Chapter 17 Flashcards
What were the three distinct phases in the development of the Nazi regime?
- Legal revolution
- Creating the new Germany
- Radicalisation of the State
Phase 1: legal revolution
1933-34. When Hitler came to power in
1933, he depended on political allies. Hitler could not completely prevent the radical SA’s violence, but he controlled it as much as he could. He consolidated his power by legal means.
Phase 2: Creating the new Germany
1934-37. By August 1934, the Nazi regime was secure, but Hitler still did not have a free hand. He worried about public opinion both at home and abroad. One example of this was the Olympic Games in Berlin in 1936. Before and during the Games, Nazi anti-Semitism was put under wraps while Nazi propaganda projected the image of Germany as a civilised society. Between 1934 and 1937, Hitler avoided confronting powerful groups like the army or the Churches.
He also knew that Germany was not yet ready for a war, whatever the propaganda said.
Phase 3: Radicalisation of the State
1938-39. By the end of 1937, the Nazi regime was far stronger than in 1933. The economy had recovered The SS completely controlled the police system. Hitler felt Germany was militarily ready for war. In 1938 and 1939, therefore, the Nazis took bold steps they would not have dared to take earlier. Hitler took control of the army, sacking its two most important commanders, Blomberg and Fritsch.
He also let loose radical persecution of his ‘racial enemies.
Why could the Nazi regime not act just as it wished in its first few years in power?
Nazi ideological aims could only be implemented when it was politically possible.
Idea of social Darwinism and what was it used to justify?
Social Darwinism was a theory that was widely discussed in nineteenth-century
Europe. Social Darwinists adapted Darwin’s scientific principles of natural biological selection (the survival of the fittest) to rather unscientific theories about human society in order to justify ideas of racial superiority and the theory of eugenics. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, many Social Darwinists put forward theories designed to justify European imperialism, by arguing that advanced’ Europeans had the right and responsibility to rule over
“inferior’ or ‘backward’ colonial peoples. In Sweden, there was an influential group of scientists seeking to eliminate disabilities through population planning and birth control. Many of these ideas were incorporated into Nazi ideology.
Idea of biological struggle
Hitler’s obsession with this ‘biological struggle’ between different races easily fitted with his view of the Jews. He viewed humanity as consisting of a hierarchy of races: the Jews, black people and the Slavs were inferior races, while the Herrenvolk (master race) was the Aryan peoples of northern Europe. Another key Nazi idea was the need to purify the stronger races by eliminating the ‘germs’ that threatened to poison them through inter-marriage with so-called ‘degenerate races. Hitler believed that it was the destiny of Aryans to rule over the inferior races. In order to ensure their success in this racial struggle, it was vital for Aryans to maintain their racial purity.
What was a degenerate?
a person considered to be lacking some usual or expected property or quality, such as physical, mental or moral
Nazi view of racial hygiene and social Darwinism
Hitler’s own concept of Social Darwinism was, therefore, on an all-or-nothing basis. Biologically and culturally, the Jews were to be treated as posing a deadly treat to the German Volk. There could be no compromises and no exceptions.
Conversion to Christianity could make no difference, nor could medals won in the First World War. The germ had to be eliminated. This is how Himmler later justified the killing of Jewish women and children as well as men.
In the same way, the Nazi principles of ‘racial hygiene justified the sterilisation (or eliminating altogether) of the mentally and physically disabled, the Roma and other racial undesirables such as homosexuals, pacifists and Jehovah’s Witnesses. This theme of removing racial enemies ran through much of the more extreme Nazi propaganda of the 1920s.
Idea of Volksgemienschaft and was loyalty enough?
Hitler’s concept of the Volksgemeinschaft (people’s community’) was not inclusive of all people living in Germany. In a way that was typical of many other aspects of Nazi ideology: the concept of the national community was twisted by anti-Semitism and racial thinking. The key word was the Volk. To qualify as a member of the Volk it was essential to be a true German, both In terms of loyalty and of racial purity. To protect the Volk, it was essential 1 ruthlessly eliminate all un-German elements, especially the Jews. So the best way of defining the Volk came through identifying the racial enemies to be excluded from it, rather than the people who naturally belonged to it, Membership of the Volksgemeinschaft - known as Volksgenossen (nationa) comrades) - was reserved for those of Aryan race, members of which were expected to be genetically healthy, socially efficient and politically reliable.
