3.

NAZISM AND THE RISE OF HITLER

Class 9th: History
Summary of World War-I (Video Link)
• When: July, 1914 to November, 1918

• Who:
• Major Allied Powers: Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy and USA
• Major Central Powers: Germany, Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Empire

• How: Huge scale attacks with new deadly technologies including mechanized
weapons, chemical weapons, long range artillery and air power

• Where: Most battles were fought in Europe (Western and Eastern fronts) with
some conflict in colonial holdings across Asia and Africa

• Results:
• 9 million people died and 20 million injured
• Europe economically devastated and politically unstable at the end of war
• Treaty of Versailles ending WW-I set stage for WW-II 20 years later
World War-I (1914-1918): Central Powers Versus Allied Powers
• Nazism & Rise of Hitler was mainly during late 1930s and
early 1940s – period of World War-2

• Hitler (Germany) was held accountable for World War-2

LETS UNDERSTAND WORLD WAR-II IN DETAIL

Main Reasons of World War II
Adolf Hitler
• Determined to make
Germany a mighty power
• Ambition to conquer
Europe
• Killed Jews
• Nazism – structure of
ideas and politics
WW-II (1939-1945) Commencement
• Axis Powers (Germany, Italy,
Japan, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria)
versus Allied powers (USA, Britain,
France, USSR, Australia, Belgium,
Brazil, Canada, China, Denmark,
Greece, Netherland, New Zealand,
Norway, Poland)
• Sep 01, 1939 (4.45 am) – Germany
attacked Poland
• Britain and France considered to be
the allies with Poland but they
couldn’t support this invasion
15 lakh German soldiers entered
Poland within hours
WW-II (1939-1945) Contd…
• April 09, 1940 – Germany attacked Norway and Demark and won.
Soon Netherland, Belgium and Luxemburg were also invaded and
merged with Germany (aim was to strengthen the defence system of
Germany)
• June 25, 1940 (4.35 pm) – France invaded by Germany (The Fall of
France)
• Britain, however remained independent—separated from Hitler's
reach by the English Channel.

The French delegation escorted by the

German victors about to enter Marshal
Foch's famous railway carriage to sign
the Armistice,
WW-II (1939-1945) Contd…
• July 10, 1940: Battle of
Britain (CLICK) – German
Air force (Luftwaffe) attacked
Britain. Brave Royal Air force
of Britain defended and air
battle came to an end on Oct
31, 1940.

Video Link
WW-II (1939-1945) Contd…

• June 22, 1941 – Germany attacked USSR

but failed to invade it
• Dec 07, 1941 – Japan (axis partner with
Germany) attacked Pearl Harbour, USA
• Dec 11, 1941 - Germany declared war with
USA (Hitler was convinced by Japan and
wanted to defeat USSR with Japan’s help)
The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on Dec. 7, 1941
during World War II. (CLICK)
WW-II (1939-1945) End
• July, 1943 – Italian military defeated by
USA and USSR (partnered with German
forces) during WW-II, Italy’s dictator
Benito Mussolini was thrown out of power
• June, 1944 – USA attacked Germany

• May, 1945 - Germany surrendered to the

Berlin Bunker
Allies Images
• April 30, 1945 - Anticipating what was
coming, Hitler, his propaganda minister
Goebbels and his entire family committed
suicide collectively in his Berlin bunker
• At the end of the war, an International
Military Tribunal at Nuremberg was set
up to prosecute Nazi war criminals for
Crimes against Peace, for war Crimes
and Crimes Against Humanity.
Aug 06/09, 1945 -
Nuclear attack by
USA on Japan
(Truman)

In retaliation of
attack on Pearl
Harbour and to end
the WW-II (CLICK)
Overview of Chapter
• Birth of the Weimar Republic

• The Effects of the War

• Political Radicalism and Economic Crisis

• The Years of Depression

• Hitler’s Rise to Power

• The Destruction of Democracy

• Reconstruction

• The Nazi Worldview

• Establishment of the Radical State

• The Racial Utopia

Birth of Weimer Republic
• Germany, a powerful nation in the
early years of 20th century, fought the
1st World War (1914-1918) alongside
the Austrian empire and against the
Allies (England, France and Russia)
• War prolonged for more duration than
anticipated and gradually Europe was
drained of its resources. Germany
made initial gains by occupying
France and Belgium. However, Allies,
strengthened by the US entry in 1917,
won, by defeating Germany and
Central Powers in November 1918

