Lu, Macala 1

1. Introduction
Any alliance whose purpose is not the intention to wage war is senseless and
useless (Hitler). The Holocaust was the systematic annihilation of six million Jews by
the Nazis during World War II (Blow, Crimes, Heroes, and Villains). Adolf Hitler, one
of the major Holocaust war criminals, led it (Trueman, Adolf Hitler). He had help from
many others including Adolf Eichmann and Josef Mengele to ensure the destruction of
all Jews (War Crimes Trails). The events of the Holocaust were initiated by war
criminals and have created a colossal impact in our society today (War Crimes Trails).
2. Background/History
A Holocaust War Criminal is considered as someone who committed crimes
against humanity (War Crimes Trails). They executed offenses such as murder,
extermination, enslavement, deportation, or persecutions on political, racial, or religious
grounds (War Crimes Trails). When the war ended and liberation came to be, all war
criminals were charged with crimes against peace (War Crimes Trails). The criminals
were sent to International and domestic courts to conduct their trials (War Crimes
Trails). Between October 18, 1945, and October 1, 1946, the IMT convicted twenty-two
major war criminals (War Crimes Trails). Twelve of those convicted were sentenced to
death (War Crimes Trails). Among them were Reich Marshall, Hermann Gring, Hans
Frank, Alfred Rosenberg, and Julius Streicher (War Crimes Trails).
3. Significant Events/People
3.1 Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler, military and political leader of Germany in 1933-1945, prompted
World War II and is responsible for the death of millions, including 6 million Jews in the

Lu, Macala 2
Nazi Genocide (Adolf Hitler). In 1919, he joined the fascist German Workers' Party
(More Info About: Adolf Hitler). He used propagandas to put fear in people and then
ensured resolutions to Germany's war complications while blaming everything on the
Jews (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). By doing this he became the leader of the Nazi
party in 1921 (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). In 1923, Hitler attempted at an
unsuccessful armed uprising in Munich (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). He was
imprisoned for nine months (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). When he was released
from prison he began to rebuild the Nazi party and used new techniques of mass
communication, backed up with violence, to get his message across (More Info About:
Adolf Hitler). In the 1932 elections, the Nazis became the largest party in the German
parliament (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). In January 1933, Hitler became chancellor
of a coalition government (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). He quickly took dictatorial
powers and began to institute anti-Jewish laws along with beginning the process of
German militarization and territorial expansion (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). He later
allied with Italy and Japan to create the Axis (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). Hitler's
invasion of Poland in September 1939 began World War II after military successes in
Denmark, Norway and Western Europe, but he failed to subdue Britain in 1941 (More
Info About: Adolf Hitler). The Jewish populations of the countries conquered by the
Nazis were rounded up and killed (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). Millions of others
whom the Nazis considered racially inferior were also killed or worked to death (More
Info About: Adolf Hitler). In December 1941, Hitler declared war on the United States
(More Info About: Adolf Hitler). The war on the eastern front drained Germany's
resources (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). In June 1944, the British and Americans

Lu, Macala 3
landed in France (More Info About: Adolf Hitler). With Soviet troops poised to take the
German capital, Hitler committed suicide in his bunker in Berlin on April 30 th, 1945
(More Info About: Adolf Hitler).
Adolf Hitler was born on April 20, 1889 (Adolf Hitler). He was the fourth child of
Alois Schickelgruber and Kara Hitler (Adolf Hitlers Childhood). His childhood was
arduous. Alois, Hitlers father, would often beat him (Adolf Hitlers Childhood). His
dream as a child was to become a priest, but as he grew up, his artistic talent surfaced
(Adolf Hitlers Childhood). In 1903, Alois died from pleural hemorrhage (Adolf Hitlers
Childhood). This was one of the main reasons Hitler dropped out of school at age
sixteen. His mother died shortly after his fathers death in December of 1908 from
breast cancer (Adolf Hitler). Hitler gave up his dream of becoming a priest and decided
to become a painter (More info about Hitler). He applied to the Viennese Academy and
Jews rejected his application, which may have triggered his hatred toward Jews (Adolf
Hitler). For six years, Hitler lived in Viennese off of the little inheritance that his father
left him and an orphans pension (Adolf Hitlers Childhood). By 1909, Hitler was
completely broke and living on the streets (Adolf Hitlers Childhood). He slept in a
different place almost every night (Adolf Hitlers Childhood). In this period of time, he
became prejudice about Jewish people (Adolf Hitlers Childhood).
3.2 Adolf Eichmann
Adolf Eichmann was born in Solingen, Germany, a small industrial city in the
Rhineland, on March 19th, 1906 (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). In 1913,
Eichmann and his family moved to Linz, Austria (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). A
few year years within moving, Eichmann lost his mother in 1916 (Cesarani, Mind of a

