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The Anschluss (, or Anschluß, Anschluss PONS Online Dictionary ), also known as the Anschluß Österreichs (, ), was the annexation of the Federal State of Austria into Nazi Germany on 12 March 1938.
The idea of an Anschluss (a united Austria and Germany that would form a "German Question") arose after the 1871 unification of Germany excluded Austria and the German Austrians from the Prussian-dominated German Empire. It gained support after the Austria-Hungary fell in 1918. The new Republic of German-Austria attempted to form a union with Germany, but the 1919 Treaty of Saint Germain and Treaty of Versailles forbade both the union and the continued use of the name "German-Austria" (Deutschösterreich); they also stripped Austria of some of its territories, such as the Sudetenland. This left Austria without most of the territories it had ruled for centuries and amid economic crisis.
By the 1920s, the Anschluss proposal had strong support in both Austria and Germany, particularly to many Austrian citizens of the political left and center. One vehement supporter was prominent Social Democrat leader Otto Bauer, who served as Austria's Foreign Minister after the war. Support for unification with Germany came mainly from the belief that Austria, stripped of its imperial land, was not viable economically. Popular support for the unification faded with time, although it remained as a concept in the contemporary Austrian political discourse.
After 1933, when Adolf Hitler rose to power in Germany, desire for unification could be identified with the Nazis, for whom it was an integral part of the Nazi "Heim ins Reich" ("back home to the realm") concept, which sought to incorporate as many Volksdeutsche (ethnic Germans outside Germany) as possible into a "Pan-Germanism". Nazi Germany's agents cultivated pro-unification tendencies in Austria, and sought to undermine the Austrian government, which was controlled by the Fatherland Front, which opposed unification. During an July Putsch, Austrian chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss was assassinated by Austrian Nazis. The defeat of the coup prompted many leading Austrian Nazis to go into exile in Germany, where they continued their efforts to unify the two countries.
In early 1938, under increasing pressure from pro-unification activists, Austrian chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg announced that there would be a referendum on a possible union with Germany versus maintaining Austria's sovereignty to be held on 13 March. Portraying this as defying the popular will in Austria and Germany, Hitler threatened an invasion and secretly pressured Schuschnigg to resign. A day before the planned referendum, the German Army crossed the border into Austria on 12 March, unopposed by the Austrian military. A plebiscite was held on 10 April, in which the ballot was not secret, and threats and coercion were employed to manipulate the vote, resulting in 99.7% approval.
In 1866 the feud finally came to an end during the Austro-Prussian War in which the Prussians defeated the Austrians and thereby excluded the Austrian Empire and German Austrians from Germany. The Prussian statesman Otto von Bismarck formed the North German Confederation, which included most of the remaining German states, aside from a few in the southwestern region of the German-inhabited lands, and further expanded the power of the Kingdom of Prussia. Bismarck used the Franco-Prussian war (1870–1871) as a way to convince southwestern German states, including the Kingdom of Bavaria, to side with Prussia against the Second French Empire. Due to Prussia's quick victory, the debate was settled and in 1871 the " Kleindeutsch" German Empire based on the leadership of Bismarck and Prussia formed—this excluded Austria. Besides ensuring Prussian domination of a united Germany, the exclusion of Austria also ensured that Germany would have a substantial Protestant majority.
The Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, the Ausgleich, provided for a dual sovereignty, the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary, under Franz Joseph I. This diverse empire included various different ethnic groups including Hungarians, Slavic ethnic groups such as Croats, Czechs, Poles, Rusyns, Serbs, Slovaks, Slovenes, and Ukrainians, as well as Italians and Romanians ruled by a German minority. The empire caused tensions between the various ethnic groups. Many Austrian pan-Germans showed loyalty to Otto von Bismarck and only to Germany, wore symbols that were temporarily banned in Austrian schools and advocated the dissolution of the empire to allow Austria to rejoin Germany, as it had been during the German Confederation of 1815–1866. Although many Austrians supported pan-Germanism, many others still showed allegiance to the Habsburg monarchy and wished for Austria to remain an independent country.
