From the time Adolf Hitler came into office in 1933, up to the time when Germany surrendered to the Allied forces and Hitler committed suicide in 1945; the future for Germany became strongly invested in the hands of the younger generations. The Hitler Youth was a paramilitary organization formed in 1926. It gave kids excitement, adventure and new heroes to idolize. Hitler admired young kids drive, energy and strong love for Germany. He recognized these qualities and made it part of his plan to control the future world but the real question is why did Adolf Hitler pick children for his future? The education and the lack of schooling in independent thinking that instilled the ideology that brainwashed the Hitler- Jugend and eventually led …show more content…
Historian Eileen Hayes summarizes:
“the Hitler Youth was such a group, with its own departments of culture, school, press, propaganda and so on. All this early organization was done because Hitler realized that, if and when he finally managed to over throw the Weimar government, we would need to have something ready to take its place immediately.”
After the HJ became the sole Nazi youth group, Hitler and Gruber stressed the importance of loyalty to the Reich and the ideologies for the Aryan race.
In October of 1936 the Hitler made Hitler youth a mandatory membership, conscripted all German boys aged ten into the HJ as well. The laws required boys age ten and over to join but there were younger boys as little as 6 years old fighting to join the Jungvolk, which was the voluntary HJ. The young boys wanted to be a part of a group and fit in, and most of all wanted to wear a uniform. Alfons Heck described his infatuation with the HJ uniforms, comparing it to being part of a sports team and having pride in wearing your own teams’ jersey.
Education for the HJ changed drastically during the years after Hitler became power, leading into the war. No longer were math, science and literature the focus in grammar school. It changed focus to Nazi racial principles, German history and leadership training. Teachers could not teach their normal lecture plans, and the German history they taught their students was
“Once Hitler rose to power, he banned all other groups, even Boy Scouts, and only allowed for the Hitler Youth Program,” (Trueman). Hitler strongly believed that the youth was the future of Germany (Trueman). Additionally, he gradually started assigning adult roles to
“He alone, who owns the youth, gains the future”. Adolf Hitler. The Nazi Youth was established for many reasons, had a lot of history, and tore families apart. What is the Nazi Youth? Why do you think the Nazi Youth is important? What would you do for your country?
Hitler isolated the youth from the rest of Germany to be able to easily manipulate their beliefs. In 1926 the Hitler Youth was founded to train boys to enter the SA (Storm Troopers), a Nazi Party paramilitary formation. After 1933, however, youth leaders sought to integrate boys, while isolating them from the German girls and from their parents, into the Nazi national community to prepare them for service in the armed forces as soldiers. The Nazi army was such a dominant
“The Hitler Youth was founded in 1926” (“The Nazi Party”). As stated by Meinecke, “The Hitler Youth is not a boy scout or a girl guide organization… it is a compulsory Nazi formation which has consciously sought to breed hate, treachery, and cruelty into the minds and souls of every German child. It is in the true sense of the word education for death” (Conley). Hitler “based the Hitler Youth on anti-intellectualism, focusing on military training in preparation for becoming a soldier at 18” ("The Nazi Party”). The Hitler Youth was split up throughout the world, with some of the groups sent as far away as South America. “Baldur von Schirach was appointed the Reich Youth Leader” (“The Nazi Party”). There were age restrictions for the German Youth under Hitler. “German Youth could join the Hitler Youth beginning at the age of 10” (“The Nazi Party”). Hitler thought that the Hitler youth would help the “Third Reich last 1000 years” (Conley). The Hitler Youth played a major part in Hitler’s ultimate plan to eliminate the Jews, the
The German youth were willing to follow orders by cause of, their acknowledgement of what was happening to the Jews, what they were being told wasn’t always the truth, and the youth were forced to obey their higher leaders.
The rise and subsequent take-over of power in Germany by Hitler and the Nazi Party in the early 1930s was the culmination and continuation not of Enlightenment thought from the 18th and 19th century but the logical conclusion of unstable and cultural conditions that pre-existed in Germany. Hitler’s Nazi Party’s clear manipulation of the weak state of the Weimar Republic through its continued failure economically and socially, plus its undermining of popular support through the signing the Treaty of Versailles all lead to the creation of a Nazi dictatorship under the cult of personality of Hitler. This clear take-over of power and subsequent destruction of any
This IA will address how the Hitler Youth program effected the Nazification of Germany leading up to World War II. Hitler started the Nazi movement in 1919 and led the Nazis for some time before the whole party took control of Germany (Featherman, 1932). The Nazis officially came to power in 1933, and The Hitler Youth was made official that same year (Baldur von Schirach, 67, Dies; Head of Hitler Youth 1933–40, 1974). Hitler chose Baldur von Schirach as the head of the youth program (“The New York Times Archives”, 1974, p. 36). Schirach’s job as the head of the Hitler Youth was to lead an organization that specializes in training the aryan German youth to embody the perfect Nazi. Once the Nazi’s were in control of Germany the Hitler Youth continued to and grow and grow, and eventually became mandatory for all the adolescent aryan youth in Germany (Central Intelligence Agency, p. 14). The Hitler Youth was the main reason that race in Germany became the society and the state (Waite, p. 340), and the German military was so abundant because of the Hitler Youths ability to train kids and put them into war quickly (Central Intelligence Agency, p. 14).
