The purpose of this paper is to provide the contemporary German high school student with a thorough explanation of the events that defined the Holocaust and the National Socialist ideology that created it. Our sincere intention is to truthfully present to you what was an aberration in German history. Every society since the dawn of human civilization has witnessed a period in their history when individuals have perpetrated injustice and inhumanity towards those within their reach.
As the reunified peaceful nation of Germany embarks on the 21st century, a milestone has been reached where its young people can honestly and critically analyze the sordid facts that surrounded the Holocaust. The value of truth is immeasurable because it contains the very essence of freedom. It is within this context that we present to you as sensitively as possible these events which forever transformed the people of Germany.
Adolf Hitler remarks in Mein Kampf that "to learn history means to seek and find the forces which are the causes leading to those effects which we subsequently perceive as historical events." (1) However, there is a danger in studying history, in that we attempt to impose our contemporary views on past events. This danger is all too real when attempting to address the study of the Holocaust. Likewise, viewing the Holocaust as a simple cause and effect event, an unfortunate atrocity of war, can be misleading. How therefore, do we begin to learn about and understand the Holocaust?
We must understand that the Holocaust was the result of a carefully considered, methodically planned political movement that began following Germany's defeat in World War I. The first attempt of a democratic form of government in the history of Germany was met with skepticism, ignorance and fear. Widespread dissatisfaction with the Weimar Republic manifested itself due to a perceived powerlessness to the threat of communism, contempt caused by the Versailles Treaty combined with runaway inflation of the early twenties (due in part to a conceived Jewish conspiracy). Organized opposition to the Weimar Government was born in early 1919 and thus the genesis of the National Socialist movement.
The political opponents to the Weimar regime were numerous and their condemnation for accepting the terms of the Versailles Treaty unanimous. The terms that followed the surrender of Germany in the Great War placed a heavy burden on the Weimar Republic in many areas. Article 231 of the Versailles Treaty was the most difficult to absorb. This clause mandated that Germany financially reimburse the Soviet Union, England, France and the rest of the Allied nations for the damage caused to them by German aggression. (2 ) Itself tremendously ravaged by the war's destruction, Germany's descent into economic turmoil was ensured. By 1923, exorbitant inflation reduced the German mark to stove kindling.
Many of the problems faced by this new bureaucracy were created out of the inexperience of running a free society and in many instances relied heavily on old authoritative measures to establish economic and political stability. One such drastic measure was Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution. This broad based power allowed for the President of the Republic in times of social crisis to "take such measures as are deemed necessary to restore public safety and order." The intentional ambiguity of this decree created the suspension of parliamentarian procedure after 1930 and eventually allowed Hitler to constitutionally gain dictatorial powers after his ascendancy in 1933. (3)
By the time Hitler became the Chancellor, the National Socialist Party had as its policy goals three major tenets. This triangle of Nazi policy included the "absorption or dissolution of the labor unions and all other social, cultural, and other organizations within Germany which were not already dominated by the Nazis, the development of a society structured on a racial basis and the immediately inaugurated preparations for war."(4 )The next step was to convince the German public that these policies would be the salvation of Germany. To do this, Hitler and his minions created an elaborate propaganda campaign that was to eventually envelope the daily workings of Nazi Germany.
The effectiveness of Hitler's propaganda machine was a result of its years of practice and fine tuning during the early development of the Nazi Party. In an attempt to cull the masses, the Nazis exploited the concept of the Volksgemeinschaft. Each member of the Aryan race was to unequivocally accept the Volk ideology and its incumbent duty to honor the purity of the blood; the value of the soil and the worth of the community. The Volk was an ideal used to "engineer the conversion of a society of fractured traditions, social classes and environments into an achievement-oriented community primed for self-sacrifice."(5) To truly belong to the Volk, one had to believe in blood honor, martyrdom and the absence of class distinction. Hitler and other members of the Nazi Party infused into the minds of their followers these doctrines of National Socialistic idealism. "True idealism is nothing but the subordination of the interests and life of the individual to the community." (6) Any deviation to these basic beliefs would be considered a crime against the state and would be dealt with appropriately.
