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Topic 14- The Terror State: - Coggle Diagram

- - - - first established as Hitlers bodyguards, but after the NoLK their powers expanded and became the main organised concerned with arresting political prisoners
        1936- SS was in charge of the entire Third Reich Police System and concentration camps
        It was in 1936 that repression increased, as the SS operated in a far more systematic way
        SS guards in concentration camps were deliberately brutalised to remove any feelings they may have prisoners, Himmler wanted the SS to be ruthless and devoid of moral standards
    - - led by Reinhard Heydrich, Himmlers deputy, and from 1933 the main role of the SD was intelligence gathering, with one of the most important roles being to monitor public opinion, identify those who voted 'no' in plebiscites, and to report these back to Hitler
        1939- SD had 50,000 officers showing how the org was successful and showed the successes of Heydrich
    - - Rather than being staffed by Nazi fanatics, most gestapo agents had served under weimar and thought of themselves as highly trained
        1939- 20,000 officers while only 3000 were also members of the SS, suggesting they valued their independence or were not good enough for the regimented SS lifestyle
        Muller who led the SS was a workaholic who led anti-communist police activities during weimar
        
        muller was so efficient he kept his job despite calling hitler an "Austrian draft dodger"- Himmlers deputy, Heydrich, was impressed by mullers cold efficiency and work ethic
        
        Evans states that- “Gestapo attained an almost mythical status on all seeing, all knowing arm of state security" but were actually a small organisation
        The Gestapo Myth- Germans perceived gestapo to be ubiquitous whereas they were very small
        e.g. 44 agents in major city of Bremen and 42 in Hannover, the lower Rhine had a population of 4million and only 218 agents
        
        was a huge beauocracy with a massive filing system, demonstrated by the increase in the budet for Berlin gestapo from 1m reichsmarks in 1933 to 40m reichsmarks in 1937
        
        only 10% of cases came from their own investigations, so relied on casual denunciations from members of the public and paid informers
        
        75% of denunciations were done out of spite, and led to a prison sentence of around 6 months
        
        from 1935 'malicious gossip law' came into force, which treated better off people more leniently and was mostly used against workers after the left had been smashed- although only a few thousand were prosecuted under this law
  - - - AH was angered when SC acquitted all but one of the defendants in reichstag fire case and a few judges and state prosecutors were dismissed by regime
    - - these courts were set up to deal with political crimes, and had 3 Nazi judges alongside 2 professional judges- there were no juries and no right to appeal for the defendants
        
        between 1934-1939 around 3400 people were tried by People's Court, most of whom were socialists and communists
        Many of those brought before the court were given death penalty, which was used increasingly in third reich
        
        the judiciary had no power to interfere with the use of Nazi terror, despite old court system continuing to exist and many non-nazi judges continuing in their jobs- lawyers and judges fell into line through threat of SA and SS terror
- - - - unofficial strikes occasionally still occurred as Gestapo records show
        
        of 25,000 workers who went on strike in 1935, 7000 spent time in prison
        
        17 minute stoppage in Opel works in 1936 meant 7 ringleaders were arrested and imprisoned
      - the tactic of 'Absenteeism' was rooted out through laws against 'slacking' in 1938 which could be punished be prison, the same with breaking machinery
        
        passive resistance could not defeat the regime, but did show workers were resistant to co-operation into volksgemeinschaft
  - - - for Protestants, the confessional church broke away from the Reich church, and resisted the Aryan paragraph and many did not wear Nazi vestments
        
        by the end of 1937, 700 confessional pastors had been arrested most notably Martin Niemoller, and many still refused to conform to nazification and did not show flags or wear nazi uniform in church
      - Jevohahs witnesses were among the most persecuted, as they could only be loyal to Jehovah and not the Nazis, so despite being a small % of germans, they were persecuted terribly
        
        around 30,000 sent to camps, and were tortured brutally, but none ever conformed as they saw their persecution as a test of obedience to God
      - R.C.C did not resist due to concordat in 1933, but in 1937 the Pope issued a 'papal encyclical' which condemned the nazis
        
        however opposition was little from the RCC as an institution, there were some individual acts of bravery from Bishops, but ultimately the Nazis increased repression on the RCC as a result, Goebbels accused priests of paedophilia for example
- - - - MYTH:
        
        AH presented as hard working, tough and uncompromising
        
        Presented as a political genius who had mastered solutions to Germanys political issues and was solely responsible for germanys national reawakening
        
        was dynamic and forceful in contrast with weak weimar politicians
        
        lived a simple life: sacrificed personal happiness for the good of the nation, did not drink and followed a vegetarian diet from 1940s, and also shown as being alone
        
        was the guardian of traditional morality and popular justice, and a statesmen of true genius
      - REALITY:
        
        AH was surrounded by officials who competed with each other to gain his attention and implement his wishes, Hitler supplied the vision and his ministers interpreted it into policy, and was actually not involved in the decision making process
        
        Far from hard working, AH stayed up late watching films, and would not usually get up until mid-day. His days consisted of eating, walking around the grounds of his mountain retreat and delivering rambling speeches to his subordinates. He disliked reading official documents and rarely got involved in detailed discussions on policy- his officials had great difficulty in getting him to make decisions