Hitler’s rise to power

biography

• Austrian, not German!• weak student• Unsuccessful application

to Vienna Academy of Fine Arts

• Orphaned by 19 years old• A corporal in WWI• Brave: Iron Cross Second

Class and First Class

1920s

• leader of the Nazis by 1921

• Spellbinding speaker• Beer Hall Putsch 1923;

charged with treason• Mein Kampf = My

Struggle

Hitler’s philosophy

• Superiority of the Aryan race

• Swastika – ancient symbol = “being fortunate”

• True Aryans: Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan; Indo-Arabian languages

• “Stabbed in the Back” Theory

"Pictures of German races" http://www.rabenclan.de/index.php/Magazin/SvenScholzAryanE

Hitler’s philosophy continued

• Successful cultures of past weakened by “effeminate” Jewish-Christian ethic

• Iron will to dominate lesser Slavic nations

• lebensraum• Soviet Union his natural

enemy (communists and Jews and Slavs)

• Personal freedoms bad• Volk collective will

• “We are barbarians” (good! action over thought)

• 1924: “Democracy must be destroyed by the weapons of democracy.”

• Problem for Hitler: economy getting better in 1924

Late 1920s• Election results: (608 seats

total)

• 1928 12 seats• Stock market crash helped

Hitler – what’s the lesson for today??

• 1930 107 seats (#2 place) (unemployment 4 million)

• Runs for President against Hindenburg.

• Loses! But...

1930s • Hindenburg 49.6% of vote (not

majority)• Hitler gets support of

millionaire publisher – owns 53 newspapers

• 1932 Election -230 seats. Nazis win!

• Hitler offered Vice-Chancellor job (like Deputy PM).

• Declines, demands Chancellorship. Alles oder Nichts.

• Hindenburg fears Civil War, so...

Power

• Hitler gets Chancellor’s job if he promises only 3 Nazis in Cabinet.

• Hitler chooses...• Burning of the

Reichstag Feb 1933

Power continued

• Elections 1933: Nazis 44% no majority, no ability to change Constitution

Enabling Act, 1933 and beyond

• 23 March 1933• Required 2/3 majority,

but...• 94 people dissented (24

of them later murdered)• July 1933 only political

party allowed is Nazis• Creates SS (for

conquests outside Germany)

http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/marcuse/classes/33d/prevyears/33d03/33d03l05-1930s.htm

• You have delivered up our holy German fatherland to one of the greatest demagogues of all time. I solemnly prophesy that this accursed man will cast our Reich into the abyss and bring our nation to inconceivable misery. Future generations will damn you in your grave for what you have done.

• Ludendorff, writing to Hindenburg, 1933• Who is Ludendorff?

What the king conquered, the prince shaped, the field marshal defended, the soldier rescued and united.

(September 1933 Nazi Congress at Nuremburg)

Rohm’s ambition

• SA (4.5 million) to replace Reichswehr

Night of the Long Knives

• June 29 – 30, 1934• (May 1934, gets Army & Navy

on his side)• SS arrests Rohm • Officially 82 murdered• Actually 400+ (people inside

and outside Nazi Party)• Paranoia!• Hitler: “I have taken a bath and

feel as clean as a newborn babe again.”

• President Hindenburg dies – wants monarchy restored

• Hitler merges role of President and Chancellor into

• DER FUHRER• All swear unconditional

obedience to der Führer

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold;Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,The blood-dimmed tide is loosed and everywhereThe ceremony of innocence is drowned;The best lack all conviction, while the worstAre full of passionate intensity.

• “The Second Coming” WB Yeats, 1919

Nazification of Germany• Censorship• Trade unions banned• Churches persecuted, • Hitler Youth created• 1935 Nürmberg Laws• 1936 economy;

Strength Through Joy; volkswagen

• Autobahn!• http://www.uncp.edu/home/rwb/

propaganda_kdf.jpg

Burning books in Berlinhttp://www.uncp.edu/home/rwb/hst430_p2.htm

Judicial System?

• Secret police• "Special Court" political

crimes • "Peoples Court" for

accusations of treason

Breaking the Treaty of Versailles

• 1935 rearmament: “Wir wollen wieder Waffen”• 1936 Germany occupies Rhineland• <1936 Berlin Olympics>• 1936 Spanish Civil War begins. Practices blitzkrieg.

Guernica• 1938 March: Anschluss• 1938 Sept.: Sudetenland (CZ); Munich Agreement• 1939 March: all of Czechoslovakia• 1939 September WWII begins

“Little Hitler”

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcrRrst1i0g

What other leaders thought about Hitler...

• "I have never met a happier people than the Germans and Hitler is one of the greatest men. The old trust him; the young idolise him. It is the worship of a national hero who has saved his country."

• David Lloyd George, Daily Express, 17.9.1936

• “the world will yet come to see a very great man - mystic in Hitler. [...] I cannot abide in Nazism -- the regimentation -- cruelty -- oppression of Jews -- attitude towards religion, etc., but Hitler, him -- the peasant -- will rank some day with Joan of Arc among the deliverers of his people.”

• Mackenzie King, Canadian Prime Minister, Diary, 1937

• "In fifteen years that have followed this resolve, he has succeeded in restoring Germany to the most powerful position in Europe, and not only has he restored the position of his country, but he has even, to a very great extent, reversed the results of the Great War.... the vanquished are in the process of becoming the victors and the victors the vanquished.... whatever else might be thought about these exploits they are certainly among the most remarkable in the whole history of the world."

• Winston Churchill, 1935.

Hitler quotes

• I use emotion for the many and reserve reason for the few.

• If you tell a big enough lie and tell it frequently enough, it will be believed.

• The art of leadership... consists in consolidating the attention of the people against a single adversary and taking care that nothing will split up that attention.

Der Führer’s FaceSpike Jones & His City Slickers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LYD0Fzf1LU • CHORUS

When der fuehrer says we is de master raceWe heil (pffft) heil (pffft) right in Der Fuehrer's FaceNot to love der fuehrer is a great disgraceSo we heil (pffft) heil (pffft) right in Der Fuehrer's Face

• When Herr Goebbels says we own the world and spaceWe heil (pffft) heil (pffft) right in Herr Goebbels' faceWhen Herr Goering says they'll never bomb dis placeWe heil (pffft) heil (pffft) right in Herr Goering's face

• Are we not the supermen, Aryan pure supermen?Ja we are the supermen (super duper supermen)Is this Nutzi land so goodWould you leave it if you could?Ja this Nutzi land is goodWe would leave it if we could

• We bring the world New OrderHeil Hitler's world New OrderEveryone of foreign raceWill love der fuehrer's faceWhen we bring to the world dis order

http://www.uncp.edu/home/rwb/hst430_p2.htm