create a German Air force and in March 1935 he said that he was going
The Soviet Union and Nazi Germany in the 1930s as Totalitarian States A totalitarian state usually refers to a country in which the central government has total control over almost all aspects of people's life. Main features include an infallible leader, one-party rule, elitism, strict party discipline, purges against enemies and political dissidents, planned economy, strong armaments, indoctrination, encouragement of nationalism, an official doctrine that everybody has to believe, and absolute obedience of individuals to the State, etc.
Article 231 of the Treaty of Versailles reads: "The Allied and Associated Governments affirm and Germany accepts the responsibility of Germany and her allies for causing all the loss and damage to which the Allied and Associated Governments and their nationals have been subjected as a consequence of the war imposed upon them by the aggression of Germany and her allies."(1) These words fueled the Nazi Party's rise to power and ignition of a Second World War. After World War I, the Allies dissected, punished, and disarmed Germany to prevent the outbreak of another brutal war. Consequently, German lands, acquired by Nazi force, were given back to their original countries, and Germany's army was reduced to 100,000 men. In addition, Germany was responsible for paying immense retribution to all of the Allied Forces, causing German money to lose its value. The result of the Treaty of Versailles was a weakened Germany, both martially and economically. The Weimar Republic, a liberal government set up after Germany's defeat, was inefficient in handling Germany's massive problems. Germany's ill state was the curtain call for a change in the Weimar administration, and Adolf Hitler led the push for a transformation. Once in power, Hitler designed laws that redefined the responsibilities of the citizen. The citizens' duties would allow the Germany to regain her autonomy in the eyes of the world. Although the citizens worked to increase Germany's overrall welfare, the State did not attempt to improve individual well-being. The State held one responsibility. It must protect the lives of its people, so that the people can, in turn, carry out their duties for the S...
Totalitarianism in Pre-War Europe Totalitarianism refers to a system of government and parliamentary ideology that was in many of the countries of Europe between the years 1918-1939. This period saw many ideologies being developed and put into practice, and many even blame the rise of totalitarian states and aggressive, autocratic leaders for the Second World War. Totalitarianism is often associated with regimes in which there is one leader and party unquestionably in power with no significant rivals. In a totalitarian state, the ideology of the party is often firmly indoctrinated.
To this day it remains incomprehensible to justify a sensible account for the uprising of the Nazi Movement. It goes without saying that the unexpectedness of a mass genocide carried out for that long must have advanced through brilliant tactics implemented by a strategic leader, with a promising policy. Adolf Hitler, a soldier in the First World War himself represents the intolerant dictator of the Nazi movement, and gains his triumph by arousing Germany from its devastated state following the negative ramifications of the war. Germany, “foolishly gambled away” by communists and Jews according to Hitler in his chronicle Mein Kampf, praises the Nazi Party due to its pact to provide order, racial purity, education, economic stability, and further benefits for the state (Hitler, 2.6). Albert Speer, who worked closely under Hitler reveals in his memoir Inside the Third Reich that the Führer “was tempestuously hailed by his numerous followers,” highlighting the appreciation from the German population in response to his project of rejuvenating their state (Speer, 15). The effectiveness of Hitler’s propaganda clearly served its purpose in distracting the public from suspecting the genuine intentions behind his plan, supported by Albert Camus’ insight in The Plague that the “townsfolk were like everybody else, wrapped up in themselves; in other words, they were humanists: they disbelieved in pestilences”(Camus, 37). In this sense “humanists” represent those who perceive all people with virtue and pureness, but the anti-humanist expression in the metaphor shows the blind-sidedness of such German citizens in identifying cruel things in the world, or Hitler. When the corruption within Nazism does receive notice, Hitler at that point given h...
The Holocaust was a terrible time. This terrible time was all a plan, led by Adolf Hitler. Adolf Hitler was sent to prison for treason. Even after he got out, he worked with the government of Germany. He even rose to be the Dictator of Germany, with the luck of the last leader's passing. He blamed others for his "struggle." He passed laws, to make it legal to descriminate and to single out groups of people, races, and religions.
