HIST410 2019 January Week 3 Discussion Latest

HIST410 Contemporary History

Week 3 Discussion

The Rise of Fascism, World War II and the Holocaust

Analyze Adolph Hitler's rise to power and the policies he used to rule Germany. The following statement was taken from a contemporary account of Germany in 1939:

"Though the Fuhrer's anti-Semitic program furnished the National Socialist party in the first instances with a nucleus and a rallying-cry, it was swept into office by two things with which the 'Jewish Problem' did not have the slightest connection. On the one side was economic distress and the revulsion against Versailles: on the other, chicanery and intrigue...Hitler and his party promised the unhappy Germans a new heaven and a new earth, coupled with the persecution of the Jews. Unfortunately, a new heaven and earth cannot be manufactured to order. But a persecution of the Jews can..."

How do you interpret this contemporary account of the persecution of people who are Jewish? Elaborate.