Black Earth: The Holocaust as History and Warning (51 page)

Auschwitz has been a relatively
See Longerich,
Davon
, 222 and passim; on property: Aly,
Hitler’s Beneficiaries
.

For similar reasons
Cf. Veidlinger,
In the Shadow
.

Auschwitz was one of the few
See the final chapter of Snyder,
Bloodlands
.

In the history of the Holocaust
More than two hundred thousand Polish Jews were murdered at Auschwitz; they were the second largest victim group, after Hungarian Jews. The third largest was non-Jewish Poles.

Auschwitz arose
Steinbacher,
Auschwitz
, 27; Steinbacher,
“Musterstadt,”
275, 293.

The purpose of Auschwitz
On the development of the camps and death facilities at Auschwitz, see Dwork and Van Pelt,
Auschwitz
, 166, 177, 219, 240, 275, 290, 293, 313, 326, 351.

Intuitions fail
See Valentino,
Final Solutions
, 234 and passim; and Croes, “Holocaust in the Netherlands,” 492; in another setting, Straus,
Order of Genocide
, 128. The level of antisemitism, insofar as this can be ascertained, does not seem to correlate with Jewish death rates; what does strongly correlate is the degree of state destruction. Helen Fein developed an asynchronous argument similar to the one here in her valuable study
Accounting for Genocide
. Where she writes of “the lack of counterauthorities resisting” German plans (90), I have sought in previous chapters to describe the process and consequences of the destruction of those authorities as one of the causes of the Holocaust as such. State destruction created opportunities for innovation, decapitated and perverted existing institutions, and left fragments that could be deployed for other purposes. But my findings certainly confirm her general case. As in so many other matters the suggestion for further research was to be found in Hilberg,
Destruction
, 2:572–99. See also Birnbaum,
Prier
, 130.

Estonia shared the fate
Fate of leaders: Kaasik, “Political Repression,” 310. Fate of ministers: Paavle, “Estonian Elite,” 393. See also Łossowski,
Kraje bałtyckie
, 46–55.

Soviet law was applied
Penal code: Maripuu, “Political Arrests,” 326; Maripuu, “Deportations,” 363. 10,200: Weiss-Wendt,
Murder Without Hatred
, 40.

Double collaboration
Weiss-Wendt,
Murder Without Hatred
, 131.

Former employees
Ibid., 115–16.

In Estonia, as everywhere
Ibid., 132. Lithuanian policemen and POW camps: Dieckmann,
Deutsche Besatzungspolitik
, 1:525.

The German occupation of Denmark
Quotation: Haestrup, “Danish Jews,” 22. Vilhjálmsson and Blüdnikow, “Rescue,” 3, 5, 7.
Wiking:
Wróblewski,
Dywizja
, 143–47. A field surgeon in that unit was a certain German physician named Joseph Mengele. Alongside Estonians: Strassner,
Freiwillige
, 15.

When the Final Solution
Haestrup, “Danish Jews,” 23, 29.

There was a will
A sober accounting of these events is Herbert,
Best
, 360–72.

Denmark’s neighbor Sweden
German stance: Dwork and Van Pelt,
Holocaust
, 327. In custody: Haestrup, “Danish Jews,” 52.

Jews who were Danish
Vilhjálmsson and Blüdnikow, “Rescue,” 1, 3.

These lists of actions and absences
Antisemitism in the states at war with Germany and in the neutral states probably worsened rather than improved during the war; Americans, according to one public opinion poll, considered Jews during the war a greater enemy than the Germans or the Japanese. Nirenberg,
Anti-Judaism
, 457–58.

Citizenship
is the name
See chaps. 5 and 6 of Snyder,
Bloodlands
.

In states allied with Germany
Frank’s decree of 15 October 1941 in Paulsson,
Secret City
, 67. Compare to Moore, “Le context du sauvetage,” 285–86. In the Rzeszów region of the General Government in occupied Poland, some two hundred Poles were executed for sheltering Jews. See Rączy,
Pomóc Polaków
, 61.

Compare the fates of Victor Klemperer
On Jews permitted to live in Nazi Germany, see Longerich,
Davon
, 252–53. Quotation from Kassow,
Rediscovering
, 13.

Because Klemperer was
Kassow,
Rediscovering
, 360. Bartoszewski makes the point about Anne Frank: “Rozmowa,” 16. Cf. Fein,
Accounting for Genocide
, 33.

Legal discrimination
On Schmid, see Wette,
Feldwebel
, 67.

