1. How did the Final solution come about and who was to blame?
Learning objectives for this week:
To investigate and answer exam questions on these topics:
Treatment of minorities
Treatment of Jews –
Reasons for the final solution – was it planned vs. Was it improvised and a reaction to WWII
How chaotic and organised was the state?
Starter:
What is this picture showing?
What does it tell us about the Nazi regime?

2. What does this image suggest about the treatment of asocials?
Using this image and your own knowledge, how may the treatment of asocials have changed when WWII began?
Using this image and your own knowledge, how similar was the treatment of Jews and other asocial groups?
Using this image and your own knowledge, how coherent was Nazi policy towards asocials?

3. The road to Auschwitz was built by hate, but paved with indifference.
Ian Kershaw, Hitler 1998
What does this quote mean?
How accurate do you think this interpretation is?

4. How did the Nazi treatment of minorities change from 1933-9?
Which minorities have you researched?
Were they all treated in the same way?
How did the treatment of minorities change over time?

5. Early actions - general trend is that treatment was getting worse
War broke out September 1939
1/09/39 – curfew for all Jews
21/09/39 – Jews to be concentrated at railway junctions and radio sets confiscated from Jews
1939 – got Poland and deported Jews from German occupied Poland
1940 – ration books stamped with a J so that they couldn’t get some materials – e.g. Leather
1941 – Star of David badge
1941 – aggressively tried to get Jews out of Berlin by explicitly saying ‘annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe’ in propaganda.
31 July 1941 – Goring gave written authorisation to Heydrich for total solution of the Jewish questions
1942 Wannsee Conference – Final Solution (Heydrich)
1942 – Jews could no longer receive Reich sports medal
1943 – German Jews lost citizenship

6. What happened in the Warsaw Ghetto?
Ghettoisation
Jan 1940 Jews used for slave labour and confined in ghettos in Lodz, Warsaw, Lublin, Radom and Lvov. Months later the Warsaw ghetto was sealed off.
In response to the pressure from greater numbers of Jews living in Poland – they can’t make them all emigrate so they move them into ghettos.
The Pianist – 15 mins 30s
What happened in the Warsaw Ghetto?

7. Deportation – add each example with a reason why the Nazis chose to do it
‘Final solution’ was territorial
1939 – Polish Jews deported because there was pressure from greater number of Jews in Poland
1940 Heydrich suggested moving 3.25 million Jews to Madagascar, Hitler like it and mentioned it to Mussolini, likely they would die en route or here. Didn’t take into account Britain may defeat Germany at sea. Because there was pressure from controlling more Jews.
Hoped after 1941 Russia invasion could relocate to other side of the Urals . Because their Madagascar plan has been ruined as Britain controls the seas. Also controlled lots of more Russian and Orthodox Jews.
1942 – deport on a much greater scale to West Poland to Warthegau as Stalin had deported 600,000 ethnic Germans to Siberia with 400,000 to follow, US had announced they would shoot on sight any German warships, Gauleiters were each trying to deport out of their area which then just built pressure on other Gauleiters. They intended to deport Jews further East when they could
Survivor testimony:

8. Recap, what’s a Gauleiter?
A Gauleiter was the party leader of a regional branch of the NSDAP (more commonly known as the Nazi Party) or the head of a Gau or of a Reichsgau.
There were 43 of them in 1941.

