Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews

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Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews Page 100

by Peter Longerich


  57. Fröhlich, Die Tagebücher Teil II, vol. v. Entry for 30 Sept. 1942, p. 606.

  58. BAB, R 22/5029, Report of the Justice Minister, 18 Sept. 1942; also IMT xxvi. 654 PS.

  59. ND NO 5522.

  60. On this subject, and on the implementation of the deportations see Ladislav Lipscher, Die Juden im slowakischen Staat 1939–1945 (Munich, 1980), 99 ff.; Raul Hilberg, The

  Destruction of the European Jews (New Haven, 2003), ii. 766 ff.; Christopher Browning,

  The Find Solution and the German Foreign Office: A Study of Referat D III of Abteilung

  Deutschland 1940–43 (New York and London, 1978), 94 ff.; Yehoshua Büchler, ‘The

  Deportation of Slovakian Jews to the Lublin District of Poland in 1942’, HGS 6 (1991)

  151–66.

  61. Dienstkalender, ed. Witte et al., 20 Oct. 1941, p. 241. The editors quote from a declaration by the Slovakian Interior minister, Mach, on 26 Mar. 1942 to the Slovakian State

  Council, from which the German offer comes.

  62. Lipscher, Juden, 31 ff.

  63. Ibid. 102 ff.

  64. Büchler, ‘Deportation’, 152.

  65. Ibid. 153.

  66. PAA, Büro StSekr, Bd. 2, published in ADAP, E II, 161–2.

  67. See p. 328.

  68. Büchler, ‘Deportation’, 153, 166; and Danuta Czech, ed., Kalendarium der Ereignisse im Konzentrationslager Auschwitz-Birkenau 1939–1945 (Reinbek b. Hamburg, 1989).

  69. Büchler, ‘Deportation’, 160.

  70. Ibid. 166.

  71. Czech, Kalendarium.

  72. Cf. Lipscher, Juden, 129 ff.; on interventions by the Church, see Livia Rothkirchen,

  ‘Vatican Policy and the “Jewish Problem” in Independent Slovakia (1939–1945)’, YVS 6

  (1967), 27–53.

  73. Livia Rothkirchen, ‘The Dual Role of the “Jewish Center” in Slovakia’, in Yisrael

  Gutman and Cynthia J. Haft, eds, Patterns of Jewish Leadership in Nazi Europe, 1933–

  1945. Proceedings of the Third Yad Vashem International Historical Conference, Jerusa-

  lem, April 4–7, 1977 (Jerusalem, 1979), 219–27; Yahuda Bauer, Freikauf von Juden?

  (Frankfurt a. M., 1996).

  74. Lipscher, Juden, 114–15.

  75. According to Büchler, ‘Deportation’, 8, transports went to the district of Lublin and 19

  to Auschwitz.

  76. Serge Klarsfeld, Vichy-Auschwitz. Die Zusammenarbeit der deutschen und franzö-

  sischen Behörden bei der ‘Endlösung der Judenfrage’ in Frankreich (Nördlingen, 1989),

  34 ff.; Ulrich Herbert, ‘Die deutsche Militärverwaltung in Paris und die Deportation der

  französischen Juden’, in Christian Jansen et al., eds, Von der Aufgabe der Freiheit.

  Politische Verantwortung und bürgerliche Gesellschaft im 19. u. 20. Jahrhundert (Frank-

  furt a. M., 1995), 439; details of the start of the ‘Final Solution’ in France are examined in the article by Ahlrich Meyer, ‘Der Beginn der “Endlösung” in Frankreich—offene

  Fragen’, Sozialgeschichte 18 (2003), 35–82.

  548

  Notes to pages 327–331

  77. Klarsfeld, Vichy, 43.

  78. 1216-RF, Minute by Dannecker, 10 Mar. 1943 published in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 374–5.

  79. Note by Zeitschel, 11 Mar. 1942 published in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 375.

  80. Klarsfeld, Vichy, 376–7.

  81. CDJC, XXVb-29, published in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 375–6.

  82. R. B. Birn, Die Höhere SS- und Polizeiführer. Himmlers Vertreter im Reich und in den

  besetzten Gebieten (Düsseldorf, 1986), 446–7.

