Between the Two World Wars

Lessons

Senior 3 · History and Citizenship

Between the Two World Wars

5 lessons

Lesson 5 of 5

The downfall of Fascism and Nazism

25 min

"Twice in our lifetime"

In June 1945, weeks after the defeat of Nazi Germany, delegates of fifty nations signed a new charter in San Francisco. It begins:

We the peoples of the United Nations determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, which twice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to mankind, and to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small …
Source A. Charter of the United Nations (1945), Preamble.

Analysing the source. "Twice in our lifetime" means the two world wars. Every phrase answers something you have studied in this unit: "human rights" and "the dignity and worth of the human person" answer the totalitarian state that crushed the individual; "equal rights … of nations large and small" answers the fate of Ethiopia in 1935. The Charter is the victors' verdict on Fascism and Nazism. This lesson explains how those regimes fell.

From aggression to defeat

Fascism and Nazism glorified war, and war destroyed them. Hitler's invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 started the Second World War in Europe; Italy joined Germany in June 1940. At first the Axis powers won quickly: by mid-1940 Germany controlled most of western Europe. Then they made fatal choices.

Figure 1. The fall of Fascism and Nazism, 1939 to 1945.

Definition

Axis powers: Germany, Italy and Japan, the alliance that fought the Allies in the Second World War.

Allies: the countries that fought the Axis, led by Britain, the Soviet Union and the United States.

Unconditional surrender: surrender in which the defeated side accepts whatever terms the winners impose.

Partisans (or resistance fighters): civilians who form armed groups to fight an occupying army or a dictatorship.

War crime: a serious violation of the laws of war, such as killing prisoners or civilians.

Why Nazism and Fascism fell

Too many enemies at once. In 1941 Hitler attacked the Soviet Union and declared war on the United States. Germany now faced the world's largest army and its largest economy together.
Allied economic power. The United States and the Soviet Union produced far more tanks, aircraft and ships than the Axis could.
Military defeats. At Stalingrad (surrender on 2 February 1943) Germany lost a whole army; in North Africa the Axis armies surrendered in May 1943; the Allied landings in Normandy on 6 June 1944 opened a second front in the west.
Italy's weakness. Italy was poorly prepared for a long war. After defeats in Africa and the Allied landing in Sicily in July 1943, Fascist leaders and the king turned against Mussolini.
Resistance. Partisans in Italy, France, Yugoslavia and elsewhere attacked the occupiers; Ethiopian patriots, with British and African troops, had already freed Ethiopia from Italian rule in 1941.
The nature of the regimes. Leaders who could not be questioned made disastrous decisions, and the regimes' cruelty turned conquered peoples against them.

The end of Mussolini and Hitler

Italy. On 25 July 1943 the Fascist Grand Council voted against Mussolini, and King Victor Emmanuel III dismissed and arrested him. Italy signed an armistice with the Allies in September 1943. German troops freed Mussolini and set him up in a puppet state in northern Italy, but Italian partisans rose against it. On 28 April 1945, trying to escape, Mussolini was captured and shot by partisans. In June 1946 Italians voted in a referendum to end the monarchy and became a republic.

Germany. As Soviet troops fought their way into Berlin, Hitler took his own life on 30 April 1945. Germany surrendered unconditionally on 8 May 1945 and was divided into four zones of occupation. The victors tried the surviving Nazi leaders at Nuremberg from November 1945 to October 1946 for crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity, the first time leaders of a state were tried by an international court for such crimes. The world also learned the full scale of the Holocaust, the genocide in which the Nazis murdered six million Jews.

The legacy: never again

Figure 2. The rise and fall of Fascism and Nazism: cause, course and effect.

The defeat of Nazism shaped the rules the world still uses. The Polish lawyer Raphael Lemkin had invented the word "genocide" in 1944 to describe the Nazis' crimes. On 9 December 1948 the United Nations adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, and the next day the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

… genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.
Source C. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948), Article II.

Case study: from Nuremberg to Arusha. For decades the Convention was rarely enforced. After the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, the United Nations Security Council created the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in Arusha, Tanzania, which applied this definition. In 1998 it delivered the first judgment for the crime of genocide by an international court. The promise of "never again", made after the defeat of Nazism, had failed in Rwanda in 1994; that is why Rwanda's Constitution now places the prevention and punishment of genocide first among its fundamental principles.

Worked example: explaining a downfall

Question: Explain three reasons for the downfall of Nazi Germany. (6 marks)

Fighting on too many fronts. By invading the Soviet Union in June 1941 and declaring war on the United States in December 1941, Hitler faced the world's two greatest powers at once.
Allied production. American and Soviet factories built far more weapons than Germany, so German losses could not be replaced.
Decisive defeats. The surrender at Stalingrad on 2 February 1943 and the Normandy landings of 6 June 1944 trapped Germany between advancing armies until it surrendered on 8 May 1945.

Tip

Rise and fall in one sentence: they rose on crisis (peace, Depression, fear of communism) and fell through war (overreach, Allied power, resistance). Link causes and downfall in your answers.

Warning

Don't confuse the two dates of 1943 and 1945 in Italy. Mussolini was overthrown on 25 July 1943 but ruled a German-backed puppet state in the north until he was killed on 28 April 1945. Hitler stayed in power until his death on 30 April 1945.

Discuss

The Nuremberg trials and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda both tried leaders for terrible crimes. Why is it important that such crimes are judged by courts, with evidence and a defence, rather than punished by revenge? Link your answer to the rule of law.

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Practice

Name the three main Axis powers.
Give two decisions by Hitler in 1941 that helped bring about his defeat.
What happened at Stalingrad, and when?
How did Mussolini fall from power in July 1943, and how did he die?
When did Germany surrender, and what happened to it afterwards?
What were the Nuremberg trials?
Using Source C, list two acts that count as genocide, and explain what makes an act genocide rather than another crime.
Source B was probably posed. Is it still useful to a historian? Explain.

Show answersHide answers

Germany, Italy and Japan.
Invading the Soviet Union (22 June 1941) and declaring war on the United States (11 December 1941).
The German army trapped at Stalingrad surrendered to the Soviet army on 2 February 1943, a turning point of the war in the east.
The Fascist Grand Council voted against him and the king dismissed and arrested him on 25 July 1943. He was captured and shot by Italian partisans on 28 April 1945.
On 8 May 1945, unconditionally. It was occupied and divided into four zones, and its surviving leaders were put on trial.
Trials held at Nuremberg from November 1945 to October 1946 in which an international court tried leading Nazis for crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Any two of: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm; inflicting conditions of life meant to destroy it; preventing births; forcibly transferring children. What makes it genocide is the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group as such.
Yes. Even if posed, it is genuine evidence from 26 April 1945 of the liberation of Milan and of how the Resistance wanted to show itself, including the role of women. A historian must use it as evidence of a message, not as an unplanned snapshot.

1"Twice in our lifetime"

2From aggression to defeat

3Why Nazism and Fascism fell

4The end of Mussolini and Hitler

5The legacy: never again

6Discuss