On the evening of January 9, 1928, twelve of the most prominent men of German heavy industry, attired in tuxedos, gathered at the Villa Hügel, the Krupp family's grandiose palace outside Essen, for the first meeting of the most mystery-shrouded industrial organization of the Weimar Republic: the Ruhrlade. The man responsible for its formation was Paul Reusch, managing director since 1908 of the coal, steel, and manufacturing combine Gutehoffnungshütte, and a respected figure in German industrial circles. After the First World War and the revolution, Reusch had been instrumental in organizing the Essener Montagsgesellschaft, an informal group of Ruhr industrialists which met in Essen once a month to consider matters of common interest. At the outset, the membership of the Montagsgesellschaft was small, but its admissions policy was liberal, so that within a few years it numbered forty-five. This proved too large a body for the conduct of confidential affairs, and after the group's meetings had been interrupted by the occupation of the Ruhr in 1923, Reusch and its other leaders decided not to revive it. Reusch continued, however, to feel a need for an informal, compact organization of the leading men of German heavy industry. In the fall of 1927 he drafted a charter for such a group, using as his model the statute of a small, highly selective prewar organization of Magdeburg industrialists, the Lade, whose name, the German word for chest or similar repository, apparently signified a commitment to secrecy.

On August 27, 1823, a courier from Rome brought word to Metternich of the death of Pope Pius VII a week before. The news, though long expected, was nonetheless unwelcome, as Pius had in general been a most satisfactory pope from the Austrian standpoint. Now the cardinals would meet in conclave to elect his successor, and Metternich was convinced that their choice was “of the greatest significance for the tranquility of Europe and the interests of our Court.”

The outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936 manifestly occasioned fundamental adjustments in European strategic considerations. While few powers had given serious thought to Spain's diplomatic, military, or even geographical importance, the rising produced numerous useful opportunities for Germany. It created a potential friend on France's southern frontier, drew the senior, more aggressive dictator, Benito Mussolini, closer to the more recently arrived Adolf Hitler, threatened Great Britain's control of the Mediterranean at Gibraltar, and redirected the focus of international diplomacy. In order to obtain a position of greater influence within the unstable vector of forces created by the new situation the two dictators had dispatched socalled volunteer military and air formations in support of the rising. While these troops and their equipment were of fundamental value to the Nationalists, their presence forced the participating military high commands to reevaluate carefully their positions and intentions.