  83. Herbert, ‘Militärverwaltung’, 440.

  84. CDJC, XXVb-29, published in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 379.

  85. This is according to the report of Walter Bargatzky, working as a lawyer in the military administration, Hotel Majestic; Walter Bargatzky, Hotel Majestic (Freiburg, 1987), 103, on the basis of information from an auricular witness; cf. Herbert, ‘Militärverwaltung’, 448.

  86. Bargatzky, Hotel Majestic, 94. See also identical information from the former chief

  judge attached to the military commander, 29 Oct. 1949, quoted from Hans

  Luther, Der französische Widerstand gegen die deutsche Besatzungsmacht und

  seine Bekämpfung (Tübingen, 1957), 214. See Ulrich Herbert, Best. Biographische

  Studien über Radikalismus, Weltanschauung und Vernunft 1903–1989 (Bonn, 1996),

  320.

  87. 1217-RF, note from Dannecker, 15 June 1942; published in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 379–80; see also ibid. 66–7.

  88. Moreshet-Archive, Givat Haviva, Israel (copy from Prague city Archive); already

  published in Tragédia slovenských Židov. Fotografie a Dokumenty (Bratisalava, 1949)

  and quoted in in Gerald Reitlinger, The Final Solution: The Attempt to Exterminate the

  Jews of Europe, 1939–1945 (New York, 1961).

  89. CDJC, XXVb-38, note concerning telephone conversation with Novak, 18 June 1942

  published in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 383.

  90. ND NG 183 published in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 384–5.

  91. 1223-RF, Dannecker note of 1 July 1942 published in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 390–1.

  92. 1220-RF, in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 388.

  93. Cf. Klarsfeld, Vichy, 68 ff. and 90 ff.

  94. CDJC, XXVI-40, Hagen note of 4 July 1942 and 1225-RF, Minute by Dannecker, 6 July

  1942, published in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 393 ff. and 398–9.

  95. CDJC, XLIX-35, Dannecker to Eichmann, July 1942, in Klarsfeld, Vichy, 399–400.

  96. APL, Gouverneur Distrikt Lublin, Sygn. 270.

  97. Yitzhak Arad, Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka: The Operation Reinhard Death Camps

  (Bloomington, Ind., 1986), 23 ff. and 68 ff.

  98. Cf. in particular Dieter Pohl, Von der ‘Judenpolitik’ zum ‘Judenmord’. Der Distrikt

  Lublin des Generalgouvernements 1939–1944 (Frankfurt a. M., 1993), 113 ff. and also

  David Silberklang, ‘Die Juden und die ersten Deportationen aus dem Distrikt Lublin’,

  in Bogdan Musial, ed., ‘Aktion Reinhardt’. Der Völkermord an den Juden im General-

  gouvernement 1941–1944 (Osnabrück, 2004), 141–64.

  99. See in particular Bogdan Musial, Deutsche Zivilverwaltung und Judenverfolgung im

  Generalgouvernement. Eine Fallstudie zum Distrikt Lublin 1939–1944 (Wiesbaden,

  1999), 229 ff.

  100. BAB, NS 19/3959; see Pohl, Lublin, 110.

  Notes to pages 331–334

  549

  101. Pohl, Lublin, 116–7.

  102. Elke Fröhlich, ed., Die Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels. Teil II. Band 3. Januar-März 1942 (Munich, 1994), 561.

  103. Trial of Eichmann, vii. 240.

  104. Statement, 10 Nov. 1964, StA München I 110 Ks 3/64, 14, 2918 ff.; see Pohl, Lublin, 125–6.

  105. Pohl, Lublin, 118 ff.; Silberklang, ‘Juden’, 150 ff.; Musial, Zivilverwaltung, 254 ff.

  106. Dieter Pohl, Nationalsozialistische Judenverfolgung in Ostgalizien 1941–1944. Die

  Organisation und Durchführung eines staatlischen Massenerbrechens (Munich, 1996),

  179 ff.

