The political views of Adolf Hitler have presented
historians and biographers with some difficulty.
His writings and methods were often adapted
to need and circumstance, although there were
some steady themes, including anti-semitism,
anti-communism, anti-parliamentarianism, German
Lebensraum ("living space"), belief in the
superiority of an "Aryan race" and an extreme
form of German nationalism.
Hitler personally claimed he was fighting
against Jewish Marxism.Hitler's political
views were formed during three periods: (1)
His years as a poverty-stricken young man
in Vienna and Munich prior to World War I,
during which he turned to nationalist-oriented
political pamphlets and antisemitic newspapers
out of distrust for mainstream newspapers
and political parties; (2) The closing months
of World War I when Germany lost the war;
Hitler is said to have developed his extreme
nationalism during this time, desiring to
"save" Germany from both external and internal
"enemies" who, in his view, betrayed it; (3)
The 1920s, during which his early political
career began and he wrote Mein Kampf.
Hitler formally renounced his Austrian citizenship
on 7 April 1925, but did not acquire German
citizenship until almost seven years later;
thereby allowing him to run for public office.
Hitler was influenced by Benito Mussolini
who was appointed Prime Minister of Italy
in October 1922 after his "March on Rome".In
many ways, Adolf Hitler epitomizes "the force
of personality in political life" as mentioned
by Friedrich Meinecke.
He was essential to the very framework of
Nazism's political appeal and its manifestation
in Germany.
So important were Hitler's views that they
immediately affected the political policies
of Nazi Germany.
He asserted the Führerprinzip ("Leader principle").
The principle relied on absolute obedience
of all subordinates to their superiors.
Hitler viewed the party structure and later
the government structure as a pyramid, with
himself—the infallible leader—at the apex.Hitler
firmly believed that the force of "will" was
decisive in determining the political course
for a nation and rationalized his actions
accordingly.
Given that Hitler was appointed "leader of
the German Reich for life", he "embodied the
supreme power of the state and, as the delegate
of the German people", it was his role to
determine the "outward form and structure
of the Reich".
To that end, Hitler's political motivation
consisted of an ideology that combined traditional
German and Austrian anti-Semitism with an
intellectualized racial doctrine resting on
an admixture of bits and pieces of social
Darwinism and the ideas – mostly obtained
second-hand and only partially understood
– of Friedrich Nietzsche, Arthur Schopenhauer,
Richard Wagner, Houston Stewart Chamberlain,
Arthur de Gobineau and Alfred Rosenberg, as
well as Paul de Lagarde, Georges Sorel, Alfred
Ploetz and others.
== Army intelligence agent ==
After World War I, Hitler stayed in the army,
which was mainly engaged in suppressing socialist
uprisings across Germany, including in Munich,
where Hitler returned in 1919.
He took part in "national thinking" courses
organised by the Education and Propaganda
Department (Dept Ib/P) of the Bavarian Reichswehr,
Headquarters 4 under Captain Karl Mayr.
Mayr recruited Hitler to help re-educate soldiers
in the wake of the social revolution occurring
across Germany.
The aforementioned specialized courses took
place at the University of Munich in June
1919, where Hitler heard lectures on Germany's
economic situation, the political history
of the war and other matters, all delivered
in an anti-Bolshevik disposition, inciting
him to proselytize nationalist messages to
his comrades.
These helped popularize the notion that there
was a scapegoat responsible for the outbreak
of war and Germany's defeat.
Hitler's own bitterness over the collapse
of the war effort also began to shape his
ideology.
Like other German nationalists, he believed
the Dolchstoßlegende (stab-in-the-back myth),
which claimed that the German Army, "undefeated
in the field", had been "stabbed in the back"
on the home front by civilian leaders and
Marxists, later dubbed the "November criminals".
"International Jewry" was described as a scourge
composed of communists relentlessly destroying
Germany.
Such scapegoating was essential to Hitler's
political career, and it seems that he genuinely
believed that Jews were responsible for Germany's
post-war troubles.In July 1919 Hitler was
appointed Verbindungsmann (intelligence agent)
of an Aufklärungskommando (reconnaissance
commando) of the Reichswehr, both to influence
other soldiers and to infiltrate the German
Workers' Party (DAP).
Much like the political activists in the DAP,
Hitler blamed the loss of the First World
War on Jewish intrigue at home and abroad,
espousing völkisch-nationalist political
beliefs with the intention of resurrecting
Germany’s greatness by smashing the Versailles
Treaty.
Along those lines, Hitler proclaimed that
the "German yoke must be broken by German
iron" (Das deutsche Elend muß durch deutsches
Eisen zerbrochen werden).
