Talk:Adolf Hitler/Archive 1

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you need to talk about henry ford and his relationship with hitler --- A conspiracy theory suggests that the bodies that were allegedly Hitler's and Braun's were actually people employed by the Nazis and Hitler to fake their deaths so they could therefore escape unharmed.

There are conspiracy theories about everything, and unless there is some sort of reason to suppose they have an ounce of truth, I don't think they need be mentioned.

I suspect an earlier draft of this article was written by a non-English speaker, who hadn't fully learned English rules of capitalization, punctuation, and so forth. May I recommend you study any or all of three books to improve your skills? --

  • Strunk and White, The Elements of Style: a brief book, outlining common English grammar mistakes, recommended to all high school and college students in the United States. Truly one of the classic books about English composition.
  • Fowler, Modern English Usage, second edition: maybe the greatest guidebook to questions on English language usage; British.
  • The Chicago Manual of Style: this is perhaps the best-respected source in the United States for questions about punctuation, bibliographies, and other mainly mechanical matters.

--Larry Sanger

I read somewhere that he had a deformed penis from a goat that bit him on the foreskin while he was peeing in its mouth--no joke!

BTW, isn't it pretty well established that around 5.8-6 million jews were exterminated? I don't want to be responsible for messing with that and starting a huge fight over it though.

Vegetarian

There are many histories told about Hitler, and I don't know which are true and which are false. They should be represented here anyway.

  • Was Hitler of partially Jewish origins ? Some people are saying that (iirc) his grandma was a Jew.
  • Was Hitler a vegetarian ?

And there's immortal question whether his alleged dead body was truly his, but this one doesn't seem to ever end with a conclusion. --Taw

Hitler was indeed a vegetarian. See William Shirer's Rise and Fall of the Third Reich for both primary and secondary source evidence. Hitler was a huge advocate for animal rights--he considered them to be better than Jews and other "lower races" of humans. Not to cast aspersions on PETA or anything like that.  :) --Chuck Kincy

I've heard it (from pro-vegetarian sources) that Hitler was not a vegetarian, but that that he dabbled in vegetarianism and various other "healthy diet" theories of the time, either from some sincere interest or to impress others who took them seriously.
I have read that Nazi propaganda claimed that Hitler was so humane that he devised a method to cook lobsters without boiling them alive. -- Error

I believe Hitler died in Germany at the end of the war, if he could not be head of state his life would have had no meaning. He was not the type of person that would do well in hiding, he would have surfaced sooner or later. Though his name is now forever linked with evil, it is often forgotten the pre-war achievements of the NSDAP.They turned the German nation from bankruptcy to a world power in a few years, if the holocaust and World war Two hadn't have happened, the nazi movement stand as a good example of national reform. {Ian Cross}

National reforms such as brutal dictatorship, the crushing of all dissent, and the persecution of Jews and other minorities (which had been going on strong long before the Holocaust happened--e.g. the Nuremberg Laws)? Even if World War II and the Holocaust had never happened, we'd still remember Hitler as a cruel and ruthless dictator, and as a bigot. Just not as bad a one. -- SJK
 Good point, however this pattern has been repeated so many times before, as in the US.
There was genocine of the native Indian population they were put into reservations
(ghettos) even during the second world war, Negro troops in the US army were segregated,
used as cannon fodder and did not enjoy the rights of promotion and recognition of their
white counterparts.They suffered till the middle sixties but, who is to blame of their
persecution? This one nation under god that thinks it has the right to dictate to the
world what the moral standards of human rights should be. We can learn from  Hitlers
Germany if we look beyond the evil and look at what was achieved in the early part of its
history. (Ian Cross)
Am I the only one who gets chills when they read this? -- Zoe

Does anyone think an extensive discussion of Adolf Hitler's abuse as a child by his father and of the origin of his anti-Semitism would survive?

I've put it in; we'll see. AxelBoldt
Alec Guiness's depiction of Hitler in Hitler: The Last Ten Days (1973) was, to say the least of it, a curiously idiosyncratic take on Hitler's persona.

Not having seen (or heard of) this movie, this comment is, to say the least of it, a bit cryptic. What does it mean? DanKeshet

From the subject page:

Psychoanalytic interpretation II

As I read the above 'psychoanalysis' of Adolf Hitler, I was tempted to update the article and make corrections, but instead decided to leave it untouched and write the following paragraphs separately.

It is not true that Hitler was abused by his father as a child. He had a more or less normal upbringing. Hitler's father, Alois, was apparently an authoritarian, as many fathers are; but there is no indication that Adolf was abused by his father or that they disliked each other.

As for Hitler's 'Jewish' blood, this has been subject to intensive investigation and it has been found that this was bogus and fabrication, probably by some Jews, with the intention of suggesting that only a person with very strange and deep-rooted psychological problems would develop a dislike for the Jews. The fact is that Hitler and his family lived in the small village of Braunau Im Inn. It was a farming area. The Jews in Europe never lived in such areas. They lived in big cities and they never were involved in farming. They lived in places like Berlin and Vienna, not in some remote farming village like Braunau Im Inn. Werner Maser's investigations have thoroughly dispelled persistent speculations regarding Jewish ancestory of Adolf Hitler. Those who fabricated this story, were saying that there was a Jewish family by the name of "Frankenburger" who lived in Braunau Im Inn, and Hitler's grandmother worked for them as a housemaid and she was probably made pregnant by one of the family's sons, and the illegitimate son was Alois Hitler (Adolf Hitler's father). There is not a single shred of evidence for this story.

For the record, the contributor of the above text changed the description of der Fuehrer in List of famous Germans from "dictator and war criminal" to "greatest leader any nation ever had". --Brion

I was of the understanding that Hitler did attend a Jewish synagogue as a child and in part this was to blame for his anti-semitism. Later, he was not accepted to a Jewish Art School and this led to his connecting Judaism and Capitalism.

This seems unlikely--I'd really want support beyond what sounds like your thinking you remember this.
Oh, and could you please sign your comments? (three tildes in a row will add your username automatically) Vicki Rosenzweig
I have never heard of this either. "Outrageous claims require exceptional evidence." So we leave it out for now. AxelBoldt 21:30 Oct 20, 2002 (UTC)

What is outrageous about the fac tthat Hitler went to a Jewish synagogue and applied to art school? --Lir

What is "outrageous" is that you are calling it a "fact", while most (all?) other people here are under the impression that it is not true. Therefore, the burden is on you to produce evidence for this new "fact" that you are introducing and asking that other people accept. That's just how conversation works... --Brion 00:05 Oct 23, 2002 (UTC)

His fixation on Jews is hard to fathom. The only thing I can think of, other than that is was part of the German zeitgeist, is that because of the lack of discrimination in Vienna many Jews occupied prominent positions, being for example about 80% of those in the professions there. So probably Jews did play an important role in the art scene there. As far as attending a synagogue that is surely false. Where he lived as a child there were almost no Jews. Fredbauder 04:23 Oct 21, 2002 (UTC)f

Lir, if you have evidence that Hitler was not a compelling orator (to those susesptible to his talents) please state it. Fredbauder 11:43 Oct 21, 2002 (UTC)

Whether he was compelling or not is an opinion. Should you feel that he was the world's greatest orator you may include a section called, "Why Hitler was the world's greatest orator" and write an argument there.Lir 23:58 Oct 22, 2002 (UTC)

I'm no Hitler expert, but I think it's fair to say that he is widely regarded as a great orator. Would something like "Widely regarded as a great orator and skillful propagandist..." be acceptable? --Camembert
absolutely. the historical footage of him with his acting teacher befofe giving a speech are ...well...genius. I'm sure Reagan took lessons ;)--dgd
Well, I've put it in; hopefully it will stick. --Camembert

widely regarded works. Lir 00:53 Oct 23, 2002 (UTC)

The following was placed in the article by 63.205.228.14. I (Camembert) have moved it here:

I know this paragraph will be removed soon, but I would like to mention:

I contribute to Wikipedia as much as I can. It saddens me to see people allow their personal feelings alter facts. Let's maintain Wikipedia with academic and intellectual honesty and spirit for the benefit of all of us.

This part about Hitler's "psychoanalysis" is misinformation. Respected academician Werner Maser completely dispelled the rumours about Hitler's "Jewish blood" (which was the bogus Farankenberger family story) and academic community has known this for a long time.

Also, it is not true that Hitler was abused by his father, as this article indicates. In fact, Hitler had respect for his father. If the author of this article is trying to suggest that it takes a highly unusual and complex psychological background to result in anti-semitism, he or she will have to come up with similar stories about millions of other anti-semites who lived then, and probably live now.

Are you claiming that Maser proved that Hitler did indeed not have Jewish ancestry, or that Hitler was never aware of rumours about his Jewish ancestry? Only the latter would contradict Miller's analysis.
What is your reference for saying that Hitler was not abused by his father and respected him? The evidence for his abuse is given in Alice Miller's book.
I don't think anybody tries to suggest anything about anti-semitism in general in the psychoanalytic paragraph. AxelBoldt 21:06 Feb 9, 2003 (UTC)

Yes, I am saying that it has been proven beyond any reasonable doubt (and accepted by the academic community) that the speculation about Hitler's so-called Jewish blood has been false. The whole speculation about his Jewish blood was based on a fabricated story that there was a wealthy Jewish family by the name of Frankenberger who lived in Braunau am Inn; and that Hitler's grandmother at one point was allegedly a part-time housemaid for this family. The story then goes on to say the family had a 19-year-old son who 'probably' was the real father of Alois (Hitler's father) and therefore, Hitler's parental grandfather was a Jew.

Werner Maser cogently demonstrated (not just by logic but also by records) that there was never ever any such Jewish family with a 'big house' in that tiny farming community of Branau am Inn or the vicinity. Furthermore, why would a wealthy Jewish family live in such a remote area, away from the big cities and their fellow Jews? Branau am Inn wasn't even a small city, it was a village; and in general, all of that area was just more or less a farming community. Would a prominent Jewish family (or any Jewish family, for that matter) live in such an area at that time? Much less in a mansion? The facts and patterns of Jewish lifestyles and practices in Europe at that time contradict this. But any way, Maser demonstrated his refutation based on actual records and investigation, not just on the basis of "this simply doesn't make sense."

As for my reference about Hitler not being abused by his father, my reference is Das Grosse Lexikon des Dritten Reiches by C. Zentner and F. Bedürftig. It is comprehensive, unbiased and widely respected by the academic community. It has been a standard fixture of the bookshelves of serious academicians and researchers in this subject area for a long time.

Regards, Keyvan.

"Widely regarded as a great orator and skillful propagandist" skillful propagandist seems OK Great orator well hitler was a good orator and possibly a very good orator. But but great seems to have some postive connonation caan we find something more neutral ? Brilliant might be better ? Well English is not my native language thus great can be more neutral than I believe. Ericd 15:45 Feb 7, 2003 (UTC)

Maybe "skillful orator and propagandist"? AxelBoldt 21:06 Feb 9, 2003 (UTC)

- Please, read Mein Kampf before you judge Hitler. I see a lot of LIES here.

" 07:24 May 3, 2003 . . Zoe (Reverted to last edit)" - Why reverted? Not the article about modern Germany describes this period, but German Empire and Nazi Germany and so on do it.

A great orator is a great orater. No two ways about it. It doesn't matter if he was St Peter or the worst human being to live since ... er ... Hitler. Our first duty is to tell the truth. Opinions belong on talk pages. Tannin 09:24 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

Tannin, Hitler was most certainly not "elected" Chancellor. Nor were any of his predecessors as Chancellor of the Weimar Republic. He was appointed by the President. So, yes, let's let the facts speak for themselves. But we should be sure we actually know the facts first. john 09:57 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

Ahh, I thought some bar-room lawyer would bring that point up. (I mean no disrespect to you here, John, but that is the reality: it's a misleading legalisim to say that Hitler was not elected by the people of Germany.) If you want to apply the strict letter of the law, then by all means. Go right ahead. While you are at it, you had better correct every one of the Prime Minister of Australia entries too - for Australian Prime Ministers are not elected either, but appointed by the Governer General. And you had better do the same for every Prime Minister of New Zealand too. And the United KingdomAnd, in fact about half or two-thirds of all the heads of government in the entire world. Ask JTD. He has a phD in this area.

Why are you arguing for one rule for Hitler, and a different rule for the rest of the world? Tannin 10:06 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

Well, I wouldn't say that Gladstone was "elected Prime Minister" either. As that would be nonsense. More recent Prime Ministers, well, that's a tougher issue, but even so I would try to avoid that phrase. In any event, Hitler's appointment was nothing like the appointment of, say, Tony Blair. Hitler was appointed Prime Minister in January 1933. The last elections had been held several months earlier (in November, I think). They had done worse in those elections than they had in the previous elections in July 1932. Hitler was never elected to the leadership by the people of Germany. Even in the March 1933 elections, the Nazis didn't get a majority, and when he came to power, his coalition with the Nationalists did not command a majority of the Reichstag. He came to power due to machinations among various right wing figures, who thought they could control him. His party was certainly popular, and it had become the largest party in the Reichstag. But to say that he was "elected chancellor" is simply nonsense. john 10:12 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

Noting: On the Tony Blair page, it says he "became" Prime Minister in 1997. Not that he was "elected". Considering that Tony Blair came a hell of a lot closer to being "elected" Prime Minister than Mr. Schickelgruber, I think this suggests that the term "elected Prime Minister" is simply wrong. john 10:15 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

When you go to an election and wind up commanding the support of the largest single party in the parliament, and the Head of State make you Prime Minister (or whatever the office happens to be called in your country), that is usually considered being "elected".

In the ordinary course of events, Hitler would have been a certainty for the top job: the fact that it took a good deal of manipulation and behind-the-scenes negotiation for him to wind up with the job that was rightfully his in the first place is immaterial. (I say "rightfully" in the sense of "having the numbers", of course, not in the sense that Hitler was a good man, or any other nonsese like that.) I have no particular attachment to the word "elected". As you say, it is not strictly correct. It is, however, a great deal closer to the truth than "he was appointed" - the phrase I replaced; a phrase which entirely failed to convey the vital information that Hiter and his party came to power on the back of a popular vote - i.e., by more-or-less legitimate, democratic means.

Quite aside from the mattter of accuracy of language and avoiding bias, this is (I believe) an important matter to make clear. Far, far too many people in Western countries think that Hitler was just some vague sort of tin-pot dictator that made it into the big league. The (largely unspoken) conclusion, of course, is that "oh, it couldn't happen here: we have a democracy". I think that we have an obligation not to pretend that Hitler was just somehow "appointed", as if by magic, to the top job. Tannin 10:33 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

I agree with Tannin. The US president is not directly elected by the population either and yet the leaders of both the UK and the US are thought of as "elected leaders". To say otherwise is pure symantics. --mav 10:41 May 3, 2003 (UTC)


(de-indenting for this) It is not pure semantics; you cannot compare the Weimar Republic of 1932/1933 to the U.S. and U.K of today. Here is my ?0.02 on the subject of "appointed" vs. "elected". I have consistently used "Hitler was appointed Reichskanzler by Paul von Hindenburg on January 30, 1933", and let me explain why I believe this is correct.

Here are some events leading to "1933":

  1. Reichstag general elections on Sept. 14, 1930 yield 18,3 % of the vote for the NSDAP.
  2. On May 30, 1932, Reichskanzler Brüning steps down after no longer having Paul von Hindenburg's confidence. Five weeks earlier, Hindeburg had been reelected Reichspräsident with Brüning's active support. (The Reichspräsident was directly elected by the people, the Reichskanzler was not.) Franz von Papen is appointed new Reichskanzler.
  3. Reichstag general elections on July 31, 1932 yield 37,2 % of the vote for the NSDAP. Hitler now demands to be appointed Reichskanzler; Hindenburg rejects this on August 13, 1932. But there is no majority in the Reichstag for any other government; as a result, the Reichstag is dissolved and elections take place once more.
  4. The November 6, 1932 elections yield 33,0 % for the NSDAP: it has lost over four percent. Note, these are the last elections before Hitler's appointment as Reichskanzler.
  5. Franz von Papen steps down (can't find what date right now); General von Schleicher becomes Reichskanzler on December 3, 1932. His audacious plan is to find a majority in the Reichstag by uniting the trade unionist left wings in the various parties, including that of the NSDAP led by Gregor Strasser. This didn't work.
  6. On January 4, 1933, Hitler meets with von Papen at the house of the Cologne banker Kurt von Schroeder. They agree on forming a joint government; besides Hitler, only two other NSDAP members (Frick as minister of the interior and Göring as Commissary for Prussia) shall be part of the Reich government. Hitler was to become Reichskanzler and von Papen Vice Chancellor. The new cabinet includes the influential media mogul Hugenberg, who was chairman of the (also right-wing) DNVP party at the time.
  7. Hindenburg was not aware of this meeting and, when presented with the results, appoints Hitler.
  8. The next Reichstag elections take place March 5, 1933, where, despite general terrorization of the voters by the SA, the NSDAP "only" yielded 43,9 %. See Gleichschaltung.

There was therefore no election directly prior to the appointment of Hitler that would justify saying that Hitler was "elected". Instead, the NSDAP had lost votes in the November 6, 1932 election compared to the earlier July 31 one. Speaking of "electing" the Reichskanzler would also give the misleading impression that the Reichstag had much significance at all any more in the last three years of the Weimar Republic; instead, government was executed by the Reichskanzler with the help of the Reichspräsident, who issued presidential decrees based on the emergence article 48 subsection 2 of the Weimar constitution, because the Reichstag had an overwhelming majority of both left-wing and right-wing parties and a "center" government no longer had a majority.

