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    Longerich: Hitler’s Role in the Persuection of the Jews by the Nazi Regime

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    (i)  For the last twenty years my academic work has been concentrated on the Nazi Dicatorship, its structure, its origins and ist legacy. My work in this field which consists in particular of a dozen monographs and editions is highly regarded both in Germany and internationally.

    (ii)  I can declare my self an expert in working with archival documents, mostly unpublished, from this period. During the last twenty years I have workd in about 40 archives in Germany, Britian, Israel, Lithuania, the Soviet Union and the United States.

    (iii)  From the very beginning of my academic research I have been particularly interested in the structure of the Nazi system and the decision making-process. This interest developed when I wrote my dissertation, a study about bureaucratic infighting and decision-making in the Nazi Propaganda machinery. After completion of my dissertation I worked for several years at the Institut für Zeitgeschichte in Munich. During a period of more than five years at the Institute I edited the Second Part of the Project Akten der Partei-Kanzlei, an attempt to reconstruct the lost original files from the Nazi Party Chancellery, the central office of the Nazi party which coordinated the organisation of the Party and controlled the state bureacracy. This work which envolved the reading and summing up of about 80.000 pages of documents from the Nazi period gave me a unique insight into the day to day history of the Nazi system and a subtle understanding for the bureaucratic language and the behaviour of officials in this system. During my stay at the Institute I wrote two other books, a history of the Nazi Stormtroopers and a organisation history of the Party chancellery.

    (iv)  Since the end of the eighties my interest concentrated more and more on what I see today as the central chapter of the Nazi period: The persecution and murder of European Jews. I started this work by editing a collection of documents about the Holocaust in 1989. When I edited the book I war particularly concerned with the authenticity of the material and therefore consulted the great majority of the dorcuments as originals in archives.

    (v)  The publication of the German version of the Encyclopedia of the Holocaust (together with Eberhard Jäcke and Julius H. Schoeps) a work which included an updating of many of the articles, provided me with an excellent overview about research in this field

    (vi)  An invitiation to spent ten month at the International Center for Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem, Jerusalem, gave me the opportunity to lay the cornerstone for a major monograph of the Holocaust, a book which was issued in 1998 (in German) under the title policy of annihilation and containes a comprehensive history of the persecution of the Jews in the period between 1933 and 1945. The manuscript of this book was accepted as Habilitationsschrift by the University of the Armed Forces in Munich in early 1999. (The Habilitation is the highest qualification at a German University and the basic condition for the award of a professorship). During the last two years I had the opportunity to give papers about the main results of this research at numerous Universities, Research Centres and Museums in Germany, Britain, the United States and Israel.

    (vii)  I have never stopped to attemped to look at the Holocaust and the Nazi period in a broader historical perspecitive; the last book before the book on the Holocaust was a comprehensive history of the Weimar Republic and at the moment I am working on a comparative study about manpower mobilisation in Germany and Great Britain during the Second World War.

    Peter Longerich: Born 4 February 1955, Krefeld, Germany: German Citizen

    Education and Degrees

    • 1961-65  St. Franciscus Schule (Primary School), Krefeld, Germany
    • 1965-73  Kaiser-Karl-Gymnasium, Itzehoe, Germany
    • 1973  Abitur
    • 1973-74  University of Göttingen: History, Sociology, Public Law
    • 1974-75  National Service
    • 1975-76  Studies at University of Göttingen: History, Sociology, Public Law
    • 1976-80  Studies at University of Munich: History, Sociology
    • 1980  Magister Artium
    • 1983  Dr. Phil, University of Munich (Thesis title: Die Presseabteilung des Auswärtigen Amtes unter Ribbentrop. Supervisor: Professor Gerhard A. Ritter).
    • 1999  Habilitation, University of the Armed Forces, Munich

    Research Grants

    • 1990  Research grant from the German Historical Institute, London
    • 1992-93  Research grant from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
    • 1995-96  Research grant from Yad Vashem, the Israeli Research Center for the Holocaust, Jerusalem, to enable me to work there for 10 months.

    Appointments held

    • 1976-1979  Department of History, University of Munich: Research Assistant to Dr. Klaus Tenfelde and Professor Gerhard A. Ritter. Project: Bibliographie zur Geschichte der deutschen Arbeiterschaft und Arbeiterbewegung (published: Braunschweig, Bonn: Institut für Sozialgeschichte, 1981)
    • 1983-8  Institut für Zeitgeschichte, Munich: Research worker and (from 1985) responsible for the project: Rekonstruktion der Akten der Partei-Kanzlei der NSDAP, Teil II
    • 1987-89  Department of History, University of Munich: Part-time undergraduate teaching: German and European history.
    • 1993-96  Lecturer, Department of German, Royal Holloway, University of London
    • 1996 to date  Department of German, Royal Holloway, University of London

    Other professional activities

    • 1991-92  Consultant historian to the Crown Office War Crimes Investigation Team, Edinburgh. I advised the Crown Office on the basis of documentation which I collected from archives in Germany, Israel, Lithuania and the Soviet Union
    • Consultancies for Second German Television, Piper Publisher (Munich), Pendo Publisher (Munich)
    • Member of the Editorial Advisory Board of The Journal of Holocaust Education.


    • Monographs

      • Propagandisten im Krieg. Die Presseabteilung des Auswärtigen Amtes unter Ribbentrop, (Munich: Oldenburg, 1987, Studien zur Zeitgeschichte, Vol. 33) 356pp
      • Die braunen Bataillone. Geschichte der SA (Munich: C.H. Beck 1989) 285pp
      • Hitlers Stellvertreter. Führung der NSDAP und Kontrolle des Staatsapparates durch den Stab Heß und Bormanns Partei-Kanzlei (Munich: Saur, 1992) 283pp
      • Deutschland 1918-1933. Die Weimarer Republik Handbuch zur Geschichte, (Hannover: Fackelträger, 1995) 425pp
      • Die Wannsee-Konferenz vom 20. Januar 1942: Planung und Beginn des Genozids an den europäischen Juden (Berlin: Edition Hentrich) 90pp
      • Politik der Vernichtung. Eine Gesamtdarstellung der nationalsozialistischen Judenverfolgung (Munich: Piper 1998) 772pp
    • Editing of Documents

      • Akten der Partei-Kanzlei, Teil II Rekonstruktion eines verlorengegangenen Bestandes, 3 Vols. (Munich: Piper, 1992)
      • Die Ermordung der europäischen Juden. Eine umfassende Dokumentation des Holocaust (Munich: Piper, 1989, 2 editions) 480pp
      • Was ist des Deutschen Vaterland? Dokumente zur Frage der deutschen Einheit, (Munich: Piper, 1990, 4th edition 1996)
      • Die zweite Republik. Dokumente zur Geschichte des Weimarer Staates, (Munich: Piper, 1992)
    • Editions

      • Enzyklopädie des Holocaust. German edition (3 Vols.) with Eberhard Jäckel and Julius Schoeps (Berlin: Argon, 1993) [German version of the Hebrew and English editions published by Yad Vashem]
    • Articles and Chapters

      • Joseph Goebbels und der totale Krieg. Eine unbekannte Denkschrift des Propagandaministers, in: Vierteljahreshefte für Zeitgeschichte 35 (1987), 289-314 [Reprinted in the series Zum Nachdenken, 1988]
      • Vom Massenmord zur "Endlösung". Die Erschie8ungen von jhdischen Zivilisten in den ersten Monaten des Ostfeldzuges im Kontext des nationalsozialistischen Judenmordes, in: Zwei Wege nach Moskau. Vom Hitler-Stalin-Pakt bis zum "Unternehmen Barbarossa", edited by Bernd Wegner, (Munich: Piper, 1991) 251-274. English translation: From Mass Murder to "Final Solution": The Shooting of Jewish Civilians during the First Month of the Eastern Campaign within the Context of Nazi-Jewish Genocide, in From Peace to War. Germany, Soviet Russia and the World, 1939-41, edited by Bernd Wegner (Providence and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 1997), 253-276.
      • Der Rußlandkrieg als rassistischer Vernichtungskrieg, in Der Mensch gegen den Menschen. überlegungen und Forschungen zum deutschen überfall auf die Sowjetunion 1941, edited by Hans-Heinrich Nolte (Hanover: Fackelträger, 1992), 78-94.
      • Nationalsozialistische Propaganda, in: Deutschland 1933-1945, edited by Karl Dietrich Bracher, Manfred Funke and Hans-Adolf Jacobsen (Munich: Piper, 1993), 291-314.
      • Vom Straßenkampf zum Anstaltsterror. Die Oranienburger SA und "ihr" Konzentrationslager, in: Konzentrationslager Oranienburg, edited by Günter Morsch, (Berlin: Hentrich, 1994), 23-33.
      • Der Untergang der Weimarer Republik und die Machtüernahme der Nationalsozialisten, in: Der neue alte Rechtsradikalismus, edited by Ulrich Wank (Munich: Piper, 1993), 65-94
      • In addition I have 23 entries in Enzyklopädie der Holocaust, German edition (Berlin: Argon 1993)
      • I have reviewed several books in academic journals and newspapers.
    • Papers and Broadcasts

      • 1991  30-minute radio programme on total war for the Westdeutsche Rundfunk, Cologne. Broadcast in January 1991.
      • 1991 to date  Numerous radio broadcasts on aspects of Nazi history arising from my publications.
      • 1991 (June)  University of Hannover: International symposium to mark the 50th anniversary or the German attack on the Soviet Union: Paper: "German Racist Warfare in the East".
      • 1992 (May)  University of Munich: Paper on German documents in Soviet archives.
      • 1993 (March)  History Society, Bad Nauheim: Paper on German Nationalism.
      • 1993 (July)  University of Munich: public lecture on the rise of the Nazi Party.
      • 1994 (April)  Oldenburg: participated in a public, recorded discussion with Professor Israel Gutman (Yad Vashem) and Professor Eberhard Jäckel (University of Stuttgart) on the occasion of the awarding of the Ossietzky Prize for the publication of the Encylopaedia of the Holocaust, in which I collaborated for the German edition.
      • 1994 (July)   Wiener Library, London: Paper on the Bomb plot of 20 July 1945.
      • 1994 (Nov)   University of St Andrews, Department of History: Paper on the commemoration of historical events in post-war West Germany.
      • 1995 (Sept)  Wiener Library, London: Paper on the Nürnberg Laws.
      • 1996 (Jan)   Hebrew University, Jerusalem: Paper: "The German Dictatorship and the Persecution of Jews"
      • 1997   Papers on my book Politik der Vernichtung at the (June/July) following universities: Cologne, Berlin, Freiburg, Stuttgart.
      • 1998 (Jan)  Annual lecture: Haus der Wannseekonferenz, Berlin.
      • 1998 (Jan)  Talk on the Wannseekonferenz, Imperial War Museum, London.
      • 1998 (April)  University of Florida: paper on decision-making and the Holocaust.
      • 1998 (Nov)  45 minutes TV discussion of my book Politik der Vernichtung, in the programme, Lesezeichen, 3SAT, German Public Television
      • 1998 (Nov)  Lecture, German Historical Institute, London on Politik der Vernichtung
      • 1998 (Dec)  Paper on the genesis of the "Final Solution", International Conference, Tel Aviv University
      • 1999 (Jan)  Paper on Himmler and the Holocaust, Symposium, Forschungsstelle für Zeitgeschichte, Hamburg
      • 1999 (March)  Paper in a German-Israeli round table discussion on the state of Holocaust research
      • 1999 (April)  Lecture tour, organised by the US Holocaust Memorial Museum (Washington, Los Angeles, Chicago, Clark University)
      • 1999 (May)  Paper on my book Politik der Vernichtung, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge


    There can be no doubt that Hitler’s behaviour during his entire political career—from the end of the First World War until the end of the Second World War—was characterised by radical antisemitism. Hitler’s actions betray a desire to—in one way or another—put an end to the existence of Jews within the "living space" (Lebensraum) of the German people. This objective carried a very high priority in his political practice.

    Of course Hitler’s antisemitic stance cannot by itself explain the persecution and murder of the European Jews by the Nazi regime; a history of the "final solution" must nevertheless take account of his central role in the decision making process.

    1. General remarks about Hitler’s Antisemitic terminology

    1.1  An account of Hitler’s role in the genesis of the final solution is complicated by the fact that the dictator avoided the use of explicit written directives relating to the murder of the Jews. When he came to speak on this subject he used expressions which, to say the least, leave a certain amount of room for interpretation. The meaning of the key words describing the aims of Nazi anti-Jewish policy changed over the years when antisemitic policy became more and more radicalized. There is no meaning to these terms independent of the time factor. To translate these terms properly, one has to take the reality of antisemitic policy into account. When the same vocabulary was used to describe Nazi aims towards other groups, the meaning might have been be completely different. As far as the fate of the Jews is concerned, formulations such as annihilation (Vernichtung), extirpation (Ausrottung), final solution (Endlösung) removal (Entfernung), resettlement (Umsiedlung), evacuation (Evakuierung) etc. were used by Hitler and leading National Socialists from mid 1941 onwards increasingly—and from Spring 1942 definitely—as camouflage for mass murder.

    1.2  Before this time, the very same vocabulary was used by Hitler and leading Nazis in a different sense. As will be described in more detail in this report, an interpretation has to take into account the different stages of anti-Jewish policy. During the 1920's and up to the mid 1930's, the main aim of Nazi anti-Jewish policy was to undermine the legal and economic situation of the German Jews so as to force them to emigrate. The Jews would disappear from the vantage point of the Nazis from German public life and later on, from German territory. When the Nazis used the term annihilation (Vernichtung) during these early years, they referred on the one hand to the planned destruction of the alleged dominant position of the Jewish minority in German society. From the context of the relevant texts, however, it is obvious, on the other hand, that this term had a vaguely defined violent and even murderous component, by which Hitler and the Nazis signified their main goal—which was the "removal of the Jews". In a cautious interpretation of this terminology, it would not be exaggerated to describe the meaning of annihilation here as ambiguous. The perspective of mass murder was already present here. In conclusion, one has to say, that during this period (the 1920's end the first half of the 1930's), the Nazis saw in the "final solution" a potentially violent "removal" of Jews from German public live and German soil.

    1.3  At the end of the 1930's, the Nazis intensified the pressure for emigration or expulsion. During this period, terms like "removal" (Entfernung) or "final solution" (Endlösung) revealed an inconsistency with the notion of a further existence of a Jewish minority in Germany. The violent aspect of anti-Jewish policy became more and more significant. In the last year before the outbreak of the Second World War the term extermination pointed clearly to the possiblility of genocide.

    1.4  Between the outbreak of war in Summer 1939 and the middle of 1941, the Nazis were looking for a so called "territorial solution" of the Jewish problem, i.e. they were planning to deport the Jews to a territory on the periphery of their empire where there were insufficient means to subsist and where they would perish. Technically the terms resettlement (Umsiedlung) or evacuation (Evakuierung) meant a kind of geographical relocation but one cannot disregard the fact that this vocabulary increasingly offered the perspective of the physical end of the Jews in Europe. The term "final solution" was used in this period in the same way.

    1.5  Between the summer of 1941 and the spring of 1942 the meaning of this vocabulary changed. It was now increasingly used as a synonym for systematic mass murder. However, even in this period—particularly between Autumn of 1941 and Spring 1942—this terminology can in some cases still be ambivalent. For an interpretation each phrase has to be analysed in its historical context. In particular, in a period in which one Jewish minority after another was being included in the process of systematic mass murder, one has to determine which Jewish minority was indicated by each of the relevant phrases.

    1.6  One cannot exclude the possibility that, for example, up to May or even June 1942, i.e. during the has when preparations for the systematic murder of European Jews were well underway, Hitler and the leading organisers of the murderous programme might have occasionally mentioned "alternative" murderous programmes for a "final solution"; they might, even at this stage, have referred to the earlier plan to deport Jews (particularly those from Western Europe, who before the summer of 1942 had not been included in the programme of systematic mass murder) to other areas than occupied Poland and to kill them or let them perish. These "alternative" considerations should be interpreted as a kind of reluctance by Hitler and members of the leading circle of Nazis, fully to articulate the consequences of the decision to kill millions of people, a decision which in fact had already been made and implemented at this point.


    2.1  Hitler’s very first political statement, his letter to Adolf Gemlich on 16 September 1919, already includes a clear declaration of his antisemitic position (Gemlich was a former participant in one of the political indoctrination courses organised by the military authorities in Bavaria, on which Hitler had taught).

    Antisemitism of the emotional sort finds its final expression in the form of pogroms. Rational antisemitism on the other hand, must lead to a systematic legal opposition and elimination of those special privileges which the Jews hold, in contrast to the other aliens living among us (alien's legislation). Its final objective must unswervingly be the removal of the Jews altogether.1

    2.2  This outlook also characterises Hitler’s early public posture. The radicalism of his antisemitic statements at this point is remarkable; clearly his vision of a "removal" of the German Jews carried definite implications of violence. As early as 1920 he spoke of extirpation (Ausrottung) and annihilation (Vernichtung). Thus according to a police report of a NSDAP meeting on 6 April 1920 he declared:2

    We have no intention of being emotional antisemites who want to create the atmosphere of a pogrom; instead, our hearts are filled with an inexorable determination to attack the evil at its roots and to extirpate it root and branch. In order to reach our goal every means will be justified, even if we have to make a pact with the devil.

    2.3  In a talk before a gathering of National Socialists in Salzburg on 7 August 1920 he said:

    Don't think that one can fight against disease without killing the cause, without exterminating the germ; and don't think that one can fight against racial tuberculosis without taking care that the peoples be freed of the germ of racial tuberculosis. The effect of Judaism will never disappear and the poisoning of the people will not end unless the cause—the Jews—are removed from our presence.1

    2.4  In the first large mass meeting of the NSDAP after the refounding of the Party (which had been banned after the failed putsch of 1923) Hitler, on 27 February 1925, looked back on the founding of the NSDAP and explained:

    The goal then was clear and simple: fight against the devilish power which has pushed Germany into this misery, fight against Marxism as well as the spiritual carrier of this world plague and epidemic—the Jews. Fight—not on the bourgeois model 'carefully' so that it doesn't hurt. No and once again no.2

    2.5  In another part of this speech Hitler spoke about the newly founded Party: "Who does this movement have to combat? Against the Jew as an individual and Marxism as his cause.3

    2.6  And in another passage, Hitler pointed once again to the chief objective of the National Socialists—to the struggle against the Jewish "poison" within the German people (Volk), in his view clearly a lethal danger:

    The greatest danger is and remains for us the poison of foreign peoples in our body. All other dangers are limited in time. Only this alone is eternally present in its consequences for us. [...] The peace treaty can be abrogated, reparation obligations can be declared invalid and rejected, political parties can be disposed of, but blood that is once poisoned can never be altered. It remains and proliferates and pushes us down from year to year ever deeper. If you are surprised today about the inner turmoil of our people than consider the following: The blood which is at odds with itself is merely expressing itself in the inner turmoil of the German people. And there lies the greatest danger, that with the continuation of this poisoning in 10, 20 and 30 years we will be weaker than now, in 100 years weaker than after 30 and in 200 years more unconsciousness than after 100 years; one day however the time will come when our people will fall from its cultural heights and will finally hopelessly perish as a result of this blood poisoning...4

    2.7  In his book, MEIN KAMPF, which appeared in 1926 and especially in a manuscript written in 1927, which remained unpublished until after 1945 (his "Second Book")5, Hitler placed this radical view, which leads to the "removal" of the Jews from Germany, within the context of a theory which he tried to derive historically. According to this theory, the meaning of world history is a permanent struggle between the races or the peoples (Völker) over "living space" (Lebensraum). In this model the Jews, who are said to be unable to develop their own territorial state or culture, play the role of parasitic beings who seek to destroy from within (together with other Jews in a international conspiracy) the construction of Lebensraum empires by the superior races.

    2.8  This "theory" is described most clearly in a lengthy section in his "second book":6

    The Jewish people, because of their own lack of productive capacity, are not able to build up their own territorial state. Rather, they need the work and creative activity of other nations as a base for their own existence. The existence of the Jews themselves thus becomes that of a parasite within the life of other peoples. The final goal of the Jewish struggle for survival is therefore the enslavement of productive peoples. To reach this goal, which in truth describes the struggle for existence of Jewry in all times, the Jew uses all weapons which correspond to the whole complex of his being. Domestically, he fights within the individual nations first for equality and then for superiority. As weapons he uses cunning, cleverness, subterfuge, malice, dissimulation, etc..., qualities which are rooted in the essence of his ethnic character. They are ruses in his struggle for existence, similar to the ruses other peoples use in sword-fights. In terms of foreign policy, he tries to make the peoples restless, distracting them from their true interests, pushing them into wars with one another and in this way, with the help of the power of money and propaganda to bring them under his dominance. His ultimate goal is the denationalisation, the promiscuous bastardisation of other peoples—the lowering of the racial niveau of the highest peoples as well as domination over his racial porridge through the extirpation of the völkisch intelligencia and its replacement by members of his own people. The end of the Jewish world struggle will thus always be bloody Bolshevisation, that means in truth the destruction of the spiritual elite which is bound with the peoples, so that he alone can ascend and become master of a mankind which has been rendered leaderless. Stupidity, cowardice and wickedness help him to achieve his goals. In the bastard he secures himself the first opening so as to break into the body of another people. The end of Jewish domination is nevertheless always the decay of all culture and finally the insanity of the Jew himself. Then he becomes a parasite of the peoples and his victory signifies the death of his victim as well as his own end.

