Preconditions: antisemitism, racism, and common prejudices in early-twentieth-century Europe -- Leadership and will : Adolf Hitler, the National Socialist German Workers' Party, and Nazi Ideology -- From revolution to routine : Nazi Germany, 1933-1938 -- Open aggression : in search of war, 1938-1939 -- Experiments in brutality, 1939-1940 : war against Poland and the so-called euthanasia program -- Expansion and systematization : exporting war and terror, 1940-1941 -- The peak years of killing : 1942 and 1943 -- Death throes and killing frenzies, 1944-1945.