Germany In The Days When God Wore A Swastika Analysis

In his memoir, A Child of Hitler:Germany in the Days When God Wore A Swastika, Alfons Hecks recollects his experience growing up in Nazi Germany and describes his involvement in the Hitler Youth. The Hitler Youth was national youth organization dedicated to impart Nazi ideologies onto juveniles early in their lives. Through his participation in the Hitler Youth and assimilation of Nazi beliefs while in the the junior Hitler Youth branch, Heck developed the notion his identity reflects values of national interests and that his efforts in the Hitler Youth would help advance the national agenda of the Third Reich. However, in the decades following the conclusion of World War II, Heck would reflect on his actions in his memoir and conclude that

While reminiscing on his time in the Jungvolk, the junior branch of the Hitler Youth, Heck recalls his indoctrination into Nazi values, “... I had been thoroughly conditioned, despite my Catholic upbringing, to accept the two basic tenets of the Nazi creed: belief in the innate superiority of the Germanic-Nordic race, and the conviction that total submission to the welfare of the state… was my first duty” (Heck 8). In the Hitler Youth, Heck and his peers were trained to instinctively accept that Germans were part of a racially superior group and were implanted with a manic sense of nationalism. By instilling the Hitler Youth with a staunch faith in Fascist propaganda, the Third Reich was able to nurture certain key values within the developing minds of the German youth. The innate presence of Nazi ideology would act as the basis of Heck’s moral compass, compelling Heck to dismiss the actions of the Third Reich against the Jews, civilians, and Germany’s rivals. Additionally, the Hitler Youth served as an essential political symbol for unity at party conferences and provided the German juveniles with

In the years following the conclusion of World War II, Heck acknowledges that, “It took several years of painful re-education to accept, reluctantly, our slaughter of millions of innocent people whom we had decreed to be ‘subhuman’. My first priority was naked survival, not moral regeneration” (Heck 197). After the war ended, Heck, alongside several Hitler Youth and Nazi Party leaders, was detained in the Wittlich penitentiary as political hostages to await execution. During his imprisonment, Heck developed a deep rancor for Hitler and struggled to recognize that he had committed act that were morally wrong. In his reflection, Heck rationalized that his actions in the Hitler Youth were propagated by Nazi brainwashing and that educators of the Hitler Youth are responsible for the actions of the Nazi youth. While Heck recognizes that the Hitler Youth were active perpetrators of the Hitler regime, Heck ultimately blames the Nazi educators for the actions of the Hitler Youth. After investigating the origins of the Nazi regime and reflecting upon his actions during his participation in the Hitler Youth, Heck concedes, “...none of us who reached high rank in the Hitler Youth will ever totally shake the legacy of the Führer. Despite our monstrous sacrifice and the appalling