Andre Garcia
Repression is the subjugation of a person or group. It is a parasite that wriggles gradually into our governmental systems if left unchecked. This is hauntingly depicted in Martin Niemöller’s famous poem “First They Came": “Then they came for me—and there was no one left—to speak out for me.” Nazi Germany is one of the most infamous cases of wide-scale repression. It came to be as a result of cumulative radicalisation; a term coined by the historian Hans Mommsen, who did extensive research on the Third Reich. It describes the slow buildup of radical ideas that eventually accumulate into calamities. In this essay, we will be delving into the causes and effects of repression in Nazi Germany.
In essence, one of the main reasons for repression initially was to facilitate Hitler’s consolidation of power. Once his power was secure, he then started to purge on the basis of his ideals. During his first attempts at taking power in the early 20’s, such as in the Munich Putsch, Hitler tried enforcing these ideas violently, inspired by Mussolini’s takeover of Rome. However, due to the stable nature of Germany under American loans, Hitler failed, though he eventually succeeded—using political tactics rather than just brute force. He especially took advantage when Germany was destabilised in the wake of the Great Depression. This was in addition to Hitler’s finessing of the vague Weimar governmental rules. With this, Hitler was able to start subjugating groups, initially for the sake of safeguarding his power but eventually in accordance with his own personal views.
Repression began with him becoming chancellor; this gave him powers to use state resources. Therefore, he started targeting left-wingers. Its focus was predominantly on the communists, but less radical groups like the SPD were soon targeted too. They were the biggest threat at the time due to the distrust they showed, along with their high influence in the Reichstag. Also, big business was concerned that a socialist revolution would happen if the left got out of control—like in Russia in 1917. Therefore, eliminating the left would keep the companies—like United Steel—on side. This was important as they had lots of power, which Hitler could leverage and use as pillars of support. Elements of Hitler’s personal distaste also fuelled this agenda at the same time. So, one of the first decisions, as chancellor, was to hold an election deciding on the dissolution of the Reichstag—which took some persuading on Hitler’s part to pull off—to eliminate left-wing power. In the buildup to these elections, Hitler started subjugating these groups using various methods to skew the vote. This started as intimidation by the SA through beatings and breaking up of meetings, eventually building up to full-scale raids like on February 24th, 1934, when Goering and his police raided the headquarters of the communists. Meanwhile, Hitler built up a narrative demonising and exaggerating the communist threat. This is demonstrated by the Reichstag Fire, in which its exact origins—although remaining unknown—bear potential evidence of Nazi tampering. Anyhow, the Nazis used this opportunity to pin blame on the communists, with the perpetrator of the fire being identified as Van de Lubbe, a communist—despite the fact that he had learning disabilities, which raises questions about his ability to even commit such an act. Despite not getting the majority, Hitler’s campaigns led to a lot of communists fleeing the country or ending up in concentration camps.
Just as an extension of political suppression, old enemies of Hitler’s were also killed. Examples of this are people like Gustav von Kahr, who was one of the people who helped stop Hitler’s first putsch; he was found hacked to death near Dachau concentration camp. This was during the Nazi purge known as the “Night of the Long Knives”.
Alongside political suppression, trade unions were targeted too. Hitler subdued trade unionists in order to clean up any more leftist opposition. This was predominantly to, again, appease big business and concentrate power. This was also to leave space for Hitler to make a new union—the German Workers’ Front—whose role was to extract more labour for the government as well as quashing any worker rebellions that could stop Nazi growth. It started off with random attacks on trade unions by the police to “remove Marxism”. How Hitler eventually managed to crush this group was by deception. Firstly, he held a massive rally, inviting all trade union leaders to it, on “National Labour Day” on the 1st of May 1933—a day traditionally reserved for the workers in Europe. Holding this massive rally would hopefully remove doubts about Nazi animosity towards trade unions, lowering their guard. The next day, when trade unionists were least expecting it, the Nazis raided the headquarters of the unionists. They confiscated all funds, dissolved the unions, and sent the leaders—even the ones who opted to support the Nazis—to concentration camps.