  107. On Sobibor see Arad, Belzec, 30 ff.

  108. Pohl, Lublin, 120 ff.

  109. Bradley F. Smith et al., eds, Himmler Geheimreden 1933 bis 1945 (Frankfurt a. M., 1974), 159.

  110. VOGG, 1942, 321 ff., ‘Erlass über die Überweisung von Dienstgeschäften auf den

  Staatssekretär für das Sicherheitswesen’; cf. Pohl, Lublin, 125.

  111. Both spellings occur in the files, but also ‘Reinhart’. Heydrich himself is known to have allowed his first name to be used in the variant ‘Reinhardt’. Individual evidence in Peter Black, ‘Die Trawniki-Männer und die Aktion Reinhard’, in Musial, ed.,

  ‘Aktion Reinhardt’, 309–52, 308–9.

  112. See Globocnik’s ‘Meldung über die wirtschaft
liche Abwicklung der Aktion Reinhardt’

  of 5 Jan. 1944, 402-PS, IMT xxxiv. 70 ff., 72.

  113. BAB, NS 19/1755, the content of the papers not only emerges from the covering letter; this was a memo, ‘The State of Jewish Labour’ in which the ‘shortcomings and

  questions are revealed that require an order to deal with them’, and a piece entitled,

  ‘The Jews in the district of Lublin’, along with the third paper dealing with ‘German-

  ness’ (Deutschtum). This was passed on by Himmler’s personal staff to the Staff

  Headquarters of the Reichskommissar for the Strengthening of the German Nation.

  114. Pohl, Lublin, 126–7.

  115. Das Diensttagebuch des deutschen Generalgouverneurs in Polen 1939–1945, ed. Werner

  Präg and Wolfgang Jacobmeyer (Stuttgart, 1975), 506 ff. See also the interpretation in

  Christian Gerlach, ‘Die Bedeutung der deutschen Ernährungspolitik für die Bes-

  chleunigung des Mordes an den Juden 1942. Das Generalgouvernment und die

  Westukraine’, in Christian Gerlach, Krieg, Ernährung, Völkermord. Forschungen

  zur deutschen Vernichtungspolitik im Zweiten Weltkrieg (Hamburg, 1998), 197 ff.,

  who stresses the role of nutritional policy in the ‘acceleration’ of the murder of the

  Jews.

  116. Diensttagebuch, ed. Präg and Jacobmeyer, 515 ff.

  117. Pohl, Lublin, 127.

  118. Ibid. 122; Pohl, Ostgalizien, 197.

  119. Arad, Belzec, 73.

  120. Arad, Belzec, 37 ff.

  121. Police meeting, 18 June 1942, Report by Deputy Department Head, Alfons Oswald; in

  Diensttagebuch, ed. Präg and Jacobmeyer, 511.

  122. Pohl, Lublin, 131–2 and Christopher Browning, Ordinary Men. Reserve Battalion 101

  and the Final Solution in Poland (New York and London, 1992), 55 ff.

  550

  Notes to pages 334–340

  123. Pohl, Ostgalizien, 196–7.

  124. Arad, Belzec, 80–1; BAB, NS 19/2655, Ganzenmüller to Wolff, 28 July 1942.

  125. On the deportations from the individual districts see the lists in Arad, Belzec, 383 ff.

  126. On this and the following see Pohl, Lublin, 127–8.

  127. BAB, NS 19/2655, 29 July 1941, here also Himmler’s letter of thanks of 13 August.

  128. Dienstkalender, ed. Witte et al., 491 ff.; Rudolf Höß, Commandant in Auschwitz

  (London, 1959), 210, 223 ff.

  129. Walter Laqueur and Richard Breitman, Breaking the Silence (New York, 1986);

  Hoess, Commandant, 236–7.

  130. BAB, NS 19/1757, printed in Longerich, Ermordung, 201. See also Pohl, Lublin, 128.

  131. See the overview by Jace Andrzej Mlynarczyk, ‘Treblinka—ein Todeslager der “Aktion

  Reinhard” ’, in Musial, ed., ‘Aktion Reinhardt’, 257–81. On the building phase also

  Arad, Belzec, 37 ff.

  132. Israel Gutman, The Jews of Warsaw 1939–1943: Ghetto, Underground, Revolt (Bloom-

  ington, Ind., 1982), 197 ff.

