by The Destruction of the European Jews, Vol. 1-3 (Third Edition) Yale University Press (2003) (pdf)
addition, that complete cooperation was to be given to killing units in their efforts to keep
spectators out. Order by 6th Army Quartiermeister, August 10, 1941, NOKW-1654.
Somewhat later, on November 12, 1941, Heydrich forbade his own men to take pictures.
“Official" photographs were tobe sent undeveloped to the RSHAIV-A-I as secret Reich
matter (Geheime Reichssache). Heydrich also requested the Order Police commands to
hunt up photographs that might have been circulating in their areas. Heydrich to Befehlshaber and Kommandeure der ORPO, April 16, 1942, USSR-297Ü).
325
MOBILE KILLING OPERATIONS
dents. But in addition to these considerations, there was an overall
objection that was rooted in the whole psychology of the destruction
process. The killing of the Jews was regarded as historical necessity.
The soldier had to "understand” this. If for any reason he was instructed to help the SS and Police in their task, he was expected to obey orders. However, if he killed a Jew spontaneously, voluntarily, or
without instruction, merely because he wanted to kill, then he committed an abnormal act, worthy perhaps of an “Eastern European”
(such as a Romanian) but dangerous to the discipline and prestige of
the German army. Herein lay the crucial difference between the man
who “overcame” himself to kill and one who wantonly committed
atrocities. The former was regarded as a good soldier and a true Nazi;
the latter was a person without self-control, who would be a danger to
his community after his return home. This philosophy was reflected in
all orders attempting to deal with the problem of “excesses.”
On August 2,1941, the XXX Corps (in the Eleventh Army) distributed an order, down to companies, that read as follows: Participation by soldiers in actions against Jews and Communists.
The fanatical will of members of the Communist Party and of the Jews,
to stem the advance of the German Army at any price, has to be broken
under all circumstances. In the interest of security in the Rear Army Area
it is therefore necessary to take drastic measures [dass scharf durchgegrif-
fen wirdl. This is the task of the Sonderkommandos. Unfortunately, however, military personnel have participated in one such action [in unerfreulicher Weise beteiligt]. Therefore, I order for the future:
Only those soldiers may take part in such actions as have specifically
been ordered to do so. Furthermore, I forbid any member of this unit to
participate as a spectator. Insofar as military personnel are detailed to
these actions [Aktionen], they have to be commanded by an officer. The
officer has to see to it that there are no unpleasant excesses by the troops
[dass jede unerfreuliche Auschreitung seitens der Truppe unterbleibt]."4
An order by the commander of Rear Army Group Area South pointed
out:
The number of transgressions by military personnel against the civilian
population is increasing. ... It has also happened lately that soldiers and 154
154.
Order by XXX Corps/lc, August 2, 1941. NOKW-2963. Oeneraloberst von
Salmuth commanded the XXX Corps. Generaloberst von Schobert commanded the 11th
Army. For similar directives, see also the following: Order by 6th Army/Qu. August 10,
1941. NOKW-1654; Army Group South Ic/AO (signed by von Rundstedt) to armies
belonging to the army group, and to Army Group Read Area Command, September 24,
1941, NOKW-541.
326
THE FIRST SWEEP
even officers independently undertook shootings of Jews, or that they
participated in such shootings.'”
After an explanation that “executive measures” were in the exclusive
province of the SS and Police, the order continued:
The army itself finishes on the spot [erUdigt auf der Sielle] only those
local inhabitants who have committed—or are suspected of having committed—hostile acts, and that is to be done only upon order of an officer.
Moreover, collective measures [Kollektivmassnahmen] may be taken only
if authorized by at least a battalion commander. Any kind of doubt about
this question is inadmissible. Every unauthorized shooting of local inhabitants, including Jews, by individual soldiers, as well as every participation in executive measures of the SS and Police, is disobedience and therefore
to be punished by disciplinary means, or—if necessary—by court martial.
Clearly, the killing operations seriously affected the local inhabitants and the army. Among the population the operations produced a submerged, deep-seated anxiety, and in the army they brought into the
open an uncomfortably large number of soldiers who delighted in death
as spectators or as perpetrators.
The third group to be confronted with major psychological problems was the mobile killing personnel themselves. The leaders of the Einsatzgruppen
and
Einsatzkommandos
were
bureaucrats—men
who
were accustomed to desk work. In the east it was their job to supervise
and report about the operations. This was not mere desk work. We
have already noted that “inspections" took the Einsatzgruppen leaders
and their staffs to the killing sites. In Einsatzgruppe C, everybody had
to watch shootings. A staff member, Karl Hennicke, tells us that he had
no choice about the matter:
I myself attended executions only as a witness, in order not to lay
myself open to charges of cowardice. ... Dr. Rasch [Einsatzgruppe commander] insisted on principle that all officers and noncommissioned officers of the Kommando participate in the executions. It was impossible
to stay away from them, lest one be called to account.1”
The Einsatzgruppe officer had to “overcome” himself. He had to
be in this business completely, not as a reporter but as a participant,
not as a possible future accuser but as one who would have to share the
fate of those who did this work. One of the officers who one day had
been commanded to watch the shootings suffered the most horrible 155 156
155. Order by Commander of Army Group Rear Area South (signed Major Geiss-
ler), September 1, 194], NOKW-2594.
