by The Destruction of the European Jews, Vol. 1-3 (Third Edition) Yale University Press (2003) (pdf)
without orders, they understood that the purpose of the pogrom was
vengeance. Either they had been ordered to kill or they had been
carried away by their feelings of hatred. Consequently, expulsion and
prosecution were not justified. Four men who had assaulted women
were expelled from the party and handed over to the courts. Moral
crimes could not be justified by the pogrom. In these cases the men had
used the riot only as a pretext for their actions.“
The
entire
German
bureaucracy,
including
most
party
leaders,
reacted to the Goebbels pogrom with a feeling of annoyance and vexation. The impact of these events abroad, the damage to property, the synagogue ruins in every major German city, the claims by foreign
Jews, and, finally, the problem of “excesses” were more than anybody
had bargained for. At the conclusion of the conference held on November 12, Goring declared: “Once and for all, I want to eliminate indi- 40 41
40. Summary of Judicial Conference, January 23-26, 1939 (signed Leimer), NG-
1566. See also summary of Judges Conference, February 1, 1939, NG-629.
41. Buch (o Goring, February 13, 1939, PS-3063. In later chapters, we shall meet
again this basic distinction between "idealistic" and "selfish" motives.
46
ANTECEDENTS
vidual
acts
[Einzelaktionen]."
Shortly
afterward,
at
a
conference
of
Gauleiter, Goring reiterated his opposition to pogroms. The riots, he
said, gave way to “baser instincts” and had undesirable foreign repercussions besides.“
The November pogrom was the last occasion for violence against
Jews in German streets. In September 1941, when, at the behest of the
Propaganda Ministry, a decree was issued for the marking of Jews with
a yellow star, the chief of the Party Chancellery, Bormann, issued
instructions to make sure that there would be no repetition of the
November '‘demonstrations.” It would be beneath the dignity of the
"movement," said Bormann, if its members were to molest individual
Jews
(wenn
ihre
Angehörigen
sich
an
einzelnen
Juden
vergreifen
würden). Such actions, he concluded, "are and remain strictly prohibited.”“
The one reason for the revulsion and even horror that the entire
leadership, save Goebbels, felt for pogroms and street violence was the
realization that these “actions” could not be controlled. When the mob
was turned loose, things inevitably got out of hand. The pogroms were
too expensive and, in the last analysis, accomplished nothing. The
party's activities during the 1930s consequently had only one effect on
the German bureaucracy. Every bureaucrat, in and out of the party,
was henceforth convinced that measures against Jews had to be taken
systematically, and that the amateurish handling of the situation by
Goebbels and other agitators was to be avoided under all circumstances. From now on, the Jews were going to be dealt with in a "legal”
fashion—that is to say, in an orderly way that would allow for proper
and thorough planning of each measure by means of memoranda, correspondence, and conferences. Henceforth the pros and cons of each measure were weighed carefully; hasty action was precluded. The bureaucracy had taken over. It is the bureaucratic destruction process that in its step-by-step manner finally led to the annihilation of five
million victims." 42 43 44
42. Affidavit by Dr. Siegfried Uiberreither (Gauleiter. Styria), February 27, 1946,
Göring-38.
43. Instructions by Amtsleiter Ruberg of the Auslands-Organisation (the parly's
Foreign Organization), September 20. 1941. enclosing Bormann order, NG-1672.
44. Ironically, it is Hitler himself who, in his first anti-Semitic tract, distinguished
between an emotional (gefühlsmüssigen) anti-Semitism—the ultimate expression of
which was a pogrom—and an anti-Semitism of reason ¡Vernunft), which in the hands of a
powerful government could lead to planned measures against the Jews and, in the end,
could bring about their complete elimination (Entfernung). Hitler (as private first class,
serving in an intelligence and propaganda unit of Reichswehrgruppenkommando 4 in
Munich) to his commanding officer. Captain Karl Mayr, September 16, 1919. The
memorandum was requested by Mayr to answer a letter by a propaganda course student,
47
ANTECEDENTS
How did the Jews react to all this violence? Curiously enough, the
Jewish reaction to the party’s excesses paralleled, in crucial respects,
the responses by the German bureaucracy. Throughout the years before Hitler's rise to power, the Jews had abstained from using invec-tives‘! and had refrained from marching in the streets, either with the
Communists or with Social Democratic formations.* In 1933, the Jewish organizations, like Vice-Chancellor von Papen, hurried to protest against demonstrations and “atrocity propaganda” in foreign countries.
