Essays & Editorials

Student Essays

A brief narrative on the 2006-09 essays by Matthew Feldman

  2008 - 2009

• E-1 Oli Fordham

• E-2 Hannah O’Dell

• E-3 Joseph Bench

• E-4 Spencer Worley

• E-5 Hannah Bigham

• D-1 Tamsin Silver

• D-2 Harriet Notley

  2007 - 2008

• E-1 Harriet Notley

• E-2 Phil Hemming

  2006 - 2007

• E-1 Stacey Kerslake

• E-2 Hayley Cassidy

• E-3 Paula Bowles

  H.E.A.R.T Editorials

• The Protocols of the  Elders of  Zion in the 21st Century

• 365 Days with H.E.A.R.T

• Freedom of Speech "A National Treasure"

• BBC Interview with Matthew Feldman on "Holocaust Denial"

• The Holocaust in The Independent State of Croatia - Matthew Feldman

• LaRouche Group -  A threat to society?

• Lyndon Larouche, neo-fascism, coded anti-Semitism, and the ‘Jeremiah Duggan Case’

• The LaRouche Organization as an extremist movement

• "While Travelling" Holocaust poem by Sara Golding

• Holocaust Deniers & Debunkers -What are they good for?

• Debate, Debunk, or Debauch?

• A Guided Tour of the Sydney Jewish Museum

• Typical Nazis, an Unusual Friendship, & Sinister Roles

• Vienna - Can a city come to terms with its past?

• Holocaust Denial: An unavoidable Introduction

• 5 Years with H.E.A.R.T

• The bankrupt state of revisionism & debunking

• The Last "Unrighteous"

Analyse Historians’ Arguments Over the Date for the Final Solution

By Oli Fordham

Over sixty years have now passed since the liberation of the Final Solution’s symbolic centre-piece, Auschwitz-Birkenau, yet still we are left debating when orders were given for the implementation of the ‘Final Solution to the Jewish question’. There is a high probability that there were in fact two orders given in relation to the Final Solution, as this essay will show. The first order relates to the extirpation of Soviet Jewry, which came in the summer of 1941. The second order sealed the fate of the remaining European Jews and appears to have come later in the same year. This idea can be highlighted though analysing the studies of historians such as Mark Roseman and Christopher Browning. While looking for a date surrounding the Final Solution it is worth considering the views of historians such as Götz Aly and Peter Longerich who suggest there was not necessarily a specific order given; instead that the Final Solution was an evolution of Nazi ideas. After analysing the views of these historians this essay will conclude by showing how the idea of a single order can be replaced by the more valid view that there were two separate, verbal orders given.

Before we can begin to analyse the views of historians it is vital to discover why there is no existing date for the order to carry out the Final Solution. One of the main problems preventing historians from being able to give a specific date for the implementation of the Final Solution is due to documentary evidence, or rather, the lack of it. Such was the nature of the Nazi regime that no order has ever been found signed by Hitler ordering the Final Solution, and it is likely that one will never be discovered, or even exists.[1] Other problems also arise when trying to date the Final Solution, including the polycratic nature of the Nazi regime.[2] This meant that officials in different areas learned of orders and initiatives at different times, and were also often told varying amounts of information. This was due to the fact that Hitler often felt not all his commanders needed to be aware of the whole story; this was one of the Nazis’ ways of keeping their actions private.

As Peter Longerich argues, it is this lack of a specific ‘Führer order’ that has led to historians being split into two opposing categories.[3] Firstly we have those historians, led by Christopher Browning, who try to construct a date for when the order was given by using existing documents and knowledge of events. Opposing this there are many historians including Götz Aly and Peter Longerich who argue that there was no single set order given by Hitler for implementation of the ‘Final Solution’. They argue that the Final Solution was actually an evolutionary step taken after previous attempts at dealing with the Jewish problem had failed, such as territorial solutions including the 1942 Madagascar Plan. The former category seems to be the most viable due to the nature of the Nazi regime. Although as the war drew to a close they did attempt to burn as much documentary evidence as possible, it is fair to say the Holocaust is the most well documented mass murder in history.[4]

Christopher Browning defines the Final Solution as “the systematic attempt to murder every last Jew within the German grasp”.[5] Crucially Browning places the order for its implementation in late 1941, specifically pointing to the significance of October. Browning’s view places great importance on the German invasions of both Poland and the Soviet Union as these had a huge impact on the number of Jews that were under Nazi control. For example, prior to Germany’s invasion of Poland in 1939 there were only a around one million Jews under German control, whereas by the end of the September offensive there were over four million.[6] This was to have a huge impact on Nazi policies towards them. The invasion of the Soviet Union on the 22^nd of June 1941, codenamed Operation Barbarossa, had huge implications for the future of the Jews, as the war offered the Nazis a backdrop during which the mass murder of millions would occur. Browning places the opportunity for mass murder as coming about with war and the ensuing victories, which offered “the opportunity and obligation to solve the ‘Jewish question’”[7].

Richard Breitman has argued that Hitler made the decision to exterminate all European Jews as early as January 1941:[8] however this seems invalid when we look at the importance of Operation Barbarossa. Alan Farmer disproves this interpretation by emphasising the fact that in the summer of 1941 few Jewish men being killed, and relatively few women and children either.[9] However by the end of 1941, between 500,000 and 800,000 Jews had already been murdered with an average of between 2,700 and 4,200 a day with the number of deaths progressively increasing.[10] This goes a long way towards questioning the validity of the idea of a pre-Barbarossa genocide order. It also raises the probability that an order was given between the invasion of the Soviet Union in June and the Wannsee conference in January 1942.

