Control and Conformity: Terror, Propaganda and Opposition

Control depended on both fear and acceptance

By August 1934, Hitler had established a dictatorship in Germany. Maintaining it meant more than removing rival politicians: the Nazis needed to discourage resistance and influence what people heard, read and believed. Between 1933 and 1939, they combined a terror state with propaganda and control of culture.

These methods worked together. Arrests made open criticism dangerous, while censorship prevented alternative views from reaching a wide audience. Propaganda presented Hitler as the leader of a united, successful Germany. Yet obedience did not always mean enthusiasm: some Germans supported the regime, some accepted it because they believed their lives were improving, and others kept their objections private.

The organisations behind the terror state

A police state uses surveillance, arrest and punishment to suppress opposition. Nazi Germany had several overlapping organisations carrying out this work, rather than a single all-purpose police force.

The SA, also called the Storm Troopers, was a Nazi paramilitary organisation—a party organisation arranged along military lines. In 1933, it disrupted opponents’ meetings and protests, attacked Communists and Social Democrats, and vandalised their offices. In February 1933, Hermann Göring ordered the Prussian police to support SA and SS actions, then recruited members into an auxiliary police force. Party violence therefore gained official backing rather than being restrained by the police.

After the Reichstag Fire, the SA and SS helped arrest thousands of political opponents and subjected prisoners to beatings and torture. The SA also helped establish early concentration camps, including makeshift detention sites in warehouses and factories. These were places where opponents could be held without trial. Violence on the streets and the threat of imprisonment made organising protests or continuing political activity extremely dangerous.

The SS, led by Heinrich Himmler, began as Hitler’s personal bodyguard. Its members were selected for intense loyalty to Hitler and commitment to Nazi racial beliefs. It ran concentration camps and became increasingly powerful after the Night of the Long Knives in June 1934, when SS members helped arrest and murder leaders of the SA. The SA’s leadership was weakened by the purge, while the SS became independent of it and gained power. Most early camps were gradually replaced by a centrally organised concentration camp system under SS control.

In 1936, Himmler became chief of all German police. The existing uniformed police were not simply abolished: they lost their independence and became part of the Nazi system of control. Familiar police uniforms therefore no longer meant that policing was independent of the dictatorship.

The SD, the intelligence branch of the SS, gathered information about possible enemies. Led by Reinhard Heydrich, it used spying and informants to monitor threats and passed information to the Gestapo.

The Gestapo was the secret police. Its officers wore plain clothes, making them difficult to identify. They investigated suspects, intercepted communications, interrogated and tortured people, and could send them to concentration camps without a normal trial. The Nazis called this detention ‘protective custody’, but it protected the regime from its opponents rather than protecting prisoners’ rights.

Denunciations made fear part of everyday life

The Gestapo depended heavily on ordinary people reporting one another. Such reports were called denunciations. A neighbour, colleague or relative could report a critical remark, so people could not be certain that even a private conversation was safe.

This helps explain how a relatively limited number of secret-police officers could influence a much larger population. They did not need to hear every conversation themselves: uncertainty about who might inform encouraged people to censor their own speech. Fear also made it harder for opponents to find one another and organise.

Concentration camps provided another threat. Dachau opened in 1933 and imprisoned political opponents alongside other groups targeted by the regime. Inmates faced brutal treatment and forced labour. Knowledge of such punishment discouraged others from taking the same risks.

Courts served the dictatorship rather than checking it

Courts normally offer safeguards against arbitrary government action. Under Nazi rule, judges and lawyers were expected to put Nazi interests first. Judges swore loyalty to Hitler, and legal professionals were brought into Nazi-controlled organisations. Defence rights were restricted, and political defendants could not rely on an impartial hearing.

The People’s Court dealt with treason cases using judges loyal to the regime, with no right of appeal. Courts could therefore give political repression the appearance of a legal process. But the police could also bypass courts altogether through detention without trial. Some prisoners were sent to concentration camps instead of being freed when their sentences ended.

The important connection is that police power and judicial power no longer checked one another. Both helped suppress opposition, leaving people with little protection against the state.

Goebbels controlled the messages Germans received

Joseph Goebbels, head of the Ministry of Propaganda, organised communication intended to strengthen support for Hitler and Nazi ideas. Propaganda selected and presented information to persuade; censorship removed competing information. Together, they narrowed the range of views Germans encountered.

Newspapers were censored, anti-Nazi publications were closed, and journalists worked within a controlled press system. This reduced opportunities to expose abuses or publicly challenge government claims.

Cheap radios widened the audience for Nazi-controlled broadcasts. Loudspeakers in public places carried speeches and messages beyond the home. Radio mattered because Hitler’s voice could reach people who had never attended one of his speeches, making national politics feel immediate and personal.

The annual Nuremberg rallies used marching formations, flags, music and speeches to create excitement and an impression of overwhelming unity. Their size and organisation suggested that the individual belonged to a powerful movement. Hitler’s portraits and Nazi symbols in schools, workplaces and public buildings reinforced the same message in everyday surroundings.

Culture offered models of the ‘right’ German society

Nazi control extended beyond political news. Books, films, music, art and architecture could shape ideas about identity, loyalty and acceptable behaviour.

