In What Ways Did The Nazis Attempt To Eliminate All The Jews In Europe From 1941 Onwards?

History coursework

Hitler and the Nazis used various different ways to eliminate the Jews. Methods such as the final solution, Einsatzgruppen, concentration camps, death camps were the main ones that were used. Beforehand the method used wasn’t as bleak. The Jews were treated with the worst conditions making their lives agonizing and therefore making them move to other countries. Other ways were liquidizing the Jews into Ghettos where they were easily controlled. Ghettos were part of the deprived living space with the worst conditions prepared for the isolation of the Jews, widely established throughout the years of 1940 and 1941. This became a failure afterwards as the Nazis invaded countries with vast populations of Jews – Poland, USSR; this meant that the Ghettos were overfilled. After nearly all the Jews in Germany had been eliminated, Hitler stepped up his attack on them making his way into Eastern Europe. So the problem of containing the Jews arose, and the Einsatzgruppen was put forward. The Einsatzgruppen were groups of highly trained SS men which were put forward to annihilate the Jews. This plan killed 1 million Jews in total. However the role of the Einsatzgruppen was found too inefficient, and with the upcoming war: too costly for the Nazis, making the Final solution. This is where the holocaust originally developed its roots. It was also an even more aggressive annihilation of the Jews than before. Generally, the final solution is known as the mass murder of all the Jews in Europe. The Final solution was made at the Wannsee Conference in 1942. Following on from the conference the method of using death camps was evolved. In this essay I am going to outline these methods and how they changed as time and Hitler’s attempts of elimination progressed to worse from the years 1941 onwards.

The idea of the final solution had long existed right from the beginning of the Nazi rein. As soon as the Nazis came to power the persecution of the Jews began, Anti-Semitist views were spread throughout Germany and this enabled the Nazis to act how they desired as the view on the Jews was purely negative. The first signs of the tactics proposed in the method of the final solution are seen in the Nuremberg laws, where the state legalizes racism and strips the Jews of any legal power. Another is when Kristallnacht - Night of the Broken Glass happens, the day when around 100 Jews were murdered and thousands of synagogues were destroyed. This firmly gives the Jews a bad name and attacks them economically as well as socially making them outcasts in German society, this attack also breaches on the Jews cultural aspects .

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A main one that outweighs the rest is the Einsatzgruppen; this was the isolation of the Jewish community from the German making further signs of an attempted murder and destruction of the Jews. Heinich Himmler, the SS chief arranged for the murder of the Jews on the streets. His four specially trained groups known as the Einsatzgruppen were sent into German occupied territory and were made to shoot Jews. A figure of 1 million Jews is shown to be the sum of the killings made by the Einsatzgruppen. Methods of purposeful violence to eliminate Jews from society can be acknowledged from the limits that the Einsatzgruppen went to: when they ran out of bullets they used flame throwers. Source F shows the descriptions of the actions of the Einsatzgruppe summed up by an eye-witness account of a German builder. The source is from Germany, 1941. Source F doesn’t suggest that the use of the Einsatzgruppen was systematic; this is because we have no other information or resource that backs up this view to prove that this method was used continuously. Also returning to the previous point of flame throwers being used, the procedures used must have not been entirely systematic as they were not prepared to the full as their bullets ran out. On the other hand the source supports the fact that they shot Jews-“I heard I series of riffle shots”, this shows that they were organized with the methods they used for their killing operations.

Further on, the Nazis introduced the final solution. This was initially the final act in which total destruction of the Jewish race within the European community was to take place. The final solution itself was decided by the Nazi leaders and held at a conference at Wannsee. The Final solution was the decided policy in which the all the Jews under Nazi control would be exterminated. The aim of the conference was to kill 11 million Jews. The “final solution” was also the code name for extermination the Jews, this was done in order to make sure other countries would not interfere and cause conflict.

Succeeding from this conference, a new method of killing the Jews was made. The concentration camps before were the basis of hard labor and attacking the political opponents that the Nazis had. Although they were used for slave labor many died from starvation, disease or through being murdered. Many of the Jews were tricked into thinking that they would have a good life elsewhere. Large trucks and trains were used to transport the Jews into the camps. Men and women were separate and their belongings were taken away. Selection took place straightly afterwards by the SS doctors: people were divided into group’s which consisted of those who were able to work and those who would not. Those who were able to work were taken to the quarantee, and then they were assigned to where they would work and given uniform. Those who were selected for death were taken to the showers to “disinfected”. The showers themselves were the gas chambers. Afterwards the bodies from the gas chambers were burned in the crematoria. Source I shows a photograph of a crematoria in Auschwitz extermination camp. The photograph itself shows a mal-nourished Jewish person about to be put into a crematorium. The photograph clearly links with the facts that we know as it shows how slave labor killed the Jews (destruction through work) and how badly fed the laborers were.

