The year is 1945, the worst war in the history of human mankind is over. In the post-war years, Europe is found destroyed economically, socially, and culturally. During those first years also come the first stories of crimes committed on unimaginable scales and a conceptually new cruelty. Obsessive, mass, and continental scale destruction of entire human groups was carried out during the Third Reich led by Adolf Hitler. Gypsies, gays, communists, and Jews were razed by immense military operations, the latter group, the Jews being the main objective of this genocide. More than a half century later, it is still difficult to create or read a document that describes what happened. They might help one to provide context on how it happened, but one will never truly understand the reasons why it happened. The Holocaust was a process that wiped out all our moral foundations, leading many to ask: how is it possible that someone is able to perpetrate such atrocities? What are their motivations? Ideology, demonstrate strength, superiority, camaraderie, or simply following orders?
Christopher Browning in his book Ordinary Men, particularly describes the activities of a small German military unit established in Poland during the invasion of the Soviet Union. The Reserve Police Battalion 101, was implicated in the massive murder of Jews for a little more than a year, from spring of 1942 until the end of 1943. In that short time, about five hundred men killed almost forty thousand jews and deported a similar amount to the extermination camps, most of them to the Lublin camp. But who were these men who were part of this Battalion? To ones amazement, the protagonists of this story were far from the stereotype of the convinced and fanatic Nazi soldier. In fact, the integrants were “middle-aged family men of working- and lower-middle-class background” and most of them where “raw recruits with no previous experience” (1). The executioners, were simply ordinary men, chosen simply by their age and availability, without being trained nor specific preparation for the terrible task that would be entrusted to them “he [Major] did not specify what was to be done with them [Jews]” (11). Therefore, how is it possible that a group of vulgar men who, with some exceptions were able to carry out those atrocities?
During the book the implication of these ordinary men in the development of the mass murders of Jews are narrated in detail. Their initial work as custodians of the deportations are giving way to a greater involvement. From being custodians passed to executors, being Josewof the debut of the Battalion 101 in the massive execution of Jews. Everything started being an alleged relocation, where everyone was taken from their homes, regardless of age or gender. However, it was later revealed that this model was inefficient and Hitler ordered the intensification of the pacification program taking all the necessary measures to accomplish his Garden of Eden (10). Therefore, the orders were clear: no more relocation masquerades, they should select the young Jews for the camps of Lublin and “The men [from the Battalion] were explicitly ordered to shot anyone tying to escape… Those too sick or frail… as well as infants and anyone offering resistance or attempting to hide, were to be shot in the spot” (57) as well as the the woman and elderly were simply to be shot on the spot.
After their first massacre, the majority of them were very affected, but except for a small group nobody discussed the orders. However, that small group was not reprised by their attitude and even stopped participating in future massacres; they were simply given another task, such as escort the “work Jews” to the marketplace (57). Those who remained, very few evaded the mission, at least one Jew had killed. Why was a drunken party organized that day? To forget the penalties and continue committing the crimes? Very possibly. “By the end of the day of nearly continuous shooting, the men had completely lost track of how many Jews they have killed… ‘a great number’” (61).
After Josefow is observed the transformation of the Battalion. After the initial shock the soldiers begin to get accustomed to their new task. Every day that passes there was less drunkenness, less cigarette breaks (65), and less besmirched uniforms of blood, bone splinters, and brains (64). Most of them do not like their obligation, but they do not discuss it. After the first massacres some obeyed almost automatically, but there comes the question of why? In the first missions the soldiers are coldly distant from the victims, they do not think about them, they just shoot. It is more important to fulfill the job and to be well with your comrades than think of the Jews as one more person. Much more than being loyal to the Fürher was more important to end the mission and not to be seen as weak or vague. More than Anti-Semitism ideas was more important to show your loyalty and honor with your comrades than the morals or values you can have.
A key passage in this book is when the commanding officer Trapp offers to his five hundred men the possibility of being exempt from the task by just stepping out; only twelve do. Reading this results impressive and revolves in one mind questions as: what would one have done? Would one have been the twelve brave or would have been the remaining