    2.9  As is clearly demonstrated in his MEIN KAMPF and his "Second Book", Hitler perceived the situation of Germany after the end of the first World War to be the consequence of an international Jewish conspiracy. Jews dominated "international finance capital" as well as the socialist movement: they were responsible for war, revolutions, the decline of national values and for the pernicious "mixing of the races".

    2.10  The language which Hitler used in this early period to refer to the Jews was filled with boundless hatred. Eberhard Jäckel once compiled a series of typical designations for Jews from MEIN KAMPF: The Jew is a maggot in a rotting corpse; a germ carrier of the worst sort; mankind's eternal germ of disunion; the spider that slowly sucks the people's blood out of its pores; the pack of rats fighting bloodily among themselves; the parasites in the body of other peoples; a sponger, who, like a harmful bacillus, continues to spread; the eternal bloodsucker; the peoples' parasite; the vampire.7

    2.11  An analysis of the public statements by Hitler in the second half of the twentieth century shows clearly that antisemitism had always played a central role in his thinking. In Hitler’s speeches in this period, antisemitism was by no means a marginal element used only for demagogic purposes. Rather, antisemitism was the central component of the ideological structure which he endeavored—with stubborn perseverence—to convey to his listerners.

    2.12  For even when Hitler concerned himself with political questions of the day, in the course of his public statements in the second half of the twenties, the large majority of his speeches and articles would usually return to the ideological train of thought which he had developed in MEIN KAMPF and in his second book. These ideological considerations were necessary for him so as to explain the precarious situation in which Germany found itself after the end of the first World War.

    2.13  Central categories in Hitler’s public statements continued to be "space" and "race": the future of the Germans as a racially valuable people depended upon the conquest of as great a space as possible.8 The fulfilment of this historical mission, which according to Hitler’s central argument was decisive for the security of the existence of the German people, was obstructed by systematic attempts by the "Jewish race" to prevent it.

    2.14  Over and over again Hitler repeated in his speeches his stereotypical grievances against the Jews: That they were not able to work productively and were unfit to create culture9; that they lacked a positive attitude towards the soil; that instead they had others work for them and charged them interest.10 He therefore called the Jews "parasites" or "spongers" (Schmarotzer).11

    2.15  In Hitler’s view, through clever activities they had gathered the economy in their hands.12 Although personally unable to create culture, they had been able to dominate the culture industry and the press and therefore controlled public opinion.13 The political parties were, in his view, dominated by the Jews.14 This was especially true for the Socialist parties.15 In a typical expression, he called "Marxism" the "greatest instrument for the annihilation of the Aryan peoples, for the annihilation of the intelligence of these Aryan peoples and for the constitution of a thin Jewish upper class".16 In the Soviet Union, this goal had already been largely achieved through Stalin’s dictatorship, in his view.17

    2.16  On an international level, the Jews had also achieved a dominating position in the economy; he claimed that "international finance Jewry" used their position to put additional economic and political pressure upon Germany.18 Communism and capitalism were, in Hitler’s view, both instruments in the hands of Jews for the attainment of a position of world domination: "Western democracy on the one hand and Russian Bolshevism on the other are the forms in which the present Jewish world conspiracy takes its form."19 The international order created by the Versailles treaty serves the Jews for the purpose of annihilating the German people.20

    2.17  In Hitler’s view, the Jews had thus largely succeeded in infiltrating the German people and manipulating and splitting it. The Jews were responsible for the fact that the German people had already begun to turn away from their task which was decisive for their future—that of accumulating soil and working it.21 The inner division of Germany, the political conflict between the bourgeoisie and the workers was also the work of the Jews.22 In his speeches, Hitler frequently used the metaphor of a "body of the people" (Volkskörper) which a foreign element had penetrated, in order to describe the supposed dominant position of the Jews within the German "Volk"23: a cancer—which had to be removed.24

    2.18  From this chain of reasoning, Hitler came to the conclusion that Germany's problems could basically only be solved by means of the removal of the dominance of the Jews. Concretely, he developed specific suggestions which were entirely based upon the Party Programme of the NSDAP: this involved the elimination of the economic ascendancy of the Jews and—in the event that they did not submit—their physical removal: "If he conducts himself well than he can stay, if not than out."25 Hitler also prepared his listeners for the concept that this settlement of accounts with the Jewish mortal enemy would not be an easy task, but rather might involve a difficult and if necessary violent confrontation.26

    2.19  If one considers the function of antisemitism within Hitler’s world view it becomes clear that it played the role of the central binding element in a hodgepodge of highly contradictory ideas. Hitler’s public statements in the second half of the 1920’s make it clear that his world-view (Weltanschauung) was unthinkable without his antisemitism. He promised his listeners that with the solution to the "Jewish problem" he could solve Germany's basic dilemmas in the areas of foreign and domestic policy, as well as in the economic, social and cultural realms.

    2.20  After 1930, when the NSDAP had become a party with a mass base, the antisemitic element began to recede markedly. Clearly Hitler was aware of the fact that the number of his electors had surpassed the number of radical antisemites in the German population.27 A more precise analysis of his speeches reveals however that he had not in any way altered his basic ideology. For in fact in the years 1930 to 1933, as the NSDAP attained unprecedented electoral sucess, the basic elements of the Hitler ideology, "space" and "race", remained the center of his speeches.28 Hitler emphasized on different occasions that he continued to regard the "Jewish race" as the main enemy of the German people.

    2.21  Thus on 29 August 1930, a few days before the greatest electoral victory of the Nazis in the Reichstag election, in a speech in Munich he announced, in regard to the Jews: "The head of another race sits upon the body of our people (Volkskörper); the heart and the head of our people are no longer one and the same."29 In another speech a few weeks later, he portrayed the struggle against the Jews (without naming them) as a contract with divinity:

    When we present ourselves as German and try to protect ourselves from poisoning by another people, then we are trying to return into the hands of the almighty Creator the very same creature which he bestowed on us...30


    3.1  From the very beginning, Hitler, as head of the National Socialist government, pursued a consistently antisemitic policy. Above all, he aspired to remove German Jews from public positions and to segregate them as much as possible from the German population. The decisive role which Hitler played in the enforcement of the Nazi government's anti-Jewish policy is apparent in the organisation of the "boycott" of Jewish businesses on 1 April 1933. Although it was Goebbels, Propaganda Chief of the Party and newly appointed Minister of Propaganda, who organised the embargo on Jewish establishments, the decisive initiative was Hitler’s. This was confirmed by Goebbels in his diary entry of 26 March 1933: according to this account Hitler called him to Berchtesgaden in order to inform him of his "resolution" according to which one could

    only deal with the slanderous attacks from abroad if we lay hold of the originators or at least those who stand to profit from them- namely the Jews who live in Germany and who have remained unmolested.31

    3.2  Moreover, Hitler took over the full responsibility for the call for a boycott committee consisting of leading NSDAP officials when he made it clear in the Ministerial Conference of 28 March 1933 "that he, the Chancellor of the Reich himself had arranged for the proclamation issued by the National Socialist party".32 On 6 April 1933, Hitler once again explicitly acknowledged his antisemitic policy when on the occasion of a reception of leading medical officials he declared that

    through the coming eradication of Jewish intellectuals from the cultural and spiritual life of Germany, Germany's natural title to spiritual leadership, which is characteristic for it, must be done justice.33

    3.3  Immediately after the boycott, still in April 1933, the Hitler regime passed three antisemitic laws: Jews were largely excluded from public office and the bar respectively34 and a quota for Jewish pupils and students was introduced.35 On the other hand, a series of utterances by Hitler from the first months of the "Third Reich" seem to give the impression, on first glance, that he might have been exercising a rather more moderate influence on the "Jewish policy" of the government and had turned against the more radical elements of the Party.

    3.4  Thus a pronouncement by Hitler which was issued on 10 March 1933 opposed the "individual actions" (Einzelaktionen) of party activists which might disturb the functioning of Jewish and other businesses.36 Further, a planned campaign against the Federal Court of Leipzig by the local Party organisation was stopped by a personal directive by Hitler.37 In the cabinet deliberation on the law concerning lawyers on 7 April, Hitler opposed further plans for exclusion and took the position that one should "at the moment ... only regulate that which is necessary"; legal discrimination against Jewish doctors—an official proposal of this kind had been submitted to the cabinet—was considered "not necessary for the moment".38

    3.5  Hitler’s attitude of apparent restraint stemmed wholly from tactical considerations. Hitler wanted to avoid unnecessary quarrels with his conservative coalition partners; he didn't want to put new stress on the already difficult economic situation or to cement the "Third Reich's" isolation in foreign affairs.39 In his address to the recently appointed Reich Governors on 6 July 1933, Hitler explicitly articulated his foreign policy concerns: "To reopen the Jewish question means to agitate the whole world once again".40

    3.6  In fact, with the take-over of power in 1933, Hitler intended—over and above the assorted antisemitic laws—deliberately to create a special legal status for German Jews: to place them under "alien status" as had been projected in the NSDAP Party Programme of 1920, and gradually to diminish their position in German society. His earlier and considerably more far-reaching plans in the area of racial laws and the reasons why these plans had been deferred were clearly elucidated in the report of his speech41 to the Reich Governors’ Conference, held on 28 September 1933:

    As concerns the Jewish question, we were not able to give way. For him, the Chancellor, it would have been preferable if we could have aggravated the treatment of the Jews step by step—beginning with a citizenship law and from that point on becoming gradually more and more severe with them. The boycott instigated by the Jews however obliged us to resort immediately to harsh counter measures. Abroad they complain mainly about the legal treatment of the Jew as a second-class citizens. They argue that the most we can do is to refuse citizenship to Jews who present a danger to the State.


    4.1  A period of relative calm in the development of National Socialist policy concerning the Jews can be identified42 in the period beginning in the second half of 1933 and extending through 1934. During this period the regime tried to avoid a further radicalisation of the persecution of the Jews, because it would have deepen its foreign political isolation, worsen the unstable economic situation, inspire the radicalism of the SA (which the Party tried to bring under control in this period), and annoy their conservative coalition partners who were still in a relatively quiet mood. This situation changed in 1935, after the Nazis had their first success in foreign policy by winning the Saarland referendum, after the Nazi Party had eleminated the leadership of the SA and conservative opponents during the "night of the long knives" (30 June 1934) and secured their dominant power position, and when the economic situation became better.

    4.2  Starting in 1935 however, Party activists once again triggered antisemitic excesses in the whole empire; these became more numerous and more extreme in the Spring and Summer of 1935. Party activists repeatedly blocked Jewish businesses, perpetrated acts of terror against so-called "racial defilers", organised demonstrations, and prevented marriages between Jews and non-Jews and assaulted Jewish citizens. By means of these abuses, the more radical antisemitic forces in the Party wanted to push through three objectives: 1) the introduction of a special citizenship for Jews 2) prohibitions against marriage as well as sexual relations between Jews and non-Jews and 3) economically discriminatory measures against the Jewish minority.43

    4.3  In August, statements were issued in Hitler’s name not only by Rudolf Hess, Hitler’s deputy in Party matters, but also by Minister of the Interior Frick, forbidding further "individual actions" (Einzelaktionen).44 Once again, Hitler’s sole concern was tactical—to subdue anti-Jewish abuses which were causing unrest and indignation in the population. In essence, however, he shared the same goals as the party activists.

    4.4  This clarifies Hitler’s role in the genesis of the Nuremberg laws whereby, in particular, marriage and sexual relations between Jews and non-Jews were forbidden and a special, inferior citizenship was defined for Jews. Hitler played a decisive role in the implementation of both of these basic early antisemitic demands of the Nazi Party. He preferred "rational antisemitism" instead of pogroms, as he had stated in 1920.

    4.5  The decision to include an anti-Jewish law which contained the long-demanded prohibition against "racial defilement" (Rassenschande) in the Reichstag session during the Nuremberg party meeting was made on the evening of 13 September 1935 by a small circle of leading Nazis who had been gathered to meet with Hitler in a Nuremberg hotel.45

    4.6  The official in charge of the Jewish question (Judenreferent) in the Ministry of the Interior, Lösener, has described very vividly in a memoir written after the war how he was unexpectedly called to Nuremberg late in the evening of 13 September in order to help formulate these new laws.46 On the next day, according to Lösener's report, together with a group of officials from the ministry, he worked out numerous drafts for the law which was later called the Law for the Protection of German Blood (Blutschutzgesetz). Minister of the Interior Frick presented them to Hitler and then brought them back with specific proposals for amendment. On Saturday, 14 September, around midnight, Hitler demanded that four alternative drafts be submitted for the Blutschutzgesetz by the following morning. Further, according to Lösener's account, Hitler now asked the officials to prepare another law, namely a blueprint of a "basic law, a citizenship law" for the next day. On the following day Hitler decided for one of the drafts of the protection of German blood law and had it passed in the Reichstag, together with the Reich citizenship law (Reichsbürgergesetz) which had also been drafted overnight.

    4.7  After laws were passed, Hitler declared at the Nuremberg Party Conference that the law for the protection of German blood was "the attempt legally to regulate a problem by which in the event of repeated failure would definitely be transferred to the National Socialist Party by law in order to achieve a final solution".47 He thereby made clear that he was prepared to use street terror by Party activists (which he had earlier condemned in public declarations) as an instrument for enforcing his policies.


    5.1  For the following years, it can be documented that Hitler personally directed anti-Jewish policy and regularly intervened in anti-Jewish legislation. The measures in question were mainly concerned with excluding the Jewish minority from the economy.

    5.2  In the summer of 1936, Hitler charged Göring with preparations for the Four-Year-Plan (Vierjahresplan), by which the German economy was to be adapted for war. The memorandum which Hitler transmitted to Göring on this subject makes clear that preparation for war and further radicalisation of anti-Jewish policy were closely associated in Hitler’s thinking. Hitler’s position in this matter was that a war against a supposed Bolshevik-Jewish menace was unavoidable:

    Since the outbreak of the French Revolution, the world has been moving ever faster towards a new confrontation. The most extreme solution to this conflict is called Bolshevism and its content and goals are the liquidation (Beseitigung) and replacement (Ersetzung) of the hitherto leading social stratum of mankind by international Jewry.48

    5.3  In the memorandum, Hitler also explained that preparations for the coming war against "international Jewry" should in part be financed through expropriation of Jewish property. To this purpose he demanded two new anti-Jewish laws: the first, a law "which makes all Jews answerable for the damages which are inflicted upon the German economy and the German people by individual specimens of this criminality"49; further, he called for the death penalty for what he called "economic sabotage", (Wirtschaftssabotage) meaning the accumulation of currency reserves abroad. This demand—as further developments would show—was particularly directed against Jewish "economic sabotage": It was satisfied by the law dealing with economic sabotage, promulgated in December 1936, which in fact called for lengthy prison terms or the death penalty for the illegal transfer of property abroad; in the following period it was primarily applied against Jews.50

    5.4  In order to put through the other law which Hitler had proposed in his memorandum on the Four-Year-Plan—the comprehensive accountability of German Jews—a draft of a "law concerning the compensation of damages incurred by the Jews to the German Reich" was prepared at the beginning of February 1937. After this draft was rejected, because of the anticipated negative implications for the economy,51 Hitler in April 1938 renewed his proposals for a special tax on Jews which could be raised "for the specific situation—behaviour by individual Jews detrimental to the Volk". A proposal of this kind was issued by the responsible departments of the government but was once again rejected by Göring.52 Only after the November pogrom was the project realised and an "atonement payment" (Sühneleistung) of billions charged to German Jews.53

    5.5  But on the other hand, in the Spring and early Summer of 1937, Hitler decided not to follow through on two important antisemitic legislative projects for the moment. One was the third decree of the law of citizenship (Reichsbürgergesetz) by which among other things, a special trade symbol (Gewerbezeichen) was to be introduced for non-Jewish businesses; as Frick told Göring in February 1937, this proposal was to be enacted according to Hitler’s specific order. Nevertheless, the project was once again not treated—and this at Hitler’s explicit behest—since the incorporation of holdings by foreign Jews would create complications; it would not be enacted until one year later.54 Similarly, due to Hitler’s specific orders, the project to enact a special document on citizenship (Reichsbürgerbrief) into law was not further pursued.55

    5.6  To conclude this section, one can say that Hitler continued to be intensely preoccupied with anti-Jewish policy in the years 1936-37 and was once again prepared to be flexible for tactical reasons in pressing his goals, as is apparent in the different treatment accorded to the diverse laws—in particular, in this time period, to the further economic discrimination against Jews. However, as the following paragraphs will show, he has not given up his basic aim: to remove the Jews from Germany.


    6.1  By the end of 1937, concurrent with the transition to an expansionist foreign policy, a new, more radical phase in the persecution of the Jews began. Priority was given to the goal of expelling the Jews from Germany; this was to be accomplished especially through further discrimination, use of direct violence and greater economic pressure.

    6.2  This more radical course was actually launched by the strongly antisemitic address given by Hitler at the Reich Party Congress in 1937.56 In this speech, he turned against, among other things, what he called—in what was typical for his antisemitic vocabulary—"Jewish-Bolshevist subversion" (jüdisch-bolschewistische Zersetzung); the causative organism of the "disease" (Krankheit) Bolshevism was "that international parasite of the Volk which for many centuries has spread in the world, reaching once again full destructive magnitude in our time".57

    6.3  On 30 November 1937 Goebbels recorded the following in his diary about a conversation with Hitler which had taken place the previous day:

    Talked about the Jewish question for a long time... The Jews must disappear from Germany, yes out of all of Europe. That will take some time still, but it will happen and must happen. The Führer is firmly committed to this...58

    At the beginning of 1938 the Office for Foreign Affairs (Aussenpolitische Amt) of the NSDAP informed the German Foreign Office that Hitler had clearly declared himself in favour of Jewish emigration to Palestine.59

    6.4  In order to accelerate the expulsion of the Jews from Germany, a Reich-wide move to arrest Jews having a criminal record (even an insignificant one) began as early as the summer of 1938. Hitler frequently intervened directly in these "actions". He personally gave the order to include Jews in a general action against "asocials" as is clear from a note by the Director of the Jewish department of the SD (Security Service, Sicherheitsdienst) of the Nazi Party) of 8 June 1938.

    In a discussion on 1 June 1938, with C (=Heydrich, P.L), it was confidentially pointed out that—on the orders of the Führer—asocial and criminal Jews should be arrested and used for the purpose of earth-moving work .60

    6.5  There also exists evidence that Hitler concerned himself with the details of the propaganda which accompanied the mass arrests. When in the course of the campaign against "asocials" and Jews Goebbels asserted in a speech that more than 3000 Jews had moved to Berlin—he did this for the purpose of stirring up antisemitic feelings—Heydrich complained to the Ministry of Propaganda about this inaccuracy. He then learned that Goebbels had used the incorrect figures "with the permission of the Führer".61

    6.6  Nonetheless, the arrests in the Reich capital degenerated: Goebbels’s ruthlessly kindled anti-Jewish excesses turned to riots by the Party base and threatened to endanger public order and led to critical reports in the foreign press. The excesses were put to an end "upon the Führer's order", as noted in a draft of a report of the Jewish Department of the Sicherheitsdienst.62

    6.7  On 24 August 1938, in a talk with Hitler, Goebbels once again confirmed that despite the break-up of the campaign he had Hitler’s basic agreement for a further radicalisation of the persecution.63

    We discuss the Jewish question. The Führer approves my procedures in Berlin. What the foreign press writes is insignificant. The main thing is that the Jews be pushed out. In 10 years they must be removed from Germany. But in the interim we still want to keep the Jews here as pawns.

    6.8  The last sentence already points to the fact that Hitler, in view of increased international tensions, was beginning to think of taking the German Jews as hostages. The German Jews would serve as pawns.


