February 13, 2026 • 38 mins
On this episode of Our American Stories, the Third Reich lasted just twelve years, but the destruction it unleashed reshaped the world forever. In this episode, we examine the rise of Adolf Hitler—not as a sudden coup, but as a political ascent made possible through elections, institutions, and public support. How did a nation renowned for its Christian tradition, artistic achievement, scientific excellence, and technological leadership descend into moral catastrophe? This is the story of how Hitler came to power, and how a modern society surrendered itself to tyranny.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American stories,
the show where America is the star and the American
people coming to you from the city where the West begins,
Fort Worth, Texas. The Third Reich which Adolf Hitler built,
lasted just twelve years, but his calculated butchery of human
lives and the human spirit surpassed anything this earth.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Had ever seen.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
How did these cultured people, steeped in Christianity and the
arts and science collapse into barbarism in the twentieth century.
To seek the answers, we must follow the Germans and
the rise of their leader, Adolf Hitler. Let's take a listen.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Evil and chaos can have gentle beginnings. It is in
the backwater countryside of northern Austria where Adolf Hitler is
born on April twentieth, eighteen eighty nine. He's the third
child of the third marriage of an Austrian customs official.
He's the first of the children to live past fifty.
(01:13):
His father, Alloys, is a harsh and restless man. Three
of his seven children are conceived out of wedlock. Adolf's
young mother, Clara, who is also his father's niece, is
the life of Adolph's existence. She is a very sweet,
hard working, and deeply religious Catholic who will forever remain
his warmest memory. As a boy, a teacher observes that
(01:37):
young Adolph has limited talent, is lazy and bad tempered,
and arrogantly fancies himself a leader. Adolf is just thirteen
years old when his father dies in nineteen o three.
At eighteen, with boundless confidence and a portfolio of schoolboy sketches,
(01:58):
young Hitler sets out to conquer Vienna, certain his talent
will open all doors. Hitler applies for admission to the
Academy of Fine Arts, but he will walk its corridors
only as a visitor. In a shattering and unexpected blow,
he is rejected.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
I'm sorry, hit though you don't have a style.
Speaker 5 (02:18):
Your people that like little billings.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
There's no light.
Speaker 6 (02:20):
Perhaps if you tried architecture or theatrical design. I'm truly sorry.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Best of luck.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Then, just four years after his father's passing, Adolf's mother
dies of breast cancer. All alone, Adolf Hitler sinks into
a world of drifters and nobody's. Unwashed and gaunt, he
sells an occasional crude painting around town for next to nothing.
While living in flophouses and in the streets.
Speaker 7 (02:49):
Hitler didn't have a plan B. When he was rejected,
he just didn't know what to do, so he started
to drift. He had very little money if he was
living in a mouth existence. He had no clear aim
in life at all. He was, in a sense, waiting
for something to happen.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
Among Vienna's discontented subculture. Hitler's heartache finds echoes throughout the streets.
Speaker 8 (03:13):
It's the Jews, swarm into our country, steal it bread
from our tapes.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Just ask on mayor.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
They are so great human form.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
For the first time, Hitler senses the uses of hate,
the explosive political force stored in the resentments and fears
of the masses. His own hates are many, the intermarriage
with non Germans, parliamentary government, inferior races, and of course
the Jews. Anti Semitism has always existed in European society,
(03:53):
but in Hitler it becomes all consuming.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
It's all their fault.
Speaker 9 (03:58):
He's swarm into our country, take the food.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
From our mouths.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
Here we are German and hungry. Early on, he begins
reciting anti Semitic platitudes to anyone on the streets who
will listen. In nineteen thirteen, Hitler leaves Vienna for the
German fatherland Munich.
Speaker 10 (04:21):
I'm off of the real Germazar.
Speaker 3 (04:24):
The harsh, brooding newcomer is out of place. Munich is
the boisterous German land of beer and pretzels, but not
for long.
Speaker 10 (04:34):
For war.
Speaker 11 (04:36):
Postriate Artsteuke's assassination leads to war.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
On August one, nineteen fourteen, a huge enthusiastic crowd, including
the misfit outsider Adolf Hitler, gathers in Munich Plaza, the
occasion to celebrate Germany's entry into World War One.
Speaker 6 (04:54):
England, France and Russia returning forces.
Speaker 4 (04:57):
Against our ali Austria.
Speaker 11 (05:00):
We must stand with that good Nik, ready to sacrifice.
The country is everything we are now only cover.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
Germany has finally given Hitler what he's always longed for
a place to belong. I fell down on my knees.
Hitler rites in mind, comp and thanked Heaven for being
permitted to live at this time. With the advent of
the machine gun, war begins, producing epic numbers of casualties.
(05:36):
Here's retired US Army General Stanley McCrystal explaining World War
one's trench warfare.
Speaker 12 (05:42):
As they found that if they dug even shallow trenches
and used machine guns, a small number of troops could
stop a large attacking force. And then both sides started
to dig trenches, and so they were locked along this line,
the Western Front, which was this extraordinarily complex set of
(06:02):
trenches that didn't move very much either way.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
The trenches cover twenty five thousand miles, laid end to end,
they would circle the globe. Two days after Germany's war declaration,
Hitler joins the German army and becomes stationed in the trenches.
The open area in between the trenches is so deadly
it's known as no man's land. Hitler becomes a dispatch runner,
(06:30):
whereby he leaves the safety of his company's trench in
order to deliver messages through the body littered no man's
land and into the nearby German trenches. But after months
on the front lines, Hitler is still seen as an outcast.
Speaker 7 (06:45):
Hitler was regarded by the other troops something of a loner,
something of a rather peculiar, eccentric person kept to himself.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
But what Hitler lacks in popularity he makes up foreign
blind ambition.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
And You've been listening to the story of the Rise
of Adolf Hitler, and what you're hearing here is a
full and total picture of what drove the man. The
story of the Rise of Adolf Hitler continues here on
our American Stories, Leehabib Here, as we approach our nation's
(07:32):
two hundred and fiftieth anniversary, I'd like to remind you
that all the history stories you hear on this show
are brought to you by the great folks at Hillsdale College.
And Hillsdale isn't just a great school for your kids
or grandkids to attend, but for you as well. Go
to Hillsdale dot edu to find out about their terrific
free online courses. Their series on Communism is one of
the finest I've ever seen. Again, go to Hillsdale dot
(07:55):
edu and sign up for their free and terrific online courses.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
And we continue with our.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
American Stories in the Story of the Rise of Adolf
Hitler and the Third Reich.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
Let's return to the story.
Speaker 13 (08:17):
Hitler's role as a messenger was actually considered perhaps the
most dangerous task in trench warfare, running from trench to trench,
exposing himself to enemy fire. The mortality rate for messengers
was quite significant.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
Then this mind crushing whopper of a what if moment
occurs on the battlefield.
