Nazi Planning Flashcards
1918: Timeline
: ToV, New Era, Weimar Republic; representative and participatory politics
1922: Timeline
Mussolini comes to power
1933 Timeline:
30th Jan - Third Reich
Who criticises the election of Hitler as Chancellor?
Evans - believes this was not democratically done
1933-34: Timeline
Gleichschaltung
1934: Timeline
Reichstag Fire - end of period of consolidation, beginning of one party rule - planning starts here
1935: Timeline
Nuremburg Laws;
1938: Timeline
Kristallnacht; night of destruction of Jewish property and synagogues
1939: Timeline
Warthegau
1941: TImeline
Final Solution touted
1942: Timeline
Lancee Conference
Name x2 important timelines that are necessary to consider
- War timeline
2. Jews
Name of plan in place for urban planning of Berlin;
When was it introduced?
WELTHAUPTSTADT GERMANIA
Jan 1938
What were the main features highlighted in scholarship concerning the Welthauptstaft Germania?
According to whom?
- monumentality
- iconography
- materials
Scobie
What was Berlin’s labour force like? Who were they made up of?
- 130,000 strong workforce
- made up of PoWs / forced labour
What was the ultimate goal of the Welthaptstadt Germania plan?
Provide a reinterpretation of Germany’s defeat
Make Germany a new world capital
What can be said of the aesthetic style of the Welthauptstadt Germania plan?
No one unitary style
Nazi’s were consumers of culture and so appropriated many styles
Although no unitary style - the massive proportions and loss of scale were characteristic
What was significant about Germany’s choice of materials in the Welthauptstadt Germania Plan?
stone used frequently
little use of ‘modern’ materials;
attempting to build the thousand year reich
= little history to conquer of their own
Through stone the nation could express its fundamental values
‘Wort aus stein’ - words in stone
What were the 4 main components of the Welthauptstadt Germania plan?
- ceremonial N-S Axis
- infrastructure i.e U-Bahn
- Basic housing provision
- based on laws of property ownership
What did Hitler consider architecture to be?
The Highest Form of Art
A way of expressing the thoughts and vision of Fascism
What type of architecture did the Nazi regime primarily use?
Ornamented, classical architecture;
i.e domes / columns / cornices / arches
Neoclassicism > romanesque / gothic
Who refers to Hitler’s love and passion for architecture and its reference in Goebbels memoire?
Spotts
What position did Hitler occupy in relation to urban planning?
Inspector General for the Reich Capital of Berlin
The 6 Principles of Reich Architecture (1935)
- cultural greatness
- not a place for imitations
- difference between public and private buildings
- design and construction to be efficient
- use of modern construction methods
- state buildings to be the grandest
Italian term for ‘Word In Stone’
Wort aus Stein
What is the name for pieces of architecture designed by the Fuhrer?
Architektur des Fuhrer
Talk about the design of the Triumphal Arch;
- Triumphal Arch designed in 1925
- Speer revealed design in 1936
What did Hitler desire the architecture to appear like?
Wanted architecture to impress and inhibit the population
How did Hitler treat architects?
Provided a special status to architects;
no military service
financial and social privileges
What year was a massive project across 5 Fuhrer cities launched?
What 5 cities were these?
1937
Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, Linz, Nuremburg
Who was the architect of Munich?
What did they install which copied Berlin?
What was a notable building there?
Geiser
W-E Axis - copied Berlin
Bonatz’s Strasburg station
What happened to social housing under Hitler?
Decline in social housing - although rise in Hitler Villages
What was a phrase that linked together the nation and architecture?
Great Architecture –> Great Nation
Great Nation –> Great Architecture
How was Hitler inspired by other cities?
Felt Cold in Paris
Only inspired by Rome
Facts about Triumphal Arch;
14m elevation (vista, frame for Great Hall, optical illusion)
Designed by H 1925, revealed by Speer 1936
Postponed due to materials & ground subsidence
Commemoration for WWI dead (1.8mil)
Stripped neoclassical style;
Arc de Triumph could fit inside the arch
Name of the building used to test marshy ground;
Exploratory Structure
Facts about the Exploratory Structure;
- 18cm subsidence in 3 years
- 12,000 tonnes
- Opened as a historical monument in 1990; heritage
GBI Office;
When was it built?
What was the GBI office?
GBI office in 1937
Task force leading planning on the x2 monumental, intersecting areas
= design based around monuments
Soldiers Hall;
- destruction for monumentalism
- scale: main attribute
- encourage future sacrifice
- surrounding area cleared: makes hall more impressive (mainly houses)
North South Axis;
N-S axis; 100m width, 38km
Ceremonial axis
W-E axis; 50km
Intersect at Brandenburg gate; finish at triumphal arch
DISENCUMBERING: 54,000 BUILDINGS - 25,000 for N-S axis
Great Hall;
Main building on axis Dome Height: 290m Can fit 150,000 - 180,000 individuals Worship site for Fuhrer Larger than Pantheon; monstrous scale Not built - materials Final Solution
How did the Great Hall link to the final solution?
