How a cultured nation, such as Germany perpetrated such crimes under the Nazi Regime

1
How a cultured nation, such as Germany
perpetrated such crimes under the Nazi regime

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INTRODUCTION
This study will result in a better understanding as to how the Nazis’
barbaric regime could have such wide support from the majority of a cultured
nation, that would go on to perpetrate the worst examples of inhumanity.
Chapter 1 will assess the beginnings of how a regime like the Nazi Party
could gain such wide support in Germany, and eventually be given the
opportunity to carry out such crimes in relation to the Holocaust. It will explore
the highly influential propaganda used by the Nazi Party upon German
culture; particularly analysing the use of German art where it was twisted into
a tool for terror in their aim to control Germany.
Chapter 2 analyses how a cultured nation allowed the development of the
Nazis’ ethnic racial policy. The ideal Aryan race and Darwinian ideals will be
explored, as well as the enthusiasm of ordinary Germans who were
brainwashed into believing that Jews were the enemy of Germany. Focus will
also be on the origins of Nazi genocide to the Nazis’ ‘Final Solution’ analysing
how a cultured nation such as Germany perpetrated such crimes.

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CHAPTER ONE
“I believe that one of the most revealing ways to explore the complexities of
the German character is through the story of German art.”

4
When critiquing Ian Kershaw’s article, How Hitler Won over the German
People (2008) he notes that the propaganda and military success carried out
by the Nazis transformed Hitler into an idol, and with this came the adulation
which helped make “the Third Reich catastrophe” 1
possible. As a result of the
death of Reich President Paul von Hindenburg, Kershaw notes how Hitler
abolished the Reich Presidency and had the army swear a personal oath of
unconditional obedience to him. The newspaper headline “Today Hitler Is All
of Germany”, as Kershaw discusses, reflected the vital shift in power that had
just taken place. To elaborate on this, the wording of the newspaper headlines
portrays how Hitler’s Germany was able to gain control of a cultured nation
and would later on perpetrate such crimes. The phrasing highlights that the
cultured nation that was Germany is now the embodiment of Hitler. It also
demonstrates a clear sign of control upon Germany, and a sense that a new
part in German history is about to form and changes are going to be seen
under Hitler and the Nazis’.
The propaganda-led image of Hitler as a hero of Germany was something
in which the Reich Minister of Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, claimed as “his
greatest propaganda achievement” 2
raising the issue of how the Nazi Party
managed to gain support from the beginning. In Hitler’s Reichstag speech of
1939, he assesses how he overcame chaos in Germany and in particular
states how he tried to “liquidate that Treaty sheet by sheet whose 448 Articles
1 Kershaw, Ian, How Hitler Won Over the German People, (30 January 2008), Available
online: http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,531909,00.html Date accessed:
January 2012.
January 2012

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contain the vilest rape that nations and human beings have ever been
expected to submit to.” 3
This reiterates how Germany managed to perpetrate
such crimes: Hitler and the Nazis presented themselves as heroes of
Germany which is demonstrated when he talks of destroying the much hated
Treaty of Versailles and “resettling in useful production those 7 million
unemployed who so touched our hearts” 4
which even Hitler’s opponents
recognized as the evolution of his popularity. In 1938, the exiled Social
Democratic organization claimed “Hitler could count on the agreement of the
majority of the people on two essential points: 1) he had created jobs and 2)
he had made Germany strong” 5
thus reflecting how Hitler and the Nazis
managed to gain such wide support and power within Germany. By assessing
issues in Germany such as unemployment, the result came in the form of the
masses being impressed with the Nazi agenda. This sense of joy is reflected
through interviewee Heribert Suntrop in Johannes Steinhoff’s Voices from the
Third Reich: An Oral History, where he states that the Nazi program, for the
improvement of the quality of life, “led to public enthusiasm, or at least
sympathy, for the new regime” 6
and he also continues to reflect upon the
moments “when self confidence - even euphoria - suddenly emerged” 7
,
portraying how and why the Nazi Party managed to receive such wide support
January 2012
January 2012.
January 2012
6 Third Reich
7 Third Reich

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throughout Germany. Its influence brought an economically prosperous
Germany, representing itself as the party of the people, and thus as a result
the majority were enthusiastic towards providing their support.
Clement Greenberg’s essay Avant-Garde and Kitsch, first published in
1939, assesses that avant-garde and modernist art was a means to resist the
'dumbing down' of culture. The phrase “Avant-Garde” represents a brand new
revolutionary sense of modern art, whilst “Kitsch” describes a more cheap art
that is easy to understand and easy to mass produce. Greenberg claims that
kitsch is the culture of the masses in countries such as Germany, Italy and
Russia not because the governments are controlled by philistines but because
it is like this everywhere else. To elaborate on this point, the masses always
favour kitsch as they are too uneducated to understand modern art. This
aspect of the Nazi rule in Germany is particularly significant in that it highlights
the progress of the Nazi Party’s rise to power, and thus how a once cultured
nation would support such a brutal regime that would eventually result in the
death of 6 million people, simply by having them believe they’re more
educated and therefore more cultured, and further to this a better people
under Nazi rule.
Hitler and the Nazi Party realised that for them to gain support, kitsch
artwork was crucial. Greenberg observes that “The encouragement of kitsch
is merely another of the inexpensive ways in which totalitarian regimes seek
to ingratiate themselves with their subjects.” 8
which develops on how the
notion that Germany perpetrated such crimes was via the development of the
8 Greenberg, Clement, ‘Avant-Garde and Kitsch’ in Harrison, Charles and Wood, Paul, ‘Art in
Theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas’, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford, 2003,
p.548.

