ocr b nazis

When did Hitler become Chancellor?

30th January 1933

When was the Reichstag Fire?

27th February 1933

Who was blamed for the Reichstag fire?

Van der Lubbe

What is Gleichschaltung?

Co-ordination and bringing in line

What was the Civil Service Act?

Jews could no longer work for any government jobs

What was Trade Union?

Organization of workers who tried to improve pay and working conditions

What were the social democrats?

Largest party before 1932, against enabling act and had very different views to Nazis

What was the Night of the Long Knives?

a lethal purge of Hitler's SA in 1934, killing over a thousand officials he considered too radical such as Ernst Röhm.

When did Hitler become Führer?

2 August 1934

Who were the SS?

The black shirts, elite group of 240 men (in 1925) run by Himmler, had to prove German inheritance before joining

Who were the SA?

Brown shirts, storm troopers, formed in 1921, led by Röhm, share propaganda, saw as a threat to Hitler due to loyalty to R

Who were the SD?

Formed in 1931 by Himmler, Reinhard Heydrich became leader, collected info on those who seemed a threat, stored info in card indexes at the brown house in Munich

Who were the Gestapo?

The secret police, 1 per 4400 people, worked through denunciations, legally permitted to torture people

What were concentration camps?

first one opened in March 1933 in dachau, isolated from the public, 6 camps by 1939, controlled what the public knew

What were death heads unit?

run by the SS death head unit, in 1937- Himmler declared guards Ould face no repercussions for their actions

Adolf Hitler

• Head of the Nazi Party
• Hitler had been the party leader since 1921
• A very charismatic speaker, could captivate a large crowd
• Nationally known figure
• Jailed for attempting to take power by force in 1923
• Hitler was hailed at this trial for his strong opinions
• While in prison, he wrote Mein Kampf (My Struggle) which clearly set out his racist and nationalistic views
• He was a central figure of the Nazi Party structure

Joseph Goebbels

-Nazi ideas were spread around by the party's propaganda team, co-ordinated by Joseph Goebbels

• As a highly educated man from the middle classes, he realised the power of modern media and utilised posters, newspapers and new technology in the form of radio and film
• Goebbels used simple, bold messages to make his point
• During the Great Depression, for example, he used the campaign motto "Bread and Work" appealing to the two demands of the sick and needy population
• He had deeply anti-Semitic views
• His propaganda emphasised the strength of Hitler and showed him as a god-like supreme being

Wilhelm Frick

• Long standing member of the Nazi party
• 1933, when Hitler was made Chancellor, there were only two positions in the cabinet going: one for Goring and one for Frick
• Ministry of Interior, with overall responsibility for most aspects of life in German society
• From 1930 - 1931, he had experience of high office in one of Germany's state parliaments where he used his powers to promote the Nazis into important positions and spread Nazi ideas in school
• Frick helped shape the party's racial policy

Ernst Rohm

• Leader of the SA (Storm department, but more commonly known as the "brownshirts")
• Originally set up as bodyguards for Hitler, the SA turned into the Nazi's private army
• Rohm took charge in 1930 and greatly increased its strength so that it had 400,000 storm troopers by 1933
• These were used to intimidate voters and other political parties
• During the election, they stood outside the polling booths and intimidating voters into voting for the Nazis
  They physically attacked Communists

Hermann Goring

• An ex-First World War fighter pilot, was second in power to Hitler
• He joined the German Cabinet alongside Frick and Hitler in 1933
• He had no clear role at first but he helped the party to run smoothly
• Before long, his government responsibilities included controlling the police in Prussia, largest region of Germany
• 1933 - Gorring formed the Gestapo, the Nazi secret police that would spy on the German people to stop opposition to the party

Rudolph Hess

• Another ex-First World War hero
• He was third in power to Hitler
• He was the Deputy leader of the party and his job was to sign off all new legalisation to ensure it closely followed the Nazi ideology
• He worked in Munich at the headquarters of the party and ensured that everyone was following the same goals

Heinrich Himmler

• Let the SS ("blackshirts")
• This, like the SA, had started as a group of Nazi volunteers who provided security for party leaders
• By the end of 1933, the SS had about 200,000 members
• Its "elite guard" was a paramilitary force with strict entry requirements whose members were fanatical about Nazi ideology
• They were numbered over 50,000 and, under Himmler, were developing methods of surveillance and terror which would later gain them notoriety
• The SS would go on to become one of the defining features of Nazi Germany, running concentration camps, spying on its people and striking fear into the hearts of anyone living under Nazi-led regime

What was the treaty of Versailles?

The "harsh" ( in the view of the Nazis) terms that Great Britain, France and the USA had imposed on Germany after the war ended in 1919

These terms in the Treaty of Versailles of 1919 were: - severely restricting the German armed forces (for example, they were only allowed an army of 100,000)

• reduced German territories
• imposed a crippling bill of £6.6 billion that the Germans owed to repair the damage they had caused in Europe

Weimar Government

• Germany was ruled by the Weimar Government

What were the main Nazi demands?

• Scrap the Treaty of Versailles
• Brot und Arbeit (Bread and Work)
• Destroy Marxism
• Subdue the Jews
• Ensure Aryan Supremacy
• Fight for Lebensruam
• Build Nationalism
• Strengthen the central government
• Nationalise important industry
• Improve eduaction

Marinius Van der Lubbe was arrested

• 27 February 1933

The Reichstag Fire - WWWHW

When? 27 February 1933
What? A fire at the Reichstag parliament building

What were the consequences of the Reichstag Fire?