Elite and popular opinion in the rump Republic of German-Austria after 1918 largely favored some sort of union with Germany. An Austrian provisional national assembly drafted a provisional constitution that stated that "German Austria is a democratic republic" (Article 1) and "German Austria is a component of the German Republic" (Article 2). Later plebiscites in the Austrian border provinces of Tyrol and Salzburg yielded majorities of 98% and 99% in favor of a unification with the Weimar Republic. Further plebiscites were then forbidden. However, Erich Bielka notes that the plebiscites were marred by electoral fraud and voter manipulation, and therefore do not reflect what the general Austrian opinion was at that time:
In the aftermath of a prohibition of an Anschluss, Germans in both Austria and Germany pointed to a contradiction in the national self-determination principle because the treaties failed to grant self-determination to the ethnic Germans (such as German Austrians and Sudeten Germans) outside of the German Reich. Hugo Preuss, the drafter of the German Weimar Constitution, criticized efforts to prevent an Anschluss; he saw the prohibition as a contradiction of the Wilsonian principle of self-determination of peoples.Staff (14 September 1919) Preuss Denounces Demand of Allies , The New York Times
The constitutions of the Weimar Republic and the First Austrian Republic both included the political goal of unification, which parties widely supported. In the early 1930s, the Austrian government looked to a possible customs union with the German Republic in 1931. However, ultimately regional patriotism was stronger than pan-German sentiment. In the Austrian Empire, each Kronland had its own functional government and enjoyed a fair amount of autonomy from Vienna, with "each looking to their own capital" instead. According to Jody Manning, the idea of unification with Germany was not overwhelmingly popular among the Austrian population in 1919, which is one of the reasons why no nationwide referendum was held, even before it was forbidden by the Entente:
The French attempted to prevent an Anschluss by incorporating Austria into a Danubian Confederation in 1927. German Minister of Foreign Affairs Gustav Stresemann opposed it, as he saw it as an attempt to re-form the Austro-Hungarian Empire and offered to form a customs union with Austria. However, Austrian Chancellor Ignaz Seipel, an Anschluss opponent, rejected the offer. Seipel was replaced in 1929 by Johannes Schober, who pursued a pro-Germany policy and attempted to form a customs union. However, a political crisis led to Schober losing power and Seipel returning to the government as Minister of Foreign Affairs. Negotiations were restarted after Otto Ender became chancellor and were finalized with German Foreign Affairs Minister Julius Curtius on 5 March 1931, before being approved by Germany on 18 March. France opposed the customs union, stating that it was in violation of Article 88 of the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye.
Hitler, an Austrian German by birth, picked up his Pan-Germanism ideas at a young age. Whilst infiltrating the German Workers' Party (DAP), Hitler became involved in a heated political argument with a visitor, a Professor Baumann, who proposed that Bavaria should break away from Prussia and found a new Southern Germany nation with Austria. In vehemently attacking the man's arguments he made an impression on the other party members with his oratorical skills and, according to Hitler, the "professor" left the hall acknowledging unequivocal defeat. Impressed with Hitler, Anton Drexler invited him to join the DAP. Hitler accepted on 12 September 1919, becoming the party's 55th member. After becoming leader of the DAP, Hitler addressed a crowd on 24 February 1920, and in an effort to appeal to wider parts of the German population, the DAP was renamed the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP).
As its first point, the 1920 National Socialist Program stated, "We demand the unification of all Germans in the Greater Germany on the basis of the people's right to self-determination. Hitler argued in a 1921 essay that the German Empire had a single task of, "incorporating the ten million German-Austrians in the Empire and dethroning the Habsburgs, the most miserable dynasty ever ruling." The Nazism aimed to re-unite all Germans who were either born in the Reich or living outside it in order to create an "all-German Reich". Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf (1925) that he would create a union between his birth country Austria and Germany by any means possible.
The First Austrian Republic was dominated from the late 1920s by the Christian Social Party (CS), whose economic policies were based on the papal encyclical Rerum novarum. The First Republic gradually disintegrated in 1933, when parliament was dissolved and power was centralized in the office of the chancellor, who was empowered to rule by decree. Rival parties, including the Austrian National Socialists, were banned, and government evolved into a corporatist, one-party government that combined the CS and the paramilitary Heimwehr. It controlled labor relations and the press. ( See Fatherland Front). The new regime emphasized the Catholic elements of Austria's national identity and staunchly opposed union with Nazi Germany.
Engelbert Dollfuss and his successor, Kurt Schuschnigg, turned to Benito Mussolini's Fascist Italy for inspiration and support. Mussolini supported the independence of Austria, largely due to his concern that Hitler would eventually press for the return of Italian territories which had once been ruled by Austria. However, Mussolini needed German support in Ethiopia ( see Second Italo-Abyssinian War). After receiving Hitler's personal assurance that Germany would not seek territorial concessions from Italy, Mussolini entered into a client relationship with Berlin that began with the formation of the Axis Powers in 1937.
When Germany permitted residents of Austria to vote on 5 March 1933, three special trains, boats and trucks brought such masses to Passau that the Schutzstaffel staged a ceremonial welcome. Gunther wrote that by the end of 1933 Austrian public opinion about German annexation was at least 60% against. On 25 July 1934, chancellor Dollfuss was assassinated by Austrian Nazis in a failed coup. Afterwards, leading Austrian Nazis fled to Germany but they continued to push for unification from there. The remaining Austrian Nazis continued terrorist attacks against Austrian governmental institutions, causing a death toll of more than 800 between 1934 and 1938.
