The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide

Where have I been for the last 25 years, not having known about this book? I had done no little reading about the Nazi era, including Ian Kershaw's HITLER, just before I read THE NAZI DOCTORS. References to dates were links to what was happening in my own life as a child at the same times. Personal tragedy had struck my family; our lives were forever changed while World War II changed populations in the same period. Our family was of German extraction. Imagine the immiscibility of revering what was German and the horrors of the Third Reich!

For anyone not having read THE NAZI DOCTORS I recommend putting aside the dishes and raking the yard, and hasting to the library or Amazon to procure a copy.

The slide from healing to killing is well explored here. While some (like me!) find the material rough sledding, this is a critically important book to read if you want to understand what is driving the concern over current policy proposals. Probably none of the issues presented about the medicalization of social issues will ever truly resolve themselves, as medicine itself, while a "hard" science, will always have a social dimension for as long as a doctor treats a patient. Yet all that worries us today was present at the holocaust: racial and religious bigotry and fear, a desire to ration resources (like healthcare), a belief in "science" as a solution for what ails the world. "Life unworthy of life:" who is to say? Hats off to Lifton for this ambitious and illuminating work.

A must read. A startling account of true stories. I couldn't put this book down from the time I started it.

I have studied terrorism, history and violence for years. I have never seen a book as concise and yet completely informative as "THE NAZI DOCTORS". Many people will miss the central theme of this book which is far more reaching than the holocaust. People, educated and uneducated; governments, democracies and dictators, are all capable of committing evil against other people and its citizens. Anyone who is willing to turn a blind eye to the powers that be, the educated elite, and law makers and not hold them accountable should read this book. Anyone who wants to understand how state terrorism (terror from above) operates should read this book. Anyone who thinks turning healthcare over to the gov't should read this book. Victor Frankl, survivor of WWII concentration camps said it best, (paraphrased) "there are two races of people: decent and indecent." The author captures this thought when he quotes one victim of Nazi Doctors. "...what was demonic was that they (Nazis) were not demonic."

Both by means of a large series of interviews of the German physicians who made the life or death decisions at the Nazi death camps and by means of reviews of post WW II trial records Dr Jay Lifton, an American psychiatrist, has helped us understand their motivation and self deception. In this scholarly, but highly readable undertaking, Dr Lifton reveals and assessess the Nazi ideology that underlay the killing of millions of Jews, mental patients, homosexuals, gypsies and others "undeserving of life." In a preface to the 2002 edition of "The Nazi Doctors" the author identifies recent events of ethnic cleasing as contemporary instances of genocide.

On reading Dr. LIfton's book after viewing two highly revealing and disturbing documentaries on the holocaust: "The Nazi's at Auschwitz" and "Shoa." I sensed myself to be so thoroughly informed about the holocaust as to be able to teach a college course on the subject.