Wannsee Conference

Commenced by Reinhard Heydrich on January 20th, 1942 to coordinate the Final Solution for the extermination of Jews.

Heydrich's goal for the conference was to establish support from various ministries and agencies to accomplish the goal bestowed upon him by Adolf Hitler himself. The decision to authorize the Final Solution was not the conference's decision to make. Rather, their task was to coordinate how all parties involved would contribute towards Hitler's goal of expanding the Lebensraum and the murder of over 11 million Jews throughout Europe.

After Heydrich's opening speech, ministry officials raised questions about the complexity of mixed marriages and the fate of Jews central to the industrial war effort. Heydrich assured them that such Jews would not be subject to liquidation.

As the attendees were drinking cognac at the end of the meeting, Heydrich breathed a sigh of relief as he realized that there was a distinct lack of resistance from the officials. Adolf Eichmann, the conference's internal coordinator, noted that the attendees were openly and boldly discussing mass execution methods and the logistics behind them.

Heydrich was also responsible for the drafting of the Wannsee Protocol, which was essentially a rough outline of what needed to be done to further the Final Solution and to where authorities should begin to direct their resources. A large portion of the minutes roughly defined what mixed marriages were and what constituted mixed blood.