== German Workers' Party ==
In September 1919 Hitler wrote what is often
deemed his first antisemitic text, requested
by Mayr as a reply to an inquiry by Adolf
Gemlich, who had participated in the same
"educational courses" as Hitler.
In this report Hitler argued for a "rational
anti-Semitism" which would not resort to pogroms,
but instead "legally fight and remove the
privileges enjoyed by the Jews as opposed
to other foreigners living among us.
Its final goal, however, must be the irrevocable
removal of the Jews themselves."
Most people at the time understood this as
a call for forced expulsion.
Europe has a long history of expelling Jews
and the auto-da-fé of the Inquisition.While
he studied the activities of the German Workers'
Party (DAP), Hitler became impressed with
founder Anton Drexler's antisemitic, nationalist,
anti-capitalist and anti-Marxist ideas.
Drexler was impressed with Hitler's oratory
skills, and invited him to join the DAP on
12 September 1919.
On the orders of his army superiors, Hitler
applied to join the party, and within a week
was accepted as party member 555 (the party
began counting membership at 500 to give the
impression they were a much larger party).
Hitler, in his work Mein Kampf, later claimed
to be the seventh party member (he was in
fact the seventh executive member of the Party's
central committee).Hitler was discharged from
the army on 31 March 1920 and began working
full-time for the party.
Displaying his talent for oratory and propaganda
skills, with the support of Drexler, Hitler
became chief of propaganda for the party in
early 1920.
When early party members promulgated their
25-point manifesto on 24 February 1920 (co-authored
by Hitler, Anton Drexler, Gottfried Feder,
and Dietrich Eckart), it was Hitler who penned
the first point, revealing his intention to
unify German-speaking peoples, claiming that
the party demanded, "all Germans be gathered
together in a Greater Germany on the basis
of the right of all peoples to self-determination."
By the spring of 1920 he engineered the change
of name to the National Socialist German Workers'
Party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei
– NSDAP), commonly known as the Nazi Party.
Under his influence the party adopted a modified
swastika, a well-known good luck charm that
had previously been used in Germany as a mark
of volkishness and "Aryanism", along with
the Roman salute used by Italian fascists.
At this time the Nazi Party was one of many
small extremist groups in Munich, but Hitler's
vitriolic beer hall speeches began attracting
regular audiences.
He became adept at using populist themes,
including the use of scapegoats, who were
blamed for his listeners' economic hardships.
He gained notoriety for his rowdy polemic
speeches against the Treaty of Versailles,
rival politicians, and especially against
Marxists and Jews.
Hitler used personal magnetism and an understanding
of crowd psychology to advantage while engaged
in public speaking.In June 1921, while Hitler
and Eckart were on a fundraising trip to Berlin,
a mutiny broke out within the Nazi Party in
Munich.
Members of its executive committee wanted
to merge with the rival German Socialist Party
(DSP).
Hitler returned to Munich on 11 July and angrily
tendered his resignation.
The committee members realised that the resignation
of their leading public figure and speaker
would mean the end of the party.
Hitler announced he would rejoin on the condition
that he would replace Drexler as party chairman,
and that the party headquarters would remain
in Munich.
They capitulated to Hitler's demand and on
29 July 1921 a special congress was convened
to formalize Hitler as the new chairman; the
vote was 543 for Hitler and one against.He
asserted the Führerprinzip ("Leader principle").
The principle relied on absolute obedience
of all subordinates to their superiors; thus
he viewed the party structure and later the
government structure as a pyramid, with himself—the
infallible leader—at the apex.
Rank in the party was not determined by elections—positions
were filled through appointment by those of
higher rank, who demanded unquestioning obedience
to the will of the leader.Early followers
of the party included Rudolf Hess, Hermann
Göring (command of the Sturmabteilung (SA)
as Oberster SA-Führer in 1923), Ernst Röhm
(later head of the SA), Alfred Rosenberg (prominent
racial theorist), Gregor Strasser, Dietrich
Eckart (a key founder of the party), Hermann
Esser, Ludwig Maximilian Erwin von Scheubner-Richter
and Erich Ludendorff (Field-Marshal who was
the party's candidate for President of the
Republic in 1925).
== The Beer Hall Putsch ==
Hitler enlisted the help of World War I General
Erich Ludendorff to try to seize power in
Munich (the capital of Bavaria) in an attempt
later known as the Beer Hall Putsch of 8–9
November 1923.
This would be a step in the seizure of power
nationwide, overthrowing the Weimar Republic
in Berlin.
