RBSE Class 9 Social Science Notes History Chapter 3 Nazism and the Rise of Hitler

These comprehensive RBSE Class 9 Social Science Notes History Chapter 3 Nazism and the Rise of Hitler will give a brief overview of all the concepts.

RBSE Class 9 Social Science Notes History Chapter 3 Nazism and the Rise of Hitler

→ Birth of the Weimar Republic:

• Germany alongside the Austrian empire fought the First world war (1914-1918) against Russia, France and England in which Germany was defeated.
• After Germany's defeat in the first world war, the Emperor abdicated his post. A National Assembly met at Weimar and established a democratic constitution with a federal structure.
• On 28 June 1919, Germany signed the Treaty of Versailles. This peace - treaty was very harsh and humiliating for the people of Germany. Many Germans held the new Weimar Republic responsible for not only the defeat in the war but the disgrace at Versailles.

1. The effect of the war:

• The war had a devastating impact on the entire Europe-Continent both psychologically and financially. By the end of the war, it became a continent of debtors.
• Germany was financially crippled at the economic level due to the war guilt, national humiliation as well as the compensation.

2. Political Radicalism (Radical Transformation) and Economic Crises:

• After the birth of the Weimar Republic, the spartacist league in Germany began executing plans for its revolutionary uprising.
• Supporters of Weimar Republic-Socialists, Democrats and catholics established a democratic rupublic against it and crushed the uprising with the help of the Free Corps Organisation.
• Hie anguished spartacists later founded the communist party of Germany. Communists and Socialists henceforth became irreconcilable enemies.
• In 1923, a terrible economic crisis spread in Germany. The value of the German mark fell. There was some stability in Germany from 1924 to 1928 with American intervention.

3. The years of Depression:

• During the period of 1929 to 1932, the whole world was in the grip of economic  recession. The German economy was the worst hit by the economic crisis.
• Politically too the Weimar Republic was fragile. Due to some inherent defects, it could ever become unstable and vulnerable to dictatership. 

→ Hitler's Rise to Power:

• Hitler emerged there during the fragile era of the Weimar Republic.
• Born in 1889, Hitler joined the German worker's Party in 1919. Soon he became the main leader of this party. He renamed it as 'National Socialist Party'. It was later known as Nazi party.

1. The Destruction of Democracy:

• On 30 January 1933, Hitler became chancellor of Germany. '
• On 3 March 1933, Hitler passed the famous privilege act (Enabling Act) and established dictatorship in Germany.

2. Reconstruction:

• Hitler assigned the responsibility of economic recovery to the economist Hjalmar Schacht. He improved the economy of Germany.
• In foreign policy also Hitler acquired quick successes. He pulled out of the league of Nations in 1933. After this, took possession of Rhineland, Austria, Czechoslovakia etc.
• In September 1939, Germany invaded poland and world war II started.
• The war ended in May 1945 with Hitler's defeat and the US dropping of the atom bomb on Hiroshima in Japan.

→ The Nazi Worldview:

• Nazi ideology was synonymous with Hitler's worldview. Hitler was racist. In his view blond, blue-eyed, Nordic German Aryans were at the top, while Jews were located at the lowest rung.
• Hitler intended to extend German boundaries by moving eastwords, to concentrate all Germans geographically in one place.

1. Establishment of the Racial State:

• Once in power, the Nazis quickly began to implement their dream of creating an exclusive racial community of pure Germans.
• For this, they started eliminating who were seen as 'undesirable' in the extended empire. Jews remained the worst sufferers in Nazi Germany.

2. The Racial Utopia:

• Under the shadow of war, the Nazis proceeded to realise their murderous, racial ideal.
• Occupied Poland was divided up. Germans living in Europe were settled there.
• The trick was to keep the entire people intellectually and spiritually servile.
• From the year 1933 to 1938 the Nazis terrorised the Jews in various ways.

→ Youth in Nazi Germany:
Hitler strengthened Nazis ideas among the youth through education. For this, He established full control over the schools. School textbooks were rewritten. Ten-year- olds had to enter Jungvolk. Nazi was a yough organisation for children under 14 years of age.

1. The Nazi Cult of Motherhood:

• Nazi cult towards women was also based on discrimination.
• They had to become good mothers and rear pure-blooded Aryan children.
• Women who bore racially undesirable children were punished and those who produced racially desirable children were awarded.
• All 'Aryan' Women who deviated from the prescribed code of conduct were publicly condemned, and severely punished.

2. The Act of Propaganda:

• Nazi was an expert in promotional arts. The Nazi regime used language and media with care, and often to great effect. The terms they coined to describe their various parctices are not only deceptive. They are chilling. Mass killings were termed special treatment, final solution (for the Jews), euthanasia (for the disabled), selection and disinfections.
• In posters, the 'enemies' of Germans were stereotyped, mocked, abused and described as evil.
• Socialists and liberals were represented as weak and degenerate.
• Propaganda films were made to create hatred for Jews.
• They sought to win their support by suggesting that Nazis alone could solve all their problems.

→ Ordinary people and the Crimes Against Humanity:

• Nazism presented such an attractive program in front of the German public which was of interest to all classes of people. They genuinely believed N azism would bring prosperity.
• The large majority of Germans, were passive onlookers and apathetic withnesses.

→ Knowledge about the Holocaust:

• After the war ended and Germany was defeated that the world come to realise the horrors of what had happened.
• The history and the memory of the Holocaust live on in memories, fiction, documentaries, poetry, memorials and museums in many parts of the world today.