Throughout the Spring and Summer of 1933 the new Nazi regime would start to make changes, some big, some small, some just a small part of larger plans.
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Email: historyofthesecondworldwar@outlook.com (mailto:historyofthesecondworldwar@outlook.com)
Sources
The Coming of the Third Reich by Richard J. Evans
Germany and the Second World War Volume 1: The Build-Up of German Aggression by Wilhelm Deist, Manfred Messerschmidt, Hans-Erich Volkmann, and Wolfram Wette
Hitler: A Biography by Ian Kershaw
The Third Reich by Thomas Childers
The Wages of Destruction: The Making and Breaking of the Nazi Economy by Adam Tooze
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William Shirer
France and the Remilitarization of the Rhineland, 1936 by Stephen A. Schuker
The First Capitulation: France and the Rhineland Crisis of 1936 by R.A.C. Parker (1956)
France, Germany, and the Saar by A.J.P. Taylor (1952)
The Franco-Polish Alliance and the Remilitarization of the Rhineland by George Sakwa
French Intelligence and Hitler’s Rise to Power by Peter Jackson
Great Britain and the Saar Plebiscite of 13 January 1935 by C.J. Hill
Hitler, Intelligence and the Decision to Remilitarize the Rhine by Zach Shore
Hitler’s Thirty Days to Power: January 1933 by Henry Ashby Turner Jr.
Prologue to Peacekeeping: Ireland and the Saar, 1934-35 by Michael Kennedy
Fantasy and Reality in Nazi Work-Creation Programs, 1933-1936 by Dan P. Silverman
Franz von Papen, the German Center Party, and the Failure of Catholic Conservatism in the Weimar Republic by Larry Eugene Jones
Causes and Consequences of the Plebiscite in the Saar by E.W (1955)
The Purge of the SA Reconsidered: “An Old Putschist Trick”? by Eleanor Hancock
The Remilitarization of the Rhineland and its Impact on the French-Polish Alliance by Roman D. Bicki (1969)
Rohm and Hitler: The Continuity of Political-Military Discord by David Jablonsky
The German Roman Catholic Hierarchy and the Saar Plebiscite of 1935 by Guenter Lewy (1964)
Saar Coal After Two World Wars by O.R. Reischer
Schacht’s Regulation of Money and the Capital Markets by Arthur Schweitzer (1948)
The Myth of Chancellor Von Schleicher’s Querfront Strategy by Henry Ashby Turner Jr.
The Struggle for Control of the German Economy by Amos E. Simpson
The Nazi State and German Society: A Brief History with Documents by Robert G. Moeller
Franz von Papen, Catholic Conservatives, and the Establishment of the Third Reich, 1933-1934 by Larry Eugene Jones
Franz von Papen, the German Center Party, and the Failure of Catholic Conservatism in the Weimar Republic by Larry Eugene Jones
British Establishment Perspectives on France, 1936-1940 by Michael Dockrill
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You’re listening to an airwave media podcast get cash for clothes at pl’s Closet in North Charleston in West Ashley it’s so easy recycle earn cash repeat we pay cash on the spot for your trendy gently used clothing shoes and accessories at pl’s closet we buy All Seasons all day everyday it’s time to
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Plus special patreon only episodes released once a month if you’d like to find out more information head on over to history of the Second World war.com members to find out more by mid July 1933 Germany was a single-party state this removed many of the possible roadblocks that the Nazi leaders could
Have faced when trying to implement their platform of Reform when discussing changes that occurred within Germany after 1933 one of the problems is the sheer scope of the changes and the way way that they evolved over the years it can be very easy to get caught up in the
End state of these changes some of which would not be reached until after the war had started and miss out on the fact that the new Naz Le government began making changes almost immediately and those changes would have meaningful impacts on the lives of many Germans as early as March
1933 during this episode we will discuss the changes that occurred in these early months during the Spring and early summer of 1933 and how it changed the way in which the German government interacted with the German people then we’re going to put some focus on the early anti-semitic efforts of the Nazi
Government and what that meant for German Jews during those months finally we will end on the Nazi Eugenics program and how it hoped to shape German Society through the use of compulsory sterilization and marriage limitations many of these topics will be Revisited in the future as we discuss how they
Evolved and shifted over time but the most important thing to note is how early they were put in place we all know how these things end in brutal violent oppression and genocide but that is not how they started instead it started with a yearslong campaign by the Nazi party
To impart its belief system on the German people as a whole and this would start with propaganda many of the cultural changes that would take place in Germany after 1933 were driven by a new government Ministry created on March 13th named the Reich Ministry of popular Enlightenment
And propaganda on the 23rd of March Hitler would say that this new ministry was created and put under the control of Geral and quote the government will Embark Upon A systematic campaign to restore the nation’s moral and material Health the whole education system theater film literature the press and
