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阿道夫·希特勒
Adolf Hitler
1937年的希特勒
元首
任期
1934年8月2日—1945年4月30日
副職
前任保羅·馮·興登堡
(聯邦大總統)
繼任卡爾·鄧尼茨
(聯邦大總統)
德國總理
任期
1933年1月30日—1945年4月30日
總統保羅·馮·興登堡(至1934年)
副職
前任庫爾特·馮·施萊謝爾
繼任約瑟夫·戈培爾
納粹黨黨主席
任期
1921年6月29日—1945年4月30日
副職魯道夫·赫斯
前任安東·德萊克斯勒
繼任馬丁·鮑曼
個人資料
出生(1889-04-20)1889年4月20日
奧匈帝國因河畔布勞瑙
逝世1945年4月30日(1945歲—04—30)(56歲)
納粹德國柏林
死因自殺
國籍
  • 1925年4月7日前為奧匈帝國、奧地利公民[1]
  • 1932年2月25日後為德國公民
政黨納粹黨(1921–45)
其他政黨德國工人黨(1920–21)
配偶愛娃·布勞恩
(1945年4月29日–30日)
父母
職業政治人物
宗教信仰參閱下列「宗教」一節
簽名
軍事背景
效忠德意志帝國
服役巴伐利亞陸軍英語Bavarian Army
服役時間1914–20
軍銜
部隊
參戰第二次世界大戰
軍事獎勵

阿道夫·希特勒(德語:Adolf Hitler,1889年4月20日—1945年4月30日)是一位奧地利裔德國政治人物,為納粹黨最高領導人,於1933年至1945年期間任德國總理和1934年至1945年間任「元首」,是納粹德國獨裁者,同時也是第二次世界大戰歐洲戰場納粹大屠殺的中心人物。

希特勒出生於奧匈帝國因河畔布勞瑙第一次世界大戰時加入德國陸軍的老兵,曾被授予過「一級鐵十字勳章」,戰後成為陸軍「里斯特團」的政治密探,由此於1919年結識和加入了「德國工人黨」,後於1921年成為黨魁,並將其改名為「國家社會主義德意志工人黨」,即「納粹黨」。1923年,希特勒於慕尼黑發動「啤酒館政變」,試圖推翻柏林政府,但最終失敗、被捕入獄。1924年,希特勒出獄,改採取正規選舉取得合法執政權的路線。透過廢除《凡爾賽條約》、反猶、反共、泛日耳曼主義的政治主張、富有吸引力的演說與宣傳活動,希特勒取得廣大德國民眾的支持,納粹黨亦在其領導下躍升為國會第一大黨,希特勒本人也於1933年被任命為德國總理。隨著納粹黨在同年3月國會選舉的勝利,國會通過《授權法案》,一次大戰後成立的威瑪共和國從此開始在「國家社會主義」意識形態下進行社會改造,轉為由納粹黨一黨專政的集權國家,通稱「納粹德國」。希特勒企圖消滅德國國內的猶太人,並建立「新秩序」、對抗其所認知的「不公正」戰後國際秩序。希特勒在執政的前六年使德國自「大蕭條」的經濟危機中迅速復甦、解除了戰勝國對德國的種種限制、併吞了週邊國家住有數百萬德裔人民的土地等政績,由此獲得廣大的國內支持。

希特勒試圖為德意志民族獲取在其他民族之上的特別「生存空間」,在外交上主張施行侵略與吞併,是第二次世界大戰在歐洲爆發的首要原因。他領導大規模武裝擴軍,並於1939年9月1日入侵波蘭,打響第二次世界大戰並使得英國和法國對德國宣戰。1941年6月22日,希特勒發動巴巴羅薩行動入侵蘇聯。至1941年年末,德國及其歐洲軸心國盟友已侵略占領歐洲和北非大部分地區。後來與蘇聯戰事的不利局面及美國的加入導致德國由攻轉守,並屢遭戰略失敗。在戰爭尾聲階段,1945年柏林戰役期間,希特勒與其長期女友愛娃·布勞恩成婚,兩天後為避免遭即將攻佔柏林的蘇聯紅軍俘獲,希特勒與布勞恩自殺身亡,其屍體被下屬焚毀並被蘇軍尋獲。

在希特勒和其種族主義政治形態領導之下,納粹政權屠殺了至少550萬包括猶太人和身心障礙者在內的被視為劣等或不受歡迎的少數族裔。希特勒和納粹政權亦在戰爭期間屠殺了近1,930萬平民和戰俘。第二次世界大戰歐洲戰場軍事行動還造成了2930萬軍人及平民的死亡,其中平民的死亡數量為人類戰爭史上最高,使二戰成為人類歷史上死亡數量最高的戰爭。

家族背景

編輯
希特勒的父母——阿洛伊斯英語Alois Hitler克拉拉

希特勒於1889年4月20日出生在奧匈帝國因河畔布勞瑙(現屬奧地利),與鄰國德意志帝國邊境相當接近,父親為阿洛伊斯·希特勒英語Alois Hitler,母親為克拉拉·勃茲爾

希特勒的家族背景頗為複雜,阿洛伊斯是瑪利亞·安娜·史克爾格魯伯英語Maria Anna Schicklgruber的私生子[3],在出生做受洗登記時就沒有紀錄其父親的名字,故阿洛伊斯出生後一直冠著母親史克爾格魯伯的姓氏。1842年,瑪利亞嫁給了磨坊工人約翰·格奧爾格·海德勒英語Johann Georg Hiedler,後來格奧爾格與安娜分別於1856年和1847年去世,阿洛伊斯即改由格奧爾格的弟弟約翰·尼普姆克·海德勒英語Johann Nepomuk Hiedler扶養長大[4]。阿洛伊斯在13歲時離開養父,到維也納做鞋匠學徒,後來設法進入了帝國稅務局,成為一名海關稅吏。尼普姆克對阿洛伊斯事業有成感到驕傲,並督促他將姓從史克爾格魯伯改為海德勒。1876年6月6日,尼普姆克與三位親戚在地方公證員面前宣誓,約翰·格奧爾格·海德勒是阿洛伊斯的生父,而後者此時登記的姓名為「約翰·格奧爾格·希特勒」(Johann Georg Hitler)[5][6][7],阿洛伊斯便再將其姓改為「希特勒」(Hitler)[6],拼法也經常變化,包括「海德勒」(Hiedler)、「徐特勒」(Hüttler)或「威特勒」(Huettler),而「希特勒」一姓的原意可能是指「住在小屋的人」、「牧羊人」或斯拉夫詞彙「住在茅屋的人」(Hidlar)[8]

阿洛伊斯的生父有主要三種可能性,納粹黨律師漢斯·法蘭克在戰後於獄中寫述的回憶錄中提到1930年代早期,希特勒曾要求他去調查關於自己存在猶太血統的流言,法蘭克認為阿洛伊斯的生父可能是格奧爾格、尼普姆克或一名富裕的格拉茨猶太人利奧波德·法蘭肯伯格西班牙語Leopold Frankenberger,瑪利亞在懷上阿洛伊斯前便曾在格拉茨的法蘭肯伯格家中當過工作,法蘭克還表示阿洛伊斯滿14歲前法蘭肯伯格都會定期寄出扶養費[註 2][9],不過根據歷史學家伊恩·克肖的調查,1837年根本沒有猶太人居住於格拉茨,也沒有名為「法蘭肯伯格」的家族登記在冊,更沒有證據能證明利奧波德·法蘭肯伯格此人的存在[10],故駁斥了阿洛伊斯具有猶太血統的說法[11][12][9]

希特勒的母親克拉拉是阿洛伊斯的第三任妻子,後者還在與第一任妻子安娜·格拉斯爾-霍爾(Anna Glasl-Hörer)保持婚姻關係時就與克拉拉和弗蘭西斯卡·馬特澤爾堡荷蘭語Franziska Matzelsberger有染,後來阿洛伊斯與安娜離異,娶了弗蘭西斯卡,並生了小阿洛伊斯和安吉拉。弗蘭西斯卡後來因為肺炎去世,而此時克拉拉也已懷了阿洛伊斯的孩子,後者便與其結婚。克拉拉一共生了六個孩子,希特勒在家中排行第四,他的兩個哥哥和一個姊姊——古斯塔夫(Gustav)、艾達(Ida)和奧托(Otto)都早夭逝世[13],下還有一位弟弟愛德蒙(Edmund,只活到六歲)和一位妹妹寶拉。由於前面三位孩子都早夭,克拉拉對希特勒相當愛護[14]

早年

編輯

童年

編輯
 
幼時的希特勒。

1892年,希特勒全家都搬到了德國帕紹[15],他在當地習得了下巴伐利亞語,而非奧地利德語,這影響了他一生的演講[16][17][18]。1894年,希特勒全家又遷至林茲附近的萊翁丁。1895年6月,阿洛伊斯退休,於蘭巴赫英語Lambach附近的哈菲爾德(Hafeld)買了一小塊土地經營養蜂業,希特勒則去就讀菲施爾哈姆附近的國民學校[19][20]。1897年,希特勒全家再搬至蘭巴赫,8歲的希特勒加入教會的唱詩班,還曾被認為日後將成為一名牧師[21]。1898年,希特勒一家又遷回萊翁丁。1900年,么弟愛德蒙因為麻疹去世,這對希特勒影響深遠,令其從原先自信、外向、認真的個性轉為孤僻、憂鬱和陰沉[22]

童年時期的希特勒與父親關係不佳,阿洛伊斯是個事業有成、嚴格和脾氣火爆的父親,會對希特勒拳打腳踢,但不比同時代家庭中的權威型父親更具「虐待性」。阿洛伊斯對希特勒同父異母的哥哥小阿洛伊斯相當失望,後者也因為受不了父親的惡劣脾氣而於1896年離家出走,使得希特勒成了阿洛伊斯在家中唯一一位出於善意、但受其厭惡的關懷對象。阿洛伊斯希望希特勒跟他一樣成為公務人員[23][24],但後者卻希望就讀普通高中,成為一位藝術家,阿洛伊斯之後於1900年9月把他送入林茲的實科中學英語Realschule[25],希特勒在自傳中表示他刻意怠慢學業,認為當父親發現他自己的學業不佳便會令他能實踐自己的夢想[26]

