Adolf Hitler

The Third Reich

See also Nazi Germany

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Having secured supreme political power without an electoral mandate from the majority of Germans, Hitler went on to gain their support by persuading most Germans he was their saviour from the Depression, the Communists, the Versailles Treaty, and the Jews along with other "undesirable" minorities.

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Economics and culture

Hitler oversaw one of the greatest expansions of industrial production and civil improvement Germany had ever seen, mostly based on debt flotation and expansion of the military. Nazi policies towards women strongly encouraged them to stay at home to bear children and keep house. The unemployment rate was cut substantially, mostly through arms production and sending women home so that men could take their jobs. Given this, claims that the German economy achieved near full employment are at least partly artifacts of propaganda from the era.

Related Topics:
German economy - Full employment

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Hitler also oversaw one of the largest infrastructure improvement campaigns in German history, with the construction of dozens of dams, autobahns, railroads and other civil works. Hitler's policies emphasised the importance of family life: Men were the "breadwinners", while women's priorities were to be "church, kitchen and children", in German Kirche, Küche und Kinder or "Drei K" (three Ks).

Related Topics:
Infrastructure - Autobahn

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Hitler's government sponsored architecture on an immense scale, with Albert Speer becoming famous as the first architect of the Reich. In 1936 Berlin hosted the summer Olympic games, which were opened by Hitler and choreographed to demonstrate Aryan superiority over all other races. Olympia, the movie about the games and documentary propaganda films for the German Nazi Party were directed by Hitler's personal filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl.

Related Topics:
Albert Speer - 1936 - Summer Olympic games - Olympia - Leni Riefenstahl

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Although Hitler made plans for a Breitspurbahn (broad gauge railroad network), they were pre-empted by World War II. Had the railroad been built, its gauge would have been three meters, even wider than the old Great Western Railway of Britain.

Related Topics:
Breitspurbahn - Broad gauge - Great Western Railway

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In 1932 Hitler was instrumental in initiating the design work on the car that later became the Volkswagen Beetle.{{ref|Volkswagen}}

Related Topics:
1932 - Volkswagen Beetle

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Repression

The Gestapo-SS complex (the SS and Gestapo organisations) were primarily responsible for repression in the Nazi state. This was implemented not only against political enemies such as communists but also against perceived "asocials" such as habitual criminals and the work-shy along with "racial enemies," mainly Jews.

Related Topics:
SS - Gestapo

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The racial policies of Nazi Germany during the early to mid-1930s included the harassment and persecution of Jews through legislation, restrictions on civil rights and limiting their economic opportunities. Under the 1935 Nuremberg Laws Jews lost their German citizenship and were expelled from government employment, the professions and most forms of economic activity. The policy was successful in causing the emigration of many thousands but nevertheless turned increasingly violent in the mid to late 1930s. In 1938 a pogrom orchestrated by Joseph Goebbels and endorsed by Hitler called Kristallnacht destroyed many Jewish businesses and synagogues and resulted in about 100 deaths. Between November 1938 and September 1939 more than 180,000 Jews fled Germany and the Nazis seized whatever property they left behind. From 1941 Jews were required to wear a yellow star in public. Throughout the 1930s the Propaganda Ministry disseminated anti-Semitic propaganda.

Related Topics:
1935 - Nuremberg Laws - Joseph Goebbels - Kristallnacht - 1941

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Rearmament and new alliances

In March 1935 Hitler repudiated the Treaty of Versailles by reintroducing conscription in Germany. He set about building a massive military machine, including a new Navy (the Kriegsmarine) and an Air Force (the Luftwaffe). The enlistment of vast numbers of men and women in the new military seemed to solve unemployment problems but seriously distorted the economy. For the first time in a generation, Germany's armed forces were as strong as those of her antagonistic neighbour, France.

Related Topics:
1935 - Treaty of Versailles - Kriegsmarine - Luftwaffe

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In March 1936 Hitler again violated the Treaty of Versailles by reoccupying the demilitarised zone in the Rhineland. When Britain and France did nothing, he grew bolder. In July 1936 the Spanish Civil War began when the military, led by General Francisco Franco, rebelled against the elected Popular Front government of Spain. Hitler sent troops to support Franco and Spain served as a testing ground for Germany's new armed forces and their methods, including the bombing of undefended towns such as Guernica, which was destroyed by the Luftwaffe in April 1937, prompting Pablo Picasso's famous eponymous painting (see Guernica).

Related Topics:
1936 - Treaty of Versailles - Rhineland - Spanish Civil War - Francisco Franco - Popular Front - Spain - Guernica - 1937 - Pablo Picasso - Eponymous - Guernica

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An Axis was declared between Germany and Italy by Galeazzo Ciano, foreign minister of Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini on October 25, 1936. This alliance was later expanded to include Japan, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. They were collectively known as the Axis Powers. Then on November 5, 1937, at the Reich Chancellory, Adolf Hitler held a secret meeting and stated his plans for acquiring "living space" (Lebensraum) for the German people.

Related Topics:
Galeazzo Ciano - Benito Mussolini - October 25 - 1936 - Japan - Hungary - Romania - Bulgaria - Axis Power - November 5 - 1937 - Reich Chancellory - Lebensraum

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The Holocaust

Between 1939 and 1945 the SS, assisted by collaborationist governments and recruits from occupied countries, systematically killed at least 11 million people (other estimates are as high as 26 million; 6 million of whom were Jews{{ref|Victims}}) in concentration camps, ghettos and mass executions, or through less systematic methods elsewhere.{{ref|Victims_1}} Besides being gassed to death, many also died of starvation and disease while working as slave labourers. Along with Jews, non-Jewish Poles (over 3 million of whom died), alleged communists or political opposition, homosexuals, dissenting Roman Catholics and Protestants, Roma, the physically handicapped and mentally retarded, Soviet prisoners of war, Jehovah's Witnesses, anti-Nazi clergy, trade unionists, and psychiatric patients were killed. This industrial-scale genocide in Europe is referred to as the Holocaust.

Related Topics:
1939 - 1945 - Slave labour - Communist - Homosexuals - Roman Catholics - Protestants - Roma - Handicapped - Retarded - Soviet - Prisoners of war - Jehovah's Witnesses - Trade unionists - Psychiatric - Holocaust

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The massacres that led to the coining of the word "genocide" (the Endlösung or "Final Solution") were planned and ordered by leading Nazis, with Himmler playing a key role. While no specific order from Hitler authorising the mass killing of the Jews has surfaced, there is documentation he approved the Einsatzgruppen and the evidence also suggests that sometime in the fall of 1941 Himmler and Hitler agreed in principle on mass extermination by gassing. During interrogations by Soviet intelligence officers declassified over fifty years later, Hitler's valet Heinz Linge and his military aide Otto Gunsche said Hitler had "pored over the first blueprints of gas chambers."

Related Topics:
Genocide - Endlösung - Einsatzgruppen - 1941

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To make for smoother intra-governmental cooperation in the implementation of this "Final Solution" to the "Jewish question", the Wannsee conference was held near Berlin on January 20, 1942, with fifteen senior officials participating, led by Reinhard Heydrich and Adolf Eichmann. The records of this meeting provide the clearest evidence of central planning for the Holocaust. Days later, on February 22, Hitler was recorded saying to his closest associates, "we shall regain our health only by eliminating the Jews".

Related Topics:
Wannsee conference - January 20 - 1942 - Reinhard Heydrich - Adolf Eichmann - February 22

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