Topic 3

War and its impact on life inGermany, 1939 -47

Nazi conquests by 1940

The invasion of the USSR in 1941

The early years of WWII, 1939 -41, were very successful:

• Germany had regained its pride afterthe humiliations of WWI and the hatedVersailles Treaty. Germany hadconquered Poland, Denmark, Norway,Belgium, Holland and France. Thesevictories meant that Germany was‘whole’ again - the Polish Corridor andAlsace-Lorraine were reunited withGermany.

• German civilians gained a great dealfrom the early part of the war 1939 -41since factory produce and luxury goodswere sent back to Germany from theconquered countries.

• Millions of foreign workers were alsosent to work in Germany so Germanbusinesses and farmers had free labour.

Germany suffered greatly during the later years of WWII, 1942 -45

The invasion of the USSR in 1941 proved to be theturning point in the war. After great initial successes, theGerman army found itself stranded nearly a thousand miles away from Germany and unable to break throughthe cities of Stalingrad, Leningrad and Moscow. Withorders not to retreat, 7.5 million German soldiers werekilled, taken prisoner or ‘lost’ in the frozen wastes of theRussian steppe.

In order to support the war against the USSR, in which75% of German military resources were directed, civilianswere organised for Total War and measures such as strictrationing and even tighter censorship and levels ofcontrol were introduced. Even this did not prevent thegrowing amount of opposition which developed followingthe military blunders in the Soviet Union.

The Battle of Stalingrad 1942 - 43 was Germany’s firstmajor defeat

A critical cartoon of the German invasionof the USSR

German soldiers were unprepared for the conditions in the USSR

Albert Speer

Rifles became so cold that if a manpicked his up with his bare hand, hishand stuck to it. It was so cold that he didnot realise that his hand was stuck to it,and when he moved it away, he foundthat the flesh of the palm and the fingersremained on the rifle.It was the height of danger to urinate inthe open; many were literally andpermanently unmanned for being rash.

A German soldier describing conditions

Total War: the economyIn 1942 Albert Speer became Minister for Armaments andMunitions, taking over the running of the economy. Speerorganised the economy for ‘Total War’; the entire economywas now directed for the war effort. This was seen in thefollowing ways:

The policy of forced labour was increased. With mostGerman men in the armed forces there was a severe shortageof workers so people from the conquered countries as well aspeople in concentration camps were used. In theconcentration camps Jews and political prisoners wereworked to their deaths making weapons and other war goods.

By 1944 there were over seven million forced workers. Thosefrom France, Belgium and Holland were given a certain

During a war, news must be carefully controlled. Some news should not be made public.Every piece of news must be used to a purpose.

Goebbels

amount of freedom, but workers from Russia and Poland were treated as slaves. Germans hadto be careful how they treated them, as acts of kindness were punished. A landowner whoattended the funeral of a 'slave' worker who died on his own farm was imprisoned for sixmonths.

Also many women were encouraged to work even though this was against previous Nazipolicy. Speer wanted all women to be mobilised and working for the war effort but only 1/3 ofthe women in Germany did war work. This was because of earlier Nazi pressure against womenworking and women in Germany were not used as much in war work as women in othercountries.

Speer was successful in many ways. Weapons production, for example, increaseddramatically during the war. Even when British and American bombing destroyed factories,Speer organised special forces to carry out immediate repairs and to build thousandsof temporary homes for those whose homes had been bombed. By 1945, however, theycould not keep up - the damage done by bombing was too great.

German civilians were required to make sacrifices as campaigns were launched to clotheand feed troops fighting in the USSR. Winter coats were sent to troops while metals and othermaterials were recycled for the war effort. Strict rationing was introduced so that essentialfood could be directed to the front. Artificial substitutes were used for foods which Germanydid not produce such as coffee. Ersatz (substitute) coffee was made from barley seeds andacorns.By 1944 all theatres, opera houses and places of entertainment (apart from cinemas forpropaganda purposes) were closed. To save on fuel all railway services were reduced andhot water was only available for two days a week. Letter boxes were also closed. By 1945 thebombing raids had destroyed so much German production that there was not enough food tohonour ration cards. People relied on the black market and on scavenging for food.