• Even though Van der Lubbe insisted he was working alone, the Nazis sowed seeds of doubt in the public's mind, suggesting that as a Communist Party member, Van der Lubbe had been working as part of a wider Communist network and plot
• Van der Lubbe was sentenced to death and guillotined in January 1934
• The Reichstag Fire Decree on 28th February 1933
• More than 4000 Communists were arrested in the week after the fire. They included 100 Reichstag deputies and Ernst Thalmann leader of the Communists
• This was crucial as an election was scheduled in March
• The Nazis - whether they started the fire or not - used it to help to eliminate their biggest political enemy so they could gain a full majority in parliament

What was the Reichstag Fire Decree?

As part of the existing Weimar constitution, President Hindenberg, a right-wing nationalist who was not himself a Nazi Party member, had power to pass laws without the consent of the Reichstag in an emergency

• Immediately after the fire, Hitler persuaded Hindenberg to pass the Reichstag Fire Decree on the 28th February 1933

It consisted of six articles:
ARTICLE 1: restricted civil liberties such as the rights of the citizen when under arrest, freedom of expression, freedom of press, the right to public assembly and the secrecy of post and telephone
ARTICLE 2 and 3: Increased the power of the central government, giving powers noramlly given to the local regional government to the central
ARTICLE 4 and 5 - Established very harsh punishments for for certain crimes including death penalty for arson of public buildings
ARTICLE 6: Stated the decree took affect immediately

March Election

• 5 March 1933
• In February, they had used SA storm troopers to intimidate other parties, breaking up meetings of the Social Democrats the second largest party in the Reichstag
• Intimidation in the streets in the week coming up to the election
• Despite their efforts, the Nazi party still failed to receive an outright majority in the Reichstag winning only 288 of 647 seats
• By forming a coalition with the Nationalist DNVP Party, this finally gave them a majority
• They could now pass any legislation they wished

The Enabling Act

• 24 March 1933
• On 24 March 1933, the members of the Reichstag met in the Kroll Opera House where Hitler gave a long speech introducing the Enabling Act
• Its official title was the Law to Remedy the Distress of People and Reich
• The Enabling Act gave the cabinet and more importantly, the office of Chancellor the ability to pass any law they wished without the consent or control of the Reichstag
• The debating chamber was surrounded by SA soldiers as an act of intimidation
• With the Communist leaders locked up because of the fire, only 94 members (Social Democrats) voted against the Act; 444 members voted to pass it

What is Gleichschaltung?

Bringing into line

Civil Service Act

• Civil Servants are people who carry out duties of the government, both nationally and locally
• As the Nazis wanted to control government, the Nazis paid attention to their roles
• February 1933, many high-ranking civil servants were removed from their posts

7 April 1933 - The Act for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service

• It required the dismissal (firing) of anyone who was a political opponent or was non-Aryan
• This meant that Jews and political opponents could no longer service as teachers, judges or university lecturers, as all these professions were counted as part of the Civil Service

Official Encouragement of Anti-Semitism

• The Nazis had always had anti-Semitic views

The first wave of legislation focused on excluding the Jews from public life

• The Civil Service Act removed them from Civil Service
• Further legislation restricted the number of Jews attending university
• Further laws began curtailing "Jewish activity" in legal and medical jobs

1 April 1933 - Nazis organised a day-long boycott of all Jewish businesses

• Anti-Semitic signs were put up on shop fronts
• SA guards were posted outside shops to discourage people from entering
• This was the first of many boycotts of Jewish business

Book Burning

• The Nazis did not just want to bring people into line according to the party or race; they also wanted to control ideas
• Encouraged by Goebbels' Propaganda Ministry, Nazis student groups were urged to take part in action against what was then called "UnGerman Spirit"
• 10 May 1933, university cities across Germany, Nazi students burned 25,000 volumes
• Violent process

The use of terror:

1933 - the Nazis turned their full force to their opponents: Jews, Communists, Social Democrats and trade unions all faced the wrath of the SA and SS

• By October of 1933, 100,000 had been arrested
• Many of these people were imprisoned and sent to concentration camps, which were set up all over Germany; the first being Dachau in March 1933
• The SA became increasingly violent
• June 1933, in what became known as the Kopenick Week of Blood, a Social Democrat shot three SA storm troopers
• In retaliation, the SA arrested 500 men and tortured them so severely that 91 died

How did the Nazis remove the opposition that was the trade unions?

• Trade Unions are set up to protect the rights of workers, fighting for better pay and conditions
• They were traditionally very left wing and as a result, the majority of the unionists were against the Nazi Party and their ideology
• February 1933, fearing that Trade Unions would organise a strike to demonstrate their opposition, the Nazis arrested the main union leaders
• The remaining leaders then felt that the only option was to co-operate with the Nazis
• Goebbels promised all workers an annual holiday to honour German labour, which pleased the union leaders
• The Day of National Labour on 1 May was a great success
• 2 May - the offices of every left-wing trades unions were raiders, leaders arrested and their newspapers shut down
• Assets and memberships were put under the control of the Nazi-led German Labour Front (DAF)

How did the Nazis remove the opposition of the remaining political parties?