In the years from 1929 to 1933 economic hardship, a faltering political regime and generational tensions left many young people with no place to turn. The Nazis used this situation to their advantage, pointing out to the youths the way the Weimar republic government were
Nazi education policies were reinforced by Nazi youth movements. Boys joined the German Young People at the age of 10 and from ages 14 to 18, they became members of the Hitler Youth. They learned Nazi songs and ideas, did athletics, hiking and camping and, as they grew older, they practised marching, map reading and military skills. There was a great sense of comradeship. This further indoctrinated boys and, in effect, made them ready for military service.
On the other hand, however, the group also did not enforce membership as stringently as their male counterparts did. The League of German Girls was the female part of the overall national-socialist youth movement known as the Hitler Youth. Its proper title was The League of German Girls in the Hitler Youth. An important part of life in the League of German Girls was to help the girls build character, and to prepare them for what were supposed to be their future tasks within the Nazi Volksgemeinschaft, or people's community, by getting them involved in programs that were for the "good of the people", such as collecting for the Winter Relief, helping with the harvest or collecting medicinal herbs in the fields. But to the girls, many of the League of German Girls' activities looked like lots of fun and like something they really wanted to participate in along with their friends. Many of the activities were not unlike what youth organizations offer today: BDM members could see movies or plays at reduced rates, go on field trips, or go away to camp during their school holidays. They were also able to compete against one another locally, regionally, and nationally in sports and other competitions.
The Success of Nazi Policies Toward Education and Youth Hitler and the Nazi party had a range of policies to control education and the German youth. This was mainly to ensure loyalty to Hitler and the Nazi party. Some believed in these policies and other did not but it was fear and glory and the fear of social inadequacy that made most comply. Hitler and the Nazis wanted to control the education system and youth by controlling the teachers, pupils and the curriculum.
The Hitler Youth was a small group when Hitler first took power in 1933, only having 107, 000 members however by the end of 1933, Hitler had 2.3 million boys and girls which was obtained by diminishing most rivals excluding catholic youth organisations. The Hitler Youth were “schooled in Nazi ideology and trained to be the future valuable members f the Reich. From the start, the Nazis pitched their appeal as the party of youth, building a new Germany… Hitler intended to inspire youth with a mission, appealing to their idealism and hope.” (Cate Haste, Nazi Women (2001)).
Hitler Youth Whether it was the gas chambers, the murder trains, or the experiments used on the jews, all around, the holocaust was one of the worst things that has happened in the history of all humanity. This inhumane treatment was normalized at that time since it was so common; the nazi party wanted to keep it that way. Hate is something to be taught, and the best way to learn is to be taught as children. Thus, creating Hitler Youth. Founded in Munich, 1923, the association barely made it to a thousand members, and gradually increased over time.
With this intention, the Hitler Youth was inculcated with Nazi teachings of revulsion towards Jews through racialism, anti-semitic songs, and propaganda. On a negative side, the Hitler Youth was centralized on anti-intellectualism instead, they concentrated on military training in preparation for becoming a solider. On the other hand, young German women were indoctrinated with the values of duty, obedience, and self-sacrifice. In effect, the purpose of girls in League of German Girls was to prepare women for the role of motherhood, raising children and housewife. Ultimately, the Nazi Party aim was to instill the National Socialist ideology into children so that they would be inclined to seek positions in the military.
After Hitler came to power, all other youth gatherings were shut so the Hitler Youth developed rapidly. In 1936, there were around 4 million parts. In 1936, it got to be entirely mandatory to join the Hitler Youth. Adolescents could abstain from doing any gathering action administration in the event that they paid their memberships yet this got to be just about incomprehensible after 1939. The Hitler Youth cooked for 10 to 18 year olds. The thought of the kid's segment was to set up the young men for military administration. Young men at 10 joined the Deutsches Jungvolk (German Youngsters) until they were 13 when they exchanged to the Hitler Jugend (Hitler Youth) until the age of 18. In 1936, an essayist, J R Tunus, expounded on the things that happened in the Hitler Jugend. He said that a piece of their "military games" (Wehrsport) included walking, blade drill, projectile tossing, trench burrowing, guide perusing, gas safeguard, utilization of holes, how to get under security fencing and gun shooting. To me it sounds more like war preparing than Physical