Hjalmar Schacht quotes

Hjalmar Schacht was a German economist, banker, and politician, who played a key role in Weimar and Nazi Germany’s economic policies. As president of the Reichsbank and later Minister of Economics, he was influential in stabilizing the German currency and promoting economic recovery. He later opposed certain Nazi policies and was acquitted at the Nuremberg Trials. Here are 32 of his quotes:

Wherever my work may take me in the near future even if you should see me one day within the fortress - you can always count on me as your reliable assistant.

Hjalmar Schacht

One thing I fear, that you Americans will do the same thing that you did after the last war. I mean that you will pull out of here and leave Europe, then Russia will have her way. Private enterprise and individual rights will be lost just as much as under a Nazi government. Frightful!

Hjalmar Schacht

Colonies are necessary to Germany. We shall get them through negotiation if possible; but if not, we shall take them.

Hjalmar Schacht

And this thesis is somewhat connected with general social and political observations, because it establishes the fact that the number of consumers is considerably larger than the number of producers, a fact which exercises a not inconsiderable social and political pressure.

Hjalmar Schacht

The presentation of the Golden Badge of the Movement is the highest honor the Third Reich has to offer.

Hjalmar Schacht

Material loss can be made up through renewed labor, but the moral wrong which has been inflicted upon the conquered peoples, in the peace dictates, leaves a burning scar on the people's conscience.

Hjalmar Schacht

There was only the choice between Communism and Hitler, and I will tell you why Hitler won. People will not give up religion, rights, freedom of personality, the opportunity to develop by individual effort - which includes private property. And the other reason for Hitler's winning is that if a whole people is treated as the Germans were, everyone will say, 'Are we worse people than others? Are we of a minor race?' Just as every single individual needs and must have self-respect, just as every family is proud of decent traditions, so every nation wants to maintain her individual manner, culture, language, and customs. It was in these respects that Communism failed. The Communists said that God was nonsense and stupidity and preached internationalism without maintaining the natural national feelings of a nation.

Hjalmar Schacht

The memory of war weighs undiminished upon the people's minds. That is because deeper than material wounds, moral wounds are smarting, inflicted by the so-called peace treaties. ... Material loss can be made up through renewed labor, but the moral wrong which has been inflicted upon the conquered peoples, in the peace dictates, leaves a burning scar on the people's conscience. ... The Versailles Dictate cannot be an eternal document, because not only its economic, but also its spiritual and moral premises are wrong.

Hjalmar Schacht

I was never in the army - I never had a uniform - I was never a soldier. I detest uniforms because they make one unfree. There is an old quotation that goes something like this: 'Your mind will be trained well, but confined to Spanish boots.' That quotation is very apt. It signifies how narrow the military mind becomes.

Hjalmar Schacht

Instead of a weak and vacillating Government, a single, purposeful, energetic personality is ruling today.

Hjalmar Schacht

The Jews must realize that their influence in Germany has disappeared for all time.

Hjalmar Schacht

The aim and the idea of the Four Year Plan were and remain entirely correct and necessary!

Hjalmar Schacht

I can assure you that everything I say and do has the complete approval of the Fuehrer and that I would not say or do anything that does not have his approval.

Hjalmar Schacht

The repeated announcements that the Russian resistance was definitely broken have been proved to be untrue.

Hjalmar Schacht

It stands, essentially, for the application of increased energy to the efforts already undertaken by my ministry since 1934 with the results shown in the above statistics.

Hjalmar Schacht

But what you could perhaps do with in these days is a word of most sincere sympathy. Your movement is carried internally by so strong a truth and necessity that victory in one form or another cannot elude you for long.

Hjalmar Schacht

Germany stays and falls with the success of the policy of Hitler.

Hjalmar Schacht

My so-called foreign friends do neither me nor the situation nor themselves any good when they try to bring me into opposition to the allegedly impossible National Socialist economic theories and declare me to some extent the protector of economic reason. I can assure you that everything I say and do has the complete approval of the Fuhrer and that I would not say or do anything that does not have his approval.

Hjalmar Schacht

The Jews must realize that their influence in Germany has disappeared for all time. We wish to keep our people and our culture pure and distinctive, just as the Jews have always demanded this of themselves.

Hjalmar Schacht

But the memory of war weighs undiminished upon the people's minds. That is because deeper than material wounds, moral wounds are smarting, inflicted by the so- called peace treaties.

Hjalmar Schacht

Allied supplies of arms to Russia, and the manpower reserves of Russia have been sufficient to bring continuous counter-attacks against our Eastern Front.

Hjalmar Schacht

Only the closest collaborators of the Fuehrer know how difficult is the burden of this responsibility; how sorrowful are the hours during which decisions must be made which bear upon the well being and the fate of all of Germany.

Hjalmar Schacht