    7.1  The course of the November pogrom of 1938 also clearly demonstrates Hitler’s personal initiative. It is inconceivable that Hitler was taken by surprise during the party meeting commemorating the 9th of November, 1923 by the news of the death of the German diplomat vom Rath—the event which the Nazis used as an excuse for launching the pogrom. Rath died in the late afternoon (17.30 German time); Hitler had expressly sent his personal physician Brandt to Paris "for consultation and for direct reportage", according to the Völkische Beobachter.64 He must therefore have already been informed at first hand in the afternoon, before the party meeting had begun, along with Goebbels65, Gauleiter (i.e. one of the regional chiefs of the Nazi Party) Jordan66 and the Foreign Office.67

    7.2  Before Goebbels held his speech that evening, in which he incited the assembled party leadership to the pogrom, he had already received clear instructions from Hitler, as he noted in his diary: "I am going to the party reception in the old City Hall. Huge crowd. I explain the matter to the Führer. He decides: allow the demonstrations to continue, Pull back the police. The Jews shall for once come to feel the anger of the people. That is correct".68

    7.3  Eyewitness reports69 according to which Hitler seemed surprised and annoyed about the pogrom in the late evening, if they are credible at all, can only be related to the extent of the damages in Munich and elsewhere, not however to the fact that the party had organised an anti-Jewish "action" that night. The concept of an unsuspecting Hitler is misleading if only because already on 7 November, the day of Rath's assassination, party activists had provoked violent anti-Jewish excesses in different parts of the Reich which were heralded by the Nazi press as a spontaneous reaction showing the anger of the German population.70


    8.1  After the pogrom, Göring was entrusted by Hitler with the direction and control of further "anti-Jewish policies"; while Hitler conferred upon Göring the task of investigating all decrees relating to the "Jewish question" before publication,71 in fact Hitler himself settled the details of further "anti-Jewish policies" in the months following the pogrom.

    8.2  Thus Göring disclosed a series of concrete decisions by Hitler in a conference with leading representatives of the Reich and the Party on 6 December.72 According to these resolutions, there was to be no particular label for Jews; no prohibition against selling to Jews; a boycott against Jews (Judenbann) could be ordered for certain localities.

    8.3  On 28 December 1938, after a discussion with Hitler, Göring communicated to central party and state officials the "authoritative expression of the will of the Führer" (Willensmeinung des Führers) on further measures to be taken against Jews.73 Accordingly, the law for the protection of tenants was not, in general, to be abrogated for Jews. On the other hand, in "individual cases" it was declared to be desirable to "proceed in such a way that Jews be quartered together in separate houses in so far as the contract situation allow".74 The use of sleeping and dining cars was to be forbidden for Jews. The use of "certain public establishments" (gewisse, der öffentlichkeit zugängliche Eirichtungen), such as bath houses or health baths, could be prohibited to Jews. Jews who were civil servants were not to be denied their pensions, but the possibility of reducing payments was to be investigated. Jewish welfare organisations were to be allowed to continue to exist. Jewish patents were to be "aryanised". Further, Hitler gave specific orders concerning living accommodations for people in "mixed marriages" and the "aryanisation" of their property. This catalogue is an excellent example of how precisely Hitler’s detailed instructions were transmitted by Göring and translated into reality by the bureaucracy.

    8.4  Thus the Reich Transport Minister (Reichsverkehrminister) forbade Jews the use of sleeping and dining cars on 23 February, following Hitler’s "will".75 By means of the law on rentals to Jews of 30 April 1939, the law for the protection of tenants was extensively curtailed thereby creating a legal situation according to Hitler’s orders whereby Jews could be quartered together in separate houses.76 The law, once again based on Hitler’s "will", however, ordered that German-Jewish mixed families with children be allowed to remain in their homes. With the circular put out by the Minister of the Interior on June 1939 Hitler’s wish regarding the "Judenbann" was fulfilled whereby the presence of Jews in baths and health establishments could be curtailed.77

    8.5  As early as 12 November, at the meeting of leading representatives of the Party and State which was held under Göring's direction and which dealt with further measures of anti-Jewish policy, Göring announced that Hitler would

    now finally make a foreign policy thrust, beginning with the powers who had raised the Jewish question, in order really to arrive at a solution to the Madagascar question. This is what he explained to me on 9 November. It doesn't work otherwise. He also wants to tell the other States: 'Why do you constantly talk about the Jews? Take them!'78

    8.6  These foreign policy initiatives took concrete form in the following weeks. Hitler left the necessary steps to Schacht, President of the Reich Bank, who elaborated on a plan initiated by Fischböck, Economics Minister in annexed Austria: according to this plan, the emigration of German Jews would be financed by means of an international loan. In this way, within the period of the next three to five years, emigration would become possible for some 400,000 employable Jews and their dependants.79

    8.7  It was only after Hitler had expressly agreed to this plan in a general meeting with Schacht,80 that Schacht was able to begin with appropriate inquiries in London at the end of December, 1938, and later with concrete negotiations. They did not lead, however, to tangible results.81

    8.8  With this foreign policy initiative, "the Third Reich" tried to make the German "Jewish problem" into an international question. The conjuring up of the memory of the pogrom of 9 November and additional threats were intended to place pressure upon German Jews to hasten to leave the country as well as to prevail upon the international community of states to prepare to admit a greater number of Jews.

    8.9  After Göring had already stated, in the meeting of 12 November, that in the event of an international conflict "an important reckoning with the Jews" would be "a foregone conclusion"82, Hitler expressed himself in a similar way in the course of the following weeks and months: The South African minister of defence and economics minister, Pirow, who had offered Hitler among other things his intervention in finding an international solution to the German "Jewish question", was told by his host on 24 November, 1938: "But the problem would be solved in the near future. This was his unshakeable will. It was not merely a German, but rather a European problem".83 During the conversation, Hitler moved to an open threat: "What do you think Mr. Pirow, what would happen in Germany if I lifted my protective hand away from the Jews? The world can not conceive of what would happen."84 With this remark, Hitler made it clear to his guest that the authority in the German anti-Jewish policy ultimately remained with him and that he was in a position to decide about a new pogrom at any time—to lift his protective hand, as he expressed it euphemistically. This expression was of course a deception. In fact, it was never Hitler’s aim to protect the Jews. By presenting himself as a "protector" of the Jews, he wanted to deflect from his own central role in anti-Jewish policy and intended to portrait potential further anti-Jewish violence as a spontaneous outburst of popular fury. He followed here the official version which the Nazis had dissmimated after the progrom of November 1938.

    8.10  The report on Hitler’s official reception of the Czech Foreign Minister Chvalkovsky on 21 January 1939, contains the following remarks by the "Führer": "The Jews would be exterminated here. The Jews will not get away with 9 November 1918. This day would be avenged".85

    8.11  In his speech before the Reichstag on the occasion of the sixth anniversary of the take-over of power, on 30 January 1939, Hitler finally expressed himself in a pivotal and lengthier passage on the "Jewish question".86

    In my life I have often been a prophet and was generally laughed at. During my struggle for power it was mostly the Jewish people who laughed at my prophecies that I would some day assume the leadership of the state and thereby of the entire Volk and then, among many other things, achieve a solution of the Jewish problem. I believe that in the meantime the then resounding laughter of Jewry in Germany is now choking in their throats. Today I will be a prophet again: If international Jewry within Europe and abroad should succeed once more in plunging the peoples into a world war, then the consequence will be not the Bolshevisation of the world and therewith a victory of Jewry, but on the contrary, the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe.87

    8.12  This threat by Hitler contained a new quality in that it no longer was aimed at putting further pressure on Jewish emigration. Rather, Hitler began to adjust to the fact that in the case of a war, a Jewish minority would continue to exist in Germany; he now intended to use this Jewish minority and the Jews of other countries, who in the case of war would fall under his domination as hostages so as to prevent an intervention by the Western Powers against his war policy. This is why his menaces concentrated on a "world war" and not merely on "war". The threatened "annihilation" (Vernichtung) of the Jews is here to be understood as a not clearly defined but in any case violent intimidation.


    9.1  From the preceding sections it has become clear that Hitler—in accordance with his programmatic statements in the twenties—consistently pursued the policy of "removal" of the Jews from Germany in the years between 1933 and 1939: he did this, to begin with, through a policy of systematic segregation and discrimination, finally through the use of violence. Hitler’s direct influence can be demonstrated for all phases of the persecution of the Jews, although the dictator remained flexible: while in general he attempted to radicalise anti-Jewish policies, he could also check the radical course of the persecution of the Jews if and when for internal or foreign policy reasons this appeared opportune.

    9.2  It has also become clear, however, that the persecution of the Jews played a central role in Hitler’s politics and that the dictator used anti-Jewish policy to try to gain advantages for his regime both within Germany and internationally. With the help of the boycott of 1933, international criticism of the terror of the Nazi regime was to be silenced; with the help of antisemitic laws, the hope of direct economic advantage, tied to antisemitic aspirations on the part of the party basis, would be satisfied; the arms programme was possible only by means of access to Jewish property; finally, Hitler intended to force the Western powers to take the Jews as hostages in order to force the compliance of the Western powers. Hitler’s antisemitic policy is therefore not merely to be understood as the implementation of an ideological fanatic; it fulfilled a significant function in his policy to secure and expand his power position.


    10.1  When Germany invaded and conquered Poland in September 1939, the Nazi Regime radicalised its anti-Jewish Policy significantly. During the war in Poland and in the months thereafter, German SS and police units shot many tens of thousands of people, members of the Polish elite, including thousands of Jews. These shootings were a part of the policy of the German leadership of rendering Poland leaderless and destroying it as a nation.88 This policy of mass murder was in accord with Hitler’s ideas and orders.

    10.2  When on 12 September 1939, the head of Military Intelligence, Admiral Canaris, drew the attention of General Keitel (Chief of the High Command of the Wehrmacht) to the existing plans for far-reaching executions in Poland, Keitel answered that "these things have already been decided by the Führer"; Hitler had made clear that "if the Wehrmacht doesn't want to have anything to do with this then it must also accept that the SS and the Gestapo act separately".89 On 2 October Hitler stated that whatever happens, it should be noted that "Polish masters should not exist, where Polish masters exist they should be killed, as tough as this may sound".90

    10.3  The very fact that Hitler at this time played a central role in all of these questions related to the persecution of the Jews is made clear in a note of 6 December 1939 issued from the Office ";f Hess, Hitler’s Deputy (in party affairs). At the beginning of December, 1939, proposals had been made by the Office of the Führer's Deputy to approach Himmler so as to be able to confiscate telephones still in Jewish hands and to decree a general identifying mark for Jews. Bormann, Chief of Staff of the Office and close personal co-worker of Hitler, let it be known "that the Reichsführer SS will discuss all measures against the Jews directly with the Führer".91

    10.4  At the end of May 1940 at a meeting of leading representatives of the police, Hans Frank, the "Generalgouverneur" in Poland (i.e. the Head of the German occupation administration) explained the intended plan for "extraordinary pacification" (Ausserordentliches Befriedungsprogramm), a further chapter in the murder of Polish citizens which was to be discharged while the world was distracted by the War in the West. Frank said:

    I admit openly that the planned pacificaton program will cost the lives of thousands of Poles, especially of those from the intellectual leadership of Poland. [...] The Führer told me: The treatment and security of German policy in the Generalgouvernement is the business of those men responsible for the Generalgouvernement alone. He expressed himself in the following way: Whatever leadership we have now identified in Poland, that is what is to be liquidated.92


    11.1  Along with this program for murder in Poland, the further general anti-Jewish policy of the "Third Reich" in Poland planned above all to set up a "reservation" (Reservat) for all Jews under German domination. In this case as well, Hitler’s influence was decisive: in a meeting with his heads of departments (Amtsleitern), Heydrich, the chief of the Security Police on 14 September 1939, reported that Hitler was given proposals regarding "the Jewish problem in Poland by the Reichsführer (i.e. Himmler, P.L.) which could only be decided upon by the Führer because they carried significant foreign policy consequences".93

    11.2  On 21 September, Heydrich was able to report to the heads of departments of the Security Police that Hitler had in the meantime made a decision on the issue of the deportations: "The deportation of Jews into the foreign-language Gau, deportation across the demarkation line, is approved." By "foreign-language Gau" was meant those occupied areas which were not directly annexed to the Reich but which were slated to become part of the Generalgouvernement later; "demarcation line" referred to the line to which the Soviet Union and the German Reich in Poland had agreed upon in order to divide their spheres of interest. Heydrich spoke further in his report on 21 September about the planned deportations:

    However, the whole process was to take place over the course of one year: Jewry is to be brought together in the cities in ghettos in order to keep better control and to make later deportation easier. The first priority is the disappearance of the Jew as a small settler in the countryside. This action must be accomplished within the next 3 to 4 weeks.94

    11.3  On 29 September, Hitler explained to Rosenberg, the Head of the Office for Foreign Affairs of the NSDAP, that the newly conquered Polish territory was to be divided into three strips: Between the Vistula and the Bug the Jews from the entire Reich were to be settled, as well as "all in any way unreliable elements". At the Vistula an "East Wall" was to be built and on the previous German-Polish border a "broad belt of Germanising and colonising", and between them, in the middle, a sort of Polish "state".95 The idea of a "Jewish reservation" was addressed relatively frequently in the coming weeks by the Nazi leadership: Thus for example, it was expressly mentioned by Hitler to the Swedish industrialist Dahlerus when he visited Germany at the end of September, seeking to mediate between the Reich and Great Britain.96 The German press was also secretly briefed on these plans.97 To the Italian foreign minister on 1 October, Hitler spoke of the idea of a re-allocation of land according to ethnic criteria, a "general purification policy" (völkischen Flurbereinigung) in the East.98 On 6 October Hitler declared in a speech before the Reichstag that the "most important task" which follows from the "collapse of the Polish state", is a "new order in ethnographic relations, i.e. a re-settlement of nationalities". In the second part of his speech, Hitler gave notice that in the course of the coming "ordering of the entire living space according to nationalities" (which was to include all of Europe under German influence) "an attempt to order and regulate the Jewish problem will be undertaken".99

    11.4  Directly after this speech, on 7 October 1939, Hitler signed his edict on the "consolidation of German ethnicity" (Festigung deutschen Volkstums). Therein Hitler transmitted to Himmler two tasks: The first one was "to take in and settle within the Reich ... German people who were previously forced to live far away"; the second was to "organise the settlement of people's communities in such a way as to set up better dividing lines between them". Hitler transmitted to Himmler in this edict, not only the job of returning to the Reich the German nationals and ethnic Germans (Reichs- und Volksdeutsche) but also of "creating new German areas of settlement through deportation" and specifically the "exclusion of the damaging influence of those alien populations who imply danger for the Reich and the German people's community". In another section of the edict, Hitler specified that "those questionable population groups can be assigned to specific living areas".100

    11.5  While Himmler started preparations to deport Poles and Jews from the annexed Polish areas, in accordance with these orders, Adolf Eichmann concerned himself with preparations to deport Jews from the rest of the "Great German Reich", also, as he said, on orders specifically issued by Hitler. On 6 October Eichmann, at this point Director of the Central Office for Jewish Emigration (Zentralstelle für jüdische Auswanderung) in Prague, which worked under Gestapo instructions to deport Jews systematically from the Protectorates of Bohemia and Moravia, received the additional order from Gestapo chief Müller to deport Jews from the Kattowitz district (i.e the recently annexed Polish area) as well as from Moravian-Ostrava (in the Protectorate) and to send them to Nisko am San in the District of Lublin of the Generalgouvernement.

    11.6  His assignment was soon extended, by virtue of orders from Hitler, to cover the deportation of all Jews from the Reich, including Austria and the "Ostmark". Thus he stated to the Gauleiter of Silesia, Wagner on 10 October:101 "The Führer has for the present ordered the restructuring of 300,000 Jews from the old Reich and the Ostmark." While visiting Vienna on 7 October, Eichmann explained to the Special Commissioner for Jewish questions in the Office of the Reich Governor for Austria: "According to strictly confidential information from the director of the Central Office for Emigration of Jews, the Führer has given the order that, to start the whole operation, 300.000 less well-off Jews from the Greater German Reich area" will be deported to Poland; in the meantime, those Jews still living in Vienna are to be seized and deported within the context of an operation which will take "at most 3/4 of a year".102

    11.7  Just as this first extensive deportation programme took place under Hitler’s personal authority, so the crushing of the Nisko experiment is also traceable to a decision by Hitler. On 17 October, after the first deportation trains with altogether about 4700 people from Vienna, Moravia-Ostrava and Kattowitz had reached Nisko, Hitler made clear to Keitel that precautions must be taken because the future Generalgouvernement "as an extended glacis which has military importance for us, could be used as a deployment area". This perspective was obviously not compatible with that of a "Jewish reservation"; the deportations to Nisko were stopped on the order of the Reich Security Head Office (Reichssicherheitshauptamt).103 From a long-term point of view, according to Hitler, nevertheless, the "leadership of the area ... must also make it possible for us to clean the area of the Reich from Jews and Poles"—a further indication that he had in no way abandoned the basic idea of a "Jewish reservation" in the Generalgouvenement.104


    12.1  After the victory over France in June, 1940, the plan to push the Jews into a "reservation" (Reservat) in Poland was replaced with another project for the territorial solution of the Jewish problem: the so-called Madagascar plan.

    12.2  As early as 25, May Himmler had presented Hitler with a memorandum which included the following key sentence with respect to the fate of the Jews: "I hope to see that by means of the possibility of a large emigration of all Jews to Africa or to some other colony—that the concept of Jew will be fully extinguished". In the same document Himmler had still rejected "the Bolshevist methods of physical extirpation (Ausrottung) of a people because of inner conviction, as un-German and impossible".105 Hitler judged this memorandum to be "very good and correct", according to Himmler's note of 28 May. The document however was "to be held in the greatest secrecy"; Himmler was to show it to Frank at some point "in order to tell him that the Führer finds it correct".106

    12.3  Plans for the re-settlement of altogether four million Jews to the island off the African east coast were worked out in the German Department of the Foreign Office107 as well as in the Reich Security Head Office (Reichssicherheitshauptamt).108 From the surviving records of the German Foreign Office it is clear that the Madagascar plan (like the plan of a "Jewish reservation" in Poland) was not a new variation of a solution for emigration (Auswanderungslösung), but rather that here the Jews were to play the role of hostages; the Jews under German control would be used in this way to prevent the United States from entering the war. Thus in a note from the Jewish expert of the German Department, Rademacher, it is said that109 under a German "police governor" (Polizeigouverneur) "the Jews" should be set up as security under German control for the future good behaviour of their racial associates in America"; and in another note, the same expert wrote that the Security Police was "experienced with carrying out appropriate punishments which had become necessary because of unfriendly activities by Jews in the USA against Germany".110 The mere fact that Madagascar lacked the basic conditions necessary for existence for four million European Jews makes it clear that the plan itself was a threat to the further existence of Jews in the area of German dominance.

    12.4  Hitler’s extreme interest in the Madagascar plan is fully documented. Ribbentrop and Hitler sketched out the plan to the Italian Foreign Minister Ciano and Mussolini during their talks in Munich on 17 and 18 June.111 Hitler mentioned the Madagascar project on 20 June to the Commander in chief of the Navy, Raeder.112 On 12 July Frank passed on to his collaborators the following information from a conversation with Hitler which had taken place four days earlier:

    Very important is also the decision of the Führer which came from a proposal of mine that there be no further transports of Jews into the Generalgouvernement. In general political terms I would like to say that it is planned to transport the entire Jewish clan from the German Reich, the Generalgouvernement and the Protectorat to an African or American colony in the shortest conceivable time span following the peace settlement. Madagascar is being considered; it would be separated from France for this purpose.113

    12.5  At the beginning of August, Hitler in a discussion with his Ambassador to Paris, Abetz,114 returned to the plan of expulsion (Vertreibung) of all Jews from Europe; a similar statement of Hitler’s from the middle of August is mentioned in Goebbels's diary.115


    13.1  Hitler’s particular interest in the furthering of "Jewish policy" becomes obvious especially through the fact of his personal involvement in subsequent plans for deportation.

    13.2  The initiative for the deportation of 7000 Jews from the two Gaue (i.e. Party districts), Baden and the Saar-Palatinate area, to France on 22 and 23 October was most probably due to the intervention of the two responsible Gau chiefs, Bürckel and Wagner.116 These abductions were specifically approved by Hitler, as is clear from a handwritten note by the Jewish expert of the foreign office, Rademacher.117

    13.3  At the beginning of November, Hitler made a personal decision concerning the distribution of 200,000 ethnic Germans (Volksdeutsche) who were to be accommodated in the Reich before the end of the year, thanks to agreements with the Soviet Union and Romania negotiated in September and October. In this connection, on the occasion of a conference with leading military leaders on 4 November, 1941, he made a decision about the further deportation of Poles and Jews from the annexed Eastern territories: "Gouvernement: plus 150-160,000 Poles and Jews from the newly won territories".118

    13.4  On the very same day, discussions began on the agreement to a quota for those to be deported from the ex-Polish areas, as we learn from the Goebbels’ diaries; According to this source, Hitler created "joyful peace" between the Gauleiters Koch (from East Prussia) and Forster (Danzig-West Prussia):119

    All would like to throw their rubbish in to the Generalgouvernement: Jews, the sick, the lazy, etc. And Frank resists. Not entirely without justification. He would like to make an exemplary country out of Poland. That is going too far. He can not and should not do this. Poland should be a large work reservoir for us—this is what the Führer has decided. [...] And the Jews—we will throw them out of these areas later as well.

