How widespread and dangerous was Youth opposition in the Third Reich?

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Simon Haug                                                                        Internal Assessment

How widespread and dangerous was Youth opposition in the Third Reich?

Initially, Youth opposition in the Third Reich was uncommon, as in the beginning Nazism was a popular and energetic movement, especially with young people. Only a few saw Hitler's real intention to militarise youth and start a world war. This is why from 1933 to 1939, i.e. in peacetime, Nazi youth organisations were popular; in contrast, in wartime they became increasingly unpopular and hence opposition grew. Although this opposition was reported on and treated severely, a real danger did not radiate from it, as only a few groupings had political intentions and were far from overthrowing or placing lasting damage on the regime. In addition there were only local groupings and not one big organisation resisting Nazism, which on the one hand made it difficult for the regime to target resistance, on the other a political change impossible. Likewise, this essay will regard youth as those born starting from 1915; why this is significant will be explained in the following.

Initial Youth opposition in Nazi Germany was small in peacetime, because the surrounding did not allow youth to oppose Nazism, for any free time in the life of a German youngster was pre-occupied with activities, camps or sports. Hence any opportunity to think or to learn about different ways of thinking and different values, such as democracy, freedom or humanity, was not available to most youngsters. Also, education in school was under Nazi control and had indoctrinating purposes. Although subjects as German, History and Physical Education had a greater emphasise in the Nazi timetable, than subjects as Maths and foreign languages, a lot of indoctrination took place unconsciously as shown in the following extract of a Maths book: “…According to estimates, there are 300,000 mentally ill, epileptics, etc. in care. (b) How much do these people cost to keep in total, at a cost of 4 RM a day? (c) How many marriage loans at 1000 RM each…could be granted from this money?” This clearly shows that even subjects no primarily concerned with ideology, as Maths, were “Nazified”.

Furthermore, the regime’s handling of general opposing factors, as the banning and `re-educating` of other political ways of thinking, as well as the policy of Gleichschaltung, which was valid for civil servants, as teachers, and for all other parts of society, i.e. parents, and the awareness of spies and the regime’s brutality, so to say the factor threat, made it almost impossible for general opposition to grow and exist. Furthermore, many adults saw in Nazi aggression a discipline, for which the party had been elected and which should erase the traces of decadent Weimar Germany, as Albert Speer points out: “It must have been during these months that my mother saw a S.A. parade…The sight of discipline in a time of chaos, the impression of energy in an atmosphere of universal hopelessness, seems to have won her over also.” Additionally the indoctrination of youth in the Hitler Youth (HJ), the Bund Deutscher Mädchen (BDM), as main bodies, at school and anywhere else in public, as well as the compulsion of attending weekly to hostel evenings (Heimabende) and camps in holidays made youth opposition unlikely. The context of these meetings was a constant indoctrination of Nazi ideology with the glorification of war and with names of `German heroes` as passwords and mottoes of the day as “To be one nation is the religion of our time” and “Nation, fly again!”. Again, this shows the sub-conscious indoctrination, where the Nazis saw in everything something political. Hitler promised adult Germans with a hurt national pride after the loss of the First World War and the Treaty of Versailles the re-building of the `Old Glory`. Strength and discipline were needed for that. In addition, through their early economic success, by bringing almost every German back to work, the Nazi regime also encouraged even more liberal or democratic adults to agree to Nazism, and hence reduced opposition at home, which could have been transferred on children, to a minimum.

Likewise, the HJ was at the beginning an attractive organisation, as recognised by a SPD report from early summer of 1934: “Youth is still in favour of the system: the novelty, the drill, the uniform, the camp life, the fact that school and parental home take back seat compared to the community of young people- all this is marvellous.”, for firstly it gave youngsters the opportunity to go into the countryside for hiking or singing at a campfire, which was attractive due to the comradeship and its apparent high ideals, as a Hitler Youth leader pointed out: “What I liked about the HJ was the comradeship…. What boy isn’t fired by being presented with high ideals such as comradeship, loyalty and honour”. Secondly, it gave them an unknown form of status, power and pride, through uniforms, daggers and promotion, as well as through the importance, they thought they had. In addition through the merging of what was called bündische Jugend before 1933, the Hitler Youth and the BDM, with the exception of Catholic organisations until 1939, had a `monopoly` on youth organisation. Furthermore, the number of 10-18 year olds organised in the Hitler youth increased from 7,529,000 at the end of 1932 to 8,870,000 at the beginning of 1939. For many there was not the need to oppose this regime. Practically those being called youth in war times (dating back until year-group 1915), were 18 or younger when the Nazi party seized power in 1933 and hence were bound to go to the HJ or other successive organisations, as the Deutsche Arbeiterfront, and did not learn from or about the positive aspects of the Weimar Republic. Consequently they accepted as truth, what they became indoctrinated in school, at leisure-time and sometimes at home, which made youth opposition towards the Nazi regime very unlikely and rare. Likewise, the Nazi regime did not only intend to get only few youngsters into their organisations, but all of them, as Reichspropagandaminister Joseph Göbbels puts it: „It is not enough for people to more or less reconciled to our regime, to be persuaded to adopt a neutral attitude towards us, rather we want to work on people until they have capitulated to us, until they grasp ideologically that what is happening in Germany today not only must be accepted, but also can be accepted“. To the regime youth education was part of the preparation for war. However, enthusiasm for Nazism and the HJ largely depended on the quality of local leadership. A good local leadership was usually uncommon, for “military and labour service removed many potential leaders, and middle class pupils…often proved unsuitable leaders”. In addition vast numbers of HJ leader were called into the armed forces and thus especially in rural areas the Hitler Youth almost disappeared and rather attended the Church, as shown in the example of the town of Schnüpflingen in rural Württemberg in 1944. A Hitler Youth leader in Wiblingen (also rural Württemberg) went for a official visit to Schnüpflingen and reported: “When I appeared on the parade ground…at eight o’clock in the evening, there were hardly any young people there and I discovered that they were still in church. It only remained for me to wait until the church service had finished…The mayor even encouraged the boy in his attitude [against the HJ]… ” The local Nazi branch leader commented on this by saying “There can be no question of Schnüpflingen being a rowdy village… Nowadays it is very difficult to lead such a black [i.e. Catholic] local branch…but it must be pointed out that it was all right when we had a local leader. Unfortunately, at the moment we don’t have a suitable boy…” Therefore, local resistance against Nazism was promoted by adults (the mayor) and due to the lack of a good local HJ leader. This incident being reported in 1944 clearly shows the growing opposition against the regime, as the war came to an end.

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The large majority of juveniles, however, accepted and participated in Nazism, although as with any generalisation, there were exceptions. These few organisations resisting Nazism, as the “White Rose”, the “Swing Youth” and the “Edelweißpiraten”, which opposed the Nazi regime, only formed and became politically active during the war and were in proportion extremely small. Despite the fact that the “Edelweißpiraten” killed the chief of the Gestapo in Cologne in 1944, a real danger did not radiate from them; neither did it from others. Those groupings were usually founded to celebrate a different way of living outside the conformity of the ...

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