THE ELIMINATION OF THE OPPOSITION
Gleichschaultung – “Nazify” government jobs
The Nazis began to destroy or take over any last source of opposition. They called this process Gleichschaultung and it was a deliberate attempt to “Nazify” Germany. Only people whom the Nazis could rely on, would remain in important jobs. The SA rebelled and used the first informal concentration camps, set up after the Reichstag fire, for prisoners of the Gleichschaultung whom they did not trust to the ordinary police.
A one-party state: The political parties were also “Nazify”. The Communists had been outlawed after the Reichstag fire, the Social Democrats were banned on June 1933, the small liberal parties (DDP, DVP and the conservative DNVP) disbanded themselves. Hitler had no more opposition, and by the middle of 1933 he secured his position from any political threat in Germany.
The threat of the SA: Inside his own party, Hitler had the threat from the SA. In 1930, Ernst Rohm was appointed leader of the SA to bring discipline to his private army. By 1934 the SA was huge and clearly had the ability to overthrow Hitler. Rohm and the SA seemed to be making demands that made Hitler uncomfortable. They believed that they had helped a ·first revolution” against the Left and some now thought that it was time to do a second one against the Forces of the Right. They expected some reward for their efforts and mocked even the local Nazi Party officials calling them “Christmas Trees Men” for their uniforms.
The SA upset the Army: The SA suggested to be integrated to the Army that disliked the idea as they did not like the prospect of being put under Rohm’s command. The SA and the Army were coming into direct conflict. The SA persecuted their enemies and used weapons in the demilitarized zone of the Rhineland, something that the army had been careful to observe.
The SA gains dangerous enemies: Hitler needed the support of the army to be appointed President and have total control. He needed the skill of the army officers if he was to achieve his long term aims of expansion beyond Germany’s borders. The leaderships and abilities of the SA would be no substitute or experienced army commanders in the battlefield. Rohm the leader of the SA was gaining power in the Nazi regime and the SS, Hitler´s bodyguard leaded by Himmler was put under Rohm’s command.
Hitler takes action against the SA: Provocations and accusations increased the tension between the SA and the regular army through 1934. On 29 June Hitler decided to act to nip the SA problem. He called a meeting of the SA leaders near Munich for the next day. The army and SS were put on alert. Hitler flew to Munich and early in the morning personally woke Rohm and arrested him at gunpoint. Rohm was taken to prison and the code word Kolibri sent by Hitler to SS units throughout Germany, started the systematic arrest and murder of the SA leaders. One of the SS officers shoot Rohm and both von Schleicher and Gustav von Kahr who had double-crossed him in 1923 were killed. On August 1934, President Hindenburg died and the powers of President were joined with those of the Chancellor, Adolf Hitler.
THE NAZI POLICE STATE
After 1933 the Nazis made Germany a “police state” which meant that the police had the power to act as they thought right and arrest everyone without trial. The backbone of the Nazi police state was the SS
The growth of the power of the SS: The SS was created in 1933 as Hitler´s body guards. In 1929, the new leader Hienrich Himmler was determined to make them into an elite and formidable force. In 1930, the SS was separated from the SA and they became Nazi Party’s internal police force, responsible for finding and removing anyone disloyal to Hitler. Himmler recruited only those who could probe their Aryan race. The SS gave unquestioning obedience to the Fuhrer. They were determined to destroy their enemies (Jews, Communists and homosexuals and criminals).
THE NAZI PROPAGANDA
Nazis preferred propaganda heard rather than read and that was the reason why they did mass meetings, preferably held at night when Hitler believed people would be more easily persuaded.
Goebbels: He was the propaganda chief, responsible for putting Hitler´s ideas about propaganda into practice. The most important new tool of the Nazi propaganda was the radio. Hitler believed it reached the German people directly. The Nazis did a factory to build cheap radios and made sure that these only had a limited range that would pick up Nazi information only. Loudspeakers were put up in restaurants, offices, factories, cafes and even in the streets!. The Nazis found very difficult to control German newspapers as there were many so they used the Nazi Party’s own publishing company, Eher Verlag, to gain ownership of the newspapers and Socialists and Communists papers were destroyed. On October 1933 the Nazis passed the “Editors Law” which reduced the power of the newspaper owners and gave the editors responsibility for what went in the newspaper.
