Misconceptions About German Society After Ww2 Essay

During World War II the citizens of Germany had to deal with economic hardships. Today if you look up the holocaust what comes up is the name given to the period of persecution and extermination of European Jews by Nazi Germany. Persecution of German Jews began with Hitler's rise to power in 1933. Jews were disenfranchised, and then terrorized in anti-Jewish riots (such as Kristallnacht), forced into the ghettos, their property seized, and finally was sent to concentration camps. After the outbreak of World War II, Hitler established death camps to secretly implement what he called "the final solution of the Jewish question." If only this was the case but not everything is so black and white. What isn't taught in classes is how non Jewish-German citizens revolted against Adolph and never wanted him in government to begin with. Once Hitler was in power Germans did everything that they could to get him out of power. Resistance groups and underground groups were popping up all over Germany. German population knew that Hitler equaled a disaster. Taking a closer
look maybe World War II could have turned out differently.
World War II was one of the most horrible experiences of European history.
Although there are misconceptions about German society in that time period a percentage of Germans were opposing Adolph Hitler. For many Germans they believed that in destroying Hitler, Germany and their families would have a greater chance of survival. The Third Reich which translates to mean "Third Empire" was from the years 1933-1945, when Germany was under the control of the national socialist German workers party, also known as the Nazi Party. It's false knowledge to say that every German was behind Hitler. That is where the misconceptions of non Jewish- German citizens come in. Starting from the beginning with how Hitler managed to get into office to begin with. How from the very beginning the election was based on propaganda. Hitler promised with him in charge German would successed in getting out of their economic
problems.
Hitler captured only 17,277,180 votes, 43.9%. Not even half of the German electorate had supported Hitler thus the Nazi party was down half of the popular vote. This election from the beginning was tainted with intimidation. Hitler manipulated the voters by stating how the Republic was not granting them authority. Hitler promised that the people of Germany would have a voice if he was elected into office. While pretending to be concerned about the countries national honor, Hitler was obsessed with his own plans for domination. With the humiliations of 1918 Germans were susceptible of influenced by Hitler to believe that nationalism and National Socialism were the same thing. Nationalism is ones love for their country and the welfare of the country and its citizens. Germans believed that Hitler was for German and had the best interest for its citizens but this just was not the case. Once the German population saw through his facade the resistance came into play. According to Hoffmann "Germans resistance to the Nazi government was a direct response to its fundamental injustice and destructiveness. Arbitrariness, criminality, doctoral oppression, police excesses, prosecution of religious leaders and political opponents, and the persecution of so-called non Aryans (Jews and Gypsies) and the frivolous unleashing of another war—these were the principal causes for the Resistance." Throughout the next few months Germany's economy was decreasing, journalists and writers were being suppressed in terms of newspapers and literary periodicals. Little by little the political parties were disappearing. The people were starting to understand that freedom of speech only went far with the Nazi party-concentration camps and prisons were starting to be used for the out spoken public. Through the entire verbal conflict taking place it did little to achieve what the society wanted so within a few months the disagreement was beginning to become muted. The second phase of opposition was called the underground phase. The German underground went to England for help. The English government essentially told them to go back to Germany for the reason that it was wrong to go against their own government.
The German underground continued to attempt to get help but were not succeeding and with the acceptable changes of National Socialism "the trade unions, the social democrats, and the communists-were not united." Communists and social democrats were more interested in what the other was doing then with the Nazi's. At this time the social democrats and Communists were unorthodox. In 1935 when it finally became orthodox it was already too late and the Nazi's had already started to seize power. There was one small underground group lead by Walter Lowenheims Marxist Leninist Organization. Walter Lowenheims organization has been in existence since 1933 to "influence, renew, and if possible to control along Marxist Leninist lines the entire socialist movement." In 1933 all of the opposition groups were illegal except for Marxist Leninist Organization, which was the longest to survive the underground movement in the pamphlet titled Neu beginnen which means New Beginning; it was produced in Czechoslovakia "under the pseudonym Miles the group became widely known." In existence there was an interesting number of opposing groups which included "conservative, socialist and communist ones." The definition of a group is two or more people, if this is correct then there were approximately one thousand Socialists and Communist groups active between 1935 and 1936, this is based on the police records of arrests and underground "leaflet distribution." Only the smaller underground organizations were still around during this time. Almost all of the larger organizations were destroyed early in Hitler's dictatorship. For example, the Miles group was repeatedly arrested by police, and in 1938 the Miles group became inactive. Earlier before World War II, "the leaders of the broken-up groups either went into exile or were given long terms in penitentiaries or concentration camps." Once there sentence was up the prisoners were kept under surveillance and was not allowed to keep in contact with others. Josef (Beppo) Romer, was in the first World War and was the previous commander of the Free Corps "Oberland," established new anti-Nazi groups every time he was released from jail. Josef was contained in Dachau Concentration Camp from 1934 to 1939; once again he created "Resistance Cells during the war." The "Resistance Cells" mostly included communists and other working class groups. Romer's last arrest was in February 1942, along with approximately 150 people who were associated with his trial and then executed. Resisting what the people believed to be wrong was hard and easy to show. It's well known that back then going against the government would not be respectable. It was little gestures such refusing the "German greeting" which was "Heil Hitler".