On January 27, 2017, the Germany’s Bundestag [Parliament] commemorated the 72nd anniversary of the liberation of the inmates of Auschwitz concentration camp. This year the focus was placed on the 300,000 disabled victims of the notorious Aktion T-4 euthanasia program.
Under Aktion T-4, beginning in 1939, people were gassed or given a lethal injection and cremated in six killing facilities in Germany and Austria. This helped the Nazi regime to refine its system for processing millions, rather than “just” thousands, of victims.
During the ceremony, a few relatives of victims related their stories. A philosopher, Hartmut Traub, narrated the story of his 27-year-old uncle Benjamin, who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia, which had virtually became a death sentence in Nazi Germany.
In 1941 he was taken on an “outing” with 60 other inmates of a mental institution to Hadamar where they were executed with carbon monoxide. Gold teeth and the brains of more interesting “specimens” were removed.
“For six months, the dark clouds from the crematorium hung over the city, plainly visible for all to see,” said Hartmut Traub.
After the war many families tried to repress the stories of their murdered relatives.
“For a long time, the euthanasia victims were the forgotten victims,” Maike Rotzoll, Deputy Director of the Institute for the History and Ethics of Medicine in Halle, told Deutsche Welle.
“That’s why it’s enormously important for us that this ceremony took place in the Bundestag. I think it’s also enormously important for the relatives, who experienced the topic being taboo for so many years, to be allowed to speak and for this group of victims to be honored in this way.”
- Peter Saunders: Lets not forget the lessons of history and the leading role that doctors played in the holocaust.
- Wesley Smith: Memorial to German Euthanasia victims.