War, Genocide, and The Holocaust: Understanding the Madness and the Motivations

This is a critical unit to explore each year. Understanding the past can help us resolve to not allow another genocide to occur. But, recent events indicate we have not learned our lessons yet. Central Question for the Unit: What ideas justify and motivate genocidal behavior?

Course Lecture PowerPoint Slides and Other Materials

• Instructor Master PP Slides

• Student PP Slides

Course Lecture Video Recordings

• Music Video Overview of the Unit (3:58 minutes) Music: Theme instrumental from "Schindler's List" movie composed by John Williams. This instrumental provides the appropriate sound background for the tragic events studied in this unit on genocides and The Holocaust.

• (Video) Part One

• (Video) Part Two

• (Video) Part Three

• (Video) Part Four

• (Video) Part Five

Required Readings and Media

• Study Guide Questions for Assigned Readings and Media (Word)

• Goldkind, Arrival at Auschwitz Prison Camp Transcript (PDF Transcript)

• Goldkind, Arrival at Auschwitz Prison Camp Transcript (Audio)

• Stone, Beyond the Auschwitz Syndrome (PDF)

• Wiesel, Perils of Indifference Speech Given at the White House to President Clinton and others. (PDF Transcript)

• Packett, Ho Chi Minh to 1950 (PDF Transcript)

• Packett, Ho Chi Minh to 1950 (Audio)

• Historpedia, The Secret War with the Hmong People

• Historpedia, Fall of the Khmer Rouge (PDF)

Unit Activities

• Reflection on lessons learned from The Holocaust (Word)

Supplemental Learning Materials (Not required for major exams)

• Overview of the Holocaust (PDF)

• Wiesel, Night and Day: Personal Account of the Concentration Camps (PDF)

• Wiesel, Speech at Buchenwald Concentration Camp (PDF)

• Laughlin, Warsaw Ghetto Uprising Transcript (PDF Transcript)

• Laughlin, Warsaw Ghetto Uprising Transcript (Audio)

• Military History Podcast, Biological and Chemical Weapons of War (PDF)

• The Holocaust: The Camp Commandant and the Camp Victims (PDF)

• President Reagan, Speech at the Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp (PDF Transcript)

• Weiss, Reflection on Survival and Liberation from a Concentration Camp

• President Roosevelt and Bombing Auschwitz (PDF)

• The Holocaust in the Netherlands: A Reevaluation

• Military History Podcast, War and Genocide in Bosnia (PDF Transcript)

• Mandel, Wearing the Yellow Star of the Jews (PDF Transcript)

• President Nixon, Cambodian Incursion TV Speech (PDF Transcript)

• Lu, The Japanese Emperor is not Divine (PDF)