• Defeat of Germany & abdication of emperor gave an opportunity to parliamentary parties

recast to German polity. A National assembly met at Weimar and established a democratic
constitution with federal structure.
• Deputies were now elected to German Parliament or Reichstag on the basis of equal and
universal votes caste by adults including women
Birth of Weimer Republic
• The Weimar Republic is the name given by historians to the federal republic and
parliamentary representative democracy established in 1919 in Germany to replace the
imperial form of government. It was named after Weimar, the city where the
constitutional assembly took place.

• This Republic, however, was a failure because of lack of faith of people in it and Treaty
of Versailles to end the war. The peace treaty at Versailles was harsh for Germans.

• Germany lost its overseas colonies, a 10 th of its population died, 13% of its territories,
75% of its iron and 26% of its coal to France, Poland, Denmark and Lithuania

• The Allied powers demilitarized Germany to weaken its power. The War Guilt Clause
held Germany responsible for the war and damages Allied countries had suffered.

• Germany was forced to pay compensation of 6.6 Billion Pounds. The Allied armies also
occupied the resource-rich Rhineland in 1920s

• Many Germans held the new Weimar Republic responsible for not only the defeat in the
war but the disgrace at Versailles
Peace Treaty of Versailles, 1919
The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace
treaties at the end of World War-I. It ended the
state of war between Germany and the Allied
Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly
five years after the assassination of Archduke
Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on
the German side of World War I were dealt with
in separate treaties.
Political Radicalism and Economic Crisis
• Germany had fought the war largely on loans
and had to pay war reparations in gold

• In 1923, Germany refused to pay, and the

French occupied its leading industrial area,
Ruhr, to claim the coal

• Germany retaliated with passive resistance and

printed paper currency recklessly. With too much French troops in Ruhr
of printed currency in circulation, the value of
German mark fell rapidly.

• This crisis came to be known as hyperinflation,

a situation when prices rise phenomenally high

• Eventually, Americans intervened and bailed

Germany out of the crisis by introducing the
Dawes Plan, which reworked the terms of
reparation to ease the financial burden on
Germans
Political Radicalism and Economic Crisis
• Birth of Weimer Republic coincided
with the revolutionary uprising of the
Spartacist League on the pattern of
the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia

• Soviet of workers and sailors were

established

• The political atmosphere in Berlin was

Spartacist Revolt
charged with the demands for Soviet-
style governance
• Those opposed to this such as Socialists, Democrats and Catholics met in
the Weimer to shape-up the democratic republic

• Weimar Republic crushed uprising with the help of a war veteran

organization called Free Corps.

• Anguished Spartacists later founded the Communist Party of Germany

Impact of World War - I
• Europe turned from creditor to debtor
• Weimar republic was financially crippled and forced to pay
compensation
• Socialists, Catholics and Democrats (‘November
criminals’) supported Weimar Republic - became easy
targets of attack in the conservative nationalist circles
• Soldiers were above civilians
• Men were aggressive, strong and masculine
Defects under Weimer Republic
• Proportional representation - made achieving a majority
by any one party a near impossible task, leading to a rule
by coalitions.

• Article 48 - President has the powers to impose

emergency, suspend civil rights and rule by decree
The Year of Depression
• Years 1924 and 1928 were somewhat stable but still German
investments and industrial recovery were totally dependent on short
term loans, largely from the USA
• This support was withdrawn in 1929 when Wall Street Exchange
crashed. Anticipating fall in prices, lots of shares were sold. (13
million shares on a single day)
• This was the start of Great Economic Depression. Between 1929 and
1932, the national income of USA was reduced by half. Factories shut
down, exports fell, farmers were badly hit and speculators withdrew
their money from the market. It affected many other countries as well.
• 1932 - Industrial production of Germany reduced to 40% of 1929 –
lost jobs, paid reduced wages, unemployment at 6 million
• People lost confidence in democratic parliamentary system as the
crisis was not managed properly.
Hitler’s Rise to Power
• Economic, social and political crisis provided circumstances for Hitler
to rise to power. He was born in 1889 in Austria and spent his youth in
poverty.
• When the First World War broke out, he enrolled for the army, acted as
a messenger in the front, became a corporal and earned medals for
bravery.
• He was furious over the Treaty of Versailles and German’s defeat.