Which groups were excluded from the Volks?
The Nazis divided those who were to be excluded from the Volksgemeinschaft according to three criteria:
• Political enemies
. ‘Asocials, i.e. people who didn’t fit the social norms imposed by the
Nazis
• Racial enemies, subdivided into:
• those of a different race (e.g. Jews, Gypsies)
• those with hereditary defects, such as disabilities or disease.
Idea of Lebensraum and how it would be achieved
The Nazi ideal of Lebensraum (living space) was yet another example of an ideological concept being twisted by anti-Semitism. Like Social Darwinism, the idea of Lebensraum was not new, nor originated by Hitler and the Nazis. In the later nineteenth century, many European thinkers had proposed opening up space for the expanding populations of the superior white race. In Germany, there was widespread support for the idea that the country was already over-populated and that industrious German farmers needed more land. Many argued that Germany’s destiny lay in the east, conquering the supposedly inferior Slav peoples of Poland and the former Russian Empire to gain access to fertile farmland and raw materials.
Nazi ideology fitted in smoothly with these ideas about Germany’s destiny to expand eastwards, but Hitler’s concept of Lebensraum had a particular focus on race. Lebensraum would not only allow for the ‘Germanisation of the eastern lands and bringing the ‘Lost Germans’ back to the Reich. More importantly it would provide the battleground for a war of racial annihilation wiping out the inferior Slav races and smashing Bolshevism in Russia.
Why were Eugenics increasingly attractive to the regime?
in Nazi racial ideology, the mentally ill and physically disabled were considered to be Biological outsiders from the Volksgemense we because heir hereditary ‘defects made them a threat to the future tithe A recal ace. Nazi thinking on the issue of mental and physical disability borrowed much from the science of eugenics, which had become increasingly Auential in Europe and the USA from the late nineteenth century and especially in the aftermath of the First World War. Declining birthrates, he loss of millions of healthy young men in war and improvements in medicine that prolonged the lives of those suffering from hereditary conditions all combined to raise concerns about the long-term health of nations. Eugenicists proposed the improvement of a race through selective breeding, which might involve the use of birth control and sterilisation of those who had hereditary ‘defects?
Historical background of Eugenics
In the decades before and after the First World War, ideas about eugenics gained support in America, Europe and especially in Scandinavia. Eugenicists suggested that ‘interventions’ were necessary to deal with ‘handicapped people such as the mentally ill, those with physical deformities and even homosexuals.
Family planning, sterilisation (and in extreme circumstances even euthanasia) were proposed as a means of eliminating biological and social flaws. From 1899, 35 states in the USA permitted the eugenic sterilisation of mentally handicapped people.
Development of sterilisation laws
Even before the Nazis came to power, the State government of Prussia had drawn up a draft law to allow the voluntary sterilisation of those with hereditary defects. In July 1933, the Nazis took this further by introducing the Law for Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Progeny (Sterilisation Law), which introduced compulsory sterilisation for certain categories of inferiors.
This law specified the ‘hereditary diseases’ that sterilisation was to be applied to: congenital feeble-mindedness; schizophrenia; manic-depressive illness; epilepsy; chronic alcoholism; hereditary blindness and deafness; severe physical malformation (if proven to be hereditary). Later amendments permitted sterilisation of children over 10 years, and the use of force to carry it out after 14 years, with no right to legal representation.
Two years later, the law was amended to permit abortions in cases where those deemed suitable for sterilisation were already pregnant. In 1936, x-ray sterilisation of women over 38 years was introduced (due to the greater risk of offspring with mental and physical disabilities). In the opposite direction, there was a ban on abortion and contraception for Aryan women and girls in an attempt to increase the birth rate.
Where were decisions about sterilisation made?
Decisions about sterilisation were made at Hereditary Health Courts.
Most of the judges were strongly in favour of the sterilisation policy. The decision process often took only 10 minutes. The operation took place, by force if necessary, within two weeks. Sixty per cent of those sterilised were Teebleminded, categorised as suffering from idiocy (1Q of 0-19) or imbecility (1Q of 20-49). The idea of ‘moral insanity was also used as a basis for Sterilisation. This was often merely an excuse to prevent births among the ‘Criminal underclass’ or ‘anti-socials.
