The Rise of Dictators 1930's

The Rise of Dictators
Chapter 9: Lesson 1

Themes for Lesson
• How did Stalin change the government and the economy of the Soviet Union? • What were the origins and goals of Italy’s fascist government? • How did Hitler rise to power in Germany and Europe in the 1930s? • What were the causes and results of the Spanish Civil War?

Key terms:
• Totalitarian- a government that exerts total control over the nation and citizens’ lives • Fascism- political philosophy that emphasizes the importance of the nation or an ethnic group, and the supreme authority of the leader over that of the individual • Appeasement- policy of giving in to a competitor’s demands in order to preserve the peace

Key Terms Cont.
• Purge- in political terms, the process of removing enemies and undesirable individuals from power • Nazism- an extreme form of fascism shaped by Hitler’s fanatical ideas about German nationalism and racial superiority • Axis powers-In world war 2, Germany, Italy and Japan

Stalin’s Soviet Union
• After the death of Lenin in 1924, Josef Stalin came to power. • Stalin decided to take “one great leap forward” to communism. • He launched the first of a series of five year plan to modernize agriculture and build new industry.

Stalin’s Economic Plan
• To modernize agriculture, Stalin encourage Soviet farmers to combine their small family farms into huge collective farms owned and run by the state. • The state takeover of farming was completed within a few years, but with terrible consequences.

Stalin’s Economic Plan Cont.
• In the Ukraine and other agricultural regions, Stalin punished resistance farmers by confiscating much or all of the food they produced. Millions of people died from starvation and millions more fled to the cities. • Stalin sent approximately 5 million peasants to labor camps in Siberia and northern Russia. • Stalin pursued rapid industrialization and by 1940 the Soviet Union was turned into a modern industrial power.

Stalin’s Reign of Terror
• Stalin completed his political domination of the Soviet Union through a series of purges. • Stalin “purified” the Communist Party by getting rid of his opponents and anyone else he believed to be a threat.

The Great Purge
• Beginning in 1943, Stalin led a series of “show trails” were the only possible verdict was “guilty” Stalin’s reign of terror during this time purged and arrested local party offices, collective farms, the secret police, and the army of anyone who he considered a threat. • By 1939, more than 7 million people from all levels of society were either executed or interned in a forced labor camp.

Fascism in Italy
• Italy’s totalitarian government arose from the failures of WW 1. • Benito Mussolini had fought and been wounded in the war. He strongly believed that the Versailles treaty should have granted Italy more Territory. • Mussolini began to attract followers, and in 1919 Mussolini formed the revolutionary Fascist Party.

Il Duce “the leader”
• Mussolini organized the Fascist groups throughout Italy by using thugs, called Blackshirts, to terrorize his opponents. • By 1922, Mussolini threatened to march on Rome and the King panicked and appointed him prime minister.

Review Continued
• Italy’s ailing economy improved under Il Duce’s firm command. Other European nations noted his success and applauded his as a miracle worker. • Mussolini soon showed his true colors by forging his dreams of a new Roman Empire. • Mussolini’s party slogan surmised his goals: “ The Country Is Nothing without Conquest”

Hitler’s Rise to Power Continued

Setting the Scene
• In September 1936, German dictator Adolf Hitler called hundreds of thousands of his followers to a week long rally in the German city of Nuremberg

• “ 180,000 people look to the heavens. 150 blue spotlights surge upward hundreds of meters, forming overhead the most powerful cathedral that mortals have ever seen. There, at the entrance, we see {Hitler}. He too stands for several moments looking upward, then turns and walks, followed by his aides, past the long, long columns, 20 deep, of the fighters for his idea. An ocean of Heil-shouts and jubilation surrounds him.”

The Nazi Party

• Grand spectacles like the Nuremberg Party Rally were essential to Hitler’s totalitarian rule. • The pride and the unity of the Nuremberg rally hid the fact that people who disagreed with Hitler were silenced , beaten or killed. • Hitler and Italy’s Mussolini were fascists. Stalin based his totalitarian government on a vicious form of communism.

Review 1
• In 1919, Hitler joined a small political group that became the National Socialist German Worker’s party or Nazi Party. • Nazism was a form of fascism shaped by Hitler’s fanatical ideas about German nationalism and racial superiority. • Propaganda helped the Nazi party grow.

Propaganda Posters
• Medieval images reminiscent of the Teutonic knights were often used as Nazi symbols.

Leader we will follow you! We all say yes!!

Review Continued
• Hitler made extensive use of children to cultivate his image as the "beloved leader." He rarely passed up an opportunity to be photographed amongst happy Aryan children.

Mein Kampf “ My Struggle”
• While in prison, Hitler began writing an autobiography, Mein Kampf. • In this book , Hitler outlined the Nazi philosophy, his views of Germany and his plans for the nations. • Hitler proposed to strengthen Germany’s military, expand its borders and create an Aryan Race by removing from Germany those groups he considered undesirable.

Hitler Becomes Chancellor
• In the 1930 elections, the Nazi Party became the largest group in the Reichstag (the lower house in the German parliament). • In 1932 Hitler placed second in the Presidential election. • In 1933, the elderly President made Hitler chancellor, or head of the German government.

Review Continued
• As chancellor, Hitler soon moved to suspend freedom of speech and freedom of the press. • Thousands of Nazi thugs, called storm troopers, or Brown shirts, waged a violent campaign that silenced those opposed to Hitler’s policies.

Germany Rearms

Germany Rearms
• The Nazis secretly began spending money on rearming and expanding the armed forces in violation of the Versailles Treaty. • Unemployment fell to near zero, industry prospered, and by 1936, the Depression had ended in Germany. In addition, the Nazis were now in a position to put Hitler’s expansion plans into action.

Germany Expands
• On March 7, 1936, German troops entered the Rhineland, a region in western Germany. • Since the Allies had taken no action in 1935 when Hitler revealed Germanys illegal rearmament, he had reason to believe that the Allies would not enforce the treaty. • In 1936, Hitler signed an alliance with Mussolini and the two nations, Italy and Germany (then eventually Japan) formed the Axis nations

Hitler Takes Control