Adolf Hitler

Hitler’s youth

Adolf Hitler was born on the 20th of April 1889 in Austria. His father Alois was a customs official. His mother didn’t had a job but she had worked once as a maid. Adolf was their third son. The two other children had died at a little age. This is why Adolf was watched very carefully by his mother because she was affraid of losing him. His father didn’t really care becasue he was to busy with working.
Then two important events happened for young Adolf. First of all he went to primary school and secundly his father retired this ment a lot of supervision for Adlof because at school the teacher would have a look on Adolf and at home his father could take control. Unless this supervision Hitler was a succes at primary school were he did a great job. But when he went to secndary it became worse and worse. This was the main reason why it didn’t went wel between Adolf and his father.He left school at the age of 16 with the dream of becoming a artist so he went to Vienna. But the school were he was supposed to go to, the Acadamy of fine arts, turned him down because of his bad drawing skills.
The next five years were for Hitler an abrupt blow. Because his father had died when he was 13 but in these five years his mother died as well and he got an orphans pension. But he became a lonely and shy man, he was also very unsure about himself because he moved houses for a couple of times but he stopped that on 1909 because he didn’t had any money left. His last house was a doss-house. From their he tried to make some money by doing odd jobs and painting post cards and posters.
In Vienna 1914, Hitler began to think of life and came to the conclusion that the Germans were superior from all other races. And he wanted to show that to the world so he moved once again this time to Munich in Germany and tried to get into the Austrian army. But he failed his medical test, and then on the 1st of August World War 1 broke out and Hitler was cheering on the streets, and ten weeks later he was in the German army fighting in the Battle of Ypres. Later in the war he worked as a messenger. In WW1 he was awarded the Iron Cross twice.
In October 1918 a terrible thing happened to Hitler because he was under a heavy gas attack from Britain, he was taken to the hospital for care but he staid there till the war was over and Hitler thought that Germany was stabbe in the back by polliticians.
www.courseworkbank.co.uk/coursework/hitler_s_youth_2323/ http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/riseofhitler/boyhood.htm

Hitler in World War 1

In the trenches of World War 1 Adolf Hitler found himself a new life and a new life purpose because now he was fighting for his new homeland Germany.
Just like any other man in Europe Adolf thought it would be a short war but this wasn’t trough it lastet very long and millions of young man died. Hitler started to cooperate in the war by voluntairing for the German army at a age of 25. His first mission for the German army was the battle of Ypres. Here in a world of trenches wich stretched from the North Sea all the way through France Adolf Hitler became acquainted with the war.
Hitler volunteered by the Bavarian Regiment. In the first battle against British and Belgian armiesnear Ypres, 2500 of the 3000 men were killed, missing or wounded. But Hitler escaped without a scratch or injury. This contineuned the whole war because more than once he moved from a place were later a bomb would explode wich killed or wounded all the soldiers in that area.
Hitler was a abnormal soldier because he was sloppy an unmilitary soldier because all his equipment was lying all through the trenches and he lost msot of his stuff. But that didn’t effect on his eager for action because he alway’s volunteerd for dangerous assignments even after many narrow escapes from death. But the rest of the war he wasn’t a soldiert but a messenger taking messeges back and to the front from the high command. And when the the fighting was little harsh Hitler took out his watercolors and then he painted the landscape of the war.
That Hitler was unusual we already knew but that was also to do by his way of life because he didn’i complained about the bad food and the terrible conditions. He also never talked about women or discuss history. He got never letters from home or packages and he never asked to leave. His fellow soldiers found Hitler to eager to please his superiors and a lucky ass because he always avoided the bombs. But then on October 7 1916 Hitler’s luck ran out and he was wounded in the leg by a shall fragment during the battle of the Somme. He was hospitalized in Germany, Hitler was very unpleased by this fact because he wasn’t in the war anymore after two years of fighting for the German army. During his recovery he went sight seeing in Berlin there he noticed that the anti war sentiment among the German civilians. He thought that the Jews spread this anti-war thought. This became an obsession to Hitler because he already thought this in Vienna and this lead to an ever growing Hatred of Jews. To get away from this people with there anti-war thoughts Hitler asked if he could go back to the front in March of 1917.
Than in August 1918 Hitler recievd the Iron cross first class. This was very rare for foot soldiers so he was very happy. But interestingly the man who recommended him for this reward was Jew. But dispite his good afford and a total of five medals he remained a corporal. This was due to his unmilitary appearance an odd personality. His superiors founded him not capelable of leading a group of soldiers ans that he didn’t had enough resp[ect for a sergeant.
When the war turned against the Germans and the morale of the soldiers smallend Hitler became drepressed. And he sat hours before his tent thinking what was happening to Germany. In October 1918 Hitler was temporarily blinded because of a gas attack from the British side. He was sent to the hospital again to recover, and Hitler was already waiting to return in the war but then on November 10, 1918 a pastor moved in the hospital and told the patients that the Kaiser and teh house of Hollenzollern had fallen and that their fatherland was now a republic. Hitler was schocked “ the war was over”. Hitler described his reaction in Mein Kampf: "There followed terrible days and even worse nights - I knew that all was lost...in these nights hatred grew in me, hatred for those responsible for this deed."