Speaker 14 (08:46):
Andy has Adolf Hitler in his sights, and even though
he's a trained soldier, he can't bring himself to pull
the trigger.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Years of trench warfare transform made off Hitler from a
directionless loaner to a hardened soldier. The gas attacks are
endless to Hitler, They've become routine, but this time it's different.
The Allies hit the Germans with a deadly new form
of chemical warfare, mustard gas.
Speaker 15 (09:24):
Mustard gas affects the central nervous system. It creates mustard
colored blisters on the skin. It blinds people, it strips
away the mucous membranes. It's incredibly pink and debilitating. And
since it had no odor, by the time you realize
that you would in held it and it was on
your skin, it was too late.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
On October fourteenth, nineteen eighteen, Hitler becomes one of the
victims of a British mustard gas attack. Then, less than
a month later, after four years of continuous fighting and
thirty seven million casualties, Germany surrenders while most of the
world celebrates the end of the fighting. One unknown twenty
(10:07):
nine year old man. Gentlemen recovering at a military hospital.
Speaker 16 (10:11):
I have your attention.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
Here's the news.
Speaker 8 (10:14):
I have an.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
Important announcement to make.
Speaker 7 (10:19):
Earlier today, the Army High Command agreed to negotiate the
terms of surrender.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
War is over.
Speaker 17 (10:28):
We must place ourselves now at the mercy of the victim.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
It will be generous.
Speaker 13 (10:40):
Hitler took the surrender personally, a personal destructive glow to himself.
He also took it as a mission, a mission in
life to avenge and rectify this surrender.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
While the fighting has stopped, the pressure is on the
United States and their fellow allied victors to come to
an agreement on how to prevent war from ever breaking
out again. The leaders of each allied country, including the
President of the United States, Woodrow Wilson, gather at the
Palace of Versailles in France. After six months of intense negotiations,
(11:31):
the resolution falls on Germany, forcing them to pay eighty
billion dollars, the modern equivalent of nearly half a trillion dollars,
a debt they won't pay off until twenty ten.
Speaker 9 (11:44):
Germany immediately is struggling with a question of survival. For
ordinary Germans. The war did not end in November nineteen eighteen.
For ordinary Germans, the battle for survival, the daily struggle
for food, the effort to find shoes and clothing, stretched
on into the nineteen twenties.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
As anger and starvation spread, tensions rise throughout the country.
Radical factions struggle to win over the hearts and minds
of the populace. The communists and the socialists battled daily
in the streets. Who will be able to best exploit
this national crisis. Hitler becomes an informer for the demobilized
(12:24):
German Army and is assigned to infiltrate one of the
many socialist factions.
Speaker 8 (12:30):
One of these groups is the German Workers' Party, ed
by man called Anton Drexler. They gather in the back
room of the beer haul, just an excuse to have
a drink, I expect, but pay them a visit and
tell me what they're planning.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
I don't drink some.
Speaker 8 (12:45):
Just listen then interest.
Speaker 3 (12:49):
The German Workers Party is an insignificant group of pessimistic
and defeated men passing the time in a beer hall
while delivering uninspired speeches and rhetorical plant attitudes about racial
superiority and social reform.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Than to declare Bavarian independence.
Speaker 3 (13:05):
Hitler tries to remain in the background, but is unable
to restrain his impassioned tongue.
Speaker 18 (13:11):
You're talking about the purity of the German people.
Speaker 19 (13:15):
Just no fairy tale, as I was saying.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
This burst of inspiration was not lost on the party's leader,
Anton Drexler. Drexler asks Hitler to speak at their next
meeting on October sixteenth, nineteen nineteen.
Speaker 14 (13:34):
Many of you may remember him by his comments at
our last meeting, so please welcome, hey, Adolf.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
Hitler.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
But the party attendees are more interested in their beer
and getting lost in their thoughts.
Speaker 6 (13:53):
Is anyone listening?
Speaker 18 (13:56):
That's the problem nowadays, isn't it?
Speaker 6 (13:59):
No one cares, no wonder we face extinction.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
This is the three two one lift off moment for
Adolf Hitler and what would soon become known as the
Nazi Party. In just five months, the German Workers Party
expands quickly. They changed the name to the National Socialist
Party or Nazi for short.
Speaker 17 (14:24):
Enemies among us.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
Under Hitler's leadership, Membership in the National Socialist Party quickly expands.
As Hitler experiences his first taste of real power. The
media love the charismatic speaker and begin printing his stories.
Over the next two decades, Adolf Hitler will seduce the
(14:48):
media all over the world. Even in the United States.
Time magazine awards him their Man of the Year in
nineteen thirty eight.
Speaker 6 (14:57):
Who alone are responsible for the moral decades? But now
riddles our society, Jews, I do you call themselves gentlemen?
But who are now?
Speaker 8 (15:09):
And who?
Speaker 6 (15:09):
I've always been unwelcome, unwanted, And they are everywhere inviting
our governments, stripping out of our savings, raping our families
and our heritage. I tell you, friends, this is war.
Speaker 8 (15:25):
Oh.
Speaker 6 (15:26):
They soon to turn, for the invaders will become their victims.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
As the National Socialist Party grows, agitators from rival political
factions pour into their meetings in order to disrupt them.
They shout down Hitler and start fights. He needs protection.
Speaker 6 (15:49):
We need more men like you in the.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
Aid of finds muscle in a military official Earns scrom
Rome is made commander of the Storm Battalion, or essay,
the Nazi Party's militia. But before this can happen, Rome
points out the obvious.
Speaker 8 (16:08):
My men can crush a revolution that can also create one,
because they love this country as much as you.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Or I does.
Speaker 8 (16:19):
The only little problem is they're unemployed.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
Yes, and you've been listening to the story of the
rise of Adolf Hitler, and what you're hearing here is
a full and total picture of what drove the man.
And it wasn't just his hatred of Jews or outsiders.
It wasn't just a quest for power. No, he wanted revenge,
(16:48):
revenge for what had happened to Germany and this surrender.
He just couldn't believe that Germany had surrendered to the Allies,
and my goodness, he went to work to do something
about it.
Speaker 2 (17:01):
Of Course, the humiliation the.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Germans faced through that gathering at Versailles, where they were
forced to pay over eighty billion dollars in restitution, would
keep Germany starved and hungry and angry. And of course
there was Hitler to just capture it all, take advantage
of it all, and then of course to take over
the Germans Workers' Party, a nascent, almost nonexistent party that
(17:27):
had no influence.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
And of course, last.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
But not least, he realizes he needs a militia for protection,
and realizes also that if you can crush a revolution,
you can start one. When we come back, the Rise
of Adolf Hitler continues here on our American stories. And
(18:08):
we continue with our American stories and the story of
the rise of Adolf Hitler. And when we last left off,
Hitler had taken the Germans Workers' Party and turned it
into the National Socialist Party.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Let's return to the story.
