the third reich, 1933-1945
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The Third Reich, 1933-1945. Kidner , Ch. 27, pp. 784-791. REVIEW: Hitler comes to power. 1924-29 : Building Nazism – vs. Bolshevism Attracted young leaders 1925-27 draw workers votes from socialism/communism 1928 won only 12 seats in Reichstag By 1929 turns toward middle classes - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
Kidner, Ch. 27, pp. 784-791
THE THIRD REICH, 1933-1945
REVIEW: HITLER COMES TO POWER
• 1924-29: Building Nazism – vs. Bolshevism• Attracted young leaders
• 1925-27 draw workers votes from socialism/communism
• 1928 won only 12 seats in Reichstag
• By 1929 turns toward middle classes
• 1932: Hitler runs against Hindenburg for president and loses – “make way, you old ones”• 6 mill. Unemployed, Great Depression hits Germany hard
• 1933, Hitler named as Chancellor by coalition!!!!• Reichstag Fire, 27 February 1933 - Blamed on communists –
Enacted Article 48 of constitution – Communism Party outlawed
• Nazis win 288 seats in March election
• Enabling Act: dictatorial power to Hitler
HEIL, HITLER!• April 1933 – German states’ power ended
• Gleichschaltung – coordination of all institutions under Nazi control
• Jews dismissed from civil service
• Concentration camps established for all opponents of regime – Dachau in southern Germany
• May 1933 – no independent labor unions, political parties, 2-day boycott of Jewish businesses
• June 1934 – Night of Long Knives• purge political dissidents
• August 1934 – complete control of the government• office of president abolished; Hitler voted “Fü
hrer of the German Reich and People”
MAINTAINING THE ARYAN RACE
• Eugenics
• Sterilization
• Euthanasia
NAZI PSEUDO-SCIENCE
WHO IS A JEW? NUREMBERG LAWS, 1935
ARTICLE 5
(1) A Jew is an individual who is descended from at least three grandparents who were, racially, full Jews...
(2) A Jew is also an individual who is descended from two full-Jewish grandparents if:
(a) he was a member of the Jewish religious community when this law was issued, or joined the community later;
(b) when the law was issued, he was married to a person who was a Jew, or was subsequently married to a Jew;
(c) he is the issue from a marriage with a Jew, in the sense of Section I, which was contracted after the coming into effect of the Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honor of September 15, 1935;
(d) he is the issue of an extramarital relationship with a Jew, in the sense of Section I, and was born out of wedlock after July 31, 1936.
• September 15, 1935 – Nuremberg Laws• Defines Reich citizen
as German or related blood; forbid interracial marriage
KRISTALLNACHT, NOV. 9-10, 1938
• Night of Shattered Glass• At least 100 Jews killed,
30,000 Jewish men sent to concentration camps
TERROR AND COERCION
• SS (Schutzstafel)• Lead by Heinrich Himmler
• started out as personal bodyguards – ended as special security units
• Controlled regular and secret police
• Concentration camps, execution squads, death camps
• Gestapo (Gehiemstaatspolizei)
• Root out “undesirables”: Jews, Roma, Slavs, socialists, communists, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witness, feminists, disabled persons, people suffering from “genetic” illnesses
NAZI DEATH TOLL OVER THE COURSE OF WWII
NAZI IDEOLOGY IN THE LIVES OF WOMEN AND CHILDREN
• Cross of Honor of the German Mother
• 4-5 children = bronze
• 6-7 children = silver
• 8+ = gold
• Unfit mothers faced sterilization and/or death
• For the Children
• Hitler Jugend
• Bund Deutscher Mädchen
NAZI ECONOMIC POLICY
• Hitler’s oppressive regime received support because he swiftly ended the Depression in Germany• Massive public works programs
• Renunciation of the Treaty of Versailles leads Hitler to appoint Hermann Gőring to undertake a four-year plan to prepare the army and economy for war
• People would sacrifice all political and civil liberty, limit private exercise of capital in order to prepare for war and aggression• Trade unions crushed and outlawed
NAZI PROPAGANDA MACHINE
• Film
• Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will & 1936 Olympics
• The Eternal Jew (Der ewige Jude)
RESISTANCE
• Soviet Union = 1935 mutual-aid pacts with France and Czechoslavakia
• France = Leon Blum and the Popular Front
• Cultural Responses – art and literature become more engaged in socio-political happenings
• Charlie Chaplin – The Great Dictator
• Religious Resistance
• Dietrich Bonhoeffer (Protestant)
• St. Maximillian Kolbe
• Pope Pius XII
• Youth Resistance
• White Rose
THE NAZI CHALLENGE TO EUROPE• 1935, Re-militarization of
Germany
• Luftwaffe
• Re-institution of the draft
• March 1936, Occupation of the Rhineland
• How did world react? How did their reaction affect Hitler?
• Late 1936, Rome-Berlin Axis
• Later included Japan
APPEASEMENT
• Why does Hitler continue to take more and more aggressive foreign policy actions?
• March 1938, annexation of Austria
• September 1938 – Munich Conference = annexation of Sudetenland
• 6 months later all of Czechoslovakia under Nazi influence
• GB and France pledge to protect Poland’s sovereignty
• Aug. 1939, Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
• Non-aggression pact between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia – Poland’s fate is sealed
WAR BEGINS!
• Sept. 1, 1939 – Germany begins blitzkrieg on Poland
• Sept. 3, France and GB declare on Nazi Germany
• Click on map for video link