Transcript The Growing Radicalization of the Third Reich, 1935-1939

PHASES IN THE HISTORY OF THE THIRD REICH
1933: The “National Revolution”
1934-36: Economic recovery and rearmament, in
partnership with conservative elites
1937-39: Radicalization of both foreign and racial
policy
1939-October 1942: Conquest and expansion
November 1942-May 1945: Defeat at the front and
the destruction of German cities from the air
“The NSDAP protects
the
olksgemeinschaft:
Racial comrades, if
you need advice or
help, turn to your
Party Local”
A proud bearer of the “Mother’s Cross,” introduced in 1938
“Merry
Christmas”
(postcard from
December 1934)
“A Child’s Gaze”
(postcard from
1937/38)
“Youth serves the
Führer. All tenyear-olds into the
Hitler Youth”
(membership
became compulsory
in 1938)
“National Sports Day,
League of German Girls,
23 September 1934”
“Build youth hostels
and homes”
(1938/39)
Two girls enjoy an
outing organized by
the League of
German Girls,
ca. 1936
The Nordic ideal of
beauty, painted by
Oskar Just and
Wolfgang Willrich.
Subgroups of the Aryan race (Hitler was “Alpine-Dinaric”)
“None shall go
hungry!
None shall freeze!
Winter Aid of the
German People,
1934/35”
“The National Labor
Service:
We strengthen body
and soul” (1934):
See Epstein, 98-9.
National Labor
Service Brigade,
marching at the
Nuremberg Party
Rally of 1937
(full employment
was achieved in
1936)
“No German had to
freeze. 11.5 million
cubic meters –
4 X the Great Pyramid
of Cheops –
that’s how much coal
Winter Aid gave you.
That’s just one of the
Führer’s deeds:
Give him your
vote!”
(March 1936)
“Help Hitler build:
Buy German goods”
(mid-1930s):
The Nazis embraced
“autarchy” or total
economic selfsufficiency
(Epstein, 100-01)
“Strength through Joy:
Now you too can travel!”
“Strength through Joy Car”
(Epstein, 102-05)
“A Simple Stew, Even for the Reich Chancellor” (1935)
The Nuremberg Laws, Sep. 1935 (compare Racial State, p. 47)
Julius Streicher, the children’s friend
“Trust No Fox and No Jew”
Expulsion of the Jews from school
Expulsion of the Jews from Germany
“The Eternal Jew”
(museum exhibition,
Munich, 1937)
COMMENTARY BY SIGMUND FREUD,
Civilization and Its Discontents (1930), Chapter 5
“It is always possible to bind together a considerable
number of people in love, so long as there are other people
left over to receive the manifestations of their aggressiveness…. In this respect the Jewish people, scattered
everywhere, have rendered most useful services to the
civilizations of the countries that have been their hosts; but
unfortunately all the massacres of the Jews in the Middle
Ages did not suffice to make that period more peaceful and
secure for their Christian fellows…. Neither was it an
unaccountable chance that the dream of a Germanic worlddominion called for anti-Semitism as its complement; and it
is intelligible that the attempt to establish a new,
communist civilization in Russia should find its
psychological support in the persecution of the bourgeois.”
Map of the arms race (ca. 1934)
Germany restored universal
conscription in March 1935
New draftees
report in
November
How they looked
after a few months
September
16, 1935:
New
Luftwaffe
bombers
and army
tanks on
display at
the
Nuremberg
Party
Congress
of Freedom
German troops reoccupy the Rhineland in March 1936,
in defiance of the Versailles Treaty
“Germany is free!”
(1936)
GENESIS OF THE FOUR-YEAR PLAN:
Hermann Göring addresses the Reich Cabinet, September 4, 1936
“Certain persons have been asked for memoranda on the basic conduct
of the economy. So far only one has been presented, by Dr. Goerdeler,
and it is absolutely useless. In addition to many other erroneous ideas it
contains the proposal for a considerable limitation of armaments.”
[Göring explains that Hitler has just given him a detailed memo on
economic policy.] “It starts from the basic premise that the showdown
with Russia is inevitable. What Russia has done in the field of
reconstruction, we also can do.….
