After picking up this book 7 years ago in a Polish bookshop, after being recommended it by my history teacher, I've finally finished this book. I've always wanted to know the answer, how is it possible for a whole nation to become so indoctrinated to the point that they'd willingly kill so many thousands of people in cold-blood? This book tries to answer by delving into more detail about the camps, police battalions, death marches etc.

The beginning of the book is heavily in depth in explaining definitions and setting up the tone of the book. I did find parts of the book a little "slow" or difficult to read because I was tripping on some terminology and vocabulary (not entirely a bad thing, I picked up on some new words) but there are also parts of the book that I found incredibly interesting.

This book is not for the sensitive . In many parts of the book, I felt uncomfortable and I believe that is the point. There is nothing comfortable or merry about what happened to all of the people who died during this period. Something I appreciate is the fact that Goldhagen is not just referring to the "millions" or "thousands" and even comments himself that he wants to get away from this generalisation. This book throws you straight into the nitty gritty, the personal stories, the individual experiences. In parts of this book, I felt I was really there. I learnt about people's experiences that I had never heard of and, at times, felt too evil and cruel to be true.

I take what I read from anything with a pinch of salt and some may argue that some of the examples given are hyperbolic or not well-sourced/not enough evidence. This could be true. But I think just reading and absorbing that humans have at some point, no matter where geographically, have gone to this extent of cruelty. It really made me face the nastiness of human nature. I loved that this book stripped back all the numbers, not just for the victims but also for the perpetrators.

Goldhagen raises many good questions that can often be glided over in textbooks or historical books. Didn't the German soliders also have children of their own? Wives that they were married to? Neighbours and friends. Didn't they speak amongst themselves about what was going on? These are real people who lived very full, complex lives. They're not just copy and paste people with the same mindset (although mass psychosis is definitely a factor during this time).

One of the things I disagree on with Goldhagen and is the main part of his conclusion to his question of "were Hitler's 'executioners' willing?" is that due to mainly the anti-Semitic belief systema having a hold over Germans, that they were able to kill willingly.

I was a bit let down by Goldhagen's conclusion. Just as it's not simple to gloss over the millions that died, human nature in those soldiers and every complicit person is not simple to gloss over either. I think he did a good job at trying to delve deeper into how it's possible for German people to be willing but there are sure to be examples and stories that no one will ever get to know, hear of or ever to be told, of people helping. Risking their lives. There are untold parts to this history. People's consciences, their own complex systems of belief and perceptions of the world. People who may have helped in their own way, something small, that showed some form of humanity.

Those are stories that I think we will never know. This is not to defend German people at all but I personally find it hard to believe that it can only come down to belief systems and that "they believed Jews were not even human and so they were able to execute."

I'm glad I read the book, glad I finished it.

This is a very hard book to read, I give you all fair warning. The photographs, in particular, are hard to look at, hard to force oneself to understand. On page 407, that really is a German soldier posing for the photographer as he takes aim at a Jewish woman and her child. On page 224-25, those really are pictures, taken by a German soldier as mementoes, of Jews waiting to be massacred.

I don't understand antisemitism. I should say that, too. The Salem witchcraft trials make more sense to me than do the commonly held German beliefs about Jews Goldhagen describes in this book.

Goldhagen's thesis, reduced to the compass of a nutshell, is that the Nazis did not invent German antisemitism. He argues--and, I think, persuasively--that the Nazis reflected and acted upon beliefs that were quite widely held in Germany and had been for a hundred years or more, and that therefore, it wasn't a matter of the Germans obeying the Nazis (for whatever reason, fear or ingrained obedience or what have you) but--and this he never quite says, but I think it is a logical extension of his argument--the Nazis giving Germans permission, explicitly, repeatedly, and with approbation, to do what they wanted.

Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.

Because that's what Goldhagen proves, over and over again: that the Germans involved in the genocidal slaughter of the Jews were involved because they wanted to be involved. They weren't necessarily Nazis; they weren't necessarily in agreement with the Nazis (Goldhagen remarks that the men who plotted to assassinate Hitler were staunch antisemites; some of them participated in the extermination of Soviet Jews). They weren't coerced. They chose to kill Jews by the hundreds of thousands because--somehow--they believed, sincerely, that it was the right thing to do.

That "somehow" reflects a cognitive gap I can't bridge. I believe Goldhagen's evidence that these were beliefs sincerely and passionately held, but I can't put myself imaginatively into the shoes of someone who could believe those things.

