1Since Germany's military had to be reduced, Hitler could no longer remain a soldier after the war,
2but he kept working for the army as an informant.
3After the war, communists in Germany had attempted a revolution,
4and the government was worried about communism in general,
5so Hitler was tasked with infiltrating and reporting on any new political parties that could pose a communist threat.
6A new party called the German Workers' Party threw up a whole bunch of red flags,
7so Hitler went along to one of their meetings but found that they weren't communists at all -
8they were extreme right, and shared many of his extreme beliefs,
9so he left the army, and signed up to join the party.
10His fantastic speaking abilities impressed the party's leadership and supporters, and he very quickly rose to the top.
11He decided the party needed a makeover, so he renamed it to the National Socialist German Workers' Party,
12or Nazi for short, and he gave it a new color scheme.
13The Nazis weren't very specific on policy,
14but Hitler made extravagant promises to return Germany to it's former glory,
15by undoing the Treaty of Versailles, and reuniting all ethnic Germans into one nation.
16He also said that only pure Aryan people should be allowed to be citizens
17and that all Jews would lose their citizenship.
18These ideas were already common in extreme right politics,
19but what set the Nazis apart was Hitler himself,
20and they quickly became the leading party on the extreme right.
21Many of the political parties in Germany at the time had paramilitary wings, and the Nazis were no different.
22Hitler set up the very descriptive "Hall Protection Detachment",
23later changed to the very delightful "Gymnastic and Sports Division"
24and finally settling on the ominous "Storm Detachment", or SA for short.
25Their job was to defend Nazi party meetings and intimidate political opponents,
26and they were frequently engaged in battles with communists on the streets.
27Since the allies had demanded a reduction in Germany's military size,
28many trained soldiers were left unemployed.
29They liked the Nazi ideology, and it was only natural for them to join the SA, which grew larger and larger over time.
30The new democratic government that formed after World War I was pretty weak and ineffective.
31In order to pay reparations to the Allies, it started printing more money.
32The problem is that printing money doesn't actually give a country more money -
33it just makes money less valuable.
34So as the country printed more and more money, it became worth less and less and the currency crashed.
35In 1919, 1 US dollar was worth about 4 German marks,
36by December 1923, one US dollar was equal to 4.2 trillion marks.
37The price of bread rose to 200 billion marks.
38Banknotes became worthless.
39Unsurprisingly, in such an economic crisis, Germany struggled to pay the allies.
40The French were pissed about this.
41So they occupied the Ruhr, an area full of factories, and took the economic output from the area as payment.
42They treated the German civilians badly
43and in total approximately 130 Germans were killed during the occupation.
44Germans were furious and Hitler and the Nazis thought that now would be a great time to lead a revolution.
45In November 1923, inspired by something a certain bold Italian man did a year earlier,
46Hitler stormed a meeting at a beer hall, and called for an uprising against the government.
47With his supporters, he marched on the streets of Munich, hoping the police would join his side.
48They did not.
49Hitler was put on trial for treason.
50He could have been sentenced to life, but the right-wing judges thought he was a pretty cool guy.
51Hitler knew the judges and knew that they would be lenient.
52So he took the opportunity to make impassioned speeches during the trial
53and in the end he was sentenced to just five years in prison, of which he only served nine months,
54and when I said prison, it was more like a pleasant hotel stay where he had plenty of time to write a book.
55The whole affair was covered by the media nationwide, and it made Hitler famous.
56Hitler and his extreme message were now known throughout Germany.
57But the everyday German still didn't care much for him.
58In the 1928 election, the Nazis only won about 2% of the vote.
59Many were still intimidated by all the violence and the shouting and how un-politician-like he was,
60but a new economic crisis would change all of that.
61To help Germany pay its reparations, America agreed to give it loans.
62In October 1929, the Wall Street crash happened and America wanted its money back.
63The economic strain this put on an already struggling Germany was severe.
64Unemployment skyrocketed.
65Poverty was widespread and Germans were sick of it.
66It was clear that the newly formed democracy wasn't working.
67In the face of crisis, Germans began moving to the political extremes.
68If you were German and want to change, your choices now were either the communists or the Nazis.
69Hitler claimed that he was the only one who could return Germany to its former glory.
