The Holocaust technically begins with the Nazis rounding up the Jews into ghettos, but the actual killing starts in Lithuania. These people wanted to gain the favor of the Nazis so they took it upon themselves to start killing. Around this time (early 1940's), the main way the Jews are killed by the Nazis is with mass shootings and gas vans, which were sparsely used and the precursors to the gas chambers at the camps. The camp complex at Auschwitz-Birkenau was brought into existence after the Wannassee conference, after they decided mass and methodical killing in camps like this were most efficient. They tested the killing on Soviet POW's, and after this trial run they began sending Jews here to work to death or be exterminated.

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