Accordingly, the propagandists delved heavily into the honor accorded those who died so that Germany might live. While this theme is evident in classical German literature and music, the Nazi party would repeatedly exploit it throughout their party rhetoric. In particular, the Nazis used blood honor and martyrdom as a bridge between the fallen heroes of the Great War and the generation that would redeem Germany. The use of this myth as a bridge is best exemplified by the rallies and memorials held in honor of the dead of Langemarck. More than a memorial for the fallen sons of World War I, these rallies exposed Germany's new sons to the idea that "death in battle not only guaranteed eternal life for the martyr but also acted as a resurgent life force for the Fatherland."(7) The importance of this bridge was further emphasized when the Hitler Youth and veterans of Langemarck gathered at the memorial services in 1935. In what has been termed a propaganda tour de force the "flag was passed from generation to generation...it was a great day to rejoice in the resurrection of the martyrs and the young nation...because the German dead have risen." (8)
While Langemarck provided the historical framework for the reverence of blood honor, Hitler's propagandists realized that every movement must claim for itself its own martyrs. The dead of the Feldherrnhalle would accomplish this for the Nazis. The putsch of 9 November 1923 would result in the deaths of sixteen party members, but more importantly became the cornerstone of the myth of the Nazi martyr. The sixteen dead were given the elevated status of Immortals, for they sacrificed their lives for the greater good of Germany.
The sacrifice of the Immortals was memorialized and revered at subsequent marches marking the anniversary of their sacrifice. However, the climax of their martyrdom would be realized in 1935. Hitler ordered the exhumation and return to Munich of the remains of the Immortals. In Munich they would occupy the newly constructed Temple of Honor and be watched over by an eternal guard. The pageantry of the ceremonies would become the model for all Nazi ceremonies of the future. The internment would take place at midnight, under the glow of oil burning pylons and hand held torches. Artificial light was not permitted. Nazi flags lined the processional route. The ceremony was masked in an aura of religiosity. The triumvirate of battle, sacrifice and resurrection replaced the Christian trio of Father, Son and Holy Ghost.
The Nazi liturgy for all future memorials and rallies was now established. The liturgical format adopted by the Nazi propaganda machine was purely intentional. The liturgy as propaganda served to fulfill what Hitler considered the basic tenet of effective propaganda, repetition. As Hitler concedes, "the most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly and with unflagging attention. It must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over." (9)
The Immortals of the Feldherrnhalle provided the Nazi propaganda machine with another cause celebre. The sixteen dead represented various social backgrounds. Some were poorly educated, some had doctorates. The two youngest were nineteen and the oldest was fifty. Their occupations ranged from manual laborer to a judge on the Bavarian Supreme Court. However, they were all "united in a common hatred and contempt for the Republic, Marxism, and, in many cases, for the Jews." (10) These sixteen were the embodiment of Hitler's Volk. Their immortality would serve as a constant reminder of the credibility of National Socialism. The Nazi party was truly the only party that embraced "all classes united by Germanic blood.(11)
The blood of Langemarck and the blood of the Immortals, Germanic blood, represented the endangered species that Hitler sought to preserve, his Volk. This need to proliferate Germanic blood, pure blood, was at the heart of Nazi racial propaganda. By defining the essence of the Volk as its pure bloodedness, Hitler formulated the beginning of the final solution. The purpose of the Volk became "to segregate and eventually eradicate (ausmerzen) all those who, on real or imaginary grounds, could not be allowed entry into the Volksgemeinschaft - 'aliens', 'incurable' political opponents, the 'asocial' and the Jews."(12 )In this sense, it is not the final solution of the Jewish question, but the final solution of the non-Aryan question.
The ideology that gave birth to the National Socialist movement was rooted in Darwinian inspired theory. Hitler differed however from Charles Darwin by using race as the determining factor in the eventual superiority of individuals. The National Socialists led by Hitler portrayed the German people as the founders of human culture. "All the human culture, all the results of arts, science, and technology, that we see before us today, are almost exclusively the creative product of the Aryan."(13) Thus all other races are subservient to the Aryan.
The exploitation of racial differences is apparent throughout propaganda films such as the anti-Semitic The Eternal Jew and the pro-National Socialist Pour le Merite. These films, and others, provided a visual basis for the distinction of races upon which the masses could rely. Moreover, the assignment of these distinctions were based upon familiar anti-Semitic, anti-Slavic, and anti-Bolshevik sentiments. In fact, sentiment and social issues played a large part in the determination of racial superiority.
