Figure 1.--For Hitler race was at the heart of world history. Some see race and the Holocaust as a part of World War II. For Hitler race ws at the heart of the War hec launched. He made no secret if it. Hitler discussed race at great length in 'Mein Kampff'. He inisisted that a nation was the highest creation of a race and that great nations like Germany were the creation of the homogeneous populations of great races with the people or Volk working together. Hitler went on to say that such nations developed cultures that naturally grew from races with 'natural good health, and aggressive, intelligent, courageous traits'. and it was the Aryan race that was the foundation of the German nation. In contrast, according to Hitler. the weakest nations were those of impure or mongrel races. Here we see Hitler Youth bopys at the annual Nurrenberg Party Congress. This wa wear the infamous Nirremberg Race Laws were announced (1935).

Hitler addressed the question of race at great length in Mein Kampf. He explains that while a young man in Austria he realized that there was a racial, religious, and cultural hierarchy in human society. He saw the Aryans at the master race. Many other races were of intermediate strength. He saw Gypsies (the Roma) and Slavic people at the bottom. At the time he was writing about people he came in contacr with which is why blacks and orientals were not a major concern for him. Hitler was born in Austria and saw the weakness of the Austro-Hungarian Empire as due ti its ethnic diversity. This is one reason that he came to despise democracy because it conveyed power to ehnic groups which in fact out numbered Austrians (ethnic Germans) in the Empire. Hitler's attitudes reflected attitudes toward race that were developed by various authors who addressed the issue of race and German nationality. The principles of social darwinism and eugenics also entered into the ideological mix. Much of this thought came to a head in the aftermath of German''s loss in World War I. German nationalists felt humiliated and the searched for an explanation. The Dolchstosslegende or stab in the back theory helped divert resonsibility from the German military and patriotic Germans. Rather the loss of the War was explained as athe work of domestic traitors--primasrily the Socialists and Jews which in the NAZI world view was largely synnoamous. The Social Denocrats (SD) were accused of "selling out" the nation. The Jews were targeted for a rnge of reasons, because they were connected with both the SD and KDP and charges wre masde of shirking from ,ilitary service and war profiteering among others. The NAZIs charged that Jews not only were not Germans, but that they were a biological threat to the Aryan race. Alfred Rosenberg played a major role in constructing NAZI racial philosophy. He enunciated the Aryan Invasion Theory which traced the ancient roots of the Aryan race. His works is largely pseudo-science, carried out before modern linguistic studies and DNA had been developed which permit researchers to make amazinging advances in understanding pre-histoy. Many important NAZIs were members of the "Thule Gesellschaft" (the Thule Society). The Thule society believe that the German nation and Aryan people were the driving force in history. They lionized the victory of the Germanic tribes over the Roman Legions in the Teutonberg Forest (9 AD). Among the members of the Thule Society was SS Commander Heinrich Himmler. Himmler became a key Hitler associate not only advancing racial theory, but concepualizing policies to using racial theories as a foundation for actual policies and then implementing those policies. Himmler wanted to turn the SS into a new order of knights, an "aristocracy of soul and blood", centered at Wewelsburg castle. It was to be a kind of German Camelot. After seizing power the NAZIs at first targeted the political opposition. They were quickly silences through control of the police and opening of concentration camps to deal with the recalcitant. Once the political opposition was silenced or eliminated, the NAZIs turned on those they considered to be a biological threat the Aryan race. NAZI supression of the political opposition was reasonably well understood in Europe. Much less well understood was the the obsession with race and the measures the NAZIs were taking. NAZI anti-Semitism was known, but the full extent of NAZI racial measures were less well known and the extent race dominated Hitler's think was much less known. The NAZIs tasrgeted several different groups on racial grounds. While in the first few years of the NAZI regime it was the political opposition which felt the impact of state security, after the Nuremurg Laws were decreed, it was the regime's biological targets felt the impact of state opression. Early on the Gestapo began arresting homosexuals, although there was no systemtic progam persued. Homosexuality was a particular concern to Himmler who established a department in the police to deal with homosexuality and abortion (1936). The NAZIs went after asocials (Asoziale). Heydrish classified "beggars, tramps [largely meaning gypsies], whores, alcocoholics" as well as the "work-shy". [Pingel, pp. 69, 71] Arests of Asocials began in 1937. They were not only arrested, but many were interned in concentration camps. Many were also sterilized because their asocial behavior was seen as genetic based. Repeat criminal offenders were also treated as asocials. Some of the first Jews to be targeed by the NAZIs were those accused of "race defilement", sexual relations with Aryans. Compulsory sterilizations began as early as 1933 and were carried out in the concentration camps, prisons, and "secure"hospitals. Precise statistics are not availble, but it is believed that the NAZIs sterilized about 0.4 million people, mostly Germans. [Bock, pp. 276-80.] Racial courts were established to identify and deal with the handicapped, both mental and physical. Finally state security turned to the Jews.

Sources

Bock, G. "Racism and Sexism in Nazi Germany: Motherhood, Compulsory Sterilization and the State," in R. Bridenthal, A. Grossman and M. Kaplan (eds.) When Biology became Destiny: Women in Weimar Germany and NAZI Germany (New York: 1984).

Hitler, Adolf. Mein Kampf.

Pingel, F. Häftlinge unter SS-Herrschaft: Selbstbehauptung und Vernichtung im Konzentrationslager (Hamburg, 1978).

Created: 5:45 AM 7/14/2012
Last updated: 5:45 AM 7/14/2012