與當時許多的奧地利日耳曼裔青年一樣,希特勒在青年時代便有強烈的德意志民族主義情節[27],厭惡哈布斯堡王朝與其統治下的多民族帝國,對鄰近的德意志帝國抱有憧憬[28][29]。1903年1月3日,阿洛伊斯去世,希特勒的學習狀況更加惡化,母親克拉拉因此讓他轉校[30],於1904年9月入學施泰爾的實科中學,而他的行為和表現也有所改善[31]。1905年,在通過重修的期末考後,16歲的希特勒在未規劃升學或職業生涯的情況下離開了學校[32]

漂泊於維也納與慕尼黑

編輯

1907年,希特勒離開林茨,前往維也納學習美術,藉著領取孤兒撫恤金和母親的金援在當地過著波希米亞式的生活。希特勒曾於1907年和1908年兩度申請就讀維也納美術學院,但皆被認為「不適合繪畫」而遭到拒絕[33][34],院長同情希特勒,建議他去報考建築系(希特勒同樣對此頗有興趣),但後者缺少必要的中學學歷而未能成事[35]。1907年12月21日,克拉拉因乳癌去世。在維也納美術學院第二次申請入學遭拒後,希特勒也用光了身上的盤纏,不得不流落街頭,之後又住進了慈善基金會創辦的維也納第二十區默爾德曼街第二十七號宿舍[36],做著各種臨時工和販賣維也納景點的畫作過活。

當時維也納正流行宗教偏見和種族主義[37],而希特勒在這時期大量閱讀了有關哲學思想的報紙和著作,包括休斯頓·斯圖爾特·張伯倫查爾斯·達爾文弗里德里希·尼采古斯塔夫·勒龐阿圖爾·叔本華,其中也不乏種族主義和反猶主義的內容,如《德意志民眾報》(Deutsches Volksblatt)即宣傳「來自東歐的猶太人將會淹沒當地」的觀點[38]。希特勒究竟是在何時形成了反猶主義的意識型態是常為歷史學家爭論的命題[39],他在自傳中表示是在維也納時代[40],而他在青年時代的友人奧古斯特·庫別茲克則稱希特勒在離開林茨前就「確定是一名反猶主義者」[41],但據一些可靠的資料指出希特勒曾在維也納有過猶太朋友[42][43]。歷史學家理查德·埃文斯指出:「目前歷史學家普遍同意希特勒那眾人皆知、殺氣騰騰的反猶主義正好是德國在一次大戰戰敗後出現,實質上也就是他個人偏執地將敗因歸咎為『刀刺在背傳說』的結果[44]。」

1913年5月,希特勒取得了父親最後一筆的遺產,並搬到慕尼黑定居[45]。歷史學家認為希特勒離開維也納是為了逃避奧地利陸軍的兵役[46],後來希特勒宣稱自己是不願在奧匈帝國那支種族混雜的軍隊的軍隊服役[45]。1914年2月5日,他在薩爾茨堡的兵役體檢中被判定不及格而免服兵役,之後他返回了慕尼黑[47]

第一次世界大戰

編輯
 
第一次世界大戰入伍的希特勒照。

1914年8月,第一次世界大戰爆發,希特勒當時住在慕尼黑,但卻以奧地利公民的身份志願加入巴伐利亞陸軍[48],被發配到巴伐利亞第16後備步兵團英語6th Bavarian Reserve Division(「里斯特團」第1連)[49][48],為佈署於西線法國和比利時一帶的傳令兵英語runner (soldier)[50],戰爭期間約有一半時間都在前線後方的富爾訥昂韋普的團指揮部[51][52]。希特勒參加過第一次伊普爾戰役索姆河會戰阿拉斯戰役英語Battle of Arras (1917)帕尚戴爾戰役英語Battle of Passchendaele,並於索姆河之戰中受了傷[53]。因作戰英勇,希特勒於1914年獲頒二級鐵十字勳章[53],而在1918年8月4日,在他的猶太裔長官胡戈·古特曼的推薦下,希特勒又獲得了一級鐵十字勳章,這種勳章很少頒給當時他所擁有的二等兵(Gefreiter)軍階者[54][55]。同年5月18日,希特勒又獲頒黑色重傷獎章[56]

During his service at headquarters, Hitler pursued his artwork, drawing cartoons and instructions for an army newspaper. During the Battle of the Somme in October 1916, he was wounded in the left thigh when a shell exploded in the dispatch runners' dugout.[57] Hitler spent almost two months in hospital at Beelitz, returning to his regiment on 5 March 1917.[58] On 15 October 1918, he was temporarily blinded in a mustard gas attack and was hospitalised in Pasewalk.[59] While there, Hitler learnt of Germany's defeat, and—by his own account—upon receiving this news, he suffered a second bout of blindness.[60]

Hitler described the war as "the greatest of all experiences", and was praised by his commanding officers for his bravery.[61] His wartime experience reinforced his German patriotism and he was shocked by Germany's capitulation in November 1918.[62] His bitterness over the collapse of the war effort began to shape his ideology.[63] Like other German nationalists, he believed the Dolchstoßlegende (stab-in-the-back myth), which claimed that the German army, "undefeated in the field", had been "stabbed in the back" on the home front by civilian leaders and Marxists, later dubbed the "November criminals".[64]

The Treaty of Versailles stipulated that Germany must relinquish several of its territories and demilitarise the Rhineland. The treaty imposed economic sanctions and levied heavy reparations on the country. Many Germans perceived the treaty—especially Article 231, which declared Germany responsible for the war—as an unjust humiliation.[65] The Versailles Treaty and the economic, social, and political conditions in Germany after the war were later exploited by Hitler for political gain.[66]

Entry into politics

編輯
 
A copy of Adolf Hitler's German Workers' Party (DAP) membership card

After World War I, Hitler returned to Munich.[67] With no formal education or career prospects, he remained in the army.[68] In July 1919 he was appointed Verbindungsmann (intelligence agent) of an Aufklärungskommando (reconnaissance commando) of the Reichswehr, assigned to influence other soldiers and to infiltrate the German Workers' Party (DAP). While monitoring the activities of the DAP, Hitler was attracted to the founder Anton Drexler's anti-Semitic, nationalist, anti-capitalist, and anti-Marxist ideas.[69] Drexler favoured a strong active government, a non-Jewish version of socialism, and solidarity among all members of society. Impressed with Hitler's oratorical skills, Drexler invited him to join the DAP. Hitler accepted on 12 September 1919,[70] becoming party member 555 (the party began counting membership at 500 to give the impression they were a much larger party than they actually were).[71]

At the DAP, Hitler met Dietrich Eckart, one of the party's founders and a member of the occult Thule Society.[72] Eckart became Hitler's mentor, exchanging ideas with him and introducing him to a wide range of Munich society.[73] To increase its appeal, the DAP changed its name to the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party; NSDAP).[74] Hitler designed the party's banner of a swastika in a white circle on a red background.[75]

Hitler was discharged from the army on 31 March 1920 and began working full-time for the NSDAP.[76] The party headquarters was in Munich, a major hotbed of anti-government German nationalists determined to crush Marxism and undermine the Weimar Republic.[77] In February 1921—already highly effective at speaking to large audiences—he spoke to a crowd of over 6,000.[78] To publicise the meeting, two truckloads of party supporters drove around Munich waving swastika flags and throwing leaflets. Hitler soon gained notoriety for his rowdy polemic speeches against the Treaty of Versailles, rival politicians, and especially against Marxists and Jews.[79]

 
Hitler poses for the camera, 1930

In June 1921, while Hitler and Eckart were on a fundraising trip to Berlin, a mutiny broke out within the NSDAP in Munich. Members of its executive committee wanted to merge with the rival German Socialist Party (DSP).[80] Hitler returned to Munich on 11 July and angrily tendered his resignation. The committee members realised that the resignation of their leading public figure and speaker would mean the end of the party.[81] Hitler announced he would rejoin on the condition that he would replace Drexler as party chairman, and that the party headquarters would remain in Munich.[82] The committee agreed, and he rejoined the party on 26 July as member 3,680. Even then, Hitler still faced some opposition within the NSDAP: Opponents of Hitler in the leadership had Hermann Esser expelled from the party and printed 3,000 copies of a pamphlet attacking Hitler as a traitor to the party.[82][a] In the following days, Hitler spoke to several packed houses and defended himself and Esser, to thunderous applause. His strategy proved successful, and at a general membership meeting, he was granted absolute powers as party chairman, with only one vote against.[83]

Hitler's vitriolic beer hall speeches began attracting regular audiences. He became adept at using populist themes, including the use of scapegoats, who were blamed for his listeners' economic hardships.[84][85][86] Psychiatrist Carl Jung commented in 1938 that Hitler is the "first man to tell every German what he has been thinking and feeling all along in his unconscious about German fate, especially since the defeat in the World War".[87] Hitler used personal magnetism and an understanding of crowd psychology to advantage while engaged in public speaking.[88][89] Historians have noted the hypnotic effect of his rhetoric on large audiences, and of his eyes in small groups.[90] The author Alfons Heck, a former member of the Hitler Youth, describes the reaction to a speech by Hitler:

We erupted into a frenzy of nationalistic pride that bordered on hysteria. For minutes on end, we shouted at the top of our lungs, with tears streaming down our faces: Sieg Heil, Sieg Heil, Sieg Heil! From that moment on, I belonged to Adolf Hitler body and soul.[91]
— Alfons Heck

Although Hitler's oratory skills and personal traits were generally received well by large crowds and at official events, some who met Hitler privately noted that his appearance and demeanour failed to make a lasting impression.[92][93]

Early followers included Rudolf Hess, former air force ace Hermann Göring, and army captain Ernst Röhm. Röhm became head of the Nazis' paramilitary organisation, the Sturmabteilung (SA, "Stormtroopers"), which protected meetings and attacked political opponents. A critical influence on his thinking during this period was the Aufbau Vereinigung,[94] a conspiratorial group of White Russian exiles and early National Socialists. The group, financed with funds channelled from wealthy industrialists, introduced Hitler to the idea of a Jewish conspiracy, linking international finance with Bolshevism.[95]

Beer Hall Putsch

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Defendants in the Beer Hall Putsch trial. From left to right: Pernet, Weber, Frick, Kiebel, Ludendorff, Hitler, Bruckner, Röhm, and Wagner.

