Big surprise he had a liking of Nazism. For some bizarre reason, a lot of Nazis got their jollies from the combination of eros and thanatos. Men were almost required to be domineering during that period, and the younger soldiers (and Hitler Youth) were exposed to all of the violence and blatant sadism while discovering their own sexual preferences. It’s part of the reason why Richie Ramirez came out a sexual sadist - his cousin showed him photos of them torturing and raping the women and girls in Vietnam while he was going through puberty.
You make an interesting point about the appeal of sadism to the young.
Fully 2/3s of Germans were under the age of 40 when Adolf Hitler came to power.