Understanding Evil: Ordinary Men and The Lucifer Effect Part I

Understanding human nature is a fascinating topic of interest. In order to understand how decent
behavior can transcend into the dimensions of evil, one must revisit historical events, however
dreadful. Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland and
The Lucifer Effect delve into the minds of those facing two choices: inflict endless agony upon
their fellow man or stand against that oppression. Both stories conclude that, although engaging
in immoral or evil deeds is ultimately an individual matter, good, ordinary people can transform
into perpetuators of evil in response to venomous, situational influences.
Written by historian Christopher R. Browning, Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and
the Final Solution in Poland follows a German, paramilitary unit consisting of 500 men
middle-aged reserve policemen, farmers, and lumber workers turned executionersas they
embark on short, intense wave of mass murder, centered in the killing fields of Poland in 1942.
The Lucifer Effect, written by psychologist Philip Zimbardo, parallels the events in Poland
with exerts from his famous work in the Stanford Prison Experiment (STE) to the analysis in
The Lucifer Effect. To note, Zimbardo participated as an expert witness in the trials of those
soldiers implicated in the Abu Ghraib torturing. His book is a result of the work conducted for
the trial. Although written 15 years apart, the anguish presented treads a common theme:
Dehumanizationclouds ones thinking and fosters the perception that other people are less
than human. In the case of Ordinary Men, soldiers became numb to the taking of a human life;
in The Lucifer Effect, psychological research (STE) suggests that ordinary people can
transform into recreants, oblivious to the suffering of their fellow being.
[Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland]
Chapter two of Ordinary Men covers the background on both the institution of the Order
Police, and what its role was according to Nazi policy. The Order Police was an attempt by
Germany to create large police formations with military training and equipment for the
elimination of revolutionary threats facing Germany following their defeat in World War I. By
1933, this police army, comprised of 56,000 men, was Hitlers secret plan to rearm Germany.
By 1939, with the threat of war looming, the Order Police increased its recruitment efforts
reaching the strength of 131,000 men. After the initial invasion in Poland in 1939, these Order
Police battalions formed into units with 500 men each. The job of each battalion was to round up
Polish soldiers and maintain general order. These battalions became the main occupying force
for holding down German-controlled territories.
In May of 1940, Battalion 101 traveled from Hamburg, Germany to one of the four regions in
western Poland conquered by Germany. As part of Hitlers strategy to purify Germany,
Battalion 101 carried out resettlement actions for a five-month period. Jews and Gypsies were
expelled from the newly-acquired territories to central Poland and other camps in the
surrounding area. The idea was for ethnic Germans to resettle in the seized properties. As

Browning notes, the racial purification of the incorporated territories desired by Hitler and
Himmler was never achieved, but hundreds of thousands of people were shoved around like so
many pieces on a chessboard. Following the dismissal of Poles from their homes, Battalion 101
redeployed to the recently built barbed-wire cities surrounding the capital, Warsaw.
Their major duty was to guard these ghettos or transition camps, which had orders to shoot
any Jew who ignored [the rules]. Battalion 101 followed those orders without hesitation
(Browning provides a short list of men killed by members of Battalion 101). Although these
killings did not inflict mass casualties, the Battalion 101 commander apparently lost patience
with the consolidation processtransferring displaced Jews to extermination or death camps.
Quickly transferring large amounts of people became a difficult task, since the relocation
movements were often interrupted by opposing forces. Facing pressure from Nazi leadership,
Battalion 101 commander found other means available to him; execution through firing squad
was the only viable alternative. Browning later provides testimony describing the callous
rationalization.
In the early hours of July 13, 1942, the men of Battalion 101 arose from their bunks in a small
Polish town. Each man gathered up extra ammunition and boxes, and placed them on the trucks
taking them to their first major action. At this point, no man, except the commanding officer,
knew of his job task. Once arriving at the destination, the men exited the truck and stood at
attention. Here, the battalion commander explained the orders. Browning notes that some of the
men looked visually upset, including the commander. Then the battalion commander made an
unusual offer: if any of the men among them did not feel up to the task that lay before him, he
could step out. Its worth noting that the battalion commander never personally participated
because German officers hardly-ever engaged in an execution. In this case, the commander
removed himself entirely from the situation. Allegedly, he could not bear the sight of watching
helpless people being stripped of their life. (Browning didnt provide any evidence that indicated
those who chose to remove themselves, faced consequencespossibly because the commander
would be hypocritical in carrying out any punishment.)
Battalion 101 proceeded to complete their orders. Browning describes the horrific scene:
As the Jews were driven out of their houses and the immobile were shot, the air
filled with screams and gunfire. All the patients in the Jewish hospital or old
peoples home had been shot on the spot. [Although witness testimony
conflicts,] they at least agreed upon the question of how the men initially reacted
to the problem of shooting infants. Everyone refrained from shooting infants and
small children. [However], even in the face of death the Jewish mothers did not
separate from their children.
Browning does mention that some witness testimony reported seeing infants and small
children lying among the dead, since women were a part of the deceased.