Control and Propaganda

Propaganda was used by Goebbels to keep up morale. This wasseen in film, radio and newspapers where tight censorship ofbattles in the war was in place so that only positive stories wereknown about. The most infamous piece of propaganda involveda special Christmas radio broadcast from the soldiers atStalingrad in 1942. In fact the broadcast was a hoax made inGermany. Many beleaguered soldiers at Stalingrad listened to thebroadcast with amazement. As the war progressed and Germanysuffered more defeats, it became harder to prevent the truth frombecoming known.

Goebbels played a vital role in preventing German morale fromcrumbling after the devastating allied bombing raids began in Wartime propaganda encouraging

everyone to support the soldiers

People jumped into the canals and waterways and remained swimming or standing intheir necks in water for hours until the heat should die down. Even these sufferedburns on their heads. They had to wet their faces constantly or they perished in theheat. The firestorm swept over the water with its heat and its shower of sparks so thateven the thick wooden posts burned down to the level of the water . . . Children weretorn away from their parents’ hands by the force of the hurricane and whirled into thefire.

Hamburg’s Chief of Police reporting the fire storm created by bombing in 1943

There was no gas, no electricity, not a dropof water, neither the lift nor the telephonewas working, no trams, no Underground.Most people loaded some belongings oncarts, bicycles, prams, just to get away.People wearing Nazi party badges had themtorn off their coats and there were screamsof “Let’s get that murderer !”

A survivor describes the effects upon Hamburg

Huge conflagrations created cyclone-like firestorms. The asphalt of thestreets began to blaze. People weresuffocated in their cellars or burned todeath in the streets. We begged Hitlerto visit the stricken cities.

Albert Speer, Inside the Third Reich

1943. As Hitler increasingly withdrew from public life, Goebbels toured the bombed cities,made public addresses and organised relief efforts.

The SS increased its size and role during the later war years as opposition to the warincreased. ‘Rumour mongers’ and critics of the war were imprisoned. The SS organisationreached its peak during these later war years and were given a great deal of freedom by Hitler.Most atrocities associated with Nazi Germany both within Germany itself and the conqueredlands were committed by the SS during these years of military difficulties and increasedopposition.

The Bombing of German citiesBritain and the USA were bombing German targets on a daily basis by 1943. This had adevastating effect upon the German war effort and was a vital factor in the demise of NaziGermany. At first they attacked only military targets but since these proved difficult to hit,blanket civilian bombing was introduced. The USA bombed by day while the British bombedby night. The extent of the massive Allied bombing is highlighted by the fact that more bombswere dropped on German cities in an average week in 1944 than Germany dropped on Britainduring the whole course of the war.

In allover 2 million tonnes of bombs were dropped on 131 German cities. Half of all bombs fellon housing areas, killing 800,000 civilians, destroying 3.6 million homes and making 7.5million people homeless.

The German economy was increasingly disrupted by the attacks. Dresden and Hanover werevery almost obliterated. In these cities, vast numbers of incendiary bombs set fire to timberbuildings and warehouses. The immense heat generated by the fires sucked in oxygen,causing a fire storm.

The suction and compression from the high explosive blasts just pulled you and pushedyou, and the whole atmosphere was turbulating so hard that, after the explosion of a nearbybomb, you could actually feel your eyeballs being sucked out. I was holding my eyes to tryand stop them going. And the suction was so vast, it ripped my shirt away and ripped mytrousers. Then I couldn’t get my breath, the smoke was like acid and everything round mewas black and yellow.

A survivor of a raid on Cologne

Hungarian Jews being moved into a ghetto

The Home Guard (Volkssturm)As military defeats in the Soviet Union combined with blanketbombing in Germany, morale plummeted and the governmentfeared foreign invasion. In order to prevent invasion and ensurestability in the increasingly chaotic Germany, a Home Guard wasformed. As most young and able men were all fighting away, theHome Guard consisted of older and less capable civilians.Germans called the Home Guard “the last round up of the lame,the children and the idiots.”