Dollfuss's successor was Kurt Schuschnigg, who followed a political course similar to his predecessor. In 1935 Schuschnigg used the police to suppress Nazi supporters. Police actions under Schuschnigg included gathering Nazis (and Social Democrats) and holding them in . Austria between 1934 and 1938 focused on the history of Austria and opposed the absorption of Austria into Nazi Germany (according to the philosophy Austrians were "superior Germans"). Schuschnigg called Austria the "better German state" but struggled to keep Austria independent.
In an attempt to put Schuschnigg's mind at rest, Hitler delivered a speech at the Reichstag and said, "Germany neither intends nor wishes to interfere in the internal affairs of Austria, to annex Austria or to conclude an Anschluss."
By 1936, the damage to Austria from the German boycott was too great. That summer Schuschnigg told Mussolini that his country had to come to an agreement with Germany. On 11 July 1936 he signed an agreement with German ambassador Franz von Papen, in which Schuschnigg agreed to the release of Nazis imprisoned in Austria and Germany promised to respect Austrian sovereignty. Under the terms of the Austro-German treaty, Austria declared itself a "German state" that would always follow Germany's lead in foreign policy, and members of the "National Opposition" were allowed to enter the cabinet, in exchange for which the Austrian Nazis promised to cease their terrorist attacks against the government. This did not satisfy Hitler and the pro-German Austrian Nazis grew in strength.
In September 1936, Hitler launched the Four Year Plan that called for a dramatic increase in military spending and to make Germany as Autarky as possible with the aim of having the Reich ready to fight a world war by 1940. The Four Year Plan required huge investments in the Reichswerke steel works, a programme for developing synthetic oil that soon went wildly over budget, and programmes for producing more chemicals and aluminium; the plan called for a policy of substituting imports and rationalizing industry to achieve its goals that failed completely. As the Four Year Plan fell further and further behind its targets, Hermann Göring, the chief of the Four Year Plan office, began to press for an Anschluss as a way of securing Austria's iron and other raw materials as a solution to the problems with the Four Year Plan. The British historian Ian Kershaw wrote:
Göring was far more interested in the return of the former German colonies in Africa than Hitler was, believed up to 1939 in the possibility of an Anglo-German alliance (an idea that Hitler had abandoned by late 1937), and wanted all Eastern Europe in the German economic sphere of influence. Göring did not share Hitler's interest in Lebensraum ("living space") as for him, merely having Eastern Europe in the German economic sphere of influence was sufficient. In this context, having Austria annexed to Germany was the key towards bringing Eastern Europe into Göring's desired Grossraumwirtschaft ("greater economic space").
Faced with problems in the Four Year Plan, Göring had become the loudest voice in Germany, calling for an Anschluss, even at the risk of losing an alliance with Italy. In April 1937, in a secret speech before a group of German industrialists, Göring stated that the only solution to the problems with meeting the steel production targets laid out by the Four Year Plan was to annex Austria, which Göring noted was rich in iron. Göring did not give a date for the Anschluss, but given that Four Year Plan's targets all had to be met by September 1940, and the current problems with meeting the steel production targets, suggested that he wanted an Anschluss in the very near-future.
Following increasing violence and demands from Hitler that Austria agree to a union, Schuschnigg met Hitler at Berchtesgaden on 12 February 1938, in an attempt to avoid the takeover of Austria. Hitler presented Schuschnigg with a set of demands including appointing Nazi sympathizers to positions of power in the government. The key appointment was that of Arthur Seyss-Inquart as Minister of Public Security, with full, unlimited control of the police. In return Hitler would publicly reaffirm the treaty of 11 July 1936 and reaffirm his support for Austria's national sovereignty. Browbeaten and threatened by Hitler, Schuschnigg agreed to these demands and put them into effect.
Seyss-Inquart was a long-time supporter of the Nazis who sought the union of all Germans in one state. Leopold argues he was a moderate who favoured an evolutionary approach to union. He opposed the violent tactics of the Austrian Nazis, cooperated with Catholic groups, and wanted to preserve a measure of Austrian identity within Nazi Germany.
On 20 February, Hitler made a speech before the Reichstag which was broadcast live and which for the first time was relayed also by the Austrian radio network. A key phrase in the speech which was aimed at the Germans living in Austria and Czechoslovakia was: "The German Reich is no longer willing to tolerate the suppression of ten million Germans across its borders."
On 9 March 1938, in the face of rioting by the small, but virulent, Austrian Nazi Party and ever-expanding German demands on Austria, Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg called a referendum (plebiscite) on the issue, to be held on 13 March. Infuriated, on 11 March, Adolf Hitler threatened invasion of Austria, and demanded Chancellor von Schuschnigg's resignation and the appointment of the Nazi Arthur Seyss-Inquart as his replacement. Hitler's plan was for Seyss-Inquart to call immediately for German troops to rush to Austria's aid, restoring order and giving the invasion an air of legitimacy. In the face of this threat, Schuschnigg informed Seyss-Inquart that the plebiscite would be cancelled.
