The Rise of Totalitarianism
Politics in the Postwar World
• Economic problems;
social unrest
• Political divisions in
Europe deepen;
parties from
conservatives to
communists compete
for power
• ‘The Red Scare’
drives a demand to
limit immigration
Irish Republican Army
volunteers in Dublin, 1922
Postwar Foreign Policy
• France wants secure
borders; alliances;
strict enforcement of
the treaty; reparations
• England wants to
relax the treaty; keep
France weak
• The Kellogg-Briand
Pact
• The League of
Nations
Postwar Economics and the Great
Depression
• Britain and France
use reparations to
pay war debts
• U.S. economy booms
• Falling demand;
overproduction
• FDR and the New
Deal
• Loss of faith in
democracy; increased
radicalism
Attempting to withdraw
funds in a bank run;
clients are denied during
the Great Depression
Postwar Italy
• Allies break promises
of A-H territory to
Italy; nationalists
upset
• Looking at Russia,
peasants seize land,
workers strike; trade
declines
• Veterans come home
to chaos, rising taxes,
unemployment
Benito Mussolini
Mussolini Comes to Power
• Mussolini comes to
power; the Black
Shirts
• Rejected socialism for
extreme nationalism
• Fascist
• March on Rome
• State control of
economy
• Loyalty to the state
What is Fascism?
• First totalitarian state
• No unifying theory;
unlike communism
• Fascism: any
authoritarian
government; not
communist; glorifies
state over individual;
destroys human rights
Fascism
Communism
Nationalist
International
Defined classes
No classes
Wealthy
Workers
Similarities
Blind devotion to state
Charismatic leader
Use of terror
Rise in hard economic times
Extreme programs for change
A Totalitarian State Under Stalin
• Five-Year Plans
• Mixed results in
industry; inefficient;
low quality; low
wages; shortages
• Forced collectivization
• Terror as a weapon;
the Great Purge
• Russification;
atheism; propaganda;
censorship
A New Elite Takes Control
• Stalin destroys the old
social order of
landholders and
peasants
• Destroys the
communism of Marx
and Lenin
• New elite; business
and military leaders
Early Twentieth Century Russian
Social Hierarchy
Weimar’s Rise and Fall
• 1919 Germany
creates the Weimar
Republic; chancellor
• It’s weak from the
start; no strong
leader; many small
parties; coalitions fall
apart; liberals v.
conservatives
• Runaway inflation
• Scapegoat
Hitler, Nazism, and the Third Reich
• Born in Austria; fights
in WWI; right-wing
extremist; hates
Weimar
• Hitler’s Manifesto
• Hitler comes to
power; creates the
Third Reich
• Gestapo; Nuremberg
Laws; Kristallnacht;
Nazi Youth
Aggression and Appeasement
• 1930s aggression
goes unanswered
• Japan takes
Manchuria; eastern
China
• Italy invades Ethiopia
• Hitler takes the
Rhineland; pacifism,
appeasement
• Rome-Berlin-Tokyo
Axis
Dr. Seuss Political Cartoon, 1940s
Moving Toward War
• Living space; the
Aryan race
• Anschluss
• Sudetenland
• ‘Peace for our time;’
appeasement and the
Munich Conference
• Nazi-Soviet Pact
• Invasion of Poland
Axis Attacks
• Invasion of Poland;
blitzkrieg
• Dunkirk
• France falls; Vichy
• Operation Sea Lion
and the blitz
• Mussolini goes into
Egypt; Rommel into
North Africa
London during the blitz
Germany Invades Russia
• June 1941 Hitler
nullifies the NaziSoviet Pact and
invades Russia
• Soviets lose 2.5
million soldiers;
scorched earth
• Hitler gets to
Leningrad and stalls
• Two and a half year
siege begins