| Chronology of the Third Reich To better understand the steps in which the Third Reich nightmare took form, it helps to know the major developments in Nazi Germany from Hitler’s ascendancy until his death. The brief summary that follows outlines the rise and fall of the Third Reich. 1933 Feb. : Hitler issues the Thirty-three Decrees—effectively banning opposition parties from functioning—and orders the Nazis to raid Communist Party headquarters. Later that month [many historians agree] the Nazis burn the Reichstag, blaming the destruction of Germany’s Parliament building on the Communists and using the incident to decree presidential emergency powers. March : Dachau opens near Munich as the Nazis’ first concentration camp and the SA jail thousands of people, launching what will become the common tactic of simply arresting and incarcerating anyone who opposes the regime. In nation-wide elections the Nazis fail to win a majority of German votes, but a deal with the Deutsche Nationale Volks Partei affords them control of the Reichstag. The SA subsequently force all provincial governments to resign in favor of centralized rule based in Berlin; the Bavarian government resists and is seized. The puppet Reichstag passes the Enabling Law, giving Hitler special powers as Chancellor, as well as the First Coordination Law of States and Reich, an attempt to exercise greater centralized power. Hitler appoints Joseph Goebbels Propaganda Minister—and, in return for Party favors, Ernst Hanfstaengl as Foreign Press Chief (right). April : State-sponsored boycott of Jewish shops and professionals decreed. The Reichstag passes the Second Coordinating Law, determining the appointment of provincial governors, as well as laws erasing all separation between Reich, provincial or civil service bureau. Except for Nazi publications, the government demands control over all media. Hitler appoints Rudolf Hess as the Nazi Party Deputy Leader. May : Independent labor unions banned, replaced by the state-run German Labor Front of Dr. Robert Ley, an alcoholic. Goebbels organizes a national book-burning campaign. June-July : Between 22 June and 5 July, six major political parties forcibly dissolved, leaving the Nazis as legally the only remaining party. Hitler and Pope Pius XI sign the Concordat, a complicit agreement between the Third Reich and the Vatican. Sept. : The Fifth Nazi Party Rally held in Nuremberg, a turning point for the ascending National Socialists and a Hitler eager to secure his power. Oct. : Reich Entailed Farm Law stabilizes small-farm ownership. Journalists required to register in order to write or broadcast. Nov. : Official national referendum claims ninety-five percent of the adult population approves of Nazi policy. Kraft durch Freude—Strength through Joy—campaign launched by the official German Labor Front as a ploy to pacify workers. Dec. : Reichstag Fire trial ends with the Dutch-born communist Marinus van der Lubbe found guilty and subsequently executed. 1934 March : Former German Chancellor Heinrich Brüning voluntarily flees the country for refuge in the United States. Having fallen out of favor with the Führer and thinking that a plot to liquidate him by being dropped from a plane is on its way, Ernst Hanfstaengl flees the Third Reich for fear of his life—only to be interned in Canada. April : Himmler (below) becomes inspector of the Prussian Gestapo . July : Roehm shot in his jail cell; the Reichstag passes a law pardoning all recent state-sponsored killings and Hitler addresses the nation, rationalizing the purge. Austrian Chancellor Engelbert Dollfuss killed in an attempted Nazi coup. Aug. : President Paul von Hindenburg dies; the Nazis abolish the German Presidency, making Hitler the supreme commander of the Third Reich and requiring loyalty oaths of all German officials. Oct. : All workers forcibly coerced to join the German Labor Front. 1935 Jan. : A Saar plebiscite returns the Saarland to German rule. March : Hitler denounces the Treaty of Versailles’ disarmament clauses and orders universal conscription of all German young men. April : The German military establishes the Luftwaffe, the new German airforce. Sept. : Nuernberg Laws passed removing the rights of all Jews in German territory. The Nazis declare their swastika banner the German national flag. Nov. : National Law of Citizenship passed, defining a “Jew” and “Mischling”—individuals of mixed race. The regime declares being Aryan prerequisite to holding public office. First Decree of the Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honor passes, forbidding marriages between Aryans, Jews and Mischling. 1936 Feb. : The Gestapo gains reign over the entire nation. March : The German government disregards the Locarno Treaty of 1928 when its troops re-enter the Rhineland. June : The Reichsfuehrer SS commander combines his post with the command of all German police. The government announces compulsory Labor Service. July : The Spanish Civil War begins, providing rehearsal for the Second World War. Aug. : The XI Olympiad Games open in Berlin, forcing the Nazi regime to exhibit its best behavior; oppression of Jews relaxed. German arrogance over sports victories pierced by the success of Jesse Owens, a Black U.S. American. Nov. : Rome and Berlin announce an Axis agreement, as well as the Anti-Comintern Pact with Japan. German bombers arrive in Spain. 