  133. Christopher Browning, ‘Nazi Ghettoization Policy in Poland 1939–1941’ in Browning,

  Path to Genocide, 28–56, 47 ff.

  134. Gutman, Jews, 219 ff.

  135. Arad, Belzec, 392–3.

  136. Pohl, Lublin, 132 ff.; Arad, Belzec, 387 provides a different date for the start of the deportation.

  137. Arad, Belzec, 393 ff.; Jacek Mlynarczyk, ‘Organisation und Durchführung der “Aktion

  Reinhardt” im Distrikt Radom’, in Musial, ed., ‘Aktion Reinhardt’, and Mlynarczyk,

  Judenmord in Zentralpolen. Der Distrikt Radom im Generalgouvernement 1939–1945

  (Darmstadt, 2007). Robert Seidel, Deutsche Besatzungspolitik in Polen. Der Distrikt

  Radom 1939–1940 (Paderborn 2006), 310 ff.

  138. Pohl, Ostgalizien, 216 ff.

  139. BAB, NS 19/3959, Office diary of the personal secretary.

  140. Pohl, Ostgalizien, 223 ff.

  141. Ibid. 238 ff.

  142. Ibid. 245.

  143. On the methods employed in ghetto clearances see Mlynarczyk, ‘Judenmord’, 251 ff.

  144. On Treblinka see the overview by Mlynarczyk, ‘Treblinka’, 257–81. On the building

  phase, see Arad, Belzec, 37 ff.

  145. Arad, Belzec, 81 ff.

  146. Ibid. 89 ff.

  147. PRO, HW 16/23, messages 12 and 13/15, transmitted 11 Jan. 1943, in Peter Witte and

  Stephen Tyas, eds, ‘A New Document on the Deportation and Murder of Jews during

  “Einsatz Reinhardt” 1942’, HGS 15 (2001), 468–86. In the original document the figure

  for Treblinka is 71,355; this should, however, be 713,555, as the addition of the remaining numbers reveals. The number of victims for Belzec is confirmed by calculations

  produced by the German Holocaust historian Wolfgang Scheffler in a report of 1973.

  He calculated the number of victims in this extermination camp as 441,442, and had

  thus been only 7,000 away from the true figure. See Wolfgang Scheffler, ‘ Die Zahl der in den Vernichtungslagern der “Aktion Reinhard” ermordeten Juden’, in Helge Grabitz

  Notes to pages 340–343

  551

  and the Judicial Authority Hamburg, eds, Täter und Gehilfen des Endlösungswahns.

  Hamburger Verfahren wegen NS-Gewaltverrechen 1946–1996 (Hamburg, 1998), 215–41.

  148. This figure is also quoted in the Korherr-Bericht, the report by the SS chief statistician on the state of the ‘Final Solution’ at the end of 1942 (ND NO 5194).

  149. Korherr-Bericht, ND NO 5194.

  150. Thomas Sandkühler, ‘Endlösung’ in Galizien. Der Judenmord in Ostpolen und die

  Rettungsinitiative von Berthold Beitz, 1941–1944 (Bonn, 1996), 461.

  151. Korherr estimated the surplus deaths and the number of emigrations in the General

  Government up to 31 Dec. 1942 as 427,920 in Korherr-Bericht, Kurzfassung, ND NO 5193.

  152. Cf. the overview in Gustavo Corni, Hitlers Ghettos: Voices from a Beleaguered Society 1939–1944 (London and New York, 2002), 300 ff.

  153. Pohl, Ostgalizien, 215; Pohl, Lublin, 157 ff.; Sandkühler, ‘Endlösung’, 181 ff.

  154. IfZ, MA 679/9, 9 May 1942; see also MA 679/8, KTB Oberquartiermeister, 8 May 1942,

  discussion at armaments inspection.

  155. Diensttagebuch, ed. Präg and Jacobmayer, 11 May 1942, p. 495.

  156. Ibid. Hauptabteilungsleitersitzung, 22 June 1942, pp. 516–17.

  157. Sandkühler, ‘Endlösung’, 182.

  158. Pohl, Ostgalizien, 15.

  159. BAB, NS 19/1765, Minute of the chief of staff of the SSPF Cracow, 27 July 1942, printed in Longerich, Ermordung, 202 ff. This concerns a ‘new order’ by Krüger. On Himmler’s

  order of 18 May 1942.

