long for a pure drink instead of the inebriating potion administered by the Nazis. The historian has to prepare positions for the reserves...". Already, at mid-day on January 30, 1933, in a fateful step, German President Paul von Hindenburg had confirmed the leader of the Nazi Party as the new German chancellor, who would lead, for a time, a minority government. Nazi regime Initial support Initially, Ritter supported the Nazi regime despite severe doubts about the Nazis, particularly over the regime's persecution of the churches. He reconciled himself to refraining from censure of the regime and its foreign policy. In 1940, he stated that "the sword is always more ready to the hand of continental statesman who stands in the midst of the fray of European power interests, and must always be armed to counter an attack before it is too late". He agreed with Benito Mussolini that "might is the precondition of all freedom". Ritter publicly referred to the Nazi Reich as the "peaceful center of Europe" that would form a "bulwark against Bolshevism", and he praised the German Anschluss (union) with Austria. Having supported well before 1933 the idea of Greater Germany, Ritter at first defended the Nazi invasion as a realisation of the German hopes like most other people. He went on record praising the Anschluss as the "boldest and most felicitous foreign policy feat of our new government". National conservative Ritter was a staunch German nationalist and belonged to a political movement generally known to historians as national conservatism. He identified with the idea of an authoritarian government in Germany that would make his country Europe's foremost power. In an article published in early 1933, "Eternal Right and Interests of the State", he argued that the German people needed most was a government "in which a strong authoritarian leadership will gain voluntary popular allegiance because it is willing to respect eternal justice as well as freedom". The deep belief that Ritter had in a Rechtsstaat (a state upheld by law) made him increasingly concerned at Nazi violations of legal codes. In 1935, while remaining very cautious about his public comments on Nazism generally, he attempted to defend his mentor, Oncken, against attacks by Nazis. The party officials had objected to a paper by Oncken, which implied that the Nazi revolution was not the greatest revolution of all time. Frederick the Great biography Ritter's 1936 short interpretive