The 'Final Solution' Flashcards
Summarise what took place during the ‘Final Solution’ 1942-45
-Implemented to the ‘Jewish Question’
-Mass killings, ghettoisation and deportations, were coordinated into a bureaucratic killing-machine.
-5-6 mill systematically murdered, mostly Jews: from the Soviet Union after it was overrun by German forces; from the countries that were under Nazi occupation, such as Poland, France and Hungary; and from Germany itself.
-Included other victims: Soviet prisoners of war, Gypsies, the disabled and the dissidents regarded by the Nazis as ‘asocial elements, or social undesirables.
-Even when defeated 1944, the killings accelerated, ending only when allies liberated camps 1945
Explain how the course of WW2 from 1940 onwards led to a radicalisation of Holocaust policies
-Complex and deep rooted.
-H’s ideological goals = fixed before 1933
-Reichkristallnacht Nov 1938 opened the way for increasingly violent persecution.
-For the Holocaust to take place WW2 = an essential precondition.
-H explicitly linked the war in Europe with the fate of the Jews.
-When the decision was taken late in 1940 to turn the war eastwards against the Soviet Union = clear that this would be a war of racial annihilation.
-End of 1941, regime had to face the fact that the complete conquest of the Soviet Union = not achieved, final victory would have to wait until the summer of 1942 at the earliest.
-Previous plans to send millions of deported Jews to be resettled on the island of Madagascar or in Siberia abandoned.
-Clear that vast no. Jews already deported to the General Government area of Poland = too many for auth there to cope with.
-Urgency of the problems facing regime late in 1941 -> radical new policies.
Outline the debate that surrounds the purpose of this meeting
-Key moment in implementation of systematic murder = Wannsee Conference 20th Jan 1942.
-The importance of conference = frequently misrepresented as the occasion when final decision was taken to exterminate Europe’s Jews.
-In reality = a meeting to inform senior bureaucrats of their roles in implementing a decision that had already been taken.
-Most historians agree that the decision came fairly soon after the invasion of the Soviet Union on 22 June.
-Exactly what that decision was = matter of controversy and debate:
-Was it the signal for a new policy of all-out genocide?
-Or a decision to widen the existing programme of deportations to ‘reservations’ somewhere in the east?
-Or was it a sudden emergency decision, forced by the fact that the German conquest of the Soviet Union had unexpectedly stalled?
What was the role of Reinhard Heydrich?
-The secret meeting comprised 15 high-ranking Nazi officials.
-Hitler and Himmler were not in attendance - chairman = Reinhard Heydrich, most powerful man in the SS after Heinrich Himmler.
-Heydrich received orders from Goering - empowering him to organise the preparations for the Final Solution’ to the Jewish question.
-Some historians believe that the driving force was an unwritten order from H
-Others speculate Heydrich was involved in empire building, acting on his own
initiative to enhance his power and authority.
What happened after the conference?
-Seemed to prove purpose of the meeting = to clarify the previously confused situation concerning deportations to the east.
-Heydrich thought meeting = great success.
-Civilian authorities were all willing to follow lead of the RSHA (Reich Security Head Office) and did not make objections.
-Deportation of Jews = no longer to vague destinations somewhere in Poland, but specific areas where there was an organised camp system.
-The way was open to coordinate and accelerate mass killings.
-More than half of all Jews to die in the Holocaust were exterminated between Feb 1942-43.
What effect did the German war effort have on the Holocaust?
-When war turned against Germany in 1942-43, it may have been expected that the regime would slacken attempts to exterminate the Jews and focus their efforts on fighting the Allies.
-Mass killings accelerated and were given higher priority than military needs.
-Nazi propaganda = even more hate-filled than before.
-The intensification of the Nazi propaganda war against the Jews ran in
parallel with the periods of crisis in Germany’s war effort.
- Spring 1943: After the Ger surrender at Stalingrad in Feb 1943, Goebbels delivered ‘Total War’ speech in Berlin in mid-Feb - followed by mass propaganda drive in Nazi press.
- Autumn 1943: When Ger suffered from mass bombing raids and Red Army beginning to push back Ger forces in the E, another similar surge of anti-Jewish propaganda occurred.
- Summer 1944: At time of Allied landings in Fr = another surge.
