The impact of war and defeat on Germany: 1939-49

Question 1

resistance and opposition-communists

Answer 1

• movement was never entirely broken, but went underground
• small communist cells continued in many of the large German cities. Particularly revived after the invasion of the USSR. Eg. Uhrig Group in Berlin and Homefront in Hamburg
• most popular was the red orchestra, a spy network which infiltrated the government and military through Arvid Harnack and Schulz-Boysen.
• The cell transmitted vital information back to Moscow and produced pamphlets attacking the Nazi government.
• ended up being destroyed by the gestapo at the end of 1942

Question 2

resistance and opposition-communists and the reason they failed

Answer 2

• took orders from Moscow and were tainted by their association with Stalin and his purges of the 1930s
• compromised by the period of co-operation between the Nazi government and the USSR as a result of the Nazi soviet pact 1939-41
• when the USSR and Germany did end up at war in June 1941 the resistance groups remained very isolated
• active resistance was limited
• more focused on self-preservation and preparation for the day Nazism would be defeated and the ‘soviet liberation’ could take place

Question 3

resistance and opposition-Christians

Answer 3

• As Nazi persecution intensified from 1941, evidence suggests that church attendance increased and many individual churchmen put their freedom and lives at risk in order to uphold beliefs/to give pastoral assistance.
• 40% catholic clergy and over 50% of protestant pastors were harassed by the Nazis

Question 4

resistance and opposition -Christians. Key figures.

Answer 4

Dietrich Bonhoeffer:
-from the start he was a consistent opponent of Nazism
-1940-had moved from religious dissent to political resistance-brought him into direct contact with conservative elites in the Kreisau circle.
Bishop von Galen of Munster:
-conservative, nationalist, aristocrat and a strong anti communist
-1930s had doubts about Nazi policy and excesses of the Gestapo.
-delivered 3 sermons in 1941 which condemned the Nazi euthanasia policy. His attacked proved so powerful with his congregations that the authorities recoiled from arresting him and stopped the programme
Alfred Delp:
-inner party member of the kreisau circle
-implicated in the Stauffenberg plot and executed in 1945

Question 5

opposition and resistance- Christians and the reason they failed

Answer 5

• posed no real threat to the strength of the regime
• mainly concerned with self-preservation and maintaining their property and wealth and their power as institutions
• no public condemnation of the Nazi genocide of the Jews