Best himmler biography
Heinrich Himmler
German Nazi leader of the SS (–)
"Himmler" redirects here. For the surname, see Himmler (surname).
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (German:[ˈhaɪnʁɪçˈluːɪtpɔltˈhɪmlɐ]ⓘ; 7 October &#;– 23 May ) was a German politician who was the 4th Reichsführer of the Schutzstaffel (Protection Squadron; SS), a leading member of the German Nazi Party, and one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany.
He is primarily known for being a principal architect of the Holocaust.
After serving in a reserve battalion during the First World War without seeing combat, Himmler went on to join the Nazi Party in In , he joined the SS, a small paramilitary arm of the Nazi Party that served as a bodyguard unit for Adolf Hitler. Subsequently, Himmler rose steadily through the SS's ranks to become Reichsführer-SS by
Under Himmler's leadership, the SS grew from a man battalion into one of the most powerful institutions within Nazi Germany.
Over the course of his career, Himmler acquired a reputation for good organisational skills as well as for selecting highly competent subordinates, such as Reinhard Heydrich. From onwards, he was both Chief of the Kriminalpolizei (Criminal Police) and Minister of the Interior, which gave him oversight of all internal and external police and security forces (including the Gestapo).
He also controlled the Waffen-SS, a branch of the SS that served in combat alongside the Wehrmacht in World War II.
As the principal enforcer of the Nazis' racial policies, Himmler was responsible for operating concentration and extermination camps as well as forming the Einsatzgruppendeath squads in German-occupied Europe.
In this capacity, he played a central role in the genocide of an estimated –6&#;million Jews and the deaths of millions of other victims during the Holocaust. A day before the launch of Operation Barbarossa in June , Himmler commissioned the drafting of Generalplan Ost, which was approved by Hitler in May and implemented by the Nazi regime, resulting in the deaths of approximately 14 million people in Eastern Europe.
In the last years of the Second World War, Hitler appointed Himmler as Commander of the Replacement Army and General Plenipotentiary for the administration of the Third Reich (Generalbevollmächtigter für die Verwaltung). He was later given command of the Army Group Upper Rhine and the Army Group Vistula. However, after he failed to achieve his assigned objectives, Hitler replaced him in these posts.
Realising the war was lost, Himmler attempted, without Hitler's knowledge, to open peace talks with the western Allies in March When Hitler learned of this on 28 April, he dismissed Himmler from all his posts and ordered his arrest. Thereafter, Himmler attempted to go into hiding but was captured by British forces. He committed suicide in British custody on 23 May
Early life
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler was born in Munich on 7 October into a conservative middle-class Roman Catholic family.
His father was Joseph Gebhard Himmler (–), a teacher, and his mother was Anna Maria Himmler (née Heyder; –), a devout Roman Catholic. Heinrich had two brothers: Gebhard Ludwig (–) and Ernst Hermann (–).
Himmler's first name, Heinrich, was that of his godfather, Prince Heinrich of Bavaria, a member of the royal family of Bavaria who had been tutored by Himmler's father.
He attended a grammar school in Landshut, where his father was deputy principal. While he did well in his schoolwork, he struggled in athletics. He had poor health, suffering from lifelong stomach complaints and other ailments. In his youth he trained daily with weights and exercised to become stronger. Other boys at the school later remembered him as studious and awkward in social situations.
Himmler's diary, which he kept intermittently from the age of 10, shows that he took a keen interest in current events, dueling, and "the serious discussion of religion and sex".
In , he began training with the Landshut Cadet Corps. His father used his connections with the royal family to get Himmler accepted as an officer candidate, and he enlisted with the reserve battalion of the 11th Bavarian Regiment in December His brother, Gebhard, served on the western front and saw combat, receiving the Iron Cross and eventually being promoted to lieutenant.