On 8 November, Hitler's forces initially succeeded
in occupying the local Reichswehr and police
headquarters; however, neither the army nor
the state police joined forces with him.
The next day, Hitler and his followers marched
from the beer hall to the Bavarian War Ministry
to overthrow the Bavarian government on their
"March on Berlin".
Hitler wanted to emulate Benito Mussolini's
"March on Rome" (1922) by staging his own
coup in Bavaria to be followed by a challenge
to the government in Berlin.
However, the Bavarian authorities ordered
the police to stand their ground.
The putschists were dispersed after a short
firefight in the streets near the Feldherrnhalle.
In all, Sixteen Nazi members and four police
officers were killed in the failed coup.Hitler
fled to the home of Ernst Hanfstaengl, and
by some accounts he contemplated suicide;
this state of mind has been disputed.
Hitler was depressed but calm when he was
arrested on 11 November 1923.
Fearing "left-wing" members of the Nazi Party
might try to seize leadership from him during
his incarceration, Hitler quickly appointed
Alfred Rosenberg temporary leader.
== Mein Kampf ==
Beginning in February 1924, Hitler was tried
for high treason before the special People's
Court in Munich.
He used his trial as an opportunity to spread
his message throughout Germany.
At one point during the trial, Hitler discussed
political leadership, during which he stated
that leading people was not a matter of political
science (Staatswissenschaft) but an innate
ability, one of statecraft (Staatskunst).
He further elaborated by claiming that out
of ten thousand politicians only one Bismarck
emerged, subtly implying that he too had been
born with this gift; continuing, he declared
that it was not Karl Marx who stirred the
masses and ignited the Russian Revolution
but Lenin, not making his appeal to the mind
but to the senses.
His rousing speeches during the trial made
Hitler famous, but they did not exonerate
him.
In April 1924 he was sentenced to five years'
imprisonment in Landsberg Prison, where he
received preferential treatment from sympathetic
guards and received substantial quantities
of fan mail, including funds and other forms
of assistance.
During 1923 and 1924 at Landsberg he dictated
the first volume of Mein Kampf (My Struggle;
originally entitled Four and a Half Years
of Struggle against Lies, Stupidity, and Cowardice)
to his deputy, Rudolf Hess; his publisher
shortened the title to Mein Kampf.The book,
dedicated to Thule Society member Dietrich
Eckart, was an autobiography and exposition
of his ideology.
In Mein Kampf Hitler speaks at length about
his youth, his early days in the Nazi Party,
general ideas on politics, including the transformation
of German society into one based on race;
some passages imply genocide.
Published in two volumes in 1925 and 1926,
it sold 228,000 copies between 1925 and 1932.
In 1933, Hitler's first year in office, 1,000,000
copies were sold.
The book acts as a reference, giving insight
into the world view from which Hitler never
wavered throughout his life.It states that
during his childhood, Hitler had little interest
in politics, as he had ambitions to become
a painter.
Like other boys in his part of Austria, he
was attracted to Pan-Germanism, but his intellectual
pursuits were generally those of a dilettante.
Hitler portrays himself as a born leader interested
in knightly adventures, exploration, and who
by the time he was eleven, was a nationalist
interested in history.
Ultimately, Hitler never finished his primary
schooling since he quit by the time he was
16, devoting his attention instead to his
artistic pursuits which led him to Vienna
in 1905.
It was in Vienna where Hitler was later to
proclaim he learned some hard lessons, namely,
that life was a critical struggle between
the weak and the strong where principles of
humanity mattered not at all, since everything
simply boiled down to "victory and defeat."While
Hitler was incarcerated at the Landsberg prison
writing Mein Kampf, he had routine visits
from the respected First World War veteran,
Major General Dr. Karl Haushofer, who was
the chair of the military science and geography
department at the University of Munich.
These meetings consisted of lectures and academic
briefings on geopolitics, most certainly covering
the Nazi ideal of Lebensraum and which likely
influenced the views Hitler laid out in Mein
Kampf.
Perhaps confirming Hitler's assertions, Haushofer
espoused the theory that Germany was defeated
in the Great War by her lack of sufficient
space and autarchy.
Continental space and the necessity of abundant
arable soil formed an important distinction
between the way the British Empire extended
its reach through sea-power and economics
and the manner in which Hitler intended on
obtaining ascendancy through territorial expansion
at the expense of conquered peoples.
Hitler believed it was Germany's right to
seize the cultivatable land in Russia since,
the earth belongs to those people willing
to till it "industriously" as opposed to the
slothful, incompetent people unworthy to possess
it.
