May 1, 1936
One looks at the people going about their daily round, crowding the streets on their business, earning their livelihood, filling the football grounds and cinemas. One reads their newspapers, always full of entertaining headlines whether the happenings are great or small. Do they realise the way events are trending? And how external forces may effect all their work and pleasure, all their happiness, all their freedom, all their property and all whom they love? I can only see one thing. I see it sharper and harsher day by day. Germany is arming more strenuously, more scientifically and upon a larger scale, than any nation has ever armed before. I make my contribution to the public thought. I give my warnings, as I have given some before. I do not deal in vague statements. I offer facts and figures which I believe to be true.
How much is the Hitler regime spending upon armaments? It is difficult to learn. All their accounts are wrapped in mystery. No estimates are submitted to any Parliament. There are no longer any budgets. There is no criticism, no debate. We have to find out for ourselves. I declared several months ago that Germany spent upwards of ￡800,000,000 sterling on warlike preparation in the calendar year 1935 alone. Challenged to produce my justification of this truly astounding assertion, I offer for public consideration four distinct lines of approach, at the end of which lies my conclusion, or something very like it.
According to official and semi-official German statements between March 1933 and June 1935 the public debt of Germany increased by ￡600 millions and German taxation by ￡400 millions, a total of ￡1,000 millions (RM. 12,227 millions). That this prodigious figure is far below the truth the second line of approach will show. Every inland bill in Germany pays a stamp duty equal to one thousandth of its face value. In addition bills usually run for three months, and even when they run for longer periods, they are drawn in the form of three-months bills and prolonged and restamped at the end of the period as if they were new. From these stamp issues we see that in February 1933 the outstanding bills amounted to 8.5 milliard marks, but in May 1935 they had grown by 18.3 milliard marks, or approximately ￡1,500,000,000 spent in the main by the German government in the three years apart from their normal expenditure as previously existing.
The third approach is this: under the Hitler regime German economy as a whole is subject to close supervision and regulation by the Government. Capital expenditure on private enterprise in particular is subject to specific approval by the German Government. Owing to the limited supply of essential raw materials the German Government permits large capital expenditure on private enterprise only in so far as the expenditure is directly or indirectly devoted to armament purposes. In its bulletin issued at the end of 1935 the Reichskredit Gesellschaft states that the extension of non-residential buildings, which began in 1933, is only to a very small extent due to building operations for purely private enterprise. The following figures are taken from the Bulletin of the Reichskredit Gesellschaft issued at the end of 1935:
In millions
of RM.
Total capital expenditure for buildings, equipment and stores, less amounts spent on residential buildings 1933 4,740
1934 7,700
(provisional) 1935 10,700
23,140
Or nearly ￡2,000 millions.
The fourth line of approach is the increase in the normal income of Germany during the last three years. This can only be due to expenditure by the German nation for capital purposes. That none of this increased income has gone into consumption is shown by the fact that both wages and the cost of living have remained stationary during the period under review. Moreover, the level of wholesale prices for all finished goods other than consumption goods has fallen during the period, while consumption goods have risen rather substantially. The inevitable conclusion is that the increased German national income represents money spent by the Government on warlike preparation.
The following figures are taken from the Statistical Year Book of the German Reich, 1935, page 485. The figure for 1935 is an estimate based on figures given in the Bulletin of the Reichskredit Gesellschaft issued at the end of 1935, page 33.
In millions
of RM.
Increase in National income as compared with 1932 1933 1,200
1934 7,200
(provisional) 1935 11,500
19,900
Or nearly ￡1,700 millions.
Now let the reader look at the figures of German capital expenditure and increase of German national income set out above. They are practically in the same progression. The capital expenditure is in round numbers, five, eight and eleven milliards in the three years 1933–34–35, and the increase of the German national income is 1,200, 7,200 and 11,500 in the same period. What does this mean? It means the natural expansion of a munitions programme which, apart from keeping body and soul together, covers and absorbs the whole of German industry. And let the reader note that the figure of 11,000 million marks is substantially the same in both cases. Eleven milliard marks at twelve to the exchange is over ￡900,000,000. I have committed myself to ￡800,000,000; but if you like, say it is ￡700,000,000 or ￡600,000,000. It makes no difference except in gravity to the significance of the facts. Be it observed that when I challenged the Chancellor of the Exchequer to deny these figures, he in no way suggested that they were not broadly representative of the truth.
As a cross-check we may note the German net imports of armament material. Since 1932 German imports of iron ore have increased 309 per cent., kieselguhr by 145 per cent., bauxite by 153 per cent., asbestos by 197 per cent., nickel by 64 per cent., manganese by 273 per cent., wolfram ore by 345 per cent., chrome ore by 127 per cent., rubber by 64 per cent., and graphite by 220 per cent.
All this has gone into making the most destructive war weapons and war arrangements that have ever been known: and there are four or five millions of active, intelligent, valiant Germans engaged in these processes, working, as General Goering has told us, night and day. Surely these are facts which ought to bulk as large in ordinary peaceful peoples' minds as horse racing, a prize fight, a murder trial or nineteen-twentieths of the current newspaper bill of fare. What is it all for? Certainly it is not all for fun. Something quite extraordinary is afoot. All the signals are set for danger. The red lights flash through the gloom. Let peaceful folk beware. It is a time to pay attention and to be well prepared.