to get rid of Strasser by hook or by crook, and the little Doctor called a packed party meeting, which Strasser and his associates were prevented by various devices from attending, as rebels. Otto Strasser retaliated with a manifesto, published in his papers throughout North Germany, which were still the official organs of National Socialism. This was entitled 'The Socialists leave the National Socialist Party'.

A furious onslaught followed. Summoning to his aid his army of words and phrases, Hitler issued a scathing attack on Strasser, whom he denounced as a 'cheap scribbler' and 'parlour-Bolshevist' - the sergeant-major touch again.

Strasser retaliated by publishing, without comment, his official war record, and took this trick, for when the contest is one of facts, and not of phrases, Hitler must lose every time.

Hitler struck again, by expelling Otto Strasser and his followers throughout the country from the party. Only one position now remained - the Kampfverlag, which was still publishing the newspapers of Hitler's Party. Gregor Strasser had yielded and sold his third-share to Hitler; now, by the offer of a Reichstag seat, Hitler won over the second partner, Hinkel, who sold out. The Kampfverlag was Hitler's and he promptly closed it down.

Otto Strasser thus paid in cash also for his convictions, a thing few men do. His third share was lost; at the first attempt to buy the Kampfverlag, Hitler had offered each of the partners 80,000 marks, at that time £4000, for their share. Strasser was left penniless.

Thus came Otto Strasser's farewell to Hitler, after a good fight, lasting five years, for his Idea. Once again he had to start at the beginning, to resume his quest for 'German Socialism'. Hitler had made a bitter enemy. For the first time, a foremost leader of the Party had defied him and left him rather than compromise.

This was the moment when Gregor should have broken away too, with his brother. But Gregor never could bring himself to do that. He always thought that Hitler was sound at heart, only misguided. He believed that the horse 'was only bucking' and would return to the course, run a straight race. This self-deception cost him his life; the same self-deception, in other men, cost Europe a new war.

Now, Otto Strasser gathered his friends about him and began his war against Hitler. It is still going on. Indeed, it is only just approaching its decisive stage. Strasser, seeing that there was neither Revolutionary Socialism nor Socialism of any kind to be hoped for from Hitler and his Party, set out to corrode that party from within. The time would come, he was convinced, when Germany would insist on having Socialism, and then he and his men would take up the heritage that Hitler had mal-administered.

So, with his eye on that future day, Otto Strasser formed his Black Front - a Brown Army within the Brown Army, a Party within the Party, a Gestapo within the Gestapo. All those men who were to rule Germany through terror now had to look over their own shoulders, to look suspiciously at their own shadows. It was a bold venture, and the Black Front from the beginning worked for a distant day - the day when Hitler should have come to power, betrayed his promised Socialism, brought Germany into war, and been overthrown.

Chapter Seven

BLACK FRONT

Just ten years have passed, as I write this book in 1940, since the Black Front was founded, and during that time its name was little known, and still less understood, in the world outside Germany.

Within Germany it was well known, both before and after Hitler's triumph, but the tide was running so strongly in his favour that its struggle was one against overwhelming odds. Hitler's fame, and later his power, was growing, and the Black Front, though it carried on a stubborn fight, only attracted, outside Germany, the languid and slightly contemptuous interest with which the majority of people always regard fighters for a lost cause.

Few were then far-sighted enough to perceive that it might one day be the petard which would blow up Hitler. But it was formed of resolute men who would not compromise and clung to their beliefs, at whatever cost. Strasser himself, as I have shown, lost a small fortune through his stand against Hitler at the Kampfverlag; his leading associates also lost money, position, liberty and sometimes life.

But the fight never stopped, and neither exile, outlawry nor even the war itself could completely sever the bond that existed between them. The Black Front exists in Germany to-day, as no other organization exists, ready to spring into action, like an engine at the touch of the starter, when the moment comes. Hitler's star is waning, and with it National Socialism in the form that he gave it. The Black Front, the members of which claim that they are the real National Socialists, is preparing for the come-back, and may have the last laugh yet.

It began, after the breach with Hitler, on July 4th, 1930, as the Kampfgemeinschaft Revolutionärer Nationalsozialisten, or Union of Revolutionary National Socialists. Later, after the adhesion of rebellious Nazi Storm Troops from the Berlin district and other sympathetic groups, it became simply The Black Front.

click for full size image

HERBERT BLANK AND OTTO STRASSER

Its chief leaders were Otto Strasser himself, Major Buchrucker, Herbert Blank, and other well-known North German figures.

Major Buchrucker deserves description, for in him the discerning reader may find a pointer to the way the Black Front may in the future re-emerge, and possibly conquer. A regular officer and fiery patriot, he organized the Black Reichswehr, that secret army of 100,000 men which was formed, with the connivance of the regular German army, after the 1914-18 war, to outwit the military restrictions put on Germany by the Versailles Treaty. In lonely fortresses, in remote country districts, behind the hedges of big East Elbian estates owned by men who sympathized, this shadow army was raised out of sight of the French, British, Belgian and Italian officers sent to see that Germany respected the Treaty.