In 1933, books by Jewish, communist and anti-Nazi writers were burned publicly. These events both removed unwanted writing and warned that certain ideas and authors were unacceptable. Modern and abstract art was labelled ‘degenerate’, while approved art promoted idealised bodies and militaristic strength.

Music by Jewish composers such as Mendelssohn and Mahler was banned, while Wagner’s operas were promoted. Jazz was condemned as ‘degenerate’ and ‘un-German’. Such judgements linked cultural taste to Nazi racial and national beliefs.

Film could make political messages emotionally powerful. Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will, released in 1935, presented the 1934 Nuremberg rally as a spectacle of unity around Hitler. Its carefully constructed images were propaganda, not a neutral record of what every German thought. Albert Speer’s monumental architecture and rally spaces similarly aimed to make Nazi power appear imposing and enduring.

The 1936 Berlin Olympics offered an international opportunity to present Germany as strong and successful. However, African-American athlete Jesse Owens won four gold medals, challenging Nazi claims of Aryan superiority. That contradiction did not mean the entire propaganda event failed; it shows that the regime could not completely control the meaning of events.

Hitler’s popularity was real, but not universal

Propaganda encouraged a cult of personality: Hitler was presented as the exceptional leader around whom the nation should unite. Rallies, films, portraits and broadcasts repeatedly placed him at the centre of Germany’s apparent success.

Nevertheless, propaganda alone cannot explain acceptance. Many Germans were committed Nazi supporters. Others had little enthusiasm for the party but tolerated its rule because the economic recovery of the later 1930s seemed to offer relief after the crises of the Weimar years. Perceived improvement could therefore produce conditional acceptance rather than complete agreement with Nazi ideology.

It is important to distinguish popularity from visible conformity. A cheering crowd might contain genuine supporters, while a salute or silence might reflect pressure or fear. Nazi propaganda emphasised enthusiasm and concealed disagreement, making the regime appear more universally popular than it was.

Opposition existed, but struggled to become effective

Political opposition survived despite repression. After rival parties were banned in 1933, some opponents worked underground. Former members of the Reichsbanner, an organisation that had defended the Weimar Republic, rebuilt an illegal network in 1933–1934. Karl Henrich and Theodor Haubach helped organise it, while Walter Schmedemann established a separate resistance group and an underground newspaper. Arrests quickly disrupted these efforts.

Church opposition also challenged aspects of Nazi control. Some Protestants, including Martin Niemöller and Dietrich Bonhoeffer, rejected the Nazi-controlled Reich Church and helped form the Confessing Church. In 1937, the papal encyclical With Burning Concern was read in Catholic churches, condemning Nazi actions after the regime had broken promises to respect Catholic independence.

Such opposition did not automatically become a united movement to remove Hitler. Defending church independence was not the same aim as restoring parliamentary democracy. Political and religious opponents had different priorities, while surveillance and arrests prevented cooperation.

There was also concern within the army. General Ludwig Beck feared that Hitler’s expansion plans would bring a premature war. He tried unsuccessfully to persuade other generals to resign together and resigned himself in August 1938. His failure to secure collective action illustrates the difficulty of turning disagreement among influential people into an effective challenge.

By 1939, opposition had not removed the regime. Its weakness resulted from a combination of repression, lost opportunities to organise, differing aims and the willingness of many Germans to support or tolerate Hitler. The absence of effective opposition was not the absence of opposition: courageous resistance existed, but it remained fragmented and vulnerable.

Terror state

• SA: street violence, disruption of opponents’ meetings, arrests and early detention camps in 1933; leadership weakened by the Night of the Long Knives, June 1934.
• SS — Himmler: concentration camps and control of the police apparatus. Himmler became chief of all German police in 1936; uniformed police lost their independence.
• SD — Heydrich: intelligence gathering and surveillance; passed information to the Gestapo.
• Gestapo: investigated opponents, used interrogation and detention without trial; relied heavily on denunciations.
• Courts: Nazi-loyal judges, restricted defence rights and no appeal in the People’s Court. Police could bypass trials.
• Dachau, 1933: imprisonment and brutal treatment helped deter resistance.

Propaganda and culture

Goebbels: censored press, cheap radios, public loudspeakers and mass rallies.

• Nuremberg rallies: spectacle, belonging and apparent unity.
• Triumph of the Will, 1935: glorified Hitler through the 1934 rally.
• Culture: 1933 book burnings; rejection of ‘degenerate’ art and jazz; approved music, art and monumental architecture.
• Berlin Olympics, 1936: showcased Germany; Jesse Owens’s four gold medals challenged Nazi racial claims.

Popularity and conformity

Propaganda promoted Hitler’s personal leadership. Genuine Nazi loyalty and perceived economic recovery also encouraged acceptance.

Support ≠ tolerance ≠ fearful obedience. Public conformity cannot prove universal enthusiasm.

Why opposition remained ineffective

Examples: underground Reichsbanner networks, the Confessing Church, the 1937 Catholic encyclical and Beck’s unsuccessful attempt at collective army opposition in 1938.

Main barriers: arrests and camps; fear of denunciation; censorship; destroyed political organisations; divided aims; substantial support or acceptance of the regime.