    13.5  At this same meeting or directly thereafter, deportation quotas were set for the two Gaue—and according to this commitment mass deportations of more than 47,000 Poles, Jews and non Jews from the annexed territories into the Generalgouvernement followed in the next months.120

    13.6  At the beginning of December, Lammers told Schirach (Gauleiter in Vienna) of his wish expressed two months earlier—that the deportation (Abschiebung) of Vienna Jews be approved by Hitler. This is further proof of Hitler’s direct involvement in the plans for deportation:


    As Reichsleiter Bormann explained to me, the Führer has decided, on the basis of one of your reports, that in the Reichsgau of Vienna, 60.000 Jews who have housing should be deported to the Generalgouvernement as rapidly as possible, i.e. while the war is still going on, because of the housing shortage in Vienna.121

    In anticipation of this deportation, beginning in February and March, 5000 Jews from Vienna were deported to the Generalgouvernement.122


    14.1  The Madagascar plan had became obsolete by the Fall of 1940 because of the continuation of the war in the West. And the comprehensive deportation of the Jews in German-dominated areas into the Generalgouvernement had proved to be difficult for various reasons. Thus Hitler assigned the responsibility for deporting the Jews to the occupied Soviet areas to the Reichssicherheitshauptamt. This decision, which was made parallel to the preparations for "Barbarossa" (the code word for the military operations involved in the attack on the Soviet Union) around the end of 1940, beginning of 1941, can be reconstructed on the basis of a series of documents.

    14.2  On 21 January, the Gestapo's Jewish expert in Paris, Theodor Dannecker, noted the following in a paper prepared for Eichmann:123

    According to the will of the Führer, the Jewish question should be carried to a final solution after the war within the German-controlled or dominated parts of Europe,. The chief of the Security Police and the SD (Heydrich, P.L.) has already received a mandate from the Führer—via the RF-SS (Himmler, P.L.) or through the Reichsmarschall (Göring, P.L.) to submit a proposal for a final solution project. On the basis of the wide experience of the departments of the CdS (Chief of the Security Police, P.L.) and SD in the treatment of the Jews and thanks to the lengthy preparations made in this domain, the most significant features of this project have been worked out. It is now in the hands of the Führer and the Reichsmarschall. It is clear that the execution involves an enormous amount of work and that it can only be successful if the greatest care is taken in its preparation. This must be be based upon a comprehensive deportation of the Jews as well as upon the planning of a settlement action prepared to the smallest detail to take place in a territory which has not yet been decided upon.

    14.3  In addition we learn from a statement to the Propaganda Ministry submitted on 20 March 1941 by Eichmann, who was head of the department in the Reichssicherheitshauptamt responsible for "evacuations" (Räumungsangelegenheiten) as of December, 1939, that "Pg. Heydrich, who was commissioned with the final evacuation of Jews, had presented the Führer with a proposal 8 to 10 weeks earlier which had not been implemented for the sole reason that the Generalgouvernement was not at that point in a position to accept a single Jew or Pole from the old Reich".124

    14.4  If we piece these various bits of information together, it becomes clear that sometime before January 1941, Heydrich -through Hitler and via Himmler and Göring—had received a commission to prepare a first draft for a "final solution project" "after the War" for all Jews in a yet to be decided territory. This plan was ready in January, but because of the situation in the Generalgouvernement it was not implementable. For on 15 March the deportations to the Generalgouvernement were stopped due to the transport situation in view of the military preparations for the attack on Russia.

    14.5  Apparently completely unimpressed by the blockade on deportations which had been imposed two days earlier, those who gathered at Hitler’s midday dinner table on 17 March conversed about further deportation programs, as Goebbels described it almost euphorically in his diary:125

    "Vienna will soon be totally free of Jews. And now it is Berlin's turn. I discuss this with the Führer and with Dr.Franck (sic!). He hires the Jews to work and they are also obedient. Later they must leave Europe entirely."

    14.6  Frank, in the meantime once again in the Generalgouvernement, also expressed himself on the issue of Hitler’s further plans in regard to the persecution of the Jews. Thus the minutes to a meeting of 25 March, read as follows:

    SS-Ogruf (Obergruppenführer, P.L.) Krüger announced the provisional stoppage of the resettlement of Poles and Jews in the Generalgouvernement. Frank states that the Führer had told him that the Generalgouvernement would be the first area made free of Jews."126

    14.7  From these statements by Frank and Goebbels we thus can conclude two things: first of all, the Generalgouvernement was not the final destination for the intended "evacuation of the Jews" because it was supposed to be made "free of Jews" and the Jews were supposed to "leave Europe altogether". Secondly, the assurance which Hitler made to Goebbels and Frank that their respective areas of domination were to be made "free of Jews" could only be realised over the long- term. This is because he gave this promise at a moment when the deportations had in fact been stopped; what Hitler’s timetable for a "Germanisation" of the Generalgouvernement really was can be deduced from another statement by Frank, made on the same day: "The Führer is decided to make this area (i.g. the Generalgouvernement, P.L.) a purely German country in the course of the next 15 to 20 years."127 Shortly thereafter, Frank went on to occupy himself with the planning for the Warsaw Ghetto, which would provide the basis for at least a medium-term existence for the Jewish "residential district" in Warsaw.128 Also Goebbels’ diary entry for 22 March 1941 shows that the Propaganda Minister had in the meantime understood that the "evacuation" from Berlin could only be implemented over a longer period of time; "The Jews can not be evacuated out of Berlin since 30,000 work in the armaments industry there."129

    14.8  In fact, by March 1941, at the very latest, the Nazi leadership was clearly aware of what was the destination planned for the Jews who were to be expelled over the long- range period "out of all of Europe" really was to be: They were to be deported to the newly conquered Eastern territories after the war against the Soviet Union for which Hitler had concretely begun preparations as early as the last months of 1940.130

    14.9  More evidence for this intention is supplied by a memo by Heydrich from 26 March 1941 concerning a discussion with Göring:

    In relation to the solution of the Jewish question, I reported briefly to the Reichsmarschall and showed him my draft which he accepted with one alteration regarding Rosenberg’s jurisdiction and ordered me to resubmit it.131

    14.10  By "Rosenberg's jurisdiction" was meant the latter's designated role as chief of an authority that was to administer the eastern occupied territories—what was later to become the Ministry of the East. Herewith it is clear that the planned "solution of the Jewish question" was to take place in the soon to-be-occupied areas of the Soviet Union. The renewed submission of the draft was to take place on 31 July 1941, when Göring entrusted Heydrich with the responsibility of "preparations in organisational, technical and material aspects for the complete solution to the Jewish question in the German area of influence in Europe",132 and stated that the "jurisdiction of other central authorities" should be taken into consideration; this was a general formula to solve the problem of Rosenberg's jurisdiction.

    14.11  What those involved in the phase of preparation of "Barbarossa" understood by the term "final solution" within the to-be-conquered Soviet Union is not clear. Before the beginning of Barbarossa, the German attack upon the Soviet Union, there had been no preparations made—not for a reservation nor for mass murder. Just as in the case of the plan for a reservation in Poland and in the case of a Madagascar plan, in the case of a deportation to the Soviet Union the European Jews would have found a situation in which the basic conditions for human existence were impossible—particularly since the essence of German policy was to systematically starve the Soviet population.133 Mass death would have been the consequence.

    14.12  For the months before "Barbarossa" a series of concrete indications proves that Hitler, in particular, had declared himself in favour of such a comprehensive deportation "to the East": Frank explained to Goebbels directly before the beginning of the attack on the Soviet Union that he was preparing for the banishment of the Jews (Abschiebung), as reported in the Goebbels diaries:134

    Dr. Franck (sic!) tells about the Generalgouvernement. There they are already pleased to be able to banish the Jews. Jewry in Poland is gradually decaying. A justified punishment for having incited the people and instigated war. The Führer has also prophesied this to the Jews.

    14.13  From statements which he made a few weeks later, it becomes clear where Frank got his certainty: to his staff he explained that there would be no further ghetto construction in the Generalgouvernement; according to a pledge which Hitler had made to him on 19 June, the Jews would be removed in the foreseeable future from the Generalgouvernement, which would then be made into a "transit camp" (Durchgangslager).135

    14.14  A further source is a complaint from the Romanian Head of State, Antonescu, to Hitler on 16 August 1941: Antonescu complained that Bessarabian Jews who had been expelled from their homes by Romanian troops and had been forced further to the east, to Ukraine, were now being pushed back from there by the Wehrmacht. This practice, according to Antonescu, stood in opposition to "the guidelines laid down to him by the Führer in Munich regarding the treatment of Eastern Jews".136 Antonescu was instructed, according to this source, that the Jews of Eastern Europe were going to be deported to the conquered Soviet areas—which is what his troops did right away—without waiting for the end of the war—as Hitler had intended.

    14.15  As a conclusion to this section, we can state that Hitler was well aware of the plans of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt for the deportation of the Jews in the to-be-conquered Soviet Union.


    15.1  In the course of the preparations for the racist war of extermination against the Soviet Union, Hitler played a central role when it came to converting Nazi ideological thought into concrete instructions. On 3 March, Hitler gave instructions to the Chief of the Army Leadership Staff (Wehrmacht-Führungsstab), Jodl, for the new version of a proposal presented to him by the High Command of the Wehrmacht (OKW) on the: "guidelines for special areas relating to instruction No. 21", which was to constitute the basis for the occupation administration in the to-be-conquered Soviet territories.

    This coming campaign is more than just a struggle of arms; it will also lead to the confrontation of two world views. In order to end this war it will not suffice by far merely to defeat the enemy army. [...] The Jewish-Bolshevik intelligentsia, the hitherto oppressor of the people, must be eliminated.137

    15.2  Already one week earlier, the Head of the Armaments Office of the OKW, Thomas, had learned while reporting to Göring, that Hitler had stated that it was "most important to execute the Bolshevist leaders".138 Explicit was also the tenor of Hitler’s statement of 17 March to the top officers of the army:139

    The intelligentsia installed by Stalin must be destroyed. The leadership machine of the Russian empire must be defeated. In the Greater Russian area the use of the most brutal force is necessary.

    15.3  On 30 March, Hitler made a speech with a similar tone to a meeting of Generals, recorded by the Chief of the General Staff of the Army, General Halder, in an abbreviated fashion:140

    Struggle of two world views against one another. Devastating judgement about Bolshevism—it is the same as asocial criminality. Communism unbelievable danger for the future. We must disavow the standpoint of soldierly camaraderie. The Communist is not a comrade, neither before nor after. We are talking about a war of extermination. If we don't look at it this way than we might well beat the enemy—but in 30 years we will once again be faced with the Communist enemy. We are not waging war in order to conserve the enemy... war against Russia: extermination of the Bolshevik Commissars and the Communist intelligentsia.

    15.4  According to Hitler’s guidelines of 3 March and Jodl’s precise instructions from the same day, a "directive concerning the special areas of Barbarossa" was issued on 13 March by Jodl.141 In this directive it says:

    In the operation area of the Army, the Reichsführer SS is granted special responsibilities by order of the Führer for the preparation of the political administration; these special responsibilities arise from the ultimate decisive struggle between two opposing political systems. In the context of these responsibilities, the Reichsführer SS will act independently and at his own risk.

    15.5  What the military men understood by these "special responsibilities" becomes clear from Jodl’s directive of 3 March, in which he spoke of the "necessity of rendering all Bolshevik chieftains and commissars harmless without delay".142

    15.6  The massacres of the four Einsatzgruppen, the task forces consisting of SS and police personnel subordinate to the Reichssicherheitshauptamt, commenced with the beginning of the war in the East. They are extensively documented, above all in the situational reports (Ereignismeldungen) for the UdSSR, put out by the Reichssicherheitshauptamt; these reports openly describe the murder of hundreds of thousands of people, more of 90% of them Jews. These reports were relatively widely circulated: for example 45 copies of situational report No. 40 of 1 August 1941 were distributed; they were sent not only to numerous offices of the SS and police but also to the Leadership staff of the Wehrmacht. In a radio telegram to the Einsatzgruppen on 1 August, Gestapo Chief Müller, who was responsible for the compilation of situational reports, ordered that "especially interesting illustrative material" should be sent to Berlin because "the Führer should be presented with continuous reports on the work of the Einsatzgruppen in the East from here".143 The distribution list of the situational report No 128 of 3 November 1941, of which there were 55 copies, included the Party Chancellery144 (Hitler’s office responsible for communication between him and the Nazi Party). It is therefore not possible to argue that the mass murders by the Einsatzgruppen were kept secret from other agencies by the Reichssicherheitshauptamt; in fact, these reports were available to many—including also to Hitler. The grounds for the mass executions which were given by the Einsatzgruppen precisely correspond to the justifications offered by Hitler for the extermination of the "Jewish-Bolshevik complex" before the beginning of the war.

    15.7  After these murders had begun on a large scale, Hitler once again demonstratively endorsed the brutal course which was being pursued; on 16 July in a conference with leading functionaries placed in the Eastern territories dealing with the ground rules of the future policy of occupation he said: "The giant area must naturally be pacified as quickly as possible; this will happen at best in that anyone who just looks funny should be shot."145

    15.8  With the beginning of the massive murder of the Soviet civilian population in the summer of 1941, a stage was reached in which these statements and similar ones by Hitler could no longer be understood as general threats of violence. The "eliminatory" language of the dictator must rather be seen in the context of the beginning mass murder of people by special commandos specially set up by "particular order of the Führer". When Hitler now spoke of the "annihilation" (Vernichtung) of people his underlings must have understood it as it was meant: as direct or indirect orders for a radicalisation of the already begun mass murders.


    16.1  In the middle of September 1941 Hitler ordered the deportation of the Jews from the Greater German Reich into ghettos in Eastern Europe. He thereby set in process the deportation plans which he had pursued at the beginning of 1941, without waiting for the original precondition—the military victory over the Red Army. Only a month earlier, in the middle of August, Hitler had spoken against the "evacuation" of Jews from the Reich area.146

    16.2  On the 18 September 1941 Himmler nonetheless announced to the Gauleiter in Warthegau, Greiser, the following:

    The Führer would like the Altreich and the Protectorate from the West to the East to be emptied and liberated of Jews as soon as possible. I am therefore trying—hopefully still in this year—to transport the Jews of the Altreich and those from the Protectorate—at least as a first stage—into the Eastern territories, which had been acquired two years earlier; this is in order to push them further East in the coming spring. I intend to place about 60,000 Jews of the Altreich and the Protectorate in the Litzmannstadt ghetto, which I understand has enough room to accommodate them, for the winter.147








    17.1  Hitler’s decision of September to deport the Jews from Central Europe did not yet include the resolution directly and systematically to murder them at the given destinations in occupied Poland and the Soviet territory (especially Lodz, Riga and Minsk). Clearly Hitler initially held on to the idea of deporting these people further to the East once the expected military victory over the Soviet Union had been achieved. When in November, 1941, a total number of 6000 Jews, coming on six transports from the Reich to Kovno and Riga, were shot on the orders of the local Security Police, Himmler ordered Heydrich to stop the executions. (In fact this order arrived too late.)155 This intervention, however, concerned only the Jews from the Reich. The policy of extermination continued in the Soviet areas undiminished.

    17.2  With the declaration of war on the USA on 11 December, the idea of taking Western and Central European Jews hostage became obsolete. Now the final solution—i.e. the systematic mass murder—of all European Jews was launched; Hitler’s pivotal role in this last step of the escalation process can be demonstrated once again.

    17.3  One day after the declaration of war on the USA, on 12 December, Hitler addressed the Gau and Reich leaders of the Party. In this speech he returned once again to his prophecy of 30 January 1939 and now announced the approaching extermination of the Jews living under German domination, as we can read in the Goebbels’ diaries:156


    17.4  Rosenberg, the Reich Minster for the occupied Eastern territories, reported in his diary that 14 on December he showed Hitler the manuscript for an address he was planning to give in Berlin. Rosenberg, who in a press conference of 18 November had openly spoken of a "biological eradication of the entirety of Jewry"157, was now, "after the decision"158, i.e. after the declaration of war on the United States, uncertain as to whether his initially planned

    comments on the New York Jews did not perhaps have to ... be somewhat altered. [...] I took the position not to speak about the extirpation (Ausrottung) of the Jews. The Führer agreed with this attitude and said they saddled us with the war and they brought the destruction; it would be no wonder if they were the first to feel the consequences.159 Rosenberg's uncertainty was related to the propagandistic representation of "extirpation"—not the fact itself; here there was agreement between himself and Hitler.

    17.5  On 18 December, Himmler noted these key words in his appointment calendar (recently re-discovered in Moscow) regarding a conversation with Hitler: "Jewish question/to be extirpated (auszurotten) as partisans".160 This memo does not, in my opinion, provide the decisive order to Himmler to start the systematic mass murder of the Jews of Europe, as has been recently argued161, but rather can more reasonably be read as a confirmation of Hitler’s intention to continue and to intensify the mass murders of Soviet Jews, which had up until then already claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands, under the same rationale as before. This memo is thus significant proof of the direct and fundamental participation of Hitler in the decision-making process concerning the mass murder of the Jews.


    17.6  The deportations which once again began on a large scale in the Spring of 1942, after the Wannsee Conference of 20 January, were preceded in January and February 1942 by a series of public declarations by Hitler, in which he unmistakably returned to his "prophecy" of January 1939, that in the case of a new world war the Jews of Europe would be exterminated. The recent entry of the USA in the war—thus the extension of the war to a world war—and the fact that in his statements Hitler continually mentioned the date of 1 September, 1939—particularly underlined his threat.

    17.7  Accordingly, in the Führer's New Year address, Hitler said: "The Jew, however, will not extirpate the European people, but he will be the victim of his own attack".162 In his address on the occasion of 30 January, Hitler exclaimed: "We are clear that the war can only end if either the Aryan peoples are extirpated or if Jewry disappears from Europe."163 In a statement read on 24 February 1942, in the Munich Hofbäuhaus, on the 22 anniversary of the founding of the Nazi Party, Hitler once again allowed it to be announced (he was not present) that:

    My prophesy will find its fulfilment in that through this war it will be not be Aryan mankind that will be exterminated, but the Jew will be extirpated.164

    At the same time, Hitler expressed himself in a smaller circle, among members of his entourage and private guests, in the same way:

    The Jew must get out of Europe! The best would be if they went to Russia! I have no sympathy with the Jews. They will always remain an element which stir up the peoples against one another.165

    17.8  Four weeks later, he expressed himself before a similar circle:

    The Jew will be identified! The same battle which Pasteur and Koch had to fight must be led by us today. Innumerable sicknesses have their origin in one bacillus: the Jew! Japan would also have got it had it been remained open any longer to the Jew. We will get well when we eliminate the Jews.166


    18.1  In the period around the second half of April 1942, the hitherto existing modus operandi of the mass murder of Jews was altered: henceforth, the Jews of Central Europe would no longer be deported to the Eastern-European ghettos nor would the local population who were labelled "not fit for work" be murdered; from now on instead, in the period between April and July a step-by-step European-wide murder program was to be set in motion: Those Jews no longer fit to work would be deported directly to the extermination camps while those who could still work were to be killed through strenuous work under the most extreme conditions. This programme included the murder of those who had been previously spared, those Central European Jews already deported to the East.

    18.2  A direct order by Hitler initiating this entire program has not been found. It is however unthinkable that these last steps in the escalation of "Jewish policy" of the "Third Reich" could have taken place without Hitler’s express consent. Hitler had expressed himself in the most drastic possible manner on the "solution" to the Jewish question from the beginning of the Russian campaign and would continue to do so until the end of his life.

    18.3  As shown above, Hitler had been constantly involved with "Jewish policy", had issued the most important orders in this area himself and had even occupied himself with the details. Over and over again, Hitler had personally radicalised the persecution of the Jews or recommended such radicalisation: he had urged the mass executions of Poles and Jews in 1939-40; he had repeatedly pushed forward the deportation plans in the years 1939 to 1941; through his guidelines, he had decisively influenced the ideological war of extermination against the Soviet Union; he had pushed forward the deportation of the Central-European Jews from 1941 on, and by means of various statements after 1941 on he had demanded the "annihilation" of European Jews.

    18.4  Also in this phase, as in the years between 1933 to 1939, Hitler would sometimes slow down that radicalisation of the anti-Jewish policy which he himself had decisively accelerated; he did this when it came into conflict with other elements of his policy. Thus in the fall of 1939 he stopped the Nisko project and in the spring of 1941 he stopped the further deportations into the Generalgouvernement because they interfered with military campaigns. However, these measures to halt the persecutions were invariably introduced as tactical manoeuvres and were of a provisional nature; they must be seen in the general context of the policy of extermination which was decisively determined by Hitler.

