Article Reinhard Heydrich

[Jake84]

In lack of a « History » sub forum, I wanted to start a thread about him; for the History nerds, or not we all know him, because he was murdered in Prague when he was still pretty young and held a powerful position in the Third Reich hierarchy.

Anyway, to refresh memory check this article out:

Reinhard Heydrich: In Depth

Reinhard Heydrich, Reich Security Main Office chief, was one of the main architects of the “Final Solution," the Nazi plan to murder the Jews of Europe.

encyclopedia.ushmm.org

(Or Wikipedia if you want to)

Interesting yet quite an eerie character, young and ambitious; would have overthrown Hitler, lock him up and taken over Germany if he could. What do you think of him for those who’ve read further than internet articles?

 

[BravoZulu]

A butcher rightly exterminated before he got the opportunity to expand his "abilities" in slaughtering the vanquished

 

[Mordoror]

A butcher rightly exterminated before he got the opportunity to expand his "abilities" in slaughtering the vanquished

Nicely summarized

A young wolf with teeth rattling the floor, without any morale boundary, without any loyalty except to himself
If he had come to power, we would have probably seen a nice purge in the Nazi state apparatus
The guy hated all other nazi "nobles", had an heavy hand on a part of the internal intelligence system and was a top fish in the Nazi feodal organization.
Good riddance

 

[muck]

It just occured to me Heydrich is a very problematic figure with regards to historical view. His character conveys the impression all Nazis were sadistic nutjobs, when most were in fact something far worse: ordinary men and petty bureaucrats, often driven by peer pressure.

Personally, I think the single most horrific fact about all the crimes committed in the name of Nazism is the fact its perpetrators were offered psychological care and vacations at health resorts, as though murdering people was just another stressful office job. This is what makes the Holocaust stand out of all the genocides of the twentieth century, I think: the grotesque banality of evil, as Hannah Arendt expressed it so skillfully.

 

[Jake84]

Muck, you’re raising an interesting point.

In fact, I’m going to veer off topic a bit but it also occurred to me lately: why were The Nuremberg trials pretty much unfair? Someone like Ernst Kaltenbrunner although involved in the Final Solution was pretty much a bureaucrat and was sentenced to death and hanged, whereas said; Sepp Dietrich, a general involved in the cold-blooded executions of Allies soldiers during the Ardennes offensive was released 12 years after the war and could still attend former Waffen SS conventions.

It’s hard to understand Nuremberg fairness regarding that; Heydrich as mentioned before was pretty much a lowest scum-of-the-earth and genocidal individual who deserved being gunned down.

 

[muck]

It’s hard to understand Nuremberg fairness regarding that;

I would assume spontaneous crimes or those committed in proximity to the front were seen as not quite as grave as those committed with premeditation in the safety of the hinterland. Which actually makes some sense from a strictly legal point of view, as atrocities like an impromptu execution of prisoners might actually not qualify as murder, "only" as manslaughter.

Besides, the Nuremberg Trials entered unchartered waters in many a way, raising some difficult problems. They marked a departure from the ancient principle that a national court does not hold authority over another country – obviously due to the intolerability of the thought some of the worst scumbags of all time could walk free for lack of a lawful judge.

However, this prompted one of the involved American scholars (regrettably I forgot his name) to oppose the participation of the Soviets on the grounds of tu quoque ("you [did it] too"), declaring them morally unfit to condemn German war crimes on the account of their own. The defence attempted to adopt that argument with regards to the allied conduct of war in general. They failed, but it's conceivable the judges didn't go as harsh on war criminals in the strict sense of the word to avoid the impression of blind "victor's justice".

 

[Mordoror]

Muck, you’re raising an interesting point.

In fact, I’m going to veer off topic a bit but it also occurred to me lately: why were The Nuremberg trials pretty much unfair? Someone like Ernst Kaltenbrunner although involved in the Final Solution was pretty much a bureaucrat and was sentenced to death and hanged, whereas said; Sepp Dietrich, a general involved in the cold-blooded executions of Allies soldiers during the Ardennes offensive was released 12 years after the war and could still attend former Waffen SS conventions.

It’s hard to understand Nuremberg fairness regarding that; Heydrich as mentioned before was pretty much a lowest scum-of-the-earth and genocidal individual who deserved being gunned down.

