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Holocaust Research Paper

Overview of and Austrian Mad Man

Jared Andrews

College English

Mr. Neuburger

February 19, 2009


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The Holocaust started around 1933 with the rise of the Nazis and ended on May 8, 1945

with the end on World War 2. The Holocaust, the disastrous period in Germany when the Nazis

took over and about six million Jews died and around eleven million in all died through out the

entire holocaust. They included Jehovah Witnesses, gypsies, people who had a mental or

physical problem, homosexuals, also just whoever Hitler or the Nazis did not like or who defied

them. The Nazi party was lead by Adolf Hitler. Hitler used several different tactics to fool the

Jewish people into going to the so-called work camps and into giving up there rights and

possessions.

At first, the Jews resisted, but according to survivor Sam Halpern, the greatest uprising

against the Nazis happened in the Warsaw Ghetto in Poland. At first when there was about half a

million Jewish people in the Ghetto, and they only started to fight back when almost the entire

Ghetto had been wiped out. Only a few thousand people remained. This group included of many

different backgrounds including liberals, Bundists, Religionists, Atheists, and Jews of every

political and religious standings bound together. Their leader, Mordechai Anielewicz acted as

commander over them. They knew they did not have any chance against the German army, but if

they were going to get killed that they were going to take a few Germans with them. Most of the

reasons the Jewish people did not fight back involving the simple reason that every time one

person did try to run or escape they were simply shot without any hesitation and no dragging

them back to punish them. Being under the gun all the time made the Jews and the other races

being persecuted during that time scared and afraid to do any thing. Because they lived in

constant fear of being killed by the heartless Nazi soldiers made them not want to resist in any

way.

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Another reason why they did not fight back is that with the help of the Nazi leaders they

tricked the Jews into giving up everything that they owned and the rights they possessed. Some

of the ways that the Nazi soldiers tricked the Jews into moving to these work camps is by

cutting of food supplies to Ghettos so that they practically starved to death in there own houses.

After they starved for a while, the Nazis herded them around worse than cattle in small boxcars

crammed full of people while moving them to either small ghettos or, depending on the age of

the adults, death camps. So they were for the most part glad to go to the work camps, because of

the Nazi troops lied to them saying that if they work they are promised to have better living

conditions and be set free if they work. When Jews arrived at these work camps, there were

these words on every set of gates Arbeit Macht Frei, which means work will set you free. Of

course after they got in there, they realized that they might be released, for that every now and

them the troops would call some workers back, and they had no idea were they were being taken,

little did they know that they were slowing being wiped out. For the majority of them there was

no hope for survival.

Some of the main and most recognized work camps and extermination camps that they

were sent to include, Treblinka, Dachau, Chelmno, Sobibor, Belzek, Majdanek, and the most

recognized Auschwitz-Brikenau. According to the web site

http://frank.mtsu.edu/~baustin/holocamp.html, the first extermination camp that began the mass

killings was Auschwitz-Brikenau. This began in mid-September 1941. This camp had around

1,200,000 people exterminated; the main way the Nazis killed the prisoners was by using a gas

normally used in controlling rodents is Zyklon-B gas. Auschwitz had several different

nationalities that it killed including Jews, Poles, Romany, and Soviet POWs. The rest of the

extermination camps included Chelmno which began December 7, 1941 and killed a total of

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320,000 people were killed and there primary source of killings were using Gas vans and driving

them around to slowly kill them. Four others that began their mass killings in March, March 17,

also, July 23, and October in 1942. These camps used Carbon Monoxide gas and Zyklon-B gas

to kill them. These camps which included Belzek, Sobibor, Treblinka, and Majdanek. Total

number of people killed in these smaller camps came to 2,930,000 people killed. The final

extermination camp Majdaek was the smallest. It started June 1944. It had a number of 65,000

people killed and used Zyklon-B gas.

In the summer of 1934, an ill elderly German President, Paul von Hindenburg lay close to

death in his summer estate in East Prussia. His health had been failing for several months and

Adolf Hitler was patiently waiting for his chance to use Hindenburgs death to take complete

total control of Germany making him Fuhrer, or the absolute leader of the German nation. On

