Anschluss (Annexation of Austria)

Also called: Anschluss Österreichs

Hitler sent troops into Austria and joined it to Germany — Nazi Germany’s first territorial expansion, justified as uniting the German people in one state.

The Treaties of Versailles and Saint-Germain forbade union between Germany and Austria. When Austrian Nazis murdered Chancellor Dollfuss in an attempted coup in 1934, Italy stopped them by moving troops to the border. Once allied with Italy, Hitler summoned Chancellor Schuschnigg in February 1938 and pressed him to bring Nazis into his cabinet; when Schuschnigg announced a plebiscite on independence, Hitler issued an ultimatum that forced him out on 11 March.

On 12 March German troops crossed the border unopposed, and union was proclaimed on the 13th. A plebiscite on 10 April was announced as more than 99 per cent in favour, and Britain and France merely protested. Austria’s Jews were persecuted at once. After the war Austria presented itself as Nazism’s first victim, but from the 1990s it officially acknowledged the responsibility of the many Austrians who took part in Nazi crimes.