Triumph of Hitler1933-1939

Gestapo• Secret Police

• Founded by Herman Goering

• Turned over to Heinrich Himmler

• 2/10/36 Gestapo Law passed making the Gestapo above the law

• Section B4 dealt with the final solution was headed by Adolf Eichmann

Concentration Camps• Dachau first camp opened March 1933

• July 1934 construction of camps such as Buchenwald, Flossenburg and Sachsenhausen begins

• Began for Enemies of the State

• Mostly Political prisoners

• For Re-education

Dachau 1934

February 1933

Reichstag fire

Hitler blames Communists

Hitler gets Emergency Decree:Limits free speech & press

Pass Enabling Act*suspends constitution*rule by decree

Only two obstacles to Hitler having absolute

power

Night of Long Knives

• June 30, 1934

• SA- Brown shirted Storm troopers

• Ernest Rohm wanted to be People’s Army– Independent of Wehrmacht

– Possibly independent of Hitler

Hitler needs support of Army and Industrialists

Army doesn’t like “People’s Army”

Industrialist think SA is socialist

•Hitler needs someone to take out SA

•SS part of the SA - was responsible just to Hitler

•SS leadership wants to be independent of SA

•Rohm and other SA leaders are killed

•Others who have crossed Hitler are targeted 300-1000

Hitler and

Rohm1933

Gustav von KahrFormer Prime Minister of Bavaria

Helped stop Beer Hall Putsch

Karl ErnstSA leader of Berlin

Started Reichstag fire?

General Kurt von Schleicher

Former Chancellor

Gregor Strasser

SS breaks into home of Willi Schmidt and takes him away

They got the wrong Willi Schmidt, the music critic not the Strasser associate.

Results

•SS became independent

•Hitler gets support of Army and Industry

Only obstacle now:

President Hindenburg

Can’t have him wacked, have to wait for him to die

Not hard to do, Hindenburg is 86

When Hindenburg dies on August 1934 Hitler assumes office of President as well as Chancellor

der Fuhrer

Nuremberg Race Laws• 9/15/35 Defined what was Jewish and

set up laws to limit Jews rights

• Laws include no mixed marriages

• Jews lost their citizenship

• No sexual relations between Jews and full blooded Germans

Chart explaining who is a Jew

Reoccupation of Rhineland• March 16, 1935 German Draft instituted• March 7, 1936 – Army crosses Rhine

into Rhineland• Violates Versailles Treaty• Germany not strong enough if France

reacts

•Group of generals vow to overthrow Hitler if France makes a move

•France does. . .

Nothing

German people

welcome troops into

the Rhineland

Results

•Hitler feels Western leaders are weak

•Plot to overthrow Hitler falls apart

•Hitler feels generals are not bold enough

Spanish Civil War

Guernica

Guernica - Pablo Picasso

1936 Berlin Olympics

• Americans vote to participate

• 312 athletes 19 African American 5 Jews

• Jesse Owens from The Ohio State University wins 4 gold medals

• Breaks myth of Aryan Supremacy

Anschluss• March 12, 1938

• Union with Austria

• Dr. Kurt von Schuschnigg

• Replaced by Dr. Arthur Seyss-Inquart

• Austria taken without a shot

• Schuschnigg arrested, taken to camps

German Army crosses into Austria

Pattern for Hitler Takeovers

*have local Nazis cause trouble*complain about unrest and how Germans are picked on*step in for benefit of everyone

Appeasement:

Leaders of France and England willing to give Hitler what he wants to avoid war

France wants to avoid war because they have still not recovers from WWI

England’s leaders looking to bottom line of balanced budget

Appeasement based on two ideas:1.There is a limit to what Hitler wants2.No one wants a war

Munich Pact• September 1938

• Neville Chamberlain

• Edouard Daladier

• Benito Mussolini

• Secedes Sudetenland to Germany

• October 1, 1938

Munich Conference: Chamberlain, Daladier, Hitler, Mussolini

Sudetenland has:

Defensive fortifications

Skoda Works - Armaments plant

Good Bye Czech

• March 15, 1939 • Hitler takes rest of Czechoslovakia • Violation of Munich Pact• Chamberlain and England stand up to Hitler• France and England guarantee all future

boundaries March 31, 1939

Hitler’s next target:

POLAND

Problem for Hitler: What will Stalin do?

Problem for Stalin: How to gain time to modernize army and get new officers?

Non-Aggression Pact• August 23, 1939

• Danzig and Polish Corridor

• Molotov- Ribbentrop agreement

• Non-aggression vs. Germany

• Soviet free hand in Eastern Europe

• Soviets take E.Poland, Baltic Republics

• Fight with Finland