Path to Genocide

in the holocaust 11 million people died. as Nazis occupied more countries in the east they controlled larger populations of ‘Jewish problem'

ghettoization

with 3.5 million Jews in Poland so they concentrated Jewish people into ghettos (enclosed districts in towns). ghettos varied in size and there were hundreds in Poland alone with the largest in Warsaw

by March 1941 the ghetto in Warsaw had 445,000 inhabitants

overcrowding and poor living conditions led to death. in three years over 140,000 died

invasion of the Soviet Union

the Einsatzgruppen were mobile killing units of SS men and four of these units followed the army as they invaded.

as they reached villages and towns, Jewish people and Communists were rounded up, taken to an area like woodland, forced to dig a large pit and shot

winter 1941 around 1 million people were dead

Babi Yar in Ukraine - 33,000 Jewish people killed in one day

eastern vs western

in 1941 the Nazis decided they would exterminate the Jewish people in the General Government. this started as Chelmno where they were gassed to death in vans

by 1942 there was Belzec, Sobibor and Treblinka

they were kept very secret, away from the towns

Jewish people from the ghettos would arrived at the train station and then be gassed

by the end of the war, 1.7 million Polish Jews had been killed in the camps

the final plan

in Jan 1942, Heydrich suggested the new plan to take all Jewish people to the central government where they would be gassed. Eichmann was in charge of organising this

Auschwitz

four gas chambers and a crematoria

people were packed onto cattle trucks from all across Europe

the fit and able were forced to work in factories but the other 75% were gassed immediately

up to 12,000 were murdered per day