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influence that Hitler had on the German people. The encouragement of kitsch
artwork and culture was how Hitler and the Nazi Party manipulated people
into their views via mass-produced propaganda, heralded as ‘high’ art by the
ruling party, and easily understood by the masses. Here Hitler’s demagogy
influenced how the masses reflected upon German art and how the Nazi
Party managed to gain such support because of the great advantage that
“Kitsch keeps a dictator in closer contact with the “soul” of the people.” 9
which
was highly important in order for the Third Reich’s support to develop. By
lowering the level of culture in Germany from the ‘high’ art movement of the
avant-garde to the easily understood ‘low’ art of kitsch, the Nazi party lead the
masses to believe that, seeing as they now understand this culture touted by
the Nazis’, they are more informed and therefore more cultured. Most
importantly, however, it furthers the image that the Nazi party is the party of
the people.
To elaborate on this issue, Greenberg continues his argument that “Since
these regimes cannot raise the cultural level of the masses - even if they
wanted to... they will flatter the masses by bringing all culture down to their
level.” 10
Perhaps one of the best examples to illustrate this is an art
exhibition partly curated by Hitler himself was put on in 1937 advertised as
“degenerate art”. Artists of the avant-garde were shown in this exhibition and
portrayed as enemies of the state, culture and reason and visitors were
encouraged to think the same. Simultaneously, a show entitled “Great
German Art” was shown in the Haus der Kunst full of kitsch Nazi propaganda
9 Ibid, p547-548.
p.548.

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paintings and was visited by Hitler to show his support of this type of work,
favoured also by the masses for its accessibility. Greenberg also notes that
“the avant garde is outlawed”11
and another example of this outlawing of the
avant-garde was demonstrated with the Bauhaus School of Art: a school that
took modern style to a radical, utopian extreme. This modern art was much
feared and despised by Hitler which resulted in the closure of the school and
the destruction of all work. In the BBC documentary, Art Of Germany,
presented by Andrew Graham-Dixon, it is shown how “to their right wing
critics, Bauhaus was Hitler’s “Jewish threat” incarnate, the ‘home of schizoid
scribbling and experiments in embarrassment’” 12
which highlights the initial
beginnings of ethnic prejudice being introduced into German art and culture.
The portrayal of this Jewish threat being associated with art further attempts
to firmly seat the ideals of kitsch in the minds of the masses to a point where
they value it highly. Then, when told it is under threat from an infectious force
(such as the avant-garde), the masses will be likely to side with this populism
and favour the Nazis’ view to eradicate the threat and maintain their original
(but manipulated) mindset. By also insinuating that the Jewish people were
not only a threat to the German masses’ new found culture but also their very
way of life, the Nazis’ agenda was bolstered by fear and gained the support of
the majority.
Greenberg (1939) observes “Under these circumstances people like
Gottfried Benn [an avant-garde writer and poet], no matter how ardently they
p.548.
12 Sacco, Silivia (dir), Graham-Dixon, Andrew (pres) ‘Art of Germany’, BBC Worldwide Ltd,
2011.

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support Hitler, become a liability; and we hear no more of them in Nazi
Germany.” 13
demonstrating how Germany was able to gain mass support as
they removed any threat to their new cultural policies. The totalitarian regime
of the Third Reich was being implemented into Germany’s culture. By
removing all threats to his policies, the actions of Hitler portray the very way in
which Germany managed to perpetrate such crimes. They would remove any
threat to their controlled and considered brainwashing of the masses, even if
these supposed “threats” were in support of them, in order to carry out their
objective.
The development of German culture dominated by kitsch artwork was an
approach towards this objective: “The literature and art they enjoy and
understand were to be proclaimed the only true art and literature and any
other kind was to be suppressed”14
, suggesting Hitler was deceiving the public
into thinking they’re better off and a more educated and cultured nation under
the Nazi Party, and therefore a better people – indeed, a supreme race.
Furthermore Greenberg notes that “The masses must be provided with
objects of admiration” 15
which would reinforce this elation they feel of
experiencing different culture under Hitler. In being kept happy and feeling
culturally educated and elevated (rather than actually being intellectually
bettered, as this requires too much difficult input), the German masses would
13 Sacco, Silivia (dir), Graham-Dixon, Andrew (pres) ‘Art of Germany’, BBC Worldwide Ltd,
2011.
14
Greenberg, Clement, ‘Avant-Garde and Kitsch’ in Harrison, Charles and Wood, Paul, ‘Art in
p.548.
15
Greenberg, Clement, ‘Avant-Garde and Kitsch’ in Harrison, Charles and Wood, Paul, ‘Art in
p.548.

