15 points about Hitler and his plans.

1. The great depression flattened the German economy.

2. By 1932 the Nazi party became the strongest political party in Germany. By1933 the Nazis
were so strong that the German president appointed Hitler as Chancellor (prime minister).
Within eighteen months Hitler had the whole of Germany under his personal control.
3. She still felt threatened by Germany and so suggested that all powers should be allowed
conscripted armies for self-defence. When France refused to co-operate, Hitler withdrew
Germany from the conference and from the League of Nations as well.
4. After the failure of the conference, Germany began to rearm at great speed. IN 1935 Hitler
announced that Germany already had a new Luftwaffe (air force). He also announced that
he was introducing conscription in order to increase the size of the German army to 500 000
men. Both these announcements confirmed that Hitler now felt powerful enough to
challenge the treaty of Versailles which had forbidden German armament.
5. In 1935 a plebiscite or vote was taken among the people of the Saar. Over 90 percent voted
to return to Germany. For Hitler this was a great boost. The unification of German-speaking
peoples had begun.
6. The invasion was a deliberate breach of the Treaties of Locarno and Versailles.
7. His first target was Austria. Hitler was Austrian by birth and 96 percent of Austrian were
German-speaking. The problem was that under the Treaty of Versailles, Germany was
forbidden to unite with Austria.
8. On 11 March German troops invaded Austria. Two days later Austria was made a province of
Germany part of the new Reich. A month later the Nazis claimed that 99 percent of the
Austrian people had voted in favour of the Anschluss in a plebiscite held on 10 April.
9. Hitler, he said, had promised to make no further demands. Indeed he had signed an
agreement with Hitler stating that Germany and Britain would never go to war with one
another again. Yet the peace lasted little more than six months.
10. Then in August came a bombshell; Nazi Germany and communist Russia had signed a
friendship or non-aggression pact.
11. Hitlers Blitzkreig (lightening war) tactics combining tanks, planes and infantry together,
overwhelmed the Poles. In four weeks it was over. Poland was partitioned between
Germany and the Soviet Union.
12. In April 1940 German forces occupied Norway and Denmark. On 10 May Churchill replaced
Chamberlain as British Prime Minister. That same day Hitler invaded neutral Holland,
Belgium and Luxembourg.
13. On 12 May the Germans entered France. Within six days the Germans had reached the
English Channel and sliced the Allied forces in two. ON 22 June 1940, France surrendered.
14. Before a sea invasion of England could be launched the Royal Air Force had to be destroyed.
But in the Battle of Britain, fought between August and October 1940, the Germans were
defeated. The invasion plans were now set aside.
15. 22 June 1941, Hitler launched a surprise attack on Russia code-named Operation Barbarossa.
Within five months the Germans were on the outskirts of Moscow but were stopped by the
freezing Russian winter and a heroic Russian resistance.