CONFIRMING SOURCES.

There are many voices who are denying already the tragedy of the Holocaust, others are trying to put the guilt on the German bureaucracy. They disregard completely all information available from the Nazi sources. In his diary Goebbels noted:

Finally we talked about the Jewish question. Here the Fuhrer is as uncompromising as ever. The Jews must be got out of Europe, if necessary by applying the most brutal methods

On March 27, 1942 Goebbels noted in his diary:

Beginning with Lublin, the Jews in the Generalgouvernment are being evacuated eastward. The procedure is a pretty barbaric one and not to be described here more definitely. Not much will remain of the Jews. On the whole it can be said that about 60 percent of them will have to be liquidated whereas only about 40 percent can be used for forced labor.

Beginning with Lublin, the Jews in the Generalgouvernment are being evacuated eastward. The procedure is a pretty barbaric one and not to be described here more definitely. Not much will remain of the Jews. On the whole it can be said that about 60 percent of them will have to be liquidated whereas only about 40 percent can be used for forced labor.

In February 1942 Goebbels wrote:

World Jewry will suffer a great catastrophe at the same time as Bolshevism. The Fuhrer once more expressed his determination to clean up the Jews in Europe pitilessly. There must be nosqeamish sentimentalism about it. The Jews have deserved the catastrophe that has now overtaken them. Their destruction will go hand in hand with the destruction of our enemies. We must hasten this process with cold ruthlessness. We shall thereby render an inestimable service to a humanity tormented for thousands of years by the Jews. This uncomprising anti-Semitic attitude must prevail among our own people despite all objectors. The Fuhrer expressed this idea vigorously".

The above was written in a private diary, not for publication, and there is no reason to doubt its authenticity.

On August 22, 1942, at the time when the killing was already going on in full force Hans Frank, the governor of Poland wrote in his Diary:

"That we have condemned one or two million Jews to death should be said in passing; if the Jews do not die of hunger, the measures will be intensified".

Some historians think that the decision to exterminate the Jews was taken By Hitler in 1942 at time when his plans for the Russian conquest started to falter. This is a doubtful assumption because the formation of the Einsatzgrouppen was completed before the attack on Russia took place. The infamous Commissar Order, the basis for the operation of the Einsatzgrouppen was drafted in March 1941, 3 months before the operation Barbarossa. At that time Hitler expected a very short Russian campaign.

On June 16, 1941, six days before the attack on Russia, Goebbels noted in his diary:

The Fuhrer estimates that the operation will take four months, I reckon of fever. Bolshevism will collapse like a house of cards. We face victories unequaled in human history."

It is the victorious Hitler that decided the fate of the Jews. Goebbels writes:

"The Fuhrer says: right or wrong, we must win. Its is the only way. And victory is right, moral and necessary. And once we have won, who is going to question our methods? In any case, we have so much to answer for already that we must win, because otherwise our entire nation will be annihilated.

It is possible that Hitler was using the Holocaust for burning of the bridges, to assure loyalty to himself of the S.S., the Army and his cohorts.

On March 1, 1941, even before the Commissars order was issued, Himmler visited Auschwitz and gave it's commandant Hoess orders to extent the camp to accommodate about 130,000 prisoners. He told Hoess that Auschwitz has been selected because of easy rail access, isolation and easy camouflage. About the same time Globocnik, the SS leader in Lublin was instructed the construction of the concentration camp in Majdanek.

On March 3, 1941 Hitler dictated Gen. Jodl a directive concerning the conducting the forthcoming war with Russia:

The bolshevist-Jewish intelligentsia must be eliminated as having been the 'oppressor' of the people up to now. .. the necessity for employment of organizations responsible to the Riechsfuhrer_SS, in addition to Field Security Police, to be examined with the Riechsfuhrer.

Although his words pertained to the Commissars in reality it was directed against the Jews.

On March 30, 1941 Hitler convened a conference of the senior officers of the Wehrmacht, warning them about the barbarity of coming war with Russia.

The war against Russia (Hitler said) will be such that it cannot be conducted in a knightly fashion. This struggle is one of ideologies and racial differences and will have to be conducted with unprecedented, unmerciful and unrelenting harshness. All officers will a have to rid themselves of obsolete ideologies. I know the necessity for such means of waging war is beyond the comprehension of the generals but... I insist absolutely that my orders be executed without contradiction. The commissars are the bearers of ideologies directly opposed to National Socialism. Therefore the commissars will be liquidated. (Halder Affidavit, Nov. 22, 1945 at Nurenberg, NCA, VIII pp 645- 46).

The war with Russia started on June 22. 1941, and the Einsatzgrouppen and all the killing apparatus were formed 3 months before, with the idea of starting the extermination process. In 1941 Hitler was full of optimism, and expected a short duration of the Russian campaign, and it is safe to assume that an oral or written order was issued, after a detailed plan was drafted. Massive unprecedented killings was part and parcel of the military campaign.

kimel@systec.com