Hitler youth
The Hitler Youth (German: Hitlerjugend, abbreviated HJ) was established by the National Socialist Workers' Party German (NSDAP) in 1926 to create a new training system for German youth to provide them with military training and develop their understanding of and obedience to Nazi ideology. Its principles were Nazism, racism, nationalism, physical activity, military training, camaraderie, life in the open air, the invocation of blood and also honor, to train leaders and "good men" in the future.
Organization
The basic motivation of the HJ was to train future citizens of the Reich and soldiers who would faithfully serve Nazi Germany as adults. Physical and military training was considered as important as academic and scientific education in all HJ organizations. The young people learned in the camps to use weapons, developed physical strength and were educated in the love of nature. His uniform consisted of a light brown shirt and brown shorts, similar to those of the scouts. Some high-ranking children wore black shirts.
In 1923, when it was founded in Munich, the HJ had around 1000 members, four years later the number increased fivefold. In 1930 there were already 25,000 boys, while a few weeks before Adolf Hitler came to power (1934) there were already 107,956. In 1933, there were more than 2,300,000 young people who joined the HJ. On February 18, 1934, it was joined by 600,000 members from the Evangelical Youth (Evangelische Jugend), a Lutheran religious organization. The following year, one million seven hundred thousand more joined.[citation needed] In 1940 the last reliable number of members of the HJ is known, which had eight million young people in their ranks.
History
Creation
The HJ were born from the Jugendbund der NSDAP (JdN), which was founded in March 1922. It held its first meeting in May of the same year and its membership was reserved for fourteen-year-old males. to eighteen years. Those between the ages of fourteen and sixteen formed the Jungmannschaften and the older ones the Jungsturm Adolf Hitler. The organization was supervised by the SA and headed at first by Adolf Lenk.
The JdN collapsed after the failed 1923 putsch in Munich and during Hitler's imprisonment. Numerous local youth groups were founded to fill the gap, such as Lenk and Kurt Gruber's Grossdeutsche Jugendbewegung or the Schilljugend, organized both in Austria and on German territory. In 1926, Gruber's Grossdeutsche Jugendbewegung was renamed Hitler Jugend, Bund Deutscher Arbeiterjugend with Gruber as the new leader, but he was soon replaced by Franz von Pfeffer.
In 1928 the HJ added a section for boys aged ten to fourteen, initially called Deutsche Knabenschaft, and in 1931 it was renamed Deutsches Jungvolk in der Hitler-Jugend. A women's section for young people between fourteen and eighteen years old called the Schwesternschaft der Hitler-Jugend, and renamed Bund Deutscher Mädel (BDM) was added in 1930, as well as a section for girls. younger, the Jungmädelgruppe, in 1931.
In 1931 the new position of Reichsjugendführer was created, and Baldur von Schirach took control of the Hitler Youth, the National-Sozialistische Schülerbund (NSS) and the National-Sozialistische Deutsche Studentenbund (NSDSt.B), subordinate to the latter. Adrian von Renteln was appointed leader of the Hitler Youth and actively purged the Youth leadership of 'inappropriate' people. However, in 1932 when the NSS joined the HJ, Adrian von Renteln's position was absorbed by von Schirach. The Hitler Youth broke away from the SA in May 1932, but both groups were outlawed by the Weimar government in June of the same year.
After the Nazis came to power, other right-wing youth groups were absorbed into the HJ. From December 1, 1936, under the Jugenddienstpflicht (compulsory youth service) all other youth groups were abolished and their members absorbed into the HJ. Membership in this organization was compulsory for young people over the age of 17 from 1939, and then for all children from the age of ten from 1941. Baldur von Schirach was replaced as HJ leader by Arthur Axmann in 1940.
During World War II
As World War II progressed, the Hitler Youth carried out the work of enlisted men in the armed forces, carrying out services in air defense and working to clear debris and rebuild facilities destroyed by bombing. allies. Its older members soon swelled the ranks of the soldiers, especially for the Waffen-SS, and in particular it served as a source of troops for the 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend under the command of Kurt Meyer.
When Germany was invaded by the Soviets and Americans from August 1944, increasingly younger members of the HJ were enlisted in the Wehrmacht, both in ground troops and in aviation and the navy, although in the latter performing minor tasks. When the Nazi regime launched the mass mobilization called the Volkssturm on October 13, 1944, the HJ was militarized as the main pool of troops and almost all adolescents over the age of fourteen serving in the HJ were called up.
During the Battle of Berlin in April 1945, many members of the HJ in the capital were directly recruited into the Volkssturm regardless of age, and formed an important part of the German defense. A makeshift Panzerjagd (tank destroyer) division was formed made up of bicycle companies; each of the riders carried two Panzerfausts attached to either side of the front wheel and to the handlebars. The Nazi leadership assumed that they would be able to dismount in an instant and be ready for action against a T-34, which was impossible in most cases and they were sent knowingly to a foretold death.
The Hitler Youth, overwhelmingly made up of teenagers with no prior military training and poor-quality weapons, fought very unevenly in the last months of the war and suffered very high casualties, although some small groups fought (in Berlin a group managed to prevent the advance of a liberation Soviet tank division for three days, thanks mainly to the Panzerfaust). After the war, the Hitler Youth were dissolved and permanently abolished.
After World War II
The Hitler Youth were disbanded by Allied authorities as part of the denazification plan. Some members were suspected of war crimes but, being minors at the time, no serious efforts were made to bring them to justice.
The Hitler Youth were never declared a "criminal organization" as it grouped minors, but they were indirectly prohibited as their adult leadership (based exclusively on NSDAP hierarchs) was considered as "corrupting the minds of young Germans» and condemned for it along with the entire Nazi government apparatus. Many adult leaders of the Hitler Youth were put on trial by the Allied authorities, and Baldur von Schirach was sentenced to twenty years in prison. However, von Schirach was found guilty for his criminal actions against Jews and dissidents in Vienna, not for his leadership of the Hitler Youth.
Because membership in the HJ was compulsory after 1936, it was not surprising that German children born between 1920 and 1939, who became adults during the Cold War, had been part of the Hitler Youth at some point in their lives., including some renowned political personalities from both East and West Germany.
Dagger of the Hitler Youth
Equivalent organizations in other countries
- In Spain, the Franco National Movement organized youth sections called Arrows and Pelayos, later called Youth Front.
- Fascist Italy had since the 1920s its infantile and youth movements (which were copied in Nazi Germany): the Opera Nazionale Balilla and Fasci Giovanili di Combattimento.
- In Japan, the Great Japan Youth Party existed in the 1940s.
- La Ethniki Neolaias (EON) during the fascist stage in Greece.
- The Croatian Eagles in Croatia during the Second World War.
- La Mocidade Portuguesa in Portugal.
- In Russia, the Yunarmiya