In 1923 Hitler enlisted the help of World War I General Erich Ludendorff for an attempted coup known as the "Beer Hall Putsch". The NSDAP used Italian Fascism as a model for their appearance and policies. Hitler wanted to emulate Benito Mussolini's "March on Rome" of 1922 by staging his own coup in Bavaria, to be followed by a challenge to the government in Berlin. Hitler and Ludendorff sought the support of Staatskommissar (state commissioner) Gustav Ritter von Kahr, Bavaria's de facto ruler. However, Kahr, along with Police Chief Hans Ritter von Seisser and Reichswehr General Otto von Lossow, wanted to install a nationalist dictatorship without Hitler.[96]

On 8 November 1923 Hitler and the SA stormed a public meeting of 3,000 people organised by Kahr in the Bürgerbräukeller, a beer hall in Munich. Interrupting Kahr's speech, he announced that the national revolution had begun and declared the formation of a new government with Ludendorff.[97] Retiring to a back room, Hitler, with handgun drawn, demanded and got the support of Kahr, Seisser, and Lossow.[97] Hitler's forces initially succeeded in occupying the local Reichswehr and police headquarters, but Kahr and his cohorts quickly withdrew their support. Neither the army nor the state police joined forces with Hitler.[98] The next day, Hitler and his followers marched from the beer hall to the Bavarian War Ministry to overthrow the Bavarian government, but police dispersed them.[99] Sixteen NSDAP members and four police officers were killed in the failed coup.[100]

 
Dust jacket of Mein Kampf (1926–27)

Hitler fled to the home of Ernst Hanfstaengl and by some accounts contemplated suicide.[101] He was depressed but calm when arrested on 11 November 1923 for high treason.[102] His trial before the special People's Court in Munich began in February 1924,[103] and Alfred Rosenberg became temporary leader of the NSDAP. On 1 April, Hitler was sentenced to five years' imprisonment at Landsberg Prison.[104] There, he received friendly treatment from the guards, and he was allowed mail from supporters and regular visits by party comrades. Pardoned by the Bavarian Supreme Court, he was released from jail on 20 December 1924, against the state prosecutor's objections.[105] Including time on remand, Hitler served just over one year in prison.[106]

While at Landsberg, Hitler dictated most of the first volume of Mein Kampf (My Struggle; originally entitled Four and a Half Years of Struggle against Lies, Stupidity, and Cowardice) to his deputy, Rudolf Hess.[106] The book, dedicated to Thule Society member Dietrich Eckart, was an autobiography and exposition of his ideology. The book laid out Hitler's plans for transforming German society into one based on race. Some passages implied genocide.[107] Published in two volumes in 1925 and 1926, it sold 228,000 copies between 1925 and 1932. One million copies were sold in 1933, Hitler's first year in office.[108]

Rebuilding the NSDAP

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At the time of Hitler's release from prison, politics in Germany had become less combative and the economy had improved, limiting Hitler's opportunities for political agitation. As a result of the failed Beer Hall Putsch, the NSDAP and its affiliated organisations were banned in Bavaria. In a meeting with Prime Minister of Bavaria Heinrich Held on 4 January 1925, Hitler agreed to respect the authority of the state and promised that he would seek political power only through the democratic process. The meeting paved the way for the ban on the NSDAP to be lifted on 16 February.[109] Hitler was barred from public speaking by the Bavarian authorities, a ban that remained in place until 1927.[110][111] To advance his political ambitions in spite of the ban, Hitler appointed Gregor Strasser, Otto Strasser, and Joseph Goebbels to organise and grow the NSDAP in northern Germany. A superb organiser, Gregor Strasser steered a more independent political course, emphasising the socialist elements of the party's programme.[112]

The stock market in the United States crashed on 24 October 1929. The impact in Germany was dire: millions were thrown out of work and several major banks collapsed. Hitler and the NSDAP prepared to take advantage of the emergency to gain support for their party. They promised to repudiate the Versailles Treaty, strengthen the economy, and provide jobs.[113]

Rise to power

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NSDAP election results[114]
Election Total votes % votes Reichstag seats Notes
May 1924 1,918,300 6.5 32 Hitler in prison
December 1924 907,300 3.0 14 Hitler released from prison
May 1928 810,100 2.6 12  
September 1930 6,409,600 18.3 107 After the financial crisis
July 1932 13,745,000 37.3 230 After Hitler was candidate for presidency
November 1932 11,737,000 33.1 196  
March 1933 17,277,180 43.9 288 Only partially free; During Hitler's term as chancellor of Germany

Brüning administration

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The Great Depression provided a political opportunity for Hitler. Germans were ambivalent to the parliamentary republic, which faced strong challenges from right- and left-wing extremists. The moderate political parties were increasingly unable to stem the tide of extremism, and the German referendum of 1929 helped to elevate Nazi ideology.[115] The elections of September 1930 resulted in the break-up of a grand coalition and its replacement with a minority cabinet. Its leader, chancellor Heinrich Brüning of the Centre Party, governed through emergency decrees from President Paul von Hindenburg. Governance by decree would become the new norm and paved the way for authoritarian forms of government.[116] The NSDAP rose from obscurity to win 18.3 per cent of the vote and 107 parliamentary seats in the 1930 election, becoming the second-largest party in parliament.[117]

 
Hitler and NSDAP treasurer Franz Xaver Schwarz at the dedication of the renovation of the Palais Barlow on Brienner Straße in Munich into the Brown House headquarters, December 1930

Hitler made a prominent appearance at the trial of two Reichswehr officers, Lieutenants Richard Scheringer and Hans Ludin, in late 1930. Both were charged with membership in the NSDAP, at that time illegal for Reichswehr personnel.[118] The prosecution argued that the NSDAP was an extremist party, prompting defence lawyer Hans Frank to call on Hitler to testify.[119] On 25 September 1930, Hitler testified that his party would pursue political power solely through democratic elections,[120] which won him many supporters in the officer corps.[121]

Brüning's austerity measures brought little economic improvement and were extremely unpopular.[122] Hitler exploited this by targeting his political messages specifically at people who had been affected by the inflation of the 1920s and the Depression, such as farmers, war veterans, and the middle class.[123]

Hitler had formally renounced his Austrian citizenship on 7 April 1925, but at the time did not acquire German citizenship. For almost seven years he was stateless, unable to run for public office, and facing the risk of deportation.[124] On 25 February 1932, the interior minister of Brunswick, Dietrich Klagges, who was a member of the NSDAP, appointed Hitler as administrator for the state's delegation to the Reichsrat in Berlin, making Hitler a citizen of Brunswick,[125] and thus of Germany.[126]

In 1932, Hitler ran against Hindenburg in the presidential elections. The viability of his candidacy was underscored by a 27 January 1932 speech to the Industry Club in Düsseldorf, which won him support from many of Germany's most powerful industrialists.[127] Hindenburg had support from various nationalist, monarchist, Catholic, and republican parties, and some Social Democrats. Hitler used the campaign slogan "Hitler über Deutschland" ("Hitler over Germany"), a reference to his political ambitions and his campaigning by aircraft.[128] He was one of the first politicians to use aircraft travel for political purposes, and utilised it effectively.[129][130] Hitler came in second in both rounds of the election, garnering more than 35 per cent of the vote in the final election. Although he lost to Hindenburg, this election established Hitler as a strong force in German politics.[131]

Appointment as chancellor

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The absence of an effective government prompted two influential politicians, Franz von Papen and Alfred Hugenberg, along with several other industrialists and businessmen, to write a letter to Hindenburg. The signers urged Hindenburg to appoint Hitler as leader of a government "independent from parliamentary parties", which could turn into a movement that would "enrapture millions of people".[132][133]

 
Hitler, at the window of the Reich Chancellery, receives an ovation on the evening of his inauguration as chancellor, 30 January 1933

Hindenburg reluctantly agreed to appoint Hitler as chancellor after two further parliamentary elections—in July and November 1932—had not resulted in the formation of a majority government. Hitler headed a short-lived coalition government formed by the NSDAP and Hugenberg's party, the German National People's Party (DNVP). On 30 January 1933, the new cabinet was sworn in during a brief ceremony in Hindenburg's office. The NSDAP gained three posts: Hitler was named chancellor, Wilhelm Frick Minister of the Interior, and Hermann Göring Minister of the Interior for Prussia.[134] Hitler had insisted on the ministerial positions as a way to gain control over the police in much of Germany.[135]

Reichstag fire and March elections

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As chancellor, Hitler worked against attempts by the NSDAP's opponents to build a majority government. Because of the political stalemate, he asked Hindenburg to again dissolve the Reichstag, and elections were scheduled for early March. On 27 February 1933, the Reichstag building was set on fire. Göring blamed a communist plot, because Dutch communist Marinus van der Lubbe was found in incriminating circumstances inside the burning building.[136] According to the British historian Sir Ian Kershaw, the consensus of nearly all historians is that van der Lubbe actually set the fire.[137] Others, including William L. Shirer and Alan Bullock, are of the opinion that the NSDAP itself was responsible.[138][139] At Hitler's urging, Hindenburg responded with the Reichstag Fire Decree of 28 February, which suspended basic rights and allowed detention without trial. The decree was permitted under Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution, which gave the president the power to take emergency measures to protect public safety and order.[140] Activities of the German Communist Party were suppressed, and some 4,000 communist party members were arrested.[141]

