Nazism was a version of the fascist ideology that thrived across Germany in chaotic political and economic conditions of the 1920s and 1930s, and Adolf Hitler was the political figure at the epicenter of this ideology. Many scholars have sought to explain the factors that led to the growth of Nazism in Germany at this time, particularly anger over defeat in World War II and the 1919 Treaty of Versailles, as well as the great inflation of 1923 and the Great Depression that began in 1929. This paper will therefore examine some of the latest research and literature about the rise to power of Hitler and the Nazis. It paper will not focus on the early life and biography of Hitler but rather on the rise of Nazism and how it paved way for the rise of dictatorial leadership in Germany. It will also describe the brutal regime imposed on Germany and, after 1939 the rest of Europe, by Hitler, who was clearly an extremely ruthless and determined leader whose rise to dictatorial power ultimately led to the destruction of his country and the deaths of tens of millions of people. Although he did believe that his own version of ‘German socialism’ would lead to the end of unemployment and improved living standards for the masses, in reality his police state completely crushed all opposition and deprived the population of basic civil rights. His arrogance, aggression and desire for total power over the world finally led to the defeat and failure of Nazism and his own death in 1945.
Hitler and the Nazis never believed that Germany would flourish as a multicultural or democratic society, but rather that it would be governed by one Leader, one Party and one Volk or Aryan race. Only then would the economy revive and the country would begin to regain the military power and international stature it had lost in 1918. Although the Nazis received over 40% of the vote in the 1932 elections, they never had a clear 50% majority to take over the Reichstag (parliament) and come to power that way, not even in coalition with the more ‘bourgeois’ Right-wing party, the German Nation People’s Party (DNVP). Only through an arrangement with Franz Papen and Hindenburg did he become chancellor of January 30, 1933, but non-Nazis still held most of the Cabinet seats (History Channel 2013). This did not matter, however, since Hitler rarely even called cabinet meetings but rather ruled directly through Nazi Party organizations, which ‘coordinated’ and took over the state bureaucracy, the media, the education system and the police. All other independent political parties and labor unions were abolished and their leaders often exiled or sent to concentration camps. Under the provisions of the Enabling Act, which was forced through the Reichstag in 1933, Hitler assumed dictatorial powers, and after the death of Hindenburg in 1934, he combined the office of Chancellor and President into that of Fuehrer of the Third Reich. Boycotts, murders and persecution of the Jews began immediately after the Nazis came to power, and one of their first acts was to expel them from the civil service and the education system. Under the Nuremberg Laws of 1935, they were deprived of their German citizenship completely, but even this was only a prelude of their ultimate fate (Livre 2013). Hitler had spoken many times in his career about his plans to exterminate the Jews and other groups he regarded as racially or genetically ‘inferior’, although this physical genocide did not begin until World War II.
Hitler’s fanaticism and obsession with power caused him to plunge the world into war in 1939, which ultimately led Germany to total destruction in 1945. Nazism was defeated at a terrible cost, but Hitler committed suicide in his Berlin Bunker rather than face trial as a war criminal. Of course, the single worst atrocity that the Nazi regime committed, and for which it will always be remembered in history, was the murder of six million Jews, but many millions of others were also enslaved and exterminated (Livre 2013). Nazism may have temporarily ended the mass poverty and unemployment of the Great Depression, but by 1945 the economy of Germany was in ruins and most of its cities had been completely destroyed in bombing raids. Although Hitler and the Nazis complained about the harshness of the Versailles Treaty, this was mild compared to the punishment that the Allies imposed after 1945. It lost all of its territory east of the Oder River and then the remainder was divided into the countries of East and West Germany until 1990. Even Berlin was divided into two cities during this time, and millions of Germans were uprooted and deported back to their homeland from all over Europe. No one will ever be able to calculate the economic destruction or the reparations that were extracted after 1945, but these were far greater that Germany ever experienced after World War I. Hitler had promised to make the Germans the most powerful nation in the world, but he left them the most feared and hated one, with a type of guilt imposed on them because of all the war crimes and atrocities that could not be erased for generations.
WORKS CITED
History Channel. “Nazi Party” History.com Articles, Video, Pictures and Facts. History.com. N.P., N.D. Web. 22 June 2013.
Lee, Stephen. “Hitler and Nazi Germany” Questions and Analysis in History (2000): n. pag. Web. 14 June 2013. http://wnlibrary.org/Portabel%20Documents/H/Hitler/Hitler%20And%20Nazi%20Germany.pdf
Livre, Hatchette. “Nazism of Adolf Hitler”. MEMO – Travel through History. N.P., N.D. Web. 22 June 2013.
Martin, C. Paul. "What Are the Causes of the Rise of Nazism?" eHow. N.P., N.D. Web. 22 June 2013.
Raver, Edward. "The Rise of the Nazi Party - Yahoo! Voices - voices.yahoo.com." Yahoo! Contributor Network. N.P., N.D. Web. 22 June 2013.
"Rise of Hitler: The Republic Collapses." The History Place. N.P., N.D. Web. 22 June 2013.
