In the effort of advocating for non-intervention, one is naturally confronted with many questions and concerns regarding how this philosophy would work throughout history. For Americans, that typically looks like objections to the idea of non-involvement in a number of notable world conflicts, most commonly that of World War II. It doesn’t take long in these conversations to hear a familiar refrain, something to the tune of, “if we hadn’t participated in World War II, then Hitler’s Germany would have emerged victorious, continued its expansion into all of Europe, and eventually the world. Some even go so far as to cheekily assert that we would be having this conversation in German if it wasn’t for those willing to stand up to the Nazi threat.
But in the spirit of questioning all things, especially those which are often portrayed as unquestionable, how true is this idea? How plausible is it that Hitler sought world domination, that he had visions of subjecting the entire human race to the Aryan Spirit? And even if so, was his intention a legitimate threat or simply the ramblings of a madman? That’s what I hope
What Exactly Was Hitler’s Motivation to Begin With?
Anyone with familiarity concerning the players and general events of World War II is sure to have retained some general knowledge of who Adolf Hitler was and what Nazi Germany under his leadership accomplished. Above all, most adults are well aware of the oft-quoted figure of six million Jews
But there was, not surprisingly, more to Hitler’s motivations than a simple obsession with racial superiority. Much as Marx viewed all of human history via the lens of the struggle between classes, Hitler, too, had a comprehensive worldview he used as a guiding ideology for his political ends and the war itself. Hitler viewed all of human history as the struggle between nations for “living space.” His worldview became thoroughly militaristic in the sense that, viewing history in such a way as nations struggling for territory, that politics and the social life of the nation were naturally involved and essential to that end; domestic policy concerned preparation of the people for war, foreign policy concerning itself with relations between those nations, including war.
Then Why the Jews?
Where do the Jewish people fit into this historical theory? In Hitler’s philosophy, the Jewish people existed in a sort of fatal dichotomy. On the one hand, the Jewish people were not a nation and their lack of coalescence and existence as a nation already doomed them to the bottom of Hitler’s ranking of ethnic worthiness. At the same time, Hitler viewed the Jewish people as part of “an international conspiracy to dominate Gentiles” and undermine any unique cultural purity that made each nation strong. Hitler objectified the aggressive “Aryan spirit” among the German peoples because of its value in maintaining German independence and superiority. Sarah Gordon does a great job in capturing the schizophrenic worldview that encapsulated Hitler’s political strategy:
“All history consists of national struggles for living space and world domination. Since Jews are a nation they participate in these national struggles, not for living space, but for world domination (racial supremacy through dominance, subjection, and extermination). Their methods threaten the political, military, economic, cultural, and most importantly,
racial strength of other nations among whom they are dispersed. Therefore, all nations should give utmost priority to their defeat in order to prevent Jewish world domination.”
As an aside, it is both tragic and ironic to compare Hitler’s perception of the Jewish question and the Zionist’s own perception of the “Jewish Problem.” For decades, Zionists saw the Jewish race as being perpetually doomed to marginalization and unable to obtain any sort of tangible or lasting honor and prestige. While the two ideologies in one sense only stoked the fires of conflict, Zionism, especially political and military Zionism which sought a formal state around which the Jewish people could coalesce, actually concerned itself with achieving the very sort of national position that Hitler criticized them for lacking. One cannot help but wonder if Hitler would be rather impressed with the Zionist’s success in winning and defending for themselves national territory.
How Did Hitler’s View Extend to Other Nations?
While much of Hitler’s obsession did center on the Jewish people themselves, we also know that he viewed other peoples and nations with varying degrees of disdain. For instance, we know that the first gassings conducted by the Nazis were actually not of Jews at all but were conducted on Russian prisoners of war on September 3, 1941. In Hitler’s terms, “whoever wants to live must therefore fight, and whoever does not wish to do battle in this world of eternal struggle does not deserve life.” According to Hitler’s view of history, nations have long conflicted for living space and domination. But with that worldview came a sense of ranking between nations in terms of their relative worth as contrasted against this worldview. Early on, as early as 1928, Hitler was focused on the eastern European nations as his desirable living space and he particularly despised the Poles, whom he viewed as “subhuman”, having been conquered multiple times in history. In the years between 1939 and 1941, the brunt of Hitler’s euthanasia and racial extermination was not against Jews primarily but against the Poles, Slavs, and Russians.