Describing the Russians in the harshest of
terms while intimating that the German people
were more deserving by virtue of their alleged
superior intellect, Hitler stated, "It is
criminal to ask an intelligent people to limit
its children in order that a lazy and stupid
people next door can literally abuse a gigantic
surface of the earth."
Presaging this Nazi goal, Hitler wrote in
Mein Kampf, "Without consideration of traditions
and prejudices, Germany must find the courage
to gather our people and their strength for
an advance along the road that will lead this
people from its present restricted living
space to new land and soil, and hence also
free it from the danger of vanishing from
the earth or of serving others as a slave
nation."
In this sense, social Darwinism and geography
were merged in Hitler's mind.
Many historians contend that Hitler's essential
character and political philosophy can be
discovered in Mein Kampf.
Historian James Joll once claimed that Mein
Kampf constituted, "all of Hitler's beliefs,
most of his programme and much of his character."
Evident within the text of Mein Kampf is nothing
less than the very crux of Hitler's program
according to Andreas Hillgruber.
One of Hitler's foremost goals was that Germany
should become "a World Power" on the geopolitical
stage or as he stated, "it will not continue
to exist at all."
Biographer Joachim Fest asserted that Mein
Kampf contained a "remarkably faithful portrait
of its author."In his infamous tome, Hitler
categorized human beings by their physical
attributes, claiming German or Nordic Aryans
were at the top of the hierarchy while assigning
the bottom orders to Jews and Romani.
Hitler claimed that dominated people benefit
by learning from superior Aryans, and said
the Jews were conspiring to keep this "master
race" from rightfully ruling the world by
diluting its racial and cultural purity, and
exhorting Aryans to believe in equality rather
than superiority and inferiority.
Within Mein Kampf, Hitler describes a struggle
for world domination, an ongoing racial, cultural,
and political battle between Aryans and Jews,
the necessary racial purification of the German
people, and the need for German imperial expansion
and colonisation eastwards.
According to Hitler and other Pan-German thinkers,
Germany needed to obtain additional living
space or Lebensraum, which would properly
nurture the "historic destiny" of the German
people; a key idea he made central in his
foreign policy.
Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf of his hatred towards
what he believed were the world's twin evils:
communism and Judaism.
He said his aim was to eradicate both from
Germany and moreover, he stressed his intention
to unite all Germans in the process of destroying
them.
== Völkisch nationalism ==
Hitler was a Pan-Germanic nationalist whose
ideology was built around a philosophically
authoritarian, anti-Marxist, antisemitic,
anti-democratic worldview.
Such views of the world in the wake of the
fledgling Weimar government were not uncommon
in Germany since democratic/parliamentary
governance seemed ineffectual to solve Germany's
problems.
Correspondingly, veterans of the First World
War and like-minded nationalists formed the
Vaterlandspartei which promoted expansionism,
soldierly camaraderie and heroic leadership,
all under the guise of völkisch traditions
like ethnic and linguistic nationalism, but
which also included obedience to authority
as well as the belief in political salvation
through decisive leadership.
The völkisch parties began to fractionalize
during Hitler's absence from the revolutionary
scene in Germany after the failed "Beer Hall
Putsch" of November 1923.
When he re-emerged upon release from Landsberg
Prison, his importance to the movement was
obvious and he came to believe that he was
the realization of völkisch nationalistic
ideals in a sort of near messianic narcissism
which included his conviction to shake off
the restrictive Treaty of Versailles, and
to "restore Germany's might and power", creating
a reborn German nation as the chosen leader
of the Nazi Party.Hitler stressed the völkisch
ideology, claiming Germanic/Aryan superiority
in Mein Kampf with:
Every manifestation of human culture, every
product of art, science and technical skill,
which we see before our eyes today, is almost
exclusively the product of the Aryan creative
power.
This very fact fully justifies the conclusion
that it was the Aryan alone who founded a
superior type of humanity; therefore he represents
the archetype of what we understand by the
term: MAN.
He is the Prometheus of mankind, from whose
shining brow the divine spark of genius has
at all times flashed forth, always kindling
anew that fire which, in the form of knowledge,
illuminated the dark night by drawing aside
the veil of mystery and thus showing man how
to rise and become master over all the other
beings on the earth.
Should he be forced to disappear, a profound
darkness will descend on the earth; within
a few thousand years human culture will vanish
and the world will become a desert.The völkisch
nationalism of Hitler and Nazis encompassed
the notion that the German Volk was epitomized
by German farmers and peasants, people who
remained uncorrupted by modern ideals and
whose greatest attribute was their "cheerful
subservience" and their capacity to respond
to their "monarchical calling."
