The power which Hitler had attained by 1933 was not his alone. The muscle behind the Nazi Party was the S.A. (Sturm Abteilung - the Brownshirts); an army of working class, and therefore unemployed, men. They were intended to represent the determination of the common people to sweep aside all obstacles in the path of their leader. Dressed in their earth-coloured uniforms they were led by ex-army officers of junior rank. The were supposed to symbolise the potential of the volkisch soil when married to discipline and order. In practice they were streetfighting thugs and bullies who beat up Communists and other ‘enemies of the state’.

However, by 1934 the SA had outlived its usefulness. Hitler had acquired a respectability and it was not in his interests to be associated with thugs. His long term plans for Germany meant Hitler needed the help of a military association. However, the leaders of the Reichswehr (regular army) made it clear that Hitler could have either the SA or the Rechswehr: not both.

In the end, events forced the issue. The SA was led by Ernst Roehm; a man who wanted to take Germany on a Socialist path which Hitler viewed as dangerously close to Communism. Roehm was a threat to Hitler’s plans and so they had to go.

The SA contained a sub-group dedicated to Hitler’s personal protection: the SS (Schutz Staffeln). On the night of 30th June 1934 Hitler struck at the leaders of the SA using the SS. This butchery was known as the Night Of The Long Knives. Afterward, the remains of the SA were submissive and Hitler established himself as the sole power in Germany.

The action was timely. In August 1934 Hindenburg died and Hitler combined the offices of the Chancellor and the President. From that point on, Germany would be ruled by the Fuhrer. The postmaster’s son who had been variously a failed artist, a house painter, a war hero and an unsuccessful author had risen to heights that neither Bismarck nor Wilhelm II had ever attained. Government through the Fuhrerprinzip (Leader Principle) had arrived and nothing could prevent the full development of the Nazi state.

The leader

Because Hitler’s long term plans for the Reich were expansionist, the economy was directed towards a war footing. Hitler sacked Dr Hjalmar Schacht, the only real economist available to the Nazis, for pointing out that the drive to rearm was actually crippling German industry by depriving it of raw materials – all of which were earmarked for the weapons factories.

The ‘natural enemy’ was identified as Soviet Russia: the source of the creed of Communism and also of the legendary German struggle against ‘Eastern barbarism’.

In 1936 one of Hitler’s top henchmen, Hermann Goering, was given four years to make the economy ready for a crusade against Russia. The resulting Four Year Plan aimed to restrict imports, make Germans aware of the need to ‘buy German’, identify war making materials and develop a balance of trade which favoured Germany.

The theme of the Plan was ‘restraint’ and it set the tone for Nazi intervention in the lives of the workforce.

The economy

Labour

Initially, the Nazis attempted to re-inflate the economy in the same way New Zealand and America would; by putting the unemployed to work in vast labour-intensive public works schemes such as highway construction.

In New Zealand these schemes were seen as busy work and failed to win public support, however, Nazi control of public opinion meant that public approval was unnecessary. This meant that the schemes (which were always inflationary in the long term) could be institutionalised and made a part of the Nazi way of life.

Hermann Goering, one of Hitler’s top henchmen who was put in charge of re-inflating the economy, was also the inventor of Blitzkrieg (Lightening War) which proved to be unstoppable in Poland and France. In the end, Goering would fall from Hitler’s favour when his Luftwaffe (airforce) could not prevent the round the clock bombing of Germany. Though once a dashing fighter pilot, he lived out his years as a grossly overweight, morphine addicted hermit who shut himself away in his luxurious home surrounded by art treasures which he had looted from all over Europe. After the war, he answered charges at the Nuremburg War Crimes Tribunal of the murder of thousands of slave labourers and of being involved in processing the ‘output’ of the death camps. Georing was sentenced to death, but managed to kill himself in his cell by swallowing poison two hours before his hanging.

