Raul Hilberg
Page 37
Under the decree of November 28, the authority of the regional
offices over the Judenräte was unlimited. The members of a Judenrat
were held personally responsible for the execution of all instructions.
In fact, the Jewish leaders were so fearful and tremulous in the presence of their German overlords that the Nazi officers merely had to signal their desire. As Frank pointed out in a moment of satisfaction
and complacency: “The Jews step forward and receive orders [die 93 94 95
93. Dr. Dietrich Redecker, “Deutsche Ordnung kehrt im Ghetto ein," Krakauer
Zeilung, March 13, 1940.
94. Emanuel Ringelblum, Notitsn fun Varshever Ghetto (Warsaw, 1952), p. 291, as
quoted in English translation by Philip Friedman (ed.), Martyrs and Fighters, pp. 81-82.
Ringelblum. a historian, was killed by the Germans. His notes were found after the war.
95. Solomon Bloom, “Dictator of the Lodz Ghetto,” Commentary, February 1949,
pp. 113, 115. Leonard Tushnet, The Pavement of Hell (New York, 1972), pp. 1-70.
218
POLAND
T A B L E 6-10
GERMAN CONTROLS OVER JEWISH COUNCILS
Incorporated Territories
Generalgouvernement
Reichsstatthalter
(or Oberpräsident)
Generalgouvemeur
I
|
1
Regierungspräsident
Gouverneur
1
1 1
1 1
(city) (rural)
(city) (rural)
Bürgermeister Landrat
Stadthauptmann Kreishauptmann
I I
I I
1 1
1 1
Judenrat Judenräte
Judenrat Judenräte
Juden treten an und empfangen Befehle].”*“ But this arrangement did
not remain unchallenged.
On May 30, 1940, at a meeting in Kraköw, the SS and Police made
a bid for power over the Judenräte. Opening the attack, the commander
of
the
Security
Police
and
Security
Service
units in
the
Generalgouvernement,
Brigadeführer
Streckenbach,
informed
his
civilian colleagues that the Security Police were “very interested” in the
Jewish question. That was why, he said, the Jewish councils had been
created. Now, he had to admit that local authorities, by close supervision of the councils' activities, had gained something of an insight into Jewish methods. But, as a result of this arrangement, the Security
Police had been partly edged out, while all sorts of agencies had
stepped into the picture. For example, in the matter of labor procurement everyone was planlessly approaching the Judenräte.
This problem required a clear “solution.” First, it would have to be
“decided" who was in charge of the Judenräte: the Kreishauptmann,
the Gouverneur, the Stadthauptmann, or possibly even the Sicherheitspolizei
(the Security Police). If Streckenbach recommended his Security Police, he did so for “functional reasons.” Sooner or later, he said, all questions pertaining to Jewish matters would have to be referred to the Security Police, especially if the contemplated action required
“executive
enforcement”
(Exekutiveingriff).
Experience
had
shown, furthermore, that only the Security Police had a long-range 96
96. Verbatim minutes of interview of Frank by correspondent Kleiss of Völkischer
Beobachter, February 6,1940, Frank diary, PS-2233.
219
CONCENTRATION
view of conditions affecting Jewry. All this did not mean in the least
that the Security Police desired to skim off the cream, so to speak. The
Security Police were not interested in Jewish property; they were receiving all their money from Germany and did not desire to enrich themselves.
Streckenbach
would
therefore
propose
that
the
Jewish
councils "and thereby Jewry as a whole" be placed under the supervision of the Security Police and that all demands upon Jewry be handled by the Security Police. If the Jewish communities were to be further
exploited as much as they already had been, then one day the Generalgouvernement would have to support millions of Jews. After all, the Jews were very poor; there were no rich Jews in the Generalgouvernement,
only
a
"Jew
proletariat."
He
would
therefore
welcome
the
transfer of power to the Security Police. To be sure, the Security Police
were by no means eager to shoulder this additional burden, but experience had shown that the present arrangement was not "functional.”
At
the
conclusion
of
the
speech,
Frank
remained
silent.
The
Gouverneur of Lublin, Zömer, gave an account of conditions in his
district. Since Frank had not spoken, the Gouverneur ventured to suggest that the Security Police could not handle the Judenräte because of insufficient numerical strength. After Zomer had finished, the Gouverneur of Kraköw, Wächter, made a speech in which he alluded to Streckenbach’s remarks by pointing out that in Jewish matters the civil
administration could not get along without the Security Police and that,
conversely, the Security Police could not act without the civil apparatus.
Cautiously
Wächter
suggested
that
perhaps
the
two
bodies
could cooperate. Finally, Frank spoke up. In terse legal language he
rejected Streckenbach’s suggestions. “The police,”
he said, "are the
armed force of the Reich government for the maintenance of order in
the interior. ... The police have no purpose in themselves.”*
The opening move by the police had failed. Yet the challenge had
been made, and for the next few years the struggle over the Jews was
to
continue
unabated. Ultimately
the police emerged victorious, but
their prize was a heap of corpses.
