The Wannsee Protocol

The original of the Wannsee Protocol only survived in one version: a copy found by American soldiers among a stash of documents of the German Foreign Office. Although there were thirty copies made of the infamous protocol, only one has ever been found.

At first, western analysts did not understand the central importance of the protocols. At the initial Nuremberg Trials, the protocols were not even used as evidence. But in March 1947,  Robert Kempner , a German-Jewish lawyer forced to flee his homeland only to return with the U.S. Army in 1945, became the chief prosecutor in one of the so-called  Subsequent Nuremberg Trials , which took place between 1946 and 1949. Kempner entered the protocols as evidence in the so-called Wilhelmstrasse Trial of 1947, which charged a series of high officials in the Foreign Office with war crimes.

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This English text of the original  German-language Wannsee protocol  is based on the public domain and official U.S. government translation prepared for evidence in trials at Nuremberg, as reproduced in John Mendelsohn, ed., The Holocaust: Selected Documents in Eighteen Volumes. Vol. 11: The Wannsee Protocol and a 1944 Report on Auschwitz by the Office of Strategic Services (New York: Garland, 1982), 18-32.

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Stamp: Top Secret

30 copies

16th copy

Minutes of discussion.

I.

The following persons took part in the discussion about the final solution of the Jewish question which took place in Berlin, am Grossen Wannsee No. 56/58 on 20 January 1942.

 Gauleiter Dr. Meyer  Reich Ministry for the Occupied

and Reichsamtleiter Eastern territories

 Dr. Leibbrandt 

 Secretary of State Dr. Stuckart  Reich Ministry for the Interior

 Secretary of State Neumann  Plenipotentiary for the

Four Year Plan

 Secretary of State Dr. Freisler  Reich Ministry of Justice

Secretary of State  Dr. Bühler  Office of the Government General

Under Secretary of State Foreign Office

 Dr. Luther 

SS-Oberführer  Klopfer  Party Chancellery

 Ministerialdirektor Kritzinger  Reich Chancellery

 SS-Gruppenführer Hofmann  Race and Settlement Main Office

 SS-Gruppenführer Müller  Reich Main Security Office

 SS-Obersturmbannführer Eichmann 

 SS-Oberführer Dr. Schöngarth  Security Police and SD

Commander of the Security Police

and the SD in the

Government General

 SS-Sturmbannführer Dr. Lange  Security Police and SD

Commander of the Security Police

and the SD for the General-District

Latvia, as deputy of the Commander

of the Security Police and the SD

for the Reich Commissariat “Eastland”.

II.

At the beginning of the discussion  Chief of the Security Police and of the SD, SS-Obergruppenführer Heydrich , reported that the  Reich Marshal  had appointed him delegate for the preparations for the final solution of the Jewish question in Europe and pointed out that this discussion had been called for the purpose of clarifying fundamental questions. The wish of the Reich Marshal to have a draft sent to him concerning organizational, factual and material interests in relation to the final solution of the Jewish question in Europe makes necessary an initial common action of all central offices immediately concerned with these questions in order to bring their general activities into line.

 The Reichsführer-SS and the Chief of the German Police (Chief of the Security Police and the SD)  was entrusted with the official central handling of the final solution of the Jewish question without regard to geographic borders. The Chief of the Security Police and the SD then gave a short report of the struggle which has been carried on thus far against this enemy, the essential points being the following:

a) the expulsion of the Jews from every sphere of life of the German people,

b) the expulsion of the Jews from the living space of the German people.

In carrying out these efforts, an increased and planned acceleration of the emigration of the Jews from Reich territory was started, as the only possible present solution.

By order of the  Reich Marshal , a Reich Central Office for Jewish Emigration was set up in January 1939 and the C hief of the Security Police and SD  was entrusted with the management. Its most important tasks were

a) to make all necessary arrangements for the preparation for an increased emigration of the Jews,

b) to direct the flow of emigration,

c) to speed the procedure of emigration in each individual case.

The aim of all this was to cleanse German living space of Jews in a legal manner.

All the offices realized the drawbacks of such enforced accelerated emigration. For the time being they had, however, tolerated it on account of the lack of other possible solutions of the problem.