Why did Hitler hated the Jews?

People sometimes ask why the Jews were the target of Hitler. Hitler hated the Jews because he felt that they caused for al the problems in the world but especially he blamed them of the loss of World War 1 because he felt that the Jewish politicians had stabbeb Germany in the back with the treary of Versailles.
Hitler wasn’t the only one who hated Jews wich is known as antisemitism because in the history of Europe there were already a lot of people who hated the Jews just as the Americans. But Hitler hate against Jews was an obsession to Hitler. Albert Speer, who was a close confidante to Hitler wrote in 1977:
The hatred of the Jews was Hitler's driving force and central point, perhaps even the only element that moved him. The German people, German greatness, the Reich, all that meant nothing to him in the final analysis. Thus, the closing sentence of his Testament sought to commit us Germans to a merciless hatred of the Jews after the apocalyptic downfall.
I was present in the Reichstag session of January 30, 1939 when Hitler guaranteed that, in the event of another war, the Jews, not the Germans, would be exterminated. This sentence was said with such certainty that I would never have doubted his intent of carrying through with it.

Then Hitler started the Holocaust but why?

That the hatred towards Jews the motivation was to start the Holocaust we already knew but was it allowed to kill all those Jew and people Hitler didn’t like. Hitler had support from the German people because they accepted the antisemitism and only a few spoke against it. But Hitler started the Holocaust because he wanted a Nazi Germany wich didn’t faced protest and the largest protest group wer Jews so Hitler had a good motivation to kill these people.
But at the Nuremberg Trial were surviving Nazi leaders were tried for their crimes. And a few witnesses were asked if the Holocaust was nedeed or a fact of the Nazi philosphy but they thought that is was just Hitler’s own thoughts wich he did under the philosphy. So the whole hatred of the Jews were only from Hitler but he told the people so they gone hating the Jews also. But the question of why he hated the Jews can be answered with the answer: because Hitler thought that he was stabbed in the back after fighting in the First World War.

