It is estimated that by the end of 1942, they had killed more than a million Soviet Jews. These victims were shot or loaded into enclosed trucks modified for the introduction of carbon monoxide to asphyxiate its victims. An additional 400,000 were killed by other SS units, anti-Semitic native civilians, police units, and the German army. One example of the Einsatzgruppen mass executions was Babi Yar. Thousands of Jews on the outskirts of Kiev were rounded up and mowed down by machine guns. The records of the Einsatzgruppen unit which participated in the executions recorded that 33,771 Jews were killed at Babi Yar on September 29-30. In all, more than 100,000 people, most of them Jews, were executed at Babi Yar between 1941-1943 by the Nazis.
The aim of the Final Solution was to murder all the Jews of Europe. In this the Nazis’ failed, despite the terrifyingly high death toll. The “Final Solution” was an extreme idea by the Nazis which was devastating on Jewish population.
(3) Study Sources A, D and E. How far do these sources agree about the reaction of German people to the Nazi’s treatment of the Jews in the years
1937-42 ?
Source A is about the treatment of Jews in 1939. It was written at the time and because it is a letter it was not intended for an audience so there is no reason for it to contain misleading information. It is about how the Jews were transported to the police station. On the way some crowds shouted abuse but the majority remained silent.
Source D suggests that if ordinary Germans were helping or were seen with Jews then they were scared of the consequences because somebody might denounce them to the Nazis. The attitude of the ordinary Germans was fast changing against the Jewish community.
Source E implies that the German attitude had changed rapidly from the years 1939-42. The extremely angry had become indifferent which could be due to numerous reasons. Firstly, because the public opinion could have just changed. Secondly, and more likely, is that people were now happier with the harsher treatment of the Jews and now fell into the indifference category. The approval rate however stayed the same from 1939-42.
The sources agree and disagree to a certain extent about the reaction of German people to the Nazis treatment of the Jews in the years 1937-42. They agree on several points. Sources A, D and E all agree that there was indifference in Germany. In source A it states that the majority remained silent and in Source E 32% of the NSDAP members show indifference. In Source D the Germans never came back to the compartment also stating indifference.
Anger is show in Sources A and E. The crowd are angry and shouted abuse at the Jews in Source A. In Source E the extreme anger column represent 63%. These sources tell us that people were not satisfied with the way in which the Jewish community were treated. They were angry about the treatment of Jews and were actively involved in bringing about even sinister conditions for the Jews.
Sources D and E tell us that although most people did not support the Nazi treatment of Jews, they were not willing to show objection either, they were passively involved. This is pointed out in Source E in 1942’s indifference row. Source D states this in “They never came back to that compartment”.
Sources A and D represent the victims prospective who are in a better position to asses everything. Personal accounts are better source in this case because Source E is an NSDAP (Nazi party) survey. So this source should be questioned because of who the survey was carried out by. The Nazi party were also in the minority. Other problems with the accuracy of this source is that from 1938-1942 the members of the party would have changed and thus representing different opinions than before.
Source A is more useful in understanding the treatment of Jews in Germany because it is written in 1939 unlike Source D which was written half a century later in 1989. Source D has the benefit of hindsight and some details could have been lost due to the time gap.
All the Sources tell us something about the treatment of Jews. But none of the sources contain any conclusive evidence about the reaction of the Germans as they do not provide the bigger picture.
(4) How useful are Sources F, G and H in explaining the reactions of Germans to the ‘Final Solution’ ?
(5) Study Sources I and J. In what ways do these sources contradict or support the view that ordinary Germans knew about and supported the ”Final Solution”?
Both of the sources, I and J, indicate the view that ordinary Germans knew about and supported the “Final Solution”.
Source I explains the numbers required to transport and maintain control of the Jews. It also goes on to state the amounts of clothing which was being collected from Auschwitz and distributed between the German population. Source I does not obviously state German support or knowledge but only hints at this. This is implicated by the different sets of clothing “collected from the gassed at Auschwitz” and distributed among Germans.