I can write up something for the Weimar Republic article (including the results of the other parties) that clarifies this so nobody gets confused, and this should be pointed to from the Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany articles then. But please don't say that Hitler was "elected". As a last note, all the German history books that I could find speak of Ernennung (appointment) as well. Thank you for your attention. :-) Djmutex 16:35 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

BTW, thanks for the "bar-room lawyer". That really got me started. :-) Djmutex 16:41 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

Essentially, I don't care much either way, but the debate is really one of how multiparty systems work when a coalition government is needed. From what you are saying, it would seem that election requires obtaining an absolute majority. In the case of coalition governments. it is normally given to the candidate with the largest percentage or the winner is chosen by a "neutral" party, who decides who has the best chance of forming a government. A system similar to the Weimar form of government in that sense is Israel, where no prime minister has ever won a majority of seats in parliament for his or her party. The president, which is otherwise a largely ceremonial role, traditionally charged the candidate with the most votes to attempt to form a government. On the other hand, until recently the president had the prerogative to select another candidate who was deemed better able to make a government. While this was never used, it was almost used after the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, when Netanyahu defeated Shimon Peres by less than 1 percent of the vote. Nevertheless, and without getting into a discussion about Israel democracy, the prime minister is always considered elected. Still, I can handle appointed as long as all the information leading to why Hindenburg selected Hitler is given. Danny

(I indented your comment above) I guess an NPOV summary of the above could be phrased as "Hitler was appointed Reichskanzler by Hindenburg after the NSDAP had yielded the largest share of the popular vote in the two Reichstag elections of 1932". That includes the popular vote and still satifies the bar-room lawyer in me. :-) Djmutex 17:00 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

Mate, I'm a bit of a bar-room lawyer myself. (In case no-one has noticed yet!) Your formulation just above is excellent. Tannin

I'm glad we agree. :-) I'll fix things up on various pages then. Djmutex 17:08 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

Oh God, the dreaded election/selection debate. It had to come, I suppose. FTR this is a debate that goes on all the time in political science, and there is no one right answer. But a growing number of academics are following a policy of absolute accuracy, becuase otherwise major problems occur, albeit in a small number of cases.

  • Example No 1: Was Albert Reynolds, Irish taoiseach in 1992, elected? Yes he got into power after an election, with is the popularly presumed criteria. But most voters in the preceding general election voted against him and were physically sick when the Irish Labour Party, who mopped up vast numbers of votes because of its anti-Albert stance, then went into a coalition with him and put him back in power.
  • Example No. 2: His successor in 1994, John Bruton, became the first Irish opposition leader to form a government without a general election. (He had been the expected victor in 1992 until Albert came back from the political dead, when Labour chose him over Bruton.) So, was Albert, who lost a general election but by a post election deal gained power, an elected leader?

What Bruton, who won a general election but got shafted and sent to the opposition and then came back, an elected leader?

  • Example No. 3: Both Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair achieved landslides in general elections that were not representative of the popular vote but a product of the electoral system. In any proportional system, they would have struggled to achieve any majority. But the quirky nature of the unproportional First Past the Post produced what were electoral 'quirks' that delivered a phoney majority, just as in the mid 1980s, it gave the SDP-Liberal Alliance a tiny handful of seats even though it had 25% of the popular vote. So if Thatcher and Blair were victors because of the British electoral system, not actual votes, can they really be called 'elected'?
  • Example No. 4: If John Major had lost the 1992 general election, would he have been described as 'elected', given that he was appointed by the Queen in exactly the same way as each of her prime ministers (ie, was commissioned to form a government and did so) but never won a general election? Ditto with John Bruton who was nominated by the Dáil and appointed by the President in 1994 and who went on to lose the 1997 general election. Was John an 'elected' prime minister?
  • Example No 5: Malcolm Frazer was appointed Australian PM by Governor-General Sir John Kerr in 1975. He did win the subsequent general election, but what if he had lost it? Would be be described as an 'elected' prime minister?
  • Example No. 6: Winston Churchill was appointed prime minister by King George VI in 1940 when Neville Chamberlain resigned after discovering he was dying of cancer. Churchill went on to lose the 1945 general election. Could Churchill in his role as a war leader be described as 'elected'? Similarly what of David Lloyd George from 1916 to 1918? What of Alec Douglas-Home, who succeeded Macmillan and lost the next general election to Labour's Harold Wilson?
  • Example No. 7: George W. Bush lost the popular vote and so, if you define elected as been chosen by the people, does not deserve the word 'elected' (just the Reynolds). But he won power through the Electoral College, just as Reynolds did, both of whom won in the technically correct way (in the Electoral College, the Dáil) but lacked the presumption that is normally behind it, namely that the EC or the Dáil is simply reflecting and rubberstamping the decision of the people. In these two instances, they in effect overuled the people's will as expressed in the election.
  • Example No. 8: How does the electoral system and methodology impact on deciding who was elected? Was Bertie Ahern more 'elected' than Tony Blair because while the former was chosen using a proper representative Proportional Representation using a Single Transferable Vote that basically gave you in seat terms the proportion you deserve based on votes, while Blair was 'elected' using the quirky and frequently bizarre First Past the Post system (in which you can get 32% and get 5% of the seats, 33% and get 45% of the seats - around that percentage 'strange' things happen!!!) If you go by accuracy, does that mean Bertie Ahern is more 'elected' than Tony Blair, who is more 'elected' than George Bush, who is more elected than Saddam Hussein, who is more elected than . . . etc etc.

So how do we describe these and other examples? Do we create a sliding scale of elected, semi-elected, 10% elected, 20% elected, almost elected, prime ministers? Is Churchill slightly more 'elected' that Douglas-Home, because he unlike DH actually did win an election, albeit later? But Lloyd George more elected than Churchill because he won his first election? If Blair wins more seats on Thatcher but on a lower percentage, which is more elected? Is Bruton Ireland's first 'unelected' taoiseach? Or is Reynolds? Is George W. Bush more or less 'elected' than Bill Clinton or Richard Nixon?

In the case of Hitler, it is 100% wrong to say he was an elected leader. He got power through the back door, through a deal arranged by political opponents with Hindenburg's connivance in which they put Hitler in power in the mistaken belief that they could control him.

As I mentioned, because of numerous problems (of which only a small number are mentioned above) many academics are now following a strict literal interpretation of the law in describing how someone comes to power. So unless someone is 100% directly elected by a body (eg, the US electoral college, the electorate), the word 'elected' is not used. Instead the word 'selected' is increasingly preferred. Where possible, a literal description of how they came to power is used. So one doesn't say 'x' was elected taoiseach but 'x' was appointed taoiseach on the nomination of the Dáil' . 'Blair was appointed prime minister after a landslide in the general election.' 'Reynolds was appointed taoiseach on the Dáil's nomination, after Labour had decided to support him after five years of crusading against him.' 'George W. Bush was elected by the Electoral College to be president, even though his opponent received more popular votes; because the nature of those votes and their location delivered less electoral college votes to Gore.' 'Hitler was appointed chancellor by Hindenburg following a deal worked out by senior non-nazi politicians, who were convinced they could control the former Austrian corporal. Hindenburg, though fiercely anti-nazi, and who had defeated Hitler in the 1932 presidential election, reluctantly agreed that, with nazi popular support on the wane, Hitler could now be controlled as chancellor and so gave him the job.'

On balance, therefore, I avoid saying someone was elected unless it is a historic fact that they were directedly so, by some body, whether the electorate, parliament or an electoral college. If they weren't, the word is not used. So I never ever write that a UK PM is elected, an Irish taoiseach is elected, a PM of Italy, Spain, Portugal, etc are elected. PMs for a couple of years in Israel were elected by the people. That has since been reverted to appointment by the president. So only those PMs who were elected are described as such. The rest are described as appointed or selected. And Hitler initially was not elected to office, and to use the word misleads by suggesting that

  1. Hitler had sufficient support in 1932 to win a national election; he didn't. His support was in decline;
  2. The electorate were responsible for bringing Hitler to power. They weren't, it was the President and the political elite who say the decline in nazi support and presumed that now was the time to offer Hitler power, he seeing it as his one and only chance for power, and thus doing whatever the political 'big boys' wanted to get a chance to be chancellor.

Crucially, Hitler used power as the appointed chancellor to win subsequent election, he did not win election and then get his hands on power. It may seem a technical point, but it is crucial in understanding the methodology by which nazism took power in Germany.

Against the odds, Wiki has managed to get the nomenclature of England/Great Britain/United Kingdom right (which most sourcebooks don't). We have struggled with royal names, with titles, with definitions of all sorts including most recently 'Communist state'. We should try to get this one right too. The more accurate we are, the better it will be of our credibility as a sourcebook. Many encyclopædias make a balls of this area. It would nice if wiki on this issue could take on the big encyclopædias and beat them by getting the facts 100% right. ÉÍREman 20:53 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

A quick note to JTDirl. The new law in Israel, which cancelled the electoral reform bill and direct election of the prime minister, requires the president for the first time to appoint the candidate whose party received the most votes. The prerogative to select another candidate to form a coalition is only given to the president of the initial candidate fails to form a coalition in a given amount of time. Danny
(I added a bar above your comment) Thanks for the information... if I understand you correctly, you are not objecting to the phrasing "Hitler was appointed Reichskanzler by Hindenburg after the NSDAP had yielded the largest share of the popular vote in the two Reichstag elections of 1932", so I can continue rephrasing this on some pages now that the server is back online. Djmutex 21:00 May 3, 2003 (UTC)
If I understand the above exchange correctly, JTDIRL and Djmutex basically agree on what happened. The phrasing Djmutex suggests seems sensible. But I have a suggestion: assuming everyone agrees on the phrasing, I think some of the historical facts brought out in the above discussion, both as to the Weimar constitution and as to the specific politics that led to Hitler's selection, need to be incoprorated into the article. As far as I can tell, the folowing paragraph is doing most of the work:
In the midst of severe economic crisis, Hitler became Chancellor of the Weimar Republic in January 1933 due to intrigues between various right wing figures in the entourage of President Hindenburg, including former Chancellor Franz von Papen, and the right wing German National People's Party (DNVP), led by Alfred Hugenburg. Papen and Hugenburg had hoped to use Hitler's popularity to secure power.
I have no objection to the wording, only to the level of detail. Everyone on this talk page seems to agree that how, exactly, Hitler rose to power in a democratic country is an important matter. I wish the article itself had some of the detail of this talk page. Slrubenstein
I have just rewritten the final section of Weimar Republic with the events outlined above (with a little more wording). I believe that these events should be there and not here with Adolf Hitler; Weimar Republic is presently the most complete article about the history of the time (although it needs more work), and most people see the formal end of it with the appointment of Hitler as Reichskanzler. I believe that the Hitler page should instead focus on issues other than the collapse of the Republic, which really doesn't belong here. This should have the events in his personal life and should, as far as those overlap with the history of Weimar, point to there. Djmutex 22:11 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

It should be noted that, according to modern research, Hitler was gay and had a sexual relationship with some soldiers during World War I.

What research? A good cite will be needed for this. --mav
See http://www.observer.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,564899,00.html

Though I am not supporting this theory, there is a book, The Hidden Hitler (2001), (ISBN 0-465-04308-9) by Lothar Machtan that supports this. I have the book but I haven't read it yet and I am not prepared to comment on its arguments. Danny

If this is mentioned at all, it shouldn't be where it was edited in by someone anonymous, but instead in the (mostly nonfactual) psychologial section below. This now sounds as if Hitler was sexually involved with all of his comrades in World War I, and then they all became Nazis. If you ask me, NPOV would dictate to say "Some scholars claim that Hitler was gay." I doubt this is widely accepted. I also think I saw that Machtan guy on TV a while ago, and it sounded as if he was trying to reduce the failure of the Weimar republic to this one cause. As a famous German journalist once said, the only thing in the world that has a single cause is pregnancy. Djmutex 23:09 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

Personally, I'd like to get rid of the entire psychology section, since it is entirely speculative. Danny

Passage moved to the indicated section and NPOVed. I wouldn't shed a tear if the whole section were removed. IMO "outing" like this is highly offensive because implicit in this type of charge is the POV the being a homosexual is somehow deviant and wrong. --mav
I agree. The section should at least be moved to Sensational psychological babble about Hitler or something of that sort. Djmutex 23:21 May 3, 2003 (UTC)
I disagree, as the fact is not unimportant and may explain the death of Röhm. It should also be noted that "Hitler himself never condemned homosexuality, but he allowed the persecution of gays in order to disguise his own true colours," as Machtan says.
I just read the chapter. The passage, based on an interview with Thomas Mend, who served with Hitler, is not very convincing: "We noticed that he never looked at women. We suspected him of homosexuality," and the Schmidt case are just a lot of speculation by someone who hated Hitler and wanted to make him look bad. Danny

Getting back to the election vs. selection crisis, I just wanted to correct whoever it was (probably Tannin), who said that Hitler had somehow been denied the just reward of being made Chancellor after the Nazis got the most votes in the election. In a multi-party system like Weimar Germany, there was no particular presumption that the party with the most seats got to try to form a government. Before 1932, the Social Democrats had always had the most seats in the Reichstag in every single election. Nevertheless, they only led governments in 1919-1920 and 1928-1930. The person to be appointed had to be someone who could be expected to have majority support in the Reichstag, or at least, to be passively tolerated by a majority. For much of the history of Weimar, the SPD refused to participate in government, so the centrist parties either had to ally with the right (the DNVP), or else form minority governments with tacit SPD support. Hitler's predecessors in power, Papen and Schleicher, had practically no support in the Reichstag at all (besides the DNVP, in at least the former case). But Hitler would not have had majority support either. The Communists and Social Democrats were inalterably opposed, and so, to a lesser extent, where the Centrists and whatever remnant was left of the Democrats (almost nobody, I think). Even with support from the Nationalists and the People's Party, Hitler could not have commanded a majority with either the July 1932 or November 1932 Reichstags. In fact, nobody at all could have, unless either the Communists or the Nazis could be persuaded to tolerate. But, in any event, the solution we've mostly agreed to seems about right to me. I'd just like to add that we shouldn't be wary of saying the actual factually correct statement (that Hitler was appointed) for fear that it is somehow unfair to Hitler, because he got a lot of votes in some elections that were held a few months before. john 23:49 May 3, 2003 (UTC)

I have had a go at trying to straighten out the political and military facts in this article and at giving the Holocaust its proper place, but someone ought to go right through and revise a lot of it. In my opinion also the psychological section at the end of dubious value, and the "popular representation" section is in poor taste. Dr Adam Carr 16:52, 21 Sep 2003 (UTC)

(I have repented and revised the rather intolerant first version of the above posting: I was fairly grumpy when I wrote it. But I do think that a topic like this deserves both accuracy and and an appropriate tone. Idle speculation about Hitler's sex life etc is (IMHO) not worthy of a serious article.) Dr Adam Carr 08:26, 22 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I am curious to know why this original intro description:

Hitler is one of the 20th Century's most unpopular figures, and today is almost universially condemned. He is often considered to be a quintessential example of human evil, and his name is generally synonymous with anti-semitism and tyranny.

had to be "softened" to this:

Hitler was one of the 20th century's most influential figures. Reactions to his policies and to World War II have shaped almost every aspect of the modern world. Most postwar historians and other writers have described him as the quintessential example of human evil, and his name is generally synonymous with anti-Semitism, genocide, and tyranny.

How is the first paragaph incorrect in any way? It's not a far-fetched POV allegation to say that no one really likes Hitler nowadays. And most people on the street generally consider him to be evil, not just "historians."

user:J.J.

Well, I don't like either version especially. But does an encyclopedia really care what "people on the street" think? Isn't the idea of an encyclopedia to cull the knowledge/opinions/views of experts on whatever subject is being discussed? john 08:11, 25 Sep 2003 (UTC)
As I said a few posts above, I think this article is generally badly written, and these rather clumsy opening paragraphs are good examples. I am going to have a go at rewriting it soon. Dr Adam Carr

I have had several tries at editing this article, but I finally decided that it would be easier to write a whole new one. I know it is Wikipedia policy to "be bold in editing," but I am not sure if this extends to completely replacing a major article with a new one without any consultation. So I am posting it here Adolf Hitler 2, and readers can make up their own minds. If the Wikipedia powers-that-be decide to replace the current version with this version, fine; if they don't, also fine. I will place it as a link at my homepage and readers can have two Hitler articles to read.

