1 September 1939 Reichstag speech
The 1 September 1939 Reichstag speech is a speech made by Adolf Hitler at an Extraordinary Session of the German Reichstag on the day of the German invasion of Poland. The speech served as public declaration of war against Poland and thus of the commencement of World War II.
Background
The first shots of the invasion had been fired at around 4:48 am of 1 September, by the German battleship Schleswig-Holstein. At 5:40 am, Hitler issued a declaration to the armed forces: "The Polish state has refused the peaceful settlement of relations which I desired, and appealed to arms... In order to put an end to this lunacy I have no other choice than to meet force with force from now on." This was followed by his speech to the Reichstag, meeting at the Kroll Opera House, at about 11:00 AM.Preparations were made – barricades and police – for an expected spontaneous and enthusiastic crowd along Hitler's route to the Opera House. But only a handful of people showed up, and Berliners were largely apathetic, even grim, and showed no enthusiasm for the war.
Speech
The speech followed Hitler's usual pattern, starting out slowly and even haltingly, then proceeding in stages to a crescendo of shouted vituperation. Although some statements in the speech were true. Hitler misrepresented in detail the course of diplomatic events preceding the invasion:Hitler then spoke of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, which had been signed just ten days before, on August 23. Although news of the pact had been published in the Soviet Union and had by then widely spread throughout the world, this speech included Hitler's first formal declaration of the Pact:
Hitler justified the German attack by claiming Polish culpability based on Polish atrocities at Pitschen and other places, including Gleiwitz and Hochlinden, both of these being part of the culmination of Operation Himmler, a false flag operation intended to demonstrate that the Poles had attacked first, the Gleiwitz incident being the most notable.
Hitler then declared himself as the "First soldier of the German Reich", a self-claimed rank, effectively equivalent of Generalissimo. This was a further step in cementing Hitler's position as supreme commander of the German Armed Forces :
Reactions
William L. Shirer observed that "Only once that day did Hitler utter the truth. In the end, this once, he would prove as good as his word. But no German I met in Berlin that day noticed that what the Leader was saying quite bluntly was that he could not face, or take, defeat should it come".First Lady of the United States Eleanor Roosevelt wrote, "At 5:00 o’clock this morning, our telephone rang, and it was the President in Washington to tell me the sad news that Germany had invaded Poland and that her planes were bombing Polish cities. He told me that Hitler was about to address the Reichstag, so we turned on the radio and listened until 6:00 o’clock... As I listened to Hitler's speech, this letter kept returning to my mind... how can you say that you do not intend to make war on women and children and then send planes to bomb cities?"
The New York Times headline for its front-page report of the speech, after leading with quotes that "Bomb Will Be Met by Bomb" and Hitler's vow to "Fight Until Resolution" of the Polish situation, focused on the order of succession decree. In the speech, Hitler had declared that the order of his succession would be Hermann Göring, then Rudolf Hess, then a successor to be chosen by "the Senate" This was the first announcement of this order of succession.