CAMBRIDGE A2 HISTORY: HITLER'S REPUTATION AND POPULARITY

HISTORY CAMBRIDGE A2 (PAPER 4)
PRESENTATION 9
HITLER MODULE
3. ACHIEVING DOMESTIC AIMS UP TO 1941
HITLER’S REPUTATION
AND POPULARITY

HITLER’S POPULARITY
For almost a decade after 1933, Hitler enjoyed a remarkable degree of
popularity among the great majority of the German people.
Recent research has done much to explain his reputation and popularity,
suggesting too that even deep into the period of the dictatorship itself
Hitler's own ideological fixations had more of a symbolic than concrete
meaning for most Nazi supporters, and they were attracted by his
charisma and way of showing it.

THE SUPERMAN IMAGE
The 'Hitler Myth' was a double-sided phenomenon. On the one hand, it
was a masterly achievement in image-building by the exponents of the
new techniques of propaganda, building upon notions of 'heroic'
leadership widespread in right-wing circles long before Hitler's rise to
prominence.
On the other hand, it has to be seen as a reflection of 'mentalities', value-
systems, and socio-political structures which conditioned the acceptance
of a 'Superman' image of political leadership.
Both the active manufacture of Hitler's public image and the receptivity
to it by the German people need to be explored.

IMAGE OF THE HEROIC LEADERSHIP
Images of 'heroic' leadership were already gaining ground in populist-
nationalist circles of the German Right in the late nineteenth century.
Their inclusion as a growing force in the political culture of the Right in the
Kaiser's Germany (and there are parallels in pre-fascist Italy, which later
gave rise to the cult of the Duce) was largely shaped by three interlinked
factors: the social and political disruption accompanying a simultaneous
transition to nation-state, constitutional government (if strongly
authoritarian in character), and industrialised society; the deep
fragmentation of the political system (reflecting fundamental social
cleavages); and, not least, the spread of a chauvinistic imperialist ideology
clamouring for a rightful 'place in the sun' for Germany, a 'have-not'
nation.

Hitler miming gestures to a record of his
speeches; one of an extraordinary series of
photographs he commissioned in 1925 to
aid self-analysis and improve his hold over
an audience.

PEOPLE’S KAISER
Growing disappointment on the populist Right with Wilhelm II promoted
notions of a 'People's Kaiser' who, embodying strength and vitality would
crush Germany's internal enemies and, at the expense of inferior peoples,
would provide the new nation with greatness and would win an empire
for 'a people without living space'.

STRUGGLE, CONFLICT AND THE VALUES OF THE TRENCHES
The extreme glorification of military values before and especially during
the First World War, and the Right's shock and trauma at defeat,
revolution, and the victory of the hated Social Democrats, promoted the
extension and partial transformation of 'heroic' leadership images in the
1920s. Following the abdication of the Kaiser and the end of the old
political order, ideal leadership was envisaged as being embodied in a
man from the people whose qualities would reflect struggle, conflict and
the values of the trenches.
Hard, ruthless, resolute, uncompromising, and radical, he would destroy
the old privilege and class-ridden society and bring about a new
beginning, uniting the people in an ethnically pure and socially
harmonious 'national community'.

ADOLF HITLER
The extreme fragmentation of Weimar politics kept such visions alive on
the nationalist and volkisch Right.
And by the early 1930s, perceptions of the total failure of Weimar
democracy and mortal crisis of the entire political system allowed the
image to move from the wings of politics to centre stage.
By then, one man in particular was making a claim – accepted by
increasing numbers of people – that he alone could re-awaken Germany
and restore the country's greatness.
This was Adolf Hitler, the leader of the Nazis.

