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| Dr Robert Jay Lifton |
THE NAZI DOCTORS:
Medical
Killing and
the
Psychology
of Genocide © |
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252 |
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| AUSCHWITZ: THE RACIAL CURE |
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of “bearer of secrets.” “He must have known
too much or perhaps talked to somebody he should not have” is the way that
one prisoner doctor put it.
With considerable personal pain, Hermann
Langbein has described still another factor: |
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One day the chief physician asked my opinion
about Samuel. Even earlier, Dr. Wirths had occasionally asked my opinion about
functionaries in the infirmary, without ever giving a reason for his question.
Afterward it always turned out that he had wanted to learn what I thought
because he was considering the person concerned for a leading function. Since,
from all I knew about Samuel, I had doubts about helping him acquire an
influential post, I answered reservedly. Wirths replied that he too did not
have the best opinion of Samuel, and [he] dictated something else. Soon
afterward, Dr. Samuel was taken to Birkenau by the chief physician’s
sergeant, Friedrich Ontl. The office was ordered to prepare his death
announcement. |
Langbein claimed, “[On further reflection] I came to
the conclusion that this was the only way I could react.” He nonetheless
continued to ask himself “whether I, too, bear unintended complicity in
the death of this man.”9
He went
on to characterize Samuel as the kind of Auschwitz prisoner, found especially
among the older ones, who “despite great intelligence and experience of
life, despite knowledge of the Auschwitz extermination machinery, refused to
accept reality and nourished the insane hope of being able to create an
exception for themselves.”10 The
exception, as we know, had to do with the survival of his daughter. But also of
great importance was Samuel’s strong sense of himself as a German and, as
such, a countryman of the Nazis and a colleague of SS doctors — an
identity he could call forth in Auschwitz in order to try to save his daughter
(who too was killed) and also himself.
If there is to be a last
word about prisoner medical collaborators, it might best be Jan W.’s. This
Polish doctor’s cautious answer, when asked his opinion about the actions
of Dering and Samuel, managed to convey some of the complexity of Auschwitz
moral truths, along with his own considerable humanity: |
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It is difficult to pass judgment on the behavior
of inmates. It’s difficult to accuse the Jews of the Sonderkommando
of helping to kill their fellow Jews by pushing them into the gas chambers. It
was done under pressure which deprived them of their will. But there were times
when a man went over the border of what we could expect from him — did
more than what was demanded or required — when he performed functions with
sadistic satisfaction or even did certain things before he
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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 252 |
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