Speaker 17 (18:22):
I know some people who would love to hear you
speak were not likely to go to a beer hall
the wealth.
Speaker 10 (18:29):
I've met a few arm chair politicians care more about
their money than you do their own country.
Speaker 17 (18:35):
Yes, but surely as your party's propagandali and you must
know that in order to defend their money, they'll spend
it a good deal of it, not as if someone
they trust tells them it's a safe bet. That's where
I come in, Hitler.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Hitler turns to the Harvard educated American businessman Earnst Homsteingle.
Hofsteingle and his wife Helena introduced Hitler to Munich High
society and help polish his image. Soon after, Ernst and
Helena invite Hitler to speak to a room of influential Germans.
It's here where Adolf will meet the future commander of
(19:09):
the Nazi Air Force, Hermann Gurry, to cast all Germany
under his spell. Hitler needs an image that will burn
into the minds of millions.
Speaker 7 (19:20):
Nowadays, we'd call it a logo. Of course, it was
designed personally by Hitler, and it may be that he
put some of his artistic impulses into this. The essential
part of it ultimately went back to India, but it
was taken up as a symbol of racism and anti Semitism.
Combined with the red background for socialism and the red,
(19:41):
white and black colors for the old.
Speaker 3 (19:42):
Kazvice, Hitler's artistic creation is known as the Swastika. Hitler
can now fund Rome's Essay police Force and begin to
push out party propaganda en mass. The Nazi Party newspaper
is also launched in nineteen.
Speaker 6 (20:01):
Maikov and the People of Germany Free Witness.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
On November eighth, nineteen twenty three, in what will become
known as the Beer Hall Push, Hitler leads his Nazis
into a Munich beer hall where top government officials are munal.
Speaker 6 (20:20):
The German Revolution against Tonight.
Speaker 3 (20:26):
Threatened at gunpoint. The government leaders reluctantly agree to support
Hitler's new regime. Then, Hitler and his three thousand Nazis
swiftly march into the Munich streets to take the city
by force.
Speaker 8 (20:41):
As an group heading course of barracks.
Speaker 3 (20:43):
His entourage includes Houstingle, Gerring, his future deputy fearer Rudolph Hess,
along with Rome and his Essay soldiers. But one hundred
German police are prepared. Sixteen Nazis and three policemen are killed.
(21:09):
Gurring is shot in the groin. Hitler suffers a dislocated
shoulder when the man he locks arms with is shot
and pulls him down onto the pavement. Hitler's bodyguards takes
several bullets after jumping on top of the fallen Hitler,
saving his life. Hitler scrambles along a sidewalk out of
the line of fire and crawls into a waiting car. Gory,
(21:33):
Hitler's attempt to seize power fails.
Speaker 10 (21:36):
I know a safe place, all right.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
I'm a hat desperate, suicidal, and still armed with his pistol.
The injured Hitler seeks refuge in Hofstingle's home just outside
of Munich. Hofstingle's wife, Helena, dissuades Hitler from committing suicide
as the police come to arrest him. He's arrested and
(21:59):
charged with treason. With the collapse of the Nazi Revolution,
Hitler's political career and the Nazi movement has come to
a crashing, almost laughable end.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
How do you plead.
Speaker 17 (22:16):
Guilty?
Speaker 3 (22:23):
Hitler uses his trial as a personal forum to publicize
his worldview to the German nationhead.
Speaker 9 (22:35):
You have been accused of high treason and called an
enemy of the state.
Speaker 10 (22:39):
If a thief takes your money and you take it back,
does that make you also a thief?
Speaker 3 (22:45):
The courtroom quickly becomes a stage, and Hitler is its
hero protagonist.
Speaker 6 (22:53):
In nineteen eighteen, we were betrayed by the November Tromans,
the ones who claimed to be our leader. They entered
the wall signed a treaty of a side.
Speaker 16 (23:06):
That's what's hires.
Speaker 6 (23:14):
This is supposed to be an interrogation, not a speech.
Speaker 3 (23:17):
The judge is visibly impressed by Hitler's response to the prosecutor.
Speaker 6 (23:21):
If I am guilty of anything, then I am guilty
of fighting to defend the rights of a German people.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
Fascinating, isn't it.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
After twenty four days of deliberation, Hitler's fate rests in
the hands of the judge.
Speaker 5 (23:41):
And Hitler, God finds you guilty of trees. Yes, hereby
sentenced to will find two hundred gold marks in Landsberg.
Speaker 4 (24:05):
You will.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
You will be eligible for parole in nine months.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
It's a slap on the wrist. Hitler has turned defeat
into triumph. The provincial troublemaker is now a national hero.
His wait vis Hey Hitler. Hitler spends all his eight
months as a celebrated guest in prison.
Speaker 6 (24:37):
Yes, sir, and if I might say so, sir, it's
an honor to serve.
Speaker 3 (24:42):
You, plotting his next move with Nazi cellmate Rudolph Hess,
who volunteers his time in prison to be Hitler's secretary.
Welcome my funeral. Thank you guys.
Speaker 16 (24:57):
Well, it's love, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Things missing an audience and an income.
Speaker 18 (25:02):
Perhaps I wrote a memoir.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
What do you think? I think it's an excellent idea.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
Good.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
Then I need the publisher to gain followers and to
spread his message. The thirty five year old Hitler creates
a manifesto financed and published by the Harvard educated Hofstingle,
the heart of which is a radical plan for world domination.
He titles it mine komf for My Struggle. On December twentieth,
(25:34):
nineteen twenty four, Hitler is free. But now Hitler's twisted
socialist crusade is stopped by the adversary he fears. Most
good times have come to Germany. Rebellions have faded, the
inflation halted, the country is back to work, and the
hardships and humiliations of defeat are fading.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
And you've been listening to the story of the rise
of Adolf Hitler and how he came to power, and
ultimately how he came to power was a failed attempt
to come to power, which led to a trial that
Hitler used brilliantly as a stage in which he set
himself up as the protagonist, as the hero in his
(26:24):
own story and a hero fighting for the cause of Germany.
And the judge he played his part in Hitler's play
as well, sentencing Hitler to a mere five years with
eligibility for parole.
Speaker 2 (26:39):
At nine months.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
Not just a slap on the wrist, almost an endorsement,
and while in prison, he takes the time to pen
his manifesto Mine comf, which of course translated from German
is my struggle.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
When we come back.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
The Rise of Adolf Hitler continues here on our American stories,
(27:37):
and we continue with our American stories and the story
of the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich.
Let's pick up where we last left off.
