Putting it as simply as possible:

• The Nazis thought that the German Jews were 'alien', 'un-German' and a 'corrupting influence' on Germany and that they were encouraging immorality.
• The Nazis believed that the Jews were Communists (and that Communism was a specifically Jewish ideology).
• There were strange conspiracy theories that claimed that the Jews were trying to achieve 'world domination'.
• The Nazis said that the Jews were enemies of Germany, and that Jews and Germans were locked in a struggle to the death. (This was another of those conspiracy theories that many Nazis took seriously).
• The Nazis believed that the Jews had made Germany lose World War 1.
• The Nazis subscribed to racialist theories that claimed that the Jews were inferior to others.
• However, Nazi propaganda also portrayed them as very clever indeed, very dangerous and close to achieving world domination: the two don't even begin to fit.
• With the start of World War 2 in September 1939 Hitler became obsessed with the idea that 'the Jews' had started the war.
• Earlier, 'religious' hostility to Judaism had often demonized the Jews and painted them as sinister and evil.
• Because some Jews were affluent and influential, they represented political positions in opposition to Hitler, and were targeted like others he saw as rivals.

All this was much more important than stories about what a Jew might or might not have done to Hitler in his childhood. There is no firm evidence that Hitler was anti-Jewish before about 1916. Beware of naive explanations.

For fuller answers click on the related questions below.

Depends on the gun.

Some guns have the year stamped on them.

Some guns may be identified by the serial number.

Some guns can be dated by particular features they have.

Some guns cannot be dated any more accurately than the nearest decade.

• The Jews had previously been subject to all kinds of earlier "religious" prejudices. From the 1870s onwards a new, racial antisemitism was added to this.
• There was widespread demonization of the Jews.
• According to the first part of Ian Kershaw's biography Hitler, 1889-1939 Hubris, Penguin Books 1998 Hitler was a "lazy leader" who did not like to bother himself much with formulating day-to-day policy ... As a result, his subordinates at various levels tried to guess what he wanted. This encouraged rapidly growing extremism. The terror apparatus, headed by Himmler and Heydrich, became a very powerful lobby.
• There were all kinds of fanciful conspiracy theories about the Jews as the 'biological root' of Communism. The Nazis kept on saying, without any evidence, that 'the Jews' were enemies of Germany and so on. In fact, most German Jews were very pro-German indeed and had fought well for Germany in World War 1. Many were tragically in love with Germany, and some were reluctant to leave the country even if they were able to do so. However, fear of Communism was a powerful force in many parts of Central and Southern Europe in the interwar period, and was ruthlessly exploited by many politicians.
• The Holocaust happened because Hitler wanted to purify Germany so to speak...He wanted the Aryan Race, of which couldn't be obtained unless all Jews were gone (along with homosexuals, Gypsies, Russians...etc.) Extermination camps were a ploy for Jews...Hitler actually told them that he was just getting them out of the country and "resettling" them in Eastern Europe but ended up killing them there...
• One motive may have been robbery - it has been estimated that the Holocaust (including confiscated property and slave labour) profited the Nazis by a sum that would today be in the tens of billions of dollars. {However, according to Raul Hilberg, the value of Jewish slave labour for the Nazis was even greater].
• Nazi conquests, especially in Eastern and Eastern Central Europe (Poland and the Soviet Union) resulted in large additional numbers of Jews coming under Nazi control, thus exacerbating the Nazis' self-imposed "Jewish problem".
• In addition, there were also Nazi plans to reduce the population of occupied Eastern Europe. This kind of thinking was propped up by various race theories.

Further input:

Many Germans blamed the Jews for Germany's defeat in World War I, some even claiming that German Jews had betrayed the nation during the war. In addition, at the end of the war a Communist group attempted to carry out a Bolshevik-type revolution in the German state of Bavaria. Most of the leaders of that failed attempt were Jews. As a result, some Germans associated Jews with Bolsheviks and regarded both groups as dangerous enemies of Germany. After the war, a republic, later known as the Weimar Republic, was set up in Germany. Jewish politicians and intellectuals played an important role in German life during the Weimar Republic, and many non-Jews resented their influence.

