Can anyone tell me what was the purpose of world war 2 , I'm doing a powerpoint on the holocaust for my class

Question

and what did it have to do with the jews?

Answer 1

The Nazi government's technical name for the Holocaust was "The Final Solution to the Jewish Problem in Europe," which is why you sometimes hear it called the Final Solution. The Jewish Problem was actually just a propaganda tool that made it easier for the Nazis to come to power, because Jewish people were looked at suspiciously by many people at the time. If this were not the case, the Nazis would have found some other race to blame all of their problems on. Specifically, the Nazis claimed that Jewish people, because some business owners were Jewish and the German economy during the First World War had collapsed from within, had stabbed Germany in the back and caused the military loss and then the economic problems that resulted from the Versailles Treaty after World War One.

As the German army continued to conquer more and more of Europe, they found themselves with a larger and larger population to govern, and as a consequence they had more and more Jewish people to deal with. The Nazis could not just let the Jewish people alone, because then they would have been confronted with their whole ideology being seen as a lie, and as the Jewish people were being mistreated more and more as time went by the Nazi government felt they would become an actual problem by revolting. The Jewish population had to be neutralized, and simple mistreatment just was not enough.

The first idea was to resettle the Jewish people in the East, in Russia, but Russia would not surrender and the Nazis could not amass millions of captive Jewish people permanently in an active war zone. England and her navy would not surrender, so the Jewish people could not be sent off to some far corner of the world either. The liquidation of the Jewish population seemed to be the only feasible, and thus final, solution.

The Nazis worked through many different techniques trying to murder all of the Jewish people they had amassed in captivity. By packing them into walled Ghettos across Eastern Europe, the idea was to starve and mistreat them to death, but this was not fast enough, and starvation was causing illnesses that were being passed to other populations. People were taken to remote locations (like Babi Yar in Russia) and were machine gunned, but this was not acceptable either because it was too costly in terms of soldiers and equipment. In the end, the industrial process of gassing and cremation was the chosen solution.

I hope this helps. Unfortunately, it is a very sad and disturbing topic.

Answer 2

I'm going to ignore the purpose part of the question because some of the other answers appear to be quite detailed.

The reasons that Hitler focused on the Jewish community was because he and many others felt that the Jews had acted against Germany in a subversive manner during World War One, when Hitler served as a runner on the frontlines and was injured in a mustard gas attack, that caused Germany to ultimately fail. The reasons he was able to gain support for his Final Solution is because he tapped into a longheld hatred for the Jewish community in Europe that goes back centuries. The Jews were always the outsiders in a predominantly Catholic/Christian oriented geographic area, they were also the primary moneylending community for that period of time. In the Middle Ages it was a widely accepted belief that to profit as a usary (Loaner of Money) went against God. The dislike of the Jewish community never faded from the European society and Hitler successfully capitalized on that hatred and an economic depression where many Jews were still well off but many Germans were not.

Answer 3

Hitler used the Jews as a scapegoat and blamed Jews for all of Germany's economic problems following WWI. The Germans fell for it for a time, but the German populace as a whole were largely unaware of the concentration camps. Ultimately, it was Hitler being maniacal about killing the Jews and his upper-minions wanting to impress him by killing millions of Jews that caused the Holocaust.

It wasn't the war, really, that brought about the Holocaust. It was the Nazis.

As for the purpose of WWII, that's too broad a question.

Answer 4

Although Austrian by birth Hitler had dreams of a german empire to match the british empire which he greatly admired. In his book Mein Kampf he set out his plans for an expansion of german territory by combining all the german speaking nations together and then conquering the lands to the east (Poland and Russia) which could be populated by german settlers.
He managed the first part without war by taking over Austria and part of Czechoslovakia by intimidation.
THe attack in 1939 on Poland was the beginning of the second part of his plan.
France and UK honoured their treaty obligations to Poland and declared war on germany.
Although he beat France, he could not beat the UK and he made the fatal error of invading Russia before finishing the war in the west
He then made another error by declaring war on the USA after Japan attacked Pearl Harbour in December 1941
For the last three and a half years of the war the germans had to fight overwhelming odds and their defeat was only a matter of time unless they could produce a new weapon such as the atomic bomb but they were too late.
Hitler blamed the jews for all germany's economic and social problems especially the defeat in WW1 his initial intention was just to rid germany of jews but as the war progressed and more jews fell into german hands, he saw the opportunity for the Final Solution of killing all jews and other unwanted groups by industrial methods and the extermination camps were set up.

Answer 5

The purpose of World War II was:

a. From Hitler's perspective: To gain territory for the Germans and to eliminate likely enemies of Germany. Since he viewed Jews as likely enemies, this included the elimination of Jews. However, he also wanted to eliminate Slavs, Poles, Gypsies, and many, many other nationalities/races.

b. From the Allies' perspective: To stop Hitler.

Answer 6

The holocaust was the deliberate extermination of millions of people - including about 6 million Jews throughout Europe. Hilter was determined to take over the world (which sounds silly, but he was dead serious) and create a master race by systematically exterminating those he felt weren't "good enough."

