B Question Flashcards
Name the 5 themes
East to West
Statical analysts and Secondary resources (language)
Comparison Between Stalinism and Nazism
Jewish and Holocaust History into European history
Connecting victims to the reader
Name all the book reviewers your going to talk about
Ahonen Browning Weinberg Hiroaki Portnov
East to West
Ahonen - points out Snyder showing the need to change the overly western view of the holocaust.
> Snyder makes this point early in preface of the book.
>Snyder claims that these misunderstandings regarding sites and methods of mass killing prevent us from perceiving the horror of the twentieth century.
>makes comparison between “concentration camp” and “death camp”.
> Americans never liberated the major death camps in the Bloodlands.
> Russians liberated Belzec, Treblinka, and Sobibor.
Stats
Browning - notes Snyder’s ability to conduct primary research being able to read secondary material written in every single ethnic language of the borderlands.
> Snyder references an August 1940 German Army General Staff study of the Ukraine that found it to be agriculturally and industrially the most valuable part of the Soviet Union. Nazis believed that if they took the Ukraine no one would be able to starve them again like in the first world war. (Economics of Apocalypse) Motivation General Plan Ost.
> notes that 2,505 people were sentenced for cannibalism in the years 1932-1933 in the Ukraine and he notes that the numbers were probably actually higher. Makes the point of noting despite these states that most people did not succumb to cannibalism. (Ukrainian Famine)
> Notes that the Hunger Plan included the most explicit Nazi language about intentions to kill large numbers of people. (Economics of Apocalypse)
> Reminds the reader that each number is a life that was lost, and had a story. (Conclusion humanity)
> Eye witness testimonies from: German Policeman back to his wife on the feeling of shooting the city’s Jews (final solution)/ Censored ship (Stalinist Anti Semitism)/ Portnov -did not mention Kopelev who tells personal story of Ukrainian famine and soviet war crimes in Eastern Prussia.
Comparing Stalinism with Nazism
Weinberg- Bloodlands in comparison between the two regimes
> Soviets and Germany in the short term realized they would not be able to defeat the British navy and they both would new large land territories in order to build their empire in the presence of the powerful British empire. (Economics of Apocalypse)
> Goring’s four-year hunger plan meant to reverse Stalin’s 5 year plan turning the Ukraine back into a more agrarian society.
> Compares 11.8 Percent survival rate of Germans in Soviet camps after the war oppose to soviets 57.5 survival rate in German camps)
> While Stalin was institutionalizing his revolution while Hitler was building political power by rejecting the institutions around him.
> both blamed capitalism on the great depression.
> collectivization in the early 30’s was treated as a war against Stalins own peasants for a fight for grain, while Hitler looked to attack others for his grain.
> tries to include both of them giving numbers for that include both Soviet death tolls and German death tolls.
> both had reasons to cover the traces of Jewish massacre (ethnic cleansing)
> at times one supported another Snyder claims that Soviet Union’s Collectivization and famine was overshadowed by the rise of Hitler in Germany.
>Russia benefitted from Pogrom in Germany in 1938 because it distracted the world from the Soviet Union’s most recent ethnic murder.
Integration of Jews
Hiroaki- Integrates Jewish and Holocaust history into European History.
> does this by looking at individual scenarios rather than trying over theorize the mass killings.
> Does this by beginning the story of mass killing before the of the holocaust
> Discusses how Jews were being viewed and used as scapegoats for the two ideological regimes. Double occupied territory.
> Snyder describes the interwar political order and geopolitical balances in Europe before discussing the atrocities that took place in the bloodlands. (Andriy Portnov)
Emotional Response
Portnov -Emotional Response and connection to the Victims
> Reminds the reader that each number is a life that was lost, and had a story. (Conclusion humanity)
> Stangl change in appearance of Treblinka, gives a detail description of the experience of Jews walking into a fake train station where they were eventually led to their death. (Nazi Death Factories)
> Straz survivor of Jews amoung Vilnius (Final Solution)
> Janina’s story of her husband and her sister being murdered during the great terror. (Great terror)
> Ukrainian family description of children begging the police to be left to starve and die in the open air and not in the death barracks. (The Soviet Famines)
Name the three Book reviewers who had opinions against Bloodlands
Ahonen
Browning
Evans
Ahonen against
complains that he does not focus enough on the Baltic states although he understands because many more died in the other areas, but he says it perpetuates the relevant English language literature to say rather little about the Baltic states.
> In the Molotov Ribbentrop chapter Snyder notes that Lithuania was one of the most complicated nationality issues and international relations.
>Russia in 1939 played on the emotions of the Lithuania’s to have Vilnius as their capital as long as they could install a military base in Lithuanian territory. From there the Russians imposed a political revolution in which Lithuanian political elite escaped to Nazi Germany. Vilnius was inhabited by mainly Poles, Jews and Belarusians. All seen as potential enemies by the soviets and Germans.
Browning Against
- Not much mention of anti-sematic collaborators. Mark Roseman also points this out in his review.
> In the Final Solution chapter he does mention that in the beginning of the war local militias participated in the in the killing of 19,655 people who were completely unprovoked or encouraged by the Germans.
> also notes that the idea of Jews being communist benefited both the occupiers as well as some of the occupied suggestion local help.
>Ahonen also notes the difficulty Snyder has with such a large scope he may not be able to include this into his story.
Evans against
Soft on the Polish
Anti Russian
Bloodlands made up place
