Hitler's Table Talk

AN INDEPENDENT GERMAN ECONOMY 73
all the taxes, there's a lot of money left. Even the average man
doesn't succeed in spending what he earns. He spends more
money on cinemas, theatres and concerts than he used to, and
he saves money into the bargain. One can't deprive people of
distractions ; they need them, and that's why I cannot reduce the
activity of the theatres and studios. The best relaxation is that
provided by the theatre and the cinema. We have working
days that far exceed eight hours, and we shan't be able to
change that immediately after the war.
A fault we must never again commit is to forget, once the war
is over, the advantages of the autarkic economy. We practised
it during the first World War, but with insufficient means, for
lack of human potential. The working-capacity lost in the
manufacture of unproductive goods must be made good. Instead
of thinking of the home market, we hurled ourselves into the
foreign markets : before the first World War, out of greed for
profits, and, after it, to pay our debts. The fact that we were
granted loans, to encourage us along the same path, only
plunged us deeper in the mire. We'd already succeeded in the
manufacture of synthetic rubber: as soon as the war was over,
we went back to natural rubber. We imported petrol; yet the
Bergius process had already proved itself!
That's our most urgent task for the post-war period : to build
up the autarkic economy.
I shall retain rationing of meat and fats as long as I'm not
certain that people's needs are largely covered. One realises
that this stage has been reached when the rationing coupons
are not all used.
What the English were most afraid of, with the Four Year
Plan, was an autarkic Germany that they could no longer have
at their mercy. Such a policy on our part necessarily entailed
for them a great reduction in the profits' of their colonies.
Coffee and tea are all we shall have to import. Tobacco we
shall get in Europe. It will also be necessary to produce the
soya bean: that will provide oil and fodder for Denmark and
Holland.
Everybody will be able to participate, under one form or
another, in this European economy.