A Lot of New Material on the Nazi Speaker System

I have a particular interest in the lower levels of the Nazi propaganda system.  A significant part of that was the speaker corp that delivered the Nazi message to people throughout Germany.  These speakers needed to be informed  — and kept from saying the wrong things.

Today I’m adding a dozen or so editions of the Redner-Schnellinformation, an irregular publication for speakers. Some are from the beginning of the crisis on the Eastern Front.  Others deal with how to treat foreign leaders, how to present Rommel’s victories in Africa, or what to say to women.

This material was done in haste, often in response to immediate events.  Mistakes sometimes occur.  For example, in #24 (4 January 1942) speakers are instructed:

We have a political interest in distinguishing clearly and intentionally that part of the American continent, namely North America, that is waging war against us from the other countries of the American continent. Avoid, therefore, speaking of America as the enemy, but rather always heed the fact that our enemy is not all of America, but rather onlyNorth America or the United States of North America, or the USA. Speakers should be sure to clearly distinguish these terms.

Issue #26 (21 February 1942) followed these instructions.  However, they were forgotten by issue #28 (14 March 1942), in which there is this passage:

Given the continuing attempts through using reports of German losses in the East, through lying reports of vast armaments capacity in America, through political agitation in the occupied territories and in the neutral world, etc., they try to create the impression that they have not been affected by the results of the war and that we have no chance of final victory. 

I also added two essays by Joseph Goebbels from Das Reich that speakers were instructed to use as the basis of their speeches: “What is Sacrifice” and “A Word to All.”

Propagandizing German Women in 1941

I have a lot of instructional material on the site, directives aimed not at the public, but at propagandists.  Today I am adding instructions for leaders of Nazi women’s groups from September 1941. This was three months after the invasion of the Soviet Union had begun.  The first item works to build morale for coming difficult days.  The second section deals with sexual relations with foreigners.  Relations with Jews, of course, were prohibited. However, there was a range of other groups, and an interesting gender difference.  It was OK for men to have relationships with racially-related foreigners such as the Dutch or Scandinavians. If they married, their wives would join the German racial community.  Women, however, were not to have such relationships, since even though their partners might be “racially desirable,” the women would likely move to their husbands’ countries and thus be lost to Germany, which “needed every German.”

Nietzsche and German Women

While scanning the cover of an issue of the Frauen Warte, the Nazi weekly for women, for a publisher who needed an illustration, I came across a peculiar article on Nietzsche and race. I’m not sure what the average reader made of it in 1938, but I’ve added a translation. The illustration is the issue’s cover.

A New Cover from the NS Frauen-Warte

The NS Frauen-Warte was the Nazi Party's magazine for women. It often had rather vivid covers. I've added an August 1941 cover from a copy I just received to the page on the magazine, an example of Nazi military art.

Eight More Weekly Quotation Posters

I've added eight more of the weekly quotation posters issued between 1937 and 1944. Each had an inspiring quotation, usually from a Nazi leader. They were posted throughout Germany in public places.

Nazi Postcards Series: "Women Working for You"

Soldiers appreciate pictures of women, and Nazi propaganda supplied soldiers with what they wanted. I've added a page with seven postcards from 1943 on the theme Women working for you. They showed attractive women at work in what formerly had been mostly male occupations.