It may well be the case that as early as January 1940 the term Final Solution was being used in relation to the Jews, but at this time it related to numerous differing policies all of which focused on mass deportation instead of mass genocide.[11] Götz Aly argues that there is a high probability that no order was given to implement the Final Solution, as it was an “evolution of events leading up to the Holocaust”.[12] This view suggests that we have never found a document signed by Hitler giving authorisation for the Final Solution because one never existed. In the spring of 1941, the main aims of the Nazis were territorial solutions, although a sense of desperation and impatience towards a prolonged war were beginning to set in. [13]

Browning points to the period between mid-July and October 1941 as a pivotal point in securing the destiny of Soviet Jews. Within the first four weeks of the German invasion into the Soviet Union the seizure of Moscow appeared inevitable after a number of German successes.[14] Browning suggests “the euphoria of victory had elicited from Hitler both a utopian vision of a future Garden of Eden as well as the shrillest exhortations for intensified bloodletting”.[15] From this moment there was inevitably to be an extension of this fate to the remaining Jews of Europe; it was now solely a matter of time. By analysing the scale of deaths we can also highlight August as an important month. Up until August 1941, 50,000 Jews had been killed, although a high amount in itself it seems moderate when considering 500,000 were to be killed in the following months.[16]

In contrast, Burrin feels “everything seems to suggest that there was a decision making process lasting several weeks before the fatal verdict was handed down in September [1941]”.[17] He, along with Ian Kershaw, argues that the Final Solution aimed at the remaining European Jews was not implemented in the ‘euphoria of victory’ but instead in a reverse of military fortune and anger at the seeming inevitability of a prolonged war. This view is in direct contrast to that of Chrisopher Browning and is suggesting the Final Solution was ordered, not out of elation as Browning argues, but instead out of frustration.

Whether a single order was given in the summer of 1941 or a series of decisions, with a second order being given in September or October the same year, the common agreement is that by the time of the Wannsee Conference in January 1942 the fate of the Jews had been sealed. “The significance of the Wannsee conference was not that it was the starting point of the Final Solution, that was already underway. It was, however, the moment when it was endorsed by a broad segment of the German government”.[18] This means that, if an order was ever given it must have come between the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 and prior to the Wannsee conference at the start of 1942.

The importance of the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 cannot be overestimated as without the opportunity to condition the minds of millions the Nazis’ may have struggled with genocide. Historians such as Richard Breitman who have argued that the implementation preceded Operation Barbarossa, have vital flaws in their argument  - such as the sudden change in the number of deaths in August 1941. Just like trying to analyse the Holocaust as a single event when looking at the implementation of orders for the Final Solution, the answers are not as easy to come across as first assumed. All events leading up to the invasion and meetings that took place after the invasion must be looked at with equal significance as each helps us to piece together a timeline. Without clear documentation for an order this is the only way historians can begin to try and understand the timing of events. The views of Aly and Longerich also raise many questions because Hitler’s importance in the Holocaust is unquestionable and their documenting of events was near flawless. Therefore the likelihood that an order was never given and the Holocaust was merely an evolution of events undermines the systematic nature and planning of the Nazi regime which, although polycratic, was also strictly hierarchical in structure.

This essay has shown that there is a high probability that two orders were actually given in relation to the Final Solution. One being given in the summer of 1941, in the Euphoria of victory as Christopher Browning says, directed at resolving the problem of Soviet Jewry and the second, as this analysis shows sealed the fate of European Jews and was not implemented until later, in September 1941. We can see this as an important month with the testing of gas in Mogilev and Minsk[19] aiming to replace the current methods of killing. One thing that does seem clear, through studies such as Roseman’s  The Villa, The Lake, The Meeting, is that by the time of the Wannsee conference on 20 January 1942 Hitler had entered into a biological campaign that could only result in the defeat of ‘World Jewry’ or, as was the case, in the Allies victory of the war.  

Bibliography

Aly. G (1999) ‘Final Solution’: Nazi Population Policy and the Murder of the European Jews. Arnold: London

Brietman. R (1991) The Architect of Genocide: Himmler and the Final Solution. Alfred A Knopf: New York

Browning. C.R (2004) The Origins of the Final Solution: The Evolution of Nazi Jewish Policy, September 1939 – March 1942. University of Nebraska Press: Lincoln

Burrin. P (1994) Hitler and the Jews: Genesis of the Holocaust. Arnold: London

Farmer. A (1998) Anti-Semitism and the Holocaust. Hodder Murray: London

Longerich. P (2001) The Unwritten Order: Hitler’s Role in the Final Solution. Tempus: Gloucestershire

Roseman. M (2002) The Villa, The Lake, The Meeting: Wannsee and the Final Solution. Penguin: London

Stolfi. R.H.S (1982) Barbarossa Revisited: A Critical Reappraisal of the Opening Stages of the Russo-German Campaign. (June – December 1941). Journal of Modern History: University of Chicago p27 - 46

‘Holocaust Prelude’ www.HolocaustResearchProject.org. Last accessed 20/03/2008

Copyright: 2009 Oli Fordham & H.E.A.R.T