The Influence of Airpower upon History: Statesmanship, Diplomacy, and Foreign Policy since 1903

3. Hitler, Airpower, and Statecraft

85 3 Hitler, Airpower, and Statecraft Richard R. Muller As war clouds gathered over Europe in the summer of 1939, Nazi leaders and propagandists pointed to the German air force, the Luftwaffe (barely four years old at the time), as the embodiment of German power and technological superiority. They argued that the air arm was almost entirely a creation of Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich, that it was the most powerful in the world, and that it stood, in the words of the Luftwaffe commander in chief Hermann Göring, “ready to carry out every command of the Führer with lightning speed and undreamed-of might.”1 Subsequent events would reveal the hollowness (or at best, partial truth) of these claims. Yet during the 1930s, and to a declining extent after war broke out in September 1939, the Nazi air arm served as an effective tool of Hitler’s statecraft. Aviation achievements provided a source of German domestic pride and lent credibility and prestige to the new regime.The latent power of German air fleets provided a secure umbrella under which German rearmament could proceed apace. Fear of German aerial might cowed the small states of Europe and affected the senior decision makers of even the major powers as they sought to contain German expansion in central Europe. Some commentators have gone so far as to suggest that what the Luftwaffe accomplished by the mere threat of its use at the time of the Munich agreement exceeded anything it later achieved in battle. This is a difficult claim to sustain; 86 Richard R. Muller the campaigns in Poland and the West in 1939–1940 and the virtual annihilation of the Red air force in the first week of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941 provide the most obvious counterarguments. Still, the diplomatic and coercive power of the Luftwaffe was undeniable. In peace and war, it was a flexible instrument of “policy by other means” until Germany’s opponents took its measure. Hitler and Aviation Adolf Hitler, führer and Reichs chancellor of Germany, was one of the first world leaders to come of age in the era of aviation. Hitler’s worldview was shaped by the nationalism and anti-Semitism rampant in late nineteenth-century Europe, the searing experience of the First World War, and a megalomaniacal sense of Germany’s destiny and future status Ready for war, pilots of a German Henschel Hs 123–equipped ground attack unit are briefed by their squadron commander. Photos such as this, showcasing the new Luftwaffe’s striking power, were widely distributed in books and periodicals in the late 1930s. (Smithsonian Institution Archives) Hitler, Airpower, and Statecraft 87 as a world power.The former frontline soldier of World War I recognized that the powerful emerging technologies of that conflict—motorization, modern artillery, armored vehicles, submarines, and aircraft—would be essential tools for the realization of his vision. Even before attaining power , he recognized the value of air travel. For his 1932 election campaign he chartered a Junkers Ju 52 trimotor from the state airline, Deutsche Lufthansa. Employing the catchy slogan “Hitler over Germany!” Hitler barnstormed across the country, making dozens of speeches and seeming to be everywhere at once. After 1933 he became the first head of state to have a personal aircraft.2 Most accounts of Hitler’s stagecraft mention the impressive opening scene of the Leni Riefenstahl film Triumph of the Will, in which Hitler descends from the clouds in a silver trimotor to attend the 1934 party congress at Nuremberg. Ironically, Hitler did not like flying—his first flight, like those of many novice air travelers, turned out poorly. Rushing to Berlin from Bavaria in bad weather during the abortive Kapp Putsch in 1920, Hitler became airsick, and his pilot had to make a forced landing before reaching the capital. Though he later flew regularly, Hitler was never really comfortable in the air. He was reportedly white-knuckled when his fellow dictator Benito Mussolini, an amateur pilot, took the controls of a huge Condor transport plane and maneuvered it enthusiastically during an inspection tour of the Eastern Front in August 1941. Hitler’s grasp of aviation, especially its operational application and technology, remained superficial. His closest collaborators frequently commented on his good memory for technical details and statistics, but he gravitated toward army armament and naval gunnery. Field Marshal Erhard Milch, Göring’s deputy and the Luftwaffe...