The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
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The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
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Re: The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
#2Does anyone know if any guard at one of these camps ever committed what would of course be termed terrorism, and shot their colleagues or even a couple of generals.
Can everyone have quietly watched children brained against the side of a truck and not thought "oh, I have a loaded gun!"
Or is complicity a terribly strong bond?
Re: The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
#3Does anyone know if any guard at one of these camps ever committed what would of course be termed terrorism, and shot their colleagues or even a couple of generals. Can everyone have quietly watched children brained against the side of a truck and not thought "oh, I have a loaded gun!" Or is complicity a terribly strong bond?
You'd march to your CO's office, and form a union, and then lobby the politicians for stricter sentencing and a more broad classification of gypsies, possibly. Anything to keep the paycheck.
We have plenty of for profit prisons in the US, and we have had judges go to jail for accepting bribes from these prisons to send more people to jail.
While a jail isn't as evil as a death camp, I think you could definitely argue the conditions in many American jails are horrible, and you are basically will never be able to fit into society afterwards.
Re: The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
#4Does anyone know if any guard at one of these camps ever committed what would of course be termed terrorism, and shot their colleagues or even a couple of generals. Can everyone have quietly watched children brained against the side of a truck and not thought "oh, I have a loaded gun!" Or is complicity a terribly strong bond?
I think the desire to avoid having one's family brutally murdered was also a powerful motive not to rebel.
Re: The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
#5Does anyone know if any guard at one of these camps ever committed what would of course be termed terrorism, and shot their colleagues or even a couple of generals. Can everyone have quietly watched children brained against the side of a truck and not thought "oh, I have a loaded gun!" Or is complicity a terribly strong bond?
You'd march to your CO's office, and form a union, and then lobby the politicians for stricter sentencing and a more broad classification of gypsies, possibly. Anything to keep the paycheck. We have plenty of for profit prisons in the US, and we have had judges go to jail for accepting bribes from these prisons to send more people to jail. While a jail isn't as evil as a death camp, I think you could definitely argue…
I rather heavily edited my parent post there - sorry.
Re: The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
#6Interesting article, stay away from the comments. I think i lost a few iq.
Re: The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
#7Does anyone know if any guard at one of these camps ever committed what would of course be termed terrorism, and shot their colleagues or even a couple of generals. Can everyone have quietly watched children brained against the side of a truck and not thought "oh, I have a loaded gun!" Or is complicity a terribly strong bond?
Just today I read about the natives from North Sentinel Island, which are known for killing intruders. Can you understand how they don’t doubt about why they should kill visitors? If yes, then you found a natural part of human psychology that is largely suppressed in modern society. Fact is, humans had and have little problem with killing if they feel it‘s necessary. During the time of the second world war, the eradication of “bad people” happened in a lot of places because societies had different standards.
Edit: I don’t mean to compare to make equal. Of course, we should understand the different situations that led to putting innocent people into camps and learn individual lessons.
Re: The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
#8I also recommend a couple of books on this subject:
- Ordinary Men by Christopher Browning
- Into that Darkness by Gitta Sereny
Into that Darkness is the most depressing book I've ever read. It is essentially an interview with Franz Stangl, one of the commandants of the Treblinka camp which, if it's possible to believe, was far worse than Auschwitz. He was an ordinary guy who simply went where things took him, ultimately into a place I can't imagine existing.
Re: The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
#9Does anyone know if any guard at one of these camps ever committed what would of course be termed terrorism, and shot their colleagues or even a couple of generals. Can everyone have quietly watched children brained against the side of a truck and not thought "oh, I have a loaded gun!" Or is complicity a terribly strong bond?
Having read a large amount on the subject, I can't think of anyone who ever rebelled in that way. It's hard for us to imagine in this day and age, but SS members were conditioned from the beginning to accept, at all cost, superior orders. It was a part of Nazi lore and (I might get some heat over this) German militarism. There was nothing more important than obedience.
Most of the men directly involved in these acts were alcoholics as a result of their experiences. Many were also sent, late in the war, to places that had very high casualty rates (eastern front, partisan suppression in Italy) so that a large number were killed before the end of the war.
Re: The Life of an Auschwitz Guard
#10I also recommend a couple of books on this subject: - Ordinary Men by Christopher Browning - Into that Darkness by Gitta Sereny Into that Darkness is the most depressing book I've ever read. It is essentially an interview with Franz Stangl, one of the commandants of the Treblinka camp which, if it's possible to believe, was far worse than Auschwitz. He was an ordinary guy who simply went where things took him, ultima…
I don't mean to be down-voted so I ask honestly, how can we accept Treblinka as an extermination camp in the face of all the Jewish testimonies attesting to it being a transit camp?
Arad denies emphatically that Treblinka could have possibly been a transit camp and says "all that arrived were killed within 15 minutes", but he has not commented on the testimonies from Shoah Foundation's own tapes who describe stopping at Treblinka for a few days on their way East.
This is a complicated field of study made all the more touchy by the fact it is easily politicized so I'd be interested only if you have comments on how to coalesce these two realities (extermination vs transit camp) in the face of the evidence. We can avoid inflammatory discussion.
Video zlFCvQttOv8 on Youtube has the video testimonies. I won't link to it here due to its inflammatory title.