THE BEGINNING OF THE PERSONALITY CULT
In the Nazi Party, the beginnings of a personality cult around Hitler go
back to 1922-3, when some party members were already comparing him
with Napoleon or describing him as Germany's Mussolini.
Hitler only gradually established an unchallengeable authority within the
party, initially having to contend with some powerful factions of
opposition.
And although his own concept of leadership was already becoming more
'heroic' in the year before his Putsch attempt, it was only during
imprisonment following its failure that he came to believe that he himself
was Germany's predestined great leader.

BUILDING THE MYTH
During the following years in which the Nazis were little more than a
minor irritant in German politics, the 'Hitler Myth' was consciously built
up within the Movement as a device to integrate the party, to fend off
leadership challenges, and to win new members.
The introduction in 1926 of a compulsory 'Heil Hitler' fascist-style greeting
and salute among party members was an outward sign of their bonds with
their leader.
Pseudo-religious imagery and fanciful rhetoric so ludicrous that it even
occasionally embarrassed Hitler became commonplace in references to
the leader in party publications.

THE NASCENT FUHRER CULT
Before 1930, the nascent Fuhrer cult around Hitler found an echo among at
most a few hundred thousand followers.
But with the Nazi Party's breakthrough in the 1930 election (which brought
it 18.3 per cent of the vote), the Fuhrer cult ceased to be merely the
property of a fanatical fringe party.
The potential was there for its massive extension, as more and more
Germans saw in Nazism – symbolised by its leader – the only hope for a way
out of gathering crisis. Those now surging to join the Nazi party were often
already willing victims of the 'Hitler Myth'. Not untypical was the new party
member who wrote that after hearing Hitler speak for the first time, 'there
was only one thing for me, either to win with Adolf Hitler or to die for him.
The personality of the Fuhrer had me totally in its spell'’.

HITLER WAS NOT JUST ANOTHER POLITICIAN
Even for the vast majority of the German people who did not share such
sentiments, there was the growing feeling – encouraged by Hitler's profile
even in the non-Nazi press – that Hitler was not just another politician, that
he was a party leader extraordinary, a man towards whom one could not
remain neutral.
He polarised feelings between bitter hatred and ecstatic devotion, but he
could no longer be ignored, or shrugged off as a political nonentity.

Another photograph
of Hitler miming

A MAN OF THE PEOPLE
For the thirteen million Germans who voted Nazi in 1932, Hitler
symbolised – chameleon-like – the various facets of Nazism which they
found appealing.
In his public portrayal, he was a man of the people, his humble origins
emphasising the rejection of privilege and the sterile old order in favour of
a new, vigorous, upwardly-mobile society built upon strength, merit, and
achievement.
He was seen as strong, uncompromising, ruthless.

HITLER REPRESENTED STRUGGLE
He embodied the triumph of true Germanic virtues – courage, manliness,
integrity, loyalty, devotion to the cause – over the effete decadence,
corruption, and effeminate weakness of Weimar society.
Above all, he represented 'struggle' – as the title of his book Mein Kampf
advertised: struggle of the 'little man' against society's 'big battalions',
and mortal struggle against Germany's powerful internal and external
enemies to assure the nation's future.
More prosaically, for the many still less convinced, he headed a huge mass
movement which, given the weak and divided Weimar parties, seemed to
offer the only way out of all-embracing crisis.

NATIONAL EUPHORIA
Still, not one German in two cast a vote for Hitler's party in the March
election of 1933 – held five weeks after Hitler had been appointed
Chancellor in an atmosphere of national euphoria coupled with terroristic
repression of the Left.
Most Germans remained either hostile to, or unconvinced by, their new
'people's Chancellor', as the Nazi press dubbed him.
Within the diehard ranks of the persecuted socialist and Communist left,
of course, the hatred of Hitler and all he stood for – which in many
respects was accurately foreseen – was implacable.

