The Most Devastating Event to Nazi Germany

[i_killed_mufasa]

They could have built the regime without anti-semitism, indeed histrians have discovered that on the whole that was the least attractive aspect of Nazism to the German people.

[Guest]

No way. The nazi’s were successful because of deep long seeding anti-semitism in Germany. However, this was not unique to Germany though as it existed in France, Spain, and Italy as well. I would be very interested to see some links to the historians you refer to or books they’ve written because I would take issue with their conclusions just on face. The Nazi party was not that different from the dozens of partys that developed in post war Germany that preached the doctrine of Germany got screwed at Versailles lets undo it by force if needed. The main difference between the Nazis and everyone else was they claimed the German people were ‘stabbed in the back’ by the Jewish people especially the Bolshevik Communists/Socialists which were the cause for the revolution and thus Germany’s defeat.

[Sorte_Marcara]

Yes as for example take the Norwegian constetution from 1814… it states that no jew is to be allowed acess to Norway… Anti-semitism is rooted in far more countries then just the ones you mentioned.

[Janus1]

exactly. Hitler could not have risen to power without anti-semitism. the jews were his scapegoat, which he used to unite the german people around him, and support his actions. after he took power though, he probably could have stopped the anti-semitism when they went to war, because by that time, the german public’s focus had shifted off of the jews.

[Guest]

Except this presupposes that Hitler and the Nazi elite were not very anti-semetic which they were. It’s really easy to say they could’ve stopped, but remember that at the time America had Jim Crow laws. If we’d begun to lose the war would we have abandoned Jim Crow in order to win. I really don’t think so. In fact, during the first 6-12 months of the war we were losing yet there wasn’t any great call to put black soldiers side by side with their white brothers. We kept Black soldiers in a lesser and subservient position because it fitted our social needs at the time. The same was absolutely true with Germany.

As for Sorte you’re absolutely right, but in Germany it was always a bit more virulent. I attribute this to the great antagonism that has historically existed between the slavs and germanic peoples and unfortunately jews got lumped in all the same. However, the example you provided of Norway is good, but lets not forget that one of the reason relatively few French or Italian jews died in the holocaust was because Spain, Franch and Italy all had inquisitions whose intent was to drive the jews from Europe. In fact the inquisition in Italy and Spain was still legally sanctioned although not in reality.

[MuthaRussia]

@F_alk:

@MuthaRussia:

And F_alk,
Vergebung mein, fur ichsein mude! :-?
"Forgive me, For i was tired!
…Hope i wrote that right! :-?

Not at all :)

Vergebung gewährt unter der Bedingung, daß du nicht mehr versuchst, Deutsch zu sprechen, bis du ein weiteres Jahr Untericht genossen hast.

Was it understandable?

[MuthaRussia]

@F_alk:

@MuthaRussia:

And F_alk,
Vergebung mein, fur ichsein mude! :-?
"Forgive me, For i was tired!
…Hope i wrote that right! :-?

Not at all :)

Vergebung gewährt unter der Bedingung, daß du nicht mehr versuchst, Deutsch zu sprechen, bis du ein weiteres Jahr Untericht genossen hast.

Was it understandable?
I think i’m forgetting to put the verbs at the beginning!

[Guest]

@i_killed_mufasa:

They could have built the regime without anti-semitism, indeed histrians have discovered that on the whole that was the least attractive aspect of Nazism to the German people.

I have read that as well.

@AgentSmith:

No way. The nazi’s were successful because of deep long seeding anti-semitism in Germany.

Untrue

However, this was not unique to Germany though as it existed in France, Spain, and Italy as well.

True

The Nazi party was not that different from the dozens of partys that developed in post war Germany that preached the doctrine of Germany got screwed at Versailles lets undo it by force if needed. The main difference between the Nazis and everyone else was they claimed the German people were ‘stabbed in the back’ by the Jewish people especially the Bolshevik Communists/Socialists which were the cause for the revolution and thus Germany’s defeat.

Half true.

