Dan Michman
approach to the Jewish question, at least as from 1936, was Hermann
Goring.®® An examination of the first years of the Nazi regime reveals
that the general situation of the Jews escalated constantly, but also that
policies still clang to parameters of traditional antisemitism.
The predominance of the economic approach in the Nazi sought-
after goal of Entfernung der Juden überhaupt ended at the end of 1938.
The notorious and so extremely important meeting at Göring’s office on
November 12, 1938, two days after Reichskristallnacht, is an important
moment in that respect. The meeting was convened upon Hitler’s order
to have “die Judenfrage jetzt einheitlich zusammengefaßt” (the Jewish
Question [...] to be summed up and coordinated once and for all) and
“die entscheidenden Schritte zentral zusammenzufassen” (the decisive
steps outlined in a coordinated way). At the opening of that meeting
Göring stated that “das Problem in der Hauptsache ein umfangreiches
wirtschaftliches Problem ist” (the problem is in the main a large-scale
economic matter), that means that the economic aspect was the predom-
inant one. But later on in the meeting Heydrich responded to that view
by saying that “Bez allem Herausnehmen des Juden aus dem Wirtschafts-
leben bleibt das Grundproblem letzten Endes doch immer, daß der Jude
aus Deutschland herauskommt” (After all the elimination of the Jew
from economic life, in the end there is still always the basic problem of
getting the Jew out of Germany).
From this moment on it becomes clear, that a more radical
approach, which interpreted total removal essentially as ridding Ger-
many from the presence of the physical Jews in its landscape — which
was represented by the SS and Police apparatus, on this occasion
through Heydrich’s person — gained predominance.” Removing Jews
from German territory meant at that moment forced emigration, or in
other words: expulsion; later on, with the expansion of German rule in
60 Knopp, Goring; Fest, Hermann Göring.
61 “Stenographische Niederschrift von einem Teil der Besprechung iiber die Juden-
frage unter Vorsitz von Feldmarschall Goring in RLA [Reichsluftamt] am 12. No-
vember 1938, 11 Uhr”, in: Der Prozess gegen die Hauptkriegsverbrecher vor dem
Internationalen Militirtribunal [IMT], Bd. XXVIII (Nürnberg 1948), 816-PS,
pp. 499, 533.
62 Kershaw, Adolf Hitler und die Realisierung der nationalsozialistischen Rassenuto-
pie, p. 139.
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