Nazi Terror + Holocaust Flashcards
What law enabled Nazi control of the people?
(4)
28th Feb 1933, The Decree for the Protection of the People and State;
- allowed Nazis to ban publications
- suspended civil rights; Nazis could search homes + workplaces, take people into ‘protective custody’ without trial
- –> initially intended as a short term emergency measure but never lifted
What was the struggle for power in the Nazi police?
(5)
- 1932, Von Papen allowed government to take over the running of police in Prussia
- Frick was Reich Interior Minister; should be in charge of police
- Göring was the Prussian Interior Minister; in charge of the Prussian police
- April 1933, Göring created the Gestapo
- Frick wanted to build a national police force but was undermined by Göring in Prussia
How was the power struggle in the Nazi police resolved?
(5)
- April 1934, Göring appointed Heinrich Himmler as inspector of the Gestapo; largely unimportant, to help Göring in struggle against Frick –> gave Himmler a foothold in state police
- 1936, Himmler was appointed the head of German Police
= struggle resolved in Himmler’s favour, not Frick or Göring - 1939, Himmler made Reich Commissioner for strengthening German Nationhood = major powers in conquered German territories (Poland)
- 1943, Himmler replaced Frick as Minister of the Interior
- 1944, (after July Bomb Plot) Himmler appointed Commander of the Reserve Army (army at home to deal with uprisings)
Police reorganisation
(3)
- 1936, orpo (ordinary police forces) reorganised under Kurt Daluege
- 1936, sipo (security police) reorganised under Reinhard Heydrich; Kripo (criminal police) + Gestapo
- 1939, RSHA Reich Security Head Office set up (RSHA); brought together Gestapo, Kripo, SD (part of SS)
What was the SD?
(4)
- party organisation
- security police
- part of SS
- brought together with police in RSHA = fusion of party + state
SS expansion
- 1938, Waffen SS set up; SS’s own armed force, state within a state
- 1939, Waffen SS has 23,000 soldiers (in 1 year)
- 1944, Waffen SS has 800,000 soldiers
Who was the target of concentration camps?
(4)
- 1933, intially targetted political prisoners; often released after a year or so unless communists
- mis 1930s, shift to those who threatened the Völk; Jehova’s witnesses, homosexuals, habitual/petty criminals, asocials
- 1939, outbreak of war; rearrested those arrested in 1938, gypsies, suspected saboteurs, threats to regime in wartime (many communists + socialists rearrested), work shy people
- 1941, Operation Barbarossa; increase in Soviet POWs (treated horribly, used for slave labour)
What happened to Jews after Kristallnacht?
1938, large number of Jews arrested and released immediately after
How did the outbreak of WWII impact concentration camps?
(3)
- executions began; before some deaths due to overcrowding, but prisoners weren’t executed
- many new camps set up; eg. Auschwitz set up in 1940
- 1935-1941, 10 fold increase in number of arrests
How were concentration camps run?
(4)
- run by SS
- inmates exploited for slave labour (eg. 1941, Auschwitz prisoners used by IG Farben to make rubber)
- 1942, at Wannsee Conference camps split into 2; economic + extermination aims (unofficially began before)
- high mortality rate in non-death camps
What happened to the population of concentration camps after the Wannsee Conference?
- 1942, wannsee Conference; found official solution to the ‘problem of the Jews’ = exterminsation
- –> massive increase in population of camps
- end of 1942; 88,000 inmates
- Aug 1943; 224,000 inmates
Origins of Hitler’s racist ideas
(3)
- Social Darwinism; popular pseudoscience, struggle between races, Aryans as the ‘master race’
- stab in the back myth; idea that Germany was stabbed in the back during WWI by communists & Jews –> poisonous link between Judaism and communism (Trotsky, Zinoviev)
- Blood Libel; myth that Jews killed young Christian boys to drink their blood
Early Nazi discrimination against Jews
(4)
- 1st April 1933, boycott of Jewish shops; not very popular, result of post-election SA violence, calmed down SA
- 7th April 1933, Jews banned from civil service
- soon ban was extended to other professions (doctors, journalists, lawyers, some exceptions made for Jewish doctors who had served in WWI)
- 1933, Law against the overcrowding of schools; limited number of Jewish students to less than 1.5% –> little effect as overall population of Jews was <1%, local initiatives’ response to pressure from extremist Nazis
Nuremburg Laws
(3)
September 1935, at Nuremburg Rally Hitler announced;
- Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honour; forbade mixed marriages and sex between Aryans and Jews
- Reich Citizenship Law; deprived Jews of German citizenship + right to vote
- Law for the Protection of the Genetic Health of the German People; needed medical examination + health certificate before marriage, medical centres to be set up to measure whether people were Aryan
What was the attitude towards Jews in 1936?
(2)
- 1936 Berlin hosted Olympics = international focus on Germany; regime discouraged open attacks on Jews but attacks on a local level continued
- 1936 was a key year for the German economy; regime decided to try and avoid global condamnation and economic sanctions
What was the attitude towards Jews in 1937?
