I was sitting here, thinking about death. Because that's what I do on a lazy Saturday. So, I was thinking about death, specifically genocide, specifically the Holocaust, specifically the argument put forward that Germany was capable of carrying out the Holocaust because the Germans were all afflicted with the aptly-named "German sickness" and now that they are cured of it Germany need never worry about committing a genocide again. I don't hold to that idea; there have been too many genocides in history, modern history, to accept that the Germans entered into some sort of unique condition that made them susceptible to genocidal impulses.
Dan v. Chris
This debate actually stems back to my time in undergrad. Well, I actually do not know from whence the debate actually started, somewhere back in the mists of time. I was introduced to it, however, in an undergraduate course on modern German history. The focal points, at the time, were books by Daniel Goldhagen and Christopher Browning. If I said "Goldhagen v. Browning," my father would probably start pawing through his law books for that case he overlooked. There is no case; in fact, the books focus on a central point in the debate, never addressing the debate itself.
Basically, who were the mental and moral juggernauts who carried out the Holocaust? We know the Nazi leadership bravely ordered the slaughter of millions of unarmed civilians, but they were just too busy to actually go out and kill children themselves. You know, they had a country to run into the ground with a war against reality and also Europe. All those people didn't kill themselves, no matter how depressing Nazi rule and occupation may have been. We're not concerned with names - the Israelis seem to be pretty good about finding the names, but we're less interested in revenge or justice, but rather with history and perhaps prevention. It is the nature of these individuals that is of interest.
Goldhagen argues in Hitler's Willing Executioners that most of Germany and those involved were some sort of "Super anti-Semite." His argument is that Germany had a unique brand of anti-Semitism that was more medieval than much of the rest of Europe. That ridiculous accusations of blood libel and Jewish "witchcraft" persisted and were taken seriously well into Enlightenment and still appeared during the Weimar Republic suggests that the rationalism that had taken hold of Europe during the Renaissance had not been applied the average German's fear and hatred of Jews. This combined with the traditional European irrationality about Jewish conspiracies of money and bankers for a more thorough and base anti-Semitism. This anti-Semitism combined with German history and the various feelings upon which Hitler rose to power (I'll not chronicle them here, though some may be mentioned later) to create a "diseased" society that was more than prepared to commit genocide, but was actually disposed to do so.
Browning, in Ordinary Men, disagrees. His focus is actually on the genocide that took place outside of Germany, whether it be Greater or Lesser. While millions were killed in the gas chambers and camps in Poland and Germany, millions more were killed in a more traditional manner - they were rounded up and shot in massive numbers and buried in mass graves (graves which the victims were often forced to dig themselves) in various countries, particular the Baltic nations. These executions were carried out largely by "Special Police" battalions or by native irregular units. The first and most obvious point is that these "native irregulars" were not Germans and thus could not be affected by Goldhagen's "German disease" caused by German prejudices and history. However, it is upon his treatment of the men who made up the German "Special Police " battalions. They were not made up of Germans who were specially selected for their anti-Semitism or homocidal tendencies. Often they were men of roughly military age who had prohibited from service in the Wehrmacht due to physical disability or that they were slightly too old for combat. Records of these battalions reveal that, although some members were positively sadistic, many were constitutionally incapable of taking part in the slaughter. These members who would back out of killing operations were resigned to logistics. Some attempted to participate as part of their job but found their victims to be subjects of pity rather than hatred. Most importantly, many of them did their job, but did so out of fear of reprisal, a sense of duty, or simply to maintain employment. And many of them found they could only do they "job" while drunk. Morale suffered terribly and alcoholism among these troopers, even when not slaughtering innocent villagers, was rampant. It was for these reasons that the Germans turned to the local Lithuanians or what-have-you to commit their butchery.
You Are Not Immune
Such a distinction may seem minor. I'm certainly not going to pity those who were party to these mass-killings. The question is whether any society can become genocidal with the appropriate set of circumstances and leadership (or lack of leadership) or whether there are only rare and particular societies, societies that are "sick" to begin with, that will attempt to eliminate an entire of group of people. I believe the former and with that comes the belief that I am not "immune." Could the U.S. become genocidal (again) within my lifetime? I must concede that it is possible. This belief engenders a responsibility to avoid the circumstances and views which lead to genocide. While genocidal beliefs may make themselves apparent, I believe it is necessary to examine the circumstances under which modern genocide has taken place. In a series of (depressing) posts, I will examine the history and conditions that led to the Holocaust, "ethnic cleansing" in the Balkans (particularly Bosnia-Herzegovina), the Armenian Genocide (or "deportations" if you're reading this in Turkey (you're not)), and the Rwandan genocide of the Tutsis by the Hutus. I will follow with a post or posts about my conclusions (which at this point in my mind are "inconclusive." Go figure).
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