• 1919 – He joined German Worker’s Party (later he renamed it to

National Socialist German Workers’ Party or Nazi Party)
• 1923 - Planned to seize Bavaria, march to Berlin and capture power –
failed, arrested and tried for treason
• He subsequently took over it and Nazism, commonly known as
National Socialism refers primarily to the ideology and practices of the
Nazi Party under Adolf Hitler; and the policies adopted by the
government of Nazi Germany, a period also known as the Third Reich.
Hitler’s Rise to Power Contd…
• Effect of Great Depression – Banks
collapsed, businesses shut down,
workers lost their jobs and middle class
was threatened with poverty &
destitution
• Nazim became a mass movement
during Great Depression
• Nazi propaganda provided hope to
Germans for better future
• Hitler was projected as Messiah, a
savior who would relieve people from
their distress
• By 1932 – Nazi became largest party
with 37% votes
Hitler’s Rise to Power Contd…
• Hitler was a powerful speaker. His
passion and words convinced
people to gain their trust.
• He promised to build a strong
nation, undo the injustice of the
Versailles Treaty and restore the
dignity of German people.
• He promised employment for those Great orating skills made Hitler very
popular among Germans
looking for work, and a secured
future for the youth. He promised to
weed out all foreign influences and
resist all foreign conspiracies
against Germany.
Main Factors that helped Nazis rise
1. Economic instability – Great
Depression of 1929
2. Failure of the Weimar
Government to cope with
problems
3. Weakness of the constitution

4. Effective use of Propaganda

5. Force used against opponents

Destruction of Democracy
• Jan 30, 1933 - President Hindenburg offered
Chancellorship, the highest position in the
cabinet of ministers, to Hitler.
• Having acquired power, the Hitler tried to
dismantle democratic rule.
• A mysterious fire that broke out in the German
Parliament Building in February facilitated his
move.
Reichstag Fire Decree
• The Fire Decree of Feb 28, 1933 indefinitely
suspended the civic rights like the freedom of
speech, press and assembly that had been
guaranteed by the Weimar Constitution.
• Hitler then turned to his archenemies, the
Communists, most of who were taken to the
concentration camps for repression.
Destruction of Democracy Contd…
• Communists were the only one among the 52
type of victims persecuted/ punished by Nazis
across the country.
• Mar 03, 1933 – Famous Enabling Act was
passed which established Hitler’s dictatorship
in Germany.
• It gave all power to the Hitler to sideline the
Parliament and rule by decree. All political
parties and trade unions were banned except
Nazi Party and its affiliates.

• The State established complete control over the economy, media, army and
judiciary.
• Special surveillance and security forces were created to control and order
society in ways that the Nazis wanted.
Destruction of Democracy Contd…
• Regular police in green uniform.

• SA or the Storm Troopers included the

Gestapo (secret state police), SS (protection
squads), criminal police and Security Service
(SD).
• It was extra constitutional powers of these
newly organized forces that gave the Nazi
state its reputation as the most dreaded
criminal state.
• People could now be detained in Gestapo
torture chambers, rounded up and sent to
concentration camps, deported at will or
arrested without any legal procedures.
• The police forces acquired powers to rule with
impunity.
Concentration/ Death Camp
Reconstruction
• Hitler assigned the responsibility of economic recovery to
economist Hjalmar Schacht who aimed at full production and full
employment through a state-funded work-creation program
• This project produced famous German superhighways and the
people’s car, the Volkswagen.
• In foreign policy, Hitler acquired quick successes
• Pulled out of the League of Nations in 1933, reoccupied the
Rhineland in 1936 and integrated Austria and Germany in 1938
under the slogan, One people, One empire, and One leader.
• He then went on to wrest German speaking Sudetenland from
Czechoslovakia, and gobbled up the entire country.
• In all this he had an unspoken support of England who also
considered the Versailles too harsh.
• These quick successes at home and abroad seemed to reverse
the destiny of country.
Reconstruction Contd…
• Hitler did not stop here. Schacht had advised Hitler against investing hugely
in rearmament as the state still ran on deficit financing.
• Hitler choose war as an option to tackle the economic crisis – resources to be
accumulated by expansion of territory.
• In September 1939, Germany invaded Poland. This started a war with
France and England.
• In September 1940, Tripartite Pact was signed between Germany, Italy and
Japan, strengthening Hitler’s claim to international power.
• Puppet regimes, supportive of Nazi Germany, were installed in a large part of
Europe.
• By the end of 1940, Hitler was at the pinnacle of his power. He now moved to
achieve his long-term aim of conquering Eastern Europe.
• He wanted to ensure food supplies and living space for Germans. Therefore,
he attacked Soviet Union in 1941.
Reconstruction Contd…
• In this historic blunder Hitler exposed the
German western front to British aerial bombing
and eastern front to the powerful Soviet armies.
• Soviet army defeated Germany at Stalingrad.
Soviet Red Army reached till heart of Berlin.
• USA resisted involvement in war due to huge
losses incurred in WWI.
• Japan was expanding its power in the east. It
had occupied French Indo-China and was
planning to attack US naval bases in the Pacific.
• When Japan extended support to Hitler &
bombed Pearl Harbor, USA entered the WW-II.
• The War ended in 1945 with defeat of Hitler and
USA dropping off nuclear bomb on Hiroshima.
The Nazi Worldview
• The crimes that Nazi’s committed were linked to a system of belief and a set of
practices