In addition to political campaigning, the NSDAP engaged in paramilitary violence and the spread of anti-communist propaganda in the days preceding the election. On election day, 6 March 1933, the NSDAP's share of the vote increased to 43.9 per cent, and the party acquired the largest number of seats in parliament. Hitler's party failed to secure an absolute majority, necessitating another coalition with the DNVP.[142]

Day of Potsdam and the Enabling Act

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Paul von Hindenburg and Adolf Hitler on the Day of Potsdam, 21 March 1933

On 21 March 1933, the new Reichstag was constituted with an opening ceremony at the Garrison Church in Potsdam. This "Day of Potsdam" was held to demonstrate unity between the Nazi movement and the old Prussian elite and military. Hitler appeared in a morning coat and humbly greeted Hindenburg.[143][144]

To achieve full political control despite not having an absolute majority in parliament, Hitler's government brought the Ermächtigungsgesetz (Enabling Act) to a vote in the newly elected Reichstag. The Act—officially titled the Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich ("Law to Remedy the Distress of People and Reich")—gave Hitler's cabinet the power to enact laws without the consent of the Reichstag for four years. These laws could (with certain exceptions) deviate from the constitution.[145] Since it would affect the constitution, the Enabling Act required a two-thirds majority to pass. Leaving nothing to chance, the Nazis used the provisions of the Reichstag Fire Decree to prevent several Social Democratic deputies from attending; the Communists having already been banned.[146]

On 23 March 1933, the Reichstag assembled at the Kroll Opera House under turbulent circumstances. Ranks of SA men served as guards inside the building, while large groups outside opposing the proposed legislation shouted slogans and threats towards the arriving members of parliament.[147] The position of the Centre Party, the third largest party in the Reichstag, was decisive. After Hitler verbally promised party leader Ludwig Kaas that Hindenburg would retain his power of veto, Kaas announced the Centre Party would support the Enabling Act. The Act passed by a vote of 441–84, with all parties except the Social Democrats voting in favour. The Enabling Act, along with the Reichstag Fire Decree, transformed Hitler's government into a de facto legal dictatorship.[148]

Removal of remaining limits

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At the risk of appearing to talk nonsense I tell you that the National Socialist movement will go on for 1,000 years! ... Don't forget how people laughed at me 15 years ago when I declared that one day I would govern Germany. They laugh now, just as foolishly, when I declare that I shall remain in power![149]
— Adolf Hitler to a British correspondent in Berlin, June 1934

Having achieved full control over the legislative and executive branches of government, Hitler and his allies began to suppress the remaining opposition. The Social Democratic Party was banned and its assets seized.[150] While many trade union delegates were in Berlin for May Day activities, SA stormtroopers demolished union offices around the country. On 2 May 1933 all trade unions were forced to dissolve and their leaders were arrested. Some were sent to concentration camps.[151] The German Labour Front was formed as an umbrella organisation to represent all workers, administrators, and company owners, thus reflecting the concept of national socialism in the spirit of Hitler's Volksgemeinschaft ("people's community").[152]

 
In 1934, Hitler became Germany's head of state with the title of Führer und Reichskanzler (leader and chancellor of the Reich).

By the end of June, the other parties had been intimidated into disbanding. This included the Nazis' nominal coalition partner, the DNVP; with the SA's help, Hitler forced its leader, Hugenberg, to resign on 29 June. On 14 July 1933, the NSDAP was declared the only legal political party in Germany, although the country had effectively been a one-party state since the passage of the Enabling Act four months earlier.[152][150] The demands of the SA for more political and military power caused anxiety among military, industrial, and political leaders. In response, Hitler purged the entire SA leadership in the Night of the Long Knives, which took place from 30 June to 2 July 1934.[153] Hitler targeted Ernst Röhm and other SA leaders who, along with a number of Hitler's political adversaries (such as Gregor Strasser and former chancellor Kurt von Schleicher), were rounded up, arrested, and shot.[154] While the international community and some Germans were shocked by the murders, many in Germany believed Hitler was restoring order.[155]

On 2 August 1934, Hindenburg died. The previous day, the cabinet had enacted the "Law Concerning the Highest State Office of the Reich".[156] This law stated that upon Hindenburg's death, the office of president would be abolished and its powers merged with those of the chancellor. Hitler thus became head of state as well as head of government, and was formally named as Führer und Reichskanzler (leader and chancellor).[157] This law violated the Enabling Act; although it allowed Hitler to deviate from the constitution, the Act explicitly barred him from passing any law tampering with the presidency. In 1932, the constitution had been amended to make the president of the High Court of Justice, not the chancellor, acting president pending new elections. Nonetheless, no one objected.[158] With this action, Hitler eliminated the last legal remedy by which he could be removed from office.[158]

As head of state, Hitler became supreme commander of the armed forces. The traditional loyalty oath of servicemen was altered to affirm loyalty to Hitler personally, by name, rather than to the office of supreme commander or the state.[159] On 19 August, the merger of the presidency with the chancellorship was approved by 90 per cent of the electorate voting in a plebiscite.[160]

 
Hitler's personal standard

In early 1938, Hitler used blackmail to consolidate his hold over the military by instigating the Blomberg–Fritsch Affair. Hitler forced his War Minister, Field Marshal Werner von Blomberg, to resign by using a police dossier that showed that Blomberg's new wife had a record for prostitution.[161][162] Army commander Colonel-General Werner von Fritsch was removed after the Schutzstaffel (SS) produced allegations that he had engaged in a homosexual relationship.[163] Both men had fallen into disfavour because they objected to Hitler's demand to make the Wehrmacht ready for war as early as 1938.[164] Hitler assumed Blomberg's title of Commander-in-Chief, thus taking personal command of the armed forces. He replaced the Ministry of War with the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (Armed Forces High Command, or OKW), headed by General Wilhelm Keitel. On the same day, sixteen generals were stripped of their commands and 44 more were transferred; all were suspected of not being sufficiently pro-Nazi.[165] By early February 1938, twelve more generals had been removed.[166]

Hitler took care to give his dictatorship the appearance of legality. Many of his decrees were explicitly based on the Reichstag Fire Decree and hence on Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution. The Reichstag renewed the Enabling Act twice, each time for a four-year period.[167] While elections to the Reichstag were still held, voters were presented with a single list of Nazis and pro-Nazi "guests" which carried with well over 90 percent of the vote.[168]

Nazi Germany

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Economy and culture

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Ceremony honouring the dead (Totenehrung) on the terrace in front of the Hall of Honour (Ehrenhalle) at the Nazi party rally grounds, Nuremberg, September 1934

In August 1934, Hitler appointed Reichsbank President Hjalmar Schacht as Minister of Economics, and in the following year, as Plenipotentiary for War Economy in charge of preparing the economy for war.[169] Reconstruction and rearmament were financed through Mefo bills, printing money, and seizing the assets of people arrested as enemies of the State, including Jews.[170] Unemployment fell from six million in 1932 to one million in 1936.[171] Hitler oversaw one of the largest infrastructure improvement campaigns in German history, leading to the construction of dams, autobahns, railroads, and other civil works. Wages were slightly lower in the mid to late 1930s compared with wages during the Weimar Republic, while the cost of living increased by 25 per cent.[172] The average working week increased during the shift to a war economy; by 1939, the average German was working between 47 and 50 hours a week.[173]

Hitler's government sponsored architecture on an immense scale. Albert Speer, instrumental in implementing Hitler's classicist reinterpretation of German culture, was placed in charge of the proposed architectural renovations of Berlin.[174] In 1936, Hitler opened the summer Olympic games in Berlin.

Rearmament and new alliances

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In a meeting with German military leaders on 3 February 1933, Hitler spoke of "conquest for Lebensraum in the East and its ruthless Germanisation" as his ultimate foreign policy objectives.[175] In March, Prince Bernhard Wilhelm von Bülow, secretary at the Auswärtiges Amt (Foreign Office), issued a statement of major foreign policy aims: Anschluss with Austria, the restoration of Germany's national borders of 1914, rejection of military restrictions under the Treaty of Versailles, the return of the former German colonies in Africa, and a German zone of influence in Eastern Europe. Hitler found Bülow's goals to be too modest.[176] In speeches during this period, he stressed the peaceful goals of his policies and a willingness to work within international agreements.[177] At the first meeting of his cabinet in 1933, Hitler prioritised military spending over unemployment relief.[178]

File:Hitlermusso2 edit.jpg
On 25 October 1936, an axis was declared between Italy and Germany.