  160. Pohl, Ostgalizien, 235.

  161. BAB, NS 19/2462.

  162. BAB, NS 19/352, Letter from Gienanth to OKW, 18 Sept. 1942; letter from Himmler to

  head of WVHA etc., 9 Oct. 1942 (ibid.); cf. Naasner, Machtzentren, 362.

  163. Boelcke, ed., Deutschlands Rüstung, 189.

  164. See Dienstkalender, ed. Präg and Jacobmayer, 22 Sept. 1942, p. 566. Presentation to

  Führer: ‘Jewish emigration—what is to be done next?’ Himmler’s next point for

  discussion, as noted in his presentation draft, is: ‘Settlement of Lublin—Lorrainers,

  Germans from Bosnia, Bessarabia etc’ and ‘conditions Gen. Gouv.—Globus’ (Globoc-

  nik’s nickname). The fact that the ‘emigration’, i.e. murder of the Jews from the district of Lublin could not be implemented at the rate notified by Himmler clearly had

  repercussions on Globocnik’s settlement projects.

  165. ND NO 1611, printed as a facsimile in Helge Grabitz and Wolfgang Scheffler, Letzte

  Spuren: Ghetto Warschau, SS-Arbeitslager Trawniki, Akt
ion ‘Erntefest’: Fotos und

  Dokumente über Opfer des Endlösungswahns im Spiegel der historischen Ereignisse,

  2nd edn (Berlin, 1993), 179.

  166. VOGG 665–6, 1 Nov. 1942, Polizei VO 28 Oct. 1942 and 683 ff., 14 Nov. 1942, Polizei VO

  10 Nov. 1942.

  167. This was how the SSPF for Galicia, Katzmann, put it in his report to HSSPF Krüger on 30 June 1943 See Berenstein et al., Faschismus, 358 ff., 361. In this context Katzmann

  mentioned another ‘instruction’ issued in autumn 1942 by the Higher SS and Police

  Commander to implement ‘the accelerated total resettlement of the Jews’.

  168. Mlynarczyk, ‘Organisation’, 191–2, based on BAM, RH-53-23/700.

  169. It is generally accepted by scholars even today that the deportations from Upper Silesia had already begun on 15 February 1942 (see Czech, Kalendarium, or Steinbacher,

  552

  Notes to pages 343–347

  ‘Musterstadt’ Auschwitz,’ 277). This mistaken view is based on information from Martin

  Broszat, who referred to a letter to him from the International Tracing Service in

  Arolsen dated 27 Mar. 1958. A glance at the original of this letter shows, however, that

  in Arolsen at the time ‘deportations of Jews from Beuthen could only be established

  from 15.5.1942 [sic!]’. I should like to thank Klaus Lankheit of the Archive of the Institut für Zeitgeschichte in Munich for letting me have a copy of the original of this letter.

  170. Steinbacher, ‘Musterstadt’ Auschwitz, 278 ff.

  171. See p. 291.

  172. Lucjan Dobroszycki, ed., The Chronicle of the Lodz Ghetto 1941–1944 (New Haven and

  London, 1984), 128, 131–2, 136 ff., 140 ff., 145, 157.

  173. Dobroszycki, ibid. (p. 139) states that there had already been around 3,000 fatalities by the end of March.

  174. Ibid. 153–4, 156–7, 159 ff., and 194.

  175. Ibid. 248 ff.

  176. Ibid. 261.

  177. Ibid. 266 and 127.

  178. Longerich, Politik, 492.

  179. Individual evidence can be found in Czech, Kalendarium.

  180. Steinbacher, ‘Musterstadt’ Auschwitz, 285–6.

  181. Czech, Kalendarium, 20 March; for 12 May 1942 Czech shows that in Bunker I 1,500

  Jewish men, women, and children from Sosnowitz were murdered.

  182. According to Christian Gerlach, Kalkulierte Morde. Die deutsche Wirtschafts und

  Vernichtungspolitik in Weissrussland 1941 bis 1944 (Hamburg, 1999), 683 ff., the

 

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