August 2, 1932, at 9:00a.m, the long awaited death of the German president who passed away at

the age of 87 had occurred. According to The History Place, the Holocaust timeline web site

states that, within days Hitler and Nazis troops began taking over and making every German

soldier and officers to swear a personal oath of allegiance to Hitler. Hindenburgs will in-

testament stated that he desired to return to a constitutional (Hohenzollern) monarchy. This wish

sealed in a letter addressed to Hitler from Hindenburg. After Hitler received this letter, he simply

ignored it and immediately destroyed it and nobody was the wiser. As Hitler campaigned with

the Nazi party to become the actual Fuhrer of Germany, he disregarded all that Hindenburg

wanted and lied to the people by saying that Hindenburg was 100% for Hitler and all his ideas to

basically to get 90% of the votes to make him the absolute leader of Germany. On August 19,

1934 Hitler received 95% of all the votes to make him officially the Fuhrer of all Germany by

direct vote from the people. On august 20, 1934 Hitler passed a law with three articles stating:

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Article 1. The public officials and the soldiers of the armed forces must take an oath of loyalty on

entering the service.

Article 2. 1. The oath of loyalty of public officials will be; I shall be loyal and obedient to Adolf

Hitler, the Fuhrer of the German Reich and people, Respect the laws, and fulfill my official

duties conscientiously, so help me God.

2. The oath of loyalty of the soldiers of the armed forces will be:

I swear by God this sacred oath: I will render unconditional obedience to Adolf Hitler, the Fuhrerof the German Reich and the people, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, and will be

ready as a brave soldier to risk my life at ant time for this oath.

Article 3. Officials already in service must swear this oath immediately according to Article 2

number 1.

These oaths were taken very seriously as an oath of honor as a sacred duty as a solder orofficer and pledged to Hitler personally, not to the German state or constitution.

www.historypalce.com/worldwar2/holocaust.

From the very beginning of Hitlers reign and to the day of his death he wanted two

things done. His main goal was to forcibly gain living space for all German people. The

second goal he wanted some kind of reckoning with the Jews. Some of the steps that he took to

achieve his goals is that he broke the Treaty of Versailles and started to rapidly rebuild the

German Army. Also, Hitler made a deal with Britain to have a naval Fleet 35% the size of

Britains and a submarine fleet just as big. The rest of the other countries leaders became nervous

and Hitler asked, Doesnt Germany have any right to defend itself like every other nation? It

did not take Hitler to long to become power hungry and began to fulfill his second goal by

destroying Germanys Problem People which included Jews, Poles, people with a mental or

physical disabilities, gypsies, and homosexuals. He began to slowly take away their rights them

forced them to work camps and later on to extermination camps. This plan was called the Final

Solution. Nobody knows when exactly the Final Solution was completely in motion to

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completely annihilate the Jewish people, rid Germany of all imperfect people, and free up some

living space for the German people.

People followed Hitler until the day he committed suicide with is young wife. The

reasoning for why he was able to fool most into following him, that he possessed the ability to

look ay someone directly in the eyes and lie to them and convinces them that to be rid of the

Jews would solve all the problems that the German people faced. Such as poverty, crowded

living space, and lack of supplies. The German people did not completely comprehend that he

did not want peace but to dictate the Germans and lead them up to another horrific war for the

German nation. According to www.ushmm.org The way Hitler lead and got the German Nation

to follow him was outstanding, his motives where wrong and the power hungry way he lead

Germany into World War II. With the following of his death was suicide.

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Bibliography

www.ushmm.org

www.historyplace.com/worldwar2

www.aish.com/holocaust/issues/Like_Sheep_Why_Didnt_You_Fight.asp

http://Frank.mtsu.edu/-baustin.holocamp.html

"The Camps." The Camps. 4 Sept. 08 .

"Final Solution overview." Final Solution overview. 20 May 08. Ushmm. 9 Sept. 08 .

Halpern, Sam. "Like Sheep: Why didn't you Fight?" Holocaust Studies. 96. Like Sheep: Why didn't you fight? 03

Sept. 08 .

"Hitler become Fuhrer." Www.historyplace.com/worldwar2. 97. 4 Sept. 08.

"Hitler Reveals War Plans." The History place. 01. The Triumph of Hitler. 03 Sept. 08

.

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http://www.ushmm.org/http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2http://www.aish.com/holocaust/issues/Like_Sheep_Why_Didn't_You_Fight.asphttp://www.aish.com/holocaust/issues/Like_Sheep_Why_Didn't_You_Fight.asphttp://frank.mtsu.edu/-baustin.holocamp.htmlhttp://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2.%2097.%204%20Sept.%2008http://www.ushmm.org/http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2http://www.aish.com/holocaust/issues/Like_Sheep_Why_Didn't_You_Fight.asphttp://frank.mtsu.edu/-baustin.holocamp.htmlhttp://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2.%2097.%204%20Sept.%2008

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