HIST2133.
The Weimar Republic through Documents,
1918-1933
The Rise of Nazism
Lecture 11
10 April 2012
Adolf Hitler (1889-1945)
• * 20 April 1889, Braunau am Inn (Austria)
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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, anticapitalist, 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, liberaldemocratic, 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:
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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)