South Carolina Voices: Lessons from the Holocaust

Teaching Lesson Eleven

(This lesson is divided into two parts because of space restrictions.)

Materials: Handout 11A: 150-Percent Nazi; Handout 11B: Nazi Education; Handout 11C: News from Germany: 1992

Key Terms: Hitler Youth, indoctrination, vigilance

PROCEDURE

Motivate: Remind students that all of the South Carolinians they have read about so far were either survivors of the Holocaust or American soldiers who saw the horrors of the concentration camps at liberation. Peter Becker, the South Carolinian they will read about in this lesson, is different. Like many thousands of non-Jewish Germans who lived during this period, he was not just a passive bystander in the persecution of Jews and other minorities, but an active supporter of Hitler and the Nazi party. In his own words, he was, "150-percent Nazi." Handout 11A offers some insight into how young Germans like Peter Becker were educated or indoctrinated in the prewar period and the war years to develop loyalty to Nazism and Hitler. In Handout 11B Becker tells the story of how he became a Nazi and of how his intense admiration for Hitler changed after the war ended.

Explain to the class that in any society, individuals learn the normal, or accepted, political beliefs and behavior of their society from their family, friends, schools, churches or synagogues, and other community organizations. Learning the accepted political beliefs and behavior of one's society is called political socialization.

Begin the lesson by asking students to name some of the political values and beliefs they have learned as Americans. Write their responses on the board. You may want to give them a few examples to begin with. Voting is an important right and responsibility of citizens. All people are created equal; all people should be treated equally under the law. The U.S. is a democracy whose leaders govern with the consent of the people. When the list is completed, have students discuss where they have learned these beliefs and behaviors of American democracy. (school, textbooks, home, church or synagogue, television and other media) Then explain that in this lesson, students will read about a young man who was socialized in a very different political culture, Nazi Germany in the late 1930s and early 1940s.

Develop: Distribute Handout 11A. Ask each student to write down eight political beliefs, values, or ideas that a German boy might have learned in the course of his schooling, judging by the statements of the Nazi Minister of Education and the examples from the arithmetic book and geography lesson. Have students share their lists with the class. Among the values or beliefs students might mention are the following: the state is more important than the individual; a good German should be willing to sacrifice or face death for the Nazis and for Hitler; the purpose of schooling is to teach obedience to authority; the most important responsibility of a girl is to bear children; girls do not need to be well educated to fulfill their responsibilities to the Nazi state; Jews are aliens; Germany is powerful because of its racial purity; the U.S. is weak because of its racial impurity; democracy is an inferior and inefficient form of government.

Distribute Handout 11B. Have students read the handout and work in groups to write answers to four questions.

1. How was Peter socialized or educated to become a Hitler Youth?

2. Name at least three values or political beliefs and ideas Peter held as a Hitler Youth.

3. Who did Peter blame for Germany's current economic problems? How did he form this opinion?

4. Why do you think Peter so willingly accepted and did not question what he learned in the special Nazi school, in public school, and in the Hitler Youth?

Have various students share their responses with the class for questions 1 and 3. To better involve the entire class, ask one student for a value or belief found in question 2, next ask for hands of all those who agree with that response. Now question those who did not raise their hands. Ask why they did not agree with that answer. Ask one or two students why they do not think that the given response was a belief or value Peter held. Continue with this method until you have covered all possible answers.

Finally, focus discussion on question 4. Make sure students understand that Peter's family, his peers, his teachers, respected authority figures like the Nazi leaders who visited his school and shared and reinforced the beliefs and values he was learning in his school, his after-school activities, and his youth group. Moreover, his textbooks taught and reinforced his distorted view of German history. In addition, his access to information, particularly accurate information, was carefully controlled in the special Nazi school. In his later teen years, although his life was less structured or controlled, information was still carefully screened and censored by the totalitarian government under which he lived.

Next have students describe the events which led Peter to question his understanding of German history and the Nazi government. List responses on the board. (viewing traveling exhibit in Bremen, listening to Nuremberg Trials, talking with the American teacher, studying German history) Ask students how each of these events affected his view of the Nazis, the war, and his own participation in the Hitler Youth.