On the basis of his antisemitic views, Nazi leader Adolf Hitler attacked the impressive role Jews played in German society during the Weimar Republic, especially in the intellectual world and in left-wing politics. He referred to them as a plague and a cancer. In his book Mein Kampf (My Struggle, translated 1939), which was published in 1926, Hitler blamed the plight of Germany at the end of World War I on an international Jewish conspiracy and used terms such as extirpation and extermination in relation to the Jews. He claimed that the Jews had achieved economic dominance and the ability to control and manipulate the mass media to their own advantage. He wrote of the need to eradicate their powerful economic position, if necessary by means of their physical removal.

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Some historians, such as Christopher Browning, see the Holocaust as part of a wider campaign to destroy what the Nazis saw as 'Judeo-Bolshevism'.

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Note also Yehuda Bauer's stark formulation:

The basic motivation [of the Holocaust] was purely ideological, rooted in an illusionary world of Nazi imagination, where an international Jewish conspiracy to control the world was opposed to a parallel Aryan quest. No genocide to date had been based so completely on myths, on hallucinations, on abstract, nonpragmatic ideology - which was then executed by very rational, pragmatic means.

How seriously individual Nazis took these illusions and conspiracy theories is another matter. This notion of the Jews as dangerous, cunning conspirators doesn't fit the Nazi view of them as inferior.

The main cause of the Jewish Holocaust was AdolfHitler's hatred of all Jews also

Please see the related questions.

The most simple answer: Adolf Hitler and the Nazis. Hitler was the driving force behind the obsessive and fanatical Nazi persecution and ultimately also the mass slaughter of the Jews and various other groups, though the details of implementation were left to the terror apparatus, headed by Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich. Here are more opinions and input:

• Nazi propaganda operated with conspiracy theories, especially the 'stab-in-the-back legend' and bizarre claims about an imaginary 'Judeo-Bolshevist' conspiracy against Germany, Austria and ethnic Germans. These ideas became popular among hardline nationalists in Germany, Austria and in some other countries. These fanciful, but dangerous notions were also fuelled by some refugees from the Russian Revolution and civil war of 1918-21. The "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" (first forged around 1900 by the Tsarist secret police and purporting to provide details of a Jewish conspiracy to dominate the world) was particularly important in this respect.
• The Holocaust unfolded as Adolf Hitler's personal vision of the cleansing of Europe of 'undesirables'.
• In World War 2 the Nazis greatly exacerbated (increased, intensified) their self-inflicted 'Jewish problem'. As a result of the Nazi invasion of other countries and especially Poland, the number of Jews under Nazi control greatly increased. At first, they herded the Jews in Poland and some other areas into ghettos, with a view to moving them all out of Europe at a future date. When it became clear that they were not going to win the war quickly, the Nazi leadership moved from a 'territorial solution' to the 'Final Solution' - that is, the Holocaust.
• In much of Europe (and America) the Jews had already been demonized for their religion, but this in itself does not explain the Holocaust.

  The Holocaust was part of a wider Nazi campaign to rid the world of what they often referred to as 'Jewish Bolshevism'. It did not start with 'a big bang' in response to any particular incident but developed rapidly in the second half of 1941 during the early stages of the German invasion of the Soviet Union.

  Please see the related question.

• Appeasement allowed the British and French to ignore an imminent threat and produced a fake peace which led to many deaths.
• Appeasement bought Britain the precious time it needed to prepare for an inevitable war.

• Appeasement led Hitler to believe that no one would oppose his expansionist policies. In short, if Europe had abandoned its appeasement policy by 1935 WWII probably could have been averted.

• Britain, already economicaly damaged and knowing that a war was impossible to avoid, tried to buy vital time. She had stepped up production ao arms but was still unable to realistically fight another great war in a quarter of a century. What Chamberlain brought back from his talks was time and it proved the balance between winning an unprovoked war.

• England under the premiership of Chamberlain, I believe, made the correct deision to appease Germany, a weakend, abused country deeply buried in debt after its ill-treatment in a post treaty of Versailles Europe. Slowly climbing out of debt, England had not the economy, or gun power to rsk and survive an all-out war with any country. Chamberlain also upheld beliefs about peace and felt that diplomacy, not mindless slaughter, was the answer in dealing with a responsible leader, as Hitler was to his German people. (Jews and other minorities were not threatened at the time.) Hitler was not the epitomy of evil, and should not have been treated as such, at that time.