The
three
preliminary
steps—marking,
movement
restrictions,
and
the establishment of Jewish control machinery—were taken in the very
first few months of civil rule. But then a full year passed before the
actual formation of the ghettos began in earnest. Ghetto formation, that
is to say, the creation of closed Jewish districts, was a decentralized
process. The initiative in each city and town was taken by the competent Kreishauptmann or Stadthauptmann and, in the case of major ghettos only, by a Gouverneur or by Frank himself. 97
97.
Summary of police meeting with verbatim remarks by Frank. May 30, 1940,
Frank diary. PS-2233.
220
POLAND
Military headquarters (the Oberfeldkommandantur, or OFK) in the
Warsaw
district
complained
that,
because
e
ach
Kreishauptmann
had
been allowed to decide the manner of gathering up his Jews (die Art der
Durchführung der Judenzusammenlegung in seinem Kreis), the migration, rather than presenting a uniform picture, created an impression of constant movements this way and that* In cities, uniform planning
was completely out of the question, if only because of complex population distributions,
intertwined
economic
activities, and intricate traffic
problems.
The earliest ghettos appeared in the incorporated territories during
the winter of 1939-40, and the first major ghetto was established in the
city of L6di in April 1940." During the following spring the ghetto-
formation
process
spread
slowly
to
the
Generalgouvernement.
The
Warsaw ghetto was created in October 1940;'“ the smaller ghettos in
the Warsaw district were formed in the beginning of 1941."“ For the
Jews remaining in the city of Krakdw, a ghetto was established in
March 1941.The Lublin ghetto was formed in April 1941.98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 The
double
ghetto
of
Radom,
shaped
into
two
separate
districts
was
finished that same month.10* The ghettos of Czestochowa10' and Kielce106 107 108 109
in the Radom district also came into existence at that time. In August
1941 the Generalgouvernement acquired its fifth district, Galicia, an
area that the German army had wrested from Soviet occupation. The
Galician capital, Lwdw (Lemberg), became the site of Poland’s third-
largest ghetto in December 1941 ,w The ghetto-formation process in the
Generalgouvernement was, on the whole, completed by the end of that
year.1* Only a few ghettos remained to be set up in 1942.118
Although the creation of the closed districts did not proceed from
98. OFK 393 to Wehrmachtbefehlshaber im Generalgouvernement, November 18,
1941, Polen 75022/17. Original folder once in Federal Records Center, Alexandria, Virginia.
99. Philip Friedman, “The Jewish Ghettos in the Nazi Era," Jewish Social Studies,
16 (1954), 80. On LOdi see documents in Dokumenry i maieriaty, vol. 3, pp. 35-49.
100. Krakauer Zeitung, October 16. 1940. Generalgouvernement page.
101. Generalgouvernement conference, January 15, 1941, Frank diary, PS-2233.
102. Krakauer Zeitung, March 23, 1941, p. 18.
103. Proclamation by Gouverneur Zdmer of Lublin, March 24, 1941, ibid., March
30, 1941, p. 8.
104. Ibid., April 6, 1941, p. 5.
105. Undated draft of order by Stadt hauptmann Dr. Wendler of Czestochowa, Yad
Vashem microfilm JM 1489.
106. Krakauer Zeitung, April 8, 1941, p. 6.
107. Ibid., November 15, 1941, p. 5.
108. Armament Inspectorate. Generalgouvernement to OKW/Wi RU/Rli III A, report covering July 1, 1940, to December 31, 1941, dated May 7, 1942, pp. 102-3, Wi/ID
1.2.
109. Friedman, “Jewish Ghettos," Jewish Social Studies 16 (1954): 83.
221
CONCENTRATION
any order or basic plan, the procedure was remarkably similar in all
cities. This should hardly be surprising, for the problems of ghetto
formation were largely the same everywhere. Let us look at the first
major ghetto-forming operation, which was the prototype of all subsequent operations: the establishment of the L6di ghetto.
On
December
10,
1939,
the
Regierungspräsident
in
Kalisz,
Uebelhoer, appointed a “working staff” to make preparations for the
formation of the ghetto. Uebelhoer himself took over the chairmanship. He appointed his representative in Lödi, Oberregierungsrat Dr.
Moser, as deputy. The working staff also included members of the
party, the offices of the city, the Order Police, the Security Police, the
Death Head Formation of the SS, the L6di Chamber of Industry and
Commerce, and the Financial Office in Lödi. The preparations were to
be made in secret; the moving was to be sudden and precise (schlagartig). As we shall see, this secrecy was needed in order to assure the hurried abandonment of a lot of Jewish property, which could then be
conveniently confiscated.
