- Who carried out the 'Final Solution?' Why?
- Who bears responsibility?
- Soldiers must carry out orders. How could a soldier refuse an order?
Rudolf Hoss, commander of the Auschwitz concentration camp:
I personally never hated Jews. I considered them to be the enemy of our nation... Himmler gave me the orders personally in the summer of 1941 to prepare a place for mass killings [of Jews} and then carry it out... At the time I wasted no thoughts about it. I had received an order; I had to carry it out. I could not allow myself to form an opinion as to whether this mass extermination of the Jews was necessary or not... Since the Fuhrer himself had ordered 'The Final Solution of the Jewish Question.' there was no second guessing.[excerpted from Rudolf Hoss, Death Dealer, The Memoirs of the SS Kommandant at Auschwitz]
Robert Fisch, Jewish Hungarian survivor of the Holocaust:
Responsibility is a very complicated issue. Eichmann was originally assigned to make emigration possible for the Hungarian Jews, for $400 each in trucks or other merchandise. But no country would "buy" the Jews. You cannot blame a Hitler when millions of people were taken by trains, "assisted" by local guards and train engineers. Roosevelt knew exactly what was happening, so why were the trains not bombed, to stop the concentration camp activities?... We should raise our voices when a mass extermination is taking place.[excerpted from Witnesses to the Holocaust, Jewish Community Relations Council/Anti-Defamation League of Minnesota and the Dakotas, edited by Rhoda G. Levin. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1990]
Hans Friedrich, 1st SS Infantry Brigade:
Hans Friedrich: Try to imagine there is a ditch, with people on one side, and behind them soldiers. That was us and we were shooting. And those who were hit fell down into the ditch. …
They were so utterly shocked and frightened, you could do with them what you wanted.
Interviewer: Could you tell me what you were thinking and feeling when you were shooting?
Hans Friedrich: Nothing. I only thought, 'Aim carefully' so that you hit properly. That was my thought.
Interviewer: This was your only thought? During all that time you had no feelings for the people, the Jewish civilians that you shot?
Hans Friedrich: No.
Interviewer: And why not?
Hans Friedrich: Because my hatred towards the Jews is too great. … And I admit my thinking on this point is unjust, I admit this. But what I experienced from my earliest youth when I was living on a farm, what the Jews were doing to us—well that will never change. That is my unshakeable conviction.
Interviewer: What in God's name did the people you shot have to do with those people who supposedly treated you badly at home? They simply belonged to the same group! What else? What else did they have to do with it?
Hans Friedrich: Nothing, but to us they were Jews!
[http://www.pbs.org/auschwitz/40-45/victims/perps.html#freidrich]
16 comments:
I believe Hitler is to blame and it is his fault for the holocaust. If we didn't stop him it would probably never stop. Mass killings of Jews is not right. Thats disguisting this hans guy had no feelings towards the jews and didn't even care about killing them. This guy is racist against Jews big time. The jews even had to pay to emigrate.
David
I believe that Hitler is also to blame for the Holocaust because if he never started to kill the jews just for him hating them then the holocaust maybe would have never happened.
Emmy =)
P.S. HAPPY SWEET 16TH B-DAY MOONEY!
The army people had to kill them. The leaders of the concentration camps had Jews killed. The train drivers had to get the Jews to the concentration camps. Hitler bears the responsibility of the killings. If he hadn't told people to do it, they would not have done it. If you wanted to refuse your orders, you could just run away and kill yourself, because Hitler would have you killed if he caught you.
Kailen M.
hitler is definently the one to blame for the holocaust. i mean that Han guy was so brain washed he had no feelings when he put all those people in a hole and murdered them. I'm sorry but he is compleatly messed up
Cody
Evil is inevitable. There will always be evil, and there will always be people to fight against it. The Holocaust was not a mistake..it wasnt an opinion that you can justify. It was the massive slaughtering of millions of innocent people! Hans wasnt brainwashed, hes evil! Thats all there is to it. There is nothing, I repeat NOTHING you can say or do to justify what the Nazis and their followers did. So what if Hitler was a good speaker, he was a coward who killed himself.
Anyway, the Holocaust was a despicable and immature act of evil, and fortunately good silenced evil, which put an end to the horror.