I would, however, be opposed to anyone trying to amalgamate the two articles. My main criticisms of the original article are that it is incoherent and that its tone is inappropriate. This problems would only be perpetuated by creating a hybrid of the two articles. Dr Adam Carr 14:18, 25 Sep 2003 (UTC)

OK no-one seems to care very much so I have replaced the old Adolf Hitler with the new one. If anyone wants to object I am happy to debate the matter. Dr Adam Carr 12:27, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)

It wasn't Hitler's father that was alleged to be Jewish but something like his mother's mother's father. Some leading Nazi (Frank?) claimed that it was true but there's no actual evidence for it. I forget the details so I didn't change anything. --zero 12:35, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Some more points: 50M is generally given as the number for all casualties in WW2. That includes 10M Chinese. How was Hitler directly responsible for that? Also, the assertion that Hitler invaded the Soviet Union to kill the Jews is debatable at best (personally I think it is just silly). He wrote about Lebensraum in Russia in Mein Kampf, Poland had a larger Jewish population and he invaded there long before Wannsee (okay, we can debate intentionalism), and there were important political (hatred of Bolshevism and of Slavs) and economic (grain in Ukraine, oil in Azerbaijan) reasons for his attack. I want a source on that assertion. Danny 12:47, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Some more problems: 1. The doctor who treated Hitler's mother in Linz was Jewish. 2. The yellow star was only decreed in Germany in 1941. Danny 13:02, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I am amazed at the near-absence of any comment on the role of religion in Hitler's belief system and his rise to power. The anti-Semitism page also glosses over its long history in Europe. It is incredible what blinders Christian apologists wear! I merely attempted to insert one link to a well-researched article on the subject and it was immediately deleted. If you want NPOV, you need to address the fact that Hitler said in Mein Kampf that he was following Jesus Christ, his anti-Semitism was derived from his religious beliefs, Christianity (combined with Teutonic mythology) was an integral part of Nazism, non-believers were persecuted, etc. Fairandbalanced 00:34, 4 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I don't know if I am allowed to delete old Talk, but I have, because otherwise the file is too long for me to open it. Someone can restore it if they want. It was mostly irrelevant anyway.

  • Zero, I have altered the reference to Hitler's father
  • Danny's points:
  • I did not take the 50m figure to include deaths in the Japanese war in China before 1941. I will check that. I think it is legitimate to include deaths in the Pacific War 1941-45 because Japan would not have launched that war had not Hitler lauched the European War
Nonsense. Japan invaded China before the launching of the war in Europe.
Yes of course they did. I said "launched the Pacific War", not launched their war against China. Using the word "nonsense" when you have misunderstood what I said is not helpful.
  • I agree that Poland had a larger Jewish population than the USSR. I think that's what I said.
And yet, it took the Nazis some time to figure out what to do with the Jews there. For example, there were initial orders to create a ghetto in early 1941. The Jews were able to play tensions between the Wehrmacht, the General Gouvernement, and the SS and have the order rescinded for about a year. (see Czerniakow's Diary's, etc.)
  • The fact that Wannsee came after the occupation of Poland isn't to the point. The Wannsee meeting was to plan the sytematic killing of the Jews (Aktion Reinhard), consequent on the occupation of western Russia. Unsystematic killing had been going on since 1939, and particularly through the einsatsgruppen operations since 1941.
The Einsatzgruppen began operation the day after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Did Hitler actually plan the mass killing of Jews in 1939 or earlier?--that is a major historical debate, and we cannot take a position on it (regardless of my own position on the matter). Perhaps it was a terror campaign to get them to leave ...
I don't think Hitler "personally planned" the mass killing of Jews at all. I think he made it clear to his most trusted subordinate, Himmler, that that was what he wanted, and Himmler and his subordinates did the planning. That is certainly the import of Himmler's 1943 Poznan speech to the Gauleiters. Wannsee wouldn't have been necessary if the whole thing had been planned all along. That is a different issue to whether it was Hitler's intention all along.
  • I agree that Hitler intended creating an empire in the east, but my view is that that was a secondary consideration in his mind. He cared little about economics and I doubt oil in Azerbaijan counted for much for him.
The key words in your response are "my view". It is certainly valid, but it is still only one view.
  • He hated Bolshevism because he believed it to be part of the Jewish masterplan. Hitler was an anti-Semite well before the Russian revolution.
This is kind of a "what came first: the chicken or the egg?" argument. Did he hate Bolshevism because of the Jews, or did he hate Jews because of Bolshevism? The two are so intertwined, I personally believe it is impossible to distinguish between them.
Maybe, but the fact is that Hitler was an anti-Semite well before he could have even heard of the Bolsheviks. He said many times that Bolshevism was just a Jewish plot to enslave the Aryans etc.
  • Also I don't think Hitler hated the Slavs. He held them in contempt as untermenschen, but we don't hate those we hold in contempt: we hate those we fear, as Hitler feared and hated the Jews.
The argument is semantic. There were mass killings of Polish intellectuals, Poles and Soviet prisoners of war were gassed, and he supported mass sterilization and slave labor for the surviving Slavs. Call it what you will.
  • I have seen the story about the Jewish doctor, but I am very resistant to the idea of attributing world-historic events to minor quirks of biography. The same applies to the story about the Jewish director of the Vienna art academy. Hitler didn't need to have grudges against individual Jews to become an eliminationist anti-Semite. The culture he grew up in was soaked in that ideology.
I did not posit it as causal. In fact, according to the story, he was very grateful to that particular doctor> i am simply rejectin the statement that he did not know any Jews until he reached Vienna.
I see. I will change that reference then.
  • I didn't mean to imply that the Yellow Star was part of the Nuremberg Laws. I will clarify that reference.
Thank you. The two are so often confused.
  • Whether Hitler's primary motivation for his actions was anti-Semitism is of course a matter of judgement. It cannot be proved or disproved by a single reference. My judgement is based on 30 years of reading on this subject - that is what historians are trained and paid to do. You are of course free to disagree.
Exactly, it is a matter of judgment. Hence, it cannot be POV, because there are certainly people who disagree with it, and with valid cause.
In reply to several of your points above: Everything historians write is their own view. It it my view that Columbus discovered America. Whether you agree with me or not depends on how much credibility you place on my view, and what evidence I can produce to support it. But many historical questions are not mere matters of "fact," as I am sure you know. They are matters of judgement, which is different to matters of opinion.
As for the rhetorical argument from authority ("that is what historians are paid and trained to do"), I also get a paycheck, from a Holocaust museum no less. Whether I disagree or not is irrelevant. The problem is presenting one interpretation of facts as fact. Describing historical phenomena as "cause and effect" requires much more proof than credentials. As you say yourself, "It cannot be proved or disproved by a single reference." Danny 14:02, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)
I had already looked at your homepage and seen that you are a historian. I was not pulling rank on you, I was making the point about judgements that I alluded to above.

Regards Dr Adam Carr 13:37, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)

OK I have now checked the questions of whether the Chinese deaths before 1941 are included in the 50m figure or not. It seems they are, although I don't think they should be. That will reduce the figure to c 40m, although I also see I understated the number of Soviet POWs who died. I will make some amendments accordingly.

Beyond that, Danny, I am not sure what we are arguing about. Surely you are not disputing my basic points that Hitler was an eliminationist anti-Semite, that his actions should be seen as growing from the German culture of anti-Semitism and not from his relationship with his father or other pseudo-Freudian rubbish, and that anti-Semitism is the key to both his policies and his ability to get the German people to carry them out? I should be very surprised if any Holocaust historian, let alone a Jewish one, seriously disagreed with any of that.
Regards Dr Adam Carr 14:37, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I am still skeptical about the 40 million number because it still includes the Pacific theater, and I am not thrilled about that. We cannot assume how Japan would have acted were there not a war in Europe--that is assuming history. In fact, it could be argued that Hitler actually managed to check Japan's ambitions until December 1941. After all, he had no interest in bringing America into the war, at least at that time. More problematic for me, however, is the assertion "Hitler’s overriding objective was to destroy the Jews: the war was only a means to that end, and the war against the western allies was only a necessary prelude to the conquest of Russia." Quite possibly true, but I want some hard evidence of that before I agree to let that stay. Oh, and yes, Hitler was an "eliminationist anti-Semite" (though possibly not always--the Madagascar Plan comes to mind). There was a German culture of anti-Semitism (personally, I believe that the mythos of the Jew, like that of the Gypsy--I am working on an article on that now--pervades European culture as the rejection of the "outsider"), however, despite Marr, Lueger, etc., there were certainly indications of shifting cultural norms--at least on the surface--in Central Europe. I don't essentially disagree with your statement: I just think it is more complicated than that. I certainly have no taste for the pseudo-Freudian babble, but there was a lot more going on in Hitler's mind than simply an obsessive dislike of Jews--lots of people felt that way, but they did not instigate gas chambers or bring the world to war. Therefore, it may be a key, but I hesitant to say that it was the key. Danny 15:35, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)


Well I don't disagree that this is a very complex topic and that whatever we might say, more can always be said. However we are not writing a book here, we are writing a 5,000 word encyclopaedia article, the object of which is to set out in broad terms the current state of historical knowledge and judgements about that knowledge, for people who are not historians. As I said in the article, I actually don't think the state of Hitler's mind is the real issue, but since we are writing a biographical essay that is one of the issues we have to tackle, and since it not a matter about which we can make simple statements of "objective" fact, we make to make judgements. I'm sure these judgements can be further elaborated, and if you want to add more material to what I have written, or render it into a more "NPOV" style, feel free. Personally I don't think this is a subject for which a dry historians' tone is appropriate - not that I think that is what you are suggesting.

On the Pacific War, I think the general view is that Japan calculated that with the European colonial powers defeated by Hitler, and the US too decadent to fight, East Asia was easy pickings. I don't believe that Japan would have launched its attacks against the western powers (as opposed to China) otherwise. For that reason I think it is reasonable to lay the whole death toll of WW2 at Hitler's feet. But again, if you wish to argue a contrary case and can do so without getting the whole article diverted onto side issues, feel free.

I tend to agree with Danny here that the deaths in the Pacific arena are a bit too indirectly the fault of Hitler even though he played an important part in the process that led to mant of those deaths. However, I wonder if the figures include German deaths. I think it would be quite proper to assign Hitler the blame for all the casualties of the European war on both sides. --zero

Dr Adam Carr 16:08, 27 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Later: Danny, I have now made some NPOV-ish amendments to the paragraphs we have been discussing. Let me know what you think. Dr Adam Carr 03:34, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Hi. Thanks for the changes. I still may not agree with everything, but the article is definitely much improved. I'm glad about that. I will look it over more tomorrow, when i am more awake, and see if there are any suggestions I would make. Danny 03:44, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Memo to 213.16.225.41: Why don't you become a User so we can debate some of the changes you have made to this article? I have deleted much of your irrelevant military detail, which does not belong in a biography of Hitler of this length. If you want to write an article on Hitler as military commander that would be a good idea. Dr Adam Carr 03:34, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Why not? I would like to know your way of thinking on the subject. I noticed that your recent changes included deleting many of the details the article had of his life as an unsuccesful artist and as a soldier. Did you considered them incorrect or just of minor significance?

Actualy most of my own changes yesterday were additions of dates to specific events and links to the relevant articles. This was under the impression that vague references to time passing in the subject's life could become more specific. Please delete those details you find irrelevant.

I am still uncertain about your exact wording on some occasions. Among others:

1)Instigator of World War II? That is questionable if we examine the events that preceded the war. But even assuming that World War II begins on September , 1939 in Europe instead of earlier in Asia we already have five combatants.:

All five denied responsibility for the war but to an extent this responsibilitie was shared between them. Singling Germany out isn't strictly the Allied view?

2)Guernica a village? Hmmm... my encyclopedic sources give its full name as "Guernica y Luno" and considere it a city of great importance to the Vizcaya province of Spain. It was also autonomous to some extend between 1366 and 1882 with its own parliament during the early 19th century. Admittedly it is not heavily populated (17, 836 citizens in 1981) but still large enough to be considered a town at least.

3)"Terror Bombing"? I am not sure if this is the best wording for it. The article about strategic bombing already includes Luftwaffe's activities in the Battle of Britain as well as the Allied bombings of Berlin, Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The article on World War II lists all those events as part of a Bomber War. The article on Terrorism mentions them as alleged incidents of State terrorism. Guernica can be seen as a forerunner to these events so I figured that strategic bombing would be a better term. The deaths of civilians and spreading of terror to the survivors is onee thing all this incidents seem to have in common.

4)"Mussolini dethroned"? He was called "Duce" but he was not a Duke and he never held or claimed a throne in the first place. He was officialy the Prime Minister of Italy and had dictatorial powers. Deposed or forced to resign would be more accurate I suppose.

Though I am still not sure whether the article depicts Adolf as a person instead of some kind of legendary figure incarnating Anti-Semitism you have my thanks for getting rid of the Freudian interpretations. They never were very convincing. User:Dimadick.


Isn't it funny how the "No bias" policy doesn't apply to this article. It is a formal exception? 80.195

Hitler is that kind of subject. It is generally accepted that an article about Hitler is going to be less NPOV than an article about almost anything else, and frankly, I can understand why. It goes without saying that I hate Hitler, we all hate Hitler, but if I have to go by a strictly objective standard, this article is POV. Fortunately, it is a POV that all reasonable people can easily agree with, but still a POV. The closing sentences of the very first paragraph are biased. I happen to agree wholeheartedly with this particular bias, however. And, from a certain standpoint, it is factually accurate even if POV. Hitler did bring death and ruin to Europe.

So, again, it's 'that kind of issue.' I really don't have a problem with the article as it is. When we are writing about a subject as emotionally volatile and difficult as Adolph Hitler, the usual standards may not always fully apply.

Nat 04:48, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I disagree. The fact that most people strongly disagree with hitler's major policies is neither here nor there. What is wrong with the article is the general use of emotive terms and opinions on this. If you simply state the facts about what hitler is believed to have done, then most people could reach such opinions by themselves. Particularly very subjective terms like "evil" can be avoided. It is a perfectly legitamate and factual viewpoint that H wasn't "evil" but merely doing what he thought was best according to his own very misguided beliefs. Also phrases like "rought ruin on [everything]" are rather bias - he did do some positive things, such as create full employment, and restore germany's economy. I'm not, of course, suggesting that these in any way justify the atrocities of his regime, but nonetheless they should be mentioned.

I am not certain why we should hate a historical figure that we try to examine. Or like/love him/her for that matter. Simply being interested in him/her should be enough.In my personal opinion at least, none of them should be sanctified or deamonized. And unfortunately Adolf has had a lot of both during his life and after his death. As with the rest of wikipedia's articles shouldn't we first describe the events and then their proposed interpretations, assuming they deserve examination? Our personal biases should not be prevalent in the articles if we want them to have any amount of accuracy. User:Dimadick

Thanks for the above comments. I have tried to write this article as dispassionately as possible, and I am open to suggestions as to how it might be made to read better. But I take the view that there are certain values which all civilised people share, such as that mass murder is wrong, and that when writing about a person who so grossly violated those values, it is acceptable for a historian to write from within that moral framework. I doubt in any case that it is possible to do otherwise. Am I supposed to write: "some people considered Hitler's plan to murder 11 million Jews to be wrong"? Dr Adam Carr 05:05, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

No, you can write that "most people considered it wrong", but not just "it was wrong". Moral values are always subjective, even if a value is shared by 99% of the people it is not an objective fact. I think this article should be as NPOV as any other. And on the whole it is, although the claim that he brought death and destruction to all countries he imposed his rule on may be misleading. Of course there was some death and destruction in all those countries, but not all of them were "ruined". --Wik 05:28, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I think most people prefix is unnecessary. If we started to take the minority into account, then we cannot say Britannica is the most prestigious because you have to say most people claim so. Adolf Hitler is a bad guy. It is not POV because it is accepted universally. -- Taku 05:31, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

No, something's prestige is a fact. If something is the most prestigious, it means precisely that most people think it is the best. It doesn't say that it is the best. Similarly, you can objectively say that Hitler has an extremely bad reputation (meaning most people think he is a bad guy). That's a big difference from saying he is a bad guy. --Wik 05:40, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Dispassionate? I am afraid then that your introduction to the article was not according to your intentions. Compare it to the older introduction that you replaced:



"Adolf Hitler (April 20, 1889 - April 30, 1945) was dictator of Germany from 1933 to 1945. He was the leader of the Nazi Party - formally the National Socialist German Worker's Party / Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (NSDAP) - from 1919 and Chancellor of Germany from 1933, from August 2, 1934, in union with the office of President of Germany, after the death of President Paul von Hindenburg, as Führer. A highly-effective and skilled orator and propagandist, he inspired and mobilized many followers. Under his leadership, Germany started World War II to gain territory and committed the Holocaust to eliminate Jews and others considered undesirable.

Hitler was one of the 20th century's most influential figures. Reactions to his policies and to World War II have shaped almost every aspect of the modern world. Most postwar historians and other writers have described him as the quintessential example of human evil, and his name is generally synonymous with anti-Semitism, genocide, and tyranny."