The idyllic Aryan was of Nordic descent, strong, healthy and socially useful. That is to say the Aryan's usefulness consisted "of obedience to the paramount norms of hard work, conformist behaviour, orderliness and efficiency."(14) In theory, these qualities could not be found in the racially inferior classes. Standing at the forefront as the antithesis to the Aryan ideal is the Jew. For the National Socialist the Jew is consumed by the self-preservation of his own ego. While the German is willing to make sacrifices for the good of the community and venerate the Fatherland, the Jew can not be a good German citizen by virtue of his Jewish nationalism. He is consumed by the prospect of the Messiah leading him back to the Holy Land. He can not reconcile his Jewish citizenship with that of his host country because the Jew's allegiance is to his people and his religion.(15) Gypsies, Slavs and countless others were likewise despised by the Aryan. Therefore, the promotion of Aryanism needed to address the elimination of inferior races.
To this end, the Nazi Party created a system of classification based upon racial indicators. Eugenics, the pseudo-scientific application of social-Darwinism, sought to identify racially pure and impure classes. As in other instances, Eugenics created an opportunity for the propagandists. Racial propaganda was not merely used to ferret out undesirables, but to extol Nazi virtues. This is most evident in the encouragement given to German women to return to the work of keeping house and bearing children. German women who supported this campaign, most notably by giving birth to children of the Reich, were awarded with the Cross of Motherhood. Thus Nazi propagandists were able to highlight the "positive and constructive side of their racial scheme." (16)
National Socialist racial propaganda was immersed in images of blood. The blood of the Langemarck and Feldherrnhalle gave rise to the blood of the Volk. The blood of the Volk, pure Germanic blood, could not allow itself to be contaminated by the racially inferior. Therefore, something had to be done regarding the racially inferior classes. The mixture of ideology and propaganda resulted in an action plan, Eugenics. The constant reengineering and improvement of this plan enabled Nazi racial policy and propaganda to begin the implementation of Hitler's new world order.
The new world order envisioned by Hitler was one governed by the Aryan race. In order for the Aryans to reign supreme, there was an immediate need to strengthen their numbers. Concurrently, there existed a need to eliminate the possibility of racial contamination. If the source of contamination was eradicated, so was the threat. In an astounding application of German engineering, programs were devised and implemented to address these needs.
The Nazi's master plan to produce a superior race not only included the elimination of what they considered sub-human, but the complete extermination of every life deemed inadequate, including Aryan. "Those who are physically and mentally unhealthy and unworthy must not perpetuate their suffering in the body of their children." (17) Hitler used mandatory sterilization as a litmus test in gauging the public's reaction to the master plan of racial purity. This led to the implementation of the sterilization laws in July 1933. Under the premise that "only the healthy begat children" (18) thousands of German children were enrolled in exclusive, special schools for the "mentally deficient" and thus targeted for sterilization.
It was the responsibility of the school's instructors to justify to the children's parents that they are "unfit for purposes of propagating the race." (19) The instructors explained Hitler's rationalization for strengthening the Aryan race by insisting that "it is a crime and hence a disgrace" to dishonor one's own Fatherland by retarding the goal of eliminating the "germs of our present physical and spiritual decay." (20)
"Wartime", Hitler suggested, "was the best time for the elimination of the incurably ill."(21) The objections expected by the German religious community would be easier to manage in a state of war. The physically and mentally handicapped were not only viewed as useless to society but posed as great a threat to Aryan genetic purity as did the sub-human races. March of 1935 was the first time Hitler confirmed his objective to end the lives of these threats to the Third Reich through euthanasia.(22) The NSDAP twisted the meaning of euthanasia to conceal mass murder. The term is usually defined as the merciful termination of a human life void of cerebral activity.
