| You do not know much history, do you? One of Hitler's selling points was the onerousness and humiliation of the terms of the Versailles Treaty, which included not only heavy reparations bills, but stringent demilitarization provisions, barely permitting Germany to maintain a force sufficient for self- defense. Indeed, even before Hitler came to power, the Weimar Rapublic had taken steps to elude key provisions of the treaty. For example, it located manufacturing plants for armaments in other countries. Additionally, Germany was on the verge of collapse by the time Hitler came to power. It was experiencing hyper- inflation, much of its heavy industry was obliged to pay for the reparations that had been imposed, unemployment was much worse than in most countries affected by the Depression, and there was a plausible fear of descent into anarchy, with Communists and Nazis fighting pitched battles in the streets. True, after Hitler came to power, the situation began to stabilize somewhat, but Germany was still a severely weakened country in the mid- '30's......... |
