Eugenics In Nazi Germany Essay

Christiana Barder

Professor Wolfe

HIST 208

11 August 2023

Downfall of the German “Monarchy”

In this essay, I intend to show that eugenics served as the core philosophy behind the nationalist movement of Nazi Germany, which required an office of absolute political power to fulfill its political goals. The absolute monarchy that emerged in Nazi Germany was filled by

Adolf Hitler, which he used to implement his racial purification, fueled by his nationalist ideology after the study of eugenics became widespread in Europe. In other words, the Nazi

Party adopted the doctrines of eugenics through an extreme sentiment of nationalism to support their purposes of racially purifying the German people.

Eugenics is a scientific theory based on improving

He turned attention toward people of Jewish nationality and blamed them for Germany’s misfortune, using them as a scapegoat. In his speech on April 12, 1921, Hitler associated democracy with the annihilation of the Aryan after stating, “...democracy is fundamentally not German: it is Jewish,” and he further claimed that democracy was “...a means towards the destruction of any existing Aryan leadership” (Hilter). Hitler succeeded in his persuasion, leading his people to believe they were being victimized and their submission to him would lead the Aryan race to victory. The extremities of nationalism in Nazi Germany were one of the leading causes of World War II, and

Hitler’s expanding claim to absolute power enabled him to increase militarism, form anti-communist movements, and gain support for his anti-Semitism beliefs.

With vengeful intentions to regain lost territories and restricted power assigned to

Germany by the Treaty of Versailles, Hitler violated the treaty’s terms and rearmed the country.

The terms of the Treaty of Versailles, signed by Germany in 1919, required that Germany accept blame for the start of the war, pay reparations, demilitarize, and relinquish territory. The

“The 25 Points of 1920” suggests there would be intentions to violate the Treaty of Versailles, as it made points for expansion of land and territory, formation of a national army, and abrogation of the peace treaty of Versailles (The 25

Points 1920: An Early Nazi Program). In 1936, Hitler began to remilitarize Rhineland, and he invaded Poland three years later, officially commencing World War II. Hitler’s revitalizations of the German military strengthened the Nazi Party, but they were still short in preparing for the devastating loss they would incur over the course of the war against the Allied powers.

The heart of Nazism prioritized nationality and race, establishing the master race as

Aryans, and communism was antithetical to these views. Communism suggests that society is divided into the proletariat (workers) and bourgeoisie (capitalists), but this will lead to the working class revolting against the elites, and the communist solution was to create a classless society. Hitler received any opposing political party as a threat to his absolute authority, but he especially hated communism as he attributed it to the Jews political agenda, claiming in his