You can find a lot of information here:http://www.ushmm.org/

Answer 7

we had to stop Germany and Japan from taking over the world.

The Italians are to blame actually the told Hitler he wasn't an artist and he took it the wrong way.

The Jew's were the scape to unifiy german under a common banner.

Answer 8

Hitler started it. He wanted first to create the perfect race (blond haired blue eyed wealthy children) by experiment and other ghoulish methods. He then proceeded to eliminate the Jews accusing them of killing Jesus being murderes (takes one to know one I guess) and herein lies the delimma, Hitler being the crazy, insane person he was killed so many people based on their ethnicity and personal hatred . He caused so much death and destruction torture etc and pulled the Japanese in to the "Arena" of it all calling for world dominance. This enterprise crossed in to other countries Great Britian, France, Poland and eventually Pearl Harbor. I think that's the gist of it.

Answer 9

From the book, The History Buffs Guide to World War II by Thomas R. Flagel, there are 10 reasons listed for the causes of WWII, which may give you a better idea as to the purpose. These are in chronological order, not necessarily order of importance.

1. World War I: Germany never lost a foot of land in WWI and "lost" WWI due to the Treaty of Versailles and not because of losses in their army. Following the war: "In Germany, pockets of ultranationalists remained active, eventually collecting around a persuasive war veteran who preached revenge."

2. "The Rise of Ethnic Nationalism:" Basically, due to the Sino-Japanese and the Russo-Japanese Wars, a great deal of ethnic pride grew in Japan. Likewise, Czechoslovakia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Yugoslavia were all new states based solely on ethnicity. In 1933, Germany imposed its 1st anti-Semitic laws.

3. The Reparations War: The treaty of Versailles forced Germany to give up 13% of its territory (which was bigger than it was pre-WWI). There were no clear cut amounts as to what Germany had to pay so they began to pay in coal, cattle, and other items until the Deutsche Mark fell to "one trillionth its prewar value." Eventually, Germany was given loans and grants that exceeded what they had before the war and they just stopped paying.

4. The Great Depression: The 1st paragraph on this section reads: "In 1920 only two European countries were dictatorships. By 1937 there were sixteen. The primary cause of this migration to extremism was in the words of economist John Maynard Keynes, the 'greatest economic catastrophe...of the modern world.'" The Great Depression caused amazing damage crumbling banks in Austria, Britain, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Poland, Romania, and the US.

5. "The Rise of Economic Autarchy": In layman's terms, since all of Europe and many other nations just came out of the war, they didnt really trust each other, especially Germany. Instead of free trade between the countries, all of the European coutries and the US fought over certain areas, i.e. the Middle East, North Africa, The Phillipines, etc. for raw materials.

6. The "China Syndrome": Even if Germany would have never invaded Poland or any of the other atrocities, there still would have been war in Asia. The Communists and Nationalists within China were fighting over the new style of government aided by Russia on one side and Japan on the other. Put wonderfully in the book: "The outbreak of war in Europe was essentially a fabrication, a manufacture of crises where none truly existed. The war in China was a culmination, the breaking point of a fractured relic."

7. "The Weakness of the League of Nations": The League of Nations (LN) was great in theory but week in practice. Under the LN, the World was nearly war free from 1924 - 1931. However, in 1931, Japan invaded Manchuria which was a direct violation of the LN charter. Unlike today's United Nations (UN), the LN had no real military power and was unable to do anything to stop Japan.

8. Adolf Hitler: The 2nd paragraph reads: "As a leader, Hitler was pure paradox. Creative and destructive, inspiring and mortifying, in command and yet out of control. His internal contradictions go far in explaining why some viewed Hitler as a rambling hatemonger and others deemed him a calculating schemer." Hitler was Hell-bent on war and he used it to promote nationalism in Germany.

9. The Arms Race: In 1935, Hitler basically said piss-off to the Treaty of Versailles and began to rebuild his army. In 1936, Japan basically did the same, sticking up their thumbs at the US. Within a few short years, the two main components of the Axis of Evil were generating weapons, aircraft, ships, etc. at a greater rate than any other country. By the time Japan attacked the US at Pearl Harbor, the US was the only country remotely close in size of weapons, ships, and planes to Germany and Japan.

10. The Nazi-Soviet Pact: Germany hated Russia and the Russians equally despised Germany. However, in 1939, the two countries signed an agreement of neutrality. The main reason was Germany wanted war against Europe (specifically Poland to start), but not Russia. Russia wanted war in China against Japan, but didnt want to worry about Germany from the west. It also meant Britain and France couldnt help the Northern and Eastern European countries when they came under attack by Germany because they couldnt use the Russian's airfields. Soon after the signing of the pact, war began on Poland and everything else is... well history.

While this doesnt delve into the reasons for the Holocaust, it should give you a much better understanding as to why WWII took place. The Holocaust was an effect and not necessarily a cause (except within the sordid mind of Adolf Hitler) for the beginning of World War II.

Answer 10

the purpose was ..POWER...hitler wanted to rule the world