Days of Remembrance

1. Days of Remembrance April 28 – May 5, 2019

2. Days of Remembrance The U.S Congress established the Days of Remembrance as the Nation’s annual commemoration of the Holocaust. Each year, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) leads the nation in commemorating the Days of Remembrance. A sampling of identification card photos of local Jewish residents that were found on the floor of the Gestapo headquarters in Biala Rawska in January 1945. Courtesy of the USHMM Days of Remembrance

3. Days of Remembrance The internationally recognized date for Holocaust Remembrance Day corresponds to the 27th day of Nisan on the Hebrew calendar. It marks the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. In Hebrew, Holocaust Remembrance Day is called Yom Hashoah. When the actual date of Yom Hashoah falls on a Friday, the state of Israel observes Yom Hashoah on the preceding Thursday. When it falls on a Sunday, Yom Hashoah is observed on the following Monday. In the United States, Days of Remembrance runs from the Sunday before Yom Hashoah through the following Sunday. This year Yom Hashoah falls on Thursday, May 2nd. Remembrance Calendar

4. The Holocaust The Holocaust was the methodical persecution and murder of six million European Jews and the millions of non-Jewish victims of Nazi persecution. To the anti-Semitic Nazi leader Adolf Hitler, Jews were an inferior race, and an alien threat to German racial purity and community. Nazi propaganda posters depicting German racial superiority and the inferiority of Jews. Courtesy of the USHMM Introduction to the Holocaust

5. The Final Solution In an address to German parliament, Hitler stated: “The peoples [of the earth] will soon realize that Germany under National Socialism does not desire the enmity of other peoples. I want once again to be a prophet. If the international Finance-Jewry inside and outside of Europe should succeed in plunging the peoples of the earth once again into a world war, the result will be not the Bolshevization of earth, and thus a Jewish victory, but the annihilation of the Jewish race in Europe.” Nazi banner. The swastika became the most recognizable icon of Nazi propaganda. Courtesy of the USHMM Hitler's speech before the Reichstag

6. Targeted Groups Other groups were also targeted and killed—including at times their children—because of their perceived racial and biological inferiority. These included Roma (Gypsies), people with disabilities, and others such as Poles, Soviet civilians, and blacks. Other groups were persecuted on political, ideological, and behavioral grounds. Among them were Communists, Socialists, Jehovah's Witnesses, and homosexuals. Propaganda article titled “Vagabonds: New Ways of Combating the Gypsy Plague.” Courtesy of the USHMM

7. Concentration Camps Between 1933 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its allies established more than 42,000 camps and other incarceration sites (including ghettos). Millions of people were imprisoned and abused in the various types of Nazi camps. Only a small fraction of those imprisoned in Nazi camps survived. Auschwitz mug shot of Czeslawa Kwaka.She arrived at Auschwitz on December 13, 1942, and died there March 12, 1943. Courtesy of the USHMM Concentration Camps

8. Identifying Prisoners: The Marking System  From 1938, Jews in the camps were identified by a yellow star sewn onto their prison uniforms, a perversion of the Jewish Star of David symbol. After 1939, and with some variation from camp to camp, the categories of prisoners were easily identified by a marking system combining a colored inverted triangle with lettering. The badges sewn onto prisoner uniforms enabled SS guards to identify the alleged grounds for incarceration. Nazi camp ID-emblems in a 1936 German illustration. Courtesy of the USHMM The Marking System

9. Identifying Prisoners: Colors Political prisoners, such as Communists, Socialists, and trade unionists wore red triangles. Non-German prisoners were identified by letters indicating their nationality: for example, P stood for Polish, F for French. Common criminals wore green. “Asocials” (including Roma, nonconformists, vagrants, and other groups) wore black or—in the case of Roma in some camps—brown triangles. Jehovah's Witnesses wore purple triangles, and homosexuals wore pink ones. The two triangles forming the Jewish star badge would both be yellow unless the Jewish prisoner was included in one of the other prisoner categories. A Jewish political prisoner, for example, would be identified with a yellow triangle beneath a red triangle. Classification System in Nazi Concentration Camps

10. Raising Awareness Days of Remembrance raises awareness that democratic institutions and values are not simply sustained, but need to be appreciated, nurtured, and protected. The Holocaust illustrates the ramifications of prejudice, racism, and stereotyping in any society. Anti-Semitism, neo-Nazism, and racism can still be found throughout the world, including the United States.

11. Conclusion The goal of the Department of Defense’s observation of Holocaust Memorial Day is to remember the atrocities of the Third Reich in hope that “Never Again” is a consciously and faithfully enforced promise. Silence and indifference to the suffering of others, or to the infringement of civil rights in any society, can—however unintentionally—perpetuate these problems. Charlotte Adelman, Holocaust survivor, meets with Airmen during the Days of Remembrance. Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force

12. “We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. Sometimes we must interfere. When human lives are endangered, when human dignity is in jeopardy, national borders and sensitivities become irrelevant. Wherever men or women are persecuted because of their race, religion, or political views, that place must—at that moment—become the center of the universe.” - Elie Wiesel, Holocaust Survivor Elie Wiesel Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech

13. End Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute, Patrick Air Force Base, Florida April 2019 All photographs are public domain and from various sources, as cited. The information in this document is not to be construed as an official DEOMI, U.S. Military Services, or Department of Defense position.