The Nazis were successful because the economic crisis was ending, the efforts done by the last “democratic” chancellor were taking effect, and they were reducing unemployment by state actions and enterprises (mainly using plans of that last deomcratic chancellor).
Also, they were successful because the democracy never was really strong and embedded in the society. From start on (!) the legend of the “stab in the back” (which is the armies back!) was around. A social democrat actually “started” it, directly after the armistice, where he said to soliders that the “armies were unbeaten in the field”.
So, the democrats had to sign the Versaille treaty (a clever move by the right wing militarists who were responsible for the situation), and thus the birth of the Weimar Republic coul not be worse. The right wing always had revisionists thoughts, the Reichswehr was not allowed to be a conscript army, thus turned into a “state within the state” under control of the right wing militarists.
The last part of the success of the Nazis is the following: the right wing was for long dominated by the old “imperial” elites, aristocrats and such.
By them, the Nazis were seen as a bunch of uneducated wild men. After some internal power struggle in the old right wing (following the last “emocratic” chancellor, who ruled by presidential emergency decrees, there were two “classic” right wing chancellors, ruling the same way)…
one of the “winners” in that struggle convinced the old President (Hindenburg, the WWI hero) that they should “engage” Hitler and his NSDAP, flank him with “classic” right wing ministers and thus use him.
Unfortunately, they gave him two minister posts, one of them being the minister of the interior. That - and the following (last) election - destroyed the right wings dream of “taming” Hitler, and he took full control.
(A last point of Hitlers success is that the Versaille treaties punishment ended during his time… with part of that being negotiated earlier, but of cours propaganda changed that impression). As well, there was a strong fear in large parts of the population that “bolsheviks” could take over, and only a strong man could halt them. Hitlers success was mainly based on his support by the “petty bourgeois”, and all who feared that they would lose even more by the economic crisis.

So, there was a “stab in the back”, but it was not a “Nazi-only” doctrine, but common in the whole right wing, and quite accepted in the population.

@Janus1:

exactly. Hitler could not have risen to power without anti-semitism. the jews were his scapegoat, which he used to unite the german people around him, and support his actions. after he took power though, he probably could have stopped the anti-semitism when they went to war, because by that time, the german public’s focus had shifted off of the jews.

Untrue. They were his scapegoat, but as i_killed_musafa said, that was a point that was more a “minus” in the eyes of part of the population (esp. the educated and elites): Jews fought for Germany in WWI, Germany was proud of culture and had no place for “barbarians”…
but most considered the anti-semitism as something they had to take (and that the situation would turn “normal” again, once the Nazis had (not only gained but) secured the power). They thought that this “evil” was the lesser one compared to the economic rise and the “good things” that Hitler achieved in their eyes.

[Guest]

@MuthaRussia:

Was it understandable?
I think i’m forgetting to put the verbs at the beginning!

It was as understandable as “Romanes eunt domus”. And please: don’t put the verbs at the beginning. Instead, conjugate them properly :) … and don’t translate too literally: “Für” is only a preposition, while “for” is also a conjunction (that’s how you used it in that sentence). And third, if you don’t have the Umlaute on your keyboard (like ä,ö,ü), substitute them by adding an “e”: ä -> ae, ö -> oe, ü-> ue. The “ß” can be replaced by a “ss”.

[Guerrilla Guy]

@F_alk:

Also, they were successful because the democracy never was really strong and embedded in the society. From start on (!) the legend of the “stab in the back” (which is the armies back!) was around. A social democrat actually “started” it, directly after the armistice, where he said to soliders that the “armies were unbeaten in the field”.
So, the democrats had to sign the Versaille treaty (a clever move by the right wing militarists who were responsible for the situation), and thus the birth of the Weimar Republic coul not be worse. The right wing always had revisionists thoughts, the Reichswehr was not allowed to be a conscript army, thus turned into a “state within the state” under control of the right wing militarists.
quote]

True but neither was the British for that part… they were still imperialistic in there ways which shines out in the treaty…
forcing a growing imperialist nation to disband it’s navy, army and colonies, not to include stealing most of there infrastructure for your use in expansion(becoming the largest empire the world had ever seen) on the part of the british and the French was not correct at Versaille… That could be stated as a cause for WW2…

GG

[Guest]

I don’t really understand your first sentence.

The problem with the treaty was: it left Germany strong enough to start a war later, but was punishing enough to build up a lot of resent.
Thus, in this combination only, a revanchist war became possible.
I mean, remember, there were radical protests, socialists upheavals and such … in the old empire. That was quite a thing. YOu have to recall that there never was such a strong social movement. I even say that the movement that led to the fall of the Berlin wall was not comparable to that one. The germans were really really tired and sick of the war. But, they all fell for the propaganda, especially as they “only” lost on one front, and won on the east. … With the peace of Brest Litovsk being the main reason why the western allies were so harsh to germans (just as harsh as they were to the Soviets)

[Guerrilla Guy]

@F_alk:

I don’t really understand your first sentence.

The problem with the treaty was: it left Germany strong enough to start a war later, but was punishing enough to build up a lot of resent.
Thus, in this combination only, a revanchist war became possible.
I mean, remember, there were radical protests, socialists upheavals and such … in the old empire. That was quite a thing. YOu have to recall that there never was such a strong social movement. I even say that the movement that led to the fall of the Berlin wall was not comparable to that one. The germans were really really tired and sick of the war. But, they all fell for the propaganda, especially as they “only” lost on one front, and won on the east. … With the peace of Brest Litovsk being the main reason why the western allies were so harsh to germans (just as harsh as they were to the Soviets)

what old empire are you referring to? The German Empire started in 1871 so at the time IMHO it wasn’t exactly new…

[Guest]

Falk, most of what you said about the rise of nazism was accurate. I guess it is true that the anti-semitism was rampant among the right wing, and the left wing was neutered by signing the treaty of versailles. However, the key distinction between the nazis and every body else was their implication of a link between bolshevism, jews, and thus liberals. This basically is what I was getting at before. Without antisemitism the Nazis would’ve had a difficult time linking their left wing opponents with Bolsheviks and it was the antipathy towards Communism and Soviet Russia that put Hitler in power.