How many people sterilised in total?
During the Third Reich, 400,000 people were sterilised.
Did the Nazis go beyond sterilisation to create the Master Race?
The Nazi desire to create their ‘master race did not stop at sterilisation and banning sexual relationships between Aryans and Jews. By October 1939, the regime had authorised euthanasia for the mentally and physically disabled, regarded by the Nazis as an ‘unproductive burden’ on Germany’s resources and as a threat to ‘racial hygiene and the ‘biological strength of the Volk.
How was euthanasia portrayed as merciful and moral?
A recurrent theme of Nazi propaganda was the idea that something had to be done about the ‘burden of the long-term ill and disabled. The openly stated solution was to pass new legislation allowing mentally and physically disabled children to be ‘mercifully put to death and so ‘relieve the burden on the national community. This idea was closely linked to the policy of sterilisation, which was a well-developed policy by 1939 and had attracted quite a lot of public support.
Development of the euthanasia programme
‘The first euthanasia programme for disabled children originated from one specific case of a badly disabled child early in 1939. The child’s father wrote a personal letter to Hitler asking for his child, this creature as he called him, to be put to sleep. Dr Philipp Bouhler, chief of the Führer’s party office, made sure the letter was brought to Hitler’s attention. Hitler sent a senior SS doctor, Karl Brandt, to examine the baby. Brandts report advised euthanasia for the child. Hitler approved the report and issued a directive announcing that he would personally protect from prosecution the doctors who carried out mercy killings.
This one case was the catalyst for the whole euthanasia programme.
Hitler gave Philipp Bouhler authority to deal with similar cases in the future.
All petitions were to go through the ‘Chancellery of the Führer? Hitler also made it clear that any such actions were to be secret. Medical staff in hospitals and asylums had to report on children suffering from mental illness or physical deformities. On the basis of these reports, children were sent to special hospitals to be starved to death or given lethal injections.
Parents were assured their child had died in spite of receiving the very best treatment. The technical and administrative methods used to kill more than 5000 innocent children, deemed by the Nazis to be ‘incurable and worthless to society, would be applied later to the Jews of occupied Europe. Philipp Bouhler and Karl Brandt then used their authority to extend euthanasia to adults.
T4 programme and how affected euthanasia programme
From October 1939, the programme was rapidly expanded and later moved to new, larger headquarters in Berlin, Tiergarten 4. It was from this address that the name by which the euthanasia programme is best known, Aktion T4, originated. The basis of T4 was bureaucracy and paperwork.
Forms about patients were to be filled in at clinics and asylums, and passed on to assessors, who were paid on a piecework basis to encourage them to process as many patients as possible. Those who made judgements of life and death did so without having to look the patients in the eyes, but rather simply looked at forms. Some doctors took part because they were careerists. Several doctors and nurses complained about the programme, but their objections were ignored.
Why did the T4 programme come to an end?
By 1941, rumours about the policy of euthanasia were spreading widely and aroused opposition. One public official filed a complaint with the Reich Justice Ministry and also an accusation of murder against Philipp Bouhler.
These proceedings got nowhere, but they worried the regime. From July 1940, there was also a groundswell of protests from the Churches. Protestant Pastor Braune wrote a long memorandum on July 1940, protesting about the T4 programme. On 12 August, Braune was arrested by the Gestapo. The Roman Catholic hierarchy made official protests behind the scenes. This led to intervention on behalf of the pope. An official statement from Rome on
2 December 1940 pronounced that the direct killing of people with mental or physical defects was against ‘the natural and positive law of God.
On 3 August 1941, Catholic Archbishop Galen of Münster preached a sermon making an emotive attack on euthanasia, backed by specific evidence provided by local congregation members. Galen’s sermon was designed to mobilise mass protest in the Rhineland-Westphalia province. Thousands of copies of Galens sermon were printed and widely distributed. As intended, this sparked further protests and public demonstrations. The Nazi regime was alarmed by the hostile public reactions. On 24 August 1941, Hitler halted the programme.
However, this was an isolated success for public protest against Nazi race policies. Archbishop Galen never took a public stance on behalf of the persecuted Jewish victims. The halting of the T4 programme in August 1941 did not mean the end of the drive to implement Nazi racial ideology; it was only a tactical pause. In many respects, the euthanasia programme provided the techniques, the trained personnel and the administrative experience for the coming ‘Final Solution’.