To secure a large majority in the referendum, Schuschnigg dismantled the one-party state. He agreed to legalize the Social Democrats and their trade unions in return for their support in the referendum. He also set the minimum voting age at 24 to exclude younger voters because the Nazi movement was most popular among the young. In contrast, Hitler had lowered the voting age for German elections held under Nazi rule, largely to compensate for the removal of German Jews and other ethnic minorities from the German electorate following enactment of the Nuremberg Laws in 1935.
The plan went awry when it became apparent that Hitler would not stand by while Austria declared its independence by public vote. Hitler declared that the referendum would be subject to major fraud and that Germany would never accept it. In addition, the German ministry of propaganda issued press reports that riots had broken out in Austria and that large parts of the Austrian population were calling for German troops to restore order. Schuschnigg immediately responded that reports of riots were false.
Hitler sent an ultimatum to Schuschnigg on 11 March, demanding that he hand over all power to the Austrian Nazis or face an invasion. The ultimatum was set to expire at noon, but was extended by two hours. Without waiting for an answer, Hitler had already signed the order to send troops into Austria at one o'clock. Nevertheless, the German Führer underestimated his opposition.
As journalist Edgar Ansel Mowrer, reporting from Paris for CBS News, observed: "There is no one in all France who does not believe that Hitler invaded Austria not to hold a genuine plebiscite, but to prevent the plebiscite planned by Schuschnigg from demonstrating to the entire world just how little hold National Socialism really had on that tiny country."CBS World Roundup Broadcast 13 March 1938 Columbia Broadcasting System retrieved from http://otr.com/ra/news/CBS_Roundup_3-13-1938.mp3
Schuschnigg desperately sought support for Austrian independence in the hours following the ultimatum. Realizing that neither France nor Britain was willing to offer assistance, Schuschnigg resigned on the evening of 11 March, but President Wilhelm Miklas refused to appoint Seyss-Inquart as Chancellor. At 8:45 pm, Hitler, tired of waiting, ordered the invasion to commence at dawn on 12 March regardless.Nazis Take Austria, The History Place, retrieved from http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/triumph/tr-austria.htm Around 10 pm, a forged telegram was sent in Seyss-Inquart's name asking for German troops, since he was not yet Chancellor and was unable to do so himself. Seyss-Inquart was not installed as Chancellor until after midnight, when Miklas resigned himself to the inevitable. In the radio broadcast in which Schuschnigg announced his resignation, he argued that he accepted the changes and allowed the Nazis to take over the government "to avoid the shedding of fraternal blood Bruderblut".See 'Vienna, 1938', in Hans Keller, 1975: 1984 minus 9, Dennis Dobson, 1977, p. 28 Detailed article on the events of the Anschluss, in German. Seyss-Inquart was appointed chancellor after midnight on 12 March.
It is said that after listening to Bruckner's Seventh Symphony, Hitler cried: "How can anyone say that Austria is not German! Is there anything more German than our old pure Austrianness?"
That afternoon, Hitler, riding in a car, crossed the border at his birthplace, Braunau am Inn, with a 4,000 man bodyguard. In the evening, he arrived at Linz and was given an enthusiastic welcome. 250,000 Austrians gathered in Linz to meet Adolf Hitler and support Anschluss. The enthusiasm displayed toward Hitler and the Germans surprised both Nazis and non-Nazis, as most people had believed that a majority of Austrians opposed Anschluss.Surprised or not, Hitler's schoolboy dream of a "greater Germany" had come to fruition when Austria was incorporated into the Reich. Ozment (2005), p. 274. Many Germans from both Austria and Germany welcomed the Anschluss as they saw it as completing the complex and long overdue unification of all Germans into one state. Hitler had originally intended to leave Austria as a satellite state with Seyss-Inquart as head of a pro-Nazi government. However, the overwhelming reception caused him to change course and absorb Austria directly into the Reich. On 13 March Seyss-Inquart announced the abrogation of Article 88 of the Treaty of Saint-Germain, which prohibited the unification of Austria and Germany, and approved the replacement of the Austrian states with . The seizure of Austria demonstrated once again Hitler's aggressive territorial ambitions, and, once again, the failure of the British and the French to take action against him for violating the Versailles Treaty. Their lack of will emboldened him toward further aggression.Hildebrand (1973), pp. 60–61
Hitler's journey through Austria became a triumphal tour that climaxed in Vienna on 15 March 1938, when around 200,000 cheering German Austrians gathered around the Heldenplatz (Square of Heroes) to hear Hitler say that "The oldest eastern province of the German people shall be, from this point on, the newest bastion of the German Reich" followed by his "greatest accomplishment" (completing the annexing of Austria to form a Greater German Reich) by saying "As leader and chancellor of the German nation and Reich I announce to German history now the entry of my homeland into the German Reich."Original German: "Als Führer und Kanzler der deutschen Nation und des Reiches melde ich vor der deutschen Geschichte nunmehr den Eintritt meiner Heimat in das Deutsche Reich." Hitler later commented: "Certain foreign newspapers have said that we fell on Austria with brutal methods. I can only say: even in death they cannot stop lying. I have in the course of my political struggle won much love from my people, but when I crossed the former frontier (into Austria) there met me such a stream of love as I have never experienced. Not as tyrants have we come, but as liberators."
