by The Destruction of the European Jews, Vol. 1-3 (Third Edition) Yale University Press (2003) (pdf)
shootings in order to be certain that they were military in character and
“humane
under
the
circumstances.”1”
Ohlendorf's
adjutant,
Schubert,
describes the reasons for the inspections more deliberately. Schubert
supervised
the
killing
operation
in
Simferopol,
the
capital
of
the
Crimea. He watched the loading on trucks to make sure that the non-
Jewish population was not disturbed. Furthermore, he kept an eye on
the guards to prevent them from beating the victims. He worried about
unauthorized traffic at the killing site and ordered that all outsiders be
detoured. During the collection of valuables, he saw to it that the Order
Police and Waffen-SS did not pocket anything. Finally, he convinced
himself that the victims were shot humanely, “since, in the event of
other killing methods, the psychic burden [seelische Belastung] would
have
been
too
great
for
the
execution
Kommando.”1“
A
former
sergeant tells us of one more reason—an important one—for the inspections. When Ohlendorf arrived at the killing site of Sonderkommando
10b one time, he complained to the commander, Persterer,
about the manner of burial. Ohlendorf ordered that the victims be
covered
a
little
better
(dass
diese
Leute
besser
zugeschaufelt
wer-
den).'a
In spite of the precautions taken by Einsatzgruppen commanders,
the emergence of repercussions was inevitable. The inhabitants at first
seemed to be unworried and carefree. Commanders reported that the
population “understood” the shootings and judged them “positively.”1“
In one town, Khemelnik, the inhabitants were reported to have gone to 133 134 * 136
133. Affidavit by Ohlendorf, April 2, 1947, NO-2836.
134. Affidavit by Heinz Hermann Schubert, February 24, 1947, NO-30S3.
133. Affidavit by Josef Guggenberger (Hauptscharfuhrer. Sonderkommando 10b),
September 9.1947, NO-4959.
136.
RSHA IV-A-1, Operational Report USSR No. 81 (48 copies), September 12,
1941, NO-3154.
320
THE FIRST SWEEP
church in order to thank God for their “deliverance” from Jewry.'"
However, the idyllic picture of a population completely at ease and
even thankful for the elimination of the Jews soon began to fade away.
In February 1942, Heydrich reported to the defense commissars in
the army districts that the shootings were now being carried out in such
a manner that the population hardly noticed them. The inhabitants, and
even the surviving Jews, had frequently been left with the impression
that the victims had only been resettled.1® The Security Police thought
it wise to hide the killings, for it could no longer trust a population that
was itself chafing under the increasing harshness of German rule and
that was already fearful for its own security and safety.
A German eyewitness (in Borisov, White Russia) who knew Russian spoke to a number of local residents before the mass shooting of the Jews was to start in the town. His Russian landlord told him: “Let
them perish, they did us a lot of harm!” But on the following morning
the German heard comments like these: “Who ordered such a thing?
How is it possible to kill 6,500 Jews all at once? Now it is the turn of the
Jews; when will it be ours? What have these poor Jews done? All they
did was work! The really guilty ones are surely in safety!”1* During the
following year, the Germans observed a wave of mysticism, including
dream
interpretations,
premonitions,
and
prophecies
in
Borisov.
People were now saying: “The Jews were killed for their sins, as was
prophesied them in the holy books. In the Holy Bible one must also be
able to find out what kind of fate is awaiting us.”'*1
The following report was sent by an army officer stationed in the
Crimea to the Economy-Armament Office (OKW/Wi Rii) in Berlin:
In the present situation of unrest the most nonsensical rumors—the
bulk of which are started by partisans and agents—find willing ears. Thus,
a few days ago, a rumor circulated that the Germans were intending to do
away [beseitigen] with all the men and women over fifty. The Ortskom-
mandantur (in Simferopol] and other German offices were mobbed with
questions about the veracity of the report. In view of the fact that the total
“resettlement” of the Jewish population and the liquidation of an insane 137 138 139 140
137. RSHA IV-A-1, Operational Report USSR No. 86 (48 copies), September 17,
1941, NO-3151.
138. RSHA IV-A-I (signed Heydrich) to Einsatzgruppen, Higher SS and Police
Leaders, and defense commissars in Army Districts II, VIII, XVII, XX, and XXI.
February 27, 1942, enclosing Activity Report No. 9 of the Einsatzgruppen, covering
January 1942, PS-3876.
139. Rom a report by Hauptfeldwebel Sönnecken, received by Generalmajor
Lahousen, October 24, 1941, PS-3047.
140. Propaganda Abteilung W to OKW/WPr le, August 4, 1942, OKW-733.
MOBILE KILLING OPERATIONS
asylum with about 600 inmates cannot be hidden forever, such rumors are
bound to gain in credibility among the inhabitants.14'
Gradually then, the local non-Jewish witnesses of the destruction process perceived the true nature of the German racial ladder. The lowest rung was already afire, and they were but one step above it.