Who were asocials and what was the Nazi strategy relating to them?
The term ‘asocial, as used by the Nazis, covered a wide range of people who were deemed to be social outcasts. These included criminals, the work-shy, tramps and beggars, alcoholics, prostitutes, homosexuals and juvenile delinquents. Nazi policy was to introduce tough measures against these groups and to give the police more power to enforce them. As with other aspects of Nazi racial policy, the approach towards asocials hardened and became more systematic as time went on.
Measures against asocials (4)
• In September 1933, the regime began a mass round-up of ‘tramps and beggars, many of whom were young homeless, unemployed people. Since the Nazis did not have enough space in concentration camps to house all of these people (estimates of their total vary from between 300,000 and 500,000), they began to differentiate between the orderly and the
“disorderly homeless. The Orderly, who were fit, willing to work and had no previous convictions, were given a permit and forced to work for their accommodation. The ‘disorderly were considered to be habitual criminals and sent to concentration camps.
•In 1936, before the Olympic Games were held in Berlin, the police rounded up large numbers of tramps and beggars’ from the streets of the capital in order to project an image of a hard-working and dynamic society to the world.
• In 1936, an ‘asocial colony’ was set up, known as Hashude, in northern Germany. The aim of the colony was to re-educate the asocials so that they could be integrated into society.
• In 1938, there was an even bigger round-up of ‘beggars, tramps, pimps and gypsies. Most of these were sent to Buchenwald concentration camp, where few survived the harsh treatment.
Info about concentration camp badges
The Nazis adopted an elaborate system of badges to identify the different categories of prisoners in concentration camps. Fig. 3 shows a series of colour-coded triangles, stars (for Jewish prisoners) and other shapes for prisoners to wear on their uniforms. The categories of prisoners (from left to right) were: political enemies; habitual criminals; foreign forced labourers; ‘Bible students (e.g. Jehovah’s Witnesses); homosexuals; asocials and the work-shy. The basic colours for each category are shown along the top line. Bars were placed above these triangles to denote repeat offenders and black, concentric circles identified members of penal battalions. Markings for Jews were the Star of David made of a yellow base triangle overlaid with an inverted triangle of a different colour to identify Jewish political enemies, etc. The yellow and black stars below showed special categories of Jewish race defilers (e.g.
Aryans who had converted to Judaism) and ‘female race defilers’ (i.e. Aryan women who had had sexual relations with Jews). The triangles with the letters ‘P’ and “I at the bottom showed prisoners of Polish and Czech nationality.
Nazi view of homosexuals
In common with most other European countries at the time, homosexuality was outlawed in Germany before 1933. In the relatively liberal climate of the Weimar Republic, however, homosexuality flourished in Berlin and other large cities. Most Nazis regarded homosexuals as degenerate, perverted and a threat to the racial health of the German people.
Measures against homosexuals (5)
•In 1933, the Nazis began a purge of homosexual organisations and literature. Clubs were closed down, organisations for gay people were banned and gay publications were outlawed.
•In May 1933, Nazi students attacked the Institute of Sex Research, a gay organisation, and burned its library. They also seized the Institute’s list of names and addresses of gay people. This was the beginning of a long and sustained persecution of gay people in Nazi Germany.
• In 1934, the Gestapo began to compile lists of gay people. In that same year, the SS eliminated Röhm and other leaders of the Nazi SA who were homosexuals.
• The law on homosexuality was amended in 1935 to widen the definition of homosexuality and to impose harsher penalties for those convicted.
After the law was changed, over 22,000 men were arrested and imprisoned between 1936 and 1938.
•In 1936, Himmler created the Reich Office for the Combatting of Homosexuality and Abortion.
Outcome of policies against homosexuals
•Overall, some 100,000 men were arrested for homosexuality, of whom about 50,000 were convicted. Even when the men arrested had served their sentences, they were immediately rearrested by the Gestapo or SS and held in concentration camps under ‘preventive custody.
•In the camps, they had to wear a pink triangle to distinguish them from other prisoners and they were subjected to particularly brutal treatment by the guards.
•Many of those imprisoned were subjected to voluntary castration’ to ‘cure them of their perversion.
