Adolf Hitler

From July 1933, the regime adopted legislation imposing sterilisation on people considered to have hereditary illnesses or to be "biologically inferior". Hundreds of thousands of people were sterilised against their will.

State of the evidence

Documented

Hitler signed a secret authorisation, backdated to 1 September 1939, permitting the killing of disabled patients considered "incurable". T4 centres used gas chambers, among other methods; the killings continued in other forms after the official halt in 1941.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Command responsibility

The invasion of the USSR was conceived not merely as a military operation but as an ideological and racial war. Einsatzgruppen, SS units and auxiliaries followed the army and systematically murdered Jews, Soviet officials and other civilians.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Directly implicated

Under Hitler's regime, antisemitic persecution developed into the systematic extermination of European Jews. Mass shootings, ghettos, deportations and killing centres resulted in the murder of approximately six million Jews.

State of the evidence

Documented

The Nazi system also targeted Roma and Sinti, people with disabilities, gay men, Jehovah's Witnesses, Soviet prisoners of war, political opponents and other groups. Persecution ranged from exclusion and imprisonment to forced labour, sterilisation and mass murder.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Command responsibility

After the failed assassination attempt of 20 July 1944, Hitler ordered a sweeping hunt for the conspirators and their real or supposed networks. More than 7,000 people were arrested and approximately 4,980 executed, often following show trials or on very weak evidence.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Directly implicated

Hitler imposed the annexation of Austria, then obtained the Sudetenland before occupying the remainder of Bohemia-Moravia. These steps violated or circumvented international commitments and demonstrated the regime's expansionism before the wider war.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Political responsibility

Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union concluded a non-aggression pact accompanied by a secret protocol defining spheres of influence, particularly in Poland and the Baltic states.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Political responsibility

Hitler's Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939 after preparing a war of expansion. Britain and France declared war two days later.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Political responsibility

Synagogues were burned, Jewish shops and homes destroyed, people murdered and approximately 30,000 Jewish men sent to camps. After the pogrom, the regime imposed a collective fine of one billion Reichsmarks and confiscated insurance compensation.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Command responsibility

The Nuremberg Laws provided a central legal basis for racial persecution, deprived Jews of full citizenship and prohibited marriages or sexual relations with persons defined as being of "German blood".

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Directly implicated

Hitler ordered the elimination of the SA leadership and other real or supposed adversaries. Ernst Röhm, Kurt von Schleicher and several dozen others were murdered without trial; the Reichstag retrospectively legalised the killings.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Directly implicated

On Hindenburg's death, Hitler merged the offices of president and chancellor under the title of Führer. The army thereafter swore allegiance personally to Hitler, consolidating dictatorial power without effective institutional checks.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Directly implicated

Following the Reichstag fire, Hitler's government exploited fears of a communist uprising to suspend constitutional freedoms, enable imprisonment without trial and neutralise opponents.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Political responsibility

The Enabling Act allowed Hitler's cabinet to legislate without parliamentary approval. Political parties were subsequently banned or dissolved, and the NSDAP became the only legal party.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Political responsibility

The Nazi regime opened Dachau to imprison communists, social democrats and other opponents. The concentration camp system subsequently expanded and became a major instrument of terror, persecution and, later, forced labour and murder.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Command responsibility

In Mein Kampf, Hitler set out his racial interpretation of history, his antisemitism, his rejection of parliamentary democracy and his intention to conquer Lebensraum in the East.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Directly implicated

Hitler and his allies attempted to overthrow the Bavarian government and then the Reich government by force during the Munich Putsch. The operation failed; Hitler was tried and convicted of high treason.

State of the evidence

Established by a court

Attribution

Accused

Hitler joined the movement that became the NSDAP and made racial antisemitism, ethnic nationalism and the exclusion of Jews central themes of his political programme.

State of the evidence

Documented

Attribution

Directly implicated