9. Death squads and early gassing
When they invaded Russia in early 1941 came into contact with Orthodox Jews. SS Einsatzgruppen (Mobile Killing Units) was authorised by Hitler to exterminate Jews in Eastern Europe and Russia – in 8 months 700,000 had been murdered. They were under the direction of Himmler. They killed Jews, Gypsies, Polish intelligentsia and Soviet political commisars. Some were involved in T4. It was made up of 4 units. They would follow the advancing armies and once land had been conquered this squad would shoot all the Jews who lived there. Often thought that they were young impressionable men, but research in the 1990s of one unit shows they were all in their 40s and fully aware of their actions and did it of their own free will – people did leave the squads if they wished to without fear of being killed – they could be moved to another unit.
Begins slowly 1941, accelerates in Once Jews were deported to Warthegau this seemed to heighten anti-Semitism. Camps began to be made – but they were holding camps and work camps at this stage – later they would be changed. Gauleiter and other local leaders got harsher. Police Chief Globocnik ordered construction of gassing facilities for killings Jews incapable of work. In Lodz Jews shot and gassed in vans. In Warthegau started killing Jews in gas vans.
Muller announced no Jew could emigrate 1942

10. What problems did Hitler face with solving the ‘Jewish problem’?
Can’t deport East as can’t win in Russia – have to do something else
Shooting Jews unrealistic for the millions remaining in Russia
Britain controlled the seas so couldn’t deport them overseas (Madagascar plan)
Could use as hostages for dealings with the USA?
December 1941 – America declared war. Shortly after Hitler announced that Jews would be ‘exterminated as partisans’
How could he deal with these problems?

13. Reasons for the final solution – was it planned vs
Reasons for the final solution – was it planned vs. was it improvised and a reaction to WWII
The Final Solution was planned from the outset
The Final Solution was improvised

14. How can we explain the development of the extermination final solution?
Experience of WWII – desensitised to violence, dehumanising, pressure on territorial solution- Russia/Madagascar/hostages
Long-term anti-Semitism/scape-goating – propaganda impact, der Jude, dehumanising Jewish people
Chaos of the Nazi state – Kristallnacht Goebbels, Hitler’s oral orders, Hitler retreated to the Berghof, Wansee Conference called to response from the Gauleiters pressure in Warthengau, radicalisation happened as lower down Nazis are trying to advance their careers
Didn’t know – focusing on surviving, rumours, Hamburg 1942 newspaper headline ‘Exterminate all the Jews!’, senior Nazis said that Hitler knew and directed it, Hitler never made a spoken or written record directing or acknowledging

16. Why did Hitler decide to set up concentration camps?
List the events of WWII which had an impact on how Jews were treated and explain the impact it had.
What was the Wannsee conference?

17. Who was to blame for the final solution?
Feedback from homework and use evidence from the lesson
Who was to blame
Evidence to support this (think about how the Final Solution came about, why it came about, whether it was planned or improvised)
Evidence to challenge this
How credible is this blame?
Hitler
Nazis
Germans
Allies
Senior Nazis
No-one – product of long-held anti-Semitism and WWII

18. No-one – product of long-held anti-Semitism and WWII
Who was to blame
Evidence to support this (think about how the Final Solution came about, why it came about, whether it was planned or improvised)
Evidence to challenge this
How credible is this blame?
Hitler
Nazis
Germans
Allies
Senior Nazis
No-one – product of long-held anti-Semitism and WWII

19. A question planning
Systematic extermination emerged as the Final Solution to the Jewish Question as result of the chaotic nature of the Nazi state. How far do you agree with this statement?

22. How chaotic and organised was the state?

23. What does this suggest to you about Hitler’s dictatorship?
This is a photograph of the Berghof – the mountain retreat where Hitler spent most of his time from 1938.
What does this suggest to you about Hitler’s dictatorship?
What do you think a chaotic plurocracy is?

24. Chaotic Plurocracy Chaotic
Plurocracy – many people and organisations creating Hitler’s will. These often overlapped with existing bodies.
However – it is still a dictatorship – but perhaps not the most efficient kind!

25. Read through all of the factors on your handout.
What interpretation do these sources have of Hitler’s dictatorship?
Was Hitler’s rule a chaotic plurocracy?
Write in different colours
Evidence to support this interpretation
Evidence to challenge this interpretation

26. How chaotic and organised was the state?

27. Homework, due Tuesday 5 May
June 2010, part A question: June 2011, Part B question: