Nazi architecture was intimidating and larger-than-life. Which was the point: an individual walking into the Reich Chancellery was meant to feel very, very tiny

Nazi architecture was intimidating and larger-than-life. Which was the point: an individual walking into the Reich Chancellery was meant to feel very, very tiny compared to the state. Dwarfed by the impact of the massive stone, what outside concerns could compare? There was never really any historical basis or long-standing traditions to lend the Nazis a sort of gravitas, much as they might have wanted it. They believed themselves to be "the master race," yet lacked the sort of history to support their conclusions. So they appropriated everything they could get their hands on to suggest otherwise. The swastika was stolen from Hindu culture and used to suggest that its thousands of years of meaning use there were the result of ancient Aryan ancestors. Nietzsche's work was butchered perverted by his horrible excuse for a sister and her husband to support Nazi ideology. Hitler's theory of ruin value, and the idea of a "Thousand-Year Reich" flipped the lack of historical gravitas on its head, borrowing against an ancient future that didn't exist in order to support their ideology in the present. If he could build buildings that made Roman ruins look positively provincial, centuries of awe and inspiration towards them could be leveraged by the Nazis. Difficulties and setbacks in the war could be overshadowed in the minds of the German people by the immense power of his buildings. Architecture, for Hitler, was a weapon: https://thefunambulist.net/architectural-projects/the-funambulist-papers-47-nazi-architecture-as-affective-weapon-by-gaston-gordillo https://thefunambulist.net/architectural-projects/the-funamb... Anyhow, Hitler's idea of a Welthauptstadt Germania betrayed his global ambitions years before the first shot was fired.