Speaker 3 (27:50):
On October twenty ninth, nineteen twenty nine, after a decade
of post World War One prosperity, the New York Stock
Exchange suffers the most catastrophic crash it will ever see,
losing over fourteen billion dollars in just one day. The
crash launches a heartbreaking era for America, the Great Depression.
(28:13):
The fallout quickly spreads throughout the world, but one of
the countries taking the biggest hit is Germany. Hitler will
not let this national crisis go to waste.
Speaker 19 (28:25):
Unemployment increased so dramatically that it opened the door for
radical movements to gain support.
Speaker 3 (28:34):
It was a Great Depression that made Hitler possible. Hitler
believes he can rally the desperate people around his vision
of a new powerful Germany, setting in motion a plan
he first described in his manifesto mancan.
Speaker 13 (28:54):
What we must fight for.
Speaker 8 (28:56):
It's to safeguard existence and production of our race and
our people.
Speaker 19 (29:04):
Mine comfort is enormously significant. It provided a kind of
outline for all the things that Lifter wanted to do.
Speaker 7 (29:12):
Eventually, Hitler clearly believed passionately from the start of his
career right to the end that the Jews were the
world enemy who intended to destroy Germany. As a paranoid fantasy,
he believed he was chosen by destiny to rescue Germany.
Speaker 16 (29:32):
We must Versai.
Speaker 3 (29:35):
Hitler recruits new members to his party and tours the
country giving impassioned speeches and distributing various forms of Nazi propaganda.
Speaker 7 (29:44):
What the Nazis did was to project an image of energy,
figure youth determination in the service of Germany. They're constantly
marching through the streets with banners as constant speeches. Thing's
huge activity, and this projects this image of the they're
(30:05):
going to do something. All the other parties are just
wasting their time talking. We're actually going to do something.
Speaker 6 (30:10):
If the nation does its duty, then the day will come,
which restalls to us one line in honor and freedom.
Speaker 13 (30:22):
Hillis speeches had some kind of unique power. He served
as a lightning rod for all the discontent in Germany.
They managed to focus it and channel it and become it.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Within a few years, the National Socialist party is transformed
from a fringe organization into a growing political movement. Hitler's
Nazi Party quickly holds the largest numbers of seats in Parliament.
The Nazi strong men come not to debate, but to
end debate. The government comes to a standstill. Now with
(31:06):
widespread support, Hitler's dream is finally within his grasp. He
has won his countrymen by demands for action. Now they
expect action. He has promised a new Germany, Now they
want it. The evangelist of hate has become the profit
of hope. Moderate parties try to remind the public of
(31:29):
Hitler's long standing promise that when he gains power, heads
will roll. It is a campaign promise Hitler fully intends
to keep.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
You solemnly swear.
Speaker 16 (31:45):
To carry out the obligations of the office of Chancellor.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
Just as Franklin Delano Roosevelt is first elected President of
the United States in nineteen thirty three, the faltering senile
German President Hindenburg ann's Hitler a ceremonial position in the
government as Chancellor of Germany, hoping to pacify his Nazi movement.
But in the slippery business of double dealing, Hitler proves
(32:11):
the master Immediately following the ceremony, twenty million people across
Germany tune into this radio broadcast, Hitler's largest audience ever.
Speaker 4 (32:29):
Okay, Germans, my people party members, rich and poor, city
and country, the educated and knowing and the ignorant. The
(32:52):
task of politics is not to represent just one faction.
Speaker 8 (32:59):
The science.
Speaker 16 (33:00):
Rather, the task of politics et popular India must be
to overcome these divisions for a greater good.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Line in our hands alone reached its coast.
Speaker 16 (33:29):
Life the destiny of the German people.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
In these hands.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
The words of the speech are unimportant oft repeated platitudes,
but the level at which they ignite passion, loyalty and
obedience is sorcery. After this speech, the Nazi Party is
flooded with so many membership requests they have to suspend admissions. Then,
(33:58):
just two weeks after being named the Chancellor, someone sets
fire to the German parliament building called the reichstog.
Speaker 2 (34:06):
Tell Rom it can still giddy.
Speaker 3 (34:08):
Hitler, who never claims responsibility, arrives on scene and feigns outrage.
Speaker 10 (34:14):
This this is a signal from God. If we're under siege.
The terrorists have open fire.
Speaker 18 (34:21):
And we will fire back.
Speaker 16 (34:23):
It's good to seem so happy.
Speaker 10 (34:24):
This is an outrageous crime, and someone will ask.
Speaker 3 (34:28):
Hitler calls an emergency meeting of the Reichstag.
Speaker 10 (34:31):
In order for the governments to carry out necessary procedures
against terrorism, Reichstag must support an enabling accent. This act
is your opportunity to hand power over those that can
wielded most effective. From now on, all legislation will be
(34:52):
handled by the administration, which will have so rights to
make constitutional changes. Speech, association and the press are temporarily suspended.
Speaker 18 (35:08):
Privacy rights in relation to telephone and personal communication are revoked.
Speaker 6 (35:16):
Return to its seat.
Speaker 16 (35:17):
I will take any.
Speaker 18 (35:18):
Refusal as a statement of opposition. You must design Will
it be peace?
Speaker 4 (35:26):
Oh?
Speaker 14 (35:32):
Deutsche Land, deuge Land.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
They approve the Enabling Act, which effectively turns Germany into
a police state with Hitler as their absolute ruler. In
what will become known as the Knight with the Long Knives,
Hitler begins arresting German citizens by the thousands and eliminates
(36:05):
nearly one hundred of his political enemies, including media figures
and reporters. Your soul, even his own essay, commander earns.
Speaker 10 (36:18):
Rome hi Fura, I'm sorry in.
Speaker 6 (36:25):
His honor I will bring you all into the risv Army.
Speaker 3 (36:29):
Rome's essay are replaced with two million Hitler control to
SS guards. In one move, Adolf Hitler has taken complete
control of the government and is now supreme leader of
Germany's sixty seven million citizens.
Speaker 18 (36:47):
A title peace, a prosperity, a white house, one thousand
year right has begun. Aga see.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Had a terrific job by the production, editing and storytelling
by our own Greg Hengler. And a special thanks to
Sir Richard Evans, Ron Rosenbaum, Douglas Brinkley and Robert Galately,
historians whose voices you heard throughout that piece and the
dramatic audio clips were from the film Hitler The Rise
of Evil, which can be purchased at Vision Video dot com.
(37:35):
That's Vision Video dot com. And what a story you
just heard. How Hitler exploited the Great Depression, use the
Great Depression, without which his rise to power was simply impossible,
and then of course used the narrative that the Jews
had destroyed the country, and then of course had an
(37:56):
answer to that, which was to seize power, total control,
absolute control over the nearly seventy million citizens of Germany.