Germany withdrew from the League of Nations and the World Disarmament Conference in October 1933.[179] In January 1935, over 90 per cent of the people of the Saarland, then under League of Nations administration, voted to unite with Germany.[180] That March, Hitler announced an expansion of the Wehrmacht to 600,000 members—six times the number permitted by the Versailles Treaty—including development of an air force (Luftwaffe) and an increase in the size of the navy (Kriegsmarine). Britain, France, Italy, and the League of Nations condemned these violations of the Treaty, but did virtually nothing to stop it.[181][182] The Anglo-German Naval Agreement (AGNA) of 18 June allowed German tonnage to increase to 35 per cent of that of the British navy. Hitler called the signing of the AGNA "the happiest day of his life", believing that the agreement marked the beginning of the Anglo-German alliance he had predicted in Mein Kampf.[183] France and Italy were not consulted before the signing, directly undermining the League of Nations and setting the Treaty of Versailles on the path towards irrelevance.[184]

Germany reoccupied the demilitarised zone in the Rhineland in March 1936, in violation of the Versailles Treaty. Hitler also sent troops to Spain to support General Franco after receiving an appeal for help in July 1936. At the same time, Hitler continued his efforts to create an Anglo-German alliance.[185] In August 1936, in response to a growing economic crisis caused by his rearmament efforts, Hitler ordered Göring to implement a Four Year Plan to prepare Germany for war within the next four years.[186] The plan envisaged an all-out struggle between "Judeo-Bolshevism" and German national socialism, which in Hitler's view required a committed effort of rearmament regardless of the economic costs.[187]

Count Galeazzo Ciano, foreign minister of Mussolini's government, declared an axis between Germany and Italy, and on 25 November, Germany signed the Anti-Comintern Pact with Japan. Britain, China, Italy, and Poland were also invited to join the Anti-Comintern Pact, but only Italy signed in 1937. Hitler abandoned his plan of an Anglo-German alliance, blaming "inadequate" British leadership.[188] At a meeting in the Reich Chancellery with his foreign ministers and military chiefs that November, Hitler restated his intention of acquiring Lebensraum for the German people. He ordered preparations for war in the East, to begin as early as 1938 and no later than 1943. In the event of his death, the conference minutes, recorded as the Hossbach Memorandum, were to be regarded as his "political testament".[189] He felt that a severe decline in living standards in Germany as a result of the economic crisis could only be stopped by military aggression aimed at seizing Austria and Czechoslovakia.[190][191] Hitler urged quick action before Britain and France gained a permanent lead in the arms race.[190] In early 1938, in the wake of the Blomberg–Fritsch Affair, Hitler asserted control of the military-foreign policy apparatus, dismissing Neurath as foreign minister and appointing himself Oberster Befehlshaber der Wehrmacht (supreme commander of the armed forces).[186] From early 1938 onwards, Hitler was carrying out a foreign policy ultimately aimed at war.[192]

World War II

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Early diplomatic successes

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Alliance with Japan

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Hitler and the Japanese foreign minister, Yōsuke Matsuoka, at a meeting in Berlin in March 1941. In the background is Joachim von Ribbentrop.

In February 1938, on the advice of his newly appointed foreign minister, the strongly pro-Japanese Joachim von Ribbentrop, Hitler ended the Sino-German alliance with the Republic of China to instead enter into an alliance with the more modern and powerful Japan. Hitler announced German recognition of Manchukuo, the Japanese-occupied state in Manchuria, and renounced German claims to their former colonies in the Pacific held by Japan.[193] Hitler ordered an end to arms shipments to China and recalled all German officers working with the Chinese Army.[193] In retaliation, Chinese General Chiang Kai-shek cancelled all Sino-German economic agreements, depriving the Germans of many Chinese raw materials.[194]

Austria and Czechoslovakia

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On 12 March 1938, Hitler declared unification of Austria with Nazi Germany in the Anschluss.[195][196] Hitler then turned his attention to the ethnic German population of the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia.[197]

On 28–29 March 1938, Hitler held a series of secret meetings in Berlin with Konrad Henlein of the Sudeten Heimfront (Home Front), the largest of the ethnic German parties of the Sudetenland. The men agreed that Henlein would demand increased autonomy for Sudeten Germans from the Czechoslovakian government, thus providing a pretext for German military action against Czechoslovakia. In April 1938 Henlein told the foreign minister of Hungary that "whatever the Czech government might offer, he would always raise still higher demands ... he wanted to sabotage an understanding by any means because this was the only method to blow up Czechoslovakia quickly".[198] In private, Hitler considered the Sudeten issue unimportant; his real intention was a war of conquest against Czechoslovakia.[199]

 
October 1938: Hitler (standing in the Mercedes) drives through the crowd in Cheb (德語:Eger), part of the German-populated Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia, which was annexed to Nazi Germany because of the Munich Agreement

In April Hitler ordered the OKW to prepare for Fall Grün ("Case Green"), the code name for an invasion of Czechoslovakia.[200] As a result of intense French and British diplomatic pressure, on 5 September Czechoslovakian President Edvard Beneš unveiled the "Fourth Plan" for constitutional reorganisation of his country, which agreed to most of Henlein's demands for Sudeten autonomy.[201] Henlein's Heimfront responded to Beneš' offer by instigating a series of violent clashes with the Czechoslovakian police that led to the declaration of martial law in certain Sudeten districts.[202][203]

Germany was dependent on imported oil; a confrontation with Britain over the Czechoslovakian dispute could curtail Germany's oil supplies. This forced Hitler to call off Fall Grün, originally planned for 1 October 1938.[204] On 29 September Hitler, Neville Chamberlain, Édouard Daladier, and Mussolini attended a one-day conference in Munich that led to the Munich Agreement, which handed over the Sudetenland districts to Germany.[205][206]

Chamberlain was satisfied with the Munich conference, calling the outcome "peace for our time", while Hitler was angered about the missed opportunity for war in 1938;[207][208] he expressed his disappointment in a speech on 9 October in Saarbrücken.[209] In Hitler's view, the British-brokered peace, although favourable to the ostensible German demands, was a diplomatic defeat which spurred his intent of limiting British power to pave the way for the eastern expansion of Germany.[210][211] As a result of the summit, Hitler was selected Time magazine's Man of the Year for 1938.[212]

In late 1938 and early 1939, the continuing economic crisis caused by rearmament forced Hitler to make major defence cuts.[213] In his "Export or die" speech of 30 January 1939, he called for an economic offensive to increase German foreign exchange holdings to pay for raw materials such as high-grade iron needed for military weapons.[213]

On 15 March 1939, in violation of the Munich accord and possibly as a result of the deepening economic crisis requiring additional assets,[214] Hitler ordered the Wehrmacht to invade Prague, and from Prague Castle he proclaimed Bohemia and Moravia a German protectorate.[215]

Start of World War II

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In private discussions in 1939, Hitler declared Britain the main enemy to be defeated and that Poland's obliteration was a necessary prelude for that goal. The eastern flank would be secured and land would be added to Germany's Lebensraum.[216] Offended by the British "guarantee" on 31 March 1939 of Polish independence, he said, "I shall brew them a devil's drink".[217] In a speech in Wilhelmshaven for the launch of the battleship 「German battleship」號 on 1 April, he threatened to denounce the Anglo-German Naval Agreement if the British continued to guarantee Polish independence, which he perceived as an "encirclement" policy.[217] Poland was to either become a German satellite state or be neutralised to secure the Reich's eastern flank and to prevent a possible British blockade.[218] Hitler initially favoured the idea of a satellite state, but upon its rejection by the Polish government, he decided to invade and made this the main foreign policy goal of 1939.[219] On 3 April, Hitler ordered the military to prepare for Fall Weiss ("Case White"), the plan for invading Poland on 25 August.[219] In a Reichstag speech on 28 April, he renounced both the Anglo-German Naval Agreement and the German–Polish Non-Aggression Pact. In August, Hitler told his generals that his original plan for 1939 was to "establish an acceptable relationship with Poland in order to fight against the West".[220] Historians such as William Carr, Gerhard Weinberg, and Kershaw have argued that one reason for Hitler's rush to war was his fear of an early death.[221][222][223]

 
Hitler portrayed on a 42 pfennig stamp from 1944. The term Grossdeutsches Reich (Greater German Reich) was first used in 1943 for the expanded Germany under his rule.

Hitler was concerned that a military attack against Poland could result in a premature war with Britain.[218][224] Hitler's foreign minister and former Ambassador to London, Joachim von Ribbentrop, assured him that neither Britain nor France would honour their commitments to Poland.[225][226] Accordingly, on 22 August 1939 Hitler ordered a military mobilisation against Poland.[227]

This plan required tacit Soviet support,[228] and the non-aggression pact (the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact) between Germany and the Soviet Union, led by Joseph Stalin, included a secret agreement to partition Poland between the two countries.[229] Contrary to Ribbentrop's prediction that Britain would sever Anglo-Polish ties, Britain and Poland signed the Anglo-Polish alliance on 25 August 1939. This, along with news from Italy that Mussolini would not honour the Pact of Steel, prompted Hitler to postpone the attack on Poland from 25 August to 1 September.[230] Hitler unsuccessfully tried to manoeuvre the British into neutrality by offering them a non-aggression guarantee on 25 August; he then instructed Ribbentrop to present a last-minute peace plan with an impossibly short time limit in an effort to blame the imminent war on British and Polish inaction.[231][232]

Despite his concerns over a British intervention, Hitler continued to pursue the planned invasion of Poland.[233] On 1 September 1939, Germany invaded western Poland under the pretext of having been denied claims to the Free City of Danzig and the right to extraterritorial roads across the Polish Corridor, which Germany had ceded under the Versailles Treaty.[234] In response, Britain and France declared war on Germany on 3 September, surprising Hitler and prompting him to angrily ask Ribbentrop, "Now what?"[235] France and Britain did not act on their declarations immediately, and on 17 September, Soviet forces invaded eastern Poland.[236]

 
Hitler reviews troops on the march during the campaign against Poland. September 1939

The fall of Poland was followed by what contemporary journalists dubbed the "Phoney War" or Sitzkrieg ("sitting war"). Hitler instructed the two newly appointed Gauleiters of north-western Poland, Albert Forster of Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia and Arthur Greiser of Reichsgau Wartheland, to Germanise their areas, with "no questions asked" about how this was accomplished.[237] Whereas Polish citizens in Forster's area merely had to sign forms stating that they had German blood,[238] Greiser carried out a brutal ethnic cleansing campaign on the Polish population in his purview.[237] Greiser complained that Forster was allowing thousands of Poles to be accepted as "racial" Germans and thus endangered German "racial purity". Hitler refrained from getting involved.[237] This inaction has been advanced as an example of the theory of "working towards the Führer": Hitler issued vague instructions and expected his subordinates to work out policies on their own.