Hitler’s first actions

After Hitler was made dictator of Germany he arranged a national boycott of jewish shops. This all was under control of the minister of propaganda Mr. Joseph Goebbels. This boycott was seen as a protest to the Nazi regime. This protest was there because of the articles wich were in the newspapers. The Nazi regime thought that most journislist who wrote these articles were jewish or had sympathie wich the jews so they named this bad publicity “atrocity propaganda” and that this type of publicity was spread by jews. The boycott started on April 1 1933 and only lastet for a day.
Although there were SA troopes standing guard for these shops and posters with the text "Germans, defend yourselves against the Jewish atrocity propaganda, buy only at German shops!" many Germans ignored them because they were more interested in shopping and looking for bargains. But the funny thing is that it ws on Saturday and most of the jewish shops were closed.
Because of the faillure of the boycott minister Goebbels held a speech to thousands of gathered people in the Berlin Lustengarten. He told the people that if the Jews from Germany couldn’t stop their fellow Jews getting rid of Nazi propaganda the Nazi’s had to punish the German Jews.
Goebbels would become the most influential Jew hater of the Nazi’s , second only to Hitler, who wanted to continue the persecution and extermination of the Jews. He was a propaganda talent. He was the man who sended all the anti Jew thought to all the people by anti-Jewish thins on the radio and anti-Jew films and anti-Jew articles in the newspaper. About propaganda Goebbels once wrote “ propaganda has absolutely nothing to do with the truth.
Most Jews felt themselves German as nationality and only Jewish by religion because they had lived in Germany for centuries. And on the Munich Putsch many Jews were celebrating together with Adolf Hitler. In World War 1 many Jews had fought for their fatherland. And some had supported the Nazi’s before they introduced the anti-Semitism.
But for the new ruler Hitler there wasn’t enough love for his land to help the Jews or honour them no they they were the eternal enemies for his beloved fatherland.
The boycott was the start of a downwords spiral for the Jews wich would end in a concentration camp. Because the boycott was followed by new laws wich took off the rights of the Jews. In the 12 years of Nazi leaded Germany there were made over 400 laws with the target, Jews. One of these laws was , "The Law of the Restoration of the Civil Service" wich made suer that you had to be a Aryan to hold a civil service position. So all Jews wich held such a position were fired.
So in the first weeks after Hitler seized power already the Jews got a hard time to survive because this was only the beginning.

Hitler becomes Führer

After the Night of the Long Knives Hitler’s goal of getting absolute power of Germany was almost acclompished only the 87 year old president Paul von Hindenburg stood in his way. But he was close to death. When he died Hitler was very happy because he just got rid of a large groop of anti- Nazi’s and he got the support of the Army’s General staff. His only problem now was who should succeed Hindinburg as Prsedident. But he already had made plans that he, Adolf Hitler, would succeed him. He would do that not as president but as Führer , wich means supreme leader, of the German civilians. Although he was a Führer in his own party and that he was very popular by the German people his actual government title was jus Reich Chancellor of Germany.
But still there were som influential old-time conservatives in Germany who wanted that Germany would get a monarchy or a non-Nazi government after the death of Hindenburg. But they also hated democracy and they hated the overload of the Hitler regime . They were brave man from the 1800’s who remebered the years of kings and princes, and they knew that country was now in hands of a murdurous fanatic as the SS leaders Himmler and Heydrich who didn’t care about the old concerns.
Before Hindenburg had died he had sended an letter to Hitler in wich he said that Germany would become a monarchy, this was due to the advise of these conservatives who wanted that Germany would become a monarchy. Hitler and his followers just laught at the letter and agreed that they would do everything to stop this idea of becoming a Monarchy. Hitler did this just by making a law wich would abolish the job as president and he proclaimed himself to be Fuher. On August 2, 1934 the prsedent died and the Nazi’s annouched the folowing law to make sure that Hitler would become president“The Reich Government has enacted the following law which is hereby promulgated.
Section 1. The office of Reich President will be combined with that of Reich Chancellor. The existing authority of the Reich President will consequently be transferred to the Führer and Reich Chancellor, Adolf Hitler. He will select his deputy.
Section 2. This law is effective as of the time of the death of Reich President von Hindenburg.”
This law was Illigal because he hadn’t asked permission but nobody was against it . The scary thing had happened, Hitler was the law,. After this law the soldiers had to swear a new outh
"I swear by God this sacred oath: I will render unconditional obedience to Adolf Hitler, the Führer of the German Reich and people, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, and will be ready as a brave soldier to risk my life at any time for this oath."
Now Hitler had the supreme power of Germany because ethis outh was sworn to Hitler himself and not to the German reich. So he had control of the people and the army now just as a real Fuher