Lu, Macala 4
War Criminal). His father quickly remarried after his mothers death (Cesarani, Mind of
a War Criminal). He began going to school in Austria (Cesarani, Mind of a War
Criminal). Not being able to complete school, he dropped out to pursue his training in
mechanical engineering (Adolf Eichmann). Due to unsatisfaction, Eichmann drifted
from job to job (Adolf Eichmann). He worked as a day laborer, an office worker, and a
traveling salesman for Vacuum Oil Company (Adolf Eichmann). Although he did well in
the oil business, he was fired (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). The owner of the
Vacuum Oil Company was Jewish, this could have been where his hatred for Jews
originated (Streissguth 26). After being fired from the oil company, his new
acquaintance, Ernst Kaltenbrunner offered him a position in the Nazi Party (Cesarani,
Mind of a War Criminal; Adolf Eichmann).
In 1932, Adolf Eichmann entered the Austrian National Socialist Nazi Party
(Adolf Eichmann). Eichmann joined an association for unemployed Nazi members
called the Austrian Legion in August 1933(Adolf Eichmann). There he started his
basic military training (Adolf Eichmann). As time went on, Eichmann was promoted
and moved to a different station within the Nazi Party. (Adolf Eichmann). Although he
loved military life, he believed that the training and the routine was tedious and desired
something more exhilarating (Streissguth 26). In 1934, Eichmann applied for the SD,
the Nazi Party Security Service (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). After seeing a
bright future ahead of him, Adolf Eichmann married his fianc, Veronika Liebl, in 1935
(Streissguth 30). Veronika later gave birth to three children (Streissguth 30). He
purchased a house just outside of Berlin because it was more convenient for his job
(Streissguth 30). In Berlin he studied Zionism and a way to implement it into the Nazi

Lu, Macala 5
(Adolf Eichmann). In March 1938, he was ordered to increase the emigration in Austria
(Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). He organized and took over a Central Office for
Jewish Emigration in Vienna (Adolf Eichmann). Eichmann then opened another
emigration office in Prague (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). At this point, Germany
had over one million Jews living in German and Poland. He planned to move them all to
one place (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). Under his order, the soldiers moved all
Jews into ghettos where they were temporarily placed (Cesarani, Mind of a War
Criminal). Germany was trying to find a way to get rid of all Jews in German territories
rapidly (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). Gathering all the Jews in one place was
not enough; the Nazis wanted to destroy all Jews. They wanted a solution immediately
(Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). Eichmann was ordered to find a way to extinct the
race of Jews (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). He observed surroundings and came
up with the idea of gas chambers (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). He prepared a
solution for the Wannsee Conference in 1942 (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). He
called it The Final Solution of the Jewish Question (Cesarani, Mind of a War
Criminal). The plot was to have all Jews in Slovakia, France, and Belgium sent to death
camps in Poland and the Soviet Union (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). In 1944,
the Germans carried out Eichmanns disposition and deported 440,000 Hungarian Jews
to death camps (Cesarani, Mind of a War Criminal). In those death camps, Jews would
be cremated (Katzander 4). At the Buchenwald death camp, they was a table where the
Nazi officers would pull out any gold fillings in peoples teeth before they got cremated
(Katzander 4). Many people would go missing in concentration camps, so the Nazi
officers would often do a count of the prisoners (Lesser). If anyone was ever missing,