Nazis made the news: Nazis created new public celebrations such as rallies, marches and rituals. The Nazis encouraged Germans to use the Hail Hitler greeting, the Nazi salute, and wear military style uniforms and popularized a Nazi song. People were punished for not having the Nazi flag on their homes.
NAZI CULTURAL LIFE
Every cultural activity such as art, theatre and music had to show Nazi ideas. The Propaganda Ministry supervised the Reich Chamber of Culture. Its job was to make sure that all cultural activities helped mould the mind of Germans to Nazi believes. Performances with music composed by Jews, were banned. German music had to be patriotic, military and popular. Only plays written by traditional playwrights like Shakespeare could be performed because they were acceptable to the Nazis. Nazi Germany was no place for talented writers. Goebbels organized the raiding of libraries and seizure of books of writers who were not approved. Art could not be modern not abstract. Cinema was the only area less restricted as Goebbels considered that if it was too controlled, Germans would be put off but however, all the scripts were checked by the Ministry. Sport and physical exercise were a major youth of the Hitler Youth activities. The major sport events during the Nazi period were the Olympic games in 1936. Hitler used it as an opportunity for propaganda. Cultural life in the Third Reich was rigidly controlled. The best of Nazi culture was only mediocre; it had little free creativity or originality. In this sense Goebbels succeeded; culture could not be used for criticism of the Nazis. However, the Nazis did not succeed in using the arts to create a permanent Nazi outlook on life in the minds of the German people.
THE NAZIS AND THE JEWS
Hitler had an obsessive hatred of Jewish people and from 1933 he was able to use his power to persecute the, Anti-Semitism became Government policy.
Laws against the Jews: These represented that Jews were banned from Government jobs, they were forbidden to join the army and so could not serve their own country. Marriage between a jew and a non-Jew was prohibited and any sexual relations between these was a criminal and imprisonable offence. The Law “Reich Citizenship” removed the rights of Jews as German citizens. They could not vote and the law made them “aliens”, “guests” in their own country. In 1936, Jews were banned from professional jobs and only Aryan doctors were allowed to treat Aryan patients. From 1938, all Jews had to use new names in their signatures, men added the name “Israel” and women “Sarah”. Passport now had a large red letter J stamped in them.
Kristallnacht
On 7 November 1938 a young Polish Jew walked into the German Embassy in Paris and shot the first official he met. The death of the officials gave Goebbels the opportunity to win favor with Hitler. He arranged a pogrom – an all out assault on Jewish property, shops, homes and synagogues. So many windows were smashed in the campaign so this night was known as the “Crystal Night”. About 100 Jews were killed and 20000 sent to concentration camps. This was not well seen by Germans. By 1928, Jewish children were banned from ordinary German schools.
The SS take over
Hermann Goering had been happy to make Jewish money to support the German economy. But in 1928 his authority over the Jews was challenged by the SS. Himmler was issuing orders restricting the lives and movements of Jews in Germany. His wish was to eliminate the Jews completely from Germany. As Goering had achieved his aim of their wealth, his interest in them declined. On January 1939, he handed to the SS the practical responsibility of removing them from Germany by forced emigration. At this time, Nazis do not seem to have considered the mass slaughter of Jews, they wanted the other countries to take Jews as refugees.