Which do you think was less biased? User:Dimadick


There are a lot of comments to reply to here, so I will have to be brief:

  • I don't think any historian seriously disputes that Hitler planned and instigated WW2. Dimadick's comments are ill-informed. Poland was invaded because it refused Hitler's demands, and Britain and France were dragged in most reluctantly.
  • I don't think the text has ever referred to Mussolini being "dethroned."
  • Guernica was a small town when it was bombed. It was of symbolic value to the Basques, which was why it was bombed, but of no military importance. To call this "strategic" bombing is a disgusting euphemism and falsification of history.
  • Terrorism is an act designed to induce terror. That was the object of bombing Guernica, and also the object of bombing Warsaw, Rotterdam and Belgrade.
  • No historian, and no person holding civilised values, should be expected to write "most people considered it wrong" in reference to Hitler's crimes. Historians do and should write within the moral framework of their society. Mass murder is wrong, and historians are as entitled as anyone else to say so.
  • There is no such thing as NPOV history writing. History is not physics - there are so simply "true" or "false" statements. That is the difference between writing history and merely compiling a catalogue.
  • Anyone who writes about Hitler has to make choices about how to organise and present the many "facts" available. In my opening para I chose to say that Hitler murdered millions of people, and not to say that he was fond of dogs and children (also a fact). The first is relevant to a discussion of his historical importance, the second (in my judgement) is not. Dr Adam Carr 07:29, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Dimadick made the following replies. Folks, please try to format things so we can see who wrote what.--zero 09:26, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

  • Actualy the Germans claimed that the Polish opened hostilities on August 31, 1939 by attacking the German transmitor of Gleiwitz (in Polish:Gliwice). Poland claimed that these "Polish soldiers" were actualy SS men in disguise trying to create a pretext for declaring war. I am uncertain on the validity of either claim. Hitler seemed to expect Britain and France to again avoid war and let him conquer undisturbed. Both countries seem to have taken an unexpected initiative. As for Hitler himself I only doubt that by this point he had planned ahead of conquering Poland.
    • It has been positively established that the attack on the transmitter station was a German stunt. I don't have the right book handy but I'm sure that both documents and German testimony are available. --zero 09:36, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)
  • The meaning of "strategic" I think includes attempts to demoralize an opponent. Most targets of bombings during War World II also had little military importance. Bombing London or Tokyo would have little material effect on the British or Japanese army but would still effect their morale. If you think this consitutes Terrorism then please add a link to the relevant article but keep a link to the article about strategic bombing. Why should we use the term "Terror Bombing" for only this instance?
    • Both "terror" and "strategic" are labels that can lead to misunderstanding. The solution is to use neither but rather state in simple language what was done. I tried to do that; you can disagree. --zero 09:36, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)
  • Morality and civilised values in relation to war is quite a subject to examine. But I am not sure that this is relevant to this article. Perhaps we should mention how his contemporaries tended to view him and how he currently tends to be viewed. But whether he was "right" or "wrong" remains a matter of view.
  • A completely NPOV historical account can surely never be achieved. This should not prevent us from at least trying. And the lack of certainty in many cases is usualy behind every major historical discussion. Mentioning opposing views in historical subjects and suggested evidence for and against their validity should be adequate enough to deal with the problem.
  • Mentioning some personal habits and preferences of the subject sometimes helps flesh out an article. True an examination of their significance is required. Focusing on them and completely ignoring them are too extremes that should be equaly avoided I think.

Thanks for taking the time to answer though. User:Dimadick

To take Dimadick's comments in more detail:

1)Instigator of World War II? That is questionable if we examine the events that preceded the war. But even assuming that World War II begins on September , 1939 in Europe instead of earlier in Asia we already have five combatants.

  • The events preceding the war were, first, German rearmament in violation of the Versailles Treaty, second the bullying of Austria and Czechoslovakia, and third, the attempted bullying of Poland. The decision to invade Poland was Hitler's alone. Possibly he dis not expect Britain and France to declare war but he was quite prepared to deal with that contingency.
  • The war in China pre-1939 is of no relevance at all.

Nazi Germany invades Poland on September 1, 1939 supposedly after provocations by the later.

  • The so-called "provocations" from Poland were German fabrications.

Britain declared war to Germany on September 3, 1939 supposedly in defense ofd Poland. France declared war to Germany six hours later on September 3, 1939 supposedly in defense of Poland and in co-operation with Britain. The Soviet Union invades Poland on September 17, 1939 supposedly in co-operation with Germany.

  • Supposedly? You have some better explanation for Britain and France entering war?
  • The USSR did not in fact enter the war in 1939 - there were no declarations of war either by or on the USSR. The occupation of eastern Poland was done by agreement with Germany. Stalin claimed that the Polish state had ceased to exist (which was in fact close to the case) so there was noone to declare war on.

All five denied responsibility for the war but to an extent this responsibilitie was shared between them. Singling Germany out isn't strictly the Allied view?

  • This is an example of the absurdity of the NPOV fetish. Of course Germany denied resposnibility for the war- aggressors usually do. It is the historian's job to examine and make judgements about these statements, and the judgements of all serious historians I am aware of is that Hitler planned the war.

Dr Adam Carr 07:51, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

  • As events preceding the war I would also take note of a small series of wars preceding it. The Abyssinia crisis, the Spanish Civil War, Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945). All three helped in undermining the League of Nations and spreading the instability in foreign relations that Hitler took advantage of. In a way all three helped pave the way to the major event. I doubt if they were "of no relevance at all".
  • If the provocations were mere fabrications then we should perhaps mention his seeking of a pre-text to justify his actions.
  • "Supposedly" here gives the justification for their actions according to the states themselves. Examining the validity of this justifications should mention the evidence for and against them. All sides of a war tend to justify even their worst actions and accuse their opponent of having sole responsibility. World War II is not much different in this matter.
  • Despite Stalin's claims the remnants of the Polish armie were still actively fighting against both invaders at least until October 5, 1939. Isn't this part of the War?
  • If NPOV is a fetish then I am indeed a fetishist.Hitler was certainly planning or closely supervising the activities of the German armies throughout his term. But in several cases he seemed to react to decisions by other combatants rather than taking the initiative. And whether he had a master plan in mind or just planning along is another matter of debate that as far as I know is still ongoing. User:Dimadick

The paragraph about Hitler's relationships is inadequate. Actually there were at least 5 women reasonably connected to him, and there is good evidence (such as testimony from the women concerned) that at least some were sexual. Ron Rosenbaum's book "Explaining Hitler : The Search for the Origins of His Evil" has a good summary of this in a dispassionate manner. --zero 09:22, 28 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Zero, you seem to know more about this than Hitler's biographers do, but if you have info on this then put it in and see what people say :)

More generally, and in light of all the above comments, I will try and do a "NPOV edit" on the whole article sometime today. Adam

OK fellow Hitler scholars, I have now done an edit on the areas which were giving people POV concerns - opinions welcome. I have also done another cull of unnecessary date-fetishism, and added more Relevant Links. I think a bigger bibliography would be useful, as would a section or article on the Historiography of Hitler. Perhaps someone can have a go at that. Adam 11:33, 3 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Made some significant changes - expanding on late-Weimar-seizure-of-power type stuff, and changing some stuff around. I think as it is now, the article has a rather intentionalist bent, so hopefully I can change it around and put in some structuralist/functionalist type stuff. I significantly changed a reference to Hitler winning votes by appealing to the German people's pre-existing anti-semitism, which I think is highly misleading - I think the general consensus is that Hitler's electoral victories generally derived from focusing on issues other than anti-semitism, particularly the Germans' economic distress and disgust with the Weimar system. Anti-semitism was certainly in there, but I think the pre-1930 weimar elections show pretty well that it wasn't really motivating anybody to vote for the Nazis. john 03:06, 4 Oct 2003 (UTC)

John, I think most of your edits are valuable. I do have some problems with the detailed history of the last days of Weimar. This is all very interesting but is it really biographical? This is an article about Hitler, and we should resist the temptation (chronic at Wikipedia) to stuff articles full of everything we know. Perhaps this material belongs in Weimar Republic or History of Germany? I won't change anything at the moment but I think that this much detail upsets the balance of the article somewhat.
I am going to revert the reference to "bourgeois parties of the right and centre." Bourgeois is a Marxist term-of-art which shouldn't appear in a general-readership text. I also object to the SPD being subsumed under this heading. Regards Adam 06:04, 4 Oct 2003 (UTC)


I agree with you that there's too much detail, at the moment. But the article as it was before was highly garbled in terms of the chronology. If someone wants to condense, that's fine. As far as the "bourgeois parties of the right and center", I don't think the term "bourgeois" to refer to the DDP, DVP, and DNVP is at all inappropriate. Firstly, "bourgeois" is not simply a term used by marxists - although Marxists certainly have used it. But it's been used by all sorts of non-Marxists, as well. Just in things I've recently read, I know that Tocqueville refers to the July Monarch as a "government of the bourgeoisie." But if you'd rather use "Middle class," that's fine. And I was purposely excluding the SPD (and, to a lesser extent, Catholic Centre) by using that term, because the SPD (and the Zentrum) didn't lose votes to the Nazis, particularly. But perhaps it's a bit unclear as it stands (or stood). john 06:35, 4 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Now John I'm sure you know perfectly well that "bourgeois" means one thing when used in a descriptive sense by a French historian, and quite another thing in English, where it is primarily a term of Marxist class analysis :) Adam

How is Tocqueville calling the July Monarchy a government of the bourgeoisie different from his contemporary Marx saying exactly the same thing? john 17:48, 4 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I am referring to the use of the adjective "bourgeois" in modern English usage, when it is nearly always (a) a Marxist term of analysis or (b) a term of snobbish disparagement (someone has bourgeois tastes). Adam

The most serious problem with the article as it stands is the prominence given to the thesis of Daniel Goldhagen. The wording "recent historians" even makes it sound like Goldhagen's ideas are a modern mainstream view. The fact is that when Goldhagen's book came out practically all the leading holocaust historians lined up to ridicule it. Since then the situation has barely changed. Goldhagen's ideas are still treated with disdain by the mainstream. Of course there is no rule that says fringe views can't be mentioned in articles, but it must be made clear that they are fringe. --zero 04:07, 6 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I don't deny that I broadly accept Goldhagen's thesis, but I do deny that the article gives undue promience to that thesis. There is only one reference to "recent historians," and if you want to change that to "Daniel Goldhagen" I have no objection. The article is about Hitler, not the history of the Holocaust, so acceptance or rejection of Goldhagen is not a central issue anyway. I argued in my first draft of this article that both that Hitler was a product of an anti-Semitic culture and that he exploited that culture to attain power and enlist the German people in carrying out the Holocaust. I suppose that is a broadly Goldhagian view, though hardly originating with him. It is still my view, but the wording of the article has been substantially changed to reflect the input of other people who disagree with me, as should be the case in a co-operatively written article. Feel free to make further changes and then we can debate them. Cheers Adam 04:39, 6 Oct 2003 (UTC)


This paragraph is far too Goldhagenian for me to be comfortable with it:

In the view of many historians, the key to this puzzle is anti-Semitism. Germany was far from being the only country in Europe in which there was endemic anti-Semitism, and Hitler was very far from being the only anti-Semitic politician in Europe. But Germany was the only great European state in which what recent historians have called "eliminationist anti-Semitism"—the belief that the Jews were malevolent enemies who should be killed - was so prevalent that a talented demagogue like Hitler could ride it to power, given the opportunity. It was the political demoralisation of Germany after the defeat of 1918, the catastrophe of the Depression, and the divisions on the left that prevented effective resistance, that gave him that opportunity.

"Eliminationist anti-semitism" could be found in other European countries, and the idea that it was particularly prevalent in pre-1933 Germany is simply ridiculous. Even the Nazis didn't use particularly "eliminationist" rhetoric in their rise to power, and in the elections they actually did well in, they tended to downplay their anti-semitism. Anti-semitism was hardly a motivating factor for more than a tiny minority of the German electorate. Even later on, during the actual killings, after years of Nazi demonization of the Jews, the Nazis took great pains to hide what they were doing to the Jews from the German population - which hardly suggests the great popularity of "eliminationist anti-semitism." And, as Zero says, this paragraph implies that this is a common view among historians, which it is not. It is the view of Daniel Goldhagen, which should not be presented as the principal explanation of the Nazi phenomenon, given its pretty solid rejection by practically every historian of note working on either German or holocaust history. Goldhagen's views perhaps merit a mention, if we must, although given that the article is, as Adam points out, on Hitler and not on the Holocaust, I don't see why even that should be necessary. At any rate, the last sentence is fairly solid. john 08:46, 6 Oct 2003 (UTC)

OK, well if my quasi-Goldhagianism is to be rejected, someone needs to write a paragraph that provides an alternative explanation of how Hitler succeeded in persuading a civilised country to put him in power and then enlisting thousands of them in committing the crime of the century. If John or Zero care to provide a draft, we can proceed. Adam 08:58, 6 Oct 2003 (UTC)


WHAT EVER HAPPPENED TO NPOV?

Hey, I thought you guys complained when I denounced Pope Pius XII in a very 'POV' manner on his article, but apparently you have no problem with denouncing Hitler as 'the instigator of the holocaust'...

Now, for obvious reasons I'm not fan of Hitler, but this article contains TONS of stuff about Hitler that isn't NPOV by any means.

HOWEVER, for even suggesting that Pope Pius XII was just another genocidal maniac like Hitler, my article additions were deleted.

Let good triumph over evil, neh?

-Khranus

I don't know what you wrote about Piux XII so I can't comment on that. I wrote the line about Hitler being "the instigator of the Holocaust" and I regard that as a simple statement of fact and not a "point of view", except in the general sense that any statement of fact represents the writer's point of view about what is true. So what is your objection to the statement? That there was no Holocaust? That what happened shouldn't be called a Holocaust? Or that there was a Holocaust but Hitler didn't instigate it? If you can clarify your objections, we can discuss them. Adam 03:56, 9 Oct 2003 (UTC)

The claims about financing of the Nazis are examined in the book "Wall Street and the rise of Hitler" by Antony Sutton which can be read at http://reformed-theology.org/html/books/wall_street/index.html . Chapter 10 concerns the book by the (almost certainly fictitious) "Sidney Warburg". I know very little about this subject and can't say whether Sutton's book is sound or not. However, it is clear that someone provided the Nazis with large sums of money and some of the companies concerned (such as I.G. Farben) were not purely German companies. --zero 02:20, 11 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Various "revisonists", neo-Nazis, Irvingites and anti-Semites have been pushing this sort of stuff for many years, presumably to make some silly point that the Jews were the authors of their own demise through their greed etc etc. Sutton's book looks to be more of the same. Where is the evidence that mysterious someones funded the Nazis? They were a mass political party, they were perfectly capable of raising large amounts of money by the usual means. It's no secret that they had some backers among the industrialists. The historical equivalent of Ockham's Razor is that when a simple explanation will do, a compex one isn't necessary. And if Frank has some evidence he should present it, not insert illiterate and offensive remarks about "the Jew Warburg" into the text. Adam 02:55, 11 Oct 2003 (UTC)


In general, even German big business didn't give all that much money to the Nazis. A few big industrialists, like Fritz Thyssen, supported the Nazis, but he was the exception rather than the rule. Most of them came around to Hitler eventually, but really only starting in 1932, after the Nazis' big electoral successes. Here's Hans Mommsen in his Rise and Fall of Weimar Democracy (pp.341-342):


Unlike the moderate and right-wing bourgeois parties, the NSDAP was not dependent on contributions from large firms or economic interest organizations. Its main sources of income were membership dues, revenues from party rallies and other events, and supplemental fund drives among the membership. In spite of the deepening economic crisis, the party's local branches were able to raise considerable sums of money, the better part of which was sent to the NSDAP's district and central offices. The income the NSDAP generated from this source was many times larger than the dues raised by the SPD. The SA, on the other hand, financed itself by acting as a sales organization for the cigarette industry and similar enterprises. It also collected regular payments from sympathizers who were not yet ready to join the party. Moreover, some of the party's publications made a considerable profit by selling advertising space.
Until the National Socialist assumption of power on 30 January 1933, financial contributions from big indsutry remained comparatively modest. Indeed, the business community as a whole was distinctly reserved when it came to giving to the NSDAP in spite of Hitler's appeals in appearances before the Düsseldorf Industrial Club, the Hamburg National Club, and in private meetings with industrial leaders. One major exception was Emil Kirdorf, who was introduced to the party through Elsa Bruckmann and temporarily joined it in 1927. A former board member of the Gelsenkirchen Mining Company, Kirdorf met with little success in his efforts to help Hitler establish contact with German heavy industry. In 1928 Kirdorf returned to the DNVP, where he advocated an alliance with the NSDAP in spite of misgivings abouts its social and economic program. The large advances that the NSDAP received for its participation in the referendum against the Young Plan were used to reduce the party's long-term indebtedness. The credit that Fritz Thyssen extended to the party was used primarily for the purchase of the former Barlog Palace, now dubbed the "Brown House," in Munich. For this expenditure, the party's rank-and-file membership was charged a one-time supplemental assessment of two marks.
Further financial contributions came to the NSDAP from the ranks of middle-sized entrepeneurs and manufactuirers, sometimes in exchange for protection from physical aggression or public polemics. This was even true in the case of I.G. Farben, a giant chemical cartel that sought tariff protection for its newly developed synthetic fuel. Rumors about foreign - and particularly French - financial contributions notwithstanding, the NSDAP financed itself essentially through its own efforts until the summer of 1932, when the July Reichstag elections sapped its financial strength. From this point on, the party became increasingly dependent on subsidies and loan guarantees from industry. The business world now began to make regular payments to certain high-ranking officials of the NSDAP. A case in point was Emil Georg von Stauß, director of the Deutsche Bank and Diskonto Gesellschaft, who established a close relationship with Hermann Göring in an attempt to influence the NSDAP's economic policy in favor of industry. This, in turn, made it possible for Göring to enjoy a luxurious life-style before the party ever came to power, one that exceeded Hitler's own efforts in that direction.
So, the idea that German industrialists funded the Nazis as a secret way to destroy Weimar democracy is unfounded. They only started giving money to the Nazis after the Nazis were already the largest party in Germany. john 02:56, 11 Oct 2003 (UTC)


After rechecking my sources I found (or believe,resp.) that this Warburg stuff is indeed crap. It indeed is a conspiracy theory. Those sources claim 150 mill. $ donations before 1933 which is difficult to keep 100% secret. sorry folks. User:Frank_A

