Colour photographs of the Nazi Flag

All images drawn from the LIFE Magazine Archive

13 comments to Colour photographs of the Nazi Flag

  • Mel Phistopheles

    Those rallies seem to have been very inspirational to the North Korean government, and that should really terrify the entire rest of the world.

  • Erik Eblana

    These terrifyingly wonderful images showcase the awe and fear of the German people in the 1930′s. Certain echoes can be seen in North Korea no doubt, but also there are striking similarities with Barack Obamas triumphant speech on Election night, Chicago 2024.

  • Miss Romwell

    Power as spectacle. You could say the same thing about the old May Day parades of Soviet Russia, the jousts if Henry VIII, the coronation of Napoleon, or the opening of the Beijing Olympics. Hitler drew inspiration from the triumphant parades of Roman emperors, where they painted their faces red to appear like the god Jupiter and led captured foreign rulers into the city of Rome in irons.

  • Rob

    Am I the only one who was reminded of the song “Be Prepared” from Disney’s “The Lion King” when seeing those images…?

  • swester

    @Rob:

    You might be the only person above age 10 who hadn’t already figured out the ludicrously obvious connection between the Scar’s hyenas and Nazism.

  • Mike Smith

    They didn’t call it the Nazi “party” for nothing!

  • Jon Watson

    In case you’re wondering why the flags were red white & black, and not another three colours, it was because the colours were based on the pre 1918 German imperial flag, which was also red, white & black. According to the wikipedia entry on this – “Hitler explained the process by which the Nazi flag design was created: It was necessary to use the same colours as Imperial Germany, because in Hitler’s opinion they were “revered colours expressive of our homage to the glorious past and which once brought so much honour to the German nation.” The most important requirement was that “the new flag… should prove effective as a large poster” because “in hundreds of thousands of cases a really striking emblem may be the first cause of awakening interest in a movement.”

  • KC

    At which point did they all start singing and dancing “Springtime for Hitler”?

  • sofaking

    3rd september 1939, iirc.

  • Ocelotty

    One precision Nuke on one of those Hitler rallies (although nuclear weapons didn’t exist at the time); and the second world war would have been between Russia & the rest of the World

  • The Real Fish

    @Ocelotty

    The Soviet Union had no intention of going to war against the ‘rest of the world’. They had much more local interests, and were, in fact, members of the Allies.

    The great face off between American and the Soviet union unfolded in the post-war years.

  • Heretic

    you are so wrong…
    they became allies due to their difficult situation
    the truth is that Germany were faster – there would have been no ww2 if the allies agree on Hitlers demands and help him with soviets (it was his ambition and not world war)
    Stalin was preparing to attack around middle 40s but Hitler was faster
    the act that there was no march on the west after defeat of the Germany was due to the manpower – 30mln dead in CCCP and no reserves
    women run the industry and all able men were in the army
    Stalin was streching to the limits – one more year (lets say no Overlord and Italy – maybe also a stealmate in Africa) and he would be defeated becouse he got no more reinforcements
    Germany were in a better situation because they were just starting to put women to factories and had already foreign workers in

  • AtlAntianGoddess

    Yes, the red/white/black flag was,indeed, based (partially) upon the Prussian flag BUT (and more importantly!) was also inspired by Plato’s descriptionin the Critia of the red, white and black building stones used in Atl Antis, which Hitler had archeologists looking for all over South America.

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