 mid-1920s with the worldwide overproduction
of farm products
 resulting lower prices and profits for farmers.
 October, 1929 the U.S. stock market “crashed,”
investors panicked, pulled their money out of
Europe,
 World Wide
 sold their U.S. stocks at cut-rate prices,
 banks closed,
 industry declined,
 unemployment & numbers of homeless
Lost Faith in Democracy
 Discouraged masses began following dictatorial
political leaders who offered “simple solutions” to
problems.
 Germany- Weimar Republic collapsed
 Totalitarianism rose
 How does a bad economy allow dictators to rise to
power?
 Benito Mussolini became dictator
of Italy as head of the Fascist
Party pro-militarism, one-party
rule, single leader, patriotic and
nationalistic
 Mussolini formed bands of armed
Fascists (squadristi, Blackshirts) to
attack Socialist Groups
 Extreme Right Wing
 Middle class industrialists & large
landowners supported Mussolini.
 Fascists threatened to march on Rome,
 so King Victor Emmanual III made Mussolini the prime
minister.
 “Il Duce” created a dictatorship that suspended freedom of
the press, made laws by decree, had one-party rule, gave
police unrestricted authority
 What are some Fascist Ideals?
 fascist youth groups was to
create a new generation fit,
disciplined and militaristic.
 Schools pushed propaganda.
 traditional roles of women as
homemakers and mothers.
 Lateran Accords = Catholicism as the
official
state religion. In return the pope urged Italians to
support the Fascists.
 After Lenin Death 1924 power
struggle between Trotsky and
Stalin
 Stalin Takes power in 1928
 1928 started first Five-Year Plan
 (economic goals for five-year
periods.)
 It emphasized maximum
production of arms, capital goods,
oil & steel production.
 quest for power and paranoid personality led him to
remove all opponents
 Eight million Russians were arrested
forced to
confess sent to labor camps (gulags) and/or executed.
 Write 2 similarities and differences between Stalin and
Mussolini
 He was an ultra-nationalist
(German “master race of Aryans”),
anti-Semitic racist, anticommunist, militarist and
expansionist
 Gifted orator who effectively used
the political party, propaganda and
terror.
 Early uprising crushed Hitler was
imprisoned,
 wrote Mein Kampf, which explained the
Social Darwinian theory of struggle and
the right of Germans to
lebensraum(living space).
 After prison, he greatly expanded his party’s
membership throughout Germany.
 By 1932, the Nazis were largestpolitical party in the
Reichstag.
 Unemployment and depression made extremists more
popular. Right-wing elites looked to Hitler.
 What allowed Hitler to take full power legally?
 1933, Pres Hindenburg appointed




Hitler as chancellor.
Reichstag building was burned and a
communist blamed.
“legal seizure”of govt. with Enabling
Act.
Government jobs were purged of Jews
and communists.
Concentration camps created for
opponents
 Hindenburg died in 1934,
presidency abolished & Hitler
became dictator.
 Public required to pledge total
loyalty to him as “Fuhrer.”
 Nazi goal was create a totalitarian
Aryan racial state of the Third
Reich
 Nuremberg Laws excluded Jews
from German citizenship, from
marriage to Gentiles and were
required to
wear yellow
Stars of David.
 burned synagogues, destroyed
Jewish businesses,
 Jews were barred from public
transportation, buildings, schools,
hospitals & prohibited from owning
or working in stores.
 Why did Hitler start promoting anti-Semitic views as
opposed to going straight into the Holocaust
 1935 creation of the Luftwaffe
(air force), the draft and
expansion of the army from
100,000 to 550,000 troops.
 sent troops into the
demilitarized
Rhineland.
 Britain began policy of
appeasement.
 League of Nations weak failed
to enforce restrictions of
Versailles
 In 1935, he invaded Ethiopia &
was condemned by Western
powers,
 LoN does nothing
 What are some things that made the L o N so weak?
 In 1936, Germany & Italy helped Francisco Franco win
Spanish Civil War and started an alliance, the RomeBerlin Axis.
 General Francisco Franco
overthrew the republican govt.
w. the help of the fascist
regimes of Italy & Germany
and set up a dictatorship which
supported clergy and the rich.
 The Soviets and international
volunteers unsuccessfully aided
the republicans.
(Review)
 Spain became testing ground for new weapons &
strategies of the Luftwaffe (German Air Force.) Pablo
Picasso’s painting of “Guernica” reflected the
suffering caused by the bombings.
 In 1938, Hitler forced the Austrian chancellor to put
Nazis in power.
 New govt. “invited” German troops in &
annexed Austria
Hitler
 Hitler demanded the Sudetenland (part of
Czechoslovakia.)
 Given this land by Western Nations
 appeased Hitler in return for his promise to not make
more demands.
 British PM Neville Chamberlain called it “peace for our
time.”
 1939, Hitler took Western Czechoslovakia
 Eastern portion was turned into the “puppet state” of
Slovakia
 to Parliament after Czechoslovakia’s betrayal at the
Munich Conference:
 “We are in the presence of a disaster of the first
magnitude… And do not suppose that this is the end.
This is only the beginning…”
 What lands did Hitler take and how did he justify the
taking of each?
 After Hitler demanded port city of Danzig, Britain
promised to protect new independent country of
Poland
from Nazi aggression.
 Fearful of a two-front war,
Hitler signed the peace
alliance with USSR
 Stalin was promised
control of east Poland and
the Baltic states
 September 1, 1939 Hitler
attacked Poland. Britain &
France
declared war.
WWII had begun!
 September 1, 1939 Hitler attacked Poland. Britain &
France
declared war.
 WWII had begun!
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