Ostkrieg

by Stephen G. Fritz

  33. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 673–74; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 80–87; Halder, War Diary, 8 October 1941, 550; Glantz, Barbarossa, 149–53.

  34. Megargee, War of Annihilation, 100–101; Kershaw, Hitler: Nemesis, 430–33; TBJG, 4 October 1941.

  35. Halder, War Diary, 4 October 1941, 546; Kershaw, Hitler: Nemesis, 433; Megargee, War of Annihilation, 102; Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 675–76; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 87–89, 95–96; Bock, War Diary, 7 October 1941, 325–26.

  36. Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 99–101; Hoffmann, “The Conduct of the War through Soviet Eyes,” 886–93; Glantz and House, When Titans Clashed, 82; Harrison, “ ‘Barbarossa’: Die sowjetische Antwort,” 458; Magenheimer, Hitler’s War, 110–11; Henderson, “ ‘Hitler’s Biggest Blunder,’ ” 42.

  37. Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 99–101, 121–22 n. 165; Hoffmann, “The Conduct of the War through Soviet Eyes,” 886–93; Kershaw, War without Garlands, 194–95; Mawdsley, Thunder in the East, 95, 105; Glantz, Barbarossa, 153.

  38. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 676–77; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 88–89, 92–93; Fritz, Frontsoldaten, 105–7; Ziemke and Bauer, Moscow to Stalingrad, 40–41; Kershaw, War without Garlands, 186–87.

  39. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 677; Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1133; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 93–94, 149, 152; Haupt, Heeresgruppe Mitte, 91–92; Bock, War Diary, 20, 24 October 1941, 337, 340.

  40. Fritz, Frontsoldaten, 109–10; Haupt, Heeresgruppe Mitte, 91–92; Bock, War Diary, 15 October 1941, 333; Haape, Moscow Tram Stop, 140–41, 182; Diary entry of Harald Henry, 18 October 1941, in Bähr and Bähr, eds., Kriegsbriefe, 81–82; Kershaw, War without Garlands, 188–91.

  41. Diary entry of Harald Henry, 20 October 1941, in Bähr and Bähr, eds., Kriegsbriefe, 83; Letter of 25 October 1941, in Buchbender and Sterz, eds., Das andere Gesicht des Krieges, 85; Kershaw, War without Garlands, 188–91; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 120 n. 149; Boberach, ed., Meldungen aus dem Reich, 30 October, 3, 6, 10 November 1941; Bock, War Diary, 25 October 1941, 340.

  42. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 678–79; Glantz, Barbarossa, 153–55, 157–58; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 91–92, 148–49, 179 n. 29; Paul, Erfrorener Sieg, 122; Kershaw, War without Garlands, 166–67.

  43. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 678–79, 685; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 91–92; Glantz, Barbarossa, 153–55, 157–58; Kershaw, War without Garlands, 182–85; Bock, War Diary, 13 October 1941, 331.

  44. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 678–81; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 93–95; Glantz, Barbarossa, 158; Megargee, War of Annihilation, 103–4; Bock, War Diary, 25 October 1941, 340.

  45. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 680–84; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 94–99; Bock, War Diary, 29, 31 October, 1 November 1941, 345–48.

  46. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 607–8; Megargee, War of Annihilation, 105.

  47. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 609–12; Megargee, War of Annihilation, 106–7.

  48. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 613–19; Megargee, War of Annihilation, 107–8; Halder, War Diary, 7 November 1941, 554.

  49. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 619–26; Megargee, War of Annihilation, 112–13; Halder, War Diary, 29 November 1941, 567–70.

  50. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 619–26; Megargee, War of Annihilation, 112–13; Kershaw, Hitler: Nemesis, 441; Ziemke and Bauer, Moscow to Stalingrad, 55–57; Halder, War Diary, 30 November, 1, 3 December 1941, 571, 573–76.

  51. Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 128–34.

  52. Ibid., 135–37, 154 n. 18, 263–67, 273 n. 26; Herbert, “Labour and Extermination,” 165–67; Ciano, The Ciano Diaries, 25 November 1941, 411; Aly and Heim, Architects of Annihilation, 248–50.

  53. Hoffmann, “The Conduct of the War through Soviet Eyes,” 849–52; Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 686 n. 523; Tooze, The Wages of Destruction, 482–83; Streit, “Sowjetische Kriegsgefangene,” 747–49, “Die Behandlung der sowjetischen Kriegsgefangen,” “Die Behandlung der verwundeten sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen,” and Keine Kameraden, 162–64; Streim, Sowjetische Gefangene, 313–15, and “Das Völkerrecht.”