The story of the rise of Adolf Hitler.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
Here on our American stories.
This is Lee Habib and this is our American stories,
the show where America is the star and the American
people coming to you from the city where the West begins,
Fort Worth, Texas. The Third Reich which Adolf Hitler built,
lasted just twelve years, but his calculated butchery of human
lives and the human spirit surpassed anything this earth.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
Had ever seen.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
How did these cultured people, steeped in Christianity and the
arts and science collapse into barbarism in the twentieth century.
To seek the answers, we must follow the Germans and
the rise of their leader, Adolf Hitler. Let's take a listen.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Evil and chaos can have gentle beginnings. It is in
the backwater countryside of northern Austria where Adolf Hitler is
born on April twentieth, eighteen eighty nine. He's the third
child of the third marriage of an Austrian customs official.
He's the first of the children to live past fifty.
(01:13):
His father, Alloys, is a harsh and restless man. Three
of his seven children are conceived out of wedlock. Adolf's
young mother, Clara, who is also his father's niece, is
the life of Adolph's existence. She is a very sweet,
hard working, and deeply religious Catholic who will forever remain
his warmest memory. As a boy, a teacher observes that
(01:37):
young Adolph has limited talent, is lazy and bad tempered,
and arrogantly fancies himself a leader. Adolf is just thirteen
years old when his father dies in nineteen o three.
At eighteen, with boundless confidence and a portfolio of schoolboy sketches,
(01:58):
young Hitler sets out to conquer Vienna, certain his talent
will open all doors. Hitler applies for admission to the
Academy of Fine Arts, but he will walk its corridors
only as a visitor. In a shattering and unexpected blow,
he is rejected.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
I'm sorry, hit though you don't have a style.
Speaker 5 (02:18):
Your people that like little billings.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
There's no light.
Speaker 6 (02:20):
Perhaps if you tried architecture or theatrical design. I'm truly sorry.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
Best of luck.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Then, just four years after his father's passing, Adolf's mother
dies of breast cancer. All alone, Adolf Hitler sinks into
a world of drifters and nobody's. Unwashed and gaunt, he
sells an occasional crude painting around town for next to nothing.
While living in flophouses and in the streets.
Speaker 7 (02:49):
Hitler didn't have a plan B. When he was rejected,
he just didn't know what to do, so he started
to drift. He had very little money if he was
living in a mouth existence. He had no clear aim
in life at all. He was, in a sense, waiting
for something to happen.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
Among Vienna's discontented subculture. Hitler's heartache finds echoes throughout the streets.
Speaker 8 (03:13):
It's the Jews, swarm into our country, steal it bread
from our tapes.
Speaker 3 (03:20):
Just ask on mayor.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
They are so great human form.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
For the first time, Hitler senses the uses of hate,
the explosive political force stored in the resentments and fears
of the masses. His own hates are many, the intermarriage
with non Germans, parliamentary government, inferior races, and of course
the Jews. Anti Semitism has always existed in European society,
(03:53):
but in Hitler it becomes all consuming.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
It's all their fault.
Speaker 9 (03:58):
He's swarm into our country, take the food.
Speaker 2 (04:01):
From our mouths.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
Here we are German and hungry. Early on, he begins
reciting anti Semitic platitudes to anyone on the streets who
will listen. In nineteen thirteen, Hitler leaves Vienna for the
German fatherland Munich.
Speaker 10 (04:21):
I'm off of the real Germazar.
Speaker 3 (04:24):
The harsh, brooding newcomer is out of place. Munich is
the boisterous German land of beer and pretzels, but not
for long.
Speaker 10 (04:34):
For war.
Speaker 11 (04:36):
Postriate Artsteuke's assassination leads to war.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
On August one, nineteen fourteen, a huge enthusiastic crowd, including
the misfit outsider Adolf Hitler, gathers in Munich Plaza, the
occasion to celebrate Germany's entry into World War One.
Speaker 6 (04:54):
England, France and Russia returning forces.
Speaker 4 (04:57):
Against our ali Austria.
Speaker 11 (05:00):
We must stand with that good Nik, ready to sacrifice.
The country is everything we are now only cover.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
Germany has finally given Hitler what he's always longed for
a place to belong. I fell down on my knees.
Hitler rites in mind, comp and thanked Heaven for being
permitted to live at this time. With the advent of
the machine gun, war begins, producing epic numbers of casualties.
(05:36):
Here's retired US Army General Stanley McCrystal explaining World War
one's trench warfare.
Speaker 12 (05:42):
As they found that if they dug even shallow trenches
and used machine guns, a small number of troops could
stop a large attacking force. And then both sides started
to dig trenches, and so they were locked along this line,
the Western Front, which was this extraordinarily complex set of
(06:02):
trenches that didn't move very much either way.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
The trenches cover twenty five thousand miles, laid end to end,
they would circle the globe. Two days after Germany's war declaration,
Hitler joins the German army and becomes stationed in the trenches.
The open area in between the trenches is so deadly
it's known as no man's land. Hitler becomes a dispatch runner,
(06:30):
whereby he leaves the safety of his company's trench in
order to deliver messages through the body littered no man's
land and into the nearby German trenches. But after months
on the front lines, Hitler is still seen as an outcast.
Speaker 7 (06:45):
Hitler was regarded by the other troops something of a loner,
something of a rather peculiar, eccentric person kept to himself.
Speaker 3 (06:54):
But what Hitler lacks in popularity he makes up foreign
blind ambition.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
And You've been listening to the story of the Rise
of Adolf Hitler, and what you're hearing here is a
full and total picture of what drove the man. The
story of the Rise of Adolf Hitler continues here on
our American Stories, Leehabib Here, as we approach our nation's
(07:32):
two hundred and fiftieth anniversary, I'd like to remind you
that all the history stories you hear on this show
are brought to you by the great folks at Hillsdale College.
And Hillsdale isn't just a great school for your kids
or grandkids to attend, but for you as well. Go
to Hillsdale dot edu to find out about their terrific
free online courses. Their series on Communism is one of
the finest I've ever seen. Again, go to Hillsdale dot
(07:55):
edu and sign up for their free and terrific online courses.
Speaker 2 (08:09):
And we continue with our.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
American Stories in the Story of the Rise of Adolf
Hitler and the Third Reich.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
Let's return to the story.
Speaker 13 (08:17):
Hitler's role as a messenger was actually considered perhaps the
most dangerous task in trench warfare, running from trench to trench,
exposing himself to enemy fire. The mortality rate for messengers
was quite significant.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
Then this mind crushing whopper of a what if moment
occurs on the battlefield.
Speaker 14 (08:46):
Andy has Adolf Hitler in his sights, and even though
he's a trained soldier, he can't bring himself to pull
the trigger.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
Years of trench warfare transform made off Hitler from a
directionless loaner to a hardened soldier. The gas attacks are
endless to Hitler, They've become routine, but this time it's different.
