German Book "Waffentraeger der Nation" - Reichswehrministerium

A red cloth-bound volume titled "Waffentraeger der Nation" ("Weapon Bearers of the Nation"), stamped on the cover with an eagle-and-swastika emblem and gilt Fraktur lettering repeated on the spine. The title page identifies it as "Ein Buch der deutschen Wehrmacht fuer das deutsche Volk, " issued by the Reichswehrministerium in Berlin and published by Dr. Riegler, Verlag fuer vaterlaendische Literatur, Berlin SW68.

This type of illustrated volume was produced as public-facing literature promoting the German armed forces to a civilian readership during the 1930s, typically featuring photographic surveys of army, navy and air force branches.

"Waffentraeger der Nation" belongs to a genre of illustrated propaganda volumes commissioned or sanctioned by the Reichswehrministerium (later absorbed into the Reichskriegsministerium) during the mid-1930s, a period when Germany was publicly re-establishing conscription and rearming under Adolf Hitler in defiance of the Treaty of Versailles. Such books were aimed at the general public rather than military professionals, using photography and accessible text to build popular support for the expanding Wehrmacht and to normalise the return of a large standing military in German civic life. The eagle-and-swastika device on the cover reflects the state emblem adopted by the Nazi government for official and quasi-official publications of this kind.