Frank it isn't often that people admit to error here so thanks for that. Adam
John's case made out above is eminently reasonable. As I said, I know little about this subject and have no intention of pushing one view. The reason I'm writing this paragraph is to express my annoyance at Adam's reply, which is way below his usual standard. Adam, try to do better than name-calling, try to read references before commenting on them (in fact, Sutton's book barely mentions Jews and certainly does not support the line you claim it does), and try not to write rubbish like "They were a mass political party, they were perfectly capable of raising large amounts of money by the usual means." Surely you know that almost all mass political parties in modern history in the West have relied on corporate support for a large fraction of their income. --zero 08:23, 11 Oct 2003 (UTC)
I didn't "claim" Sutton's book said anything, I said it "looks to be more of the [revisonist] same," and from the table of contents at the website, it does look to be more of the same. As for name-calling, you can characterise what I write as "rubbish" if you please, but your statement about political parties is a matter of opinion, not (necessarily) fact. John has just shown that your statement is not true in relation to the NSDAP, and it is also not true of the political party I belong to. I try to maintain a civil tone in discussions here and I suggest you do the same. Adam 08:40, 11 Oct 2003 (UTC)

on Sutton discussing Warburg affidavit: Appearently Warburg mainly answered to being blackmailed by the "spanischer Sommer" author after the war, which is why he didn't care about the 1933 original source. Norbert Marzahn is a dubious source on this issue, if one at all. The Dr.Abegg source is forged by Mr. Alhard Gelpke of Switzerland. Frank

After carefully reading both the extract from Mommsen posted by John above, and the summary chapter of Sutton here, I frankly can't see all that much conflict between them. Most of the claims Sutton makes about contributions to the Nazis are in the same 1932-3 time period for which Mommsen says From this point on, the party became increasingly dependent on subsidies and loan guarantees from industry. Both sources even name many of the same companies. Sutton's work is marred by an excessive enthusiasm to establish the US connections of the companies concerned, and does not mention that a company might make political contributions without the approval of its foreign directors, but if you make allowances for this bias there is information there that is apparently well-sourced. --zero 13:14, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)


The myth "Hitler could only win the elections because he secretly got huge sums of money from foreign billionaires and jews" was fabricated by Alhard Gelpke among others, wo provided international archives with homemade forged documents. see below http://www.afz.ethz.ch/handbuch/nachl/nachlaesseGelpkeAlhard.htm Especially the weird story about Dr. Abegg's archive is made up. Gelpke also made up his vita to be a hero. pretty weird guy. User:Frank_A

Well Frank, you dragged this topic in to the article in the first place, so I guess you can drag it out again. The general point to make is that there are few subjects as encrusted in myth and propaganda and loony conspiracy theories as Hitler and Nazi Germany, and all this kind of stuff needs to be treated with extreme caution. I repeat the point I made above: where resort to conspiracy theories is not necessary to explain something, do not resort to them. Adam 00:30, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)

This may be a minor point but I still fail to see the idea behind it. On 27 September 2003 User:Adam Carr reduced the "Further reading" section without giving any explanation. Not just that -- one-line comments concerning the recommended books and the ISBNs were also deleted. I'm still looking for a satisfactory answer to why anyone would want to remove factual knowledge from an article. --KF 18:03, 12 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Actually I didn't reduce the reading list. I deleted two references and added two (one of which has subsequently been deleted by someone else). I did this because I had undertaken the rewriting of the whole article, and I concluded with the references I had used in writing it, references I could vouch for. I hadn't read the other two titles on the old reading list, so I didn't include them. If you have read them and feel they are valuable references, you are free to reinstate them. Adam 00:23, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)


"It has become an established myth that Hitler came to power by democratic means." I'm not sure I understand the history well enough to dispute this sentence's assertion that Hitler's ascension wasn't democratic, but in any event the claim could be better supported by the paragraph it heads. My sense of the facts (which may be faulty) leads me to think that the claim is misleading and so should rephrased and/or weakened. My issues are: Someone who wins fairly by a plurality is democratically elected. Passage of acts or legislation according to the rules of the constitution by a coalition government represent democratic activities of a government. "Democratic" in this sense is different than what's implied by "the people's choice," but it is a legitamate meaning of the word "democratic." Maybe the "undemocracy" asserted implicitly by the topic sentence has to do with representatives having been intimidated or coerced to vote a certain way by the SA. I think that's a good point, but also a fine one, and too fine to mesh with the first sentence's breezy designation as "myth" the idea that Hitler came to power democraticaly. Came to power by, at some stages, somewhat corrupted or tainted democratic means, is what the paragraph leads me to think. 168... 08:34, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Re:U.S. funding of Nazi's, here's a couple articles about money the Bush family is supposed to have provided: http://www.conspiracyplanet.com/channel.cfm?channelid=39&contentid=963&page=2 http://www.counterpunch.org/wasserman10062003.html

on the other hand there's this http://www.straightdope.com/columns/030214.html

which despite apparent evenhanded defense of Prescott Bush remarks that lots of US companies funded the Nazi's 168... 08:58, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I have been waiting for someone to tell us that Bush is responsible for Hitler. The depths of Bushophobia among American intellectuals at the moment is truly a wonder to behold.
Excessive Bushophobia is a logical impossibility. However, the mention of Aarons (your countryman, Adam) and Loftus as the source of this information should be enough to discredit it. The book those two wrote (The Secret War against the Jews) is possibly the greatest piece of crap I've had the misfortune of reading (and I've read some pretty smelly stuff). --zero 11:26, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)
Anyway... I did acknowledge in that paragraph that Hitler came to power by constitutional means, although the process was a pretty sorry perversion of the spirit of the Weimar constitution if not of its letter. What I was trying to get at is the myth that he came to power with a democratic mandate, that the German people made him a dictator of their own free will. Perhaps the paragraph doesn't convey that. If someone can recast it they are welcome to try. Adam 10:28, 13 Oct 2003 (UTC)

This article now spends nine paragraphs on the two years leading up to Hitler becoming Chancellor, and three paragraphs on the Holocaust. This is what heppens when people start obsessing on relatively minor points without considering the balance of the piece as a whole. I will attempt a re-edit when I get time. Adam 02:15, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I think you could use the idea of the popular democratic myth at the beginning to motivate the section. Perhaps a summary nutgraph would be useful too, and then keep something like the current end graph to that section as a kicker.168... 03:16, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I can't imagine why "Nazis received only 44% of the vote" is presented as proof that the Nazis didn't have a popular mandate. It looks to me like proof of the opposite. In an election with many strong parties, getting 44% of the vote (much more than any other party) is a very good result. It is quite a normal thing for parties to come to power in democratic countries with less than 50%. Take Israel for example: no party there ever achieved an absolute majority since the beginning of the state. --zero 02:34, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Firstly the 1933 election at which the Nazis officially obtained 44% of the vote was not fairly conducted and in my opinion doesn't count. Secondly a mandate to form a government for four years (or as long as you can retain support of the legislature) is a different matter to a mandate to establish a dictatorship. 44% is not a majority. Adam

I think a big reason there's a point to be made about Hitler not being elected dictator has nothing to do with the plurality-majority distinction, which I agree isn't much of a point by itself. The point is that because people see Hitler as having enjoyed the almost universal support of the German people as dictator, and because they may be vaguely aware of his basically constitutional route to power, they will be prone to construct by themselves (i.e. no one needs to tell it to them) the myth that it was enormous popularity that made Hitler dictator. Given that people are also certain to hear or read this myth, I think it's good to administer a little prophylaxis against it. 168... 03:09, 14 Oct 2003 (UTC)

I agree with Adam that the 44% number is a crock. The Nazis got 32% in the last actually free election - considerably worse than their numbers in July of the same year, when they got nearly 38%. As far as the length of the Hitler coming to power stuff, I put in a lot because the chronology was seriously skewed before, and I wanted to clarify it. If somebody wants to cut it down, now, I absolutely concur that that would be a good idea. john 00:02, 15 Oct 2003 (UTC)


Regarding somebody's recent edit to make all attributions to Nazis and Nazi German rather than to Germans and Germany, I appreciate what imagine is the motive--not besmirching the reputation of the current government and the vast majority of living Germans--I think it defies conventions and does more harm than good. We don't refer to "pre-Lincolnian Americans" owning and trading slaves or to "Isabellan Spain" being beastly to Native Americans. Why give special treatment to early 20th century Germany? "Germany" isn't even the name of the modern German state (what is it in English, the Federal Republic of Germany?). The way it does more harm than good is that "Nazis" supports the common tendency to think of Nazis as something other than ordinary human beings, who might well believe and act the same way again in some other country if we realize there is a lesson in this history for humans that we should all pay attention to. 168... 03:09, 26 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Let's please not get politically correct about the terminology to be used against these people. They were Nazis, and it was Nazi Germany. Or would you rather that Germany be used to refer to the people and the place in which these crimes were committed? RickK 03:13, 26 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Yes, I'd like "Germans" and "Germany" to be the defaults, or at least options for use where apt. I don't understand your use of "politically correct." I'm not even sure what you mean by "they were Nazis." The unfortunate German draftees who invaded Poland or Russia, were they "Nazis"? Were the soldiers that survived the Allied victory still "Nazis" ten years later? What about their wives? Did everyone who was a "Nazi" during the war cease to be a Nazi the moment the Third Reich administration was dissolved? Contrary to what you seem to be suggesting, I don't think there's any simple fact of this particular matter--or if there is a fact, it's so complicated as to make it impossible to speak about, it would take so long to describe. Instead of a fact, we just have conventions of speach--like by convention we say men are taller than women, even though it's plainly false as an absolute statement. Insisting on an exclusive use of "Nazis" and never "Germans" means that in many case you'll be going against an applicable convention and so giving special treatment to "somebody" ("Germans"? I don't know who the beneficiaries would be or what we should call them, but somebody). 168... 04:19, 26 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Adolph

Here is the very long discussion about whether the spelling Adolph should be mentioned and if it should be mentioned as misspelling or just another possible spelling. Any comment by me is in the typewriter font. I didn't change any posting of anyone, just organized them and tried to add sensible headings without having to completely reorganize really everything and having to break up many posting :-D . (Hope everyone is happy the way I did it.) Laudaka 07:09, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC) (Paul/laudaka)

First postings about (mis?)spelling Adolph

header added by me

moved from posting about other subject In any case, Amazon.com is selling ~600 books about "Adolph Hitler". Lirath Q. Pynnor probably 11 Nov 2003

moved from posting about other subject Also, most of the early results from the Amazon search on "Adolph Hitler" either seem to be older books or books not particularly about Hitler. A search for "Adolf Hitler" yields more than 4500 results. A google search on "Adolf Hitler" yields 392,000 results. A search on "Adolph Hitler" gives less than 70,000. I think the word "occasionally" is appropriate. john 23:46, 11 Nov 2003 (UTC)

moved from posting about other subjectOccasionally is fine, I never removed it. Lirath Q. Pynnor probably 11 Nov 2003

Vote about mentioning the (mis?)spelling Adolph

header changed by me

Hundreds of books use Adolph exclusively, tens of thousands of websites use Adolph, Britannica acknowledges this spelling...should Wikipedia? This is not a vote on whether to use "Adolph"; it is a vote on whether to mention that other writers do use it. probably 12 Nov 2003

Yes

  • Lirath Q. Pynnor
  • Definetly as an alternative spelling, like Alphonso for Alfonso. Check Adolph in google.de for 371,000 hits. Enough? Muriel 14:25, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
    • 53,700 hits for "Adolph Hitler" (google.de). If you think this is wrong, i'm not going to contradict you anymore, because i lack the patience. But is not nonsense and its not a mis-spell. Have a nice day! Muriel 14:47, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  • But you get zero hits inGerman language newspapers 168... 20:14, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
      • but google.de lists English language web sites as well as a default - you need to search for German language results only. Secretlondon 14:52, Nov 12, 2003 (UTC)
        • So its not just a German spelling! :) Muriel
          • It's a not a german spelling at all, as far as I can see. Secretlondon 14:55, Nov 12, 2003 (UTC)
            • 53,700 hits for "Adolph Hitler" so, if not german, what? You can always ask andy. I'm just 1/2 german... Muriel
              • While in German "ph" is an old spelling for "f" (which gets more and more uncommon nowadays) to all my knowledge Hitler always used "Adolf". I could find many websites spell him with "ph" so a redirect is needed, but AFAIK it is a misspelling. andy 15:24, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  • So far as I know, the "ph" is sometimes used in German instead of the "f". Especially at the end of words. Thus you sometimes see "Emperor Franz Joseph" rather than "Emperor Franz Josef", and so forth. The "Adolph" spelling, while not normally used, is not, I think, necessarily incorrect. It seems to me that it's a valid alternative spelling, even if rather aesthetically unpleasant. john 19:45, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
    • No, in German you cannot interchange ph and f. If your name is Adolph, then your name isn't Adolf. If your name was Adolf, you cannot write Adolph. There are some particular words, which can be written both with ph and f (Telegrafie, Telegraphie), but in case of names, you have to be exactly. Hitler's name was Adolf!
      • So, Emperor Franz Josef, or Franz Joseph? I have certainly seen both. And that's a different question from anclicizing the name to "Francis Joseph". john 04:09, 13 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  • reddi ... just make a note that it is sometimes spelled Adolph Hitler.
  • Mention it, but not in the introduction. Somewhere towards the end of the article discuss how in English Adolph is a common mispelling. - SimonP 03:45, Nov 13, 2003 (UTC)
    • Its not exactly a mispelling, AFAIK, it was (for whatever reason) specifically used as an English transliteration -- eventually, people decided that German names didn't need to be modified so heavily. Lirath Q. Pynnor
  • Yes, it's a Wikipedia convention to confirm that you've landed at the right page and to mention regularly used alternative meanings near the start of the article so people know that they have arrived at the right place. We're a descriptive work, not a prescriptive one. JamesDay 09:07, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  • Yes, a note on the other spelling isn't a bad idea.168... 22:37, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)
    • 168...'s excellent research on the subject is compelling, and I think very much worthy of a note in the article. Martin 23:32, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)

No

  • If you are checking _german_ websites in google, Adolf has 37.500 hits, Adolph only 178. I think Adolph is a misspelling. - user:82.82.117.83
  • I personally can't stand the other spelling of Adolf. Let's not just follow Brittanica on this issue, as we try to be better than them elsewise. --user:zanimum
  • Including the wrong spelling in the introduction makes the incorrect spelling appear equally valid, which it is not -- it is simply wrong.Maximus Rex 14:44, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  • Adolph is wrong. I guess it's an anglicisation, although I've never seen it in the books I've read. Maybe a US thing? Secretlondon 14:49, Nov 12, 2003 (UTC)
  • Adolph is definitely a misspelling. All German -ph hits are amateurish websites, while the -f hits include reliable sources. "Adolph" may be a redirect to the correct spelling, but the incorrect spelling should not be mentioned in the introduction. -- Baldhur 15:50, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  • His name only had one spelling, the one in his passport. Everything else can be redirects, but nothing more. andy 19:53, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  • Just spell it the way he himself wrote it. --snoyes 20:01, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  • It is properly "Adolf" even in English, so it should be spelled that way. This is kind of like Wilhelm II of Germany, which is not William (although there is Frederick William II of Prussia, for example, not Friedrich Wilhelm). But "Adolph" can redirect here because it is such a common misspelling. Adam Bishop 20:08, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
  • The modern common spelling is Adolf, Adolph is just a hangover from an older english spelling (it was used first AFAIK in the New York Times Nov 9 1923). --Imran
  • A redirect is enough.—Eloquence 13:16, Nov 13, 2003 (UTC)
  • I second that. Moriori 01:53, Nov 16, 2003 (UTC)
  • Adolf himself called himself "Adolf", I think de Fuher's opinion should count as another user's. Not that I'm supporting him in general, just his opinion of his name. Okay? Zanimum


More arguments whether Adolph is a mispelling or an alternative spelling (yet without any suggestions how to say it in the article)

header added by me

Here's the cover and title page of what appears to be a 1941 (and hence presumably official) German language edition of Mein Kampf with the "Adolf" spelling. And here it is blown up 168... 19:57, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Google News pulls out 677 hits for "Adolf", among them the New York Times but only 56 hits for "Adolph." I like the stats for newspapers better than the stats for all the Web when it comes to usage conventions.168... 20:09, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)

O.K., here's the doosey. Google News 'Deutschland' pulls up 208 hits for "Adolf" and not one for "Adolph." 168... 20:14, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)

But here's a book on Amazon that shows "Adolph" on the cover. Other out-of-print books by well known publishers, such as Bantam don't have their covers visible on Amazon but are listed with "Adolph" in the title. This back cover was published or republished in 2000 by the very reputable New York Review of Books. So I don't think it can be disputed that "Adolph" was and is a recognized spelling. Also the contemporary English media that Google News pulls up with "Adolph" supports this. This is how dictionaries decide how things are spelled and whether variations in spelling are legitimate--by looking at what gets published.168... 22:57, 13 Nov 2003 (UTC) Here was a list of the links in 168... postings, it seems to me it is enough to preserve his postings above which contain those links

This is the English wiki, English writers sometimes use "Adolph", we should note that it is sometimes spelled that way. You may not like the spelling, but it is used. Lirath Q. Pynnor