Hitler said as a personal note to the Anschluss: "I, myself, as Führer and Chancellor, will be happy to walk on the soil of the country that is my home as a free German citizen."
Hitler's popularity reached an unprecedented peak after he fulfilled the Anschluss because he had completed the long-awaited idea of a Greater Germany. Bismarck had not chosen to include Austria in his 1871 unification of Germany, and there was genuine support from Germans in both Austria and Germany for an Anschluss.
The Austrians' support for the Anschluss was ambivalent; the Austrian population was given no choice and was subjected to extensive intimidation and suppression of the political opposition, as at the time of the plebiscite, the annexation of Austria was a 'fait accompli' as the German army had already occupied Austria and integrated it into Germany. American historian Evan Bukey argues that there was a genuine German nationalist feeling in Austria amongst at least a part of the population, and those holding antisemitic sentiments were more than ready to "fulfill their duty" in the "Greater German Reich". Bukey also states that since the Social Democratic Party of Austria leader Karl Renner and the highest representative of the Roman Catholic church in Austria Cardinal Theodor Innitzer both endorsed the Anschluss, approximately two-thirds of Austrians might have voted for it. However, Julie Thorpe notes that endorsements of people such as Renner "do not stand on their own as evidence for broad pan-German sympathies amongst Austria’s working population".
British historian Donny Gluckstein notes that Austrian socialists reacted with "disgust" to Renner's endorsement of Anschluss, provoking a split in the SPÖ. Austrian left circles vehemently opposed Anschluss, and Renner's declaration prompted many to defect to Revolutionary Socialists under Otto Bauer or the KPÖ. The relevance of Innitzer's endorsement is also disputed — he was reportedly "despised" by Austrian workers,: "In contrast, there was no remorse about the Nazi assault on the church: the workers despised Cardinal Innitzer and recommended even harsher measures against both his clergy and flock." and the Anschluss sparked Catholic protests in Austria under the slogan "Our Führer is Christ" (rather than Hitler). According to the Austrian historian Alfred D. Low, one of the reasons why Germany did not allow the plebiscite to be held by the Austrian government was that the Nazi regime feared to be defeated at the polls; Low states that in 1938, there was "majority support to Austria's independence".
According to Hungarian historian Oszkár Jászi, writing in 1938, the idea of Anschluss was opposed amongst most political circles in Austria. Jászi noted that "the annihilation of the German labor movement showed to Austrian socialism what it could expect from an Anschluss under Nazi rule", while "Austrian Catholicism realized what its fate would be under a system which crushed the great Catholic Party of Germany, the Centrum". It was also opposed by other groups, such as the Austrian Jews as well as "old Hapsburgist officers and officials and by a considerable part of Austrian capitalism". Most contemporary writers estimated that about two-thirds of Austrians wanted Austria to remain independent.
How many Austrians behind closed doors were against the Anschluss remains unknown, but only one "unhappy face" of an Austrian in public when the Germans marched into Austria has ever been produced. According to some Gestapo reports, only a quarter to a third of Austrian voters in Vienna were in favour of the Anschluss. In most rural areas, especially in Tyrol, the support for the Anschluss was even lower. According to Evan Burr Bukey, no more than one-third of Austrians ever fully supported Nazism during the existence of Nazi Germany. According to the estimates of the Austrian government, with the voting age of 24, about 70% of Austrians would have voted to preserve the Austrian independence. Czech-American historian Radomír Luža estimated that between 65% and 75% of Austrians supported the continuation of Austrian independence. About a quarter of the Austrian population was estimated to be supportive of the NSDAP.
