Worse Than War: Genocide, Eliminationism, and the Ongoing Assault on Humanity

Goldhagen's insights are original. His take on the subject might make you uncomfortable, but this is not an easy subject, of course, and Goldhagen has treated it with inarguable logic and analysis. Brilliant in every respect. - Brown Thrasher

Goldhagen narrates the atrocities that had been committed throughout recent history. In South Africa,Turkey,British Occupied Kenya, Indonesia,Burundi,Cambodia,Guatemala,Bosnia,Rwanda,Darfur,Germany and its occupied lands. Mass murder of innocent people has indeed been the scourge of humanity prior to the Holocaust,during and after the Holocaust. It is shocking and disturbing that so many of the broader populace had been willing to collaborate with the perpetrators, to join rather than contest or protest. Most people became aware when mass murder was carried out by their countrymen on helpless victims who posed no physical or military threat to the perpetrators or to themselves, the bystanders. The apathy of so many within Germany, as well as all over the world, in effect enabled the perpetrators to continue the mass murder during WWII. According to Goldhagen, (p.149) "during the Holocaust no German perpetrator was ever killed, sent to a concentration camp, imprisoned, or punished in any serious way for refusing to kill Jews. Many knew they did not have to kill, because their commanders explicitly told them so. Some men accepted their commander's offer and removed themselves from the task of killing. Nothing happened to them; they were given other duties." Apparently most mobilized Germans chose to take part in the murder of innocent men, woman and children. Their leaders' planted seeds of hatred sprouted in the minds and hearts of those who succumbed to their bestiality lurking inside. I have often been asked: "Did German civilians know about the ongoing annihilation of the Jewish people?" My response to my life audiences or readers of my autobiography (From A Name to A Number) is in the affirmative: Every German family had somebody or knew somebody serving in the police, military, government etc. Furthermore, there were twenty thousand forced labor and concentration camps in Germany. More than 600 of them were located in Berlin, the capital. In four camps (out of five) that I had been incarcerated, local civilians saw our haggard bodies marching to work, and back. In one camp, I worked at the same factory where German employees worked. In Death Marches, as Goldhagen depicts so eloquently "created the broadest permanent imprint on a human landscape precisely because they cover much territory, with the dying, broken, and unwanted strewn in columns over main roads, past cities and towns, announcing to the countless bystanders unmistakably what their leaders and countrymen do in their name, and leaving indelible images in mind." I survived the Holocaust with a stabbed soul and traumatic memories. Still, I do not deem the entire German people culpable for the Holocaust. There was one German woman who risked her life, thirty times, for me. She was definitely not the only compassionate German. I witnessed the best of humanity alongside its worst. Regrettably, I saw many devils, but very few angels. Nevertheless, the Bible tells us in Genesis 18

Let's hope that everyone at the United Nations and in responsible parties in governments around the world read this book. More needs to be done to stop mass killing, and Goldhagen says just how. Goldhagen comes down pretty hard on the UN for not preventing genocidal deaths, and it deserves the rap. On the other hand, there is a ray of hope: the International Criminal Tribunal for Rawanda, which is part of the UN has indicted perpetrators of genocide. Goldhagen argues that large bounties should be placed on the heads of these sorts of folks. I don't know why I've seen some people on the internet laugh at this idea. It's working. There is in a place a successful bounty program to hunt down perpetrators of Genocide. This past month, Ildephonse Nizeyimana, considered the #2 man in Rwandan genocide was captured. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, put a warrant for his arrest. The United States offered a $5million bounty for him under the Rewards For Justice program. Interpol arrested him in Uganda, and the Ugandan Government is claiming the bounty. Earlier in the year Gregoire Ndahimana was arrested in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The U.S. also put a bounty on his head. The United States through the Rewards for Justice program has a bounty on 13 individuals it says are responsible for Genocide in Rwanda. Here's an official U.S. press release: [...] I think Goldhagen's book is right on in his description of the genocidal mindset. He argues passionately that more needs to be done. We must do more.

I heard this book covers a lot of ground when it comes to genocide. It does, for sure. I was surprised though, but I shouldn't have been, that thematically, it's bigger than that. It goes deep into the human psyche and the way nations behave towards its citizens and each other. I've read a bit on the subject, and am something of an activist. I've come across many fine books about genocide. In general, they are very specific in the attention they give. Be it Bosnia, Cambodia, Armenia, or any of the other places or peoples that genocide has affected. It's quite remarkable that in this one volume, Goldhagen has connected all the dots. He looks at genocide as a phenomenon. Played out in one venue or another, they share common characteristics. Most important of all for all of us to remember is that genocide as a human enterprise can be understood, and can be explained. It is a hate crime. The UN calls it a crime against humanity. That it is. But when it comes to the killing, it's personal. It is brought about because one group of people hates another group of people so much -- that mass murder seems to the perpetrators logical and just, and the killing is done under the auspices of a government, usually a dictator. Unfortunately we read and write books about it, and we have not done a good job of saving people's lives. I'd love for all good people to read this book. Goldhagen does a brilliant job. He's arranged it thematically. You don't plod from one country to the next. You visit the big picture issues. Each chapter has a theme: "Why They Begin", "How They are Implemented", "Why The Perpetrators Act", "Why They End", "Prologue For The Future". By the end of it you understand a lot about genocide, a lot about human nature and a lot about world affairs. He leaves no stone unturned. It's genocide from A to Z. Even though I have read many books on the subject, this book helped me fill in the blanks, and make sense of it all. Because it's organized thematically, I didn't even have to read it in order. I read it one theme at a time, and the ones I wanted to cogitate on I re-read. This is a really great book.

This book goes way beyond talking about numbers. It looks deep down into the heart of darkness. There have been many genocides. Goldhagen explains that they all share common elements. I read this book and came to a deeper understanding of the planet and the people on it. Ultimately this book is about the human condition. What's in people's hearts. What's it like to mobilize others to kill, what's it like to be a killer, to be a victim, to be a bystander. The book is breathtaking in its scope. Panoramic. It opened my eyes. This book makes the incomprehensible understandable -- that more people have died in genocides than in all military combat combined is breathtaking to think about, and is just the start. That huge, abstract number frames the book. To kill large numbers of people means large numbers of other people are mobilized to do the job. Goldhagen looks into the hands, the hearts and the minds of those who are pulling the triggers and holding the machetes. He examines the local and global conditions at the moment a man, a woman, or a child is felled. He makes it very real, very personal. At the very core of genocide is hate. The perpetrators hate their victims for reasons simple and complex, and the spark of killing is ignited time and again by a political decision, a political calculus, usually by a tyrant in one place or another to mobilize local hatreds for his own political purposes. The killing usually stops when all or substantially all of the victims are gone. The world watches. Time and again, it does nothing or not enough. This is a hugely important book. Because by reading it, you realize, it's not the world that's watching anymore. It's us. It is each one of us looking, knowing, understanding that somewhere not just one child is being killed, but ultimately millions. Goldhagen points out that if a child were killed on a suburban street in the United States or in England or in France there would be outrage, and a call for action. Good people do not want killing like this to happen. Yet no action is taken when it is half a world away. Nearly ALL the children, the men and the women of the targeted group die. This book is what happens in places far from our everyday lives. The sanctity of life. Of human suffering. Of the hate in people's hearts. Of the failure of good people and their institutions to protect the weak. After reading it, you can no longer say that you don't know, or don't understand. This book is a very important work that makes sense of the world. It looks evil in the eye and it makes you think.