Part I. The Rise of Totalitarianism
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Transcript of Part I. The Rise of Totalitarianism
Part I. The Rise of Totalitarianism
Themes of Totalitarianism
• Dictatorship/Cult of Personality • Rejection of Individual Liberties• Expansionism • Provided a sense of security to their people
– The poverty of the Great Depression
– The Age of Anxiety
• Promised to Restore Honor – Done partly through the use of scapegoats
• Reliance on Nationalism
WWI Paved the Way for Totalitarianism
• People are used to taking orders from a government– Rationing– Military control, etc.
1a) the Soviet Union –
• Fall of the Tsar and the Rise of Communism– Collapsed out of WWI – Civil War Lenin and Communism
• World’s first Communist nation
– Communism is a rejection of ‘government hands-off economics’, aka Capitalism
– Instead- violent revolution to overthrow the haves– End of private property no more class structure or
oppression– Must happen everywhere to work (according to Marx)
Stalin Takes Power and Sets Up a Totalitarian State
• Lenin dies• Stalin, not Lenin’s
chosen successor, takes power by force
• His Policies – Collective Farming– Farmers must merge their
farms into collectives to provide food for the state
– Five Year Plans– Soviet Industry Was Put
on Steroids
Was Stalin successful?
• THE GROWTH OF HEAVY INDUSTRY IN THE USSR• INDUSTRY UNIT 1932 1938• Coal millions of tons 64 132• Oil millions of tons 22 32• Pig Iron millions of tons 6 14• Steel millions of tons 6 18• Automobiles thousands 23 211• Tractors thousand 50 176• Machinery billions of rubles 18 33• Chemicals billions of rubles 2 6
But at what cost? Totalitarian Methods…
• Starvation in the Ukraine
• Elimination of wealthy farmers
• Gulags
• Purges
• Propaganda and Censorship
1b) Fascism in Italy• Italy’s Anger at the end of WWI
– Had fought for allies, but didn’t feel that they’d been rewarded properly
– Felt overlooked in Europe• Few colonies• Poor and unindustrialized
• Mussolini was a journalist who discovered the power of propaganda– If he put good stories about himself in the
media, however untrue, they bolstered his image
– He promised a bold, bright future • A renewed Roman Empire
• Was Willing to Use Violence– Assassination of his chief political rival– Secret police
Mussolini’s Secret Police
(cont.)
• Mussolini Promised to Protect Italy from Communism (which at the time was attractive to many poor or radical Western Europeans)
• Why did Communism provoke such fear in the ruling classes? – Think of the stories filtering out of Russia at this
time– Ukraine Starvation, forced collectivization
1c) Germany –German Anger…
The Weimar Republic in Germany was Weak
• Black mark as gov’t that signed the Treaty of Versailles
• Started its life with crushing reparation debts
• Had no significant military, which allowed small extremist groups to play a role in German politics
Occupation of the Ruhr Valley (1923-1924)
I just can’t pay…
The German MarkThe German Mark
The German MarkThe German Mark
Results: Occupation of the Ruhr Valley (1923-1924)
• Hyperinflation
• International sympathy for Germany
• May have convinced the French that military options against Germany were of little value…
• Dawes Plan…U.S. loans to Germany to get them back on their feet…
• Why was the Dawes Plan Ridiculous?
• Dawes Plan did quiet German Radicalism for a while
The Great Depression, However, Smashed Apart the German Recovery (and made the Western Democracies
Less Likely to support military action)
Great Depression (1929)
• A worldwide phenomenon
• Destroys brief Dawes Plan stability
Hitler
• Radicalism Surged in Germany During the Ruhr Valley Invasion
• Hitler’s Beer Hall Putsch
• Trial Makes Him a Household Name – Slap on the wrist
• Mein Kampf
Hitler Promises to Solve Germany’s Problems
• Put Germans to Work!
• Fight Communism!
• Perhaps most importantly: Regain German Honor by Renouncing Treaty of Versailles!
Hitler’s Methods- True to His Idol Mussolini
• Propaganda– Use of mass technology
• Radio and even television– ‘Contact’ Sci-Fi story
• Secret Police – Gestapo
• Violence– Assassination of rivals and
even powerful (and thus rival) supporters
• Charisma
Hitler was Elected
• Hitler had cleverly affected a more moderate platform after his prison stint
• After his election, he quickly Cemented His Hold On Power– Oath of Loyalty to the Military– Reichstag Fire
• Eliminates All Parties Except the Nazis
– Rejects Treaty of Versailles • Begins to remilitarize
– Nuremburg Laws– Women’s role
• Baby machine’s. Why?
• …stab in the back theory
• scapegoats
Germany was not invaded fully invaded at the end of WWI…
1d) Japan’s Turn Away From the West
• Leader in Asian Westernization/Industrialization– Defeat of Russia in 1905
• Joined allies in WWI • Angered at racism during Treaty of Versailles
– Literal, in your face, racism• Clemenceau- (paraphrase) - “I can’t believe we have to stay cooped up in
here with these ugly bastards (Japanese diplomats) while there are blond women in the world.”
– No racial equality clause in the Treaty of Versailles
• U.S. Pushed the British to renounce their alliance with Japan– U.S. sees Asian Pacific as its economic backyard
• Japan began to feel that its aspirations of being a world class power would be forever frustrated by the white powers– Island has limited resources- need for an empire! – The rise of militarism
• World at War Film
1e) Reactions to Totalitarianism
• America’s Reaction– Isolationism
France’s Reaction
• The U.S., Britain, and the League are doing squat to protect us… and who is Hitler going to come for first? – France!
• Maginot Line – Kinda like the best trench
system ever built– Makes a lot of sense after WWI
Fort Eben
Britain’s Reaction
• The British Reaction- appeasement- will start off our next unit and lead to the war itself