man and keep us apart. I am going down to see Mussolini
shortly,” he added, “and I intend to tell him quite clearly that
Anschluss is coming like it or not!”
Göring visited Rome in January , and told the Italian
government that for six million Germans to live outside Ger-
many’s door was “against all morality.” Mussolini, who had be-
lieved Göring was coming only to talk about Spain, was taken
aback by Göring’s unexpected approach on Austria. He left no
doubt that Italy regarded the German-Austrian agreement of
as inviolate. According to the Italian foreign minister Count
Ciano, Göring undertook not to indulge in any surprises:
“Whatever decision Germany makes on questions so vital to her
as Austria, Danzig, or Memel will be preceded by consultations
with Italy.” Afterward, however, Göring told his friend the am-
bassador in Rome, Ulrich von Hassell, that Italy was going to
have to accept that Austria was in the German sphere of interest.
Following a brief vacation in Capri, Göring returned for a
pointed talk with Mussolini on January , in which as the
transcript in Göring’s papers shows he adopted a more re-
strained position. He now merely asked Mussolini to prevail on
Vienna to adhere to the agreement. “In Germany’s name he
[Göring] could reassure him and he assumed the same held
true for Italy that there were to be no surprises over Austria.”
“Yes,” triumphed Ciano afterward to the Austrian ambassador
in Rome, “a highly inflated Göring arrived here; a rather more
modest one left.”
General Göring had not, however, given up over Austria.
Before the Duce visited Berlin in September , Göring com-
missioned an artist to paint on one wall of Carinhall a medieval-
style fresco, a map of the Reich with each city designated by its
“trademark” and with the frontier between Germany and
Austria erased. He paraded the Italian dictator past it several