    18.5  As far as terminology is concerned, the concepts of "deportation" (Aussiedlung) or "resettlement" (Umsiedlung) or "evacuation" (Evakuierung) to the East were used in this phase of the policy, just as before: thus the concept of a "territorial final solution", which would occur after the war, "outside of Europe" was still used. Illustrative for this is for instance the entry in Goebbels’s diary for 27 April 1942:

    I spoke with the Führer once again in great detail about the Jewish question. His point of view on this problem is unyielding. He wants to push the Jews altogether out of Europe. That is also correct. The Jews have brought so much misfortune to our Continent that the most severe punishment which could be imposed upon them would still be too mild. Himmler is at the moment carrying on the greatest resettlement of Jews from the German cities to the Eastern ghettos.167

    18.6  One must proceed on the assumption that even those who were involved in mass murder up to the period May-June 1942 believed that the "real" "final solution" would only take place after the end of the war and that the murders taking place before then were only "provisional" measures, "anticipatory" measures to the "final solution". Only in Spring and early Summer of 1942 did the realisation slowly come through that the "final solution" would take place during the war: it finally became clear which means would be chosen to achieve the "final solution".

    18.7  Even at the end of May 1942, when the preparations for the systematic murder of European Jews in extermination camps were in full swing, Hitler referred in a talk with Goebbels to the old plan to deport Jews to Africa168, according to Goebbels's diaries:

    Thus I plead once again for a more radical Jewish policy, whereby talking to the Führer is like walking through an open door [...] The Germans only ever take part in subversive movements when the Jews seduce them to it. Therefore one must liquidate the Jewish danger, cost what it may [...] Therefore the Führer also does not wish at all for the Jews to be evacuated to Siberia. There, under the harshest living conditions, they would undoubtedly form an element of vitality once more. He would rather settle them in Central Africa. There they live in a climate that would surely not render them strong and capable of resistance. In any case it is the Führer's aim to make Western Europe completely Jew-free. Here they will not be allowed to have any home any more.

    To interpret this statement as evidence for a clear intention or a plan of Hitler to deport European Jews to Africa seems rather absurd.

    18.8  However, even at this stage, only a few weeks before the deportations to extermination camps were being extended to all Districts of the General Gouvernment, to Slowakia and Western Europe, one can not exclude the possibily that Hitler and leading organisors of the extermination programme were talking about "alternatives" to the "final solution", i.e. deporting Jews from countries still not effected by the programme of systematic mass-murder to areas other than occupied Poland and to killing or letting them perish there. These eventual "alternative" considerations were clearly speculative and had nothing to do with the reality of mass murder which was unfolding at the same time. Hitler himself referred here to a wish ("he would rather...") which was completely unrealistic at a time when Central Africa was entirely inaccessable to the Nazi regime. One can interpret his statement as an attempt to camouflage the consequences of the murderous decisions already taken. Even talking to his closest associates Hitler avoided speaking openly on mass killing. That he did not seriously consider stopping the preparations for the deportations to extermination camps is clear from his statement in the last sentence of Goebbels's note that he wanted "in any case" to make "West Europe completely Jew free".

    18.9  Hitler’s statements after this point, i.e. from the Summer of 1942 on—about possible "resettlement projects"—are unquestionably diversions meant to deceive his listeners; for example, his remarks at his dinner table on 24 July 1942, when he tried to make his listeners (consisting of personal aids and private guests) believe that the "Führer" had nothing to do with the rumoured murder of the Jews:

    After the end of the war, he will rigorously take the standpoint that he will smash to pieces city after city if the dirty Jews don't come out and emigrate to Madagascar or another Jewish national state. [...] When it was reported to him that Lithuania was also free of Jews, that was therefore significant.169

    18.10  In fact, the plan to deport Jews to Madagascar (occupied by British troops in May), had been officially abandoned in February 1942; according to the files of the Foreign Office, it was Hitler who had taken this decision.170 The fact that Hitler referred in the same statement to the fact that Lithuania had been made "free of Jews" (in fact the vast majority had been murdered, only those forced to work for the Germans had been spared171) gives us a clear idea what the term "emigrate" represented.


    19.1  In the period 1942-1945 we have numerous further statements by Hitler that show that he continuously intervened in "anti-Jewish policy" and tried to push it forward in the sense of a radical "solution".

    (1) From Goebbels’ diary entry of 29 May it emerges that Hitler on Goebbels's insistence, agreed to order Speer to "be sure to see to it, as soon as possible, that Jews presently working in the German armaments industry be replaced by foreign workers".172 In September 1942 once again speaking at an armaments conference, Hitler was supposed to have insisted that the "pulling out of Jews from armament works in the Reich" was an important priority.173 A few days later, Hitler communicated to Goebbels "once again his firm decision to bring the Jews out of Berlin under all circumstances", according to the Goebbels’ diaries. In so far as this group of people were at all active in production, it would not be difficult to replace them by foreign workers.174

    19.2  (2) At the above-mentioned conference on arms in September 1942, Hitler had expressed agreement with a proposal from Sauckel (his special Commissioner for forced labour) to continue using qualified Jewish skilled workers in the Generalgouvernement, in view of the enormous shortage of workers.175 Himmler then, on 9 October 1942, gave out the order that "so-called armament workers" in the textile firms etc. in Warsaw and Lublin should be collected in concentration camps. The Jews in the "real armament industries" were to be progressively released from these factories, so that there would finally only be "fewer Jewish Kl (=Konzentrationslager, concentration camps, P.L.) large-scale enterprises in the East of the Generalgouvernement if possible": "Nevertheless, the Jews are supposed to disappear from there as well, according to the wishes of the Führer."176

    19.3  (3) On 28 July 1942 Himmler wrote to Gottlob Berger, one of the senior SS-officials: "The Führer placed on my shoulders the implementation of this very difficult order. The responsibility cannot be taken away from me in any case."177

    19.4  (4) On 29 December 1942, Himmler presented Hitler with the "report to the Führer on fighting against gangs", No. 51.1 This report178, which covered the period from August to November, 1942, and which referred only to a part of the occupied Soviet area (southern Russia, Ukraine and the district of Bialystok); included the following numbers concerning persons imprisoned or executed:

    1.  Bandits
      1.  established number of deaths after combat 1.337
      2.  prisoners executed immediately 737
      3.  prisoners executed after lengthy thorough interrogation 7.828
    2.  Gang helpers and suspects
      1.  arrested 16.553
      2.  executed 14.257
      3.  Jews executed 363.211.

    19.5  According to this, from the altogether 387.370 people killed, more than 90% were Jews. This document shows that according to Hitler’s orders to Himmler of 18 December 1942, in fact Jews were exterminated as "Partisans" systematically and on a large scale.

    19.6  (5) For a report to Hitler on 10 December 1942, Himmler set up a hand-written list of the points which he wanted to bring up. Under "II. SD and police affairs" Himmler specified as point 4 the following key word:

    • Jews in France
    • 6-700 000
    • other enemies.

    19.7  Next to these key words can be found a tick and in Himmler's own handwriting the word "abolish" (abschaffen): Himmler had thus brought up these points with Hitler and received permission from him to "abolish" i.e. to liquidate* the estimated 600.000 to 700.000 Jews in France as well as "other enemies".179 After the meeting, Himmler sent a note to Müller, head of the Gestapo, in which he stated:

    The Führer gave orders that the Jews and other enemies in Frances should be arrested and deported. This should take place, however, only once he has spoken with Laval about it. It is a matter of 6-700.000 Jews.180

    19.8  Two months later, in February 1943, Eichmann, on a brief Paris visit submitted a maximum programme for the deportation of all Jews living in France including those with French citizenship.181

    19.9  At the meeting on 10 December 1942 Himmler presented Hitler with a proposal to set up a work camp for Jewish hostages from France, Hungary and Romania, for altogether 10.000 people. According to a hand-written note by Himmler, Hitler accepted this proposal.182 After the meeting, Himmler sent an order to Müller to concentrate these 10.000 people in a "special camp" (Sonderlager). He stated: "Certainly they should work there, but under conditions whereby they remain healthy and alive."183

    19.10  Himmlers handwritten notes about this meeting with Hitler and the orders sent to Müller confirm that it was Hitlers will that those French Jews which did not fall under this rule were not "to be kept alive " (am Leben bleiben) but were to be "abolished", i.e. to be murdered.

    19.11  (5) On the occasion of an address by Hitler on 19 June 1943, Himmler learned of his decision "that the evacuation of the Jews, despite the disturbances this will cause in the next 3 to 4 months, is to be radically expedited and must be endured".184

    19.12  (6) By the time of the so-called first Klessheim conference on the 17 and 18 April 1943, according to the protocol, Ribbentrop answered—in Hitler’s presence—Horthy’s question "what he then should do with the Jews" ("he [=Horthy, P.l.] can't kill them after all") by stating unambiguously that they must either be exterminated or brought to concentration camps". Hitler thereupon noted, in regard to the Jews in Poland:

    If the Jews there don't want to work they will be shot...If they cannot work, they must rot. They should be treated like tubercular bacillus which could attack healthy bodies. That is not cruel—if one keeps in mind that even innocent natural beings like hares and deer must be killed so that no damage occurs.185

    19.13  In various addresses over the years 1943-1944 Himmler expressed himself very clearly about the murder of the European Jews by his SS and at the same time referred to having received a commission for these mass murders. Also without naming names it was clear to his listeners from whom he had received this commission since as Reichsführer of the SS he was subordinate to only one person, namely Adolf Hitler.

    19.14  On 6 October 1943, Himmler explained to Gau and Reich chiefs of the party in Posen:

    I ask of you that that which I say to you in this circle be really only heard and not ever discussed. We were faced with the question: what about the women and children?—I decided to find a very clear solution to this problem—say, to kill or have them killed—and then allow the avenger in the form of the children to grow up for our sons and grandsons. The difficult decision must be made to have this people disappear from the face of this earth. For the organisation which had to execute this task, it was the most difficult which we had ever had.186

    19.15  It is true that Himmler in this speech gives the impression that the murder of women and children was his responsibility, yet he refers at the end of the paragraph to the most difficult "task which we ever had" and not for instance to a task which he might have assigned to the SS.

    19.16  In a speech on 5 May 1944 to generals of the Wehrmacht who joined an ideological-political training in Sonthofen, Himmler became even clearer:

    The Jewish question has been solved within Germany itself and in general within the countries occupied by Germany. It was solved in an uncompromising fashion in accordance with the life and death struggle of our nation in which the existence of our blood is at stake [..] You can understand how difficult it was for me to carry out this military order which I was given and which I implemented out of a sense of obedience and absolute conviction. If you say:'we can understand as far as the men are concerned but not about the children’, then I must remind you of what I said at the beginning. In this confrontation with Asia we must get used to condemning to oblivion those rules and customs of past wars which we have got used to and prefer. In my view, we as Germans, however deeply we may feel in our hearts, are not entitled to allow a generation of avengers filled with hatred to grow up with whom our children and grandchildren will have to deal because we, too weak and cowardly, left it to them.187

    19.17  A few weeks later, on 24 May 1944, he spoke once again in Sonthofen, again to a group of Generals of the Wehrmacht:

    Another question which was decisive for the inner security of the Reich and Europe, was the Jewish question. It was uncompromisingly solved after orders and rational recognition. I believe, Gentleman, that you know me well enough to know that I am not a bloodthirsty person; I am not a man who takes pleasure or joy when something rough must be done. However on the other hand, I have such good nerves and such a developed sense of duty—I can say that much for myself—that when I recognise something as necessary I can implement it without compromise. I have not considered myself entitled—this concerns especially the Jewish women and children—to allow the children to grow into the avengers who will then murder our fathers and our grandchildren. That would have been cowardly. Consequently the question was uncompromisingly resolved.188

    19.18  Himmler is thus speaking here—in the context of the murder of the Jews—unmistakably about an "order" and of a "sense of duty". His way of formulating it—that he considered himself "entitled" to have the women and children killed as well- speaks for the view that this mass murder followed from a Himmler initiative; it also however shows that Himmler was firmly convinced that this decision was covered by Hitler’s authority and was in accordance with his will.

    19.19  Even more clearly, a few weeks later Himmler spoke on 21 July once again in the context of an ideological-political training for the Generals:189

    It was the most terrible assignment and the most terrible task which an organisation can possibly get: the task of solving the Jewish question. I am allowed to say this once again quite openly in this circle a few sentences. It is good that we had the toughness to extirpate the Jews in our area."

    19.20  Hitler himself stated in a speech addressing high officers of the Wehrmacht on 26 May 1944:

    By removing the Jew, I abolished in Germany the possibility to build up a revolutionary core or nucleus. One could, naturally, say to me: Yes, couldn't you have solved this more simply—or not simply, since all other means would have been more complicated—but more humanely? My dear officers, we are engaged in a life and death struggle. If our opponents win in this struggle than the German people would be extirpated.190

    19.21  Hitler described in the following sentences what sort of gruesome extirpation would take place and then went on to say:

    Humanity would mean here as well as in general the worst atrocities against one's own people. If I draw the hate of the Jews upon myself than at least I don't want to miss the advantage of such hate. The advantage consists in that we will have a clean, organised body of the Volk, where no others can ever again meddle in our affairs.191

    19.22  In his testament of 29 April 1945, Hitler once again, in what was literally his last written words, gave vent to his deep antisemitic hatred:

    But I have also never left open any doubt about the fact that if the peoples of Europe were once again to be regarded only as packages of shares of these international monetary and financial conspirators, then that people would be held responsible, which is the true culprit behind the murderous struggle: Jewry ! I have also not left anybody in the dark about the fact that this time it would not only be millions of children of Europeans from the Aryan nations who will die of hunger, not only millions of grown men who will suffer death, and not only hundreds of thousands of women and children who will burn to death in the cities and be permitted to be bombarded to death, without holding the true culprit responsible for this crime, even though it may be by more humane methods. Above all I pledge the leadership of the nation and its followers to the scrupulous observation of the racial laws and to an implacable opposition against the universal poisoner of all peoples, international Jewry.192


    20.1  Throughout his entire career—in the time span from the period immediately after the German defeat in 1918 until the end of the Second World War—Hitler’s behaviour and thinking was dominated by the idea of "removing" the Jews from Germany. Antisemitism was clearly the central binding element in Hitler’s political ideology, which in fact was a conglomerate of highly contradictory ideas. His language concerning Jews was full of hatred and threats.

    20.2  Through the twenties and early thirties, Hitler wanted to achieve the "removal" of the Jews by emigration or expulsion which would, according to his view, be enforced by violent measures and even murderous acts.

    20.3  From the beginning of his time in office, Hitler was continually occupied with anti-Jewish measures. He was not only actively engaged in the preparations for the central anti-Jewish enterprise (the "boykott" of 1 April 1933, the Nuremberg Laws and the pogrom of November 1938), but gave also orders and directions concerning detailed anti-Jewish legislation and other measures against Jews.

    20.4  He took the initiative to radicalise anti- Jewish policy step by step. The fact that from time to time he was prepared to make tactical concessions and to postpone single anti-Jewish mesasures reveals how much he was engaged in the formulation of policy in this field.

    20.5  After Kristallnacht, when Hitler realised that Jewish emigration might not be completed before the beginning of a war, he announced (prophesized?) at different occasions the "annihilation of the Jews" living in the territory under his control. With these statements Hitler threatened to use the Jews as hostagages to prevent the Western powers from intervening on the continent. These statement clearly included the possibility of Genocide.


    20.6  Hitler avoided giving a clear written order to exterminate Jewish civilians. He avoided speaking openly about killing in his entourage. However, there is clear evidence that he was deeply involved in the anti-Jewish policy during the war, particularly when it reached a murderous stage. In general, Hitler’s comments on the "Jewish question" reveal his essential commitment to radicalise persecution to the extreme.

    20.7  Hitler was fully responsible for the order for the mass executions in Poland in 1939 and 1940. He was also actively engaged in setting up plans for a Jewish reservation in Poland and he backed the Madagascar plan. He was continually preoccupied with further deportations and deportation plans.

    20.8  In 1941 Hitler ordered the extermination of the "Jewish-Bolshevist intelligentisa" and the elemination of every potential enemy in the occupied Eastern territories. He was fully aware of mass executions of Jewish civilians in the occupied Eastern territories.

    20.9  In mid September 1941 Hitler ordered the beginning of mass deportations from Germany to ghettos in Eastern Europe. During Autumn 1941 and the following Winter, when preparation for the "Final Solution" in Europe were in full swing, Hitler spoke at various occasions openly about the annihilation of the Jews in Europe. It can be ruled out that the massive preparations for the systematic murder of European Jews in extermination camps in Poland, undertaken in Spring and Summer of 1942, were taken without his consent or his knowledge.

    20.10  Finally, from a number of letters and speeches of Himmler it becomes clear, that the Reichsführer SS referred to the Holocaust as a task which he had to carry out on the behalve of the highest authority in the Third Reich—Hitler.




    A. Printed Documents

    • Akten der Reichskanzlei. Die Regierung Hitler, Teil I 1933/34, 2 vols. ( Boppard a. Rh. 1983)
    • Aly, Götz, Heim, Susanne (eds.): Staatliche Ordnung und Organische Lösung. Die Rede Hermann Görings "über die Judenfrage" vom 6. Dezember 1938, in: Jahrbuch für Antisemitismusforsch. 2 (1993) pp. 378-404.
    • Aus dem Kriegstagebuch des Diplomaten Otto Bräutigam. Eingeleitet u. kommmentiert v. H.D. Heilmann, in: Biedermann und Schreibtischtäter, Materialien zur deutschen Täter-Biographie (Berlin 1987)
    • Below, Nicolaus von: Als Hitlers Adjutant, 1937-45 ( Mainz 1980)
    • Boelcke, Willi A. (ed.): Deutschlands Rüstung im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Hitlers Konferenzen mit Albert Speer 1942-1945 (Frankfurt a. M. 1969)
    • Ciano, Galleazzo: Tagebücher 1939-1943 (Hamburg 1949)
    • Domarus, Max: Hitler. Reden und Proklamationen, 2 vols.(Würzburg 1963)
    • Fröhlich, Elke (ed.): Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels. Sämtliche Fragmente. 4 vols. (Munich etc. 1987ff)
    • Fröhlich, Elke (ed.): Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels, part II. Diktate 1941-1945, 15 vols., (Munich 1994-1996)
    • Grabitz, Helge, Scheffler, Wolfgang (eds.): Letzte Spuren. Ghetto Warschau, SS-Arbeitslager Trawniki, Aktion Erntefest, Fotos und Dokumente über Opfer des Endlösungswahns im Spiegel der historischen Ereignisse (Berlin 1988)
    • Halder, Franz: Kriegstagebuch. Tägliche Aufzeichnungen des Chefs des Generalstabes des Heeres 1939-1942., 3 vols. (Stuttgart 1962-1964)
    • Hillgruber, Andreas (ed.): Staatsmänner und Diplomaten bei Hitler. Vertrauliche Aufzeichnungen über Unterredungen mit Vertretern des Auslandes 1939-1941, 2 vols. (Frankfurt a. M. 1967)
    • Hitler. Reden, Schriften, Anordnungen, part I-VI (Munich etc. 1992-1998)
    • Hitler, Adolf, Mein Kampf (Munich 1941)
    • Hubatsch, Walther (ed.): Hitlers Weisungen für die Kriegführung 1939-1945. Dokumente des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht, 2. Edition, (Koblenz 1983)
    • International Military Tribunal: Der Prozeß gegen die Hauptkriegsverbrecher vor dem Internationalen Militärgerichtshof, 14.10.45-1.10.46, 42 vols. (1947-1949)
    • Jäckel, Eberhard, Kuhn, Axel (eds.): Hitler. Sämtliche Aufzeichnungen 1905-1924 (Stuttgart 1980)
    • Jochmann, Werner (ed.): Monologe im Führerhauptquartier. Die Aufzeichnungen Heinrich Heims (Hamburg 1980)
    • Jordan, Rudolf: Erlebt und Erlitten. Weg eines Gauleiters von München bis Moskau (Leoni am Starnberger See 1971)
    • Kerrl, Hans (ed.): Reichstagung in Nürnberg 1937. Der Parteitag der Arbeit (Berlin 1937)
    • Krausnick, Helmut, Deutsch, Harold C. (eds.): Tagebücher eines Abwehroffiziers 1938-1940. Mit weiteren Dokumenten zur Militäroppositon gegen Hitler (Stuttgart 1970)
    • Longerich, Peter (ed.) Die Ermordung der europäischen Juden. Eine umfassende Dokumentation des Holocaust (Munich, Zurich, 1989)
    • Parteitag der Freiheit. Reden des Führers und ausgewählte Kongreßreden am Reichsparteitag der NSDAP (Munich 1935)
    • Präg, Ernst, Jacobmeyer, Wolfgang (eds.): Das Diensttagebuch des deutschen Generalgouverneurs in Polen 1939-1945 (Stuttgart 1975)
    • Reichsgesetzblatt (Berlin)
    • Reichsministerialblatt für die innere Verwaltung
    • Reuth, Georg (ed.): Joseph Goebbels: Tagebücher 1924-1945, 5 vols. ( Munich, Zurich 1992)
    • Ritter, Gerhard (ed.): Hitlers Tischgespräche im Führerhaupquartier 1941-42 (Bonn 1951)
    • Röhr, Werner (ed.): Die faschistische Okkupationspolitik in Polen (1939-1945) (Cologne 1988)
    • Rürup, Reinhard (ed.): Der Krieg gegen die Sowjetunion 1941-1945. Eine Dokumentation (Berlin 1991)
    • Schmidt, Paul: Statist auf diplomatischer Bühne, 1923-45. Erlebnisse des Chefdolmetschers im Auswärtigen Amt mit den Staatsmännern Europas ( Bonn 1953)
    • Schramm, Percy (ed.): Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht (Wehrmachtführungsstab), 1940-1945. Geführt v. Helmuth Greiner u. Percy Ernst Schramm, 4 vols. (Frankfurt a. M. 1961-1979)
    • Seraphim, Hans-Günther (ed.): Das politische Tagebuch Alfred Rosenbergs aus den Jahren 1934/35 und 1939/40 (Göttingen 1956)
    • Smith, Bradley, Peterson, Agnes F. (eds.): Himmler, Heinrich, Geheimreden 1933 bis 1945 und andere Ansprachen (Frankfurt a. M.,Berlin,Wien 1974)
    • Strauss, Walter (ed.): Das Reichsministerium des Innern und die Judengesetzgebung. Aufzeichnungen von Dr. Bernhard Lösener, in: VfZ 9 (1961), pp. 262-313
    • Treue, Wilhelm (ed.): Hitlers Denkschrift zum Vierjahresplan 1936, in: VfZ 3 (1955), pp. 184-203.
    • Verhandlungen des Reichstages (Berlin)
    • Wagner, Gerhard (ed.): Lagevorträge des Oberbefehlshabers der Kriegsmarine vor Hitler 1939-1945 (Munich 1972)
    • Walk, Joseph (ed.): Das Sonderrecht für die Juden im NS-Staat. Eine Sammlung der gesetzlichen Maßnahmen und Richtlinien—Inhalt und Bedeutung (Heidelberg 1981)
    • Witte et. al.,: Der Dienstkalender Heinrich Himmlers 1941/42, Hamburg 1999

