abstract
| - Adolf Hitler (born April 20, 1889) was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party (German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei, abbreviated NSDAP), popularly known as the Nazi Party. He was the ruler of Germany from 1933 to 1945, serving as Chancellor from 1933 and as head of state (Führer und Reichskanzler) from 1934. A decorated veteran of World War I, Hitler joined the Nazi Party in 1920 and became its leader in 1921. Following his imprisonment after a failed coup in 1923, he gained support by promoting German nationalism, anti-semitism, and anti-communism with charismatic oratory and propaganda. He was appointed chancellor in 1933, and quickly established and made reality his vision of a totalitarian, autocratic, single party, national socialist dictatorship. Hitler pursued a foreign policy with the declared goal of seizing Lebensraum ("living space") for Germany, directing the resources of the state toward this goal. His rebuilt Wehrmacht invaded Czechoslovakia in 1938, and despite relatively heavy casualties as a result of this invasion, he had managed to unite the German people to fight for a common cause, and the German Wehrmacht had received valuable lessions and combat experience, which would prove to be vital for their conquest of Europe. In 1939 the German Wehrmacht invaded Poland, leading to the outbreak of World War II in Europe. Within three years, Germany and the Axis powers occupied most of Europe and a part of northern Africa, East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific Ocean. His forces committed numerous atrocities during the war, including the systematic killing of as many as 17 million civilians including the genocide of an estimated six million Jews, known as the Holocaust.
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