The newly installed Nazis, within two days, transferred power to Germany, and Wehrmacht troops entered Austria to enforce the Anschluss. The Nazis held a controlled plebiscite ( Volksabstimmung) in the whole Reich within the following month, asking the people to ratify the fait accompli, and claimed that 99.7561% of the votes cast in Austria were in favor. Austria: A Country Study. Select link on left for The Anschluss and World War II. Eric Solsten, ed. (Washington, D. C.: Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress, 1993).Emil Müller-Sturmheim 99.7%: a plebiscite under Nazi rule Austrian Democratic Union London, England 1942
Although the Allies were committed to upholding the terms of the Treaty of Versailles and those of St. Germain, which specifically prohibited the union of Austria and Germany, their reaction was only verbal and moderate. No military confrontation took place, and even the strongest voices against the annexation, particularly Fascist Italy, France, and Britain (the "Stresa Front") remained at peace. The loudest verbal protest was voiced by the government of Mexico.
Germany, which had a shortage of steel and a weak balance of payments, gained iron ore mines in the Erzberg and 748 million Reichsmark in the reserves of Austria's central bank Oesterreichische Nationalbank, more than twice its own cash. In the years that followed, some bank accounts were transferred from Austria to Germany as "enemy property accounts".
The Nazis dissolved Jewish organisations and institutions, hoping to force Jews to emigrate. Their plans succeeded—by the end of 1941, 130,000 Jews had left Vienna, 30,000 of whom went to the United States. They left behind all of their property, but were forced to pay the Reich Flight Tax, a tax on all émigrés from Nazi Germany; some received financial support from international aid organisations so that they could pay this tax. The majority of the Jews who had stayed in Vienna eventually became victims of the Holocaust. Of the more than 65,000 Viennese Jews who were deported to concentration camps, fewer than 2,000 survived.
While historians concur that the votes were accurately counted, the process was neither free nor secret. Officials were present directly beside the voting booths and received the voting ballot by hand (in contrast to a Secret ballot where the voting ballot is inserted into a closed box). In some remote areas of Austria, people voted to preserve the independence of Austria on 13 March (in Schuschnigg's planned but cancelled referendum) despite the Wehrmachts presence. For instance, in the village of Innervillgraten, a majority of 95% voted for Austria's independence. However, in the referendum on 10 April, 73.3% of votes in Innervillgraten were in favor of the Anschluss, which was still the lowest number of all Austrian municipalities. According to Peter R. Knaur, Germany believed that a defeat in a fair referendum was likely, and thus enforced a non-free and non-secret vote instead; Knaur wrote: "The Nazis supposedly admitted that they only had the following of twenty percent, of the potential votes of the country."
Austria remained part of Germany until the end of World War II. A provisional government in Allied-occupied Austria declared the Anschluss "null und nichtig" (null and void) on 27 April 1945. Henceforth, Austria was recognized as a separate country, although it remained divided into occupation zones and controlled by the Allied Commission until 1955, when the Austrian State Treaty restored its sovereignty.
concentration camp]]In March 1938 the local Gauleiter of Gmunden, Upper Austria, gave a speech to the local Austrians and told them in plain terms that all "traitors" of Austria were to be thrown into the newly opened concentration camp at Mauthausen-Gusen. The camp became notorious for its cruelty and barbarism. During its existence an estimated 200,000 people died, half of whom were directly killed.
The Anti-Romanyism sentiment was implemented initially most harshly in Austria when between 1938 and 1939 the Nazis arrested around 2,000 Romani men who were sent to Dachau and 1,000 Romani women who were sent to Ravensbrück. Starting in 1939, Austrian Romani had to register themselves to local authorities. The Nazis began to publish articles linking the Romani with criminality. Until 1942, the Nazis had made a distinction between "pure Gypsies" and "Gypsy " ("mixlings" or "half-breeds"). However, Nazi racial research claimed that 90% of Romani were of mixed ancestry. Subsequently, the Nazis ordered that the Romani were to be treated on the same level as the Jews.
After breaking off the negotiations regarding the position of the Catholic Church in Austria, Cardinal Theodor Innitzer (a political figure of the CS) was intimidated into supporting the Anschluss after being assaulted. Vatican Radio, however, broadcast a strong denunciation of the German action, and Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, the Vatican Secretary of State, ordered Innitzer to report to Rome. Before meeting the Pope, Innitzer met Pacelli, who had been outraged by Innitzer's statement. He told Innitzer to retract his statement; he was made to sign a new statement, issued on behalf of all the Austrian bishops, that stated: "The solemn declaration of the Austrian bishops... was clearly not intended to be an approval of something that was not and is not compatible with God's law". The Vatican newspaper reported that the German bishops' earlier statement had been issued without approval from Rome. The Vatican condemned Nazism in its newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, and forbade Catholics from following their ideas or supporting Anschluss. On 11 March 1938, one day before the occupation of Austria by the Wehrmacht, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Vienna issued an appeal to Austrians: "As Austrian citizens, we stand and we fight for a free and independent Austria".