Conclude by exploring with the class the final paragraph of Handout 11B entitled "A Warning." Write the following statement on the board: "Eternal Vigilance Is the Price of Liberty." Briefly review with the class Overviews II and III. Now have a volunteer paraphrase the statement and explain how it applies to events in Nazi Germany. What safeguards exist in a democracy to make the rise of a Hitler or a catastrophe like the Holocaust less likely? Why does Becker consider a free press so important to the defense of liberty? How would Becker's education have been different if Nazi Germany had allowed a free press at that time? Why didn't Hitler allow a free press? Why do you think Becker says people need to become "politically active" to protect their freedoms? What does he mean by "politically active"? Examples of politically active citizens include people who are informed about events in their community, state, and nation; knowledgeable about the candidates who run for office; registering and voting; willing to speak out against actions by other citizens or government leaders that affect or take away the rights of citizens and minorities.

Extend: As a final activity, use Handout 11C, which comes from a 1992 newspaper article. Explain to the class that Nazi Hunter Simon Wiesentahl has identified six conditions that he believes made it possible for the Holocaust to take place. These conditions are:

1. The existence of a feeling of overpowering hatred by the people of a nation.

2. A charismatic leader able to identify the feelings of anger and alienation that existed within the nation and able to convert these feelings into hatred of a target group.

3. A government bureaucracy that could be taken over and used to organize a policy of repression and extermination.

4. A highly developed state of technology that makes possible methods of mass extermination.

5. War or economic hard times.

6. A target group against whom this hatred could be directed.

Write these six conditions on the board. Then distribute Handout 11C. Have students decide or summarize for students whether any of these conditions existed in Germany in 1992 at the time this article was written and how many if any, exist in Germany or any other country today. Discuss what students might do or encourage others to do to make sure that the situations such as those they read about in this newspaper article do not escalate further. Sould the government play a role in ending outbreaks of violence such as these? What responsibility do individuals or private citizens have for defusing such situations? Have students report to the class on how the German government and private citizens responded to the rise in hate crimes in their country. (banning neo-Nazi parties, limiting immigration from Eastern Europe, marching to protest Nazism)

HANDOUT 11A—150 PERCENT NAZI

(Today Peter Becker is the chairperson of the History Department at the University of South Carolina, but in the 1930s he was growing up in Germany, his native country. Becker was born in Munich, Germany in 1929. He was the oldest of four boys. When he was five years old, his father died. His widowed mother had no way to support her young children and she decided to place Peter in one of Hitler's special schools for Hitler Youth, the future leaders of the Nazi Party.)

Enrolled in School by Mother

At the age of six I was not aware of the existence of the Hitler Youth or of Hitler for that matter. It was a shock to me to be going on a trip with my mother. I was taken to Potsdam and introduced to various people. All of a sudden my mother said goodbye and left. I was then in a school, but I was not aware of the purpose of the school. The school in which I was enrolled and where my brothers also came later was set up for the training of the future leaders of the Nazi party. I was in the National Political Education Institution at Potsdam. It was the only school in which children were enrolled as young as age six. Nazi party membership was not a requirement for my school. To get into this school, you had to be reasonably intelligent and in good physical condition, healthy, no blemishes, no impairments. You also had to be an Aryan, no Jewish blood. It was a boarding school. We only went home during vacations, Easter, Christmas, and the six-week summer vacation.

The Curriculum

As Hitler Youth, our activities were not much different from other German school children. Our curriculum included English, mathematics, biology, chemistry, and physics, Latin, geography, and music. We were in a boarding school and under constant supevision. We were raised in a military lifestyle. Our lives were regulated from morning until night. We all got up at a certain time, very early. We then performed exercises out in the yard regardless of the weather, winter and summer. We then ate breakfast, made our beds, washed, dressed and went to school. At lunch time we marched to lunch. After lunch we did some homework. Then we ate the evening meal and had more activities.

Extracurricular Activities

It was in the after-school activities that my life differed from that of a normal boy who went to public school. Our life was much more structured. Whatever Hitler wanted to do with us, we took in, in a very careful fashion. We were not aware of being indoctrinated. It was a very subtle process. We had a great number of activities. One afternoon was devoted to marching out into the countryside. We played games where we chased each other, but the objective was to learn how to move in underbrush, forests, and fields. Even play was designed to prepare us for a military life. Once a week we drilled, learning how to march, salute, and make turns.

