Not only were institutions created for its development, such as the German Society for Racial Hygiene (1904), but democratic countries such as the United States, Denmark and Sweden passed restrictive laws for carriers of hereditary diseases that went as far as forced sterilization.
These ideas caught on with some National Socialist leaders, Adolf Hitler includedThe first official measure took place on July 14, 1933, barely half a year after the coming to power in Germany. Beyond the theories and objectives set forth in innumerable books, the first official measure took place on July 14, 1933, barely half a year after his accession to power in Germany, with the enactment of the Law for the Protection of Hereditary Health. It established that those suffering from "congenital imbecility, schizophrenia, manic depressive dementia, hereditary epilepsy, Huntington's disease [...] and acute alcoholism" were to be sterilized, and special courts were created to enforce compliance.
In spite of complaints from the Catholic Church and some personalities, it is assumed that between 1933 and 1945, some 400,000 Germans were subjected to forced sterilization.. Other cases not provided for in the law were included, such as children of German mothers and French colonial soldiers born in the Ruhr during the Gallic occupation (1923-25).
But, as Hitler himself confessed in 1935 to Dr. Gerhard Wagner, the leader of the National Socialist Society of German Physicians, he it seemed necessary to go further, even if the situation did not yet allow it.. It was necessary to continue taking steps until the right moment arrived, and this would come at the sound of the drums of war.
A poster from a 1921 conference on eugenics, showing U.S. states that had implemented sterilization laws.
On February 20, 1939, Gerhard Kretchmar was born in the small Saxon town of Pomssen. What was supposed to be a joy for his parents, Richard and Lina, turned into despair. He was missing an arm and a leg, was blind and suffered from other pathologies. When he consulted his family doctor, he said that the best thing that could happen was for him to die.
Convinced National Socialists, The parents petitioned Hitler to that effect, since the euthanasia was illegal. The Chancellor agreed to the request, sending his personal physician, Karl Brandt, to Leipzig to gather all the information and to act if he considered it appropriate. On July 25, 1939, with everyone's acquiescence, the child died after being given an injection of Luminal.
Possibly, the conviction that a large part of German society would understand that the the extension of eugenic measures prompted the regime to take a further step. A few days earlier, on account of the case, a secret meeting had taken place in a villa in Berlin's Tiergartenstrasse 4. The meeting, chaired by Brandt himself and Philipp Bouhler, head of the Chancellery of the Führer in the NSDAP, was attended by various members of the Ministry of the Interior, as well as prestigious doctors and psychiatrists.
There he set himself the goal of establishing a large-scale euthanasia program affecting patients incurable, in Nazi slang, "lives unworthy of being lived", so that they could be given a "merciful death".
Put a face to your donation. Help us form diocesan and religious priests.
In the discussion, the possibility of drafting a euthanasia law was considered, but it was concluded that a large part of the population, especially the Churches, would not understand it. It was then decided to take these measures discreetly and on the sly, so that there could be no question of murder. One of the first was the establishment of the Reich Committee for the Scientific Registration of Hereditary and Congenital Diseases, which would draw up a census of newborns with deficiencies.
The final meeting took place on September 5. At the meeting a document signed on the 1st (date of the invasion of Poland) by Hitler was exhibited which stated: "The Reichsleiter and Dr. Brandt, M.D., are charged, under their responsibility, with extending the powers of certain physicians who will be nominally appointed. These may grant a merciful death to the sick whom they have considered incurable. according to the most rigorous appraisal possible". Everyone thought that the German public, busy with the war, would pay little attention to him.
At the same time, a campaign was orchestrated for to raise German society's awareness of the economic and social that was involved in keeping these people alive. From books and pamphlets we would move on to short films such as Das Erbe ("The Inheritance", Carl Hartmann, 1935), and to successful feature films such as Ich klage an ("I accuse", Wolfgang Liebeneiner, 1941).
Meanwhile, in the schools, the children were given problems like this: "If it costs 500,000 marks a year to maintain an insane asylum for incurable mental patients and it costs 10,000 marks to build a house for a working family, How many family homes could be built per year on what is being squandered on the asylum?".
Karl Brandt, Hitler's personal doctor and organizer of Aktion T-4.
The operation was launched under the name Aktion T-4, after the mansion in Tiergartenstrasse where it was based. Hospitals and mental sanatoriums throughout the Reich were compelled to report those patients considered incurable.. They had to do so through a form established by the Ministry of the Interior that included three groups:
Once the files arrived, three doctors reviewed them and checked a box that decided the future of the patient. A red cross signified death; blue, life; and a question mark, doubt with future revision. The first ones were picked up by large gray buses, used by Deutsche Post, the postal service, which had the particularity of having the windows tinted in black.
Shortly after the patients were transferred, the families received a new letter informing them of the death.
The destination was one of six gassing centers: Grafeneck, Hartheim, Sonnenstein, Brandenburg, Bernburg and Hadamar. At these centers a cursory visual examination that spared few from immediate death. Very young children were eliminated with injections of morphine or scopolamine.
Although the family was notified of the transfer, not many details were added. After a short time, a new letter was received informing of the death and its presumed cause, and announcing that the corpse had been cremated for public health reasons. In some cases the ashes were added, and in others a short period of time was given so that they could be collected by the relatives.
The number of groups affected increased progressively. A directive obliged doctors and midwives to report children born with malformationsShortly thereafter, the parents were informed of the existence of special sanatoriums for their care and rehabilitation, requesting their authorization to transfer them to centers from which almost no one returned.
Karl Brandt (right), together with Adolf Hitler and Martin Bormann. Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-H0422-0502-001 / CC-BY-SA 3.0
Letters of condolence, on the other hand, were not always convincing. Some contained errors of sex or age, and the pathologies of the deceased did not always match the cause of death. Sometimes the urn was empty, or there were two urns for the same person. The pressure on the staff of the centers began to become excessive, and Rumors began to spread in the towns adjacent to the sanatoriums.
As early as March 19, 1940, Theophil Wurm, Protestant bishop of Württemberg, sent a letter to the Minister of the Interior asking for explanations.. Others were to follow, while the families became increasingly reluctant to transfer. However, it was Bishop Clemens August von Galen of Münster, Bishop of Münster, who gave a homily on August 3, 1941, that set the tone for Aktion T-4.
Bishop Clemens August von Galen.
In the sermon, which was reproduced in some parishes of the diocese, Von Galen said: "The suspicion has spread, bordering on certainty, that so many unexpected deaths among mental patients are not due to natural causesIt is not that they have been deliberately programmed, but that officials, following the precept that it is permitted to destroy 'lives not worth living', kill innocent people, if it is decided that these lives are of no value to the People and to the State. It is a terrible doctrine that justifies the murder of innocent peoplewhich gives carte blanche to kill invalids, the deformed, the chronically ill, the elderly who cannot work and the sick who suffer from an incurable disease".
The denunciation could not have been louder and clearer, and it made an impact. Opposition to the euthanasia measures grew, while the nervousness of the Aktion T-4 executives increased. Immersed in the campaign against the USSR, Hitler did not want any social unrest in the rearguard, so he had no choice but to officially" suspend the operation on August 24, 1941.
By then, 70,273 victims had been registered. However, recent studies suggest that the operation continued covertly and with other methods. Although the transfers ceased, a lethal injection, drug poisoning or starvation replaced gassing. The number of victims will probably never be knownalthough it could very well be around 200,000.
Published in La Vanguardia