The work concerned with emigration was, later on, not only a German problem, but also a problem with which the authorities of the countries to which the flow of emigrants was being directed would have to deal. Financial difficulties, such as the demand by various foreign governments for increasing sums of money to be presented at the time of the landing, the lack of shipping space, increasing restriction of entry permits, or the cancelling of such, increased extraordinarily the difficulties of emigration. In spite of these difficulties, 537,000 Jews were sent out of the country between the takeover of power and the deadline of 31 October 1941. Of these

approximately 360,000 were in Germany proper on 30 January 1933

approximately 147,000 were in Austria (Ostmark) on 15 March 1939

approximately 30,000 were in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia on 15 March 1939.

The Jews themselves, or their Jewish political organizations, financed the emigration. In order to avoid impoverished Jews’ remaining behind, the principle was followed that wealthy Jews have to finance the emigration of poor Jews; this was arranged by imposing a suitable tax, i.e., an emigration tax, which was used for financial arrangements in connection with the emigration of poor Jews and was imposed according to income.

Apart from the necessary Reichsmark exchange, foreign currency had to presented at the time of landing. In order to save foreign exchange held by Germany, the foreign Jewish financial organizations were – with the help of Jewish organizations in Germany – made responsible for arranging an adequate amount of foreign currency. Up to 30 October 1941, these foreign Jews donated a total of around 9,500,000 dollars.

In the meantime the Reichsführer-SS and Chief of the German Police had prohibited emigration of Jews due to the dangers of an emigration in wartime and due to the possibilities of the East.

III.

Another possible solution of the problem has now taken the place of emigration, i.e. the evacuation of the Jews to the East, provided that the Führer gives the appropriate approval in advance.

These actions are, however, only to be considered provisional, but practical experience is already being collected which is of the greatest importance in relation to the future  final solution  of the Jewish question.

Approximately 11 million Jews will be involved in the  final solution  of the European Jewish question, distributed as follows among the individual countries:

Country Number

A. Germany proper 131,800

Austria 43,700

Eastern territories 420,000

General Government 2,284,000

Bialystok 400,000

Protectorate Bohemia and Moravia 74,200

Estonia – free of Jews –

Latvia 3,500

Lithuania 34,000

Belgium 43,000

Denmark 5,600

France / occupied territory 165,000

unoccupied territory 700,000

Greece 69,600

Netherlands 160,800

Norway 1,300

B. Bulgaria 48,000

England 330,000

Finland 2,300

Ireland 4,000

Italy including Sardinia 58,000

Albania 200

Croatia 40,000

Portugal 3,000

Rumania including Bessarabia 342,000

Sweden 8,000

Switzerland 18,000

Serbia 10,000

Slovakia 88,000

Spain 6,000

Turkey (European portion) 55,500

Hungary 742,800

USSR 5,000,000

Ukraine 2,994,684

White Russia

excluding Bialystok 446,484

Total over 11,000,000

The number of Jews given here for foreign countries includes, however, only those Jews who still adhere to the Jewish faith, since some countries still do not have a definition of the term “Jew” according to racial principles.

The handling of the problem in the individual countries will meet with difficulties due to the attitude and outlook of the people there, especially in Hungary and Rumania. Thus, for example, even today the Jew can buy documents in Rumania that will officially prove his foreign citizenship.

The influence of the Jews in all walks of life in the USSR is well known. Approximately five million Jews live in the European part of the USSR, in the Asian part scarcely 1/4 million.

The breakdown of Jews residing in the European part of the USSR according to trades was approximately as follows:

Agriculture 9.1 %

Urban workers 14.8 %

In trade 20.0 %

Employed by the state 23.4 %

In private occupations such as

medical profession, press, theater, etc. 32. 7%

Under proper guidance, in the course of the  final solution  the Jews are to be allocated for appropriate labor in the East. Able-bodied Jews, separated according to sex, will be taken in large work columns to these areas for work on roads, in the course of which action doubtless a large portion will be eliminated by natural causes.

The possible final remnant will, since it will undoubtedly consist of the most resistant portion, have to be treated accordingly, because it is the product of natural selection and would, if released, act as a the seed of a new Jewish revival (see the experience of history.)

