Adolf Hitler’s Summary

Language and Culture II

By name: Der Fuhrer (in German: “The Leader”)

Born on April 20, 1889, he was the leader of the National Socialist (Nazi) Party, chancellor and Fuhrer of Germany. He
feared and disliked his father who died in 1903, but was a devoted son to his mother, who died after a long illness in
1907. Hitler spent most of his childhood in Linz, capital of Upper Austria; it became his favourite city and he declared
that his wish was to be buried there. He never advanced beyond secondary school, and lived precariously and isolated
for some years until he joined the German Army as a volunteer as soon as the World War 1 broke out. During the
conflict, he was continuously in the front line as a headquarters runner; his bravery in action rewarded him with two
Iron Crosses (First and Second Class). He was wounded in October 1916 and poisoned with gas two years later; he was
hospitalized when the war ended. He greeted the war with enthusiasm, where he found discipline and comradeship
satisfying and was confirmed in his beliefs in the heroic virtues of the war.

In May-June 1919, he worked as an army political agent, joined the small German Worker´s Party and assumed the
responsibility of its propaganda in 1920, leaving the army to devote himself to improve his position within the party,
renamed that year as the National-Sozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (Nazi).

The city was a gathering place for former servicemen who were unwilling to return to civilian life and for political
plotters against the Republic. Many joined the party, being Ernst Rohm one of the most important among them; he was
a staff member of the district army command and of great help in furthering Hitler´s rise within the party, recruiting and
organizing the squads used to protect party meetings, to attack socialists and communists and to exploit violence.

In July 1921 Hitler´s became the party leader with almost unlimited powers. He set out to create a mass movement with
power enough to bind its members in loyalty to him through unrelenting propaganda and persuasive speeches in their
meetings. His charismatic personality and dynamic leadership caused friction with other leaders of the party, but since
they depended on him to organize publicity and acquire funds, they stepped aside.

In November 1923, General Erich Ludendorff and Hitler tried to force the Bavarian leaders to proclaim a national
revolution. Hitler was injured, placed in trial for treason and sentenced to prison for five years, but was released after
nine months. During the trial he took advantage of the immense publicity afforded to him, and used the time in jail to
dictate the first volume of the Mein Kampf, his political autobiography and a compendium of his vast ideas. These
included inequality among races, nations and individuals as part of an unchangeable natural order that exalted the
“Aryan race” as the creative element of mankind. He stated that the natural unit of mankind was the Volk (“the people”),
from which the Germans were the greatest, and that the state existed to serve the Volk. All morality and truth were
judged according with the interests and preservation of it, and its unity was incarnated in the Fuhrer, endowed with
perfect authority. Below the Fuhrer the party was drawn from the Volk and was in turn its safeguard. The greatest enemy
of all were the Jew, who was for Hitler the representation of evil, and just behind it the Marxism (for Hitler, social
democracy and communism together) with its resolve on internationalism and economic conflict. He didn´t believe in
principles like the equality of individuals and parliamentary democracy.

In 1930 Hitler allied with nationalist Alfred Hugenberg in a campaign against the Young Plan, reached for the first time a
nationwide audience through Hugenberg´s newspapers and found support from many of the magnates of business and
industry, a fact that enabled Hitler to appeal to the lower class and unemployed, assuring them that Germany would
awaken from its sufferings to restate its natural greatness. This is an example of his ability to use the people who sought
to use him instead; but the most important achievement was the establishment of a truly national party, unique in
Germany at that time. On January 30, 1933, Hindenburg offered him the chancellorship of Germany; his cabinet
included few Nazis at that point.

1
Once in power, Hitler established an absolute dictatorship. The Reichstag fire enabled the opportunity to override
through a decree all guarantees of freedom and for an intensified campaign of violence. Later the Enabling Bill was
passed in the Reichstag, giving Hitler full powers. In less than three months all non-Nazi parties, organizations, and labor
unions ceased to exist. The disappearance o the Catholic Centre Party was followed by a German Concordat with the
Vatican in July.

Hitler didn´t want a radical revolution, so he executed all members of his circle who were in favour of a “continuing
revolution” during the so called the “Night of the Long Knives”. When Hindenburg died on August 2, the Army leaders
assented the merging of chancellorship and presidency, and officers and men took an oath of allegiance to Hitler
personally. Economic recovery and a fast reduction in unemployment made the regime increasingly popular, and a
combination of success and police terror conveyed the support of 90 percent of the voters in a plebiscite.