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5 - The “Final Solution” Decision and Its Initial Implementation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 July 2009

Shlomo Aronson
Affiliation:
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
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Summary

The decision to kill the Jews could have been made by Hitler regardless of the war and its development. In other words, the decision was to be made, and the war allowed it to be implemented in various stages. Yet there is a problem with this assertion, and this must be seen in the light of the forced emigration policy beforehand, which obviously did not entail the physical annihilation of the deportees. Nor can we prove on the basis of Hitler's moves before late 1940 that he had envisioned a multifront war, which would allow him to implement a decision to kill the Jews wherever he found them. Such a decision was made in October or November 1941, following the initial decision to destroy the Jews in occupied Soviet territory. Before that, various territorial “solutions,” including the Madagascar Plan, were considered within the overall framework of the war as it had developed until then, including dubious American neutrality, British policies and actions, including bombing raids on Germany, and Nazi–Soviet relations. Hence, my argument is that the Final Solution decision was the result of a radicalized German policy toward the Jews in the context of the behavior of third parties toward the Third Reich as it affected Hitler after the “Battle of Britain.” Yet one may ask immediately how Soviet Jews became the first victims of Hitler's wrath against the British and the Americans while Polish Jews were under Germany's control since fall 1939.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2004

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