Adolf Hitler

Der Führer’s Biography, a monograph about a Dictator… and a

Military Leader

Marlon Saldana Olguin 10/18/17 English Basic

 Adolf Hitler

QUICK FACTS

NAME

Adolf Hitler

OCCUPATION

Dictator, Military Leader

BIRTH DATE

April 20, 1889

DEATH DATE

April 30, 1945

DID YOU KNOW?

Adolf Hitler wanted to be a painter in his

youth, but his applications to obtain
proper schooling were rejected.

DID YOU KNOW?

Hitler personally designed the Nazi

party banner, appropriating the
swastika symbol and placing it in a
white circle on a red background.

DID YOU KNOW?

Hitler was a vegan.

DID YOU KNOW?

Hitler avoided multiple assassination

attempts by chance.

PLACE OF BIRTH

Braunau am Inn, Austria

PLACE OF DEATH

Berlin, Germany

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About Der Führer:

At the turn of the 21st century more books had been written about Hitler since
his death than about Napoleon during the half-century after the latter’s demise.
Time and distance from the events of World War II have also affected the
historical interpretation of Hitler.

There is a general consensus about his historical importance (a term that does
not imply a positive judgment). Hitler was principally, and alone, responsible
for starting World War II. (This was different from the various responsibilities
of rulers and of statesmen who had unleashed World War I). His guilt for the
implementation of the Holocaust—that is, the shift of German policy from the
expulsion to the extermination of Jews, including eventually Jews of all of
Europe and of European Russia, is also obvious. Although there exists no single
document of his order to that effect, Hitler’s speeches, writings, reports of
discussions with associates and foreign statesmen, and testimony by those who
carried out the actions have often been cited as evidence of his role. Many of his
most violent statements were recorded by his minions during his “Table Talks”
(including the not entirely authentic “Bormann remarks” of February–April
1945). For example, on January 30, 1939, to celebrate the sixth anniversary of
his rule, Hitler told the Reichstag: “Today I will once more be a prophet: If the
international Jewish financiers in and outside Europe should succeed in
plunging the nations once more in a world war, then the result will not be the
Bolshevization of the Earth and thus the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of
the Jewish race in Europe.”

In his final will and testament, written just before his suicide in April 1945, he
charged the Germans to continue the struggle against the Jews: “Above all, I
enjoin the government and the people to uphold the race laws to the limit and
to resist mercilessly the poisoner of all nations, international Jewry.”

Despite the immense mass of surviving German documents (and the large
volume of his recorded speeches and other statements) Hitler was, as he
himself said on a few occasions, a secretive man; and some of his views and
decisions differed at times from his public expressions.

For a long time, historians and other commentators took it for granted that
Hitler’s wishes and ambitions and ideology were clearly (and frighteningly) set
forth in Mein Kampf. In the first, autobiographical, portion of Mein Kampf,
however, he twisted the truth in at least three matters: his relationship to his
father (which was very different from the filial affection he had set forth in Mein
Kampf); the conditions of his life in Vienna (which were less marked by abject
poverty than he had stated); and the crystallization of his worldview, including
his anti-Semitism, during his Vienna years (the evidence now suggests that this
crystallization occurred much later, in Munich).

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 The popular view of Hitler often involves assumptions about his mental health.
There has been a tendency to attribute madness to Hitler. Despite the
occasional evidences of his furious outbursts, Hitler’s cruelties and his most
extreme expressions and orders suggest a cold brutality that was fully
conscious. The attribution of madness to Hitler would of course absolve him
from his responsibility for his deeds and words (as it also absolves the
responsibility of those who are unwilling to think further about him). Extensive
researches of his medical records also indicate that, at least until the last 10
months of his life, he was not profoundly handicapped by illness (except for
advancing symptoms of Parkinson disease). What is indisputable is that Hitler
had a certain tendency to hypochondria; that he ingested vast amounts of
medications during the war; and that as early as 1938 he convinced himself that
he would not live long—which may have been a reason for speeding up his
timetable for conquest at that time. It should also be noted that Hitler possessed
mental abilities that were denied by some of his earlier critics: these included
an astonishing memory for certain details and an instinctive insight into his
opponents’ weaknesses. Again, these talents increase, rather than diminish, his
responsibility for the many brutal and evil actions he ordered and committed.