Hitler was their new 'monarch' in a manner
of speaking.
Völkisch nationalism also forged into its
ideals, the importance of nature, the centrality
of a knightly savior (Hitler in this case),
and the belief in the superior Aryan.
Antisemitism remained a key component of the
völkisch movement and a permanent undercurrent
throughout conservative parties in German
history and after many years culminated with
the view that the Jews were the only thing
standing in the way of the ideal society.
Unfortunately, Germany's newfound völkisch
nationalist leader, Hitler, instantiated a
policy of ethnic nationalism replete with
directives to exterminate Jews and other identified
enemies as Nazism ultimately became the religion
of the movement and the "irrational became
concrete" under the terms of its "ideological
framework."
== Social conservatism ==
Hitler and the Nazis promoted a socially conservative
view concerning many aspects of life, supported
by harsh discipline and a militaristic point
of view.
Conservative opinions about sexuality amid
the Nazis led to extreme homophobia which
resulted in the systematic persecution of
homosexuals.
Hitler and his paladins also controlled what
constituted acceptable artistic expression
in Nazi Germany, abolishing what they considered
to be "degenerate art".
The Nazis strongly discouraged, and in some
cases outright rejected the following behaviors:
the use of cosmetics, premarital sex, prostitution,
pornography, sexual vices, smoking, and excessive
drinking.
In many ways, there was a distinct Anti-intellectualism
present within Nazi philosophy.
Hearkening back to a simpler time, Hitler
and the Nazis attempted to vindicate the glorious
past as the key to a more promising future.Evidence
of Hitler's disdain for Weimar's cultural
and social decadence appears on multiple occasions
in Mein Kampf.
In his seminal tome, he expresses an ultra-conservatism:
If we study the course of our cultural life
during the last twenty-five years we shall
be astonished to note how far we have already
gone in this process of retrogression.
Everywhere we find the presence of those germs
which give rise to protuberant growths that
must sooner or later bring about the ruin
of our culture.
Here we find undoubted symptoms of slow corruption;
and woe to the nations that are no longer
able to bring that morbid process to a halt.
Hitler raved against what he considered to
be tasteless and morally destructive art on
display throughout Germany in Mein Kampf,
calling some of it morbid and declaring that
"people would have benefited by not visiting
them at all."
Convinced that it was necessary to show the
German people what comprised, "degenerate
art" so as to protect them in the future,
Hitler arranged for a formally commissioned
exhibit in July 1937 of specially selected
carvings, sculptures, and paintings.
Once the exhibit was at an end, selected artist's
works were banned from Nazi Germany.Well known
was Hitler's vehement opposition to racial-mixing;
he also believed as did other Pan-Germans
that Germans had an obligation to procreate:
That such a mentality [racial purity] may
be possible cannot be denied in a world where
hundreds and thousands accept the principle
of celibacy from their own choice, without
being obliged or pledged to do so by anything
except an ecclesiastical precept.
Why should it not be possible to induce people
to make this sacrifice if, instead of such
a precept, they were simply told that they
ought to put an end to this truly original
sin of racial corruption which is steadily
being passed on from one generation to another.
And, further, they ought to be brought to
realize that it is their bounden duty to give
to the Almighty Creator beings such as He
himself made to His own image.
Another area of concern for Hitler and which
was mentioned by his childhood companion in
Vienna, August Kubizek, was prostitution - which
Hitler associated with venereal disease and
cultural decline.
Moreover, Hitler found the practice counter
to proper family development and displayed
a puritanical view in Mein Kampf, writing:
Prostitution is a disgrace to humanity and
cannot be removed simply by charitable or
academic methods.
Its restriction and final extermination presupposes
the removal of a whole series of contributory
circumstances.
The first remedy must always be to establish
such conditions as will make early marriages
possible, especially for young men...
He goes on asserting that prostitution was
dangerous and intimated much more significant,
destructive socio-political implications.
Once Hitler came to power, his regime moved
against all forms of sexual deviations and
sexual crimes, especially homosexuality, a
'crime' which was prosecuted as many as 30,000
times between 1934 and 1939.
Hitler's social conservatism was so extreme
towards homosexuals that he deemed them "enemies
of the State" and grouped them in the same
category as Jews and Communists; a special
department of the Gestapo was formed to deal
with the matter.Hitler's general perception
about women was ultra-conservative and patriarchal,
with their foremost task being a domestic
one as a mother of children who worked contentedly
at home, ensuring it remained clean and orderly;
meanwhile, it was the woman's role to educate
her children to be conscious of their importance
as Aryans and instill within them a commitment
to their ethnic community.