Broadcasting all these will be used as a means to this end they will be harnessed to help preserve the Eternal values which are part of the integral nature of our people end quote many of the Ministries inherited by the Nazi government were staffed with long- serving Civil Service workers a problem
That would eventually be reduced but that would take time this new ministry was different and its creation would provide Geral with the ability to staff it entirely with incredibly loyal highly educated and and True Believer Nazi Party members they were United with one goal to push back against the ideas of
Cultural bolshevism which is what the Nazi party had long declared was eroding German culture and robbing it of its historic power interestingly there was resistance to gal’s appointment among the cabinet the conservative leader hugenberg distrusted Geral in no small part due to the campaigns that the Nazi party had run in previous elections
Geral was the one responsible for many of the most Vivid and vicious attacks on the traditional German conservative and nationalist parties however these concerns like so many of hugenberg concerns would come to nothing and he would not be able to in any way hinder the creation of the new ministry as the
Propaganda Ministry got into working and trying to achieve its purpose it ran into new problems the first on the list were the number of social Democrats liberals and Jews within the German Civil Service which often made it challenging to push through certain changes and so it was a problem that had
To be solved on April 7th 1933 a new law was passed the law for the restoration of the professional civil service this law prevented non-aryan individuals from entering into the Civil Service and those who were already employed within it could be dismissed this had already been true for those tied to the
Communist party and most had already been removed from their positions but the new law added a whole host of new individuals mostly Jews or those of Jewish descent who would all be pushed into forced retirement along with jobs in National and state government this also included School teachers judges and
Doctors many of Germany’s most distinguished academics were dismissed from their positions under the provisions of the new law and many would leave the country during this period there were some exceptions within the law and at least initially the laws were not applied equally in all areas of the civil service for example many
Jewish doctors were not affected due to concerns that patients would not be pleased to lose their normal physician there were also explicit exemptions for those who were War veterans or those whose father or husband had died during the war or those who had served served in their position since the start of the
First world war these official exemptions were added at the insistence of Hindenburg over 100,000 Jews had served in the military during the first world war 78,000 of them at the front with 12,000 dying in combat and 30,000 receiving military commendations this shining record of War service meant that
A huge percentage of Jewish doctors lawyers and other civil servants qualified for the first world war exemption realizing some limits to their abilities to enact changes during this early period the Nazi leaders accepted hindenburg’s requests because they knew that Hindenberg was running out of time and they would spend the next 5 years
Chipping away at the various exemptions until they were finally removed in 1938 this is a really good example of how the process of change occurred in the 1930s in Germany the Nazi government would introduce a new law which had the possibility of really harming midi citizens of Germany however at at the
Beginning there would be many exemptions to the law or the law would just not be applied in all possible instances once the law became an accepted part of German Society then it would be slowly changed exemptions would be removed and the language of the legislation that was previously interpreted very narrowly
Would slowly be expanded so that it could be applied to more and more situations one of the reasons that Nazi leaders were emboldened in their push to start all of their reforms was the reaction Across the Nation after the March elections all over Germany millions of people would sign up to
Enter the party 2.5 million would join before limitations were placed on how individuals could join the party in May there was of course some True Believers among this group those who now believe that the Nazi party was the correct path forward for Germany but there were also
Of course many who joined simply because it seemed like the best opportunity for their personal Futures this created some antagonism between those newer members and those of the Old Guard who had been with with the party during the leaner years before 1933 and this antagonism would continue to cause problems into the mid1
1930s however what was clear is that many more people were signing up in support of the Nazi vision of the future of Germany and that meant Nazi changes to German Society changes that were well underway by May 1933 some of these reforms completely restructured the political makeup of
