Plan Germania

Plan Germania

Adolf Hitler, if you look at history in general through the eyes of a seeker for common features of the most important dictators, he was quite remarkable in this regard. His creative sense turns out to be decisive in this aspect, which Adolf Hitler wanted to implement earlier in the form of his painting, later in architectural concepts.

Hitler wanted to fulfill his artistic needs. For this, he drew columns, roofs of buildings, building facades or projections of entire interiors, and this is for projects such as the reconstruction of his family, the Austrian city of Linz. Finally it went with time and on, wanting to erect a new opera house in Berlin with the hands of Aryan workers. Such concepts of the Führer were first implemented by Paul Ludwig Troost, and then Albert Speer himself.

Crazy architectural vision

Adolf Hitler intended to rebuild Berlin in accordance with his architectural visions right after the end of hostilities, which he predicted for a year 1945. He called the project Plan Germania, for here the capital of Germany was to be the Mecca of a world dominated by Germans. This extremely ambitious, if not just a crazy project, was approved still in 1937 year, and stood at its head, from Hitler's anointing, Albert Speer.

This plan assumed, that the city center of Berlin will be located at the intersection of two large ones, because the representative boulevards, but the changes to the thorough reconstruction were also to affect Berlin's rail network, along with the construction of new airports, parks and suburbs. Interestingly, there were even plans to remove the alien plant species growing there from the city map, that is, non-German. Meanwhile, Speer's father managed to summarize it all in advance, very simple sentence: "You all must be completely crazy".

Details of the heart of "New Berlin"

On the boulevards, which formed the east-west and north-south axes, The largest and most representative buildings in the capital were to be erected. Hitler wanted, that the buildings evoke a specific Aryan "sense of heroism" in Germany, for being a symbol of the greatness of the nation and a testimony to future generations. Among the erected new edifices, Hitler saw, for example, a great hall with a height of over 300 meters, which could hold a plenum of 180 thousands of supporters of National Socialism. Another of the enormous planned facilities was the so-called Zirkus, that is, a huge roundabout with a fountain with a diameter placed there 200 meters and the figure of Apollo surrounded by bronze statues.
The heart of the project, however, was to be the triumphal arch which Hitler himself sketched. As Speer later mentioned, it was, in his opinion, an example of the "architectural fantasies" of a wolf dictator - monumental in scale and pretentious in assumptions. Admittedly, the architect tried to inhibit his leader and modify his plans in accordance with the foundations of architecture and the necessary pragmatism, but eventually he had to yield to the Leader's charisma. The arch was therefore designed by the Führer himself, and Speer had to note this on the resulting plans, writing down the name of the author of the object, as the enigmatic "XXX". Because the monument was to commemorate the Germans who died in the battlefields of World War I., a staggering amount of placement on a huge triumphal arch was provided 75 huge marble slabs with names on them, attention here – 1,8 million soldiers killed. So this 117-meter-high monument was supposed to be so big, that his famous Parisian counterpart could easily fit underneath it.

Facts

The turn of events on the fronts of World War II made, as we know, that the Plan of Germania could not be put into practice. On the other hand, the theory of these intentions proves, what was at the beginning - how great plans in the artistic field guided Adolf Hitler. He was sure he was, when it comes to Berlin, a great enthusiast who believes in the secret runic power of the Germanic center.

In the southern outskirts of the city of Berlin, near the place, in which it was intended to put a behemoth of Hitler's design, a concrete block of dizzying weight was erected 12,6 thousand tons. It is a heavy load-bearing object, whose task was to test the bearing capacity of Berlin's wetlands, thanks to the measuring equipment installed there. In any case, the course of the war caused it, that the project was abandoned in 1943 year, while the concrete block testifies to the present day of the German architectural pomp, well described with operas straight from Wagner.
This test block of concrete, zwany heavy load bodies, has survived happily until today. It turns out to be too big, to tear it down, and therefore it slowly deteriorates under the influence of the aura of the following seasons, being a peculiar testimony to the National Socialist megalomania of Adolf Hitler.

More interesting threads from the biography of Adolf Hitler can be found at:
https://zyciorysy.info/adolf-hitler/