Hitler reveals war plans

From the moment that Hitler was stabbed in the back by the politians during the first world war, Hitler wanted two things first he wanted lebensraum wich ment that Hitler wanted that the Germans had more freedom and secondly he wanted to get rid of the Jews. To acclompish the first thing Hitler violated openly towards the treaty of Versailles. Because in 1935 he rebuilded the German army very rapidly. Then Hitler managed to get a pact with Britain allowing that Germany could have a navy of 35 % of the British fleet and a submarine fleet equal in size. After this actions Hitler ralized that the world leaders became a bit scared and angry because if Germany would build up his armies it would be as big as the army that started the War 20 years earlier. But Hitler told this leaders and diplomats that Germany’s army build up wasn’t for starting a war but just for defense reasons. He made this statement stronger by using the horrors of the war like in the speech of may 21, 1935; "The blood shed on the European continent in the course of the last three hundred years bears no proportion to the national result of the events. In the end, France had remained France, Germany Germany, Poland Poland, and Italy Italy. What dynastic egotism, political passion and patriotic blindness have attained in the way of apparently far-reaching political changes by shedding rivers of blood has, as regards national feeling, done no more than touched the skin of nations. It has not substantially altered their fundamental characters. If these states had applied merely a fraction of their sacrifices to wiser purposes the success would certainly have been greater and more permanent." This kind of speeches made the leaders of France and England and Hitler’s neigbour countries sure that this man wouldn’t start a war, but years later they would knew that he actually was planning a war by reviving the old war economy and the Army's General Staff organization, which had been banned after World War I. This all was of course a special talent of Hitler, lieing to put the world on a wrong idea because he was making the impression that the horrors of the first world war should never be repeated. But in secret he was preparing the war of his own. Even the German people and the army top didn’t knew what their new leader was doing and preparing. For the top army leaders the reveal of his plans came on the November 5, 1937 when Hitler held a secret meeting with them about how to aquire more living space for the Germans. Before this meeting Hitler had met the Poland ambassador and together they had signed a treaty that Germany would respect Poland’s territorial rights. In the beginning of the meeting Hitler made the present people swoar an outh of secrecy. Abd then told the them that when he would die early his idea’s and last will were in his testament. Then the meeting started and Hitler told the people what his idea was of Lebensraum ,the livingspace of the Germans, and told them that the Germans should have a greater living space than other peoples. Hitler got his idea’s of the old Roman and Britain empire’s and told the present people that they had to take risks and had to face obstacles. The major obstacle was , to hate youre enemy’s like in this case Britain and France. And that because of these oponents they had to get Lebensraum by force.

He wanted to get Lebensraum in the years 1943 to 1945 to the very last guard wich offended the militairy rulership. He wanted to attack because othre countries defence were still rebuilding their defences. His major enemy was Russia because here there was enough space for the Germans. Although this was his ultimate want he focused in this meeting more of the seizure of Czechoslovakia and Ausria to protect the German borders. Hitler had made three strategies to achieve this wich had all the goal of the caputalation of Britain and France. These three startegies were; First he would wait till 1943 because then the rearmament was finished and France and Britain would be outgunned. Second, he would look at the international problems of France and attack Czechoslovakia when France would be weakend by an event due to the political problems such as civil war. Third, he would attack Austria and Czeckoslovakia in 1938 if France had a conflict with Germany’s new ally Fascist Italy.
This idea’s scared some people that were present that day because of the fact that the strong countries France and Britain would be the new enemies. Further they thought that Germany wasn’t raedy for a war and not even in 1943 good equipted. Because of these thoughts Hitler told them to go and accepte dtwo new Generals who did believed in him, Himmler and Heydrich.