Which, mind you, is not necessarily a bad thing, but it made the experience of reading this book rather hallucinatory.

I am not, of course, an expert on twentieth century German history, so when I say that Goldhagen's argument seemed persuasive, well researched, and compelling to me, you may take that for what it's worth. His writing style is pedestrian ranging to clunky, and he sometimes doesn't have the sense to let the atrocities committed by the Germans speak for themselves, indulging--albeit understandably--in rhetoric that is superfluous to the needs of his material. But these are surface flaws that do not detract from the achievement that is the book itself.

Un poco repetitivo y esperaba que se centrara más en la genealogía de las ideas en la reforma protestante y el marxismo. De todas formas está fantásticamente documentado y prueba como la sociedad alemana estaba ya inbuida en la ideología antisemita mucho antes de que llegara hitler al poder. Muy recomendable.

"What happened during the Third Reich was consensual." Mr. Goldhagen drives this point home throughout his convincing, at least to this reader, historical account of life in Nazi Germany.

"Judenfrage," the Jewish Problem began long before Adolph Hitler. Mr. Goldhagen argues, that as far back as 1880, the Germans had long held contempt for Jews. He also argues that the Jews "were a race inexorably alien to the German race."

On February 27, 1933 the Reichstag in Berlin was set on fire. Hitler blamed the arson on the Communists. Because of this incident Hitler declared Marshall Law and set out to destroy any forms of what democracy was left in Germany.

Mr. Goldhagen further argues that the German perpetrators were coerced. They were forced to comply or face death. And most were willing.

It is without question that Mr. Goldhagen writes as an intellectual; so needless to say his book is not always so easily read. But to this reader he presents an accurate portrayal of life during The Third Reich.

Um, this is tough. Like really, really tough to read. The thing about this book is that the author is really not talking about the death camps we all know about. He covers death marches and ghetto clearings. He gets very specific in the specifics of the killings to the point that I was having nightmares. His main thesis is that everyone who participated had the option not to - whether that meant they were dead (he shows many ways in which they actually had an out) or not. This is a bit of a controversial take. Many people assume that the general public wasn’t either are of or unable to make a decision regarding their complicity in the holocaust. He sets out to prove that assumption wrong. I would suggest the book, but beware of the amount of detail regarding the gore and cruelty.

Ez talán a legbrutálisabb szakkönyv, amit valaha olvastam – ehhez képest a Schindler listája csak játszódás kölökbárányokkal zöldellő mezőkön. De brutalitása nem öncél, hanem eszköz, amivel Goldhagen saját állításait bizonyítja – ezzel, a népirtás gyakorlatának ábrázolásával, és a gyilkosok közelképeivel teremti meg azt a „kognitív keretet”, ami szerinte az egész holokauszt kulcsa. A kötet elvitathatatlan érdeme, hogy igen kellemetlen kérdéseket tol az arcunkba – olyasmiket, amelyektől el szokás fordítani a pillantásunkat. Szerinte a népirtás nem egy szűk réteg által elkövetett cselekménysorozat, amihez a többség legfeljebb tudatlanul asszisztált, hanem egy antiszemitizmustól teljesen átitatott társadalom közös bűne. Nem véletlen, hogy a kötet jelentős részében nem az SS-szel, hanem a rendőrzászlóaljakkal foglalkozik – ezeket az egységeket ugyanis nem nácikkal, hanem a társadalom legszélesebb rétegéből válogatva töltötték fel, nem vizsgálva a belépők pártállását, következésképpen tagjaik között meglepően kevés politikailag elkötelezett személyt találunk. (Sőt: a Hamburg környékéről toborzott egység tagjai között számosan szociáldemokrata múlttal rendelkeztek.) Emellett ezek az egységek jellemzően az idősebb korosztályból verbuválódtak – vagyis nem a Hitler-rezsim oktatási viszonyai között szocializálódtak. Visszafogottabban vettek hát részt a népirtásban? Goldhagen bőséges adatokat szolgáltat arra, hogy nem. Ugyanolyan embertelenül viselkedtek, mint az SS*.

