The Biography of Adolf Hitler - Essay Example

The biography of Adolf Hitler Nazism remains one of the most controversial aspects of the world history. Throughout years, thousands of historians and scholars in military science sought to assess the contribution and effects of Nazism and personally Hitler to the development of anti-Semitism and nationalist trends around the globe. It is essential to mention that a great leader of Nazi was born in a very plain family. He was born on April 20, 1889 in Austrian town Braunau am Inn, in the family of an official. His mother was from peasant family. Hitler’s father cultivated in Adolf the bad attitude towards church. In school Hitler studied badly. He did not finish school and failed to enter higher Viennese Academy. In 1913 Hitler came to Germany in order to avoid conscription. The next year he was called out, but then was rejected due to bad health. However, when the World War I started, he decided to join the army and managed to make a good career as a soldier. Hitler was a brave soldier; he called the war “the greatest of all experiences». When Germany failed the War, Hitler discharged from the army and started his political career working in National Socialist German Workers Party – NSDAP. He became the head of the party in 1921. In 1923 Hitler already made an attempt to capture the power, but failed and was imprisoned. The imprisonment played a very important role in the formation of Hitler as a nationalist. The reasons of Hitler’s hate towards Jews and other nation except Germany are unknown, but It is possible to define three stages in the formation of Hitler as a politician. The first stage is his life in Vienna in 1909-1913. Here the outlook of Hillier was formed, an outlook of an active German nationalist, who hated Jews, the Slavs and Marxism. The second stage can be defined in 1918-1923, when Hitler became a politician. The main goal of his party was to unite all the Germans in one state. The third stage was his imprisonment in 1924. it was the period during which he was creating the plan to conquer the whole word. When Hitler was released in 1924, he started working on the realization of his plan. He party did not have any influence until 1929 when the economic crisis started. People started looking for a new hero and readily believed in Hitler’s worlds. He was a perfect orator and easily made Germans, who were suffering from crisis, believe that they are the superior race. He became a chancellor and the only head of the state after the death of the President in 1934. Having received a great power, Hitler did his best to improve the economy and strengthen the army. Cruel and obstinate, he killed everyone who represented a threat to his plans to conquer the world. He had a great ability to impact other countries, their decisions and make them afraid of him. Pursuing his clever goals and having occupied a part of Czechoslovakia. The heads of European states were afraid of him and were glad when he offered to sign non-aggression pacts. They did not know what consequences these pacts may have. Hitler-Stalin Non-Aggression Pact now seems strange and ineffective in regards to the World War II events. However, it had a definite sense. After the “anschluss” of Austria and the division and capture of Czechoslovakia German political control made a decision to reach the supremacy in Europe by means of military forces and to make Earthen Europe a colony. Poland should have become the next victim. Hitler hesitated only because he was afraid of the double front war. As at that time “Anti-Hitler coalition” was not concluded yet, thus national and socialist control benefited from the situation by offering the Soviet Union the unification that was contradictory to the anti-Soviet politics propaganda held before. However, such offer did not imply a refusal from the annexationist plans against Soviet Union. The main reason, which caused the victory of the USSR in World War II is the nationwide character of war. The army of Hitler was very powerful and by the time he attacked Soviet Union, he had already gained definite reputation: “many people through out the world were morbidly afraid of Hitler, paled even at the mention of his name, and they grew pessimistic about the international situation. At the lime Hitlers fascist armies were considered to be virtually invincible. Not only were the small European countries unable to withstand them , even the forces of such imperialist powers as Britain and France collapsed at the first encounter or fled pell-rnell” (Jui-Ching). However, Even now many historians ask the same question: what made Hilter risk to attack a so huge and powerful country as Soviet Union. The answer is quite simple: he did not know that the country is so united both terrorially and mentally. He did not take into account Soviet culture and the spirit of Soviet people. He could not even expect to face such a strong love to motherland and such a strong desire to defend it. All these were developed by the Soviet Union, which represented not only strong political, but also cultural system. This system brought up the people who were ready to die for their land “In their struggle against the fascist brigands, the Soviet people demonstrated iron will and unparalleled heroism. Fearing no sacrifices and defying all difficulties, they made a great contribution to victory in the Anti-Fascist War. Holding aloft the banner of