Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler

"Hitler" redirects here. For other uses, see Hitler (disambiguation).

Adolf Hitler

Führer of Germany
In office
2 August 1934 – 30 April 1945
Preceded by Paul von Hindenburg
(as President)
Succeeded by Karl Dönitz
(as President)
Reichskanzler (Chancellor) of Germany
In office
30 January 1933 – 30 April 1945
Preceded by Kurt von Schleicher
Succeeded by Joseph Goebbels
Born 20 April 1889
Braunau am Inn, Austria–Hungary
Died 30 April 1945 (aged 56)
Berlin, Germany
Citizenship Austrian (1889–1932)
German (1932–1945)
Nationality Austrian citizen until 1925[1] German citizen after 1932
Political party German Workers' Party (1920–1921)
National Socialist German Workers' Party (1921–1945)
Spouse(s) Eva Braun
(married on 29 April 1945)
Occupation politician, soldier, artist, writer
Religion See Adolf Hitler's religious beliefs
Signature
Military service
Allegiance German Empire
Service/branch Reichsheer
Years of service 1914–1918
Rank Gefreiter
Unit 16th Bavarian Reserve Regiment
Battles/wars World War I
Awards Iron Cross First and Second Class
Wound Badge
The Holocaust
Early elements
Racial policy · Nuremberg Laws · Nazi eugenics · Action T4
Jews
German Jews
Pogroms: Kristallnacht · Bucharest · Dorohoi · Iaşi · Kaunas · Jedwabne · Lviv (Lvov)
Ghettos: Budapest Ghetto · Lublin · Lviv (Lvov) · Łódź · Kraków · Kovno Ghetto · Minsk · Warsaw · Vilnius · (List of ghettoes)
Einsatzgruppen: Babi Yar · Rumbula · Ponary · Odessa · Erntefest · Ninth Fort
Final Solution: Wannsee · Operation Reinhard · Holocaust trains · Extermination camps · Madagascar Plan
Resistance: Jewish partisans · Ghetto uprisings (Warsaw · Białystok · Łachwa)
End of World War II: Death marches · Berihah · Surviving Remnant
Other victims
Romani people (Gypsies) · Homosexuals · People with disabilities · Slavs in Eastern Europe · Poles · Soviet POWs · Jehovah's Witnesses
Concentration and
extermination camps
Nazi concentration camps ·
Nazi extermination camps ·
Auschwitz-Birkenau · Bełżec extermination camp · Bergen-Belsen · Bogdanovka · Buchenwald · Chełmno · Dachau · Gross-Rosen · Herzogenbusch · Janowska · Jasenovac · Kaiserwald · Majdanek concentration camp · Maly Trostenets · Mauthausen-Gusen · Neuengamme · Ravensbrück · Sachsenhausen · Sajmište · Salaspils · Sobibór · Stutthof · Theresienstadt · Treblinka · Uckermark · Warsaw ·
(List of Nazi concentration camps)
Responsible parties
Nazi Germany: Adolf Hitler · Heinrich Himmler · Ernst Kaltenbrunner · Theodor Eicke · Reinhard Heydrich · Adolf Eichmann · Rudolf Höss · Nazi Party · Schutzstaffel (SS) · Gestapo · Sturmabteilung (SA)
War Collaborators
Nazi Ideologues
Aftermath: Nuremberg Trials · Denazification · Reparations Agreement
between Israel and West Germany
Lists
Survivors · Victims · Rescuers
Resources
The Destruction of the European Jews Functionalism versus intentionalism
v • d • e
Adolf Hitler (German pronunciation: [ˈadɔlf ˈhɪtlɐ]; 20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party (German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, abbreviated NSDAP), commonly known as the Nazi Party. He was the absolute dictator of Germany from 1934 to 1945, with the title of chancellor from 1933 to 1945 and with the title head of state (Führer und Reichskanzler) from 1934 to 1945.
A decorated veteran of World War I, Hitler joined the precursor of the Nazi Party (DAP) in 1919 and became leader of NSDAP in 1921. Following his imprisonment after a failed coup in Bavaria in 1923, he gained support by promoting German nationalism, anti-semitism, anti-capitalism, and anti-communism with charismatic oratory and propaganda. He was appointed chancellor in 1933, and quickly transformed the Weimar Republic into the Third Reich, a single-party dictatorship based on the totalitarian and autocratic ideals of national socialism.
Hitler ultimately wanted to establish a New Order of absolute Nazi German hegemony in Europe. To achieve this, he pursued a foreign policy with the declared goal of seizing Lebensraum ("living space") for the Aryan people; directing the resources of the state towards this goal. This included the rearmament of Germany, which culminated in 1939 when the Wehrmacht invaded Poland. In response, the United Kingdom and France declared war against Germany, leading to the outbreak of World War II in Europe.[2]
Within three years, Germany and the Axis powers had occupied most of Europe, and most of Northern Africa, East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific Ocean. However, with the reversal of the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, the Allies gained the upper hand from 1942 onwards. By 1945, Allied armies had invaded German-held Europe from all sides. Nazi forces engaged in numerous violent acts during the war, including the systematic murder of as many as 17 million civilians,[3] an estimated six million of whom were Jews targeted in the Holocaust and between 500,000 and 1,500,000 were Romanis.[4] Others targeted included ethnic Poles, Soviet civilians, Soviet prisoners of war, people with disabilities, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, and other political and religious opponents.
In the final days of the war, at the fall of Berlin in 1945, Hitler married his long-time mistress Eva Braun and, to avoid capture by Soviet forces less than two days later, the two committed suicide[5] on 30 April, 1945.[list][*]