And more arguments whether Adolph is a (mis?)spelling MIXED with possible ways to say this in the article (part 1)

header added by me

What about "Sometimes the spelling 'Adolph' is used by english authors. But, it is wrong."? 82.82.117.83 20:32, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
But it might not be wrong sometime in the future...maybe in hundreds of years they will be interchangeable :) I know for example that the name "Amalric," as in Amalric I of Jerusalem is also spelled Amaury, Aimery, and Maury, Amalric being only the "official" Latin form in the 11th century...so in 1000 years English may have some completely unrecognizable way of spelling Adolf. Anyway, what I'm getting at is "Adolph" is not wrong, it's just not how it is commonly spelled right now. Adam Bishop 20:47, 12 Nov 2003 (UTC)
Why don't you post you arguments in the Pro/Contra section? I suppose the user meant posting in the section I have renamed to 'Vote about mentioning the (mis?)spelling Adolph'

There seems to be some confusion among some of the arguments here. I don't think anybody has proposed to move the page to Adolph Hitler. Rather, it has been suggested to have, in the introduction, something saying Adolf Hitler (occasionally Adolph), or the like. Since it is, occasionally, spelled "Adolph" in English (and even more occasionally in German, seemingly), I don't see what's particularly offensive about this. In any event, in order to avoid this nasty argument, I propose that we move the page to Adolphus Hitler. Any seconds? john 04:09, 13 Nov 2003 (UTC)

There is a fundamental difference between a misspelling and an alternative spelling or transliteration. Misspellings should be addressed using redirects and not mentioned in the article itself -- Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a dictionary. Alternative spellings can be noted, but we should not elevate misspellings to the status of alternative spellings. If "Adoplh" ever was an alternative spelling in academia (it certainly isn't today), that can be noted somewhere long after genocide, war, and his love of dogs.—Eloquence 13:40, Nov 13, 2003 (UTC)


What about "In the beginning of Hitler's political career, in English he sometimes was spelled Adolph, but later only Adolf, which is correct." (perhaps in better english (-:) 82.82.127.117 13:43, 13 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Is there an article on List of longest Wikipedia debates about completely trivial and inconsequential subjects? If so this debate should head the list. I have made a small edit. Can we move on? Adam 09:54, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Do we have a final tally? Is everybody happy with where their votes stand? We're reverting back and forth between a version that notes "Adolph" as an incorrect spelling and one that makes no mention of it. The "incorrect" note strikes me as something that most "no" voters wouldn't object to, although at least user Wik (who argues simply that a "misspelling" isn't worth noting) seems adamantly opposed, so I don't know. What do others think about this specific proposition? 168... 22:37, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Wik is just plain wrong on his characterisation of the Adolph Hitler spelling. If I write "Adolf Jitler", that is a mispelling. But "Adolph Hitler" is not a mispelling, it is an incorrect but common alternative spelling. It arose because many classically educated people used to feel that the Greek "ph" is somehow superior to the simple "f", even in a pure Germanic name like Adolf. Even some Germans preferred this, as Wik himself demonstrated when he showed that Goebbels spelled his name "Joseph" rather than "Josef." The article should simply note that the alternative spelling exists but is incorrect, and move on to something more important. Adam 02:11, 15 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Well said. Agreed. -- Mattworld 02:17, 15 Nov 2003 (UTC)
You are wrong. Goebbels spelled his name Joseph because that was his name as much as Hitler's was Adolf. Other people may well be named Josef or Adolph. German names can occur in various spellings, but it is fixed for each individual. And it is not up to other people to define alternative spellings. I have to remind you that you were wrong before when you claimed that Goebbels somehow changed his spelling in 1933 from Joseph to the supposedly more Germanic Josef - now you seem to claim the opposite. --Wik 16:00, Nov 15, 2003 (UTC)
(Not that it's relevant to this discussion, but that is not what I said. I said that after 1933 the regime seems to have used the Josef spelling, as evidenced by the street names. And anyway the issue here is not what was the correct spelling of Adolf, but what we should say in this article about the fact that the Adolph spelling is sometimes used. Adam)

Actually, it is indeed "up to other people to define alternative spellings" when the original name is spelled in another alphabet, like Chinese or Arabic. So we have Peking and Bejing and Mecca and Makkah, etc. Typographically, there's nothing standing in the way of us English speakers writing "Deutschland" and yet many of us choose to spell it "Germany."168... 17:00, 15 Nov 2003 (UTC)

But German isn't using another alphabet, other than a few special letters which however don't occur in "Adolf Hitler". And "Deutschland" and "Germany" are words in different languages, not just different spellings of the same word. However, modern names (except some royalty) aren't translated like countries. Also, the claim that "Adolph Hitler" is somehow an English specialty is completely wrong; you'll find this misspelling on German sites too, just a bit less frequently because naturally Germans are more familiar with the correct spelling. --Wik 17:22, Nov 15, 2003 (UTC)

The fact of misspelling is not evidence one way or the other about legitimate spellings. While English publishers use both spellings, German publishers only use "Adolf":

I doubt "Adolph" and "Adolf" count as "modern names." Surely they must go back a few centuries, and so it wouldn't be surprising if countries had favorite renderings, like "Adolfo" and so occasionally used "Adolfo Hitler" (46 hits in Spanish media). You might be right that the modern convention is to spell names as their owners did when you use the same alphabet. And yet either that wasn't always the convention or else it wasn't a universal convention, because it's just a fact that some professional writers and publishers in the English speaking world used and continue use "Adolph" to refer to Hitler. 168... 18:56, 15 Nov 2003 (UTC)

That definitely wasn't always the convention. john 19:03, 15 Nov 2003 (UTC)
This may be shocking, but professional writers and publishers commit misspellings too. With "modern names" I meant names of modern people, who have all kinds of official documents with a fixed spelling of their name. That was different a few centuries ago, but not in Hitler's time. Those who use Adolph do so out of sheer ignorance, not as a conscious "translation" of Adolf. As I said, Germans are much more familiar with the name so German books are much less likely to have this misspelling. --Wik 20:08, Nov 15, 2003 (UTC)

English people have had spellings written down in dictionaries for centuries and yet dictionaries have had to evolve as the way people choose to spell has drifted. In English history and public discourse, Adolph/Adolf is adrift. It may be destined to berth at "Adolf", but it's not tied up there yet.168... 20:46, 15 Nov 2003 (UTC)

This is a proposed note for the bottom of the article that you want to censor:

'A note regarding the spelling "Adolph"'
'In the first half of the last century, Hitler's first name was often translated into English as "Adolph." This variant persists to some extent in English speaking countries, although in Germany and elsewhere "Adolf" is used exclusively. Hitler himself spelled his name "Adolf."'

How is this inaccurate? How does this encourage the spelling you are opposed to? You called it "not worth mentioning" in the subject line of one your reversions and "plainly wrong" in another. The former is sort of an argument, but I don't see how you could sincerely mean the latter. What exactly is wrong, in your view, with having some such note as this at the bottom? 168... 21:01, 15 Nov 2003 (UTC)

As I said, I don't think it was consciously translated. If you think so, provide evidence. It was (and is) misspelled, and I don't think misspellings are worth mentioning (other than in Misspelling, maybe you want to add it there). --Wik 21:21, Nov 15, 2003 (UTC)

I don't think it matters whether it was by someone's expert linguistic analysis or by an epileptic seizure that "Adolph Hitler" became common in English publishing. If it was a mistake, that's unfortunate, but mistakes happen and affect the course of history. As I argued, the above note does not actually encourage perpetuation of what you are calling a mistake, it merely notes that it happened and the amount of influence that it has had. So now is it only the word "translated" that you object to?168... 22:24, 15 Nov 2003 (UTC)

No, I also wonder what the basis is for the "first half of the last century". This seems like pure speculation. What is the evidence that at that time it was more often spelled Adolph than today? --Wik 22:30, Nov 15, 2003 (UTC)
I posted a moment ago results of a Library of Congress title search for "Adolph Hitler" but most of the items are graphics, so the title they're catalogued under is a function not of the date of publication but when they were catalogued, which I can't tell from the entries, and so I decided they're not helpful.168... 01:01, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I think this whole thing is fascinating, especially the passion it has evoked. Clearly, for English speakers (which I am) the subject of the misspelling of Hitler's name is something that should be mentioned somewhere. Why not here? Is it really such a problem? My apologies for interrupting such an erudite discussion, but really, why not mention it? WormRunner 22:37, 15 Nov 2003 (UTC)

The problem is that some people deny that it is a misspelling. --Wik 22:46, Nov 15, 2003 (UTC)

The problem is also that people disagree what makes something a "misspelling."168... 00:53, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)

And more arguments whether Adolph is a (mis?)spelling MIXED with possible ways to say this in the article (part 2) (was named 'spelling')

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the debate still continues on the same subject

What makes the spelling so important? Obviously

  1. in German Adolf is used, Adolph is never used.
  2. in other languages Adolf is used
  3. in English today Adolf is used, even though in the very beginning, before Hitler became Nazi Germany's dictator, the New York Times or whoever spelled it Adolph, but later Adolf. If you want to, you can mention it, but not in the introduction, because it is just a misspelling.
  4. in German names ph cannot be interchanged by f.

All these arguments are repeated and repeated and the misspelling still is a misspelling. maybe it is mentionable, maybe it is absolutely unimportant because today in English nobody spells Adolph and it has no historical relevance, because Hitler never used Adolph, it was not his name. 82.82.131.134 01:10, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)

As has been documented over and over above, in fact publishers do to this day put "Adolph Hitler" in their newspapers and on the jackets of their books. Also, what we've lately been discussing is effectively a footnote, not something to include in the introduction. Don't ask me why it seems so important to someone that it not be mentioned.168... 01:27, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)


Nobody??
I provide this link to the University of San Diego History Department.
http://history.acusd.edu/gen/WW2Timeline/Prelude03.html
WormRunner 01:34, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)
It is not impossible that even a university history department could be wrong. Adam Bishop 01:36, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)

And more arguments whether Adolph is a (mis?)spelling MIXED with possible ways to say this in the article (part 3) (was named 'Write a footnote about the misspelling')

header changed by me

the debate still continues on the same subject

Okay, not "nobody". But, it is a minority as the google figures showed. Mention it! Write a short paragraph about the spelling, but, also say, that Adolph is not correct. If I would write "Jeorge Bush" and Millions of historians would do so, too, Jeorge wouldn't be correct, would it? In fact it is a misspelling, many people seem to use. But many people write "nesseccary", too. 82.82.131.134 01:40, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)


Did you not notice the one above? Here it is again:


A note regarding the spelling "Adolph"
In the first half of the last century, Hitler's first name was often translated into English as "Adolph." This variant persists to some extent in English speaking countries, although in Germany and elsewhere "Adolf" is used exclusively. Hitler himself spelled his name "Adolf."

Wik doesn't like "translated" or the unproven assertion of "the first half of the last century."

So how about

A note regarding the spelling "Adolph"
Occasionally in English Hitler's first name is rendered "Adolph." In Germany and elsewhere "Adolf" is used exclusively. Hitler himself spelled his name "Adolf." -- 168... 01:51, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)
Sounds reasonable to me. WormRunner 01:54, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)
Yeah. If Adolf friggin' Hitler spelt his name Adolf, I the de Fuher himself just settled it for us. - user:zanimum
Occasionally sometimes... well, if you think that's relevant. But 1) it's still a misspelling and therefore "rendered" should be "misspelled", and 2) it's not true that in Germany Adolf is used "exclusively" - it is just misspelled less frequently, for obvious reasons. --Wik 02:57, Nov 16, 2003 (UTC)
1)"rendered" is accurate and neutral. "misspelled" would add no information to the paragraph in question (which says how Hitler, the rest of the world and how people writing in English other than in occasional instances spell it), only a value judgement reflecting your POV but not the POV of others here 2) zero hits on German Amazon and zero hits on German Google News means zero usage of "Adolph" in Germany to me. I don't think we care so much about how 17 year-old Berlin bloggers spell it. Seeing as you find even the New York Review of Books an untrustworthy source for accepted word usage, I would have thought that a search restricted to German book titles and newspapers would have been quite wide enough for you. 168... 03:33, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)
A misspelling is a misspelling. It makes no difference whether it's a 17-year-old Berlin blogger or the New York Review of Books saying Adolph - neither has the authority to redefine the spelling. If I'm reading the poll right, the majority here supports my view that a redirect is enough. But I don't want to belabour this any further. While you're at it, you might want to go to Fascism and add a note "occasionally rendered Facism". --Wik 03:49, Nov 16, 2003 (UTC)
Geez, somebody better inform the University of San Diego, they still think its a transliteration! Lirath Q. Pynnor
You don't have the authority to define the spelling either. Anyway, I believe the proposed note is written in such a way that a reader will not fail to conclude that "Adolph" is misspelled, if he or she shares your concept of what constitutes a misspelling. Meanwhile, it's hard to know what to conclude from the poll at this point. Most "no" votes predate my posting of additional evidence and my suggestion we change the question to being about whether "Adolph" is worth a mention at the end. 168... 04:04, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)

If I ever write an article on "why collective editing of an encyclopaedia is a bad idea," this discussion will be Appendix A. Adam

If, hypothetically, everyone in English starts writing it "Adolph," would it still be wrong? (And should this discussion turn into something about the philosophy of spelling?) Adam Bishop 04:54, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Although I find this amazing, what we seem to be discussing is

  • a)whether people who do not dispute the accuracy of a footnote but who find it uninteresting should be allowed to require that it not appear in the article, despite the opinions of others who think it deserves inclusion as a footnote

and

  • b)whether people who have one of two popular philosophies about spelling (prescriptive versus descriptive) should be allowed to require that the facts in the footnote should be not merely presented but should in addition be interpreted through the lens of their philosophy as indicating a misspelling, even though other people here interpret them as showing the complete opposite.168... 06:23, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Whoops: Actually Wik did dispute the accuracy of "exclusively", but I'm sure that a small tweak could make the assertion unambiguously accurate to all interpretation. e.g. "more or less exclusively" or "in publishing....more or less exclusively" etc 168... 06:40, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Final remark by the "reorganizer" Paul/laudaka)

of course this header is by me

I tried to organize everything in a way that was NPOV, I hope no one noticed I found it a hopelessly long discussion *very big smile* . If you didn't, I must have done it in a NPOV way. BTW I could have added much more headings but as it seems everyone finally agreed I didn't think it was that important. PHEW Done, hopefully. Hmm maybe I'm to perfectionist, but well I don't seem to be the only person here :-P Laudaka 07:09, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC) (Paul/laudaka)

Did Hitler start World War II or was he only one of the persons starting it?

heading added by me Since World War II as such began in Europe, I don't see why we can't just say Hitler started World War II? The ongoing Sino-Japanese War was not considered a part of World War II until Japan attacked the United States and the United Kingdom in December of 1941. john 22:48, 11 Nov 2003 (UTC)

A number of Historians feel that World War II started in ~1933 (see the WWII article); furthermore, actions by Italy and Russia were also quite aggressive. In addition, Germany itself blamed the war on the Allies. I really don't think its fair to say that he single-handedly started the war; of course, if you have somebody you'd like to quote on this, feel free to use a quote to that effect. Lirath Q. Pynnor

I'd say the general consensus on the start of World War II proper is that it began on September 1, 1939, with the German invasion of Poland. I suppose one might argue for the British and French declarations of war two days later. But, as I said, the Sino-Japanese War, and even more so the invasion of Ethiopia or the Spanish Civil War, were, while related, not the same thing as World War II. Only in retrospect can they be considered to be a part of the same war. I'm not sure what actions by Russia prior to September 1939 could be seen as particularly aggressive (although their conduct in Spain was certainly odious). In any event, the article would not say that he was the instigator of World War II, but that he is widely seen as such, which is hardly controversial. john 22:56, 11 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Why not be more accurate tho, and note that Germany had little to do with the Pacific. part has been moved to Talk:Adolf Hitler/mentioning the (mis?)spelling Adolph Lirath Q. Pynnor

If we establish a precedent of saying what Hitler was not responsible for, we would have to note that he was not responsible for the Peloponnesian War, the Thirty Years War or the War of Jenkins Ear. Or rather, in correct Wikipedia style, we would have to say that "some people say" he was not responsible for those wars, thus leaving open the logical possibility that some other people (User:Khranus, perhaps) say that he was. Then we could spend six months arguing on Talk:War of Jenkins Ear about whether he was or not. Adam 23:12, 11 Nov 2003 (UTC)

But we can easily note what he wasn't responsible for, by clearly noting what he was repsonsible for; ie: the European war. Lirath Q. Pynnor

Yes, which is why I said "World War II in Europe". I think that's better than "the European theatre of World War II," which implies that World War II had already started in another theatre. part of posting has been moved to Talk:Adolf Hitler/mentioning the (mis?)spelling Adolph john 23:46, 11 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Giving exact dates of Hitler's Chancelorship and Führer-ship is making the first sentence hard to read

heading added by me

the text looked like this before the changes: "was Chancellor (January 30, 1933 - April 30, 1945) and Führer (August 2, 1934 - April 30) of Germany."

All those dates in the introductory sentence make it very hard to parse and to read. The birth/death dates where they appear conform to a fairly familiar encyclopedia convention, so they aren't such a stumbling block as the others. Could we take out the date ranges of his chancellorship and fuhrer-ship? It seems to me that if readers know when Hitler lived then they're already acquired the gross conception of historical context that one hopes to convey in an introductory summation. Can't they wait until later in the article to learn precisely when he attained first this form of leadership and then that one? I think most readers curious for that info would have the patience to do so. 168... 22:19, 13 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I agree. Lirath Q. Pynnor

Was Hitler Gay?

