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Adolf Eichmann – Brief Background Info
EICHMANN, [KARL] ADOLF (1906-1962). SS officer charged with the destruction of millions of Jews. … He hated the Jews he met in Vienna, a sentiment stimulated by attendance at Nazi meetings. “Hitler was right,” he said later, “when he charged that this one people had intrigued to link as many nations as possible against our country and bring about the terrible times we are going through.” … In 1932 he became a member of the Austrian Nazi party. As a protégé of Ernst Kaltenbrunner, he took part in Nazi activities, which brought him to the attention of the Austrian police.
…he learned that there was an opening in Heinrich Himmler’s SD (Sicherheitsdienst), the information center for the Gestapo. Himmler, who believed that Eichmann could speak Hebrew, made him head of the Scientific Museum for Jewish Affairs…. he was promoted rapidly … Obersturmbannfuhrer (lieutenant colonel). After service in the Reich Central Office of Jewish Emigration, he was made chief of Subsection IV-B-4 of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt (RSHA), the Reich Central Security Office, as an expert on Jewish affairs. He was present at the Wannsee Conference on January 20, 1942, when it was decided to deport Jews to the extermination camps. In August 1944 Eichmann reported to Himmler that, although the death camps kept no exact statistics, 4 million Jews had died in them and that 2 million more had been shot or killed by mobile units.”
Eichmann was arrested by Israeli agents, in Argentina, and smuggled to Israel in May of 1960. He was tried, convicted, and hung (May 31, 1962) for crimes against the Jewish people and humanity.
Encyclopedia of the Third Reich, by Dr. Louis L. Snyder, Professor of History, The City College and The City University of New York. Paragon House, New York, 1989. ISBN 1-55778-144-3
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