In November , while Himmler was still in training, the war ended with Germany's defeat, denying him the opportunity to become an officer or see combat. After his discharge on 18 December, he returned to Landshut. After the war, Himmler completed his grammar-school education. From to , he studied agriculture at the Munich Technische Hochschule (now Technical University Munich) following a brief apprenticeship on a farm and a subsequent illness.
Although many regulations that discriminated against non-Christians—including Jews and other minority groups—had been eliminated during the unification of Germany in , antisemitism continued to exist and thrive in Germany and other parts of Europe.
Himmler was antisemitic by the time he went to university, but not exceptionally so; students at his school would avoid their Jewish classmates. He remained a devout Catholic while a student and spent most of his leisure time with members of his fencing fraternity, the "League of Apollo", the president of which was Jewish.
Himmler maintained a polite demeanor with him and with other Jewish members of the fraternity, in spite of his growing antisemitism. During his second year at university, Himmler redoubled his attempts to pursue a military career. Although he was not successful, he was able to extend his involvement in the paramilitary scene in Munich.
It was at this time that he first met Ernst Röhm, an early member of the Nazi Party and co-founder of the Sturmabteilung ("Storm Battalion"; SA). Himmler admired Röhm because he was a decorated combat soldier, and at his suggestion Himmler joined his antisemitic nationalist group, the Bund Reichskriegsflagge (Imperial War Flag Society).
In , Himmler became more interested in the "Jewish question", with his diary entries containing an increasing number of antisemitic remarks and recording a number of discussions about Jews with his classmates.
His reading lists, as recorded in his diary, were dominated by antisemitic pamphlets, German myths, and occult tracts. After the murder of Foreign Minister Walther Rathenau on 24 June, Himmler's political views veered towards the radical right, and he took part in demonstrations against the Treaty of Versailles. Hyperinflation was raging, and his parents could no longer afford to educate all three sons.
Disappointed by his failure to make a career in the military and his parents' inability to finance his doctoral studies, he was forced to take a low-paying office job after obtaining his agricultural diploma. He remained in this position until September
Nazi activist
Himmler joined the Nazi Party on 1 August , receiving party number As a member of Röhm's paramilitary unit, Himmler was involved in the Beer Hall Putsch—an unsuccessful attempt by Hitler and the Nazi Party to seize power in Munich.
This event would set Himmler on a life of politics.
Best himmler biography quotes: Wola massacre Death marches. After the failed attempt on Hitler's life in July , Himmler's position was strengthened still further. It called for the Baltic States , Poland, Western Ukraine , and Byelorussia to be conquered and resettled by ten million German citizens. After his discharge on 18 December, he returned to Landshut.
He was questioned by the police about his role in the putsch but was not charged because of insufficient evidence. However, he lost his job, was unable to find employment as a farm manager, and had to move in with his parents in Munich. Frustrated by these failures, he became ever more irritable, aggressive, and opinionated, alienating both friends and family members.
In –24, Himmler, while searching for a world view, came to abandon Catholicism and focused on the occult and in antisemitism.
Germanic mythology, reinforced by occult ideas, became a religion for him. Himmler found the Nazi Party appealing because its political positions agreed with his own views. Initially, he was not swept up by Hitler's charisma or the cult of Führer worship. However, as he learned more about Hitler through his reading, he began to regard him as a useful face of the party, and he later admired and even worshipped him.
To consolidate and advance his own position in the Nazi Party, Himmler took advantage of the disarray in the party following Hitler's arrest in the wake of the Beer Hall Putsch. From mid he worked under Gregor Strasser as a party secretary and propaganda assistant. Travelling all over Bavaria agitating for the party, he gave speeches and distributed literature.
Placed in charge of the party office in Lower Bavaria by Strasser from late , he was responsible for integrating the area's membership with the Nazi Party under Hitler when the party was re-founded in February
That same year, he joined the Schutzstaffel (SS) as an SS-Führer (SS-Leader); his SS number was The SS, initially part of the much larger SA, was formed in for Hitler's personal protection and was re-formed in as an elite unit of the SA.