Germany since its foundation in 1871 Germany had been an interesting mix of national powers from the government in Berlin and in states that held a large amount of local autonomy this manifested in various ways like Bavaria having their own army during the first world war this was something of a unique
Feature of Germany and and was a constant source of political maneuverings as national leaders in Berlin triying to assert more power while state governments were zealously protective of their traditional Independence and freedom of action on April 7th all of this would change on that date a new law was created which
Appointed Reich Governors for each of the German states these men had the ability to appoint or remove government officials within the state with this power now in the hands of a nationally appointed person the historic Independence of the German states was essentially dissolved overnight and it would never return while March and April
Would be the end of some things like the German states it would be the beginnings of others on March 22nd four police trucks took 200 prisoners from state prisons and drove them to a disused factory outside Munich this was the first in a new type of prison one designed specifically for political
Prisoners a new setup was required because the scale of the arrests over the previous months had caused serious overcrowding problems within the normal prison system the solution to the problem would be this new style which be called a concentration camp with that disused factory outside of Munich being
The first at a place called DACA other camps would spring up across Germany in the coming months and they were used by the sa and the SS to house prisoners for questioning torture and violence were common place and by the end of May 12 inmates had already been killed during
March April and May tens of thousands of people from around Germany would be arrested 25,000 in Prussia just during March and April and that’s not considering those elected in Berlin 10,000 would be arrested in Bavaria by the end of April and then twice that number would be arrested in June by the
End of July 27,000 people were known to be imprisoned in what the Nazis authorities referred to as protective custody either concentration camps prisons or in makeshift holding areas in buildings that the sa had turned into holding cells however this number is somewhat deceiving because it was just
The number of people imprisoned at that specific moment and not the total number of people arrested during this time there was generally a pretty short duration for most imprisonments a huge number of people would cycle in and out of the concentration camps during this early period most prisoners were only
Held at the camps for a few days or weeks but during that time they were completely at the mercy of the guards and physical violence and mental abuse were Constant Fargo the new virtual assistant from Wells Fargo makes banking faster and easier like this Fargo what’s my checking account routing number and this Fargo uh turn off my debit card and this Fargo what did I spend on groceries last month and that’s just the beginning do
You Fargo you can in the Wells Fargo mobile app learn more at wellsfargo.com getf Fargo terms and conditions apply your mobile carrier availability and message and data rates may apply Wells Fargo Bank NA member FDIC these actions were illegal under the German Constitution and there were judicial actions brought against the Nazi party for doing them for example the Bavarian Minister of Justice Hans Frank would attempt to prosecute those accused of torture at daau in 1933 but Frank was a member of the Nazi party and
He would later be made governor general of Poland during the war and even though he at least made the action of bringing charges against the guards these legal actions never came to anything in the courts it was the same when the Reich Ministry of Justice also attempted to
Prosecute those who had arrested and tortured individuals in other parts of Germany in all cases the charges were brought into the legal system and then they were frustrated delayed and finally removed by high-ranking Nazi party leaders sometimes escalating all the way up to Heinrich Kimler and Hitler himself
At the highest levels the party was already working on new laws to take care of this problem permanently and on March 21st they would put in place the first of several amnesty laws that were passed to Grant amnesty to all crimes committed up to that point this is just one
Example of how the government would get around the legal structures of Germany which they held a great deal of contempt for here is Richard J Evans who would say in the coming of the Third Reich that quote most crucial of all was the fact that Hitler and the Nazis at every
Level were very much aware of the fact that they were breaking the law their contempt for the law and for formal processes of Justice was palpable and made Plain on innumerable occasions might was right and law was an expression of power end quote the quick shift of power to the Nazi leaders made
Official by the enabling Act allowed this hatred for the judicial system to transition from an idea to a set of concrete actions to undermine the entire system the Nazi leaders were also quick to start dismantling other aspects of the viar Legacy within the Nazi movement there had always been a belief