• Although the Enabling Act made the Reichstag redundant, other political parties still existed and started complaining about Nazi changes

The Social Democrats (SD)

• had been the largest party before 1932 and once the trade unions were removed, became the Nazi target

• 10 May - Nazis claimed there had been a corrupt use of SD funds and so seized all offices and wealth, with many leaders fleeing as a result

• 21 June, Frick used an emergency degree to ban the Social Democrats as a "dangerous" enemy

• In total, 3000 party workers were arrested,imprisoned and tortured

• Once other parties had seen what had happened, they knew a similar fate awaited them. One by one other parties began to dissolve

14 July 1933 - The Act to Ban New Parties

• The Nazis were now running a one-party state with no official opposition

Controlling Local Government

• Local Government in Germany was organised into regions, or Lander
• Each region could elect its own assembly to manage local affairs
• The Nazis could not tolerate this, as this was part of the Government system that was out of their control
• During 1933, power had been slowly removed from the Nazis

January 1934 - The Act for the Reconstruction of the State

• the power of the local government was removed completely
• Germany was no longer seen as a country of different regions more as a highly centralised state
• The states were split into 42 Gaue, each run by a Gauleiter directly elected by the party and answerable to central government

People's Court

• Hitler had been highly infuriated by the trial of those accused of causing the Reichstag
• Four Communists had been acquitted but only one was sentenced to death

April 1934 - The Act to Set Up the People's Court

• this created a separate court outside of the normal justice system
• It dealt with "political offences" and ensured rapid decisions
• Vague term - ranged from slow workers to treason plotters
• The numbers of death penalties issued rose rapidly as the years passed

What threats were stopped on the Night of Long Knives?

1934 - two potential threats remained

Non-Nazi conservatives

• one threat came from the non-Nazi conservatives who had been given places on the cabinet when Hitler became Chancellor
• Their leader, Franz von Papen, was the Vice-Chancellor
• Rumours began circulating that he planned to take Hitler's place

Hitler's own storm troopers , SA

• The second threat came from Hitler's SA
• By 1934, the SA was becoming increasinly violent and difficult to control
• Numbered around 3 million at the beginning of 1934
  -What made the SA a significant threat was there leader: Ernst Rohm
• He had openly declared that he wanted the SA to take over the army,
• Hitler could see that even though the army only had 100,000 men, it was still better equipped and easier to control
• Hitler rejected the takeover plans
• There was no evidence that Ernst Rohm was plotting Hitler's downfall

What happened / led to the Night of the Long Knives in Munich?

• Hitler needed to do something about these two threats until they endangered his power
• He dealt with both in June of 1934
• He tasked the SS to begin manufacturing evidence that Rohm was planning a nationwide uprising
• Lists were draw up of "politically unreliable people"

30 June 1934 - Night of the Long Knives

• SS went into action against these carefully identified enemies
• The SA leaders, including Rohm, had been instructed to go to a hotel outside of Munich for a special meeting
• There was no meeting
• Along with SS officers, Hitler, Goebbels and other entered the hotel, arrested the SA leadership and sent them to prison, where many were killed
• Rohm was given the option to commit suicide but refused so he was brutally arrested by two SS officers

What happened on the Night of the Long Knives in Berlin?

• In Berlin, Goring was in charge of the operation
• He did not stop at the SA and moved on to the Communists
• Von Paper escaped arrest as he was too promient a figure
• After an interview with Hitler, he resigned from office
• Hitler used this opportunity to get rid of other older enemies too
  Von Schleicher (the previous Chancellor) for instance

In total at least 85 people, 12 people who were Reichstag deputies were murdered

What were the consequences of the Night of the Long Knives?

THE POWER OF THE SA WAS REDUCED:

• Its leaders now knew the consequences of questioning Hitler
  -The role of the SA was reduced, but it still continued to exist
• Its membership dropped severely from 2.9 million in August 1934 to 1.6 million by October 1935

THE LOYALTY OF THE ARMY WAS SECURED:

• The army knew that Hitler had made a choice between the army and the SA
• When Hitler chose to support them, they repaid him with great loyalty
• Oath of Loyalty

THE RISE OF THE SS AND HEINRICH HIMMLER WAS ESTABLISHED:

• The success of the Night of the Long Knives was largely down to the SS and Himmler who had coordinated it
• Himmler's men were a crucial part of the operation, leading arrests and murdering the opponents
• Before this,the SS had been a relatively small off-shoot of the SA
• They had now proven their loyalty, and rose in promeniance
• Himmler would now go on to be one of the most powerful men in Germany

A CULTURE OF FEAR WAS CREATED:

• The SS, not the SA now became the key instrument of Nazi terror in the German state
• The culture of fear that followed the Night of the Long Knives was by far its most importance consequence

THE NAZI REGIME GAINED A STRANGE LEGAL GROUNDING:

• The Night of the Long Knives involved the execution without trial of at least 85 people
• In a speech to the Reichstag on 13 July 1934, Hitler insisted he was the "supreme judge of the German people
• He established "extra judicial" killing by the regime was acceptable

How did Hitler become the Fuhrer?

