NaziTyskland

Nazityskland, commonly used to refer to the period of Nazi rule in Germany, designates the German state under the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) from 1933 to 1945. After Adolf Hitler became chancellor in January 1933, the regime dismantled the Weimar Republic's democratic institutions, consolidated power through the Enabling Act, and established a totalitarian state led by the Führerprinzip.

The regime pursued aggressive nationalist and racist policies, central to which were antisemitism and the attempt to create a racially defined community. The Nuremberg Laws of 1935 stripped Jews of civil rights; other groups also faced persecution. The state exercised control through propaganda, the police, and a party apparatus, while the economy was mobilized for rearmament and war.

In foreign policy, the regime pursued territorial expansion, annexing Austria and Czechoslovakia's border regions and invading Poland in 1939, triggering World War II. Early military successes gave way to military overreach and the Allied counteroffensive from 1942 onward, with invasion and occupation across Europe.

The regime orchestrated the genocide known as the Holocaust, in which six million Jews and millions of others, including Romani people, disabled individuals, Poles, Soviet prisoners of war, and political opponents, were killed or deported to extermination and forced labor camps; the Wannsee Conference of 1942 laid plans for coordination of these policies.

Germany surrendered in 1945, ending Nazityskland. The aftermath included occupation by Allied powers, denazification, and the Nuremberg Trials, which prosecuted Nazi leadership for war crimes and crimes against humanity. The period remains a central subject of historical study and collective memory.