阿道夫·希特勒

阿道夫·希特勒 (Adolf Hitler) 1889年出生于奥匈帝国因河畔布劳瑙 (Braunau am Inn)，父亲阿洛伊斯·希特勒 (Alois Hitler) 是一名海关官员，父亲克拉拉·珀尔兹尔 (Klara Pölzl)。一家人在上奥地利州多次搬家。他的父亲于1903年去世，母亲于1907年去世。希特勒读过中学，但没有毕业。他曾两次尝试在维也纳申请成为一名艺术家，但都遭到拒绝。

1908年至1913年，希特勒在维也纳生活贫困，遭遇反犹太主义和民族主义政治。这些年对他后来的世界观的确切影响存在争议。后来的自传说法并不总是可靠的。 1913年，他移居慕尼黑，从1914年起，第一次世界大战期间在德国军队服役，期间负伤并获得勋章。

Biographies describe Alois as an authoritarian father who physically abused his children and clashed with Adolf over schooling and career choices. Violence at home, family bereavements and especially his mother's death were distressing childhood experiences. The evidence partly consists of later recollections and requires critical comparison; a retrospective psychiatric diagnosis is not justified. Abuse also provides neither a sufficient explanation nor an excuse for Hitler's later antisemitism, political decisions and responsibility for mass murder.

1918年德国战败后，希特勒继续留在军队，并被指派观察政治团体。 1919年，他加入德国工人党（后来成为德国国家社会主义工人党），并作为演说家而受到关注。 1923年啤酒馆政变失败后，他被定罪入狱。在《我的奋斗》中，他提出了反犹太主义、种族主义和扩张主义思想。他获释后，该党在恐吓和宣传的同时寻求参与选举。

经济危机、政治不稳定和保守派精英的支持帮助纳粹党成长。 1933年1月，希特勒就任总理，利用紧急权力和立法镇压反对派，建立独裁政权。该政权解散工会、限制公民权利、迫害犹太人和其他团体，并重新武装德国。 1938年，它吞并了奥地利并占领了苏台德地区； 1939年9月，德国入侵波兰。

希特勒在战争期间做出了有关军事战略和迫害的核心决策。 1941年入侵苏联与殖民征服战争和大规模屠杀有关。他的政权组织了大屠杀，杀害了六百万犹太人，还迫害和杀害了罗姆人、残疾人、波兰和苏联平民、政治对手、同性恋者和其他群体。 1945年4月，希特勒在柏林自杀身亡。

On 23 August 1939 Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union concluded the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, signed by their foreign ministers. The public non-aggression treaty was accompanied by a secret protocol on spheres of influence in eastern Europe. It facilitated the German and Soviet invasions of Poland in September 1939 and subsequent occupation and repression. Germany broke the pact by invading the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941. It was a diplomatic agreement between ideological enemies, not a rejection of territorial expansion.

The Reich government enacted the Animal Protection Law on 24 November 1933, prohibiting cruelty to animals and restricting animal experiments, subject to exceptions and implementing rules. Nazi-era anti-tobacco campaigns included smoking restrictions in certain government buildings, transport and institutions; there was no universal national smoking ban. Historian Robert Proctor places tobacco policy in the context of racial and bodily 'purity', propaganda and medical research. These measures do not alter the regime's responsibility for persecution and genocide.

希特勒的政治崛起发生在德国第一次世界大战战败和魏玛共和国建立之后。和平解决、通货膨胀、街头政治暴力和大萧条削弱了人们对议会政党的信心。在整个欧洲，威权主义和法西斯运动通过民族主义、反共主义和群众宣传的结合而获得支持。

种族主义伪科学和反犹太主义早于纳粹主义，但纳粹将它们制定为国家政策并将其与领土扩张联系起来。广播、电影和群众集会被用来组织支持和压制批评。第二次世界大战带来了空前规模的占领、强迫劳动、驱逐和破坏；地方机构和合作者在被占领土发挥着不同的作用。

Jesse Owens won four gold medals at the Berlin Olympic Games of 1–16 August 1936: in the 100 metres, the 200 metres, the long jump and with the US 4 × 100 metres relay team. Newspaper reports from 1936 describe the Olympic Stadium crowd cheering him loudly and acknowledging his athletic performances with ovations. The German regime used the Games for international propaganda; the Nuremberg racial laws remained in force while, among other measures, anti-Jewish signs were temporarily removed from public view.

On returning to the United States, Owens received public celebrations, including a parade in New York. At the same time, as a Black American he continued to encounter racial separation and segregation. President Franklin D. Roosevelt did not invite him to a White House reception or personally congratulate him on his Olympic achievements. According to the biographical sources consulted, Owens also received no official congratulatory telegram from the president. The National Archives documents that the other Black American medal winners of 1936 likewise received no White House invitation.

For a celebration at New York's Waldorf-Astoria hotel, Owens had to use the freight elevator to reach the gathering because of the racial access restrictions of the period. The International Olympic Committee describes this specific incident in its account of Owens' life after the Games. This treatment at home occurred alongside public celebrations and the ovations he had previously received in Berlin. In 1976 Owens received the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the White House from President Gerald Ford.

1939年，纳粹政权入侵波兰，在欧洲引发了第二次世界大战。这场战争导致数千万人因战斗、占领、轰炸、饥饿和疾病而丧生。大屠杀是对欧洲犹太人的系统性种族灭绝；该政权还杀害了数百万其他受害者，或通过强迫劳动、驱逐出境、医疗谋杀计划和大规模处决来迫害他们。

在德国境内，该政权摧毁了政治反对派和独立工会，而警察、宫廷和特勤部门则实施迫害。犹太公民的权利逐渐被剥夺、被剥夺、被驱逐和被谋杀。罗姆人、残疾人、政治反对派和其他目标群体也受到影响。后果包括社区遭到破坏、流离失所和持久的创伤，以及欧洲边界和国际机构的持久变化。

Victim numbers are reconstructed from German records, testimony and demographic evidence. Approximately six million murdered Jews is the broadly established historical estimate for the Holocaust, not an exact individual register or an arbitrarily disputed figure. For other victim groups and total war deaths, definitions, source coverage and estimates differ. Such uncertainties should be identified for each group without relativising the documented genocide or silently adding together different categories.

1945年4月30日，当苏联军队占领柏林时，希特勒在柏林元首地堡自杀身亡。爱娃·布劳恩在嫁给他不久后也自杀身亡。据目击者称，他们的尸体在掩体外被焚烧；不久之后，柏林被占领，德国投降。尽管后来有阴谋论，但根据文件和证词重建了当时的情况。

1945年后，纳粹领导人在纽伦堡受到审判，大屠杀通过证词、档案和物证被广泛记录。历史学家分析了希特勒的个人权力以及政党、国家、军队、商业和占领当局的合作。他的名字在国际上与种族灭绝和独裁统治联系在一起，但学术界也强调需要解释执行他的政策的机构和社会参与。

After liberation, parts of some former camp sites were reused for detention. According to the Majdanek museum, the NKVD held Polish resistance members in two barracks of field III in August 1944; on 23 August the remaining prisoners were deported to the Soviet Union. According to the Auschwitz museum, Soviet authorities established transit camps at Auschwitz and Birkenau by April–May 1945 for German POWs and, among others, Polish civilians, with Polish security services involved. These were separate post-war detention practices, not a reopening of the Nazi extermination programme. Dates, camp sections, authorities and prisoner groups must therefore be distinguished precisely.