Uebelhoer did not look upon the ghetto as a permanent institution.
“The creation of the ghetto,” he said in his order, “is, of course, only a
transition measure. I shall determine at what time and with what means
the ghetto—and thereby also the city of Lödi—will be cleansed of
Jews. In the end, at any rate, we must burn out this bubonic plague
[Endziel muss jedenfalls sein, dass wir diese Pestbeule restlos ausbren-
nen].'"'°
The working staff selected a slum quarter, the Bahity area, as the
ghetto site. The district already contained 62,000 Jews, but more than
100,000 Jews who lived in other parts of the city and its suburbs had to
be moved in.1" On February 8, 1940, the Polizeipräsident of Lödi,
Brigadeführer Schäfer, issued his sudden and precise orders. Poles and
ethnic Germans had to leave the ghetto site by February 29.'" The Jews
had to move into the ghetto in batches. Every few days the Polizeipräsident published a moving schedule affecting a certain quarter of the city. All Jews living in that quarter had to move into the ghetto within
the time allotted. The first batch had to vacate its apartments between 110 111 112
110. Uebelhoer to Greiser, thirty District Lödi, Representative of the Regierungspräsident in Lödi (Moser), City Administration of Lödi, Polizeipräsident of Lödi, Order Police in Lödi, Security Police in Lödi, Lödi Chamber of Industry and
Commerce, and Finance Office in Lödi, December 10,1939, Dokumenty i materiafy, vol.
3, pp. 26-31.
111. Statistical report on the Lödi ghetto, apparently prepared by the Jewish Council for the German administration and covering the period May I, 1940 to June 30, 1942, Lödi Ghetto Collection No. 58.
112. Order by Schäfer, February 8, 1940, Dokumtntary i mareriaty, vol. 3, pp. 35-
37.
222
POLAND
February 12 and February 17,"’ the last moved in on April 30. Ten days
later, on May 10, Polizeipräsident Schafer issued the order that closed
off the ghetto population from the rest of the world. “Jews,” he ordered, “must not leave the ghetto, as a matter of principle. This prohibition applies also to the Eldest of the Jews [Rumkowski] and to the chiefs of the Jewish police. . . . Germans and Poles,” he continued,
“must not enter the ghetto as a matter of principle.” Entry permits
could be issued only by the Polizeipräsident. Even within the ghetto,
Jews were not allowed freedom of movement; from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m.
they were not permitted to be on the streets."4
After the movements had been completed, the Germans threw a
fence around the ghetto. The fence was manned by a detachment of the
Order Police."’ The more intriguing job of secret police work was
entrusted to the Security Police. This organization consisted of two
branches:
State
Police
(Gestapo)
; and
Criminal
Police
(Kripo).
The
State Police, as its title implies, concerned itself with enemies of the
state. Since the Jews were enemies par excellence, the State Police
established an office within the ghetto. The Criminal Police was competent in the handling of common crimes. A Criminal Police detachment of twenty men was consequently attached to the Order Police that
guarded the ghetto. The function of the detachment was to prevent
smuggling, but the arrangement irked the Criminal Police. Like their
colleagues of the Gestapo, the Criminal Police men wanted to be inside
the
ghetto.
Accordingly,
Kriminalinspektor
Bracken
drafted
a
memorandum in which he set forth the reason for the urgent necessity
of moving his detachment across the fence. “In the ghetto,” he said,
“live, at any rate, about 250,000 Jews, all of whom have more or less
criminal
tendencies."
Hence
the
necessity
for
“constant
supervision”
by officials of the Criminal Police."6 The detachment moved in.
As Regierungspräsident Uebelhoer had predicted, the ghetto was a
transitional measure, but the transition did not lead to emigration. It
led to annihilation. The inmates of the Lödi ghetto either died there or
were deported to a killing center. The liquidation of the ghetto took a
very long time. When it was finally broken up in August 1944, it had
existed for four years and four months. This record was unequaled by
any ghetto in Nazi Europe. 113 114 * 116
113. Police order, February 8, 1940, ibid, pp. 38-49.
114. Order by Schäfer, May 10. 1940, ibid., 83-84.
113. The units guarding the ghetto belonged to the Schutzpolizei. For instructions
to the Schutzpolizei detachments to “shoot on sight," see order by commander of LAit
Schutzpolizei, Oberst der Polizei Keuck. April II, 1941, ibid., 86-87.
116.
Memorandum by Kriminalinspektor Bracken, May 19, 1940, ibid., pp. 92-94.
See also memorandum by the chief of the Criminal Police in tôdi, Kriminaldirektor
Zirpins, October 23, 1940. ibid., pp. 100-101.
223
CONCENTRATION
Across the border from the incorporated territories, in the General-
gouvemement,
three
specific
arguments
were
made
for
the
formation of ghettos. One was put forth by German physicians, who were
convinced