Ethan J. Hollander
ejhollan@ucsd.edu
Department of Political Science
University
of California, San
Diego
Swords or Shields?
Implementing
and Subverting the Final Solution in Nazi-occupied Europe
“If I could not be your sword,
at least I would be your shield.”
— Marshal Pétain, collaborationist leader of Vichy France
Rates of Jewish victimization in
German-occupied countries during World War II varied quite significantly. This
is surprising because it suggests that, despite its totalitarian character, the
Nazi regime faced very real limitations for policy implementation in its sphere
of influence. Despite its obvious relevance for the study of military
occupations and state-sponsored violence, political scientists rarely turn
their attention to the Nazi genocide. And due to their tendency to focus on
particular countries or regions under German occupation, historians have been
relatively silent on the issue of comparative
victimization. Thus, this intriguing question is virtually ignored in the
extant literature.
Using the methods of comparative political science and international
relations, I explain variation in the level of Jewish victimization among
German-occupied countries during World War II. I demonstrate that the ‘success’
of the German genocide program depended most importantly upon the level of
political hierarchy between Germany and each occupied country. Where Germany ruled directly, and therefore had complete
or near-complete say in the policy of a given territory, German demands and
interests, including the desire to rid the territory of Jews, prevailed. Where Germany shared sovereignty over a given territory
with domestic officials — where it ruled, indirectly, through collaborators and
quislings of various stripes — principal-agent problems had a ‘negative’ effect
on the implementation of Nazi policy. In short, my independent variable is the
mode of German occupation: Where Germany ruled a territory directly, the rate
of Jewish victimization was high. Where it relied on collaborators, ceteris paribus, the rate of
victimization was lower. The degree of Jewish victimization varied inversely
with the relative autonomy of domestic officials.
Nazi Germany clearly found indirect rule to be beneficial in a number
of respects. Usually, what Germany lost in terms of inefficiency and
compromise, it gained in terms of lower governance costs. Thus, so long as
collaborationist regimes could be trusted not to sabotage the German war
effort, Germany was more than willing to let its collaborators take on the
responsibilities of fighting partisans or enforcing local law. Indeed, with
locals at the helm, local administration retained at least the pretense of
legitimacy, something that was nearly impossible where Germany ruled directly.
But German occupation was not an unmitigated evil for most
collaborators, either. First, by advocating ‘accommodation’ with the Third
Reich, collaborationist officials were allowed to keep their positions in
office. More broadly, collaborators often used their positions in office to
‘soften the blow’ of Nazi terror. By acknowledging Germany’s position in the new world order,
collaborators and their constituents could reap the economic benefits of trade
with the Third Reich. And by contributing to Germany’s military might, collaborationist leaders
could win for their countries significant concessions or even territorial
rewards. On the most basic level, countries that demonstrated the ‘right
attitude’ toward their new German masters usually won a ‘gentler’ form of
military occupation. And though Jews certainly suffered more than their fellow
citizens all over occupied Europe,
they, too, benefited from having their own government act as an intermediary.
Ironically, this was even the case in collaborationist countries characterized
by high degrees of antisemitism.
Because they were helpful in matters of occupational administration,
collaborationist officials had significant bargaining power in negotiations
with the Germans. But why would they use their leverage to protect local Jews?
Certainly, genuine concern for the well-being of Jews, or reflection upon the
sheer horror of the Nazi program, was sometimes a relevant factor; indeed, this
factor was only more salient when the Jews in question were citizens of the
collaborationist country, war heroes, parishioners of cooperative churches or
members of the local fascist party. But ‘protection’ was often accidental,
since employees of the collaborationist regime could simply get away with
‘sloppy’ or ‘unenthusiastic’ implementation of the Final Solution in a way that
Germany’s own henchmen could not. In the most
cynical sense, collaborators who deported local Jews also gave up a
potentially-profitable opportunity to exploit them. Jews who otherwise faced
deportation were fertile targets for political or even financial blackmail.