His most amazing achievement was his uniting the great mass of the German
(and Austrian) people behind him. Throughout his career his popularity was
larger and deeper than the popularity of the National Socialist Party. A great
majority of Germans believed in him until the very end. In this respect he stands
out among almost all of the dictators of the 19th and 20th centuries, which is
especially impressive when we consider that the Germans were among the best-
educated peoples in the 20th century. There is no question that the
overwhelming majority of the German people supported Hitler, though often
only passively. Their trust in him was greater than their trust in the Nazi
hierarchy. Of course, what contributed to this support were the economic and
social successes, for which he fully took credit, during his early leadership: the
virtual disappearance of unemployment, the rising prosperity of the masses, the
new social institutions, and the increase of German prestige in the 1930s—
achievements unparalleled in the histories of other modern totalitarian
dictatorships. In spite of the spiritual and intellectual progenitors of some of his
ideas there is no German national leader to whom he may be compared. In sum,
he had no forerunners—another difference between him and other dictators.

By 1938 Hitler had made Germany the most powerful and feared country in
Europe (and perhaps in the world). He achieved all of this without war (and
there are now some historians who state that had he died in 1938 before the
mass executions began, he would have gone down in history as the greatest
statesman in the history of the German people). In fact, he came very close to

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 winning the war in 1940; but the resistance of Britain (personified by Winston
Churchill) thwarted him. Nevertheless, it took the overwhelming, and in many
ways unusual, Anglo-American coalition with the Soviet Union to defeat the
Third Reich; and there are reasons to believe that neither side would have been
able to conquer him alone. At the same time, it was his brutality and some of his
decisions that led to his destruction, binding the unusual alliance of capitalists
and communists, of Churchill and Roosevelt and Stalin together. Hitler thought
he was a great statesman, but he did not realize the unconditional
contemptibility of what he had unleashed; he thought that the coalition of his
enemies would eventually break up, and then he would be able to settle with
one side or the other. In thinking thus, he deceived himself, though such wishes
and hopes were also current among many Germans until the end.

Open and hidden admirers of Hitler continue to exist (and not only in
Germany): some of them because of a malign attraction to the efficacy of evil;
others because of their admiration of Hitler’s achievements, no matter how
transitory or brutal. However, because of the brutalities and the very crimes
associated with his name, it is not likely that Hitler’s reputation as the
incarnation of evil will ever change.

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April 1889:

A. Birth and childhood

Adolf Hitler was born on 20 April in the small Austrian town of Braunau am Inn, in Upper
Austria on the Austrian-German border. His father, Alois, was a customs official while his
mother, Klara, came from a poor peasant family. Life was financially comfortable for the
Hitler family but Alois was a domineering character and young Adolf frequently found
himself on the wrong side of his father's short temper. At primary school Hitler was a clever,
popular child. At secondary school he withdrew psychologically, preferring to re-enact
battles from the Boer War than study. He left school with no qualifications at 16.

February 1908:

B. Down and out in Vienna

Hitler dreamt of a career as an artist. His father had rejected the idea but after he died in
1903 Hitler would try to make his dream a reality. He applied to the Vienna Academy of Fine
Arts but was promptly rejected in October 1907. Shortly after, Hitler's beloved mother died.
He moved to Vienna and scratched out a precarious bohemian existence sleeping in hostels
and painting postcards. Here he began to develop many of the views which would later
characterize his ideology and desire to unite Germany and Austria. The anti-Semitic politics
of Vienna's mayor, Karl Lueger, were particularly influential.

August 1914:

C. Fighting for the Fatherland

Hitler hated the multi-ethnic composition of Austria's ruling Habsburg Empire. Determined
to avoid military service, he moved to Munich in 1913. Hitler was keen to prove his loyalty
to Germany. In August 1914 the world plunged into a war unlike any seen before. Hitler
quickly enlisted. In the army he finally found purpose; a cause with which he could wholly
identify. Serving in both France and Belgium, he was twice decorated for bravery. In 1916,
Hitler was wounded at the Somme, one of the bloodiest battles of the war. Convalescing in
Germany, he affected a distinctive toothbrush moustache.

November 1918:

D. 'Stabbed in the back'

Hitler was wounded for a second time following a British gas attack. While recovering in
Pasewalk, the unthinkable happened – Germany surrendered. Before the surrender, facing
serious discontent at home and the prospect of defeat at the front, Germany's High
Command sought to shift the blame. The majority parties in the Reichstag were handed a
poisoned chalice. They were given more power but implicated in the impending defeat.

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 Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated days before Armistice. Like others, Hitler was enraged by what
he saw as the betrayal of an undefeated German Army by Jews and socialists at home. He
resolved to go into politics.