One of the most infamous cases of repression started at this time too, with the suppression of Jews. There were two main reasons for this: firstly, to supplement a political narrative, and secondly, as an outlet for Hitler’s anti-Semitism. The Nazis framed them as the root of many social, economic, and political problems. This was effective for some people who were frustrated in the context of the Great Depression and looked for something to blame. Other things that they were blamed for were Germany’s defeat in World War I, which led to the embarrassing Treaty of Versailles, which was also another source of frustration. Hitler also made claims about the Jewish people’s ”evil intentions” in wanting to leech off of the pure Germans as their way to live—making them sound more akin to parasites than human beings. However, Hitler’s reign of terror did not start with all-out genocide; it initially started off with loads of Jews being attacked, robbed, murdered, and deported from the country. This led to refugee crises, and an interesting point to make is that other countries were hesitant to take Jews in despite the chaos, possibly symbolising an underlying anti-Semitic narrative. Continuing on, one of the first major events was the boycott of Jewish shops on April 1, 1933, with Nazis blocking entry to these places. As the Nazis gained more power, Jewish people were eventually weeded out of society and kicked out of public facilities and professions. Laws from this time include the 1934 law disallowing their entry into stock exchanges and the 1935 law removing their citizenship. Taunting signs were also placed around Germany, with their captions saying things like “Jews enter at their own risk”. This all eventually accumulated into a night of terror dubbed “Kristallnacht”, translating to “The Night of Broken Glass”. This was a series of pogroms against the German Jewish population, and the name comes from the glass that littered the street as a result of violence and vandalism of Jewish-owned property. Despite the Nazis kick-starting the event, they described it “as a spontaneous outburst of public sentiment” in response to the Jewish problem. From here, the extermination of Jews started to be carried out.
Hitler also wanted to control the Church’s influence in Germany. He needed to be careful, though, as Germany was predominantly Christian, so he needed to sideline their power while not causing too much dissent. Therefore, Hitler pledged to “protect Catholic values” and signed a concordat with Pope Pius XI, which guaranteed Catholic freedom as long as they did not interfere with the Nazis. However, this was just a front, as a mere 5 days later, a law permitting the sterilisation of specific groups of people was signed, breaking Catholic beliefs and offending the Church. Over the next few years, steps were taken to dissolve the Catholic Youth League, which was eventually dissolved on December 1st, 1936; the reason for this was to make space for the German Youth League. Catholic priests, nuns, and lay leaders were also arrested for flimsy reasons such as “immorality” and “smuggling foreign currency,” when in fact they were being silenced. In response, Pope Pius created an encyclical named “Mit Brenneder Sorge,” translated as “With Burning Sorrow,” charging the Nazis with violations against the concordat.
Protestants were also repressed alongside Catholics. Initially, a lot of them welcomed the Nazi arrival. Many saw the previous Weimar Germany as “years of darkness," a time of sleazy debauchery. However, many of these people would experience disillusionment over the next few years as the Nazis attempted to subjugate them. This was done through the creation of “The German Christians’ Faith Movement”, which was headed by fanatical Nazi Protestants who ardently rallied for Nazism. It was supposed to “unite all Protestants” under a nazified church—this targeted the many different and divided Protestant sects at the time. However, this ultimately failed, instead creating more divisions. Some Protestants fought against this, such as Martin Niemöller, who founded “The Confessional Church”. He and his group rejected Nazi ideals and the Nazification of the Church, and later, pastors found following these disobedient groups were arrested. Niemöller himself was arrested after delivering a sermon about disobeying Nazis, saying, “We must obey God rather than man”. These people were sent to concentration camps for cover-up reasons such as “disrespecting the pulpit”. The rest of the submissive clergy were forced to swear allegiance to the Fuhrer.
Many other groups were persecuted during the latter years, such as the Gypsies, black people, and homosexuals, who were murdered en masse in camps; disabled people who were sterilised to “stop them passing on their genes”; women who were forced out of their jobs to work as housewives to fit traditional conservative views; and many more just as equally important groups were faced with fates similar to this.
Moving on, repression also extended to the destruction of anything seen as “un-Nazi-like”. Examples of these are the burning of books the Nazis did not like at Berlin Square. A new “Chamber of Culture” was made to replace the “bad” culture prevalent in Germany. This chamber banned Jewish composers like Mendelssohn and promoted more “pure” German works from people such as Beethoven. Other methods of subjugation were the control of the press, radio, and films. The Berlin Daily Express, for example, was told by Goebbels what news to print and suppress; one had to be “politically and racially clean" in order to work as a journalist, as it was seen as a vocation. This resulted in the eradication of newspapers not seen as fitting the political narrative, such as Vossische Zeitung, a socialist paper. Films were also written with pro-Nazi plotlines, and directors were told to ”lift the film industry out of the sphere of liberal economic thought.".
All of this ties back to the term used at the start—cumulative radicalisation. We must realise that the ideas from these past events are not anything new. There are many cases of it throughout history and even in the present; we need to keep ourselves educated in this age of misinformation so we can identify threats like these, which target our very freedoms. We need to identify the root causes of our being, because if we do not, we are doomed to just stand by the sidelines. We need to see everyone as equal in value and human, for many brutal things arise when we are unable to understand people, just as people were when they were misinformed about the various groups in Nazi Germany. This causes misunderstandings and, in extreme circumstances, wars and deaths.
When radical ideas build up, they can cause calamities. Therefore, we need to stop this loop of hatred now and promote understanding between all people, or you could be targeted next.
Just as Martin Niemöller puts it in the last line of his famous poem:
“And there was no one left—to speak out for me.”