  54. Letter of 26 August 1941, in Moltke, Letters to Freya, 155–56; Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1147, 1172–73; Berkhoff, “ ‘Russian’ Prisoners of War”; Herbert, “Labour and Extermination,” 152 n. 18; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 263–67; Hartmann, “Verbrecherischer Krieg—verbrecherische Wehrmacht?” 11–12, 21–25.

  Christian Gerlach argues that the high mortality rates suffered by Soviet prisoners of war during the transport phase were not simply due to neglect but part of a systematic strategy of annihilation. See Gerlach, Kalkulierte Morde, 843–45.

  Christian Hartmann disputes the notion of a deliberate plan to murder Soviet prisoners of war but does admit that the autumn 1941 order to deny food to those incapable of working had devastating consequences. By his reckoning, some 2 million Soviet prisoners of war died in the winter of 1941–1942. See Hartmann, Wehrmacht im Ostkrieg, 531, 566–67, 592.

  55. Streit, “Sowjetische Kriegsgefangene,” 748–50, “Die Behandlung der sowjetischen Kriegsgefangen,” “The German Army and the Politics of Genocide,” 9–10, and Keine Kameraden, 106–8, 136; Gerlach, Kalkulierte Morde, 774–76, and “Verbrechen deutscher Fronttruppen in Weißrußland,” 92–94; Diary entry of Gustav Vetter, 26 December 1941, in Dollinger, ed., Kain, wo ist dein Bruder? 114; Konrad Jarausch, Letters of 23, 25 October, 1, 14 November 1941, 10 January 1942, in Jarausch, ed., Reluctant Accomplice, 307–9, 311, 314, 324, 361.

  56. Streit, “Sowjetische Kriegsgefangene,” 748–50, “Die Behandlung der sowjetischen Kriegsgefangen,” “The German Army and the Politics of Genocide,” 9–10, Keine Kameraden, 136, and “Die Behandlung der verwundeten sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen”; MacKenzie, “Treatment of Prisoners of War”; Schulte, “Korück 582,” 327–30, and German Army, 180–210; TBJG, 27 August 1941; Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1147–48; Hartmann, Wehrmacht im Ostkrieg, 592. For Bock’s reaction, see Bock, War Diary, 20 October 1941, 337.

  57. Streit, “Sowjetische Kriegsgefangene,” 748–49, Keine Kameraden, 87–105, and “Die Behandlung der verwundeten sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen”; MacKenzie, “Treatment of Prisoners of War,” 504–12; Förster, “Operation Barbarossa as a War of Conquest,” 520; Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1177; Berkhoff, “ ‘Russian’ Prisoners of War,” 4–5.

  Considerable controversy surrounds the number of Soviet troops who died in German captivity as well as both the extent of Wehrmacht cooperation in the killings of commissars and the total number shot. In the former debate, Christian Streit and Hans-Adolf Jacobsen argue for a figure of 5.7 million prisoners, of whom 3.3 million died, while Alfred Streim puts the numbers at 5.3 and 2.5 million, respectively. Joachim Hoffmann, on the basis of Soviet records, asserts a figure of 5,245,882 prisoners, with some 2 million dead by the spring of 1942.

  In terms of deaths by direct shootings, Streit has claimed that at least 580,000–600,000 Soviet prisoners of war fell victim to the shooting squads or army killers, a number that is certainly too high (as he essentially concedes in the third edition of his book). By contrast, Alfred Streim puts the actual number executed as at least 140,000 while stressing that the number could be considerably higher since no exact figures are available for Ukraine. Hoffmann and Christian Gerlach, on the other hand, put the number shot by the Einsatzgruppen at perhaps less than 30,000, while Reinhard Otto claims 38,000 men were shot up to the end of July 1942. See Streit, Keine Kameraden, 10, 105; Jacobsen, “Kommissarbefehl und Massenexekutionen sowjetischer Kriegsgefangener,” 197, 279; Streim, Die Behandlung sowjetische
r Kriegsgefangener, 244; Hoffmann, “The Conduct of the War through Soviet Eyes,” 852 n. 71; Gerlach, Kalkulierte Morde, 839; and Otto, Wehrmacht, 63–65, 263–68. See also Hartmann, “Massensterben oder Massenvernichtung?” and “Verbrecherischer Krieg—verbrecherische Wehrmacht?” 49. For Bock’s objections to the use of these “special detachments,” see Bock, War Diary, 9 November 1941, 353.

  58. Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 140–61, 267–68; Schuler, “Eastern Campaign as Transportation and Supply Problem,” 216; Tooze, The Wages of Destruction, 493–99.

  59. Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 140–61, 270–72; Schuler, “Eastern Campaign as Transportation and Supply Problem,” 216; Hayward, “Hitler’s Quest for Oil,” 101–7; Tooze, The Wages of Destruction, 493–99.