Lu, Macala 6
they would pick every tenth person and give them a beating (Lesser). Anyone who could
not withstand the beatings were instantly shot (Lesser).
At the end of the war, his plans were stopped and he was imprisoned (Adolf
Eichmann). He found a way to escape from the US and fled to Argentina in 1946,
where he lived until 1960 (Adolf Eichmann). Later that year, he was captured once
again by the Israeli Security Service (Adolf Eichmann). He was put on trial for the
crimes that he had committed against Jews (Adolf Eichmann). Adolf Eichmann was
found guilty on December 15, 1961 and was hung at midnight between May 31 and
June 1, 1962 (Adolf Eichmann).
Adolf Eichmann was a man who was lost and confused early in his life (Adolf
Eichmann). He saw a bright future ahead of himself in the Nazi Party (Adolf
Eichmann). But his job required him to kill lives of innocent people that did nothing
wrong (Adolf Eichmann).
4. Impact on Holocaust
The criminals during the Holocaust had the utmost impact (Adolf Hitler). They
commenced and triggered the war against Jews (Adolf Hitler). Adolf Hitler killed over 6
million Jews and was the one who initiated the Holocaust (Adolf Hitler). Adolf
Eichmann created the final solution and assisted Hitler in the destruction of Jews (Adolf
Eichmann). The criminals during this event have impacted the Holocaust significantly
(Adolf Hitler).
5. Relevance Today
Although it has been many years since Hitlers reign and death during the
Holocaust, his beliefs still linger with some people today (Donahue, Hitlers affect on

Lu, Macala 7
society). The Holocaust began when the Nazis came into power in 1933, and ended in
the surrender of Germany in 1945 (Introduction to the Holocaust). In the time that the
Nazis ruled, they permanently changed Germany and our society (Reams, Adolf Hitler
Changes Europe). The events of the Holocaust have changed the way that our
civilization sees diverse religions and races. The Holocaust itself was viewed in
numerous ways (Reams, Adolf Hitler Changes Europe). Some individuals believe that
the Holocaust was a sham, while others see it as a catastrophic event that killed over 6
million Jews (Reams, Adolf Hitler Changes Europe). It can be said that the Holocaust
was one of the few occurrences that has altered the course of History and made a
colossal impact in our culture today (Reams, Adolf Hitler Changes Europe).
6. Reflection/Conclusion
Hitler and his accomplices had a vision of an unflawed country with seamless
people (Donahue, Hitlers affect on society). There are still people today who believe
that what Hitler did was right, or that the Holocaust never happened (Donahue, Hitlers
affect on society). The Holocaust was an historical event that will never be forgotten
(Donahue, Hitlers affect on society). The criminals that commenced the Holocaust
made an impact in our society today (Donahue, Hitlers affect on society). Our
generation can look back and see that we cannot have one superior race. The world
was meant for imperfection.
Initiated by war criminals, the Holocaust was a tragic event that will forever go
down in history and continue to influence our everyday lives. Everyone may have
distinctive opinions, but if we cause conflict over our differentiations, we can end up war
criminals ourselves. Lines may divide us, but hope will unite us.

Lu, Macala 8
Works Cited
Adolf Eichmann. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Holocaust Memorial
Museum. 6 Jan. 2011. Web. 6 May 2012.
Adolf Hitler. History learning site. n.p. n.d. Web. 9 May 2012.
Adolf Hitler. Jewish Virtual Library. The American-Iraeli Cooperative Enterprise. n.d.
Web. 9 May 2012.
Adolf Hitler. More or Less. n.p. 30 April 2001. Web. 9 May 2012.
Adolf Hitlers Childhood. Library.thinkquest. Oracle. n.d. Web. 9 May 2012.
Blow. Louis. The Holocaust: Crimes, Heroes, and Villains. Auschwitz. n.p. n.d. Web,
9 May 2012.
Cesarani, David. "Adolf Eichmann: The Mind of a War Criminal." BBC News. BBC. 17
Feb. 2011. Web. 6 May 2012.
Introduction to the Holocaust. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Holocaust
Memorial Museum. 6 Jan 2011. Web. 9 May 2012.
Katzander, Howard. Buchenwald Camp. Yank: the army weekly. 18 May 1945: 4. Print.
Lesser, Ben. Ben Lessers Story. Southwest Career and Technical Academy, Las
Vegas. 9, May 2012.
Reams, Karen. Hitler Changes Europe. Karen-Reams.Suite101. n.p. 31 Mar 2008.
Web. 9 May 2012.
Streissguth, Thomas. Adolf Eichmann: Executing the Final Solution." Berkeley Heights,
NJ: Enslow Pub., 2005. Print.
War Crimes Trials. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Holocaust Memorial
Museum. 6 Jan 2011. Web. 9 May 2012.

Lu, Macala 9
What is a war criminal. Wise geek. Conjecture Corporation. n.d. Web. 9 May 2012.
Web. 9 May 2012.