Talk:Adolf Hitler's 50th birthday

Effect of this article is questionable for wikipedia itself>> Merge and trim down
Surely, Hitler's birthday was somehow a notable event. And of course it is still a good example for the skilled propaganda and "Führerkult", which were staged by the Nazis for this occasion as for many others. But I'm German. Therefore I still feel concerned, that this article is simply a good opportunity to read a text about Hitler's birthday that is flying high above all that man's terrible acts and orders, which had happened to that date and were yet to come. There are cities in Germany fighting for many years against people "remembering" the birthday of Rudolf Hess or similar dates. I suggest Wikipedia should be aware to provide a stage for such kind of "Totenkult". The quotation from Kershaw for example is correct, but it sounds - for me- like a key witness statement, that the first six years were not so bad.This was not the intention of Kershaw's biography. Why does the article intensively discuss the reasons, why the US ambassador etc. were absent at certain parts of the festivities, but only shortly mentions, there was no Polish delegation? As if that could be a clue to Hitler's decision to invade Poland about six months later.

I'd feel much better, if that article could be merged with related topics, where that information is more suitably embedded e.g. the article about Hitler itself or about "Nazi propaganda". MaBaMucBY (talk) 11:56, 20 April 2012 (UTC)MaBaMucBY


 * You have nothing to fear - at this point in time, virtually everyone on the planet knows what Hitler was about - and many articles within Wiki make it very clear ... even neo-facists/racists know, deep down. HammerFilmFan (talk) 18:06, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Not notable?
Not notable event? Are you joking? It was the biggest military parade in the history. Don't be quicky, I will put more sources and complete the article, plus actual videos of the event. Then you will see what's notable and what's not! :-)--Professional Assassin (talk) 01:50, 9 January 2010 (UTC)

Removal of citation
I had to remove a citation from this draft of an article, as it was not in English and was so poorly formatted that I couldn't figure out what was being cited. -- Orange Mike  &#x007C;   Talk  21:19, 8 January 2010 (UTC)


 * You had to remove a citation because it was not English? Would you please explain more. The title of that documentary film is in German and I wrote in front of it, that it is a documentary film about the event. So what's wrong? Of course the name is not English, but the description is!--Professional Assassin (talk) 01:45, 9 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Please read WP:CITE for instructions on how to format a citation. -- Orange Mike  &#x007C;   Talk  17:11, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Propaganda films as reliable sources.
I have referred the following sources to WP:RSN for reliability vetting.


 * UfA TON-WOCHE, Hitler's 50th Birthday - Documentary film
 * http://www.ihffilm.com/16.html

It doesn't seem to me that advertising blurb on a website selling a DVD, nor "an official documentary by the government" (a nazi propaganda film) are reliable in any way, but we'll see what the noticeboard says. Hohum (talk) 21:02, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia|Protector of Bohemia and Moravia
Was not a soverign state but part of the greater German Riech, as such Dr. Hácha was not a foreign dignitory but a member of the German government.Slatersteven (talk) 23:01, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Greater German Reich is something after 1944! In 1939 Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was a sovereign state.Professional Assassin (talk) 23:06, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * NO! The 'greater' Reich was established almost immediately after the conquest of Poland. HammerFilmFan (talk) 18:00, 20 April 2012 (UTC)
 * The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was established by a German decree on March 15, 1939. Emil Hácha, with the title State President, acted under orders from the Nazi German government. The protectorate was thus not a sovereign state. In particular, the German government could have ordered Hácha to attend Hitler's birthday celebration. Cs32en   Talk to me  23:13, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * It was an automamous region of the Third Riech [] that had some soverign rights but that many functions of government were contorled by Berlin, not a soverign country. Unless you can find a source that states otherwise?Slatersteven (talk) 23:16, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Right, in this manner, UAE, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and so many other countries are puppet states of the United Kingdom and they can not be considered sovereign states. The way Cs32en talks, is a German wikipedia's style, which is totally influenced by the heavy censorship and restriction of free speech by the government of Federal Republic of Germany. I have to inform him, that this is English wikipedia and here is NOT censored and unlike German wikipedia, articles are supposed to represent neutral point of view. This is not a place to condemn (or glorify) any ideology or type of government such as National Socialism, capitalism, socialism etc...--Professional Assassin (talk) 00:13, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
 * No they are independant states who may be pupets, but they are officaly independant, HMG execisise no direct control ove rthem (and has not since the 1960's). The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was not officaly independant it was officaly automamous, but was still a region of the german state (see the sourse I provided), that the German state exercised direct control over. Now I will ask again do you have a souce stating that the protectoate was an independant state.Slatersteven (talk) 00:19, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Slovak Republic
this Slovak Republic (1939–1945) is the page for the Slovak government in the period in question, why therefore is this not being allowed? Aslo onve you remove Dr Hácha from this list only one person is left.Slatersteven (talk) 23:01, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Photos
Not sure that this mass deletion of phtots is appropriate.Slatersteven (talk) 23:50, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