While Hitler was able to view these national peoples through a lens that did not directly involve the “Jewish Conspiracy,” there was another facet to his ranking and opinion of foreign nations. For he also viewed poorly institutions which he believed were borne or sustained by Jewish influence, a sort of “spiritual Judaism.” For Hitler, this conspiracy extended to just about all other political and intellectual traditions, that of Judeo-Christianity, democracy, socialism, liberalism, individualism, Bolshevism, and humanism; virtually any and all institutions of western civilization which he viewed as “Jewish Inventions.” This certainly further drove his animosity against the Russians, with Communism/Bolshevism being a central object of hate for the Nazi political party. And since Eastern Europe was both populated by weak peoples and housed a vast number of the world’s Jews at the time, it makes perfect sense why this would serve as the focus and thrust of his war ambitions.
So, WOULD Hitler Have Seriously Embarked Upon World Domination?
It is against the backdrop of Hitler’s racial theory and the outworking of it that we can then seriously consider the proposition and potential that Hitler honestly desired or was capable of the sort of world domination used as justification for intervention.
Given that Hitler had a ranking in mind given the current world powers that demanded his attention in the early third of the 20th century, we should be interested in his thoughts on their relative worth. The Austrians, those once united with Germany, he viewed proudly as they had historically defended themselves against external domination for a long time. He viewed Japan rather favorably, declaring “now we have a partner who has not been defeated in three thousand years.” Britain possessed a sort of mixed place in Hitler’s view. On the one hand, he viewed their racial purity as lacking in modern times compared with its past. However, he held this opinion in sharp contrast to his desire, that “our two people belong together, racially and traditionally–this is and always has been my aim…The blood of every single Englishman is too valuable to be shed…I do not intend to conquer her…”, preferring instead to
France, having quite the sordid history of defeats throughout the 19th century and World War I was viewed quite negatively and Germany’s actions in the war accorded with that view with one half of the country being occupied. Hitler’s attitude toward the United States was similar; while Germany did not seek an alliance with the US, they would seek a policy of racial purity, seeking to remove Jewish influence.
Hitler’s Utopian War Aims
Overall, Hitler’s war aims from his own writing were primarily focused on the conquest of Europe, removing security threats, the reorganization of Europe according to his own racial rankings of worthiness, and the establishment of a powerful central German power block that would guarantee Germany’s future for a thousand years. There are glimpses of lofty goals and opinions given concerning Hitler’s wishes to further his reach and extend his racial policy to the rest of the globe. So while there may be evidence that Hitler had some sort of goals and plans for world domination, there is equal evidence and argument to show that such plans were more utopian than achievable. As Sarah Gordon distills, after considering how unlikely an invasion of the west would have been, “his vision of conquering the world assumed success in the face of far more formidable obstacles and uncertainties; it was utopian because it was founded on imaginary perfections.”
So, do the facts surrounding the timeline and events of World War II shed light on the matter? They can certainly provide us with some perspective. Pursuant to Hitler’s opinions on France and Britain, it is interesting to note that only after Hitler invaded Poland had Britain and France declared war on Germany, not the other way around. Moreover, per the agreement between Hitler and Stalin regarding Poland, Stalin invaded Poland at roughly the same time yet Britain and, indeed, the US found themselves allied with Stalin, eventually to hand him Poland outright. Hitler was very reluctant to the idea of invading England and even after the war began with Britain, British intelligence had learned that Germany had abandoned plans for an amphibious invasion. And despite some willingness by Germany to pursue a negotiated peace with Britain early in the war, it was Churchill that refused such a peace, not Hitler.
For the US, Jacob Hornberger tells us that “no documentary evidence has ever been found of a German plan to invade the Western Hemisphere.” Hitler’s forces were unable to even cross the English channel in
The Bottom Line
Many egomaniacs desire world domination in the abstract. Though I found it difficult to find clear, first-hand evidence of any lack of desire for world domination for Hitler, it is not difficult to find conflicting evidence. And it is certainly not difficult to show that the means which were used to disrupt Hitler’s vision, regardless of scope, have led to just as much if not more global chaos than Hitler himself could have sown.
During the Cold War, Communism was also said to have desired world domination. And yet we proudly allied with the Soviet Union and Stalin, an (at least!) equally murderous tyrant with similar goals as Hitler himself. This logic amounts to: “We had to ally with an ideology that desired world domination to stop another ideology that desired world domination so that we can then fight them to stop their plans of world domination.” However clear one may perceive the evidence against the possibility of German world conquest, I hope that this information has at least shown that blanket claims of such at least lack any nuance and background of Hitler’s actual thoughts and actions.
It fleshes out Hitlers motivation for his bizarre murderous behavior