Editing History of Germany (section)

==Nazi Germany, 1933–1945==
{{Main|Nazi Germany}}
[[File:World War II in Europe, 1942.svg|thumb|European territory occupied by Nazi Germany and [[Axis Powers|its allies]] at its greatest extent in 1942, Germany (Reich) is shown in the darkest blue.]]
<!-- [[File:NS administrative Gliederung 1944.png|thumb|upright=1.35|''Nazi Germany'' in 1944]] This is a map of the internal structure of the NSDAP, not that of Germany. -->
The Nazi regime suppressed labor unions and strikes, leading to prosperity which gave the [[Nazi Party]] popularity, with only minor, isolated and subsequently unsuccessful cases of [[German resistance to Nazism|resistance among the German population]] over their rule. The [[Gestapo]] (secret police) destroyed the political opposition and persecuted the Jews, trying to force them into exile. The Party took control of the courts, local government, and all civic organizations except the Christian churches. All expressions of public opinion were controlled the propaganda ministry, which used film, mass rallies, and Hitler's hypnotic speaking. The Nazi state idolized Hitler as its Führer (leader), putting all powers in his hands. [[Nazi propaganda]] centered on Hitler and created the "Hitler Myth"—that Hitler was all-wise and that any mistakes or failures by others would be corrected when brought to his attention.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Kershaw |first=Ian |title=[[The "Hitler Myth"|The "Hitler Myth": Image and Reality in the Third Reich]] |date=2001 |author-link=Ian Kershaw}}</ref> In fact Hitler had a narrow range of interests and decision making was diffused among overlapping, feuding power centers; on some issues he was passive, simply assenting to pressures from whoever had his ear. All top officials reported to Hitler and followed his basic policies, but they had considerable autonomy on a daily basis.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Williamson |first=David |date=2002 |title=Was Hitler a Weak Dictator? |journal=History Review |pages=9ff}}</ref>

===Establishment of the Nazi regime===
{{Main|Adolf Hitler's rise to power|Government of Nazi Germany}}
[[File:Flag of German Reich (1935–1945).svg|thumb|left|National flag of Germany, 1935–1945]]

To secure a ''Reichstag'' majority for his party, Hitler called for new elections. After the 27 February 1933 [[Reichstag fire]], Hitler swiftly blamed an alleged Communist uprising, and convinced President Hindenburg to approve the [[Reichstag Fire Decree]], rescinding civil liberties. Four thousand [[Communist Party of Germany|communists]] were arrested{{Sfn|Evans|2003|pp=329–334}} and Communist agitation was banned. Communists and Socialists were brought into hastily prepared [[Nazi concentration camp]]s, where they were at the mercy of the [[Gestapo]], the newly established secret police force. Communist ''Reichstag'' deputies were taken into "[[protective custody (Nazi Germany)|protective custody]]".

[[File:WWII, Europe, Germany, "Nazi Hierarchy, Hitler, Goering, Goebbels, Hess", The Desperate Years p143 - NARA - 196509.jpg|thumb|Key leaders of the Nazi regime (left to right): [[Adolf Hitler]], [[Hermann Göring]], [[Joseph Goebbels]] and [[Rudolf Hess]]]]
Despite the terror and unprecedented propaganda, the last free General Elections of 5 March 1933, while resulting in 43.9% failed to give the Nazis their desired majority. Together with the [[German National People's Party]] (DNVP), however, he was able to form a slim majority government. On 23 March 1933, the [[Enabling Act of 1933|Enabling Act]] marked the beginning of Nazi Germany,{{Sfn|Evans|2003|p=354, 336}} allowing Hitler and his cabinet to enact laws on their own without the President or the Reichstag.{{Sfn|Evans|2003|p=351}} The Enabling Act formed the basis for the dictatorship and the dissolution of the [[States of Germany|Länder]]. Trade unions and all political parties other than the Nazi Party were suppressed. A centralised totalitarian state was established, no longer based on the liberal [[Weimar Republic|Weimar]] constitution. Germany withdrew from the [[League of Nations]] shortly thereafter. The coalition parliament was rigged by defining the absence of arrested and murdered deputies as voluntary and therefore cause for their exclusion as wilful absentees. The Centre Party was voluntarily dissolved in a ''quid pro quo'' with the [[Holy See|Pope]] under the ''anti-communist'' [[Pope Pius XI]] for the ''[[Reichskonkordat]]''; and by these manoeuvres Hitler achieved movement of these Catholic voters into the Nazi Party, and a long-awaited international diplomatic acceptance of his regime. The Nazis gained a larger share of their vote in Protestant areas than in Catholic areas.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Geary |first=Dick |date=October 1998 |title=Who voted for the Nazis? (electoral history of the National Socialist German Workers Party) |url=https://archive.org/details/sim_history-today_1998-10_48_10/page/8 |journal=[[History Today]] |volume=48 |issue=10 |pages=8–14}}</ref> The Communist Party was proscribed in April 1933.