• The policy of appeasement used by Neville Chamberlain, while intended to preserve the peace, hindered the Allies and help Germany when WWII broke out. Letting Germany increase its navy, army, and air force, reoccupy the Rhineland, and give it the Czech Sudatenland all helped to strengthen the German postition in Europe. It would lead to Germany taking over most of Europe with relative ease in a matter of months.

• Appeasement refers to the foreign policy of England and France toward Germany in the years prior to WWII. They let Hitler rebuild the German army and navy, occupy the Sudetenland and Czechoslovakia. If they had put up a fight at the beginning, perhaps Hitler would not have kept pushing until the situation turned into a World War. Or maybe not.

• Originally Appeasement was a positive concept, it had started in 1919 after the Treaty of Versailles. During the 1920's Britain had control however by 1930's Hitler had seized the intiative. Appeasement was apopulare concept especially among British policy, there were several reasons as to why Neville Chamberlain favoured this policy- people in Britain during the early 1930's had voted against war and favoured collective security, this could also be down the economic problems that had arised after the Great Depression such as high unemployment which the treasury had wanted to improve rather than muntions armament. Due to the econonmic problems this led to military weakness as the country virtually had no airforce and the navy was insufficient as was the army. In light of all these problems Neville Chamberlain had seen the effects of Hitler and the Nazis however he had believed that by getting Hitler to sign compromise documents that this would successfully bind Hitler into keeping his promises. Was Chamberlain naive? Chamberlain persisted with appeasement well after it had been crushed i.e. the Czech Crisis. However in doing so he had stepped up rearmament to give him more time. So did Hitler take advantage of Chamberlain's naivity? Subject to evidence it can be almost certain to say the answer is yes, the evidence is seen clearly right from the remilitiarization of the Rhineland up to the Munich Conference. Historians say that Chamberlain appeased Hitler in order to avoid war, others say that he was propelling Europe into war by basically allowing Hitler to do as he pleased. As Hitler prepared fo invasion of Poland, Chamberlain had no choice but to issue an ultimatum to Hitler over Poland- invade Poland and risk war with Britain or step back from Poland and reintroduce peace? Hitler did not think that Britain would go through with its 'ultimatum' so invaded Poland sept 1939. Had Britain and France resisted German aggression world war II might not have broken out.

2. In 1933, when Hitler came to power, the official British policy was multilateral disarmament and talks were in progress to try to achieve this. Britain and France were caught out at the time.

3. It's not clear how well informed Baldwin and Chamberlain really were about the intentions of the Nazi regime.

4. The ultimate irony is that in many respects the policy of appeasement continued well into WWII. Britain and an even more reluctant France declared war on Germany supposedly in order to uphold Polish sovereignty - but did absolutely nothing to give any practical assistance to Poland. Viewed coldly, the declaration of war in 1939 bears the hallmarks of grandstanding, of an empty gesture. In many ways it was a barely rational act ... Among some British grandees there was talk of making peace - until the Nazis bombed civilian areas of London in September 1940.

5. Britain never had much influence in Eastern Central Europe. It was an area where Britain could only have acted by proxy.

6. There's a widespread belief that all Britain needed was to "do something", but very few are realistic about what that something should have been. A thunderous roar of condemnation (for example, in 1935 or 1936) might well have strengthened, not weakened Hitler, as Germans would have rallied round. A few minutes with a good atlas of Europe should make it clear that Britain would have had to act *through France*. In the mid and late 1930s France was bitterly divided into Left and Right and not well placed to take decisive action, as the events of 1940 made very clear.

7. Although Britain had a vast empire at the time it was rather weak in Europe.

8. As for Chamberlain being 'naive', people seem to think that politicians operate in a vacuum, which is not the case. Chamberlain had become Prime Minister in May 1937 and inherited a very difficult situation. Moreover, Britain was (and is) a democracy, and fighting a major war without broad support is very foolish.

Appeasement gave Germany and other Axis powers an opportunity to build strength before attacking the rest of Europe.

[It also gave Britain more time, too.]