Recently, a new hypothesis, explaining Hitler's behavior, has emerged. This makes the clame that Hitler was himself a homosexual. This claim hinges on a number of things. The claim first arose from an inerview with a former squadmate conducted in the 1950's. Here he mentions that Hitler was very detached and showed effeminate behavior. Also, he expressed more intreast in art then women. The squadmate also makes the claim that Hitler was cought having sex with another member of his squad. These claims were initally debunked since the man who made them was a career criminal. However, being gay would explain some of his behavior. It is notable that Hitler seemed uncomfortable around women. Also it is belived that Hitler did not have a sexual relationship with Eva Braun. Hitler's maids said that they checked the beadsheats for evidence of sex, however, they never found any. Hitler's neice, the only other woman he had a relationship with, commited suicide, presumibly due to the fact that he was molesting her.

I'm speachless. This is so filled with homophobic bias that I don't konw where to begin. Being detached, more interested in art and uncomfortable around women (an adolescent boy trait NOT a gay trait!) are not indications of anything other than what they are. This type of outing of Hitler is also insulting - read: being gay explains his behavior. So that is why he caused the Holocaust? --mav 05:35, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)
There are theories, none of them especially credible, that Hitler was gay. (How that explains genocide, I don't know.) This might be worth salvaging, with the ridiculous bias trimmed; I'll look into it. --Mirv 05:37, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)
Hey, I didn't come up with it! I'm just synthesizing the guy who makes this claim. More information can be found in Lothar Machtan's new book "The Hidden Hitler."

There are tons and tons of stories about Hitler that all have a tiny bit of evidence for them but nothing within a mile of proof. Supposedly he only had one testicle (supported by the Russian autopsy, refuted by a Jewish doctor who examined him as a child). Supposedly part of his penis was bitten off by a goat (story from a classmate; I'm not making this up, promise!) Supposedly he liked to be pissed on (claimed to have been revealed by his niece to someone who later repeated it). Supposedly he had sex with 7 different women who nearly all tried (or succeeded) to commit suicide afterwards (US intelligence report). And so on, I'm sure there are lots more. Perhaps the article should mention that there are lots of unsubstantiated stories, but we shouldn't give credence to any of them. --Zero 08:30, 7 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I don't think there's anything to say that AH was gay, but there seems to be some evidence that he was a mostly a sublimator but engaged in coprophilia and urolagnia. This was also mentioned in a psychoanalytical study done for US secret sercvice. This article deals with the available evidence. Very entertaining, and useful knowledge if you come across nazis and want to shock them a little (a welcome change to the nazis offending everyone else). pir 14:42, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Pfffff done with all the organizing. Oops it's 7 am and haven't slept yet. *blush* Laudaka 05:42, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Perhaps it wasn't made clear earlier that Dr. Lothar Machtan is a university scholar, a Ph.D historian, a full Professor of History at a German university. When such a scholar writes a book squarely in his field, perhaps we should not be so quick to dismiss it as not even being a valid POV. I don't think editors took a serious look, but deleted presumptuously. I think instead of deletion, a re-write was in order. The British Guardian/Observer didn't think one of his books was too crackpot to report on: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,564899,00.html See also a review of yet another book on the same issue by Professor Machtan at http://www.allreaders.com/Topics/info_10328.asp?BSID=0 Now, I am not saying Machtan is right, I am just saying that maybe there is new scholarship now that some of the sources we have read in the past did not know about. Maybe. We should be open-minded and neutral.ChessPlayer 08:27, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

I deleted from the article, Profilers in Britain eventually dismissed these theories from official consideration, but they persist to this day in popular culture. as it is vague and worded in a way that makes it sound like the article is saying this is true, Hitler was not gay. To be NPOV, the statement must be re-phrased so that it is clear it is only an assertion by someone, and info should be provided who that someone is. The article cannot state to the reader that Hitler was not gay or bisexual, that is not a known fact. ChessPlayer 09:12, 15 May 2004 (UTC)


I would like to know more about this. Who are these "profilers"? What source did the information for this statement come from? ChessPlayer 07:54, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

In response to your message on Hitler's Profilers:

I'm afraid I don't know their names, nor do I remember much about them. I know only that they were employed by the British MoD, and that they dismissed the theory of Hitler's homosexuality in the forties. I first heard of this on the History Channel or the Biography Channel. It was either a documentary called Why Did Hitler Murder Ernst Rohm?, which was an episode of Dead Men's Secrets, or it was a biography called Eva Braun: Love and Death.

In retrospect that section should have been more heavily researched, given the host of unsubstantiated rumors surrounding Hitler's sexuality, so my bit should probably be deleted for the time being. Binadot 15 May 2004

Thank you for your candid and informative answer. If we can make it into a factual statement, I have nothing against using what you present here in the page. If you wanted, it could be "In the 1940's, two researchers at the British Ministry of Defense dismissed the idea that Hitler was homosexual.", if you feel this is factual. Of course, we are implying that the MoD as a whole for the war was saying that the rumors where not true; do you feel comfortable with that, or would you prefer leaving the passage out for now pending better research? Also, shall we leave this text here, or shall I copy it all over to the Hitler Talk page? ChessPlayer 22:36, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
To answer your question, yes, the MoD's official position during and after the war was that Hitler was not a homosexual, but that he may have had other sexual peculiarities (i.e. masochism). Back when I wrote that section, I had the idea of expanding it and including everything about Hitler's private/sexual life. However, I never got around to that, nor to finding the original source.
I'm fairly certain that it's true, but I would prefer to find a source for it. Until then we should probably move that section, along with this talk, to the Hitler Talk page. Meanwhile I'm looking for the source on that information. Thanks for noticing and reminding me about this. I probably would have completely forgotten. Binadot 18 May 2004

Did Hilter have Syphilis?

Hitler's entry is linked from the entry for syphilis as a person who "probably had" the disease. The entry doesn't make any back reference.

I, [[User:JimD],] don't feel that I have the expertise in this topic to add any such material to the main entry. However, here are some links from a quick Google search. 

* http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2842819.stm (Hitler Syphilis Theory Revived)
* http://poxhistory.com/work15.htm (Critical article characterizing the theory as hearsay)
* http://www.kimel.net/syphilitic.html

There are 34,000 other hits on that search. The few that I read seem to lack the scholarly standing for me to consider them as authoritative sources; so I suspect the issue should be adressed by reference to offline sources by experts or serious students of the subjects.


For a scholarly study of this question, check out the last reference in the syphilis article by the author of the book: POX: Genius, Madness, and the Mysteries of Syphilis. In summary, Hitler's final doctors hid his condition and destroyed his medical records to mock the war crimes trials, so the only remaining proof is secondary.

Question about what happened to Hitlers body

Just a near-idle question for all you HItler experts.

I understood that AH's body was dug up by the Soviet when East German went away and was cremated, the ashes being scattered in the North Sea.

Other than my spotty memory, it there any evidence of this being true?

Paul, in Saudi

Just added the header Laudaka 13:16, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC) (Paul/laudaka)

Was Hitler actually the 55th member of the Nazi Party?

In the BBC series "The Nazis: A Warning from History" it is said that the Nazi Party started numbering their members at 500. First question: Do you believe me that I saw this in this series? :-) (And I know it's important to be skeptic for an encyclopaedia.) Second question: If you do, do we trust the BBC series?

  • It is correct that the "Deutsche Arbeiterpartei" (DAP) the predecessor of the NSDAP started counting at 500 to pretend a higher membership. And it is right that Hitler was member number 555 in the DAP. See: [1]. The NSDAP began counting with #1 Captain-c 14:13, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC)
Now that's got to be the worst case of a punctuation error I've ever seen:
"The NSDAP began counting with #1 Captain-c"
Unless you really were NSDAP member number one, you forgot one crucial period there. Mkweise 01:33, 3 Mar 2004 (UTC)


Unfortunately a transcript of the series or the text of the book is not on the web. If somebody finds it interesting you could of course buy one or both of them (just search the web for "nazis a warning from history" (WITH the quotes). Laudaka 13:16, 27 Jan 2004 (UTC) (Paul/laudaka)

Hugo Gutmann

Why is the following paragraph interesting in an article about Hitler? I don't think that's self-evident, so it has to be explained.

"It is interesting that man who awarded him the medal, his superior was Hugo Gutmann a Jew himself. Gutmann, born in Nurenberg in1880 immigrated to US (St Louis MO.), and was known under the name of Henry G. Grant. During the war he acquired a passionate German patriotism, despite not being a German citizen (a detail he did not rectify until 1932). He was shocked at the German capitulation in November 1918, when the German army was (so he believed) undefeated. He, like many other German nationalists, blamed civilian politicians (the "November criminals") for the surrender." Captain-c 09:08, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)

It is an interesting snippet (if true) but it doesn't belong in this article. I suggest it be made into an article of its own (with citation) and that this (Hitler) article have nothing more than a link to it. --Zero 11:23, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)
Should note, that in the "During the war he acquired a passionate German patriotism" sentence, "He" refers to Hitler, not Gutmann, as does all the rest of the material that comes after. john 19:42, 31 Jan 2004 (UTC)
I like it much better they way John wrote it now. But it still has to be said why the fact (if it is a fact) is interesting. This is not self-evident. Is it interesting because Hitler later hated the Jews? Is there any relation between the fact that a Jew awarded Hitler and his anti-Semitism? Or what else could be interesting about said fact?
Yes, I'm not sure how interesting it is. Perhaps it's "worth noting" rather than "interesting"? At any rate, my main concern was that the way it was formerly written seemed to attribute various of Hitler's actions to Gutmann. which needs to be avoided. john 21:06, 1 Feb 2004 (UTC)
I deleted said sentence about Hugo Gutmann. I think it is irrelevant for the article unless someone explains why the fact (if it is a fact) is important for Hitler himself. Captain-c 09:07, 2 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Well, I imagine the idea is "Hitler hated Jews - but yet, a Jew was his benefactor." At any rate, I have no particular objection to removing it. john 09:36, 2 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Hitler as a painter

The new edit says that Hitler worked as a house painter for a while. I think that's a myth but I am bookless at the moment. --Zero 10:36, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Also, the passage about "Schiklgruber" contradicts itself. --Zero 18:53, 10 Feb 2004 (UTC)

He was certainly not a house painter. He was homeless for some time in Vienna, though, I believe. john 20:19, 10 Feb 2004 (UTC)
In Vienna he worked as a painter, but not a house painter. He painted postcards and larger pictures. There's a book about Hitler as a painter. In German, though: PRICE, Billy F.: "ADOLF HITLER ALS MALER UND ZEICHNER". In "Mein Kampf" Hitler states that he always wanted to be a painter, an artist. Captain-c 08:30, 11 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Here you can find some drawings of Hitler. Captain-c 08:34, 11 Feb 2004 (UTC)


Dictator or legally elected Führer (leader) and politician?

All right. If Adolf Hitler was not a dictator, who was? - Hephaestos|§ 06:37, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

It's not that simple: Hitler first came to be chancellor by legitimate democratic election, and only later proclaimed himself Führer (a title that can fairly be translated as "Dictoator".) Mkweise 07:20, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Hitler did not come to power by a legitimate democratic election, exactly, as has been pointed out numerous times. He came to power in what might be seen as a parody of Weimar democratic forms, at a time when those forms had been completely ignored by the very men who brought him into power for quite some time. Furthermore, Hitler can certainly be termed a "dictator" from well before Hindenburg's death in 1934 (which is when he officially became Führer). I'd suggest that the Enabling Act of April 1933, at latest, established Hitler as "dictator" in all meaningful senses of the word. john 07:54, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Hitler became gradually a dictator. I think he was a 100% dictator when he succeeded Hindenburg as a president in 1934 and thereby gained control of the military. Andries 10:20, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

Hitler's remains

I notice that someone deleted this paragraph on the grounbs that it is not documented. Apart from the detail about the SMERSH headquarters, which I haven't seen before, I think the rest of this story is pretty well established. Can anyone document this, or else refute it?

Hitler's partly burnt remains were found by the Russians. They kept this fact secret, and for years the Soviet Union fostered rumours that Hitler had somehow survived the war and was living in Latin America (where many ex-Nazis were actually living). In fact his remains were buried behind Smersh's East German headquarters in Magdeburg, and remained for 25 years under a yard later owned by a waste-disposal firm. It was not until 1970 that the remains of Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun were dug up from Magdeburg and destroyed.

Adam 07:37, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

This is a news story dating from 1999. There are several Internet articles examining the case but I am uncertain of their validity. Concider the following samples:

User:Dimadick


"Adolf Hitler is still regarded by many historians as a dynamic orator and one of the most influential...personalities of the 20th century"

Exactly which historians? See Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_terms - 216.195.149.84 07:46, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

All of them.
Actually, the sentence would be better cast as: Hitler was a dynamic orator and one of the most influential personalities ... No competent historian woud challenge either statement. Tannin 07:50, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Prove it with names. Again, I direct you to Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_terms. Please read it carefully. - 216.195.149.84 07:58, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)
"Hitler was a dynamic orator and one of the most influential personalities..." has no weasel terms. - Nunh-huh 08:01, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

"one of the most influential...personalities of the 20th century" is a blindingly obvious cliche. "dynamic orator" is also pretty meaningless. "powerful orator" might be better. Adam 08:04, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

As to proving it with names, I could start with Ian Kershaw, and go from there. I doubt even, say, Hans Mommsen or Martin Broszat, whose views tended to downplay Hitler's importance within the Third Reich, would (have) dispute(d) the statement under discussion here. Or that a Marxist like Tim Mason would have. Nazi apologist David Irving, who doesn't count as a credible historian, would likely also agree with this statement. Let's add Hitler biographers Alan Bullock and Joachim Fest. And good old intentionalists like Eberhard Jäckel, Claus Hildebrand, Andreas Hillgruber, Gerhard Weinberg, and so on and so forth. But this is pointless, all I've proved is that I've read Kershaw's The Nazi Dictatorship (ah, historiographical surveys, the holy grail of the graduate student...), and thus know the names of lots of historians of Nazi Germany, and it's hard to imagine any of them disputing the statement. On the other hand, Adam Carr is right that the phrase is pretty lame and meaningless. So whatever. john 08:07, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Thanks. Some names are all I'm looking for. I'd be even happier if you would include some as references. - 216.195.149.84 08:12, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)
Lame and meaningless for you and me. These are facts. Someone could be reaing about Hitler in wikipedia for the first time. All statements look trivial from cetain level of expertise. Of course, "powerful" is better, but still it does't reflect Hitler's hypnotism over masses, but we are not writing a poem here. Mikkalai 08:19, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

The purpose of references, 216, is that you cite them:

  • (a) To provide the reader with a starting point for further study. (So, for example, we might cite Bullock's Hitler and Stalin as a general biography providing a good, middle-of-the-road life and times sort of approach. Others too, of course, including contrary views as appropriate.)
  • (b) To provide evidence of any assertons you make which might reasonably be regarded as crucial to your point, as controversial, or as questionable. You do not reference every statement you make, only those that require support.

The statement you are questioning certainly does not fall into category (b), and a reference for it would only be appropriate if you were recommending a work that included a particular focus on Hitler's oratory. It's one of those very obvious "the sky is blue" statements that, unless you want to mention a particular work with a focus on just that facet of his personality, should normally be keft un-referenced. Referencing is all about including the essential supports for your argument and not wasting the readers's time and diverting his attention from the important things you have to say with trivial, obvious, or irrelevant links. Tannin 08:34, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

If I was going to be very picky I would question the statement that "Adolf Hitler [was] one of the most influential...personalities of the 20th century." A "personality" is someone who hosts a TV game show. Hitler had a personality (that of a narcissistic hysteric I believe) but I would dispute that he was one. And it wasn't his personality that made him one of the most important figures of the 20th century, it was ther fact that he started a world war and murdered millions of people. (I knew there was a reason I decided to stay away from this page...) Adam 08:59, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Wait a second, isn't that quote from an old edit anyway? I thought something looked funny... Matt gies 09:05, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)
That's one of the two common meanings of "personality", Adam. Given that sense of the word, I agree with you entirely. But "personality" can also be used in the psychological sense. Hitler had an extraordinary personality (in this second, more useful sense) and that is a great part of the reason he was able to start a world war and kill so many people. If Hitler had not been so enormously capable of charming, impressing, persuading, and motivating people by sheer force of personal presence, he could not have done what he did. Consider the example of Rommel, nobody's fool and a tough, self-disciplined military man. Rommel regarded Hitler very poorly until Hitler turned the force of his charm on him. From that point on, Rommel was Hitler's man through and through, and did not cease to be so until the sheer callous lunacy of Hitlers instructions to him (Rommel) during the dying days of the desert campaign brought home how badly he has been hoodwinked. That's a single example, but the literature is chock full of similar ones. Hitler was an extraordinary personality. The current article does not convey this essential truth about the man.
But to return to the sentence in question, yup: it's the sort of thing I'd expect to see in a Year 8 essay. We can do better. Lots better. Tannin

Maybe. At much of Wikipedia Year 8 standards rule. We'll see. Adam 09:30, 10 Mar 2004 (UTC)

"a gifted orator with great personal presence" isn't exactly brilliant prose either. I was in the *middle* of developing that paragraph and having to deal with edit conflicts when all this back seat driving was going on over a sentence that was only in that paragraph for 20 minutes and was in the process of being refined by me. --mav

Image:Ah_berghof.jpg

Does anyone the source or licence of Image:Ah berghof.jpg? — Matthäus Wander 13:30, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I must say that that's a cute propagnda picture of the tyrant. -- user:zanimum
Images which have been created before 1960 had only 25 years term of copyright (old German copyright law before 1965), so I guess it's public domain. — Matthäus Wander 18:54, 16 Mar 2004 (UTC)

---

savitri devi claimed hitler was an incarnation of the hindu god vishnu

Schicklgruber

The paragraphs on the surname "Schicklgruber" are flatly contradictory. What's the real situation? --Robert Merkel 01:16, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I'm guessing you misread "Alois Hitler" as "Adolf Hitler", because I did that a few times too. --Zero 03:51, 17 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Part-Jewish?