The Organization of Jewish War Veterans attacked the emigrants as
people who had “deserted” their fellow Jews and who were now
“shooting arrows from secure hiding places” to the detriment of Germany and the German Jews.47
The
Central-Verein
deutscher
Staatsbürger
jüdischen
Glaubens,
the principal agency of assimilationist Jews, declared with indignation:
“Nobody can rob us of our German fatherland.... In that we fight this
battle, we carry out a German, not a selfish-Jewish, fight* The Jews
were convinced that they were going to have hard times but that their
position would not become untenable. "One may condemn us to hunger, but one cannot condemn us to starve. [Man kann uns zum Hungern verurteilen, aber nicht zum Verhungern.]"" Like Schacht, the
Jews were waiting for the implementation of decrees that would put an
end to uncertainty and define their status. “One can live under any law.
[Man kann unter jedem Gesetz leben.]"K
In the beginning of April 1933—at the time of the first wave of
Adolf Gemlich. Mayr, agreeing with most of Hitler’s sentiments, passed them on to
Gemlich. See correspondence in Ernst Deuertein, ed., Der Aufstieg der NSDAP in
Augenzeugenberichten (Munich, 1974), pp. 89-95.
45. In the main, they stressed their accomplishments in the arts and sciences and
defended their record in the First World War. See, for example, Verein zur Abwehr des
Anti-Semitismus, Abwehr-Blätter 42 (October, 1932): insert. Also Arnold Paucker, “Abwehrkampf." in Entscheidungsjahr. pp. 405-499.
46. On Communists, see Hans-Helmuth Knfltter, “Die Linksparteien," in Ent-
scheidungsjahr, pp. 323-45, particularly pp. 335-36; on Social Democrats, see Werner
Mosse, “Der Niedergang der Republik,” ibid., pp. 36-37; on both, see Paucker. “Abwehrkampf," ibid., p. 459n.
47. Press release by Reichsbund jüdischer Frontsoldaten, containing telegram sent
to U.S. Embassy, in Kölnische Volkszeitung, March 27, 1933, RC-49.
48. Central-Verein Zeitung, March 23, 1933, in Hans Lamm, “Über die I
nnere und
Äussere Entwicklung des Deutschen Judentums im Dritten Reich,” (Erlangen, 1951;
mimeographed), pp. 143, 176n. Also, Zionist declaration in Jüdische Rundschau, March
17, 1933, in Lamm, “Deutsches Judentum,” pp. 143, 176n.
49. Ismar Elbogen in Central-Verein Zeitung, April 6, 1933, quoted by Lamm,
“Deutsches Judentum.” pp. 144, 176n.
50. From a Statement by Georg Kareski, an "extreme Jewish nationalist,” quoted
by Lamm, "Deutsches Judentum,” pp. 147-48.
48
ANTECEDENTS
party propaganda, boycott, and violence, and at the moment when the
first
anti-Jewish
decree
was
published—a
controversy
developed
between two wings of the Jewish community. This polemic is characteristic of all that is to be said. The Central-Verein Zeitung, organ of the assimilationists, had published an editorial, bom out of despair, which
contained Goethe's famous line of frustrated love: “If I love you, what
business is it of yours?” The Zionist paper Jiidische Rundschau thereupon published a reply that stated with defiance: “If I love you, then it is your business. The German people should know: a historical alliance, hundreds of years old, cannot be severed so simply.”51 52 53 But it was severed. The bureaucracy cut, link by link, the ties between the
German and Jewish communities. Already in June the Zionist paper, all
hope gone, made a final plea:
The National Socialists, in their demonstrations, designate the Jews as
“enemies of the state." That designation is incorrect. The Jews are not
enemies of the state. The German Jews desire and wish for the rise of
Germany, for which they have always invested, to the best of their knowledge, all their resources, and that is what they wish to continue to do.”
By 1939 even the reproachful appeal had vanished. The Jewish
community leadership in its officially approved publication had only
one word of advice for its readers: the fulfilment with the greatest
exactitude of all official orders and directives.55 The Jews had their
laws.
51. Jiidische Rundschau, with quotation of Central-Verein Zeitung editorial, April
13, 1933. in Lamm, “Deutsches Judentum," pp. 152-53, I77n.
52. Jiidische Rundschau. June 27. 1933, in Lamm, “Deutsches Judentum,” pp. 157.
I77n.
53. Jüdisches Nachrichtenblatt (Berlin), September 5, 1939.
49
c
H
A
P
T
E
R
T
H
THE R
STRUCTURE *
OF E
DESTRUCTION E
At first sight the destruction of the Jews may have the appearance
of
an
indivisible,
monolithic,
and
impenetrable
event.
Upon
closer observation it is revealed to be a process of sequential steps that
were taken at the initiative of countless decision makers in a far-flung
bureaucratic machine. An underlying characteristic of this upheaval is
therefore its structure: a logic of development, a mechanism for arriving at decisions, and an organization involved in daily administrative action.
