E had hardly finished with the first great meeting V V of February 24th, 1920, in the Hofbrähausfestsaal at Munich, when preparations for the next one were under way. Hitherto we had not dared to think of holding a meeting once a month, or even once a fort¬ night, in a city such as Munich, but now a large one was to be arranged for each week.
At that time the Hall held an almost sacred meaning for us National Socialists. It was better filled each time and the people were more and more attentive. The proceedings nearly always started with the subject of War Guilt, about which nobody then bothered, and went on to the Peace Treaties ; violent methods of speech were found suitable and, indeed, necessary.
In those days, if a public mass meeting, at which not phlegmatic bourgeois but harried proletarians were present, dealt with the Versailles Treaty, it meant an attack on the Republic, and was held to be a sign of reactionary, if not monarchist, feeling. The moment Versailles was criticized, there would regularly be interruptions : “And Brest-Litovsk ?” The crowd would continue to shout until it gradually got more heated or the speaker gave up trying to persuade them. We felt inclined to dash our heads against the wall with despair at such a set of people ! They would not understand that Versailles was a shame and a disgrace, or that dictated peace was a frightful plundering of our nation. The Marxist work of destruction and the enemy’s poison propaganda had made these people blind to all reason. And yet no one might complain;
for how immeasurably great was the guilt of the other side ! What had the bourgeoisie done to stem this terrible disintegration, or by better and more intelligent handling to pave the way for freedom of action ? Nothing whatever !