Menschenschreck
Uploaded by Admin on Jan 22, 1999
"If the international financiers in and outside Europe should succeed in plunging the nations once more into a world war, then the result will not be the Bolshevizing of the earth, and thus the victory of Jewry, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe." Adolf Hitler- Jan 30, 1939
When the Nazi party came to power in January of 1933, it almost immediately began to take hostile measures toward the Jewish people. The government passed special legislation that excluded Jews from the protection of German law. The property of Jews was then legally seized, and concentration camps were set up in which Jews were executed, tortured, or condemned to slave labor. The Nazis organized sporadic and local massacres which occurred in a nationwide program in 1938. After the outbreak of World War II anti-Semitic activity increased dramatically. By the end of the war, millions of Jews and others targeted by the Nazis, had been killed in the Holocaust. The Jewish dead numbered more than 5 million: about 3 million in killing centers and other camps, 1.4 million in shooting operations, and more than 600,000 in Polish ghettos. Who were the men that carried out these terrible murders? One would think them to be savage killers specially selected for their history of brutality and violence. But, in fact, these men were typically normal middle-aged business men. How could these ordinary men be influenced in such a way to allow them to commit such atrocities? The governmental policies, pressures of comrades and individual behaviors helped to transform these men into the mass murderers of European Jews that they soon became.
The government and the military were very important to the transformation of these men. The men of the battalions were often told how the German race was the greatest on earth. Their commanding officers continually reminded them that as Germans they had to be strong and ruthless. They were told to project an image of superiority and not to show any mercy on the inferior Jewish race. Anti-Semitism was practiced throughout the government and military. One policy the government continually reinforced was that that the Jews were not even humans. The Jews were often referred to as "wild animals" and given no respect. Some commanders of the Order Police encouraged shooting blindly into the ghettos to try to shoot down Jews for sport. Company recreation rooms were commonly decorated with racist slogans...