Hitlers Killing Factories
Hitler's rise to power following World War I was nothing short of mercurial. He was able to rise to this position of dominance by offering Germans a chance to shed the fetters imposed upon them by the Treaty of Versailles. As a master of rhetoric and deception he was able to place the blame for the loss of World War One on the subversive forces within Germany. Number one on this list of subversives were the Jews. Through propaganda in support of nationalism and social Darwinism he made it obvious that Germany must rid itself of negative forces that reduced the purity of the master race. In this way the Jews became scapegoats of Germany's decline and decay socially, politically and militarily. The leaders of the Riech deemed it neccessary to remove the blemish on their pure society, covertly at first and then successively in a more principled and well orchestrated program of genocidal activity, known to them as the Final Solution. Hitler's idea to eradicate the Jews was conceived long before he became Chancellor in 1933. Murdering an entire people was a daunting, but for Hitler, a necessary task designed for the restoration of Germany and the "master race". The logistics and economics behind the plan of mass genocide required th
in protective custody in a concentration camp. Asocial elements who had brought harm to the entire To annihilate millions is a complex process, and therefore efficiency was key to the macabre success of the killing factories. To kill the Jewish masses, time, money and manpower needed to be organized and controlled in order to maintain a quick and efficient "work" schedule. With escalation of war, extermination camps were created following the Wansee meeting as an efficient method in which to eliminate the alleged cause of German shortcomings and shame. Forced labour camps had preceded the establishment of the death camps and although similar in many respects, the division lay in that concentration camps were theoretically for labour while the function of the "resettlement" camps was to generate the assembly-line death needed to facilitate the Final Solution. This "benevolent" explanation of Hoss's (view of Auschwitz) is challenged when compared to the more ruthless camp objectives at Treblinka. "In the minds of its creators, Treblinka, like the five other extermination camps , Auschwitz, Sobibor, Majdanek, Belzec, and Chelmo, had a double vocation: extermination and recovery. Extermination of the Jews and the recovery of their clothing, money, assets and various objects which they managed to bring with them." A meticulous Himmler not only demanded efficient killing centres, he demanded that great care be given to recovering Jewish material goods which was considered lost German wealth. "[He having] observed in the course of a visit to the General Government of Poland that hundred of thousands, even millions of watch crystals were being thrown away when they could have been turned over to German watchmakers." Policy punishments were given to prisoners who were in violation of order and discipline. According to policy a warning was to be given, receiving punishment labour and loss of leisure time. Thirdly, a prisoner could be transferred to the punishment company for a certain time, up to one year. Fourthly, there was detention, followed by hard detention with partial food withdrawal. The sixth option was detention in darkness of up to forty-two days. These punishments were handed down by the camp Kommandant, while the final punishment consisting of corporal punishment, (twenty-five lashes with a cane on the rear) was handed down by order of the camp inspectors or Himmler himself. It seems odd that a place built to systematically murder people had a rigid policy in regards to punishment. The answer to this curious question is apparent in the physical day-to-day operations of Auschwitz and other extermination facilities. Camp policy was but a loose parameter or guide neccessary to mentally instill order amongst the prison staff. The intended objective was to create a favourable environment not for the prisoners, but for the Nazi officials. Combined with self-administration, Jews and criminals governed themselves allowing for a gap to develop between the SS and the condemned. The secrecy of location and intentions reduced prisoner panic, making the loss of life manageable. The threat of violence and death, compounded by malnutrition and filthy conditions, created enforced order and discipline. Combined with the disassociation between Jews and the SS, the killing process operated in an orderly and seemingly incident-free fashion. e investment of excessive amounts of time, labour and money. Despite the high cost of the operation Nazi leaders felt the solution must be imposed in order to cleanse the Fatherland. nation shall be rehabilitated to become useful people again by educating them to order, cleanliness and One of the key cogs in the killing operations at Treblinka was the implementation of self administration. "In order for the camp to run by itself it was neccessary , as in Vilna, to organize it for self administration. The Jews themselves had to be responsible for the output as well as the dis
Some common words found in the essay are:
Hoss Auschwitz, Ultimately Lalka, Kommandant Policy, Death Hoss, Treblinka Auschwitz, Auschwitz Jews, Wannsee January, Call Square, Jehovahs Witness, Helinger Fraudulently, death camps, gas chambers, camp policy, final solution, self administration, extermination camps, concentration camps, killing factories, assembly line, extermination camp, forced labour camps, self administration camp, thousands prisoners arriving, arbeit macht frei, purpose camp doctor,
Approximate Word count = 4613
Approximate Pages = 18 (250 words per page double spaced)
|
