Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

How Hitler Won Over the German People
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,druck-531909,00.html ^ | Ian Kershaw

Posted on 02/06/2008 11:32:13 AM PST by ventanax5

One day after this report was submitted, however, German troops marched into the demilitarized zone of the Rhineland. In a spectacular move that fully exposed the weakness of the western democracies, Hitler could celebrate his greatest triumph in foreign policy to date. The domestic problems of previous months — shortage of foodstuffs, high prices, low wages and, in Catholic areas, much antagonism towards the regime over the struggle between the church and state were temporarily forgotten in the euphoria.

(Excerpt) Read more at spiegel.de ...


TOPICS: Government; News/Current Events; Philosophy; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: cult; germans; hitler; nazi
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-48 next last

1 posted on 02/06/2008 11:32:17 AM PST by ventanax5
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: ventanax5

If the French had marched then, no Hitler. Too bad.


2 posted on 02/06/2008 11:36:44 AM PST by Anti-Bubba182
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5

Replace Catholic areas with Mormon areas and right now you would have a dozen hysterical posts saying how dare Mormons be mentioned.


3 posted on 02/06/2008 11:37:05 AM PST by Berlin_Freeper (GO Huckabee! GO-GO! Oh Huckabeegoodtonight!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Anti-Bubba182

“If the French had marched then, no Hitler. Too bad.”

The French stayed behind the Maginot Line because they felt safe there. They know how it would have turned out if the Germans had caught them out in the open, but it would have brought Poland and England into the war sooner.


4 posted on 02/06/2008 11:42:46 AM PST by Spok
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5

Brings to mind...

How do we know that the Vietnamese didn’t implant a chip in McCain’s head. He was a prisoner and under their absolute control for a number of years.

It might be safest to avoid a communist future to avoid McCain.


5 posted on 02/06/2008 11:47:32 AM PST by George from New England (A tax cap should work both ways)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Spok
The French stayed behind the Maginot Line because they felt safe there.

Also,the Germans had taken measures to inflate the numbers of troops that the French thought were present, marching in during the day, sneaking back out at night, and making a big show when they marched back in.

6 posted on 02/06/2008 11:51:11 AM PST by gundog (John McCain is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I've ever known in my life.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5

Here is a German guy that loved his grandather.

Andreas Gora Cathedral Bagpipe The Flowers of the Forest

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=by7v8pMNg6Q


7 posted on 02/06/2008 11:59:43 AM PST by fishhound
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Spok
They know how it would have turned out if the Germans had caught them out in the open

Its the Germans who would have been caught out in the open. Setting aside the Soviet Union, for which good numbers are hard to come by, in 1936 the French had the largetst army, the largest artillery corps, the largest tank force, and the the largest airforce in the world. Hitler had begun a huge expansion program, but it wasn't very along in 1936.

The German Generals were shaking their boots at the thought of a couple of million French soldiers, and all of that gear, heading their way. The German troops that marched into the Rhineland had very strict orders that they were to march back the way they had come if the sighted any French troops. A single caporal-chef and a squad of infantry would have sent the German Army back.

8 posted on 02/06/2008 12:19:54 PM PST by Pilsner
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5

Scary how history is going to repeat itself and here in the cradle of freedom.


9 posted on 02/06/2008 12:20:53 PM PST by RetiredArmy (A man alone. Without a party. Without a political voice. Bush destroyed conservatives.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Anti-Bubba182

In 1936, Adolf Hitler decided to test the will of the Allies by invading the demilitarized Rhineland between France and Germany in violation of the Treaty of Versailles. Since the relatively weak German army was in no condition to face off against the then much more powerful French army, he sent in a few battalions. He had instructed his commanders to retreat should they meet any resistance.