• According to this, there was no equality between people rather only a racial hierarchy

• Nordic German Aryans were at top and Jews at lowest rank (Hitler’s racism idea was
borrowed from Charles Darwin – evolution and natural selection; Herbert Spencer –
survival of fittest)
The Nazi Worldview Contd…
• Strongest race would survive and weakest would perish

• Aryans – finest race, pure, strong and would dominate the world

• The other aspect of Hitler’s ideology was related to geopolitical

concept of Lebensraum or living space. He believed that new
territories to be acquired for settlement.
• This would enhance area of mother country and enable new
settlers. Also enhance the material sources and power of Germany.
• Hitler intended to extend German boundaries y moving eastwards,
to concentrate all Germans geographically in one place.
• Poland became the laboratory for experimentation
Establishment of the Racial State
• Once in power, the Nazis quickly began to implement their dream of creating
an exclusive racial community of pure Germans.

• Pure Nordics
1

• Healthy Nordics
2
Nazi’s wanted • Desirable
a society
3

• Prosperous
4

• This means that Germans who were seen as impure or abnormal had no right
to exist.
• Physically eliminated all those who were not desirable
Establishment of the Racial State Contd…
• Euthanasia Program – German physically or mentally unfit were
condemned to death
• Jews were not only the community classified as “undesirable”. There
were other Inferior clans i.e. Gypsies and Blacks (inferiors), Russian
and Poles (considered as subhuman).
• When Germany occupied Poland and parts of Russia, captured
civilians were forced to work as slave labour. Many of them died due
to starvation and hard work.
• Jews remained the worst sufferers in Nazi regime because they had
been stereotyped as killers of Christ and usurers.
• Until medieval times, Jews were barred from owning land. only trade
and do moneylending and lived in specially marked areas called
Ghettos.
Establishment of the Racial State Contd…
• They were often prosecuted through periodic organized violence and
expulsion from the land.
• Hitler hatred of Jews was based on pseudoscientific theories of race
according of which Jews total elimination is the solution.
The Racial Utopia
• Under the shadow of war, the Nazis proceeded to realize their
murderous, racial ideal.
• Genocide and war became two sides of the same coin. Occupied
Poland was divided up.
• Much of the north-western Poland was annexed to Germany.

• Poles were forced to leave their homes and properties behind for to
be occupied by ethnic Germans brought in from occupied Europe.
• Poles were then herded like cattle the other part called General
Government, the destination of all “undesirables” of the empire.
• Members of the Polish intelligentsia were murdered in large numbers
in order to keep the entire people intellectually and spiritually servile.
The Racial Utopia Contd…
• Polish children who looked like Aryans
were forcibly snatched from their
mothers and examined by race experts

• If they pass the race test, they were

raised as German families and if not,
they were deposited in orphanages
where most perished