  60. TBJG, 9 July 1941; Streit, “The German Army and the Politics of Genocide,” 9; Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1141–45, 1149; Aly and Heim, Architects of Annihilation, 244.

  61. Streit, “The German Army and the Politics of Genocide,” 9; Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1145–49, and “Menschenjagd,” 93; Tooze, The Wages of Destruction, 481–82; Herbert, “Extermination Policy,” 31–34; Hartmann, “Verbrecherischer Krieg—verbrecherische Wehrmacht?” 36–42; Gerlach, Kalkulierte Mord, 265–318, and “German Economic Interests,” 215–17; Kershaw, Hitler: Nemesis, 471.

  62. Tooze, The Wages of Destruction, 480–84; Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1161–66, and “Das ‘Unternehmen Barbarossa’ als wirtschaftlicher Raubkrieg,” 185–88; Hartmann, “Verbrecherischer Krieg—verbrecherische Wehrmacht?” 42; “Schreiben des Rüstungsinspekteurs Ukraine, General Leutnant Hans Leykauf, an den Chef des Wehrwirtschafts- und Rüstungsamtes im OKW, General d. Inf. Thomas, vom 2. 12. 1941,” in Ueberschär and Wette, eds., “Unternehmen Barbarossa,” 338–39.

  For examples of efforts by local commanders to ameliorate local civilian hunger, see Hürter, “Die Wehrmacht vor Leningrad,” 404–6. For an example of an order to release food supplies from army rear areas to the civilian population, see “Schreiben des Generalquartiermeisters Wagner an den Wirtschaftsführungsstab vom 3.8.1942,” in Hamburger Institut für Sozialforschung, ed., Verbrechen der Wehrmacht, 305.

  63. Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1163–72; Tooze, The Wages of Destruction, 483–85; Schulte, German Army, 86–116; TBJG, 19 August 1941.

  64. Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1163–72; Tooze, The Wages of Destruction, 483–85; Schulte, German Army, 86–116; TBJG, 19 August 1941; “Die Ernäherung der Front und der Heimat. Richtlinien für die Behandlung in Frontzeitungen (Nicht zum wörtlichen Abdruck bestimmt),” OKH, 1 November 1941, in Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 124 n. 187, 269–70.

  65. Herbert, “Extermination Policy,” 37–41; Matthäus, “Operation Barbarossa and the Onset of the Holocaust,” 297–300, and “Ausbildungsziel Judenmord?” 692; Rosenberg quoted in Gerlach, Kalkulierte Morde, 581; Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 320–21, and Ordinary Men, 179.

  66. Matthäus, “Operation Barbarossa and the Onset of the Holocaust,” 286–87; Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 320–25, and “Nazi Ghettoization Policy in Poland”; Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 760, 763; Kershaw, Fateful Choices, 460–61; Herbert, “Extermination Policy,” 34, 37–38, and “Labour and Extermination.”

  For an early argument of the connection between the murder of the Jews and economic considerations, see Aly and Heim, “The Economics of the Final Solution.” For suggestions of a link between the murder of the Jews and the Nazi desire to reduce the Eastern European population for food-related reasons, see Aly and Heim, Architects of Annihilation, 250–52; Aly, “Final Solution,” 214–42; Kettenacker, “Hitler’s Final Solution and its Rationalization”; Gerlach, Krieg, Ernährung, Völkermord, 13–30, 167–257, and “German Economic Interests”; Dieckmann, “The Killing of the Lithuanian Jews,” 253–66; Herbert, “Extermination Policy,” 31–34.

  67. Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 323–25; Kershaw, Hitler: Nemesis, 476–81. See also Witte, “Two Decisions.”

  68. Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 325–27; Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 763–64; Kershaw, Fateful Choices, 462–63.

  69. Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 328–30, 333–34; Kershaw, Fateful Choices, 462–63; Matthäus, “Operation Barbarossa and the Onset of the Holocaust,” 304–5; Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1137.

  70. Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 392–98; Matthäus, “Operation Barbarossa and the Onset of the Holocaust,” 304–5; Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 766–71.

  71. Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 328–30, 353–54, 396–98; Matthäus, “Operation Barbarossa and the Onset of the Holocaust,” 356; Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 769–71; Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1137.

  72. Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 354–58, 365–68; Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 762–63; Kershaw, Hitler: Nemesis, 483–87; van Pelt and Dwork, Auschwitz, 279–83, 292–93; Allen, “ ‘The Devil in the Details,’ ” 199–201; Pressac, “Machinery of Mass Murder,” 198–201.

  73. Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 362–69.

  74. Ibid., 366–73, 416–23; Jochmann, Monologe im Führerhauptquartier, 17, 21, 25 October 1941, 90–91, 96–99, 106; Gerlach, “Failure of Plans,” 60–64, and Kalkulierte Morde, 650–53; Aly, “Final Solution,” 223–25.

