Yeah. A less nutty dictator could have lasted a lot longer and made a much more negative stamp on history. Hitler changed history by forever discrediting fascist ideology and smashing the pre-war status quo. A more pragmatic dictator could have expanded German lebensraum at the expense of the slavs and made it stick, dying in bed 30 years later like Franco. And that alternate Germany wouldn’t have the soft landing that Spain had, into a peaceful united Europe…since that united democratic liberal Europe was the result of smashing Hitler.
Plus, a German dictator that didn’t chase out all the Jews means lots of Jewish physicists stay in greater Germany instead of fleeing to the US. Hello German nuclear program.
I hate to do this, but part of me wants to compare this to the neocons and George Bush. I don’t want to, because of all the negative connotations, and I’m not certainly saying that Bush is equivalent to Hitler (at least not in THIS discussion) but it seems that movements aren’t made from the top-down very often. It seems like there are some idealists that realize the weather is right for them and find a connection, whether it be to money, power, prestige, charisma, or more connections that have these other traits.
Seeing as how we’ve got more information on the specific instance with regards to Hitler, I don’t feel that I need to banter on any more.
Actually, he didn’t sell out. When Hitler came to power the Rohm-wing of the party basically wanted a second revolution. Rohm controlled the SA. Hitler on the other hand was satisfied with the way things were, thus the purge. Up until that point NSDAP has been based on two power centres, Strasser’s partially socialist Berlin organization and Hitler’s Munich organization. Goebbels initially belonged to the Strasser-wing.
Neither did Hitler get a “buy-in” from the industrialists to “suppress” workers. They supported him financially (pre-1933) to buffer the revolutionary agenda of the communist party (nationalization), primarily after the political center began to collapse. The key to understanding the politics of this era is assessing the impact of the revolution of 1917 on Europe.
I don’t think we would have seen a Nazi Germany without Hitler. Nazism is largely based on Hitler’s own ideas. There were a lot of these “wing-parties” in the twenties who could have made it with a populist. Even if NSDAP had managed to come to power, it’s not given its leader would have shared Hitler’s ideas of lebensraum or the Jewish population. The Jewish extermination would probably not have happened, after all that didn’t begin until 1941. On the other hand, it might have been even worse.
As a matter of fact the the German Workers Party founded by Anton Drexler in 1919 was really the forerunner of the Nazi party. Shortly after Hitler joined the GWP, he pursuaded Drexler to change the name to the German Workers Nationalist Workers Party (NSDAP)
So really it’s true that the Nazi party was Hitlers idea but the roots of it were Drexlers
Maybe I didn’t say it right, because I think we’re saying the same thing. I understood that Krupp, Theissan, et.al. feared the communists so much that it created an opening for Hitler to take advantage of. When I consider this against my OP, I think that only Hitler would have taken advantage of this opening. The original Nazi party leaders (the more socialist ones) would not have take advantage of it.
Without this alliance, the re-arming and the accompanying economic growth that occurred '33-'39 would not have been possible.
The idea of big businesses financing Hitler’s rise to power is mostly a myth. NSDAP relied more on small businessmen. From what I can tell big business viewed Hitler as an unpleasant second, if not third, choice. In those days the far left and far right both wanted the Constitution overturned. At some point they even had a majority of the seats, thus no democratic rule was possible. The opening you speak of is of political importance, not financial.
I think any leader would have accepted donations from businesses, in fact, historically I can’t think of anybody but the communists who wouldn’t.
Again, I’m agreeing with you. I’m not even considering financial support. If the industrials had truly wished to oppose Hitler, they would have started backing opposition candidates in '33 and raising legal objections in the courts (while they were not yet under Hitler’s control). And perhaps they would not have been as discrete about accepting contracts that were in direct violation of Versailles. That’s the kind of support I’m talking about.
What there anything fishy about the way the armament contracts were financed that would require a level of complicity from the industrialists? In simpler terms, how good was the government’s money at the time?
I’m not sure what you mean by “raising legal objections in the courts” or on what grounds they would do that, but the business community supported other candidates as well, with more than NSDAP got I assume. With a couple of exceptions, the coorporations usually cited didn’t support NSDAP until 31-33, but at that point the party was the second-largest in the parliament with 18% of the vote. AFAIK, membership fees was a main source of income even until 1933, with the previously mentioned additional donations from small businessmen. However, due to lack of records this is still a matter of debate.
As for the armament contracts I don’t know, but AFAIK German industry didn’t shift into war gear until the Four Year Plan was adopted in 1936. Violations of the treaty before that rarely included the industry. Fishy? I have no idea but I assume at that point the cat was out of the bag. Post-1933 NSDAP could do what they wanted with German companies and their leaders anyway. Some companies who opposed new regulations were nationalized, in fact, even Thyssen AG was briefly nationalized in 1939 when Thyssen stated he wouldn’t support the war and left Germany for Switzerland. I don’t think German companies were against industry-related violations of the treaty (throw the French occupation in 1923 of the heavily industrialized Ruhr area into the mix), but they were generally opposed to Hitler’s foreign policy. German money (mefos to bypass deficit limits) was good, the economic turnaround in Germany was quite impressive.
The remilitarization of the Rhineland and the annexation of Austria would have happened without Hitler. I don’t think anybody else would have attacked Poland or even taken such huge risks over the Sudetenland. Not to mention blitzkrieging France.
That doesn’t mean that a confrontation with the Soviet Union might not have happened sooner or later, but probably not in the way it actually did.
Also, a more reasonable ultra-rightwing party leader may have formed a coallition with other conservative parties instead of going for a dictatorship, so democracy might have survived. I think the re-installation of the Kaiser’s heir as a figurehead is very likely in this scenario. It’s also probable that persecution of the Jews would not have happened (or would have been much less severe) if the republic had lived on. In our timeline, it only became politically feasible after the powergrab. In addition, the European powers would have been able to intervene effectively in Spain and against the ill-advised colonial adventures of Mussolini.
Hitler’s rise to leadership was a low-probability event (considering all the dumb risks he took) and a great misfortune for almost everybody in the world then and for generations afterwards.
most everybody has agreed that only hitler could have forever discredited german nationalism, which is true. without hitler, it would have been more like the new deal.
as noted, german jewish scientists would have worked on zero point energy and the usa and germany would have prevailed over stalinist russia. yes the reversal of the versailles treaty and re annexation of legitimate territory was really ok with the uk.
there is nothing inherently more brutal about prussian militarism than russian style.
strasser’s national socialism was not malignant or hyper authoritarian like hitler’s.
at very worst strasser would have been to germany as putin is to russia today.
I think without Hitler, there would have been a chance of what we know as the Nazi party and it’s organizations might have imploded from power struggles between the various leaders.