Hitler an evil man took the lives of innocent civilians just because he had it against Jewish religion when its believed Hitler was a Jew.(lol) what Hitler did to the millions of lives he took there is no words to explain how disgusting it is/was.
ya boy :KFred
1. Who carried out the 'Final Solution?' Why?
2. Who bears responsibility?
3. Soldiers must carry out orders. How could a soldier refuse an order?
Things like this have long been questioned. Almost everyone who was not a Jew, who were under Hitler's rule can be argued to have helped carry out the 'Final Solution'. However, more directly Hitler, his commanders, and his commanders' soldiers were the main participants in the carrying out of the 'Final Solution'. When should a soldier stand up and say no to an order they know is wrong? According to all militaries...never. You can never delibrately disobey your superior, and must always follow the orders given to you by that person. So are the soldiers who killed and/or helped kill the Jews of Europe during the Holocaust to blame? Partially, yes. They did face many horrible things if they chose not to do what they were told, but if all the soldiers who thought the senseless killing of the Jews was wrong, stood up, and sat out, the war could not have continued. At the same time, the soldiers were forced to do what their superiors told them to, and were brainwashed never to question such an order. Not to mention they were scared rainbowless.
Who bears the responsibility for the Holocaust? Hitler, of course, but really all the people who tried to get it underway, and all the people who, of their own free will, let it continue.
-Samuel I. Conner, Student at the prestigious Norman Howard School. March 10, 2008.
i think that people in Hitler army could of refuse and walk way from the army and go home but if they did say no Hitler would have killed them on the spot so its still not right but they did want they had to do to live
Brian
i think that Rudolph Hoss was an unfeeling super soldier in some aspects, but a normal human being in other aspects. he seemed to be an unfeeling super soldier in the sense that, although he did not see the jewish to be enemies, he still followed his orders which would lead to their deaths. he seemed to be a normal human being in the sense that he only followed the order because it was given by the fuhrer, which makes it seem as though he only did it because he was brainwashed and gave way to the cult of personality.
The holocaust was a bad time. It can be said that for every one in valved there was no good out come. Even for the Nazi soldiers. Looking back it seems that most of the Nazi soldiers have regrets and claim they were following orders. I think in order to progress we must empathizes with the German soldiers. They were bred to preform killing with no emotion. FoR
r example at an early age Hitler youth youth were given a puppy and told to kill it shortly after to harden themselves for what Hitler had planned. Hitler knew that normal people couldn't commit such evil acts like killing on a mass level so he knew he had to alter their state of mind. Also Hitler's word was divine right what he said was the law. There was no disobeying. Sure if the German Soldiers took the time to really think about what was going on they would want to rebel but all of Germany would be against them. Hitler was not dumb he knew how to cut off all options in order to present you with one, his option. IS what the Nazis did okay? No, but if anyone of us was in there position would we have done anything different?
-Matt
I think it is just terrible how people could not feel any feelings for what they were doing to the Jewish people. Just one person does not make up for the whole race, he should have known that instead of just taking his wrath out on everybody. It's sad how kids only grew up with that, not knowing that everyone is equal.
-Jennifer-
It is truly hard to explain the reasons for the mass murder except that hitler needed a scapegoat. The nazi's themsleves may have not liked to carry out the orders given to them, but that was the way they were raised to serve and protect Adolf Hitler. You could say that the reason for the holocaust was indeed Hitler, but we were no better by not helping out quickly enough. We did know a little about what was going on so we could have done something.
-Ethan
To say that Hitler was to take all responsability for the holocaust is not true. It says right in the article that president Roosevelt knew what was going on within Germany, and yet there was not bombings or trade offs to send Jews to safety. That is really sad to know that there could have been less casualties just because we wanted to win the war.
-Ethan
A soldier could not refuse an order. They were taught with too much hatred for the Jews and would not think otherwise. The complications that this caused was extremely wrong. It was a real shame to beleive that these people were ruthless killers towared the ones that they killed. It goes to show that a leaders Cult of Personality really makes a huge impact on the country and it's people.
-Ethan
Daniel
What happend in the holocaust was horible that is why there are people that try to stop this kind of crulness. The massive killing Hitler did was just messed up. It takes a sick mind to kill millions of people for what they beleave in. The guy in the story is just watching this whating to be next to go to the camp not doing any thing.
In response to Matt, I must say yes. I would not enjoy making the decision of killing mass amounts of people, or getting killed for disobeying an order. However I would choose to give my own life in order to save however many people that I would have ended up killing....thats the way it is for me. I say this because the Jewish were not being defeated by Nazis...they were being exterminated. I believe the right decision would be to give myself instead of killing innocent people.
And I know your thinking that I am jumping the gun, and I dont really mean what I just stated. I not saying that I wouldnt be scared! Infact, I would probably have a heart attack before they shot me.
I just stand by my decisions and beliefs, and I think before I say things like this. I try to do whats right.
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