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| Dr Robert Jay Lifton |
THE NAZI DOCTORS:
Medical
Killing and
the
Psychology
of Genocide © |
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181 |
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| Selections in the Camp |
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had to be kept alive to perform the necessary work.²
Toward the end, the selections diminished considerably — except for the
destruction of two entire camp units in mid-1944.
At times the orders
for camp selections seemed to be sufficiently precise — at least
sufficiently translated by command and medical authorities into precise numbers
— that doctors performing the selections did so with rather exact
requirements. More often there was considerable leeway so that it could be, as
one knowledgeable survivor put it, "very, very arbitrary," and the individual
selecting doctor could frequently “do as he liked.”
Selections could be requested unofficially as well as officially. (The
head of a subcamp, as the same survivor tells us, might approach an SS doctor
with the complaint of Überlag [“overcrowding”].) In
either case, there was likely to be a combination of pressure on the doctor to
follow a general policy and considerable discretion on his part is to how to do
that.
Dr. Otto Wolken, the prisoner doctor who kept records, told of a
mass camp selection, held on “the last Sunday in August in 1943,” in
which four thousand Jews were sent to be gassed. He referred to a sequence of
ramp selections; of individual killings by capos, encouraged by camp
authorities; of prisoners admitted to the camp but unable to do the heavy work
assigned them — and when “these heroes lost their pleasure in doing
this [killing], . . the camp doctor appeared.” His appearance was
synonymous with the dreaded order of “Blocksperre!” ["Block
sealed!"], which meant that no one could leave his or her block and curtains or
blinds were drawn to prevent vision into or from the affected
blocks: |
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The camp doctor, accompanied by some SS, went
from block to block. He received from the office the number of Jews in each
single block. The Jews were taken from the blocks ... and their numbers were
checked at roll call. Then they had to strip completely, whether it was summer
or winter. And now the doctor went along the rows of naked people, and all who
appeared weak or frail, who had bandages, showed boils, or even scars or
scabies were ... sent along with those to be
killed.³ |
| Wolken went on to convey the systematic organization of
the process from block to block, with those selected taken to a specially
emptied block where they remained for a day or two, “packed like
sardines,” the near-starvation rations allocated for them largely
intercepted by capos who traded food for alcohol and “had drinking
orgies, which usually ended with severe mistreatment of the selected.” It
did, not matter that some prisoners were killed in this way because “only
the [total] number had to be correct, they didn't have to be alive.” When
transporting them at night in trucks to the gas chamber, SS men engaged in
“rough jokes,” again enhanced by alcohol, and in additional beatings
and killings.4 |
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THE NAZI DOCTORS:
Medical Killing and the
Psychology of
Genocide
Robert J. Lifton
ISBN 0-465-09094
©
1986 |
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Page 181 |
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