Analyse the consolidation of Nazi power in Germany 1933-1939, including the Reichstag Fire (February 1933), the Enabling Act (March 1933), the Night of the Long Knives (June 1934), the Nuremberg Laws (1935), the Four Year Plan (1936), and the path to war

What this dot point is asking

VCAA wants you to analyse the consolidation of Nazi power in Germany between 1933 and 1939, including the seizure of power (Machtergreifung), the racial state, the rearmament economy, and the path to war.

Seizure of power (January-August 1934)

Chancellor appointment

30 January 1933 by President Hindenburg.

Reichstag Fire

27 February 1933. Dutch communist Marinus van der Lubbe arrested at the scene. The next day, the Reichstag Fire Decree suspended civil liberties indefinitely.

March 1933 election

Held under SA terror. Nazis won $43.9$%, fell short of majority. Combined with allied DNVP they had enough to pass legislation.

Enabling Act

24 March 1933. Two-thirds majority secured by arresting Communist deputies and intimidating others. Gave the Cabinet legislative powers for four years; effectively suspended the constitution.

One-party state

SPD banned 22 June 1933. All other parties dissolved or self-dissolved by 14 July 1933. Trade unions abolished 2 May 1933.

Night of the Long Knives

30 June 1934. Hitler purged the SA leadership (Röhm), placating the army. Other political opponents (Schleicher, Strasser) murdered.

Hindenburg's death and Führerprinzip

Hindenburg died 2 August 1934. Hitler merged Chancellor and President into the office of Führer. Army swore personal loyalty to Hitler.

The Nazi state

Gestapo and SS

Secret state police (Gestapo, 1933) and Heinrich Himmler's SS (originally Hitler's bodyguard, became the regime's primary security apparatus, 1934 onward). Concentration camps from Dachau (1933).

Racial state

Nuremberg Laws (15 September 1935). The Reich Citizenship Law stripped Jews of German citizenship. The Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour banned marriage and extramarital relations between Jews and Germans. Approximately $500\,000$ German Jews in 1935 were progressively dispossessed and emigrated where they could.

Kristallnacht

9-10 November 1938. State-coordinated pogrom triggered by the assassination of a German diplomat in Paris. $267$ synagogues destroyed; over $7\,500$ Jewish businesses; $91$ Jews killed; $30\,000$ Jewish men sent to concentration camps. Marked the transition from legal persecution to organised violence.

T4 euthanasia programme

From 1939, the Nazi regime murdered approximately $70\,000$ disabled Germans. The mechanism (gas chambers, lying death certificates) prefigured the Holocaust.

Economy and rearmament

Schacht era (1933-1937)

Hjalmar Schacht as Economics Minister. Public works (autobahns), MEFO bills financing rearmament without obvious inflation. Unemployment fell from $6$ million (1932) to less than $1$ million (1937).

Four Year Plan (1936-1940)

Hermann Göring directed the economy toward war preparation. Autarky (economic self-sufficiency) prioritised. Schacht resigned in opposition (1937).

Forced labour

Concentration camp inmates, then conquered populations from 1939, supplied labour to German industry.

Foreign policy and the path to war

Withdrawal from disarmament conference and League of Nations (October 1933).

Saar plebiscite (January 1935). Saar returned to Germany after $90.8$% vote.

Rearmament announced (March 1935). Conscription reinstated, breaching Versailles.

Anglo-German Naval Agreement (June 1935). Allowed Germany to build a navy up to $35$% of British size. Britain's tacit acceptance of Versailles' end.

Remilitarisation of the Rhineland (March 1936). German troops re-entered the demilitarised zone. France and Britain did not respond militarily.

Rome-Berlin Axis (1936). Spanish Civil War cooperation (Condor Legion sent to Franco). Anti-Comintern Pact with Japan (November 1936).

Anschluss with Austria (12 March 1938). German troops entered Austria; plebiscite confirmed union with $99.7$% Yes.

Munich Agreement (29-30 September 1938). Britain (Chamberlain), France (Daladier) and Italy (Mussolini) ceded the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia to Germany without Czech consent. "Peace in our time."

Occupation of rest of Czechoslovakia (15 March 1939). Broke the Munich Agreement; ended British appeasement.

Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (23 August 1939). Soviet-German non-aggression pact with secret protocols dividing Poland and Eastern Europe.

Invasion of Poland (1 September 1939). Britain and France declared war (3 September 1939).

Historiography

Ian Kershaw (Hitler 1889-1936: Hubris, 1998; Hitler 1936-1945: Nemesis, 2000). Standard biography.

Richard J. Evans (The Third Reich Trilogy, 2003-2008). Comprehensive narrative.

Christopher Browning (The Origins of the Final Solution, 2004). Functionalist account of the Holocaust's emergence.

Adam Tooze (The Wages of Destruction, 2006). Economic history of Nazi Germany.

In one sentence

Hitler consolidated dictatorial power between January 1933 and August 1934 through the Reichstag Fire pretext, the Enabling Act, the elimination of other parties and unions, and the Night of the Long Knives, then built a racial, rearmament-oriented state (Nuremberg Laws 1935, Four Year Plan 1936, Kristallnacht 1938) and pursued an expansionist foreign policy that produced the Anschluss (March 1938), Munich (September 1938), the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (August 1939) and the invasion of Poland (September 1939).

Examples in context

Example 1. The Reichstag Fire to Enabling Act sequence as a worked illustration of "legal" dictatorship. Read the events of February to March 1933 as the mechanism behind the dot point's theme of consolidation through legal forms backed by violence. The Reichstag Fire (27 February) justified the Reichstag Fire Decree suspending civil liberties; the March election under SA terror gave the Nazis $43.9$%; and the Enabling Act (24 March) passed only after Communist deputies were arrested, granting the Cabinet legislative power and effectively suspending the constitution. The example shows how each "legal" step depended on coercion, culminating in the one-party state by 14 July 1933.

Example 2. Kristallnacht (November 1938) as the hinge from legal persecution to organised violence. The Nuremberg Laws (1935) had stripped Jews of citizenship and banned intermarriage, a legal phase. Kristallnacht ($267$ synagogues destroyed, over $7\,500$ businesses, $91$ killed, $30\,000$ men sent to camps) marks the transition the dot point captures: the racial state moving from legislation to state-coordinated violence, prefiguring the later trajectory of the regime.

Try this

Q1. "Hitler's consolidation of power between 1933 and 1934 was achieved by legal means." To what extent do you agree? [10 marks]

• Cue. Thesis: legal in form, but underpinned by violence and elite bargains. Evidence: Reichstag Fire Decree and Enabling Act (legal form); SA terror at the March election and the Night of the Long Knives (violence); the army's loyalty oath after Hindenburg's death (2 August 1934).

Q2. Explain how the Nazi regime built a racial state between 1935 and 1938. [6 marks]

• Cue. Nuremberg Laws (1935) removed Jewish citizenship and banned intermarriage; progressive dispossession of around $500\,000$ German Jews; Kristallnacht (1938) shifted to organised violence; the T4 programme extended murder to disabled Germans from 1939.

Q3. Analyse the steps by which Nazi foreign policy moved Germany toward war between 1935 and 1939. [6 marks]

• Cue. Rearmament and conscription (1935) breached Versailles; remilitarisation of the Rhineland (1936) went unopposed; Anschluss (March 1938) and Munich (September 1938) expanded Germany; occupation of Czechoslovakia (March 1939) ended appeasement, and the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (August 1939) cleared the way for Poland.