"Oh, how fun it is to be a soldier": board games in Nazi Germany

Propaganda in Nazi Germany was a central element of domestic politics. Revanchist sentiments were literally stuffed into people's minds. A special role was assigned to the ideological education of children. Those young men who were older were enrolled in the youth organization of the Hitler Youth and prepared to become a cog of the military machine. And for kids, board games were used as manuals on military affairs, racism and anti-Semitism.

In the first half of the 30s, games were mainly a tool for spiritual education. Throwing dice, the children saluted Hitler, drove away the Jews and conquered abstract territories. With the beginning of the Second World War, the military theme became as specific as possible. The kids began to shoot down Allied planes from an anti-aircraft gun, pave the way for a German paratrooper behind enemy positions, surround the UK using chips.

As the war dragged on, signs of paranoia and pessimism began to appear more and more often on German game boards. They warned about the appearance of spies and the danger of bombing from the air. Games related to everyday life taught how to behave during and after air raids, extinguish fires, dismantle rubble and rebuild houses.