1937 June : SS orders those jailed for racial offenses to be sent to concentration camps. Nov. : Italy signs Anti-Comintern Pact. 1938 Feb. : Hitler assumes role of Minister of War and Commander in Chief of the military; he appoints Joachim von Ribbentrop as Foreign Minister. Hitler calls Austrian Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg to Berchtesgaden and gives ultimatum to surrender Austrian autonomy. March : Germany annexes Austria without an armed struggle and applies all German laws to Austria—now renamed “Ostmark” and headed by Nazi collaborator, Artur Seyss-Inquart. April : All Jews required to register their wealth. June : Nazis destroy a Munich synagogue; all Jews required to register businesses. July : British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain visits Hitler at Berchtesgaden to discuss the future of Czechoslovakia. Aug. : Nazis destroy a Nuernberg synagogue; all Jews ordered to use either “Israel” or “Sara” as their middle names, effective in 1939. Sept. : Chamberlain meets with Hitler at Godesberg, then with French Prime Minister Edouard Daladier and Benito Mussolini at Munich; they agree to allow Germany to occupy the Sudetenland. Oct. : The Wehrmacht occupies the Sudetenland; seventeen thousand Polish Jews expelled from the region and all Jews’ passports stamped with a distinguishing “J”. Nov. : Ernst vom Rath, junior official at the German embassy in France is shot by the Polish-born Jew Herschel Grynszpan, providing an excuse for the Nazis to instigate the Kristallnacht—the Night of Broken Glass—Pogrom and imprison more than twenty thousand Jews. The Nazi government decrees Jews excluded from the national economy and demands a collective fine of twelve-and-a-half million Marks to pay for damage done by Nazi mobs. Jews expelled from schools. President Roosevelt recalls the U.S. Ambassador. Dec. : The German government oversees Aryan confiscation of all Jewish businesses. 1939 March : Declaring them “Protectorates,” Germany occupies Bohemia and Moravia. Hitler demands that Poland surrender its legal possession of Danzig and the Polish Corridor. Spain signs the Anti-Comintern Pact. April : All Jewish valuables confiscated; Law on Tenancies passes in an effort to house all Jews in “Jewish houses.” Aug. : Hitler and Stalin sign Non-Aggression Pact; Britain and Poland sign mutual assistance agreement. Sept. : Germany invades Poland and annexes Danzig, leading Britain and France to declare war on the Third Reich. The Soviet Union invades Poland, as allowed by the Non-Aggression Pact. The Germans force all Jews indoors after eight on winter evenings—nine on summer evenings—and confiscate all radios held by Jews. 1940 Feb. : The Nazis first deport German Jews, mostly from Pomerania. April : Germany invades Denmark and Norway. May : Germany invades the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg and France. June : France surrenders at Compiegne, where the Germans had surrendered at the end of the First World War. Germany divides France into occupied and officially “unoccupied” (Vichy) zones. July : Romania becomes a German ally. Ion Antonescu is PrimeMinister. Aug. : The Battle of Britain begins. The Soviet Union occupies the Baltic republics of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. Sept. : Japan joins the Axis. Oct. : Germany expels all non-Germans from Alsace-Lorraine, the Saarland and Baden. Nov. : Hungary, Romania and Slovakia sign treaties with Nazi Germany and divisions from these countries take part in the invasion of USSR. 1941 Jan. : Germany and the Soviet Union forge trade and boundary agreements. Hitler forms the Afrika Korps to send to Libya and occupies Bulgaria. April : Germany invades Yugoslavia and Greece. May : Rudolf Hess flies to Britain in an attempt to negotiate an end to the war. June : Germany invades the Soviet Union. July : Goering orders all occupied lands cleared of Jews. German troops reach the Ukraine. Sept. : The German government requires all Jews to wear yellow stars and begins a general deportation of German Jews. The Wehrmacht takes Kiev and begins its siege on Leningrad. Nov. : The German assault on Moscow begins to fail. Sensing that the U.S. A. entry into the war nears, the German Propaganda Ministry begins excluding U.S. American journalists from press conferences and government officials begin excluding U.S. diplomats from state functions. Dec. : Japan attacks the U.S. navy at Pear Harbor, as well as Dutch and British territories in Asia. War ensues between the United States, Germany and Japan. The Gestapo occupies the United States Embassy and its compound, while the German Foreign Office interns all U.S. Americans remaining in the Third Reich at Bad Nauheim, a converted resort near Frankfurt am Main. 1942 Jan. : At the first “United Nations” conference—held in Washington— Britain, France, the Soviet Union and the United States agree not to sign separate peace agreements with a defeated Germany. In