Q&A: A Historian Explains Hitler's Rise to Power — and the Parallels to Trump
In a new book, Timothy Ryback writes that Hitler lied about elections and used courts to his political advantage in his relentless quest for absolute power.
Timothy Ryback has written on history and politics for more than three decades and is an expert on World War II, Hitler, and the Nazi regime. He is the author of a new book, Takeover: Hitler's Final Rise to Power. In the book, Ryback recounts the critical months before President Paul von Hindenburg [pictured right] appointed Hitler as Chancellor of Germany in January 1933. Ryback argues that Hitler used democratic processes to destroy democracy itself and his installation in power was a matter of contingency, not historical inevitability. He also tells how Hitler lied about election results and used hate speech against migrants and foreigners -- tactics that Donald Trump is deploying in his 2024 presidential campaign. Ryback is also the author of Hitler's First Victims, Hitler’s Private Library and The Last Survivor. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, and the Financial Times. He divides his time between Europe and the U.S. We spoke last week over Zoom. Our conversation follows, condensed and edited for clarity.
Luke Johnson: One of the things that stuck out to me in reading the book is how determined Hitler was to get to power. He had so many setbacks over more than a decade. Is it fair to say that eventually wore down the German conservative establishment and finally, they relented and appointed him?
Timothy Ryback: No. Instead of looking at the historical moment and asking how we got here, I decided to start at a point in time. I followed the press day by day, the way a person was experiencing it at the time. It eliminates this notion of historical inevitability. You see political contingency. What emerged for me was that fierce, unrelenting determination of Hitler. Just as fierce as his determination was, he had this ability to take any possible humiliation, degradation, or defeat.
He was 43 years old. Most of his opponents were a generation older. Paul Von Hindenburg, the President of Germany, was twice Hitler's age. He could have been running in 1962 [rather than 1932] and he still would have been younger than Trump or Biden.
Did he just wear people down? I think yes, to a certain degree he did. It was a process that he was just going to keep doing this until the odds fell in his favor. I don't know if Hindenburg got worn down, but he ran out of options [and appointed him in January 1933].
LJ: Age aside, I asked the question because the United States is now in its third election with Trump on the ballot, which is unusual. Most losers of presidential elections don't run again -- let alone for the third time. In reading the book, I was making all these comparisons between 1933 and 2024. What are some of the main ones that you see?
TR: I used to cite a quote by Hans Frank, Hitler's private lawyer, who designed the legal strategy for destroying democracy through the democratic process. Before he was hanged at Nuremberg, he said that the Führer [a tyrant] was only possible in 1933. He said [Germans] were too far beyond the monarchy to go back, but only a half a generation into a democracy. So, we didn't have democratic values. Nazis came when the German people could not escape into the past nor into the future. In the late 1980s, I used the U.S. as an example saying, Weimar Germany had 12-13 years of democracy, America has 200-plus years of living in democratic values. The notion of America ever seeing these kinds of issues was beyond comprehension for me.
But there are parallels, and they became evermore striking and almost terrifying. Hitler [had] fierce determination and strong ability to endure endless ridicule in the press to to ignore every reality possible. Hitler said he was going to get 51% of the vote, and he got 37% [in July 1932]. He came back and said, you have to understand 37% is 75% of 51%. So, I have the majority, I should be chancellor. When he lost by 6 million votes in a presidential election [in April 1932], the only time he ever ran, he went to court claiming voter fraud. The judges threw the case out.
Some of the similarities are in rhetoric. Hitler said if he ever came to office, "heads will roll." In the run-up to the 1932 election, he told his followers, "Be there, it's going to be wild." Hitler said when he was [finally] in the chancellery, "People laughed at me for 13 years; no one is laughing now."
One parallel I saw was the polarization in the press. When you read the Weimar press, you see that Hitler is failing every week; there's some scandal and there's something that 's going to be the end of Hitler's political ascendancy. There's a cartoon in January 1933 -- one week before he is appointed chancellor -- of Hitler standing in a Hamlet pose in the graveyard of National Socialism, where all the headstones are broken swastika crosses.
A man named Alfred Hugenberg controlled a media network that fed news to 1600 local newspapers across the country. He was very conservative, antisemitic, and anti-democratic. He developed a strategy that he called Katastrophenpolitik, the politics of catastrophe, bringing what we would "wedge issues," and putting them on the public agenda. He would flood the media landscape with fake news. For example, under the Treaty of Versailles, Germany was burdened with war debts. He put these stories out that the German government was taking German teenagers and selling them into slavery abroad to pay off German war debts -- a complete invention. But it got out there and it became a debated issue.