Consequently, Hitler believed women had no
place in public or political life due to their
differing nature from men.
Like many Romantic artists, musicians, and
writers, the Nazis valued strength, passion,
frank declarations of feelings, and deep devotion
to family and community (with women being
seen as the center of the family in Nazi Germany).So
great was Hitler's influence in all political
aspects of social life, that even education
for children was subordinate to his opinion.
Profoundly anti-intellectual and against conventional
education for children, Hitler determined
instead, that training and education should
be designed to create young German 'national
comrades' who were utterly convinced of their
"superiority to others."
Moreover, Hitler wanted to create young German
soldiers who were willing to fight for their
convictions, so they were accordingly indoctrinated
by Nazi propaganda, trained in military discipline,
and taught obedience to authority in the Hitler
Youth.
Ultimate obedience was then transferred directly
to their Führer and his political cause.
== Contempt for democracy ==
Hitler blamed Germany's parliamentary government
for many of the nation's ills.
The Nazis and Hitler especially, associated
democracy with the failed Weimar government
and the punitive Treaty of Versailles.
Hitler often denounced democracy, equating
it with internationalism.
Since democratic ideals espoused equality
for all men, it represented to Hitler and
his Nazi ideologues the notion of mob rule
and the hatred of excellence.
Not only was democracy antithetical to their
social-Darwinist abstractions, but its international-capitalist
framework was considered an exclusively Jewish-derived
conception.
Hitler also thought democracy was nothing
more than a preliminary stage of Bolshevism.Hitler
believed in the leader principle (hence his
title, the Leader, der Führer), and he considered
it ludicrous that an idea of governance or
morality could be held by the people above
the power of the leader.
As Joachim Fest described a 1930 confrontation
between Hitler and Otto Strasser, "Now Hitler
took Strasser to task for placing 'the idea'
above the Führer and wanting 'to give every
party comrade the right to decide the nature
of the idea, even to decide whether or not
the Führer is true to the so-called idea.'
That, he cried angrily, was the worst kind
of democracy, for which there was no place
in their movement.
'With us the Führer and the idea are one
and the same, and every party comrade has
to do what the Führer commands, for he embodies
the idea and he alone knows its ultimate goal.'"Although
Hitler realized that his ascension to power
required the use of the Weimar Republic’s
parliamentary system (founded on democratic
principles), he never intended for the continuation
of democratic governance once in control.
Contrarily, Hitler proclaimed that he would
"destroy democracy with the weapons of democracy."
The rapid transition made by the Nazis once
they assumed control clearly reveals that
Hitler succeeded in this regard.
For the most part, democratic governance was
never embraced by the German masses or by
the elite.
The ill-fated Weimar democracy’s inability
to provide economic relief to the German people
during the Great Depression further enhanced
its image as an ineffectual system of government
amid the masses.
Hitler offered people the prospect of a "new
and better society".
He exploited the conditions in Germany in
the ultimate expression of political opportunism
when he brought his dictatorial and totalitarian
government to power; thereafter, attempting
to impose himself and his system upon the
world in the process.
== Anti-communism ==
In Hitler's mind, communism was a major enemy
of Germany, an enemy he often mentions in
Mein Kampf.
During the trial for his involvement in the
Beer Hall Putsch, Hitler claimed that his
singular goal was to assist the German government
in "fighting Marxism".
Marxism, Bolshevism, and communism were interchangeable
terms for Hitler as evidenced by their use
in Mein Kampf:
In the years 1913 and 1914 I expressed my
opinion for the first time in various circles,
some of which are now members of the National
Socialist Movement, that the problem of how
the future of the German nation can be secured
is the problem of how Marxism can be exterminated.
Later in his seminal tome, Hitler advocated
for "the destruction of Marxism in all its
shapes and forms."
According to Hitler, Marxism was a Jewish
strategy to subjugate Germany and the world
and saw Marxism as a mental and political
form of slavery.
From Hitler's vantage point, Bolsheviks existed
to serve "Jewish international finance."
When the British tried negotiating with Hitler
in 1935 by including Germany in the extension
of the Locarno Pact, he rejected their offer
and instead assured them that German rearmament
was important in safeguarding Europe against
communism, a move which clearly showed his
anti-communist proclivities.In 1939, Hitler
told the Swiss Commissioner to the League
of Nations, Carl Burckhardt, that everything
he was undertaking was "directed against Russia"
and continued with, "if those in the West
are too stupid or too blind to understand
this, then I shall be forced to come to an
understanding with the Russians to beat the
West, and then, after its defeat, turn with
all my concerted force against the Soviet
Union."