Hitler’s war - a time line

September 1, 1939 Germany invades Poland. Britain and France give Hitler ultimatum. September 3, 1939 Great Britain and France declare war on Germany. September 17, 1939 Soviet forces, under terms of a secret agreement with Germany, marched into Poland from the East. April 9, 1940 Germany invades Denmark and Norway. May 10, 1940 German army invades Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands. May 11, 1940 Luxembourg falls to Germany. May 12, 1940 Germans cross French frontier using air/tank/infantry "Blitzkrieg" tactics. May 14, 1940 Netherlands falls to Germany. May 28, 1940 Belgium surrenders to Germany. June 10, 1940 Italy enters war on the side of Germany, declares war on UK and France. Italy invades France. June 22, 1940 France and Germany sign armistice at Compiègne. September 27, 1940 Germany, Italy and Japan sign the Tripartite Pact in Berlin. November 14, 1940 Germany bombs Coventry, England. March 11, 1941 Congress passes the Lend-Lease Act. April 6, 1941 German forces invade Greece and Yugoslavia June 22, 1941 Germany invades the Soviet Union. December 11, 1941 Germany and Italy declare war on U.S. December 11, 1941 United States declares war on Germany. November 19, 1942 Soviets counterattack Germany at Stalingrad.
This is known as the turning point of the war because the Germans led great losses and couldn’t defend their conquerd area’s not that good so the allies could invade almost on every spot. September 3, 1943 Allied troops land on Italian mainland after conquest of Sicily. September 8, 1943 Italy surrenders. June 4, 1944 U.S. and British troops enter Rome. June 6, 1944 Allied troops cross the English Channel and land on beaches in Normandy, France (D-Day). June 13, 1944 First German V-I guided missile falls on London. July 20, 1944 Hitler wounded in bomb plot. August 25, 1944 Paris liberated. August 26, 1944 General Eisenhower announces the destruction of the German Seventh Army. October 20, 1944 Americans invade Philippines. December 16, 1944 Germans launch counter-offensive in Belgium Battle of the Bulge. May 1, 1945 Admiral Doenitz takes command in Germany; suicide of Hitler announced. May 7, 1945 Germany surrenders unconditionally in Rheims, France. May 8, 1945 V-E (Victory in Europe) day..

Conclusion

In the beggining of this assignment I had a question wich was “ what were Hitler’s goals” this quetsion can be anwserd by 3 answers;

1. He wanted to create Lebensraum.
He wanted this because he felt that the treaty of versailles had smallend the empire of the Germans. He wanted to take back what belonged to them and even take more because he felt that the Germans were the most superior rase of the world and that they were here to rule all the other people that lived on this earth.

2. He wanted to punish the Jews.
He wanted this because he had fought in the first world war so hard and lost so many friends and that the Jewish politians had said we surrender while in Hitler’s eyes they could have won the war. Like you could have read in the chapter “Why the Jews”

3. He wanted a nation wich had no protest.
He wanted to rule Germany without protest of others so he could do whatever he liked while the civilians would obbey whatever he wanted. This was due he wanted to start a war without questions like why do you want to start a factory wich makes steel or any other questions wich had a link to starting a war. And he did this very wel by using propaganda as the answer to all the qoustions people had.

But these are all quesses of me after writing this report because Hitler never had written down his plans only what he wanted to be done but not any goals and the people he had told his goals committed suicide as well so this question can’t be answerd with a perfect answer and that is why I find it a pitty that he’s dead because their were even more answer’s that we wanted to be solved and that’s why I hope that their will be many reports about Hitler so we can find all this answer’s.

Sources

www.historyplace.com (in the middle of the page)
www.courseworkbank.co.uk/coursework/hitler_s_youth_2323/
www.worldhistory.com/worldwarii.htm
www.holocaust-history.org/short-essays/why-the-jews.shtml