  75. Kershaw, Fateful Choices, 464–66, and Hitler: Nemesis, 487–91; Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 416–19; Jochmann, Monologe im Führerhauptquartier, 5 November, 2 December 1941, 125–26, 130–31, 148; Domarus, ed., Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen, 2:1772–73, 1781; TBJG, 13 December 1941.

  Christian Gerlach sees Hitler’s 12 December speech as marking the fundamental shift from a policy of locally driven murder campaigns, justified on the basis of specific situations, to a centrally ordered policy of genocide. This is an overstatement of the significance of the speech from the point of view of decisionmaking, but, certainly, it had a clarifying effect on the party leadership. See Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference.”

  76. Kershaw, Fateful Choices, 465–67, and Hitler: Nemesis, 490–94; Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 780–86; Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 372–73, 398–415, 540 n. 120; Longerich, Politik der Vernichtung, 440, 448, 456, 466–82, 514–15.

  77. Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 780–81, 790, 793–800; Kershaw, Fateful Choices, 465–67, and Hitler: Nemesis, 490–94; Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 408–15.

  78. Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 780–81, 790, 793–800; Kershaw, Fateful Choices, 465–67, and Hitler: Nemesis, 490–94; Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 408–15; Longerich, Politik der Vernichtung, 440, 448, 456, 466–82, 514–15; Sandkühler, “Anti-Jewish Policy,” 115, 118–19; Kaienburg, “Jüdische Arbeitslager,” 19–20. Tooze (The Wages of Destruction, 476, 751 n. 46) maintains that, at Wannsee, Heydrich clung to the idea of working Jews to death on road construction and not killing them through gassing or shooting. See also Roseman, The Villa, the Lake, the Meeting.

  The only heated debate at Wannsee concerned the issue of Mischlinge. Heydrich wanted to deport (i.e., exterminate) half Jews but treat quarter Jews as Germans. Jews in mixed marriages would be assessed on a case-by-case basis. Wilhelm Stuckart of the Interior Ministry favored compulsory sterilization of half Jews, while Otto Hofmann of the Race and Resettlement Main Office proposed giving them a choice between sterilization and deportation. These issues were never resolved, although they continued to be debated over the next two years. See Browning, The Origins of the Final Solution, 412–13; and Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 801–3.

  79. Kershaw, Hit
ler: Nemesis, 494; Gerlach, “The Wannsee Conference,” 806–12; Domarus, ed., Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen, 2:1829. On the German invasion as a program of planned murder, see Müller, “Economic Alliance,” 150–54, 170–87; and Gerlach, Kalkulierte Morde, and Krieg, Ernährung, Völkermord.

  80. “Beurteilung der Kampfkraft des Ostheeres,” in Schramm, ed., Kriegstagebuch, 6 November 1941, 1, pt. 2:1074–75; Halder, War Diary, 19 November 1941, 558; Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 684–89; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 170–90.

  81. Bock, War Diary, 11, 20–21 November 1941, 354, 365–66; Halder, War Diary, 11 November 1941, 555; Ziemke and Bauer, Moscow to Stalingrad, 43.

  82. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 689–90; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 191–94; Ziemke and Bauer, Moscow to Stalingrad, 43–46; Megargee, War of Annihilation, 109–10.

  83. Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 691–92; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 173–83; Ziemke and Bauer, Moscow to Stalingrad, 43; Bock, War Diary, 18 November 1941, 362; Halder, War Diary, 22 November 1941, 561–62.

  84. Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 173–83; Halder, War Diary, 18 November 1941; Boberach, Meldungen aus dem Reich, 6 November 1941; Steinert, Hitler’s War, 131–32; Das Reich, 8 November 1941.

  85. Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 199–201, 203 n. 19; Klink, “The Conduct of Operations,” 692–93; Bock, War Diary, 11, 16–17 November 1941, 355, 359, 361. Halder was informed on 30 November that the Ostheer had a shortage of 340,000 men but that only thirty-three thousand replacements existed in Germany. See Halder, War Diary, 30 November 1941, 571–72.

  86. Müller, “The Failure of the Economic ‘Blitzkrieg Strategy,’ ” 1130–41; Schüler, “The Eastern Campaign,” 216–19; van Creveld, Supplying War, 173; Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 199–204; Kershaw, War without Garlands, 197–98; Halder, War Diary, 11, 30 November 1941, 556, 571–72.

  87. Reinhardt, Moscow—the Turning Point, 205–8; Hoffmann, “The Conduct of the War through Soviet Eyes,” 894–96; Ziemke and Bauer, Moscow to Stalingrad, 47–49; Bock, War Diary, 18 November 1941, 362; Mawdsley, Thunder in the East, 111–17; Glantz, Barbarossa, 165–69.