Especially among the rank and file of the organization that once the party came to power there would be a great reordering of German Society undesirable people would be taken care of either through arrests or expulsions from the country and the systems that they had created would be dismantled while other groups outside of
The party may not have agreed with all of these plans groups like The conservatives and Catholics did approve of certain changes to what they saw as problematic shifts to Germany during the viar period many of these items were at least initially related to sexual Freedom during the viar years homosexuality had been decriminalized
Abortion laws had been reformed and access to contraceptives had been greatly increased these were seen as a sign of moral Decay by many Within in Germany and Nazi leaders saw this concern as an opportunity the dismantling of these reforms went hand inand with an overall Crackdown of many
Actions that were seen as socially deviant the social changes throughout Germany which we will track throughout the rest of these episodes in this series were not just laws passed from above or the actions of violent sa groups in in Germany they were also pervasive throughout all of society for
Example it would be during this period that book burnings would begin with May 10th being a day of bond on Fires throughout Germany as universities and libraries disposed of books by authors that were deemed to be unacceptable of course one form of this action against those found to be unacceptable would
Manifest in the fanatical anti-Semitism that would overtake Germany during these years anti-Semitism was of course a core belief for Hitler and for the Nazi party as a whole it was perhaps the most constant and consistent policy position that the party had held throughout its entire existence and after coming to
Power they did not hesitate very long before turning that policy into reality part of this was not even specific pieces of legislation passed by the government but instead just actions of those who had for over a decade now been told time and time again that Jews were
Causing all the problems this meant that after Nazi power had been solidified throughout the nation Nazi Party members without any specific orders from above began to increase the violence against Jews and the destruction of Jirus policy throughout Germany these acts were not a coordinated offensive against Jewish Germans but instead almost random acts
Of violence now I use the phrase Jewish Germans but Hitler would not have agreed with that phrase he had always made it clear that he did not consider Jews who lived in Germany to be Germans this is one of the justifications for their removal from the Civil Service that we
Discussed earlier on April 1st The Next Step was taken and a national boycott of jewish-owned businesses was announced there were concerns among many within the government that this was a bad plan the German economy was still in a very rough position due to the depression and any kind of boycott activity would both
Weaken it internally and harm the country’s reputation on the international stage these concerns would cause Hitler to publicly downplay the importance of the boycott however even while he was downplaying it in public in private he was firmly in support of the action more importantly Geral and the propaganda Ministry would launch a full
Campaign in support of the boycott or as they would call it an Enlightenment campaign aimed at informing the German people of the harm that had been done to Germany by Jewish businesses when April arrived the boycott went forward with little public opposition but also little outright public support sa men were
Found outside many Jewish businesses all over Germany often with anti-semitic signs and many of those smaller businesses were negatively impacted by the event however the larger jewish-owned businesses have been officially Exempted due to their overall importance to the National economy many of these employed a good number of
People and in the midst of an unemployment crisis it seemed like a really bad time to take any action against them which might cause them to lay off German Workers and so instead what public anger existed or which was created by the propaganda and the actions of the sa was all directed
Against small often familyowned businesses all over Germany who could do little to either defend themselves or weather the storm when discussing anti-Semitism in Germany during this period we all all Know How It Ends but the genocide it would eventually result in was not where it began in fact one of the first
Results of all of these efforts by the Nazi government to discriminate against Jews in Germany was a burst in Immigration this was exactly in line with what the Nazi leaders wanted they wanted these people out of Germany and during 1933 over 37,000 Jewish individuals would leave Germany and the
Next year 22,000 and in 1935 a further 21,000 in these three years that brings the numbers to 880,000 out of a starting population of around 525,000 this also obviously means that most of them did not leave Germany during this period and instead most believe that the huge wave of
Anti-Semitism during these years would simply eventually pass and things would go back to normal throughout Germany all of these new laws and restrictions also made race and racial thinking far more important for everyone many Germans started carrying a kind of racial passport to prove that they were Aryan heritage during this time and
