Key Terms - Germany, Russia, Italy, Japan

Question 1

Anschluss

Answer 1

The event in 1938 which incorporated the entirety of Austria into Nazi Germany.

Question 2

Anti-Semitism

Answer 2

Discrimination and prejudice against Jewish people.

Question 3

Aryan

Answer 3

The race that the Nazis saw as superior, generally consisting of those with northern European appearance.

Question 4

Autarky

Answer 4

The concept of economic self-sufficiency.

Question 5

der Führer

Answer 5

Literally ‘the leader’, used as Hitler’s main title and more broadly encapsulates the idea of an absolute leader with total power

Question 6

Führerprinzip

Answer 6

Literally ‘the leader’s principle’, part of Nazi propaganda which established Hitler’s total authority.

Question 7

Final Solution

Answer 7

Term given to the Holocaust: the systematic extermination of Jews.

Question 8

Gestapo

Answer 8

The Nazi secret police force, formed by Hermann Göring in 1933.

Question 9

Gleichschaltung

Answer 9

The name given to the process of ‘Nazify-ing’ Germany in all areas of life.

Question 10

Holocaust

Answer 10

The systematic elimination of six million Jews and other minorities (including gypsies, homosexuals and people of colour).

Question 11

Kristallnacht

Answer 11

Literally ‘Night of the Broken Glass’, refers to an event on 9-10th November 1937 where Jewish businesses and synagogues were pillaged, with government support for the violence.

Question 12

Lebensraum

Answer 12

Literally ‘living space’, refers to the need for Nazi Germany to expand its territory.

Question 13

Luftwaffe

Answer 13

The Nazi Air Force.

Question 14

Mein Kampf

Answer 14

Hitler’s book, written in prison after the failed Beer Hall Putsch of 1923, which set out his radical political and racial ideology.

Question 15

Reich

Answer 15

Literally ‘Empire’, used to refer to the Nazi government broadly, as they self-referred to the regime as the ‘Third Reich’.

Question 16

Reichstag

Answer 16

The German Parliament, also sometimes used to refer to the building which housed the Parliament, which famously burned down in 1933.

Question 17

SA

Answer 17

Also known as the brownshirts, this was the private Nazi army used in the early years of the regime as a tool of public intimidation. Famously led by Ernst Röhm, who was executed during the 1934 Night of the Long Knives.

Question 18

SD

Answer 18

The Nazi interior police force, responsible for intelligence services. Formed by Heinrich Himmler.

Question 19

Social Darwinism

Answer 19

Disproved racial evolutionary theory which argued that the Aryan race was the most evolved.

Question 20

SS

Answer 20

Short for the Schutzstaffel, Hitler’s personal guard which developed into the Nazi police force.

Question 21

Volksgemeinschaft

Answer 21

Literally ‘people’s community’, used for the ideal concept of the racially pure German population united against enemy races and political groups, such as communists.

Question 22

Wehrmacht

Answer 22

The name given to the German Army during WWII.

Question 23

Weimar Republic

Answer 23

The government which preceded the Nazis. They held power from 1918-1933, between the fall of the Imperial government and the start of the Nazi regime.

Question 24

Bolsheviks

Answer 24

The Bolshevik Party was the socialist party run by Vladimir Lenin that overthrew the Tsarist government in the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. They became the Soviets.

Question 25

Mensheviks

Answer 25

A competing communist party to the Bolsheviks (who lost a civil war to them right after WWI).

Question 26

Russo-Japanese War

Answer 26

Fought in 1905 between Russian and Japan over interests in Manchuria and Korea, Japan won causing revolutionary upheaval in Russia.

Question 27

Soviet

Answer 27

A ‘soviet’ is a small communist council, and the union of these councils formed the Soviet Union. Later on, ‘the Soviets’ became the common name used for the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU).

Question 28

Abyssinia

Answer 28

A North African region in modern-day Ethiopia which Mussolini invaded in 1935 as part of Fascist Italian Imperialism.

Question 29

Blackshirts

Answer 29

Mussolini’s domestic paramilitary group, consisting of armed squads whose uniform consisted of black shirts.

Question 30

Corporate State

Answer 30

Mussolini’s class-based system of government, where all members of society were organised into “corporations” subordinate to the state.

Question 31

Il Duce

Answer 31

Literally ‘the leader’, a term used to refer to Mussolini.

Question 32

Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis

Answer 32

Sometimes just referred to as ‘the Axis’, refers to the group of nations (Italy, Germany, Japan) who opposed the Allied forces in WWII.

Question 33

Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere

Answer 33

A sphere of influence in East Asia, designed to support Japanese expansionism in the region against the presence of European control.

Question 34

Japanese militarism

Answer 34

The idea in Japanese nationalism that a society must maintain strong armed forces, and that the military should be at the centre of the political and social arenas.

Question 35

Manchuria

Answer 35

A large geographical region North of China and South of Russia which Japan invaded in 1931.

Question 36

The Second Sino-Japanese War

Answer 36

Fought between Japan and China from 1937—1945 in response to increasing Japanese imperial aggression. The USA intervened to help China, leading to the famous bombing of Pearl Harbour.