Fascism: A Warning

by Madeleine K. Albright

In November 1923, Hitler’s impatience got the better of his judgment and he tried to replicate Mussolini’s already legendary March on Rome. It was a harebrained scheme. The Nazis hoped to spark a nationwide coup by seizing control of Bavaria, but to prevail, they needed the army’s support, which they didn’t get. The ringleaders were arrested and the coup went nowhere. Of the conspirators, Hitler alone was brazen enough to admit that he had intended to overthrow the government. In his first appearance on the national stage, he made the case for an uprising that would cleanse all Germany, then told the court that he had no choice but to perform his duty as “a man born to be a dictator.” Given a five-year sentence, he was released on probation after thirteen months, having made productive use of his time. The manuscript tucked under Hitler’s arm as he exited the prison bore the title Four and a Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity, and Cowardice, later shortened by his publisher to volume one of My Struggle—or Mein Kampf.