I 'd add several point besides the ones raised by Muck (appropriately so)

Frontline crimes were probably less punished also because
1- they were the "exception" not the rule on the Western Front in comparison with the Eastern Front
Soviet prosecutors sometime jumped like crazied fleas in reagrd to some sentences because what happened on the Ostfront appeared lessened or dismissed to them

2-there was also (in some instances) calculations for the follow up of the war. i.e opposition of the two new emerging blocks. It is now clear that some war criminals or hard core nazis went through the net because they were deemed a necessity for the CW that was slowly emerging
I am not even talking about some Japanese and the Tokyo trial (in this instance, you'd note that sentences regarding the field commanders for war crimes were probably harsher in some cases but some famous criminals went through it unskated)

3-Lack of proofs/testimonies. Nazi state being what it was (a totalitarian hellhole) it kept a bunch of documents that accused higher fishes. Field commanders mis(deeds) were less documented

4- there was the whole thing about "Whermacht clean" hand by opposition to "SS dirty hands"

5- the necessity to keep a functionning state so keep some civil servants in service (the same thing made that Hiro Hito was not trialed)

 

[muck]

Last but not least:

Nuremberg was the first major criminal proceedings in history to discard with the excuse of compulsion to obey orders. Yet still the notion was fairly new and not universally accepted, and some of those tried argued not without reason they'd been forced to execute immoral or downright inhumane orders.

Interestingly, those who did so successfully were (to my knowledge) all members of fighting units below general staff level, whereas Nazi organization members attempted the same in vain. Now, this is just conjecture on my part, but I should think it had something to do with the fact the SS and SD bastards engaged in the Holocaust were all volunteers who did not face consequences for refusal to participate in war crimes, whereas regular soldiers did.

Now, this is not to defend the myth of the "untainted Wehrmacht" (@Mordoror), but the fact is that 30000 German soldiers were sentenced to die for disobedience during the war, a further 70000 were imprisoned in concentration camps and over 1 million were either given prison sentences or were sent to penal battalions to serve as cannon-fodder. The sobering truth is the vast majority would call that an obvious choice: It's either me or them.

 

[Mordoror]

Last but not least:

Nuremberg was the first major criminal proceedings in history to discard with the excuse of compulsion to obey orders. Yet still the notion was fairly new and not universally accepted, and some of those tried argued not without reason they'd been forced to execute immoral or downright inhumane orders.

Interestingly, those who did so successfully were (to my knowledge) all members of fighting units below general staff level, whereas Nazi organization members attempted the same in vain. Now, this is just conjecture on my part, but I should think it had something to do with the fact the SS and SD bastards engaged in the Holocaust were all volunteers who did not face consequences for refusal to participate in war crimes, whereas regular soldiers did.

Now, this is not to defend the myth of the "untainted Wehrmacht" (@Mordoror), but the fact is that 30000 German soldiers were sentenced to die for disobedience during the war, a further 70000 were imprisoned in concentration camps and over 1 million were either given prison sentences or were sent to penal battalions to serve as cannon-fodder. The sobering truth is the vast majority would call that an obvious choice: It's either me or them.

No problem @muck
The "untainted" Whermacht is a complicated issue.
Thing is that from 1950 to pretty late, Whermacht was regarded and sold as entirely clean from the major war crimes and all the burden was charged on the SS. This was a way for the higher command to clean itself and present itself as frequentable.
More recent studies and document show that it was not the case and that regular Whermacht units were part (sometimes "happily") of both field war crimes and actions against the jews and others.
It was certainly not a generality, far from it, as you say.
But quite a few units and more importantly quite a few upper officers (that wanted to remain clean) had dirty hands (sometimes as orders followers only, sometimes also as orders emitters ....)

 

[Gaz]

Honestly don't know a whole lot about the subject other than the basics but how is Heydrich's assassination looked back on by historians? By that, I mean did killing him have an impact on the war and it was arguably "worth" (Horrible word to use, but I can't think of another way to phrase it) the massive reprisals against Czechoslovakian civilians?

 

[Mordoror]

Honestly don't know a whole lot about the subject other than the basics but how is Heydrich's assassination looked back on by historians? By that, I mean did killing him have an impact on the war and it was arguably "worth" (Horrible word to use, but I can't think of another way to phrase it) the massive reprisals against Czechoslovakian civilians?

From the general way of the war, it seemingly didn't do any difference. Especially in the concerned area where in fact retaliation made things worse.
Now it is difficult to extrapolate because of Heydritch personality.
We obviously don't know how he would have reacted during the course of the war, especially in regard to his main political "opponents" (Himmler, Canaris etc) and with the various disasters met by the State during his military campaign
After his death, the RSHA was overtaken by Himmler and later transmitted to Kaltebrunner that were already there (as well as Nebe, Olendorf etc) so the transmission of power was "easy"
So maybe the death of Heydritch helped Himmler to concentrate the intelligence services of the Reich into his only hands and if Heydritch would have stayed alive, there would have been at least an internal fight between the two men and Himmler wouldn't have got a so much important position but we don't know.
In any case, i don't see him turning his coat and going to negociate like Rudoph Hess nor be part of the elimination attempt against A.H