[Guest]

Now a better question from my point of view is how might the world be different had the two world wars been avoided. I argue that much of the technological and social progress made in the 20th Century was due largely because of the devasting effects on the social order WWI and II had. Therefore, had WWI and II been avoided the world especially Western Europe and America would remain much as they were circa 1900. Much in the way the Civil War in the United States led to positive social changes, like the abolition of slavery, the two wars had a similar affect.

But I would like to see what others have to say on this.

[Janus1]

WWI had more of a negative effect though, in causing WWII. nothing was solved after WWI, so WWII was inevitable. WWII it can be argued had mostly a positive effect.

[Zhukov_2003]

Hmm, the Cold War and the build up of thousands of nuclear weapons doesn’t sound like a positive effect to me.

[Guest]

Most people would argue that WWII had a positive effect, but IMO it was nothing more than a continuation of what was begun because of WWI.

Zhukov, has any of those nuclear weapons ever been used? No, I would argue the devastion wrought by two world wars has done much in the way of preventing nuclear armageddon, and further catastrophic conflicts. In fact the Cold war may have indirectly led to economic development in the 3rd world. Additionally, WWI caused a great deal of social change throughout Europe and America, and that social change/progress led to many of the technological advancements we now enjoy. Would we enjoy television had WWI and II not created a large consumer market for those products. Prior to WWI many of the people of the industrialized world had little to no disposable income and therefore consumer goods like Tv would not have beensuccessful. Also, world war I created cracks in the imperialist system which caused its end after WWII. Further, the destruction of imperialism led to an era of global ‘free trade’, and thus many countries that were once very poor have been able to create wealth in their countries which has led to economic development in the ‘3rd world’. Economic development that would not have happened with the continuation of imperialism.

[Guerrilla Guy]

Agent Smith a couple of things:

WW1 stopped imperialism in Germany and Turkey giving free reign for other Nations to steal te territories of those “UnDemocratized More Barbaric then thou spiked helmet scum” to stop “torturing the world”… In the meantime in Germany people were suffering due to inflation and loss of infrastructure caused by the Allies… When the depression hit they were one of the hardest in europe hit which caused a great resentment against The Allies and bingo! WW2… But all that free trade and Global Prosperity was still the product of global empires in whom all the labor fell on some natives backs… and unfortanutely Germany wallowed in pits(yes they might of had miracles in military development but that was because Hitler got his scientist woring)… Those countries who Developed vast wealths were wealth earned for the Gvernment official more then a common laborer… so I really don’t see much of how WW1 helped the world get out of a nut shell…

GG

[Guest]

Historically, the economic effects of military mobilization creates capital in an economy. In the case of WWI this did happen and contributed to the roaring 20’s. The dire situation in Germany was not immediately felt in the rest of the western world. The predecessor of TV was radio, and sales of radios soared throughout the 20’s and led to the development of the modern media which in turn has developed into the information age of today. However, without the wartime mobilization the market for radios may not have existed, and the yellow journalism common prior to 1914 may have remained dominant. Additionally, sales of automobiles did not really take off until the 20’s as well.

Your implication that WWI did not stop imperialism is correct, however, it did destablize it and after WWII it was not viable anymore. In Britain the very symbol of their imperial might was their navy, yet after WWI they were forced to scuttle 2 dozen battleships because they couldn’t afford them anymore. As for free trade I should have clarified that this has happened only after WWII. In fact the primary causes of WWII in both Europe was the lack of free trade which stunted Germanys post WWI economy, and kept Japan a second rate economic power. However, after WWII Japan got the access to foreign markets which was its primary war aims to begin with.

On a side note the Allies did not destroy any German infrastructure after or during WWI. In fact Allied troops never stepped foot on German soil during the War. If anything the French had a bigger complaint against the Germans, and a ‘right’ I might add to demand reparations since much of their infrastructure was damaged because the entire war was fought on their soil. The turmoil in post war Germany was caused by the rapid development of Democracy in their country which had been violently suppressed since 1848. It’s quite analogous to what is currently go on in Iraq where a country that has been repressed for so long is finally waking up to democracy. In Britain and the US this was a more gradual process, but in France democracy caused an equal amount of turmoil.

[Guerrilla Guy]

Read Article 231 and 232 of the Versaille Treaty… It is a list of requirements on the German part and it did just about wipe them out…