Goldhagen azt a mítoszt is cáfolni igyekszik, hogy a gyilkosságok egy automatizált, parancsalapú rendszer gépies, de a maga perverz módján racionális működése során történtek volna. Nem, az elkövetők az esetek jelentős részében indokolatlan szadizmussal öltek, nem pusztán eliminálni akarták a zsidóságot, hanem létében megalázni, és rendszeresen túlteljesítették a normát. Elvetettek minden gazdasági észszerűséget: még ha a munkaerőhiány miatt akadozott is a német termelés, vonakodtak a zsidókra mint munkaerőre tekinteni**. Az irracionalitás leglátványosabb példái pedig talán a halálmenetek (amikkel Goldhagen szintén sokat foglalkozik), amelyek során egy már elvesztett háborúban ide-oda masíroztatták értelem nélkül a foglyokat olyan németek, akik pontosan tudták, hogy hamarosan el kell számolniuk a tetteikkel – mégis alig mutattak könyörületet. Mindezt úgy, hogy ekkor Himmler már konkrétan parancsba adta, hogy kíméljék a zsidókat (a szövetségesek nyugati felével való egyezkedés aranyfedezetének szánta őket) – de speciel ezt a parancsot a legtöbben hajlandóak voltak figyelmen kívül hagyni.

Ezekben a kérdésekben Goldhagen bőségesen megadatolt és meggyőző, ugyanakkor más állításaiban tág tere van a cáfolatnak. Egyrészt itt van az, hogy a népirtás alanyai szerinte csak a zsidók lehettek, akik semmi mással nem behelyettesíthetőek. No most tény, hogy amíg az eutanáziaprogrammal kapcsolatban léteztek (sikeres!) tiltakozások, és a sztrájk fogalma sem volt ismeretlen a Harmadik Birodalomban, addig a holokauszt ellen intenzív tömegmegmozdulást nem ismerünk – jellemző, hogy még a Stauffenberg-féle összeesküvők többségének is legfeljebb a megvalósítással, nem magával az antiszemitizmussal volt problémája. Az is igaz, hogy az antiszemitizmus az összes idegengyűlölet közül a legkomplexebb jelenség (Európában legalábbis), ami a kereszténység bizonyos ágaiban is erős gyökeret vert – szóval ez legalábbis védhető álláspont. Ugyanakkor erősen leszűkíti azt a kört, amiben a kötet tanulsággal bír – én a magam részéről meggyőzőbbnek tartom Snyder megközelítését, aki a hangsúlyt inkább arra helyezi, hogy a gyilkos az gyilkos: az elkövető mentális állapota a kulcs, nem az áldozat hovatartozása***. Az viszont már egyértelműen ellenérzéseket kelt bennem, hogy Goldhagen az elkövetők körét is leszűkíti azzal, hogy a holokauszt feltételei szerinte kizárólag Németországban alakulhattak ki – hiába taglalja hosszasan, milyen történelmi specifikumai vannak a német antiszemitizmusnak, egy tényből (hogy a németek fejéből pattant ki az ötlet) visszakövetkeztetve gyűjti össze a bizonyítékokat, amik őt támasztják alá. És ez így logikailag elég problémásnak tűnik. Megemlít ugyan érintőlegesen más elkövetőket (elsősorban a hiwiket), de nem foglalkozik velük – holott az ő puszta létük elbizonytalaníthatná saját állításával szemben.

Összegzés: fontos, provokatív könyv, aminek súlya háttérbe szorítja amúgy nagyon is számottevő hiányosságait, illetve hajlamát az önismétlésre. A holokauszt, és egyáltalán: az emberi gonoszság iránt érdeklődőknek erősen ajánlott olvasmány – olyan szegletekbe világít be a témával kapcsolatban, ahol eleddig vaksötét volt. Jó lett volna, ha egy igazán jó fordító magyarítja. (Bocs, Bokor Pál, de Luther Márton mint "Martin Luther king" - sic!!! -, a Saar-vidék pedig mint Szárvidék... hát... viccnek is rossz.)

