Jozefow

A detailed Summary of Jozefow

There is no doubt that during Hitler's reign in Germany, someone killed Jews. Someone ordered the killings, someone organized the killings and someone killed them. Is there a difference in these "someones"? For many years there has been controversy surrounding the extermination of the Jews during the Nazi era. People were tried and convicted for their involvement: some of them denied their contribution, others appeared neutral, and still others were proud of their involvement. These killers came from numerous nationalities, mixed political backgrounds, varied social/economic statuses, and age range. In the article ONE DAY IN JOZEFOW, Initiation to mass murder, the author, Christopher R. Browning, gives his reader an intriguing perspective into the mindset of men who were actually given a choice of whether or not to kill the Jews. Because his perspective only focuses on one specific event, his conclusions are, for the most part, not completely convincing. It is reasonable to believe that there was a stronger underlying force which caused otherwise normal people to become killers during the Nazi era, but Browning's use of minimal sources, skewed numbers and somewhat vague statements, causes the reader to feel they h

For the average American citizen today, Christopher R. Browning's article ONE DAY IN JOZEFOW, Initiation to mass murder provides a intriguing and insightful look into one specific group of Germans that were tranformed from ordinary, overseeing, policemen, to mass murderers in just one day. If the purpose of the article were just to show this remarkable finding, then Browning's article would be incredibly sufficient. The problem is that he attempts to predict the would-be actions of any German official based soley on one groups' action. The fact that members of Reserve Police Battalion 101 chose to continue killing the Jews even after given the opportunity to refuse does not provide enough basis to conclude or predict the actions of any other group. Browning uses minimal sources, skewed numbers and vague statements to support his thesis. Therefore his thesis is, for the most part, unconvincing. If anything at all, it provokes the reader to consider more specifically the reasons WHY these men and all the other murderers of Jews continued to blindly follow orders. Simply stating reasons such as loyalty, need of a job, pursuit of advancement and manliness only minimizes the enormous area that a real study should emcompass.

ave been subjected to a micro-study with macro conclusions.

The statistics given in this article are somewhat shoddy. In some cases it seems that Browning has skewed the numbers to support his thesis. For example, the reader needs to realize that, of the approximately 500 members of Reserve Police Battalion 101, only about 210 of them were included in the records of interrogations. (Browning, 303) This number is less than half of the total battaloin, so when Browning uses words like "majority" and "most" , he is referring to the "majority" or "most" of less than half of the battalion. The reader should consider the missing weight of the study before coming to agreement or disagreement with Browning's statements. Another instance where numbers seem to be missing is in Browning's reference to the NCO's of the battallion. He states that "of the 32 NCO's on whom we have information, 22 were party members but only seven were in the SS." Br

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Approximate Word count = 1474
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: History