Himmler's first leadership position in the SS was that of SS-Gauführer (district leader) in Lower Bavaria from Strasser appointed Himmler deputy propaganda chief in January As was typical in the Nazi Party, he had considerable freedom of action in his post, which increased over time. He began to collect statistics on the number of Jews, Freemasons, and enemies of the party, and following his strong need for control, he developed an elaborate bureaucracy.
In September , Himmler told Hitler of his vision to transform the SS into a loyal, powerful, racially pure elite unit. Convinced that Himmler was the man for the job, Hitler appointed him Deputy Reichsführer-SS, with the rank of SS-Oberführer.
Around this time, Himmler joined the Artaman League, a Völkisch youth group.
There he met Rudolf Höss, who was later commandant of Auschwitz concentration camp, and Walther Darré, whose book The Peasantry as the Life Source of the Nordic Race caught Hitler's attention, leading to his later appointment as Reich Minister of Food and Agriculture. Darré was a firm believer in the superiority of the Nordic race, and his philosophy was a major influence on Himmler.
Rise in the SS
Upon the resignation of SS commander Erhard Heiden in January , Himmler assumed the position of Reichsführer-SS with Hitler's approval;[a] he still carried out his duties at propaganda headquarters.
One of his first responsibilities was to organise SS participants at the Nuremberg Rally that September. Over the next year, Himmler grew the SS from a force of about men to about 3, By Himmler had persuaded Hitler to run the SS as a separate organisation, although it was officially still subordinate to the SA.
To gain political power, the Nazi Party took advantage of the economic downturn during the Great Depression.
The coalition government of the Weimar Republic was unable to improve the economy, so many voters turned to the political extreme, which included the Nazi Party. Hitler used populist rhetoric, including blaming scapegoats—particularly the Jews—for the economic hardships. In September , Himmler was first elected as a deputy to the Reichstag. In the election, the Nazis won percent of the vote and seats in the Reichstag.
Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany by President Paul von Hindenburg on 30 January , heading a short-lived coalition of his Nazis and the German National People's Party. The new cabinet initially included only three members of the Nazi Party: Hitler, Hermann Göring as minister without portfolio and Minister of the Interior for Prussia, and Wilhelm Frick as Reich Interior Minister.
Less than a month later, the Reichstag building was set on fire. Hitler took advantage of this event, forcing Hindenburg to sign the Reichstag Fire Decree, which suspended basic rights and allowed detention without trial. The Enabling Act, passed by the Reichstag on 23 March , gave the Cabinet—in practice, Hitler—full legislative powers, and the country became a de facto dictatorship.
On 1 August , Hitler's cabinet passed a law which stipulated that upon Hindenburg's death, the office of president would be abolished and its powers merged with those of the chancellor. Hindenburg died the next morning, and Hitler became both head of state and head of government under the title Führer und Reichskanzler (leader and chancellor).
The Nazi Party's rise to power provided Himmler and the SS an unfettered opportunity to thrive.
By , the SS numbered 52, members. Strict membership requirements ensured that all members were of Hitler's AryanHerrenvolk ("Aryan master race"). Applicants were vetted for Nordic qualities—in Himmler's words, "like a nursery gardener trying to reproduce a good old strain which has been adulterated and debased; we started from the principles of plant selection and then proceeded quite unashamedly to weed out the men whom we did not think we could use for the build-up of the SS." Few dared mention that by his own standards, Himmler did not meet his own ideals.
Himmler's organised, bookish intellect served him well as he began setting up different SS departments.
In he appointed Reinhard Heydrich chief of the new Ic Service (intelligence service), which was renamed the Sicherheitsdienst (SD: Security Service) in He later officially appointed Heydrich his deputy. The two men had a good working relationship and a mutual respect. In , they began to remove the SS from SA control. Along with Interior Minister Frick, they hoped to create a unified German police force.