The Allies hit the Germans with a deadly new form
of chemical warfare, mustard gas.
Speaker 15 (09:24):
Mustard gas affects the central nervous system. It creates mustard
colored blisters on the skin. It blinds people, it strips
away the mucous membranes. It's incredibly pink and debilitating. And
since it had no odor, by the time you realize
that you would in held it and it was on
your skin, it was too late.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
On October fourteenth, nineteen eighteen, Hitler becomes one of the
victims of a British mustard gas attack. Then, less than
a month later, after four years of continuous fighting and
thirty seven million casualties, Germany surrenders while most of the
world celebrates the end of the fighting. One unknown twenty
(10:07):
nine year old man. Gentlemen recovering at a military hospital.
Speaker 16 (10:11):
I have your attention.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
Here's the news.
Speaker 8 (10:14):
I have an.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
Important announcement to make.
Speaker 7 (10:19):
Earlier today, the Army High Command agreed to negotiate the
terms of surrender.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
War is over.
Speaker 17 (10:28):
We must place ourselves now at the mercy of the victim.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
It will be generous.
Speaker 13 (10:40):
Hitler took the surrender personally, a personal destructive glow to himself.
He also took it as a mission, a mission in
life to avenge and rectify this surrender.
Speaker 3 (11:07):
While the fighting has stopped, the pressure is on the
United States and their fellow allied victors to come to
an agreement on how to prevent war from ever breaking
out again. The leaders of each allied country, including the
President of the United States, Woodrow Wilson, gather at the
Palace of Versailles in France. After six months of intense negotiations,
(11:31):
the resolution falls on Germany, forcing them to pay eighty
billion dollars, the modern equivalent of nearly half a trillion dollars,
a debt they won't pay off until twenty ten.
Speaker 9 (11:44):
Germany immediately is struggling with a question of survival. For
ordinary Germans. The war did not end in November nineteen eighteen.
For ordinary Germans, the battle for survival, the daily struggle
for food, the effort to find shoes and clothing, stretched
on into the nineteen twenties.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
As anger and starvation spread, tensions rise throughout the country.
Radical factions struggle to win over the hearts and minds
of the populace. The communists and the socialists battled daily
in the streets. Who will be able to best exploit
this national crisis. Hitler becomes an informer for the demobilized
(12:24):
German Army and is assigned to infiltrate one of the
many socialist factions.
Speaker 8 (12:30):
One of these groups is the German Workers' Party, ed
by man called Anton Drexler. They gather in the back
room of the beer haul, just an excuse to have
a drink, I expect, but pay them a visit and
tell me what they're planning.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
I don't drink some.
Speaker 8 (12:45):
Just listen then interest.
Speaker 3 (12:49):
The German Workers Party is an insignificant group of pessimistic
and defeated men passing the time in a beer hall
while delivering uninspired speeches and rhetorical plant attitudes about racial
superiority and social reform.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Than to declare Bavarian independence.
Speaker 3 (13:05):
Hitler tries to remain in the background, but is unable
to restrain his impassioned tongue.
Speaker 18 (13:11):
You're talking about the purity of the German people.
Speaker 19 (13:15):
Just no fairy tale, as I was saying.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
This burst of inspiration was not lost on the party's leader,
Anton Drexler. Drexler asks Hitler to speak at their next
meeting on October sixteenth, nineteen nineteen.
Speaker 14 (13:34):
Many of you may remember him by his comments at
our last meeting, so please welcome, hey, Adolf.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
Hitler.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
But the party attendees are more interested in their beer
and getting lost in their thoughts.
Speaker 6 (13:53):
Is anyone listening?
Speaker 18 (13:56):
That's the problem nowadays, isn't it?
Speaker 6 (13:59):
No one cares, no wonder we face extinction.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
This is the three two one lift off moment for
Adolf Hitler and what would soon become known as the
Nazi Party. In just five months, the German Workers Party
expands quickly. They changed the name to the National Socialist
Party or Nazi for short.
Speaker 17 (14:24):
Enemies among us.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
Under Hitler's leadership, Membership in the National Socialist Party quickly expands.
As Hitler experiences his first taste of real power. The
media love the charismatic speaker and begin printing his stories.
Over the next two decades, Adolf Hitler will seduce the
(14:48):
media all over the world. Even in the United States.
Time magazine awards him their Man of the Year in
nineteen thirty eight.
Speaker 6 (14:57):
Who alone are responsible for the moral decades? But now
riddles our society, Jews, I do you call themselves gentlemen?
But who are now?
Speaker 8 (15:09):
And who?
Speaker 6 (15:09):
I've always been unwelcome, unwanted, And they are everywhere inviting
our governments, stripping out of our savings, raping our families
and our heritage. I tell you, friends, this is war.
Speaker 8 (15:25):
Oh.
Speaker 6 (15:26):
They soon to turn, for the invaders will become their victims.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
As the National Socialist Party grows, agitators from rival political
factions pour into their meetings in order to disrupt them.
They shout down Hitler and start fights. He needs protection.
Speaker 6 (15:49):
We need more men like you in the.
Speaker 3 (15:52):
Aid of finds muscle in a military official Earns scrom
Rome is made commander of the Storm Battalion, or essay,
the Nazi Party's militia. But before this can happen, Rome
points out the obvious.
Speaker 8 (16:08):
My men can crush a revolution that can also create one,
because they love this country as much as you.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Or I does.
Speaker 8 (16:19):
The only little problem is they're unemployed.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
Yes, and you've been listening to the story of the
rise of Adolf Hitler, and what you're hearing here is
a full and total picture of what drove the man.
And it wasn't just his hatred of Jews or outsiders.
It wasn't just a quest for power. No, he wanted revenge,
(16:48):
revenge for what had happened to Germany and this surrender.
He just couldn't believe that Germany had surrendered to the Allies,
and my goodness, he went to work to do something
about it.
Speaker 2 (17:01):
Of Course, the humiliation the.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Germans faced through that gathering at Versailles, where they were
forced to pay over eighty billion dollars in restitution, would
keep Germany starved and hungry and angry. And of course
there was Hitler to just capture it all, take advantage
of it all, and then of course to take over
the Germans Workers' Party, a nascent, almost nonexistent party that
(17:27):
had no influence.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
And of course, last.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
But not least, he realizes he needs a militia for protection,
and realizes also that if you can crush a revolution,
you can start one. When we come back, the Rise
of Adolf Hitler continues here on our American stories. And
(18:08):
we continue with our American stories and the story of
the rise of Adolf Hitler. And when we last left off,
Hitler had taken the Germans Workers' Party and turned it
into the National Socialist Party.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Let's return to the story.
