War of Extermination

The German Military in World War II
1. Auflage 2004
ISBN: 978-1-57181-493-7
Verlag: Berghahn Books

Buch, Englisch, Band 3, 504 Seiten, Format (B × H): 140 mm x 216 mm, Gewicht: 628 g

Reihe: War and Genocide

Among the many myths about the relationship of Nazism to the mass of the German population, few proved more powerful in postwar West Germany than the notion that the Wehrmacht had not been involved in the crimes of the Third Reich. Former generals were particularly effective in spreading, through memoirs and speeches, the legend that millions of German soldiers had fought an honest and "clean" war and that mass murder, especially in the East, was entirely the work of Himmler's SS. This volume contains the most important contributions by distinguished historians who have thoroughly demolished this Wehrmacht myth. The picture that emerges from this collection is a depressing one and raises many questions about why "ordinary men" got involved as perpetrators and bystanders in an unprecedented program of extermination of "racially inferior" men, women, and children in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union during the Second World War. Those who have seen these terrible photos of mass executions and other atrocities, currently on show in an exhibition in Germany and soon to be in the United States, will find this volume most enlightening.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Heer, Hannes

Naumann, Klaus

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Deutsche Geschichte
• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politische Gewalt Völkermord, Ethnische Säuberung, Kriegsverbrechen
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Genozid und ethnische Säuberung
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Besondere Kriege und Kampagnen

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of Abbreviations

Preface

Volker R. Berghahn

Introduction

Hannes Heer and Klaus Naumann

Chapter 1. The Concept of the War of Annihilation: Clausewitz, Ludendorff, Hitler

Jan Philipp Reemtsma

PART I: CRIMES

Chapter 2. “Coming Along to Shoot Some Jews?” The Destruction of the Jews in Serbia

Walter Manoschek

Chapter 3. Killing Fields: The Wehrmacht and the Holocaust in Belorussia, 1941–42

Hannes Heer

Chapter 4. Soviet Prisoners of War in the Hands of the Wehrmacht

Christian Streit

Chapter 5. The Logic of the War of Extermination: The Wehrmacht and the Anti-Partisan War

Hannes Heer

Chapter 6. Men of 20 July and the War in the Soviet Union

Christian Gerlach

Chapter 7. Military Violence and the National Socialist Consensus: The Wehrmacht in Greece, 1941–44

Mark Mazower

Chapter 8. Civitella della Chiana on 29 June 1944: The Reconstruction of a German “Measure”

Michael Geyer

PART II: FORMATIONS

Chapter 9. Local Headquarters Liepaja: Two Months of German Occupation in the Summer of 1941

Margers Vestermanis

Chapter 10. On the Way to Stalingrad: The 6th Army in 1941–42

Bernd Boll and Hans Safrian

Chapter 11. Incident at Baranivka: German Reprisals and the Soviet Partisan Movement in Ukraine, October–December 1941

Truman Anderson

Chapter 12. Koru¨ck 582

Theo J. Schulte

Chapter 13. How Amorality Became Normality: Reflections on the Mentality of German Soldiers on the Eastern Front

Hannes Heer

Chapter 14. Emptying the Gaze: Framing Violence through the Viewfinder

Bernd Hu¨ppauf

PART III: AFTERMATH

Chapter 15. Forward Defense: The “Memorandum of the Generals” for the Nuremberg Court

Manfred Messerschmidt

Chapter 16. Whose History Is It, Anyway? The Wehrmacht and German Historiography

Omer Bartov

Chapter 17. The “Unblemished” Wehrmacht: The Social History of a Myth

Klaus Naumann

Notes on Contributors

Appendix: Charts and Maps

Index of Names

Index of Locations

Über Autor(innen)

Naumann, Klaus
Klaus Naumann is a historain and journalist; both are Fellows of the Hamburg Institute for Social Studies.

Heer, Hannes
Hannes Heer is a historian and film director.

Hannes Heer is a historian and film director.