Robert Kauer, president of the minority Lutheran Church in Austria, greeted Hitler on 13 March as "saviour of the 350,000 German Protestants in Austria and liberator from a five-year hardship". Karl Renner, the most famous Social Democrat of the First Republic, announced his support for the Anschluss and appealed to all Austrians to vote in favour of it on 10 April.
The international response to the Anschluss was publicly moderate. The Times commented that 300 years before, Scotland had joined England as well and that this event would not really differ much. On 14 March, the British Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain spoke about the "Austrian situation" in the House of Commons. He noted that the British ambassador in Berlin objected to the use of "coercion, backed by force" that would undermine Austria's independence. Within this speech Chamberlain also said, "The hard fact is that nothing could have arrested what has actually happened in unless this country and other countries had been prepared to use force." Chamberlain informed the Foreign Policy Committee that the Anschluss would not alter the National Government's European policy.Williamson Murray (2025). 9780674041301, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. ISBN 9780674041301
On 18 March 1938, the German government communicated to the Secretary General of the League of Nations about the inclusion of Austria.Chronology of the League of Nations [4] Retrieved 4 September 2016. And next day in Geneva, the Mexican Delegate to the International Office of Labor, Isidro Fabela, voiced an energetic protest, stronger than that expressed by European countries, denouncing the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany.Kloyber, Christian: " Don Isidro Fabela: 50 años después de muerte. Recuerdo al autor de la protesta de México en contra de la "anexión" de Austria por la Alemania Nazi de 1938." 12 August 2014 League of Nations. Communication from the Mexican Delegation. C.101.M.53.1938.VII; 19 March 1938 [5] (Note: Also available in French.) Retrieved 4 September 2016.
Some sources, like the Encyclopædia Britannica, describe the Anschluss as an "annexation" rather than a union.
Prior to annexing Austria in 1938, Nazi Germany had remilitarized the Rhineland, and the Saar region was returned to Germany after 15 years of occupation through a plebiscite. After the Anschluss, Hitler targeted Czechoslovakia, provoking an international crisis which led to the Munich Agreement in September 1938, giving Nazi Germany control of the industrial Sudetenland, which had a predominantly ethnic German population. In March 1939, Hitler then dismantled Czechoslovakia by recognising the independence of Slovakia and making the rest of the nation a protectorate. That same year, Memelland was returned from Lithuania.
With the Anschluss, the Republic of Austria ceased to exist as an independent state. At the end of World War II, a Provisional Austrian Government under Karl Renner was set up by conservatives, Social Democrats and Communists on 27 April 1945 (when Vienna had already been occupied by the Red Army). It cancelled the Anschluss the same day and was legally recognized by the Allies in the following months. In 1955 the Austrian State Treaty re-established Austria as a sovereign state.
The governments of the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States are agreed that Austria, the first free country to fall a victim to Hitlerite aggression, shall be liberated from German domination.They regard the annexation imposed on Austria by Germany on 15 March 1938, as null and void. They consider themselves as in no way bound by any changes effected in Austria since that date. They declare that they wish to see re-established a free and independent Austria and thereby to open the way for the Austrian people themselves, as well as those neighbouring States which will be faced with similar problems, to find that political and economic security which is the only basis for lasting peace.
Austria is reminded, however, that she has a responsibility, which she cannot evade, for participation in the war at the side of Hitlerite Germany, and that in the final settlement account will inevitably be taken of her own contribution to her liberation.Barbara Jelavich – Modern Austria: Empire and Republic, 1815–1986, Cambridge University Press 1987, p. 238
The Moscow Declaration is said to have a somewhat complex drafting history.Gerald Stourzh, "Waldheim's Austria" , The New York Review of Books 34, no. 3 (February 1987). The declaration was mostly intended to serve as propaganda aimed at stirring Austrian resistance. Although some Austrians aided Jews and are counted as Righteous Among the Nations, there never was an effective Austrian armed resistance of the sort found in other countries under German occupation.
Despite the declaration, the Nuremberg trials decided against classifying participation in planning of the Anschluss as a crime against peace, stating in the judgement of Ernst Kaltenbrunner (who was nonetheless convicted and sentenced to death for other war crimes) that "the Anschluss, although it was an aggressive act, is not charged as an aggressive war."Yale Law School: Kaltenbrunner judgement In most cases this distinction proved a moot point, as the Nazis responsible for planning the Anschluss were either dead by the time of the Nuremberg trials, or were convicted for their roles in planning the invasions of other countries. Arthur Seyss-Inquart"[http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/imt/tgmwc/judgment/j-defendants-seyss-inquart.html Judgment, The Defendants: Seyss-Inquart ," The Nizkor Project. and Franz von Papen," The Defendants: Von Papen ," The Nizkor Project. in particular, were both indicted under count one (conspiracy to commit crimes against peace) specifically for their activities in support of the Austrian Nazi Party and the Anschluss, but neither was convicted of this count. In acquitting von Papen, the court noted that his actions were in its view political immoralities but not crimes under its charter. Seyss-Inquart was convicted of other serious war crimes, most of which took place in Poland and the Netherlands, was sentenced to death and executed.