• With some of the largest Ghettos and

gas chambers, the General Government
also served as the killing fields for the
Jews.
Freight cars used to deport Jews to the Death
Chambers
Steps to Death
STAGE-1: Exclusion 1933-1939
YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO LIVE AMONG US AS CITIZENS
Nuremberg Laws of citizenship of September, 1935:
1) Only Persons of German or related blood would henceforth be German citizens
enjoying the protection of the German empire.
2) Marriages between Jews and Germans were forbidden.
3) Extramarital relations between Jews and Germans became a crime.
4) Jews were forbidden to fly the national flag.
5) Other legal measures included:
• Boycott of Jewish businesses
• Expulsion from government services
• Forced selling and confiscation of their properties

6) Jewish properties were vandalized and looted, houses attacked, synagogues

burnt and men arrested in pogrom. November, 1938 remembered as “Night of
broken glass”
Steps to Death Contd…
STAGE-2: Ghettoization 1940-1944
YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO LIVE AMONG US
1) From Sep 1941, all Jews had to wear a yellow star of David.

2) This identity mark was stamped on their passport, all legal documents and
houses.
3) They were kept in Jewish houses in Germany and in Ghettos like Lodz and
Warsaw in the east.
4) These became sites of extreme misery and poverty.

5) Jews had to surrender all their wealth before they entered a Ghetto.

6) Ghettos were brimming with hunger, starvation and disease due to

deprivation and poor hygiene.
Steps to Death Contd…
STAGE-3: Annihilation 1941 onwards
YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO LIVE
1) Jews from Jewish houses, concentration camps and ghettos from different
parts of Europe were brought to death factories by goods trains.

2) In Poland and elsewhere in the east, most notably Belzek, Auschwitz,

Sobibor, Treblinka, Chelmno and Majdanek, they were charred in
gas chambers.

3) Mass killings took place within minutes with scientific precision.

Click on the hyperlinks to watch videos

Youth in Nazi Germany
• Schools cleansed and purified under Nazis

• Jew teachers were dismissed

• German and Jews children were separated

• The undesirable children were taken to the Gas chambers in 1940s

• Good German got Nazi schooling

• Educate in spirit of National Socialism

• 10 years old – enter Jungvolk (Nazi youth Group)

• 14 years old – boys joined Nazi Youth Organization – Hitler Youth

(worship war, glorify aggression and violence, condemn democracy,
and hate Jews, communists, Gypsies)
Youth in Nazi Germany Contd…
Youth in Nazi Germany Contd…
• 18 years – join Labour Service, serve
Armed forces & enter Nazi organization
• 1922 - Youth League was formed (after 4
years it was renamed as Hitler Youth)
• To unify the movement under Nazi control,
all other youth organizations were
systematically dissolved and finally banned.
• Nazi Germany all mothers were not treated equally. Those
who bore racially undesirable children were punished while
those who produced racially desirable children were
awarded.
• To encourage women to produce many children, Honor
Crosses were awarded. A bronze cross was given for four
children, silver for six and gold for eight or more.
• While boys were taught to be aggressive, masculine and steel hearted, girls were told
that they had to become good mothers and rear pure-blooded Aryan children. Girls
had to maintain the purity of the race, distance from Jews, look after children and
teach Nazi sentiments
Propaganda
• Nazis never used the words ‘kill’ or ‘murder’ in their official communications.

• ‘Evacuation’ meant deporting people to gas chambers

• Gas chambers were known as ‘disinfection-areas’, and looked like

bathrooms equipped with fake showerheads.
• Socialists and liberals were represented as weak and degenerate.

• Orthodox Jews were stereotyped and marked – shown as flowing beard

wearing Kaftan (in reality hard to differentiate from German Jews)
Propaganda Contd…
• Media was carefully used to win support for the regime and
popularize its worldview.
• Nazi ideas were spread through visual images, films, radio,
posters, catchy slogans and leaflets. German enemies
were stereotyped, mocked, abused and described as evil
in these materials.
• Many people saw world through Nazi eyes and believed
that Nazism would bring prosperity and improve well-
being.
• Charlotte Beradt book “Third Reich of Dreams” - describes
how Jews themselves began believing in the Nazi
stereotypes about them. They dreamt of their hooked
noses, black hair and eyes, Jewish looks and body
movements. Jews died many deaths even before they
reached the gas chamber.
• Nazi killing operations called as Holocaust - when the war
seemed lost, the Nazi leadership distributed petrol to its
functionaries to destroy all incriminating evidence available
in offices.
THANK YOU !!
Any Queries/ Doubts ??