• Final obstacle: President Hindenberg
• Although Hitler was the Chancellor and had the power to make laws, the German constitution allowed the President to block any action of the Chancellor
• President Hindenberg was dying

ACT concerning the HEAD OF STATE

• At the moment of the President's death, the office and power of the President would be merged with the power of the Chancellor under the new title of Fuhrer

• That moment came on the 2 April 1934

• Hitler was now the dictator of Germany where he would hold this power till he committed suicide in April 1934

Himmler and the SS:

• Heinrich Himmler was born in Munich to a middle-class family and joined the Nazis in 1923
• He had become a member of the SS, an off-shoot of the SA which only 250 members to act as personal bodyguards for Hitler
• 1929 - Himmler was made the leader of the SS and he began transforming the tiny force into a paramilitary force
• Members wore special black uniforms with the SS double lightning bolt logo, and had a reputation for blind obedience and total commitment
• Unlike the SA, the SS was kept small
• Himmler was ruthless in selection, focusing on men of pure German blood who had the ideal Aryan features
• On the Night of the Long Knives, the dominance of the SA was removed and from that point Hitler looked to the obedience and ruthlessness of the SS to carry out purges, removing enemies
• The SS was made an independent organisation and over the next few years, Himmler absorbed more and more policing power of Germany
• In 1936, he became the Chief of all German Police, which made him one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany

The SD

• The SD (Secret service) was the main official intelligence-gathering agency
• Originally, set up to serve the Nazi Party, it developed until the leadership of Reinhard Heydrich, and became the Secret Service in 1938
• The role of the SD was to identify actual or potential enemies of the Nazi leadership
• It had a few hundred full-time agents and several thousand volunteer agents
• Historians have found that most SD agents were young, well-educated fanatical Nazis
• The SD focused on any opposition to the party - all aspects of education, government and the Jewish community etc
• It also tracked foreign reporting of Germany affairs and looked out for any spy networks serving other nations
• From their findings, they wrote extensive reports on the morale and attitude of the German people - this enabled the Nazi leadership to monitor the impact of their changes an tailor propaganda
• The SD did not take action against individuals but passed inforamtion on to the Gestapo

Reinhard Heydrich

• The leader of the SD was Reinhard Heydrich
• Heydrich joined the SS in 1931, then made such an impression that he was asked to lead the SD the following year
• By 1934, he was also the head of the Gestapo
• Put his at the centre of the Nazi regime and horrific events
• In 1934, it was his Gestapo team that built evidence against Rohm and carried out many of the murders during the Night of the Long Knives
• June 1936, when all the police forces in Germany was united under one force, Himmler became its director and Heydrich its deputy
• They were the two most important people controlling the German nation

The Gestapo

• The Gestapo (Secret Police) was undoubtedly the most infamous organisation within the Nazi terror system

• Whereas the SD started as a Nazi Organisation, the Gestapo started as the Prussian state police and expanded into a nationwide group, not directly controlled by the party itself

• At its height, the Gestapo had 15000 active officiers to police a population of 6.6 million

• Even with such low numbers, the Gestapo were deep;y feared

• It was a highly effective effective, ruthless organisation that had power to arrest and imprison any person suspected of opposing state

• In the early years after 1933, the Gestapo focused in the Nazi's political opponents but then later on, Jews, homosexuals and religious dissenters were also targeted

• It was the Gestapo's ability to identify opponents that was terrifying

• They could tap telephones, open mail but mostly relied on informers who might pass on remarks they had overhead or general suspicions

• A lot of useful information came from the Nazi Party's system of Block leaders that had been originally set up to spread the Nazi message

The polices, judges and courts

• When the Nazis took control of Germany, they inherited a justice system that had professional and independent police and judges
• They did not abolish this simply adapted it in order to control it
• Any potential enemies where removed from the ranks and Nazis were moved into leadership positions
• Controlling the justice system meant that the Nazis could fully enforce any new laws they passed and issue whatever punishments they wanted against the found guilty

Police

• Many police reacted positively to Nazi rule as their powers were extended
• The Nazis centralised police organisations and provided them with far better funding
• In 1936, the police were put under the control of the SS and were encouraged to join the forces
• The Orpo (ordinary police) and Kripo (criminal police) continued to carry out their everyday duties in the community and investigated crimes, as they had done before the Nazi takeover of power
• But, they also became an important part of the Nazi terror system, providing intelligence on potential enemies and arresting them

How did work look from the surface?

• On the surface, the Nazis greatly improved life for workers
• During the election of 1932, there were nearly 6 million unemployed
• The Nazi manifesto promised to provide jobs
• By 1939, unemployment had officially reduced to 35,000 out of a total of 25 million men

What effect did the Nazis have on the small craftsmen?

• Improving business for the Mittelstand (or small craftsmen) was a key priority for the Nazis
• 1933 The Law to Protect Retail Trade was passed which increased taxes on a large stores to protect these smaller businesses
  Despite this, the smaller craftsmen still could not compete with the larger firms so the number of artisans actually fell from 1.6 million to 1.9 million from 1936 to 1939

What effect did the Nazis have on the industrial workers?

• Industrial workers were a large and growing group, about 46 per cent of the population
• The Nazi obsession of re-armament and preparation made industrial jobs plentiful and employment rates soared
• By the 1936, the average wage was 35 marks per week, ten times more than the dole money that the 6 million unemployed received.
• These rates were frozen at 1933 levels and so rising prices meant that they were still not enough to feed a family easily
• On taking power, the Nazis cut some of the welfare support provided by the welfare government, but in September 1933, the Nazis had set up their own Winter Relief Collection to help the worst of by providing soup stations
• Technically, donations were voluntary but constant pressure from the SA meant that families on average gave 3% of their family's income
• These enforced contributions meant that bring employed did not necessarily mean comfortable

What effect did the Nazis have on the peasants?

• In line with their "Blood and Soil" , the Nazis made agricultural workers or peasants, another priority
• May 1933, The Reich Entailed Farm Law was passed - this aimed to strengthen Germany's small farms by forcing owners to pass their land to their eldest son instead of dividing between brothers or selling on to larger-scale farmers
• This tied the peasants to the land and stifled innovation,
• In this period , the rural population actually fell from 21 per cent of the population to 18 per cent

What was the Deutsche Arbeitsfront (DAF)?

