Nazi Propaganda

"Propaganda is the art of nearly deceiving one's friends without quite deceiving one's enemies." F. M. Cornford once offered this as an offhand explanation of what he believed propaganda to be. In reality, the human behavior of propaganda has grown from its origination into a complex web of technique and strategy. It can be traced back to as early as written accounts could have been taken, such as the Arthashastra, which was written around the 4th century BCE. Written by Chanakya, it discussed propaganda in a variety of aspects.

As one looks through history's timeline, propaganda can be observed to have spread from the Maurya Empire of ancient India into the writings of Romans, such as Livy. This may not specifically mean propaganda originated in India and then spread out past Rome and so forth, but offers the point that it is a human behavior which has roots in the earliest years of human civilization. It became blatantly public, though, during World War II with the Nazi movement.

World War II was sparked by the invasion of Poland by Germany on September 1st 1939. Led by Adolf Hitler, the Nazi party invaded in accordance with a secret agreement with the Soviet Union, which was destined to join their forces on September 17th. War was declared on September 3rd, at 11:15 GMT, as a response from France along with the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. South Africa joined this movement on September 6th, and Canada joined it on September 10th. In Hitler's wake, Poland, Norway, The Netherlands, Belgium, and France were left powerless. Yugoslavia and Greece joined this list within the ensuing year.

Hitler's ideology of a pure Aryan race set the stage for the atrocities to humanity committed by him and his Nazi party, the most widely known being the Holocaust. The Holocaust was Hitler's final solution to the Jewish "question." The final result of this genocide was the death of approximately six million Jews, twenty-two hundred Sinti and Roma, six million Poles, five hundred thousand Servs, nearly five hundred thousand Bosniaks. The murder of Europe consisted of the Jewish, the mentally or physically disabled, homosexuals, Africans, Jehovah's Witnesses, Communists and political dissidents, trade unionists, Free Masons, Eastern Christians, and the Catholic and Protestant. The total estimate of Holocaust victims has been as high as twenty-six million. An estimate of sixteen hundred Jews committed suicides in Berlin. The Nazi controlled territories were forced to surrender on May 1945, when the Allies finally entered Germany, completely ending World War II.

The arrival of the Great Depression in Germany, in 1930, was the political turning point in Hitler's rise to power. The Weimar Republic was openly opposed by right wing conservatives, as well as monarchists, communists, and the Nazis. The new Chancellor Heinrich Bruning of the Roman Catholic Sentre Party was lacking a majority in the Parliament. Bruning's measure of budget consolidation and financial austerity brought little economic improvement and was extremely unpopular. Hitler appealed to the farmers, war veterans, and the middle class, who had been hard hit by both the inflation of the 1920's and the unemployment of the Depression.

In 1932, Hitler ran against president Paul Von Heidenburgh during the election. Hitler didn't even have a German citizenship at the time. Hitler was supported by a broad range of reactionary nationalists, monarchists, Catholics, Republicans and even by the social democratic party. He ran against the Communist presidential candidate. His campaign was called "Hitler uber Deutschland." (Hitler Over Germany) The name had a double meaning. There was a reference to Hitler's dictatorship and also the more literal reference to his aerial campaign. This was a brand new political tactic that allowed Hitler to speak to more than one city in any given day. Hitler came in second on both rounds, and gained 35% of the votes during the second election. Even though he lost, the election established Hitler as an alternative in German politics. January 30th 1933, Hindenburg appointed Hitler as Chancellor. Next, He presented the Parliament with the Enabling Act.

Hitler founded a government using a combination of his legislative and executive power. Many of the other German political parties were banned and labor unions were merged with employers federations into an organization under the Nazi control. "Nazi" was a member of the Nationalist Socialist Germany Worker Party. Nazism believed in the superiority of the German race, or in other words an "Aryan master race." The ideological race was be spread throughout the nation by using propaganda.

Propaganda affected the German mass media to a point where the language began to alter. Words of normal society began to acquire negative implications and slogans for the purposes of the Nazi party under the sense of Nazism. Everyday words would change into battle words. "Battle for jobs. Struggle for existence. Fight for culture." (Evans, 214). The phrases or slogans, were already modified into the society's language, making everyday a battleground. "The language itself began to mobilize war" (Evans, 215). War was put upon the society everyday, making each day a battle for survival. The German language became strident, aggressive and militaristic.

The Third Reich was introduced in 1944 along with many other new Reich offices, authorities, and ministries. Legislative branches meant that there was no separation of powers. The Third Reich was eliminating any kind of possibility of thinking about dissent and resistance. Propaganda was used as a business. Seducing many middle class voters who were promised many benefits of the new regime.

Nazi propaganda hit an area that would overlap between Nazi ideology and other ideologies. It was also able to build on existing beliefs and values and to create new consensus that encompassed the majority of Germany. The Nazi's put a spin on events that would play upon existing "fears and prejudices." This was one type of propaganda. "Fear" or ""black propaganda" is identified as being from one source, but then really from another one. It was as if there was a common disguise to the truth of propaganda, even if it originated from an enemy country or from an organization with a negative public image. This type of propaganda would also work in other countries and other societies.

Another type of propaganda is the "glittering generalities." This is a type of propaganda, in which, the message and the information being put forth would be very vague. This is the main tactic that the Nazi's used to keep their potential at a high level. "Glittering