It was the first experiment in secret rearmament; the last, and greatest, was Göring's secret creation of an enormous air force between the years 1933 and 1936. Here the word 'Black' appears for the first time; it had nothing to do with the colour of the uniforms worn by this clandestine force, which were not black, but meant secret. Exactly the same thing applies to the Black Front, and this is important to understand; it has nothing to do with the Strasser 'Black Guard' afterwards raised, which actually wore black shirts. Göring's air force, until it was revealed, was a black air force.

Major Buchrucker led one of the very earliest Putsches (those post-war attempts of the Nationalists to unseat the detested Republican Government by force of arms) in Germany - the Küstrin Putsch of 1922. It might be called the first Hitler Putsch. Its aim was to overthrow the Berlin Government and set up a new regime. General von Seeckt, the head of the regular Reichswehr, knew of it and was half in sympathy with it, but lost his nerve at the last moment.

Buchrucker was left alone and the Putsch collapsed. At his trial, he kept silence about the connivance of the regular Reichswehr in the formation of the secret Reichswehr and received ten years penal servitude, five of which he served. His sentence was not commuted, like that of the allegedly persecuted, but actually fortunate Hitler.

In 1928 he was set free and joined the Strasser Group of the National Socialist Party. At the breach with Hitler, he followed Strasser, and became commander of the uniformed 'Black Guard'. After Hitler's triumph he was thrown into a concentration camp and kept there for eighteen months. There he was drilled for weeks at a time. 'Quick march. Halt. About turn. Double. Halt. About turn. Double. Halt. About turn. Double. Halt. Was, du Schwein, du willst ein Major gewesen sein? What, you swine, you mean to say you were a Major? About turn. Double.' And so on, and so on.

Major Buchrucker was released when conscription was reintroduced in Germany - and is now a senior staff officer, with the rank of colonel!

I have chosen him to try and show the kind of man who helped Otto Strasser build his Black Front.

Strasser's breach with Hitler and formation of a new organization made a deep impression on the younger, more urgent and more idealistic National Socialists, and among the younger generation in general throughout the country. The Young German Order of Lieutenant Artur Mahraun (who was also put in a concentration camp after Hitler's triumph and terribly maltreated, so that he lost an eye, and now has a little bookshop in Berlin) entered into working collaboration with Strasser. So did the revolutionary peasants of Schleswig-Holstein, under their leader Klaus Hein. So did Richard Schlapke, who had a large following among the National Socialists of Silesia. So did a coterie of rising young men called the Tatkreis, whose foremost figures were Hans Zehrer and Ferdinand Fried, author of a most celebrated book called The End of Capitalism. (Fried is to-day the right-hand man of Hitler's Minister for Agriculture, Darré, whose Hereditary Peasant Holdings Act, drafted by Fried, and other bills represent the solitary attempt to put National Socialism into practice.)

These men and their movements represented what was best in Germany at that time. They all ardently desired the liberation of Germany, but also a new social order, and their common fear, which was afterwards vindicated, was that Hitler would betray them in this and, instead of making a new Germany, would simply bring another period of militarist reaction in the place of the chaotic, licentious, alien-inspired post-war Republic they lived in and detested.

From these men and these groups Strasser made his Black Front. But, here again, the significance of the word 'Black' must be remembered.

It meant 'secret', and precisely for that reason it is not possible to say, just what men and groups were in it then, or are in it now. That will be shown when the moment comes. Otto Strasser was already working for a distant future. The visible organization - The Black Front, The Black Guard, the three weekly papers in Berlin, Breslau and Munich - comprised but a quarter of the whole. This was the outward and visible structure. The other three-quarters remained invisible; at the instruction of Otto Strasser, they remained in the parties or organizations to which they belonged, in accordance with the first clause of the Black Front programme, which stated 'The Black Front is a school for the officers and non-commissioned-officers of the German Revolution'.

Strasser deliberately chose this penetration-from-within, enemy-inside-the-walls system. Through it, he had his men in all the parties of those days, save the Communist Party; namely, in the National Socialist, Socialist, Nationalist, Democratic, and other parties.

At this very day, months after the outbreak of war, his Black Front men are in all existent organizations in Germany, but especially in the Army, the Brown Army, the National Socialist Party, the Labour Front and the SS.

This is only possible because of the 'black' method he adopted three years before Hitler came to power. Through it, the members of the Black Front were always anonymous, apart from the visible structure. For the same reason he never put up candidates at the elections, and thus there was never an open trial of strength or demonstration of the size of the Black Front and its appeal.

Otto Strasser and his men never felt that they were counter-revolutionaries. They held themselves to be the real revolutionaries. Their whole fear was that Hitler would not make a revolution, and they were right. He only destroyed, or half-destroyed, leaving it to his successors to build. Their spiritual community of views with him was that they were against the old; but they wanted something new, which he has never achieved and which, as seems clear from the conversations with Otto Strasser in 1930 which I have quoted and from Hitler's actions since he came to power, he never intended.

Perhaps I can best show the conflict of hopes and fears which tormented the mind of idealist young Germans in those days by describing a strange episode in which both Hitler and Otto Strasser figured.