In March , Reich Governor of Bavaria Franz Ritter von Epp appointed Himmler chief of the Munich Police. Himmler appointed Heydrich commander of Department IV, the political police. Thereafter, Himmler and Heydrich took over the political police of state after state; soon only Prussia was controlled by Göring. Effective 1 January , Hitler promoted Himmler to the rank of SS-Obergruppenführer, equal in rank to the senior SA commanders.
On 2 June Himmler, along with the heads of the other two Nazi paramilitary organizations, the SA and the Hitler Youth, was named a Reichsleiter, the second highest political rank in the Nazi Party. On 10 July, he was named to the Prussian State Council. On 2 October , he became a founding member of Hans Frank's Academy for German Law at its inaugural meeting.
Himmler further established the SS Race and Settlement Main Office (Rasse- und Siedlungshauptamt or RuSHA).
He appointed Darré as its first chief, with the rank of SS-Gruppenführer. The department implemented racial policies and monitored the "racial integrity" of the SS membership. SS men were carefully vetted for their racial background. On 31 December , Himmler introduced the "marriage order", which required SS men wishing to marry to produce family trees proving that both families were of Aryan descent to If any non-Aryan forebears were found in either family tree during the racial investigation, the person concerned was excluded from the SS.
Each man was issued a Sippenbuch, a genealogical record detailing his genetic history. Himmler expected that each SS marriage should produce at least four children, thus creating a pool of genetically superior prospective SS members. The programme had disappointing results; less than 40 per cent of SS men married and each produced only about one child.
In March , less than three months after the Nazis came to power, Himmler set up the first official concentration camp at Dachau.
Hitler had stated that he did not want it to be just another prison or detention camp. Himmler appointed Theodor Eicke, a convicted felon and ardent Nazi, to run the camp in June Eicke devised a system that was used as a model for future camps throughout Germany. Its features included isolation of victims from the outside world, elaborate roll calls and work details, the use of force and executions to exact obedience, and a strict disciplinary code for the guards.
Uniforms were issued for prisoners and guards alike; the guards' uniforms had a special Totenkopf insignia on their collars. By the end of , Himmler took control of the camps under the aegis of the SS, creating a separate division, the SS-Totenkopfverbände.
Initially the camps housed political opponents; over time, undesirable members of German society—criminals, vagrants, deviants—were placed in the camps as well.
In Himmler wrote in the pamphlet "The SS as an Anti-Bolshevist Fighting Organization" that the SS were to fight against the "Jewish-Bolshevik revolution of subhumans". A Hitler decree issued in December allowed for the incarceration of anyone deemed by the regime to be an undesirable member of society. This included Jews, Gypsies, communists, and those persons of any other cultural, racial, political, or religious affiliation deemed by the Nazis to be Untermensch (sub-human).
Thus, the camps became a mechanism for social and racial engineering. By the outbreak of World War II in autumn , there were six camps housing some 27, inmates. Death tolls were high.
Consolidation of power
In early , Hitler and other Nazi leaders became concerned that Röhm was planning a coup d'état. Röhm had socialist and populist views and believed that the real revolution had not yet begun.
He felt that the SA—now numbering some three million men, far dwarfing the army—should become the sole arms-bearing corps of the state, and that the army should be absorbed into the SA under his leadership. Röhm lobbied Hitler to appoint him Minister of Defence, a position held by conservative General Werner von Blomberg.
Göring had created a Prussian secret police force, the Geheime Staatspolizei or Gestapo in and appointed Rudolf Diels as its head.
Göring, concerned that Diels was not ruthless enough to use the Gestapo effectively to counteract the power of the SA, handed over its control to Himmler on 20 April Also on that date, Hitler appointed Himmler chief of all German police outside Prussia. This was a radical departure from long-standing German practice that law enforcement was a state and local matter.
Heydrich, named chief of the Gestapo by Himmler on 22 April , also continued as head of the SD.
Hitler decided on 21 June that Röhm and the SA leadership had to be eliminated. He sent Göring to Berlin on 29 June, to meet with Himmler and Heydrich to plan the action. Hitler took charge in Munich, where Röhm was arrested; he gave Röhm the choice to commit suicide or be shot.
