Austria within Nazi Germany
was part of Nazi Germany from 13 March 1938, an event known as the Anschluss, until 27 April 1945, when Allied-occupied Austria declared independence from Nazi Germany.
Nazi Germany's troops entering Austria in 1938 received the enthusiastic support of most of the population. Throughout World War II, 950,000 Austrians fought for the German armed forces. Other Austrians participated in the Nazi administration, from Nazi death camp personnel to senior Nazi Party leaders including Adolf Hitler; the majority of the bureaucrats who implemented the Final Solution were Austrian.
After the Anschluss in 1938, Nazi Germany sought to eliminate Austria's separate national and cultural identity by portraying it as an inseparable part of the Greater Germanic Reich. The Austrian flag, anthem, and national symbols were banned, and the use of the name "Austria" was replaced with "Ostmark". From 1942, even this term was considered too closely associated with the former Austrian state, and the official designation for the area was changed to "Alpen- und Donau-Reichsgaue". Education, propaganda, and public institutions were reoriented to promote German nationalism and suppress Austrian traditions. The regime aimed to erase any notion of an independent Austrian state or culture.
After World War II, many Austrians sought comfort in the theory of Austria as being the first victim of the Nazis. Although the Nazi Party was promptly banned, Austria did not have the same thorough process of denazification that was imposed on post-war West Germany. Lacking outside pressure for political reform, factions of Austrian society tried for a long time to advance the view that the Anschluss was only an imposition of rule by Nazi Germany. By 1992, the subject of the small minority who formed an Austrian resistance, versus the vast majority of Austrians who participated in the German war machine, had become a prominent matter of public discourse.
Early history
The origins of Nazism in Austria have been disputed and continue to be debated. Professor Andrew Gladding Whiteside regarded the emergence of an Austrian variant of Nazism as the product of the German-Czech conflict of the multi-ethnic Austrian Empire and rejected the view that it was a precursor of German Nazism.In 1918, at the end of World War I, with the breakup of the multi-ethnic Austro-Hungarian Empire, and with the abolition of the Habsburg monarchy, there were three major political groups competing with one another in the young republic of Austria: the Social Democratic Party of Austria, Christian Social Party, and the nationalist Great German Union, which became the Greater German People's Party in 1920. At the time, smaller parties such as the Communist Party of Austria and the Austrian National Socialists were neither present in the Reichsrat nor the National Council of Austria.
SDAP, GVP, and DNSAP clearly, although for different reasons, favoured a union of German Austria with the German state, which was also a republic by that time. The CS also tended to favour the union, but differed at first on a different subject – they were split on the idea of continuing the monarchy instead of a republic. Whereas only the KPÖ decidedly spoke against the annexation in the course of the 1920s and 1930s, the monarchists originally spoke up against the annexation and later turned to favor it, after the Bavarian Soviet Republic had failed, and Germany had a conservative government. The Treaty of Saint-Germain, signed 10 September 1919 by Karl Renner, first chancellor of the republic, clearly forbade any union with Germany, abolished the monarchy, and clearly stated the First Austrian Republic as an independent country.
First Austrian Republic
The First Austrian Republic angered many Austrian pan-Germans who made the claim that the republic violated the Fourteen Points that were announced by United States President Woodrow Wilson during peace talks, specifically the right to "self-determination" of all nations.Life and politics in the early years were marked by serious economic problems, hyperinflation and a constantly increasing tension between the different political groups. From 1918 to 1920, the government was led by the Social Democratic Party and later by the Christian Social Party in coalition with the German nationalists.
Plebiscites in Austrian Tyrol and Salzburg in 1921, saw majorities of 98.77% and 99.11% voted for a unification with Germany.
On 31 May 1922, prelate Ignaz Seipel became Chancellor of the Christian Social government. He succeeded in improving the economic situation with the financial help of the League of Nations. Ideologically, Seipel was clearly anti-communist and did everything in his power to reduce, as far as possible, the influence of the Social Democrats – both sides saw this as a conflict between two social classes.
The military of Austria was restricted to 30,000 men by the allies and the police force was poorly equipped. Already by 1918, the first homeguards were established like the Kärntner Abwehrkampf. In 1920, in Tirol the first Heimwehr was put in duty under the command of Richard Steidle with the help of the Bavarian organisation Escherich. Soon other states followed. In 1923, members of the Monarchist "Ostara" shot a worker dead and the Social Democrats founded their own protective organization. Other paramilitary groups were then formed from former active soldiers and members of the Roman Catholic Church. The Vaterländische Schutzbund were National Socialists. Later they started the Austrian Sturmabteilung.