The process of destruction unfolded in a definite pattern.1 It did
not, however, proceed from a basic plan. No bureaucrat in 1933 could
have predicted what kind of measures would be taken in 1938, nor was
it possible in 1938 to foretell the configuration of the undertaking in
1942. The destruction process was a step-by-step operation, and the
administrator could seldom see more than one step ahead.
The steps of the destruction process were introduced in the following order: At first the concept of Jew was defined; then the expropriatory operations were inaugurated; third, the Jews were concentrated in
ghettos; finally, the decision was made to annihilate European Jewry.
Mobile killing units were sent to Russia, while in the rest of Europe the
victims
were
deported
to
killing
centers.
The
chronological
development may therefore be summarized as follows:
Definition
I
Expropriation
Concentration
,___________________ I_____________________ ,
Mobile killing operations
Deportations and killing center operations
in occupied USSR
in rest of Axis Europe
The concept destruction process excludes the party actions discussed in the previous chapter. Schacht and Frick called these party activities
Einzelaktionen
(isolated
actions).
The
Einzelaktionen
were
without
administrative
significance.
They
fell
into
no
administrative
pattern. They accomplished no administrative objective. They did not
constitute a step in an administrative process. That is why after 1938
1.
The pattern was first suggested in an affidavit by Dr. Rudolf Kastner, September
13, 1945, PS-2605.
53
THE STRUCTURE OF DESTRUCTION
they vanished completely in Germany and occurred only rarely in occupied territory.
The definition of the Jews appears to be a relatively harmless measure in comparison with the bloody riots of 1938. Yet its significance is much greater, for the definition of the victim was an essential requisite
for further action. The measure itself did not harm anyone. But it had
administrative continuity. This is the chief difference between a pogrom and a destruction process. A pogrom results in some damage to property and injuries to people, and that is all. It does not call for
further action. On the other hand, a measure in a destruction process
never stands alone. It may not always do damage, but it always has
consequences. Each step of a destruction process contains the seed of
the next step.
The destruction process straddled two policies: emigration (1933—
40) and annihilation (1941-45). In spite of this change of policies, the
administrative
continuity
of
the
destruction
process
was
unbroken.
The reason for that phenomenon is to be found in the fact that the three
steps introduced before 1940 (definition, expropriation, and concentration) served not only as inducements to emigrations, but also as stepping-stones to a killing operation: Definition
J
— »Emigration
Expropriation
|
— Emigration
Concentration
|
' ■— —.Emigration
Annihilation
The path to annihilation leads directly through these age-old steps.
We are dealing with an administrative development that was to
become more and more drastic. In the course of this process, many a
bureaucrat perceived a barrier in old procedural principles and requirements. What he wanted was unrestrained action. Therefore he created an atmosphere in which the formal, written word could gradually be
abandoned
as
a
modus
operandi.
This
transformation
of
emphasis,
from public law making to concealed operations, may be portrayed in
the following continuum:2
2.
A definitive exploration of this evolution is Uwe Adam's Judenpolitik im Dritten
Reick (Düsseldorf, 1972).
54
THE STRUCTURE OF DESTRUCTION
Implementation decrees
Ministerial or territorial ordinances or regulations
Announcements to the public in pursuance of laws and decrees
Announcements by local officials acting only in accordance
with presumed necessities
Written directives not published
Broad authorizations to subordinates not published
Oral directives and authorizations
Basic understandings of officials resulting in decisions not
requiring orders or explanations
In the final analysis, the destruction of the Jews was not so much a
product of laws and commands as it was a matter of spirit, of shared
comprehension, of consonance and synchronization.
Who shared in this undertaking? What kind of machinery was used
for these tasks? The machine of destruction was an aggregate—no one
agency was charged with the whole operation. Even though a particular
office might have exercised a supervisory ("federführende") function in
the implementation of a particular measure, no single organization directed or coordinated the entire process. The engine of destruction was a sprawling, diverse, and—above all—decentralized apparatus.
Let us consider for a moment how large that apparatus had to be.
In 1933 the Jews were almost completely emancipated and almost completely integrated into the German community. The severance of Jew from German was consequently a very complex operation. There was
hardly an agency, an office, or an organization that did not at one time
or another have an interest in anti-Jewish measures. If we were to
enumerate the public and private agencies that may be called the “German government” and those agencies that may be called the “machinery of destruction,” we would discover that we are dealing with identical offices.
However, the designations German government and machinery of
destruction do refer to different roles, since government is the more
inclusive term. It implies the totality of administrative functions in a
society. Destruction is only one very specialized administrative activity. What may be a powerful agency in the government may not be a vital part of the machinery of destruction, and, conversely, what may