Totalitarianism

Treaty of Versailles

Treaty that ended WW I. It blamed Germany for WW I and handed down harsh punishment.

Weimar Republic

born out of the German defeat in WWI. Charged with stabbing the German nation in the back for signing the Treaty of Versailles.

hyper-inflation

extreme devaluation of the currency and rapid increase in the overall level of prices in the economy

fascism

a political system headed by a dictator that calls for extreme nationalism and racism and no tolerance of opposition

Benito Mussolini

Known as "Il Duce" -- the Leader -- Mussolini was the Fascist dictator of Italy during World War II.

March on Rome

A strike "led" by Mussolini (who was no where to be found during this March) in which 30,000 or so Blackshirts marched to Rome and Mussolini was legally put into power

Blackshirts

gangs of fascist thugs who followed Mussolini

Adolf Hitler

started the Holocaust, leader of the Nazi Party, dictator of Germany

Anti-Semitism

hatred of Jews

Gestapo

Nazi secret police

Nuremberg Laws

restrictions on Jews; denied German citizenship and intermarrying with non-Jews

Mein Kampf

Hitler's book that he wrote in prison that means "My Struggle"

Joseph Stalin

Bolshevik revolutionary, head of the Soviet Communists after 1924, and dictator of the Soviet Union from 1928 to 1953. He led the Soviet Union with an iron fist, using Five-Year Plans to increase industrial production and terror to crush opposition

Totalitarianism

Government ruled by a single party and/or person that exerts unlimited control over its citizen's lives.

Brownshirts

gangs of Nazi thugs who followed Hitler

Nazism

Fascism with racism added

Czechoslovakia

Last remaining democracy in Eastern Europe

GULAG

in the Soviet Union, a system of forced labor camps in which millions of criminals and political prisoners were held under Stalin

Master Race

Hitler's idea that German Arayans were the superior race.

Dawes Plan

A plan to revive the German economy, the United States loans Germany money which then can pay reparations to England and France, who can then pay back their loans from the U.S. This circular flow of money was a success.

Great Depression

the economic crisis beginning with the stock market crash in 1929 and continuing through the 1930s

The Ruhr Crisis

1922-1923. Germany announced they couldn't pay their repeaations, France invades the Ruhr Valley to collect reparations "in Kind." (leads to Germany printing money causing hyperinflation)

Five Year Plan

Stalin's economic policy to rebuild the Soviet economy after WWI. tried to improve heavy industry and improve farm output, but resulted in famine

Command Economy

An economic system in which the government controls a country's economy.

The Great Purge

A campaign of terror directed at eliminating anyone who threatened Stalin's power

Collective Farms

a large government-controlled farm formed by combining many small farms

Indoctrination

Teaching someone to accept an idea or principle without question

Night of the Long Knives

Hitler's purge of the Brown Shirts