Soon after the German armed forces' invasion of Poland, the plans to murder the weak and undesirable were secretly put into motion. The infamous decree signed in October 1939 expanded "the authority of physicians, to be designated by name, to the end that patients considered incurable in the best available human judgment, after critical evaluation of their state of health, may be granted a merciful death."(23) The euthanasia program, also known as the T-4 program after the address of the program's Berlin headquarters at Tiergartenstrasse 4, became the model for the mass murder of all people designated as sub-human by the National Socialists. Since Hitler would issue no law legalizing such forced "euthanasia", and since physicians would hesitate or refuse to take part in killing unless they had written protection from later prosecution, Hitler was persuaded to sign this document on his personal stationary instructing Reich Leader Philipp Bouhl and Dr. Karl Brandt to initiate this program.(24)
The euthanasia program consisted of doctors who reviewed the medical files of patients in institutions to determine which handicapped or mentally ill individuals should be killed. These same doctors also supervised the actual killings. Doomed patients were transferred to six institutions in Germany and Austria, where they were killed in specially constructed gas chambers. Handicapped infants and small children were also killed by injection with a deadly dose of drugs. The bodies of these victims were then burned in large crematoria ovens.
Despite the Nazis attempt to keep the program concealed, the public did learn about it two years later, but that did not deter the continuation of the genocide until the War's conclusion. The Lutheran Church's vigorous protest over euthanasia did not deter the eventual total of over 200,000 murders of handicapped infants, children and elderly among others. The Church characterized these victims as people who were often times "by no means not fit for work." These were "people who for years led productive lives."(25)
Another clandestine Nazi program was the antithesis of the euthanasia program. Lebensborn was at the very heart of the National Socialist movement whereby the "most talented, the most beautiful pure blood of the Aryan race would be produced and become the crown jewel of humanity."(26) Heinrich Himmler the SS Reichsfürher, developed the idea of selective breeding.
Young women who possessed the qualities of pure Aryan stock were urged to bear children for Hitler and the Fatherland. After proving their untainted blood over several generations, these married and unmarried women would be paired with members of the SS (many times much older and married) in hopes of populating a "master race."(27) It was viewed as the ultimate honor for a young woman to give birth to a soldier's newborn son who may never return. Twelve Lebensborn (Spring of Life) homes were set up throughout Germany during the Third Reich. Pregnant mothers arrived for a four to six month stay after swearing that they had not had sexual relations with anyone but the Aryan who fathered the child. These breeding farms produced an estimated 11,000 babies in the ten years between 1935-1945. Many times these newborn babies were taken from their mothers to be placed with families of SS soldiers.
Lebensborn began to extend it's crimes against humanity by stealing Polish, Czech and French children with the same physical characteristics as German born children. Over 200,000 mostly Polish children were kidnapped from the only families they ever knew. They were sent first to special "Kiddie Concentration Camps" were they received an extensive examination to determine racial purity, intelligence and physical attributes. They were then divided into three categories. Those who passed the tests and conformed to Himmler's specifications were sent to "Germanization" institutions. These camps were set up to educate these victims in the language and culture of Nazi Germany. Those unfortunate souls who did not meet the expectations of the SS were dealt one of two fates. Either they were taken to a child labor camp and became part of the work force, or would be immediately put to death.
In the aftermath of these atrocities, perpetrated by Himmler's SS, the Nüremberg Trials cleared those responsible of murder and kidnapping. They were simply convicted of running a continuous criminal enterprise. What the Nüremberg Trials did not reveal were the eye witness accounts of starvation and malnutrition, hundreds of cases of exposure, hypothermia and even children who presumed dead, died instead of suffocation by being buried alive.(28)
The horrific loss of life the Nazi concentration and extermination camps perpetrated on the peoples of Europe are beyond anything human civilization has ever had to endure. When the killing was completed between 14 to 16 million Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals and other civilian sub-humans deemed racially inferior lost their lives. Soviet Prisoners of War, Catholic Clergy, Jehovah's Witnesses, political enemies of the state and those designated as unable to work were also included as victims of the Nazis plan to purge Europe of inferiors to make room for their new world order.(29)
Soon after Hitler accepted the duties of Chancellor in January 1933 the Nazi concentration camps were created to remove from society those vocally opposed to the NSDAP. The prisoners of these camps were made to serve as slave labor while being indoctrinated in National Socialist ideology. From the proven success of the euthanasia program the focus of many concentration camps assumed a similar destiny as early as 1938.
