Recently I've been reading up a lot on all things Nazi related. Set aside their genocidal hatred for the Jews, I remain confused about their political ideology. I've heard from left leaning sources they were far right lunatics and from right leaning sources that they were in fact more left wing due to socialism part of their ideology. I think we can all agree that the extreme nationalism and racial fascism qualifies as far right/authoritarianism, however Hitler famously despised Marxists so I don't understand the socialism title they gave themselves. I've heard other explanations calling them extreme authoritarians or completely syncratic (removed from classic political scales). Any answer would be appreciated, thank you
This simple division left / right is absurd.
Nationalism and socialism were often mixed. Various national-socialist parties were quite common from the end of 19th century up to min of 20th century in all European countries. Italian fascism and german nazis had socialist roots. However it was not marxist socialism, it was application of socialist ideology to organize society inside a national state. Spanish frankism or authoritative regime in Austria after 1933 or Horty's regime were based on different principles. Stalin during war started openly support Russian nationalism even though he was not Russian but Georgian. And after WW II "socialist patriotism" was official part of communist ideology in all communist states. And you should understand that in Europe the concept of nation has different meanings. French or Spanish concept of nation is different from German, Czech or Catalonian and it is all far from American (US) concept.