Hitler used the [[Schutzstaffel|SS]] and Gestapo to purge the entire SA leadership—along with a number of Hitler's political adversaries in the [[Night of the Long Knives]] from 30 June to 2 July 1934.{{Sfn|Kershaw|2008|pp=309–314}} As a reward, the SS became an independent organisation under the command of the ''[[Reichsführer-SS]]'' [[Heinrich Himmler]]. Upon Hindenburg's death on 2 August 1934, Hitler's cabinet passed a law proclaiming the presidency to be vacant and transferred the role and powers of the head of state to Hitler.

===Antisemitism and the Holocaust===
{{Main|History of the Jews in Germany#Jews under the Nazis (1933–1945)|The Holocaust}}
[[File:Buchenwald-bei-Weimar-am-24-April-1945.jpg|thumb|U.S. Senator [[Alben W. Barkley]] views the bodies of prisoners at a liberated [[Buchenwald concentration camp]] in April 1945.]]

The Nazi regime was particularly hostile towards Jews, who became the target of unending [[antisemitic]] propaganda attacks. The Nazis attempted to convince the German people to view and treat Jews as "subhumans"<ref name="Marchak2003">{{Cite book |first=M. Patricia |last=Marchak |title=Reigns of Terror |publisher=McGill-Queen's Press&nbsp;— MQUP |date=2003 |isbn=978-0-7735-2642-6 |page=195}}</ref> and immediately after the [[March 1933 German federal election|1933 federal elections]] the Nazis imposed a nationwide [[Nazi boycott of Jewish businesses|boycott of Jewish businesses]]. In March 1933 the first [[Nazi concentration camp]] was established at [[Dachau concentration camp|Dachau]]{{Sfn|Evans|2003|p=344}} and from 1933 to 1935 the Nazi regime consolidated their power. The [[Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service]] forced all Jewish civil servants to retire from the legal profession and the civil service.{{Sfn|Majer|2003|p=92}} The [[Nuremberg Laws]] banned sexual relations between Jews and Germans and only those of German or related blood were eligible to be considered citizens; the remainder were classed as state subjects, without citizenship rights.{{Sfn|Kershaw|2008|p=345}} This stripped Jews, [[Romani people|Romani]] and others of their legal rights.{{Sfn|Evans|2005|p=544}} Jews continued to suffer persecution under the Nazi regime, exemplified by the [[Kristallnacht|Kristallnacht pogrom]] of 1938, and about half of Germany's 500,000 Jews fled the country before 1939, after which escape became almost impossible.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Friedlander |first=Saul |title=Nazi Germany and the Jews |date=1998 |volume=1: The Years of Persecution 1933–1939}}</ref>

In 1941, the Nazi leadership decided to implement a plan that they called the "[[Final Solution]]" which came to be known as the [[Holocaust]]. Under the plan, Jews and other "lesser races" along with political opponents from Germany as well as [[German–occupied Europe|occupied countries]] were systematically murdered at murder sites, and starting in 1942, at [[extermination camps]].<ref>{{Cite book |title=Interpreting the 20th Century: The Struggle Over Democracy, The Holocaust|first=Pamela |last=Radcliff |pages=104–107 |url=http://anon.eastbaymediac.m7z.net/anon.eastbaymediac.m7z.net/teachingco/CourseGuideBooks/DG8090_EFF59C.PDF |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714184534/http://anon.eastbaymediac.m7z.net/anon.eastbaymediac.m7z.net/teachingco/CourseGuideBooks/DG8090_EFF59C.PDF |archive-date=14 July 2014 |access-date=10 June 2014}}</ref> Between 1941 and 1945 Jews, Gypsies, Slavs, communists, homosexuals, the mentally and physically disabled and members of other groups were targeted and methodically murdered – the origin of the word "[[genocide]]". In total approximately 11 million people were killed during the Holocaust.<ref>{{Cite web |first=Jennifer |last=Rosenberg |title=Holocaust Facts |url=http://history1900s.about.com/od/holocaust/a/holocaustfacts.htm |website=About.com Education |access-date=10 June 2014 |archive-date=19 February 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170219040820/http://history1900s.about.com/od/holocaust/a/holocaustfacts.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref>

