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Poland

  resurrected

  the

  medieval

  ghetto,

  shut off entirely from the rest of the world.

  It may be recalled that the introduction of the destruction process

  in

  Germany

  was preceded by Einzelaktionen—short, violent outbursts

  against individual Jews. In Austria, too, for a brief period after the

  Anschluss there were a few Einzelaktionen. When the German army

  moved east, these Einzelaktionen occurred also in Poland. As in the

  case of the Reich and Austria, the violence had the function of convincing both the authorities and the victims of the need for law and order.

  Just as in Germany, the Einzelaktionen were started by party elements

  and curbed by the authority having responsibility for the administration of the area. The party elements in Poland were the Armed SS

  (Waffen-SS), military party formations that fought as integral units in

  the armed forces. The initial governing authority was the army.

  The first reports of violence arrived a few days after the outbreak

  of war. In one locality a member of the army’s Secret Field Police and

  an SS man drove fifty Jews, who had been employed in the repair of a

  bridge all day, into a synagogue and shot them down without any

  reason whatever (in einer Synagoge zusammengetrieben und grundlos

  zusammengeschossen). After a long correspondence, in which it was

  pointed out that the SS man had been aroused by Polish atrocities and

  held acted in “youthful initiative” (Jugendlichen Draufgängertum), the

  punishment of both culprits was fixed at three years.'

  1.

  Diary of Chief of the Genera] Staff Haider, September 10, 1939, NOKW-3140.

  Army memorandum. September 13, 1939, D-421. Oberkriegsgerichtsrat 3d Army (signed

  Lipski) to Oberstkriegsgerichtsrat in Office of Generalquartiermeister, September 14,

  1939, D-421.

  189

  CONCENTRATION

  A few days after this incident, the commander of the Fourteenth

  Army, Wilhelm List, had to issue an order to prohibit the looting of

  property, burning of synagogues, raping of women, and shooting of

  Jews.! But even after the end of hostilities, the Einzelaktionen continued. On October 10, 1939, Chief of the General Staff, Haider, made a cryptic remark in his diary: “Jewish massacres—discipline!“2 3 4 During

  the following month the army began to collect systematically the evidence of SS atrocities. It may be pointed out that the army was concerned not so much with the Jews as with the attempt to build up a case against the SS in general. Hence the army memoranda dealing with

  anti-Jewish Einzelaktionen are filled also with other complaints against

  the SS, all mixed together.

  On November 23, 1939, General der Artillerie Petzel, commander

  of the newly formed Army District XXI in Poznan, reported an incident

  that had taken place in the town of TUrek on September 30. A number

  of SS trucks filled with SS men and under the command of a senior SS

  officer had driven through the town. The SS men had been armed with

  horsewhips and had used those weapons freely, whipping passersby on

  their

  heads

  without

  discrimination.

  Apparently,

  a

  number

  of

  ethnic

  Germans had also been horsewhipped. The party had then driven up to

  a synagogue, had crowded the Jews into the building, and had forced

  the victims to crawl, singing, under the benches. The Jews had then

  been obliged to drop their pants to be whipped. In the course of this

  whipping, one Jew had in fright moved his bowels. The SS men had

  thereupon forced the victim to smear the dirt on the faces of other

  Jews. The report then continued with a complaint against a Goebbels

  representative who had apparently made a victory speech in which he

  had managed to laud the SS without even mentioning the army.1

  In

  February 1940

  the army commander in Poland (Blaskowitz)

  compiled a long list of complaints for presentation to the Commander-

  in-Chief

  of

  the

  army

  (von

  Brauchitsch).

  The

  report

  contained

  altogether

  thirty-three

  items,

  each

  one

  of

  which

  was

  a

  separate

  complaint. Item 7, for example, dealt with a search that had been

  earned out on December 31, 1939, in the bitter cold, at night, on the

  street. The Jews, particularly the women, had been forced to undress

  as the police had pretended to look for gold. Another complaint (item

  8)

  mentioned

  that

  an

  SS

  lieutenant,

  Untersturmführer

  Werner,

  was

  living under an assumed name with a Jewish actress (Johanna Epstein)

  2. Order by List, September 18, 1939, NOKW-M2I.

  3. Haider diary, October 10, 1939, NOKW-3140.

  4. High Command of the Army/Chief of the Replacement Army (Fromm) to High

  Command of the Armed Forces, November 30, 1939, enclosing report of General der

  Artillerie Petzel, dated November 23, 1939, D-419.

  190

  POLAND

  in a Warsaw apartment—a clear case of Rassenschande committed by

  an SS officer. Item 31 was a description of a whipping orgy in Nasielsk,

  This orgy had lasted all night and had affected 1,600 Jews. Item 33,

  which was reserved for the end, discussed the case of two policemen

  who had dragged two teen-age Jewish girls out of bed. One of the girls

  had been raped in a Polish cemetery. The other girl, who had become

  ill, had been told by the policemen that they would get her some other

  time and that they would pay her 5 zloty. However, the portion of the

  report most interesting to us is its conclusion. “It is a mistake," noted

  Generaloberst Blaskowitz, “to massacre some 10,000 Jews and Poles,

  as is being done at present; for—so far as the mass of the population is

  concerned—this will not eradicate the idea of a Polish state, nor will

  the Jews be exterminated.”5

  The complaint by Blaskowitz echoed the words that Schacht had

  spoken five years earlier. Like Schacht, the general was not outraged

  by the idea of drastic action but only by the amateurish way in which

  the SS attempted to deal with such a massive body as two million Jews.

