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Summary:
Shocking as it is, this book--a crucial source of original research used for the bestseller Hitler's Willing Executioners--gives evidence to suggest the opposite conclusion: that the sad-sack German draftees who perpetrated much of the Holocaust were not expressing some uniquely Germanic evil, but that they were average men comparable to the run of humanity, twisted by historical forces into inhuman shapes. Browning, a thorough historian who lets no one off the moral hook nor fails to weigh any contributing factor--cowardice, ideological indoctrination, loyalty to the battalion, and reluctance to force the others to bear more than their share of what each viewed as an excruciating duty--interviewed hundreds of the killers, who simply could not explain how they had sunken into savagery under Hitler. A good book to read along with Ron Rosenbaum's comparably excellent study Explaining Hitler. --Tim Appelo
Customer Reviews:
Average Customer Rating:
Ordinary Men is a grisly look at a German killing squad implementing the Final Solution in Poland
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Christopher Browning is a distinguished historian of the horror of the Nazi holacaust against the Jews during World War II, His book on Reserve Police Battalion 101 is a microcosmic examination of how ordinary men responded to the Hitler's regime's insane plan to kill all of the Jews in Europe. The book focuses on the Reserve Police Battalion 101 made up of lower middle class men from Hamburg. These men were typical Germans in their views toward Jewry and the Nazi propaganda drummed into their heads. Most of the soldiers were long married, had some level of education and managed to avoid frontline service. These men were not in the military elite and most prefered civilian life back home in Hamburg. These approximately 500 soldiers particpated in several shooting of Jews in Polish villages; transportation of the Jews to death camps and Jew hunts in which the hapless Semites would be captured. They are responsible for the shooting of 6,500 Jews at Jozefow and Lomazy; 35,000 at Majdanek and Poniatowa and placing Jews on trains to Treblinka. In all they participated in the deaths of 83,000 Jewish men, women and children. The vast majority of the German soldiers took part in the murders. Some were reluctant to engage in this murderous enterprise by they were in the minority. Among reasons given for the odious and criminal behavior of the men in Reserve Police Batallion 101 are according to Browning: 1. Peer pressure of their comrades in arms. These were men in hostile territory who did not want to be accused of letting their buddies down. 2. Obedience to orders from higher authorities. 3. Fears of their or their family's punishment if orders were not obeyed. 4. A belief that the Jews were not Aryan human beings and were responsible for the killing of German women and children. Browning claims each person's motivations are a mystery to the rest of us and we can never say beyond extrapolation what led these men to commit such abhorrent deads of cruelty and murder. Browning has included a long appendix in which he responds to the criticisms on his work made by Dr. Daniel Goldhagen. Goldhagen believes that Germany was pervaded by antisemetic culture making the entire nation into Hitler's willing executioners. Browning contrarily argues that antisemitism was not limited to Germany. Browning states that German authoritarianism, conformity with the social group and Nazi propaganda all played a role in turning regular individuals into mass killers. He is cautionary on the power for harm which can be inflicted by authoritarian states on their citizens. Browning's book is a classic of holocaust literature and is essential in any study of the gruesome and heartbreaking study.
How important stories get to be told the wrong way
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Another brick from the the Professors' classroom. I got to page 148, which was quite a feat, believe you me. But important it is. I don't deny that, and true too.
Here's a token of the Professor's clear narrative style: "The portrayal of German-Polish and German-Jewish relations in these testimonies is extraordinarily exculpatory; in contrast, the portrayal of Polish-Jewish relations is extraordinarily damning. If we begin by examining the first two relationships as described by the former policemen, we can better see the asymmetry and distortion involved in their account of the third." Of the third! The third what? Do you know what he's taking about anymore?
Please, give me a break, mister. I believe the Lord gives gifts and talents to every one of His creatures. You can pick to be a bullfighter, a fireman, or a professor. But pick right.
Frightfully banal
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This book, which follows step by step the itinerary of a battalion of German security police in the East during WWII, is a scary confirmation of Hannah Arendt's theory on the "banality of evil" that emerged after Eichmann's trial in 1961. It shows how perfectly average people, representing a cross-section of a developped country's society, when placed in certain circumstances, are able to perform the most gruesome and crual acts of barbary in an efficient and non-committal way against innocent populations. It is a depressing book, all the more so as almost none of these perpetrators suffered any consequence after the war. They went on to live their banal and mediocre lives as ordinary people, until the 1960's when some of them were tried and suffered very light sentences.
Excellent
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Very well-done and insightful study on ordinary Germans in the Holocaust and Browning's overall thesis extends to "ordinary men" in many circumstances.
Not for the faint of heart, or the weak of stomach!
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This book (as described by previous reviewers and the product description) details what the men in the Nazi Reserve Police Battalion 101 went through, specifically during the SS Invasion of Poland.
Browning describes in detail the process of dehumanizing the Jews, and writes at length on the style of execution that the Germans refined and perfected in Poland, prior to the widespread use of gas chambers: the person to be killed forced to lie down flat on their face, and then shot at a particular spot in their neck. The accounts of these executions is not just gratuitous violence -- graphic gore for the sake of shock or horror -- but rather, demonstrates that over time, the police officers involved in the executions worked to make the process of mass killing more humane (an idea that was at the root of the gas chambers, as ironic as that seems). It also serves to drive home the point that after so many hundreds of people were shot, the officers were able to completely dehumanize the people they were killing.
What is unique about this book is that it is not just another historical account; the author takes into consideration what the Nazis themselves had to go through, psychologically and emotionally, in order to carry out their orders. Many other historians have analyzed historical events during WWII while still demonizing the Nazi forces ~ but Browning shows us that the troops really were Ordinary Men, and these men suffered tremendous emotional tolls as a result.
And herein lies the Truth that makes this book so chilling: any one of us could have found ourselves in the very same position, carrying out the very same orders, as the German troops in WWII.
Browning describes the various social conditions and governmental policies that effected how the Nazis were able to so completely dehumanize their enemy and rationalize their own involvement -- in part, because the men were assuaged of their sense of responsibility for their actions, and also in part due to the tremendous number of times that the actions had to be carried out. Repetition bred a sense of normalcy.
In the Afterword, Browning addresses another author who has critiqued Browning's work -- Daniel Jonah Goldhagen -- whose work I feel compelled to mention since it directly relates to this book.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who is studying modern history, sociology / psychology, or WWII, but keep in mind that it is extremely graphic and very, very hard to read -- not because of the language used, but because of the events that Browning so meticulously describes.
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