the radicalisation of the state Flashcards
(92 cards)
What were the three distinct phases in the development of the Nazi regime?
- The legal revolution 1933-34
- Creating the new Germany 1934-37
- The radicalisation of the State 1938-39
Who did Hitler depend on when he came to power in 1933?
His political allies, he could not completely prevent the radical SA’s violence but controlled it as much as he could.
How did Hitler consolidate his power?
By legal means.
By what time had the Nazi regime secured themselves?
By August 1934.
Why did Hitler still not have a free hand when securing his power?
He still worried about public opinion at home and abroad.
What is an example of Hitler being worried about public opinion?
The Olympic Games in Berlin 1935-36, where antisemitism was put under wraps with Nazi propaganda projecting an image of a civilized society.
Why was the Nazi regime much stronger at the end of 1937 than it had been in 1933?
The economy had recovered, the SS completely controlled the police system, Hitler felt that Germany was militarily ready for war.
What bold steps did Hitler take in 1938/39 that he would not have taken earlier?
He took control of the army and sacked its 2 most important commanders, Blomberg and Fritsch.
He also let loose radical persecution of ‘racial enemies’.
What was Social Darwinism?
The adaptation of Darwin’s scientific principles of natural biological selection and applying it to human society in order to justify racial superiority and theory of eugenics.
What were an influential group of scientists seeking to do in Sweden?
To eliminate disabilities through population planning and birth control.
Many of these ideas incorporated into Nazi ideology.
How did Hitler view humanity?
As a hierarchy of races:
- Jews, black people and the Slavs were inferior
- Aryan people of northern Europe were the master race
What was it vital for the Aryan race to maintain in order to achieve success in their racial struggle?
Purity.
How did Himmler come to later justify the killing of Jewish women and children as well as man?
Hitler was decided on an all-or-nothing basis where there would be no compromises. Conversion to Christianity, Medals won in the First World War made no difference, Hitler believed that they were a ‘germ that had to be eliminated’.
How could a person qualify as a member of the Volk?
They had to be a true German, both in terms of loyalty and racial purity.
What was essential in protecting the Volk?
The ruthless elimination of all un-German elements, especially the Jews.
What was the best way to define the Volk?
Identifying the racial enemies to be excluded from it rather than those who naturally belonged to it.
What were members of the Volk expected to be?
Genetically healthy, socially efficient and politically reliable.
What were the 3 divisions that the Nazis made to identify who were to be excluded from the Volksgemeinschaft?
- Political enemies
- Asocials (people who did not fit social norms of the Nazis
- Racial enemies (different races and those with hereditary defects)
What is the meaning of lebensraum?
Living Space.
Where had the idea of lebensraum originated from?
The later 19th Century where many European thinkers had proposed opening up space for the expanding populations of the superior white race.
Where did many Germans argue that their destiny was?
In the east where they were to conquer inferior Slav peoples in Poland and the former Russian Empire to gain access to fertile farmland and raw materials.
What did Hitler’s concept on lebensraum have a particular focus on?
Race, would provide a battleground for a war of racial annihilation, wiping out inferior Slav races.
Why were the mentally ill and physically disabled considered to be biological outsiders from the Volksgemeinschaft?
Because their hereditary defects made them a threat to the future of the Aryan race.
What did Nazi ideology on the issues of mental and physical disability borrow mindset from?
The ‘science’ of Eugencis