  Actually, the “professionals" in the SS had already taken the situation

  in hand.

  On September 19, 1939, Security Police Chief Heydrich met with

  Generalquartiermeister Wagner of the Army High Command to discuss

  some Polish problems. The two officials agreed upon a “cleanup once

  and for all,” of “Jews, intelligentsia, clergy, nobility.”6 On the next day

  word came from the Commander-in-Chief of the Army that “the ghetto

  idea exists in broad outline; details are not yet clear.”’ They were

  developed twenty-four hours later in a meeting of office chiefs from the

  Reich Security Main Office and commanders recalled from Security
>
  Police units (Einsatzgruppen) already in Poland. The decision was to

  clear German-speaking areas of Jews, to remove the Jewish population

  from the Polish countryside, and to concentrate Jewry in ghettos within

  major cities.* These conclusions, which were incorporated on the same

  day in an order directed to the Einsatzgruppen,5 constituted an ambitious concentration plan. 5 6 7 8 9

  5. Notes for an oral report prepared by Blaskowitz, February 6, 1940, NO-3011.

  6. Haider diary, September 10, 1939, NOKW-3140.

  7. Haider diary, September 20, 1939. NOKW-3140.

  8. Conference minutes of September 21, 1939, in Staatsanwaltschaft beim Landgericht Berlin, 3 P (K) Js 198/61. ''Schlussvermerk in der Strafsache gegen Beutel u.a.

  wegen Mordes," January 29, 1971, pp. 17-19. Zentrale Stelle der Landesjustizverwaltungen, Ludwigsburg.

  9. Heydrich to Einsatzgruppen, copies to Army High Command (OKH), Staatssekretär Neumann in Office of Four-Year Plan, Staatssekretär Stuckart of the interior Ministry, Staatssekretär Landfried of the Economy Ministry, and Chief of Civil Administration in the Occupied Territories, September 21, 1939, PS-3363.

  191

  CONCENTRATION

  The introduction of the order makes a brief reference to an ultimate

  goal, an emigration of the Jews that was to be completed later, but that

  was not spelled out at the moment. Part I provided that the Jews were

  to be ejected from the territories of Danzig, West Prussia, Poznaft, and

  Eastern

  Upper

  Silesia.

  These

  areas

  later

  became incorporated

  territory, that is, territory integrated into the administration of the Reich.

  The Jews from these areas were to be shoved into the interior of

  Poland, a territory later known as the “General Government” (Generalgouvernement). The Jews in the General Government were to be concentrated in cities. Only cities that were located at railroad junctions, or at least along a railroad, were to be chosen as concentration points.

  All Jewish communities of less than five hundred were to be dissolved

  and transferred to the nearest concentration center.

  In part II of the order Heydrich directed that a council of Jewish

  elders (Ältestenrat, also Judenrat) composed of influential persons and

  rabbis was to be set up in each Jewish community. The councils were

  to be made fully responsible (in the literal sense of the word) for the

  exact execution of all instructions. They were to take an improvised

  census of the Jews in their area, and they were to be made personally

  responsible for the evacuation of the Jews from the countryside to the

  concentration points, for the maintenance of the Jews during transport,

  and for housing upon arrival. There was no objection against Jews

  taking with them their movable possessions. The reason to be given for

  the

  concentration was

  that the

  Jews

  had participated decisively in

  sniper attacks and plundering.

  It is interesting to note that the army wanted no part in the execution of this plan. During the Heydrich-Wagner discussion of September 19, 1939, the army quartermaster-general had insisted that the military

  authorities be notified of all activities by the SS and Police but that the

  "cleanup” take place after the withdrawal of the army and the transfer

  of power to the civilian administration, that is, not before early December.10 In view of the army’s early abdication of power in Poland, this demand could easily be fulfilled. This time the army did not have to

  dirty its hands with such business. In 1941, as we shall see, the military

  could no longer extricate itself from its assigned role in the destruction

  of the European Jews, but in Poland the concentration process was

  placed squarely into the laps of the newly formed civil administration.

  The Einsatzgruppen, on their part, were not able to accomplish

  much. Ghettoization was a procedure far too complex for a handful of

  battalion-sized units that were to be disbanded and transformed into a

  regular Security Police administration upon the cessation of military

  10. Haider diary, September 19, 1939, NOKW-3140.

  192

  POLAND

  rule. They did establish several Jewish councils, simply by calling on

  an identified Jewish leader to form a “Judenrat.”" In Warsaw on October 4, 1939, a small Security Police detachment raided the Jewish community headquarters, showing an interest in the safe and asking who the chairman was. The janitor told them it was Adam Czerniaköw." On

  the same day, Czemiakdw was driven to the building occupied by the

  staff of the Einsatzgruppe and told to co-opt twenty-four men to serve

  on the council and to assume its leadership.1’ For the next few days,

  Czemiaköw

  made

  lists

  and

  drafted

  organization

  charts."