When Hitler finally ordered the attack against
the Soviet Union, it was the fulfillment of
his ultimate goal and the most important campaign
in his estimation, as it comprised a struggle
of "the chosen Aryan people against Jewish
Bolsheviks."Biographer Alan Bullock avows,
Hitler "laid great stress" on the need to
concentrate on a single enemy, an enemy he
lumps together as "Marxism and the Jew."
Shortly in the wake of the Commissar Order,
a directive pursuant to the German invasion
of the Soviet Union, SS Deputy Reinhard Heydrich
informed the SS of Hitler's geopolitical philosophy,
which conflated Bolshevism and Jews, writing
"eastern Jewry is the intellectual reservoir
of Bolshevism and in the Führer's view must
therefore be annihilated."
Considering the eventual Nazi invasion of
the Soviet Union (Operation Barbarossa), no
additional inducements are really requisite
concerning Hitler's hatred of communism, particularly
since the Nazi persecution and extermination
of these groups was not only systematic, but
it was extensive both within Germany and only
intensified in the occupied zones during the
war under Hitler's leadership.Because Nazism
co-opted the popular success of communism
among working people while simultaneously
promising to destroy communism and offer an
alternative to it, Hitler's anti-communist
program allowed industrialists with traditional
conservative views (tending toward monarchism,
aristocracy, and laissez-faire capitalism)
to cast their lot with, and help underwrite,
the Nazi rise to power.
== Lebensraum and the invasion of the Soviet
Union ==
Historian Roderick Stackelberg contends that
Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union (Operation
Barbarossa) was the result of "mutually reinforcing
ideological, racial, and geopolitical assumptions"
that Hitler had plainly laid out in Mein Kampf.
Noted German historian Andreas Hillgruber
shares this view.
In fact, Hillgruber encapsulates Hitler's
political views (which drove German policy
throughout his rule) in summary through the
invasion of the Soviet Union.
He places it within the context of Hitler's
intent to create a continental Reich, which
included the destruction of the Jews.
According to Hillgruber, Hitler had the following
objectives in mind when he invaded the former
Soviet Union:
1.
The total eradication of all forms of "Judeo-Bolshevik"
leadership, which encompassed its perceived
biological roots, namely the millions of Jews
occupying central and eastern Europe;
2.
The requisite acquisition of Lebensraum or
colonial space necessary for German settlement
in the finest and most arable territories
within Russia, or in those parts of Russia
which provided political or strategic advantages
in Hitler's mind;
3.
The subjugation and decimation of the Slavic
people, which was to be divided into four
German territories or "Reich Commissariats"
entitled Ostland, Ukraine, Moskovia and Caucasus;
each subordinated to German "viceroys" and
ruled much the same way the British ruled
their colonial dominion India.
One of the principal aims of German leadership
in these Reich Commissariats would be the
cancellation of any semblance or memory of
Russian statehood and the conditioning of
these subordinated "states" to German mastery;
4.
Ultimately, a "great space" autarchy in continental
Europe under German suzerainty would result,
one capable of defeating any possible Allied
blockade and for whom, the vanquished eastern
territories could provide a theoretically
inexhaustible source raw materials and food
necessary for any protracted war against the
Anglo-Saxon powers.
The establishment of this "German Reich of
the Germanic nation" also included in its
planning - to feed its soldiers off the Russian
land, even though that meant that "many millions
of people will be starved to death"; a directive
already contemplated by the Economic Staff
East no later than 02 May 1941.Not alone in
this interpretation of Hitler's invasion of
the Soviet Union as a move of continental
expansion and one with an anti-Semitic eliminationist
political intent, Hillgruber is joined by
the likes of historian Karl Dietrich Bracher
among others.
In his work, The German Dictatorship, Bracher
called the invasion the consequence of Hitler's
"ideological obsession" and stated that "Hitler's
drive for territorial expansion and the relentless
expansion of the SS state ushered in the final
phase of National Socialist rule."
That final phase proved disastrous for the
Jews, Slavs, Roma-Sinti, and countless others
– atop the reality that it also brought
untold suffering to Hitler's beloved German
Volksgenossen as the British and American
bomber forces unleashed their wrath turning
the Reich to rubble; meanwhile the Red Army
laid waste to the German army and once-occupied
German land as they counter-attacked.
