the rise of hitler great speaker created popular nazi party sa (sturmabteilung)– brownshirts...
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The Rise of HitlerThe Rise of Hitler
Great speaker Created popular NAZI party SA (sturmabteilung)– brownshirts
Hitler’s Rise
11/08/1923 - Hitler & co surround gov’t
officials in a beer hall in Munich Goal - turn gov’t over to military
Force them to swear loyalty to him Unsuccessful Hitler sent to prison for high treason
Beer Hall Putsch
Freed from prison - Nazi party grew
2nd largest political party in DE President - Paul von Hindenburg reluctantly
appointed Hitler Chancellor Reichstag Fire - blamed on communists
(probably was Hitler) Enabling Act - right to enact laws w/o
Reichstag (4 yrs) Article 48 - gov’t right to curtail
constitutional rights in emergencies Hitler became a dictator through “legal”
means
Rise
Schutzstaffeln “Guard Squadrons” “SS”
Important in keeping order Orig Hitler’s bodyguards Under Heinrich Himmler – controlled secret &
regular police Terror – repression & murder, secret & criminal
police, concentration camps, execution squads, death camps
Terror
• Seemed to solve financial woes• Public works projects• Rearmament program• Unemployment dropped from 6 mill in 1932
to 500,000 in 1937• Mass demonstrations• Nazi youth• “Get ahold of pots and pans and broom and
you’ll sooner find a groom!”
Why was Hitler popular?
By 1933 – 50 concentration camps
25,000 Socialists, Communists, & Jews imprisoned
1933 - Boycott of Jewish businesses Detrimental to economy
The Beginning…
anti-Semitic laws 04/07/33 – Restoration of the Professional Civil
Service No Jewish gov’t employee
04/21/33 – ritual prep of meat forbidden 04/25/33 – quotas for GER schools/uni No Jewish dr.’s, pharmacists, lawyers, athletes
“paper violence”
Aryan ancestry
Had to prove Priests, pastors, clerks
Defined Jewish 3 Jewish grandparents 2 Jewish grandparents + belonged to Jewish
community married to a Jew offspring of a Jew
37,000 GER Jews emigrated Cost of flights high Some hoped it would pass
Result
11/09/38 - Night of broken glass Massive, coordinated attack on Jews Response to GER embassy staff murder in
Paris SA, SS, Hitler Youth beat & murdered
Broke into & destroyed homes Brutalized women & children Burned down synagogues
US recalled its ambassador
Kristallnacht
7500 business destroyed 1,668 synagogues ransacked, 267 burned 91 Jews killed 25,000 Jewish men concentration camps Forced to clean up damage bc of
Kristalnacht Banned from public transportation &
buildings / retail stores
Kristallnacht
Legal acts of discrimination Announced at Party Rally in Nuremberg Law for the Protection of German Blood and
German Honor Prohibited marriages and xtra marital relations
between Jews and GERs The Reich Citizenship Law
Stripped Jews of citizenship
Nuremberg Laws - 1935
Rhineland (strip of land in DE bordering on FR, BE, NL) demilitarized No DE troops to be stationed there Aim - increase FR security by making it
impossible for DE to invade FR by surprise Restrict DE army to 100,000 men, navy to
36 ships
Treaty of Versailles Revisited
Locarno Treaty reasserted demilitarization
Voluntarily signed FR concerned about safety - especially with
Hitler in charge DE began to re-arm
Treaty of Versailles Revisited
Early 1936 Hitler decided to reoccupy the
Rhineland Franco-Soviet pact of 1935
Renewed alliance Defense strategy?
Occupation of the Rhineland
• DE re-armament not ready for a well-armed nation like FR
• FR - verge of elections - politicians unwilling to take unpopular actions
• FR look to GB• GB felt Treaty was unfair– Simply re-claiming what was theirs– Plus GB didn’t want another war
• League of Nations - condemned but no economic/military sanctions
Gamble
Hitler moved from the occupation of the
Rhineland in 1936 to Annexation of Austria and Seizure of Sudetenland in 1938 and Takeover of Czechoslovakia and Poland in 1939
Results
Hitler wanted AT and CZ in 3rd Reich AT created after WWI
Majority of pop was German
03/12/38 - DE marched into AT unopposed
03/13 - DE announced Anschluss or union w/ AT
US & world did nothing
Austria & Czechoslovakia Fall
CZ - 3 mill Germans (Sudetenland)
More space & natural resources Hitler accused Czechs of abusing Sudeten
Germans FR & GB promised to protect CZ War seemed inevitable
Austria & Czechoslovakia Fall
Hitler invited Edouard Daladier & Neville
Chamberlain to Munich Fuhrer declared annexation of Sudetenland
was his last Eager to avoid war - they believed him 09/30/38 - Munich Agreement
Turned Sudetenland over w/o a single shot
Munich Agreement
The Munich conference. From left: Chamberlain, Daladier, Hitler, Mussolini, Ciano.
Chamberlain’s satisfaction not shared w/
Churchill Appeasement - giving up principles to pacify an
aggressor
“Britain and France had to choose between war and dishonor. They chose dishonor. They will have war.”
Winston Churchill
Churchill right 03/15/39 - Hitler invaded rest of CZ Then he wanted Poland
“mistreatment of Germans” Stalin’s surprise
Nonaggression pact w/ Hitler Committed to never attacking each other
Secret pact - divide Poland 2 front war eliminated
DE Offensive
“Lightning war” 09/01/39 - Luftwaffe (air force) dropped bombs
over PL Same time - DE tanks
09/03 - GB & FR declare war on DE Blitzkrieg successful - 3 wks USSR attacked PL from east PL gone, and WWII began
Blitzkrieg