June 1919:

E. Treaty of Versailles

To the victors the spoils: when the Treaty of Versailles was signed in summer 1919,
Germany was forced to accept sole responsibility for the war. Just as damaging, the peace
obliged Germany to pay large amounts in reparations. The huge loss of territory it also
dictated came as a devastating blow. Hitler bitterly resented it. Defeat and then humiliation
at Versailles challenged his whole sense of worth. Still in the army, Hitler was sent to report
on an emerging far-right group, the German Workers' Party (later renamed the Nazi Party).
Finding he agreed with their nationalist, anti-Semitic beliefs, he joined.

July 1921:

F. Der Führer

Hitler’s oratory skills helped him rise quickly through the ranks of his new party. In
February he spoke before a crowd of nearly 6,000 in Munich. To publicize the meeting, he
engaged in propaganda tactics – sending out party supporters in trucks with swastikas to
leaflet the area. But the party executive, including founder Anton Drexler, were uneasy at
Hitler's growing popularity. In an effort to weaken his position, they formed an alliance with
a socialist group while Hitler was in Berlin visiting other nationalist parties. It backfired
spectacularly. Hitler promptly resigned and rejoined only when he was handed sole control.

November 1923:

G. Beer Hall Putsch

Germany’s government was on the brink of collapse. Hyperinflation saw the price of a loaf of
bread rise from 250 marks to 200 billion by November. Hitler sought to start a revolution.
On 8 November, Bavarian Prime Minister Gustav Kahr addressed a meeting of businessmen
at a beer hall in Munich. Hitler burst in with his storm troopers (the SA) – a motley crew of
far-right paramilitaries. At gunpoint, Kahr was forced to pledge support. The next day, Hitler
led 3,000 men onto the streets. But the police were waiting. In the ensuing violence, 16
Nazis and 3 policemen died. Hitler was arrested and sentenced to five years in prison for
treason.

July 1925:

H. Mein Kampf

Hitler served just nine months of his sentence in the Bavarian fortress of Landsberg am
Lech. Here he wrote Mein Kampf, defining his political vision. For him, the state was not an

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 economic entity but racial. He declared the superiority of a white Aryan race, with particular
vitriol reserved for the Jews he viewed as "parasites". Their elimination, he said, "must
necessarily be a bloody process". Mein Kampf outlined the central tenets of a Germany
under Nazi control – military expansion, elimination of "impure" races and dictatorial
authoritarianism. After its publication in July 1925, the book saw more exposure for Hitler’s
views.

October 1929:

I. Wall Street Crash

After the failure of his revolution Hitler looked to the ballot box. But despite his own rising
profile, in 1928 the Nazis won just 2.6% of the vote. A resurgent German economy had seen
public opinion move to the political centre. Events on the other side of the world would
change all that. When the American stock exchange collapsed, the foreign loans on which
Germany's economic recovery relied were called in. Unemployment rose to six million and
parties on both the extreme left and right saw support skyrocket. At the same time, Hitler
first met a 17-year-old German Catholic girl called Eva Braun.

January 1933:

J. Leader of Germany

Now a German citizen, Hitler led the Nazis to become the largest party in Germany with
over 37% of the popular vote in the elections of July 1932. German President von
Hindenburg's concern at growing Communist support persuaded him to give Hitler the post
of Chancellor in January. Hitler quickly consolidated his position. By March he had
dictatorial powers courtesy of the Enabling Act, which allowed him to pass laws without
Reichstag approval. Political parties, organizations and unions unassociated with the Nazis
were soon disbanded. But Hitler still needed the support of the army to fulfil the vision he
had outlined in Mein Kampf.

January 1934:

K. The Night of the Long Knives

Army leaders were wary of the paramilitaries who had helped Hitler to power. He allayed
those concerns ruthlessly, tightening his own grip on power. The leader of the SA, Ernst
Röhm, was among hundreds assassinated in one night as Hitler purged his party. Röhm's
commitment to 'continuing revolution' was not conducive to Hitler's own ambitions. He
could not tolerate opposition to his plans to suppress workers' rights and make Germany
ready for war. The army, however, approved and after President Hindenburg died in
August, they supported Hitler's elevation to Führer. Hitler was now in total control.

September 1935:

L. Nuremberg Laws

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 Since 1933 the Nazis had tried to exclude Jews and other 'undesirables' from public life. In
1935 a new phase began – enforced biological segregation. At the annual Nuremberg rally
Hitler announced laws denying Jewish people citizenship and prohibiting marriage or
sexual relations with people of "German or related blood". Anyone with three or more
Jewish grandparents was affected, irrespective of their own religious identity. Hitler
characterized the laws as an effort to "achieve the legislative regulation of a problem which,
if it breaks down again, will then have to be transferred by law to the National Socialist
Party for final solution".

