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<\/a>The Villa, the Lake, the Meeting: Wannsee and the Final Solution—–by Mark Roseman (Penguin, 2002) [Photograph by Edith-Mary Smith]<\/p><\/div>On 20 January 1942, SS-Obergruppenfuehrer<\/em> Reinhard Heydrich<\/a> chaired one of the most infamous meeting in the history of the world: the conference held at an elegant lake-side villa in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee. Those present included Gestapo Chief Heinrich Muller, and SS-Obersturmbannfuehrer<\/em> Adolf Eichmann (who escaped to Argentina after the war, but was eventually brought back to Israel for trial).<\/p>\n Nazi Party elite, SS chiefs, and representatives from the various ministries, and from the Office of the Reich Kommissar for the Strengthening of Germandom, wined and dined and formally approved a program of mass extermination as their ‘Final Solution of the Jewish Problem.’ The fifteen men of Wannsee thereby settled the fate of six million European Jews in a few short hours.<\/p>\n In his concise 152-page book, The Villa, the Lake, the Meeting: Wannsee and the Final Solution<\/em>, historian Mark Roseman tells the story, basing his exposition upon the original minutes of the meeting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" On 20 January 1942, SS-Obergruppenfuehrer Reinhard Heydrich chaired one of the most infamous meeting in the history of the world: the conference held at an elegant lake-side villa in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee. Those present included Gestapo Chief Heinrich … Continue reading