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want a continuation of this regime and thus go forward with their support of
and belief in the Nazi Party as it further established itself within Germany.
Alfred H. Barr Jr, [American art historian] notes in his essay Is Modern Art
Communistic? that throughout Nazi Germany the Big Lie triumphed. The Big
Lie being the conspiracy circulated by the Nazis’, where they proclaimed that
the modern art involved “an international cartel of Jewish dealers, corrupt art
critics, irresponsible museum officials and artists who were spiritually un-
German, Bolsheviks, Jewish and degenerate” 16
which proceeded to pave the
way for Nazi art to take form whereas Barr describes how Luftwaffe and S.A
troopers began to be idealized figures within Nazi Germany. These images
were accompanied with paintings of “pretty German landscapes, generals, the
Nazi ringleaders and above all the Fuehrer” 17
thus explaining how Germany
managed to coerce the majority under the Nazis’ power, by tarnishing modern
art and associating it with the Jewish and Communistic enemy.
Radio was to prove a significant tool for the Nazis’ as they carried out their
aim for support throughout Germany. Cultural theorists Theodor Adorno and
Max Horkheimer argued in their work The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as
Mass Deception (1944) that popular culture is similar in comparison to a
factory producing standardized cultural goods such as radio where, through
access to and consumption of popular culture, people are made content and
to feel like a part of the wider party themselves as they can be subject to it at
their leisure – as though Hitler was in their living room. Adorno and
Horkheimer (1994) discuss that, when the German Fascists decided one day
16
Barr, Alfred H, ‘Is Modern Art Communistic?’ in Harrison, Charles and Wood, Paul, ‘Art in
p.673.
17 Ibid.

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to launch a word - say, “intolerable” - over the loudspeakers, the next day the
whole nation was saying “intolerable”. Furthermore, the pronunciation of the
announcer, according to Adorno and Horkheimer, when he “says to the
nation, ‘Good night, everybody!’” 18
or “This is the Hitler Youth, and even
intones the Fuhrer in a way imitated by millions.” 19
develops the notion of how
the radio becomes the “universal mouthpiece” 20
of Hitler, and thus highlights
how the masses were conditioned under the Nazis’ regime, which produces to
some extent an answer to how Germany managed to manipulate the masses
via new cultural advances via mass production of the media and ultimately to
succeed and perpetrate such crimes. Martin Koller, a former Hitler Youth
troop and reconissance mission pilot in Voices From The Third Reich: An Oral
History, describes how his family reacted to the introduction of the radio into
their home stating, “These were our first impressions of a new technology that
let us take part in what was happening in the world” 21
which develops Adorno
and Horkheimer’s argument that “mass-produced entertainment aims, by its
very nature, to appeal to vast audiences and therefore both the intellectual
stimulation of high art and the basic release of low art.” 22
Here, it can
therefore be seen how, via a method that flatters the German people (they
receive the artful “intellectual stimulation” of politics) in an easy and
accessible manner (the mass produced media of the radio – the “basic
release of low art”), the Nazis were even able to enter the homes, and
18 Adorno, Theodor and Horkheimer, Max, The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass
Deception
Deception
Deception
21 Steinhoff, Johannes, Pechel Peter, Showalter, Dennis, Voices From The Third Reich: An
Oral History, New York, Da Capo Press Inc, 1994, p.xxxvii.
22 Durham Peters, John (2003). The Subtlety of Horkheimer and Adorno, Cambridge, Polity
Press, 2003, pp.66.

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ultimately the very psyches, of ordinary German people to deliver their
propaganda-fuelled messages.
Alfred Rosenberg was an intellectually influential member of the Nazi Party
who stated in his book, The Myth of the Twentieth Century, that the existence
of modern art was, “to undermine the ‘beauty ideal’ of the Aryan race” 23
developing racial policy among Germans and thus the persecution of Jews.
To elaborate “The titular ‘myth’ is ‘the myth of blood, which under the sign of
the swastika unchains the racial world-revolution. It is the awakening of the
race soul, which after long sleep victoriously ends the race chaos.” 24
linking in
with how he notes the race chaos of Germans, Jews and anti-natural street
races was abroad and due to this the result was “mongrel art.” 25
This
develops the notion of how the introduction of the Nazis’ Aryan race ideology
began to take influence on Germany when such literature was being
published, which will be discussed in Chapter 2.
The introduction of the Hitler Youth was an example of child propaganda.
Rudolf Hess’ broadcast to the nation aimed at the Hitler Youth stated, “For
you, doing your duty means: Obey the Führer’s orders without question!” 26
and also refers that the Hitler Youth will be “the best living memorial to the
dead comrades of the first years of the war when you maintain discipline in
23 Rosenberg, Alfred, ‘The Myth of the Twentieth Century’, in Harrison, Charles and Wood,
Paul, ‘Art in Theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas’, Blackwell Publishing,
Oxford, 2003, p.412.
24 Viereck, Paul, ‘Metapolitics: From Wagner and the German Romantics to Hitler’, USA,
Transaction Publishers, 2004, p.229.
25 Rosenberg, Alfred, ‘The Myth of the Twentieth Century’, in Harrison, Charles and Wood,
Paul, ‘Art in Theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas’, Blackwell Publishing,
Oxford, 2003, p.412.
26 Hess, Rudolf, The Oath To Adolf Hitler, (25 February 1934) Available online:
http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/hess1.htm Date accessed: 11 March 2012.

