Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews, Peter Longerich [essential books to read TXT] 📗

Juden, 144 ff.; Ivan Kamenec, ‘Die erfolglosen Versuche zur Wiederauf-

nahme der Deportationen der slowakischen Juden’, TSD (2002), 318–37.

189. Lipscher, Juden, 178–9; Fatran, ‘Deportation’, 116 ff.

190. PAA, Inland II g 208, Luther to Ribbentrop, 16 Jan. 1942; cf. Browning, Final Solution, 132.

191. PAA, Inland II g 208, Bergmann to Bormann. 9 Mar. 1943.

192. IMT xxxv. 428, D-736.

193. Sztojay to Horthy, 28 Apr. 1943, in Eichmann in Ungarn, ed. Lévai, 61 ff. On German activities with regard to Hungary in the spring and summer of 1943 see Braham, Politics, 250 ff.

194. Diary entry 8 May 1943, See Fröhlich, Die Tagebücher, Teil II, Band 8, p. 236 on

statements by Hitler the previous day.

195. ADAP E VI, no. 43.

196. Donauzeitung, 1 June 1943, cf. Hilberg, Destruction, 876.

197. Report of 10 Dec. 1943, NG 5560, in Randolph L. Braham, The Destruction of Hun-

garian Jewry: A Documentary Account (New York, 1968), no. 110.

198. Braham, Politics, 381 ff.; on the organization of the occupying administration, ibid. 406 ff.

199. Ibid. 396 ff.

568

Notes to pages 407–408

200. In Götz Aly and Christian Gerlach, Der letzte Kapitel Realpolitik, Ideologie und der Mord an den ungarischen Juden (Stuttgart, 2002) the authors argue in contrast that

four stages of escalation can be perceived within the decision-making process con-

cerning the deportation of the Hungarian Jews (Aly and Gerlach, Kapitel, 249 ff.).

Thus, according to them, there had been no ‘long planned preparation of the

deportations’, no deportation plan existing from the beginning; the decision for

ghettoization and deportation was to be seen not as a ‘unique act’ but as an ‘interactive process’ (ibid. 252, 266, 416). In their view many factors must be taken into account to

explain this process: the redistribution of resources (finance, labour, food supplies,

military and economic potential), the disposing of social burdens, internal political

mobilization in Hungary, relations with the German ally, etc. In their view, ‘Hungar-

ian pressure’ played a large part in the acceleration of the deportations (ibid.,

summary on p. 265). This interpretation is the result of an analysis of situational

factors and in my view takes too little account of the intention of the Germans,

demonstrable as early as the end of 1941, and pursued continuously from then

onwards, to set the deportations in motion with the help of the Hungarians. It was

the German occupation that created the crucial preconditions for radicalizing the

anti-Semitic policy of the Hungarian government to such an extent that the deport-

ations could begin. The events of 1944 must be seen in this perspective. Moreover, in

my view, Aly and Gerlach overstress rational m0tives (Zweck-rational) in their

analysis of the decision-making process. Thus, for example, the Germans plainly

had no genuine interest in an effective exploitation of the workforce of the Jewish

prisoners, as Aly and Gerlach themselves show in their account of the treatment of the

deported workers: only a very few of the 200,000 Jewish forced labourers were in fact

deployed in the context of the Fighter Programme for which they had originally been

requested. Instead, they worked mostly in functions that had little to do with the war

and with no regard for their qualifications. Because of their bad treatment, the

productivity of the forced labourers, who had been robbed of all material and

emotional support by separation from their families, was poor and mortality rates

were extremely high so that a third of the forced labourers had died by the end of the

war (ibid. 409).

201. Ibid. 259.

202. Veesenmayer to the AA, 22 Apr. 1944, BD no. 144.

203. Braham, Politics, 510 ff. and 446 ff.

204. Diary entry 27 Apr. 1944 in Fröhlich, Die Tagebücher, Teil II, Band 12, p. 199.

205. Braham, Politics, 573 ff.

206. Ibid. 674 ff.

207. Ibid. 662 ff.

208. Veesenmayer was already working on the basis of four transports each carrying 3,000

Jews on 4 May 1944: telegram to the AA (BD, No. 153).

209. BD, no. 157, Thadden to German Mission in Bratislava, 6 May 1944.

210. See Braham, Politics, 733 ff.

211. The figure of 433,000 also contains several thousand Jews who were deported to

Auschwitz after the official halt to deportations.

212. Braham, Politics, 780 ff.

Notes to pages 408–412

569

213. Ibid. 850 ff.

214. Ibid. 1205 ff.

215. Telegram from Veesenmayer to Ribbentrop, 6 July 1944, ADAP E VIII, 101.

216. PAA, Inland II g 210; Braham, Destruction, 700–1. Ribbentrop to Veesenmayer, 10 July 1944. Veesenmayer to the AA, 24 Aug. 1944. On this complex, Braham, Politics, 884–5.

217. PAA, Inland II g 209; Braham, Politics, 887–8.

218. Braham, Politics, 890 ff.

219. PAA, Inland II g 210, Gesandtschaft Budapest to the AA, 19 Aug. 1944, in ADAP E VIII, 167. On the events in August see Braham, Politics, 911 ff.

220. PAA, Inland II g 210, Veesenmayer to AA, 24 Aug. 1944.

221. PAA, Inland IIg 209, Veesenmayer to Ribbentrop in Braham, Destruction, no. 214.

222. Braham, Politics, 916.

223. Bauer’s view, (Jews for Sale? Nazi Jewish Negotiations, 1933–1945 (New Haven and

London, 1994), 221), that Himmler’s order to halt the deportations of 24 August has to

do with the beginning of negotiations between Kurt Becher and Saly Mayer in Switz-

erland, concerning the possible release of Jews for foreign currency or the delivery of

goods, cannot be verified. In order to influence these negotiations effectively, it would have made more sense, as had already happened in Strasshof in June, to keep certain

contingents of deportees within the territory of the German Reich in camps as hostages.

224. Braham, Politics, 947 ff.

225. At this point the the decision to dismantle the extermination facilities in Auschwitz had either already been taken or was about to happen. See Czech, Kalendarium, 31

Dec. 1944 (last murder with gas) and 25 Nov. 1944 (start of the destruction of the

crematoria).

226. Veesenmayer’s report to the AA, 18 Oct. 1944, ADAP E VIII, 275. Eichmann kept to

this intention until at least mid-November (Veesenmayer, report 13 Nov. 1944, PAA,

Inland II g 209).

227. Braham, Politics, 957 ff.

228. PAA, Inland IIg 209.

229. Braham, Politics, 976 ff.

230. Shmuel Spector, ‘ “Action 1005”: Effacing the Murder of Millions’, HGS 1 (1990),

157–73.

231. Ibid. 159 ff.

232. Ibid. 161 ff.

233. Adalbert Rückerl, NS Vernichtungslager in Spiegel deutscher Strafprozesse. Belzec,

Sobibor, Treblinka, Chelmno (Munich, 1977), 280–1.

234. Arad, Belzec, 165 ff., 370 ff.

235. Sybille Steinbacher, Auschwitz: A History (London, 2005), 123 ff.

236. On this see Bauer, Sale; Richard Breitman