• From the abolition of the trade unions, the Nazis set up the DAF, literally meaning German Labour Front
• Run by Robert Ley
• Membership was voluntary but those who did not join struggled to find work
• By 1939, there was 29 million workers
• Workers had to pay to join and through the scheme, the Nazis raised a significant income

What are the names of the four important branches and functions of the DAF?

• Strength through Joy
• Beauty of Labour
• Reich Labour Service
• Volkswagen Scheme

What was Strength through Joy? (KDF)

• Strength through joy aimed to organise the workers' leisure time
• This included subsidised holidays, cheap theatre tickets, touring orchestras and gym evenings
• Each of these activities involved ideological content delivered by the party ( for example they had political lectures on cruise ships)
• In 1937 alone, 1.7 million went on their package tours and 7 million took short excursions
• It is not difficult to see the appeal of the programme, even if you did not completely agree with Nazi ideology

What was the Beauty of Labour?

• The Beauty of Labour aimed to improve the work places
• Through this branch, new toilets, changing rooms and showers were built at factories across Germany

What was the Reich Labour Service?

• The Reich Labour Service aimed to tackle unemployment by providing cheap labour for big state projects like new motorways
• From 1935, all men between ages 18 and 23 had to serve for six months
• They trained along the lines of a military force and took part in Nazi rallies, marching past Hitler with their shovels on their shoulders as if they were soldiers carrying rifles

What was the Volkswagen scheme?

• In 1938, the DAF created the Volkswagen scheme
• This mean that workers could pay 5 marks per week and eventually get a car
• Many paid into the scheme, but no one ever received a car as the Second World War stopped production

What was a negative effect caused by the Nazi's pressure?

The Nazis' pressure for them to respond to all of these initiatives left many workers feeling harassed

• By 1939, there was growing disillusionment

What were the Nazi views of how women should live?

• Women should not smoke, particularly as smoking could lead to a higher chance of miscarriage
• Women should appeal more natural and not wear makeup. Cosmetics and dyes were seen as a French obsession
• Women should dress in traditional German clothes and not show sexuality overtly
• The role of women in the kitchen was crucial. Once a month they had "One Pot Sunday", making stew from leftovers to reduce waste. The SA and the Block Wardens ensured they were fulfilling their duty
• Women should not be thin, but physically "robust". Strong women were best for bearing children
• Women should be a part of the National Socialist Women's League. Led by Gertrud Scholtz-Klink, this organisation had 2 million members by 1938 and offered meetings, a bi-weekly magazine and training in domestic duties

What was the Honour Cross of the German Mother?

An award given to mothers who gave birth to a large number of children.

Nazi policy on Marriage and Children

• Soon after coming to power in 1933, the government decided to encourage young women to get married and have children rather than take employment
• It offered loans to Aryan couples who were getting married. (Non-Aryans) were not offered the same loans
• The couple could receive goods of up to 1000 Reichmarks if the woman gave up her job and promised to not return to work till the loan had been paid
• Goods rather than cash were given to German couples and this had a side effect of stimulating German manufacturing
• To encourage child bearing, the loan was reduced by a quarter for every child a couple went on to have
• This meant a couple who had four children would not have to repay the loan
• In 1934, 250,000 loans were issued
• In 1937, the requirement for women to give up work was removed in hope of increasing the marriages and births even further

Divorce

Divorces were made easier to obtain so that women could remarry and have more children

Women in higher education

Reducing opportunities for the women in higher education:

• Women's participation in higher education was severely limited
• Female enrolment at university was limited to 10 per cent of all students

What was the overall impact of the Nazis' policies on the womens' lives?

It is difficult to judge what effect theses policies had:

• MARRIAGES did increase from 516,000 in 1932 to 772,000 in 1939
• BIRTHS rose in the early 1930s but by 1939 the rate had declined again. The average number of children per couple in 1932 was 3.6 but by 1939, it had dropped to 3.3

The number of WOMEN IN EMPLOYMENT increased between 1933 and 1939.

• This was natural as other Nazi policies helped to create a booming agriculture

The number of WOMEN IN HIGHER EDUCATION fell.

• This is the one policy that had the desired effect
• The Nazi government came to regret this decision
• At the point they needed highly qualified women to take on the work of the rapid re-armament programme in the preparation for war
• Women were reluctant to take places at universities having been discouraged from doing so since 1933

What was the Reich Entailed Farm Law; when was it introduced and what effect did it have?

WHAT?
The Reich Entailed Farm law was passed, which aimed to strengthen Germany's small farms by forcing owners to pass their land to their eldest son instead of dividing it between brothers or selling it on to larger-scale farmers

WHEN?
May 1933

EFFECT?

• This tied peasants to the land and stifled innovation
• In this period, the rural population actually fell from 21 per cent to 18 per cent

What was the Law to Protect Retail Trade and when was it introduced? + effect

WHAT?