The Second World War
With the outbreak of war, the persecution of German Jews increased. On September 1939 Jews were subject to a curfew. By 1940, clothes and food for Jews was reduced. The outbreak of war in September 1939 changed Nazis attitudes to the Jews in to ways. First, it allowed more extreme treatment of the Jews without concern for world opinion. Secondly, the war increased the number of Jews under German control and removed the very areas that the Nazis had hoped to use for the forced emigration of Jews from Germany. The 3 million Polish Jews were the most pressing problem. Nazis experimented with the idea of gathering them all in one place in “Jewish reservations” or “Reich ghettos”. During 1940, the organized Jews ghettos in the cities of Poland. Many Jews died from starvation. Close to the ghettos the Nazis organized labour camps. They did not mind how many Jews died doing this hard physical work without adequate food because there were many more to take their places.
The invasion of Russia
With the invasion of Russia in 1941, Special Task Forces moved into Russia behind the advancing German armies to round up and kill Jews. Their orders made no distinction between Jews and Communists. Those picked out were marched to the outskirts of their villages, forced to dig their own graves and then shot. Jewish women and children were included in the executions. However the vast numbers of Jews in Germany and the newly occupied lands remained a problem for the Nazis. Himmler´s deputy was having difficulty deporting so many Jews.
The Final Solution
In 1941, a decision was taken by senior Nazi leaders to seek a permanent and final solution to the Jewish question. Although Goering signed the order, the initiative seems to have come from Himmler and the SS with Hitler´s approval. On January 1942, Heydrich summoned senior officials to Berlin to discuss the Jewish problem. They decided to start the extermination of all Jews in German territory. The first extermination camp was built and began operating in March 1942 on the eastern Polish border. By 1943, Jews from all over Europe were being transported to their deaths in these camps.
THE NAZIS AND YOUNGER PEOPLE
The Nazis believed that to control Germany’s future they had to influence the minds of young people in Germany. Adults were harder to influence than children. They aimed to make all young people loyal Nazis. Boys joined the DJ at the age of 10 and moved on to HJ - Hitler Youth – when they reached 14.
Nazi Youth organizations: The main purpose of the Hitler youth organizations was to indoctrinate young people with important Nazi ideas and values, therefore duty, obedience, honor, courage, strength, and ruthlessness were stressed, whereas peace, kindness, intellect, individuality and humanity despised. Boys were prepared to excel military type activities and the girls for motherhood. Both girls and boys were expected to take part in physical training. Young people were attracted by the exciting and interesting activities od the Youth movements. There were many outdoor events such as camping and hiking as well as sports. Also the military discipline and the songs that were frequent in military parades. The Youth groups were encouraged to do better at their training through competition with each other.
Forced to join?: The Hitler Youth Law of 1 December 1936 confirmed this state of affairs. The HJ was given equal status to home and school. The law made it virtually impossible to avoid joining Hitler Youth organizations. However, 25 March 1939, the Second Youth Hitler Law was passed and it made membership of the Hitler Youth and the “duty of youth service” to Germany, compulsory. Members of the Hitler Youth had to swear an oath loyalty to the Fuhrer.
Spying on teachers and parents: The Young people were a valuable way of checking up on society. They kept watch on their parents and made sure they were behaving and speaking in a war the Nazis would approve of and teachers were also checked.
THE NAZIS AND EDUCATION
The Nazis changed education that young people received in schools. The used the schools to produce good young Nazis.
The Nazis and the teachers: The teachers were persuaded by a mixture of propaganda and threat into joining the National Socialist Teachers League. By 1937, the 97% of the teaching profession had joined. Teachers had to be given a reference that they were good Nazis. They turned to the Nazis in the hope that their pay, status and conditions would be improved (they had been particularly hit by the cuts in wakes introduced during the economic crisis of 1929-1933). But they were soon disappointed as Hitler and the leading Nazis speeches showed that they had little respect for teachers and their payments were not improved.
Nazi changes to what is taught: The Nazis took control of the school. They picked out the subjects which would help them to get Nazi ideas across to young people. Those with physical handicaps were refused a secondary education. German language and literature work was carefully chosen and biology was to teach children about Nazis ideas on race. History was given great importance. The timetable of children was very strict; they went to school on Saturdays, all the days they had Sports, domestic science, race studies and German.