Introduction and Nazi Germany
Overview
Statewide Dual Credit Modern World History: Unit 14, Lesson 1
A discussion of the build up to WWII with the rise of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. It covers Hitler's consolidation of power, the persecution of Jews, and the lead up to the Holocaust, as well as Stalin's rise and policies in the Soviet Union.
Fought from 1939-1945, World War II was the bloodiest war in world history. Fought in theaters stretching from the frozen fields of Russia to the sweltering jungles of Myanmar, the Second World War witnessed the defeat and division of Germany, the use of nuclear weapons on Japan, the expansion of Soviet-style communism throughout Eastern Europe, the emergence of the United States as a superpower, and the decline of colonial empires around the world.
Nazi Germany
Having seized control of the German political system, Hitler turned next to stifling dissent within his own ranks. During his rise to power, Hitler had used the Nazi party to formally agitate for more power. However, behind the scenes he relied upon a group of paramilitary party members known as the Sturmabteilung (storm battalion), informally known as the SA or the “Brownshirts” due to their habit of dressing in brown shirts complete with ties. Hitler used the Brownshirts to intimidate, beat or even kill political rivals. Although many Brownshirts were World War I veterans completely loyal to Hitler, they were also a well-trained and well-armed group that could at times prove difficult to rein in. In June 1930, Hitler received word of a rumor that SA leader Ernst Röhm (1887-1934) planned to launch a coup against him. On June 30 to July 2, Hitler ordered a group of handpicked Brownshirts and Gestapo (secret police) agents to purge Röhm and his followers. Hitler used his emergency powers to suspend all political and civil rights, to arrest anyone suspicious of agitating against the government, and keep them in prison indefinitely without fair trials or due process. As only Nazi Party members could now become judges, Hitler’s regime controlled what judicial processes remained in Germany.
The Nazis reorganized Germany into Gaue, or districts, and put them under the command of Gauleiters (district leaders). Each town was also divided into smaller units called Viertels (quarters). Each quarter had its own warden who would monitor his section and investigate suspicious individuals. The warden was the direct link to the Nazi Party. People were encouraged to report their families, neighbors and friends if they were not in full support of Hitler and the Nazi Party.
Within the state, all cultural activities were geared toward propagating the ideology of National Socialism. Many cultural events were organized to show open support for Hitler. Everything was strictly controlled, and non-monitored art and cultural activities were prohibited. The Nazis used an immense propaganda machine to support Hitler and the Nazi state. Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945) was put in charge of the Nazi propaganda programs, which were broadcasted through completely controlled radio stations, cinemas, speeches, parades and rallies, youth organizations and K-12 education. Given limited opportunities, women were told to concern themselves with “children, church, kitchen” (Kinder, Kirche, Küche).
Hitler worked closely with Heinrich Himmler (1900- 1945), the head of the SS and the Gestapo. Himmler headed the Reich Security Main Office, which was charged with internal safety and security. He is also seen as the principal architect of the concentration and death camps. Concentration and death camps housed political opponents and were used to systematically murder people – most of them Jews.
On September 15, 1935, the Nazi government announced the passage of a slew of laws that discriminated against Jewish people. These Nuremburg Laws, (the Reich Citizenship Law and the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor) emphasized that Germans, but not Jewish people, belonged to the so- called Aryan race. According to these discriminatory laws, Jewish people threatened the purity of the German people and thus, the Nazis believed that they had to identify and separate Jews from German society. The law banned marriages and relationships with Jews and pushed Jews into ghettos. The rules also applied to the Sinti and Roma communities. The Reich Citizenship Law underscored that only racially pure people could hold German citizenship, which meant that Jews could never be considered full German citizens. The situation worsened in 1938 when new laws were passed that prohibited Jews from any participation in public life. The regulations also highlighted if Jews were to emigrate that they would surrender their property to the German state. Furthermore, Jews had to publicly wear a yellow star embossed with the word “Jew” and obtain a “J” label on their passports. On November 9, 1938, during Kristallnacht (Night of the Broken Glass), over 7500 Jewish businesses and over 400 synagogues were destroyed, more than 90 Jews were killed, and over 30,000 arrested.
Spotlight On | KRISTALLNACHT
Kristallnacht was a wave of state- sponsored terrorism directed against Germany’s Jews from November 9-10, 1938. In early November, Nazi officials expelled over 5,000 Jews of Polish descent from Germany. When learning that his parents had been among the deportees, 17-year-old Herschel Grynszpan (b. 1921) assassinated Ernest vom Rath (1909-1938), a German embassy official in Paris. Vom Rath died on November 9, the anniversary of Hitler’s 1923 attempted coup known as the “Beer Hall Putsch.” When Hitler’s propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels suggested that his followers begin a series of spontaneous demonstrations to protest the assassination of vom Rath, violence against Jewish synagogues, businesses and homes broke out across Germany, Austria and the Sudetenland. By the morning of November 10, over 7,500 Jewish businesses had been looted, and nearly a hundred victims lay dead.
At the Wannsee Conference in Berlin in 1942, Hitler suggested the Final Solution for the Jewish problem. Jews were collected from the ghettos and sent to the death camps in Poland. The Holocaust did not end until Germany’s defeat in 1945 and the end of World War II. By the time of their liberation, over 6 million Jews died in the Holocaust and another 6 million Romani, Slavs and other targeted groups had also been killed by the Nazis. Millions of prisoners of war, especially from the Soviet Union, also died at the hands of the Nazis.
Many people blindly supported Hitler because he reduced unemployment. He built up the German weapon industry, which created many jobs and helped promote economic efficiency. Overall unemployment fell from 6 million in 1933 to below 1 million in 1939. The rearmament benefited big enterprises especially. Although the overall economy did not necessarily improve under Hitler’s leadership, the German people saw shrinking unemployment, vigorous social investment policies, and some prosperity. An increased industrial effort was centered on the armament industries and presupposed the coming of a war.