Speaker 17 (18:22):
I know some people who would love to hear you
speak were not likely to go to a beer hall
the wealth.
Speaker 10 (18:29):
I've met a few arm chair politicians care more about
their money than you do their own country.
Speaker 17 (18:35):
Yes, but surely as your party's propagandali and you must
know that in order to defend their money, they'll spend
it a good deal of it, not as if someone
they trust tells them it's a safe bet. That's where
I come in, Hitler.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Hitler turns to the Harvard educated American businessman Earnst Homsteingle.
Hofsteingle and his wife Helena introduced Hitler to Munich High
society and help polish his image. Soon after, Ernst and
Helena invite Hitler to speak to a room of influential Germans.
It's here where Adolf will meet the future commander of
(19:09):
the Nazi Air Force, Hermann Gurry, to cast all Germany
under his spell. Hitler needs an image that will burn
into the minds of millions.
Speaker 7 (19:20):
Nowadays, we'd call it a logo. Of course, it was
designed personally by Hitler, and it may be that he
put some of his artistic impulses into this. The essential
part of it ultimately went back to India, but it
was taken up as a symbol of racism and anti Semitism.
Combined with the red background for socialism and the red,
(19:41):
white and black colors for the old.
Speaker 3 (19:42):
Kazvice, Hitler's artistic creation is known as the Swastika. Hitler
can now fund Rome's Essay police Force and begin to
push out party propaganda en mass. The Nazi Party newspaper
is also launched in nineteen.
Speaker 6 (20:01):
Maikov and the People of Germany Free Witness.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
On November eighth, nineteen twenty three, in what will become
known as the Beer Hall Push, Hitler leads his Nazis
into a Munich beer hall where top government officials are munal.
Speaker 6 (20:20):
The German Revolution against Tonight.
Speaker 3 (20:26):
Threatened at gunpoint. The government leaders reluctantly agree to support
Hitler's new regime. Then, Hitler and his three thousand Nazis
swiftly march into the Munich streets to take the city
by force.
Speaker 8 (20:41):
As an group heading course of barracks.
Speaker 3 (20:43):
His entourage includes Houstingle, Gerring, his future deputy fearer Rudolph Hess,
along with Rome and his Essay soldiers. But one hundred
German police are prepared. Sixteen Nazis and three policemen are killed.
(21:09):
Gurring is shot in the groin. Hitler suffers a dislocated
shoulder when the man he locks arms with is shot
and pulls him down onto the pavement. Hitler's bodyguards takes
several bullets after jumping on top of the fallen Hitler,
saving his life. Hitler scrambles along a sidewalk out of
the line of fire and crawls into a waiting car. Gory,
(21:33):
Hitler's attempt to seize power fails.
Speaker 10 (21:36):
I know a safe place, all right.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
I'm a hat desperate, suicidal, and still armed with his pistol.
The injured Hitler seeks refuge in Hofstingle's home just outside
of Munich. Hofstingle's wife, Helena, dissuades Hitler from committing suicide
as the police come to arrest him. He's arrested and
(21:59):
charged with treason. With the collapse of the Nazi Revolution,
Hitler's political career and the Nazi movement has come to
a crashing, almost laughable end.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
How do you plead.
Speaker 17 (22:16):
Guilty?
Speaker 3 (22:23):
Hitler uses his trial as a personal forum to publicize
his worldview to the German nationhead.
Speaker 9 (22:35):
You have been accused of high treason and called an
enemy of the state.
Speaker 10 (22:39):
If a thief takes your money and you take it back,
does that make you also a thief?
Speaker 3 (22:45):
The courtroom quickly becomes a stage, and Hitler is its
hero protagonist.
Speaker 6 (22:53):
In nineteen eighteen, we were betrayed by the November Tromans,
the ones who claimed to be our leader. They entered
the wall signed a treaty of a side.
Speaker 16 (23:06):
That's what's hires.
Speaker 6 (23:14):
This is supposed to be an interrogation, not a speech.
Speaker 3 (23:17):
The judge is visibly impressed by Hitler's response to the prosecutor.
Speaker 6 (23:21):
If I am guilty of anything, then I am guilty
of fighting to defend the rights of a German people.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
Fascinating, isn't it.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
After twenty four days of deliberation, Hitler's fate rests in
the hands of the judge.
Speaker 5 (23:41):
And Hitler, God finds you guilty of trees. Yes, hereby
sentenced to will find two hundred gold marks in Landsberg.
Speaker 4 (24:05):
You will.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
You will be eligible for parole in nine months.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
It's a slap on the wrist. Hitler has turned defeat
into triumph. The provincial troublemaker is now a national hero.
His wait vis Hey Hitler. Hitler spends all his eight
months as a celebrated guest in prison.
Speaker 6 (24:37):
Yes, sir, and if I might say so, sir, it's
an honor to serve.
Speaker 3 (24:42):
You, plotting his next move with Nazi cellmate Rudolph Hess,
who volunteers his time in prison to be Hitler's secretary.
Welcome my funeral. Thank you guys.
Speaker 16 (24:57):
Well, it's love, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Things missing an audience and an income.
Speaker 18 (25:02):
Perhaps I wrote a memoir.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
What do you think? I think it's an excellent idea.
Speaker 4 (25:07):
Good.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
Then I need the publisher to gain followers and to
spread his message. The thirty five year old Hitler creates
a manifesto financed and published by the Harvard educated Hofstingle,
the heart of which is a radical plan for world domination.
He titles it mine komf for My Struggle. On December twentieth,
(25:34):
nineteen twenty four, Hitler is free. But now Hitler's twisted
socialist crusade is stopped by the adversary he fears. Most
good times have come to Germany. Rebellions have faded, the
inflation halted, the country is back to work, and the
hardships and humiliations of defeat are fading.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
And you've been listening to the story of the rise
of Adolf Hitler and how he came to power, and
ultimately how he came to power was a failed attempt
to come to power, which led to a trial that
Hitler used brilliantly as a stage in which he set
himself up as the protagonist, as the hero in his
(26:24):
own story and a hero fighting for the cause of Germany.
And the judge he played his part in Hitler's play
as well, sentencing Hitler to a mere five years with
eligibility for parole.
Speaker 2 (26:39):
At nine months.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
Not just a slap on the wrist, almost an endorsement,
and while in prison, he takes the time to pen
his manifesto Mine comf, which of course translated from German
is my struggle.
Speaker 2 (26:54):
When we come back.
Speaker 1 (26:56):
The Rise of Adolf Hitler continues here on our American stories,
(27:37):
and we continue with our American stories and the story
of the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich.
Let's pick up where we last left off.
Speaker 3 (27:50):
On October twenty ninth, nineteen twenty nine, after a decade
of post World War One prosperity, the New York Stock
Exchange suffers the most catastrophic crash it will ever see,
losing over fourteen billion dollars in just one day. The
crash launches a heartbreaking era for America, the Great Depression.