A Nazi without Knowing It

In the evenings we were shown movies. The movies generally had some kind of patriotic or political message even though we were not aware of that. When we were older, speakers came who spoke to us on various issues. Once the war started, it became one of the primary topics: how the war was going, what Germany was going to do, how Germany was successful in doing this or that. We were indoctrinated in a very subtle fashion so that by the time the war ended in 1945, when I was 15, I had become a Nazi without even becoming aware that I was one. That is, I didn't know how I had become one.

To me Hitler was the great man in Germany's life. I had become convinced that Hitler was the savior of Germany. I could believe all this because our knowledge of what had gone on in the past was very limited. We were carefully kept from having a broad picture of history. We were not aware of what Germany had done before. Our history lessons started with the First World War and the depressing period after Germany had been beaten down as a result of the Treaty of Versailles, disarmed, and saddled with reparations. We learned that Hitler came along to lift Germany out of this muck and bring it back to greatness. We felt that we were part of that and we were very proud. The Jews were not mentioned very often. Our enemies were the French, the Russians or Bolsheviks, and the English. We were taught that the war was all an attempt by the other European countries to encircle Germany and keep it down. Hitler had succeeded in exploding this ring of encirclement to make Germany free again. He had rearmed Germany, making it a great power again.

Learning Anti-Semitism

We were aware that the Jews existed, but there was very little attention given to the Jews. We received publications which, however, were very effective. They dealt with such distortions and lies as, for example, how the Jews were the big imperialists in England and France. The Jewish people were woven into the general picture that was drawn for us of the outside world. We never saw any Jews. We didn't know any Jews, at least not in the school. In the school we saw publications in which Jews were depicted as fat and ugly. Those pictures stayed with me longer than any verbal impression that could have been given to me. I didn't know any Jews except the one Jewish family across the street from my grandfather's house in Oranienburg. I played with the daughter when I was younger. I only learned after the war that they were Jewish.

We did not have access to radio on a regular basis. We were not given newspapers. Our knowledge of what was going on in the outside world came totally from what we were told. Once the war started, we listened to radio broadcasts about the military progress but this news was very controlled. We were winning and that was great, so we all felt very happy.

Hitler's picture was in every room, in every classroom, and in every dormitory room. Hitler and other powerful Nazi leaders were our heroes. Because we were in a school close to Berlin, we were used for exhibit purposes whenever the regime had an important visitor, a prime minister or some other foreign visitor. We were shown off as part of the New Germany. We saw Goebbels, Himmler, Goering, Mussolini and Mussolini's Secretary of State. All the important people who happened to be in Berlin and who had dealings with the Third Reich came to our school. We were all very impressed with that and thought, "How great and good we are."

When I was 13, I left the school and came home. I had become ill. My illness kept me from staying and I was very happy about this. What I hated about the school was not the indoctrination. It was being away from home. We were in an environment which consisted of 50 other boys. I did not get much attention. Certainly not as much as I wanted to. I didn't resent being there because of the nature of the school. I resented being away from home.

History Rewritten by the Nazis

I went to a normal public school in Potsdam. The curriculum was not similar to what we had in the Nazi school. It was a normal curriculum except that biology, history, and geography were clearly affected by Nazi ideology. Jews were depicted in the biology books as an inferior race who exploited others. In biology we also learned about racial purity. In geography we were told how Germany had suffered and how Germany had lost its colonies while England, for example, was amassing its empire. The poor Germans had been deprived of all the pleasures of empire. It was the French and British who had kept the Germans down. The Germans were a downtrodden people resurrected by Hitler for greatness. Germany was the only pure Aryan country. All the others were contaminated. We were led to believe that we were the top people. The Germans had made all the important innovations in modern civilization. It was German order and discipline and German industry which was foremost.

Joins the Regular Hitler Youth

When I left the Nazi school, I became a member of the regular Hitler Youth. By that time membership in the Hitler Youth was compulsory. I never questioned the fact that we had to join. It was also something that I wanted to do. It was fun. I joined the Hitler Youth Cavalry. We learned how to ride horses and drive a coach with four horses. It was all very exciting. These activities were interspersed with indoctrination evenings when all Hitler Youth groups came together to listen to speakers praising Hitler and the Nazi party and to talk about the victories Germany was winning, even though we were, by that time, retreating.