===Military===
{{Main|Wehrmacht}}
{{See also|Military Administration (Nazi Germany)}}

[[File:Bundesarchiv B 145 Bild-P017073, Berlin, Olympische Spiele im Olympiastadion.jpg|thumb|The [[1936 Summer Olympics]] in Berlin&nbsp;– a great propaganda success for the Nazi regime]]
In 1935, Hitler officially re-established the [[Luftwaffe]] (air force) and reintroduced universal military service, in breach of the [[Treaty of Versailles]]; Britain, France and Italy formally protested. Hitler had the officers swear their personal allegiance to him.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bullock |first=Alan |url=https://archive.org/details/hitlerstudytyran00bull |title=Hitler: a study in tyranny |publisher=Harper Torchbooks |date=1991 |page=[https://archive.org/details/hitlerstudytyran00bull/page/n163 170] |url-access=limited}}</ref> In 1936, German troops [[Remilitarization of the Rhineland|marched into the demilitarised Rhineland]].{{Sfn|Evans|2005|p=633}} As the territory was part of Germany, the British and French governments did not feel that attempting to enforce the treaty was worth the risk of war.{{Sfn|Evans|2005|pp=632–637}} The move strengthened Hitler's standing in Germany. His reputation swelled further with the [[1936 Summer Olympics]] in Berlin, and proved another great propaganda success for the regime as orchestrated by master propagandist [[Joseph Goebbels]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Thacker |first=Toby |title=Joseph Goebbels: Life and Death |date=2009 |pages=182–184}}</ref>

===Foreign policy===
{{Main|Foreign relations of Nazi Germany}}
{{See also|Relations between Nazi Germany and the Arab world}}

[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-L09218, Berlin, Japanische Botschaft.jpg|thumb|Flags of [[Nazi Germany|Germany]], [[Empire of Japan|Japan]], and [[Kingdom of Italy|Italy]] draping the facade of the Embassy of Japan on the [[Tiergartenstraße]] in Berlin (September 1940)]]

Hitler's diplomatic strategy in the 1930s was to make seemingly reasonable demands, threatening war if they were not met. When opponents tried to appease him, he accepted the gains that were offered, then went to the next target. That aggressive strategy worked as Germany pulled out of the [[League of Nations]], rejected the [[Versailles Treaty]] and began to re-arm, won back the Saar, remilitarized the Rhineland, formed an alliance with Mussolini's Italy, sent massive military aid to Franco in the Spanish Civil War, annexed Austria, took over Czechoslovakia after the British and French ''appeasement'' of the Munich Agreement, formed a peace pact with [[Joseph Stalin]]'s Soviet Union, and finally invaded Poland. Britain and France declared war on Germany and [[World War II]] in Europe began.{{Sfn|Evans|2005|pp=618, 623, 632–637, 641, 646–652, 671–674, 683}}{{Sfn|Beevor|2012|pp=22, 27–28}}

Having established a "Rome-Berlin axis" with [[Benito Mussolini]], and signing the [[Anti-Comintern Pact]] with Japan&nbsp;– which was joined by Italy a year later in 1937&nbsp;– Hitler felt able to take the offensive in foreign policy. On 12 March 1938, German troops marched into Austria, where an attempted Nazi coup had been unsuccessful in 1934. When Austrian-born Hitler entered [[Vienna]], he was greeted by loud cheers and Austrians voted in favour of the annexation of their country. After Austria, Hitler turned to [[Czechoslovakia]], where the [[Sudeten German]] minority was demanding equal rights and self-government. At the [[Munich Agreement|Munich Conference]] of September 1938, Hitler, Mussolini, British Prime Minister [[Neville Chamberlain]] and French Prime Minister [[Édouard Daladier]] agreed upon the cession of Sudeten territory to the German Reich by [[Czechoslovakia]]. Hitler thereupon declared that all of German Reich's territorial claims had been fulfilled. However, hardly six months after the Munich Agreement Hitler used the smoldering quarrel between [[Slovak people|Slovaks]] and [[Czechs]] as a pretext for taking over the rest of Czechoslovakia. He then secured the return of [[Klaipėda Region|Memel]] from [[Lithuania]] to Germany. Chamberlain was forced to acknowledge that his policy of [[appeasement]] towards Hitler had failed.