Here are more opinions and answers from other FAQ Farmers:

• For a history of the POW camps in the United States during WW2, please refer to Dr. Arnold Krammer's fantastic book, NAZI PRISONERS OF WAR IN AMERICA, Davis Fiedler's book, THE ENEMY AMONG US and CAMP GRANT by Gregory S. Jacobs, Historian and author.

• I am aware of prisoner of war camps in the State of Washington in the Pacific Northwest of the United States for: Germans, Japanese and Italians. I was born in Washington State therefore I am able to confirm the information.

• I am referring to Ontario Canada. I visited a site in 1964 and have photos of a camp at mile 34 Pic River, Marathon, Ontario. In 1999 I visited the Little Martinette Lake POW camp northwest of Marathon. Is there a map showing these and other Ontario Canada camps?

• Dulag Luft Frankfurt-am-main, Germany All (Interrogation) 1 Stalag Luft I Barth, Germany Officers, 3 Stalag Luft III Sagan, Poland Officers, 3s Stalag Luft III-South, 3c Stalag Luft III-Central, 3w Stalag Luft III-West, 4 Stalag Luft IV Gross Tychow, Poland Enlisted Men, 6 Stalag Luft VI Heydekrug, Germany Enlisted Men, 7a Stalag VII-A Moosburg, Bavaria Officers & EM, 13d Stalag XIII-D Nurnberg (Nuremberg), Bavaria Officers, 17b Stalag XVII-B Krems, Austria Enlisted Men

• HOSPITALS - LAZARETT LOCATIONS L9b Lazarett IX-B Bad Soden, Germany Hospital L9C(a) Reserve-Lazarett IX-C(a) Obermassfeld, Germany Orthopedic Hospital

• SECONDARY POW CAMPS - 8th AF CREWMEN 5 Stalag V Officers & EM, 8b Stalag VIII-B Teschen, Poland Enlisted Men, 10b Stalag X-B Bremervorder, Germany Enlisted Men, 18c Stalag XVIII-C Markt Pongau, Austria Enlisted Men

• Dulag Luft Near Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany Interrogation Camp Dulag Luft was the first stop for most United States Army Air Force Personnel captured in German occupied Europe. Newly arrived POWs were usually told "Vas Du Das Krieg Est Uber" - "For You the War is Over." Hardships, suffering, deaths, illness, etc., in subsequent POW camps, proved that our POWs were very much a part of the war until their 1945 liberation. Location: There were three installations: Interrogation center at Oberursel; Hospital at Hohemark; Transit camp at Wretzlar Opened:1942 POW Strength: From 1,000 per month in late 1943, to an average monthly intake of 2,000 in 1944. The Peak month was July 1944 with over 3,000 Allied Airmen and paratroopers. Since solitary confinement was the rule, the capacity of the camp was supposedly limited to 200 men. Strength on any given day averaged 250. Camp Description: The camp had four large wooden barracks. Two of the barracks contained about 200 cells eight foot high, five foot wide wide and twelve feet long. Each cell held a cot, table, chair and an electric bell for the POW to call a guard. The third barrack contained the administrative headquarters. The fourth barrack, an L-shaped structure, held the interrogation offices, files and records. The camp was surrounded by a barbed wire fence and the perimeter was not equipped with floodlights or watchtowers. Interrogations: Each prisoner was held in solitary confinement for a limited period of time - usually four or five days. During rush periods as many as five men were held in a cell. The interrogators used various methods in an effort to obtain operational information from the captured airmen. Most POWs gave only the information required by the Geneva Convention - Name, rank and serial number. After interrogation the men were sent to a transit camp and then to their established POW camp. Liberation: On 25 April 1945 American troops overran Oberursel. The camp had already been vacated by German personnel and records destroyed or moved elsewhere. Stalag Luft I in Barth, Germany(Officers) Location: At Barth, Germany - A small town on the Baltic Sea 23 km northwest of Stralsund. Opened: Near the end of 1942 as a British Officer POW camp. Closed in April 1942 with British Officers moved to other POW camps. Reopened in October 1942 with transfer of 200 RAF NCOs from Stalag Luft III. In early 1943 a small number of American POWs fluttered into the camp from time to time. By the end of 1943 American POWs flowed into the camp at a constant rate. They were initially held in the South Compound but this was eventually combined with the West Compound. POW Strength: Held 5076 American Officers by January 1944, 3,463 in April 1944 and 7,717 and 1,427 British POWs at the time of liberation in April 1945. Camp Description: South Compound: Opened in 1942. Had very inadequate cooking, washing and toilet facilities. West Compound: Opened in 1942 - Had inside latrines and running water in the barracks. North 1 Compound: Opened in February 1944. Formerly housed Hitler Youth personnel. Had a communal mess hall, inside latrines and running water taps. North 2 Compound: Opened on 9 Sept 1944. Constructed similar to the South Compound. North 3 Compound: Opened on 9 Dee 1944. Constructed similar to the South Compound. Each barracks contained triple tiered wood beds with mattresses filed with wood chips. Each had a communal day room but equipment was sparse. North I and West Compounds contained a kitchen barrack, theater room, church room, library and study room. These were used by all compounds. Stoves for heating and cooking varied in each compound and all were inadequate. Most building were not weather proofed and were not properly ventilated. This made for difficult living conditions during the cold winter and hot summer periods. Prior to the spring of 1944 the compounds were intercommunicating with gates kept open during the day. After that the gates were closed at all times. The perimeter was enclosed with a double set of electrified barbed wire with guard towers and flood lights at strategic locations Liberation and evacuation: With Russian troops approaching German personnel left the camp on 30 April 1945. After contact was made with the Russians arrangements were made to evacuate the liberated POWs by air. This was completed by 15 May 1945,