There was an anti-Hitler movement in Germany at that time led by the former chief of the German general staff, Ludwig Beck. Beck and his fellow co-conspirators were planning on the Allies enforcing the requirements of the Versailles Treaty and forcibly ejecting the German army. This would give them the cover they needed to arrest Hitler in a coup de tat, possibly ending the Hitler régime, averting World War II and saving 53 million lives. But Hitler’s successful coup in the Rhineland and Allies spinelessness only enhanced his popularity almost the German people and nullified the plot against him.

Flash foreward to today. Saddam Hussein violated the armistice that he signed when he lost the Gulf War in 1991, the part that required him to allow United Nations weapons inspectors unfettered access. We now know that Saddam Hussein intended to continue to try to obtain weapons of mass destruction, another violation of the armistice, and that George Bush’s actions against Saadam may have prevented another conflagration on the scale of a World War III.

But maybe we are fortunate that George Bush was made of sterner stuff than the Frech Prime Minister, Albert Sarraut.


10 posted on 02/06/2008 12:22:45 PM PST by DMZFrank
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Berlin_Freeper

As I recall, the Nazi & fascist leaders of that era were Roman Catholic to a man...... I don’t belive any were mormon!


11 posted on 02/06/2008 12:28:21 PM PST by Fletch357 (Je Maintiendrai!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: DMZFrank
Read Goebbels’s analysis of Hitler’s speaking style. It sounds like Oprah talking about Obama.
12 posted on 02/06/2008 12:29:35 PM PST by massgopguy (I owe everything to George Bailey)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5
Kershaw is the greatest historian of the Hitler era, and the best biographer.
13 posted on 02/06/2008 12:29:45 PM PST by elhombrelibre (Al Qaeda: enemy of civilization and humanity.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5

Effectively banned smoking and implemented gun control.


14 posted on 02/06/2008 12:47:19 PM PST by NaughtiusMaximus (Monica Lewinsky's ex-boyfriend's wife for president! (Bumpersticker))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: ventanax5

Effectively banned smoking and implemented gun control.


15 posted on 02/06/2008 12:47:31 PM PST by NaughtiusMaximus (Monica Lewinsky's ex-boyfriend's wife for president! (Bumpersticker))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: massgopguy

So help me, the documentary images of German women indulging in orgasmic swoons before Der Fuhrer remind me of the current unthinking and unreasoning fawning over Barack Hussein Obama. Not that the two men are similar, they are of course hugely different, but the reaction to them by their faithful following is eerily alike. They spout gaseous platitudes and their flocks just faint away or click their heels.


16 posted on 02/06/2008 12:48:42 PM PST by DMZFrank
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies]

To: DMZFrank

Keep in mind that France was going through their own political turbulence during this same period of time. Leon Blum, the prime minister in 1936-37, was a Marxist who was always concerned about a civil war in France, and he later spent much of World War II in prison — both in France and in Germany.


17 posted on 02/06/2008 12:49:07 PM PST by Alberta's Child (I'm out on the outskirts of nowhere . . . with ghosts on my trail, chasing me there.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]

To: DMZFrank

It is true and it’s completely insane..


18 posted on 02/06/2008 12:51:54 PM PST by sheik yerbouty ( Make America and the world a jihad free zone!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 16 | View Replies]

To: Fletch357
As I recall, the Nazi & fascist leaders of that era were Roman Catholic to a man.
Himmler and Goebbels had Catholic backgrounds. Hitler was born into a Catholic family, but rejected Catholicism and rejected Christianity in general.
Goering had mixed Catholic-Protestant parentage, while Rodulf Hess, Martin Bormann, Speer, and Adolf Eichmann had Protestant backgrounds.
19 posted on 02/06/2008 12:59:55 PM PST by oh8eleven (RVN '67-'68)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: George from New England
How do we know that the Vietnamese didn’t implant a chip in McCain’s head. He was a prisoner and under their absolute control for a number of years.

Because in those days it would have been rather difficult to hide a huge discrete-transistor and mechanical relay device inside the human brain. Besides, the noise from the waist mounted diesel power pack would have been a dead giveaway.

20 posted on 02/06/2008 1:01:59 PM PST by BlazingArizona
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-48 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson