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Flashcards by izzydonnachie, updated more than 1 year ago
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Created by izzydonnachie
about 11 years ago
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| Question | Answer |
| GLEICHSCHALTUNG 1933-34 • Gleichschaltung= the sustained drive to heighten national awareness spearheaded by Goebbel's Ministry of Propaganda and National Enlightenment. • It was the persecution of a range of minorities- Jews, homosexuals, the disabled- on the basis that they were not fit to belong to the 'national community'. • Processes not confined to political parties, trade unions and churches: local gov, civil service, justice system, education and media were all affected. | •May 1933: Nazis disbanded the trade unions, once a powerful force. •June 1933: Social Democratic Part was outlawed (communist party already destroyed), however it lasted a few weeks longer than its associated trade union movement. •July 1933: Nazis introduced a Law Against the Formation of New Parties. This made Germany officially a one-party state. |
| • Gleichschaltung violence and terror was common in suppressing the political left, with hundreds of socialists/communists murdered by the SA. •Hitler handed responsibility for neutralising potential threats to his regime to Heinrich Himmler's SS, leading to the construction of over 80 concentration camps. | •Although people died in these camps they were not built for the purpose of extermination. Their purpose at first was to keep known opponents of the Nazi regime in what was called 'protective custody.' • Most camp inmates in 1933 were Communists and Social Democrats. |
| Gleichschaltung and the churches: Nazis did not regard Christian belief as compatible with membership of the National Community as Christians could not be relied on to put the state first. •Protestant churches persuaded in 1933 to organise themselves into a Reich Church with a Reich Bishop, Ludwig Muller at its leadership. •Opposition= Confessional Church. • For Catholic churches Hitler dealt directly with the Pope- in 1933 agreement between Nazis and Vatican resulting in Nazis promising not to interfere in work of Catholic Church if German priests stayed out of politics. | •Opposition after 1933: Martin Niemoller headed the Confessional Church and in 1937 was arrested and taken to a concentration camp, as well as Dietrich Bonhoeffer. • By 1937 hundreds of Catholic priests arrested= breach of agreement leading to Pope's letter 'with burning anxiety'. •However there was no all-out conflict between the Nazi regime and Christian churches- relations deteriorated but churches remained open and services were held. |
| 1934-Night of Long Knives: • SA leadership (Ernst Rohm) began to make demands Hitler was unwilling to meet. •SA was 3 million strong and wanted to merge with smaller German army- Hitler feared this would undermine the discipline/effective of Germanys Armed forces. • SA leaders were socialist 'left wing' Nazis- in 1933 they called for a 'second revolution' on big business but Hitler was looking to involve Germany's industrial leaders in his plans to rebuild the country's economic strength- had not intention of waging war on big business. | • 30th June 1934- Hitler ordered SS to murder over 50 of the SA's top leaders, including Rohm and settled old scores by killing Gustav von Kahr, Gregor Strasser and Kurt von Schleicher. • Outside of Germany it was seen as a shocking act of political gangsterism but inside it did no harm to Hitler's reputation as the SA leaders were deeply unpopular. |
| Key Dates of Gleichschaltung: • March 1933= Communist Part outlawed. •May 1933= Abolition of trade unions • June 1933= Social Democratic Party outlawed | •July 1933= Law against the formation of New Parties. • July 1933= Agreement (concordat) between Nazi Germany and the Vatican. • July 1933= Establishment of the Protestant 'Reich Church'. • 30 June- 2nd July 1934= Night of the Long Knives. |
| Propaganda used to create National Community: • Goebbels made Minister of Propaganda and National Enlightenment soon after March 1833 election. • Used posters/ slogans to promote sense of unity: 'The community before the individual.' •Germans urged to worship Hitler as the master- builder of the National Community and he exemplified the ideal of putting community before self. • Political rituals/ celebrations in form of rallies, marches, parades to create impression that a united Germany was behind Hitler. • Introduced Winter Aid programme- richer Germans encouraged to give money, food and clothing to poverty stricken 'national comrades.' | • Goebbels believed written word not as effective an instrument of propaganda as the spoken word or film- Nazis therefore made extensive use of radio and cinema to inspire feelings of solidarity among the German people. • Reich Chamber of Culture- only loyal Nazis allowed to join, so non-members could not get their work published or performed. • KDF 'Strength through joy' was part of the German Labour Front which replaced trade unions and offered wide range of leisure and cultural opportunities, e.g. sponsored cheap travel (holidays)- 1938 was the Volkswagen 'people's car' scheme, where over 300,000 payed 5 marks a week yet never received the car. |
| Persecution of Jews- key dates: • 1 April 1933= One day boycott of Jewish shops • 7 April 1933= Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service. • 10 May 1933= Public burning in Berlin of books by Jewish, Socialist etc. • 15 September 1935= Nuremburg Laws. • April 1938= Beginning of Goering's 'Aryanisation' policy. • 9 November 1938= Kristallnacht; billion-mark fine imposed on the Jewish community. | Why were Jews targeted: • According to Nazis Jews were a race, not a religious group and were bent on world domination. • Claimed Jews would resort to any means to further their objectives (using communism as a front to hide behind.)- Hitler believed in the existence of a 'Jewish-Bolshevik conspiracy' to take over the world. • Believed Jews had conspired to win control of Germany's financial institutions. |