In the course of the practical execution of the final solution, Europe will be combed through from west to east. Germany proper, including the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, will have to be handled first due to the housing problem and additional social and political necessities.

The evacuated Jews will first be sent, group by group, to so-called transit ghettos, from which they will be transported to the East.

 SS-Obergruppenführer Heydrich  went on to say that an important prerequisite for the evacuation as such is the exact definition of the persons involved.

It is not intended to evacuate Jews over 65 years old, but to send them to an old-age ghetto –  Theresienstadt  is being considered for this purpose.

In addition to these age groups – of the approximately 280,000 Jews in Germany proper and Austria on 31 October 1941, approximately 30% are over 65 years old – severely wounded veterans and Jews with war decorations (Iron Cross I) will be accepted in the old-age ghettos. With this expedient solution, in one fell swoop many interventions will be prevented.

The beginning of the individual larger evacuation actions will largely depend on military developments. Regarding the handling of the final solution in those European countries occupied and influenced by us, it was proposed that the appropriate expert of the Foreign Office discuss the matter with the responsible official of the Security Police and SD.

In Slovakia and Croatia the matter is no longer so difficult, since the most substantial problems in this respect have already been brought near a solution. In Rumania the government has in the meantime also appointed a commissioner for Jewish affairs. In order to settle the question in Hungary, it will soon be necessary to force an adviser for Jewish questions onto the Hungarian government.

With regard to taking up preparations for dealing with the problem in Italy, SS-Obergruppenführer Heydrich considers it opportune to contact the chief of police with a view to these problems.

In occupied and unoccupied France, the registration of Jews for evacuation will in all probability proceed without great difficulty.

 Under Secretary of State Luther  calls attention in this matter to the fact that in some countries, such as the Scandinavian states, difficulties will arise if this problem is dealt with thoroughly and that it will therefore be advisable to defer actions in these countries. Besides, in view of the small numbers of Jews affected, this deferral will not cause any substantial limitation.

The Foreign Office sees no great difficulties for southeast and western Europe.

 SS-Gruppenführer Hofmann  plans to send an expert to Hungary from the  Race and Settlement Main Office  for general orientation at the time when the  Chief of the Security Police and SD  takes up the matter there. It was decided to assign this expert from the Race and Settlement Main Office, who will not work actively, as an assistant to the police attaché.

IV.

In the course of the  final solution  plans, the  Nuremberg Laws  should provide a certain foundation, in which a prerequisite for the absolute solution of the problem is also the solution to the problem of mixed marriages and persons of mixed blood.

 The Chief of the Security Police and the SD  discusses the following points, at first theoretically, in regard to a letter from the chief of the Reich chancellery:

1) Treatment of Persons of Mixed Blood of the First Degree

Persons of mixed blood of the first degree will, as regards the final solution of the Jewish question, be treated as Jews.

From this treatment the following exceptions will be made:

a) Persons of mixed blood of the first degree married to persons of German blood if their marriage has resulted in children (persons of mixed blood of the second degree). These persons of mixed blood of the second degree are to be treated essentially as Germans.

b) Persons of mixed blood of the first degree, for whom the highest offices of the Party and State have already issued exemption permits in any sphere of life. Each individual case must be examined, and it is not ruled out that the decision may be made to the detriment of the person of mixed blood.

The prerequisite for any exemption must always be the personal merit of the person of mixed blood. (Not the merit of the parent or spouse of German blood.)

Persons of mixed blood of the first degree who are exempted from evacuation will be sterilized in order to prevent any offspring and to eliminate the problem of persons of mixed blood once and for all. Such sterilization will be voluntary. But it is required to remain in the Reich. The sterilized “person of mixed blood” is thereafter free of all restrictions to which he was previously subjected.

2) Treatment of Persons of Mixed Blood of the Second Degree

Persons of mixed blood of the second degree will be treated fundamentally as persons of German blood, with the exception of the following cases, in which the persons of mixed blood of the second degree will be considered as Jews:

a) The person of mixed blood of the second degree was born of a marriage in which both parents are persons of mixed blood.

b) The person of mixed blood of the second degree has a racially especially undesirable appearance that marks him outwardly as a Jew.

c) The person of mixed blood of the second degree has a particularly bad police and political record that shows that he feels and behaves like a Jew.