When Röhm refused to kill himself, he was shot dead by two SS officers. Between 85 and members of the SA leadership and other political adversaries, including Gregor Strasser, were killed between 30 June and 2 July in these actions, known as the Night of the Long Knives. With the SA thus neutralised, the SS became an independent organisation answerable only to Hitler on 20 July Himmler's title of Reichsführer-SS became the highest formal SS rank, equivalent to a field marshal in the army.
The SA was converted into a sports and training organisation.
On 15 September , Hitler presented two laws—known as the Nuremberg Laws—to the Reichstag. The laws banned marriage between non-Jewish and Jewish Germans and forbade the employment of non-Jewish women under the age of 45 in Jewish households. The laws also deprived so-called "non-Aryans" of the benefits of German citizenship.
These laws were among the first race-based measures instituted by the Third Reich.
Himmler and Heydrich wanted to extend the power of the SS; thus, they urged Hitler to form a national police force overseen by the SS, to guard Nazi Germany against its many enemies at the time—real and imagined. Interior Minister Frick also wanted a national police force, but one controlled by him, with Kurt Daluege as his police chief.
Hitler left it to Himmler and Heydrich to work out the arrangements with Frick. Himmler and Heydrich had greater bargaining power, as they were allied with Frick's old enemy, Göring. Heydrich drew up a set of proposals and Himmler sent him to meet with Frick. An angry Frick then consulted with Hitler, who told him to agree to the proposals.
Frick acquiesced, and on 17 June Hitler decreed the unification of all police forces in the Reich and named Himmler Chief of German Police and a State Secretary in the Ministry of the Interior. In this role, Himmler was still nominally subordinate to Frick.
Best himmler biography Toggle the table of contents. MusicBrainz FID. London; New York: Penguin Classic. Rathkolb, OliverIn practice, however, the police were now effectively a division of the SS, and hence independent of Frick's control. This move gave Himmler operational control over Germany's entire detective force. He also gained authority over all of Germany's uniformed law enforcement agencies, which were amalgamated into the new Ordnungspolizei (Orpo: "order police"), which became a branch of the SS under Daluege.
Shortly thereafter, Himmler created the Kriminalpolizei (Kripo: criminal police) as an umbrella organisation for all criminal investigation agencies in Germany.
The Kripo was merged with the Gestapo into the Sicherheitspolizei (SiPo: security police), under Heydrich's command. In September , following the outbreak of World War II, Himmler formed the SS-Reichssicherheitshauptamt (RSHA: Reich Security Main Office) to bring the SiPo (which included the Gestapo and Kripo) and the SD together under one umbrella.
He again placed Heydrich in command.
Under Himmler's leadership, the SS developed its own military branch, the SS-Verfügungstruppe (SS-VT), which later evolved into the Waffen-SS. Nominally under the authority of Himmler, the Waffen-SS developed a fully militarised structure of command and operations.
It grew from three regiments to over 38 divisions during World War II, serving alongside the Heer (army), but never being formally part of it.
In addition to his military ambitions, Himmler established the beginnings of a parallel economy under the umbrella of the SS. To this end, administrator Oswald Pohl set up the Deutsche Wirtschaftsbetriebe (German Economic Enterprise) in Under the auspices of the SS Economy and Administration Head Office, this holding company owned housing corporations, factories, and publishing houses.
Best himmler biography book Historisch Nieuwsblad in Dutch. The author emphasizes the centrality of Himmler's personality to the Nazi murder machine-his surveillance of the private lives of his men, his deep resentments, his fierce prejudices-showing that man and position were inseparable. Heinrich Luitpold Himmler was born in Munich on 7 October into a conservative middle-class Roman Catholic family. In , he joined the SS, a small paramilitary arm of the Nazi Party that served as a bodyguard unit for Adolf Hitler.Pohl was unscrupulous and quickly exploited the companies for personal gain. In contrast, Himmler was honest in matters of money and business.
