How Did Hitler Establish a Dictatorship in Germany from 30th January 1933 to August 1934? Essay

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How Did Hitler Establish A Dictatorship In Germany From 30th January 1933 To August 1934?

On The 30th of January 1933, President Hindenburg appointed Hitler as Chancellor. In the 18 months succeeding this, Hitler became, essentially, a dictator. This essay will look at what a dictatorship is and how it operates, how the population is brought to a point where they accept a dictatorship, and examine and analyze the vital events that took place in Germany which lead to Hitler assuming dictatorial power: the Reichstag fire, the Emergency Decree, the Enabling Act, the banning of trade unions and other political parties, the Night Of The Long Knives, the death of President Hindenburg, and the German army’s oath of loyalty to Hitler. It will

Not long after this, on July 14th, a law was passed against the formation of political parties. A dictatorship is “the governing power where no opposition is tolerated” 1. After the Reichstag Fire, Hitler had already eliminated his most threatening opponents – the Communists – but until this law was passed, other political parties had been accepted. “The Law against the Formation of Parties declared the Nazi Party the only political party in Germany” . Hitler dealt with opponents to the Nazi’s by opening up concentration camps, as well as passing censorship laws “to prevent anti-Nazi views being published” .

The Night Of The Long Knives was another major event that occurred in those 18 months. It was, in essence, a purge of the Sturm Abteiling (the SA) and people who had angered Hitler in the recent past. By June of 1934, due to a developing power-struggle in Nazi-leadership, “Hitler had to make a choice between the army and the SA” . Each of the two groups had their pros and cons: The army, while being, well trained, efficient, and crucially, the only organization with the power to remove Hitler, was limited to 100,000 men (consequences of the Treaty of Versailles), and had many Generals who disliked Hitler and the Nazis, therefore its loyalty was undisclosed. The SA were committed Nazis who had fought with and for Hitler in the past, and consisted of 2,500,000 men – 25 times larger than the army – but Röhm, while