Source J states that there was a particular code widespread in Hitler’s Germany, about how people did not talk about what they knew and nor were questions being asked. Even if the were then they received no answers. Source J, in contrast to Source I, makes no attempt at hiding the fact that Germans knew about the “Final Solution”, “those who knew”. But support is show in the form of “ignorance”.
In Source I support and knowledge of the “Final Solution” among ordinary Germans is shown. Clothing was collected from the “gassed at Auschwitz” and “distributed on Germany’s Home Front”. The numbers of clothing were extraordinary over just a six week period, “222,269 sets of men’s suits and underclothes, 192,652 sets of women’s clothing and 99,922 sets of children’s clothing”. With this amount of clothing being provided for the Germans they must have questioned where it came from.
Another - more conclusive - piece of evidence can be extracted from the source. “ those damned Jews, they wont even let one sleep at night”. This statement was recorded when crowded trains were rattling through the hours of darkness. It conclusively shows that there was knowledge of what was happening to the Jews, but because it was a daily occurrence it had become nuisance. Before this statement there is a line saying “Most Germans knew the significance” of the trains so most Germans must have know exactly what fate awaited the Jews.
Apart from knowledge, support is also clearly represented in the source. This strong support is implemented by the figures. “There were 900,000 of them in the SS alone, plus another 1,200,000 involved in the railways”. There is over two million people in the SS and railways alone who would have known exactly what was happening in the Death/Concentration Camps. By participating there is strong support shown. These men on the railways and in the SS would have told what they knew to a relative or a friend. This would have spread fresh knowledge.
Source J is different because it is split up by the layers of knowledge within Germany. There is a divide of knowledge because different Germans have different access to government propaganda.
Support and knowledge of the “Final Solution” is shown much more clearly in this source. The Source claims that everybody had some idea of what was going on. Even if there was little understanding of what was being done about the Jewish problem, there was still knowledge because “those who did not know did not ask questions”. This suggests to me that there was still a vague of what was going on and that is why they “did not ask questions”.
Support is harder to interpret because it is stated in the form of ignorance. “German citizen won and defended his ignorance”. The public were not actively supporting the treatment of Jews but a passive attitude towards the situation could
have been interpreted as ignorance. Also if Germans succeeded in being ignorant then this shows that they still support the Nazi’s.
The support and knowledge in Source I is much less obviously than in
Source J. It lets the reader interpret this for themselves and gives hints such as the figures.
Both of the sources in question are from a victims prospective. This is significant because the victims would want to find a guilty party to be responsible for the suffering they have suffered. Sources I and J are both from a Jewish prospective. Source I is an extract from the book ‘The History of the Jews’ and was written in 1980 with the advantage of hindsight. Source J however has no date but was definitely after 1945 because it was lecture. It was by a Holocaust survivor, Primo Levi, answering the question ‘Did the Germans know what was happening’. His answer might have been clouded by the fact that he was a Holocaust survivor. But he also had first hand experience of event and this source ties in with the Source J. They both say the same thing that ordinary Germans knew about and supported the “Final Solution” but state it in different forms, layers and figures.
(6) ‘Most Germans supported and sustained the ‘Final Solution’. Use all the sources and your own knowledge to explain whether you agree or disagree with this interpretation?
The statement, ‘Most Germans supported and sustained the ‘Final Solution’ is correct to some extent. In order to answer this question I will have to use all the Sources, A-J, as well as my own knowledge. I will be talking about which people were supportive, if any, the knowledge they had and weather the Germans were involved actively or passively in the sustaining the ‘Final Solution’. I will also be outlining the choices that Germans had and principal things that were necessary in order for the extermination of the Jews to occur.
For the extermination of the Jews to occur, four principal factors were necessary:
1.The Nazis - that is, the leadership, specifically Hitler - had to decide to undertake the extermination.
2. They had to gain control over the Jews, namely over the territory in which they resided.
3. They had to organise the extermination and devote to it sufficient resources.
4. They had to induce a large number of people to carry out the killings.
The SS men or other people who were carrying out the killings were left, by the threat of punishment, with no choice but to follow orders. They were part of institutions with a strict chain of command, demanding subordinate compliance to orders, which would have punished severely, perhaps with death. Put a gun to anyone's head, so goes the thinking, and he will shoot others to save himself. This could be a reason to why large numbers of people were carrying out killings and why people “who knew did not talk”.
