War and Genocide: A Concise History of the Holocaust

Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) was the dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death by suicide in 1945. He orchestrated the genocide of roughly 6 million European Jews, as well as Roma people, Slavs, the disabled, queer people, and communists, among others. Though historians disagree on Hitler’s leadership qualities—whether he was a weak dictator, “a pawn swept along by forces outside of his control” (30), or a cunning and charismatic mastermind—he is universally regarded as the 20th-century posterchild for fascism, military aggression, and antisemitism.

Hitler’s role in the Holocaust was instrumental. Any book about the Holocaust must become, in some ways, an Adolf Hitler biography. In War and Genocide, Bergen is careful to show that, despite his global-scale crimes and thundering bombast, Hitler’s origins were banal, and many of his personal qualities were unremarkable. Without downplaying the magnitude of his actions, Bergen points out that he was not the larger-than-life figure he posed himself as.

Josef Stalin (1878-1953) was the general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1952. As the leader of the USSR, he was one of the most pivotal world leaders of the 20th century and posed a significant threat to both the Axis Powers and the Allies at different turns throughout World War II. One month prior to the war’s official commencement, Stalin and Hitler established an NAP and divvied up Eastern European territories among themselves. Between 1941 and 1942, German forces invaded the Soviet Union, violating the NAP and prompting Stalin to ally with the United Kingdom and United States. The Nazis’ failure to conquer Russia resulted in the hemorrhaging of German resources and marked a turning point in the war.

Stalin and his military forces are presented as a sort of wild card in the context of War and Genocide—an ally and antagonist for different world leaders at different junctures in the conflict. The Soviets were key players in World War II, but Bergen’s presentation of Stalin is largely from an outsider’s perspective. Unlike her examination of individual Germans, Poles, and Ukrainians, Bergen’s interest in Stalin largely pertains to his influence on an international scale.

As the head of the Schutzstaffel (SS) and the chief of German police, Heinrich Himmler (1900-1945) was the second most powerful man in the Third Reich. Himmler is known by many as the “architect of genocide”; he is noted for his earnest fear and hatred of Jews. Along with Reinhard Heydrich and Hermann Göring, Himmler convinced Hitler to initiate Operation Hummingbird and carried it out. Hitler considered Himmler an incredibly loyal asset; however, he betrayed Hitler’s confidence in an attempt to align Germany with the Allies against the Soviets just days before the war’s end in 1945. Enraged, Hitler dismissed Himmler from his post. Within a month, Himmler was captured by the Allies and committed suicide while in custody.

Bergen characterizes Himmler as uniquely powerful among inner circle members at the height of his influence. Meticulous and ruthless, Himmler is presented as a dark and foreboding figure, even among Nazis. This is exemplified in his active role in genocidal conquest and in his interpersonal activities. For example, Himmler directly orchestrated the assassination of Ernst Röhm, a man with whom he had associated for over a decade, since the Nazi party’s beginnings.

Josef Goebbels (1897-1945) is best known as the Reich Minister of Propaganda. He was also a member of Hitler’s inner circle. Goebbels was highly educated and academically inclined. He held a PhD from the University of Heidelberg and authored several books. Despite his significant role in the Nazi Party, Goebbels suffered from chronic ill health and a congenital physical disability in the form of a club foot.

Bergen presents Goebbels as a “true believer” in Nazi dogma. He was also a close personal friend to Hitler and included him on family vacations. Though the Nazi Party was plagued with careerism, duplicity, and insincere sycophancy, Goebbels remained loyal to Hitler and his ideals. In the wake of Hitler’s suicide in 1945, Goebbels and his wife Magda poisoned their six children and then took their own lives.

Under Hitler, Hermann Göring (1893-1946) was the president of the Reichstag, the commander-in-chief of the Luftwaffe (air force), and the head of Germany’s Four Year Plan. He also established the Gestapo. Prior to his involvement with the Nazi Party, Göring was a World War I veteran. He was also present for the genocide of the Herero and Nama people in Southwest Africa. After joining the Nazis in 1922, he struck up an association with Hitler and participated in the Beer Hall Putsch. This netted him the distinction of “old fighter,” a nickname for Nazis whose party membership predated the putsch. In 1945, just days before his suicide, Hitler expelled Göring from the Nazi Party. He was later captured and tried at Nuremberg, and committed suicide in his cell before his death sentence could be meted out.

Bergen presents Göring as a particularly vicious figure in Hitler’s inner circle. She describes him as a “swaggering, flamboyant individual […] an ambitious schemer and vicious infighter” (42). If the intellectual Goebbels is presented as an earnestly loyal disciple of Hitler, and Himmler as a particularly vicious exemplar of Nazi race hatred, Göring represents the Nazi Party’s spate of social climbers and powermongers.

Ernst Röhm (1887-1934) was an early member of the Nazi Party and a longtime associate of Adolf Hitler and his inner circle. He had a critical role in building up the Stormtroopers during the 1920s, and the Stormtroopers were instrumental in Hitler’s rise to power. By the 1930s, however, Hitler “began to view the Stormtroopers as a liability” (70) and initiated Operation Hummingbird to dispatch Röhm, tens of other high-ranking Stormtroopers, and an unknown number of his own allies.

Röhm is best remembered as a symbol of betrayal and hypocrisy, as he was openly gay throughout his career with the Nazis. Though Hitler did not seem to care about Röhm’s sexuality prior to Operation Hummingbird, he publicly used it as an excuse for the killings. Röhm’s position in the party represents the complexity of Nazi persecution. His sexual orientation was initially overlooked, and he was granted special privileges, but it was later used as a smokescreen to justify his assassination. Bergen also uses Röhm’s legacy to exemplify the vicious duplicity that plagued the Nazi Party. Though he held a position of distinction in the party and maintained a long-term professional and personal relationship with Hitler, Röhm was violently discarded as soon as he became inconvenient.

Paul von Hindenburg (1847-1934) was the president of Germany from 1925 until his death. Under the advisement of former Chancellor Franz von Papen, Hindenburg appointed Adolf Hitler chancellor in 1933, a move that ultimately kickstarted World War II and the Holocaust. Prior to his presidency, Hindenburg led the Imperial German Army in World War I and was a highly decorated war hero. When Hitler took office, Hindenburg was in his late 80s, and many regarded him as doddering and inattentive in his old age.

Bergen presents Hindenburg as a symbol of the German government’s old guard, which was swept aside in the advent of Nazism. In a twist of dramatic irony, Hindenburg’s invocation of Article 48 and appointment of Hitler ultimately spelled doom for his own era of German statesmanship.

Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) was a Jewish-German political philosopher and Holocaust survivor. She is best known for her 1963 book Eichmann in Jerusalem, which recounts and analyzes the trial of Adolf Eichmann, a high-ranking Nazi official and key architect of the Holocaust. Eichmann in Jerusalem famously argues for the concept of “the banality of evil.” According to Arendt, Eichmann was neither exceptional nor inherently monstrous, and he disavowed responsibility for his extraordinary crimes under the auspices of merely following orders.

Arendt’s scholarship is highly influential in the sphere of Holocaust studies, and it plays a key role in Bergen’s argumentation. Though she only mentions it by name once, the banality of evil principle is weaved through the entirety of War and Genocide. This is perhaps best exemplified in Bergen’s appraisal of Hitler as a thoroughly unremarkable man outside his cataclysmic actions. It is also evident in Bergen’s focus on the extenuating factors that led to civilian complicity and collaborationism in Nazi Germany and occupied territories.