What is more important for a 10 year old kid? To learn how to tie shoelaces or how
to properly throw a hand grenade? To climb trees and have fun with friends
or to become a tool of massive fascist propaganda? The Hitler Youth program
corrupted the innocence of a vast number of German children between 1929 to 1945.
Welcome to Nutty History and let’s explore what it was like to be part of the Hitler Youth program.
Hitler’s vision for Nazi Germany involved grooming children from the get-go. The top leadership of
the Nazi government saw these young kids as future leaders of the Gestapo and the Third Reich and
that is why Adolf Hitler started programs such as Jungvolk and Jungmädel as early as the 1920s.
And when Hitler assumed power in 1933, he started pushing these programs
under the name of Hitler Youth all over the country. The number of kids enrolled in the
Hitler Youth program rocketed from about a hundred thousand to two million in the year 1933 alone.
In 1936, Hitler made the program mandatory which raised the enrollment to over five and
a half million. Youths who were discovered not to have joined would be sent to “re-education” camps
and have their parents fined and imprisoned. On the other hand, the oblivious and innocent kids
saw youth camps as a fun social activity as they knew no better just like in the movie Jojo Rabbit.
Millions of German kids back then were brainwashed with fanaticism and radicalism in these camps.
Alfons Heck and Gerhard Richter described their experience of the Hitler Youth, no different
than being part of the Boy Scouts. That's ironic because to make way for Hitler Youth, Hitler and
the Third Reich banned Boy Scouts in Germany. Deep down members of the Hitler Youth knew that
they were a cult dedicated to Hitler. The former members mentioned that the rituals were painful
and borderline traumatic but the reward laced in propaganda and peer pressure influenced the minds
of the innocent teenagers. Some of the former participants mentioned post-second world war
that the Hitler Youth program was seen as a leg up in society. Getting a coveted dagger as a
symbol of graduating from Jungvolk to Hitler Youth was a matter of pride and recognition for them.
When the second world war began in 1939, it cast a shadow on the Hitler Youth program as well.
The Jew-hating propaganda replaced the Nazi patriotic propaganda and things became not
so different from what Jojo Rabbit satirically portrayed. German preteens at these camps were
taught to believe in Aryan racial superiority, tormenting Jews, and hate the Allied nations for
threatening German freedom. The idea of innocent camping trips and bonds of friendship was long
left behind as rifle fire training and hand grenade launching replaced them. Eleven-year-olds
were fed grand tales of great German destiny while being prepared to indoctrinate in the Third
Reich. Every boy who participated in the Hitler Youth program had his records of punctuality,
orderliness, reliability, subordination, aggressiveness, and physical talents maintained
by the leaders of the program so it could be used by Army psychologists in the future. Meanwhile,
girls collected tin foil and warm clothes for soldiers, and received lessons on farming,
and cooking, and cleaning, and singing, swimming, gymnastics, and running activities that might
sound pleasant enough, but were designed to keep their bodies and their homes in good
physical shape so that they could attract a mate and raise children in the Nazi ideology.
As the war developed, it became clear that the Hitler Youth’s real goal was to create
more soldiers for the Reich. Children who had been manipulated with the Nazi ideology for years made
obedient, fanatical soldiers. Eventually, those soldiers became younger and younger.
Started in 1943, all boys 17 and older were forced to serve in the military. In 1945, the desperate
Nazi leadership began pulling younger boys out of school and sending them to the front. Just
like Jojo and his best friend Yorki fighting to defend Berlin in the movie, these inexperienced
children were essentially conscripted for suicide missions—and if they balked, they were executed.
Those who survived faced harsh treatment at the hands of the Allies who captured them.
Gladly, Hitler Youth was disbanded after the war. And the only legacy of the group is that it is
considered one of the most chilling facets of the Nazi regime. Thanks for watching Nutty History.