THE ANTI-CHRISTIAN TENDENCIES OF NAZISM
In Catholic quarters, deep suspicions lingered about the anti-Christian
tendencies of Nazism – though there was already a growing readiness to
distance Hitler himself from the 'dangerous elements' in his movement.
And bourgeois circles continued to see in Hitler the social upstart and
vulgar demagogue, mouthpiece of the hysterical masses, the head of a
party containing some wild and threatening elements – but a man, with
all his faults, who could have his uses for a time.
Attitudes towards Hitler in early 1933 varied greatly, therefore, and were
often heatedly negative.

WEIMAR SYSTEM WAS BANKRUPT
Three factors at least have to be taken into account in explaining how,
nevertheless, the Fuhrer cult could, within a strikingly short time, extend
its hold to wide sections of the population, and eventually to the
overwhelming majority of Germans.
Of crucial significance was the widespread feeling that the Weimar
political system and leadership was utterly bankrupt. In such conditions,
the image of a dynamic, energetic, 'youthful' leader offering a decisive
change of direction and backed by an army of fanatical followers was not
altogether unattractive. Many with grave doubts were prepared to give
Hitler a chance. And compared with the pathetic helplessness of his
predecessors as Chancellor, the apparent drive and tempo of government
activity in the months after he took office seemed impressive.

UNDERESTIMATING HITLER
Secondly, the gross underestimation of Hitler again paved the way for at
first reluctant or condescending, and then wholehearted, enthusiasm for
the way he apparently mastered within such a short time the internal
political situation which had seemed beyond the capabilities of an upstart
rabble-rouser.
Thirdly, and most importantly, Hitler embodied an already well-
established, extensive ideological consensus which also embraced most of
those, except the Left, who had still not given him their vote in March
1933.

HITLER’S DISCOURSE
Its chief elements were virulent anti-Marxism and the perceived need for
a powerful counter to the forces of the Left; deep hostility towards the
failed democratic system and a belief that strong, authoritarian
leadership was necessary for any recovery; and a widespread feeling,
even extending to parts of the Left, that Germany had been badly
wronged at Versailles, and was threatened by enemies on all sides.
This pre-existing wide consensus offered the potential for strong support
for a national leader who could appear to offer absolute commitment,
personal sacrifice, and selfless striving in the cause of inner unity and.
outward strength.

CHARISMATIC AUTHORITY
By 1933, Nazi propaganda had been highly successful in establishing
'charismatic authority' as the organisational premise of the Nazi Party,
and then in portraying Hitler to Nazi sympathisers as not just another
party leader, but as the Leader for whom the nation had been waiting – a
man of incomparably different stature to contemptible party politicians.
The most important propaganda step now remained to be taken: the
conversion, for the 'majority of the majority' that had still not supported
Hitler in March 1933, of his image from that of leader of the Nazi
Movement to that of national leader.

RESTORING ORDER AND FIXING UNEMPLOYMENT
Given the fact that Nazi propaganda now enjoyed a virtual monopoly
within Germany, and that those taking a less than favourable view of
Hitler's qualities were now incarcerated or silenced by fear and
repression, the scene was set for the rapid establishment by the end of
1934 of the full-blown Fuhrer cult of an almost deified national leader.
No doubt many Germans found the extremes of the now omnipresent
Hitler cult nauseating. But they were for the most part coming to accept
that Hitler was no ordinary head of government.
Above all, one could not ignore his 'achievements': 'order' had been
restored; unemployment was falling rapidly; the economy was picking up
strongly; Germany was beginning to stand up for itself again in the world.

THE SYMBOL OF THE NATION
By 1935, Hitler could be hailed in the Nazi press – and there was by now
hardly any other press to speak of inside Germany – as the 'Symbol of the
Nation' who, having struggled as an 'ordinary worker' to establish
Germany's 'social freedom', had now, as a one-time ordinary 'Front
soldier', re-established Germany's 'national freedom' – a reference to the
German military sovereignty.
The message being conveyed was that people and nation found their
identity, their 'incarnation', as it was put, in the person of the Fuhrer. To
this weight placed upon Hitler's 'achievements', Goebbels added the
pathos of the human qualities of the Fuhrer: his simplicity and modesty,
toil and endeavour for his people, mastery of all problems facing the
nation, toughness and severity, unshakable determination.