In , as part of his preparations for war, Hitler ended the German alliance with China and entered into an agreement with the more modern Japan. That same year, Austria was unified with Nazi Germany in the Anschluss, and the Munich Agreement gave Nazi Germany control over the Sudetenland, part of Czechoslovakia.
Hitler's primary motivations for war included obtaining additional Lebensraum ("living space") for the Germanic peoples, who were considered racially superior according to Nazi ideology.
Heinrich himmler biography Heinrich Himmler. Early policies. He was also in charge of the Wehrmacht penal system, and controlled the development of Wehrmacht armaments until January As the principal enforcer of the Nazis' racial policies , Himmler was responsible for operating concentration and extermination camps as well as forming the Einsatzgruppen death squads in German-occupied Europe.A second goal was the elimination of those considered racially inferior, particularly the Jews and Slavs, from territories controlled by the Reich. From to , hundreds of thousands of Jews emigrated to the United States, Palestine, the United Kingdom, and other countries. Some converted to Christianity.
Anti-church struggle
Main articles: Kirchenkampf and Nazi persecution of the Catholic Church
According to Himmler biographer Peter Longerich, Himmler believed that a major task of the SS should be "acting as the vanguard in overcoming Christianity and restoring a 'Germanic' way of living" as part of preparations for the coming conflict between "humans and subhumans".
Longerich wrote that, while the Nazi movement as a whole launched itself against Jews and Communists, "by linking de-Christianisation with re-Germanization, Himmler had provided the SS with a goal and purpose all of its own". Himmler was vehemently opposed to Christian sexual morality and the "principle of Christian mercy", both of which he saw as dangerous obstacles to his planned battle with "subhumans".
In , Himmler declared:
We live in an era of the ultimate conflict with Christianity. It is part of the mission of the SS to give the German people in the next half century the non-Christian ideological foundations on which to lead and shape their lives. This task does not consist solely in overcoming an ideological opponent but must be accompanied at every step by a positive impetus: in this case that means the reconstruction of the German heritage in the widest and most comprehensive sense.
In early , Himmler had his personal staff work with academics to create a framework to replace Christianity within the Germanic cultural heritage.
The project gave rise to the Deutschrechtliches Institut, headed by Professor Karl Eckhardt, at the University of Bonn.
World War II
When Hitler and his army chiefs asked for a pretext for the invasion of Poland in , Himmler, Heydrich, and Heinrich Müller masterminded and carried out a false flag project code-named Operation Himmler.
German soldiers dressed in Polish uniforms undertook border skirmishes which deceptively suggested Polish aggression against Germany. The incidents were then used in Nazi propaganda to justify the invasion of Poland, the opening event of World War II. At the beginning of the war against Poland, Hitler authorised the killing of Polish civilians, including Jews and ethnic Poles.
The Einsatzgruppen (SS task forces) had originally been formed by Heydrich to secure government papers and offices in areas taken over by Germany before World War II. Authorised by Hitler and under the direction of Himmler and Heydrich, the Einsatzgruppen units—now repurposed as death squads—followed the Heer (army) into Poland, and by the end of they had murdered some 65, intellectuals and other civilians.
Militias and Heer units also took part in these killings. Under Himmler's orders via the RSHA, these squads were also tasked with rounding up Jews and others for placement in ghettos and concentration camps.
Germany subsequently invaded Denmark and Norway, the Netherlands, and France, and began bombing Great Britain in preparation for Operation Sea Lion, the planned invasion of the United Kingdom.
On 21 June , the day before invasion of the Soviet Union, Himmler commissioned the preparation of the Generalplan Ost (General Plan for the East); the plan was approved by Hitler in May It called for the Baltic States, Poland, Western Ukraine, and Byelorussia to be conquered and resettled by ten million German citizens.
The current residents—some 31&#;million people—would be expelled further east, starved, or used for forced labour.