File:Hitler50i.jpg does tell us nothing about the event. It's a propaganda picture. I've inserted File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-1988-0202-503, Hitlers 50. Geburtstag.jpg instead. Cs32en  Talk to me  23:59, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I though the himler picture mwas rather good. As to the picture of tghe children, as this was a propoganda (and possilbe stagemanaged) event I feel that demonstrated that rather nicley.Slatersteven (talk) 00:01, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Stage managed? Another conspiracy theory? Do you have any proof for what you say? You can simply watch the video of the event and see that is NOT stage managed, manipulated etc...--Professional Assassin (talk) 00:15, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
 * It would need to be described as a propaganda picture then, and in that case, I'd agree to its inclusion. Cs32en   Talk to me  00:20, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Mistaken edit summary
I deleted a reference link to a site called ihffilm.com calling it neo-Nazi spam. Looks like I was wrong about the neo-Nazi part. Looks like the ihf stands for International Historic Films, not Institute for Historical Review. But it's still a commercial site so the deletion was correct, but not the edit summary. Apologies all around. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 01:32, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

Armed forces ("Wehrmacht")
I have changed "Nazi Germany's armed forces" to "Germany's armed forces", and has changed the text back to "Nazi Germany's armed forces".

Beyond My Ken stated: "On the contrary, the armed forces took a personal oath of loyalty to Hitler, making them complicit in the actions of the regime." I agree with this, and one could even argue that the Reichswehr, which was renamed to Wehrmacht in 1935, planned for war since 1925. The oath to Hitler was a minor element in the complicity.

My reasoning is that the armed forces leadership and command structures did not change much from the Weimar Republic to Nazi Germany, and thus calling them Germany's armed forces is appropriate. For comparison, we would call Berlin a German city, whether we refer to 1929, 1939 or 2009. But of course, the leadership of the city of Berlin (as well as many inhabitants) was complicit in the actions of the Nazi regime.

Calling everything that existed during 1933 to 1945 "Nazi German" can also create the false impression that it would have had nothing to with "Germany". So I'd argue for using "Nazi Germany" in preference to "Third Reich", for example, but I don't think that we must use "Nazi Germany" instead of "Germany" in all instances, if the meaning is unambiguous. See also the use of "armed forces of Germany", "German Air Force", etc. in the article Wehrmacht.

I also think that it would be best to discuss these things. An edit summary that seems to imply that I would be of the opinion that the Wehrmacht would not have been complicit in the actions of the Nazi regime is not helpful, in my view. Cs32en  Talk to me  18:25, 24 January 2010 (UTC)


 * The German armys 'complicity' was something to be discussed at Nuremburg, not this article. There doesn't seem to be any reason not to use the simplest form here, that of 'Germanys armed forces', the context is perfectly clear in the article. Unless there were in fact two German armys using the same name but swearing an oath to different people which needed to be referred to separately but I do not believe that was the case. Weakopedia (talk) 20:40, 24 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, the only source for confusion could be that the Waffen-SS existed as a separate paramilitary organization that was independent of the Wehrmacht. This was a military force that was actually based on Nazi ideology, while the Wehrmacht was primarily nationalistic, and supported the NSDAP because it saw the Nazis as the best instrument to advance the nationalistic agenda, given the circumstance. Many generals and other members of German armed forces supported the Nazis ideologically, of course, and very few raised moral objections against the Nazi ideology or the atrocities of the Holocaust. Cs32en   Talk to me  20:53, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

No cake or invite
Is it relevant who did not show up? I do not see for example China as not having sent anyone.Slatersteven (talk) 14:02, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I also wondered about that.... the text says that only 23 of the worlds many countries sent representatives. Poland is singled out in a paragraph of it's own with no supporting text. Unless there is some reasoning to go with the statement then it is irrelevant to the article, as Poland then belongs to the group of all countries other than the 23 who attended the event. Weakopedia (talk) 14:16, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
 * If Poland would be the only neighbor country that did not sent anyone to the parade, it would be notable. Maybe Kershaw's text provides further context that indicates the relevance of this information. After all, Kershaw seems to have concluded that the information is somehow important. He is an expert in the field, so I think we should decide on whether to remove that info only after we know the context given by him. Cs32en   Talk to me  14:57, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
 * There could be many reasons why the information is relevant however the article does not provide any. Third party opinions are generally notable only when given appropriate context. This is not a failing of Kershaw but of the person who introduced Kershaws text without sufficient context.
 * Kershaw may be an expert but as far as I can tell he did not add the text about Poland to this article, that was done by a Wikipedia editor. That editor has added text without sufficient context to support it's inclusion and if that context is not supplied within a reasonable amount of time then regardless of the validity of Kershaws claims the text about Poland should and will be removed. Weakopedia (talk) 15:49, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Was Poland the only nieghbour that did not send a representative? We would also still need to know (from an RS) why that was notable.Slatersteven (talk) 13:26, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

