Chapter 19 Flashcards
Key chronology anti-Semitic policies 1938-40
1938 April
Registration of Jewish assets over 5000 marks
October
Jewish passports stamped with a large ‘J’
November
Jews forbidden to visit theatres, etc.
Reichkristallnacht
Expulsion of all Jewish pupils from schools
December
Compulsory sale of all Jewish businesses
1939 September
German invasion of Poland
Ghettoisation of Jews in Poland
October
Euthanasia programme authorised by Hitler
November
Jews in occupied Poland made to wear Star of David
1940 April
German invasion of Western Europe
The Anschluss with Austria
A union between Germany and Austria (Hitler’s birthplace and formerly a part of Germany) into a greater Germany was one of Hitler’s key aims, although it had been prohibited by the Treaty of Versailles. In the years after 1933, Hitler encouraged Nazi groups in Austria to agitate for union but the Austrian government banned Nazi demonstrations and called a plebiscite in March 1938 to show that the majority of Austrians were opposed to union. When it became clear that Britain, France and Italy would not intervene to support Austrian independence, the government resigned and Hitler ordered the German army to invade.
Although the Anschluss (union) with Austria was banned under the Treaty of Versailles, it was a long-term ambition of German nationalists and was achieved in March 1938. The German takeover of Austria was achieved without a shot being fired and German troops were welcomed enthusiastically by the Austrian people.
Significance of ‘bloodless victory’
This ‘bloodless victory further emboldened Hitler and the Nazi leadership to pursue their ambitions in foreign policy and to adopt more radical racial policies in the Greater Germany they had created.
Hitler’s foreign policy aims to create a Racial State (3)
Hitler had long made clear his ambitions for Germany. These induded:
•an end to the restrictions of the Treaty of Versailles on Germany’s armed forces and its territorial expansion
• the creation of a Greater Germany which would re-unite Germans living in Austria, Czechoslovakia and Poland with the Reich
•the acquisition of land in the east to give Lebensraum to the Aryans, as a superior race.
Aryanisation meaning
Nazi policy of removing all Jews and other non-Aryans from key aspects of Germanu’s cultural and economic life; the policy was designed to lead ultimately to the complete expulsion of non-Aryans from
Germany
Conquests of Sudetenland and Czechoslovakia
By 1938, therefore, Hitler was growing in confidence that Germany was ready for war if necessary and that the Allied powers lacked the resolve to act against him. After his bloodless victory’ in Austria, his next target was Czechoslovakia, which included a large German minority living in the area known as the Sudetenland. In September 1938, Hitler risked war with Britain and France over his demand for the Sudetenland to be handed over to Germany. Once again, he achieved a ‘bloodless victory after Britain and France agreed to the German takeover. In March 1939, he achieved another success with the occupation of the rest of Czechoslovakia. In August 1939, Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia signed a non- aggression pact (known as the Nazi-Soviet Pact) under which the USSR agreed not to oppose the German invasion of Poland. This invasion followed on September 1939, which led to war between Germany and Britain and France two days later.
How did military conquest in Austria remove obstacles in way of anti-Semitic policies?
The more radical phase of Nazi anti-Semitism was part of the more general radicalising of the regime’s policies, which began in the winter of
1937-38. By late 1937, the Four Year Plan was beginning to improve both the economic and the military situation in Germany. Those who had been urging caution - Schacht in economic policy and Blomberg and Fritsch in the military - were swept aside and the balance of power in the regime shifted towards the more radical elements in the Nazi Party. Schacht had argued strongly against radical anti-Semitism in the economic field because he did not want to alienate foreign investors. Goering, in charge of the Four Year Plan, did not care about foreign opinion and was determined to remove Jews from businesses as soon as possible. The occupation of Austria in March 1938 led to a rapid acceleration of the economic campaign against Jews as the Nazis in Austria were allowed to act against Jews without constraint. This prompted Goering to take more radical action in Germany itself.
Anti-Semitic decrees, April to November 1938
In April 1938, the Decree of Registration of Jewish Property provided for the confiscation of all Jewish-owned property worth more than 5000 marks.
