Chapter 23- The Final Solution Flashcards
July 1942
Jews rounded up in Vichy France to be sent to the death camps
Origins of the final solution
Nazi ideology ensured ethnic cleansing
Kristallnacht (9-10th Nov 1938) opened the door for open violence agains jews
Invasion of Poland and Eastern Europe ensured racial annihilation
Urgency in 1941 due to failed plans to send Jews to Siberia or Madagascar (overcrowding in Poland)
Wannsee Conference Jan 1942
Meant to be in Dec 1941, Soviet counter offensive pushed it back
Heydrich was the leading Nazi (Second in command of SS behind Himmler)
the decision to implement the final solution was very likely made just after Barbarossa (22nd June 1941)
objective was to let Nazi officials know what to do with genocide and prepare for it
Significance of Feb 1942- Feb 1943
More than half of all jews killed was between these dates
expectation vs reality when the war turned against Germany
Expectation: Killings would slow and focus on war effort
reality: killings accelerated
nazi propaganda became more hateful
“Total War” speech
Goebbels delivered it in Berlin in spring 1943 after the Germany surrender in Stalingrad (feb 1943)
What followed after was a massive surge of hateful Nazi propaganda
Significance of Summer 1944 on Propaganda
Allied landing in France led to a surge of anti-Jewish propaganda
Destruction of Auschwitz
When soviets entered Poland, the Nazis blew up the crematoria and tried to cover auschwitz up
June 1944
the sheer size of Birkenau made it impossible to fully destroy
Difference between Concentration camps and Death camps
Concentration camps:
brutal conditions but used for labour. effectively prisons
housed political prisoners of all kind
Death camps:
space organised for the systematic killings of people
Untermenschen
Literally ‘sub-human’
everyone the Nazis considered racially inferior
% and figure of Auschwitz victims
1/5 of all Holocaust victims died In Auschwitz
Between 1.1 and 1.8 million people
Zyklon B
A form of poisonous cyanide gas
Originally designed as a weapon for a weapon in WW1
used in Gas chambers
Revolt at Sobibor
800 escaped in 1943 after a revolt
resistance at Auschwitz
1944- prisoners blew up crematorium 4
Death camps
6
sites of extermination
all in Poland
Trainlines ran all over Europe. Longest distance was to Greece and the journey took 7 days
Chelmno
40 Miles East of Lodz
Established in Dec 1941
At first used Gas Vans and Carbon monoxide until development of Zyklon B in 1942
145k died there
Majdanek
Near Lublin
Built in 1940 as a KZ
From late 1941 (soviet counter offensive) it was changed into a death camp
200k died there. 60% Jews. Others POWs and Polish political prisoners
Belzec
South Poland
originally a labour camp
used as a death camp from 1942 to 1943
500k+ Jews killed and thousands of Gypsies
Sobibor
Built near Lublin as part of construction programme decided at Wannsee
250k victims
Mostly Jews and Soviet POWs
oct 1943- revolt. camp closed soon after
Auschwitz
Few miles West of Krakow
Became main camp in 1943
400k Hungarians died there
1.1-1.8 million total victims
Auschwitz was a KZ
Birkenau was a Death camp
1944 crematorium 4 blown up by prisoners
Treblinka
75 miles from Warsaw
operated from July 1942-Sept 1943
almost 1 million killed there
300k jews from Warsaw
later Jews from all over Europe
No survivors
Auschwitz 3
Site of ammo and resource production
SS were dependent on the things produced here
Sonderkommando
Jewish prisoners forced to work in gas chambers and crematoria, periodically executed to eliminate witnesses.