Also in these cases exemptions should not be made if the person of mixed blood of the second degree has married a person of German blood.

3) Marriages between Full Jews and Persons of German Blood.

Here it must be decided from case to case whether the Jewish partner will be evacuated or whether, with regard to the effects of such a step on the German relatives, [this mixed marriage] should be sent to an old-age ghetto.

4) Marriages between Persons of Mixed Blood of the First Degree and Persons of German Blood.

a) Without Children.

If no children have resulted from the marriage, the person of mixed blood of the first degree will be evacuated or sent to an old-age ghetto (same treatment as in the case of marriages between full Jews and persons of German blood, point 3.)

b) With Children.

If children have resulted from the marriage (persons of mixed blood of the second degree), they will, if they are to be treated as Jews, be evacuated or sent to a ghetto along with the parent of mixed blood of the first degree. If these children are to be treated as Germans (regular cases), they are exempted from evacuation as is therefore the parent of mixed blood of the first degree.

5) Marriages between Persons of Mixed Blood of the First Degree and Persons of Mixed Blood of the First Degree or Jews.

In these marriages (including the children) all members of the family will be treated as Jews and therefore be evacuated or sent to an old-age ghetto.

6) Marriages between Persons of Mixed Blood of the First Degree and Persons of Mixed Blood of the Second Degree.

In these marriages both partners will be evacuated or sent to an old-age ghetto without consideration of whether the marriage has produced children, since possible children will as a rule have stronger Jewish blood than the Jewish person of mixed blood of the second degree.

 SS-Gruppenführer Hofmann  advocates the opinion that sterilization will have to be widely used, since the person of mixed blood who is given the choice whether he will be evacuated or sterilized would rather undergo sterilization.

 State Secretary Dr. Stuckart  maintains that carrying out in practice of the just mentioned possibilities for solving the problem of mixed marriages and persons of mixed blood will create endless administrative work. In the second place, as the biological facts cannot be disregarded in any case, State Secretary Dr. Stuckart proposed proceeding to forced sterilization.

Furthermore, to simplify the problem of mixed marriages possibilities must be considered with the goal of the legislator saying something like: “These marriages have been dissolved.”

With regard to the issue of the effect of the evacuation of Jews on the economy,  State Secretary Neumann  stated that Jews who are working in industries vital to the war effort, provided that no replacements are available, cannot be evacuated.

SS-Obergruppenführer Heydrich indicated that these Jews would not be evacuated according to the rules he had approved for carrying out the evacuations then underway.

 State Secretary Dr. Bühler  stated that the General Government would welcome it if the final solution of this problem could be begun in the  General Government , since on the one hand transportation does not play such a large role here nor would problems of labor supply hamper this action. Jews must be removed from the territory of the General Government as quickly as possible, since it is especially here that the Jew as an epidemic carrier represents an extreme danger and on the other hand he is causing permanent chaos in the economic structure of the country through continued black market dealings. Moreover, of the approximately 2 1/2 million Jews concerned, the majority is unfit for work.

State Secretary Dr. Bühler stated further that the solution to the Jewish question in the  General Government  is the responsibility of the Chief of the Security Police and the SD and that his efforts would be supported by the officials of the General Government. He had only one request, to solve the Jewish question in this area as quickly as possible.

In conclusion the different types of possible solutions were discussed, during which discussion both  Gauleiter Dr. Meyer  and  State Secretary Dr. Bühler  took the position that certain preparatory activities for the  final solution  should be carried out immediately in the territories in question, in which process alarming the populace must be avoided.

The meeting was closed with the request of the Chief of the Security Police and the SD to the participants that they afford him appropriate support during the carrying out of the tasks involved in the solution.

The Wannsee Protocols enumerate nations, yet its murderous implications involved the "liquidation" of countless Jewish communities. By January 1942, many of these communities were enclosed ghettos.