Citizenship in modern states
Soviet bureaucracy might seem to be an exception. But it is in fact an exception that proves the rule. First, the Soviet state was not, constitutionally or in practice, a traditional state bound by law. It was subordinate to the communist party, and thus in the end to the subjective reading of history by party leaders. Second, in times of massive state terror, such as 1937–1938, conventional Soviet legal practices were set aside in favor of a state of emergency.

Even German bureaucracy
Bloodstream: “Endlösung der Judenfrage,” in Pauer-Studer,
Rechtfertigungen
, 439. Breitman notes that it was a major mass murderer, Bach-Zelewski, who began the intellectual association of death with bureaucracy. “Himmler,” 446. Wasserstein provides the startling example of a Jewish bureaucracy, a council to aid Jewish emigration, that in personnel and in mode of operation was similar to the
Judenrat
of Amsterdam. What changed in the meantime was the arrival of the German state destroyers, who had created a stateless zone to which Dutch Jews were now sent. Westerbork, at first a refugee camp, became a transit camp for death facilities in occupied Poland. See his
Ambiguity
, passim.

Bureaucracies in Germany
Gerlach, “Failure of Plans,” 68.

Germany invaded Yugoslavia
See Manoschek,
Serbien
, 39, 51, 55, 79, 86, 107, 186; and Pawlowitch,
New Disorder
, 281.

Croatia as a state had no hope
Korb,
Im Schatten
, 439–49 for summary of major findings; see also Korb, “Mass Violence,” 73; Dulic, “Mass Killing,” 262, 273.

Slovakia was the other
Ward,
Priest, Politician, Collaborator
, 209, 214, 221.

Slovakia joined the Axis
Himmler and 20 October 1941 meeting: Witte et al.,
Dienstkalender Heinrich Himmlers
, 278. See generally Ward,
Priest, Politician, Collaborator
, 227, 230, 233, 235.

Romania, Germany’s major
Tradition of “securitized” Jewish policy: Iordachi, “Juden,” 110.

Romania had been regarded
On Romanianization, see Livezeanu,
Cultural Politics
.

Traditionally Romania had been
See Geissbühler,
Blutiger Juli
, 46, 49.

When on July 2, 1941
Deportation figures: Olaru-Cemiertan, “Wo die Züge,” 224. Iasi and 43,500: Geissbühler,
Blutiger Juli
, 54, 119.

The Romanian political
Solonari, “Patterns,” 121, 124, 130, “killing all Jews” quotation at 125. “Nobody except Jews”: Dumitru, “Through the Eyes,” 125. See also Prusin,
Lands Between
, 154.

Romanian soldiers quickly
Glass,
Deutschland
, 144–47, 266–67; Dumitru, “Through the Eyes,” 206–13; Geissbühler, “He spoke Yiddish.”

From the perspective of Bucharest
Numbers and analysis: Glass,
Deutschland
, 15. See also Hilberg,
Destruction
, 2:811; Bloxham,
Final Solution
, 116.

Romanian policy
Ancel,
Holocaust in Romania
, 479, 486; Solonari, “Ethnic Cleansing,” 105–6, 113. Hitler trying: Hillgruber, “Grundläge,” 290. Diplomatic protection: Glass,
Deutschland
, 230.

Under their longtime ruler
For a convincing analysis, see Case,
Between States
, especially 182–88. For an example, see Antonescu’s conversation with Hitler on 23 March 1944, cited in
Staatsmänner
, 392.

Budapest passed anti-Jewish
Forty thousand: Lower, “Axis Collaboration,” 194.

The expropriation
Gerlach and Aly,
Letzte Kapitel
, 81, 83, 104, 114, 126, 148, 188–89.
New York Times:
Bajohr and Pohl,
Der Holocaust
, 115.

Like all of Germany’s allies
Ungváry,
Siege of Budapest
, 286–91; Segal, “Beyond,” 16; Kenez,
Coming of the Holocaust
, 244–48, 257. 320,000: Pohl,
Verfolgung
, 107. Arrow Cross: Jangfeldt,
Hero of Budapest
, 240.

Jews who were citizens
Kenez comes to a similar conclusion:
Coming of the Holocaust
, 234.

When the war turned
29 April: Kershaw,
Fateful Choices
, 469. “Weltvergifter aller Völker”: Hillgruber, “Gründlage,” 296.

Hitler was seeking to lift
Cf. Bloxham,
Final Solution
, 7; Ther,
Ciemna strona
, 19.

