“Instead of a weak and vacillating Government, a single, purposeful, energetic personality is ruling today. That is the great miracle which has actually happened in Germany and which has had its effects in all fields of life and not least in that of economy and finance. There is no German financial miracle. There is only the miracle of the reawakening of German national consciousness and German discipline, and we owe this miracle to our Fuehrer Adolf Hitler.” (EC-611)
(2) Schacht favored the acquisition of additional territory for Germany—peacefully if possible, but by aggressive war, if necessary. Schacht had long been a German nationalist and expansionist. As early as 1927, he spoke against the Versailles Treaty:
“The Versailles Dictate cannot be an eternal document, because not only its economic, but also its spiritual and moral premises are wrong.” (EC-415)
He strongly favored the acquisition by Germany of both colonial territory and contiguous territory in Europe. At the Paris conference on 16 April 1929, he said:
“Germany can generally only pay if the Corridor and Upper Silesia will be handed back to Germany from Polish possession, and if besides somewhere on the earth colonial territory will be made available to Germany.” (3726-PS)
In a speech in Danzig in June 1935, Schacht ascribed the economic difficulties which confronted Danzig to “historical errors of the greatest extent which were beyond the control of the German people”. He sought to comfort his listeners with the assurance that
“We Germans in the Reich today are looking with fullest confidence upon our comrades in the Danzig Free State, and maintain our people’s fellowship with the interests, wishes and hopes of this territory which has unfortunately been separated from us.” (EC-498)
In January 1936, Schacht again publicly spoke against the Versailles Treaty, and impliedly threatened war unless its terms were revised in Germany’s favor. At that time, he stated:
“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. 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 spirit of the Versailles has perpetuated the fury of war, and there will not be a true peace, progress or reconstruction until the world desists from this spirit. The German people will not tire of pronouncing this warning.” (EC-415)
Later in the same year, Schacht again publicly advocated “Lebensraum” for the German people in terms not unlike those employed by Hitler. In his speech at Frankfurt on 9 December 1936, Schacht said: