Hitler's Willing Executioners
Fifty years after Adolph Hitler’s failed attempt to exterminate the Jews of
Europe, there still remains no consensus upon the causes of this event. Daniel
Jonah Goldhagen, author of Hilter’s Willing Executioners, attempts to provide a
new approach and new explanations to the perplexing questions left in the
aftermath of 1945. Upon it’s publication, Goldhagen’s thesis came under much
scrutiny by his academic peers. Goldhagen’s argument is that the usual
historical explanations of the Holocaust do not add up. The Holocaust was not
perpetrated by a small band of Nazis but by “ordinary Germans” in the hundreds
of thousands. The abrupt transformation of Germans from bakers, bankers and
bureaucrats to mass murderers was due to a particularly virulent strain of
anti-Semitism. Goldhagen’s indictment focuses on the citizenry’s complicity in
three of Nazi Germany’s institutions of mass killing; the Ordnungspolizie (the
Nazi Police Battalions), the work camps where Jews were incarcerated, and the
death marches from the those camps led by prison guards and their charges
near the end of the war.
While Goldhagen efficiently states the thesis to his dissertation, his
organizational style leaves much to be desired. One of the primary problems
with his style is it’s irritatingly repetitive nature. Goldhagen simply reiterates his
position, particularly in the opening chapters. In these chapter, on no less than
five occasions, he states the need for academicians to “reconceive our
understanding of modern German anti-Semitism by applying the theoretical and
methodological prescriptions enunciated here, including the dimensional
framework, to a more specific analysis of the histor...
... middle of paper ...
...oners. However, these people were
guilty for failing to protest Hitler’s murderous intentions and policies while there
was still time, and for this, they should be ashamed.
Bibliography:
Bibliography
Goldhagen, Daniel Jonah. Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the
Holocaust. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996
Pagination
Complete Pagination: 622 pages
Map Pagination: 8 maps appear throughout the text.
Appedices Pagination: 2 Appendices include 9 total pages.
Indices Pagination: 15 pages
Chart Pagination: N/A
Bibliography: The extended bibliography is found in the Notes section of the work. The
pagination of the note section is 126 pages.
Miscellaneous Pagination:
2 pages entitled Acknowledgement
1 page entitled Pseudonyms
2 pages entitled Abbreviations
2 pages of Photo Credits
Goldhagen's book however, has the merit of opening up a new perspective on ways of viewing the Holocaust, and it is the first to raise crucial questions about the extent to which eliminationist anti-Semitism was present among the German population as a whole. Using extensive testimonies from the perpetrators themselves, it offers a chilling insight into the mental and cognitive structures of hundreds of Germans directly involved in the killing operations. Anti-Semitism plays a primary factor in the argument from Goldhagen, as it is within his belief that anti-Semitism "more or less governed the ideational life of civil society" in pre-Nazi Germany . Goldhagen stated that a
The Third Reich sought the removal of the Jews from Germany and eventually from the world. This removal came in two forms, first through emigration, then through extermination. In David Engel’s The Holocaust: The Third Reich and the Jews, he rationalizes that the annihilation of the Jews by the Germans was a result of how Jews were viewed by the leaders of the Third Reich-- as pathogens that threatened to destroy all humanity. By eliminating the existence of the Jews, the Third Reich believed that it would save the entire world from mortal danger. Through documents such as Franzi Epsteins’s, “Inside Auschwitz-A Memoir,” in The Jew in the Modern World: A Documentary History by Paul Mendes-Flohr and Jehuda Reinharz, one is able to see the struggle of the Jews from a first-hand account. Also, through Rudolf Hoess’s “Commandant of Auschwitz,” one is able to see the perspective of a commandant in Auschwitz. In Auschwitz: A History, Sybille Steinbacher effectively describes the concentration camp of Auschwitz, while Hermann Langbein’s People in Auschwitz reflects on Rudolf Hoess’s power and control in Auschwitz as commandant. Through these four texts, one is able to see the effects that the Third Reich’s Final Solution had on the Jews and the commandants.
Goldhagen, Daniel J. (1997) Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust (Abacus : London)
“He cut into me, without anesthetic, . . .The pain was indescribable. I felt every slice of the knife. Then I saw my kidney pulsating in his hand. I cried like a madman, I cried out the prayer; ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one . . . And I prayed to die, that I might not suffer this agony any more’” (Hall). This was said by a ‘patient’ of Dr. Josef Mengele, Mr.Yitzhak Ganon. Mr. Ganon was of the survivors of the inhumane experiments that took place in Auschwitz by the hand of the abominable man that is Josef Mengele. Josef Mengele was one of the most infamous men associated with the Holocaust, his cruel experiments on prisoners being held at Auschwitz made him widely known for his cruelty, warranting him the title “The Angel of Death.”
During World War II, Germany made an attempt to overrun Europe. What happened when the Nazis came into power and persecuted the Jews in Germany, Austria and Poland is well known as the Holocaust. Here, human's evil side provides one of the scariest occurrences of this century. Adolf Hitler and his Nazi counterparts conducted raids of the ghettos to locate and often exterminate any Jews they found. Although Jews are the most widely known victims of the Holocaust, they were not the only targets. When the war ended, 6 million Jews, Slavs, Gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, Communists, and others targeted by the Nazis, had died in the Holocaust. Most of these deaths occurred in gas chambers and mass shootings. This gruesome attack was motivated mainly by the fear of cultural intermixing which would impurify the "Master Race."
Norton, James R. The Holocaust: Jews, Germany, and the National Socialists. New York: Rosen Pub., 2009. Print.
Bard, Mitchell G., ed. "Introduction." Introduction. The Holocaust. San Diego: Greenhaven, 2001.
They witness the ransacking of Jewish businesses, increasingly anti-Semitic laws, and the surreal atmosphere of a proud ‘new Germany’ as its young Nazi troops gradually devolve into decadence. In such circumstances some individuals are charged with making great moral decisions. While a number of characters escape their duties for the third Reich, it seems that the vast majority of citizens are all too eager to be complicit in these shocking crimes against Jews. It seems that, as is often the case, any text about the Holocaust has as part of its theme the notion that humanity is capable of indescribably evil acts, and can become extremely dangerous when its willing to follow the dictates of authority figures
It should come as no surprise to anybody that the Jewish Holocaust is one of the most appalling crimes against humanity the world will ever know. With a death toll of 11 million people, the Holocaust may not be the reigning champion for most murders, but it remains as a scar on the face of humanity that cannot be removed. Millions killed, simply because a single man who came to extreme power decided he didn’t want them around. The following essay contains a summary of what was learned about it, a review of one of the many novels written about the event, and the main idea we can all take from the Holocaust.
Secondly, the main character, Oskar Schindler, is described correctly throughout the entire movie. In the film, Schindler is a businessman who is apart of the Nazi party. This statement is also true in real life, as one article says, “In February 1939, five months after the German annexation of the Sudetenland, he joined the Nazi Party. An opportunist businessman with a taste for the finer things in life” (“Oskar Schindler”). He bought a Jewish-owned factory during World War II and the Holocaust. Throughout the forced movements of the Jewish people, Schindler tried to keep his workers from being taken. The article states, “Schindler intervened repeatedly on their behalf, through bribes and personal diplomacy, both for the well-being of Jews
Adolf Hitler comes to control in Germany is because of the force of his words. He never uses the beast compel of a firearm; he basically weirds the capacity of his words to get what he needs. Hitler's utilization of manipulative force of words is ostensibly the best ever, ascending to control and getting a large portion of a nation to detest a solitary race. Furthermore, restricting conclusions can stray individuals from the first point; all other capable words must be pulverized to have a totally unprejudiced idea. Close to the start of the novel, Jewish books are singed in the interest of the Fuhrer in a gigantic blaze. The reason for the campfire is to annihilate the stories and words that restrict the lessons of Adolf Hitler, since he understands
Understanding the Nazi regime’s decision-making process involves comprehending the level of Adolf Hitler’s involvement and the German state’s assistance in legalizing and executing policies of annihilation. While Hitler played a central role in instigating the Holocaust, he was not the only agent involved. Reliance on political, military and popular support ensured the radical Nazi dictatorship achieved its primary initiative. Through the analysis of three sources, one essay (Perpetrators of the Holocaust: a Historiography, by Claus-Christian W. Szejnmann), one academic and historical (How Could This Happen: Explaining the
Hitler was a guy that may have seemed nice on the outside but really he is a guy that turned lives upside down. Many people were feared of Hitler because he was a terrible and evil guy. He destroyed millions of people's lives because he did not agree with what they believed in. The Jews, Gypsies, Homosexuals, Disabled people, And Jehovah's Witness were all the victims of Hitler. He believed that they did not make a good image for him.
One of the darkest episodes in the recorded history of mankind was the Nazi effort at systematic extermination of the Jewish race. This notorious act mostly took place in concentration or extermination camps. This paper will analyze the location, infrastructure, conditions, people involved and the brutal nature of three concentration camps- Auschwitz, Treblinka and Chelmno.
On July 13, 1942, the Jewish community of Jozefow, Poland was annihilated by Reserve Police Battalion 101, who was working with Einsatzgruppen, the most fanatical members of the SS. This group received orders to collect the town’s Jews and to kill them all, except for the young boys who could perform labor. Christopher Browning’s arguments in his essay, Reserve Police Battalion 101, reveal that the humans who partook in the killings of Jews were just humans doing typical things. They were blindly obedient and pressured by their peers. Also, when people are around their friends, they can have a tendency to be less moral and humane.