Collaborators protected the politically connected, allowed Jews to buy their
freedom, or took bribes to save Jewish lives. For various reasons, such
‘corruption’ was more likely when local collaborators, rather than German
Nazis, were in positions of political power.
The significance of this project for
Political Science.
As a contribution to the vast literature on
the Nazi Holocaust, the significance of this project should be clear. While many
Holocaust scholars have considered the implementation of the Final Solution in
this or that particular country, there are few broadly comparative studies of
the Nazi genocide, and none
that provides such a close analysis of the incentives facing the main actors in
this tragedy. Indeed, even much of the scholarly work on the Holocaust tends to
see that event as unique or impervious to rational analysis. And while both of
these things are true to a certain extent, this focus has led many to overlook
its comparable and comprehensible aspects. We cannot learn from the worst
events in human history unless we are prepared to generalize from them.
Standing at the interface of two enduring global phenomena —
imperialism and ethnic animosity — this project also sheds light on several
important debates in political science. By showing that antisemitism was only
indirectly related to Jewish victimization, we learn to question the centrality
of ‘ancient hatreds’ in modern instantiations of state-sponsored violence. By
studying the implementation of a common policy throughout a vast empire, we
learn more about the relationship between regional hegemons and the
subject-states they try to influence.
This project also fills a shocking gap in the political literature on
comparative military occupations.
Though usually not addressed by political scientists, World War II and the
Final Solution provide intellectual raw material for the study of occupation
regimes and the implementation of hegemonic policy in times of war. My project
demonstrates that a hegemon’s choice about modes of occupation has tremendous
impact on policy implementation in the wider sphere of influence. Similar in
form, if not in substance, military administration during World War II can
inform the military policy of today.
Most important, this project explores the logic and limits of mass
coercion as a tool in contemporary politics. It therefore addresses the most
fundamental issue in Political Science, the role of violence in the maintenance
of political order. In many respects, World War II is the most vivid
illustration of this issue that history has to offer. It is therefore all the
more surprising that the Nazi regime is so seldom used as a case in comparative
political analysis. The contemporary
importance of understanding Nazi Germany cannot be overstated.
Chapters 1 and 2. Theory,
literature review and large-n analysis.
A brief introductory chapter [Chapter 1] summarizes my argument and
contextualizes it within existing literatures in comparative politics,
international relations, and the historical study of the Holocaust. In chapter
two, I show how German occupation regimes can be conceptualized as forms of
international hierarchy, thus allowing them to be understood and analyzed in
terms of the existing scholarship on international hierarchy, hegemony, and
imperialism. Next, I operationalize my variables and conduct a number of large-n regressions. These demonstrate a
statistically significant correlation between levels of German hierarchy and Jewish
victimization rates. The chapter ends with my reflections on the contemporary
relevance of the Nazi case, showing its potential for the study of military
occupation and political order.
Chapter 3. Denmark
(Victimization rate: 6%) and Norway
(46%).
Because the local population helped nearly all of the Jews escape to
neutral Sweden, Denmark is seen as a “ray of light” in the dark
history of the Holocaust. The common view, prevalent even in the scholarly
literature, contends that Danish traditions of democracy and religious
tolerance trumped Nazi tyranny and made the persecution of the Jews
unacceptable to the average Dane. A comparison with Norway, which shared proximity to neutral Sweden and also had long traditions of democracy
and religious tolerance, challenges this conventional wisdom. In my view, the
unique aspect of the Danish case is the Danish government’s willingness to
negotiate with the Germans, thus insuring that Denmark would be treated (in the words of one German
official) with “velvet gloves.” By supplying Germany with economic goods, contributing to its war
effort, and even arresting local communists, the Danish government was able to
preserve a degree of autonomy unprecedented in the German occupational sphere.
