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The Senseless Slaughter of Millions in the Nazi German Concentration Camps

  • Category(s): Modern Historical Essays
  • Created on : 19 June 2013
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  • Author: Richard Michael Lamb

Preface

The Nazi directed slaughter in the German Concentration Camps.

1. THE BEGINNING

We start with the assertion of the responsibility of the regime and all of the Germans for this terrible policy but a policy it was.

2. ORIGINS

From where did this policy originate? Essentially in the mistaken and delusional belief the Jews controlled the Banks and thereby the means of production in Germany so vital to a leadership set upon lebensraum and starting World War.

3. DELUSION

Was this belief genuinely if mistakenly held? Regrettably yes, hence the drive from the top to carry out this policy and exterminate the Jews. Clearly an overkill policy that bore no relation to reality.

4. IMPLEMENTATION

How was the regime so successful in implementing this policy of persecuting and massacring the Jewish people? First and foremost German soldiers all took a personal oath of allegiance to Adolf Hitler akin to a lifelong vow by a monk. The Regime therefore commanded absolute obedience which is an innate German quality. The command to construct the Camps and transport the innocent victims to them came from the highest level. That High Command knowingly and intentionally built up the apparatus with which to control the whole process of extermination. Of course it was a militaristic procedure officered and manned by soldiers up to the most important levels of command. Hitler demanded and got personal loyalty from the military and quasi-military personnel deployed for the extermination policy. The guards were soldiers as were the Camp Commandants. The net result of the Nazi creation of the Third Reich was a militarist state sworn to obey and follow one man – the Fuhrer. Everyone focussed on him including Josef Goebels (propaganda) and the Gestapo.

5. CHRISTIANITY AND NAZISM

The German wartime state was completely irreligious and atheistic. I very much doubt Christianity had any influence or role in the Wermacht (See Rommel Field Marshall from South Germany – probably a Catholic – who killed himself – the most well-known German General and one time Commander of the Afrika Corps and the Atlantic Wall – 1944). Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a practising protestant pastor put to death in a concentration camp. He came from North Germany and opposed Hitler in the Bomb Plot 1944 July – his cry was not heeded.

6. PLOT TO KILL HITLER JULY 1944

Thus Germany and Germans were not in tune with the July bomb plotters – Rommel was at the most ambivalent – at the least against their plot. In 1944 Germany was losing the War and facing a catastrophic defeat in the East and crumbling in the West and Italy with Divisions disappearing without trace in the East as the Romans lost legions without seeing them again to the Barbarians centuries ago in Germania. Yet still they obeyed the call to arms by Hitler and his lackeys: Goebels, Himmler and Goering not to mention their own officers up to the level of their Generals. The SS were the elite Nazi fighters and stiffened the resolve as Hitler’s own proclaimed bodyguard. No one could believe in life after death so everyone would sacrifice his life for Hitler.

7. PSYCHOLOGY OF THE NAZI REGIME

This philosophy of the regime was based on a militarised state – even civilian men and women were harnessed like soldiers to the War effort. It meant it was a very short step from simple military obedience to the enforcement of the death camps policy. The Germans involved would not stand against this appalling policy because their leader had demanded and received complete obedience already. The policy of extermination was not an offensive against the allies but it was an expression of murderous intent and actions against the perceived internal enemy – les juifs. Maybe Hitler was so determined on the policy of gassing the Jews through Germany and occupied Europe because he regarded them ‘malentendu’ as the hidden enemy and he wished to put them in the searchlight. At any rate the militarisation of Germany misguidedly reached its zenith in the death camps policy which had no military purpose whatsoever and would not have been possible without that militarised state and its psychology.

8. CONCLUSION

There always has to be the spark to light the fire – in this case the motivating anti-Semitic paranoia of the Nazis which they obsessively clung to right through to 1945. Once that spark was lit the fire would not go out until Nazism was finally defeated thanks be to God. The fire drove this terrible policy but the policy was only effectively carried out by virtue of the regime’s military structure from every echelon down to the ordinary soldat. Therefore the real culprits were the Nazi ‘criminals’ who imposed this regime. Let the modern Germans have the last word.