The Final Solution By Kurt Grossmann: An Analysis

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All throughout Jewish history, and even into the 21st century, Jews have been constantly fighting the battle against anti-Semitism. This has been a recurring hardship for Jews all around the world. The Nazi rise to power in Germany led to the prime example of anti-Semitism thus far, the development of the Final Solution. This was the plan to exterminate all of the Jewish people, and resulted in the death of six million Jews, two-thirds of Europe’s Jewish population. More than 70 years after this tragedy, scholars are still debating many aspects of the Holocaust. The question that is constantly asked regarding the Final Solution is, “When did the plan to annihilate all of the Jews develop?” This leads to one of the most common historiographic …show more content…
Grossmann, a German born historian, expanded on the functionalist belief in his article, “The Final Solution”. He described the Final Solution as a step-by-step process that escalated as the war progressed. The first major preparatory step began once the war started, and Germany had almost all of the Jews in Europe in their hands. The plan was to confine Jews into small territories which became known as the General Government. Then, the forced removal of Jews from their communities and into ghettoes began. The phase which really corresponded to the beginning of the Final Solution was in 1942, when the Jews who were not helping the German war work were sent to gas chambers and execution pits (Grossmann 58-60). But still, each of these steps occurred at different rates in different places due to the fact that some conquered countries were slow to develop German policies. Since everything was different in separate countries there could have been no way to plan something as big as the Final Solution, without all of them being on the same page. Grossman used this to help support the point that the Final Solution was not concrete enough during this time and therefore not intended beforehand (Grossmann …show more content…
Hilberg is considered to be one of the most distinguished Holocaust scholars, and this book is known to be one of the most influential ones regarding the Holocaust. Hilberg used a historical trend in order to support his thesis. This trend is one which the Jews are persuaded to convert, the ones who do not convert get expelled, and if all else fails then the perpetrators proceed to the last resort of annihilation (Hilberg 7-9). In this case, the Final Solution was the shortest and quickest way to achieve their final goal. He stated, “They did not begin a development; they completed it,” (qtd. Hilberg 8). According to him, the Final Solution could have only been implemented after many other methods of getting the Jews out of Europe had been tried, which would be around mid-1941. Hilberg also believed that the anti-Semitism at the time played a very large role in the planning of the Final Solution. He expressed that, “both perpetrators and victims drew upon their age-old experience in dealing with each other. The Germans did it with success. The Jews did it with disaster,” (qtd. Hilberg 24). This quote exemplified Hilberg’s belief that the implementation of the Final Solution was based off of previous German-Jewish relations, and part of the cyclical trend (Hilberg

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