Lenin and Stalin, the Soviet Red Army fought valiantly in an indomitable revolutionary spirit, advanced wave upon wave and brilIiantly performed immortal deeds in playing its glorious role as the main force against fascism” (Jui-Ching). Hitler risked to start the double front war, because he was sure that the invasion of German army would immediately cause the split in the Soviet society. He was too self-assured and the situation appeared to be quite different: Soviet people realized that their salvation is in their unity and it was impossible to convince them in something else. This appeared to be an important precondition for German army failure (Swianiewicz, 1965). Notwithstanding that there were people, who decided to take the side of the enemy because of the natural fear to die, the split, which was expected by Hitler, did not happen. It is essential to mention that all the people were fighting against enemy no matter what attitude they had towards Stalin: negative or positive. They were fighting not for Stalin, who was not considered a hero, they were fighting for their life and freedom, for their country and for their future. Thousands of immigrants of the first wave, who were against Soviet power, were fighting against Hitler in Europe (Klein, 1983). A plain soldier was the main force of the Soviet army as he expressed a real courage and tolerance especially at the beginning of the war. Long months of defeat did not destroy his willing to win. Young people under the age 18 and women, who were not supposed to fight, did their best to appear on the front line (Tupper, 1982). At the beginning Hitler was sure of his victory as the war started in unequal economic conditions. “How cheap was Germany’s early military success? Germany’s prewar economic preparations were very substantial. In the years 1935-9 Germany had procured a volume of combat munitions far greater than any other power, and equal in real terms to the munitions production of all her future adversaries combined. Already in the last “peacetime” year of 1938 Germany’s military expenditures were costing her one-sixth of her national income. Only the Soviet Union had applied resources to rearmament on anything approaching the Germanorder of magnitude” (Harrison). By the end of 1941 the industrial base of Germany was much stronger. After the occupation of the wide territories, Germany only strengthened its positions in terms of production volume. Hitler did not take into account two important facts. The first was the difference in the climate of Eastern and Western Europe and this made his repeat the mistake made by Napoleon. In 1940s the winters in Russia were very cold and severe. German soldiers simply could not live and fight in such conditions, they suffered from severe cold they did not get used to (Michalka, 1965). Secondly, Soviet culture played a very special role in the struggle with Nazi army. The culture helped people realize their place in the struggle with enemy and contributed to their development in the atmosphere of patriotism and heroic traditions. There were many songs, books and poems specially created for soldiers to make their spirit stronger. Successful foreign policy also served as one of the sources for Soviet Union victory. Modern historical literature presents different opinions about the reasons of USSR’s victory over huge military force of Germany. This was connected with the unavailability to estimate the character of these events correctly. Unfortunately, there are many myths, which suddenly appeared around the issue due to different political interests. The defeat of Germany can be explained by different reasons: wide territory of the Soviet Union, cold Russian winters, serious mistakes made by German rule. When the Soviet Army entered Germany, Hitler committed a suicide. He wanted to conquer the world that is why he was often considered to be mad or sick. Hitler is deservingly considered to be an outstanding personality the legacy of which is very strong as the ideas of Nazism are still alive. References Goldsmith, R.W 1946, “The power of victory: munitions output in World War II”, Military Affairs, 10, pp. 69-80. Jui-Ching, L n.d. Commemorate the victory Over German fascism! Foreign Language Press Peking Harrison, M n.d. Resource mobilization for World War II: the U.S.A., U.K., U.S.S.R., and Germany, 1938-1945. Department of Economics University of Warwick Klein, B. H 1983, Germany’s economic preparations for war (Cambridge, Mass., 1959). Lieberman, S. R n.d. “The evacuation of industry in the Soviet Union during WorldWar II”, Soviet Studies, 35, pp. 90-102. Lieberman, S. R 1985, “Crisis management in the U.S.S.R.: the wartime system of administration and control”, in S. J. Linz, ed., The impact of World War II on the Soviet Union , pp. 59-76. Michalka,W 1965, ed., Das Dritte Reich: Dokumente zur Innen- und Aussenpolitik, vol. 2: Weltmachtanspruch und nationaler Zusammenbruch, 1939-45 (Munich, 1985). Moorsteen, R. and Powell, R. P 1962, The Soviet capital stock, 1928-1962, Homewood, Ill. Overy, R. J 1982 “Hitler’s war and the German economy: a reinterpretation”, Economic History Review, 35, pp. 272-91. Swianiewicz, S 1965 Forced labour and economic development: an enquiry into the experience of Soviet industrialization, Oxford. Tupper, S. M 1982“The Red Army and Soviet defence industry, 1934-1941” (unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Birmingham. Read More