HITLER WAS PERFECT
With all this went the intense loneliness and sadness of a man who had
sacrificed all personal happiness and private life for his people.
This extraordinary catalogue of personal virtues – making the 'human'
Hitler almost inhuman in the degree of his perfection – was set alongside
the political genius of the Fuhrer as a human counterpart to the image of
the lofty, distant statesman.
It amounted to almost a mirror of contemporary bourgeois values –
characteristics with which almost everyone could find some point of
association.

GOEBBELS AND HIS GREATEST PROPAGANDA ACHIEVEMENT
Evidence of the receptivity to this image – drawn both from sources from
within the regime and those hostile to the Nazi system – lends strong
support to Goebbels' claim in 1941 that the creation of the 'Hitler Myth'
had been his greatest propaganda achievement. The powerfully
integrative force of Hitler's massive popularity seems undeniable.
Goebbels might have added, however, that the way had been paved for
him by the constant exposure to rabid chauvinist-imperialist values
pumped into the population for decades by a stridently nationalist press
(excepting the publications of the Left) and by a variety of forms of
'socialisation' in schools, the bourgeois youth movement, the army, and
an entire panoply of 'patriotic' clubs, leagues, and associations.

OPPOSING: CHURCHES, COMMUNISTS AND SOCIALISTS
Of course, the political culture was far from a unitary one, and not all
Germans were affected.
As is well known, the socialist subculture remained relatively immune.
Those 'schooled' in the traditions of the Socialist and Communist parties
continued throughout the Third Reich to be the least susceptible to the
appeal of the 'Hitler Myth'.
To a lesser extent, the Catholic subculture was also resistant to the full
extremes of the Fuhrer cult, though strong traditions of authoritarianism
and especially endemic anti-Marxism allowed for substantial inroads.

HITLER’S POPULARITY WAS FAR FROM COMPLETE
Clearly, therefore, Hitler's popularity was far from complete, the Fuhrer
cult far from uniform in its impact.
However, detailed examination of an extensive mass of sources relating to
the formation of popular opinion and attitudes in the Third Reich suggests
at least seven significant bases of the 'Hitler Myth' which can be singled
out.

POPULAR JUSTICE
Firstly, Hitler was seen as the embodiment of strong and, where necessary,
ruthless enforcement of 'law and order' – the representative of 'popular
justice', the voice of the 'healthy sentiment of the people'. An example can
be seen in the great gains in popularity which accrued to him in spring
1933 as a result of the brutal Nazi onslaught on the Left, 'clearing away'
the Socialist and Communist 'enemies of the state'.
Even more spectacular as an illustration is the extraordinary boost to
Hitler's popularity following the ruthless massacre of members of his own
Movement – the leaders of the highly unpopular SA – in June 1934. In
reality, the purge of the SA leadership served to crush a destabilising
element in the regime and further the power-political ambitions of the
army and the SS.

HITLER AS NORMALITY
But none of this was reflected in Hitler's image following the purge. As
even opponents of the regime acknowledged, Hitler's blood-letting was
hugely popular, welcomed as a blow struck for law and order – 'popular
justice' eradicating corruption and immorality within the Movement.
The propagated image of a leader upholding public morality
corresponded closely with commonly-held values and prejudices – for
instance, in the condemnation of rowdiness and disorder, venal
corruption and homosexuality.
In what was a complete inversion of reality, Hitler was seen to be
signalling a triumph for values associated with 'normality'.

