Kapp Putsch 1920 Led by reactionaries within the

Kapp Putsch - 1920 • Led by reactionaries within the army • Failed as the German workers wouldn’t support them, going on strike

Munich (Beer Hall) Putsch - 1923 French occupation of the Ruhr Inability to pay reparations hyperinflation

Weaknesses of the Weimar • No democratic tradition in Germany • Weimar had signed the Treaty of Versailles • Mark became worthless in 1923 • A series of weak, feeble coalitions

Founding of the Nazi Party 1925 Hitler would become leader of the German Workers’ Party in 1920 He changed the name to the National Socialist German Workers Party This party created the S. A. or “Brownshirts”

Strumabteliung – “Brownshirts”

Ernst Rohm Gregor Strasser

“Social Darwinism” this is what this person suffering from hereditary defects costs the Community of Germans during his lifetime. Fellow Citizen, that is your money, too

Aryan “Struggle” To Hitler, Germans were the purest example of a superhuman “Aryan” race. The other key feature of Nazi racial policy was the concept of “lebensraum” (living space)

Anti-Semitism “The Jew: War Monger, War-Prolonger”

Anti-Bolshevism “Bolshevism without a mask”

Great Depression

Electoral Growth 1930 – Nazis gain 107 seats out of 647 – 2 nd larges party in Reichstag 1932 (1 st election) – Nazis gain 230 seats – largest party in Reichstag 1932 (2 nd election) – Nazis drop to 198 seats – Hindenburg ‘safely’ appoints Hitler chancellor

President Paul von Hindenburg Chancellor Franz von Papen Heinrich Bruning

Reichstag burns…? ? Allegedly done by a young Dutch communist – convicted and executed Hitler used this as evidence of an impending communist revolution

Enabling Act

“Night of the Long Knives” Ernst Rohm, Leader of the SA (Brownshirts)

• Goering and Himmler constructed “evidence” of an SA conspiracy aimed at overthrowing Hitler • Hitler summoned all SA leaders to meet with him at the hotel in Bad Wiessee • Executions of SA went on throughout the weekend

Hindenburg dies – Hitler “elected” president Hitler merges the position of Chancellor and President – no opposition exists

Nuremburg Laws – 1933 -39 All Jews must wear the Star of David Jews must give up businesses and professions Jews may not marry/mingle with Germans Jews must give up German citizenship

Creating the Totalitarian State • The Nazi party is soon declared the only party • Free speech is abolished • Freedom of press, radio, stage, cinema – all gone • Education served the interests of the Nazi Party

Staatspolizei – “Gestapo” • Ruthlessly efficient • Inhumanely cruel • In charge of concentration camps

Joseph Goebbels

Hermann Goering – Reich Commissioner

Heinrich Himmler – Chief of the S. S. , head of the Gestapo