Nazi Terminology - K

K

• Kameradschafts- und Gemeinschaftsstärkung – strengthening of comradeship and community; Nazi party Gleichschaltung of social institutions.
• Kampfzeit-"Struggle time". The NSDAP's term for the years between 1925 and 1933 in political opposition. Much glorifed after 1933 as the heroic period of the NSDAP.
• Kapo (Cabo) – A privileged prisoner-work-squad leader, within the concentration camps, labor camps, and death camps; an overseer of the Sonderkommando laborers. Oftentimes criminals sent to the camps were assigned kapo duty. While on duty, they would often be issued a whip or nightstick. Generally they had a reputation for brutality.
• Kdf-Wagen – official name of the Type I Volkswagen Beetle, a project of the Kraft durch Freude program.
• Kehlsteinhaus - The "Eagle's Nest," Hitler's summerhouse atop a mountain overlooking Obersalzberg, near Berchtesgaden. Not to be confused with the Berghof.
• Kinder, Küche, Kirche - "Children, Kitchen, Church" (part of Hitler's co-ordination of every aspect of life to a state-sponsored orthodoxy)--slogan delineating the proper role of women in the Nazi State. Hitler said, “National Socialism is a male movement.”
• Kirchenkampf - "church struggle" - see Kirchenkampf
• Knight's Cross - see Ritterkreuz.
• Kontinentalimperium - German World War II aim for achieving continental hegemony by territorial expansion into Eastern Europe. Contrast Kolonialimperium, the exclusive aim for an overseas imperial domain.
• Konzentrationslager often abbreviated KZ for concentration camp. The correct abbreviation would be KL, but KZ was chosen for the tougher sound. Concentration camps were established for the internment of those who were declared "enemies of the volk community" by the SS.
• Kraft durch Freude (KdF) – "strength through joy", state-sponsored programs intended to organize people's free time, offering cheap holidays, concerts, other leisure activities, and (unsuccessfully) a car (Kdf-Schiff, Kdf-Wagen). It was initially called Nach der Arbeit.
• Kreditschöpfungstheorie – Gregor Strasser's idea for government spending and credit creation.
• Kreis-Uschla - an intermediate level of the four-tiered Uschla system, immediately below the Gau-Uschla and immediately above the lowest-level Ort-Uschla.
• Kriegserlebnis – (myth of the) war experience.
• Kriegsmarine, "War Navy", one of the three official branches of the Wehrmacht.
• Kriegsverdienstkreuz "War Merit Cross" - decoration for exceptional service not involving combat valor as was required for the Iron Cross. Awarded in three grades, 2nd Class, 1st Class, and Knight's Cross; with swords for frontline soldiers and without for rear-area personnel and civilians.
• Kriegsverdienstmedaille "War Merit Medal" - decoration for meritorious civilian service to the war effort, generally awarded to factory workers.
• Kriminalpolizei (Kripo) - "Criminal Police" - In Nazi Germany, it became the national Criminal Police Department for the entire Reich in July 1936. It was merged, along with the Gestapo into the Sicherheitspolizei (SiPo). Later in 1939, it was folded into the RSHA. The Kripo was also known as the "Reich Criminal Police Department" or RKPA.
• Kristallnacht or Reichskristallnacht – Crystal Night; refers to the "Night of Broken Glass", November 9–10, 1938, when mob violence against Jewish people broke out all over Germany.
• Kunstbolschewismus (Art Bolshevism) - derogatory catchword of Nazi propaganda, directed against modern and socially critical art. The term was applied by Hitler himself to painting, in particular: "The Bolshevism of art is the only possible cultural life form and spiritual expression of Bolshevism"; thus, the "officially recognized art" in Bolshevist states was represented by the "sickly outgrowths of insane and debilitated people that we have come to know since the turn of the century as Cubism and Dadaism" (Mein Kampf). Also see: Kulturbolschewismus (Cultural Bolshevism).