The Polish invasion camps in Sobibor, Treblinka, Belzec and Chelmo were created expressly for the purpose of mass genocide. Auschwitz-Birkenau and Majdanek, initially created as concentration camps took on the added duties of extermination as well. These camps employed a number of techniques to terminate the lives of prisoners. Lining up the victims in front of mass graves before mowing them down by machine gun fire was the first method employed. As this proved to be too much trouble and chaotic, another technique was developed. Victims were poisoned while being transported to their final destination. An SS commando unit in Chelmo murdered over 150,000 Jews using the carbon monoxide from these specially constructed vans which guided the deadly exhaust into the passenger section.(30)
The method that proved to be the most efficient at completing Hitler's goal of racial purity was the gas chamber. Unlike the euthanasia program, the extermination camps used the concentrated form of the acidic insecticide Zyklon B. After countless hours of travel via train in human "cattle" cars (which a significant portion of the passangers would not survive) the unsuspecting victims were quickly divided into groups that determined whether they would die painfully quick or suffer a slow torturous death through slave labor complicated by malnutrition and disease.(31)
In a totalitarian state such as Nazi Germany, public acceptance by German citizens of implemented policy was impossible to gauge. Near universal acceptance of policies such as the persecution of non-Aryan races and sterilization were enjoyed at least publicly by the NSDAP with the threat of ostricization looming overhead. Since it was important to secure favorable public opinion, there were programs that from the beginning the Nazi's would not risk losing their people's respect. This would necessitate implementing more drastic measures under the most stringent secrecy.
What made the Nazi movement strikingly different from other political movements was its desire to give tangible form to its ideology. It wasn't enough to say that one was anti-Semitic, anti-Slavic, anti-Bolshevik or anti-anything not Germanic. To the Nazi Party, ideology without action was useless and action without the appearance of popular support was intolerable. The carefully planned propaganda campaigns carried out by Goebbels served to garner the illusion of solidarity and support that would be needed to engineer a program of Germanization. For in the end, the Holocaust was not about killing Jews. It was about creating room for a new master race.
By all accounts, the Jews were the most numerous victims of Nazi racial policy. However, we must remember that they were not the only victims. Poles, Belorussians, Ukrainians, Slavs and countless others faced similar fates. In the eyes of Nazi Germany, they too were racially inferior. To understand the implications of the final solution, let us envision a victorious Nazi Germany. A victory implies that there would be no Jews left in the territories controlled by Nazi Germany. Therefore, the Nazi racial policies would be "applied to other racial groups considered racially inferior but whose labor on farms, in industry or in mines was still needed for a time until they could be replaced by Germans."(32) The replacements were being produced in the Lebensborn programs.
Accordingly, the propaganda surrounding the implementation of Nazi Germany's racial ideology was focused on one ultimate goal. The elimination of racially inferior peoples would create the necessary room for the cultivation and sustainment of the Aryan race. The Nazi Party would create a New World Order. Yet, in the aftermath, this New World Order "was little more than a slave empire, a vast system of organized oppression, exploitation, and extermination. Not a single humane ideal inspired it. All it left was a trail of hideous and unspeakable crimes."(33)
In 1979, Frank Brandenburg, a sixteen year old German High School Student from Hildesheim, West Germany, casually began to watch on television an American made documentary simply titled "The Holocaust." Before this time Brandenburg had no knowledge of the specific events which had transpired in the Nazi Concentration Camps and Extermination Camps. "What he saw and heard horrified him. It filled him with a mixture of resentment and disbelief. And questions. Mostly questions. Could it be true? Could it have been so? Could such things have happened? In his country? His people?"(36)
After an odyssey that lasted over seven years, and included interviewing some of the highest ranking surviving Nazi leaders, Brandenburg verified that these "unspeakable crimes against humanity"(37) did indeed occur under Hitler's regime. This project culminated in 1990 with the publication of Quest: Searching for the Truth of Germany's Nazi Past.
Frank Brandenburg embodies the spirit of the contemporary German youth. A spirit that does not claim as their own the misdeeds of their grandfathers. A spirit that places at its summit that all human beings, regardless of their ancestry, have an unequivocal right to a life free from persecution. A spirit that finally recognizes that a nation that can not learn from its past can not effectively provide for its future.