(3)
- 1937, German economy had improved as gearing up for war = persecution of Jews intensifies
- Sept 1937, Hitler fiercely attacked Jews at the Nuremburg rallies
- Schacht resigned; critical of anti-Jewish economic measures
How did Anschluß affect the treatment of Jews?
(3)
March 1938, Anschluß with Austria;
- large Jewish population in Vienna = Nazis became more drastic
- Central Office for Jewish Emmigration based in Vienna; Heydrich + Eichmann, forced many Viennese Jews to leave Austria
- –> replicated for whole reich in less than a year; Jan 1939, Reich Central Office for Jewish Emmigration set up
What were the causes of Kristallnacht?
(3)
- officially triggered by the murder of German diplomat, Ernst Von Rath by Jewish teen in Paris, Nov 1938
- in reality Göbbels had an affair with a Czech actress and had fallen out of favour with Hitler = personal advancement
- Stormtroopers (SA) growing bored of rallies
What happened at Kristallnacht?
(4)
November 1938;
- Jewish homes, shops, synagogues attacked
- 100 Jews murdered
- 20,000 Jews subsequently sent to concentration camps but shortly released
- Jews fined 1 billion RM for the damages caused
Decrees against Jews passed in 1938
(5)
- Jewish professionals banned from having Aryan patients/clients
- Jews to add Sarah or Israel to their names
- identity cards of Jews to be stamped with a J
- Jews banned from trades, shops, businesses
- Jews excluded from schools, universities, cinemas, sports facilities
(attack on Jewish economic life)
How did the outbreak of war (invaasion of Poland 1939) affect the treatment of Jews?
(5)
- 1st Sept 1939, invasion of Poland; tightening of restrictions on Jews
- German Jews placed under curfew + radios confiscated
- Heydrich ordered movement of Jews to areas near railway junctions; to be transported easily
- 3 mil Jews in Poland = more extreme policies
- –> Polish Jews moved to ghettos
Einsatzgruppen
(4)
- special task forces of the security police (killing squads)
- operated in German occupied territories
- main task = to shoot hostile elements, particularly Jews and communists
- 1939-1943, shot over 2 mil civilians; 1.5 mil Jews
How did war generally affect Jews?
(4)
- brutalisation; people accepted killings more openly
- public opinion decreased in importance
- increased number of Jews because of newly conquered territory
- foreign opinion did not matter any longer
Policies against Jews after the outbreak of war
post 1939 (7)
- 1939, Himmler ordered Jews to be removed from north-west Poland to southern areas
- ration books of Jews stamped with a J; denied access to certain good (eg. leather)
- 1940, Heydrich planned to transport 1/2 mil Jews to Madagascar; Hitler very keen, logistically unfeasible due to war
- mid 1941, decision to embark on ‘final solution’ announced by Göring
- Sept 1941, all Jews forced to wear a star of David
- Oct 1941, emmigration banned; mass deportation of German Jews to the east begun
- Jan 1942, Wannsee Conference; final solution planned, chaired by Heydrich
How did the German invasion of the USSR affect the treatment of Jews?
(2)
June 1941, embarked upon Operation Barbarossa;
- Einsatzgruppen permitted to kill any suspected enemies
- within 8 months, 700,000 Jews killed
extermination camps
listed (6)
- Belzec
- Chelmno
- Treblinka
- Sobibor
- Majdanek
- Auschwitz
–> Nazis went to great lengths to hide their actions; in Treblinka buried bodies were dug up and burnt to hide evidence
How were asocials targeted?
(1)
- made to wear black triangles in concentration camps
How were homosexuals targeted?
(4)
- 1936, The Reich Central Office for the Combatting of Homosexuality and Abortion created
- 1937, Himmler tried to place all gay members of the SA in concentration camps, some shot for trying to escape
- made to wear pink triangles
- many used for experiments
(most hostility towards gays, not lesbians)
How were gypsies targeted?
(2)
- also sent to ghettos (5,000)
- 1/2 million killed by the end of the regime
How were the mentally ill targeted?
(2)
- Jul 1933, law for the compulsory sterilisation of the mentally ill
- 1940-1941, 70,000 mentally ill people were gassed
How were the disabled targeted?
(3)
- Sept 1939, T4 euthanasia programme began for disabled children
- 1941 programme publically ended, yet continued in secret
- by 1944, 200,000 disabled children killed
Sterlisation
(5)
- 1st Jan 1934, compulsory sterilisation programme began for all deemed ‘unfit’ to breed; hereditary defects, Jews, gypsies, criminals, black people, mixed race people
- June 1935, law widened to allow for the aboortion of the unfit
- publicised; press, public meetings, taught in schools
- 1934-1945, 400,000 people sterilised, almost all against their will
- at least 5,000 died from procedure (mostly women)
