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Just a quibble, the concentration camps didn't start out as part of the Final Solution. They started out as a place to confine dissidents, etc.
by greedo 9y ago
Just a quibble, the concentration camps didn't start out as part of the Final Solution. They started out as a place to confine dissidents, etc.
- moomin 9y agoThere's a terminology problem here. Scholars call the "final solution" camps extermination camps. They started after the invasion of Poland. Concentration camps in general began the moment the Nazis took power.
- greedo 9y agoExactly. The Germans referred to the initial camps as "Konzentrationslager" or "Arbeitslager" designed primarily around slave labor. They weren't overly concerned about prisoner death, but that was a byproduct in their minds. They wanted to work the Jews and other groups they considered Untermenschen until they dropped dead. Some camps were two-part; comprising a slave camp and an extermination camp. Auschwitz is a good example of this, though Treblinka also had a small work camp connected to its extermination camp. The work camp was primarily to support the vernichtungslager. In contrast, the sole goal of the extermination camps (Vernichtungslager) was the expeditious murder of "undesirables."