Nazism

Communism and fascism or nazism, although poles apart in their intellectual content, are similar in this, that both have emotional appeal to the type of personality that takes pleasure in being submerged in a mass movement and submitting to superior authority. ~ James A.C. Brown

National Socialism, commonly referred to as Nazism, was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party through which Adolf Hitler rose to power in the era of Nazi Germany. It is a specific form of fascism which expressly promotes racism and antisemitism as policies.

Quotes

The power of the Executive to cast a man into prison without formulating any charge known to the law, and particularly to deny him the judgment of his peers, is in the highest degree odious and is the foundation of all totalitarian government whether Nazi or Communist. ~ Winston Churchill

Fascism, at any rate the German version, is a form of capitalism that borrows from Socialism just such features as will make it efficient for war purposes. ~ George Orwell

At its very inception this movement depended on the deception and betrayal of one's fellow man; even at that time it was inwardly corrupt and could support itself only by constant lies. ~ White Rose

• Communism and fascism or nazism, although poles apart in their intellectual content, are similar in this, that both have emotional appeal to the type of personality that takes pleasure in being submerged in a mass movement and submitting to superior authority.
  • James A.C. Brown, in Techniques of Persuasión : From Propaganda to Brainwashing (1963), p. 105

• The power of the Executive to cast a man into prison without formulating any charge known to the law, and particularly to deny him the judgment of his peers, is in the highest degree odious and is the foundation of all totalitarian government whether Nazi or Communist.
  • Winston Churchill, as quoted in In The Highest Degree Odious : Detention Without Trial in Wartime Britain (1992), by A. W. B. Simpson

• Fascism, Nazism and Stalinism have in common that they offered the atomized individual a new refuge and security. These systems are the culmination of alienation.
  • Erich Fromm, in The Sane Society (1955), p. 237

• Thirty centuries of history allow us to look with supreme pity on certain doctrines which are preached beyond the Alps by the descendants of those who were illiterate when Rome had Caesar, Virgil and Augustus.
  • Benito Mussolini's early opinion of Nazism, as quoted in Hitler's Ten-year War on the Jews (1946), by Institute of Jewish Affairs.

• Fascism, at any rate the German version, is a form of capitalism that borrows from Socialism just such features as will make it efficient for war purposes. Internally, Germany has a good deal in common with a Socialist state. Ownership has never been abolished, there are still capitalists and workers, and—this is the important point, and the real reason why rich men all over the world tend to sympathise with Fascism—generally speaking the same people are capitalists and the same people workers as before the Nazi revolution. But at the same time the State, which is simply the Nazi Party, is in control of everything. It controls investment, raw materials, rates of interest, working hours, wages. The factory owner still owns his factory, but he is for practical purposes reduced to the status of a manager. Everyone is in effect a State employee, though the salaries vary very greatly. The mere efficiency of such a system, the elimination of waste and obstruction, is obvious. In seven years it has built up the most powerful war machine the world has ever seen.
  • George Orwell, The Lion and the Unicorn (1941).

• If demands coming under the first of these principles were interpreted objectively, something very much resembling Marxian communism would result. Here are some of them: abolition of all income not earned by work; workers to share the profits of the large industries; abolition of land rent, and enactment of a law under which land might be confiscated without compensation for purposes of common interests; socialization of all incorporated business organizations.
  • On the NSDAP's programme.
  • Kate Pinsdorf, 'Nature and Aims of the National Socialist German Labor Party', The American Political Science Review > Vol. 25, No. 2 (May, 1931), pp. 377-388.

• From the point of view of fundamental human liberties there is little to choose between communism, socialism, and national socialism. They all are examples of the collectivist or totalitarian state ... in its essentials not only is completed socialism the same as communism but it hardly differs from fascism.
  • Ivor Thomas, in The Socialist Tragedy (1951), p. 241

• Marxism has led to Fascism and National-Socialism, because, in all essentials, it is Fascism and National Socialism.
  • Frederick Augustus Voigt, Unto Cæsar (1939), p. 95.

• It is impossible to engage in intellectual discourse with National Socialist Philosophy, for if there were such an entity, one would have to try by means of analysis and discussion either to prove its validity or to combat it. In actuality, however, we face a totally different situation. At its very inception this movement depended on the deception and betrayal of one's fellow man; even at that time it was inwardly corrupt and could support itself only by constant lies.
  • The White Rose, Second leaflet

• Though we know that National Socialist power must be broken by military means, we are trying to achieve a renewal from within of the severely wounded German spirit. This rebirth must be preceded, however, by the clear recognition of all the guilt with which the German people have burdened themselves, and by an uncompromising battle against Hitler and his all too many minions…
  • The White Rose, Fourth Leaflet

See also

• Fascism