70The Nazi party used propaganda to make Hitler seem like a great and powerful man
71and they gave the German people a scapegoat to blame for all their suffering.
72The promise of a single strong dictator was a breath of fresh air for Germans after years of failing democracy.
73Some bought into his extreme ideology.
74Some didn't agree with the racism, but were willing to vote for him anyway.
75Many didn't know much about politics at all, but just got caught up in the hype.
76Election after election, the Nazis became more and more popular.
77Until in 1932, they became the biggest party in the German parliament.
78Hitler came to truly believe that he was some sort of great destined savior of Germany.
79He turned megalomaniac.
80He decided to run for president and did surprisingly well,
81but still lost to the extremely popular World War I general, Paul von Hindenburg.
82Since he was now the leader of the biggest party, though,
83he demanded President Hindenburg make him chancellor.
84But Hindenburg was reluctant, seeing that Hitler was clearly such a big racist.
85Industry leaders urged Hindenburg to give Hitler the chancellorship,
86fearing the rising support for communism,
87and leader of the center party von Papen,
88who had been secretly negotiating with Hitler, said to Hindenburg,
89"How about we make Hitler chancellor on the condition that I get to be vice chancellor
90and most government jobs go to us, moderate conservatives.
91That way I'll get to keep my power, I mean, we'll get to keep our power and we'll control Hitler like he's our angry little puppet.
92What could possibly go wrong?"
93As it turned out, EVERYTHING.
94Hitler became chancellor of Germany in January 1933, but he was not yet a dictator.
95In February, the German Parliament building was set on fire.
96Historians still aren't sure who did it and many suspect the Nazis did it themselves, but Hitler blamed the communists,
97and he convinced president Hindenburg to sign an emergency decree
98allowing him to imprison all communists and other political opponents.
99Communists and others were sent off to the first concentration camp in Dachau.
100At this time, the elderly president Hindenburg passed away, giving Hitler the perfect opportunity.
101He introduced a law to parliament that would allow him to make all future laws and decisions entirely on his own.
102With his political opponents in prison and the SA intimidating others, Hitler's law passed.
103Just two months after becoming chancellor, Hitler was now a dictator.
104He still had one problem.
105The leader of the SA wanted the SA to take over the job of the regular German Army
106and the German Army didn't like that idea.
107Hitler needed to maintain the support of his professionally trained German army,
108more so than his rough and rowdy SA.
109So one night in June 1934,
110he had Rohm and many other of his own SA officers rounded up and murdered.
111While he was at it, he took the opportunity to brutally settle some personal scores as well.
112Politicians who had disagreed with him in the past,
113reporters who had printed negative articles about him,
114one guy who did absolutely nothing, but they thought he was someone else.
115In some cases, even their families were murdered.
116In total, up to 200 people were killed in what became known as the Night of the Long Knives.
117The army, now satisfied that they wouldn't be replaced,
118pledged total allegiance to their new fuhrer and Hitler's control was now absolute.
119Life in Germany changed violently.
120Freedom of the press, expression, and public assembly were suspended.
121Jews were initially branded and their businesses boycotted,
122and eventually, Hitler would go on to have six million Jewish men, women, and children killed in concentration camps.
123Hundreds of thousands of people were forced into sterilization for physical and mental imperfections.
124The Hitler Youth became a way to brainwash the young.
125Boys were trained to fight and returned home from camp violent.
126Girls were told their purpose was to have many pure Aryan children
127and they would sometimes return from camp pregnant.
128When their parents were understandably horrified,
129their children would threaten to turn them over to the Gestapo for standing in the way of Germany's greatness.
130The standard greeting changed and you could be sent to a concentration camp for not using it.
131This way, it seemed like everyone was a Nazi supporter.
132If you dare to pose Hitler or speak out against him in any way,
133you also would be sent to a concentration camp.
134German Nationalism captivated the young Adolf.
135Extreme ideology and anti-semitism vested in him as a young man living a hard life on the streets.
136Germany's defeat in the First World War filled him with hatred and a thirst for vengeance.
137A political movement that treated him like a god
138and hundreds of thousands looking up to him as their savior made him a megalomaniac,
139and soon, his aggressive foreign policies would drag the world into a second tragic global conflict,
140otherwise known as...