No Awareness of Germany Losing War

Towards the end of the war, all news in Germany was carefully controlled. We didn't see any pictures in the paper about the results of air raids. In Potsdam, where I lived, we did not know what an air raid really meant.

It was not until 1943 when I took my first trip to Berlin that I saw ruins. I was shocked, but I still believed we were going to win the war. The bombing of Berlin was a temporary setback. The city would be rebuilt in much greater splendor than before.

Until the very last minute I thought we were winning because I was also a full believer in the propaganda which said that the Germans were working on wonder weapons. Until the day the Russians showed up on the outskirts of Potsdam and began to shell it, I was convinced that Germany would win the war. It shows how strong indoctrination and propaganda can be, and how easily people can be misled.

150-Percent Nazi

When the war ended in 1945, I was almost 16. The Russians moved in and occupied Potsdam. The janitor in our building was a member of the Communist party. He went to the police and denounced me as having been a very strong Nazi. Indeed I was a Nazi. What kind of Nazi was I? I think I was 150-percent Nazi. That's how strongly I believed in the system and what Hitler was doing. I was picked up by the Russians and questioned. When they realized I was harmless, I was released. That's when my family decided to move to Bremen, another city in Germany.

Shortly after the Russians occupied Berlin, they put up bulletin boards on street corners to which were pasted newspaper articles or newspapers. I remember seeing a headline that said Germans killed 4 million Jews. I was outraged. I was convinced at first that this headline was similar to the accusations made against the Germans during the First World War. It was just propaganda by the British and Americans. I was convinced that Germany was being set up as the guilty party to pay reparations again. Then after a while the figures changed. Ultimately it was 6 million. I still did not believe it.

I looked in an almanac which said Germany only had about 600,000 Jewish people. I wondered how we could possibly have killed 6 million. Then I looked at the areas which Germany had occupied from 1939 until 1945 and at the Jewish population in France, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Austria, Poland and Russia. Then I realized that the numbers fit. It was possible for the Germans to have done this. I still did not believe it. To me it was inconceivable that we Germans could have done that.

Begins to Question

My mind changed slowly. It was a painful process which took place over a period of two years between 1945 and 1947. The first thing that made me change my mind or accept what had happened was a traveling exhibit that came to Bremen. It consisted of things from various concentration camps. The ones that I remember were lamp shades made out of human skins.

Reluctantly I became convinced that what the Germans were accused of was actually true. By that time I was 16 or 17 and the Nuremberg Trials had begun. I listened to them on the radio and read the reports about them. Then we saw newsreels of the concentration camps, showing what the Germans had done, not only in Germany, but also, in the death camps in Poland. I began to learn the difference between the camps in Germany and the camps in Poland.

Learns the Truth at Last

Then I met an American high school teacher working in Germany. We had long talks about Hitler, politics, and democracy. At first I was a defender of Hitler and of Germany. I felt that Germany had been unjustly maligned. But through our discussions I began to see a different picture. It took me two years to fully accept what the Germans had done. I think that's why I became a historian. I wanted to understand what had happened to Germany and to me. It has helped me to understand. But have I come to terms with my past? The answer is no.

An Unanswered Question

Had I become a member of the SS and been assigned as a guard to a concentration camp or to a police unit which did nothing but shoot people, what would I have done? I don't know. I would hope that I would have realized that what I was being asked to do was a great crime. But I don't know whether I would have had that internal strength or whether I would have been swept up in events to become a mindless follower as all the others were who did not speak out or even blink an eye at what was happening. It is something I still, to this day, cannot answer. I'm very fortunate I never had to answer that question.

A Warning

There is a saying on the columns of the National Archives building in Washington, D.C.: Eternal Vigilance Is the Price of Liberty. People like Hitler exist in every age under different guises. There are always people who follow such leaders without questioning too much because whatever convinces them is so strong they don't see anything else. What prevents a society from falling into that trap is eternal vigilance, making sure that there are no secrets. A strong press is one of the absolute safeguards of a democratic political system. So are openness and popular participation. People have to become politically active not necessarily in the sense of joining a party, but contributing their share to society and not letting other people do it for them.

Teaching Lesson Eleven (cont.)