(28:13):
The fallout quickly spreads throughout the world, but one of
the countries taking the biggest hit is Germany. Hitler will
not let this national crisis go to waste.
Speaker 19 (28:25):
Unemployment increased so dramatically that it opened the door for
radical movements to gain support.
Speaker 3 (28:34):
It was a Great Depression that made Hitler possible. Hitler
believes he can rally the desperate people around his vision
of a new powerful Germany, setting in motion a plan
he first described in his manifesto mancan.
Speaker 13 (28:54):
What we must fight for.
Speaker 8 (28:56):
It's to safeguard existence and production of our race and
our people.
Speaker 19 (29:04):
Mine comfort is enormously significant. It provided a kind of
outline for all the things that Lifter wanted to do.
Speaker 7 (29:12):
Eventually, Hitler clearly believed passionately from the start of his
career right to the end that the Jews were the
world enemy who intended to destroy Germany. As a paranoid fantasy,
he believed he was chosen by destiny to rescue Germany.
Speaker 16 (29:32):
We must Versai.
Speaker 3 (29:35):
Hitler recruits new members to his party and tours the
country giving impassioned speeches and distributing various forms of Nazi propaganda.
Speaker 7 (29:44):
What the Nazis did was to project an image of energy,
figure youth determination in the service of Germany. They're constantly
marching through the streets with banners as constant speeches. Thing's
huge activity, and this projects this image of the they're
(30:05):
going to do something. All the other parties are just
wasting their time talking. We're actually going to do something.
Speaker 6 (30:10):
If the nation does its duty, then the day will come,
which restalls to us one line in honor and freedom.
Speaker 13 (30:22):
Hillis speeches had some kind of unique power. He served
as a lightning rod for all the discontent in Germany.
They managed to focus it and channel it and become it.
Speaker 3 (30:43):
Within a few years, the National Socialist party is transformed
from a fringe organization into a growing political movement. Hitler's
Nazi Party quickly holds the largest numbers of seats in Parliament.
The Nazi strong men come not to debate, but to
end debate. The government comes to a standstill. Now with
(31:06):
widespread support, Hitler's dream is finally within his grasp. He
has won his countrymen by demands for action. Now they
expect action. He has promised a new Germany, Now they
want it. The evangelist of hate has become the profit
of hope. Moderate parties try to remind the public of
(31:29):
Hitler's long standing promise that when he gains power, heads
will roll. It is a campaign promise Hitler fully intends
to keep.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
You solemnly swear.
Speaker 16 (31:45):
To carry out the obligations of the office of Chancellor.
Speaker 3 (31:50):
Just as Franklin Delano Roosevelt is first elected President of
the United States in nineteen thirty three, the faltering senile
German President Hindenburg ann's Hitler a ceremonial position in the
government as Chancellor of Germany, hoping to pacify his Nazi movement.
But in the slippery business of double dealing, Hitler proves
(32:11):
the master Immediately following the ceremony, twenty million people across
Germany tune into this radio broadcast, Hitler's largest audience ever.
Speaker 4 (32:29):
Okay, Germans, my people party members, rich and poor, city
and country, the educated and knowing and the ignorant. The
(32:52):
task of politics is not to represent just one faction.
Speaker 8 (32:59):
The science.
Speaker 16 (33:00):
Rather, the task of politics et popular India must be
to overcome these divisions for a greater good.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Line in our hands alone reached its coast.
Speaker 16 (33:29):
Life the destiny of the German people.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
In these hands.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
The words of the speech are unimportant oft repeated platitudes,
but the level at which they ignite passion, loyalty and
obedience is sorcery. After this speech, the Nazi Party is
flooded with so many membership requests they have to suspend admissions. Then,
(33:58):
just two weeks after being named the Chancellor, someone sets
fire to the German parliament building called the reichstog.
Speaker 2 (34:06):
Tell Rom it can still giddy.
Speaker 3 (34:08):
Hitler, who never claims responsibility, arrives on scene and feigns outrage.
Speaker 10 (34:14):
This this is a signal from God. If we're under siege.
The terrorists have open fire.
Speaker 18 (34:21):
And we will fire back.
Speaker 16 (34:23):
It's good to seem so happy.
Speaker 10 (34:24):
This is an outrageous crime, and someone will ask.
Speaker 3 (34:28):
Hitler calls an emergency meeting of the Reichstag.
Speaker 10 (34:31):
In order for the governments to carry out necessary procedures
against terrorism, Reichstag must support an enabling accent. This act
is your opportunity to hand power over those that can
wielded most effective. From now on, all legislation will be
(34:52):
handled by the administration, which will have so rights to
make constitutional changes. Speech, association and the press are temporarily suspended.
Speaker 18 (35:08):
Privacy rights in relation to telephone and personal communication are revoked.
Speaker 6 (35:16):
Return to its seat.
Speaker 16 (35:17):
I will take any.
Speaker 18 (35:18):
Refusal as a statement of opposition. You must design Will
it be peace?
Speaker 4 (35:26):
Oh?
Speaker 14 (35:32):
Deutsche Land, deuge Land.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
They approve the Enabling Act, which effectively turns Germany into
a police state with Hitler as their absolute ruler. In
what will become known as the Knight with the Long Knives,
Hitler begins arresting German citizens by the thousands and eliminates
(36:05):
nearly one hundred of his political enemies, including media figures
and reporters. Your soul, even his own essay, commander earns.
Speaker 10 (36:18):
Rome hi Fura, I'm sorry in.
Speaker 6 (36:25):
His honor I will bring you all into the risv Army.
Speaker 3 (36:29):
Rome's essay are replaced with two million Hitler control to
SS guards. In one move, Adolf Hitler has taken complete
control of the government and is now supreme leader of
Germany's sixty seven million citizens.
Speaker 18 (36:47):
A title peace, a prosperity, a white house, one thousand
year right has begun. Aga see.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Had a terrific job by the production, editing and storytelling
by our own Greg Hengler. And a special thanks to
Sir Richard Evans, Ron Rosenbaum, Douglas Brinkley and Robert Galately,
historians whose voices you heard throughout that piece and the
dramatic audio clips were from the film Hitler The Rise
of Evil, which can be purchased at Vision Video dot com.
(37:35):
That's Vision Video dot com. And what a story you
just heard. How Hitler exploited the Great Depression, use the
Great Depression, without which his rise to power was simply impossible,
and then of course used the narrative that the Jews
had destroyed the country, and then of course had an
(37:56):
answer to that, which was to seize power, total control,
absolute control over the nearly seventy million citizens of Germany.
The story of the rise of Adolf Hitler.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
Here on our American stories.
Host
Lee Habeeb
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