Although the entire German population was not in agreement with Hitler's
persecution of the Jews, there is no evidence of any large scale protest regarding their treatment. There were Germans who defied the April 1st, 1933 boycott and purposely bought in Jewish stores, and there were those who aided Jews to escape and to hide, but their number was very small.
Within Germany, opposition to Hitler was predominately by two different groups. The first comprised those individuals who felt a moral or philosophical objection to the Nazi state and thus defied it openly or passively. Members of the Evangelical Church formed a splinter institution - Confessing Church - that openly opposed Nazi racism and brutality.
Students and teachers at the University of Munich formed an underground resistance movement (“The White Rose”) but were eventually apprehended and executed in April 1943. Socialists and Communists who had escaped Nazi roundups also fought the fascist government, although with negligible results.
The second type of German resistance to Hitler came from highly placed individuals who believed that Hitler's leadership and methods had grown erratic and thus threatened Germany. This group, which included civil servants, military staff officers of various ranks, engaged in a conspiracy to remove him.
At no point, however, was there a unified resistance movement within Germany to prevent the ‘Final Solution’.
The support within Germany came from different groups and the type of support was also different. There were two types of support that existed in Germany:
- Active - taking a direct part, involved directly in bringing about the
‘Final Solution’. Examples of this would be ordinary Germans denouncing the Jews. The SS were an example of active involvement.
- Passive - Not wanting to do anything. Letting things happens without approval or disapproval. Examples of this would be an ordinary German who has little interest in what happens to the Jews.
The main active support for the ‘Final Solution’ was by SS men, Einsatzgruppen or "Special Action Squads", the railway operators who helped transport the Jewish population to the Death camps and other Germans who were directly involved with the ‘Final Solution’. All these groups were actively involved because they had knowledge of what was happening and still opted to help. But this support might not have been out of choice but out of the fear of death.
The passive support came from most ordinary Germans who were not helping to transport or exterminate the Jewish race. These were the people who did nothing about what was happening and had little interest in the fate of the Jews. An example of a passive attitude towards the Jewish is represented in Source I, “ those damned Jews, they wont even let one sleep at night”.
Nazi persecution of Jews and other opponents were common knowledge in Germany. Thus, for example, everyone knew about the Boycott of April 1st 1933, The Night of the Broken Glass (Kistallnacht) 9th November 1938 and the Nuremberg Laws of 1935, because they were fully publicised. Moreover, offenders were often publicly punished and shamed. The same holds true for subsequent anti-Jewish measures. The Night of the Broken Glass, (Kistallnacht) 9th November 1938, was a public pogrom, carried out in full view of the entire population. While information on the concentration camps was not publicised, a great deal of information was available to the German public, and the treatment of the inmates was generally known, although exact details were not easily obtained.
As for the implementation of the "Final Solution" and the murder of other undesirable elements, the situation was different. The Nazis attempted to keep the murders a secret and, therefore, took precautionary measures to ensure that they would not be publicised. Their efforts, however, were only partially successful. This is because there was knowledge of the ‘Final Solution’ available to ordinary Germans as indicated in Source J.
As far as the Jews were concerned, it was common knowledge in Germany that they had disappeared after having been sent to the East. It was not exactly clear to large segments of the German population what had happened to them. On the other hand, there were thousands upon thousands of Germans who participated in and/or witnessed the implementation of the ‘Final Solution’ either as members of the SS, the Einsatzgruppen, death camp or concentration camp guards and as police in occupied Europe.
I conclude that Most Germans did not supported or sustained the ‘Final Solution’ because there was only a proportion of Germans that actually did. Most of Germany was passive in their response to the Jewish problem. This is not support but it still shows knowledge and ignorance among the German population. The passive attitude, although did not support the ‘Final Solution’, still sustained it. If questions were asked and protests carried out successfully then there would have been a chance of stopping the ‘Final Solution’ and extermination of about 6 million European Jews.