Was Adolf Hitler part-Jewish? --Lst27 21:50, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It is a myth for which there is essentially no evidence. --Zero 23:52, 11 Apr 2004 (UTC)
A better answer would be: Nobody knows. No one knows who Hitler's paternal grandfather was, so no one can state that it is a fact that he [the grandfather] was or was not Jewish. There are only opinions on this matter, and in Wikipedia, NPOV requires that opinions never be asserted by the article, they only can be attributed and cited. See Neutral Point of View ChessPlayer 06:59, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

Latest Revision

Now I know users like 172 are going to point to my most recent addition and call me Fascist. How dare I write anything nice about Hitler, after all, unless I were some knuckle dragging fascist.

I did this to prove a point.

This article paints hitler in a bad light. Now, there is nothing wrong with that, he certainly was an SOB and one of the most horrific leaders in human history, but if I were to write an article with this tone about Pol Pot, Mao, Stalin or the USSR, it would spark the mother of all edit wars.

I have seen an ongoing edit wart on Pol Pot with some of the most ludicrous and nonsensical justifications being made for his and his regimes behavior.

I wonder why that is? Why is it that a article which accurately condemns Hitler and Nazi Germany is not contested, but an article which would portray Stalin in a similar light would be flooded with apologists? Why does Wikipedia reward the most stubborn, and allow them to basically re-write history? Why the hell should we even be having this debate?TDC 15:35, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

  • I fully support your addition. It is necessary to show all colors of the spectrum in order to get a NPOV encyclopedia, and inclusion of this particular matter is, if not for any other reason, warranted on its factual grounds. Fredrik 15:51, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Hitler's Testament and Dönitz

Inconsistency with another article

This article states that Hitler's testament appointed Dönitz to be Führer, but the [[Karl_D%f6nitz]] article claims Dönitz was to be President of Germany rather than Führer. This inconsistency should be researched and corrected. avarame


Headline text

What was Hilter like?

The rise to power of such an unpleasant individual is something which we should all be keen to avoid happening again and so an accurate character portrayl is important. I am bothered that he is portrayed as powerful only: and that the pictures we have included of him look cross. Life would be easier if evil men looked grumpy and had cleft feet. But Lady Moseley described Hilter as a charmer, a man with sparkling eyes. Bad-tempered spiteful men rarely get power. I think his personal charisma and particularly charm should be in the description as a warning to us. BozMo(talk)

Good point. You should add that. (But keep in mind that he did present an image of being powerful and angry during his speeches, and the Germans liked him for this reason.) Quadell 13:17, Apr 29, 2004 (UTC)

Most recent picture

I'm unsure what this picture illustrates for this article. Hitler is not particularly clear in it, and the leader he is shaking hands with is not mentioned much in the article. Furthermore, the captioning was rather POV and the section the picture was added to (The Holocaust) doesn't really seem the place. I think perhaps the picture would be better suited to an article on Naziism, where it could go along with discussions of other Nazi-supported governments. Snowspinner 14:32, 13 May 2004 (UTC)

I f we have picture with mussolini than we will have the one with pavelic. BTW Croatia was puppet state. Puppet state is term in English language. Dictionary desribes it as state with a government that is appointed by and whose affairs are directed by an outside authority that may impose hardships on those governed.

So maybe you don`t like history of Croatia, but I don`t like it either.

Pavelic was Hitler`s "boss" for Eastern Europe and he has to stay.

Avala 08:54, 14 May 2004 (UTC)

Mussolini is notable as one of the three leaders of the Axis - a photograph of Hitler and Mussolini is thus of major importance because it's 2/3 of the leaders that World War II sought to overthrow. Pavelic is of less historical note in that regard, in that he wasn't one of the major targets of WW2. Furthermore, the placement of the picture was problematic in the extreme. Pavelic is not mentioned in the article - he is certainly not relevent to the Holocaust section in which the picture was placed. beyond that, it's not that good a picture - neither Hitler nor Pavelic are identifiable without a caption, etc. I'm not objecting to a discussion of Pavelic's role in Easern Europe during World War 2. I'm objecting to that picture, with that caption, at that position, in this article.
Also, please do not start new sections to respond to points that are being made in other sections. It makes noticing that you've replied to me tremendously difficult. Snowspinner 16:41, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia NPOV Policy

Everyone who edits at Wikipedia should go to Neutral point of view and study it until they understand it well. I see a lot of evidence in articles, including this one, that people have not done this. For example, I see articles where it appears that people think the policy advocates that a neutral point of view be argued in the text. This is not what the policy states. Other people seem to think that neutral means balanced, that it is ok for the article itself to assert a point of view, if it is done fairly. This also is not what the policy states. Others seem to feel that it is ok for articles to promote a point of view, if that point of view is overwhelmingly popular and not offensive to the vast majority of people. This also is not what the policy states. You need to read the policy page to understand NPOV, the policy is not intuitive. ChessPlayer 06:28, 14 May 2004 (UTC)

I'm hoping you're not targeting me as one of the failures to understand, as I've read over the page multiple times. If so, though, I'm curious exactly what you see my error as being. Snowspinner 16:41, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
I wasn't targeting anyone. ChessPlayer 17:09, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

Democratically Elected

The article claims Hitler was "democratically elected," but does not mention what office he was elected to, because it can't, Hitler was never elected to any government office. I think the statement is misleading and should be removed. Hitler was not elected, he was appointed. Hitler then gradually increased his power by politics and force until he was the sole authority. The enactment of the Enabling Acts was not an election, but a ceremony masquerading as an election. There was no real vote, as the choice was cooperate or die. If my memory is correct, the hardcore opposition was banned entirely from the chamber when the "vote" took place, and the rest where acting under knowledge that to oppose the Act was likely to get them tortured and/or killed. At no point in Hitler's rise to power did he get elected. ChessPlayer 01:37, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

Ga. It didn't used to say that. We had a whole argument where it is patiently explained that we shouldn't say that. I'm going to look through the article and find out when that was put in. john 03:01, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

The version of the intro saying Hitler was "democratically elected" seems to have been introduced some ten days ago by an anon user. I've reverted back to the version previous to that. Except for the addition of a dubiously relevant picture of Ante Pavelic, I don't think any contributions of note have been lost. john 03:06, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

Twelve-year Reich

ChessPlayer, regarding your point on the ironic "twelve-year Reich" sentence, I think it makes a good endpoint to that section: it makes clear the hubris of Hitler's ambitions. -- The Anome 17:55, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

I completely agree that it makes clear the hubris of Hitler's ambitions. And that is why I deleted it. Making clear the folly of Hitler's conduct, is asserting an opinion by the article itself, and that is forbidden by NPOV. NPOV forbids the article to tell the reader, "this is good" or "that was bad". ChessPlayer 18:05, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
NPOV does not forbid any such thing. It is clearly idiotic to not suggest that genocide is a bad thing, at the very least for the victims. NPOV specifically states that articles should represent all views fairly. Retaining the "twelve-year Reich" sentence does not in any way compromise this policy Mintguy (T) 18:15, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
Yes, NPOV does prohibit articles from telling readers opinions like "genocide is bad" We are not allowed to tell readers what to think in matters of opinion, and its only an opinion that genocide is bad. That is not a fact. Hitler didn't think genocide of the Jews was bad, so clearly, its an opinion, and advocating opinions by the article itself, is a violation of NPOV. I am glad we are discussing this, as many people don't know the NPOV policy. Its ok, the policy is not intuitive. ChessPlayer 18:26, 15 May 2004 (UTC)
"Hitler didn't think genocide of the Jews was bad, so clearly, its an opinion,". NPOV does not mean "NO POINT OF VIEW". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutral_point_of_view#Giving_equal_validity says ... that does not stop us from representing the majority views as such; from fairly explaining the strong arguments against the repugnant views; from describing the strong moral repugnance that many decent people feel toward them; and so forth, but equally we avoid weasel terms like "most people think genocide is a bad thing". There is nothing wrong with saying genocide is a bad thing if the vast majority of opinion believes that it is a bad thing, much like there is nothing wrong in saying that lager beer is best served chilled. As regards this sentence, stating explicitly that the Reich lasted 12 years is no more giving the article a biased point of view than it is to state explicitly that he was 56 when he died. If the sentence read the so-called "thousand year Reich" lasted a mere twelve years that would be a different matter. Please understand that NPOV does not mean removing all potentially emotional content from articles, because it could be interpreted as a point of view. Points of view are not BANISHED from articles, they are tempered. Mintguy (T) 09:30, 16 May 2004 (UTC)
You are misunderstanding what it is saying. It is saying that NPOV does not prevent us from presenting the majority's views; the article is free to, and should, present those views in depth. The views of those who abhor genocide should be given....and attributed to whoever has them...not the article. ChessPlayer 10:49, 16 May 2004 (UTC)
As someone who has been a regular contributor to Wikipedia for nearly two years, I think it's a bit rich for you to lecture me on NPOV, when you've only just arrived here. "The views of those who abhor genocide should be given....and attributed to whoever has them...not the article." - ridiculous. Please re-read this sentence and try to think what you would write in this case. Mintguy (T) 15:32, 16 May 2004 (UTC)


You raise points which I think are common misunderstandings of the NPOV policy. Let me quote:

To avoid endless edit wars, we can agree to present each of these views fairly, and not assert any one of them as correct. That is what makes an article "unbiased" or "neutral" in the sense we are presenting here. To write from a neutral point of view, one presents controversial views without asserting them; to do that, it generally suffices to present competing views in a way that is more or less acceptable to their adherents, and also to attribute the views to their adherents.

What this means is, the article does have NO point of view itself. All it has is the views of the various sides, each attributed to each side, with NO POINT OF VIEW advocated by the article. If the article is to have a point of view, this produces edit wars, as people fight over what the article's view will be. Supposing I was a Nazi. I would not like the article rubbing it in that the Third Reich lasted only twelve years. I would be insulted. I would want the article to end some other way. To avoid this problem, the NPOV policy was declared. Under NPOV, both a Nazi and a Jew can agree to an article, because the article will not make any judgements about either side. It will not brand the Holocaust as evil, but simply state that it happened. Neither will it brand Hitler as the best thing that ever happened to the Aryan race. What you advocate, is not NPOV, but a sort of appeal to consensus, and that is a different policy entirely. ChessPlayer 09:55, 16 May 2004 (UTC)


To elaborate further, NPOV allows readers to make up their own minds by being presented with facts. In the article, they can figure out, if they want to, that the Third Reich only lasted twelve years. They then can make of that whatever they wish. That is ok. But NPOV prohibits we, the editors, of suggesting the answer to them, by phrases such as Germany surrendered. Hitler's "Thousand Year Reich" had lasted a little over 12 years. , even though we the editors all hold that opinion, we all agree how well-phrased the final sentence is, and we agree how it makes a nice wrap up to the article...alll except one thing...Wikipedia has Jimbo Wales' non-negotiable policy to obey: NPOV. Articles can't advocate opinions, and it certainly is an opinion that there is something wrong with the 12 year life of a 1000 year Reich. We can't praise Hitler for improving the lives of Germans with better economic conditions; we can't speak ill of him for the bad things he did. We can't do both, and say because its "balanced" its ok. We can't do those things, because by doing them, we are making up our own definition of NPOV. We have to read and follow NPOV as Jimbo Wales says it is, and that means going to the official policy pages and learning them. Note: We ARE allowed to say economic conditions got better, if that is a fact. We just can't call it good or bad, or use it to say Hitler is good or bad; nor can we be clever in our selection of facts to suggest truths to the reader on matters of opinion. ChessPlayer 18:35, 15 May 2004 (UTC)

I think you need to re-read it. Bear in mind BTW that the text of the NPOV page is not different from any other on Wikipedia, what the NPOV pags says today is different from what NPOV said 12 months ago. Mintguy (T)
I just did. And I checked the page history. The article is pretty stable, and it is the official policy, right? Here is what it says:

The neutral point of view policy is easily misunderstood. The policy doesn't assume that it's possible to write an article from just a single unbiased, "objective" point of view. The policy says that we should fairly represent all sides of a dispute, and not make an article state, imply, or insinuate that any one side is correct.

So, our goal is not to try to write objective articles that assert some truth by consensus. The Hitler page is trying to do that, and its wrong to do so. What NPOV calls for is for the presentations of sides on anything not a hard fact. The article then presents the sides fairly, and the reader is left to make of it what they like, without any nudge from the article as who to believe. Earlier, you said some things which are flat out wrong. Wikipedia articles simply are not allowed to express opinions wether innnocent, like "Beer tastes best cold" or serious, like "Genocide is a horrible thing." What can be stated are facts: "Most people think genocide is a horrible thing." or "Most people like their beer cold". However, we have to be careful when using weasel words like "most people" as it often is used as a way of getting around NPOV so that the page is asserting the editor's views.

To sum up what I believe is a fundamental philosophic issue between us. I support the NPOV policy, and you don't. The NPOV policy calls for the creation of articles that simply present hard facts, and in any matter not factual, asserts no point of view, but instead repots the fact of what all the sides are on an issue. What you advocate is articles that reflect whatever the editors have agreed to as "fair." You are entitled to that philosophy on your own wiki, but this one is Jimbo Wales', and he insists on NPOV. Personally, I think Jimbo's way is much better, cause even with his way, there will be lots of edit wars, but with your way, the edit wars will be ten times worse. Your way also leads to the creation of gangs and factions and discourages the expression of minority views, because articles are allowed to advocate views. Currently, the Hitler article is advocating an anti-Hitler view by pointing out that he failed, and implying there was something wrong with him that lead to failure. However, suppose a group of Nazis wrote the article, and suppose they didn't have to follow NPOV; then they would write an article where perhaps the failure was due to the evil Jews, perhaps. Do you see why consensus of this sort is not a good way to run a wikipedia? If forced to follow NPOV, even a gang of Nazis have to produce a fair article, as all they can do is give hard facts and fairly present the views on anything that is opinion. The NPOV policy is very crucial to both keeping the articles honest, and to cutting down on edit wars. Because I believe that, I take so much time to support it, I feel I am doing the Wikipedia a valuable service, more valuable than spending the time improving articles directly.ChessPlayer 10:35, 16 May 2004 (UTC)

It would appear that a restructuring of the sentence may be satisfactory to you. After all, the fact that the reich lasted for 12 years is not disputed. The fact that its aim was to last for 1000 years also does not appear to be disputed. Oh, and as for your comment "the Hitler article is advocating an anti-Hitler view by pointing out that he failed" - please: the article can hardly be expected to omit any mention of his death, Germany losing the war and the reich ending. I can almost see your point of view though; however, it is not stated anywhere else in the article that the reich lasted for 12 years, and certainly I don't think I should be expected to have to deduce that myself (seriously). - wgm. 16 May 2004


Talk:FOX News. - VV 10:08, 16 May 2004 (UTC)

TIME 1938

The reason Hitler was on TIME's cover was because of the events in Munich. To mention TIME right after the events of 38 is exactly right. ChessPlayer 07:05, 16 May 2004 (UTC)

Who is to blame for the destruction of the war?

"The regime he led caused the deaths of millions and the displacement of millions more." - Only by a twisted, one-sided interpretation, can this statement be called a hard fact. It is as one-sided as saying, "The US caused the deaths of millions and the displacement of millions more in WWII" which is equally true. One sided statements that imply blame are POV and not allowed to be asserted by the article itself, but can be stated as the opinions of sources, when those sources are cited,

The crucial point here is the word "caused". Causation in historical works is almost always a matter of opinion, debate, and often controversy. To claim its hard fact here is completely unjustified.

I am rewording the intro so that it is not POV and blaming Hitler's "military-industrial" complex for "the deaths of millions and the displacement of millions more." If someone disagrees, let them show how this statement is not in the same category as stating that America, or Britain, or Russia caused it. History is not science, and historical analytical statements are opinions, and this one definately is. ChessPlayer 00:32, 17 May 2004 (UTC)

Don't forget about the concentration camps. Fredrik 00:55, 17 May 2004 (UTC)
I think its factual to assert that Hitler was responsible for the camps. The sentence does not give the impression it refers to the camps, as it does not mention them, and the sentence before was refering to conquest. If it is the camps, then it should make that clear. ChessPlayer 01:08, 17 May 2004 (UTC)


Hitler's sex life

The article mentions that Hitler may be gay. That is fine but then I also feel that I have to include to extensive evidence that Hitler was a heterosexual to balance it. That would make the article unwieldy. I propose removing the reference to Hitler's hidden gay life. Andries 07:36, 22 May 2004 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Adolf Hitler/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

missing citations plange 05:24, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Last edited at 20:33, 21 July 2011 (UTC). Substituted at 20:21, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

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