The Final SolutionThe invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941also saw the introduction of the Final Solution to the‘Jewish problem’. Millions of Jews had been captured by the German army in Poland,Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Russia. Initially special SS groups, known as Einsatzgruppen,were used to shoot Jews, partisans and captured enemy soldiers. By the end of 1941 over halfa million people had been shot.

In the 1942 Wannsee Conference Heydrich suggested a dramatic solution to the problem ofthe Jews and the danger they posed for Germany - a total extermination policy whereby allremaining Jews living within Germany and all Jews in countries occupied by Germany wouldbe moved into camps run by the SS to either work or be exterminated. This Final Solutioninvolved:• the identification of all Jews and their removal into sealed off areas in local towns calledghettoes.• moving Jews from the ghettoes and into the camps when they were operational. Thoseunable to work were immediately gassed in specially built chambers.

The policy was not made public for fear of a publicoutcry. Instead Jews were told that they were simplybeing taken to live and work in the east.

Many camps were built outside Germany so thatordinary Germans were not aware of what washappening. The Final Solution led to deaths of 6million Jews and as many Russian prisoners of waras well as other ‘undesirables’ such as gypsies andhomosexuals.

Changing attitudes and increased oppositionThere was a marked increase in the amount of opposition to Nazi rule as the tide of the warturned and Germans began to suffer. Local Block Leaders and Gauleiters (regional leaders)reported this on to central Nazi headquarters. This, in turn, led to greater amounts of controland terror on behalf of the SS. Much opposition was ‘grumbling’ and unorganised.

There were, however, a number of organised opposition groups who took great risks topublicise the realities of the failing and the Final Solution.

The White Rose group involved a number ofMunich university students, including brotherand sister Hans and Sophie Scholl. Theyproduced leaflets highlighting the FinalSolution and the losses against the USSR andthen posted them around the country or leftthem in public places. In 1943 they werecaught and guillotined.

Hans and Sophie Scholl

The rumour mongers are still with us, or more correctly they are busier than ever . . . someeven openly criticise the Fuhrer himself, attacking him in the most hateful and vulgar manner.Unfortunately, too many of our countrymen blabber and repeat everything they hear . . . toooften our Block leaders are indolent and lax; they hear subversive enemy propaganda butseldom muster the courage to strike a blow.

Block Leader report 1943

Colonel von Stauffenberg

Other opposition included the Edleweiss Pirates, teenage opponents of the Hitler Youth.They often fought Hitler Youth and refused to support the war. The 16 year old leader of theCologne group was hanged in 1944. Jazz loving youngsters called The Swing Youth (so-called because of their interest in American ‘swing’ or Jazz music) were attacked by the SSbecause of their longer hair and ‘dangerous’ attitudes. Hundreds were arrested and had theirhair cut and the worst ‘offenders’ were sent to concentration camps.

Church leaders including the Catholic Bishop Galen and the Portestants Martin Niemoller andDietrich Bonhoeffer also criticised Nazi policy. Bonhoeffer was executed in 1945 for organisingresistance to the Nazis.

There were also a growing opposition to Hitler among leading sections of the army. Followingthe failures against the USSR and then the Normandy Landings in June 1944, many in thearmy were convinced that Germany was going to lose and that the sooner Germanysurrendered, the better.

The July Bomb PlotIn July 1944 a group led by General Ludwig Beck and Colonelvon Stauffenberg attempted and nearly succeeded inassassinating Hitler during a high ranking army conference. VonStauffenberg prepared Operation Valkyrie. The plan was to usetwo time bombs in a briefcase to kill Hitler and in the chaos seizecontrol of Berlin using the army.

After several last minute cancellations, Stauffenberg carried hisbriefcase into an army conference called in Hitler’s headquarters,Rastenberg, on July 20th 1944. The briefcase was placed underthe map table and near enough to kill Hitler. Immediately beforethe detonation, however, another colonel pushed the suitcasewith his foot. Seconds later the briefcase exploded and fourofficers were killed. Hitler emerged shaken but alive.