The plan would have extended the borders of Germany to the east by one thousand kilometres ( miles). Himmler expected that it would take twenty to thirty years to complete the plan, at a cost of 67&#;billion&#;ℛ︁ℳ︁. Himmler stated openly: "It is a question of existence, thus it will be a racial struggle of pitiless severity, in the course of which 20 to 30 million Slavs and Jews will perish through military actions and crises of food supply."
Himmler declared that the war in the east was a pan-European crusade to defend the traditional values of old Europe from the "Godless Bolshevik hordes".
Constantly struggling with the Wehrmacht for recruits, Himmler solved this problem through the creation of Waffen-SS units composed of Germanic folk groups taken from the Balkans and eastern Europe. Equally vital were recruits from among the Germanic considered peoples of northern and western Europe, in the Netherlands, Norway, Belgium, Denmark and Finland.
Spain and Italy also provided men for Waffen-SS units. Among western countries, the number of volunteers varied from a high of 25, from the Netherlands to each from Sweden and Switzerland. From the east, the highest number of men came from Lithuania (50,) and the lowest from Bulgaria (). After most men from the east were conscripts.
The performance of the eastern Waffen-SS units was, as a whole, sub-standard.
In late , Hitler named Heydrich as Deputy Reich Protector of the newly established Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. Heydrich began to racially classify the Czechs, deporting many to concentration camps. Members of a swelling resistance were shot, earning Heydrich the nickname "the Butcher of Prague".
This appointment strengthened the collaboration between Himmler and Heydrich, and Himmler was proud to have SS control over a state. Despite having direct access to Hitler, Heydrich's loyalty to Himmler remained firm.
With Hitler's approval, Himmler re-established the Einsatzgruppen in the lead-up to the planned invasion of the Soviet Union.
In March , Hitler addressed his army leaders, detailing his intention to smash the Soviet Empire and destroy the Bolshevik intelligentsia and leadership. His special directive, the "Guidelines in Special Spheres re Directive No. 21 (Operation Barbarossa)", read: "In the operations area of the army, the Reichsführer-SS has been given special tasks on the orders of the Führer, in order to prepare the political administration.
Best himmler biography wikipedia International Military Tribunal Nuremberg. Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk. After the Nazis came to power in Germany in , Himmler became police president in Munich and head of the political police in Bavaria. Wannsee Conference Operation Reinhard Holocaust trains.These tasks arise from the forthcoming final struggle of two opposing political systems. Within the framework of these tasks, the Reichsführer-SS acts independently and on his own responsibility." Hitler thus intended to prevent internal friction like that occurring earlier in Poland in , when several German Army generals (including Johannes Blaskowitz) had attempted to bring Einsatzgruppen leaders to trial for the murders they had committed.
Following the army into the Soviet Union, the Einsatzgruppen rounded up and killed Jews and others deemed undesirable by the Nazi state.
Hitler was sent frequent reports. In addition, &#;million Soviet prisoners of war died of starvation, mistreatment or executions in just eight months of – As many as , Soviet prisoners of war died or were executed in Nazi concentration camps over the course of the war; most of them were shot or gassed. By early , following Himmler's orders, ten concentration camps had been constructed in which inmates were subjected to forced labour.
Jews from all over Germany and the occupied territories were deported to the camps or confined to ghettos. As the Germans were pushed back from Moscow in December , signalling that the expected quick defeat of the Soviet Union had failed to materialize, Hitler and other Nazi officials realised that mass deportations to the east would no longer be possible.
As a result, instead of deportation, many Jews in Europe were destined for death.
Final Solution, the Holocaust, racial policy, and eugenics
Further information: Final Solution, the Holocaust, Nazism and race, Racial policy of Nazi Germany, and Nazi eugenics
Nazi racial policies, including the notion that people who were racially inferior had no right to live, date back to the earliest days of the party; Hitler discusses this in Mein Kampf.
Around the time of the German declaration of war on the United States in December , Hitler resolved that the Jews of Europe were to be "exterminated".