the Berlin suburb of Wannsee, the Nazi government decides to implement the “Final Solution” to the “Jewish problem.” April : Jews banned from all German pubic transportation. May : The German army pushes the British out of Libya. British bombing raids on Germany intensify. June : The Nazis initiate mass gassings at Auschwitz. The German government repatriates all remaining U.S. Americans captured inside the Third Reich the previous December in exchange for the return of its nationals living in the United States. July : The Germans reach El Alamein in Egypt and Sevastopol in the Soviet Crimean. Aug. : The U.S. air force begins bombing raids on European targets. Sept. : German troops enter Stalingrad. Oct. : The British repel the German offensive at El Alamein. Nov. : British and U.S. troops land in Morocco and Algeria; German troops retreat from Egypt and Libya to Tunisia, meanwhile occupying Vichy France. The Soviets begin their counter-attack at Stalingrad. 1943 Jan. : The Soviets defeat the Germans at Stalingrad. May : German and Italian troops surrender in North Africa. July British and U.S. troops capture Sicily. Mussolini overthrown. Sept. : Allied troops land on Italian mainland; Italy surrenders. Oct. : Italy declares war on Germany. The Soviets recapture Kiev. 1944 Jan. : The Germans end their siege on Leningrad. May : The Soviets recapture Sevastopol. June : Allied troops capture Rome. Under the code name “D-Day,” British and U.S. military units land in Normandy France. Germany begins V-1 bombing of Britain. July : A failed assassination attempt barely misses taking Hitler’s life and the Soviets liberate the first concentration camp in Poland. Aug. : Allied forces recapture Paris. The Soviets enter Bucharest. Sept. : The Soviets enter Yugoslavia. Oct. : The Soviets enter Hungary. Birthday of the Webmaster in Marseilles (France) Nov. : The SS destroy the Auschwitz crematoria as they evacuate the former death camp. Dec. : The Ardennes offensive begins. 1945 Jan. : The Soviets liberate Auschwitz, revealing to the world for the first time the full horrors of Nazi tyranny against the Jews as well as other prisoners. March : U.S. troops capture the Rhine bridge at Remagen, while the British cross Germany’s largest river to the north. U.S. troops approach Frankfurt am Main. April : The Soviets capture Vienna while British and U.S. troops advance east. As the Soviet army reaches the outskirts of Berlin, the German dictator Adolf Hitler commits suicide with his bride Eva Braun. May : The Third Reich collapses * Hitler commits suicide * Himmler commits suicide * Goebbels and his wife commit suicide *In 1946 Göring commits suicide *The Nazi leaders were a bunch of cowards The 3rd Reich was supposed to last 1000 years A chronology of the Holocaust |
| E.Hanfstaengl |
| Dr. Robert Ley, Labor Front Leader |
| Ernst Röhm leader of the SA shot in his jail without any explanation |
| Ernst Kaltenbrünner, Chief of the Security Police and Security Service. |
| Joachim von Ribbentrop, a Champagne monger, become Foreign Minister for the better and the worse. Hitler thought he was a genius greater than Bismarck |
| Vom Rath killed for no reason |
| When two bloody dictators meet, they sign a Pact of friendship |
| The fool flew to England to secure some peace with the Brits |
| Paulus was defeated by the Soviets in Leningrad after Hitler ordered to fight to the last man |
| The madman from Austia who never dared to face the music committed suicide |
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Jan. : Adolf Hitler and conservative leader Franz
von Papen form a coalition with Hitler as its head.
German Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher—failing to
attract splinter groups and losing majority-party
control over the Reichstag—resigns. President Paul
von Hindenburg reluctantly agrees to offer Hitler
the chancellorship, which the Nazis celebrate with
dramatic evening torch processions through Berlin.
von Papen form a coalition with Hitler as its head.
German Chancellor Kurt von Schleicher—failing to
attract splinter groups and losing majority-party
control over the Reichstag—resigns. President Paul
von Hindenburg reluctantly agrees to offer Hitler
the chancellorship, which the Nazis celebrate with
dramatic evening torch processions through Berlin.
June : Hitler initiates the “Roehm
Purge,” ostensibly because of an
alleged assassination attempt on
his life; Hitler puts the army on
state-of-emergency notice. In an
atmosphere of confusion and
intrigue, Goering denounces the
monarchists and the SS prepare
for a possible coup d’etat.
Purge,” ostensibly because of an
alleged assassination attempt on
his life; Hitler puts the army on
state-of-emergency notice. In an
atmosphere of confusion and
intrigue, Goering denounces the
monarchists and the SS prepare
for a possible coup d’etat.
| A handshake that rather looks like a "I'm gonna to f.. you assh.. !" Chamberlain told Hitler they should have a discussion "eyes in the eyes" like real grown up men ! The fool never understood anything to Hitler in spite of sir Neville Henderson his ambassador to Berlin. |
| Mr. Propaganda alias Paul J. Goebbels |