Another dispute pitched one side represented by Himmler and Greiser, who championed ethnic cleansing in Poland, against another represented by Göring and Hans Frank, governor-general of the General Government territory of occupied Poland, who called for turning Poland into the "granary" of the Reich.[239] On 12 February 1940, the dispute was initially settled in favour of the Göring–Frank view, which ended the economically disruptive mass expulsions.[239] On 15 May 1940, Himmler issued a memo entitled "Some Thoughts on the Treatment of Alien Population in the East", calling for the expulsion of the entire Jewish population of Europe into Africa and reducing the Polish population to a "leaderless class of labourers".[239] Hitler called Himmler's memo "good and correct",[239] and, ignoring Göring and Frank, implemented the Himmler–Greiser policy in Poland.

 
Hitler visits Paris with architect Albert Speer (left) and sculptor Arno Breker (right), 23 June 1940

Hitler began a military build-up on Germany's western border, and in April 1940, German forces invaded Denmark and Norway. On 9 April, Hitler proclaimed the birth of the Greater Germanic Reich, his vision of a united empire of the Germanic nations of Europe, where the Dutch, Flemish, and Scandinavians were joined into a "racially pure" polity under German leadership.[240] In May 1940, Germany attacked France, and conquered Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Belgium. These victories prompted Mussolini to have Italy join forces with Hitler on 10 June. France and Germany signed an armistice on 22 June.[241] Kershaw notes that Hitler's popularity within Germany—and German support for the war— reached its peak when he returned to Berlin on 6 July from his tour of Paris.[242] Following the unexpected swift victory, Hitler promoted twelve generals to the rank of field marshal during the 1940 Field Marshal Ceremony.[243][244]

Britain, whose troops were forced to evacuate France by sea from Dunkirk,[245] continued to fight alongside other British dominions in the Battle of the Atlantic. Hitler made peace overtures to the new British leader, Winston Churchill, and upon their rejection he ordered a series of aerial attacks on Royal Air Force airbases and radar stations in South-East England. The German Luftwaffe failed to defeat the Royal Air Force in what became known as the Battle of Britain.[246] By the end of October, Hitler realised that air superiority for the invasion of Britain—in Operation Sea Lion—could not be achieved, and he ordered nightly air raids on British cities, including London, Plymouth, and Coventry.[247]

On 27 September 1940, the Tripartite Pact was signed in Berlin by Saburō Kurusu of Imperial Japan, Hitler, and Italian foreign minister Ciano,[248] and later expanded to include Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria, thus yielding the Axis powers. Hitler's attempt to integrate the Soviet Union into the anti-British bloc failed after inconclusive talks between Hitler and Molotov in Berlin in November, and he ordered preparations for a full-scale invasion of the Soviet Union.[249]

In the Spring of 1941, German forces were deployed to North Africa, the Balkans, and the Middle East. In February, German forces arrived in Libya to bolster the Italian presence. In April, Hitler launched the invasion of Yugoslavia, quickly followed by the invasion of Greece.[250] In May, German forces were sent to support Iraqi rebel forces fighting against the British and to invade Crete.[251]

Path to defeat

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On 22 June 1941, contravening the Hitler–Stalin Non-Aggression Pact of 1939, 4–5 million Axis troops attacked the Soviet Union.[252] This large-scale offensive (codenamed Operation Barbarossa) was intended to destroy the Soviet Union and seize its natural resources for subsequent aggression against the Western powers.[253][254] The invasion conquered a huge area, including the Baltic republics, Belarus, and West Ukraine. After the successful Battle of Smolensk, Hitler ordered Army Group Centre to halt its advance to Moscow and temporarily diverted its Panzer groups north and south to aid in the encirclement of Leningrad and Kiev.[255] His generals disagreed with this change of targets, and his decision caused a major crisis among the military leadership.[256][257] The pause provided the Red Army with an opportunity to mobilise fresh reserves; historian Russel Stolfi considers it to be one of the major factors that caused the failure of the Moscow offensive, which was resumed only in October 1941 and ended disastrously in December.[255]

 
Hitler during his speech to the Reichstag attacking American President Franklin D. Roosevelt, 11 December 1941

On 7 December 1941, Japan attacked the American fleet based at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Four days later, Hitler formally declared war against the United States.[258]

On 18 December 1941, Himmler asked Hitler, "What to do with the Jews of Russia?", to which Hitler replied, "als Partisanen auszurotten" ("exterminate them as partisans").[259] Israeli historian Yehuda Bauer has commented that the remark is probably as close as historians will ever get to a definitive order from Hitler for the genocide carried out during the Holocaust.[259]

In late 1942, German forces were defeated in the second battle of El Alamein,[260] thwarting Hitler's plans to seize the Suez Canal and the Middle East. Overconfident in his own military expertise following the earlier victories in 1940, Hitler became distrustful of his Army High Command and began to interfere in military and tactical planning with damaging consequences.[261] In December 1942 and January 1943, Hitler's repeated refusal to allow their withdrawal at the Battle of Stalingrad led to the almost total destruction of the 6th Army. Over 200,000 Axis soldiers were killed and 235,000 were taken prisoner. Of the estimated 91,000 German soldiers captured in the city itself, only around 6,000 survived captivity and returned to Germany after the war.[262] Thereafter came a decisive strategic defeat at the Battle of Kursk.[263] Hitler's military judgement became increasingly erratic, and Germany's military and economic position deteriorated along with Hitler's health.[264]

 
The destroyed map room at the Wolf's Lair after the 20 July plot

Following the allied invasion of Sicily in 1943, Mussolini was removed from power by Victor Emmanuel III after a vote of no confidence of the Grand Council. Marshal Pietro Badoglio, placed in charge of the government, soon surrendered to the Allies.[265] Throughout 1943 and 1944, the Soviet Union steadily forced Hitler's armies into retreat along the Eastern Front. On 6 June 1944, the Western Allied armies landed in northern France in what was one of the largest amphibious operations in history, Operation Overlord.[266] As a result of these significant setbacks for the German army, many of its officers concluded that defeat was inevitable and that Hitler's misjudgement or denial would drag out the war and result in the complete destruction of the country.[267]

Between 1939 and 1945, there were many plans to assassinate Hitler, some of which proceeded to significant degrees.[268] The most well known came from within Germany and was at least partly driven by the increasing prospect of a German defeat in the war.[269] In July 1944, in the 20 July plot, part of Operation Valkyrie, Claus von Stauffenberg planted a bomb in one of Hitler's headquarters, the Wolf's Lair at Rastenburg. Hitler narrowly survived because staff officer Heinz Brandt moved the briefcase containing the bomb behind a leg of the heavy conference table. When the bomb exploded, the table deflected much of the blast away. It was also lessened by the open windows. Later, Hitler ordered savage reprisals resulting in the execution of more than 4,900 people.[270]

Defeat and death

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By late 1944, both the Red Army and the Western Allies were advancing into Germany. Recognising the strength and determination of the Red Army, Hitler decided to use his remaining mobile reserves against the American and British troops, which he perceived as far weaker.[271] On 16 December, he launched an offensive in the Ardennes to incite disunity among the Western Allies and perhaps convince them to join his fight against the Soviets.[272] The offensive failed after some initial but temporary successes.[273] With much of Germany in ruins in January 1945, Hitler spoke on the radio to say: "However grave as the crisis may be at this moment, it will, despite everything, be mastered by our unalterable will."[274] Hitler's hope to negotiate peace with the United States and Britain was buoyed by the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt on 12 April 1945, but contrary to his expectations, this caused no rift among the Allies.[272][275] Acting on his view that Germany's military failures had forfeited its right to survive as a nation, Hitler ordered the destruction of all German industrial infrastructure before it could fall into Allied hands.[276] Minister for Armaments Albert Speer was entrusted with executing this scorched earth policy, but he secretly disobeyed the order.[276][277]

On 20 April, his 56th birthday, Hitler made his last trip from the Führerbunker ("Führer's shelter") to the surface. In the ruined garden of the Reich Chancellery, he awarded Iron Crosses to boy soldiers of the Hitler Youth, who were now fighting the Red Army at the front near Berlin.[278] By 21 April, Georgy Zhukov's 1st Belorussian Front had broken through the defences of General Gotthard Heinrici's Army Group Vistula during the Battle of the Seelow Heights and advanced to the outskirts of Berlin.[279] In denial about the dire situation, Hitler placed his hopes on the undermanned and under-equipped Armeeabteilung Steiner (Army Detachment Steiner), commanded by Waffen SS General Felix Steiner. Hitler ordered Steiner to attack the northern flank of the salient, while the German Ninth Army was ordered to attack northward in a pincer attack.[280]

Hitler on 25 April 1945 in his last public appearance, in the garden of the Reich Chancellery, five days before he and Eva Braun committed suicide.
Front page of the US Armed Forces newspaper, Stars and Stripes, 2 May 1945, announcing Hitler's death

During a military conference on 22 April, Hitler asked about Steiner's offensive. He was told that the attack had not been launched and that the Soviets had entered Berlin. Hitler asked everyone except Wilhelm Keitel, Alfred Jodl, Hans Krebs, and Wilhelm Burgdorf to leave the room,[281] then launched into a tirade against the treachery and incompetence of his commanders, culminating in his declaration—for the first time—that "everything was lost".[252] He announced that he would stay in Berlin until the end and then shoot himself.[282]

By 23 April the Red Army had completely surrounded Berlin,[283] and Goebbels made a proclamation urging its citizens to defend the city.[281] That same day, Göring sent a telegram from Berchtesgaden, arguing that since Hitler was isolated in Berlin, Göring should assume leadership of Germany. Göring set a deadline after which he would consider Hitler incapacitated.[284] Hitler responded by having Göring arrested, and in his last will and testament, written on 29 April, he removed Göring from all government positions.[285][286] On 28 April Hitler discovered that Himmler, who had left Berlin on 20 April, was trying to discuss surrender terms with the Western Allies.[287][288] He ordered Himmler's arrest and had Hermann Fegelein (Himmler's SS representative at Hitler's HQ in Berlin) shot.[289]

