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| Dr Robert Jay Lifton |
THE NAZI DOCTORS:
Medical
Killing and
the
Psychology
of Genocide © |
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242 |
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| AUSCHWITZ: THE RACIAL CURE |
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| he described hearing them say, upon the arrival of Jewish
transports: “For us Poles, Hitler has one good side — he is freeing
us from Jews.” Although he knew there to be admirable people in the
resistance “from all over Europe,” all the “non-Jewish prisoners
were anti-Semitic, … merely with different nuances.” |
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| Four Medical
Collaborators |
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It was inevitable that at least a few prisoner doctors
would cross the line into what was perceived by other inmates to be active
collaboration with the SS. We will examine four of them — three Poles and
a German Jew — each identified with a particular form of collaboration:
respectively, selections, experimental operations, physical violence, and
“Jewish collaboration.” These four patterns of collaboration tell us
much. about not only the men themselves but the Nazi doctors who orchestrated
the collaboration and the Auschwitz environment where it occurred.
All
four of them were men, probably for several reasons the greater number of male
prisoner doctors, the greater authority given them in general, and perhaps the
greater capacity of women doctors — as women — to adapt flexibly to
Auschwitz and, specifically, to SS doctors without succumbing (or at least
doing so less extremely and less frequently) to the lure of a “power
position” in the Auschwitz hierarchy. |
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| Performing Selections: Adam T. |
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Adam T. was the only one of the four medical collaborators
still alive. I found him not in Poland but in Germany, where he had been living
since the end of the war, having even Germanized his last name. Dr. Jacob R.
echoed other prisoner doctors in describing him as “an opportunist …
and anti-Semite” — a judgment R. somewhat qualified by adding,
“All of us preferred to help ours [our own people].” Dr. Peter D.
also considered Adam T. anti-Semitic as well as “overzealous,” a man
who “wanted to be on the good side of the [SS] doctor because he had a
better chance [that way] as a Christian of getting out of the camp.” But
Dr. D. added, “With me he was very nice.” A non-Jewish former inmate
able to observe him closely placed Adam T. among those prisoner doctors
“who selected more people than even the SS doctors would have.” And
the nonmedical scientist also a close observer, summed the matter up “Adam
T. was a rabid anti-Semitic Polish nationalist with an evil temper. He was
quick to rouse. He could swing from cruelty to kindness. He could go either
way. He was unpredictable.”
Having been received by most survivors
in tones of warm colleagueship and sympathy with my work, I was struck by Adam
T.’s discomfort about meeting me (“Well, that all happened so long
ago. I don’t like to talk |
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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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