{"id":130,"date":"2022-01-04T20:45:18","date_gmt":"2022-01-04T20:45:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/his247su22\/?post_type=chapter&p=130"},"modified":"2022-01-07T23:22:32","modified_gmt":"2022-01-07T23:22:32","slug":"rise-of-authoritarian-regimes-and-world-war-ii","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/his2015\/chapter\/rise-of-authoritarian-regimes-and-world-war-ii\/","title":{"raw":"3.1 Rise of Authoritarian Regimes and World War II","rendered":"3.1 Rise of Authoritarian Regimes and World War II"},"content":{"raw":"

Introduction<\/h2>\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_159\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"529\"]\"Generalissimo Virtual Defense Library Photographic Portrait of Generalissimo D. Francisco Franco Bahamonde (MUE-120279). Attribution: Wikimedia Commons, CC0.[\/caption]\r\n\r\nThe period between World War I and World War II was marked by a worldwide economic crisis and a tense international situation. There were serious underlying problems which contributed to alternative systems such as Totalitarianism, Fascism, and Nazism. As you saw in the last Module, most of the industrialized world faced the Great Depression - a worldwide phenomenon caused mainly by the economic imbalances resulting from the disorder of WWI.\r\n

Macrohistory: Civil War, Lenin and the Rise of Stalin (10 pages)<\/a>\r\nMacrohistory: Spain and Civil War (2 pages)<\/a>\r\nMacrohistory: Mussolini and Fascism in Italy (5 pages)<\/a>\r\nMacrohistory: Austria, Left and Right, to 1934<\/a><\/p>\r\n

After World War II, nationalism seemed to disappear because Europeans at the time associated nationalism with Fascism. The left gained credibility and took over in some Western European countries. After all, communists played a significant role in resisting the Nazis. The conservatives were discredited and associated with dictatorship. Another border realignment created truer nation states since borders were drawn more according to ethnic lines. Some things, however, remained the same.<\/p>\r\n

Dictatorships survived in Spain and Portugal, even after WWII. Anti-Semitism also survived. With the exception of 12 female guards at Auschwitz, only the Nazi leadership was put on trial; the remaining party members escaped punishment. This skillfully suppressed Nazi past stimulated student revolution in 1968.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

\r\n

Historical Perspective of Antisemitism<\/h2>\r\n

There is a long tradition of anti-Semitism in Western culture, but it was especially entrenched in Germany. Part of this was the demonization of Jews among European Christians for \"killing Christ\". The role of Jews in the crucifixion became the justification for treating Jews as second-class citizens back to the Middle Ages. This was especially true during epidemics and other times of hardship which Jews were often blamed for causing. They could not own property or work in the artisan crafts. This forced them into banking, and required Jews to be relatively mobile, especially given periodic persecutions against Jews, which were encouraged by local nobility and the Churches in order to maintain control over common people. The legacy of this anti-Semitism was used by Hitler to show Germans that Jews were too cosmopolitan and had no national loyalty. He also stirred up anger against the banking establishment because of German Jews.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_160\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"507\"]\"Jewish A Jewish synagogue set aflame on Kristallnacht. Attribution: Digital image, Wikimedia Commons.[\/caption]\r\n

By 1940, democratic regimes (Great Britain\/France\/Scandinavia) allowed Jews to be citizens. They were freed in France as early as 1789. In areas dominated by authoritarian and monarchical regimes, Jews lacked rights and citizenship, especially in the East. In these areas, they were segregated in villages and cities. In Germany, a balance between these extremes existed. During the 19th century, German Jews gained some civil rights and more integration. Jewish families worked to integrate into German society in order to have the same rights and obligations as other Germans. They were fully assimilated into German society by 1940 which made their persecution much more shocking.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n

\r\n

War in Europe<\/h2>\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_161\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"624\"]\"Hitler \"Hitler saluting a crowd during a Nazi Rally,\" Bundesarchiv, Bild 102-10541. Attribution: Georg Pahl, Wikimedia Commons, CC-BY-SA 3.0.[\/caption]\r\n\r\nThe causes of the Great War were very complex with no clear aggressor. However, World War II in the European theater was the responsibility of one man \u2013 Adolf Hitler. On September 1, 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland from the west and on September 17, the Soviet Union from the east. Both countries were responsible for terrible war crimes.\r\n