After midnight on 29 April, Hitler married Eva Braun in a small civil ceremony in the Führerbunker. After a modest wedding breakfast with his new wife, Hitler took secretary Traudl Junge to another room and dictated his will.[290][b] The event was witnessed and documents signed by Krebs, Burgdorf, Goebbels, and Bormann.[291] Later that afternoon, Hitler was informed of the execution of Mussolini, which presumably increased his determination to avoid capture.[292]

On 30 April 1945, after intense street-to-street combat, when Soviet troops were within a block or two of the Reich Chancellery, Hitler shot himself and Braun bit into a cyanide capsule.[293][294] Their bodies were carried up the stairs and through the bunker's emergency exit to the bombed-out garden behind the Reich Chancellery, where they were placed in a bomb crater and doused with petrol.[295] The corpses were set on fire as the Red Army shelling continued.[296][297] Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz and Joseph Goebbels assumed Hitler's roles as head of state and chancellor respectively.[298]

Berlin surrendered on 2 May. Records in the Soviet archives, obtained after the fall of the Soviet Union, state that the remains of Hitler, Braun, Joseph and Magda Goebbels, the six Goebbels children, General Hans Krebs, and Hitler's dogs were repeatedly buried and exhumed.[299] On 4 April 1970, a Soviet KGB team used detailed burial charts to exhume five wooden boxes at the SMERSH facility in Magdeburg. The remains from the boxes were burned, crushed, and scattered into the Biederitz river, a tributary of the nearby Elbe.[300] According to Kershaw the corpses of Braun and Hitler were fully burned when the Red Army found them, and only a lower jaw with dental work could be identified as Hitler's remains.[301]

The Holocaust

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If the international Jewish financiers in and outside Europe should succeed in plunging the nations once more into a world war, then the result will not be the Bolshevisation of the earth, and thus the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe![302]
— Adolf Hitler addressing the German Reichstag, 30 January 1939
 
A wagon piled high with corpses outside the crematorium in the liberated Buchenwald concentration camp (April 1945)

The Holocaust and Germany's war in the East was based on Hitler's long-standing view that the Jews were the great enemy of the German people and that Lebensraum was needed for the expansion of Germany. He focused on Eastern Europe for this expansion, aiming to defeat Poland and the Soviet Union and on removing or killing the Jews and Slavs.[303] The Generalplan Ost ("General Plan East") called for deporting the population of occupied Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union to West Siberia, for use as slave labour or to be murdered;[304] the conquered territories were to be colonised by German or "Germanised" settlers.[305] The goal was to implement this plan after the conquest of the Soviet Union, but when this failed, Hitler moved the plans forward.[304][306] By January 1942, it had been decided to kill the Jews, Slavs, and other deportees considered undesirable.[307][c]

 
Hitler's order for Action T4, dated 1 September 1939

The Holocaust (also known as the "Endlösung der Judenfrage" or "Final Solution of the Jewish Question") was ordered by Hitler and organised and executed by Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich. The records of the Wannsee Conference, held on 20 January 1942 and led by Heydrich, with fifteen senior Nazi officials participating, provide the clearest evidence of systematic planning for the Holocaust. On 22 February, Hitler was recorded saying, "we shall regain our health only by eliminating the Jews".[308] Although no direct order from Hitler authorising the mass killings has surfaced,[309] his public speeches, orders to his generals, and the diaries of Nazi officials demonstrate that he conceived and authorised the extermination of European Jewry.[310][311] He approved the Einsatzgruppen—killing squads that followed the German army through Poland, the Baltic, and the Soviet Union[312]—and he was well informed about their activities.[310][313] By summer 1942, Auschwitz concentration camp was rapidly expanded to accommodate large numbers of deportees for killing or enslavement.[314] Scores of other concentration camps and satellite camps were set up throughout Europe, with several camps devoted exclusively to extermination.[315]

Between 1939 and 1945, the Schutzstaffel (SS), assisted by collaborationist governments and recruits from occupied countries, was responsible for the deaths of at least eleven million people,[316][304] including 5.5 to 6 million Jews (representing two-thirds of the Jewish population of Europe),[317][318] and between 200,000 and 1,500,000 Romani people.[319][318] Deaths took place in concentration and extermination camps, ghettos, and through mass executions. Many victims of the Holocaust were gassed to death, whereas others died of starvation or disease or while working as slave labourers.[320] In addition to eliminating Jews, the Nazis also planned to reduce the population of the conquered territories by 30 million people through starvation in an action called the Hunger Plan. Food supplies would be diverted to the German army and German civilians. Cities would be razed and the land allowed to return to forest or resettled by German colonists.[321] Together, the Hunger Plan and Generalplan Ost would have led to the starvation of 80 million people in the Soviet Union.[322] These partially fulfilled plans resulted in the democidal deaths of an estimated 19.3 million civilians and prisoners of war.[323]

Hitler's policies also resulted in the killing of nearly two million Poles,[324] over three million Soviet prisoners of war,[325] communists and other political opponents, homosexuals, the physically and mentally disabled,[326][327] Jehovah's Witnesses, Adventists, and trade unionists. Hitler did not speak publicly about the killings, and seems never to have visited the concentration camps.[328]

The Nazis also embraced the concept of racial hygiene. On 15 September 1935, Hitler presented two laws—known as the Nuremberg Laws—to the Reichstag. The laws banned sexual relations and marriages between Aryans and Jews and were later extended to include "Gypsies, Negroes or their bastard offspring".[329] The laws also stripped all non-Aryans of their German citizenship and forbade the employment of non-Jewish women under the age of 45 in Jewish households.[330] Hitler's early eugenic policies targeted children with physical and developmental disabilities in a programme dubbed Action Brandt, and later authorised a euthanasia programme for adults with serious mental and physical disabilities, now referred to as Action T4.[331]

領導風格

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希特勒以完全獨裁統治的方式控制納粹黨,並將其詮釋為「領袖原則」,意旨下屬對上級的無條件服從。因此希特勒將政府視為金字塔型的架構,他本人則是毋庸置疑的最高領袖。在黨內的地位高低並非透過選舉,而是由上級給予的職位所決定,且被要求無條件服從其命令[332]。Hitler's leadership style was to give contradictory orders to his subordinates and to place them into positions where their duties and responsibilities overlapped with those of others, to have "the stronger one [do] the job".[333] In this way, Hitler fostered distrust, competition, and infighting among his subordinates to consolidate and maximise his own power. His cabinet never met after 1938, and he discouraged his ministers from meeting independently.[334][335] Hitler typically did not give written orders; instead he communicated them verbally, or had them conveyed through his close associate, Martin Bormann.[336] He entrusted Bormann with his paperwork, appointments, and personal finances; Bormann used his position to control the flow of information and access to Hitler.[337]

Hitler dominated his country's war effort during World War II to a greater extent than any other national leader. He assumed the role of supreme commander of the armed forces during 1938, and subsequently made all major decisions regarding Germany's military strategy. His decision to mount a risky series of offensives against Norway, France and the Low Countries in 1940 against the advice of the military proved successful, though the diplomatic and military strategies he employed in attempts to force the United Kingdom out of the war ended in failure.[338] Hitler deepened his involvement in the war effort by appointing himself commander-in-chief of the Army in December 1941; from this point forward he personally directed the war against the Soviet Union, while his military commanders facing the Western Allies retained a degree of autonomy.[339] Hitler's leadership became increasingly disconnected from reality as the war turned against Germany, with the military's defensive strategies often hindered by his slow decision making and frequent directives to hold untenable positions. Nevertheless, he continued to believe that only his leadership could deliver victory.[338]。到了戰爭最後幾個月,希特勒拒絕考慮任何和平談判、寧可讓德國徹底毀滅也不要投降[340]。德國軍方也並未挑戰過希特勒對整場戰爭的控制權,高級軍官也普遍支持和執行希特勒的一切命令[341]

Legacy

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Outside the building in Braunau am Inn, Austria, where Hitler was born, is a memorial stone placed as a reminder of the horrors of World War II. The inscription translates as:

For peace, freedom
and democracy
never again fascism
millions of dead remind [us]

Hitler's suicide was likened by contemporaries to a "spell" being broken.[342][343] Public support for Hitler had collapsed by the time of his death and few Germans mourned his passing; Kershaw argues that most civilians and military personnel were too busy adjusting to the collapse of the country or fleeing from the fighting to take any interest.[344] According to historian John Toland, National Socialism "burst like a bubble" without its leader.[345]

Hitler's actions and Nazi ideology are almost universally regarded as gravely immoral;[346] according to Kershaw, "Never in history has such ruination—physical and moral—been associated with the name of one man".[347] Hitler's political programme brought about a world war, leaving behind a devastated and impoverished Eastern and Central Europe. Germany itself suffered wholesale destruction, characterised as "Zero Hour".[348] Hitler's policies inflicted human suffering on an unprecedented scale;[349] according to R.J. Rummel, the Nazi regime was responsible for the democidal killing of an estimated 19.3 million civilians and prisoners of war.[316] In addition, 29 million soldiers and civilians died as a result of military action in the European Theatre of World War II,[316] and Hitler's role has been described as "... the main author of a war leaving over 50 million dead and millions more grieving their lost ones ...".[347] The total number of civilians killed during the Second World War was an unprecedented development in the history of warfare.[350] Historians, philosophers, and politicians often use the word "evil" to describe the Nazi regime.[351] Many European countries have criminalised both the promotion of Nazism and Holocaust denial.[352]

Historian Friedrich Meinecke described Hitler as "one of the great examples of the singular and incalculable power of personality in historical life".[353] English historian Hugh Trevor-Roper saw him as "among the 'terrible simplifiers' of history, the most systematic, the most historical, the most philosophical, and yet the coarsest, cruelest, least magnanimous conqueror the world has ever known".[354] For the historian John M. Roberts, Hitler's defeat marked the end of a phase of European history dominated by Germany.[355] In its place emerged the Cold War, a global confrontation between the Western Bloc, dominated by the United States and other NATO nations, and the Eastern Bloc, dominated by the Soviet Union.[356] Historian Sebastian Haffner avers that without Hitler and the displacement of the Jews, the modern nation state of Israel would not exist. He contends that without Hitler, the de-colonisation of former European spheres of influence would not have occurred as quickly and would have been postponed.[357] Further, Haffner claims that other than Alexander the Great, Hitler had a more significant impact than any other comparable historical figure, in that he too caused a wide range of worldwide changes in a relatively short time span.[358]

