Free Hitler and the Forgotten Nazis by Bruce F. Pauley

circulation of the Deutsche Arbeiter-Presse rose from 4,000 to 22,000 in
    1922 and 1923. The paramilitary Ordnertruppen, founded in 1922, had 9,800 members a year later. 62
    While this modest progress was being made, the Austrian Nazis succeeded in establishing contact with kindred groups in other countries. Ties with the parent Sudeten Nazis had never been broken. As early as December 1919 the Sudetens attended a joint meeting in Vienna along with some Nazis from Polish Silesia. The relative strength of the Sudeten Nazis was revealed in the fact that they were accorded four voting representatives at the conference compared to just two for Austria, and one for the German-Poles. The meeting set up the Interstate National Socialist Bureau of the German Language Territory, with Walter Riehl as its chairman.
    In September 1919 Riehl sent copies of the Austrian Nazi program to the chairman of the German Workers’ party, Anton Drexler. Riehl also tried to persuade Drexler to change the name of his party to coincide with that of the Austrian Nazis. In 1920 the German Nazis did change their title to one nearly identical to that used by the Austrians (except the word German came in the middle of the name instead of at the beginning, thus NSDAP instead of DNSAP). We do not know whether the Austrians were responsible for this change. But Drexler was prepared to collaborate with the Austrians because he shared their desire to strengthen the working-class element of the parties. 63
    Riehl was especially anxious to coordinate the program and insignia of the Austrian and German Nazis. In February 1920 he designed a flag using a swastika on a white field; the flag was first flown in public on 1 May. In the meantime Hitler had been designing his own swastika flag (apparently independently) in Munich.
    It was Walter Riehl, once again, who was responsible for organizing a second conference of the federated Nazi party. This meeting took place in Salzburg and was, as far as we know, the first to be attended by Adolf Hitler
    34 - Hitler and the Forgotten Nazis
    and Anton Drexler. Already at this point the Munich Nazis who now joined the Interstate Bureau began to influence the Austrians. 64 However, the relationship was still far from one-sided. Riehl made a reciprocal arrangement for speakers between Germany and Austria. As a result, Hitler spoke in Innsbruck, Salzburg, Hallein, Saint-Poiten, and Vienna in 1920 and again in Vienna in December 1921 and June 1922. 85 Meanwhile Riehl, Jung, Gattermayer, and other Austrian and Sudeten Nazis spoke in Nuremberg, Munich, Rosenheim, Bayreuth, and Augsburg, always stressing the prolabor aspects of National Socialism. Riehl also wrote a number of articles in the German Nazis’ official newspaper, the Volkischer Beobachter, and Hitler published an article in the Deutsche Arbeiter-Presse in February 1923. Riehl and Hitlfl - also exchanged letters between 1920 and 1923 in which both men used the informal “Du” in their salutations. 66

     

     
    These developments meant that by the summer of 1923 the Austrian Nazis had some reason for optimism. Their party was still very small, but was grow-
    nazi representatives at an interstate meeting in Salzburg, August
    1920. In the first row from left to right are Rudolf Jung, Engineer Brunner (Sudetenland), Dr. Walter Riehl , Anton Drexler, and Hans Knirsch (Sudetenland). The first person in the second row (on the far left) is Walter Gattermayer (DOW).
     
    Nazis and Proto-Nazis • 35
    ing at a respectable rate. Ties with the Sudeten Nazis were close; and new and I:    apparently warm relations with the German Nazis had been established. In
    Dr. Wiilter Riehl they had an admired and popular leader, not only of their own party, but of the international Nazi federation as well. As late as August
    1923 few Austrian Nazis could have foreseen the disasters that lay just ahead.

CHAPTER III THE NAZI CIVIL WAR, 1923-1930
    The year 1923 was critical for both the German