• There was a POW camp located near Whitewater Lake in Riding Mountain National Park in Manitoba Canada. The camp consisted of temporary buildings. Housed in the camp were 560 prisoners captured in North Africa. The camp was in operation from Oct. 1943, until the end of the war in 1945. The prisoners were then all sent back to Germany. I have visited the site many times and some of the remains of the camp are still there today.

Contributed by Zlladlo:

An additional source I have found on the topic is a book titled "Stalag Wisconsin: Inside Ww II Prisoner of War Camps" SKU: 09781878569837. I did find the above answer to be very informative.

The "Axis" powers were a military and political alliance between Germany, Italy and Japan. Its goals were to achieve vast expansion through aggressive warfare. They promised to fight against Communism and never interfere with each other's foreign takeovers. They fought against the Allied powers (chiefly the US, France, Britain, and the Soviet Union) in World War 2.

Major Axis Powers: Germany, Japan, Italy.

Minor Axis Powers: Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Croatia and Slovakia (joined or left the alliance separately).

The three main Axis powers were:

• Germany: Führer (Leader) Adolf Hitler.
• Italy: Duce (Leader) Mussolini.
• Japan: Prime Minister Tojo Hideki.

The two main powers originally referred to as the Rome-Berlin Axis were Germany and Italy. They were joined by Japan in the Tripartite Pact signed on September 27, 1940 in Berlin. A number of other nations joined this alliance under various other pacts and all were thereafter generally referred to as Axis Nations. These included Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, and Croatia.

Axis Powers in World War 2

• Major Powers of the Axis: Germany, Japan and Italy (Italy later fought against the Axis).
• Minor Powers of the Axis: Hungary, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia.
• Co-Belligerents of the Axis: Thailand (Japan) and Finland (Germany).
• Japanese Puppet States: Manchuria, Inner Mongolia, Burma, The Second Phillipine Republic.
• Italian Puppet State: Albania.
• German Puppet State: Italian Social Republic.
• Collaborators: Vichy France.
• Neutral, but aiding the Axis: Spain.

Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and Imperial Japan.

The Central Powers are in WW1 it consisted of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria,The Ottoman Empire & Turkey. The Axis Powers in WW2 consisted of Germany (Adolph Hitler) Italy (Benito Mussolini) & Japan (Emperor Hirohito).

The Axis powers were on the losing side in World War II, they included

Germany

Italy

Japan

Hungary

Romania

Bulgaria

Thailand

Finland fought against the U.S.S.R. alongside the axis, but is usually considered a "co-belligerent" rather than an Axis power.

Iraq was briefly a member of the Axis during May of 1941, but they were destroyed by the Empire of Britain's army within that one month.

Germany and all of the people on the side of the Nazis

1. germany

2. italy

3. japan