Jak se Hitler stal nacistou
How Hitler became a Nazi

Summary/Abstract: Weber, Thomas: Becoming Hitler: The Making of a Nazi. New York: Basic Books, 2017, 423 pp., 2 maps, 32 photographs, ISBN 9780465032686; Plöckinger, Othmar: Unter Soldaten und Agitatoren: Hitlers prägende Jahre im deutschen Militär 1918–1920. Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh, 2013, 377 pp., 26 illustrations, ISBN 978-3-506-77570-2. In the reviewer’s opinion, the question how Adolf Hitler had become a Nazi, i.e.a full-fledged follower and ideologist of the nationalistic and racial doctrine, which declared Jews and Bolsheviks enemies of the German nation, remained open for a long time. Hitler’s own version to the effect that the transformation had occurred as early as during his apprenticeship years in Vienna, is utterly implausible. It must have happened after the Great War, in the chaos shortly after the defeat of the Bavarian Council Republic in May 1919. The reviewer describes the events taking place at that time, Hitler’s situation and circumstances of his conversion to Nazism, and compares both publications dealing with that period. He admires Weber’s style, vivid in comparison with Plöckinger’s heavy-handed language; on the other hand, Plöckinger precisely documents all his arguments, while Weber does not hesitate to use dubious and obscure sources to confirm his conclusions.

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