[Care_Bear]

What event was most influential into fully shaping Hitler's political ideology. From 1918 -1919 I can think of 4 major events which are candidates.


1. The loss of World War 1 in November 1918.

2. The creation of the Weimar Republic in 1919 and the short lived Bavarian Soviet Republic.

3. The Versailles Treaty of June 1919.

4. Meeting Karl Mayr and becoming a intelligence agent for the military between May-July 1919.



I would say the Versailles Treaty because it clearly showed that the new German government would roll over to demands of the the victorious nations (France in particular).

If it wasn't for the Versailles Treaty I cannot see Hitler or the Nazi party becoming the movement they were in Bavaria during the early and mid 1920s, leading to the Beer Hall Putsch.

Though the way Germany surrendered in World War 1 and the creation of the Weimar Republic were distasteful to Hitler it was clearly the Versailles Treaty which put him over the top.

[Zagadka]

Penis envy.

Versailles would probably be the most proximate, but the loss, the Weimar Republic, and the Treaty are all pretty much the same event. If the Versailles treaty had been less heavy handed, he probably would not have gained the support.

One thing to add to your list would be the rise of the Soviet Union, which really pushed the issue for ideology.

[Quantum]

The Dolchstosslegende was probably the most influential post-war in shaping Hitler because he suspected that Jew, socialists and liberals had actively wrecked Germany and had to be stopped before further degradation of the country occurred.

[Care_Bear]

Maybe Hitler was desperate to find something of meaning in his life after World War 1. He had no education or useful work experience or credentials. Maybe he latched onto ideals already held by the far right in the freikorps. In this way he appropriated those ideas and used his oratory skills to build a career and a cult for himself.

[Far-Right Sage]

All you have to know essentially is that Hitler always sympathized with German romantic ideals, dating back to his experiences in Linz and coming of age in Vienna, which manifested itself in a passionate appreciation for opera and the arts, and later, that passion was translated into politics following the conclusion of the war. Why were German people enthusiastic? A desire to liberate one's country from the filthy clutches of finance once and for all.

[Unperson-K]

Why were German people enthusiastic? A desire to liberate one's country from the filthy clutches of finance once and for all.

Except when the Nazis made their opposition to finance a major plank of their platform in the election of late 1932, support for the Nazis dropped from 13.7 million to 11.7 million as lower middle class voters (the Nazi core) fled to the Nationalists, put off by such socialist rhetoric. This actually points to one of the major reasons for German support of the Nazis: fear of the Communists. One cannot understand the rise of the Nazi Party in Germany, and the far right's success elsewhere in Europe, without remembering the impact that the Russian Revolution and the rise of the Soviet Union had on European politics. Hitler remembered the lesson and made sure to be snuggle up to big business in the future, as indeed he had been doing since the inception of the National Socialists.

If anyone can be upheld as having disconnected Germany from international finance, it was the Weimar Republic whose response to the Great Depression was to disconnect Germany's currency from the international gold market and thus cease trading the reichmark on the money markets. The Great Depression also wiped out a lot of international companies. Finally, most European economies had been becoming increasingly autarchic since the turn of the 20th century, a trend that increased dramatically in the First World War when the businesses of enemy aliens (and sometimes even allies) were nationalized en mass in nearly every European country. Seen in this context, Hitler's contribution to 'freeing' Germany from the 'clutches' of international finance were insignificant, the full stop at the end of a long process.

The German people were enthusiastic for a large number of complex reasons but any review of the period leaves one major answer: desperation. The singular lesson that fascists should take away from the rise of the Nazis and similar groups in inter-war Europe is that their fetid ideology only rises when people are so desperate that they will literally turn to anyone to save them. Only desperation will ever push people to eat up the thin gruel of romanticism, nostalgia, violence, anti-semitism and conspiracy theory that fascists denote with the word 'ideology'.

[R_G]

Well.....didn't some Art Prof give him a bad grade on a painting around that time???



But seriously........Germany losing WWI.

[GandalfTheGrey]

very interesting analysis kirillov.

I think Hitler lost a sister, or someone very close to him some time in the 20s - I've got an idea that radicalised him somewhat...

that - and getting his testical bitten off by a goat...

[Siberian Fox]

I think Hitler lost a sister, or someone very close to him some time in the 20s - I've got an idea that radicalised him somewhat.

Hitler lost his brother as a child. You are probably thinking of Hitler's half-niece Geli Raubal, who committed suicide in 1931.