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your ranks” 27
developing that this military based environment that was
provided for the German youth helped gain such popular support. The Hitler
Youth provided an opportunity for the German youth to feel a part of the
Nazi’s regime, thus highlighting that it was another form of brainwashing
propaganda, adopted by the Nazis’ in order to gain popularity and condition
German youth to believe that the Jews were the enemy of Germany. Albert
Bastian, a former Hitler Youth and war volunteer explains in Voices From The
Third Reich: An Oral History, that “We boys had the task of convincing our
parents not to do with business with Jews.” 28
This develops the notion that
the Hitler Youth were to be a vital advantage to the Nazis. If the young people
of Germany were won over, and adopted this anti-semtic and ethnic racial
policies demonstrated by the Nazis’ their support would increase. The Hitler
Youth were Germany’s next generation. The conditioning of the Hitler Youth
was an easy task for Hitler and the Nazis which is clearly evident when
Richard Gellately in Backing Hitler notes that Hitler’s strongest supporters
were indeed the young people of Germany. Melita Maschmann, part of the
Hitler Youth “was swept away by anti-Semitism as well as new teachings that
awakened in her a sense of idealism and spirit of self sacrifice based on the
theory of being part of the ‘master race’.” 29
thus highlighting that the appeals
to the youth via the Hitler Youth were successful and the Nazis’ were
achieving their aim of spreading anti-Semitic messages. Although anti-
27 Hess, Rudolf, The Oath To Adolf Hitler, (25 February 1934) Available online:
http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/hess1.htm Date accessed: 11 March 2012.
Oral History, New York, Da Capo Press Inc, 1994, p.xxxvii.
29 Gellately, Robert, Backing Hitler: Consent and Coercion In Nazi Germany, United States,
Oxford University Press, 2001, p.116.

14
Semitism throughout the Hitler Youth was evident, it wasn’t just through the
Hitler Youth that the young people were in support of Nazi rule. Eva Kranz, a
teenager in the 1930s, remembers the Nazi rule as “a glimmer of hope…not
just for the unemployed but for everybody because we all knew that we were
downtrodden.” 30
and she claims “We weren’t living in affluence like today but
there was order and discipline” 31
reflecting that the young people within
Germany also recognised the advantages of living under the Nazi regime.
There was a vast improvement and one which was noted. To elaborate, the
pageants and celebrations provided for the young people were fondly
appreciated and still spoken of after the unique horrors were perpetrated. The
‘Night of the Amazons’ held in Munich each year for four years, starting in
1936 consisted of showing topless German maidens on horseback. The idea
of this being that the semi-naked young women were “arranged to represent
historical tableaux” 32
which also included Greek myths’ hunting scenes. Eva,
Kranz, a teenager in the 1930s, remembers how the purpose of such events
was to portray Germans as an elite: “People had the conceit to say that a
German is special, that the German people should become a thoroughbred
people, should stand above the others” 33
developing that this ‘Aryan’ and
Darwinian ideology produced by the Nazis’ was contagious as Kranz states
that, “You used to say that if you tell a young person every day, you are
something special, then in the end they will believe you.”34
developing how the
young people were indoctrinated under the Nazis and brainwashed into
believing that they, the German nation, are a ‘master race’ which developed
30 Rees, Laurence, The Nazis a Warning from History, London, BBC Books, 1997, p.56.
31 Rees, The Nazis a Warning from History, p.56.

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the support throughout the young people and anti-Semitism was therefore,
seen at all levels of German society.
This also demonstrates how the Nazis managed to achieve such support
and how a cultured nation perpetrated such crimes. Every person of Germany
was experiencing the Nazis’ brainwashing and children were evidently no
exception, when a piece of child propaganda book was produced titled the
The Poisoned Mushroom, in which it warned of the “insidious danger of the
Jews” 35
and this was carried out in a way by portraying the mushroom as
attractive on the surface but in reality poisonous, thus reflecting how the Jews
are like the mushroom. Anti-Semitism was introduced at a young age so that
that is what the children of Germany were used to and therefore, they think
the way the Jews are treated and made examples of are justifiable as they are
the enemy of Germany, and thus highlights how a cultured nation could have
perpetrated such crimes.
35 Rees, Laurence, Auschwitz: The Nazis & The ‘Final Solution’, UK, BBC Books, 2005, p.33.

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CHAPTER TWO
“The policy of deportations and mass murder succeeded because the public
displayed moral insensibility to the Jews’ fate. 36
-
36
Bankier, David, The Germans and the Final Solution: Public Opinion under Nazism, UK,
Blackwell Publishers,1992, p.156.

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The Nazis’ racial ethnic policy was allowed to be produced and developed
into what it did because of the success of Nazi propaganda. The increase of
anti-Semitism in Germany developed because the majority of Germany were
conditioned to believe that the Jews were indeed the enemy of Germany, and
the persecution the Jews faced is only what they deserved. The Aryian ideals
and ‘master race’ statements produced by Hitler and the Nazis indoctrinated
the ordinary Germans into believing that they were indeed the ‘master race’.
Extreme measures were taken by the Nazis as Hitler claimed that in the future
any undesirables in society would “forbid procreation to indiviudals known to
be sick or suffering from hereditary defects, and would ‘physically remove
their reproductive capacity’ 37
which highlights the Nazi eugenics policy.
Further development of these kinds of policies and one in which it became
apparent how a nation perpetrated such crimes, is because of the system - of
the Chancellery that was organized. It was organized by five offices, each
man claiming to represent Hitler and thus, as Rees states, they aimed to
please the Fuhrer in order to increase their influnece. As a result it was a
system “in which chance events could provoke radical policies” 38
which was
demonstrated when a father of a ‘deformed’ child wrote to Hitler describing his
disabilities and he wanted the child to be “put down”39
. Philipp Bouhler,
leading the Chancellery of the Fuhrer, put forward the peition to Hitler. As a
result of Hitler’s “obsessive psuedo-Darwininan views”40
it resulted in one of
37 Burrin, Philippe, Hitler and the Jews, p.26.
40 Rees, Laurence, The Nazis a Warning from History, p.74.