To envision this process, consider what it meant to the venerable Jewish community of Salonica in northern Greece. By far the largest Jewish community in Greece, Salonica's 42,000 Yiddish and Ladino speaking Jews made up nearly two thirds of the Jewish population of the country. When the Nazis and their allies (Italy and Bulgaria) invaded Greece in April 1941, they divided it into zones of occupation, and Solonica fell to the Italian zone. This accident of division initially shielded the Jews of Salonica. Seeing the Nazi terror campaign as an assault on their own prerogatives, the Italian occupiers followed the Nazis directives only reluctantly.

Yet in 1942, the sharper, post-Wannsee, genocidal policy of the Nazis also began to shape Jewish life in Salonica. In July, the Nazis sent some 2,000 Jewish men to degrading, humiliating, slave labor detail. In December, aided by eager Greek collaborators, the Nazis razed the city's spacious and beautiful old Jewish cemetery, including its tombstones dating back to the early sixteenth century. They then piled up the tombstones, and used them for constructing defenses and as slabs for road pavement.

By February 1943, the Jews were forced to wear the yellow star and the Nazis began to issue a battery of ordinances that culminated in confining Jews to two ghettos. As the Nazis restricted food, hunger set in. Rumours of deportation also swirled, and within weeks, starting on March 15, 1943, the first deportations began: 2800 people, 80 per wagon, a five day journey to Auschwitz.

Nearly twenty more such deportations follwed. We can trace these deportation through Yad Vashem's "Deportation to Extinction" site. The site includes information on the the train, the route, the organizers, and a great deal of supporting documentation, including from survivors.

We can also listen to their words. In the  last letter  that that Elie Sides wrote to his daughter and son in law in Athens, on April 5, 1943, just before Elie and his wife Sarina were forced on a deportation train.

And we can listen to survivors, like  Yaacov (Jacki) Handeli 

or  Moshe Ha-Elion .

The Wannsee Protocol marked a decisive step forward in the evolution of the "final solution." To understand that evolution, it helps to return to a document of January, 1939.

The original charge to Reinhard Heydrich—made in January 1939—had been to pursue, “by emigration or evacuation, a solution of the Jewish question.” The “solution,” as envisaged before the start of the war, was to make the Third Reich, including the recently incorporated territories of Austria, Bohemia, and Moravia, “free of Jews.”

On July 31, 1941, two and a half years later, Göring gave Heydrich the task of “making all the necessary organizational, functional, and material preparations for a complete solution of the Jewish question in the German sphere of influence in Europe.”

Some historians see Göring's note as the order to kill the Jews of Europe. It states:

"As a supplement to the task which was entrusted to you in the decree dated January 24, 1939, to solve the Jewish question by emigration and evacuation in the most favorable way possible, given present conditions, I herewith commission you to carry out all necessary preparations with regard to organizational, substantive, and financial viewpoints for a complete solution of the Jewish question in the German sphere of influence in Europe. Insofar as other competencies of other central organizations are affected, these are to be involved."

"I further commission you to submit to me promptly an overall plan showing the preliminary organizational, substantive, and financial measures for the execution of the intended final solution of the Jewish question."

Yet even this note, drafted after the beginning of the invasion of the Soviet Union, does not mention a change in the end goal, forced emigration and evacuation.

Since January 1939, the date of the initial note to Heydrich, circumstances had changed dramatically. The sphere of German influence was greater and the number of Jews in German-ruled territory significantly larger. In a note sent on June 24, 1940 to Foreign Minister Joachim Ribbentrop, Heydrich wrote:

"The overall problem – there are already around 3¼ million Jews in the territories now standing today under German sovereignty – can no longer be solved through emigration however. A territorial final solution is therefore necessary."

Since the war began in September 1939, Nazi Germany had sought a "territorial solution," as Heydrich put it, and considered places ranging from the Pripet Marshes in the Ukraine to Madagascar. None of them became reality. Meanwhile, beginning in June 1941, with the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, the war had become a major conflagration, with dramatically higher levels of lethality, unprecedented numbers of civilian casualties, and an enormous increase in geographical scope.

In this context of a brutal war in the east, Göring's memorandum of July 31, 1941 gave the SS the go ahead to "carry out all necessary preparations" for the “complete solution.”

