The Bills of Exchange of Schacht and Rearmament in the Third Reich
ABSTRACT
The economic recovery under Hitler stands as a remarkable feat of financial swiftness. Consummated in less than four years, the Nazi resurgence could vaunt by the end of 1938 the erasure of nearly eight million unemployed, the total absence of inflationary pangs, and the most ravaging army one could then conceive. The monetary contrivances behind such a conjuring of awesome potency were imagined by a team of traditional bankers, headed by Reicksbankpräsident Hjalmar Schacht. It is here argued that the financial underlining of the Nazi episode is but a variation of the famous ‘monetary sleight-of-hand’ that Mephisto played before the Kaiser in Goethe’s Faust. Theatrical prophecy and war expectancy mix uncannily in thisunique example of economic expediency achieved without the least concern for ideological etiquette.