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the most “repungnat policies” 41
– the Children’s ‘Euthanisia’ programme.
From this a detailed criteria were drawn up for children who were to be
“referred for treatment” 42
under the new programme. The incidents at
children’s hopsitals such as Aplerbeck in Dortmund highlighited the true
atrocities of the Nazis’ child euthansia policy. An example of such child
euthansia is Gerda Bernhardt’s family who lost her younger brother, Manfred,
who had “always been retarded.” 43
As Rees explains in The Nazis: A
Warning From History, Manfred was sent to a children’s hospital called
Aplerbeck in Dortmund. However, hospital authorities had stated that Manfred
had died a natural death of measels. Paul Eggert, an 11 year old patient at
Aplerbeck claims whilst he was pushing trolleys containing dirty washing, “he
pulled back the washing and saw the bodies of two girls and a boy.” 44
Thus,
this reflects the horror story of children’s hospitals such as Aplerbeck. Uwe
Bitzel, a historian, pieced together the true story of Aplerbeck and records
show that the same day Manfred Bernhardt met his death, two other children
died. This therefore develops the notion that children weren’t dying from
natural deaths but being killed under this evil policy of child euthanasia, as the
previous week eleven children lost their lives and Uwe Bitzel notes that “This
is such a high death rate that it can be ruled out that all these children died of
natural causes.” 45
Therefore, not only did the child euthanasia derive out of
Nazi ideology but it was the influence and conduct of decisions being made
within the Third Reich. This has been demonstrated by the deaths of “more
42 Rees, Laurence, The Nazis a Warning from History, p.74.
43 Rees, Laurence, The Nazis A Warning from History, p.74.

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than five thousand children” 46
resulting from a letter which pleased Hitler’s
Darwinian ideology. As the euthanasia programme continued, hospitals such
as Aplerbeck were not required to fill in Bouhler’s form resulting in how typical
examples of policies spiralled out of control. Staff were able to independently
select the children they wanted to kill. How a cultured nation perepetrated
such crimes is evidently down to the chaotic structure of the Nazis. The
origins of child euthanasia were not only abhorrent, but instructive.
Furthermore, the ordinary Germans chose to see the dynamic and prosperous
Germany evolve, not the Germany that was perpetrating such horrendous
crimes.
Hitler described Germany as a state going through the transition of racial
contamination and “must one day become master of the earth.”47
This
conditioning that the Germans faced from Hitler and the Nazis brainwashed
the Germans into thinking they were indeed the ‘master race’ and would
continue to be so under Hitler, consequently supporting his aim to rid
Germany of the Jews. The Nazis’ believed the Jews to be a second-class
citizen within Germany, and amongst them held several views towards the
Jewish race. Hitler believed the Jews to be “a parasite race which exploited
the labour of the people among whom they settled” 48
whilst Goebbels claimed
that “There is only one effective measure: cut them out.” 49
Thus, this
demonstrates how Germany managed to perpetrate such crimes. The
47 Burrin, Philippe, Hitler and the Jews: the Genesis of the Holocaust, Great Britain,
Routledge, 1994, p.43.
48 Burrin, Hitler and the Jews, p.43.
49 Goebbels, Joseph, The Jews are Guilty! (1941) Available online:
http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/goeb1.htm Date accessed: April 2012.

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beginning of the Nazis’ ideological views regarding eugencis started to
develop. Therefore, the whole process of Jewish persecution was seen to be
justified. This ‘parasitic race’ raised the ‘Jewish question’ in Germany, and
because of these terms that were implemented into Germany society, the
atrocities that would happen reagarding the Holocaust and the Final Solution
to the perpetrators were justified.
The announcement of the Nuremberg Race Laws of September 1935
resulted in legitimate legislation regarding the ‘Jewish question’. As Steinhoff
observes in Voices from the Third Reich, Jews were deprived of their German
citizenship, and forbade marriage between Christian and Jews: also labelling
children or grandchildren of mixed marriages “Jews and “half breeds”.
Furthermore, it forbade Jews to employ Gentile housemaids under the 45
years of age, justifying it by stating it was for “the protection of German
honour,” 50
demonstrating the limited standing Jews had within the
community. As Philippe Burrin lists in his book, Hitler and the Jews, there
were also examples of immediate removal of German citizenship from all
Jews, which resulted in emigration or expulsion. Violent attacks were occuring
from Nazi mobs, especially storm troops where they were stripping Jewish
pedestrians of their money and leaving them dead: “45 Jews were killed in
this fashion in 1933, and hundreds of others wounded more or less
severely.”51
This highlights the increase of the Jewish persecution throughout
Germany, developing how a cultured nation, such as Germany, perpetrated
Oral History, New York, Da Capo Press Inc, 1994, p.41.
51 Burrin, Philippe, Hitler and the Jews: the Genesis of the Holocaust, Great Britain,
Routledge, 1994, p.43.

