Hitler's War Aims In 1976 Analysis

In 1933, Adolf Hitler led the Nazi Party to power in Germany. When he led his invasion in 1939, he referred to it as the “Defensive War” because he proclaimed that Poland attacked Germany, so the Germans living in Poland were to be oppressed with bloody terror and to be driven from their homes. To Hitler, the series of border violations proved that the Poles were no longer willing to respect the German frontier. On September 1st, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, later being joined by the Soviet Union on September 17th. German army forces invaded from the north, south and west of Poland, where the Polish army forces retreated to defend the eastern border. After being defeated in the Battle of the Bzura, the Polish fled to the southeast, seeking …show more content…
Rich was not a revisionist; rather, he viewed the history from an orthodox perspective. Rich claimed that Hitler did plan on a world war. Hitler did not just want to invade Poland; rather he also planned to make it a world war. Rich says “even during the hardest endurance tests of the Second World War racial dogma triumphed over economic or military calculations in Hitler’s thought,” (Hitler’s War Aims. Norman Rich 1: 249). He says that in 1940-1941, Hitler “undoubtedly possessed one of the most forceful leadership personalities in recorded history, and as leader dedicated to effecting decisive changes in world history he accomplished what he believed essential for his purpose,” (Hitler’s War Aims. Norman Rich 1:76). Hitler attacked the Soviet Union as a war aim and method, and racism was a large factor of Hitler’s mentality; Hitler decided it would be safer for his people to be German and wipe out everybody else. Rich believed that Hitler wanted a world war because of racial superiority; Hitler believed that he had to bring the rest of Eastern Europe and Russia into the war so that he can dominate them and make everyone German as well. Rich analyzed the Nazi foreign policy to prove his point that Hitler did not just take opportunities as they came but rather had a set goal to dominate the world, and stated that “Race, far from being a mere propagandistic slogan, was the very rock on which the Nazi church was built” (Hitler’s War Aims. Norman Rich 1:4). To support his thesis, Norman Rich used Hitler’s Mein Kampf. (As opposed to Geoffrey Barraclough) Rich used Mein Kampf to support that Hitler did want a world war. In this document, Hitler discussed how much he opposed Communism and Judaism, as well as how Germans are racially superior to the rest of Europe therefore Europe should become