But what did “complete solution” actually mean? Our first instinct is to assume that it meant killing all the Jews of Europe. Yet if we consider the course of the war until the end of July 1941, it becomes clear that the Nazis, exalting in the initial victories of the first six weeks of their Soviet invasion, would not have imagined that the war would drag on for another four years. Instead, they likely assumed the war in the east would end much sooner, and the possibility of expulsion—to somewhere in the Soviet Union's vast territory—would remain open.

The note also charged Heydrich with submitting “an overall plan.” The eminent historian of the Holocaust, Christopher Browning, calls this charge a request for a "feasibility study." As far as we know, Heydrich produced no such study or plan.

Yet the systematic killing, mainly by bullets, had already begun. The Wannsee Protocol even references these mass murders. Note the number of Jews listed in Baltic countries:

"Estonia – free of Jews.

Latvia 3,500.

Lithuania 34,000.

Prior to the invasion of the Soviet Union, there had been roughly 4550 Jews in Estonia, 74,000 Jews in Latvia, and 220,000 Jews in Lithuania. This new tabulation means that Heydrich's office had received the reports of the Einsatzgruppen, including the  Jäger Report , and his officials used these reports to prepare the documentation for the Wannsee Conference. At the time the documents were prepared--December 1941/January 1942--Nazi Germany concentrated its genocidal killings in the militarily over-run Soviet Union, occupied Yugoslavia, and to a limited extent in the lands of Poland. In western and central Europe, mass murder was not yet policy or general practice.

Yet by November 1941, the highest level of Nazi leadership began to consider whether to "exterminate" all the Jews of Europe. An early indication of this brutal turn was a speech delivered on November 18, 1941. Two nights after meeting with Hitler and Himmler, Alfred Rosenberg, the Reichsminister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, wondered aloud whether it was now still necessary “to push them [the Jews] across the Urals" or whether "to bring about in some other way their eradication.” There are two novelties to note. The first is the precise articulation of the second possibility, bringing about "in some other way their eradication." It represented a step across a threshold, even if it reflected the murderous mass killings, from Ponary to Babi Yar, that had already transpired in the vast region between the Baltics and the Caucuses. The second novelty involved the extension of the scope of the genocide. For in this same speech, indeed in the same paragraph, Rosenberg referred to the “biological eradication of all Jewry in Europe.” In effect, the Minister of the Occupied Eastern Territories raised the possibility, in a public speech, that the de facto genocide occurring in eastern Europe would be extended to western Europe.

The possibility of a wider, more comprehensive, murder policy set off a macabre competition, as various Nazi leaders attempted to anticipate the new direction. Rosenberg insisted that Jewish questions, even when taken care of on the ground by the SS, were nevertheless to be pursued in “the context of the overall policy” of the ethnic reshaping of the east, which would have the effect of placing it under his direction. Hans Frank, the Gauleiter of the General Government in Poland, tried, as one SS officer complained, “to pull the management of the Jewish problem completely to his sphere.” And in his appointment calendar on November 24, Heinrich Himmler, the head of the SS, wrote: “Jewish questions belong to me.”

It was largely in order to demarcate administrative territory and adjudicate disputes that Reinhard Heydrich, Himmler’s right-hand man, sent out, on November 29 and December 1, invitations for a meeting scheduled for December 9, 1941. But when the United States declared war on Japan on December 8, the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, all calculations for a short war were suddenly dashed. In this context of uncertainty, Heydrich postponed the meeting, and Germany declared war on the United States on December 11.

Around this time, the second week in December, Hitler likely announced his intention to exterminate all the Jews of Europe. From a range of documents, we know that he raised the specter of extermination on seven occasions between October 19 and December 18, and five of these occasions fell within days of December 11. On December 13, Joseph Goebbels, the notorious propaganda minister, noted in his diary that Hitler had decided to “make a clean sweep,” and paraphrased Hitler as saying, “We are not here to feel empathy with the Jews, but to have empathy with the German people.”

