What were the Nazis trying to achieve and how did they achieve it?

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How did the Nazis run Germany?

  • Dictatorship
  • A one-party state: the Nazis were the only political party allowed
  • Economic success
  • A police state: if there was opposition the ** and the police had absolute power to arrest, punish and if necessary execute
  • A propoganda state: Nazis believed that if they controlled what people heard, saw and read then they would be able to win their hearts and minds
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The **

  • The ** were ruthless and fiercly loyal to Hitler
  • They became the main means of terrorising or intimidating Germans into obedience
  • They had absolute and imidiate power to arrest people without trial, search houses or confiscate property
  • They ran the concentration camps too
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Concentration camps

  • Germany gained a massive buisness through the slave labour of extracting raw materiala and manifacturing weapons
  • Later they became a place of genocide 
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The Gestapo

  • Originally they were the Prussian secret police ran by Goering
  • They later became the state secret police ran by Himmler
  • They tapped telephones, intercepted mail and spied on people
  • They had informers throughout Germany so anyone who even whispered any opposition to Hitler could be arrested
  • It was the Gestapo that the opponents to Nazism most feared
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How did the Nazis deal with the 'Burdens' of the c

  • Step 1: Propoganda
  • Step 2: The sterilisation Law - This allowed the Nazis to sterilise people with certain illnesses, between 1934 and 1945 between 320,000 and 350,000 men and women were compulsorily sterilised
  • Step 3: Concentration camps
  • Step 4: The euthanasia campaign
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Goebbels'propoganda

  • Newspapers: Goebbels took over most of the publishers, put controls on what journalists could write and set up a press agency to tell newspapers what the news should be
  • Films: Propoganda films were used to spread the Nazi view
  • Radio: Goebbels formed the Reich Radio Company which controlled all radio stations. 70% of the German households had radios and for those who did not, 6000 loudspeakers were erected in public squares all over Germany. Typical broadcasts were Hitlers speeches, German music and progams about German history
  • Festivals and Celebrations: People were encouraged to celebrate a new list of events, these spread the Nazi view
  • Culture: Goebbels set up the Reich Chamber of Culture, musicians, actors and writers had to be members of the Chamber.

- Music: Only acceptable music was allowed, no jazz as that was 'black people's' music and therefore racially inferior

- Theatre: It was concentrated on German history and political drama

- Literature: Banned books were removed by the Gestapo from libraries and book shops

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