Genealogists were very busy creating them all of this was functioning exactly according to Nazi goals with so much of their future policy built upon racial Concepts and especially upon creating divisions along racial lines getting all Germans to consider race to be an important differentiator among people was an important first step or has
Historian Thomas chter would say quote the ultimate goal of this intense indoctrination was to condition Germans to think racially to view the world along biological lines and to infuse German Society with a new racial ethos Germans were constantly reminded they were no longer merely Germans they were
Aryans and their first Duty was to the vul defined in racial terms end quote it is also worth noting that at this point there was not a precise and exact medical definition for Aryan it was Fuzzy at best and it would always be so these racial policies were not confined
Just to anti-Semitism another was based around what the Nazis would refer to as racial hygiene or as it is better known Eugenics Eugenics was very popular during this period in Many Nations and Germany would not be the only nation around the world where Eugenics theories would eventually be turned into
Government policy the non leaders believed that the viar system of social medicine and providing support for all within Society was problematic at best they believe that it caused the German race as a whole to somehow grow weaker over time time and it also put economic strains on the government as it tried to
Support people who at times could not support themselves The Next Step from this argument led to discussions about sterilization of people who the government believed should not be allowed to reproduce and then the obvious Next Step was forced sterilization this was obviously a very big step but it was a step that was
Already being prepared for before 1933 in 1932 there was a discussion in the Prussian Health Council that concerned a new new law which allowed what would be called voluntary sterilization but it gave power to medical professionals to influence patients and so at best it could be described as coerced
Volunteerism these laws were put in place under the constraints that the that were present before March 1933 which were then of course no longer present after the enabling act in June 1933 a committee was created under the interior Ministry to begin creating supporting arguments and evidence for
The planned law seeking to prepare the public for compulsory sterilization this resulted in a new long being approved by the cabinet on June on July 14th 1933 titled law for the prevention of hereditarily diseased Offspring the list of possible hereditary diseases was lengthy schizophrenia manic depression hereditary blindness or deafness
Hereditary epilepsy and serious physical deformities the presence of several mental illnesses provided doctors with a lot of leeway when it came to who fell within the boundaries of the law they were also able to give an intelligence test with those who did not achieve a certain score considered to be
Feebleminded during 1934 there would be 56,000 sterilizations performed and until 1939 there would be at least 50,000 per year in total 400,000 people would be sterilized under the law by 1945 while sterilizations were the most severe outcome of the Nazi Eugenics program there were also more mild but
Just as pervasive efforts for example the Ten Commandments of selecting a mate would be released to try and provide guidance for Germans on who they should choose to marry it would say things like remember you are German if you are genetically Healthy You shall not remain unmarried keep your body pure as a
German select only a mate with Nordic blood when you select a mate ask about ancestry uh health is a precondition for external beauty hope for as many children as possible eventually in 1935 a law was put in place where all couples who were seeking marriage had to obtain
A certificate of genetic Health from local authorities if this was not obtained the marriage was not officially recognized by the state all of these Eugenics efforts were supported by the government and the Nazi propaganda machine was utilized to gain support for them and they were the subject of a
Concerted campaign that appealed to both scientific and economic consequences of not having such laws in place this campaign stressed the fincial burden that all German taxpayers had to pay to care for individuals who were deemed to be disabled and the importance of finding the best possible partner eventually this would became such an
Important element of Nazi propaganda efforts that a special office of racial policy was created to coordinate it all calling back to something I said earlier we all know where many of these policies end or what they turn into and its genocide but that’s not where they began
Instead the Nazi party would spend the better part of a decade convincing the German people that racial differences between people were critical that they had to be considered that they were a critical component of decision-making this allowed them to break Society along racial lines to demonize certain races or genetic characteristics and this
Would lay the groundwork for all of their later actions