WWII in Nazi Germany' Flashcards
when did Germany surrender to the allies, wwii?
may 1945
when did Hitler commit suicide?
april 1945
when did germany invade poland?
september 1939
how was Denzafication done, after the end of WWII?
- Nazi Party banned
- advocating National Socialist ideas made punishable by death.
- Swastika and other Nazi emblems banned in public.
- Germans made to complete questionnaires about the extent of their involvement in Nazism.
- Ex-Nazis taken on tours of concentration camps or made to watch video clips of Jewish prisoners.
what was the aim of denazification after WWII?
to force Germans to confront the crimes of the Nazi regime, but also to re-educate them in order to leave Nazism behind.
IN 1946, what five categories of involvement in nazism were established?
- Major offenders
- offenders
- lesser offenders
- followers
- persons exonerates
when were the nuremburg trials?
started November 1945
what were the nuremburg trials?
Tried those involved in suspected war crimes - first hearings concerned 23 most important political, military and economic leaders of Nazi Germany - Only 3 acquitted whilst 12 sentenced to death.
how was West Germany treated after WWII?
- Initially, allies pursued a policy of de-militarisation and de-industrialisation to ensure Germany could not equip itself to fight a war but relaxed when they realised Germany needed to be economically strong to protect against the Cold War threat of communism.
- USSR wanted reparations from Germany for the damage caused during the war - much of East Germany’s industry was dismantled and taken back to the USSR, leaving already shattered country very weak.
how was East Germany treated after WWII?
- allies established a democratic, federal constitution and Konrad Adenauer became the country’s first Chancellor, serving until 1963.
- USSR ensured the creation of a communist dictatorship led by the Socialist Unity Party and Wilhelm Pieck became its first President.
how did Hitler justify leaving the LoN?
used other countries refusal to disarm as a pretext for withdrawing Germany from the League of Nations.
what was the 12 November 1933 plebiscite for, and its result?
plebiscite on his decision to withdraw Germany from LoN - seemed to show that the German public overwhelmingly voted in support of the move, although there was a large amount of pressure from the Nazis to vote this way.
when did Germany withdraw from the LoN?
14 October 1933
when was the Polish Non-aggression Pact?
26 January 1934,
what was the Polish Non-Aggression Pact?
unexpected diplomatic peace which agreed that both countries would work together diplomatically to address any issues, and would not engage in armed conflict with each other for a minimum of ten years.
why did Hitler sign the Polish Non-Aggression Pact?
- wanted to ensure that Poland did not sign a military alliance with France, as Germany was not yet prepared for another war.
- gave Poland assurance that Germany would not invade in the immediate future and therefore gave them no reason to have a military alliance with France which gave Germany time to fully rearm.
when was the Luftwaffe officially est.?
26 February 1935
when did Hitler publicly announce his plan to reintroduce conscription and increase the size of the German Army to 500,000 men?
16 March 1935
in 1939, how many men were in the German Army, and how many planes in the Luftwaffe?
German Army had approximately 1 million men, and the Luftwaffe had 8000 planes
when was the Anglo-German Naval Agreement with Britain?
18th June 1935
what did the Anglo-German Naval Agreement mean?
Germany could expand its navy to 35% of the size of the British Navy
when was the remilitarisation of the Rhineland?
7 March 1936
how did Germany initially respond to the outbreak of war, wwii?
- Most Germans believed the attack on Poland was a reaction to Polish aggression and was designed to reclaim territory lost in ToV
- When poland occupied, Hitler publicly offered to make peace with western allies, while secretly ordering his generals to prepare for an invasion of France that winter. Britain and France refused to trust Hitler so the war continued.
- reacted with resignation as they could still remember the pain of 1918, their surrender and the subsequent punishment at Versailles
- vast majority of Germans reluctantly supported the war and signed up to play their part in the war effort.
when was rationing introduced, wwii?
27 August 1939
how was rationing decided, wwii?
Food entitlements depended upon the importance of individuals to the war effort: ‘normal consumers’, ‘heavy workers’ ‘very heavy workers’ – there were also categories for children, pregnant women. Jews’ food entitlements were set below Aryans’.
when was the points system for clothing introduced, wwii?
October 1939.
Why were there meat shortages in wwii?
lack of imports from the USA.
what happened to German diets in WWII?
became more monotonous, with lots of bread, potatoes and preserves.
how did autarky affect rationing?
Autarky and rearmament meant consumer goods were already expensive due to low supply.
what was ‘area bombing’?
targeting large industrial cities with incendiary bombs (bombs designed to cause fires), and not distinguishing between military and civilian targets.
when was the first British ‘thousand bomber raid’ launched and where?
30 May 1942, against Cologne
what impact did area bombing have on German morale?
mixed impact - Nazi propaganda tended to downplay their impact and the number of deaths.
from 1942-45, how many german cities were attacked in ‘area bombing’?
61 German cities - combined population of 25 million
from 1942-45, how many homes were destroyed in ‘area bombing’?
3.6 million
from 1942-45, how many people were made homeless in ‘area bombing’?
7.5 million
from 1942-45, how many people were killed, and how many wounded, in ‘area bombing’?
300,000 – 400,000 Germans were killed in the raids, 800,000 people were wounded
how many men served in the German army during the WWII?
13.7 million
how did employment change during WWII?
- huge labour shortage on home front
- women entered the workforce in large numbers, working in armaments factories and as medics
- extensive use of forced labour, transporting hundreds of thousands of civilians and prisoners of war from Eastern Europe and elsewhere to Germany to keep war effort going.
how many enslaved labourers and other ‘displaced persons’ became refugees inside Germany by end of wwii?
8 million
how many ethnic Germans were either refugees or had been expelled from the countries surrounding Germany in the East?
11 million
when were polish ghettoes set up?
autumn 1939 - German conquest of Poland
when is Hitler believed to have given the order to begin the attempted extermination of Europe’s 11 million Jews?
1941
how did people die in ghettoes?
mainly of starvation and disease
when did germany invade the USSR?
June 1941
what happened when Germany invaded the USSR?
mass killings
what were ‘mass killings’?
- Einsatzgruppen rounded up Jews, communist officials, Russian army officers, Roma, etc and executed them.
- victims taken to the edge of towns and villages, forced to dig mass graves and then shot and buried in huge numbers
how many Jews were killed in mass killings by Einsatzgruppen?
~500,000
what was the total number of victims of the Einsaztgruppen?
~1.2 million
why did Hitler begin to look for the ‘final solution’?
mass killings by einsaztgruppen were expensive and time consuming and affecting the soldiers’ mental health
when was the Wannsee conference?
20 January 1942
what did the Wannsee conference decide?
agreed that all Jews under German occupation would be brought to Poland, where those fit enough would be worked to death and the rest exterminated.
how many Jews were murdered during the Holocaust?
~6 million - Up to 88% of Polish Jews killed
how many german companies used auschwitz prisoners as slaves to build goods?
~150
