Adolf had re-entered the First World War in the March of 1917, back in his original position, a Gefreiter (Lance Captain) in the German Army. However, there appeared to be a change in him. Adolf’s once joyful mood in his love of war had turned to depression. It is said that happened because of Germany’s morale failing and the German citizens’ anti-war effort. One of his comrades, Hans Mend, remarked about Hitler’s behavior that “He sat in the corner of our mess holding his head between his hands in deep contemplation. Suddenly he would leap up, and running about excitedly, say that in spite of our big guns victory would be denied us, for the invisible foes of the German people were a greater danger than the biggest cannon of the enemy.” The invisible foes being the marxists (communists) and the Jewish people.

In the following year in August, Adolf was awarded the Iron Cross 1st Class, a rarity amongst  foot soldiers such as himself. He was awarded this medal for single-handedly capturing a group of French soldiers who hid in a shell hole. This happened at the final German offensive on the Western Front. The medal was suggested to him by a German lieutenant, Hugo Gutmann, a Jew. In Hugo’s later life, he and his family first moved to Belgium (1939) then to the United States (1940), being able to avoid the Holocaust and an encounter with the Gestapo in 1938.                                                           

Adolf could have been promoted to the rank of sergeant. Despite his good record and medals, his unmilitary-like appearance and odd personality led his superiors to think he lacked any leadership skills and could not command enough respect. On October 14, 1918, Adolf Hitler, among fellow German soldiers, were in a British gas attack outside Ypres. Adolf and his comrades were temporarily blinded by the gas. Adolf was given an initial treatment, and then was hospitalized in Pasewalk of Pomerania.

While Adolf was in the hospital, the Central Powers had began falling apart. First, the Ottoman Empire, despite their victory at Gallipoli, was collapsing due to invading forces and an Arab revolt that decimated the economy and the land. The Turks (of the Ottoman Empire) signed its treaty with the Allied Powers in late October of 1918. Austria-Hungary was second to fall with constant infighting and growing national movements of the diverse populace. An armistice was reached on November 4, 1918. The German Empire was the last. The Germans have been suffering under what was considered dire conditions throughout the last few years. The German Empire’s resources have been severely strained, and the population was starving as there was extreme food shortages due to naval blockades from France and Britain. They would then sign an armistice on November 11, 1918.

It was a day earlier whenever Adolf, still recovering in Pasewalk, was informed by an elderly pastor that the war has ended and Germany has lost. Adolf was infuriated and frustrated by this news, and he stated, “I staggered and stumbled back to my ward and buried my aching head between the blankets and pillow”. In 1919, he was then more outraged by the Treaty of Versailles (signed on June 28, 1919), which proposed certain expectations that seemed ridiculous. The treaty had forced Germany, and Germany solely, to be the “scapegoat” for the war as they were to take all of the blame, German territories were to be abandoned and given up, the Rhineland was to be demilitarized, the German military was to be reduced substantially to a meager 100,000 troops, there was to be no airforce of the German military, stockpiles of armored vehicles, chemical weapons, tanks, and military aircraft were prohibited, the navy was reduced to only a total of 36 ships, the empire would be changed to a republic that was run by foreign powers, and much more requests that were to be followed by Germany. One of the devastating requests was that Germany was to pay a war debt of a grand total of 20 billion gold marks ($5 billion in American currency), which would put a heavy, economic strain on the already poor economy.

Adolf had wished to still be in the German military, but he was apart of those who were demobilized. He had also stated in his book, Mein Kampf, that “There followed terrible days and even worse nights – I knew that all was lost...in these nights hatred grew in me, hatred for those responsible for this deed." Adolf very much believed in the belief that the reason Germany lost the war were the German populace itself, more specifically the Jewish population. He will eventually find himself in the hands of a group that will officially lead him to way of being Chancellor of Germany and then Germany’s dictator. The Nazi party.

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                                    Hugo Gutmann

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