Hitler

autumn 1938. The 1,690 businesses in Jewish hands in Munich in February 1938, for instance, had fallen to only 666 (two-thirds of them owned by foreign citizens) by October. The ‘aryanization’ drive not only closed businesses, or saw them bought out for a pittance by new ‘aryan’ owners. It also brought a new flood of legislative measures imposing a variety of discriminatory restrictions and occupational bans – such as on Jewish doctors and lawyers – even to the extent of preventing Jews from trying to eke out a living as pedlars. It was a short step from legislation to pinpoint remaining Jewish businesses to identifying Jewish persons. A decree of 17 August had made it compulsory for male Jews to add the forename ‘Israel’, females the forename ‘Sara’, to their existing names and, on pain of imprisonment, to use those names in all official matters. On 5 October, they were compelled to have a ‘J’ stamped in their passports. A few days later, Göring declared that ‘the Jewish Question must now be tackled with all means available, for they [the Jews] must get out of the economy’.
    Alongside the legislation, inevitably, went the violence. Scores of localized attacks on Jewish property and on individual Jews, usually carried out by members of party formations, punctuated the summer months. Far more than had been the case in the earlier antisemitic waves, attention of party activists increasingly focused on synagogues and Jewish cemeteries, which were repeatedly vandalized. As an indicator of their mood, and an ‘ordered’ foretaste of what would follow across the land during ‘Crystal Night’, the main synagogue in Munich was demolished on 9 June, the first in Germany to be destroyed by the Nazis. During a visit to the city a few days earlier, Hitler had taken objection to its proximity to the Deutsches Künstlerhaus (‘House of GermanArtists’). The official reason given was that the building was a hindrance to traffic.
    Hitler saw it as important that he should not be publicly associated with the anti-Jewish campaign as it gathered momentum during 1938. No discussion by the press of the ‘Jewish Question’ was, for example, permitted in connection with his visits to different parts of Germany in that year. Preserving his image, both at home and – especially in the light of the developing Czech crisis – abroad, through avoiding personal association with distasteful actions towards the Jews appears to have been the motive. Hence, he insisted in September 1938, at the height of the Sudeten crisis, that his signing of the fifth implementation ordinance under the Reich Citizenship Law, to oust Jewish lawyers, should not be publicized at that stage in order to prevent any possible deterioration of Germany’s image – clearly meaning his own image – at such a tense moment.
    In fact, he had to do little or nothing to stir the escalating campaign against the Jews. Others made the running, took the initiative, pressed for action – always, of course, on the assumption that this was in line with Nazism’s great mission. It was a classic case of ‘working towards the Führer’ – taking for granted (usually on grounds of self-interest) that he approved of measures aimed at the ‘removal’ of the Jews, measures seen as plainly furthering his long-term goals. Party activists in the Movement’s various formations needed no encouragement to unleash further attacks on Jews and their property. ‘Aryans’ in business, from the smallest to the largest, looked to every opportunity to profit at the expense of their Jewish counterparts. Hundreds of Jewish businesses – including long-established private banks such as Warburg and Bleichröder – were now forced, often through gangster-like extortion, to sell out for a fraction of their value to ‘aryan’ buyers. Big business gained most. Giant concerns like Mannesmann, Krupp, Thyssen, Flick, and IG-Farben, and leading banks such as the Deutsche Bank and the Dresdner Bank, were the major beneficiaries, while a variety of business consortia, corrupt party functionaries, and untold numbers of small commercial enterprises grabbed what they could. ‘Aryan’ pillars of the establishment like doctors and lawyers were equally welcoming of the economic advantages that could come their way with the expulsion of Jews from the medical and legal professions. University professors turned their skills, without prompting, to defining alleged