Hitler was not
Changing character of USSR:
Table Talk
, 587, 657, 661; Hitler to Antonescu, 26 March 1944, in
Staatsmänner
, 398. Stronger man: Steinberg, “Third Reich,” 648; Kershaw,
The End
, 290; see also Jäckel,
Hitler in History
, 89.

Here, as with Estonia
Van der Boom, “Ordinary Dutchmen,” 32, 42. Van der Boom argues that Dutch Jews were killed in such large numbers because they feared hiding more than deportation. As he points out, a Jew who tried to hide was sixty times more likely to survive in the Netherlands than a Jew who did not. But punishment for hiding was not unique to the Netherlands, and Jews survived in higher numbers elsewhere in German-dominated Europe without going into hiding. The fear of hiding might indeed be a special Dutch circumstance, but it cannot alone explain why a higher percentage of Dutch Jews were killed than, say, German or Romanian Jews. On Dutch antisemitism, see Wasserstein,
Ambiguity
, 22.

The Netherlands was, for several reasons
Kwiet,
Reichskommissariat Niederlande
, 51–52.

Amsterdam was the only
Michman,
Emergence
, 95, 99; Moore,
Victims and Survivors
, 191, 193, 195, 200; de Jong,
Netherlands and Nazi Germany
, 12–13; Griffioen and Zeller, “Comparing,” 64.

The situation of rescuers
Romijn, “ ‘Lesser Evil,’ ” 13, 14, 17, 20, 22; Griffioen and Zeller, “Comparing,” 59.

The murder of Greek Jews
Mazower,
Salonica
, 392–96. On the cemetery, see Saltier, “Dehumanizing,” 20, 27; for more direct German material interests, consult Aly,
Hitler’s Beneficiaries
, 251–56.

In the first weeks
Mazower,
Salonica
, 402–3. This account of the war in Greece follows generally Mazower,
Inside Hitler’s Greece
, 1, 14, 18, 20, 235, 238, 240, 244, 250, 251, 259, and Rodogno,
Fascism’s European Empire
, 364, 390.

The French case
Hitler quotation, Vichy’s foreign recognition, and number of civil servants: Rousso,
Vichy
, 15, 47. See also Birnbaum,
Sur la corde raide
, 252.

France did introduce
Rousso,
Vichy
, 79–81. Madagascar: Marrus and Paxton,
Vichy
, 14, 60, 113. Same people: Bruttman,
Au bureau
, 199–201. I cannot enter here into the interesting issue of relationships between the French state’s treatment of its Jewish and Muslim subjects. See Surkis,
Sexing the Citizen
;
Shepard,
Invention
.

The reasoning behind
7,055: Personal communication from Patrick Weil, 11 October 2012; on the denaturalization process see his
How to Be French
, 87–122. Camps in France in 1939 and 1940: Grynberg,
Les camps
, 11, 35 and passim.

Under the Vichy regime
Paris and Drancy: Wieviorka and Laffitte,
Drancy
, 21, 106, 118–19.

French and German policies
Ibid., 120, 209.

In summer 1942
Weil,
How to Be French
, 122; Rousso,
Vichy
, 92–93.

The decisive matter
See Marrus and Paxton,
Vichy
, 325. The case of Belgium, where 60 percent of the Jews present survived, is midway between the Netherlands and France. The occupation was crucially military rather than civilian, as in France. The sovereign remained in the country, unlike the Netherlands. In Belgium, unlike in France but like the Netherlands, the Germans were able to place their own people atop the police. Like France, in Belgium there were a large number of Jews who were not citizens; unlike in France they were not specially targeted by a sovereign authority. Unlike in the Netherlands, however, the Germans did not assemble a large police force of their own. Belgian Jews seem to have been better informed than Dutch Jews about the meaning of deportation; thus Van der Boom’s explanation of the unwillingness of Dutch Jews to go into hiding would not apply to Belgian Jews. See Griffioen and Zeller, “Comparing,” 54–64; also Conway,
Collaboration
, 24; Fein,
Accounting
, 156–67.

The Holocaust in France
Rousso,
Vichy
, 93. Thronged: Marrus and Paxton,
Vichy
, 85, also 364. Soviet citizenship: Sémelin,
Persécution et entraides
, 208–9.

Considerably more Polish Jews
Klarsfeld gives 26,300 Polish and 24,000 French Jews. Many of the 5,000 he classifies as Soviet would have been Polish Jews who took Soviet citizenship after the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact.
Le mémorial
, 19.