| Germany's Jewish Community: • 1933- only 0.7% of Germany's population was Jewish (only small minority, numbers falling.) • Did not dominate German business as the Nazis alleged- actually under-represented in upper reaches of industry and finance. • Assimilated community- members saw no incompatibility between their faith and nationality; 1914-1918 war 100,000 of Jewish community served in German army and 12,000 died in action. | Persecution of Jews 1933-39: Earliest moves vicious and uncoordinated; spring 1933 SA units beat up Jews, destroyed Jewish property. •1 April 1933- Hitler ordered one day boycott of Jewish shops. • 7 April 1933- Nazi government issued Law for the Restoration of Professional Civil Service= ordered dismissal of all non- Aryan civil servants. • 1935 returned to attack, two new anti- Jewish laws at annual party rally at Nuremburg= Reich Citizenship Law (deprived Jews of German citizenship and Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honour outlawed marriage between Jews and non-Jews no sexual relations.) |
| • 1936- Berlin Olympics; Hitler saw it as an opportunity to showcase the Nazi regime so anti-Semitic activity was toned down, with all signs of anti-Semitism removed in public places. • 1937-38- Himmler, head of SS, argued Germany should be made 'Jew-free' by terrorising Jews into leaving the country. • Herman Goering favoured policy of 'Aryanisation.' • 9 November 1938 after murder of German diplomat in Paris by Jew Goebbels launched the pogrom (Kristallnacht)= at least 90 Jews killed, 200 synagogues destroyed, 8,000 businesses ruined. • Result of Kristallnacht= Decree Excluding Jews from German Economic Life, fine of 1 billion marks on Jews, 30,000 sent to concentration camps. | • BEFORE 1939: Nazis' anti-Jewish policies before 1939 were unsystematic and chaotic. • No settled policy- competition between rival approaches (Himmler/Goering.) • Initiatives sometime cut across each other- Goering furious at Goebbels after Kristallnacht as he could not strip Jews of their property if it had been destroyed. • Intensity of persecution varied- quiet years in 1934 and 1936-7. |
| • 1939-41: Nazi Jewish policy changed in two important ways= Germany now at war (gained 5 million Jews from invasion of Poland and Russia) and in occupied Russia and Poland Nazis could operate out of public view. • Nazi policy moved first from mass murder to systematic genocide. | • Sept 1939= SS Einsatzgruppen followed German armies into Poland and killed over 50,000 Polish civilians- many (but not all) were Jews. • Late 1939 onwards Poland's Jews herded into ghettoes; a million died due to malnutrition and disease. • Summer 1941 Einsatzgruppen shot over a million Jews in Soviet Russia. • Mid 1941= decided that Jews in other parts of Nazi-occupied Europe would be taken to extermination camps. |
| Other persecutions= 35,000 Roma and Sinti 'gypsies' excluded from National Community, as they were stereotyped as work shy, criminal and non-Aryan. •After 1933 they were persecuted, many sent to concentration camps and the Nuremburg Laws of 1935 also applied to them. • After 1939, persecution gave way to genocide- estimates of the number killed vary between 220,000 and 500,000. • Homosexuals excluded from community on the grounds that they were 'deviants' failing in their duty to the Third Reich by not producing children= 50,000 German men arrested for homosexual offences in the 1930s and around 15,000 ended up in concentration camps. | Other persecutions= mentally ill and physically disable were deemed unfit to belong to the National Community because they were 'genetically defective', a source of weakness (based on eugenics movement theories). They were seen as a burden on society- 'useless mouths' (Hitler.) •July 1933= Law for the Prevention of hereditarily diseased offspring provided the compulsory sterilisation of 400,000 people in this category. • Launched Operation T-4 in 1939 (euthanasia) which targeted seriously ill mental hospital in-patients= between 1939-41 70,000 were killed but was halted after public criticism by Clemens von Galen. |
| Overall success: • Appealed to middle class Germans wearied by the squabbles and divisions of the 1920s. • Working class appreciated the leisure opportunities available through the 'Strength through Joy' organisation and the increased holiday entitlements they received in the Nazi era, as well as Nazi attempts to improve factory conditions- the very poor benefited from the 'Winter Aid' scheme. • Goebbels depiction of the Fuhrer in Nazi propaganda as the selfless leader of a unified nation paid dividends. • There was little active resistance to Nazi rule in the 1930s; no more than small attempts of KPD/SPD to keep going as underground organisations, protests made by church leaders and the emergence of a handful of dissident youth groups- limited due to fear of Nazi secret police forces. •HOWEVER does not mean all Germans were enthusiastic supporters of Nazi rule- some engaged in acts of minor dissent, such as refusing to salute, whereas others maintained 'inner emigration.' | Overall failure: ULTIMATELY the attempt to construct a Volksgemeinschaft was a failure. • German society did not become more equal, as differences in wealth and power remained- Nazis said the community was not about being equal but about them being equally valued, making them vulnerable to the charge that the they made were purely cosmetic. • Failed to integrate the working class into the community- enjoyed KdF scheme but did not mean they were wholly won over by the Nazi regime- 'propaganda varnish' (historian Ian Kershaw.) • Research shows religious affiliations and regional identities remained strong in 1930s Germany. • Nazi attempts to foster sense of unity by scapegoating and persecuting Jews and other minorities were largely unsuccessful- may not have defended minorities due to fear of SS terror but this does not mean all of them viewed what went on with enthusiasm. |
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