73 Introduction & Editorial Notes (Holocaust: Reinhard)
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This article is from the Holocaust FAQ, by Ken McVay kmcvay@nizkor.org with numerous contributions by others.
73 Introduction & Editorial Notes (Holocaust: Reinhard)
On January 30, 1942, ... Hitler reaffirmed to the German public his
prewar prophecy that a world war would result in the destruction of
Jewry. Three days later, in private, he told Himmler and other
evening guests: "Today we must conduct the same struggle that Pasteur
and Koch had to fight. The cause of countless ills is a bacillus:
the Jew....We will become healthy if we eliminate the Jew." (Hitler's
speech in the Sportplast on 30 Jan. 1942, reprinted in Max Domarus,
Hitler, Reden und Proklamationen 1932-1945. Munich, 1965, II,
1,828-29; Adolf Hitler, Monologe im Fu"hrerhauptquartier 1941-1944:
Die Aufzeichnungen Heinrich Heims. ed. Werner Jochmann, Hamburg,
1980. 293, 2 Feb. 1942) Two months later Hitler associated himself
completely with Himmler's broad plans for Germanization of the East.
According to what Gottlob Berger heard from a firsthand source,
Hitler told a group of officers whom he decorated with the Iron Cross
with oak-leaf cluster:
I know exactly how far I have to go, but it is so that the whole
East becomes and remains German -- primeval German
[urdeutsch]...We don't need to express our ideas about that now,
and I will not speak about it. That [task] I have given to my
Himmler and he is already accomplishing it. (Berger to Himmler,
10 April 1942, NA RG 242, T-175/R 127/2649922)
Here was the politician calculatingly allowing subordinates to carry
out his dirty work.(Breitman, 234-35) ...the nature of which would
become clear all too soon...
After the assassination (mid-1942) of Reinhard Heydrich, Hitler's
Reich Protector of Bohemia-Moravia, the destruction of the Jews in
the Government General (Poland) became formally known as "Operation
Reinhard," in a final tribute to the slain Nazi. This document will
outline the history and effectiveness of the Reinhard camps.
Arad's preface offers these reflections:
BELZEC, SOBIBOR, & TREBLINKA: An integral part of the Nazi
killing machine in occupied Poland - these camps served one
purpose, and one purpose only - the total destruction of the
Jewish people.
The Nazi leaders adopted and executed a deliberate and massive
campaign of genocide which has been documented beyond dispute
and is accepted by an entire world, excepting only those
Neo-Nazi elements cloaking their continuing hatred of the Jewish
people in pseudo-historical nonsense.
The existence of Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka, Auschwitz,
Maidanek, Chelmno and others is beyond question. The purpose
for which these camps were created is also beyond question.
(http://www.nizkor.org/ftp.cgi/camps/aktion.reinhard/preface.arad)
This article is the result of the combined effort of many, and
contains data from myriad sources. I would like to acknowledge the
assistance of the subscribers to the Holocaust Research Information
List. Without their contributions, this document could not have been
written.
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