Other high-ranking leaders expressed similar sentiments. “We want to have compassion only for the German people,” announced Hans Frank a week later before a gathering of district officials in the General Government on December 16, “otherwise for no one in the world.” He reminded his audience to surrender any vestiges of compassion: “We must destroy the Jews wherever we encounter them and wherever it is possible, in order to preserve the entire structure of the Reich.”

There is also compelling evidence for dating the definitive change in course around this time from Himmler’s appointment book. In his meetings with high-ranking officials involved in the euthanasia campaign, Himmler explored ways to step up the efforts to use gas to kill Jews. Within two weeks, euthanasia technicians appeared in Bełżec, a death camp that had been under construction since November but was not yet in operation. A note from December 18 mentions a meeting with Hitler at Wolf’s Lair. It states tersely: "Jewish Question / as partisans to exterminate."

In early January, Heydrich rescheduled the meeting for January 20, 1942. We can see this change in a letter, dated January 8, 1942, that he sent to Hans Luther, Undersecretary of the Foreign Office. The letter states:

"At the last minute, because of suddenly announced events and the related preoccupation of some of the invited men, I had to cancel the conference that had been scheduled for December 9, 1941 concerning questions related to the final solution of the Jewish question."

"Since the questions to be considered permit no further delay, I therefore invite you anew to a discussion followed by brunch."

"The circle of men invited in the last invitation remains the same."

Heydrich's note makes clear that events in the beginning of December led to the cancellation of the initial meeting. The interpretive issue is whether the events--the attack on Pearl Harbor and the widening of the war to a world war--made the meeting more urgent or changed its agenda.

Historians who see the final solution as emerging directly from the killing fields of the Baltic countries, Belarus, and the Ukraine in the summer and fall of 1941 would emphasize continuity, and see the Wannsee Conference as clarifying the leading role of the SS in the "final solution" while changing the methods and widening the geographic scope of the killing operations. By contrast, historians who stress the contextual importance of early December emphasize Hitler's decision to kill all the Jews of Europe during, not after, the war.

In either case, the Wannsee Conference did not create the change in policy. It was, however, the organizational manifestation of that change.

What, then, actually changed?

First, the geographic scope of the Holocaust widened dramatically. The protocol enumerates the Jews living in countries within Germany's Empire and in those countries, like Romania, Italy, and Vichy France, allied to it. The protocol also lists the number of Jews in those countries under direct German military control, like occupied Poland and France. More surprising, and revealing of an overall plan to kill all the Jews of Europe, is that the Wannsee Protocol tabulates Jews living in countries well beyond the German sphere of influence, like England and Ireland.

Why should this be the case? Was the inclusion of countries like England and Ireland merely a matter of the thoroughness of the second and third level bureaucrats who prepared the tables? Or does the Wannsee Protocol suggest that the "final solution" was a long term policy to be achieved after a significant number of years, when Nazi Germany finally subjugated all of Europe?

These questions are not easily answerable--although a post-meeting letter of instruction that Heydrich sent to his units makes clear that his writ to carry to a "comprehensive solution" was for "the Jewish question within the German sphere of influence." This underscores, again, that the protocol mainly set the parameters for the inter-agency work. It is also for this reason that the protocol devotes considerable space to determining the geographical scope of the final solution, defining who counts as Jewish, and where the killing should begin.

Recalling the precise stipulations of the Nuremberg Laws, Heydrich announced that "persons of mixed blood of the first degree will, as regards the final solution of the Jewish question, be treated as Jews." By "mixed blood of the first degree," Heydrich meant people with two Jewish grandparents, a definition of "Jewish" that Nazi radicals wanted but failed to get included in the Nuremberg Laws (except when the so-called "Mischling of the first degree" practiced Judaism or had a Jewish spouse). According to the Wannsee Protocol, "Mischling of the first degree" were to be considered Jews for purposes of the "final solution" or, if given exemptions, to be sterilized. Heydrich also addressed "Mischling of the second degree"--people with one Jewish grandparent, and advocated considerable latitude in allowing local Nazis to decide whether such people would also be swept up in the genocidal fury.