But the arrangement also forced Germany to postpone action against the nation’s
Jews, essentially until it was too late. In Norway, on the other hand, the constitutional
government refused to bow to German demands and, instead, fled the country.
While, in a moral sense, refusing to negotiate with Nazi Germany may have been
the right thing to do, this action left Norway with a veritable power vacuum. Germany soon filled the vacant seats of government
with members of Norway’s small and maligned national socialist party. With German appointees
at the helm, the implementation of the Final Solution was much more complete in
Norway than in Denmark.
The Denmark-Norway comparison questions the significance of Danish
political culture in foiling the German genocidal effort; instead, it directs
our focus to political institutions. By highlighting Denmark’s significant (and often unnoticed)
contribution to the German cause, I
show the celebrated failure of the Final Solution in Denmark to be the result of a morally questionable
policy of negotiation. I thus present Norway’s reaction to German occupation as a tragic
moral choice: By resisting the occupation, Norway’s government may have done the right thing;
but its population, Jew and non-Jew alike, was left to face the full force of
Nazi brutality.
Chapter 4. The Netherlands
(67%), Belgium
(53%), and France
(26%).
In Chapter 4, I investigate the imposition of German hierarchy and the
implementation of the Final Solution in the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. Though Germany invaded the Netherlands and offered authorities there a
‘Danish-style’ compromise, the Dutch
government and Queen largely followed a ‘Norwegian’ path, fleeing the country
and encouraging the resistance. This left the Netherlands with virtually no political officers of its
own. German administrators staffed
the vacant political positions and even replaced much of the bureaucracy with
‘reliable’ substitutes. Though somewhat re-constituted in the face of the
German invasion, the French
government, on the other hand, remained largely intact and ruled from the
resort town of Vichy. The Vichy government was of considerable help to the Germans: fighting
partisans, ensuring economic cooperation, and ultimately putting a ‘French
face’ on the German occupation. But when it came to the Final Solution, the Vichy government routinely deported immigrant Jews
with the explicit understanding that Jews with French citizenship would be
spared. Indeed, even though native police forces were enlisted to help in the
arrest of France’s Jews, their progress was so ‘unsatisfactory’ that the Germans
stopped making use of them. In the end, 76% of the Jews in France (and 85% of
the Jews with French citizenship) survived the war. In comparison with the Netherlands and France, Belgium emerges as a ‘middle’ case: The Belgian
ministers of government fled; but the king stayed in the country and signed a
surrender with the Germans. The king even met with Hitler to request that his
country be treated gently; and when German officials implemented the Final Solution
in Belgium, the Queen Mother intervened on behalf of
Belgian Jews.
This chapter makes extensive use of material from my personal interview
with Maurice Papon, a former Vichy official now under house arrest for
complicity in crimes against humanity. The comparison shows that, even for Jews
in a relatively antisemitic country, citizenship had its advantages. It also
demonstrates the very real importance of nominally powerless rulers, like Belgium’s constitutional monarch. Finally, the
comparison shows us that, be it by conscious design or otherwise,
collaborationist governments can and did act as buffers between German
occupiers and the local population. This does not excuse the collaborators,
who, after all, helped advance the German cause. But it does show their
wholesale condemnation to be somewhat simplistic.
Chapter 5. Test of the
Democracies.
Chapter 5 summarizes the findings of chapters 2 and 3. Thus, it allows
us to see German occupation regimes in Scandinavia and in Western Europe in comparative perspective. This comparison
allows us to control for political culture, religious tolerance and levels of
democracy. Even so, we see a remarkable correlation between German occupation
regimes and levels of Jewish victimization.
Chapter 6. Bulgaria
(18%), Romania
(51%), and Hungary
(78%).
