the terror state

Question 1

who controlled the police systems?

Answer 1

-April 1933- Goring became Minister-President of Prussia (largest police force in Ger)
-April 1934- Himmler in charge of all the other police forces

Question 2

Who were the SS?

Answer 2

-Hitler’s bodyguard
-1936: in control of the whole police system and camps
-Racially pure, obedient

Question 3

Who were the SD?

Answer 3

-1931
-internal security service of Nazi party (investigate infiltration of party)
-led by Reinhard Heydrich (most senior commander after Himmler)
-1939= 50k officers

Question 4

What was the Gestapo?

Answer 4

-1939= 20k officers
-myth of ‘all knowing’ (the nazis being everywhere)
-successful in instilling fear and people changed behaviours to not seem suspicious
-professional police officers (not always Nazis)
-informers to spy, overwhelming amount of info

Question 5

Himmler

Answer 5

-Became leader of SS 1929
-control of police/ camps when Hitler came to power
-In charge of opposing the Red Army but failed, Himmler attempted to make a peace deal with the allies, this failed and he khs as a Br POW

Question 6

Heydrich

Answer 6

-responsible for coordinating ‘final solution’ plans at Wannsee Conference 1942
-Governed Czech territories in the Reich
-1942 assassinated

Question 7

CJS

Answer 7

-traditionally had freedom from political control
-Some judges etc were dismissed
-April 1933: Front of German Law (merged legal associations with League of Nationalist Socialist Lawyers)
-1934-9= 3400 tried by the people’s court

Question 8

New Courts

Answer 8

-1933 Special Courts
-1934 People’s Courts
-deal with political crimes
-3 Nazi judges and 2 professional ones, defendants not able to appeal

Question 9

opposition from protestants

Answer 9

-around 40 mill (out of 60 mill)
-Nazi tried to win over the church which led to a split and formation of the Confessional Church 1934
-Confessional church= by pastors who were not Nazis and refused to be part of ‘co-ordinated’ Reich church
-Niemoller was leading figure (arrested for 7 yrs)

Question 10

Catholic opposition

Answer 10

-20 mill (very few voted for Nazis bc of Z party- but supported 1933 Enabling Act)
-1933 Concordat= agreement for Nazis not to interfere in the Church and vice versa (Nazis broke this)
-Archbishop Clemens von Galen= criticised the sterilisation/ euthanasia programme
-Pope Pius VI= 1937 encyclical ‘With Burning Concern’ abt the Nazi influence of the Catholic

Question 11

Political opposition

Answer 11

-left was split between KPD & SPD
-both hunted down, murdered, camps, exiled
-opposition from abroad (SOPADE= info from ex SPD in Ger to members exiled)

Question 12

Opposition from trade unions/ workers

Answer 12

-250 strikes 1937
-strict penalties for ‘slackers’ in 1938 and sabotage became a criminal offence

Question 13

opposition from the youth

Answer 13

-1937 Rhineland: Edelweiss pirates (mainly wc, rebelling against HJ, bohemian clothes, jazz, beat up members of HJ)
-Swing Kids: mc group who acted similarly
-1939 arrested/ executed

Question 14

opposition from the elite

Answer 14

-many disliked Hitler
-compromised w/ Nazis, small number of opponents
-1938 General Blomberg & Fritsch expressed doubts abt foreign policy/ said Ger was unprepared (they were replaced)
-Military coup planned by General Beck due to Hitler’s planned invasion of Czechoslovakia
-shelved after Munich Conference

Question 15

Kreisau Circle

Answer 15

-elite etc met
-shared vision of Christian Germany under a restored monarchy
-before 1939 they new Hitler’s rule was a disaster
-BUT: not a serious group

Question 16

Totalitarianism

Answer 16

-political system which has no limits to its authority
-stay in political power through propaganda, control of mass media, education, economy, politics, capital punishment, surveillance, camps
-has a dictator and personality cult