Roles During the Holocaust

I think it is easy to say that the victims of the Holocaust are the groups that were sent to the concentration camps or forced into hiding to prevent such things from happening. While these groups are the obvious victims of the Holocaust, I wonder if it is possible to look at the preceived persecutors, the Nazi soldiers, as victims as well. Although I feel like it is never a simple excuse to say that you are just following orders, I can imagine that there was a large sense that the Nazi soldiers had no other choice than to do what they did to Jews or face severe consequences and some did take that chance. Additionally, I cannot imagine what kind of a double life you would have to play. Killer by day, family man by night. Additionally after the war was over the soldiers were deemed the persecutors and therefore some were punished for their actions and, I would assume, some were unable to fully function in society again. Therefore their lives were forever changed. Also I can't comprehend what kind of mental trauma you would suffer from the knowledge of the harm you created for so long. While I am in no way defending what happened in the Holocaust, I think it is interesting to look at the human condition of what happens when someone has so much power that they are able to have so many people carrying out their evil deeds. Therefore is it correct to say that an everyday soldier, whose hands are tied and has little control over the situation, is also a victim to the atrocities of war and genocide? It is interesting to think about.

Those Who Save

Whenever I think about what I would do if a genocide was happening around me, I always think of those who saved Jews and other victims of the Holocaust. Immediately my thoughts turn to Miep Gies. Why is this? Certainly she did great things in defending the Frank family for as long as possible. However didn't other people do the same thing she did for other families? Why do we not know the name of those people? Although I'm sure most, if not all, did not do it for recognition, I believe that they should get just as much recognition and credit as Ms. Gies does. I tend to think her name is well-known because Anne Frank is the most common name associated with the Holocaust. However I think that we need to honor and recognize all those of defended victims and potential victims of the Holocaust. I think many times history discounts how much people put on the line to stand up for what they thought was right. There should be many more household names when we think of Holocaust survivors and rescuers.