Talk:Final Solution

David Cesarani's "Final Solution"

David Cesarani's Final Solution: The Fate Of The European Jews 1933-49 (2016) is an important overview of this subject, which synthesises the latest research in several areas. The thrust of Cesarani's narrative is how haphazard and inconsistent Nazi policy was towards the Jews. Above all, Cesarani argues the Final Solution was shaped by the fast-changing conditions of war. For Cesarani, the fact that the Nazis were ultimately successful in killing 5 to 6 million Jews was not due to the efficiency of the Third Reich or the clarity of their policies. "Rather, the catastrophic rate of killing was due to German persistence… and the duration of the murderous campaigns. This last factor was largely a consequence of allied military failure." (Cesarani, Final Solution, p. 796) I have added a summary of Cesarani to the "Historiographic debate about the decision".

I noticed that the 16 December 1941 statement by Hans Frank, "But what will happen to the Jews? Do you believe they will be lodged in settlements in Ostland? In Berlin, we were told: why all this trouble; we cannot use them in the Ostland or the Reichskommissariat either; liquidate them yourselves!" is in the article twice. First, towards the end of the Barbarossa section, and second, towards the end of the Historiographic debate. I think it works well the first time it is quoted, no need to repeat it in historiographic section. I've replaced it with part of Himmler's 4 October 1943 Posen speech. Cesarani notes that as the German military position worsened in 1943, the Nazi high command became more explicit about the Final Solution and used knowledge of "the fate of the Jews as a sort of blood bond to tie the civil and military leadership to the Nazi cause."

I've left the Ron Rosenbaum quote in at the end of Historiographic debate. I'm not sure if it adds anything to the article, but would like to hear from others whether it should be removed. Mick gold (talk) 15:13, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

• Short paragraph from Ron Rosenbaum can safely be removed because it adds nothing to the narrative as the (possibly unintended) article closing statement. – By the same token, "blood bond" quotation from Himmler is insufficient without some kind of ending paragraph along the line of what User:Mick gold said right above in his own voice. You can do it. Poeticbent talk 03:48, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

• I've changed the final para of Historiographic debate, replacing Rosenbaum with a more general summary of the situation from Himmler, per comment of Poeticbent above. Mick gold (talk) 18:17, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

The final solution and the use of the words 'extermination' 'extermination camps'

The Wannasse conference is where they planned the 'expulsion' of the jews, no one ever use the words extermination on paper, the closest thing to that happening was when they liquidated the ghettos' thanks to the SS office, but the wannasse conference never talked about extermination.

"that extermination camps such as Auschwitz II Birkenau and Treblinka were fitted with permanent gas chambers to kill large numbers of Jews in a relatively short period of time"

Not really, they had crematoriums built to get rid of bodies of course, but their preferred method for getting rid of the mentally/physically handicap was to gas them and then send them back to loved ones as ashes. Inside the camps they had over 1 million people in a camp meant for just 100k, so to think that no one would ever die there is crazy, even if the crematoriums were used to cover up the murders. The people they deemed unfit to do physical labour like the really old gypsies and really young were locked in the shower rooms and someone would stop by with containers of zyklon-B, a fumigation insecticide. This method was actually proposed by Aushwitz SS physician Joseph Mengele!

I'm just not too sure of the words being used here, and the words being associated with 'the final solution,' on other sites. Remember that at the time being an illegal immigrant, communist or gay in America could get you locked up as well. If you tried to sneak out of Ukraine, Russia would send you and your family to a labor camp, where you'd work to death. When the 3rd Reich asked other countries if they had ' the jewish question,' they were asking specifically about the census and whether or not they should deport them. Finland said no and ultimately all of their Jews were spared. 50% in Germany and 20% in France were not.

The prisoners in the prison camps were only fed 200 calories a day. In the labor camps 350 calories.

(This is my main gripe about the camps.) So the methods weren't so much extermination, but neglect and mass starvation. If they were lucky they were fed one hard rocky potato, else they'd get a watery soup instead. The non-jewish prisoners were supposedly fed a real diet, but I'm not sure where this took place, only that it was happening in 1941. Add to that the decay with sickness' like typhus is why everyone's head is shaven in the pictures, because of fleas and body lice. Also about 400k people died after the camps were liberated because the allies didn't understand they couldn't digest food.

I really think that that the words 'extermination' and 'extermination camp' ignore the realities of those prison camps back then, before and after the war. The Germans outside the camps had no idea what was going on, they just smelt a terrible odor. Also the six million figure comes no where close to the amount of jews in the camps. No more then 250k jews died at aushwitz the other 1 million people that died were polish, russian p.o.w.'s and slovaks. This is verifiable truth if you look at the Aushwitz memorial. There were another five camps in eastern Poland, where people died/were gassed I'm sure, but the 'six million jews dying' did not specifically take place in the prison camps themselves. Six million people in the camps maybe, but six million jews in the camps? Not likely.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.167.63.166 (talk) 21:18, 5 May 2018 (UTC) 

This is not a forum, see WP:NOTAFORUM. The talk page is for making specific suggestions to improve the article using information from reliable sources. (Hohum ^@) 22:16, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

You're misapplying WP:NOTAFORUM, Hohum. This is very much a discussion about the article and the language used in it, and it's in the most appropriate place: the Talk page. The fact that you disagree with these considerations does not make them impertinent here. WisdomTooth3 (talk) 08:07, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

I didn't express agreement or disagreement with the views. However, they were views without sources, and no concrete suggestions were made. That is entirely within the meaning of NOTAFORUM. Additionally, a second editor added the hatnote which you have removed, so it was not my unilateral opinion. A discussion requires a reply, nobody has for six months. You have also not added anything on topic. (Hohum ^@) 19:52, 16 November 2018 (UTC)

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Contradiction on the number of deaths at the Great Synagogue?

Hey there, the article says that 5000 or so people died, but this other article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Police_Battalion_309 said that 2,000 did. And so does the article on the Great Synagogue.

It is unclear what the "first mass killing" it refers to here means.

The burning, or the entire episode?

Qwartz2003 (talk) 09:31, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 18 July 2020

In the background section, change

For example, Mark Roseman wrote that "their normal mode of communicating about murder".

to

For example, Mark Roseman wrote that euphemisms were "their normal mode of communicating about murder".

This sentence was mangled in a recent edit (3rd of July 2020). 91.87.92.1 (talk) 10:17, 18 July 2020 (UTC)