• It was passed to increase the taxes on large stores to protect these smaller businesses

WHEN?
Introduced in 1933

EFFECT?
Despite this, the Mittelstand could not complete with the larger firms and between 1936 and 1939, the number of artisans actually fell from 1.6 million to 1.5 million

Ubenmenschen

• Hitler and other Nazis had made their feelings very clear for many years before gaining power
  -Hitler's book, Mein Kampf, was filled with anti-antisemitism
• Taking inspiration from German philosophers and scientists, Nazis believed the strongest and best race was the Aryans, the people of northern and western Europe
• They saw them as Ubermenschen, super human or the master race
• Strong, athletic, Aryans were represented in Nazi art and propaganda
• Nazis believed Germany would only regain strength if they were exclusively filled with Aryans and run by them
• Leading scientists like Hans F.K Gunther who influenced Nazi policy, taught that there were distinct types of Aryan who shared the same features
  -Posters were used to show the typical features of Aryans
• The most superior type of Aryan was the Nordic group with blond hair and blue eyes

Untermenschen

• The Nazis believed that the non-Aryans were inferior and called them Untermenschen or sub-humans
• The term was used to describe a wide range of people including gypsies, black people and Slavs (people from Eastern Europe such as Poland or Russia)
• Slavs were also called Dungervolk, or dung-people
• To be defined as Jewish, a person did not have to hold Jewish beliefs
• Everything depended on ancestry
• According to the Nuremberg Laws of 1935, anyone with three or four grandparents who were Jewish was also Jewish
• Those with one or two grandparents were called Mischling or half- Jews
• The Nazis believed that the races had distinct features and in particular, Jews and Gypsies could be defined by their large noses
• To aid to their research, they measured Jewish people's noses

The Jews of Germany - Nazi myths and historical reality

THERE WAS A LONG CONTINUOUS HISTORY OF WIDESPREAD ANTISEMITISM IN GERMANY?
Although the root of antisemitism went back to the Middle Ages, Jews were fully integrated into German society. Marriages between Jews and non-Jews were common for example

JEWS WERE RACIALLY INFERIOR

• There is no scientific evidence to support this. There is a single "race" of humans

GERMANY WAS DOMINATED BY JEWS WHO CONTROLLED THE COUNTRY

• In 1933, there were only 505,000 Jews out of a population of 67 million
• Their influence was very limited
• In the previous Weimar government, only a few key ministers were Jewish

JEWS WERE THE COMMUNISTS. THEY HAD LED THE REVOLUTION IN RUSSIA IN 1917 AND WOULD LEAD A REVOLUTION IN GERMANY

• Although some leading Communists were Jews, German Jews belonged to the full spectrum of political parties

JEWS WERE COWARDS AND PACIFISTS. THEIR REFUSAL TO FIGHT FOR GERMANY HELPED TO CAUSE ITS DEFEAT IN 1918

• Jews fought in the German army in the same way as other citizens
• Some even received an Iron Cross for bravery

JEWS OWNED THE BIG BUSINESSES IN GERMANY AND PROFITED FROM THE ECONOMIC PROBLEMS OF THE 1920s AND EARLY 1930s

• Some of the Jews did own big businesses, but they did not own all of them.
• Jews belonged to all classes of society from the workers to the upper class

Social exclusion?

• Social exclusion was common by 1935
• Signs like the ones saying "Jews not wanted here" appeared in public places such as parks, shops and restaurants, increasingly isolating the Jewish population from the rest of the German people

Physical persecution?

• Although physical persecution was not as common in this period than in the war years, the Jews still lived in fear of mistreatment
• March 1933 - in the city of Munich, a Jew had his window smashed by the SA
• His lawyer, Micheal Siegel complained to the police. Instead of listen, they forced Siegel to work through the Munich streets barefoot with a sign
• Many Jews in other cities faced similar experiences during the summer of 1935

Publications?

• Publications throughout the period portrayed Jews as money grabbers and communists intent on bringing about the destruction of Germany
• Nazi newspapers - like the Der Sturmer - regularly printed horrific anti-semitic cartoons showing the Jews as paedophiles and racists
• Even some children's books were deeply anti-semitic.
• Der Giftpilz (The Toadstool) was published in 1938, by Julius Stretcher, the same man who edited the Der Strumer.
• It described Jews as poisonous mushrooms and told the children that the a mushroom could kill families and nations

What is Kristallnacht

The most extreme outbreak of violence against German Jews took place on the 9 and 10 of November 1938 pre war

What caused Kristallnacht and the violence that ensued?

• 7th November, a seventeen year old Polish Jew, Herschel Grynszpan, assassinated a German embassy official, Ernst von Rath in protest of the deportations of Polish Jews in Germany.

• In Germany there was widespread anger at the Jewish population

• On 9 November, Nazi leaders met in Munich to decide how to respond

• Goebbels announced that the Fuhrer had said that the Nazis were not directly organising attacks on the Jews, but if such events do occur, they must not be stopped

• This message conveyed to local Nazi parties and many SA and Hitler Youth Groups took this invitation to unleash violence

What were the events of Kristallnacht?

9th-10th of november

• 267 synagogues were destroyed and 7500 Jewish-owned commercial establishments had their windows smashed and contents looted

• At least 91 Jews were murdered and the police records show a high number of associated suicides

• At the same time, in a move that was carefully planned, the SS and Gestapo arrested up to 30,000 Jewish men and sent most of them to concentration camps

• This was the first time Jews had been imprisoned in mass

• Many died in the following weeks due to horrifying conditions which they were kept

Anti Semitic legislation in the 1930s

• 1933 - Jews were excluded from all legal professions
  1935 - The Nuremberg Laws made marriage and sex between Germans and Jews, punishable with prison
  1938: Jews had to have a J printed on their passports. They had to add Israel or Sarah onto their name
  1938 - Jewish children were banned from non-Jewish schools
  1939 - Jewish emigrants, were not allowed to take valuables when emigrating

Jewish emigration in the 1930s

• Under the growing persecution, 282,000 Jews chose to emigrate from Germany between 1933 and 1939
• They had to pay high emigration tax, and, by 1939, they had to leave almost all their posesions
• Most moved to neighbouring countries only to find that the the Nazis followed them a the Germans spread through Europe in the Second War

What happened in September 1939

• The Nazis invaded Poland on 1 September 1939

• They had prepared for limited war

• Within three days, Britain and France had declared war on Germany in support of Poland

• The war quickly escalated and German forces made rapid advances into western Europe

• To fight of this scale required a huge increase in in the supply of weapons and ammunition

What did the move to a war economy at the end of 1939 look like?