    B. Secondary Literature

    • Adam, Uwe: Judenpolitik im Dritten Reich ( Düsseldorf 1972)
    • Adler, Hans-Günther: Der Verwaltete Mensch. Studien zur Deportation der Juden aus Deutschland (Tübingen 1974)
    • Aly, Götz: "Endlösung". Völkerverschiebung und der Mord an den europäischen Juden (Frankfurt a. M. 1995)
    • Barkai, Avraham: Vom Boykott zu "Endjudung". Der wirtschaftliche Existenzkampf der Juden im Dritten Reich 1933-1943 (Frankfurt a. M. 1988)
    • Botz, Gerhard: Wohnungspolitik und Judendeportation in Wien 1938 bis 1945. Zur Funktion des Antisemitismus als Ersatz nationalsozialistischer Sozialpolitik (Vienna, Salzburg 1975)
    • Broszat, Martin: Nationalsozialistische Polenpolitik (Stuttgart 1961)
    • Dröscher, Hans-Jürgen: "Reichskristallnacht". Die November-Pogrome 1938 (Frankfurt a. M./Berlin 1988)
    • Fischer, Albert: Hjalmar Schacht und Deutschlands "Judenfrage". Der "Wirtschaftsdiktator" und die Vertreibung der Juden aus der Wirtschaft (Cologne 1995)
    • Genschel, Helmut: Die Verdrängung der Juden aus der Wirtschaft im Dritten Reich (Berlin 1966)
    • Gerlach, Christian: Die Wannsee-Konferenz, das Schicksal der deutschen Juden und Hitlers politische Grundsatzentscheidung, alle Juden Europas zu ermorden, in: Werkstattgeschichte 18 (1997), pp. 7-44
    • Gruchmann, Lothar: Justiz im Dritten Reich 1933-1940. Anpassung und Unterwerfung in der ära Gürtner (Munich 1988)
    • Hagemann, Jürgen: Die Presselenkung im Dritten Reich (Bonn 1970)
    • Headland, Ronald: Messages of Murder: A Study of the Reports of the Einsatzgruppen of the Security Police and the Security Service, 1941-1943 (Rutherford, N.J./London 1992)
    • Jäckel, Eberhard: Hitlers World View: A Blueprint for Power (Cambridge, Mass 1972)
    • Jansen, Christian, Weckbecker, Arno: Der "Volksdeutsche Selbstschutz" in Polen 1939/40 (Munich 1992)
    • Kingreen, Monica: Jüdisches Landleben in Windecken, Ostheim und Heldenbergen (Hanau 1994)
    • Klarsfeld, Serge: Vichy—Auschwitz. Die Zusammenarbeit der deutschen und französischen Behörden bei der "Endlösung der Judenfrage" in Frankreich (Nördlingen 1989)
    • Longerich, Peter: Politik der Vernichtung. Eine Gesamtdarstellung der nationalsozialistischen Judenverfolgung (Munich etc. 1998)
    • Majer, Diemut: "Fremdvölkische" im Dritten Reich. Ein Beitrag zur nationalsozialistischen Rechtssetzung und Rechtspraxis in Verwaltung und Justiz unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der eingegliederten Ostgebiete und des Generalgouvernements (Boppard a. Rh. 1981)
    • Obst, Dieter: "Reichskristallnacht". Ursachen und Verlauf des antisemitischen Pogroms vom November 1938 (Frankfurt a. M. etc. 1991)
    • Pätzold, Kurt, Runge, Irene: "Kristallnacht". Zum Pogrom 1938 (Cologne 1988)
    • Popplow, Ullrich: Der Novemberpogrom 1938 in Mhnden und Göttingen, in: Göttinger Jahrbuch 28 (1980), pp. 177-192
    • Safrian, Hans: Die Eichmann-Männer (Vienna 1993)
    • Toury, Jacob: Die Entstehungsgeschichte des Austreibungsbefehls gegen die Juden der Saarpfalz und Badens (22./23. Oktober 1940—Camp de Gurs), in: Jahrbuch des Instituts für Deutsche Geschichte 15 (1986), pp. 431-464,
    • Vogt, Martin: Selbstbespiegelungen in Erwartung des Sieges. Bemerkungen zu den Tischgesprächen Hitlers im Herbst 1941, in: Michalka, Wolfgang (ed.): Der Zweite Weltkrieg. Analysen, Grundzüge, Forschungsbilanz. Im Auftrag des Militärgeschichtlichen Forschungsamtes (Munich 1989), pp. 641-651
    • Weingarten, Ralph: Die Hilfeleistung der westlichen Welt bei der Endlösung der deutschen Judenfrage. Das "Intergovernmental Committee on Political Refugees" IGC 1938-1939 (Bern, Frankfurt a. M., Las Vegas 1981)
    • Wilhelm, Hans-Heinrich: Rassenpolitik und Kriegführung. Sicherheitspolizei und Wehrmacht in Polen und der Sowjetunion (Passau 1991)

    List of abbreviations

    • AA … Auswärtiges Amt
    • Abt. … Abteilung
    • ADAP … Akten zur Deutschen AuswärtigenPolitik
    • BAB … Bundesarchiv Berlin
    • BAM … Bundesarchiv/Miliärchiv (Freiburg)
    • BDC … Berlin Document Center
    • Bd. … Band
    • Gestapo … Geheime Staatspolizei
    • HSTA … Hauptstaatsarchiv
    • IMT … International Military Tribunal
    • IfZ … Institut für Zeitgeschichte (Munich)
    • MBliV … Ministerialblatt für die innere Verwaltung NA National Archives (Washington)
    • OS … Osobi Archive (Moskow)
    • PAA … Politisches Archiv des Auswärtigen Amtes
    • RFSS … Reichsführer SS
    • RGBl … Reichsgesetzblatt
    • RMBliV … Reichsministerialblatt für die innere Verwaltung
    • RSHA … Reichssicherheitshauptamt
    • SA … Sturmabteilung
    • SD … Sicherheitsdienst
    • Sipo … Sicherheitspolizei
    • SK … Sonderkommando
    • SS … Schutzstaffel
    • StA … Staatsarchiv
    • VB … Völkischer Beobachter
    • VfZ … Vierteljahreshefte für Zeitgeschichte
    • vol. … volume
    • YV … Yad Vashem (Jerusalem)
    • z.b.V. … zur besonderen Verwendung
    • ZSt … Zentrale Stelle der Landesjustizverwaltungen zur Aufklärung nationalsozialisticher Verbrechen


    1  'Der Antisemitismus aus rein gefühlsmäßigen Gründen wird seinen letzten Ausdruck finden in der Form von Pogromen. Der Antisemitismus der Vernunft jedoch muß führen zur planmäigen gesetzlichen Bekämpfung und Beseitigung der Vorrechte der Juden, die er zum Unterschied der anderen zwischen uns lebenden Fremden besitzt (Fremdengesetzgebung). Sein letztes Ziel aber muß unverrückbar die Entfernung der Juden überhaupt sein.' Jäckel/Kuhn (eds.), Hitler, Aufzeichnungen,No. 61, HSTA München, Abt. IV, GruppenKdo 4, Bd. 50/8).

    2  'Wir wollen keine Gefühlsantisemiten sein, die Pogromstimmung erzeugen wollen, sondern es beseelt uns die unerbittliche Entschlossenheit, das Öbel an der Wurzel zu packen und mit Stumpf und Stil auszurotten. Um unser Ziel zu erreichen, muá uns jedes Mittel recht sein, selbst wenn wir uns mit dem Teufel verbinden müßten.' Jäckel/Kuhn (eds.), Hitler, Aufzeichnungen, No. 91 (StA München, PolDir. 6698. Police-Report).

    1†  'Denn denken Sie nicht, daß Sie eine Krankheit bekämpfen können, ohne nicht den Erreger zu töten, ohne den Bazillus zu vernichten, und denken Sie nicht, daß Sie die Rassentuberkulose bekämpfen können, ohne zu sorgen, daß das Volk frei wird von dem Erreger der Rassentuberkulose. Das Wirken des Judentums wird neimals vergehen, und die Vergiftung des Volkes nicht enden, solange nicht der Erreger, der Juden, aus unserer Mitte entfernt ist.' Jäckel/Kuhn (eds.), Hitler, Aufzeichnungen, No. 129 (BAB, NS 11/28).

    2†  'Das Ziel war damals klar und einfach: Kampf der Teufelsmacht,die Deutschland in dieses Elend hineingestürzt, Kampf dem Marxismus sowie dem geistigen Träger dieser Weltpest und Seuche, dem Juden. Kampf nicht nach bürgerlichem Muster, 'vorsichtig', damit er nicht zu weh tut. Nein und nochmals nein.' Hitler, Reden I, No. 6, p. 20.

    3  'Gegen wen aber hat diese Bewegung zu kämpfen? Gegen den Juden als Person und den Marxismus als seine Sache.' Ibid., p. 21.

    4  'Die größte Gefahr ist und bleibt für uns das fremde Völkergift in unserem Leibe. Alle anderen Gefahren sind zeitlich bedingt. Nur diese eine allein ist in ihrer Folgewirkung ewig für uns vorhanden. [...]Den Friedensvertrag kann man brechen, Wiedergutmachtungsverpflichtungen können ungültig erklärt und abgelehent werden, politische Parteien vermag man zu beseitigen, aber das Blut, das einmal vergiftet ist, kann man nie mehr ändern, das bleibt und wuchert fort und drückt uns von Jahr zu Jahr tiefer herunter. Wenn Sie sich heute wundern über die innere Zerrissenheit unseres Volkes, so bedenken Sie folgendes: Es sprich aus die deutschen Volke in seiner Zerrissenheit nur sein zerrissenes Blut heraus. Und darin liegt die größte Gefahr, da wir bei einer Fortsetzung dieser Vergiftung in 10, 10 und 30 Jahren schwächer sein werden als jetzt, in 100 Jahren schwächer als nach 30 und in 200 ohnmächtiger als nach 100 Jahren; einmal aber kommt die Zeit, da unser Volk von seiner kulturellen Höhe sinken wird, um endlich an diesr Blutvergiftung rettungslos zugrunde zu gehen...' Ibid., p. 23.

    5  Hitler, Adolf: Manuscript, printed under the title: Außenpolitische Standortbestimmungen nach der Reichstgswahl, Juni-Juli 1928, (Hitler, Reden II A).

    6  'Das jüdische Volk kann mangels eigener produktiver Fähigkeiten einen Staatsbau räumlich empfundener Art nicht durchführen, sondern braucht als Unterlage seiner eigenen Existenz die Arbeit und schöpferische Tätigkeit anderer Nationen. Die Existenz des Juden selbst wird damit zu einer parasitären innerhalb des Lebens anderer Völker. Das letzte Ziel des jüdischen Lebenskampfes ist dabei die Versklavung produktiv tätiger Völker. Zur Erreichung dieses Zieles, das in Wirklichkeit den Lebenskampf des Judentums zu allen Zeiten darstellte, bediente sich der Jude aller Waffen, die dem Gesamtkomplex seines Wesens entsprechen. Innenpolitisch kämpft er dabei innerhalb der einzelnen Völker erst um die Gleich- und später und die Überberechtigung. Als Waffen dienen ihm hierzu die Eigenschaften der Schläue, Klugheit, List, Tücke, Verstellung usw., die im Wesen seines Volkstums wurzeln. Sie sind Kriegslisten in seinem Lebenserhaltungskampf, so wie die Kriegslisten anderer Völker im Schwertkampf. Außenpolitisch versucht er, die Völker in Unruhe zu bringen, von ihren wahren Interessen abzulenken, in gegenseitige Kriege zu stürzen und auf diesem Wege langsam mit Hilfe der Macht des Geldes und der Propaganda sich zu ihrem Herrn aufzuschwingen. Sein Endziel ist die Entnationalisierung, die Durcheinanderbastardierung der anderen Völker die Senkung des Rassenniveaus der Höchsten sowie die Beherrschung dieses Rassenbreies durch Ausrottung der völkischen Intelligenz und deren Ersatz durch die Angehörigen seines eigenen Volkes. Das Ende des jüdischen Weltkampfes wird daher immer die blutige Bolschewisierung sein, daß heißt in Wahrheit die Vernichtung des mit den Völkern verbundenen eigenen geistigen Oberschichten, so daß er selbst zum Herrn der führerlos gemachten Menschheit aufzusteigen vermag. Dummheit, Feigheit und Schlechtheit arbeiten ihm dabei in die Hände. In den Bastarden sichert er sich die ersten Öffnungen zum Einbruch in einen fremden Volkskörper. Das Ende einer Judenherrschaft ist dabei stets der Verfall jeglicher Kultur und endlich der Wahnsinn des Juden selbst. Denn er ist Völkerparasit, und sein Sieg bedeutet ebensosehr den Tod seines Opfers als sein eigenes Ende.' Ibid., P. 183.

    7  Jäckel, Hitler’s World View, Hitler, Mein Kampf:'wie die Made im faulenden Leib'(p. 61), 'Bazillenträger schlimmster Art' (p. 62), 'ewiger Spaltpilz der Menschheit' (p.135), 'Die Spinne begann, dem Volke langsam das Blut aus den Adern zu saugen' (p. 212) 'eine sich blutig bekämpfende Rotte von Ratten' (p. 331), 'Parasit im Körper anderer Völker' (p. 334), 'ein Schmarotzer, der wie ein schädlicher Bazillus sich immer mehr ausbreitet' (p. 334), 'den ewigen Blutegel' (p. 339), 'Völkerparasiten' (p. 358) 'Vampir' (p. 358).

    8  Hitler, Reden I, No. 7, speech in Weimar, 4.7.1926; ibid. II/1, No. 102, speech in Munich, 9.4.1927; ibid. II/2, No. 168, speech in Nürnberg, 21.8.1927; ibid., II/2, No. 187, speech in Hof, p. 521; ibid. III/1, No. 2, speech in Berlin, 13.7.1928, pp. 14f; ibid., III/1, No. 24, speech in Bad Elster, 14.9.1928, pp. 89f; ibid., III/1, No. 37, speech in Oldenburg, 18.10.1928, pp. 157ff; ibid. III/3, No. 54, speech in Bautzen, 6.6.1930; ibid. II/1, No. 160, 6.8.1927.

    9  Ibid. I, No.62, speech in Stuttgart, 15.8.25; ibid. I, No. 72, speech in Wismar, 8.10.25; ibid. II/1, No. 140, speech in Munich, 3.6.1927; ibid. II/1, No. 144, speech in Nuremberg, version A, 9.6.27, p. 363.

    10  Ibid. II/1, No. 140, speech in Munich, 3.6.1927, p. 340; ibid., II/1, No. 144, speech in Nuremberg, version A, 9.6.1927, p. 363.

    11  Ibid. II/1, No. 140, speech in Munich, 3.6.1927, p. 340; ibid. II/1, No. 159, speech in Munich, 30.7.1927, p. 434.

    12  Ibid. I, No. 62, speech in Stuttgart, 15.8.1925, p. 145; ibid. I, No. 72, speech in Wismar, 8.10.1925, p. 172; ibid. II/1, No. 159, speech in Munich, 30.7.1927, pp. 428ff.

    13  Ibid. I, No. 62, speech in Stuttgart, 15.8.1925, 145; ibid. I, No. 65, Völkischer Beobachter, 17.9.1925, p. 155; ibid. I, No. 72, speech in Wismar, 8.10.1925, p. 172.


    15  Ibid. II/1, No. 102, speech in Munich, 9.4.27,; ibid., II/1, No. 140, speech in Munich, 3.6.27, p. 340.

    16  'Er ist das große Instrument zur Vernichtung der arischen Völker, zur Vernichtung der Intelligenz dieser arischen Völker und zur Einsetzung einer dünnen jüdischen Oberschicht.' Ibid., III/1, No. 34, speech in Munich, p. 136; similar statement ibid. II/1, No. 153, speech in Freilassing.

    17  Ibid., II/1, No. 159, speech in Munich, 30.7.28, p. 433; ibid. III/1, No. 2, speech in Berlin, 13.7.28; ibid. III/3, No. 14, Illustrierter Beobachter, 8.2.30, p. 81.

    18  Ibid. I, No. 57, speech in Zwickau, 15.7.1925, p. 125; ibid., No. 34, speech in Munich, 10.10.1928, p. 143.

    19  'Westliche Demokratie einerseits und russischer Bolschewismus andererseits bilden die Form, innerhalb derer die heutige jüdische Weltbeherrschung ihren Ausdruck findet.' Ibid. I, No. 65, Völkischer Beobachter, 17.9.1925, p. 153.

    20  Ibid. II/1, No. 146, speech in Munich, 13.6.1927, p. 369.

    21  Ibid. III/1, No. 39, speech in Augsburg, 25.10.28, p. 177; ibid., III/1, No. 61, speech in Nuremberg, 3.11.1928, p. 307.

    22  Ibid. II/1, No. 144, speech in Nuremberg, 9.6.1927, version A, p. 363; ibid, II/1, No. 10, circular for the organisation of the Nazi Party in Austria, 20.7.26, p. 31.

    23  Ibid. II/1, No. 159, speech in Munich, 30.7.1927, p. 428; ibid., II/1, No. 235, speech in Munich, 24.2.28, p. 674; ibid. III/1, No. 13, speech in Munich, 31.8.1928, p. 42.

    24  Ibid. II/1, No. 159, speech in Munich 30.7.1927, p. 431.

    25  'Führt er sich gut auf, kann er bleiben, wenn nicht, dann hinaus damit!' Ibid. II/1, No. 235, speech in Munich, 24.2.1928, p. 674. Similar statement ibid. II/1, No. 159, speech in Munich, 30.7.1927, p. 431.

    26  Ibid. II/1, No. 159, Speech in Munich, 30.7.1927, p. 431.

    27  Paul, Aufstand, pp. 236ff/

    28  Ibid. IV/1, No. 29, speech in Bielefeld, 16.1.1930, p. 110; ibid. IV/1, No. 96, speech in Kaiserlautern, 26.4.1931; ibid. IV/2, No. 67, speech in Gießen, 9.11.1931; ibid. IV/2, No. 70, speech in Darmstadt, 13.11.1931; ibid. IV/3, No. 4, speech in Lemgo, 8/1/1932.

    29  'Der Kopf einer anderen Rasse sitzt auf unserem Volkskörper, Herz und Kopf in unsrem Volk sind nicht mehr ein und dasselbe.' Ibid. IV/1, No. 97, speech in Munich, 29.8.30, p. 371.

    30  'Wenn wir heute als Deutsche auftreten und uns der Vergiftung durch ein anderes Volk zu erwehren versuchen, dann versuchen wir, in die Hand des allmächtigen Schöpfers dasselbe WEsen wieder zurückzulegen, das er uns gegeben hat. Sein Wille und seine Vorsehung ließ uns zu werden, was wir sind...' Ibid. IV/1, No.14, speech in Munich, 25.10.30., p. 31.

    31  'gegen die Auslandshetze nur ankommen, wenn wir ihre Urheber oder doch wenigstens Nutznießer, nämlich die in Deutschland lebenden Juden, die bisher unbehelligt blieben, zu packen bekommen'. Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 26.3.33.

    32  'daß er, der Reichskanzler, selbst den Aufruf der nationalsozialistischen Partei veranlaßt habe'. Akten der Reichskanzlei/Regierung Hitler, part I, vol. 1, p. 271.