Views on religion

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Hitler was born to a practising Catholic mother and an anticlerical father; after leaving home Hitler never again attended Mass or received the sacraments.[359][360][361] Speer states that Hitler made harsh pronouncements against the church to his political associates and though he never officially left it, he had no attachment to it.[362] He adds that Hitler felt that in the absence of the church the faithful would turn to mysticism, which he considered a step backwards.[362] According to Speer, Hitler believed that either Japanese religious beliefs or Islam would have been a more suitable religion for the Germans than Christianity, with its "meekness and flabbiness".[363]

Historian John S. Conway states that Hitler was fundamentally opposed to the Christian churches.[364] According to Bullock, Hitler did not believe in God, was anticlerical, and held Christian ethics in contempt because they contravened his preferred view of "survival of the fittest".[365] He favoured aspects of Protestantism that suited his own views, and adopted some elements of the Catholic Church's hierarchical organisation, liturgy, and phraseology in his politics.[366]

Hitler viewed the church as an important politically conservative influence on society,[367] and he adopted a strategic relationship with it that "suited his immediate political purposes".[364] In public, Hitler often praised Christian heritage and German Christian culture, though professing a belief in an "Aryan Jesus", one who fought against the Jews.[368] Any pro-Christian public rhetoric was at variance with his personal beliefs, which described Christianity as "absurdity"[369] and nonsense founded on lies.[370]

According to a U.S. Office of Strategic Services report, "The Nazi Master Plan", Hitler planned to destroy the influence of Christian churches within the Reich.[371][372] His eventual goal was the total elimination of Christianity.[373] This goal informed Hitler's movement very early on, but he saw it as inexpedient to express this extreme position publicly.[374] According to Bullock, Hitler wanted to wait until after the war before executing this plan.[375]

Speer wrote that Hitler had a negative view of Himmler's and Alfred Rosenberg's mystical notions and Himmler's attempt to mythologise the SS. Hitler was more pragmatic, and his ambitions centred on more practical concerns.[376][377]

Health

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Researchers have variously suggested that Hitler suffered from irritable bowel syndrome, skin lesions, irregular heartbeat, coronary sclerosis,[378] Parkinson's disease,[264][379] syphilis,[379] and tinnitus.[380] In a report prepared for the Office of Strategic Services in 1943, Walter C. Langer of Harvard University described Hitler as a "neurotic psychopath".[381] In his 1977 book The Psychopathic God: Adolf Hitler, historian Robert G. L. Waite proposes that Hitler suffered from borderline personality disorder.[382] Historians Henrik Eberle and Hans-Joachim Neumann consider that while Hitler suffered from a number of illnesses including Parkinson's disease, he did not experience pathological delusions and was always fully aware of, and responsible for, the decisions he was making.[383][252] Theories about Hitler's medical condition are difficult to prove, and placing too much weight on them may have the effect of attributing many of the events and consequences of Nazi Germany to the possibly impaired physical health of one individual.[384] Kershaw feels that it is better to take a broader view of German history by examining what social forces led to the Nazi dictatorship and its policies rather than to pursue narrow explanations for the Holocaust and World War II based on only one person.[385]

Hitler followed a vegetarian diet.[386] At social events he sometimes gave graphic accounts of the slaughter of animals in an effort to make his dinner guests shun meat.[387] Bormann had a greenhouse constructed near the Berghof (near Berchtesgaden) to ensure a steady supply of fresh fruit and vegetables for Hitler throughout the war.[388] Hitler publicly avoided alcohol. He occasionally drank beer and wine in private, but gave up drinking because of weight gain in 1943.[389] He was a non-smoker for most of his life, but smoked heavily in his youth (25 to 40 cigarettes a day). He eventually quit, calling the habit "a waste of money".[390] He encouraged his close associates to quit by offering a gold watch to any who were able to break the habit.[391] Hitler began using amphetamine occasionally after 1937 and became addicted to it in late 1942.[392] Speer linked this use of amphetamine to Hitler's increasingly inflexible decision making (for example, rarely allowing military retreats).[393]

Prescribed 90 medications during the war years, Hitler took many pills each day for chronic stomach problems and other ailments.[394] He suffered ruptured eardrums as a result of the 20 July plot bomb blast in 1944, and 200 wood splinters had to be removed from his legs.[395] Newsreel footage of Hitler shows tremors of his hand and a shuffling walk, which began before the war and worsened towards the end of his life. Hitler's personal physician, Theodor Morell, treated Hitler with a drug that was commonly prescribed in 1945 for Parkinson's disease. Ernst-Günther Schenck and several other doctors who met Hitler in the last weeks of his life also formed a diagnosis of Parkinson's disease.[394][396][252]

Family

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Hitler in 1942 with his long-time lover, Eva Braun, whom he married on 29 April 1945

Hitler created a public image as a celibate man without a domestic life, dedicated entirely to his political mission and the nation.[124][397] He met his lover, Eva Braun, in 1929,[398] and married her in April 1945.[399] In September 1931, his half-niece, Geli Raubal, committed suicide with Hitler's gun in his Munich apartment. It was rumoured among contemporaries that Geli was in a romantic relationship with him, and her death was a source of deep, lasting pain.[400] Paula Hitler, the last living member of his immediate family, died in 1960.[401]

In propaganda films

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Film of Hitler at Berchtesgaden (c. 1941)

Hitler exploited documentary films and newsreels to inspire a cult of personality. He was involved and appeared in a series of propaganda films throughout his political career—such as Der Sieg des Glaubens and Triumph des Willens—made by Leni Riefenstahl, regarded as a pioneer of modern filmmaking.[402]

List of propaganda and film appearances

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See also

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註解

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  1. ^ 大部分中文文獻都將希特勒在帝國陸軍中的最高軍階譯作「下士」,但實屬誤譯,其軍階應為「二等兵」(Gefreiter),高於列兵(Schütze)和上等列兵(Obersoldat),但低於一等兵(Oberfreiter),屬於士兵而非士官[2]
  2. ^ 不過希特勒後來告訴法蘭克,因為他祖母瑪利亞和祖父太窮了,不得不向法蘭肯伯格敲詐,誤以為自己是阿洛伊斯的父親,才能取得贍養費。後來蓋世太保又重新調查了此事,但並未發現新證據證明希特勒的祖父為猶太人[9]

References

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  1. ^ NS-Archiv, 7 April 1925.
  2. ^ 劉怡(2015年),第24頁
  3. ^ Bullock(1999年),第24頁
  4. ^ Maser(1973年),第4頁
  5. ^ Maser(1973年),第15頁
  6. ^ 6.0 6.1 Kershaw(1999年),第5頁
  7. ^ Fischer(2015年),第90-94頁
  8. ^ Jetzinger(1976年),第32頁
  9. ^ 9.0 9.1 9.2 Crowe(2015年),第122-123頁
  10. ^ Hamann(2010年),第50頁
  11. ^ Toland(1992年),第246–247頁
  12. ^ Kershaw(1999年),第8–9頁
  13. ^ Shirer(1960年),第6–9頁
  14. ^ Fischer(2015年),第97頁
  15. ^ Rosmus(2004年),第33頁
  16. ^ Keller(2010年),第15頁
  17. ^ Hamann(2010年),第7–8頁
  18. ^ Kubizek(2006年),第37頁
  19. ^ Kubizek(2006年),第92頁
  20. ^ Hitler(1999年),第6頁
  21. ^ Shirer(1960年),第10–11頁
  22. ^ Payne(1990年),第22頁
  23. ^ Kershaw(2008年),第9頁
  24. ^ Fischer(2015年),第95-96頁
  25. ^ Kershaw(2008年),第8頁
  26. ^ Hitler(1999年),第10頁
  27. ^ Evans(2003年),第163–164頁
  28. ^ Bendersky(2000年),第26頁
  29. ^ Ryschka(2008年),第35頁
  30. ^ Kershaw(2008年),第10頁
  31. ^ Kershaw(1999年),第19頁
  32. ^ Kershaw(1999年),第20頁
  33. ^ Hitler(1999年),第20頁
  34. ^ Bullock(1962年),第30–31頁
  35. ^ Bullock(1962年),第31頁
  36. ^ Bullock(1999年),第30–33頁
  37. ^ Shirer(1960年),第26頁
  38. ^ Hamann(2010年),第341–345頁
  39. ^ Kershaw(1999年),第60–67頁
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Sources

編輯

Online

編輯
官銜
前任者:
Kurt von Schleicher
Chancellor of Germany(1)
1933–1945
繼任者:
Joseph Goebbels
前任者:
Paul von Hindenburg
As President
Führer of Germany(1)
1934–1945
繼任者:
Karl Dönitz
As President
政黨職務
前任者:
Anton Drexler
Leader of the NSDAP
1921–1945
繼任者:
Martin Bormann
軍職
前任者:
Franz Pfeffer von Salomon
Oberste SA-Führer
1930–1945
繼任者:
Disbanded
前任者:
Office created
Oberste Führer der Schutzstaffel
1934–1945
繼任者:
Disbanded
前任者:
Walther von Brauchitsch
Oberbefehlshaber des Heeres (Army Commander)
1941–1945
繼任者:
Ferdinand Schörner
榮銜
前任者:
Chiang Kai-shek and Soong May-ling
Time Person of the Year
1938
繼任者:
Joseph Stalin
註解
1. The positions of Head of State and Government were combined 1934–1945 in the office of Führer and Chancellor of Germany


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