The killing operations had repercussions not only for the population but also for the military. One of these consequences was an undercurrent of
criticism
in
the
army’s
ranks.
On
October
10,
1941,
Feldmarschall Reichenau, commander of the Sixth Army, sent an order
to the troops in which he exhorted them to be a little harsher in their
treatment of partisans. He explained that this was not an ordinary war
and recited all the dangers of the Jewish-Bolshevist system to German
culture. “Therefore," he continued, “the soldier must have full understanding of the necessity for harsh but just countermeasures [Suftne]
against Jewish subhumanity." These measures, Reichenau pointed out,
had the added purpose of frustrating revolts behind the back of the
fighting troops, for it had been proved again and again that the uprisings were always being instigated by Jews.1” Hitler read this order and found that it was “excellent.”141 142 143 144 145 146 Feldmarschall von Rundstedt, commander of the Southern Army Group, sent copies to the Eleventh and Seventeenth Armies, as well as to the First Panzer Army, for distribution.144 Von Manstein, the Eleventh Army commander, elaborated on the order, explaining that the Jew was the liaison man (Mitlelsmann)
between the Red Army on the front a
nd the enemy in the rear.145
A second problem, more serious than lack of “understanding” of
the killings, was soon discovered with dismay by unit commanders.
Among the troops the shootings had become a sensation. Many years
after having become a witness to such an event, a former soldier recalled: “Although we were forbidden to go there, it drew us magically."1“ They watched, took pictures, wrote letters, and talked. With rapidity, the news spread in the occupied territories, and gradually it
seeped into Germany.
To the army this was an embarrassing business. In Kiev a group of
141. llth Army/iV Wi (Oberstleutnant Oswald) via Wirtschaftsstab Ost to OKW/
Wi RU, March 31, 1942, Wi/ID 2.512.
142. Order by Feldmarschall Reichenau, October 10, 1941, D-41t.
143. Order by Oeneralquartiermeister Wagner, October 28, 1941, D-411.
144. Rundstedt to llth Army, 17th Army, and 1st Panzer Army, and to commander
of Rear Army Group South, October 17, 1941, NOKW-309.
145. Order by von Manstein, November 20, 1941, PS-4064.
146. Tape-recorded statement by a businessman, in Walter Kempowski, Haben Sie
davon gewusst? (Hamburg, 1979), pp. 72-73. At the time, the witness was nineteen.
322
THE FIRST SWEEP
foreign journalists who had been invited to view the “Bolshevist destruction" of the city quickly looked up the representative of the civil administration with Army Group Center, Hauptmann Koch, and ques-tiond him about the shootings. When Koch denied everything, the
journalists told him that they had pretty exact information about these
matters anyway.“’The members of a Swiss army medical mission with
the German forces were similarly informed. One of the Swiss officers,
Dr. Rudolf Bucher, not only reported his experiences to his superiors
but gave numerous lectures about what he had heard and seen to
military and professional audiences in Switzerland.1*’
The
German
army
attempted
to
take
various
countermeasures.
Initially, several officers blamed the Einsatzgruppen for performing the
shootings where everybody could see them. One such protest was sent
by the deputy commander of Army District IX in Kassel (Schniewindt)
to Generaloberst Fromm, the chief of the Replacement Army. In his
protest the army district official dealt with the rumors about the “mass
executions” in Russia. Schniewindt pointed out that he had considered
these rumors to be vast exaggerations (weit übertrieben) until he received a report from a subordinate, Major Rosier, who had been an eyewitness.
Rosier commanded the 528th Infantry Regiment in Zhitomir. One
day while he was sitting in his headquarters and minding his own
business, he suddenly heard rifle volleys followed by pistol shots. Accompanied by two officers, he decided to find out what was happening (dieser Erscheinung nachzugehen). The three were not alone. From all
directions, soldiers and civilians were running toward a railroad embankment. Rosier, too, climbed the embankment. What he saw there was “so brutally base that those who approached unprepared were
shaken and nauseated [ein Bild dessen grausame Abscheulichkeit auf
den
unvorbereitet
Herantretenden
erschütternd
und
abschreckend
wirkte].”
He was standing over a ditch with a mountain of earth on one side,
and the wall of the ditch was splattered with blood. Policemen were
standing around with bloodstained uniforms, soldiers were congregating in groups (some of them in bathing shorts), and civilians were watching with wives and children. Rosier stepped closer and peeked
into the grave. Among the corpses he saw an old man with a white
beard and a cane on his arm. Since the man was still breathing. Rosier
approached a policeman and asked him to kill the man “for good” 147 148
147. Report by Oberst Erwin Stolze (deputy to Lahousen), October 23, 1941.
NOKW-3147. The author of the report is identified in the Lahousen affidavit of March 17,
1948, NOKW-3230. For Koch’s position, see his report of October 5, 1941, PS-53.
