Germany's Union ("Anschluss") With Austria. 1938

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The union was widely popular amongst the Austrians. Hitler's vision of a big powerful Reich had appealed to them too.

Hitler gets a standing ovation in the Reichstag after he announces the union of Austria with Germany. 1938

German police marches through the Tyrolean town of Imst during the Anshluss

 Germans move into Salzburg

 Tyrolean peasants wave the swastika to welcome German troops

Upper Austria. The Germans move in.

 German and Austrian soldiers dismantle a border post. March 15, 1938.

These Austrian girls are full of joy in Salzburg.

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 Austrians welcomes the German soldiers

Vienna welcomes the Germans

March 13, 1938. Hitler triumphantly enters Vienna.

Hitler with Seyss Inquart the governor of Austria. He was Hitler's man in Austria. Hitler had earlier forced Schusnigg, the Austrian Chancellor to resign in favor of Seyss Inquart. After the Union he was made a governor of the new province of the Reich.

The darker side of the union. Hitherto safe and prosperous Jews in Austria began to be persecuted. Here they are made to wash the roads of Vienna.

Jewish property was confiscated and the expulsion of Jews from Austria began

In the almost tribal mentality exhilaration that even these Austrian girls felt forgotten was the persecution of the Jews. But nemesis awaited them as the Red Army marched into Austrian ion 1945.

"Mander s'ischt time!" ("Men, it's time!") Was a famous battle cry of the Tyrolean freedom fighter Andreas Hofer during the uprising in 1809 against the Bavarians and French. The same words were chosen by the Austrian Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg, in a speech on 9 March 1938 in view of the threat posed by Germany to emphasize that he would fight for a free and independent Austria. After the "Anschluss" of Austria, the Nazis took on this slogan to imprison politicians such as Kurt von Schuschnigg (center) as well as Jews, Social Democrats and other opponents of the "Anschluss" or drive. Only then would Austria be really free, so goes the statement of the postcard.

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