Hitler suspends euthanasia program (This Day in History)

History.com ^ | 08/18/2014 | staff

[Kid Shelleen]

On this day in 1941, Adolf Hitler orders that the systematic murder of the mentally ill and handicapped be brought to an end because of protests within Germany.

In 1939, Dr. Viktor Brack, head of Hitler's Euthanasia Department, oversaw the creation of the T.4 program, which began as the systematic killing of children deemed "mentally defective." Children were transported from all over Germany to a Special Psychiatric Youth Department and killed. Later, certain criteria were established for non-Jewish children. --SNIP-- Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS and the man who would direct the systematic extermination of European Jewry, had only one regret: that the SS had not been put in charge of the whole affair. "We know how to deal with it correctly, without causing useless uproar among the people."

[Ouchthatonehurt]

[vetvetdoug]

Ironically, Hitler's euthanasia program looks just like the Death Panels in the Healthcare Law.

[Heartlander]

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[Rockingham]

For Hitler and Himmler, the euthanasia program provided two important lessons in planning and conducting the Holocaust: (1) that Hitler would never sign an order directing the Holocaust because secrecy was essential in order to forestall potential public opposition and protect Hitler's standing; and (2), that even as Jews disappeared from Germany, continued anti-Semitic propaganda was necessary in order to provide motivation and to sustain morale among those in charge of the Holocaust.