World War and Holocaust

¶ … Solution become policy and take shape in World War II? The Nazis worked through a lot of scenarios and ideas in their minds about how to kill the Jews in an effective and efficient way. Just shooting the all was too taxing and the ghettos that were set up were not quick enough either. Of course, the eventual method used were the concentration camps like Auschwitz and others.

The Final Solution was unprecedented in terms of its efficiency and the scope of its intent, that being the wiping out of an entire ethnicity the size of the Jews. To be clear, the Nazis wanted to kill every last Jew...all of them. This is just one thing that demarcates the Holocaust from every other genocide that is known in human history. Explain the killing process at the death camps and life in the labor camps.

There was some plodding and indecision and much of this happened over several decades rather than a few months or years. However, things truly kicked into gear during the heat of the second World War. August of 1941 and a meeting between Goebbels and Hitler seemed to be a rather marked point where things got moving.

Not long thereafter, Sept/Oct 1941 to be precise, it became all about expansive and "systematic extermination." This is where the gas chambers and other mass killing devices were used so as to kill Jews as quickly as possible. One rather jaw-dropping method that was used was a crematorium. The gas was not kept onsite but was rather brought onto the property with vehicles that had Red Cross insignia. The Nazi soldiers would quietly and procedurally kill off 3,000 Jews and then go about their business after their "work" was done.

Prior to that, Jews that were deemed worthy were allocated to labor camps while those incapable of engaging in such labor were simply done away with. Indeed, there was the active question prior to that as to what should be done with Jews that were not "useful" when it came to the labor that the Nazis wanted to use the Jews for.

What did survivors do and how were they treated after liberation and since? Why? A lot of the survivors could hardly move due to their condition that was brought on by forced labor, lack of food, lack of water and beyond. One would think that the Jews that survived would want to return home but that was often not the case. One big reason for this was that they feared persistent and aggressive anti-Semitism despite the deposing of Hitler.

It was to the point that the Allies had to work together to assist with the people that were displaced so that they could be put somewhere where they would be safe and be able to live out their years. Many of the organizations that assisted were themselves Jewish. They either already existed or were formed in response to the vast amount of need that revealed itself in the aftermath of World War II.

This is a huge part of how Israel came to be founded and created using land that was controlled in the past by the British. Who is guilty for the Holocaust? Why? Be sure to tell me why certain groups are or are not guilty. Even if you think the high-ranking Nazis are the only ones who should be blamed or punished, you need to discuss why other perpetrators or bystanders are not guilty or should not be blamed or punished.

There are certainly two lines of thought when it comes to this question. Indeed, there is one group that actively rejects, in totality, the idea of "I was just following orders." Conversely, it stands to reason that anyone who refused to follow orders was subject to death or, at the very least, very nasty consequences for not doing as they were told. There is always the prospect of trying to desert and run away but.