HITLER AND THE NATIONAL INTEREST
Secondly, Hitler was seen as representing the national interest, putting
the nation first and detached from any personal motives. Crucial to this
image was the way, after 1933, in which propaganda succeeded in
isolating Hitler from the growing unpopularity of the Nazi Party itself.
The wholly positive resonance of the portrayal of Hitler, the national
leader, contrasted vividly with the sullied reputation of party
functionaries, the 'little Hitlers', whose corruption and greed, jumped-up
arrogance and highhandedness, pettiness and hypocrisy, were a daily
scandal. And whereas the local party officials bore the brunt of extensive
and real daily discontent, Hitler's popularity was cushioned by the myth
that he was being kept in the dark about the misdeeds of his underlings
and was unaware of the just complaints of his people.

THE ECONOMICAL MIRACLE
Without at least the prospect of an improved living standard, the extent
of the effective integration produced by the 'Hitler Myth' would have
been difficult to achieve.
A third, extremely important, component of the perceived Fuhrer image
was, therefore, that of the architect and creator of Germany's 'economic
miracle' of the 1930s.
Part of the apologetic of the post-war era was, of course, that despite his
'mistakes', Hitler had revamped the economy, rid Germany of
unemployment, and built the motorways. This is itself testimony to the
penetrating and enduring features of this aspect of the contemporary
Hitler image.

PERCEPTIONS
By 1939 it was difficult to deny that economic conditions in Germany, for
whatever reasons, had improved dramatically since the Depression era.
However, more than in any other sphere, perceptions of Hitler's image in
the context of economic and social policy were determined by
experiences which were divided, for the most part, along class lines.

PROSPERITY
The working class remained the social grouping least impressed by the
'economic miracle' and relatively immune to the image of Hitler as the
creator of Germany's striking new prosperity.
After all, with their own standard of living pinned down to Depression
levels in the years 1933-36, most industrial workers saw no particular
reason to offer marked signs of gratitude to the Fuhrer.
Through repression and intimidation, low wages, and longer hours, the
'economic miracle', as most realised, was being carried out on their own
backs. Nevertheless, as the underground worker resistance was forced to
admit, Hitler undoubtedly did gain some popularity among workers for
'his' work creation and the economic recovery which 'he' had brought
about.

THE SOCIALIST ASPECT
And in the first years of the Third Reich in particular, the 'socialist' aspect
of the Hitler image also struck a chord among many of the poorer
Germans who were recipients of the 'Winter Aid'.
Even so, on the whole it appears that the image of the economic miracle-
worker, the restorer of Germany's prosperity, had its greatest appeal
among those sectors of the population who benefited most from the
economic boom of the rearmament period: the middle class, who,
despite their unceasing grumbling, continued to provide the main base of
support for the regime and devotion to Hitler until at least the middle of
the war.

HITLER AS A MODERATE
Fourthly, in matters affecting established institutions and traditions,
Hitler was seen as a 'moderate', opposed to the radical and extreme
elements in the Movement. An obvious example is the 'church struggle'.
Whenever fundamental institutions or basic traditional props of both
major Christian denominations were under attack – as in the Nazi
attempt in 1934 to abolish surviving Protestant bishoprics with a firm
tradition of independence, or to remove crucifixes, the symbol of
Christianity itself, from Catholic schoolrooms in 1936 and again in 1941,
Hitler was looked to as the defence against the 'wild elements' in the
party.

GOD-FEARING HITLER
His apparent non-involvement in, or aloofness from, the bitter conflicts,
before finally intervening to end the disturbance – put down to party
radicals and the 'new heathenism' associated above all with Rosenberg –
and 'restore order', left Hitler's standing among churchgoers relatively
unscathed, despite the slump in popularity of the party.
Grotesque as it seems, Hitler himself continued to be widely regarded as a
God-fearing and deeply religious man. Even church leaders with a
reputation for hostility to Nazism were persuaded of his sincerity, belief in
God, and acceptance of the role of Christianity and the churches. Their
public avowals of obedience to the Fuhrer and recognition of his
leadership and achievements played no small part in helping to give
legitimation to the 'Hitler Myth'.