September 1938:

M. Appeasement and expansion

With his vision under way domestically, Hitler set his sights beyond Germany's borders.
Lebensraum – territorial expansion – was next on his agenda. In March Hitler triumphantly
led Nazi troops into Austria, achieving his goal of unifying the country of his birth and the
country he ruled. His next target was the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. Convinced that
neither Neville Chamberlain, the British prime minister, nor his French counterpart
Edouard Daladier wanted war, Hitler pressed his demands. At a conference in Munich
organized by Chamberlain, those demands were met. Nazi troops marched into
Czechoslovakia and took the Sudetenland.

September 1939:

N. The gambler

Spurred by his success at Munich, Hitler looked east to Poland. But first he had to make a
deal with Stalin's USSR. Hitler was willing to set aside his hatred of Communism for
strategic gain. The two powers agreed the Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact in late August.
Hitler believed his path was clear and on 1 September the invasion of Poland began. It was a
gamble – the German Army was not yet at full strength. But Hitler was confident Britain and
France would not go Poland's aid any more than they had for Austria or Czechoslovakia. He
was wrong. Britain and France declared war on 3 September.

June 1940:

O. Hitler's revenge

Though he'd lost the gamble, Hitler was winning the war. Poland fell quickly. The Blitzkrieg
tactics of the German Army destroyed all before them. When France surrendered on 17
June, Hitler took revenge for the German defeat more than two decades before. Hitler
ensured the French submission should take place at Compiegne, in the same train carriage
Germany had been forced to sign the Armistice ending the First World War. There, in a
forest clearing, stood a monument to that day: "Here on the 11th of November 1918
succumbed the criminal pride of the German Empire”. At the scene of Germany's greatest
humiliation, Hitler now stood in triumph.

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1941:

P. New enemies

Despite the Nazi-Soviet Pact, Hitler retained a staunch hatred of Communism. Extension of
Lebensraum in the east was always his ultimate aim. Hitler was extremely suspicious of
Stalin. He'd initially planned to complete the subjugation of Western Europe before turning
to the Soviet Union. When Soviet troops occupied the Baltic States, he decided to invade.
Hitler was convinced the Red Army could be defeated in a matter of months. He was wrong.
He compounded his error by declaring war on another powerful enemy, the US.

February 1943:

Q. A wrong turn

As the German invasion of the USSR foundered, Hitler assumed day-to-day operational
command of the army, convinced only he could succeed. Hitler was now directing the entire
army from his headquarters, thousands of miles away. In spring 1942 he was convinced the
Soviets would be defeated if his army followed his plan to the letter. He was proven wrong
at Stalingrad. Freezing, starving and hopelessly outnumbered, German forces could not hold
the city. "Surrender is forbidden," Hitler said. His commanders on the ground chose to
ignore the order. For the first time Hitler faced sustained personal criticism because of the
defeat.

June 1944:

R. Asleep at the wheel

Hitler's intransigence had left German forces in retreat in the east. Now, his mistrust and
refusal to delegate cost them dearly in the west. When Allied troops landed on French soil
on D-Day, Hitler was asleep in his Eagle's Nest retreat. No significant decisions could be
taken without his authorization. Crucial German panzer divisions which may have delayed
the Allied invasion could not be moved until Hitler woke up. The landings were a success.
Germany was now fighting and losing a war on two fronts. Yet Hitler had met the news with
enthusiasm, believing his forces could finally take the US and Britain out of the war.

July 1944:

S. A weakening grip

As Germany's military situation deteriorated, opposition to Hitler grew among the army
elite. Many of his previously loyal commanders wanted him dead. Hitler was increasingly
paranoid, and frequently modified his schedule at the last moment. But on 20 July an
opportunity came at last. Hitler was meeting with top military aides at the Wolf's Lair field
headquarters. A senior army officer, Lt Col Claus von Stauffenberg, left a bomb in a briefcase
in the conference room. At 12.42 pm it went off. A stenographer and three officers died.

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 Hitler was lucky to escape with only minor injuries, shielded from the full force of the blast
by an oak table.

April 1945:

T. Defeat and death

As Soviet troops closed in on his bunker in Berlin, Hitler accepted the inevitability of his
defeat. He set into action his plan to take his own life. Hours beforehand, he married Eva
Braun, who had remained by his side for 11 years. They were wed early on the morning of
29 April. The next day, at a little after 3.30 pm, they bit into thin glass vials of cyanide. Hitler
then shot himself through the head. The man responsible for untold suffering, who had
almost single-handedly brought the world to the very brink of destruction, was dead.

Conclusion

A. Restate topic

B. Summarize three main points

C. Revisit introduction or tie all ideas together

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