• All industries focused on supporting the war effort.

• Military expenditure rose dramatically

• By 1941 47% of goods produced were related to the war effort

• 55% of Germans were working in war related work

• There was a lack of central control until 1941 and so the war economy struggled to produce the necessary supplies for Hitler’s war.

Who was Albert Speer, and what was his plan?

• February 1942 - Albert Speer was appointed as Minister of Armaments and War Production

• April 1942, he created the Central Planning Board which established greater freedoms for factories but bought them all under a central authority.

• Speer removed the military from the administration

In addition to giving factories more autonomy, his main policies were to:

• focus factories on producing a single product

• employ more women in the factories

• use concentration camp prisoners as workers

• exclude skilled workers from compulsory military service

Why and when did the Nazis invade Poland?

Before 1918 Poland was part of Germany.
In September 1939, the Nazis invaded to take the Lebensraum (living space) and to completely ‘germanise’ the culture.

Shortages:

• In the spring of 1940, the Nazi’s realised that the war economy was reducing the amount of manpower focused on agriculture and that they couldn’t rely on imports to make up for it. They therefore increased rationing.

• The German rationing system was very complicated.

  • People were allocated points depending on their age and occupation, and were given colour-coded ration cards for different foods and clothes.

  • These were reissued every month

• The ration cards for the German Jews were marked with a red "J" - Jews were given a much lower allocation and could only shop usually after the others had shopped, leaving little food

How were women affected by the war economy?

• The Nazi leadership were divided of the role of women in the war effort.
  SPEER: He wanted women to work in factories to help boost production)
  HITER: Hitler and others believed that women should remain at home to continue as wives and mothers

• The restrictions of women in education from the early Nazi were lifted during the war

• From 1939, women aged under 25 had to complete six months Labour Service before being allowed to enter full employment

• Most of the women worked their 6 months in agricultural jobs

• In 1939, 760,000 women worked in war industries and this had rise to 1.5 million in 1941

• However, out of the total number of German woman aged between 15 to 65 was nearly 30 million

Bombing

• Spring 1940- the RAF began a bombing campaign against industrial areas in the north and west of Germany

• On 28 August, British planes make a first devastating attack on Berlin

• During the autumn of 1940, people in many cities were faced with an air raids three to four times a week

• A programme was introduced to build air raid shelters and to improve air defences in the cities but these were not always safe.

• For example, at the end of October, fifteen Berliners were killed when an air raid shelter collapses

Evacuation

• September 1940- the Nazis introduced the KLV programme- voluntary evacuation from the cities of Hamburg and Berlin.

• Children below the age of fourteen were eligible for a six-month stay in a rural area

• Those below the age of 10 were placed in families and could be accompanied by their mothers

  • Older children were put in Hitler youth camps

• These camps were often very strict and the removal of children from their parents allowed the Nazis to continue their indoctrination.

• Many parents were reluctant to send their children due to this so of 250,000 eligible children in Berlin, only 40,000 participated

The July Bomb Plot 1944

• The plot was led by Colonel Claus Graf von Stauffenberg, a member of the German nobility who agreed with many of the Nazi's nationalistic policies but became disillusioned with the Nazi leadership and the policy against the Jews

• He joined a resistance group planning to kill Hitler and initiate Operation Valkryie

  • An emergency order which would allow the plotters to use the reserve army to remove the SS and Gestapo

On 1 July, Stauffenberg was appointed Chief of Staff to the Reserve Army

• On the 20th of July he brought a briefcase full of explosives to a meeting with Hitler

• The bomb detonated but due to the meetings location and a table leg, Hitler survived.

• Stauffenberg headed to Berlin to continue the Coup. He was later caught and executed.

Cardinal Galen

• The Catholic Bishop of Munster, Cardinal Galen began to spoke out against Nazi racial policies after 1934
• During the war, his opposition increased as the crimes became more apparent
• In 1941, Galen delivered three famous sermons denouncing the use of terror by the Gestapo, the taking of Church property and the murder of mentally and physically disabled people
• The sermons were printed and distributed illegally
• Three of the Catholic priests who took part in this were caught and executed in Lubeck
• Galen himself survived the war as be was too prominent a figure to eliminate but lived under house arrest from 1941-45

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer was Protestant pastor who had opposed the Nazis from the outset in 1933
• During the 1830s, he preached against the and trained new pastors to join his cause
• In the late 1930s, he secretly joined the German resistance and despite being hounded by the Gestapo, he continued his work
• Banned from writing or speaking publicly, he joined Abwehr (military intelligence_, which were army officers who secretly opposed the Nazi regimne
• As an Abwehr member, he learned of the full scale of the Nazi attrocities and this increased their resistance
• Under cover, he relayed messages for the underground resistance and helped to organise the escape of Jews to Switzerland
• In 1943, he was arrested and held in jail where he preached his inmates
• He was killed in Flossenburg concentration camp in April 1945

