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This makes me reflect on the German Empire elections taking place at this time. There is a mention that the far Right National Empire Party is the successor party to some groups, one of which was the outlawed National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP). Their leadership by Ernst Roehm and the Strasser brothers antagonized the Reich Government under Bruening so much that he outlawed them, with the full support of Kaiser Wilhelm. The Kaiser reportedly said "Brown Communists are just as much a horse's dungheap as Red Communists."

Could the former NSDAP leader Hitler have done any better? Although he was an uncouth failed "artist" who had a perverted affair with his niece (!!!!)(which led to their double suicide in 1930), he was considered a magnetic speaker who was also more moderate (or at least less threatening to the nobility and big business) than Roehm or the Strassers.

Although Germany managed to fight to a bloody stalemate in World War One (thanks in large part to America's isolationist stance), the huge costs of the war caused economic depressions in the 1920s and early 1930s. There was fear that an extremist party could gain power, rather than the "elected dictatorship" of Bruening and Hugenberg.

So, could the NSDAP have made a go of it under Hitler?
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