== 
Anti-Semitism and the Holocaust ==
Among scholars of the Nazi era, Hitler's role
and relationship to the regime and the Holocaust
has been a source of consternation and acrimonious
historiographical debate.
Biographer Ian Kershaw wrote that for historians,
Hitler was "unreachable" and that he was "cocooned
in the silence of the sources."
What Kershaw was referencing was the absence
of any clear political directives accompanied
by Hitler's signed authorization (primary
source documents) regarding the atrocities
carried out by his Nazi underlings.
Given the abounding circumstantial evidence
in Hitler's speeches, writing in Mein Kampf,
administrative meeting notes taken by subordinates,
and the recollections of those in or near
his inner-circle, it seems that his political
intention was for Jews, Slavs, and other "enemies"
of the Nazi state to be persecuted without
mercy – in lieu of how gradual the process
actually developed.
Two primary schools of thought emerged about
Hitler's political role in Nazi policy and
the Holocaust.
One is termed intentionalist, represented
by scholars who contend that virtually all
Nazi policies (including the extermination
of the Jews) were resultant from Hitler's
desires; whereas the other school, entitled
functionalist/structuralist, consists of scholars
who see the intensification of Nazi persecution
policies due to power struggles within the
Nazi government as his minions attempted to
"interpret" their master's wishes, often acting
autonomously.Either way, anti-Semitism always
constituted one of the most important aspects
of Hitler's political views.
Historian Peter Longerich writes that "There
can be no doubt that Hitler's behaviour during
his entire political career... was characterised
by radical antisemitism."
Correspondingly, Germanic cultural and racial
purity remained paramount in his understanding
of the world, having once exclaimed, "The
greatest danger is and remains for us, the
alien racial poison in our body.
All other dangers are transitory."Hitler wrote
his first antisemitic letter to Adolf Gemlich
on 16 September 1919 stating that Jews were
a race and not a religious group, and that
the aim for the government "must unshakably
be the removal of the Jews altogether".
Throughout Mein Kampf, Hitler employs biological
crudity by describing the Jews as "parasites"
or "vermin."
Reflecting back on the beginning of the First
World War, Hitler makes the eerily prescient
statement, that had these "Hebrew corrupters"
been "held under poison gas" that it may have
otherwise saved millions of German lives.Underlining
the argument that Hitler had overt eliminationist
intentions for the Jews is the quote from
the 30 January 1939 Reichstag speech:
Today I want to be a prophet once more: Should
the international Jewry of finance (Finanzjudentum)
succeed, both within and beyond Europe, in
plunging mankind into yet another world war,
then the result will not be Bolshevization
of the earth and the victory of Jewry, but
the annihilation (Vernichtung) of the Jewish
race in Europe.
German historian Klaus Hildebrand insisted
that Hitler's moral responsibility for the
Holocaust was the culmination of his pathological
hatred of the Jews and his ideology of "racial
dogma" formed the basis of Nazi genocide.
Historian David Welch asserts that even if
Hitler never gave the direct order for the
implementation of the Final Solution, this
is nothing more than a "red herring" as it
fails to recognize his "leadership style"
where Hitler's simple verbal statements were
sufficient to launch initiatives "from below".
Those "working towards the Führer" would
often implement "his totalitarian vision without
written authority."
Throughout his work, Hitler and the Final
Solution, historian Gerald Fleming demonstrates
that on multiple occasions, Heinrich Himmler
referenced a Führer-Order concerning the
destruction of the Jews, making it abundantly
clear that Hitler had indeed, at the very
least, verbally issued a command on the matter.
The diary entries of Propaganda Minister Joseph
Goebbels allude to Hitler being the driving
force behind the Nazi genocide, that he followed
the subject closely, and Goebbels even described
Hitler as "uncompromising" about eliminating
the Jews.
Taking the scale of the logistical operations
that the Holocaust comprised in the middle
of a war into consideration alone, it is highly
unlikely, if not impossible, that the extermination
of so many people and the coordination of
such an extensive effort could have occurred
in the absence of Hitler's authorization.
As Welch relates, if Himmler was the "architect
of genocide", he was merely "an instrument
of Hitler's will."
In the final analysis, Hitler was essentially
omnipotent as the Führer of Nazi Germany
with all encompassing power as the "supreme
legislator, supreme administrator, and supreme
judge" along with being the "leader of the
Party, the Army, and the people."
Every major political decision and move in
Nazi Germany was made at his discretion - to
include the wholesale extermination of millions
of people.
== See also ==
Adolf Hitler's rise to power
Early timeline of Nazism
Religious views of Adolf Hitler
List of books about Nazi Germany
Nazism
