Members of the SS wore black uniforms and swore a personal oath of loyalty to Hitler. He established the Hitler Youth to organize youngsters, and created the Schutzstaffel (SS) as a more reliable alternative to the SA. Over the next few years, Hitler laid low and worked on reorganizing and reshaping the Nazi Party. In it, Hitler expanded on the nationalistic, anti-Semitic views he had begun to develop in Vienna in his early twenties, and laid out plans for the Germany-and the world-he sought to create when he came to power. During this period, he began to dictate the book that would become ' Mein Kampf' (“My Struggle”), the first volume of which was published in 1925. Tried for treason, Hitler was sentenced to five years in prison, but would serve only nine months in the relative comfort of Landsberg Castle. Even though it failed spectacularly, the Beer Hall Putsch established Hitler as a national figure, and (in the eyes of many) a hero of right-wing nationalism. Hitler fled quickly, but he and other rebel leaders were later arrested. Wielding a revolver, Hitler proclaimed the beginning of a national revolution and led marchers to the center of Munich, where they got into a gun battle with police. On the evening of November 8, 1923, members of the SA and others forced their way into a large beer hall where another right-wing leader was addressing the crowd. Many dissatisfied former army officers in Munich would join the Nazis, notably Ernst Röhm, who recruited the “strong arm” squads-known as the Sturmabteilung (SA)-which Hitler used to protect party meetings and attack opponents. After his father, Alois, retired as a state customs official, young Adolf spent most of his childhood in Linz, the capital of Upper Austria.īy the end of 1921, Hitler led the growing Nazi Party, capitalizing on widespread discontent with the Weimar Republic and the punishing terms of the Versailles Treaty. Early LifeĪdolf Hitler was born on April 20, 1889, in Braunau am Inn, a small Austrian town near the Austro-German frontier. After the tide of war turned against him, Hitler committed suicide in a Berlin bunker in April 1945. Hitler’s virulent anti-Semitism and obsessive pursuit of Aryan supremacy fueled the murder of some 6 million Jews, along with other victims of the Holocaust. Germany’s invasion of Poland in 1939 led to the outbreak of World War II, and by 1941 Nazi forces had occupied much of Europe. Hitler capitalized on economic woes, popular discontent and political infighting to take absolute power in Germany beginning in 1933.

Adolf Hitler, the leader of Germany’s Nazi Party, was one of the most powerful and notorious dictators of the 20th century.

Hitler plays civ 5