This book, The Origins of the Final Solution; The origin of Nazi Jewish Policy September 1939-March 1942, was authored by Christopher R. Browning. The book was published by the University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and Yad Vashem, Jerusalem, in 2007. Jurgen Matthaus also contributed to the book’s development and publication. The book is considered a part of a larger project that aims to produce multiple volumes that will give a comprehensive history of the happenings of the Holocaust.
The book is one of the three books produced to examine the establishment of the Nazi Jewish policy. In the second chapter of the book Poland, “Laboratory of Racial Policy,” Browning discusses the German invasion and conquest of Poland in September 1939 (Browning 15). This chapter best suits to be in the second chapter after the background. This is because the book describes the Nazi Jewish policy and starts from the beginning of the prewar in 1939. The events of 1939, therefore, should come in the book’s first chapter.
The author Christopher Browning was an American Historian born in 1944. He is a professor emeritus of history at North Carolina University at Chapel Hill. He is a known specialist on the Holocaust and a writer on the various historical happenings. Browning has also served as an expert witness at Holocaust-related legal proceedings such as the Irving V Penguin Books LTD in 2000 and 1988 at the Ernst Zundel second trial (Browning 29). He has authored nine books, including The Origins of the Final Solution and Ordinary Men.
The Origins of the Final Solution was drafted to serve the sole purpose of providing the detail of the Holocaust to people. Therefore, the book has no specific target audience as different population uses it. However, it can be argued that Browning was aiming at his students; the book is used in universities by tutors and students perusing history. The general public also has access to the book as they seek to have an understanding of the past happening. Experts such as those in the legal field have also used the book’s details in managing their affairs in Holocaust-related trials.
Browning’s book The Origin of Solution can be categorized as a more specialized book. The details of the writings provide objective facts Holocaust happening. Each event in the book is attributed to the exact dates of its occurrence. The book covers up to 1942, when the Germans liquated the gas Jews and the polish Ghettos in Belzec (Browning 19). This book provides an interpretational framework of Holocaust history.
In this chapter on Poland, the Laboratory of Racial Policy describes the events following the German invasion and conquest of Poland. It approximates that over two million Jews were taken captive by Germans (Browning 15). Approximately 1.8 million Jews were retained after the German and Russian borders were drawn (Browning 15). This led to a dilemma that was named the Jewish question. The query posed could hardly be solved unless the regions within the German influence and occupation were redefined.
The chapter further describes the events that led to Poland becoming a laboratory for racial experiments. Hitler believed that there was a need for the application of German Lebensraum (Breitman 67). He envisioned developing the Nazi empire that could be analogous to the others built by European Imperial powers (Browning 20). Such a goal could, however, lead to the Nazi regime being imposed on populations that had been conquered in Europe.
For this reason, Poland was declared a laboratory for which the Nazi ideologies were to be turned into reality (Chappel and Tom 60). These trials included living space (Lebensraum), ethnic or racial struggle (Volkstumskampf), and the final solution to the Jewish problem (Endlosung der dudenfrage) (Browning 19). The processes were trial and error because nobody understood the explicit slogans or their exact meaning, and they required significant compromises. Hitler deployed the Army to conduct its operations in Poland to aid in the conquering operations (Matthäus 102). This, however, resulted in conflict between military leaders, the church, and those associated with National Socialism when the soldiers used excessive force, resulting in massive deaths.
This chapter also describes the order of activities that led to the collapse of Poland. The shaping of the Nazi Policy was the first one on September 7 1939 (Browning 25). Leaders such as Heydrich and other division heads met to evaluate and propose concerns regarding Poland, racial policy and the Nazi’s Lebensraum plan. In their strategy, there could be massive deportation and resettlement and the creation of new institutions, techniques, and training of personnel. The German terror followed the formulation of the policy (Mosse 160). Intensification of terror began during the Polish campaign when 10,000 arrests were made to neutralize any possible anti-German movements (Schleunes 128). The horror intensified throughout September as the Army was deployed and equipped.
The terror was followed by the liquidation of certain people who were deemed to be a danger to pacification. This included the incorporation of territories and deportation of groups that were an obstacle to the Germanization process (Browning 26). This was followed by the leaders providing a proving environment for the Nazi personnel to conduct their operations without much distraction. The last occurrences were the killing and flying of poles and Jews that had been expelled.
Browning only used both secondary and primary in his writing. He, however, used primary sources such as recordings and documentaries of the historical happening of that time. He reports the rise of Germany and the fall of nations such as Poland in the dilemma of the Nazi question. In the first chapter of Poland, Laboratory of Racial Policy, Browning provides no argument but details the Holocaust between 1939 and 1942 (Browning 27). He provides a sequential explanation of every occurrence under the regime of Hitler in his effort to invade and conquer nations and establish a Nazi empire.
Works Cited
Breitman, Richard. The Architect of Genocide: Himmler and the Final Solution. Plunkett Lake Press, 2022.
Browning, Christopher R. The Origins of the Final Solution: The Evolution of Nazi Jewish Policy, September 1939-March 1942. University of Nebraska Press, 2007.
Chappel, James, and Tom Stammers. An Analysis of Christopher R. Browning’s Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Batallion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland. Macat Library, 2017.
Matthäus, Jürgen. Predicting the Holocaust: Jewish Organizations Report from Geneva on the Emergence of the “Final Solution,” 1939–1942. Rowman & Littlefield, 2018.
Mosse, George L. Toward the final solution: A History of European Racism. University of Wisconsin Press, 2020.
Schleunes, Karl A. “Nazi Plans for Addressing the Jewish Problem: From “Fringe Irritant”(1929) to the “Machtergreifung”(1933).” Beyond” Ordinary Men”. Brill Schöningh, 2019, pp. 121-133.