The Impact of WW2 on Germany

Question 1

What promises during the 1930s did Hitler fulfil?

Answer 1

• Reverse the Treaty of Versailles
• Rebuild Germany’s armed forces
• Unite Germany and Austria
• Extend German territory into eastern Europe

Question 2

When did WW2 start and end?

Answer 2

1st September 1939 – 2nd September 1945

Question 3

WW2: September 1939

Answer 3

• Food rationing was introduced
• Clothes rationing followed in November 1939
• From 1939-1941 it wasn’t difficult to keep up civilian morale because the war went spectacularly well for Germany
• Hitler was in control of much of western and eastern Europe and supplies of luxury goods flowed into Germany from captured territories

Question 4

WW2: 1941 (Card 1)

Answer 4

• Hitler took the massive gamble of invading the Soviet Union
• For the next three years his troops were engaged in an increasingly expensive war with Russian forces who ‘tore the heart out of the German army’ as Churchill put it
• The tide turned against the German forces
• Civilians found their lives disrupted
• Had to cut back on heating and work longer hours

Question 5

WW2: 1941 (Card 2)

Answer 5

• Goebbels tried to maintain people’s support for the war by involving them in it through making sacrifices
• They donated 1.5 million fur coats to help clothe the German army in Russia
• At this stage, Germans began to see and hear less of Hitler
• His old speeches were broadcast by Goebbels, but Hitler was increasingly preoccupied with the war

Question 6

WW2: 1942 (Card 1)

Answer 6

• The ‘Final Solution’ began which was to kill millions of Jewish civilians in German-occupied countries
• Albert Speer began to direct Germany’s war economy and all effort focused on the armament industries
• Postal services were suspended and letter boxes were closed
• Places of entertainment closed except cinemas for propaganda films
• Women were drafted into the labour force

Question 7

WW2: 1942 (Card 2)

Answer 7

• Country areas had to take evacuees from the cities and refugees from Eastern Europe
• The SS empire had its own armed forces, armaments industries and labour camps
• It developed a business empire that was worth a fortune but even the SS couldn’t win the war or keep up German morale
• Nazi support weakened as defeat loomed nearer
• Stayed away from Nazi rallies and refused to give the ‘Heil Hitler’ salute when asked to do so

Question 8

What was the bombing of Dresden? (February 1945)

Answer 8

• In 1942 the Allies decided on a new policy towards the bombing of Germany
• The British began an all-out assault on areas of all the major German cities
• Wanted to cripple German industry and to lower to morale of civilians so they would be terrorised into submission
• Bombing escalated through the next three years
• Then the bombing of Dresden happened in February 1945
• Killed between 35,000 and 150,000 people in two days

Question 9

What did the end of WW2 look like for Germany?

Answer 9

• By 1945 Germans were in a desperate state
• Food supplies were dwindling
• 3.5 million German civilians had died
• Refugees were fleeing the advancing Russian armies in the east
• Three months after the Dresden bombing, the war was over
• Goebbels and other Nazi war leaders committed suicide or were captured
• Germany surrendered; it was a shattered country