* Jegyezzük meg, mert fontos: a rendőrzászlóaljak tagjainak volt választási lehetőségük. Azoknak, akik kérvényezték áthelyezésüket, vagy nem kívántak részt venni a kivégzésekben, semmilyen bántódásuk nem esett. És mégis – legfeljebb néhányan választották ezt az utat.
** A munkatáborok rendszerének ugyanis – mint Goldhagen meggyőzően bizonyítja – valójában semmi köze nem volt a munkához, a bennük végzett teljesen improduktív feladatok csak a rabok megalázásának eszközei voltak.
*** "Az Einsatzgruppék több ezer tagja és több tízezer olyan német között, akik zsidókat öltek, egyetlen elkövetőről sem tudunk, aki vállalta, hogy zsidókat öl, viszont azt nem, hogy belorusz civilekkel vagy szovjet hadifoglyokkal végezzen. Mint ahogy olyanok sem voltak, akik vállalták belorusz civilek vagy szovjet hadifoglyok vagy cigányok megölését, de zsidókét nem. Akik embert öltek, azok embert öltek." (Timothy Snyder: Fekete föld) Amúgy is Snyder témába vágó könyvét jóval kiforrottabb alkotásnak érzem, mint ezt.

I suppose I take this book personally, given that my grandparents were German and in Germany during the Holocaust - they weren't Nazis (my very existence is proof of that), they were simply trying to survive, and I think there's a difference between that, and actively aiding genocide. I don't think that Goldhagen even allows for this. On the other hand, given what is going on in Iraq today, or in Darfur today, in Rwanda a few years ago, or Bosnia a decade ago, I think we are living proof of...something. How do you fight against this kind of madness when you are rendered powerless by the state, be it by fear, by law, or...? All the drama of the 60s and 70s have shown us that rebellion and protest make absolutely no difference in the end, so where does that leave us?

I very little hope that humanity is going to see this century through without destroying itself.

Started as a dissertation and certainly reads like it.I couldn't make sense of it and finally gave up.

It has been hard for most people to figure out how and why something like the Holocaust could happen in a cultured country like Germany. We think of Germans as rational and disciplined, but there was a dark and irrational side to them when it came to the Jews. Germans, according to Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, had been deeply and almost universally antisemitic since Medieval times. The antisemitism went into high gear sometime in the 19th Century when the Jews' "nature" began being seen in genetic, rather than religious, terms; and because of these supposed genetic reasons, was seen as immutable.

What was this supposed Jewish nature? Jews were seen as absolutely malevolent, powerful creatures who were responsible for any and all problems that beset Germany, and who actively wished to destroy Germany. They were responsible for World War I, and for the Treaty of Versailles. Hitler held the Jews responsible for the world war he himself set in motion. Several metaphoric descriptors were used in Germans' view of the Jews: demons, vermin, pathogens. The work of exterminating the Jews was seen not as shameful, but as heroic.

According to Goldhagen, the Nazi years should not be seen as a matter of monsters sneaking into power and forcing the populace to do their bidding. The Germans knew Hitler's intentions toward the Jews from the beginning, and most of them agreed with them. Goldhagen paints a picture of a German culture so steeped in hatred for the Jews that they were more than ready for a final "solution." Even liberals, who did not think the Jews should be expelled from Germany, or exterminated, also believed that Germany had a "Jewish problem." Their hope was that the Jews would assimilate (as many Jews in Germany had done), or that their low birth rate would cause them to disappear in time. But the pseudo-scientific picture of the Jewish racial nature ruled out assimilation.

Goldhagen gives us descriptions of the camps (both extermination and so-called work camps); of the activities of the Order Police; and finally of the death marches that happened as the war neared its end. In all of these cases, he notes that the Germans in charge of the Jews, from the top to the bottom of the command hierarchy, were never forced to kill Jews if they had no stomach for it, and were almost never punished for refusing. But most members of the Order Police, who were not particularly well-trained and also not well-versed in Nazi ideology eagerly volunteered for their assignments to clear out Jewish towns and ghettos, and either kill Jews on the spot or get them ready for transport to the death camps. In the camps themselves, the lowliest guards had free rein in their treatment of the Jews, and could have been as cruel and murderous as they pleased, or not. Almost all of the guards were unthinkably murderous and brutal, to the extent that any guard who performed an act of kindness was a notable person in the eyes of the inmates, almost a miracle.

As for whether Germans were somehow, in general, murderous by nature, Goldhagen points out the differences between the treatment of Jewish prisoners, and the treatment of other types of prisoners: politicals, Slavs, common criminals, etc. Germans saw the Poles and other Slavic people as inferior, and fit for subjugation and slavery; but in prison, they were fed adequately to allow them to work; whereas the Jews were starved, constantly beaten, denied hygiene and medical care. In fact, such was the irrationality of the antisemitism that Jews in so-called work camps were treated in a way that made it impossible for them to work even as Germany faced a severe labor shortage. A work camp was just another step towards death.

