Download World War II and the Holocaust

World War II
1939-1945
How it All Began…
At the end of World War I, Germany
was economically devastated. The
Treaty of Versailles unfairly placed
all the blame for the war on
Germany, gave away a lot of
German land, and demanded
heavy payments.
The treaty humiliated the German
people and blocked the nation’s
efforts to rebuild itself and move
forward economically and
technologically. In the late 1920’s
and early 1930’s, the worldwide
Great Depression made things
even more difficult.
The Palace of Versailles, outside Paris,
where the Treaty of Versailles was signed.
Rise of the Nazi Party
As resentment and desperation grew
in Germany, radical political
parties became more popular.
Among the more extreme activists
was Adolf Hitler, who had joined
the National Socialist German
Workers’ Party (more commonly
known as the Nazi Party) in 1920,
and had increased membership in
large part through the power of
his public speaking.
By the time of the depression in
Germany, Hitler’s party had more
than 100,000 members and was
growing rapidly, and it began
participating in elections with
growing success.
Hitler Gains Power
In 1933, Hitler pressured the German
president, Paul von Hindenburg, into
appointing him chancellor (head of the
government.) As chancellor he was
able to gain even more power.
By 1935, Germany no longer recognized
the Treaty of Versailles or its
restrictions. Hitler announced his
intention to totally rebuild Germany’s
military, which broke the rules set by
the treaty.
Anti-Semitism
Germans felt humiliated and angry after
World War I, and many blamed the
Jews for what had happened.
Hatred or dislike of Jews is known as
anti-Semitism, and it was a large
part of the Nazi party. Hitler and the
Nazis blamed the Jews for Germany’s
problems, and said that if they could
get rid of the Jews, Germany would be
a better place.
So Jews were discriminated against; they
were denied freedoms and rights given
to non-Jewish Germans, their shops
were boycotted, and they were forced
to wear the Star of David to identify
themselves.
German soldiers blocking entrance into
a Jewish store
“Germans! Defend yourselves against
Jewish propaganda! Buy only at
German shops!”
Segregated streetcar in
Krakow telling which rows
are “Fur Juden” and which
are “Fur nicht Juden”
Burning a synagogue in Germany
Burned synagogue in Poland
Jews were forced out of their homes, and moved into ghettos.
Ghettos were usually established in the poor sections of a city, where
most of the Jews from the city and surrounding areas were forced to
reside. Often surrounded by barbed wire or walls, the ghettos were
sealed. The ghettos were characterized by overcrowding,
malnutrition, and heavy labor. All were eventually dissolved, and the
Jews murdered.
Chopping up furniture to use as fuel in the Krakow
Ghetto.
Forced to
relocate to the
Krakow
Ghetto, Jews
move their
belongings.
A child working in a ghetto
workshop (and wearing the Star of
David)
It Begins…
In 1938, Germany began invading its
neighboring countries.
When Germany attacked Poland on
September 1st 1939, Britain and
France joined forces to fight
against Germany, and World War
II began.
The US Enters the War
In 1940, Japan signed an agreement
to join Germany and Italy.
The United States disapproved of
this, and placed a heavy trade
embargo on Japan. This means
that the U.S. severely restricted
Japan’s ability to import oil, scrap
metal, and other resources
necessary to its war effort.
Japan was facing a crisis, and needed
to take action. The action Japan
chose was a surprise attack on the
U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor,
Hawaii, on December 7, 1941.
With this, the U.S. entered the war.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt
President of the United States during World
War II. He died one month before the war
ended.
The swastika, the symbol of Nazi Germany. The Nazi
Party took the swastika, an ancient symbol, and
turned it up on a “leg” so that it looked like it was
rolling. It was supposed to symbolize progress, and
movement forward to a better world.
To control a country completely, you
have to control what people think. The
Nazis found books to be dangerous—they
encourage thinking.
Burning books in Nazi Germany
The Holocaust
ho·lo·caust \'hO-l&-"kost, 'hä- also "kästor'ho-l&-kost\ noun
1 : a sacrifice consumed by fire
2 : a thorough destruction especially by
fire. (i.e. a nuclear holocaust)
3 a often cap. : the mass slaughter of
European civilians and especially Jews
by the Nazis during World War II -usually used with the b : a mass
slaughter of people; especially
genocide.
The Killing Begins
As more and more of eastern Europe
was taken over by Germany, it
became a sort of backyard for the
Nazis, where the ugliest parts of
their plan could be carried out.
By late 1941, the first Jews from
Germany and western Europe
were gathered and moved, along
with many other minorities, to
concentration camps in Poland,
Czechoslovakia, Lithuania, Latvia,
Ukraine, and western Russia,
where they were first used as
slaves and then murdered.
Locked in a
building
and burned
alive
Modes of Killing
In the first years of the war,
the gas chambers of the
later Nazi concentration
camps were not yet
common.
Most victims were taken in
groups to secluded areas
where they were stripped
of clothing, pushed into
open pits, machinegunned, and then quickly
covered over, in many
cases even before all of
them were dead.
Shooting women who remained alive
Forced labor
Executing a man kneeling
before a mass grave
Digging their own
graves before execution
Awaiting execution
Mass execution
The Final Solution
On January 20, 1942, a group of Nazi
officials met in a villa outside
Berlin to settle the details for
solving the so-called “Jewish
question.”
The meeting set a secret goal to
remove 11 million Jews from
Europe by whatever means.
Site of the conference
The Final Solution would end in the
deaths of over six million Jews,
Gypsies, homosexuals, and people
with handicaps.
Extermination Camps
By 1942, the murder of Jews became more
and more organized and Hitler
encouraged his officers to speed up the
process. S.S. commanders had
experimented with different methods,
and gas chambers proved to be the
favorite.
The first extermination camps began in
1942. Although prisoners died by the
thousands from disease, overwork, or
starvation in German labor camps
throughout Europe, there were only
seven official extermination camps,
also known as death camps.
These camps existed purely for the
purpose of killing, and most of the
prisoners taken there were dead within
hours of arrival. A small number of
prisoners considered healthy were
temporarily forced to work, but they
were underfed and overworked until
they were no longer able to work, and
then killed.
Barracks at Auschwitz
Children in
Auschwitz
Bags of human hair
cut from prisoners
Registration of new prisoners
Newly arrived prisoners at
roll call
Prisoners walking by pile of
shoes taken from murdered
Jews
Prisoners in barracks
Clothing and rings taken
from prisoners.
Mass grave
Human bones inside crematorium ovens (after
being murdered in a gas chamber, bodies were
oftentimes burned instead of buried).
Prisoners
placing bodies
in the
crematoriums
Human remains in a
crematorium
Nazi Germany and Italy
had taken over much of
Europe, but eventually
the Allied Forces
(Britain, France, the US
and Russia) began to
experience some
victories.
As the Russians took
over Berlin on May 2,
1945, it was reported
that Hitler had
committed suicide rather
than be captured. The
German government
surrendered May 7,
1945. Finally, the camps
were liberated.
American
congressman
viewing a camp.
After the liberation, a
funeral for those unsaved or
killed.
What the Allied soldiers
saw at the camps, they
would never forget.
Austrian citizens
assisting in the
removal of corpses.
German civilians forced to assist in
burial
German civilians forced to walk
through the camps, to witness what
they had earlier chosen to ignore.
Survivors drinking broth
provided by the U.S. Army
Survivors
The war cost more
than 36 million
lives.
First they came for the socialists,
and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I did not speak out because I was not a trade
unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me,
and there was no one left to speak for me.
Pastor Martin Niemoller, Nazi Germany, circa 1945.