Would have been built with money from the war; symbol of victory over jews
Forced labour from Jewish camps and PoWs
Who was the designer for the House of German Art?
What was significant about this building?
Troost
House of German Art = 1st project Hitler commissioned
Problems with construction / design in Nazi Germany;
- marshy ground
- Jewish problem
- lack of materials due to wartime constraints
- GBI cohesion
Who suggests that it is important to look at how different institutions adopted anti-Semitism within urban planning?
Jaskott
Was Speer’s planning anti-semitic, or was he simply following Nazi ideology?
Architecture has a political Function
Speer’s architecture actively pursued anti-semitic policy
+ Architecture could not be developed without anti-semitic policy;
+ Speer was not aided by A-S policy, but furthered it to suit his means; extended it
+ Went further than the Gestapo and predetermined some of the advanced stages of the Final Solution
+ Forced labour; GBI takes these over
+ Commitment to aesthetic = overran administrative boundaries
Jaskott
Necessary to investigate how different institutions within urban planning considered and acted upon anti-semitism
What did Speer consider of housing
Considered monumental planning > housing
On scholarship of Nazi Germany urban construction what is there little of;
Little analysis of North-South architecture
What is unique about Berlin and its critique?
Only city criticised for persecuting for the sake of architecture
What did Speer wish to do with substitute housing?
How was this justified
Wished to dispossess the Jews and not build any substitute housing
Justified by economic savings (400mil RM)
Who was assisting Speer in the formulation of laws against Jews?
How did this relationship go?
What was Speer demanding?
Dr. Vockmar at Ministry of Justice
Did not act fast enough so Speer acted largely alone
Led to High Level meeting in Nov 1938
Speer was demanded that he needed 2,500 large dwellings
When was the Decree on Jewish Housing imposed?
What did this mandate?
April 1939; Decree on Jewish Housing
Jews had to be taken in by other Jews
When was the second decree on Jewish Housing imposed?
What did this do?
What did Speer do with this power?
April 1941; New Law
Speer controls the dispersal of 70,000 Jewish individuals
Evicted 5,000
Which area had a large number of Jewish evictions following the April 1941 law?
TIERGARTEN
9% of residential population of Berlin Jews
Differences between Italians and Germans Fascist architecture;
- competition rate
- I is more realistic; G more monumental
- autonomy
- anti-semitism
- timeline into power
- Conquering of History
What was Italy trying to create from its history? What was Germany trying to create?
Both trying to conquer history;
I = ‘Third Rome’
G = ‘Thousand Year Reich’
Who considered every German to be associated with Nuremburg in some way
Brockman
Brockman
Who considered every German to be associated with Nuremburg in some way
Describe the city of Nuremburg;
- more closely related to Rome than Berlin was
- cultural capital
- site of rally grounds
- preserved old city centre architecture (ancient city components)
Name for small villages in Germany
Why were these important for Germany?
How were provincial towns celebrated?
What did Hitler impose here, how was he inspired?
Reichsgaue
‘Salt of the Earth’ element of ideology
Towns celebrated through celebrating all things alpine / bells / tradition
Introduced ‘party forums’ -
Area of West Poland that Germany occupied in October 1939;
Warthegau
Where was Warthegau located
When was it occupied by Germany
Warthegau located in West Poland
Occupied in October 1939
Composition of Warthegau population;
85% Poles
400,000 Jews
325,000 Germans
By October 1944 what had happened to the Polish population in the Warthegau?
Reduced by 12% as Poles were sent to the Old Reich as labour
What was the program called which attempted to encourage Germans to move to Warthegau?
Positive Germanisation
Strategies involved in Positive Germanisation
- afforestation
- German institutions established
- German culture / ‘blonde province’
- modern transport networks i.e new roads
How many Germans were repatriated to Warthegau?
When did this occur?
Where were this Germans from?
290,000 Germans who were minorities living in the Balkans
1939-41
What was important about the Germanisation program?
You could only Germanise the region- not the people
wanted strict segregation of races
Describe the Nazi’s afforestation program
400,000 acres of afforestation in Warthegau
contradictory policy;
- needed wood to burn bodies of Jewish dead
- needed wood for construction purposes
What types of institutions did the Germans establish in Warthegau as part of their positive Germanisation program?
- German University
- Posen Castle
- Afforestation
What did the Old Reich envision Warthegau being?
Bread Basket for the Reich
Evidence that colonisation was important to the Third Reich?
3rd point in NSDAP’s 1920s plan;
Who was charged with the demographic reordering of Warthegau? When?
Himmler in October 1939
What did Himmler establish in October 1939 to help him with his demographic reordering in the Warthegau
RFK : Reich Commission for Strengthening Germandom
What did Himmler demand of the Jewish population in his demographic reordering strategy?
Demanded Jews deportation by Feb 1940;
Was not a fan of Jews working for the Third Reich
What happened to the Jews in 1940?
