Was Hitler A Sexual Deviant?
The short answer is no. The earliest look into Hitler comes from his boyhood friend, August Kubizek, who was Hitler's friend when they were in their teenage years living in Vienna. Kubizek describes the young Hitler as someone who was enamored with women, but hopelessly awkward around them. He carried on full romantic relationships with women in his mind, but was frozen in silence when he was in their presence.
The young Hitler was outspoken in his revulsion towards prostitution and other gross outward signs of sexual perversion. Some speculate that Hitler's guardedness with women was the result of his own shyness and introversion, but also because his father had been openly sexually promiscuous.
Alois Hitler was a known philanderer, often having affairs with women considerably younger than himself. Hitler's mother, Klara, was one of these women. She was 16 years old when she began a relationship with Hitler's father, who was 40-years old at the time. They were first cousins.
Hitler is reported to have had only two real love interests in his life. The first was Angela Raubal, who was known as Geli. She was Hitler's half-niece and they began their relationship when she was 17 and he was 38. Geli was in a relationship with Hitler from 1925 until her death by suicide in 1931. Hitler went into a deep depression following her death and declared that Geli was the only woman he had ever truly loved.
Hitler first met Eva Braun when she was 17 years old and he was still in a relationship with Geli. Eva was 22 years younger than Hitler. Following the death of Geli, the relationship between Hitler and Eva Braun began to grow deeper. When Hitler came to power in January 1933, his relationship with Braun was kept a secret, and she was hidden from the public during the remaining years of Hitler’s reign. Hitler believed it would circumvent his credibility as a leader to be seen with a younger woman who was not his wife. Moreover, Hitler relied on the charisma and attraction he had in his public persona with women, and the reality that he was married or had a mistress would have diminished this to a degree.
Side Note: The Nazis were extremely pro-family. They publicly held a very high view of marriage and placed great significance on raising moral children. Hitler preached this message openly and would often privately rail against high ranking Nazi officials who had mistresses and multiple affairs.
Everything indicates that Hitler was a "one woman man" throughout the remainder of his life. Eva Braun remained his mistress until the very last hours of his life, when they were married in the Führer Bunker on April 29, 1945. On April 30, they committed suicide together and their bodies were burned in the courtyard of the Reich Chancellery.
While Hitler exhibited no sexual perversions during his lifetime, this was not true of other Nazis. As stated above, many high-ranking Nazi officials had multiple affairs and mistresses throughout their lives.
Most significant of these was Hitler's close associate and the man who was perhaps most responsible for helping the Nazis gain power. Captain Ernst Röhm was the leader of the SA, the Nazis paramilitary organization, (aka the Brown Shirts). Röhm was an open homosexual and the SA leadership was filled with homosexuals who were known for their brutish outward sexuality and predatory pursuit of young men.
Given the importance of the SA and Röhm personally to Hitler's rise to power, Hitler chose to look the other way and accept Röhm's homosexuality. This wasn't a problem until Hitler became chancellor in 1933. In order to effectively lead Germany, Hitler needed the strong support of the Army, and the Army office corp detested Röhm and saw the SA as a threat to their own power and authority.
In a devil's bargain, Hitler agreed to eliminate the SA leadership in exchange for the Army's support. This happened on June 30, 1934 and is known as "The Night of the Long Knives." During this event, Röhm and the majority of the SA's leadership were executed.
True Sexual Perversion: Lavrentiy Beria
If you are looking for an illustration of true sexual perversion in a powerful national leader, the most notorious of the 20th Century is likely Lavrentiy Beria, who served as the chief of the NKVD, the Soviet secret police under Stalin, and Stalin's deputy premier during World War II. Beria was a known sexual predator who would cruise the streets of Moscow looking for young women and girls. When he saw one who would interest him, he would have his body guards take the girl, bring her to his home where he would rape her in a sound proof room. After the rape, the body guards would give the girl a bouquet of flowers implying that the sexual encounter was consensual. If the girl refused to go along, she would be arrested and likely not seen again. After Stalin, this man was the most powerful and feared man in the Soviet Union. Following Stalin's death in 1953, Beria was arrested, tried, and executed.
