On 30th January, 1933, Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany by President Hindenburg, but why did he get this prestigious honour - why did Hitler become Chancellor? There are four main reasons as to why this happened, and they are as follows: the Weimar government's weaknesses; his own leadership skills and the Nazis tactics; the Great Depression; and political manoeuvring between von Schleicher and von Papen. It is to be shown, however, that it really down to the involvement of von Schleicher and von Papen that Hitler became the Chancellor of Germany, when he did.
Firstly, Hitler was only able to come to power due to the failure of the previous government, the Weimar Republic. From the start, the Republic had weaknesses, such as its unstable economic situation and its bad image, mainly down to the Versailles Treaty. Hitler was able to use these weaknesses to his advantage by telling the people of Germany that he knew how to solve the economic unrest, and banish the Versailles Treaty, and that only he could do it.
According to Bullock, Hitler was an opportunistic ...
English: German Reichs-Chancellor Franz von Papen ...
Hitler with von Papen: May 1, 1933The weakness of the Weimar also encouraged the public to vote for extremists parties, like the Nazis, in the hope that they would be the lesser of evils.
Next, Hitler was able to use his leadership skills, and the Nazi Party's tactics to win over the voters. He had a natural gift for propaganda and an extremely aggressive speech style to whip the crowd into a Nazi fuelled frenzy. He also believed that it was his destiny to become the German Fuhrer, which he called the Inevitable Truth, and was based on a social adaptation of Darwin's Evolution Theory. While this may seem like a ridiculous claim, he did in fact become the Fuhrer, so it is not as far-fetched as it sounds.