“We must strive with the greatest energy for autarky in all those spheres
in which it is technically possible; the yearly amount of foreign exchange
savings must still surpass… 600 million Reichsmarks.
“We have to tide over with foreign exchange all cases where it seems
necessary for armaments and food. In order to provide for foreign
exchange, its flow abroad must be prevented by every means; on the
other hand, whatever is abroad must be collected….
“Through the genius of the Führer things which were apparently
impossible have very quickly become reality.”
THE HOSSBACH PROTOCOLL:
Minutes of a secret conference on November 10, 1937
Hitler told his top national security advisors that he was
resolved “to solve the question of Lebensraum” by
1943/45 at latest. He hoped that a solution might come
sooner, if France fell into civil war or a war with Italy in
the Mediterranean. Arms spending and the quest for
autarchy must be accelerated.
Foreign Minister Neurath, War Minister Blomberg, and
Army Commander-in-Chief General Fritsch all protested
that Germany must not risk war with France and Great
Britain. Reichsbank President Hjalmar Schacht, not
present, had long been protesting that arms spending
must be decreased to avoid inflation.
Within four months the protesters were all removed from
office.
Hitler greeted by cheering
throngs as he enters Vienna on
March 14, 1938,
and a poster urging voters to
approve the Anschluss
“One People, One Reich,One Leader!”
(Anschluss referendum campaign, April 1938)
Hitler & Mussolini
celebrate their
“Axis” in Rome,
May 1938
Charlie Chaplin as
Adenoid Hinkel
and Jack Oakie as
Benzino Napoloni,
The Great
Dictator
THE SUDETEN CRISIS, SEPTEMBER 1938
• May 1935: Konrad Henlein’s Sudeten German “Home
Front” wins majority of votes in the Czech Sudetenland.
• November 1937: Neville Chamberlain sends Lord Halifax
to Hitler to discuss Austria, Danzig, & the Sudetenland.
• May 1938: War scare caused by false rumors.
• August 1938: Runciman Mission studies Sudeten German
grievances.
• September 15, 1938: Chamberlain in Berchtesgaden,
agrees with Hitler on a plebiscite for the Sudeteland.
• September 22/23, 1938: Chamberlain in Bad Godesberg;
Hitler ups his demands.
• September 29/30, 1938: Mussolini offers a “compromise”
at the Munich Conference.
MILITARY EXPENDITURE AS PERCENTAGE OF GNP
YEAR
1932
1934
1935
1936
1937
1938
1939
1940
1941
1942
Germany
1
6
8
13
13
17
23
38
47
55
USA
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
11
31
Britain
2
3
2
5
7
8
22
53
60
64
A cordial Hitler receives Neville Chamberlain
in Berchtesgaden, 15 September 1938, in the first of three
summit conferences on the fate of Sudeten Germans
Hitler pushed his
luck at
Bad Godesberg
on September 22,
and a war crisis
loomed
The heads of government in Munich, 29 September 1938:
Chamberlain, Edouard Daladier, Hitler, & Mussolini
The Implementation of the Munich Pact
The Synagogue of Bielefeld, November 9/10, 1938
The New
Synagogue
of Berlin,
painted by
Emile de
Cauwer,
ca. 1880
The Berlin Synagogue after it was destroyed in
the Reichskristallnacht, 9 November 1938
The Synagogue in Siegen
Reinhard
Heydrich
(postcard, 1942),
head of the secret
police, was
placed in charge
of pressuring
Jews to emigrate
Jews arrested during Reichskristallnacht are
mustered in Buchenwald, November 1938
German troops occupy Prague, 15 March 1939;
Britain responded with a guarantee of Poland’s border
Joachim von Ribbentrop (standing at left) and V.M. Molotov
sign the “Hitler-Stalin Pact,” August 23, 1939
Hitler informs the Reichstag on September 1, 1939,
that Poland had attacked Germany the night before:
“Since 4:45 a.m. fire has been returned!”
“Reich Party
Congress of Peace”
(cancelled on
account of war)