  The

  Einsatzgruppe reported back that it had “secured the Jewish community

  together

  with

  president

  and

  secretary,

  just

  like

  the

  museum.

  [Die

  Jüdische

  Kultusgemeinde

  mitsamt

  Präsident

  und

  Schriftführer

  wurde

  ebenso wie das jüdische Museum sichergestellt.]”'1

  The era of civil administration began at the end of October. There

  were two kinds of administrative structures, one in territories incorporated into the Reich, the other in the so-called Generalgouvernement. In the incorporated areas, administrative offices were modeled on those of the Reich itself. Two new Reichsgaue had been carved out

  of the conquered incorporated territory: Danzig-West Prussia and the

  Wartheland. A Reichsgau was a territorial unit that combined the features of a Prussian province (or non-Prussian Land) and a party district (Gau). The chief of this territorial unit was a regional Reich official

  (Reichsstatthalter), who was at the same time a regional party official

  (Gauleiter).

  The Reichsstatthalter and Gauleiter of Danzig-West Prussia was a

  man called Forster. Inasmuch as Forster had already been the Gauleiter

  of the “Free City” of Danzig, the appointment resulted in a widening of

  his functions. The Reichsstatthalter and Gauleiter of the Wartheland,

  Greiser, had previously been the president of the Danzig senate. In that

  office he had distinguished himself by introducing the whole gamut of

  anti-Jewish legislation long before the arrival of German troops. The

  “Free City” had enacted a Law for Blood and Honor, decrees for the 11 12 13 14 15

  11. See Isaiah Trunk, Judenrai (New York, 1972), pp. 21-26.

  12. Apolinary Hartglas, “How did Czerniakow Become Head of the Warsaw

  Judenrai?" Yad Vashem Bulletin 15 (1964): 4-7.

  13. Czemiakdw's entry in his diary, October 4, 1939, in Raul Hilberg, Stanislaw

  Staron, and Josef Kermisz, eds.. The Warsaw Diary of Adam Czerniakow (New York,

  1979), p. 78. All subsequent citations of the diary will refer to this edition. The diary was

  translated into English by Professor Staron and the staff of Yad Vashem. For an edition

  in the original Polish language, see Marian Fuks. ed., Adama Czerniakowa dziennik gella

 
warszawskiego (Warsaw, 1983).

  14. Entries for October 5-14, 1939, Hilberg, Staron, and Kermisz, pp. 78-83.

  15. Report by Einsatzgruppe IV, October 6, 1939. in Berlin prosecution, final summation against Beutel, 3 P(K) Js 198/16.

  193

  CONCENTRATION

  MAP 1

  POLAND UNDER GERMAN OCCUPATION 16

  removal of Jewish doctors and lawyers, and a systematic Aryanization

  program. All but a remnant of Danzig's 10,000 Jews had emigrated

  before the war.14 After Danzig had been overrun, Senatsprasident

  16.

  F. Redlin, "Danzig lost die Judenfrage," Die Judenfrage, January 26, 1939, p. 5.

  Greiser had worked in close cooperation with the German Foreign Office. Weizsacker via

  Wdrmann to Erdmannsdorff, October 17, 1938, NG-5334. See also Herbert S. Levine,

  194

  POLAND

  Greiser, who was out of a job, was shifted south to become the chief

  executive of the Wartheland. Unlike his colleague Forster, who had

  only some tens of thousands of Jews, Greiser had several hundred

  thousand. His role in the concentration, the deportations, and even the

  killing operations therefore became crucial.

  In addition to the two Reichsgaue, the incorporated territory contained also two smaller units that were parceled out to neighboring Reich provinces. The province of East Prussia annexed some territory

  in

  this

  process,

  and Silesia

  became Great Silesia.

  However,

  Great

  Silesia was a cumbersome administrative unit. Thus in January 1941

  the Grossgau was divided into two Gaue: Lower Silesia (seat, Breslau),

  which contained only old German territory and was governed by Ober-

  prasident

  and

  Gauleiter

  Karl

  Hanke,

  and

  Upper

  Silesia

  (seat,

  Katowice), which consisted mostly of incorporated territory and which

  was placed under Oberprasident and Gauleiter Fritz Brecht."

  Counterclockwise,

  the

  new

  administrative

  units,

  with

  their

  chief

  executives and the number of Polish Jews under their jurisdiction, were

  therefore as follows:

  Danzig-West Prussia (Forster)

  Expulsions (no ghettos)

  East Prussia (Koch)

  30,000 to 40,000

  Wartheland (Greiser)

  ca. 400,000

  Upper Silesia (Bracht)

  100,000

  East and south of the incorporated territories, the Germans created

 

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