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Having attained power as Chancellor, Hitler--who had fought in the First World War--began planning a Second World. He declared that if millions of Germans had to perish in the next war, he would not shrink from making this sacrifice.
But then he reflected: if the leader of a great nation has the right to send its "best" people to die in war--its own honorable, soldiers--why would this leader not also have the right to send its "worst" people to die? Why would he shrink from sending the dishonorable ones to die? The "shirkers?"
The logic of the Holocaust followed based on the logic of warfare.
By the end of the winter of 1941-42, more than 90% of the Jews trapped by the Germans east of the Soviet border were dead. The extermination of men, women, and children did not disturb Hitler:
Nature is cruel. Therefore, we, too, may be cruel. If I don't mind sending the pick of the German people into the hell of war without regret for the shedding of valuable German blood, then I have naturally the right to destroy millions of men of inferior races who increase like vermin.
Hitler understood the meaning of the Holocaust. His thinking was not complex. He simply recognized and embraced the ideology of nationalism and the relationship between nationalism and warfare.
"Nations" are given the right to send their young men to die in war. We don't feel this is wrong. This is the obligation of young men. It happened during the First World War in which most of the nations of the world participated. You know the story. Young men were sent to be slaughtered.
So, Hitler reasoned, if nations during the First World War had no compunctions about sending their own men to run into machine gun fire, why can't I also slaughter Jews, the world people, dishonorable shirkers without honor?
The Holocaust grew out of Hitler's understanding of the logic of the First World War.
But we don't want to say this. Deep down, we know it, but don't want to allow the truth to enter consciousness. We kill our own young men. Can you say it? Can you know it?
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