It appears that these shifts in the definition of who counted as Jewish called forth objections, notably from  State Secretary Dr. Stuckart , ostensibly for the bureaucratic confusion these definitions would create. And indeed, the question was the subject of a series of further deliberations in the Spring and Summer of 1942.

Finally, the protocol pinpoints where and when this second phase of the genocide would start: namely in Poland, and as soon as possible.

The bureaucratic jockeying is revealing. One notes the eagerness of two delegates in particular:  Gauleiter Dr. Meyer , who attended the meeting in his capacity as the right-hand man of Rosenberg, the Minister for the Occupied Areas of Eastern Europe, and  State Secretary Dr. Bühler , who represented Hans Frank, the powerful Gauleiter of the Gouvernment Poland. Their vying for position suggests that their bosses have come over to the new line, and are trying to assert their primacy in support of the SS-led final solution.

Bühler's rationale bears closer scrutiny. In occupied Poland, he notes, transportation "does not play such a large role." Bühler, who thus implied that it played some role, tacitly admitted that the participants assumed, knew about, and discussed transportation to dedicated killing centers in Poland--as Adolf Eichmann indeed conceded at his postwar trial in Jerusalem in 1960. Bühler also argued that the Generalgouvernement should be rid of Jews, on account of the outbreaks of typhus in central Poland. Since transportation "does not play such a large role" (as it would if deportations were to a place far away), this can only mean that the men sitting around the table at the Villa at Wannsee were speaking of the one remaining option: deportation to nearby killing center. They were speaking of murder. While the image of Auschwitz dominates our understanding of the Holocaust, it bears recalling that the other death camps, which together are responsible for the death of still more Jews, were essentially regional killing centers.

Seen this way, the Wannsee Protocol cemented the leading role of the SS in the final solution, extended the geographical scope of the killing, widened the definition of who was Jewish for the purpose of the genocide, and decreed that the "final solution" should commence, without delay, in occupied Poland. In this phase of the "final solution," the Nazis would transport Jews to extermination camps.

By far the most comprehensive digital source for further research is  House of the Wannsee Conference - A memorial and Educational Site . It is bilingual (German-English) and should be the first stopping point for online research. For published sources, see the below.

Friedländer, Nazi Germany and the Jews, 1933 - 1945, vol. 2, The Years of Extermination (New York: Harper Collins, 2007), 339-345.

Christian Gerlach, "The Wannsee Conference, the Fate of German Jews, and Hitler's Decision in Principle to Exterminate All European Jews," in The Journal of Modern History, Vol. 70, No. 4. (Dec., 1998), pp. 759-812. Longer version in German in Gerlach, Krieg, Ernährung, Völkermord. Forschungen zur deutschen Vernichtungspolitik im Zweiten Weltkrieg (Hamburg: Hamburger Edition, 1998), 85-166.

Gedenk- und Bildungsstätte Haus der Wannsee-Konferenz, ed. The Wannsee Conference and the Genocide of the European Jews (in German--Die Wannsee-Konferenz und der Völkermord an den europäischen Juden). Catalogue. (Berlin: 2006). The catalogue of the permanent exhibit. See also the  museum's website .

Hans Christoph Jasch and Christoph Kreuzmüller, The Participants: The Men of the Wannsee (New York: Berghahn Books, 2017).

Norbert Kampe and Peter Klein, ed. Die Wannsee-Konferenz am 20. Januar 1942 – Dokumente, Forschungsstand, Kontroversen. (Cologne: Bohlau, 2013). A series of revisionist essays, plus documents.

Peter Longerich, Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010).

Peter Longerich, Wannseekonferenz: Der Weg zur "Endlösung" (Berlin: Pantheon Verlag, 2016); and, in English, as Wannsee: The Road to the Final Solution (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021).

Mark Mazower, Salonica. City of Ghosts. Christians, Muslims, and Jews, 1430 - 1950 (New York: Vintage Books, 2004), 392-411. (On the case we considered above).

Mark Roseman, The Villa, The Lake, the Meeting. Wannsee and the Final Solution (London: Allen Lane, 2002). (The Best short account).

I am happy to field criticism, and correct where possible. For contact details go   here  . Unless otherwise acknowledged, all images are screenshots with links to the original, or images covered under creative commons license.