The German Workers' Party had already been founded in Bohemia as early as 1903. It was then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It supported German nationalism and anti-clericalism, but at first was not particularly antisemitic. This party stood mainly for making Austria and the Austrian Germans a part of Germany. In 1909, lawyer and politician Walter Riehl joined the party and he became leader in 1918. Soon after that the name was changed to the German National Socialist Workers' Party. After the fall of the monarchy, the party split into a Czechoslovakian party and an Austrian party under Riehl. From 1920 onwards, this Austrian party cooperated closely with Munich formed German Workers' Party, which Adolf Hitler led after 1921. In 1923, Riehl's party had about 23,000 members and was a marginal factor in Austrian politics. In 1924, there was another split and Karl Schulz led a splinter group. The two opposed each other. In 1926, Richard Suchenwirth founded the Austrian branch of Hitler's German National Socialist party in Vienna. Around that time Benito Mussolini formed his Fascist dictatorship in Italy and became an important ally of the far right.
The Austrian National Socialists linked to Hitler got only 779 votes in the 1927 General Election. The strongest grouping besides the Social Democrats was the Unity Coalition led by the Christian Social Party but including German Nationalists and the groups of Riehl and Schulz. In the course of these years there were frequent serious acts of violence between the various armed factions and people were regularly killed. In the General Election of 1930, the Social Democrats were the largest single party. The Christian Social Party came second but stayed in office in a coalition with smaller parties. The Austrian National Socialists linked to Hitler's NSDAP received only 3.6% of the votes and failed to enter Parliament. In the following years, the Nazis gained votes at the expense of the various German national groups, which also wanted unity with Germany. After 1930, Hitler's NSDAP doubled its membership every year because of the economic crisis. One of their slogans was, "500,000 Unemployed – 400,000 Jews – Simple way out; vote National Socialist".
Dictatorship, civil war and banning National Socialism
The Christian Social Party had ruled from 1932 and Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuß had led them from 1932. The Social Democrats were no longer their only threat. The previous chancellor and priest Ignaz Seipel had worked towards an authoritarian state. Seipel based this on the Papal Encyclicals, Rerum novarum#Impact and legacy and Quadragesimo anno. Abolition of the parliamentary system was necessary for this. A crisis in the Austrian parliament on the 4 May 1933 gave Dollfuß the opportunity he wanted.Later in May 1933, the Christian Social Union was converted to the Patriotic Front. The Patriotic Front was a political organisation, supposedly above partisan considerations, Roman Catholic and vehemently anti-Marxist. It purported to represent all Austrians who were true to their native land. Within a week the Austrian Communist Party was banned, and before the end of the month the republican paramilitary organisation and Freethinkers Organisations were banned along with numerous other groups. Nazis failed to get more than 25% of the votes in local elections in most areas. In Zwettl and Innsbruck however they got more than 40%, and they tried to lever this into a basis for agitation against the ruling Patriotic Front. Nazi supporters generated a wave of terrorism which crested in early June with four deaths and 48 people injured.
In Germany, Hitler became Chancellor early in 1933. The Social Democrats deleted any intention to cooperate with Germany from its party programme. Nazis had fled to Bavaria after their party was banned in Austria and founded there the Austrian Legion. The Nazis there had military style camps and military training. Nazi terrorists in Austria received financial, logistic and material support from Germany. The German Government subjected Austria to systematic agitation. After the expulsion of the Bavarian Minister of Justice in May 1933, German citizens were required to pay a thousand marks to the German Government before travelling to Austria. The Austrian Nazi Party was banned in June after a hand grenade attack in Krems. Nazi terrorism abated after that though five more people were killed and 52 injured by the end of the year.
On 12 February 1934, there was a violent confrontation in Linz with serious consequences. Members of a paramilitary group acting to assist the police wanted to enter a building belonging to the Social Democrats or a party member's home. They wanted to find any weapons belonging to the Social Democrat paramilitary which had by then been banned. Violence spread to the whole country and developed into civil war. The police and their paramilitary supporters together with the army won the confrontation by the 14 February. There were many arrests. Constitutional courts were abolished, trade unions and the Social Democrat Party were banned, and the death penalty was reintroduced. After political opposition had been suppressed the Austrian Republic was transformed into the Ständestaat. The authoritarian Maiverfassung was proclaimed on 1 May.