Revision wrote:"We’ve long known that the process of destruction was an undertaking step by step, that no one in 1933 had a clear idea of what would happen in 1936, and no one in 1936 knew about 1939, and no one even in 1939 foretold 1942. There was no blueprint, there was no central office, there was no planning in any fundamental, central way of this process. And yet it reached a point, after the Jews had been concentrated in ghettos within Polish cities, after they had been deprived of livelihoods, after their food rations were cut, when the open question was asked, 'what now?'"
- Raul Hilberg, "Facing Evil" conference (March 28, 1988)
https://billmoyers.com/content/facing-evil/
Didn't Hilberg also state that there was no allocated funding?
Compared to the construction of coastal fortifications in north-west Europe, flak defences in the Reich, or practically any other aspect of the war effort, in material terms the war against the Jews was a sideshow. It was ill-planned, under-funded, and carried through haphazardly at breakneck speed.”
David Cesarani, Final Solution: The Fate of the Jews 1933-1949 (Macmillan, 2016), pp. 459
Ultimately, the course of the war rather than decisions within the framework of anti-Jewish policy triggered the descent into a Europe-wide genocide.
David Cesarani, Final Solution: The Fate of the Jews 1933-1949 (Macmillan, 2016), pp. xxxvi
“Unlike most previous narratives, this account contests whether Nazi anti-Jewish policy was systematic, consistent or even premeditated. […] While it is possible to locate programmatic statements from key players, particularly in the SS, there was no overall, centralized, coherent policy or practice until late 1938. While there may have been a broad anti-Semitic consensus within the Nazi movement and throughout the institutions of government, and even if policy tended in one direction towards ever-harsher measures, this does not mean that one thing led to another logically, necessarily, or even deliberately.”
David Cesarani, Final Solution: The Fate of the Jews 1933-1949 (Macmillan, 2016), pp. xxxi
On the gassing and Mein Kampf quote, even Ian Kershaw admitted it wasn't an indication of the Holocaust:
He had commented in the last chapter of Mein Kampf that 'the sacrifice of millions at the front' would not have been necessary if 'twelve or fifteen thousand of these Hebrew corrupters of the people had been held under poison gas.' Such rhetoric, appalling though the sentiments were, was not an indication that Hitler already had the 'Final Solution' in mind.
Ian Kershaw, Hitler 1936-1945: Nemesis (Allen Lane, 2001), Pp 151
Kershaw has to cope for a second by saying:
But the implicit genocidal link between war and the killing of Jews was there
Ibid
He just totally invented this based on nothing. Not surprising that scum like him would take liberties in interpretation.
He goes on:
stating that it was his 'unshakeable will' to solve 'the Jewish problem' in the near future, and at a time when official policy was to press for emigration with all means possible, he showed no interest in the plans advanced by South African Defence and Economics Minister Oswald Pirow, whom he met at the Berghof on 24 November, for international cooperation in the emigration of German Jews.128
Ibid.
I would have to agree with Hitler, there's nothing sinister about this. Earlier on the page Kershaw speaks about how the Jews could be potentially used as hostages because they were entwined with world jewry and had influence:
The Jews were to be treated as members of a warring power and interned to prevent their engagement for the interests of world Jewry.126
Ibid.
So it only makes sense that Hitler would not just willingly give them up until the war was over and they could be deported without providing the Allies any extra ammunition.
No wonder that's why Hitler spoke of waiting until the war was over to solve the Jewish question, but Kershaw is disingenuous and a liar, so it's not surprising he finds something malicious about this.
He does have another admission which is useful to note:
The same motive was probably also behind the horrific threat he made to the Czechoslovakian Foreign Minister Franzisek Chvalkovsky on 21 January 1939. 'The Jews here (bei uns) will be annihilated (vernichtet) , he declared. 'The Jews had not brought about the 9 November 191 8 for nothing. This day will be avenged.'129
Again, rhetoric should not be mistaken for a plan or programme. Hitler was scarcely likely to have revealed plans to exterminate the Jews which, when they did eventually emerge in 1941, were accorded top secrecy, in a comment to a foreign diplomat. Moreover, 'annihilation' (Vernichtung) was one of Hitler's favourite words. He tended to reach for it when trying to impress his threats upon his audience, large or small. He would speak more than once the following summer, for instance, of his intention to 'annihilate' the Poles. 130 Horrific though their treatment was after 1939, no genocidal programme followed.
Ian Kershaw, Hitler 1936-1945: Nemesis (Allen Lane, 2001), Pp 152
Well there goes the bullshit about Hitler's so-called use of the word "extermination". Makes the address of January 30th 1939 look pretty different, and those historians who claimed it was proof of Hitler's intentions rather stupid and desperate for an admission from Hitler that they cannot find anywhere else. Speaks volumes.