The specter of Hitler and Nazi Germany still looms over the Germany of today. No doubt there are many who still hold Germany responsible for the acts committed a half century ago. But to ironically quote Hitler, "Isn't the very idea of responsibility bound up with the individual?"(38) The responsibility for the Holocaust belongs with the perpetrators. The responsibility for ensuring that such a program remains history, and is not repeated, lies within each of us.
"The young German generation does not regard Germany's history as a burden but as a challenge for the future. They are prepared to shoulder their responsibility. But they refuse to acknowledge a collective guilt for the deeds of their fathers. We should welcome this development". (Gerhard Schroeder, former German Prime Minister)
Notes 1. Hitler, Adolf, Mein Kampf, Translated by Ralph Manheim, Houghton Mifflin Company: Boston, 1971, pg. 14.
2. Sax, Benjamin; Kuntz, Dieter, Inside Hitler's Germany: A Documentary History of Life in the Third Reich, D.C. Heath and Company: Lexington, MA, 1992, pg. 48.
3. ibid. pg. 54.
4. Weinberg, Gerhard L.,Germany, Hitler and World War II, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1995, pg. 71.
5. Peukert, Detleu, J.K., Inside Nazi Germany-Confromity, Opposition and Racism in Everyday Life, Yale University Press: New Haven, 1987, pg. 209.
6. Hitler, Adolf, Mein Kampf, Translated by Ralph Manheim, Houghton Mifflin Company: Boston, 1971, pg. ?.
7. Baird, Jay, W., To Die For Germany: Heroes in the Nazi Pantheon, Indiana Univesity Press: Bloomington, 1990, pg. 2.
8. ibid pg. 10-11.
9. Hitler, Adolf, Mein Kampf, Translated by Ralph Manheim, Houghton Mifflin Company: Boston, 1971, pg. 184.
10. Baird, Jay, W., To Die For Germany: Heroes in the Nazi Pantheon, Indiana Univesity Press: Bloomington, 1990, pg. 46.
11. ibid pg. 46.
12. Peukert, Detleu, J.K., Inside Nazi Germany-Confromity, Opposition and Racism in Everyday Life, Yale University Press: New Haven, 1987, pg. 209.
13. Hitler, Adolf, Mein Kampf, Translated by Ralph Manheim, Houghton Mifflin Company: Boston, 1971, pg. ?.
14. Peukert, Detleu, J.K., Inside Nazi Germany-Confromity, Opposition and Racism in Everyday Life, Yale University Press: New Haven, 1987, pg. 217.
15. Lecture 7/11/96.
16. Peukert, Detleu, J.K., Inside Nazi Germany-Confromity, Opposition and Racism in Everyday Life, Yale University Press: New Haven, 1987, pg. 216.
17. Hitler, Adolf, Mein Kampf, Translated by Ralph Manheim, Houghton Mifflin Company: Boston, 1971, pg. 404.
18. ibid pg. 403.
19. Sax, Benjamin; Kuntz, Dieter, Inside Hitler's Germany: A Documentary History of Life in the Third Reich, D.C. Heath and Company: Lexington, MA, 1992, pg. 212.
20. Hitler, Adolf, Mein Kampf, Translated by Ralph Manheim, Houghton Mifflin Company: Boston, 1971, pg. 404-5.
21. Friedlander, Henry, The Origins of Nazi Genocide: From Euthanasia to the Final Solution., University of North Carolina Press: Chapel Hill, 1995, p.42.
22. Sax, Benjamin; Kuntz, Dieter, Inside Hitler's Germany: A Documentary History of Life in the Third Reich, D.C. Heath and Company: Lexington, MA, 1992, pg. 214.
23. ibid pg. 221.
24. Friedlander, Henry, The Origins of Nazi Genocide: From Euthanasia to the Final Solution., University of North Carolina Press: Chapel Hill, 1995, p.67.
25. Sax, Benjamin; Kuntz, Dieter, Inside Hitler's Germany: A Documentary History of Life in the Third Reich, D.C. Heath and Company: Lexington, MA, 1992, pg. 217.
26. D 7/16/96.
27. Ibid.
28, D 7/18/96
29. Sax, Benjamin; Kuntz, Dieter, Inside Hitler's Germany: A Documentary History of Life in the Third Reich, D.C. Heath and Company: Lexington, MA, 1992, pg. 432.
30. Ibid pg. 428.
31. Ibid pg. 430.
