HITLER part 1 "the struggle"

More than 50 million people died in world war 2, hundreds of million are wounded,  made homeless, hundred of cities are smashed and the costs are uncalculable. A half of a centuries had past but still we asked, why it should happened? There are no feuding monarchs, no trade wars, no arms races, no lack of communication among competing superpowers. And yet in 1939 the world light up in flames. and one man lighted the match, his name is Adolf Hitler.

For many of us the story is a simple one. American arms and American resourses won the war, this is the common held view, but there is  a quite  deferent view.  That Hitler substantially won and then lost the war in Europe before America entered the war in  the end of 1941. It was Hitler's military and political mistake  tipped the balance towards the Allies. That if he did not have those mistakes America might stands alone against a NAZI Britain and a NAZI Europe, and faced the future we can  barely imagine.

We know who won the war. But no story of WW2 can be told by not knowing and understanding of how Adolf Hitler was able to gain power and seized control of a cultured nation and some say's driven it insane. Hitler had unbelievable influence in the masses, he was a genius. And the big question is, why all the Germans followed him?

Adolf Hitler early life was a recipe of failure rather than fame. He was ugly and hostile child, some say's he was abused by his  father (a minor official in an obscure Austrian town). Hitler grew up deprived from comfort, and deprived of love.  In fact Hitler is a lousy student and had a terrible study habit with sequence of failures and basically lazy and this habits followed him throughout.  Some of the important decision of WW2 could not be made because he was sleeping. At 11 o'clock in the day of Allied invasion in Normandy. The german commander in chief demanded that the armed forces high command releases the armored divisions that are standing the channel cost. But they could not get an answer, because Hitler could not be disturbed and was still a sleep.

Young Hitler's life are full of rejection. He drop-out from school and went to Vienna to become an artist. He scratched out a living by selling paintings that he made, to the tourist. Twice he enrolls in Vienna academy of fine arts, twice they turn him down. One of Hitler's great ambition is to be an architect or an artist. The course of world history would be changed if he was allowed to enter the academy to become a painter or an architect or both. But not a politician.

It was in 1918 the world war one is coming to an end, still a career ambition would be denied for Hitler. He served as an enlisted man during the war he has been wounded and decorated with the iron cross. He likes the army, he wants to stay in, but the army said no. The seed of Adolf Hitler future emerges from it shell in Munich. It was 1919, with no other career opened to him he decided to become a politician. Hitler came across a small party that did not have apparently any members, and had only a board originally. It was called the Germans workers party but later became National Socialist German Workers Party, the NAZI party. Hitler found something in this party that he particularly liked,  it was extremely nationalistic and anti-Semitic . He became the speaker for the party and all of the sudden he found out that he could draw a crowd. His speeches basically focusing the same thing, that he was always the prosecuted person, Germany is always the victim.
The power begins in 1923 when Hitler and his followers tried to seized the government, but the coup fails. He was convicted of treason and sentenced to five years in prison, but he only served nine months. While in prison he  wrote the book My Struggle an autobiography and he presented the master plan of astonishing boldness, the Jews would be eliminated. Germany will enslaved and kill the slugs, to provide a living space for the people from Germany in the east, at that time few read the book. Released from prison Hitler decided that the best way to achieved his goal is to destroy the system from with in. He bounds  the country by airplane a noble thing to do at the time, and told the people that only the Nazi party can right the wrong that they suffered. He became an effective speaker, an intuitive politician he attracted money from rich men who think he may become a usefull tool. An election after election the Nazi lost but steadily gain political power.

By 1932 they win a third of the total vote and become the largest party in Germany. The aged president Paul von Hindenburg appoint chancellor after chancellor trying to form a majority to govern the bankrupted and divided country, but all failed. In 1933 it was Hitler turn, now he asks the legislator to pass an enabling act  to give him dictatorial power for four years, tired and intimidated they pass it.



next: HITLER part 2 "reclaiming the territory"
to read HITLER " reclaiming the territory" click here