Explanatory Notes

The Bund Neuland, or Neuland League, grew out of the Christian German Students’ Association in 1919. The aim of the Austrian association was to unite all Christian and German youth movements under one roof and thereby position itself against liberal or Jewish organizations.[1] The Bund Neuland adopted an openly antisemitic and German nationalist stance.[2] This included, for example, a call to boycott Jewish businesses published in the League’s official journal.[3] In their publications during the 1930s, they advocated a corporatist, anti-parliamentary, pan-German program. The Bund Neuland is regarded as one of the “bridge-builders”[4] between the Catholic Church and Nazi ideology.

National Socialism is an ideology that emerged before World War I and gained considerable support from 1918 onwards. In Salzburg, the first National Socialist movement was founded as early as 1913.[5] With the founding of the NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers’ Party) in 1920, National Socialism became an increasingly powerful political movement. National Socialists were and are extremely nationalistic, anti-democratic, racist, and antisemitic.[6]
In March 1933, although the NSDAP failed to win an absolute majority in the Reichstag election of the Weimar Republic, it used the “Enabling Act” to suspend the separation of powers. This marked the beginning of the transformation of the Republic into a dictatorship.[7] From March 1938 onwards, Austria was incorporated into the German Reich as the so-called “Ostmark.” Those in power promoted a social order centered on “race” and the “Volksgemeinschaft” (national community), in which minorities were excluded. As a result, various groups of victims were persecuted and murdered. These included people with disabilities, homosexuals, Sinti and Roma, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and people who resisted for political reasons. The largest group of victims consisted of six million Jews murdered in the Shoah.

The “Anschluss” refers to the annexation of Austria by the National Socialist German Reich in March 1938. Significant political upheavals had already become apparent by February 12, 1938. On that day, under pressure, Kurt Schuschnigg signed the “Berchtesgaden Agreement” at Obersalzberg, which led to a reshuffling of the government and an amnesty for approximately 3,000 National Socialists.[8] A referendum scheduled for March 13 was canceled on March 11. On the evening of the same day, the chancellor of the Austrofascist state, Kurt Schuschnigg, resigned, and in several federal states, local National Socialists seized power. On March 12, the Wehrmacht marched into Austria. At the border near Salzburg, Austrian officials helped remove the border barriers, which were then burned by members of the Hitler Youth at Salzburg’s Residenzplatz, thereby symbolically sealing the “Anschluss”.[9]

The term “Austrofascism” refers to the political system in Austria between March 1933 and March 1938. After the National Council was dissolved, the government under Engelbert Dollfuss established an authoritarian one-party regime that was intended to be organized along corporatist lines (although this was not fully implemented by 1938). In 1933, first the Communist Party, then the NSDAP, and finally, in 1934, the Social Democratic Party were banned. This left only one officially permitted party, the “Fatherland Front,” which was founded by Dollfuss in May 1933.[10]
Because Austria’s political system during these years exhibited fascist characteristics (anti-liberalism, anti-democratic rule, and a cult of the leader), but was not fascist through and through (it lacked extreme nationalism), other terms have also been used to describe this period. However, these either downplay the nature of the regime

(corporatist state) or shift the focus away from the political system and those responsible toward individual figures (chancellor’s dictatorship).[11]

By the end of the nineteenth century, the major European powers, the United States, and Japan had leased Chinese ports to pursue, among other things, the gradual colonization of the country. However, since the imperial powers effectively neutralized one another, no country succeeded in doing so. To expand their influence, these predominantly Christian countries increasingly focused on missionary work among the Chinese population. The Yihetuan[12], as the movement called itself, initially targeted Chinese people who had converted to Christianity. As the influence of the European states, Japan, and the United States grew in China, foreigners in China increasingly became viewed as enemies.[13]

In the spring of 1900, the uprising escalated. Around 25,000 insurgents, supported by Chinese troops, attempted to force their way into the Beijing legation quarter. In the summer of 1900, the colonial powers decided to take joint action to break the siege after two months. During the Boxer Rebellion (also known as the Boxer War)[14], 23,000 Chinese Christians were murdered, along with numerous embassy staff members.