    33  'durch baldige Ausmerzung der Überzahl jüdischer Intellektueller aus dem Kultur- und Geistesleben Deutschlands dem natürlichen Anspruch Deutschlands auf arteigene geistige Führung gerecht werden müsse' Völkischer Beobachter, 7.4.33.

    34  Gesetz zur Wiederherstellung des Berufsbeamtentums, RGBl I 175; Gesetz über die Zulassung zur Rechtsanwaltschaft, RGBL I 188.

    35  Gesetz gegen die Überfüllung deutscher Schulen und Hochschulen, RGBl 1933 I, 225.

    36  Völkischer Beobachter, 12.3.33.

    37  Gruchmann, Justiz, p. 126.

    38  'im Augenblick [...] nur das Notwendige regeln', 'zur Zeit noch nicht notwendig'. Akten Reichskanzlei/Regierung Hitler I/1, p. 323.

    39  Longerich, Politik, pp. 46ff.

    40   Akten Reichskanzlei/Regierung Hitler I.1, pp. 629ff.

    41  'Was die Judenfrage anlange, so könnten wir auf diesem Gebiet nicht zurückweichen. Ihm, dem Reichskanzler, wäre es lieber gewesen, wenn man schrittweise zu einer Verschärfung in der Behandlung der Juden in Deutschland hätte kommen können, indem man zunächst ein Staatsbürgerrecht geschaffen und dann hiervon ausgehend die Juden allmählich schärfer angefaßt hätte. Der von den Juden angezettelte Boykott habe jedoch zu sofortigen, schärfsten Gegenmaßnahmen gezwungen. Im Ausland beschwere man sich vor allem über die rechtliche Behandlung der Juden als Staatsbürger zweiter Klasse. Nach der im Ausland hauptsächlich vertretenen Auffassung sei es höchstens angängig, die staatsgefährlichen Juden abzulehnen.' Akten Reichskanzlei/Regierung Hitler I/1, p. 865.

    42  Longerich, Politik, 47ff and 53ff.

    43  Longerich, Politik, pp. 70ff.

    44  IfZ, Rundschreiben R 164/35, 9.8.35; BAB, R 43II/602

    45  Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 14.9.37.

    46  Strauss (ed.), Reichsministerium (Lösener).

    47  'der Versuch der gesetzlichen Regelung eines Problems, das im Falle des abermaligen Scheiterns dann durch Gesetz zur endgültigen Looosung der nationalsozialistischen Partei übertragen werden müßte". Parteitag der Freiheit, pp. 110ff (p. 113f).

    48  'Seit dem Ausbruch der französischen Revolution treibt die Welt in immer schärferem Tempo in eine neue Auseinandersetzung, deren extremste Lösung Bolschewismus heißt, deren Inhalt und Ziel aber nur die Beseitigung und Ersetzung der bislang führenden Gesellschaftsschichten der Menschheit durch das international verbreitete Judentum ist." Treue (ed.), Hitlers Denkschrift.

    49  'das das gesamte Judentum haftbar macht für alle Schäden, die durch einzelne Exemplare dieses Verbrechertums der deutschen Wirtschaft und dem deutschen Volke zugefügt werden'. Ibid.

    50  RGBl 1936 I, 999, 1.12.36. Although the death penalty was never pronounced, in many instances lengthy prison terms were imposed: Fischer, Schacht, pp. 199f.

    51  Barkai, Boykott, pp. 126f; details in: BAB, R 2/31.097. For this and the other two anti-Jewish legal proposals which were deferred: Adam, Judenpolitik, pp.159ff.

    52  'gegebenem Anlaß (volksschädigendes Verhalten einzelner Juden'). IfZ, Nuremberg Documents, NG 4030, Memorandum from Reichsfinanzministerium, 25.4.38; Genschel, Vedrängung, pp. 150f.

    53   RGBl 1938 I, 1579.

    54  GehStA, Rep 90/2256.

    55  The proceedings can be found in the same file.

    56  Kerrl (Hg.), Reichstagung, pp. 366ff.

    57  'jener internationale Völkerparasit, der sich seit vielen Jahrhunderten in der Welt verbreitet, um in unserer Zeit wieder zur vollen zerstörenden Auswirkung seines Daseins zu gelangen'.

    58  'Lange über Judenfrage diskutiert. [...]Die Juden müssen aus Deutschland, ja aus ganz Europa heraus. Das dauert noch eine Zeit, aber geschehen wird und muß das. Der Führer ist fest entschlossen dazu...'. Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 30.11.37.

    59  Memorandum Clodius (Handelspolitische Abteilung)for the Referat Deutschland, ADAP, Serie D, vol. 4, No. 579.

    60  'In einer am 1.6.38 stattgefundenen Besprechung bei C (=Heydrich, P.L.) wurde vertraulich darauf hingewiesen, daß auf Anordnung des Führers zur Erledigung von wichtigen Erdbewegungsarbeiten im gesamten Reichsgebiet asoziale und kriminelle Juden festgenommen werden sollen.' OS, 500-1-261.

    61  'mit Genehmigung des Führers'. OS, 500-1-645, Hagens note from 30 June 1938 on the discussion with Berndt as well as further material on this subject in the same file. For Goebbels speech: Völkischer Beobachter, 21.6.

    62  'auf Befehl des Führers'. OS, 500-1-261, 29.6.38, letter to SD-Führer Oberabschnitt Süd. In the final copy corrected to "upon higher orders" (auf höheren Befehl).

    63  Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 25.8.38.

    64  Völkischer Beobachter, 9.11.38.

    65  Reuth (ed, Goebbels: 'In the afternoon the death of the German diplomat vom Rath is reported.' (Nachmittags wird der Tod des deutschen Diplomaten vom Rath gemeldet.)

    66  Jorden, Erlebt, p. 180.

    67  In the study by Dröscher ("Reichskristallnacht"), which is based on the files of the German Foreign Office, it becomes clear (pp. 79f) that the news of the death must have reached Hitler via Ribbentrop before 8 pm and that the Foreign Office was informed in the course of the afternoon that it was expected that he would die on the same day.

    68  'Ich gehe zum Parteiempfang im alten Rathaus. Riesenbetrieb. Ich trage dem Führer die Angelegenheit vor. Er bestimmt: Demonstrationen wieterlaufen lassen. Polizei zurückziehen. Die Juden sollen einmal den Volkszorn zu verspüren bekommen. Das is richtig." Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 10.11.38.

    69  Below, Adjutant, p. 136; Schallermeier (personal adjutant in Himmler's staff), affidavit, 5 July 1946. (SS-(A)-5, IMT XLII, 511ff).

    70  On the reporting by the Nazi press: Obst, Reichskristallnacht, pp. 65f. Concerning the destructions before the evening of 9 November: Popplow, Novemberpogrom; Paaatzold/Runge, Kristallnacht; Kingreen, Landleben, p. 132.

    71  According to Göring in the discussion of 6 December (next footnote).

    72  Edited by Aly/Heim, Ordnung.

    73  069-PS, IMT XXV, 131ff (transmitted by direction of the Stab des Stellvertreters des Führers. No. 1.39, 17.1.39).

    74  'Einzelfällen so zu verfahren, daß Juden in einem Haus zusammengelegt werden, soweit die Mietverhältnisse dies gestatten'. Ibid.

    75  Walk (ed.), Sonderrecht, III 154.

    76   RGBl 1939 I, 864.

    77   RMBliV, 1291, 16.6.39

    78  'jetzt endlich einen außenpolitischen Vorstoß machen, zunächst bei den Mächten, die die Judenfrage aufgeworfen haben, um dann tatsächlich zur Lösung der Madagaskar-Frage zu kommen. Das had er mir am 9. November auseinandergesetzt. Es geht nicht mehr anders. Er will auch den anderen Staaten sagen: 'Was redet ihr immer von den Juden?—Nehmt sie!" 1816-PS, IMT XXVIII, pp. 499ff. On the session see also the description by Lösener in: Strauss (ed.), Reichsministerium, 286ff.

    79  For the origins of the Schacht plan: Weingarten, Hilfeleistung, pp. 127ff; Fischer, Schacht, pp. 216ff.

    80  Schacht got the consent during a talk at Hitler’s in Munich: ADAP, Serie D, vol. 5, No. 654, undated note to the draft of a Telegram, 12.12.38.

    81  BAB, 25-01, 6641, Rublees note to Schacht on 23 December, 1938 with the sketch of the project. Details on the plan and the negotiations in Schacht entry, 16.1.39, ibid., printed in ADAP, Serie C, vol. 5, No. 661. Vgl. Weingarten, Hilfeleistung, 135ff.

    82  'eine große Abrechnung an den Juden...selbstverständlich'. 1816-PS, IMT XXVIII, pp. 499ff.

    83  'Aber das Problem würde in der nächsten Zeit gelöst werden. Dies sei sein unerschütterlicher Wille. Es sei aber nicht nur ein deutsches, sondern ein europäisches Problem.' ADAP, Serie D, vol.4, No. 271.

    84  'Was meinen Sie, Herr Pirow, wenn ich die schützende Hand von den Juden wegziehen würde, was in Deutschland geschehen würde ? Das könnte die Welt sich nicht ausdenken.' Ibid.

    85  'Die Juden würden bei uns vernichtet. Den 9. November 1918 hätten die Juden nicht umsonst gemacht, dieser Tag würde gerächt werden." ADAP, Serie D, vol. 4, No. 158.

    86  Speech of January 30, printed in Domarus, Hitler, vol. II., pp. 104ff, for the relevant passage pp. 1055-1058.

    87  'Ich bin in meinem Leben sehr oft Prophet gewesen und wurde meistens ausgelacht. In der Zeit meines Kampfes um die Macht war es in erster Linie das jüdische Volk, das nur mit Gelächter meine Prophezeiungen hinnahm, ich würde einmal in Deutschland die Führung des Staates und damit des ganzen Volkes übernehmen und dann unter vielen anderen auch das jüdische Problem zur Lösung bringen. Ich glaube, daß dieses damalige schallende Gelächter dem Judentum in Deutschland unterdes wohl schon in der Kehle erstickt ist. Ich will heute wieder ein Prophet sein: Wenn es dem internationalen Finanzjudentum in und außerhalb Europas gelingen sollte, die Völker noch einmal in einen Weltkrieg zu stürzen, dann wird das Ergebnis nicht die Bolschewisierung der Erde und damit der Sieg des Judentums sein, sondern die Vernichtung der jüdischen Rasse in Europa." Domarus, Hitler, vol. II, p. 1057.

    88  Jansen/Weckbecker, Selbstschutz: the main objectives of the German occupational policy in Poland are explained in: Broszat, Polenpolitik, Stuttgart and more recently in Majer, Fremdvölkische.

    89  'diese Sache bereits vom Führer entschieden sei'; 'wenn die Wehrmacht hiermit nichts zu tun haben wolle, sie es auch hinnehmen müsse, daß SS und Gestapo neben ihr in Erscheinung treten'. Memorandum Oberstleutnant Lahousen, printed in: Krausnick/Deutsch (eds.), Groscurth, Tagebücher, pp. 357ff.

    90  'keine polnischen Herren geben dürfte, wo polnische Herren vorhanden seien, sollten sie, so hart das klingen möge, umgebracht werden'. IMT XXXIX, pp. 425ff, 172-USSR, 2.12.39.

    91  'daß der Reichsführer SS alle Maßnahmen gegen die Juden direkt mit dem Führer besprechen werde." Bormanns letter, 12 December 1939, replying to two notes from the Office of the Deputy of the Führer, 5 and 6 December 1939 (BAB, NS 18alt/842 [NA, RG 242, T 81, 5594ff]).

    92  'Ich gestehe ganz offen, daß das vorgesehene Befriedungsprogramm einigen tausend Polen das Leben kosten wird, vor allem aus der geistigen Führerschicht Polens [...] Der Führer hat mir gesagt: Die Behandlung und Sicherstellung der deutschen Politik im Generalgouvernement ist eine ureigene Sache der verantwortlichen Männer des Generalgouvernements. Er drückte sich so aus: Was wir jetzt an Führerschicht in Polen festgestellt haben, das ist zu liquidieren.' Präg/Jacobmeyer (eds.), Diensttagebuch, 30.5.40.

    93  'das Judenproblem in Polen', 'vom Reichsführer Vorschläge unterbreitet, die nur der Führer entscheiden könne, da sie auch von erheblicher außenpolitischer Tragweite sein werden'. BAB, r 58/825, 15.9.39.

    94  'Die Juden-Deportation in den fremdsprachigen Gau, Abschiebung über die Demarkationslinie, ist vom Führer genehmigt worden.' 'Jedoch soll der ganze Prozeß auf die Dauer eines Jahres verteilt werden: Das Judentum ist in den Städten in Gettos zusammenzufassen, um eine bessere Kontrollmöglichkeit und später Abschubmöglichkeit zu haben. Hierbei vordringlich sei, daß der Jude als Kleinsiedler vom Land verschwindet. Diese Aktion muß innerhalb der nächsten 3 bis 4 Wochen durchgeführt sein.' BAB, R 58/825, Amtschefbesprechungen, Protocol, 27.9.39.

    95  'Ostwall', 'breiter Gürtel der Germanisierung und Kolonisierung', 'Staatlichkeit'. Seraphim (ed.) Tagebuch, p. 81.

    96  Hillgruber (ed.), Staatsmänner und Diplomaten, vol. I, pp. 29f(26.9.39).

    97  Vertrauliche Information (Bulletin of the Minister of Propaganda), 9.10.41, printed in: Hagemann, Presselenkung, 145.

    98   ADAP, Serie D, vol. 7, No. 176, pp. 143ff, protocol, 2.10.39.

    99  'wichtigste Aufgabe', 'Zerfall des polnischen Staates', 'eine neue Ordnung der ethnographischen Verhältnisse, daß heißt, eine Umsiedlung der Nationalitäten'. 'Ordnung des gesamten Lebensraumes nach Nationalitäten', 'der Versuch einer Ordnung und Regelung des jüdischen Problems zu unternehmen'. Verhandlungen des Reichstages, vol. 460, pp. 51ff.

    100  'deutsche Menschen, die bisher in der Ferne leben mußten ... im Reich aufzunehmen und anzusiedeln'; 'die Siedlung der Volksgruppen so zu gestalten, daß bessere Trennungslinien zwischen ihnen erreicht werden', 'Gestaltung neuer deutscher Siedlunsgebiete durch Umsiedlung', 'Ausschaltung des schädigenden Einflusses von solchen volksfremden Bevölkerungsteilen, die eine Gefahr für das Reich und die deutsche Volksgemeinschaft bedeuten','den in Frage stehenden Bevölkerungsteilen bestimmte Wohngebiete zuweisen'. IMT XXVI, 255f, 686-PS.

    101  'Der Führer hat vorerst die Umschichtung von 300.000 Juden aus dem Altreich und der Ostmark angeordnet.' YV, 053/87, Günther's Memo, 11.10.39.

    102  'Gemäß streng vertraulicher Mitteilung des Leiters der Zentralstelle für Judenauswanderung hat der Führer den Auftrag erteilt, daß zur Einleitung der geplanten Gesamtaktion fürs erste 300.000 minderbemittelte Juden aus dem großdeutschen Reichsgebiet nach Polen', 'längstens 3/4 Jahren'. Memorandum of the Sonderbeauftragte', 10.10.39 (original not available, excerpt prepared post factum), cited in Botz, Wohnungspolitik, 105, from Österreichisches Staatsarchiv.

    103  'als vorgeschobenes Glacis für uns militärische Bedeutung hat und für einen Aufmarsch ausgenutzt werden kann'. YV, 053-87, Gestapoaußenstelle Mährisch-Ostrau, 21.10.39.

    104  "Führung des Gebiets ... es uns ermöglichen, auch das Reichsgebiet von Juden und Polacken zu reinigen'. IMT XXVI, pp. 378f, 864-PS, protocol, 20.10.39. For the hesitations of the Military against further concentration of Jews in the area of Lublin-also the note of Krüger on 1 November, Präg/Jacobmeyer (ed.), Diensttagebuch, p. 56).

    105  'Den Begriff Jude hoffe ich, durch die Möglichkeit einer großen Auswanderung sämtlicher Juden nach Afrika oder sonst in eine Kolonie völlig auslöschen zu sehen.' 'die bolschewistische Methode der physischen Ausrottung eines Volkes aus innerer Überzeugung als ungermanisch und unmöglich'. The documdent is published in VfZ 5 (1957), pp. 194-198 (with a short introduction by Helmut Krausnick).

    106  'sehr gut und richtig', 'ganz geheim zu behandeln', 'um ihm zu sagen, daß der Führer das für richtig hielte'. Ibid., Himmler's note, 28.5.40.

    107  Die Judenfrage im Friedensvertrage, 9.7.41 (PAA, Inland II g 177, printed in ADAP, Serie D, vol. 10, pp.92ff). See also Rademacher's note of 2 July 1941: "Plan zur Lösung der Judenfrage" (ibid.)

    108  Summarized in a Brochure: PAA, Inland IIg 177.

    109  'die Juden als Faustpfand in deutscher Hand für ein zukünftiges Wohlverhalten ihrer Rassegenossen in Amerika'. Die Judenfrage im Friedensvertrag (ibid.)

    110  'die Erfahrung darin, Strafmaßnahmen, die wegen feindseliger Handlungen von Juden in USA gegen Deutschland erforderlich werden, in der geeigneten Weise durchzuführen'. Plan zur Lösung der Judenfrage (ibid.).

    111  Ciano, Tagebücher, p. 249; Schmidt, Statist, pp. 494f.

    112  Wagner (ed.), Lagevorträge, pp. 106ff.

    113  'Sehr wichtig ist auch die Entscheidung des Führers, die er auf meinen Antrag gefällt hat, daß keine Judentransporte ins Generalgouvernment mehr stattfinden. Allgemein politisch möchte ich dazu sagen, daß geplant ist, die ganze Judensippschaft im Deutschen Reich, im Generalgouvernment und im Protektorat in denkbar kürzester Zeit nach Friedensschluß in eine afrikanische oder amerikanische Kolonie zu transportieren. Man denkt an Madagaskar, das zu diesem Zwecke von Frankreich abgetrennt werden soll.' Präg/Jacobmeyer (eds.), Diensttagebuch, 12.7.40.

    114  PAA, Inland IIg 177, note by Luther 15.8.40; printed in ADAP, Serie D, vol. 10, No. 345: "intented, after the war to evacuate all Jews from Europe". ('beabsichtige, nach dem Krieg sämtliche Juden aus Europa zu evakuieren')

    115  Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 17.8.40 (concerning the discussion with Hitler on the previous day).

    116  Toury, Entstehungsgeschichte.

    117  Rademacher in a draft for a letter on December 7, 1940 changing the wording "deportation ordered from Führer" to "deportation approved by Führer" (PAA, Inland II g 189, Toury, Austreibungsbefehl, 443).

    118  'Gouvernement: plus 150-160.000 Polen und Juden aus den wiedergewonnenen Gebieten,' vol. 2, 4.11.40.

    119  'Der Führer stiftet wieder einmal lachend Frieden. Alle möchten ihren Unrat ins Generalgouvernement abladen. Juden, Kranke, Faulenzer etc. Und Frank sträubt sich dagegen. Nicht ganz mit Unrecht. Er möchte aus Polen ein Musterland machen. Das geht zu weit. Das kann er nicht und soll er nicht. Polen soll für uns, so bestimmt der Führer, ein großes Arbeitsreservoir sein. [...] Und die Juden schieben wir später auch einmal aus diesem Gebiet ab.' Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 5 November ("yesterday").

    120  Summary of the numbers on the basis of Polish sources and research in: Röhr (ed.), Okkupationspolitik in Polen, pp. 356f.

    121  Wie mir Reichsleiter Bormann mitteilt, hat der Führer auf einen von ihnen erstatteten Bericht entschieden, daß die in dem Reichsgau Wien noch wohnhaften 60.000 Juden beschleunigt, also noch während des Krieges, wegen der in Wien herrschenden Wohnungsnot ins Generalgouvernement abgeschoben werden sollen.' IMTXXIX, pp. 176f, 1950 PS, Letter of Lammers to Schirach, 3 December 1940.

    122  Safrian, Eichmann-Männer, pp. 97f; Adler, Verwaltete Mensch, pp. 147ff with further details.

    123  'Gemäß dem Willen des Führers soll nach dem Kriege die Judenfrage innerhalb des von Deutschland beherrschten oder kontrollierten Teiles Europas einer endgültigen Lösung zugeführt werden. Der Chef der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD hat bereits vom Führer über den RF-SS bezw. durch den Reichsmarschall Auftrag zur Vorlage eines Endlösungsprojektes erhalten.—Auf Grund der bei den Dienststellen des CdS und des SD vorhandenen umfangreichen Erfahrungen in der Judenbehandlung und dank der seit längerer Zeit geleisteten Vorarbeiten wurde dann das Projekt in seinen wesentlichsten Zügen ausgearbeitet. Es liegt dem Führer und dem Reichsmarschall vor. Fest steht, daß es sich bei der Ausführung um eine Riesenarbeit handelt, deren Erfolg nur durch sorgfältigste Vorbereitungen gewährleistet werden kann. Diese müssen sich sowohl auf die einer Gesamtabschiebung der Juden vorausgehenden Arbeiten als auch auf die Planung einer bis ins einzelne festgelegten Ansiedlungsaktion in dem noch zu bestimmenden Territorium erstrecken.' CDJC, V-59, printed in Klarsfeld, Vichy—Auschwitz, pp. 361ff.