. Gay men who would not agree to abandon their sexual orientation were sent to concentration camps where they were subjected to unusually harsh treatment. Many were beaten to death. It has been estimated that about 60 per cent of gay prisoners died in the camps.
• Lesbians did not suffer the same degree of persecution as they were considered to be ‘asocial’ rather than degenerate.
General policy and ban on religious sects
here were a number of Christian sects that had become established in Germany or the time the Nazis came to power - the Jehovahs Witnesses, Christian scientists, Mormons, Seventh-Day Adventists and members of teristar postolic Church. All had international links, which aroused Nazi suspicions out their loyalties, and most were banned by the regime in November 1933. the ban on some sects, however, was lifted when they demonstrated their willingness to cooperate with the regime. Where sects were allowed to continue, however, Gestapo agents attended and reported on their services.
Religious sect opposition and Nazi response
The Jehovah’s Witnesses were the only religious group to show uncompromising hostility towards the Nazi State. With around 30,000 adherents in Germany in 1933, the Jehovah’s Witnesses were a small but closely knit sect.
Their belief that they could only obey Jehovah (God) led them into conflict with the Nazi regime because they refused to take a loyalty oath to Hitler. They refused to give the Hitler salute, participate in Nazi parades or accept army conscription. They regarded persecution as a test of their faith and became more resistant under pressure from the regime.
Many were arrested. In prison, they refused to obey orders, to attend parades or remove their caps. By 1945, around 10,000 Jehovah’s Witnesses had been imprisoned and many had died.
However, the regime had failed to break their resistance and the Witnesses had made some converts to their beliefs in the camps.
Examples of religious sects complying with Nazis
Unlike the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Seventh-Day Adventists gave a positive welcome to the Nazi regime, describing it as the beginning of Germany’s rebirth.
The ban on the sect was removed within two weeks as it agreed to display the swastika flag in its churches, conclude its services with the ‘Heil Hitler greeting and remove the so-called Jewish language of the Old Testament from its services. is well-developed welfare organisation, which provided food and shelter, agreed to exclude asocials, Jews and other ‘race enemies’ from receiving help.
Other sects also strove to make the necessary compromises with the regime in order to ensure their survival. The Mormons’ welfare organisation, like that Of the Seventh-Day Adventists, selected its recipients according to Nazi criteria.
The New Apostolic Church incorporated SS and SA flags into its church parades.
Nazi strategy towards Gypsies
Jes were not the only victims of the intensification of Nazi race policies alter,
1935. There was also growing persecution of Germany’s 30,000 gypsies (Roma did sinti people), known in Germany as Zigeuner. Gypsies had been subjected to legal discrimination well before 1933. Local authorities frequently harassed them into moving away. The Nazis made the persecution much more systematic.
Measures against Gypsies (4)
•In 1935, Nazi legal experts ruled that the Nuremberg Laws applied to Gypsies, even though they were not specifically mentioned in the laws.
•In 1936, the SS set up a new Reich Central Office for the Fight Against the Gypsy Nuisance. A university psychologist, Dr Robert Ritter, became the expert ‘scientific adviser to the SS and the Ministry of Health. Using Ritter’s criteria, the SS began the process of locating and classifying Gypsies. The centralised files they collected were essential to facilitate police action against them. Ritter was particularly concerned to identify and isolate those whose heritage was part-Gypsy (the ‘so-called Mischlinge, or ‘mongrels) and who had become fully integrated into German society, since they represented a threat to the Aryan racial purity.
•In December 1938, Himmler issued a Decree for the Struggle against the Gypsy Plague, which led to a more systematic classification of Gypsies.
•After war broke out in September 1939, Gypsies were deported from Germany to Poland
Chapter summary
The treatment of various groups excluded from the Nazi concept of Volsksgemeinschaft was a stark illustration of the Nazi belief that the individual counted for nothing when the interests of the community were at stake.
In the Third Reich, the all-powerful State could, and did, take action to exclude those it considered to be political, social or racial enemies of the People’s Community. These groups were subjected to increasing levels of discrimination and persecution as the Nazis began to feel more secure and confident in their hold on power. After 1938, Nazi racial policy became more radical and the use of euthanasia against the mentally and physically disabled prefigured the policy of extermination applied to Jews after 1942.