Bulgaria, Romania, and Hungary were all German allies and formally
independent. However, they were subjected to different degrees of informal
German hierarchy. Be it due to its cooperative attitude, peripheral location,
or both, Bulgaria “retained a greater degree of control over its domestic and
foreign affairs … than any other country in Southeastern Europe” [Rich 1974:
258]. Bulgaria also cooperated with Germany in the attack on Yugoslavia and Greece, winning handsome territorial rewards
(namely, Macedonia and Thrace) for its effort. But when it came to the
Final Solution, Bulgaria reached an explicit arrangement with the
Germans: It would deport 20,000 Jews from the newly-acquired territories with
the agreement that 51,000 Jews in Bulgaria itself would remain unharmed. Ultimately,
‘only’ 11,400 Jews from Macedonia and Thrace were deported and killed. Bulgarian Jewry
was virtually untouched. Romania was also, formally speaking, a German ally;
however, the thousands of German troops stationed in the country constituted “a
garrison force” and rendered Romanian independence “a facade” [Gutman: 1291].
Romanian forces participated in the wholesale massacre of Jews in
newly-acquired territories along the Soviet border. But meanwhile, in Romania itself, a thriving industry developed for
the exploitative taxation and extortion of local Jews. Throughout Romania, Jews bribed local officials for protection
from the Nazi genocide. Thus, in one of Europe’s most antisemitic countries, ‘only’ about
half of the Jewish population fell victim to the Holocaust. As in Bulgaria, these deaths were concentrated in the
newly-acquired territories. In fact, if these territories are exempted from the
analysis, Romania’s victimization rate was only 12%.
Hungary is the best single illustration of the
relationship between German occupational hierarchy and Jewish victimization
rates. Until March 1944, Hungary was a loyal (if unenthusiastic) German ally.
Jews remained virtually unharmed, and even fought in Hungarian uniform on the
Eastern Front. When suspicion arose that Hungary was prepared to switch sides, however,
German forces occupied the country, replaced the Prime Minister, and eventually
took the Prince Regent’s son as a hostage. In under a year at the very end of
the war, with the world watching and almost fully aware of their fate, almost
80% of Hungary’s Jews were deported and killed.
The Hungarian case shows that the late onset of deportations did not
significantly affect occupational policy outcomes. Events in Romania show that even severe antisemitism did not
ensure high rates of victimization. Thus, two potential rival hypotheses are
dismissed. Informal hierarchy, a political science concept under-appreciated in
the historical literature, clearly played an important role in victimization
rate variation.
Chapter 7. Conclusion.
In the concluding chapter, I summarize my argument and attend to this
project’s moral implications. First, though Jews consistently suffered more
than their national compatriots, their suffering was somehow ‘proportional’ to
that of their fellow citizens. Germany unleashed brutal retaliation on the citizens
of any country that resisted its
hegemony. But citizens suffered less when high-ranking government officials
stayed in office to collaborate. While Jews were certainly among those who
suffered most in any given case, Jew and non-Jew alike benefited from such
negotiated arrangements.
This project also calls into question simplistic judgments of
collaboration as morally vacant. As I have shown, high-level collaboration
correlated with high rates of Jewish survival and a reduction in the suffering
of the population at large. The purpose of this project, of course, is not to
exonerate the collaborators — who, after all, cooperated with the Germans,
prolonged the war, and ultimately contributed to the suffering of (Jewish and
non-Jewish) Europeans elsewhere on the continent. But in his postwar trial for
treason, Vichy leader Marshal Pétain claimed that he
intentionally acted as France’s shield
because he was unable to act as its sword.
His statement may not have been sincere; but it raises harrowing moral
questions in any case.
Throughout this project, we are faced with the notion that reaction to
German occupation entailed a tragic choice. Collaboration often meant giving up
the noble effort to resist German occupation. But resistance was often futile,
and usually increased the brutality of the occupation that inevitably followed.
Under such circumstances, it may have been better to protect one’s own
citizens, even if that meant helping the Germans as well. It is neither my
ability nor my intention to adjudicate between these compelling moral claims.
But we do ourselves and our science a disservice if we do not at least recognize
the tragic logic of collaboration and its consequences.