Student Question
What are the origins, causes, course, and consequences of the Nazi rule?
Quick answer:
The Nazi regime originated in the 1920s from a mix of German nationalism, anti-Semitism, and the fallout from World War I and the Treaty of Versailles. Under Hitler, the Nazis rose to power in 1933, leading to the Holocaust and World War II. The Holocaust resulted in the murder of six million Jews and other minorities. Post-war, Nazism was discredited, Germany was divided and later reunited, and the Holocaust's long-term effects persist in global consciousness.
The origins of the Nazis, also known as National Socialism, lie in the 1920s. The ideological origins of Nazism in part can be traced to the eugenic theories of the day that posited that white northern Europeans were superior in intellect and physical qualities to people of other ethnicities and backgrounds. The belief in eugenics also went along with a sense of wounded German nationalism. This sense of nationalism arose in Germany in the 18th century with thinkers such as Johann Gottlieb Fichte and others. In part a reaction to the horrors of World War I and the sudden growth of urbanization and industrialization in Germany, German nationalism called on traditional folk culture to reinstitute vigor and pride in the country. One strain of nationalism emphasized restoring the purity of the German people through expelling elements of what made Germany a cosmopolitan, modern culture, including the Jews. Hitler adopted the...
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anti-Semitic nature of this aspect of German nationalism.
In addition, Nazism was a reaction to Germany's defeat in the World War I, including the abdication of the Kaiser and the provision in the Treaty of Versailles of 1919 that Germany accept responsibility for the war and pay reparations. As a result of this war guilt clause, Germans felt that their pride as a nation had been wounded. In addition, Germany lost a great deal of land and had to reduce their armed forces, adding to their injured sense of nationalism. In the early 1920s, political and economic instability also led to massive inflation in Germany. Finally, the Russian Revolution of 1917 caused a feeling of anti-communism in Germany that was also absorbed into the Nazi program.
By 1921, Hitler became head of the Nazi party. In 1923, his coup attempt in Munich led to his imprisonment, during which time he wrote the book Mein Kampf, or My Struggle, about his anti-Semitic and fascist ideas to restore a sense of pride in Germany. In 1933, the Nazis gained control of the Reichstag, or Parliament, and Hitler became Chancellor. His belief in restoring German pride led to his attacking and conquering land that Germany had lost in World War I, including the Rhineland and the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. Eventually, Hitler joined the Axis powers, along with Italy and Japan, and fought in World War II. His "final solution" to exterminate Jews and other "undesirable" people led to the Holocaust in which over 6 million people were exterminated in ghettoes, concentration camps, and other places.
As a consequence of Germany's defeat in 1945 by the Allied powers, many of the ideas of Nazism were widely discredited, including eugenics. West Germany was rebuilt in the western model, and East Germany was rebuilt in a communist model. They were reunited in 1990.
What are the origins, causes, and consequences of the Holocaust?
Shoah, Hebrew for catastrophe or calamity, has become a preferred term among Jewish people referring to the events of the Holocaust.
The origins of the Holocaust can be traced back to German anti-Semitic sentiment as early as the Middle Ages. The mid to late 1800s brought the Völkisch movement, which espoused a pseudo-scientific view of Jewish people as a race threatening the purity of the Aryan race. These ideas were highly influential to the development of Nazi ideals.
Germany’s anti-Semitism had three main sources—cultural, racial, and religious. Immediate causes of the Holocaust include economic pressure from the Great Depression. Before Hitler came to power, the medical community was already starting to promote euthanasia as a cost-saving measure and eugenics to encourage racially valuable traits and get rid of racially undesirable traits. Hitler’s 1925 autobiography Mein Kampf admits to hatred of Jews and announced his intention to remove them from participation in German society.
The course of the phenomenon progressed from the Nazi party taking power in 1933 and Hitler becoming chancellor. Throughout the 1930s, the rights of Jewish people in Germany were increasingly restricted. The first concentration camp was established in Dachau, originally imprisoning Communists. In 1938, the terror increased on Kristallnacht, the “Night of Broken Glass,” when Nazis attacked and vandalized Jewish people, synagogues, and businesses throughout Germany and Austria, and 30,000 Jews were sent to concentration camps. By 1940, Jews were forced into ghettos. Nazis began deporting Jews and carried out the first mass murder of Jews in Poland. By 1942, Nazi officials planned to kill all European Jews. In 1944, Hungarian Jews were deported to the Auschwitz concentration camp where they were murdered. The loss of Jewish life is estimated at close to six million people.
Consequences of the Holocaust include the plight of displaced persons, often without surviving family members and facing persistent anti-Semitism in their home countries. An estimated 170,000 Jewish survivors immigrated to Israel by 1953, but many faced economic hardship there. Of the hundreds of thousands of Nazis responsible for these injustices, only 31,651 Nazis went to trial. The long-term cultural, social, and psychological effects of this large-scale genocide are still being felt.