This view of the events of 1938 has deep roots in the 10 years of Allied occupation and the struggle to regain Austrian sovereignty: the "victim theory" played an essential role in the negotiations for the Austrian State Treaty with the Soviets, and by pointing to the Moscow Declaration, Austrian politicians heavily relied on it to achieve a solution for Austria different from the division of Germany into separate Eastern and Western states. The state treaty, alongside the subsequent Austrian declaration of permanent Neutral country, marked important milestones for the solidification of Austria's independent national identity during the course of the following decades.Steininger (2008)
As Austrian politicians of the left and right attempted to reconcile their differences to avoid the violent conflict that had dominated the First Republic, discussions of both Austrian Nazism and Austria's role during the Nazi-era were largely avoided. Still, the Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) had advanced, and still advances, the argument that the establishment of the Dollfuss dictatorship was necessary to maintain Austrian independence. On the other hand, the Austrian Social Democratic Party (SPÖ) argues that the Dollfuss dictatorship stripped the country of the democratic resources necessary to repel Hitler; yet it ignores the fact that Hitler himself was a native of Austria.
It has also helped the Austrians develop their own national identity as before. After World War II and the fall of Nazi Germany the political ideology of Pan-Germanism fell into disfavor and is now seen by the majority of German-speaking people as taboo. Unlike earlier in the 20th century when there was no Austrian identity separate from a German one, in 1987 only 6% of the Austrians identified themselves as "Germans." A survey carried out in 2008 found that 82% of Austrians considered themselves to be their own nation.
Another factor was the rise of Jörg Haider and the Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) in the 1980s. The party had combined elements of the pan-German right with free-market liberalism since its foundation in 1955, but after Haider ascended to the party chairmanship in 1986, the liberal elements became increasingly marginalized. Haider began to openly use nationalist and anti-immigrant rhetoric. He was criticised for using the völkisch (ethnic) definition of national interest ("Austria for Austrians") and his apologetics for Austria's past, notably calling members of the Waffen-SS "men of honour". Following a dramatic rise in electoral support in the 1990s that peaked in the 1999 elections, the FPÖ entered a coalition with the Austrian People's Party (ÖVP), led by Wolfgang Schüssel. This was condemned in 2000. The coalition prompted the regular Donnerstagsdemonstrationen (Thursday demonstrations) in protest against the government, which took place on the Heldenplatz where Hitler had greeted the masses during the Anschluss. Haider's tactics and rhetoric, often criticised as sympathetic to Nazism, forced Austrians to reconsider their relationship to the past. Haider's coalition partner, former Chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel, in a 2000 interview with The Jerusalem Post, reiterated the "first victim" theory. Short note on Schüssel's interview in The Jerusalem Post (in German), Salzburger Nachrichten, 11 November 2000.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center continues to criticise Austria (as recently as June 2005) for its alleged historical and ongoing unwillingness aggressively to pursue investigations and trials against Nazis for war crimes and crimes against humanity from the 1970s onwards. Its 2001 report offered the following characterization:
Given the extensive participation of numerous Austrians, including at the highest levels, in the implementation of the Final Solution and other Nazi crimes, Austria should have been a leader in the prosecution of Holocaust perpetrators over the course of the past four decades, as has been the case in Germany. Unfortunately relatively little has been achieved by the Austrian authorities in this regard and in fact, with the exception of the case of Heinrich Gross which was suspended this year under highly suspicious circumstances (he claimed to be medically unfit, but outside the court proved to be healthy) not a single Nazi war crimes prosecution has been conducted in Austria since the mid-1970s.Efraim Zuroff, " Worldwide Investigation and Prosecution of Nazi War Criminals, 2001–2002 ," Simon Wiesenthal Center, Jerusalem (April 2002).
In 2003, the Center launched a worldwide effort named "Operation: Last Chance" in order to collect further information about those Nazis still alive that are potentially subject to prosecution. Although reports issued shortly thereafter credited Austria for initiating large-scale investigations, there has been one case where criticism of Austrian authorities arose recently: The Center put 92-year-old Croatian Milivoj Asner on its 2005 top ten list. Asner fled to Austria in 2004 after Croatia announced it would start investigations in the case of war crimes he may have been involved in. In response to objections about Asner's continued freedom, Austria's federal government deferred to either extradition requests from Croatia or prosecutorial actions from Klagenfurt, claiming reason of dementia in 2008. Milivoj Ašner died on 14 June 2011 at the age of 98 in his room in a Caritas Austria nursing home still in Klagenfurt.
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