If Adolf Hitler was killed in the Munich beer hall putsch would the Weimar republic have survived or would radicals still take over?
Hitler killed in putsch, Weimar republic lives?
- Thread starter Bullmoose713
- Start date
without some really meaningful changes it was doomed. It was simply too easy for some despot to take power, even in the best of times the President could rule by decree. combine that with the insane partisanship you had a recipe for failure. The Constitution needs to be rewritten and you need a President the Army will listen too and who has the moral authority to do these things (Hindenburg could have been this but he was the wrong man for the job). This all has to be done by 1929 as well.
My bet is that Germany becomes a conservative-nationalist military dictatorship by the early 1930s. With his rule by decree Hindenburg was turning Germany into an authoritarian regime. That wouldn't change even if Hitler wasn't around.
Deleted member 1487
If the right is not as strong or united, he may well fail. There is no guarantee that the right would be able to form an authoritarian regime in 1932 if there needed to be more elections in 1933 that sees the left rise more. Hitler was able to be respectable enough thanks to his association with Goering and relationship with industrialists to get a lot of powerful endorsements and money to top out far right electoral success IOTL that I don't think any other right wing politician was capable of.
Most likely , yes. However, the good news is that it is very unlikely that they would be as murderous or psychotic as the Nazis.... not that is saying much!
Ian_W
Banned
It's saying a great deal.
You're unlikely to see the Anschluss, or the Sudetenland crisis.
Rhineland in '36 is probable at some point though.
Withut Hitler's there might have been a Communist takeover instead. Or perhaps there would have been a different Nazi leader
I can see the attempt of a Communist takeover. I.e. the elections and stuff happen as they did OTL. Nazis are much lesser presence or non-existent. DNVP and the Communists get close to an equal number of votes and Hindenburg appoints Hugenburg chancellor. General strike follows and the Communist paramilitary formations attempt to take over Berlin. Reichswehr intervenes supported by the Freikorps and other anti-communist paramilitaries. Emergency decree suspends the constitution and perhaps a military junta or a government under strong influence of the military forms.
Without Hitler, there is no Nazi Party but there would have been a party - or more likely parties - of the radical right on the one hand and the Communists on the far left on the other. Weimar simply didn't have enough support to survive so wouldn't have. It was pretty dead after 1930 anyway.
The question as to what would have replaced it is far more open but it's likely that given that instability elections would have been suspended one way or another, either by a communist takeover or (more likely) by a reactionary coup suspending them indefinitely while the communist threat remained strong and then their not being reintroduced as the 'emergency government' loses popularity.
While there were obviously differences, the parallel with Spain is perhaps not a bad one. Would there have been a civil war? That depends on the willingness of the communists to fight (they probably wouldn't have given that they didn't IOTL when they faced a greater threat). More likely they would just end up suppressed.
The question as to what would have replaced it is far more open but it's likely that given that instability elections would have been suspended one way or another, either by a communist takeover or (more likely) by a reactionary coup suspending them indefinitely while the communist threat remained strong and then their not being reintroduced as the 'emergency government' loses popularity.
While there were obviously differences, the parallel with Spain is perhaps not a bad one. Would there have been a civil war? That depends on the willingness of the communists to fight (they probably wouldn't have given that they didn't IOTL when they faced a greater threat). More likely they would just end up suppressed.
It might be an American expression but what I meant by it is that it is really easy not to be as murderous or psychotic as the Nazis!
The German Army and the right-wing paramilitaries like Stahlhelm would never allow a Communist takeover.
Deleted member 1487
The vast majority of Germans were not interested in it either. They might top out at about 20% of the vote, but that was the outer limit of support for them.
That is if the rank and file of the Reichswehr don't mutiny in favour of the Communists. With the right leader the Communists could engineer a revolutionary situation in the early 1930s. The fact is that the left in Germany was deeply divided and likely would have remained so unless a Hitler like fiigure emerged to unite them and that never happened.
http://isj.org.uk/divided-they-fell-the-german-left-and-the-rise-of-hitler/
It may be that the Nazis or another far right party would have found another leader
If not the Weimar Republic still experiences great instability but manages to stagger on therough the Depression, most likely under Hindenburg
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Germany might remain on paper a republic with the 1919 constitution, but as a liberal democratic regime, the Weimar Republic was doomed by the Great Depression. The best outcome might be a conservative/nationalist regime that was (honestly) only interested modifying Versailles restrictions on German rearmament and only seeking fairly limited border revisions in line with Wilson's 14 points. Things such as an Anschluss with Austria and some revision to the Prussian border with Poland. I believe this would have been doable with a reasonable diplomatic approach given French and (especially) British willingness to give in to Hitler.
The worst outcome would be a radical Nazi-like movement just about as bad as Hitler or a radical communist revolution. Both would have probably led to a second war one way or the other.
The worst outcome would be a radical Nazi-like movement just about as bad as Hitler or a radical communist revolution. Both would have probably led to a second war one way or the other.
An extreme far-right takeover doesnt seem all that likely to me.
For one a proper unification of the right would be difficult without Hitler (that is if the NSDAP or something like it would have taken off at all).
Additionaly 32 nearly spelled the end for the Party and it was only Hitlers preservence that held the whole thing together (the NSDAP was basicly bankrupt at that time and nearly folded to Papen and Schleicher) and lets not forget that the Novembervote went quite poorly for them, compared to the previous one.
Lastly the actions of the democratic parties of 31-32 started to bear fruits and there were signes of recovery 33-34.
For one a proper unification of the right would be difficult without Hitler (that is if the NSDAP or something like it would have taken off at all).
Additionaly 32 nearly spelled the end for the Party and it was only Hitlers preservence that held the whole thing together (the NSDAP was basicly bankrupt at that time and nearly folded to Papen and Schleicher) and lets not forget that the Novembervote went quite poorly for them, compared to the previous one.
Lastly the actions of the democratic parties of 31-32 started to bear fruits and there were signes of recovery 33-34.
shiftygiant
Gone Fishin'
Hitler's space can always end up filled by another party ideologist, like Hess, Rohm, Fredrick Weber, although the Nazi's simply becoming a non-entity after this point isn't too out of reach. A Communist take over is extremely unlikely at this point, although the emergence of a Reichswehr led Junta isn't out the question.