Historians argue that in Nazism, ‘the value of the totalitarian concept seems extremely limited’ as they compare the regime to other totalitarian states. They state that Nazism could not have been totalitarianism because it wasn’t as organized and monolithically structured as Stalin’s Russia. The Nazism ideology was a mere scheme of self-fulfilment and lacked the methodical theory of Marxism. Under no circumstance was there a level of state possession and influence over the economy in comparison to that which developed in Stalin’s Russia. In spite of the Nazi Party’s dominance over state affairs, authority was divided between themselves and a quantity of major power groups including the industrialists and the armed forces, while Stalin’s Communist Party possessed unconditional power over all Russian state affairs. A German historian stated that Hitler ‘...brought about a state of affairs in which the various autonomous authorities ranged alongside and against one another...’ Hitler relied on a level of popularity from the nation acquired through promoting himself through propaganda to maintain his leadership. There are no implications that Stalin sought popular appeal to maintain his power. Generally, historians have debated the weak dictatorship of Hitler but never have they contemplated ...
The foreign policy of Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1945 was different than any other country during that era. Their distinct approach to ruling came from the nation’s many diverse philosophies. Furthermore, every basis of motivation and control came from the beliefs in which they so strictly followed. Many aspects, such as, communism, fascism, and nationalism, influenced these ideologies.
In response to the factional society of the Weimar Republic, Nazism endeavored to create a new, more-unified society; an ideal national community, populated by an ethnically and culturally homogenous citizenry dogmatically obedient to the theories, laws, and policies of the central governing apparatus (the Nazi Hierarchy and ultimately Hitler). To attain its aims, Nazism employed a variety of tactics: laws were enacted to ethnically purify the population (e.g., the 1935 Nuremberg Laws), sentiments were propagated with the intention of uniting the population behind its leadership (i.e., the Führer Principle), and policies were instituted to ensure total cultural, political, and economic unity (e.g., the 1933 implementation of “Gleichschaltung”). In addition, Nazism utilized enormous amounts of written and oral propaganda to reinforce its principles and accompany its measures, rendering them more palatable to the public and consequently increasing their success, “Local cooperation and leadership were essential to the success of Coordination. So was a bombardment of propaganda from party newspapers and publicists…[e.g., Dr. Goebbels, der Angriff, etc.]” (Bergen 65).
Frei, Norbert. “People’s Community and War: Hitler’s Popular Support.” The Third Reich Between Vision and Reality: New Perspectives on German History, 1918-1945. Ed. Hans Mommsen. Oxford: Berg - Oxford International Publishers, Ltd., 2001. 59-77.
The Aims and the Results of the Attempts by the Nazi Regime to Transform German Society
The Nazi regime, beginning in 1924 and moving through till 1945, accomplished the perversion of an entire peoples’ principle through the sustained and all-encompassing use of propaganda. Without outside influence the German people were exposed to an influx of Nazi co-ordinated information that perpetrated no views but their own; the acceptance of views by those around them prevented free-will through a semi-national belief in the ideology of one party.
Following the beginning of the Second World War, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany and Joseph Stalin’s Soviet Union would start what would become two of the worst genocides in world history. These totalitarian governments would “welcome” people all across Europe into a new domain. A domain in which they would learn, in the utmost tragic manner, the astonishing capabilities that mankind possesses. Nazis and Soviets gradually acquired the ability to wipe millions of people from the face of the Earth. Throughout the war they would continue to kill millions of people, from both their home country and Europe. This was an effort to rid the Earth of people seen as unfit to live in their ideal society. These atrocities often went unacknowledged and forgotten by the rest of the world, leaving little hope for those who suffered. Yet optimism was not completely dead in the hearts of the few and the strong. Reading Man is Wolf to Man: Surviving the Gulag by Janusz Bardach and Survival in Auschwitz by Primo Levi help one capture this vivid sense of resistance toward the brutality of the German concentration and Soviet work camps. Both Bardach and Levi provide a commendable account of their long nightmarish experience including the impact it had on their lives and the lives of others. The willingness to survive was what drove these two men to achieve their goals and prevent their oppressors from achieving theirs. Even after surviving the camps, their mission continued on in hopes of spreading their story and preventing any future occurrence of such tragic events. “To have endurance to survive what left millions dead and millions more shattered in spirit is heroic enough. To gather the strength from that experience for a life devoted to caring for oth...
The Nazi government achieved there power through fear from the terror of the SS and Gestapo, and the feared Police State is a characteristic of totalitarian States.
Within Nazi government, Hitler acted as the final source of authority, which serves as evidence against the notion that Hitler was ‘weak’. Having consolidated power by 1934 Hitler was, at least theoretically, omnipotent, being Chancellor, Head of State and “supreme judge of the nation”. However, the notion that Nazi government systematically pursued the clear objectives of the Fuhrer is challenged by the reality of Nazi government structure. It has been widely accepted by historians that the Nazi State was a chaotic collection of rival power blocs. Mommsen’s explanation that this was the result of Hitler’s apathy towards government a...