In 1918, he was an unknown, bitter war veteran. By 1934, he was the Führer of Germany. The transformation of Adolf Hitler from obscurity to absolute dictator took just sixteen years, and it was built on the ruins of the Weimar Republic, the desperation of economic collapse, and the willingness of Germany’s old guard to believe they could control him. After Germany’s surrender in World War I, the newly formed Weimar Republic signed the Treaty of Versailles.
The terms were brutal: massive war reparations, significant territorial losses, and a military reduced to a shadow of its former strength. Hitler was devastated by the humiliation of the country he loved. His political and racial radicalization grew fiercely. He came to believe the conspiracy that Germany’s surrender was not a genuine military defeat but the work of communists, Jews, and weak politicians who had undermined the war effort from within.
These beliefs primed him for a step into politics when the chance arose. In 1919, communists tried and failed to seize power in Germany. Hitler, still working for the army as an informant, was sent to spy on political parties that might pose a communist threat. One of the organizations he was ordered to observe was the German Workers’ Party, the precursor to the Nazi Party.
He soon discovered they were not communists at all. They were extreme right-wing nationalists who shared his core beliefs, blaming the Jews for Germany’s shocking state and wanting the nation to regain its glory. Drawn to their ideology, he left the army, joined the party, and rapidly rose through its ranks thanks to his speaking skills and charisma. By 1920, he had helped rebrand the movement as the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, or the Nazi Party.
By 1921, he was its leader. Using mass rallies, fiery speeches, violence against rivals, propaganda, and promises of restoring Germany’s greatness, he built a devoted following. But at this stage, the Nazis were still a minor force in German politics. The early 1920s saw Germany drowning in debt from the Treaty of Versailles.
The government began printing more money to pay reparations, which only devalued the currency. Hyperinflation set in, and money became worthless. In 1918, one US dollar equaled about four German marks; by December 1923, it was worth over four trillion marks. A loaf of bread cost well over one hundred billion marks, and shoppers had to carry wheelbarrows full of cash for the most basic purchases.
The masses were furious, and Hitler decided the time had come to overthrow the government. On November 8, 1923, he attempted to seize power in what became known as the Beer Hall Putsch. Inspired by Benito Mussolini’s march on Rome the year before, Hitler aimed to take Munich and use it as a launchpad to march on the Weimar Republic’s headquarters in Berlin. The coup began when Hitler and roughly six hundred of his paramilitary SA men surrounded a beer hall where the Minister of Bavaria, who had previously banned some Nazi gatherings, was giving a speech.
Hitler entered the building, fired his pistol into the ceiling, and declared the Bavarian government ousted and a national revolution underway. The next day, Hitler and about two thousand Nazis marched into the center of Munich, only to be stopped by police. A shootout erupted, killing four police officers, one member of the public, and fifteen Nazi Party members. Hitler escaped the skirmish and fled to the countryside, but two days later he was arrested and charged with treason.
He could have been jailed for life, but the judges were right-wing and sympathetic to his cause. Hitler used the trial as a national platform, tearing apart the failing Republic, promoting Nazi ideology, and insisting he had acted patriotically. He was found guilty but served only nine months in Landsberg prison. During that time, he wrote Mein Kampf, an autobiographical and political manifesto outlining Nazi ideology, the desire for a racially pure Germany led by a single ruler, and the need to acquire Lebensraum, or living space, through conquest.
When Hitler left prison in December 1924, he set about restructuring the fragmented Nazi Party. Over the following years, he rebuilt it into a more efficient organization with a new strategy: attaining power through legal means, such as elections, rather than violent revolutions. Still, the masses were not behind him. In the 1928 election, the Nazis won only two percent of the vote, with many voters put off by the party’s past violence and extreme message.
The Great Depression of 1929 changed everything. In 1924, Germany had accepted American loans under the Dawes Plan to help pay its reparations, and for a time the economy stabilized. But in October 1929, Wall Street crashed, the world spiraled into the Great Depression, and America wanted its money back. The economic strain on Germany was massive.
Inflation and unemployment skyrocketed, and trust in the floundering Weimar Republic hit rock bottom. Hitler and the Nazis capitalized on the chaos, promising economic recovery, revenge for the Treaty of Versailles, and a return to national greatness. After years of failed democracy, the idea of a single strong ruler became increasingly appealing. By 1932, the Nazis had become the largest party in Germany.
But Hitler did not gain power immediately. He ran for president and lost to the popular World War I general Paul von Hindenburg. As leader of the largest party, Hitler demanded Hindenburg make him chancellor, but Hindenburg was wary, seeing the Nazis as a threat to democracy. However, fearing rising civil unrest, economic misery, and growing support for communism, he concluded the only way to maintain democracy and get the country back on track was to work with the Nazis.
Reluctantly, Hindenburg made Hitler chancellor in January 1933, hoping to control him and use him to his benefit. Hitler quickly outfoxed everyone. In February 1933, the German parliament building, the Reichstag, was set on fire. To this day, it is not clear who started the fire, though many suspect the Nazis.
Hitler blamed the communists and convinced Hindenburg to sign an emergency decree allowing him to imprison communists and other political rivals. Just weeks later, in March 1933, Hitler pushed the Enabling Act through parliament under the guise of emergency legislation. Even with Hindenburg still president, this law gave the chancellor the power to make all future laws and decisions entirely on his own. Because it was a parliamentary law rather than a presidential decree, Hindenburg could not veto it, and it required only a two-thirds majority vote to pass.
With his political opponents in prison and the SA and SS intimidating the rest, Hitler’s law passed. The German democratic system was no more, and Hitler had legally become a dictator. He then moved to cement his power. He banned political parties and trade unions, and any defiance was crushed.
Most notably, in late June and early July 1934, Hitler and his loyal followers, including Hermann Göring and Heinrich Himmler, staged the Night of the Long Knives, systematically murdering members of the Weimar Republic who posed a threat to their power. After Hindenburg’s death in 1934, with no one left to resist him, Hitler combined the chancellorship and the presidency into one role and declared himself Führer of Germany. The Republic was dead, and the sixteen-year journey from bitter veteran to absolute dictator was complete.