Battles & Wars › Between the wars › World War II
Adolf Hitler
1889–1945· Person· Europe
Well documentedSolid records, physical evidence or scientific consensus.
Austrian-born leader of the Nazi Party who ruled Germany as dictator from 1933 to 1945 and started World War II in Europe.
See it on the Battles & Wars map →What happened
Twice rejected by Vienna's art academy, Hitler served as a soldier in World War I and joined a small nationalist party in Munich, soon renamed the Nazi Party. After a failed coup in 1923 he wrote Mein Kampf in prison. The Great Depression made the Nazis Germany's largest party, and he became chancellor in January 1933. He crushed opponents, rearmed and invaded Poland in 1939. He drove the Holocaust, and killed himself in Berlin in April 1945 as Soviet troops closed in.
Why it matters
His aggression caused World War II in Europe, the deadliest war in history, and his racial ideology drove the murder of about six million Jews and millions of others.
Legacy and how we know
Nazi government records captured in 1945, his speeches and writings, evidence at the Nuremberg trials, and accounts by those around him; Ian Kershaw's biography is a standard account.
Still debated
Historians debate how much he directed every decision himself versus officials 'working toward the Führer' on their own initiative.
Connections (6)
▸Treaty of Versailles fueled the grievances exploited by Adolf HitlerMostly agreed
The connection
Many Germans saw Versailles as a humiliating dictated peace that blamed them for the war. Hitler made tearing it up central to his message, attacking the 'November criminals' who signed the armistice. In power he broke its limits step by step: open rearmament in 1935, troops into the Rhineland in 1936, and union with Austria in 1938.
When and how
Germany, 1919–1939: from Hitler's early speeches in Munich in the 1920s to his treaty violations of 1935–1938.
How sure are we?
His speeches and Mein Kampf attack the treaty repeatedly; historians agree it fed resentment, though many weigh the Depression more heavily in his rise.
Debates and open questions
How much Versailles itself, rather than the Depression and the Weimar Republic's weaknesses, explains Hitler's rise is a classic debate.
▸Adolf Hitler launched World War IIWell documented
The connection
Hitler's goal of conquering 'living space' in the east for Germans required war. He rearmed Germany, absorbed Austria and Czechoslovakia in 1938–39, signed a pact with Stalin, and ordered the attack on Poland for September 1, 1939, knowing Britain and France had pledged to defend it.
When and how
Berlin, 1933–39; the attack order on Poland was issued on August 31, 1939, a week after the August 23 Nazi–Soviet Pact.
How we know
His book 'Mein Kampf', the 1937 Hossbach memorandum recording his war plans, and his signed directives, all used as evidence at Nuremberg.
Debates and open questions
Historians debate whether he wanted a general war in 1939 or gambled that Britain and France would back down again, as at Munich in 1938.
▸Adolf Hitler was the driving force behind The HolocaustWell documented
The connection
Hitler's obsessive antisemitism, set out in Mein Kampf, shaped Nazi policy from 1933. In January 1939 he publicly 'prophesied' that a new world war would bring 'the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe'. Under his authority the regime moved from persecution to mass murder, organized by Himmler's SS and carried out by many thousands of others.
When and how
Germany and occupied Europe, 1933–45; Heinrich Himmler, Reinhard Heydrich and Adolf Eichmann organized the killing on the leadership's authority.
How we know
His speeches, Himmler's notes of their meetings, Goebbels's diaries and perpetrators' testimony; no single signed extermination order has ever been found.
Debates and open questions
Whether Hitler gave one decisive order, and when, is still debated; historians propose dates ranging from summer to December 1941.
▸Adolf Hitler ordered Operation BarbarossaWell documented
The connection
Hitler saw destroying the Soviet Union as his central war aim: seizing land for German settlement and crushing what he called 'Jewish Bolshevism'. In December 1940 he issued Directive 21 ordering the invasion, and during the campaign he overrode his generals by diverting armor south to Ukraine before turning on Moscow.
When and how
Directive 21 was signed in Berlin on December 18, 1940; the invasion began June 22, 1941.
How we know
Directive 21 survives, as do the 'Commissar Order' and other criminal orders, and generals' diaries such as Franz Halder's record Hitler's decisions.
Debates and open questions
A few writers claim he struck to forestall a Soviet attack; most historians reject this 'preventive war' thesis, though Stalin's long-term intentions are debated.
▸Adolf Hitler took his own life during Battle of BerlinWell documented
The connection
Hitler stayed in his bunker under the Reich Chancellery as Soviet troops closed in, refusing to leave the city. On April 30, 1945, with Soviet forces a few blocks away, he shot himself; Eva Braun, his wife of one day, took poison. His death let his successors seek surrender.
When and how
The Führerbunker, central Berlin, April 30, 1945; witnesses to the aftermath included his valet Heinz Linge and adjutant Otto Günsche.
How we know
Testimony of bunker survivors, Soviet investigators' recovery of his remains and dental identification, and a 2018 French study of the preserved teeth.
Debates and open questions
Stalin publicly hinted Hitler had escaped, fueling decades of myths; a skull fragment in Moscow proved female in 2009, but the jaw and teeth confirm his death.
▸Albert Speer and German war production was made armaments minister (1942) by Adolf HitlerWell documented
The connection
Speer was Hitler's favorite architect and one of the few people close to him socially. When Fritz Todt died in February 1942, Hitler named the 36-year-old Speer armaments minister. Speer gained wide power over industry, but in 1945 he quietly resisted Hitler's 'Nero Decree' ordering German infrastructure destroyed.
When and how
Hitler's headquarters at Rastenburg, East Prussia, February 8, 1942; the Nero Decree, March 19, 1945.
How we know
Ministry records, Nuremberg testimony, and Speer's own memoirs, which historians treat with caution.
Debates and open questions
His claim that he plotted to gas Hitler's bunker in 1945 is doubted, as is his portrayal of a mostly professional relationship.