Four Year Plan
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- For a high school academic guidance plan, see 4-year plan.
The Four Year Plan was a series economic reforms created by the Nazi Party. The Four Year Plan included: increased synthetic fiber production; public works projects, headed by Fritz Todt; called for increased automobile production; initiated numerous building and architectural projects; and further developed the Autobahn system. The plan also placed an emphasis on building up the nation's military defenses, which was a direct violation of the terms set up by the Allies of World War I at the Treaty of Versailles, which stated:
The German army was to be restricted to 100,000 men, there was to be no conscription, no tanks or heavy artillery and no general staff. The German navy was restricted to 15,000 men and no submarines while the fleet was limited to six battleships (of less than 10,000 tonnes), six cruisers and 12 destroyers. Germany was not permitted an air force. Finally, Germany was explicitly required to retain all enlisted men for 12 years and all officers for 25 years, so that only a limited number of men would have military training.
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[edit] Global reaction
However, following a tour of the German countryside in 1936, former British Prime Minister Lloyd George had the following to say about the breach of the Treaty he had helped to formulate:
"That Germany is rearming cannot be denied. After all the victors in the Great War except England disregarded their own disarmament pledges, the Führer abrogated the agreement which bound his own country, thus following the example of the nations who were responsible for the Versailles Treaty. It is today a commonly admitted part of Hitler's policy to develop an army strong enough to resist any attack, regardless of from which side it may come. I believe that he has already reached this point of inviolability."
In a September 1936 speech before the Labour Front, Hitler explained the plan's focus, and drew a comparison between the resources at Germany's disposal and those accessible to the "incapable" Bolsheviks. The American press immediately interpreted this speech as Hitler's call for war with the Soviet Union and addressed it to the public as such. However, Hitler's proclamation actually suggested that, because of Germany's undersupplied position, a great task was set ahead for the country to "develop a form of life which [was] higher than that existing in [the] Bolshevist paradise of Soviet Russia."
[edit] Methods
The Four Year Plan favoured both the protection of agriculture and economic independence. Hermann Göring was put in charge of the Four Year Plan on October 18, 1936 and was given extraordinary powers for an extraordinary situation. In short, Goering had complete control over the economy including the private sector, especially after the Minister of Economics, Hjalmar Schacht, began to lose favour with Hitler because of his opposition to growing military expenditures. During the following years, Germany began building refineries, aluminium plants, and factories for the development of synthetic-materials. The four year plan technically expired in 1940, but the "Office of the Four Year Plan" (considered a cabinet level agency) had grown to such a power base that the Four year plan was extended indefinitely. Indeed, much of the Four Year Plan's goals relating to economic production were accomplished between 1941 and 1944.
[edit] Influence and imitation
The project’s achievements outperformed Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal both in size and scope. The USSR’s Second Five Year Plan, provided several ideas borrowed by the Nazi regime, especially in the area of militarization. The Soviet Plan was reaching its conclusion just as the German equivalent was beginning.