This was the starting point for the Aryanisation of Jewish property and businesses. In April 1938, there were roughly 40,000 Jewish-owned businesses houlGermany; a year later only around 8000 had avoided being closed down or
Aryanised.
Further legislation banned Jews from work as travelling salesmen, security guards, travel agents and estate agents - 30,000 Jewish travelling salesmen lost their jobs. In 1938, Jews also lost their entitlement to public welfare. The increasing number of unemployed and poor Jews depended completely on the charities set up by the Jewish community, such as the Central Institution for Jewish Economic Aid.
From October 1938, the passports of German Jews had to be stamped with a large J.
Nazi persecution of Jews in Austria
There were 183,000 Jews living in Austria at the time of the Nazi takeover. Overnight, they were subjected to the loss of their rights, property and employment, and to physical assaults. Within a month, over 500 Jews had committed suicide in Austria. Thousands more decided to emigrate to escape Nazi persecution.
More than 1500 were sent to Dachau and Buchenwald concentration camps in Germany during 1938.
Turning point significance of Reichkristallnacht, 9-10 November 1938
Between 1933 and 1938, Jews in Germany were subjected to increasing pressure of persecution, through anti-Semitic legislation, propaganda and the growing power of the police state. For many Jews, however, it was still possible to carry on some kind of normal existence. However, all this was changed on Reichkristallnacht (the Night of the Broken Glass) on 9-10 November. Jewish homes and businesses were looted and vandalised, synagogues were set ablaze and thousands of Jews were arrested, beaten up and killed.
How was Jewish individuality removed?
From October 1938, the passports of German Jews had to be stamped with a large J. The drive to make Jews easily identifiable and, at the same time, strip them of their individuality led to a new law in 1939 - Jews that were deemed to have non-Jewish names had to change them. Jewish women had to take the name ‘Sarah’ and Jewish men had to take the name Israel? At this stage, Hitler turned down the suggestion of making all Jews wear a yellow star in public - this did not come into practice within the Reich until 1941.
Myth of Reichkristalnacht
The Reichkristallnacht pogrom can be viewed as an uncontrolled outpouring of anti-Semitic feeling amongst radical elements of the Nazi movement, partly supported by German public opinion. Certainly this was the view put out by Nazi propaganda, which announced that the National Soul has boiled over.
It is also true that some people in the Nazi hierarchy were concerned about the violence running out of control. In the days after the pogrom, Hitler gave Hermann Goering a coordinating role to sort things out. From this point of view, it might appear that the situation in November 1938 was similar to that of April 1933, when the regime had to rein in the SA boycott.
How did Reichkristalnacht really come about?
In reality, Reichkristallnacht was orchestrated by the Nazi leadership and the majority of those involved in the violence and vandalism were SA and SS men who had been instructed not to wear uniforms. The Nazis seized the opportunity presented by the murder of Ernst vom Rath on 9 November. Rath was a minor German official in Paris who was killed by Herschel Grynszpan, a young Polish Jew angry at the treatment of his parents by the Nazi regime. The killing of vom Rath was more an excuse for unleashing anti-Jewish terror than the real cause.
The chief instigator of the pogrom was Joseph Goebbels. He gave instructions to the Nazi officials in the regions to organise the violence and vandalism, but to be careful to make it appear that it was not orchestrated by the Nazi Party. The fifteenth anniversary of the 1923 Munich Putsch was on 9
November and Goebbels hoped to please Hitler by marking the occasion with a spectacular event.
What was a pogrom:?
an organised massacre of an ethnic group; the Reichkristallnacht pogrom was not the first massacre against Jews in Europe - there had been a number of pogroms against Jews living in the Russian Empire during the nineteenth century
Damage in Reichkristalnacht
In the violence, 91 Jews were killed and thousands injured. There was looting of cash, silver, jewellery and works of art. Damage to shops and businesses amounted to millions of marks. Much of the vandalism was purely destructive, not for gain. Orders from the SS directed the police not to intervene against the demonstrators; they were ordered to place 20,000-30.000 Jews in ‘preventive detention. The fire brigades watched and did nothing as synagogues burned to the ground; their only concern was to stop the fires spreading to other buildings. How many signagougues burned?
