This introduction covers The Secret Meeting That Revealed Everything within Hitler's Foreign Policy for GCSE History. Revise Hitler's Foreign Policy in Conflict and Tension 1918-1939 for GCSE History with 8 exam-style questions and 15 flashcards. This topic appears regularly enough that it should still be part of a steady revision cycle. It is section 1 of 13 in this topic. Use this introduction to connect the idea to the wider topic before moving on to questions and flashcards.
📖 The Secret Meeting That Revealed Everything
It is 5 November 1937. In the Reich Chancellery in Berlin, Hitler calls a secret meeting of his top military commanders and foreign minister. His aide, Colonel Friedrich Hossbach, takes notes. What Hitler reveals over four hours will not become public until after the war — but it changes everything historians know about his intentions. Hitler is not reacting to events. He has a plan. He tells his generals that Germany must achieve Lebensraum — "living space" in the east — by 1943-45 at the latest. Austria and Czechoslovakia must be destroyed first. War is not something to be avoided; it is something to be prepared for. The "Hossbach Memorandum" is the smoking gun: proof that Hitler had a deliberate programme, not just a series of opportunistic reactions. By the time anyone outside that room reads it, 70 million people will have died.
Practice questions for Hitler's Foreign Policy
What did Hitler mean by 'Lebensraum'?
In which year did Hitler remilitarise the Rhineland?
Quick recall flashcards
Hitler's 3 aims?
1. Destroy Versailles, 2. Greater Germany, 3. Lebensraum (living space)
What is Lebensraum?
"Living space" — expansion eastward into Poland/USSR for German people