History is full of "ifs". Writers and historians alike are keen to imagine that if an event had a different outcome, different situations would arise.
For example, if the Axis powers had won World War II, how would the situation have changed? What if Napoleon had successfully invaded Russia in 1811? What if President John F. Kennedy survived his assassination in 1963?
One of the lesser-known "ifs" was the Madagascar Plan, which was almost about to be realized during World War II. The Madagascar Project was a policy proposed by the Nazi government in Germany to relocate European Jews to the island of Madagascar at the height of the war.
The idea was proposed by Franz Rademacher, head of the Jewish Department under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, whose idea was to hand over Madagascar, which was then a French colony, to Germany as part of the conditions of France's surrender. The project was approved by Adolf Hitler. On August 15, 1940, he ordered Adolf Eichmann to begin placing 1 million Jews a year in Madagascar, a police state under SS rule, for a period of four years. The plan was eventually shelved because the Nazis chose to systematically genocide the Jews.
One of the reasons for the abandonment of the "Madagascar Plan" was that Germany failed to defeat the British and take control of the naval fleet necessary to carry out the logistical plan of expulsion. Hitler considered this plan until 1942, when British troops finally seized control of Madagascar from Vichy France.
We never know how history would have changed if Germany had implemented the Madagascar Plan. But what we do know is that Madagascar played a central role in many decisions made during World War II, but in most of the decisions made at the time, it seems that the fate of the country's people was not taken into account.