Hermann Goering

After 1935 every male between the ages of 18 and 26 was required to perform National Service in the military. Here they were subjected not only to political indoctrination but also constant repetition of the idea that they were building the ‘volkisch state’ through their labour. Women faced the same treatment in industries which the Nazis deemed suitable for the future mothers of the nation.

Nazi propaganda made a great deal of this nation building idea and it was a key feature of the ‘Strength Through Joy’ organisation which underpinned working life in Germany. Since trade unions had been abolished, (their sectional interest had no place in a unified society) the Strength Through Joy organisation aimed to show the German workers how their leaders had their best interests at heart. Recreational and cultural facilities were provided for workers at little or no cost, and these also played a part in the indoctrination process.

Workers in Nazi Germany were obliged to accept much lower wages than they had been paid under the Weimar Republic. It is true that Hitler’s policies got Germans working again, but it is also true that the jobs he created were short term in outlook and depended on raw materials which would have to be captured by the army at some point in the future.

The Workers

The Nazis never wanted to take over businesses that could serve the state. The Nazis simply invited Germany’s biggest businesses to play their part in the re-birth of the nation. Given that Hitler’s aims were expansionist (and would mean the country would be at war) it made no sense to disrupt the running of the industries which would be vital to the war effort.

German industrialists were quite happy to work for the Nazis because they each needed the other. The Nazi leaders needed efficient industries in order to win wars abroad. The leaders of big business were happy to be rid of trade unions. The Nazis promised them lengthy contracts and increased their profits by suppressing small businesses.

The bosses

Propaganda was the life blood of the Nazi state. Throughout their daily lives, Germans came up against Nazi ideology. Hitler felt propaganda was so important he set up a Propaganda Ministry under Josef Goebbels.

Under Goebbels, no corner of the media was left untouched by fascist propaganda: radio, print, film, theatre, music and art. Germans were subjected to a constant stream of anti-Semitism, even in their own homes. Goebbels was at his best justifying the appalling barbarity of the Nazi state and he served Hitler with more devotion than any other Nazi. Thousands of ordinary Germans hung on Goebbels pronouncements on racial purity and Aryan supremacy. In the end, Goebbels would shoot himself the say after Hitler’s suicide, taking his wife and six children with him.

Fascism appeals to the emotions more than the intellect and for this reason Goebbels spread propaganda through events that stirred the blood: Wagner’s crashing music telling of Germany’s heroic past, torchlight parades and mass rallies which featured the deliberate fostering of togetherness through ‘Sieg Heil’ chanting. These things set the scene for Hitler’s compelling and hypnotic oratory.

The Ministry Of Propaganda controlled what Germans could listen to, read and view through the Reich Chamber Of Culture. One of the most distasteful activities of the Chamber was the public burning of books which were deemed unfit, usually written by Jewish or Liberal authors. The Chamber also ensured Nazi taste in art, music and architecture was promoted to the exclusion of all others. No aspect of German life escaped Nazification.

Society

Religion initially presented Hitler with a major problem. Germany had been, after all, the birthplace of the Protestant Reformation. In other areas, some Germans remained staunchly Catholic. However, a power greater than the Nazi state, be it either Catholic or Protestant, was not to be tolerated.

It seemed the answer lay in united the Catholic and Protestant faiths under one Germanised Church. However, as the Nazi state encouraged ever more barbaric behaviour towards ‘enemies of the state’, churchmen got to the point where their consciences could no longer tolerate the fascist ideology. Inevitably, priests and pastors came to be treated as enemies of the state themselves. By 1938, those members of the clergy who had survived were forced, just like teachers and civil servants, to take an oath of loyalty to Hitler.

Churches within Germany had been criticised for failing to stand up to the evils of the Nazi state, however, it must be remembered that the Nazis made opposition both difficult and dangerous.