Deportation rate slows
Required as labour
Nazi’s need middle class Poles housing worthy of Germans, not Jewish ghettos
War = Jews allowed, although reduced to 20,000
This provided Greiser authority to kill 100,000
What action did Himmler take in 1943;
Himmler’s camp closures - extermination
Polish Assets Decree; explain
RFK could seize Polish Assets with little justification
Points FOR: Warthegau being a success
+ functional segregation effectively enforced; i.e curfews
+ German population increased:
1939: 6.6% –> 1944: 22.9%
although doesn’t necessarily constitute success
+ Greiser’s intentions to create space for German identity in Eastern Europe were more impressive than results
Who was in charge of the Germanisation of the Warthegau?
Greiser
Points AGAINST: Warthegau
- Contradictions; i.e workforce; required Germans / Poles even at cost of having them living in the Gau
- Germans from Balkans weren’t really German
- Poles motivation for work reduced; most projects barely even begun
Paul Bonatz got famous through his design of;
Stuttgart Station
What did Frank describe Bonatz as?
Balancing force between the Neues Buen and Neoclassical movements preferred by Speer
Describe Bonat’z inherent style;
one of mixed principles, refused modernist - traditionalist divide
What was the nature of Bonatz’s collaboration with the Nazi regime?
Not an NSDAP member
Did not subscribe to anti-semitic principles
When did Bonatz emigrate to Turkey
What was special about this
1943-44
1/500 allowed to stay post-war
What did Bonatz help design in Turkey?
How was this redesigned?
Ankara state opera
Transformed modernist / internationalist building into one which represented Turkish national architecture
When did Bonatz return to Germany?
Returned to Germany in 1954;
What was part of Bonatz’s return to Germany?
Reconciliation period / meeting: 1950
Bonatz appointed to commission rebuilding in French Zone
What year were the German Olympics?
What was important about the budget?
Why was this?
1936 : Berlin Olympics
Budget exceeded excessively; 1.8million marks to 28million
All part of putting Germany in a position of ‘World City’
Quote from Speer on what hitler desired from Berlin;
‘Architectural Stage Set of Imperial Majesty’
Why was Hitler not the biggest far of Berlin?
- too Prussian
- too Experimental
What was special about the Soldiers Hall?
What was destroyed?
What were the consequences?
Destruction for monumentality
Primarily houses which were destroyed - in order to make Great Hall more impressive (akin to Italians Sventramenti)
Limited compensation for those affected -
What was the main target of disencumbering in Berlin?
How many dwellings demolished in Berlin in total?
Mainly vernacular structures
i.e houses targeted for Great Hall
54,000 dwellings demolished in Berlin
How did Speer describe the Great Hall;
When was it intended to be built?
‘Berlin’s greatest construction’
Intended to be built post WWII victory
Architecture in Germany was intended to show ‘inwards political greatness’ , what X3 means was this attempted to be achieved through?
- self-gratification
- self indoctrination
- nationalistic self-assertion
When was the Welthauptstadt Germania introduced?
Jan 28th 1938
How can the relationship between planning and anti-semitic policy be termed?
Planning had an influence on the time and active pursuit of anti-semitic policy
When were the 6 principles of Third Reich Architecture introduced?
1935
Was Neoclassicism only in Fascist states?
What does this say about Third Reich style?
No - also used in the likes of France and USA
Third Reich was an absorber of culture; appropriated many different styles
When did material shortages begin to be a problem for Germany?
Example
Problem of finding adequate building supplies from late 1930s
i.e wood - high demand although rationed from 1937
What did Hitler think of modern materials ; i.e concrete, glass?
Shunned them
What theory did Speer think he had coined, yet was not actually novel?
‘Theory in Ruin Value’
What does Hilberg comment on in relation to the Jews?
Hilberg considers the Jews to have been victims of economic exploitation through the use of property rights
What did the Ministry of Justice and Speer gather in order to formulate policy on the Jews?
Increased statistical information on the Jews themselves
By 1942 how many forced labour camps were there in the Warthegau?
160 forced labour camps by 1942
What system required the presence of Jews and Poles to be registered in the Warthegau?
DVL
Name for ‘Homeland’
Heimat
National Socialism recognised only one Heimat; slogan for this;
‘One Volk, One Native Soil’
Who suggests that it is important to consider the heritage of places in terms of whether they are ‘Victim’ or ‘Perpetrator’ locations?
Assmann
Where can Assmann’s theory be applied to in Germany?
Nuremburg;
in terms of whether certain locations represent victim or perpetrator locations of heritage
What was Nuremburg a centre of?
Why was this?
rallies / race laws / trials
High degree of identification between Nuremburg and National Socialism
Why was Nuremburg an attractive location for rallies and culture
Location in the centre of the country
One of the oldest and most in tact town centres ; huge architectural relics
Tangible proof of difficult heritage
Idea of collective memory
What was a defining feature of the Nuremberg rally sites? How has this influenced how their heritage has developed?
Nuremburg rally sites were massive in scale :
11km^2 and gradually increased
Continues to be a problem as the size of site suggests it should be used for multiple uses
Immediately post WWII what were the Nuremburg rally sites being used for ?
sports grounds almost immediately post WWII
= convergence of sports and remembrance
Nazi era victims called for abandonment of leisure project
