Adolf Hitler, possibly the most hated man in the history of the world, had a vision for a new Germany. Following World War I, he sought to fulfill that vision by employing a vicious political agenda and a brilliant mind for propaganda. His campaign to elevate the Nazi party into power was truly a multimedia tour de force, and with the above combination of attributes, Hitler was able to sway the German public to enable him to (unfortunately) make possible the events that would make the world change forever.
The Nazi Party employed many methods of demonstrating its political potency to the citizens of Germany: grandiose speeches, radio telecasts, posters, pamphlets and newspapers. Hitler commissioned the creation of a newspaper in 1927 called Der Angriff (The Attack). The way the paper was marketed was by creating an air of suspense about it. (337) A campaign making use of posters was launched to pique the interest of the German public. The first posters simply said, “The Attack?” The following set stated, “The Attack takes place on July 4!” The final set of posters provided information about the paper, letting readers know that it would be published on Mondays, that its motto was “For the Suppressed against the Exploiters” and that “Every German man and every German woman will read ‘The Attack’ and subscribe to it!” (337)
Hitler was a master of political propaganda; he was able to identify the hopes and fears of the very people he was trying to influence. Says Hitler in his book Mein Kampf (My Struggle): “The art of propaganda lies in understanding the emotional ideas of the great masses and finding, through a psychologically correct form, the way to the attention and thence to the heart of the great masses.” (345) All Germans hoped for a revision of the Treaty of Versailles, which essentially crippled the country; it blamed the war on Germany, and forced the nation to pay huge reparations to the victorious allied countries, as well as imposing disarmament....