FANATICAL COMMITMENT
Fanatical commitment to uncompromising and ruthless action against the
'enemies of the people' was a fifth crucial component of Hitler's image.
But he was regarded as condoning only lawful, 'rational' action, not the
crude violence and public brutalities of the party's distasteful 'gutter'
elements.
No one could have been left in any doubt, for instance, of Hitler's fanatical
anti-Semitism and determination to exclude Jews from German society.
And at the beginning of his career, anti-Semitism had been a keynote of
almost all his speeches and must have been a dominant component of his
popular image among early converts to Nazism.

ANTI-SEMITISM
During the period of the party's major electoral successes, anti-Semitism
appears to have featured less prominently in Hitler's public addresses, and
was less important as an electoral drawing card than has often been
presumed – as a general touchstone for other propaganda themes.
After 1933, Hitler was extremely careful to avoid public association with
the generally unpopular pogrom-type anti-Semitic outrages, particularly of
course following the nation-wide 'Crystal Night' pogrom in November
1938. In the years when his popularity was soaring to dizzy heights,
moreover, Hitler's public pronouncements on the 'Jewish Question' were
less numerous than might be imagined, and, while certainly hate-filled,
were usually couched in abstract generalities in association with western
plutocracy or Bolshevism.

PASSIVE ANTI-SEMITISM
In these terms, bolstering the passive anti-Semitism already widespread
among the German people and lending support to 'legal' measures – for
the most part popular – excluding Jews from German society and the
economy, Hitler's hatred of the Jews was certainly an acceptable
component of his popular image, even if it was an element 'taken on
board' rather than forming a centrally important motivating factor for
most Germans.
Even during the war, when his vitriolic public onslaughts on the Jews
came far more frequently and contained dire allusions to their physical
extermination, the signs are that this was not a centrally formative factor
shaping attitudes towards Hitler among the German people.

HITLER AS A MAN OF PEACE
Sixthly, Hitler's public profile in the arena of foreign affairs stood in stark
contrast to reality. He was commonly seen here as a fanatical upholder of
the nation's just rights to territory 'robbed' from Germany in the peace
settlement after the First World War, a rebuilder of Germany's strength,
and a statesman of genius – to which his astounding run of diplomatic
coups seemed to offer ample testimony.
Amid the widespread, deep fears of another war, he was also,
astonishingly, seen by many as a 'man of peace' who 'would do everything
he could to settle things peacefully' (as one then youthful observer later
came to describe her feelings at the time) – a defender of German rights,
not a racial-imperialist warmonger working towards a 'war of annihilation'
and limitless German conquest.

TRIUMPHS WITHOUT BLOODSHED
Hitler's imposing series of 'triumphs without bloodshed' directed at
'peace with honour' – tearing up the Versailles settlement, winning back
the Saar, restoring 'military sovereignty', recovering the Rhineland,
uniting Austria with Germany, and bringing the Sudetenland 'home into
the Reich' – won him support in all sections of the German people and
unparalleled popularity, prestige, and acclaim.
Finally, there is Hitler's image, when war came, as the military strategist
of genius, outwitting Germany's enemies in an unbelievable run of
Blitzkrieg victories, culminating in the taking of France within four weeks
when a generation earlier four years had not been enough.

FUHRER’S DEVOTION TO DUTY
Even after the war started to turn sour for Germany in the winter of 1941-
2, the unpopularity of the party and its despised representatives at home
continued for a time to stand in stark contrast to the image of the Fuhrer's
devotion to duty in standing with his soldiers at the Front.
However, according to Max Weber's model, 'charismatic leadership' could
not survive lack of success. And indeed, as 'his' astonishing run of victories
turned gradually but inexorably into calamitous defeat, the tide of Hitler's
popularity first waned rather slowly, then ebbed sharply.
The decline accelerated decisively following the catastrophe of Stalingrad,
a defeat for which Hitler's personal responsibility was widely recognised.

