Nazis

Question 1

What percentage of the German population were Jewish before WWII?

Answer 1

0.76%

Question 2

What is the Theory of Vital Space?

Answer 2

○ The East was the natural expansion for Germans as they considered the Slavic populations worth to be enslaved or eradicated
Idea the Germans had the right as the Aryan race

Question 3

What was the General Government?

Answer 3

When Poland was invaded, it was split into the annexed territories and the General Government. Initially, the General Government was a resettlement space for Jews in the Reich.

Question 4

What did Generalplan Ost entail?

Answer 4

German aims in the East:
- Re-ordering of Eastern Europe
- Expulsion of Jews and undesirables e.g., Gypsies and Slavs
- Germanization of the remaining:
○ 80% of Poles
○ 50% of Czechs 
○ 50% of Russians 
30% of Ukrainians

Question 5

What was Operation Tannenberg?

Answer 5

The SS given orders to eliminate the clerical, political, aristocratic and military leadership of Poland

Question 6

What does Shelley Baranowski say about the invasion of Poland?

Answer 6

“the German attack was an ideologically motivated total war aimed at the destruction of the polish nation”

Question 7

What is Operation Barbarossa?

Answer 7

The invasion of the USSR on the 22nd June 1941. Also the largest war operation ever.

Question 8

What did Hitler deem the war in the East?

Answer 8

A war of annihilation

Question 9

What is Kommissabefeh?

Answer 9

German soldiers ordered to kill political commissars, Jews, the soviet secret police - reminiscent of Operation Tannenberg

Question 10

What is Reichenau?

Answer 10

German soldiers not persecuted for crimes against civilians

Question 11

Why was the USSR an enemy of Nazism?

Answer 11

Because the basis of Bolshevism was seen to be Jewry and this was to be eliminated

Question 12

What role did the Einsatzgruppen play in Operation Barbarossa?

Answer 12

4 groups of between 600-1000 men were deployed as systematic death squads to kill male Jews. This extended to all Jews, including women and children, as the war progressed. A similar technique was deployed in Poland

Question 13

By the end of 1941, how many police were deployed in battalions within the USSR?

Answer 13

33,000

Question 14

What does Ian Kershaw deem the two crucial decisions taken by the Nazis?

Answer 14

1. To kill the Jews of the USSR

2. To extend this killing to the whole of Europe

Question 15

What did Hitler believe the end of the Jews would bring?

Answer 15

Salvation for Germany. This is because he believed Jewry was the root cause of both WWI and WWII.

Question 16

What was unique about Poland’s population for the Nazis?

Answer 16

Ethnic Germans were a minority.

Question 17

What was the initial plan for the final solution?

Answer 17

TO round up all Jews and dump them in far-east Poland - genocidal implications as they had no intentions of sustaining the Jewish population once they reached their destination

Question 18

Can we be sure when the decision to enact the final solution took place?

Answer 18

No, due to the high levels of secrecy among party leaders. Camouflage language and hushed tones meant very few people knew of the actual plans. Instead, historians base their findings of circumstantial evidence.
Ian Kershaw argues it was a series of authorizations that culminated in a decision.

Question 19

When the Germans invaded Poland how many Jews did they now “contend” with?

Answer 19

3.25 million

Question 20

After the initial final solution was disproved, what was the second idea?

Answer 20

To relocate them to Madagascar but this failed after the counter-offensive in the West increased. An increasing number of Jews also meant it was logistically impossible/extremely hard

Question 21

After the invasion of the USSR, how many more Jews succumbed to Nazi rule?

Answer 21

1 million more

Question 22

Why did the Nazis hope for a rapid victory over the USSR?

Answer 22

So as to quickly “resettle” the ever-increasing number of Jews in Siberia and enact “racial cleansing” on an unprecedented scale

Question 23

How many people did the Nazis plan to “resettle” in Siberia?

Answer 23

31 million over the next 25 years but they did not account for the 5-6 million Jews who seemingly disappeared in the first few years

Question 24

In the summer of 1941, what did the term “final solution” mean?

Answer 24

It meant territorial resettlement with genocidal implications. Now in the East instead of Madagascar.

Question 25

Why was there a move away from the General Government?

Answer 25

To make way for Polish Workers

Question 26

In what ways was the USSR a salvation mission for the Nazis?

Answer 26

As they were controlled by Bolsheviks they wanted to “restore peace to a country that suffered from the oppression of a criminal Jewish group”

Question 27

In September 1941, what did Hitler order that radicalized the treatment of Jews further?

Answer 27

The deportation of all Reich Jews. Jews in ghettos incapable of work - i.e., the elderly, children or the infirm- now killed

Question 28

In September 1941, what instructions were given as how to treat Jews?

Answer 28

Those being sent Jews were told to act as “they saw fit”. Many began to act as they imagined they should and mass shooting now spread beyond the USSR

Question 29

Why was the use of gas introduced?

Answer 29

In Himmler’s eyes, it was more humane for the killers. Gas-vans were employed and according to Kershaw, the fundamental decision to kill Europe’s Jews had been taken.

Question 30

Why was deportation to Siberia abandoned?

Answer 30

Because in September the Soviets launched a strong counter-offensive

Question 31

Why was Pearl Harbour so significant for the holocaust?

Answer 31

Because it signified American entry to the war and in 1939, Hitler “prophesied” that if there was t o be another world war, the Jews would be decimated. America’s entry meant warfare was now global and the Jews had to be destroyed as a “necessary consequence”

Question 32

What does Ian Kershaw say would have happened if the Soviets conceded defeat?

Answer 32

“If the invasion of the Soviet Union proceeded as the German leadership hoped it would, the “final solution” known to history would not have taken that particular form.” - “only the method and timing would have differed” - BUT they would have suffered the same fate

Question 33

According to Baranowski, what was the first use of Einsatzgruppen? What did this signify?

Answer 33

To combat “anti-german elements” in Poland. Signified the first aggression against non-German Jews - directed/targeted sentiments that were to worsen

Question 34

In what ways did the German invasion of Poland reflect European colonialism?

Answer 34

Baranowski:
Economic exploitation, exploitation of labour, expulsion of indigenous peoples, the suspension of European “warfare” rules in the fight against subordinate savages. For Baranowski, Poland was the first trial of “Nazi colonialism”

Question 35

For Baranowski, the East offered the Germans the opportunity to do what?

Answer 35

“undo the shame of Versailles”