The Rosenstrasse

• One group of men was taken to Rosenstrasse 2-4, a building that had been the Welfare Office of the British Jewish community
• The Jews taken to Rosenstrausse where the Nazis who they considered "half-Jewish"
• Many of these men had Aryan wives, and it was these women who gathered at Rosenstrasse that day
• The crowd grew and a spontaneous protest in the support of the captured men
• In the following days, there was around 600 women in Rosenstrasse
• Occasionally, the women's chanting was interrupted when SS guards threatened to shoot
• The women took cover in the streets and then returned
• For several days, they stood shouting and chanting
• Friday 5th March, the first prisoners were released
• The wider deportation of Jews to the death camps continued, but the women had shown remarkable courage

The White Rose

• The White Rose was a group at Munich University centred around Hans and Sophie Scholl
• Influenced by a sermon of Galen and having seen the mistreatment of Jews on the Eastern Front during compulsory service, the students decided to produce a series of anti-Nazi leaflets
• The first four leaflets were produced between June and July 1942 and were distributed locally to students, encouraging them to resist the Nazis
• The fifth leaflet, produced in January 1943, brought them to prominence
• Written for a broader audience, it was entitled "Appeal to All Germans"
• Between 6000 and 9000 leaflets were distributed in the nine large cities around the world
• After the German army had failed at Stalingrad, the group produced a sixth leaflet, hoping to encourage the German people to resist the Nazis at a time of low morale
• On 18th February 1943, the Scholls brought suitcases of leaflets and distributed them
• Unfortunately, their last act was seen by the caretaker who alerted the Gestapo
• The Scholls were arrested, Sophie assumed full responsibility to protect the others, but in the end most of the prominent members, including Hans and Sophie, faced People's Court and execution

The Hampels

• The Hampels were a working-class couple from Berlin who although not Nazi supporters, did not really oppose the regime in its first few years
• However, Elise's brother was killed in action in 1940 and it seem that this spurred them into resistance
• Between September 1940 and autumn of 1942, they hand wrote over 200 postcards urging people to refuse military service, to stop donating money to the Nazis and to overthrow Hitler
• The postcards were left in post boxes and stairwells around the Wedding district of Berlin
• Nearly all of the 200 postcards were handed to the Gestapo, showing the fear of the public
• It still took two years to identify the couplr
• Tried by the People's Court and executed

Passive Resistance

• Writing anti-Nazi graffiti was one way in which Germans showed their opposition to Nazi rule during the war years

Individual acts of opposition took a variety of forms:

• Saying "Good morning" instead of Heil Hitler

• Telling anti-Nazi jokes

• Reading banned literature

• Listening to the BBC

• Hiding Jews

• It is difficult to know how much of this "passive resistance" took place, bur historians have concluded that it increased during the war years

• As soldiers returned from the Eastern Front, information about the treatment of Poles and Jews filtered through, and people began to turn against the Nazis

Why wasn't there more opposition?

LACK OF KNOWLEDGE

• Most people had little direct experience of Nazi brutality
• It is very difficult to know how much ordinary Germans knew about the Nazi crimes that were taking place in their country and wider Europe
• A lot was covered up and many claim they had no idea of events such as the Holocaust

FEAR

• The repressive nature of the Nazi regime meant that most people were scared of stepping out of line
• During the war, persecution increased, making opposition even more difficult
• People knew what could happen if they opposed the Nazis

NAZI SUCCESS

• Hitler's foreign policy was successful until 1941
• The Nazis also delivered on its promises to protect the German people
• There was a massive programme of government bunker building to protect the civilised population
• Welfare schemes helped people whose homes were destroyed by Allied bombing
• These successes convinced many Germans that the Nazis deserved their support

NAZI PROPAGANDA

• The Nazi Propaganda machine became more effective during the war years
• Goebbels and his ministry fought hard to win the hearts of the nation, and sold them the myth that Hitler would be their savior

4.3 Total War

As Germany increasingly faced defeat in the war, more and more was asked of the German people
The Nazis began a policy of "total war" affecting all ages and classes of society

What was Goebbels' plan for total war?

• Faced with loses in Battle, the Nazis needed a new plan
• The war could only be won if the German people made huge sacrifices
• "Total war" was now required

18 FEBRUARY 1943

• Goebbels addressed a large public meeting at the Berlin Sportscast
• The stadium had once hosted ice-hockey games, but had been used for political rallies since 1933
• The Sportspalast had been carefully prepared for Goebbels speech: huge swastika banners hung from the balconies; the stylised eagle and a banner
• The audience in the Sportspalast had been carefully selected from a cross-section of the German people who were loyal Nazis
• Goebbels made a long and powerful speech, which broadcast on German radio

What was the impact of the move to total war?

THE NAZIS FINALLY TRIED TO MOBILISE WOMEN INTO THE WAR EFFORT

• A total of 3 million eligible women between the ages of 17 and 45 were called to work
• Only 1 million actually took up the call, with some avoiding it by deliberately getting pregnant
  ANYTHING THAT DID NOT CONTRIBUTE TO THE WAR EFFORT WAS ELIMINATED
• Professional sport, magazines, and non essential businesses were closed
• For example, w women could have her cut but dyed
  THE SHORTAGES BECAME EVEN WORSE
• In August 1943, clothing rationing was suspended as the production of civilian clothes was ended
• As an alternative, exchange centres were set up where people
  THERE WAS AN INCREASE IN PROPAGANDA
• Goebbels' speech was shown in cinemas around the country and posters were put up to encourage the war effort