One Terrible Day in the History of Mankind.

In the beginning of Browning’s piece, he explains how most of the men involved in the Police Battalion 101 were typical. Most of the men were older working class, mildly educated, the typical Hamburg men, who had not been involved in the Nazi party very long. Browning points out that the majority of these men presumably had been Communists, Socialists, or Labor union members before 1933. Also, members of the Police Battalion had known many Jews prior to Hilter’s rise. Certainly, anti-semitism is not the reason for the members of Police Battalion 101 mass murdering the Jews in Jozefow. Browning clearly states “They were mainly apolitical, and even the officers were only partly hard-core Nazi” (127). So the question still remains: Why did the members of the Police Battalion willingly kill thousands of Jews? Some of the members responded that they thought it was an order. Yet, some of the same men witnessed other men stepping out and telling the Major they could not perform this task. The Major assigned the men another designated task. Unlike the typical mass murder in the Holocaust, the battalion members had a choice not to kill another. Some said they did not want to look like a coward to the other members of the battalion. While others blamed the alcohol, that the authorities kept providing to quench their thirst. Finally, others expressed the need for money, they were economically dependent upon this job. Without performing the task at hand, which was shooting Jewish women, children, and the elderly at a point blank situation, their careers would not prosper. The men who participated in the mass murdering, never questioned the authority figures, even though they clearly knew that the action was wrong. Obviously, the reasons for the members of Police Battalion 101 participating in this horrid happening are broad. However, each of these reasons are immature, juvenile, self-centered, and cowardly. Regardless that the Major offered to relieve the men of their duty, the majority of the men still participated in the mass murder simply because they were told to.