These methods were now to be used in a more efficient way because from that time onward the Jews wanted to exterminate the Jews completely. Relating back to the source, the extermination camps which were introduced as the “more efficient way” were much harsher than the concentration camps. Also because there were so many bodies the Nazis decided that it would be better for them to dispose of them by burning them instead of burial. There were many changes made throughout the gas chambers to make sure that the extermination process was much quicker. The Jews also worked for the German firms and were part of the discovering Zyklon B which was the gas used to kill the Jews in less time as the carbon monoxide used previously. Source H, the memoirs of Rudolf Hoss, who was the commandant of Auschwitz camp, shows information on some of the methods used to kill the Jews. Carbon monoxide as previously mentioned was replaced in camps in order to kill the Jews more quickly, and they also used larger gas chambers to make sure the amounts they killed were as big as possible. Quoting “… build gas chambers that could hold 2,000 people”. When the death camps came into existence they were built in remote areas of Eastern Europe. Then, arrangements were mad for the Jews to be rounded up. Jews were collected throughout Germany and every part of Nazi controlled Europe. All the Jews that had to be rounded up were sent to death camps.

While the Nazis made their way into Europe, Figures from Source J show that the vast majority of the Jews were from Poland. This can be related to the fact that Poland was one of the first countries that the Nazis invaded from the break of war. It can also be seen that most of the death camps are likely to be located there. This shows how secretive the Nazis in order to achieve what they wanted. Also the death camps are very likely to have been located there because they didn’t want conflict in the act of another country standing up against them. The source also shows how the Nazis attacked the countries most known to have the highest population of the Jews; this shows how eager they were to make the final solution become reality.

Overall, the Nazis used concentration camps, death camps, ghettos and mostly the final solution. Concentration camps were to make life unbearable for the Jews and to hurt them physically while making them destructed through too much work. They made ghettos have the harshest conditions and made sure that all the Jews were cramped together. This was in order to make the Jews, move away to other countries. There had been an idea that that the Jews should be transported to other countries such as Madagascar, but this was turn down as the other countries did not agree and were not welcoming. The final solution came into existence when the Nazis came to face hard economical pressure making them over think what they were to do to the Jews. The decision of not keeping them alive any longer was the final word. Leading on from this the idea of the final solution was in exsitence

The Nazis used many methods to eliminate all the Jews in Europe from 1941 onwards. They used concentration camps, Ghettos, Death camps, Einsatzgruppen (murder squads) and the Final Solution. The Final Solution was the plan to annihilate all the Jews out of Europe. This was also known as the mass murder of the Jews (Genocide). The persecution of the Jews was applied in stages. After the Nazi party achieved power, state enforced racism resulted in anti-Jewish legislation, boycotts, "Aryanization," Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass) programme, all of which was aimed towards the Jewish population, specifically to isolate them from the German society and to drive them out of the German area. After the June 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union, Einsatzgruppen (mobile killing units) began killing operations...

In what ways did the Nazis attempt to eliminate all Jews in Europe from 1941 onwards? By 1942 Hitler was advancing into Europe conquering countries and gaining more under his control. However more and more opposition were starting to fight back and Hitler knew that this war was not going to be as easier as expected. Because of the sheer number of Jews captured by Hitler, was massive. Containing them was going to be a problem if the Jewish population continued to rise, so the SS used several methods. Ghettoes were used earlier in the war by Hitler in a bid to control the Jews. Ghettoes were usually a small area of cities where Jews were forced to leave together with fellow Jews. The Ghettoes were designed to control the Jewish population and isolate them from the outside world. No Jews could leave the Ghettoes and those caught were killed. Living conditions...

. The Nazis also attempted to control them inside Ghettos. They were even trying to deport them to the African country of Madagascar. There were major problems with this. One was that the countries they invaded had large populations of Jews. This meant that the Ghettos would be even more packed than before. Their plan to deport the Jews to the African country of Madagascar wasn't carried out because of the outbreak of War. The Jews were unable to move to other countries because the other countries didn't want to take them into their countries.

Before 1941, the Nazis used one main method to eradicate the Jewish population in Nazi controlled Europe. They attempted to make life for the Jews unbearable so that they would move to other countries

During the years 1939-45 the treatment of Jews got a lot worse from small 'accidental' killings to eventually the total removal of the Jewish race.

They also set up transportation systems to the concentration/death camps from the ghettos.