21
such crimes. The Nazis’ propaganda previously discussed is therefore a
major contributor into how the Nazis’ crimes were able to continue.
Furthermore, as businesses and personal property were confiscated, “the
nets around the Jews were drawn even tighter”. 52
This was evident when
Germany implemented a process regarding identity cards where male Jews
were required to add ‘Israel’ and women assume ‘Sara’ (Steinhoff 1994). This
reflects the growing exclusion of the Jews within German communities. It was
a sense of the Nazis against the Jews. The Jews’ daily struggles in Germany
were going to continue, and persecution increased. How Germany managed
to perpetrate these crimes under the Nazi regime is portrayed in the
Nuremberg Race Laws. The Nazis’ ideology regarding the development of a
‘pure Aryan’ Germany is reflected in the Race Laws. The language used to
describe the legislation portrays this sense of master race and Darwinian
ideals of Nazism. This is seen when the word “race” is used to title the
legislation. It demonstrates how the Jews were developing to be seen as a
‘parasite’ and a weaker race in comparison to the Germans, and that the
‘Jewish question’ had to be solved.
Kristallnacht, which took place in November 1938, reflected that the Nazis’
anti-Semitic policy was only to develop a stronger sense of anti-Semitism
throughout Germany. As Rees describes in Auschwitz: The Nazis & The Final
Solution, German Jews were rounded up and property of the Jews destroyed
by Nazi stormtroopers. Lucille Eichengreen, growing up in Hamburg in the
1930s describes how “Walking to school we saw the synagogues burning” 53
52
Steinhoff, Johannes, Pechel Peter, Showalter, Dennis, Voices From The Third Reich: An
53
Rees, Laurence, Auschwitz: The Nazis & The ‘Final Solution’, UK, BBC Books, 2005, p.39.

22
and “the glass of Jewish shops broken, merchandise in the streets, and the
Germans laughing…We were so afraid.” 54
Ordinary Germans had clearly
adopted the Nazis’ racial ethnic policies towards Jews and these ideologies
were transferred into everyday life, and forced into the forefront of the German
communities. As a result of the night of Kristallnacht, Rees lists in Auschwitz:
the Nazis & the Final Solution, that more than 1000 synagogues were
destroyed, 400 Jews killed and around 30,000 male Jews imprisoned for
months in concentrations camps. This caused a large number of German
Jews to emigrate. This reflects the Nazis provided predominantly successful
solutions when it came to sorting the ‘Jewish question’. The terror
implemented by actions such as Kristallnacht, demonstrated just how the
nation perpetrated such crimes under the Nazi regime. The Nazis’ and their
ardent supporters were ruthless.
The introduction of the wearing of the yellow star in September 1941 was
all in the aid of Jewish isolation with German communities. The reactions to
the wearing of the yellow star from some, “praised the labelling, which brought
them into the open.” 55
This highlights that ‘them’ means the Jews, and this
also demonstrates Nazi ideology had brainwashed ordinary Germans, as
some had adopted the Nazi viewpoint that the ‘Jewish enemy’ could be
beside you. On the other hand, there was some criticism amongst the
Germans of the labelling of the Jews which resulted in sympathy towards the
Jews. This was the opposite effect the Nazis’ wanted, so the decree of 24
October 1941 was a tool to intimidate anyone who criticised the wearing of the
yellow star or showed symptathy towards Jews, in which it threatened
54 Rees, Auschwitz, p.39.
55 Bankier, David, The Germans and the Final Solution: Public Opinion under Nazism, UK,

23
Germans with a three month incarceration in a German concentration camp.
Furthermore Goebbels, in his article, The Jews are Guilty! states that the Jew
is “an enemy of the people” 56
and also reiterates that “Anyone who deals with
him is the same as a Jew and must be treated accordingly.” 57
This raises the
issue of Germany sympathy being demonstrated towards Jews, and also
notes the dangers of being so sympathetic to the ‘enemy’. As the wearing of
the yellow star progressed and the Nazis became more threatening, the
criticsm of the yellow star declined considerably.
Furthermore, the Jewish deportations are a vital factor into determining how
the Nazis managed to get a cultured nation like Germany to perpetrate such
crimes. Kurt Maier, an interviewee in Bankier’s The Germans and the Final
Solution, describes how after deportration in Baden it “elicted comment and
praise from his teacher in class.” 58
and other interviewee Ludwig Haydn
discusses how “Jews were taken on open trucks like animals to the
slaughter….others laughed and enjoyed the view.” 59
Both of these accounts
highlight important aspects of Nazi Germany. Kurt Maier at the time was in
school: a part of the Nazis’ ploy to gain support was to involve the German
youth. This anti-Semitism being demonstrated by Maier’s teacher develops
how the Nazis gained power. With the support of this being demonstrated by
a teacher in school, this could influence the youth to adopt the same feelings.
Furthermore, Haydn’s account of the deportation opens up the beginnings of
the most inhumane crimes to occur. The enjoyment of such an inhumane way
59 Bankier, The Germans and the Final Solution, p.132.

24
to treat another human being portrays the success the Nazis’ brainwashing
had over some in Germany. This idea that they are ‘parasites’ and second-
class citizens is reflected in the deportations, when they are transferred like
cattle to the concentration camps to their deaths. However, there were some
claims from the German public that they helped the Jews by doing their best
to send families together. Depsite this act of what they believe to be kindness,
Bankier’s observes that “it was not only a banal response to criminal policy,
but in fact a grotesque ploy to evade responsibility.” 60
Therefore, this
develops the notion that Germany managed to perpetrate such crimes
because the majority would not oppose such a cruel regime. They tried to
avoid responsibility to such a barbaric regime and this relaxed approach is
exactly why the crimes were committed so easily.
To elaborate on this point Raul Hilberg, a political scientist and historian,
observed how participation in the process of disenfranchisement and
genocide extended to almost every agency of the German state. An example
of this is during the process of transferring Jews to ‘Aryan’ artists who had
been bombed out of their homes or apartments and supervising the
‘Aryanization’ of art objects from Jews prior to deportation. These practices
embodied “cultural eugenics in a particularly direct form.” 61
Evidently, the
deportation process for some within Germany was an opportunity for them to
gain from the Jews’ persecution. With attitudes like this, it is no surprise as to
how the nation managed to perpetrate atrocious crimes. Lucille Eichengreen
grew up in a Jewish family in Hamburg during the 1930s and describes the
reaction to the Jews being forced out of their current building and moved to
60 Bankier, The Germans and the Final Solution, p.138.
61 National Socialists Cultural Policy, p.31.