THE HITLER MYTH FATALLY FLAWED
The 'Hitler Myth' was now fatally flawed. In the face of defeats, personal
losses, misery, and sacrifice, the earlier successes began to be seen in a
new light. Hitler was now increasingly blamed for policies which had led to
war.
His much vaunted strong will, resolution, unshakeable determination, and
absolute fanaticism were regarded more and more not as attributes but as
the main stumbling blocks to the longed-for peace.
With no more successes to proclaim, Hitler was now reluctant even to
speak to the German people. The new image put out by Goebbels of Hitler
as a latter-day Frederick the Great – distant majesty finally triumphant in
the face of extreme adversity – symbolised the growing gulf.

POPULARITY TILL THE BITTER END
Important reserves of popularity remained to the end.
Hatred of the Allies prompted by terror bombing campaigns partially
benefited Hitler and the regime for a while; some temporary vain hopes
were placed in the Fuhrer's promises of new weapons which would
accomplish the desired 'retaliation'; a short-lived upsurge of support and
proclamation of loyalty followed the attempt on his life in July 1944 – an
indication that a successful coup might have encountered a new version of
the 'stab-in-the-back' legend; and surprisingly large numbers of prisoners-
of-war in the west continued till the end to avow their belief in Hitler. But
the potency of the 'Hitler Myth' had vanished.

COMMENTARY
Eloquent commentary on this is a report on a remembrance ceremony at
the war memorial in the little Bavarian alpine town of Markt Schellenberg
on March 11th, 1945:
When the leader of the Wehrmacht unit at the end of his speech for the
remembrance called for a 'Sieg-Heil' for the Fuhrer, it was returned neither by
the Wehrmacht present, nor by the Volkssturm, nor by the spectators of the
civilian population who had turned up. This silence of the masses had a
depressing effect, and probably reflects better than anything the attitudes of
the people.

CONCLUSION
The adulation of Hitler by millions of Germans who may otherwise have
been only marginally committed to the Nazi ideology, or party, was a
crucial element of political integration in the Third Reich.
Without this mass base of support, the high level of plebiscitary
acclamation, which the regime could repeatedly call upon to legitimise its
actions and to take the wind out of the sails of the opposition, is
unthinkable. It also enabled the specifically Nazi elite to free itself from
dependence upon the support of traditional conservative ruling groups,
thereby boosting the autonomy of the 'wild men' in the Movement.
Without the degree of popular backing which Hitler was able to command,
the drive and momentum of Nazi rule could hardly have been sustained.

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN NAZIS AND HITLER
The Fuhrer cult necessarily influenced the relations of the Nazi leadership
itself with Hitler, as well as those of the traditional ruling elites.
Inevitably, it surrounded Hitler with toadies, flatterers, and sycophants,
shielding him from rational criticism or genuine debate, and bolstered
increasing detachment from reality.
Nor could Hitler himself remain impervious to the extraordinary cult which
had been created around him and which came to envelop him. His own
person gradually became inseparable from the myth.

THE FUNCTION OF FUHRER
Hitler had to live out the image of omnipotence and omniscience. And the
more he succumbed to the allure of his own Fuhrer cult and came to
believe in his own myth, the more his judgement became impaired by faith
in his own infallibility and guidance 'by providence', enabling him to 'go his
way with the certainty of a sleepwalker'.
His room for manoeuvre now became restricted by his own need to protect
the 'Hitler Myth' and sustain his prestige, aware as he was that if Nazism
lost its forward momentum and stagnation set in, Hitler's own popularity
and the mass base of the regime's support would be fatally undermined.
Hitler well understood his own function, the role which he had to act out as
"Leader" of the Third Reich, and he 'transformed himself into a function,
the function of Fuhrer'.

CAMBRIDGE A2 HISTORY: HITLER'S REPUTATION AND POPULARITY

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CAMBRIDGE A2 HISTORY: HITLER'S REPUTATION AND POPULARITY