And as to Germans being a people who naturally followed orders, Goldhagen notes that the Germans pushed back when the Nazis started the forced "euthanasia" program to weed out the mentally and physically handicapped, and also against the Nazis' goal of dismantling the Christian religion in Germany. And when, at the end of the war, Himmler was negotiating with the Americans, and ordered the leaders of the death marches to treat Jews with more kindness and to cease murdering them, the guards did not follow those orders, but killed them all the more quickly.

Hitler's Willing Executioners, in terms of its historical importance, is a five-star book, but it is a chore to read. It is endlessly repetitious, as Goldhagen explains again and again what every example and bit of data he presents proves. The gist of the book can be gleaned by reading Chapters 15 (Explaining the Perpetrators' Actions: Assessing the Competing Explanations) and 16 (Eliminationist Antisemitism as Genocidal Motivation). This, Goldhagen's first book, is an adaptation of his PhD dissertation, and that shows in some of the more technical language. His 2002 book, A Moral Reckoning, about the Catholic church's part in the Holocaust, is a much easier read.

THIS is Hannah Arendt's "banality of evil." These are the folks who brought you the Holocaust in all its "glories." These are the average German citizens of the early 20th century. It SHOULD be a "must read" for all people, especially those in school, but the author is dry and academic and the book could be cut by at least 1/3.

Goldhagen begins with a study of the development of the German identity. Unlike the rest of Europe, Germany kept its anti-Semitism strong throughout its early history (remember "Germany" as such didn't exist until the end of the 19th century) and always took an "elimination" approach. It preferred to have no Jews. Their anti-Semitism had moved from a religious one, which most of the rest of Europe had maintained and was growing out of, to a racial one - Jews were Jews even if they converted to Christianity or never practiced Judaism. This put them in direct competition (to the Germans) with the German "race." Taking the picture of Jewry that the Middle Ages set in motion - Jews are lazy, live off the sweat of everyone else, accumulate all the wealth and rule everything behind the scenes - the Germans were off and running with their own form of virulent anti-Semitism. Even before unification, those who would become German held antisemitic views and felt that Jews should be eliminated. The key word here is "eliminated." This is NOT extermination. Germans simply wanted the Jews out. They tried their best to convince them to leave. In the early days of Hitler's reign, they encouraged emigration. When that didn't completely work, they tried turning them into social nonentities - this is where the spitting, beard cutting, forcing Jews off sidewalks, making fun of them in public started. After this depersonalization, Hitler could take it one step further and say that the ones remaining needed to be moved to some other place. Madagascar was even considered!!!! However, the Jews were "only" moved to Poland.

Because of the Germans' inherent anti-Semitism, these steps seemed normal. They were something they believed it, part of their cognitive world. Jews were non-people. Even the hated Slavs of Russia were human, even if they were at the bottom of the pile. No one was concerned because the views were "normal."

Then the theme turned to "extermination." Camps were built; Jews were killed rather than deported; killing squads were sent out to Poland and the Russian border (Germany, by this time, actually had few Jews left. They had emigrated or were in camps in Poland.)

But what Goldhagen really shows is that ordinary Germans took part in extermination activities without being indoctrinated into Nazi ideology. It was natural to them to eliminate Jews. He takes three examples: Police Battalions, Work Camps and Death Marches.

There isn't enough room or time here to do justice to his entire argument. But all three of these institutions were manned by people, few of whom were Nazi party members, who were military reservists or had been rejected by the military as too old or for medical reasons. They were older, not indoctrinated by ideology. Yet they killed when asked to.

They had the right to refuse. Goldhagen shows very clearly examples of men who refused and were assigned other duties or transferred. Absolutely NO evidence exists to prove the oft-repeated statement that to refuse meant death. The ones who did kill and then complained did not complain about having to kill but that it was done sloppily.

It's a lot to read, but I suggest that you get the book and read the first 5 parts. This will give you Goldhagen's theory of the eliminationist mindset and how it developed and the examples concerning the three organizations he has chosen. His research is impeccable and he has wonderful examples for all the assertions he makes. You can probably even skip some parts of the example sections since he tends to repeat often as if writing a doctoral thesis and making sure his point if understood.

But DO read it - at least parts. And DO read Part I completely. The development of the cognitive reasoning behind German anti-Semitism is crucial and often misunderstood.

And the result? The banality of evil.

Would have preferred first hand experiences

Good effort, I suppose.