25
places called ‘Jewish houses’ 62
She says “I think we more or less accepted it”
63
and adds “This was the law, those were the rules, and you could do nothing
about it.” 64
This reflects how Germany perpetrated such crimes under the
influence of the Nazi regime. It was the ‘norm’ for Jews to be treated like this:
it had to be accepted. Furthermore, as Glenn lists in National Socialist
Cultural Policy, a combination of indifference, fear, and opportunism led most
to look away, leaving active persecution to a small minority and active
opposition to an even smaller one.
The Jewish persecution in reality was everyday life under the Nazi regime.
Those who were opposed to the persecutions didn’t criticse the Nazi regime
effectively enough for the everyday persecution of the Jews to diminish, so
therefore it was only going to continue and to develop into such horrific
crimes. This was just the beginning of the Holocaust and the Final Solution.
This viewpoint is discussed in Bankier’s The Germans and the Final Solution,
where he notes that such acceptance of ‘mild’ persecution paved the way for
harsher measures. Furthermore, as long as the Jews were being segregated
the public could “claim ignorance and deny the reality created by the
antisemitic policy” 65
and therefore remain “emotionally distant” 66
developing
the notion as to how such crimes were ever perpetrated. The German public
lived in agentic ignorance of the Jews’ welfare, being witness to persecution
such as the wearing of the yellow star and deportations: they simply co-
operated with the Nazis.
62
Rees, Laurence, Auschwitz: The Nazis & The ‘Final Solution’, UK, BBC Books, 2005, p.38.
66 Bankier, David, The Germans and the Final Solution, p.129.

26
The popularity of Nazi leaders needs to be anlaysed in order to determine
how a cultured nation like Germany perpetrated such crimes under these
leaders. Officer Karl Boehm –Tettelbach, and also an aide to Field Marshal
von Blomberg, had only the kindest words for head of the SS, Heinrich
Himmler. He states how “he was a very nice and agreeable guest because he
involved younger people like me and would enquire about the air force” 67
also
adding that he thought Nazi leaders like Himmler and Goebbels were “good at
their jobs.”68
However, when the later horrors came to emerge in Germany he
claims how he found it “hard to reconcile with the considerate man he met
across the dinner table” 69
thus illustrating that it wasn’t just the Nazi regime
that was popular, but also the elite, whom were later to become the names of
one of the most inhumane crimes to occur. By having this popularity, the
support for the Nazi regime would increase. It also shows how Nazi leaders
like Himmler and Goebbels were regarded in a different light than to those
men involved with the later atrocities, and it is quite difficult to come to terms
with the fact of how these men could suddenly change when it came to the
Jews.
With support for the Nazi regime developing, ‘ordinary’ Germans were
becoming involved in the process of the crimes that were continually
perpetrated by the Nazis. This is evident when the Gestapo, the official secret
police of Nazi Germany, started to develop. It has been highlighted that “80
percent of all political crime was discovered by ordinary citizens who turned
the information over to the police or the Gestapo.”70
This reiterates the

27
development of the crimes perpetrated under the Nazi regime. This want to
‘denunciate’ or ‘report’ developed as the ordinary Germans lived under the
Nazi regime, and realised that there were gains that could be made. It was
seen that “Denunciations could also be used for personal gain; you want the
flat an old Jewish lady lives in – you denounce her; your neighbours irritate
you – you denounce them too.”71
Thus, this can to some extent explain how
such crimes were allowed to happen within such a cultured nation. The
indoctrination of propaganda and the increase of violent conduct towards the
Jews, accompanied with a brutal inhumane treatment of them, highlighted to
the ordinary Germans that the Jews were an easy target. However, it was not
only Jews who were targeted for denunciation but fellow ‘ordinary’ Germans.
This attitude, therefore, reflects the mindset of Germany at the time, and if
people were denunciating their neighbours for personal gains, then the crimes
the Nazis were undertaking would be irrelevant.
The development of the concentration camps to which the Jews and other
‘undesirables’ in society were deported to reflect the lasting symbol of Nazi
genocide and inhumanity. The analysis and focus of the concentration camps,
particularly Auschwitz, will evolve how a cultured nation managed to
perpetrate such crimes. Inside the concentration camps, Hitler’s Darwinian
ideology was implemented, with the aid of Nazi leaders who had adopted the
Nazis’ racial ideology regarding the Jews and other ‘undesirables’. Hitler’s
speech in 1928, touched upon “The idea of struggle is as old as life itself,” 72
and that “In this struggle the stronger, the more able, win while the less able,
the weak, lose. Struggle is the father of all things…It is not by the principles of

