The Rise of Nazism

Lecture 11

10 April 2012

HIST2133.The Weimar Republic through Documents,1918-1933

Adolf Hitler (1889-1945)

• * 20 April 1889, Braunau am Inn (Austria)

• 1895 in Linz (Lower Austria)

• 1903 in Vienna (capital of A-H)

• 1913 in Munich (Bavaria, Germany)

• 1914-18 in World War I (Bavarian army)

• 1919 with DAP in Munich: Member No. 55(Deutsche Arbeiterpartei = German Workers’ Party)

Common Prejudices vs. Jews

• Deeply rooted in Christian religion

• Fears of Jewish world conspiracy + dominance

• Jews seen as alien elements / parasites / bacillus + enemies to ‘Aryan race’ + hostile to nation’s ‘healthy body’

How Many German Jews lived in Germany in 1933?

Ca. 500,000 German Jews (1933) +

+ an unknown number of people of Jewish descent

65,362,000 million Germans (1933)

= 0,77 % Jews

Deutsche Arbeiter-Partei (DAP)German Workers’ Party

• Tiny right-wing party in Munich, Bavaria, created during post-war period (1919)

• Twenty-Five Point Program (24 Feb 1920): Combining nationalist, socialist, anti-capitalist, anti-Semitic ideas

• Hitler increasingly dominating figure with small closed-up circle of staff

NSDAP

• DAP renamed (1920/1) Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei

= National Socialist German Workers’ Party:

→ Swastika (Hakenkreuz) as party emblem

+ Völkischer Beobachter (‘Racial Observer’) as major party organ

• Hitler first chairman (29 Jul 1921 → Strong powers → Major group of supporters:

Rosenberg, Hess, Göring, Amann

Mein Kampf (1)

• Munich Beer Hall Putsch 8/9 Nov 1923: → Hitler’s + Ludendorff’s failed attempt to establish rightist dictatorship in Germany → call for ‘March to Berlin’ from Munich → Hitler & others arrested

• Hitler sentenced to 5 years in jail but sits only 9 months in Landsberg prison

= Book Mein Kampf (‘My struggle’), 1925-6: The ‘Bible of National Socialism’

= Zweites Buch (‘Second Book’), 1928: Mostly on foreign politics

Mein Kampf (2)

► Four types of states: Voluntary, liberal-democratic, nationalist, racial

► Major concerns of state: race, cleanness of race, modern birth control, sports, army, racial knowledge, patriotism & national pride

Mein Kampf (3)

Three types of human beings globally:

• Founders of civilization (Kulturbegründer): Aryans: Germanics + North Americans

• Bearers of civilization (Kulturträger): Japanese + Orientals / Asians

• Destroyers of civilization (Kulturzerstörer): Jews + ‘Gypsies’ + Africans, etc.

Mein Kampf (4)

• Economic theories:

• Breaking of interest-slavery (Zinsknechtschaft)

• National self-sufficiency + Economic independence = Autarchy (Autarkie)

• National state capitalism

Mein Kampf (5)

Jews:

• In strong contrast to Aryans• No own but only borrowed culture• Nakedly egoistic + parasites• Judaism not religion but race• Seek to destroy Germans + Germany• Responsible for both Capitalism + Marxism

(‘the Modernity’)

Mein Kampf (6)

• Violently, extremely nationalist text

• Anti-Marxist, anti-Bolshevist but ‘truly’ socialist

• Race (Rasse) as guiding principle: Anti-Semitic

• Darwinist theory of struggle → Social Darwinism (Survival of the fittest)

• Anti-liberal, anti-parliamentary, anti-Catholic, anti-French

• Peoples’ community (Volksgemeinschaft)

• Autarchy & living space (Lebensraum)

NSDAP (1925)‘New founding’ with Hitler’s come-back (1925) with 3

principles:

• Putsch replaced by legal tactics to achieve mobilisation of masses

• Centralised organisation to separate her clearly from other völkisch & nationalist parties + to place SA under Hitler

• Absolute obedient tool of Führer (leader) H as party dictator

NSDAP typical features

• Creation of special ‘milieu’ to form party into microcosm of German society → many support organisations for workers, students, artists, intellectuals, farmers, etc.

• Launching of mass propaganda actions: Young Plan + global economic crisis (1929)