Religion

Martin Luther

Hitler envisioned a ‘thousand year Reich’ and an essential step to this was the indoctrination of the nation’s youth. Existing youth groups were not permitted; Boy Scouts, Girl Guides Church groups, all were required to come into the Nazi fold or disband. Hitler tasked Baldur von Schirach to create a Ministry Of Youth.

The organisation which von Schirach created saw all German children between ages 6 – 18 prepare themselves to serve the Reich. At age six, children joined the Pimpfen. At 10 boys entered the Organisation Of German Young People and girls entered the League Of Maidens. These groups taught they duty of obedience and love of the nation, in preparation for the next stage. At age 14, boys joined the Hitler Youth and girls the League Of German Maidens. In these groups children were exposed to the full force of Nazi black propaganda whilst doing volkisch activities: tramping, canoeing and other outdoor activities with a strong emphasis on physicality to prepare the body for the demands of warfare. The nobility of motherhood as a way of serving the Reich was preached at girls as a part of the Nazi Holy Trinity for women: ‘Kirch, Kinder, Kueche’ (Church, Children, Cooking). If girls could not be future soldiers for the Reich, then they would be the mothers of soldiers.

The final step was three years in Arbeitsdienst (Labour Service). Boys lived in military style service doing public works by day and learning doctrine by night. Girls did a year’s service on farms as housemaids and farm workers.

Children therefore experienced in total 15 years being indoctrinated into the idea that the Reich came before the individual. This was brainwashing on a large scale.

Youth

German schools worked in conjunction with other youth organisations to indoctrinate the nation’s youth. Teachers from pre-school to tertiary level were required to belong to the National Socialist Teachers League and take an oath of loyalty to Adolf Hitler.

The curricula were modified until they were ‘acceptable’. Textbooks were rewritten to reflect ‘true’ German history and Nazi publications became classroom texts. The major effect of this was the lowering of educational standards, as schools turned their backs on knowledge and embraced dogma.

Schools became places of division as boys in the Hitler youth took revenge on ‘unpopular’ teachers by denouncing them as disloyal to the Reich. Children were encouraged to report disparaging comments about the leadership uttered by weary parents at the dinner table. Jewish children were persecuted savagely.

Education

To the Nazis it was obvious that a co-ordinated state under an all-knowing leader had little need for a legal system designed to debate guilt or innocence. Legality was what the leader said it was. Within six months of Hitler’s accession, all magistrates, like teachers, were proclaimed to be civil servants. As servants of the state they were required to act in the interests of the state. The interests of the state were those defined by the Nazi party.

In April 1934 the right to try cases of treason was transferred from the traditional law courts to the new People’s Court. Decision were made by a seven man panel made up of two judges and five others drawn from the Nazi Party, the armed forces and the SS. No right of appeal existed in this court, so sentences were carried out immediately.

However, the real function of the courts in Nazi Germany was propaganda, because the real business of enforcement had already taken place before any trial by the terror apparatus of the totalitarian state.

Justice

Policing

Ongoing control within Nazi Germany needed to depend on something more than uniforms at rallies and parades and streetbrawling. In 1933 on organisation was created known as the Gestapo (secret police). It was to grow into the terror of Europe. Heinrich Himmler was appointed as its leader.

Himmler had risen to prominence in the Nazi Party as leader of the SS (Schutzstaffeln), the black uniformed security squads sworn to defend Hitler’s personal security. The SS proved their worth by destroying the leadership of the SA during the Night Of The Long Knives.

Membership in the SS was not easily come by. They were specially selected to undertake training that would turn them into killing machines dedicated to the service of Adolf Hitler. The relationship between elite soldier and leader was recognised in the tattoo all SS members. They received a tattoo under their left armpit so that they would be given preferential medical treatment after battles and riots.

The Totenkopf (Death’s Head) division of the SS manned the concentration camps and were dedicated to the extermination of the state’s enemies. The Gestapo was the plain clothes division of the SS. Its function was to root out enemies of the state within the German population. No hold were barred in this process. Since anything the police did in the service of the state was considered legal, people’s rights were not permitted to impede investigations and many thousands of Germans who had been denounced as anti-Nazi simply vanished.

