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Chapter 13
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Ordinary Men, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Freedom of Choice
Peer Pressure, Conformity, and Acceptance
Normalization of Violence
Nationalism, War, and Ethnic Cleansing
Summary
Analysis
By mid-November 1942, after a string of mass executions and deportations, the men of Reserve Police Battalion 101 have killed at least 6,500 Jews and helped deport at least 42,000 to Treblinka. With the towns and ghettos clear of Jews already, the battalion’s next task is to hunt down all the Jews who are hiding in the area and make their region judenfrei. It is easier for the Jews in the battalion’s district to hide because, unlike in other districts, many of their ghettos are not walled in and the Jews are freer to move around. Although the battalion that was stationed in the area before Reserve Police Battalion 101 did occasionally execute Jews they found outside of approved zones, systematically hunting them down doesn’t really pick up steam until after the ghettos are cleared.
A major element of the Nazis’ Final Solution is their vision of a utopian world that is entirely free of Jews and where Germans reign supreme. To achieve this, they plan on killing every single Jew in a given area, sometimes replacing them with “pure” Germans who can have a lot of children to increase the populations of the “master race.” Consciously making a place judenfrei by systematically hunting down individual Jews is one of the advanced stages of the Final Solution—it means all sizable groups of Jews in that area have been killed, and all that is left are individuals who are hiding and trying to survive.
Themes
Parczew is the first ghetto in Reserve Police Battalion 101’s security zone to be completely cleared (it is not clear if the battalion cleared it or another unit), but even after that, Steinmetz continues finding Jews in the area. He imprisons them at first, but then Gnade orders him to kill them and any other Jew he finds. Steinmetz is essentially tasked with keeping his region judenfrei. This becomes an official order in numerous areas in October. The battalion creates special patrols to find any Jews (called “suspects”) who are hiding. They call this process the judenjagd, or “Jew hunt.” The judenjagd is not just one big event, but a prolonged and important phase of the Final Solution.
Participation in the “Jew hunt” requires the men to have a much different mindset than when they commit an isolated mass murder. Instead of simply rounding the Jews up, the men must purposely go looking for them, which frequently includes turning houses inside out and combing the surrounding countryside and farms, knowing that if they find any Jews they must be shot on sight, not brought back to the group to possibly be killed by someone else. Using the word “suspects” to describe the Jews they are looking for encourages the men to continue thinking of the Jews of an enemy because it implies that the Jews have committed a crime.
Themes
On two occasions (fall of 1942 and spring of 1943), the battalion launches two huge sweeps of the Parczew forest looking for both Jews and escaped Russian prisoners of war. According to one man from Third Company, during the first battalion-wide sweep they struggle to find any Jews in the woods until their second walkthrough, when they discover chimneys sticking up out of the ground. They realize that entire families of Jews are living in underground bunkers, and they are all shot on the spot. According to one policeman’s estimation, the body count for the first sweep is about 500.
Themes
In the spring, the judenjagd intensifies and becomes more dangerous. During the sweep, the men find a camp full of escaped Russians and Jews who are armed and ready to fight. The escapees and policemen exchange gunfire and ultimately all 100 to 120 Jews and Russians are killed. In addition, Lieutenant Hagen is accidentally killed by one of his own men. There is also some trouble with the Jews who work on nearby “agricultural estates.” When a unit of Steinmetz’s platoon kills all the Jewish workers on one estate, the owner is furious. The owner of another estate has a different problem—Jews in hiding sneak on and act like workers, so first Hoffmann and then his replacement Messmann periodically kill the excess Jews.
Themes
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The battalion also sweeps the town for Jews, occasionally finding them in basements and getting them to give up the locations of other hideouts. On one occasion, a Jewish woman runs away from the battalion and the men track her down to her father’s house. They tell the man to choose between his own life and his daughter’s—he promptly turns over his daughter and she is shot on the spot. It’s often Polish informants who discover bunkers. The battalion then comes out, throws a grenade in the bunker, and shoots anyone who survives the blast. The “Jew hunts” become such a frequent event that, in their interrogations, most men can’t remember how many times they participated in them.
Themes
In Browning’s estimation, the battalion’s involvement in the judenjagd is them coming full circle—their killings at Józefów were intensely personal, subsequent actions were (mostly) not as personal, and with the “Jew hunt” they once again come face to face with their victims and the killings are again personal. Additionally, each individual policeman has a lot of freedom of choice, and the choices they all make reveal the clear division between the “tough” and “weak” in the battalion. Since the initial massacre in Józefów, some men have become numb to the violence or are even enthusiastic about it, while others consciously try to limit their involvement with violence whenever it’s easy to do so, and a very small minority consistently abstain from violence entirely.
The men’s behavior after shootings reveals a growing callousness. After the Józefów massacre, every man had been bitter and didn’t want to eat or talk about what had happened. Over time, however, they become less sensitive to the violence. One policeman remembers some of his comrades making jokes about eating the brains of slaughtered Jews after a shooting. Whenever there is a judenjagd or shooting task, many men are happy to volunteer; in fact, there are so many volunteers that sometimes men must be turned away. One thing most of the policemen agree on is that there is never trouble finding enough shooters when they are needed, and anyone who says they can’t keep shooting is allowed to stop.
The minority of men who don’t want to participate in any of the violence typically take one of several lines of action: they either never volunteer, keep their distance from the officers while they organize firing squads or patrols, and some are very open about their personal dislike of violence. Otto-Julius Schimke, the first man to step out at Józefów, reports in his interrogation that, because he asked not to shoot the first time, he was excluded from all other violent actions. Other men who voice their discomfort with the violence are also spared having to be part of it. Another policeman claims his personal dislike of violence is the reason he is excluded from violent actions because the commanders want “men” to participate in the actions and they no longer consider him a man.
Themes
When distance and reputation aren’t enough to get the men out of violent actions, they have to blatantly refuse. Lieutenant Hoppner soon earns himself a reputation as a judenjagd enthusiast and tries to make all of his men shoot at some point in time. One of his men remembers Hoppner telling him he must shoot a Jew, but when the opportunity arises later, the man refuses. He credits Trapp with saving him from being punished. Some men only shoot when an officer is around and even let Jews go if they know they won’t get in trouble for it (like when they’re with trusted friends).
Themes
There are no reports detailing how many hundreds or thousands of Jews the battalion kills during the judenjagd but reports from other units provide a valuable clue. From May to October 1943, after the bulk of the Jews who have been hiding in the woods or elsewhere have been killed, a report for the Lublin district (which includes Reserve Police Battalion 101) says 1,695 Jews were killed. Another report for a gendarmerie unit in Warsaw reports 1,094 Jews are found and shot between March and September 1943. This supports Browning’s assertion that the judenjagd is an important part of the Final Solution. Because it goes on for so long, is so violent, and occurs so often, the judenjagd is also important in understanding the men’s mental state (namely, that many have become thoroughly habituated to violence)—for the battalion, the judenjagd is an existential condition, not an isolated event.