    124  'daß Pg. Heydrich—der vom Führer mit der endgültigen Judenevakuierung beauftragt sei—dem Führer vor 8-10 Wochen einen Vorschlag vorgelegt habe, der nur deshalb noch nicht zur Ausführung gelangt sei, weil das Generalgouvernement z. Zt. nicht in der Lage sei, einen Juden oder Polen aus dem Altreich aufzunehmen.' Printed in Adler, Verwaltete Mensch, p. 152.

    125  'Wien wird nun bald ganz judenrein sein. Und jetzt soll Berlin an die Reihe kommen. Ich spreche das schon mit dem Führer und Dr. Franck (sic !) ab. Der stellt die Juden zur Arbeit an, und sie sind auch fügsam. Später müssen sie mal ganz aus Europa heraus." Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 18.3.1941.

    126  "SS-Ogruf Krüger teilt die vorläufige Einstellung der Umsiedlungen von Polen und Juden in das GG mit. Frank äußert dazu, der Führer habe ihm zugesagt, das GG werde als erstes Gebiet judenfrei gemacht." Präg/Jacobmeyer (eds.), Diensttagebuch, 25.3.41.

    127  'Der Führer ist entschlossen, aus diesem Gebiet im Laufe von 15 bis 20 Jahren ein rein deutsches Land zu machen.' Ibid.

    128  Ibid., 3.4.41.

    129  'Die Juden können nicht aus Berlin evakiert werden, da 30.000 in Rüstungsbetrieben arbeiten.' Fröhlich, (ed.), Tagebücher, 22.3.41

    130  Decisive for this are Hitler’s orders No. 18 (Rußland) v.12.11.1940 as well as No. 21 v.18.12.41 (Fall Barbarossa): Hubatsch (ed.), Weisungen.

    131  'Bezüglich der Lösung der Judenfrage berichtetete ich kurz dem Reichsmarschall und legte ihm meinen Entwurf vor, dem er mit einer Änderung bezüglich der Zuständigkeit Rosenbergs zustimmte und Wiedervorlage befahl.' Aly, Endlösung, p. 270 (Archival reference: OS, 500-3-795).

    132  'Vorbereitungen in organisatorischer, sachlicher und materieller Hinsicht zu treffen für eine Gesamtlösung der Judenfrage im deutschen Einfluágebiet in Europa', 'Zuständigkeiten anderer Zentralinstanzen". PAA, Inland II g 177, IMTXXVI, 710-PS.

    133  For details see below.

    134  'Dr. Franck erzäahlt vom Generalgouvernement. Dort freut man sich schon darauf, die Juden abschieben zu können. Das Judentum in Polen verkommt allmählich. Eine gerechte Strafe für die Verhetzung der Völker und die Anzettelung des Krieges. Der Führer hat das ja auch den Juden prophezeit." Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 20.6.41 on the previous day.

    135  Präg/Jacobmeyer (eds.), Diensttagebuch.

    136  "ihm vom Führer in München über die Behandlung der Ostjuden gegebenen Richtlinien". ADAP, Serie D, vol. 13, No. 207.

    137  'Richtlinien auf Sondergebieten zur Weisung Nr. 21', 'Dieser kommende Feldzug ist mehr als nur ein Kampf der Waffen; er führt auch zur Auseinandersetzung zweier Weltanschauungen. Um diesen Krieg zu beenden, genügt es bei der Weite des Raumes nicht, die feindliche Wehrmacht zu schlagen. [...] Die jüdisch-bolschewistische Intelligenz, der bisherige 'Unterdrücker' des Volkes, muß beseitigt werden." Schramm (ed.), Kriegstagebuch OKW, vol. I, p. 341.

    138  'zunächst schnell die bolschewistischen Führer zu erledigen', BAM, RW 19/185.

    139  'Die von Stalin eingesetzte Intelligenz muß vernichtet werden. Die Führermaschinerie des russischen Reiches muß zerschlagen werden. Im großrussischen Bereich ist Anwendung brutalster Gewalt notwendig.' Halder, Kriegstagebuch II, pp. 317ff (p. 320).

    140  'Kampf zweier Weltanschauungen gegeneinander. Vernichtendes Urteil über Bolschewismus, ist gleich asoziales Verbrechertum. Kommunismus ungeheure Gefahr für die Zukunft. Wir müssen von dem Standpunkt des soldatischen Kameradentum abrücken. Der Kommunist ist vorher kein Kamerad and nachher kein Kamerad. Es handelt sich um einen Vernichtungskampf. Wenn wir es nicht so auffassen, dann werden wir zwar den Feind schlagen, aber in 30 Jahren wird uns wieder der kommunistische Feind gegenüberstehen Wir führen nicht Krieg, um den Feind zu konservieren. [...] Kampf gegen Rußland: Vernichtung der bolschewistischen Kommissare und der kommunistischen Intelligenz.' Ibid., pp. 335ff (p. 336f).

    141  'Im Operationsgebiet des Heeres erhält der Reichsführer SS zur Vorbereitung der politischen Verwaltung Sonderaufgaben im Auftrage des Führers, die sich aus dem endgültig auszutragenden Kampf zweier entgegengesetzter politischer Systeme ergeben. Im Rahmen dieser Aufgaben handelt der Reichsführer SS selbständig und in eigener Verantwortung." Halder, Kriegstagebuch I, p. 341.

    142  'Notwendigkeit alle Bolschewistenhäuptlinge und Kommissare sofort unschädlich zu machen". BAM, RW 4/v. 522, (=IMT XXVI, pp. 53ff, 447-PS).

    143  'besonders interessantes Anschauungsmaterial'. 'Dem Führer soll von hier aus lfd. Berichte über die Arbeit der Einsatzgruppen im Osten vorgelegt weren.' ZSt, Dok. UdSSR No. 401.

    144  Printed in Headland, Messages, pp. 22f.

    145  'Der Riesenraum müsse natürlich so rasch wie möglich befriedet werden; dies geschehe am besten dadurch, daß man jeden, der nur schief schaut, totschieße.' IMT XXXVIII, pp. 86ff (221-L).





    150  Heydrich to Himmler, 19 October 1941, Eichmann-Prozeß, No. 1544.


    152  Longerich, Politik, 432f.

    153  Ibid., 431f.


    155  Telephone note of Himmlers concerning a discussion with Heydrich, 30 November 1941, BAB, NS 19/1438.


    157  'biologischen Ausmerzung des gesamten Judentums in Europa'. Concept, quoted in: Wilhelm, Rassenpolitik, Passau 1991, pp. 131ff (archival reference: PAA Pol XIII, 25, VAA-reports); see also the notes of a reporter ("strictly confidential informational report") from this press conference: 'The number of Jews in this entire area is estimated at 6 Million, brought across the Urals in the course of the year or otherwise became somehow victim to extermination' ('streng vertraulicher Invormationsbericht'. 'Die Zahl der Juden in diesem ganzen Raum wird auf 6 Milionen geschätzt, die im Laufe des Jahres über den Ural gebracht weren sollen oder sonst irgendwie der Ausmerzung verfallen werden.') Hagemann, Presselenkung, 146.

    158  'nach der Entscheidung'. Wilehlm, Rassenpolitik, pp. 131ff.

    159  'Anmerkungen über die New Yorker Juden vielleicht ... etwas geändert werden müßten. [...] Ich stünde auf dem Standpunkt, von der Ausrottung des Judentums nicht zu sprechen. Der Führer bejahte diese Haltung und sagte, sie hätten uns den Krieg aufgebürdet und sie hätten die Zerstörung gebracht; es sei kein Wunder, wenn die Folgen sie zuerst träfen.' Ibid.

    160  'Judenfrage/als Partisanen auszurotten'. Witte et. al. (ed.), Dienstkalender, 18.12.41.

    161  Gerlach, Wannsee-Konferenz, pp 23f.

    162  'Der Juden aber wird nicht die europäischer Völker ausrotten, sondern er wird das Opfer seines eigenen Anschlags sein.' Domarus II, 1821.

    163  'Wir sind uns dabei im klaren darüber, daß der Krieg nur damit enden kann, daß entweder die arischen Völker ausgerottet werden, oder daß das Judentum aus Europa verschwindet'. Ibid. II, pp. 1828f.

    164  'Meine Prophezeiung wird ihre Erfüllung finden, daß durch diesen Krieg nicht die arische Menschheit vernichtet, sondern der Jude ausgerottet werden wird'. Völkischer Beobachter, 26.2.42, printed in Domarus II, pp. 1844.

    165  'Der Jude muß aus Europa hinaus! Am besten, sie gehen nach Rußland! Ich habe kein Mitleid mit den Juden. Sie werden immer ein Element bleiben, das die Völker gegeneinander hetzt." Jochmann (ed.), Monologe, 27.1.42

    166  'Der Jude wird erkannt werden! Der gleiche Kampf, den Pasteur und Koch haben kämpfen müssen, muß heute von uns geführt wrden. Zahllose Erkrankungen haben die Ursache in einem Bazillus, dem Juden! Japan würde ihn auch bekommen haben, wenn es dem Juden weiter offen gestanden hätte. Wir werden gesunden, wenn wir den Juden eliminieren.' Ibid., 22.2.42.

    167  'Ich spreche mit dem Führer noch einmal ausführlich die Judenfrage durch. Sein Standpunkt diesem Problem gegenüber ist unerbittlich. Er will die Juden absolut aus Europa herausdrängen. Das ist auch richtig so. Die Juden haben unserem Erdteil so viel Leid zugefügt, daß die härteste Strafe, die man über sie verhängen kann, immer noch zu milde ist. Himmler betreibt augenblicklich die große Umsiedlung der Juden aus den deutschen Städten nach den östlichen Ghettos.' Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 27.4.42.

    168  'Ich plädiere also noch einmal für eine radikalere Judenpolitik, womit ich beim Führer nur offene Türen einrenne [...] Die Deutschen beteiligen sich an subversiven Bewegungen immer nur, wenn die Juden sie dazu verführen. Deshalb muß man die jüdische Gefahr liquidieren, koste es was es wolle [...] Deshalb wünscht der Führer auch gar nicht, daß die Juden nach Sibirien evakuiert werden. Dort unter härtesten Lebensbedingungen würden sie zweifellos wieder ein lebenskräftiges Element darstellen. Er möchte sie lieber nach Zentralafrika ansiedeln. Dort leben sie in einem Klima, das sie gewiß nicht stark und widerstandsfähig macht. Jedefalls ist es das Ziel des Führers, Westeuropa gänzlich judenfrei zu machen. Hier dürfen sie keine Heimstätte mehr haben. Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 30.5.42.

    169  'Nach Beendigung des Krieges werde er sich rigoros auf den Standpunkt stellen, daß er Stadt für Stadt zusammenschlage, wenn nicht die Drecksjuden rauskämen und nach Madagaskar oder einen sostigen jüdischen Nationlstaat abwanderten. [...] Wenn ihm berichtet werde, daß heute auch Litauen judenfrei sei, so sei das bezeichnend.' Ritter (ed.), Tischgespräche.

    170  Brechtken, Madagaskar, p. 279.

    171  Longerich, Politik, pp. 398f.

    172  'so schnell wie möglich dafür zu sorgen, daß in der deutschen Rüstungswirdschaft beschäftigte Juden durch ausländische Arbeiter ersetzt werden.' Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 30.5.

    173  'Herausziehung der Juden aus den Rüstungsbetrieben im Reich', printed in: Boelcke (ed.), Rüstung, p. 189.

    174  'noch einmal seiner festen Entschlossenheit Ausdruck, die Juden unter allen Umständen aus Berlin herauszubringen'. Fröhlich (ed.), Tagebücher, 30.9.

    175  Boelcke (ed.), Rüstung, 20-22 September 1942, p. 189.

    176  'ein paar wenige jüdische Kl-Großbetriebe tunlichst im Osten des Generalgouvernements' hätte: 'Jedoch auch dort sollen eines Tages dem Wunsche des Führers entsprechend die Juden verschwinden.' IfZ, Nuremberg Documents, N0 1611; printed as facsmile in: Grabitz/Scheffler: Letzte Spuren, p. 179.

    177  'Die besetzten Ostgebiete werden judenfrei. Die Durchführung dieses sehr schweren Befehls hat der Führer auf meine Schultern gelegt. Die Verantwortung kann mir ohnedies niemand abnehmen." IfX Nuremberg Documents, NO 626.


    1. 'Banditen

      1. festgestellte Tote nach Gefechten 1.337
      2. Gefanene sofort exekutiert 737
      3. Gefangene nch längerer eingehender Vernehmung exekutiert 7.828
    2. Bandenhelfer und Bandenverdächtige

      1. festgenommen 16.553
      2. exekutiert 14.257
      3. Juden exekutiert. 363.211.'

    Printed in: Rürup (ed.), Krieg (reference: BDC, SS-HO, 1206-1313)

    179  'II. Angelegenhetien des SD u. Polizei'. 'Juden in Frankreich 6-700.000 sonstige Feinde.' IfX, MA 316 (=NA, RG 242, T 175 Roll 94), 5330.

    180  'Der Führer hat die Anweisung gegeben, daß die Juden und sonstigen Feinde in Frankreich verhaftet und abtransportiert werden. Dies soll jedoch erst erfolgen, wenn er mit Laval darüber gesprochen hat. Es handelt sich um 6-700,000 Juden.' IfZ, MA 466 (=NA, RG 242, T 175 Roll 103), p. 5558.

    181  CDJC XXVI-71, Letter from Knochen to Müler, 12 February 1943, printed in Klarsfeld, Vichy, pp. 488f.

    182  IfZ, MA 316 (=NA, RG 242, T 175 Roll 94), p. 5330

    183  'Dort sollten sie zwar arbeiten, jedoch unter Bedingungen, daß sie gesund sind un am Leben bleiben." IfZ, MA 466 (=NA, RG 242, T 175, Roll 103), p. 5557.

    184  'daß die Evakuierung der Juden trotz der dadurch in den nächsten 3 bis 4 Monaten noch entstehenden Unruhen radikal durchzuführen sei und durchsgestanden werden müßte". BAB, NS 19/1432.

    185  'was er denn mit den Juden machen solle", 'erschlagen könne er sie doch nicht', 'entweder vernichtet oder in Konzentrationslager gebracht werden'. 'Wenn die Juden dort nicht arbeiten wollten, würden sie erschossen. Wenn sie nicht arbeiten könnten, müßten sie verkommen.Sie wären wie Turbekuluosebazillen zu behandeln, an denen sich ein gesunder Körper anstecken könne. Das wäre nicht grausam, wenn man bedenke, da sogar unschuldie Naturgeschöpfe wie Hasen und Rehe getötet werden müßten, damit kein Schaden entstehe.' IMT XXXV, D-736, pp. 426ff (p. 428).

    186  "Ich bitte Sie das, was ich Ihnen in diesem Kreise sage, wirklich nur zu hören un nie darüber zu sprechen. Es trat an uns die Frage heran: Wie ist es mit den Frauen und Kindern?—Ich habe mich entschlossen, auch hier eine ganz klara Lösung zu finden—sprich also, umzubringen oder umbringen zu lassen—und die Rächer in Gestalt der Kinder für unsere Söhne und Enkel groß werden zu lasen. Es mußte der schwere Entschluß gefaßt werden, dieses Volk von der Erde verschwinden zu lassen. Für die Organisation, die den Auftrag durchführen mußte, war es der schwerste, den wir bisher hatten.' IfZ, MA 309 (=NA, T 175, R 85), pp. 0152-0200), printed in: Smith/Peterson (eds.), Himmler, Geheimreden, p. 169.

    187  "Die Judenfrage ist in Deutschland und im allgemeinen in den von Deutschland besetzten Ländern gelöst. Sie wurde entsprechend dem Lebenskampf unseres Volkes, der um die die Existenz unseres Blutes geht, kompromißlos gelöst. [...] Sie mögen mir nachfühlen, wie schwer die Erfüllung dieses mir gegebenem soldatischen Befehls war, den ich befolgt und durchgeführt habe aus Gehorsam und wollster ßberzeugung. Wenn Sie sagen: 'Bei den Männern sehen wir das ein, nicht aber bei Kindern', dann darf ich an das erinnern, war ich in meinen ersten Ausführungen sagte. In dieser Auseinandersetzung mit Asien müssen wir uns daran gewöhnen, die Spielregeln und die uns lieb gewonnenen und uns viel näher liegenden Sitten vergangener europäischer Kriege zur Vergessenheit zu verdammen. Wir sind m.E. auch als Deutsche bei allem so tief aus unserer aller Herzen kommenden Gemütsregungen nicht berechtigt, die haßerfüllten Rächer groß werden zu lassen, damit dann unsere Kinder und Enkel sich mit denen auseinanderetzen müssen, weil wir, die Väter oder Großväter, zu schwach und zu feige waren und ihnen das überließen." IfZ, MA 314 (=NA, T 175, R 92), pp. 3449ff (p. 3475).

    188  "Eine andere Frage, die maßgeblich für die innere Sicherheit des Reiches und Europas war, ist die Judenfrage gewesen. Sie wurde nach Befehl und verstandesmäßiger Erkentnis kompromißlos gelöst. Ich glaube, meine Herren, daß sie mich so weit kennen, daß ich kein blutrünstiger Mensch bin und kein Mann, der an irgendetwas Hartem, was er tun muá, Freude oder Spaß hat. Ich habe aber anderseits so gute Nerven und ein so großes Pflichtbewußtsein—das darf ich für mich in Anspruch nehmen—daß ich dann, wenn ich eine Sache als notwendig erkenne, sie kompromißlos durchführe. Ich habe mich nicht für berechtigt gehalten,—das betrifft nämlich die jüdischen Frauen und Kinder- in den Kindern die Rächer groß werden zu lassen, die dann unsere Väter und unsere Enkel umbringen. Das hätte ich für feige gehalten. Folglich wurde die Frage kompromißlos gelöst." IfZ, MA 316 (=NA, T 175, R 94), pp. 4609ff (pp. 4639ff).

    189  "Es war die furchbarste Aufgabe und der furchtbarste Auftrag, den eine Organisation bekommen konnte: der Auftrag die Judenfrage zu lösen. Ich darf dies auch in diesem Kreis wieder in aller Offenheit mit ein paar Sätzen sagen. Es ist gut, daß wir die Härte hatten, die Juden in unserem Bereich auszurotten.", IfZ, MA 315 (=NA, T 175, R 94), pp. 3945ff (p. 3961).

    190  'Indem ich den Juden entfernte, habe ich in Deutschland die Möglichkeit irgendeiner revolutionären Kernbildung oder Keimzellenbildung beseitigt. Man kann mir natürlich sagen: Ja, hätten Sie das nicht einfacher—oder nicht einfacher, denn alles andere wäre komplizierter gewesen, aber humaner lösen können? Meine Herren Offiziere, wir stehen in einem Kampf auf Leben und auf Tod. Wenn in diesem Kampf unsere Gegner siegen, würde das deutsche Volk ausgerottet werden.' IfZ, MA 316 (=NA, RG 242, T 175, Roll 94), pp. 4971ff (p. 5021).

    191  'Humanität wäre gerade hier wie überhaupt überall höchste Grausamkeit gegen das eigene Volk. Wenn ich mir schon den Haß der Juden zuziehe, dann möchte ich wenigstens nicht die Vorteile eines solchen Hasses vermissen.' Ibid.

    192  'Ich habe aber auch keinen Zweifel darüber gelassen, daß, wenn die Völker Europas wieder nur als Aktienpakete dieser internationalen Geld- und Finanzverschwörer angesehen werden, dann auch jenes Volk mit zur Verantwortung gezogen werden wird, das der eigentlich Schuldige an diesem mörderischen Ringen ist: Das Judentum! Ich habe weiter keinen darüber im Unklaren gelasssen, daß dieses Mal nicht nur Millionen Kinder von Europäern der arischen Völker verhungern werden, nicht nur Millionen erwachsender Männer den Tod erleiden und nicht nur Hunderttausende an Frauen und Kindern in den Städten verbrannt und zu Tode bombardiert werden dürften, ohne daß der eigentlich Schuldige, wenn auch durch humanere Mitttel seine Schuld zu bußen hat. Vor allem verpflichte ich die Führung der Nation und die Gefolschaft zur peinlichen Einhaltung der Rassegesetze und zum unbarmherzigen Widerstand gegen die Weltvergifter aller Völker, das internationale Judentum.' IMT XLI, pp. 549ff, Streicher-9.