World View

There can be no doubt that the Nazi world view was founded in evil, however, stripped of the moral dimension, Nazi rule did have a terrible logic to it. The Fascist state could not tolerate weaklings. Only the strong could see the struggle through to success, so it was logical that the mentally and physically handicapped be euthanized. The same logic applied to the incurably ill and ‘racially undesirable’. The Nazi philosophy dictated that the end justified the means and the needs of the state were placed above the needs of individuals (even if they were handicapped).

The Fascist state existed in a constant condition of struggle. It was surrounded by jealous enemies who wished to destroy it, so it had to be constantly on guard. The defence of the state justified all sacrifices that the German people might have to make. Similarly, the state had to be on guard against internal enemies. This alone justified the suppression of religion and Communism.

The Fascist state served humanity by leading the struggle against sub-humanity. The master race was duty bound to purify both itself and the world. This made necessary the Eastern crusade against the Slavic races (Drang Nach Osten – Drive To The East)and the ‘Final Solution’ to the Jewish Problem.

Hitler’s aim for Germany was always expansionist. Der Kampf (The Struggle) justified the sacrifices which he demanded of the people. With internal control achieved after the Night Of The Long Knives, there was no possibility of the kind of political dissent which had hindered the Weimar Republic. It was therefore time for the Reich to begin its crusade to the East (Drang Nach Osten).

By 1935 conscription had been introduced in Germany and the West had failed to enforce to terms of the Treaty of Versailles. A year later, Germany occupied the Rhineland; again the West did nothing about this breach in the Treaty. In 1938, Germany joined together with Austria (the Anschluss). This too had been forbidden under the Treaty of Versailles. In the same year, Germany annexed part of Czechoslovakia known as the Sudetenland. A year later, Hitler annexed the remainder of Czechoslovakia. Upon finally realising the threat to Poland, the West guaranteed her independence. When Germany invaded Poland, France and Britain declared war; the European conflict which would grow into WWII had arrived.

Foreign Policy

Racial Hatred

The Nazi world view was nowhere more visible than in the event which has become synonymous with Hitler’s Germany: the Holocaust. This was an attempt to exterminate an entire race.

Anti-Semitism in Europe had its roots far in the past. The Jews had settled in Europe after leaving first century Rome. Even Martin Luther, the founder of Protestantism, had been violently anti-Semitic. Hitler’s tirades against the Jews therefore fell on receptive ears.

In the wake of military humiliation and financial suffering, Germans needed someone to blame. The ‘alien within’ provided an easy scapegoat. Anti-Semitism was one of the Five Points Of National Socialism and was a recurrent theme in Hitler’s Mein Kampf.

In 1933 the SA proclaimed a boycott of Jewish shops, goods and services. Jewish professionals were forbidden to practise and civil servants who could not demonstrate Aryan descent were sacked. Farmers who could not prove that their families had not intermarried with Jews during the past 50 years lost their land. By 1935 Jews were forbidden to use public amenities such as parks and swimming pools. In the same year Jews lost their citizenship as a result of the Nuremburg Laws.

On 9th November 1938 Jewish homes, shops and synagogues went up in flames in the event that came to be known as Krystallnacht (Night Of The Broken Glass). The destruction had been ordered by Goebbels, the Minister for Propaganda, as a ‘spontaneous’ demonstration of the German peoples’ hatred for the enemy within.

Hitler’s plan was to make the Reich Judenrien (Jew free). Initially, the notion of genocide was not part of the plan. The campaign of persecution was aimed at forcing Jews to leave Germany. Eventually, having lost their citizenship and property rights, Jews were forced to live in ghettos in the cities, until genocide became the only answer.

Auschwitz Concentration Camp

“Work Will Set You Free”