148. Alfred Häsler, The Lifeboat Is Full (New York, 1969), pp. 76-80.
323
MOBILE KILLING OPERATIONS
(endgültig zu töten). The policeman replied in the manner of someone
who does not need advice: “This one has already got something seven
times into his----------he is going to perish by himself [ Dem habe ich schon
7 mal was in den--------- gejagt, der krepiert schon von alleine].” In conclusion, Rösler stated that he had already seen quite a few unpleasant things in his life but that mass slaughter in public, as if on an open-air
stage, was something else again. It was against German customs, upbringing, and so on.1* Not once in his account did Rosier mention Jews.
Complaints in the held were not lacking either. A local battalion
commander at Genicke protested (complete with sketch map) that a
killing operation had been carried out near the city limit, that troops
and civilians alike had become involuntary witnesses of the shooting,
and that they had also heard the “whining” of the doomed. The SS
officer in charge replied that he had done the job with only three men,
that the nearest house was 500 to 800 yards from the spot, that military
personnel had insisted on watching the operation, and that he could not
have chased them away.'"
As late as May 8, 1942, the military government officers of Rear
Army Group Area South met in conference and resolved to persuade
the killing units in a nice way (im Wege guten Einvernehmens) to conduct their shootings, “whenever possible,” not during the day but at night, except of course for those “executions” that were necessary to
“frighten”
the
population
(die
aus
Abschreckungsgründen
notwendig
sind).“'
However, in spite of the occasional attempts to regulate the location or even the time of the shootings, the army soon realized that it could not remove the killing sites from the reach of “involuntary” (let
alone “voluntary”) witnesses. The only other way to stop the entertainment (and the flow of rumors resulting from it) was to conduct an educational campaign among the soldiers. The army then tried this
method also.
Even during the first weeks of the war, soldiers of the Eleventh 149 150 151
149. Deputy Commander of Wehrkreis IX (signed Schniewindt) to Chief of Replacement Army (Fromm). January 17, 1942, enclosing Rösler report, dated January 3, 1942, USSR-293(1).
150. See the following correspondence in document NOKW-3453: 11th Army Ic/
AO (Abwehr II) to Einsatzgruppe D. copy to 22d Infantry Division Ic, October 6. 1941;
Sonderkommando lOa/Feilkommando (signed UStuf. Spiekermann) to Sonderkom-
mando 10a, October 8, 1941; Sonderkommando 10a to Einsatzgruppe D, copy to Stubaf.
Gmeiner (liaison officer of the Einsatzgruppe with the army), October 8, 1941; 3d
Battalion of 65th Regiment Ic (in 22d Division) to regiment, October 12, 1941.
151. Summary of military government conference in Kremenchug (Oberkriegsverwaltungsrat Freiherr von Wrangel presiding). May 8,1942, NOKW-3097.
324
THE FIRST SWEEP
Army watched Romanian shootings at Bälji.li!
Since the killers were
Romanians, the chief of staff of the Eleventh Army, Wohler, allowed
himself the use of some blunt language. Without making direct references to the incident, he wrote:
In view of a special case, the following has to be pointed out explicitly.
Because of the eastern European conception of human life, German
soldiers may become witnesses of events (such as mass executions, the
murder of civilians, Jews, and others) which they cannot prevent at this
time but which violate German feelings of honor most deeply.
To every normal person it is a matter of course that he does not take
photographs of such disgusting excesses or report about them when he
writes home. The distribution of photographs and the spreading of reports
about such events will be regarded as a subversion of decency and discipline in the army and will be punished strictly. All pictures, negatives, and reports of such excesses are to be collected and are to be sent with a
notation listing the name of the owner to the Ic/AO of the army.
lb gaze at such procedures curiously [ein neugieriges Begaffen solcher Vorgänge] is beneath the dignity of the German soldier.'55
Sensationalism and rumor spreading did not exhaust the army’s
troubles. The operations of the mobile killing units had created another
problem, even more far reaching and disturbing in its implications. It
happened that Jews were killed by military personnel who acted without orders or directives. Sometimes soldiers offered their help to the killing parties and joined in the shooting of the victims. Occasionally,
troops participated in pogroms, and once in a while members of the
German army staged killing operations of their own. We have pointed
out that the army had helped the mobile killing units a great deal. Why,
then, was the military leadership concerned with these individual actions?
The army had several administrative reasons for anxiety. As a
matter of status, the idea that soldiers were doing police work was not
very appealing. Pogroms were the nightmare of military government
experts, and unorganized killings on the roads and in occupied towns
were dangerous, if only because of the possibility of mistakes or acci- 152 153
152. Ttstimony by General Wohler. Case No. 12, tr. pp. 5790, 5811-12,5838-39.
153. Order by Wöhler, July 22,1941, NOKW-2523. An order by the Quartiermeister
of the 6th Army similarly directed the confiscation of photographs and specified, in