King George VI's congratulations
If we would write "U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt did not congratulate Hitler on his birthday, in accordance with his practice of not sending birthday greetings to any but ruling monarchs, but King George VI of the United Kingdom dispatched a message of congratulation to Hitler.", the "but" would sound somewhat like "in defiance to the U.S.". Compare, for the sake of argument, the reverse version of the sentence, i.e. "George VI congratulated, but Roosevelt did not". I have removed the "but", which is not present in the sources, for this reason. has accepted the change as a compromise. I don't want to start a new discussion about this, therefore, but describe my view on the issue, in case this question becomes relevant in the future. Cs32en  Talk to me  15:18, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Factitas
I do not see the need to point out that both Italy and Germany were fascist states. They wer not the only fascist states, nor the only contires to send telegrams.Slatersteven (talk) 13:43, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I included this because the issue of the relationship between the two most powerful fascist countries in Europe was an important issue both at the time (1939) and during the fascist period as a whole (see Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)). Also, Hitler's relationship with Mussolini was different from his relationship with the leaders of smaller, and weaker, Eastern European countries. Going into any more detail would be beyond of the scope of the article, however. Cs32en   Talk to me  14:16, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Which is why people would look at that article, if we do not have details as to why this is important then it seems it should not be here. Moreover if the relasionship was as important as you imply why did Mussolini not attend? Did Franco send a telegram?Slatersteven (talk) 14:23, 26 January 2010 (UTC)


 * As far as I can see from the sources, Mussolini was busy with political developments in Eastern Europe. The same was probably true for Hungary, that's likely the reason why the country sent a former prime minister. We need more sources to make a detailed description of what exactly happened in these few days. The inclusion of the reference to Italy, however, is based primarily on the well-documented importance of the relationship between Nazi Germany and the fascist Italian state of the time. Cs32en   Talk to me  15:57, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I do not dispute the mention of Italy, I do dispute drawing attention to the fact that they were both fascist states, they were not the only fascist states. Moreover reading about German/Italian relations it becomes clear that they were not in fact that close. In fact it would seem that (at least in the caser of Mussolini) tehre was a rivalry between the two leaders (and thus states) as to who would be the dominant leader in Europe. Nor did I metion Hungery, I asked did Franco send a telegram or delgation? The referance to thier political ideologioes seems undue to me.Slatersteven (talk) 16:32, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I mainly wanted to give a hint to those people who are unfamiliar with the history of Europe. That the relationship was not steady rather strengthens the case for inclusion. Rivalry between people who belong to the same camp is certainly not uncommon, and closeness could be defined in terms of interaction as well as agreement. I don't know of any other European state whose relations were closer, if you excluded those relationships which were seen as clearly unequal or hierarchical. Cs32en   Talk to me  16:45, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Forgive me but saying they were both fascist does not give any hint of any particular closeness, there were other fascist state in europe and using the same logic the fact they were fascist means they must have been as close. I woulkd argue that in the period in question Britain and France were as close (and arguably closer). Moreover Mussolini was repulsed by the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact agreement. Mussolini saw this as a betrayal of the Anti-Comintern Pact. So it would seem that there was no real co-operation (on the same polictical level (as say the Entete Cordial) between Italy and Germany then there was between Germany and Spain. Germany does not appear to have consulted il duce on any matters of inport. Also it should be noted that the pact of steel (the formal millitary allianve between Italy and Germany was not signed until May 1939 a month after the Furhers birthday.Slatersteven (talk) 17:27, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I was talking about relationships of Germany with other countries in Europe, not about relationships between any pair of European countries. The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact came later on, in August 1939. That both countries were ruled by fascist regimes was the basis on which their relationship developed. As for the closeness, I did not wan't to imply that the relationship was always cordial, and such an implication or assertion would be unnecessary for the validity of the argument the the relationship was a very important relationship at the time. I would of course add something about Spain as well, but I don't have a source for such content. I think other editors should weigh in in this discussion, we both do not really make too much progress discussing this at the moment. Cs32en   Talk to me  17:39, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Ian Kershaw what is with all the qoutes by this guy he wasn't even there or born yet how can you give them any credibility they are written as if he was there! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.138.213.57 (talk) 17:23, 20 April 2012 (UTC)
 * That's probably too nonsensical to even deserve comment, but I'll give a short one: he's considered a Reliable Source. HammerFilmFan (talk) 18:08, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

12 March 2015
I have just finished my improvement of this article in my sandbox and implemented the whole lot. Going to nominate it for GA-status. Cheers, Jonas Vinther • (speak to me!) 14:32, 12 March 2015 (UTC)


 * Copy edit notes:


 * I sharpened up some of the linking. For example, link to Nazi propaganda rather than propaganda
 * Quotations of less that 40 words should not be offset as a block quote.
 * Don't use seasons (winter, summer, etc) as the southern half of the planet has opposite seasons.
 * You should add publication dates to the online newspaper articles that you used as citations. I recommend that your Harvard citations should use the publication date, not the access date.
 * You mention celebrations in other countries in the lead, but that subject isn't really covered in the article. Either find some coverage, or amend the lead.
 * The lead seems too short. You should in my opinion lengthen it. Make sure you include a bit of content from each part of the article. Cheers, -- Diannaa (talk) 22:50, 14 March 2015 (UTC)