28
humanity that man lives or is able to preserve himself above the animal world,
but solely by means of the most brutal struggle.” 73
This quasi-Darwinian
attitude was at the very core of Nazism and the administration of the
concentration camps. This was demonstrated by the Kapos. The Kapos were
prisoners within the camps who had been assigned to supervise labour work.
This system was designed to turn prisoner against his fellow prisoners. The
Kapos for example could ‘justly’ mistreat those in their charge since they had
proved themselves in life’s struggle. Furthermore, in order for the
concentration camps to function efficiently, they would need them under Nazi
control. These leaders were to become known as the SS. The SS were a vital
factor into how such crimes were perpetrated. The SS leaders’ views
regarding the Jews and the function of the concentration camp, taking into
account their personalities, and why they were a part of the SS are vital into
determining how such inhumanity took place. As Rees notes in Auschwitz:
The Nazis & The Final Solution, the process of learning how to bury emotions
like compassion and pity towards those in the concentration camp, Rudolf
Hoess, a high ranking member of the SS, absorbed the sense of brotherhood
that was also strong in the SS. This sense of brotherhood reflected the power
an SS man should hold, and how the crimes continued. It was portrayed that
“The SS man knew that he would be called upon to do things that ‘weaker’
men could not” 74
and Reinhard Heydrich, the most powerful figure in the SS
after Himmler, claimed that “We must be hard as granite; otherwise the work
of our Fuhrer will perish” 75
developing the notion that the SS guards
75 Glover, Jonathan, Humanity – a Moral History of the Twentieth Century, Pimlico, 200,
p.344.

29
continued to work under this Nazi regime under the belief that they were doing
the right thing: Hitler’s work in solving the ‘Jewish question’. Johannes
Hassebroeck, commandant of a concentration camp claimed that “Many of us
had been so bewildered before we joined the organization” 76
and adds that
“the SS offered us a series of simple ideas that we could understand, and we
believed in them.” 77
these simple ideas and beliefs they held were in terms
relating to the crude values demonstrated by the SS. As Rees lists, the
unquestioning loyalty, hardness and protection of the Reich against the
enemy within became almost a “substitute religious creed, a distinct and
easily absorbed world-view.” 78
Thus, this reflects how a cultured nation
managed to perpetrate such crimes under the Nazi regime. Ordinary
Germans had been continually brainwashed, and the ideas regarding the
Third Reich, the master race, and the constant anti-Semitism resulted in men
in the SS adopting such views that they believed in what they were doing, and
therefore reflects how they managed to perpetrate them. They believed what
they were doing was the right thing.
The development of both Auschwitz and the ‘Final Solution’ were
undertaken by individual Nazis who committed crimes in order “to feel more
personally in control” 79
which reflects how the crimes continued to develop.
This sense of control overpowered them, and was an emotion which didn’t
diminish during their roles in such perpetrations. Nazism in the environment of
a concentration camp gave the Nazi leaders full freedom to treat non-
Germans as they saw fit. Goldhagen notes in Hitler’s Willing Executioners that
76 Glover, p361-2.
77 Glover, p361-2.
79 Rees, Laurence, Auschwitz, p.16.

30
moral rules and practices that governed ‘ordinary’ Germany, did not apply to
the camp. As a result the camps were thus a place where, according to their
ideologically informed understanding of their victims, they carried out such
atrocious crimes within them. The central feature of the camp system
highlighted the brutality and the justification by the Nazis who “thought it
appropriate in conformity with the moral order of the world” 80
thus portraying
how they deemed it fit to “dehumanize”81
the prisoners.
Auschwitz in particular organized them indistinguishably. Goldhagen states
the tattooing each prisoner with a number rather than using their name,
developed the dehumanization undertaken by the Nazi leaders, and to some
extent denied their existence as human beings. To elaborate, the crimes that
were perpetrated developed because of the Germans’ view of the prisoners’
“sub-humanity”. Psychological consequences derived from such violent
attacks and beating the prisoners, as it lead them to “cower in the presence of
their German overlords, to cower as no people would before equals” which
shows that that the crimes were perpetrated because the Germans’
refashioned and conditioned the prisoners in this camp world. “The conditions
of life” 82
proved imminently significant as it provides a deep understanding on
how such crimes could be committed. The Nazis had installed in them that
such treatment was justified: they weren’t human beings in their eyes. Dora
Volkel, a survivor of Auschwitz, talks about her experiences in Voices From
The Third Reich, describing the conduct of the SS. She claims, “Essentially,
80 Goldhagen, Daniel , Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans And The Holocaust,
United States of America, Abacus, 1997, p.175.
81 Goldhagen, Hitler’s Willing Executioners, p.175.
82 Goldhagen, Hitler’s Willing Executioners, p.176.

31
there were very primitive people. They were animals. The SS men were most
likely all good husbands and fathers. But when it came to us, they beat us,
they hunted us down, and they murdered us. They didn’t hesitate before using
their pistols.” 83
Rudolf Hoess, a model member of the SS eventually rose to become
commandant of Auschwitz - the lasting symbol of Nazi inhumanity. As Rees
notes, creating a model concentration camp in the new Nazi empire was his
biggest challenge, and one he relished. Furthermore, Rees also states that
Hoess, responsible for the murder of more than a million people to his last
breath, felt the reasons for the extermination of the Jews were ‘right’. This
belief that Hoess held whilst he rose to the commandant of Auschwitz was to
result in the development of mass murder. During the early stages of
Auschwitz, Hoess and his colleagues “had already used their own initiative to
help devise temporary methods by which to kill large numbers of people” 84
reflecting the chaotic system the Nazi Party had in aspects of its system. It
demonstrates how such crimes developed. Accompanied with the belief that it
was ‘right’ was to prove fatal.
83
Steinhoff, Johannes, Pechel Peter, Showalter, Dennis, Voices From The Third Reich: An
84
Rees, Laurence, Auschwitz: The Nazis & The ‘Final Solution’, UK, BBC Books, 2005,
p.148.

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