Along with backing from Goebbels and his exploitation of the media, Nazis were confident in securing the majority of votes in the election. The Nazi terror went as far as persecution of the communists; they were blamed for the Reichstag fire on the 27th of February 1933. They were used as scapegoats for the Nazis to put some blame onto; Van der Lubbe a Dutch communist was arrested. Still to this day we are unaware of the truth of what went on in the Reichstag fire, it was believe than Van dee Lubbe had acted alone. Nazi’s were able to use the fire to exploit the communists and gain support for themselves.
Hitler bowed deeply in front of Hindenburg and gave a very impressive speech. However Hitler’s intentions were more clearly seen in a piece of legislation introduced in the same day, the Malicious Practices Law, marking the brutality and resilience of the Nazi Party, banned criticism of the regime and its policies. Propaganda was a key tool to help maintain the appearance of legality and to increase Nazi support by playing on the communist threat, for example after Reichstag fire it portrayed the decree as a necessary step in the battle against communism and it paved the way for the March 1933 election success. The strength of the widely perceived communist threat
However others believe it were the Nazi parties clever us of propaganda that solidified their stance in Germany. Some others might even say that those two weren’t the main reasons but rather economic recovery (popular policies) or the focus on national pride and unity which really helped them maintain control. I partially agree with the statement as I believe the use of terror was incredibly effective/ important but I also think that propaganda was important almost to the extent of terror. The use of terror was a major reason as to why the Nazis kept control over society. By the time the Nazi party got control of Germany completely, the other parties popularity decreased rapidly.
The Nazis felt like this political group was trying to undermine their “people’s community”. Hitler made it very clear that he did not want the communists in his people community when he and the Nazi party realised their 25 point programme of 1920.However the Nazis also portrayed the socialist and any other party of which had taken part in coalition governments during the Weimar republic as they collaborated with communism and Jewish democracy. Hitler wanted to introduce the policy of volksgeminschaft in this case because if he could eliminate the communists and the other parties who were associated as collaborating with them, the Nazis could then get their votes as they had a high amount of supporters, which would mean them having the majority and coming into power. Anybody who the Nazis believed that represented a threat to the racial purity of which Hitler wanted would come under the socialism categories. This included, Jews, gypsies and those who were seen as mentally or physically unfit.
Hitler used this to express fear of communism and display anti-communist messages through media and speeches.He also used this to pass down a Law for the Protection of People and State, this presidential decree was regarded by historians as an important factor in Hitler establishing a one-party Nazi state. It enabled him to arrest a large amount of communists and hold them for a long time without trial,imprison anyone considered opponents to the Nazi and suppress any publications and newspapers that were not friendly to the Nazi cause. The anti-communist messages they used and the Reichstag fire used to justify this message and the imprisoning of opponents were indeed effective as in March 1933 the Nazis achieved their best ever election result (44% of the votes). The enabling act aslo was important to establish a dictatorship in Germany. The Reichstag voted itself out of existence where the communists were banned from voting and the Social Democrats and Centre Party voted for the Enabling Act to be passed down.
During a depression, political trends become extremist and so the Nazis flourished; Hitler offered both a scapegoat and himself as a strong leader to look up to. The depression gave Hitler the edge he needed to gain ninety-five[1] seats in the Reichstag and ultimately progress from the leader of a minority party to the Dictator of the Third Reich. The Depression also drew attention to the weaknesses of the Weimar Constitution; as poverty and unemployment increased, respect for the democratic system drastically decreased. The German population did not want to be governed by a democracy as it was such a governing body that signed the Treaty of Versailles. Hatred for this document was still rife in Germany and so Hitler, who openly detested the Treaty, became the obvious choice.
This made people give up hope on the democracy as it was not working and caused people to resort to extremist groups which made the Nazis seem like they were the solution to the problem. This links to Germans viewing the Nazis as an alternative party to support. The rise in unemployment and a renewed fear of communist uprisings gave Hitler’s messages a new importance which increased the support for the Nazis. They had Hitler, someone who could be seen as strong party leader, to be seen as being someone who could prevent a similar crisis from happening again. The Nazi’s had also made promises to solve the problems and promised most groups in Germany what they wanted such as being promised jobs, employers having restored profits, farmers higher prices and shopkeepers protection against competition.
The first was the “Hatch act of 1939”, which prevented the hiring of federal workers who were part of the Communist Party. Next came the “Public Law 135” in 1941, which gave the government power to investigate any worker suspected of being a “commie” and fire them. The government benefited from Anti-Communism because it was an easy way to control the masses into thinking that whatever they did was right because it was for the “greater good of democracy”. This ideology was very effective because the American people were eager to fight for their country, to get rid of the communist threat, which was necessary during WWII. After WW2, Anti-Communism grew even more during the Cold War.
Hitler chose his army to be his own rather than be mercenaries or auxiliaries. He also wanted two kinds of principalities, “new” and “mixed”. Machiavelli also described how to hold on to the lands a prince gained, which Hitler took into account. Machiavelli stated “it would be best to be both loved and feared…the two rarely come together…” Hitler had rare qualities that made him both loved and feared by people. This is one of the reasons he was so successful in building such a loyal following in Germany.
The Congress of victors was a short term cause of the great terror and only added to the main cause of Stalin’s paranoia. Kirov beat Stalin in the votes to elect a central committee which showed Kirov was more popular than Stalin. Older Bolsheviks also tried to persuade Kirov to become General Secretary and despite refusing Stalin found out and believed a purge was necessary. The