Another striking parallel was Hitler's use of courts. In one speech, Hitler said "I've been hauled into court more times than I can count." His private lawyer, Hans Frank, represented Hitler in 120 to 130 cases.
He used the courtroom as a political soapbox for grandstanding. Before Frank was executed at Nuremberg, he said that everyone always thought by taking Hitler into court that they were going to ruin his political career, and what they ultimately learned was that every time he went to court, he came out stronger with the electorate.
Probably the most famous example was when Hitler was in court as a witness, rather than on trial. Hitler said, "I'm out to destroy democracy through democratic means." The judge then replied, "So you mean by following the Constitution?" Hitler answered "Jawohl." Then, he went about destroying democracy through democratic processes.
LJ: Wow.
TR: Just like now, there were liberal and conservative judges. When Hitler went into court claiming voter fraud, the judge essentially said it's 6 million votes, get out of here. After the Beer Hall Putsch [a failed Nazi coup in 1923] in his trial for treason, the judge allowed Hitler to make endless tirades and he used the court [to rally] political support.
LJ: You mentioned that you wrote this book from the point of view of somebody living through this period. Using that method, what were some things that stuck out to you that somebody reading backwards wouldn't necessarily understand?
TR: I think you wouldn't understand just how perilous the situation was. People knew it was a rocky road to the top. But, we've filtered out a lot of the perils that Hitler faced, I think Hitler helped filter them out by executing [his rivals]. I was struck by the financial challenges that the Nazi party faced. By the November 1932 election, they were about 16 million Euros in debt -- hundreds of millions of dollars today.
The Nazis were also hemorrhaging votes. They had 37% in July 1932. By November, it was down to 32%. Then they really started to hemorrhage. Hitler was saved by this last-minute appointment in January 1933.
LJ: Hitler was appointed as chancellor constitutionally. How did constitutional protections such as due process, free press, and public referendum fail to stop his ascension?
TR: Hindenburg was head of state, and the chancellor is the head of government. Hitler had run for the presidency against Hindenburg in spring 1932 and lost by 6 million votes. He then decided to run for chancellor and he needed 51% of the vote. Traditionally, the individual with the largest party backing became chancellor. In the July 1932 elections, the Nazis won 37% of the vote, which was the highest number they ever got in a free election. As practice would have it, Hitler should have been appointed chancellor, but Hindenburg absolutely despised him. He referred to him as the "Bohemian corporal" and said he would never appoint him "for the sake of God, my country and my conscience." He said this to Hitler's face.
Move forward six months later, and Hindenburg had run out of candidates. A lot of people in Hindenburg's circles started urging him to appoint Hitler with the belief that his appointment as chancellor would be temporary. By political realities, the majority of the cabinet would not be National Socialists. They could "box" him in. There was also the possibility that the president had under Article 53 of the Constitution to appoint and dismiss chancellors at will and in the course of nine months, Hindenburg had just appointed and dismissed three chancellors.
In the end, Hindenburg took the risk. He had run out of viable candidates. After Hitler's appointment as chancellor, I don't think there was any going back. In retrospect, Hindenburg did have the capacity to dismiss Hitler. He should have tried and it would have led to a lot of chaos. But I think ultimately he would have succeeded. [Hindenburg died on August 2, 1934 at the age of 86. The day before, Hitler had his cabinet pass a law appointing him as head of state and head of government, officially making him Germany's dictator.]
LJ: Explain the line you end the book with, which is Alfred Hugenberg [head of the nationalist German National People's Party and the aforementioned media mogul] telling a friend the day after Hitler was appointed chancellor [on January 30, 1933]: "I just made the biggest mistake of my life."
TR: Hitler still needed a majority; the Nazis never had an absolute majority in the Reichstag. But Hindenburg wanted a majority coalition of conservative forces. Hugenberg had about 40 seats in the 600-seat Reichstag. He had enough seats to push Hitler over the edge. When they were outside of Hindenburg's office waiting for Hitler's possible appointment, Hitler and Hugenberg got into a scuffle. Hugenberg almost pulled out of it. If Hugenberg had held back his 40 seats, Hiter could not have been chancellor. He was browbeaten into going along with it. But he woke up the next day and said, "I just made the biggest mistake of my life."