===World War II===
{{Main|World War II}}
[[File:Nazi Occupied Europe September 1943 Map.png|thumb|[[German-occupied Europe]], September 1943]]
At first Germany was successful in its military operations. In less than three months (April – June 1940), Germany conquered [[German invasion of Denmark (1940)|Denmark]], [[Norwegian campaign|Norway]], the Low Countries, and [[Battle of France|France]]. The unexpectedly swift defeat of France resulted in an upswing in Hitler's popularity and an upsurge in war fever.{{Sfn|Beevor|2012|pp=70–71, 79}}{{Sfn|Kershaw|2008|p=562}} Hitler made peace overtures to the new British leader [[Winston Churchill]] in July 1940, but Churchill remained dogged in his defiance with major help from US president [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]]. Hitler's bombing campaign against Britain (September 1940 – May 1941) failed. Some 43,000 British civilians were killed and 139,000 wounded in [[the Blitz]]; much of [[London]] was destroyed. Germany's armed forces [[Operation Barbarossa|invaded the Soviet Union]] in June 1941 swept forward until they reached the gates of Moscow. The [[Einsatzgruppen]] (Nazi mobile [[death squads]]) executed all Soviet Jews that it located, while the Germans went to Jewish households and forced the families into concentration camps for labor or to extermination camps for death.

[[File:SFP 186 - Flug ueber Berlin.ogv|thumb|US Air Force photographs of the destruction in central Berlin in July 1945]]

The tide began to turn in December 1941, when the invasion of the Soviet Union hit determined resistance in the [[Battle of Moscow]] and Hitler declared war on the United States in the wake of the Japanese [[Attack on Pearl Harbor|Pearl Harbor attack]]. After surrender in [[North African Campaign|North Africa]] and losing the [[Battle of Stalingrad]] in 1942–1943, the Germans were forced into the defensive. By late 1944, the United States, Canada, France, and Great Britain were closing in on Germany in the West, while the Soviets were victoriously [[Operation Bagration|advancing in the East]].
[[File:Raising a flag over the Reichstag - Restoration.jpg|thumb|A Russian soldier [[Raising a Flag over the Reichstag|raising the Soviet flag over the Reichstag]] during the [[Battle of Berlin]]]]

In 1944–1945, Soviet forces completely or partially liberated [[Second Jassy–Kishinev Offensive|Romania]], Bulgaria, [[Budapest Offensive|Hungary]], [[Belgrade Offensive|Yugoslavia]], Poland, [[Prague Offensive|Czechoslovakia]], [[Vienna Offensive|Austria]], Denmark, and [[Petsamo–Kirkenes Offensive|Norway]]. Nazi Germany collapsed as [[Battle in Berlin|Berlin was taken]] by the Soviet Union's Red Army in a fight to the death on the city streets. 2,000,000 Soviet troops took part in the assault, and they faced 750,000 German troops. 78,000–305,000 Soviets were killed, while 325,000 German civilians and soldiers were killed.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Axelrod |first1=Alan |title=Encyclopedia of World War II, Volume 1 |last2=Kingston |first2=Jack A. |date=2007 |publisher=H W Fowler |page=165}}</ref> Hitler committed suicide on 30 April 1945. The final [[German Instrument of Surrender]] was signed on 8 May 1945, marking the end of Nazi Germany.

By September 1945, Nazi Germany and its Axis partners (mainly [[Fascist Italy|Italy]] and [[Empire of Japan|Japan]]) had all been defeated, chiefly by the forces of the Soviet Union, the United States, and Britain. Much of Europe lay in ruins, over 60 million people worldwide had been killed (most of them civilians), including approximately 6 million Jews and 11 million non-Jews in what became known as [[the Holocaust]]. World War II destroyed Germany's political and economic infrastructure, caused its partition, considerable loss of territory (especially in the East), and historical legacy of guilt and shame.<ref>{{Cite book |first=David Clay |last=Large |url=https://archive.org/details/berlin00larg_0 |title=Berlin |publisher=Basic Books |date=2001 |isbn=978-0-4650-2632-6 |page=[https://archive.org/details/berlin00larg_0/page/482 482] |url-access=registration}}</ref>