A maelstrom of malice

1. A maelstrom of malice

2. Buchenwald Buchenwald was one of the largest concentration camps during the Holocaust. It was established in 1937 and is located near Weimar, Germany. When the camp opened, its original prisoners were political enemies and criminals to the Nazis. However, a mass influx of Jews arrived to the camp shortly after the event known as Kristallnacht. Like most concentration camps, prisoners in Buchenwald were brutalized and forced to work continuously in unsanitary conditions in an ammunitions factory. In 1942, as per Adolf Hitler’s “Final Solution”, a vast quantity of Jewish prisoners were sent to Auschwitz-Birkeneau, a notorious death camp. However, due to the approach of the Soviet army in 1945, prisoners in Auschwitz were evacuated, and some were deported to Buchenwald. Ignited by the hope for the end of WWII, along with the assistance of U.S. troops, Buchenwald was at last liberated on April 11, 1945. Despite the joyful victory, many survivors cannot forget the horrors they experienced. In total, Buchenwald held over 200,000 prisoners, including the renowned Elie Wiesel. In total, 43,045 prisoners died at Buchenwald. American soldiers liberating Buchenwald in 1945. http://www.scrapbookpages.com/Buchenwald/Liberation0.html Buchler, Yenashua. “Buchenwald.” Encyclopedia of the Holocaust. 1990. Print.

3. Medical experiments During the Holocaust, over 7,000 Jews, Gypsies, and other cultural groups whom the Nazis considered “non-Aryans” died a specifically inhumane death. These people were singled out to partake in “medical experiments”. These experiments were intended to portray the body’s limits in order to support men in the Nazis' war effort. However, these experiments were intolerably extreme and inhumane towards the body, such as: Having prisoners drink saltwater, put into a near vacuum to simulate high altitude, subjected to freezing temperatures, wounded to simulate combat, and other extremes. Experiments were also conducted in regard to certain prisoners being “non-Aryan”. These “experiments” however, were nothing more than torture, for instance, prisoners were starved, conjoined through merely sewing, and had blue dye injected into their eyes. At the end of WWII, these injustices were at last recognized at the Nuremburg Trials. 7 of the doctors whom conducted the experiments were executed, and 9 were sentenced to life in prison. Simulated war wounds http://www.oocities.org/remember_wwii/ravensbruck.html “Medical Experiments.” The Holocaust. 1997. Print

4. Nazi Party The infamous Nazi Party was the perpetrator of all of the horrors observed in the Holocaust. The Nazi (National Socialist German Workers) Party was formed just after WWI by unemployed former German soldiers. Infuriated by Germany’s loss of the war, the Nazi party promoted fascism and “race over borders”. The Nazis believed that they were the superior race amongst humans, and held strong anti-Semitic views (which had been held for nearly 400 years in Germany), believing that Jews had caused Germany’s defeat in WWI. In 1921, a poor worker named Adolf Hitler became head of the Nazi Party, and through intimidation, symbolism, and the influencing of German military leaders, Hitler gained power, and in 1933, he allowed the Nazi Party to overthrow the current Weimar Republic. Hitler promptly became chancellor of Germany, and under his rule, all German rights were revoked, and all whom the Nazis considered “non-Aryan (German)” were brutalized and stripped of their citizenship, an act that many consider to be the beginning of the Holocaust. Nazi leaders addressing the military http://thehistoryprofessor.us/bin/histprof/misc/hitler.html Lace, William. The Nazis. San Diego, CA: Lucent Books, 1998. Print.

5. Nuremburg Trials At the end of WWII, the leaders of the Nazi Party received justice for their many crimes. These “Nuremburg Trials” were run by the victorious Allied Powers. These trials were not intended to punish the nations and populations that lost the war, but rather the individual leaders who had caused the many inhumanities during the war, primarily the Holocaust. In total, 72 Nazi leaders were tried, including Herman Goring, Rudolf Hess, and Josef Mengele. 12 of these Nazis were sentenced to death, including Goring, Hitler’s chosen successor. However, Goring committed suicide before he could be executed. In the trials, the prosecutors strived to preserve justice, allowing those being prosecuted to defend themselves, despite overwhelming evidence of their crimes. This juncture was intended to portray humanity to the world, in an effort to prevent a potentially devastating WWIII. Herman Goring being prosecuted http://historyimages.blogspot.com/2011/12/nuremberg-trials-removing-traces-of.html Mushkat, Marian. “Nuremburg Trial”. The Encyclopedia of the Holocaust. 1990. Print

6. Elie Wiesel Eliezer Wiesel was an only son born in Romania in 1928. with the oncoming of Nazi power, he and his family were arrested in 1944, when he was only 15 years old. His family was then deported to Auschwitz-Birkeneau, and under the advice of an inmate he encountered, Wiesel claimed he was eighteen, in order to pass the inspection of the notorious Dr. Josef Mengele. In 1945, Wiesel was deported alone to Buchenwald, for the rest of his family had died in Auschwitz. Later, Wiesel was freed when Buchenwald was liberated in the spring of 1945. Wiesel later went on to study at the Sorbonne, in Paris, France. In 1956, Wiesel wrote his most renowned novel, “Night”, which depicted his ordeal in Auschwitz in a unique manner. Wiesel later wrote 24 more novels, and later won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 for his work in promoting humanity. Elie Wiesel, as of 2011 http://weekly.citypaper.com/Events/e159588/Elie_Wiesel Altman, Linda. The Jewish Victims of the Holocaust. Berkeley heights, NJ: Enslow Publishers, Inc., 2003. Print Pfefferkorn, Eli. “Wiesel, Elie.” Encyclopedia of the Holocaust. 1990. Print

7. Simon Wiesenthal Simon Wiesenthal was a Jew born in 1908 in what is now Buchach, Ukraine. He studied architecture at the Prague Technical University from 1928 until 1932. He then worked as an engineer and an architect until he was deported to a concentration camp in 1941. He was later freed in 1945 when U.S. soldiers liberated Mauthausen, the concentration camp he was in at the time. Appalled by the ordeals he and others suffered in the Holocaust, Wiesenthal resolved to devote his life to tracking down Nazi war criminals that had escaped justice after WWII. While working with various intelligence agencies in Austria, Wiesenthal helped locate various Nazi war criminals, including Adolf Eichmann, Franz Stangl, Gustav Wagner, Franz Murer, and Karl Silberbauner. He has been commemorated through the Simon Wiesenthal center in Los Angeles, and has also written various books commemorating the suffering of Holocaust victims. He died in 2005. Simon Wiesenthal as of 2000 http://austria-forum.org/af/Wissenssammlungen/Biographien/Wiesenthal%2C_Simon Zuroff, Efraim. “Wiesenthal, Simon”. Encyclopedia of the Holocaust. 1990. Print.