VON RIBBENTROP: I must say this here: In the winter of 1940-41 the Führer was confronted with the following situation. I think it is most important to make this clear.
England was not prepared to make peace. The attitude of the United States of America and of Russia was therefore of decisive importance to the Führer. He told me the following about this—I had a very lengthy discussion with him on the subject and asked him to give me clearly defined diplomatic directives. He said that Japan’s attitude was not absolutely secure for Germany; although we had concluded the Tripartite Pact, there were very strong oppositional elements at work in Japan and we could not know what position Japan would take; Italy had proved to be a very weak ally in the Greek campaign. Germany might, therefore, have to stand entirely alone.
After that, he spoke of the American attitude. He said that he had always wanted to have good relations with the United States, but that in spite of extreme reserve the United States had grown steadily more hostile to Germany. The Tripartite Pact had been concluded with a view to keeping the United States out of the war, as it was our wish and our belief that in that way those circles in the United States which were working for peace and for good relations with Germany could be strengthened. We were not successful in this, however, as the attitude of the United States was not favorable to Germany after the conclusion of the Tripartite Pact. The Führer’s basic idea, and mine, namely, that if the United States did enter the war in Europe, they would have to reckon with a war on two fronts and therefore would prefer not to intervene, was not realized.
Now the further question of Russia’s attitude came up and in this connection the Führer made the following statement: We have a friendship pact with Russia. But Russia has assumed the attitude which we have just been discussing and which causes me a certain amount of concern. We do not know, therefore, what to expect from that side. More and more troop movements were reported; he had himself taken military countermeasures, the exact nature of which was, and still is, unknown to me. However, his great anxiety was that Russia on the one hand and the United States and Britain on the other, might proceed against Germany. On the one hand, therefore, he had to reckon with an attack by Russia and on the other hand with a joint attack by the United States and England, that is to say with large-scale landings in the West. All these considerations finally caused the Führer to take preventive measures, to start a preventive war against Russia on his own initiative.
DR. HORN: What actual political reasons were there for the Tripartite Pact?
VON RIBBENTROP: The Tripartite Pact was concluded, I believe, in September 1940. The situation was as I have just described it, that is to say, the Führer was alarmed that the United States might sooner or later enter the war. For this reason I wanted to do all I could, in the field of diplomacy, to strengthen Germany’s position. I thought we had Italy as an ally, but Italy showed herself to be a weak ally.
As we could not win France over to our side, the only friend apart from the Balkan States was Japan. In the summer of 1940 we therefore tried to achieve closer collaboration with Japan. Japan was trying to do the same with us and that led to the signing of the pact. The aim, or substance, of this pact was a political, military, and economic alliance. There is no doubt, however, that it was intended as a defensive alliance; and we considered it as such from the start. By that I mean that it was intended in the first place to keep the United States out of the war; and I hoped that a combination of this kind might enable us to make peace with England after all. The pact itself was not based on any plan for aggression or world domination, as has often been asserted. That is not true; its purpose was, as I have just said, to arrive at a combination which would enable Germany to introduce a new order in Europe and would also allow Japan to reach a solution acceptable to her in East Asia, especially in regard to the Chinese problem.
That was what I had in mind when I negotiated and signed the pact. The situation was not unfavorable; the pact might possibly keep the United States neutral and isolate England so that we might all the same arrive at a compromise peace, a possibility of which we never lost sight during the whole course of the war, and for which we worked steadily.
DR. HORN: What effect, according to the embassy reports which reached you, did the Anschluss of Austria and the Munich Agreement have on the United States?
VON RIBBENTROP: There is no doubt that the occupation of Austria and the Munich Agreement produced a much more unfavorable feeling towards Germany in the United States.