Covering the next few Battalion 101 redeployments is immaterial. Chapters 11-15 tell the
story of how these men participated in the enforcement of Hitlers Final Solution. By
the end of 1942, Reserve Police Battalion 101 participated in the executions of 4,600
Jews, and helped deport approximately 15,000 more to extermination camps.
Chapters 16-17 attempt to decipher why the Battalion 101 commander made the
unconventional offer. Only 12 of the 500 men dispersed, and decided not to partake in
these executions. Browning asserts that the matter of suddenness or not having the correct
amount of time to make such a rash decision aided in their thought process. He gives us a
few reasons as to why the other 488 souls felt the pressure to conform.
First, having recently being brought up to full strength, they knew little of one another;
the bonds of military comradeship were not yet fully developed. Leaving your brother
behind would be admitting that one was a coward, even though, up to this point, no
soldier faced reprimand. Second, some failed to hear the commander because of their
position on the line. Third, orders are orders, and from one piece of testimony provided
to Browning from investigators, Jews stood outside of their circle of human obligation
the standard action in the course of war.
The final chapter of the story focuses on the ordinary man turning into a carnifex.
Browning asks the question of why so few choose not to participate. His basic premise is
that the situational force of war invariably accompanies atrocities. Negative, racial
stereotypes are added to the brutalization inherent in sending armed men to kill one
another on a massive scalerules of combat are even more frequently broken on all
sides. War leads men on the path of brutalization, which leads to atrocity.
Browning argues that the notion of wartime explains the actions of Battalion 101an
example of a powerful, situational force. Zimbardo upheld this assertion. Browning also
claimed that so-called, desk commanders in Nazi leadership, along with the upper
echelons of the German military, aided in the killing by distancing themselves from their
victims. Ordering men to kill is the same as pulling the trigger. Indeed, many of those
who participated in the Holocaust were bureaucrats. The tasks of administrating
confiscation, deportation, legislation, or compiling listscould be complete without
facing the reality of mass murder. Battalion 101, however, literally shot their victims at
point-blank range.
In the final pages of his book, Brownings efforts transition to The Lucifer Effect:
The story of ordinary men is not the story of all men. The reserve policemen faced
choices, and most of them committed terrible deedseven among them, some
refused to kill and others stopped killing. At the same time, however, the collective
behavior of Reserve Police Battalion 101 has deeply disturbing implications. If

the men of Reserve Police Battalion 101 could become killers under such
circumstances, what group of men cannot?
The parallel between Browning and Zimbardos work is how situational context aids in
behavioral modifications to the human psyche. These 500 men were ordinary, every-day people.
There is no evidence stating that these men were criminals prior to joining the war effort. Both
books help explain why the millions of other German, military personnel fought in the war
without killing anyone but uniformed, enemy soldiers. Battalion 101s unique circumstance
altered their minds because their training only required fighting enemy combatants on a distant
battlefield, rather than gunning down helpless, unarmed civiliansover the course of two years.
The lack of familiarity was a detriment to their understanding as soldiers, more importantly, as
human beings.
Browning provides an influential quote to close out his story: War, a struggle between our
people and the enemy creates a polarized world in which the enemy is easily objectified
and removed from the community of human obligation. The implication couldnt be clearer: War
is nothing more than an excuse for governments to lay siege to a populace they deem unworthy.
Hostility elimination is an absurd sentiment, and the innocent often die with the rest of them.
In Part II of this thesis, we take a look at Zimbardos work in mans, unfamiliar circumstances
presented in his STE project, and share his efforts in the defense of Abu Ghraib military
personnel.