Genocide in Germany 1933 – 1945
Debra Wei
Block B
The genocide began in 1933, eliminating all Jews, Jehovah’s witnesses, homosexuals, and other “harmful beings to the rise of Germany”. Though many were targeted, Jews were the majority. It was entirely initiated by Adolf Hitler, who was first elected as chancellor of Germany, and then later assumed the dictator position. The reasons were that he believed the Jews were lowering the economical status of Germany, and that they were the reason why Germany suffered a terrible loss from World War I.
I believe the occurrence of this genocide is due to three chief reasons. The Jewish’s mistake for not escaping while they still had opportunities, the people who carried out Hitler’s tasks, and the other large religions who chose not to help. I imagine that if these three mistakes were corrected during the war, the genocide would have hardly gotten far or even gotten anywhere at all.
A large portion of the cause behind the genocide is due to the primary people who obeyed Hitler, the Schutzstaffel officers. These people were in charge of keeping order during the process of murdering the Jews, giving them most of the power to execute Hitler’s tactics. Though it was Hitler himself who conducted his own project, the events would have resulted differently if these men had chosen not to participate, as a man cannot accomplish much without a team. Every single officer had control in their actions, but the fault was that they believed it was for a better cause. As mentioned by Elie Wiesel during the Barbie trial, “the killer had not lost his sense of morality, but his sense of reality”. Furthermore, a misleading fact is that these people were not given a choice, but truth is that many of them were. In fact, it was considered an ‘honor’ to be a Nazi, as being one, you were known as a pure German. This being the idea, many people were eager to participate as officers.
