Conspiracy: The Wansee Conference

This isn't a new film, released in 2001, but Conspiracy is an amazing film and I recommend it for any student of the Holocaust. The film stars Kenneth Branagh as Reinhard Heydrich and Stanley Tucci as Adolf Eichmann. 

This film is a brilliant depiction of the Wannsee Conference, a meeting that would have been lost to history had it not been for one conference member who kept the notes he was ordered to burn.

The purpose of the Wannsee Conference was to unify various branches of the Third Reich under Heydrich's leadership in the definition and concept of  The Final Solution to the Jewish Problem and organize the logistics of processing millions of people to their deaths. Fifteen men met at a table over a two hour luncheon and decided the fate six million Jewish men, women, and children.

The astounding method at which these horrific decisions were made keeps the viewer's attention on the screen. These men discuss the annihilation of a people as if they were discussing the transportation of freight or munitions. 

When tensions begin to run high as at least some men in the room are having a small battle with their consciences, preferring sterilizations over gassings, Heydrick makes his makes his intentions clear:

Heydrich: We will not sterilize every Jew and wait for them to die. We will not sterilize every Jew and then exterminate the race. That's farcical. Dead men don't hump, dead women don't get pregnant. Death is the most reliable form of sterilization, put it that way.

With sterilization taken off the table, Heydrich and Eichman explain their proposal for the Final Solution.

Adolf Eichmann: Now, last summer Reichsführer Himmler asked me to visit a camp up in Upper Silesia, called Auschwitz, which is very well isolated, and close to significant rail access. And we are turning that camp into a major center, solid structures (and here's where your Jewish labor comes into play, Herr Neumann, the Jews haul the bricks and they build the buildings themselves). And when the structures are complete, we expect to be able to process 2500... an hour. Not a day, an hour. Heydrich: And those numbers look a lot better. Luther: 2500 an hour? Hofmann: 2500? Adolf Eichmann: At 24 hours a day, that is 60,000. Kritzinger: 60,000 each day... Adolf Eichmann: That's 21,900,000 Jews a year, if ever there were that many. Heydrich: And we are also constructing the means of disposal, which will obviously depend upon the process of combustion. Adolf Eichmann: Yes, it'll be industrial in nature: large commercial gas-fed ovens, no residue to speak of. Müller: 60,000 Jews every day go up in smoke. Heydrich: We can achieve that. Imagine. 

This film helps students of the Holocaust understand the mindset of those in power and explains how Hitler was able to stay away from the blame even though the carnage took place under his direction. This is a must-see for anyone interested in the mechanisms of the Holocaust.