Hitler is leading the German people into the abyss with calculable certainty. He cannot win thewar, merely prolong it. His guilt, and that of his accomplices, extends beyond all knownbounds.

But what do the German people do? Germans see and hear nothing. They blindly follow theirleader to their ruin. ‘Victory at any price’ is the slogan on their flags.’I shall fight to the last man’says Hitler - when the war is, in fact, already lost.Germans! Do you and your children wish to suffer the same fate as the Jews ?

Do you want to be judged by the same standards as those leader who have led you astray? No!Disassociate yourselves from the depravity of National Socialism. . . Do not succumb toNational Socialist propaganda which has terrified you with its Bolshevik bogeyman. Stopbelieving that Germany’s security is bound up with the victory of National Socialism.

Disassociate yourselves with everything concerned with Nazism, while there is still time.

Leaflet distributed by the White Rose group in 1942 - the leaders of the group were publiclyexecuted in 1943

Hitler showing ally Mussolini the damage

The Nazis and their leader were motivated at the core by hatred and had created astructure within which the most evil ideas in modern history could grow and flourish.In the end Hitler’s own hatred had turned on the Germans he ruled and, like a fire, hadended by consuming itself - a fitting and predictable end for Hitler and the Nazi Party.

Born of crisis and hatred, they had died in crisis and hatred.

Historian Lawrence Rees

Hitler exacted a terrible revenge on all suspected participantsin the plot against him. General Beck committed suicide andStauffenberg and 5000 others were executed in horrificcircumstances. The trial and executions were filmed for thepersonal viewing of Hitler and his immediate circle.

Within a couple of months, however, the allied armies were advancing through Nazi occupiedEurope. By April 1945 the British and American armies had reached Germany from the westand the Soviet Red army from the east.

As a result of the war, millions of Germans were now refugees; hungry, homeless andfrightened. German civilians were terrified of the Soviet soldiers who were guilty of lootinghouses and raping thousands of German women.

By late April 1945 the Red Army was advancing through the streets of Berlin. Realising thatdefeat was inevitable, Hitler committed suicide. He was joined by his recently married wife aswell as the entire Goebbels family. On May 7th the German representative Admiral Doenitzsigned a surrender.

The Soviet Red Army seize the Reichstag in Berlin, 1945

The allied countries who had defeated Germany met twice in 1945to decide what should happen to it. At conferences in Yalta andthen Potsdam, the USSR, Britain, USA and France agreed:

• that Germany should be disarmed and demilitarised so that itcould not threaten world war again

• that Germany should be divided between the four of them intoseparate zones of occupation - Germany would no longer exist asa single country

• that those responsible for war crimes should be punished

• that Germany should be de-Nazified (all traces of Nazismremoved) and democracy restored.

• that Germany should pay compensation for damage done inthe war (though the USA, Britain and France did not insist on thislater and instead gave considerable financial help to their zones)

The Nuremburg Trials, 1945-4621 surviving Nazi leaders were put on trial atNuremberg. The town of Nuremburg was chosenbecause the Nazis had held their rallies there. Tenwere hanged for crimes including planning anaggressive war, war crimes and crimes againsthumanity. Goering was the highest profile Nazion trial and was found guilty but he committedsuicide the night before he was due to be hung.

Further trials were held involving thousands of otherNazis from the SS and Gestapo.

De-NazificationAs well as the criminal trials, the allies wanted the German public to come to terms with the atrocitiesthat their country had committed.

• the Nazi Party was declared illegal and evidenceof Nazism (eg street signs, flags, posters) destroyed• Concentration camps were maintained andGermans were forced to visit them • Germans filled in questionnaires and committedNazis were banned from important jobs• Nazi teachers were sacked and text booksrewritten• Adults were re-educated in evening classes

Opinion polls from 1945-48 showed that mostGermans were horrified by what they had learned.However, 10% of Germans remained convinced Nazisand over 40% still believed that “Nazism was a goodthing badly carried out.”

Germany was divided into 4zones occupied by foreigncountries at the end of the war

Germans were forced to visit concentration camps