156. Affidavit by Karl Hennicke (SD-Ili officer on the staff of the Einsatzgruppe),
September 4, 1947, NO-4999.
327
MOBILE KILLING OPERATIONS
dreams (Angstträume fürchterlichster Art) during the following night.151
Even the Higher SS and Police Leader Central Russia, Obergruppenführer von dem Bach-Zelewski, was brought into a hospital with serious stomach and intestinal ailments. Following surgery, his recovery was slow, and Himmler dispatched the top physician of the SS, Grawitz, to the bedside of his favorite general. Grawitz reported that
von dem Bach was suffering especially from reliving the shooting of
Jews that he himself had conducted, and other difficult experiences in
the East (er leidet insbesondere an Vorstellungen im Zusammenhang
mit
den
von
ihn
selbst
geleiteten
Judenerschiessungen
und
anderen
schweren Erlebnissen im Osten).1*
The Commanders of the mobile killing units attempted to cope
systematically with the psychological effects of the killing operations.
Even while they directed the shooting, they began to repress as well as
to justify their activities. The repressive mechanism is quite noticeable
in the choice of language for reports of individual killing actions. The
reporters tried to avoid the use of direct expressions such as “to kill” or
“murder." Instead, the commanders employed terms that tended either
to justify the killings or to obscure them altogether. The following is a
representative
list:
hingerichtet: put to death, executed
exekutiert:
executed
ausgemerzt:
exterminated
liquidiert:
liquidated
Liquidierungszahl:
liquidation
number
Liquidierung des Judentums: liquidation of Jewry
erledigt: finished (off)
Aktionen: actions
Sonderaktionen: special actions
Sonderbehandlung: special treatment
sonderbehandelt: specially treated
der
Sonderbehandlung
unterzogen:
subjected
to
special
treatment
Säuberung: cleansing
Großsäuberungsaktionen: major cleaning actions
Ausschaltung: elimination
Aussiedlung: resettlement
Vollzugstätigkeit: execution activity
Exekutivmassnahme: executive measure
entsprechend behandelt: treated appropriately 157 *
157. Report by Oberst Erwin Stolze, October 23, 1941, NOKW-3147.
138. Grawitz to Himmler, March 4, 1942, NO-600. On Bach's life, see Wtadislaw
Bartoszewski, Erich von dem Bach (Warsaw, 1961).
328
THE FIRST SWEEP
der Sondermassnahme zugeführt: conveyed to special measure
sicherheitspolizeiliche Massnahmen: Security Police measures
sicherheitspolizeilich durchgearbeitet: worked over in Security Police
manner
Lösung der Judenfrage: solution of the Jewish question
Bereinigung der Judenfrage: cleaning up of the Jewish question
judenfrei gemacht: (area) made free of Jews
Aside from terminology designed to convey the notion that the
killing operations were only an ordinary bureaucratic process within
the framework of police activity, we find—in logical but not psychological
contradiction—that
the
commanders
of
the
Einsatzgruppen
constructed various justifications for the killings. The significance of
these rationalizations will be readily apparent once we consider that
the Einsatzgruppen did not have to give any reasons to Heydrich; they
had to give reasons only to themselves. Generally speaking, we find in
the reports one overall justification for the killings: the Jewish danger.
This fiction was used again and again, in many variations.
A Kommando of the BdS Generalgouvernement reported that it
had killed 4,500 Jews in Pifisk because a member of the local militia had
been fired on by Jews and another militia man had been found dead.1*
In Bälli the Jews were killed on the ground that they were guilty of
“attacks" on German troops.'" In Starokonstantinov the 1st SS Brigade
shot 439 Jews because the victims had shown an “uncooperative” attitude toward the Wehrmacht.159 160 161 162 163 164 165 In Mogilev the Jews were accused of attempting
to
sabotage
their
own
“resettlement.”IS
In
Novoukrainka
there
were Jewish
“encroachments”
iÜbergriffe).'a
In
Kiev the
Jews
were suspected of having caused the great fire.'" In Minsk about
twenty-five
hundred
Jews
were
shot
because
they
were
spreading
“rumors.”'“ In the area of Einsatzgruppe A, Jewish propaganda was
the justification. “Since this Jewish propaganda activity was especially
heavy in Lithuania," read the report, “the number of persons liq-
159. RSHA IV-A-l, Operational Report USSR No. 58, August 20, 1941, NO-2846.
160. RSHA IV-A-l, Operational Report USSR No. 37 (45 copies), July 29, 1941
NO-2952.
161. RSHA IV-A-i, Operational Report USSR No. 59, August 21, 1941, NO-2847.
162. RSHA IV-A-l, Operational Report USSR No. 124 (48 copies). October 25,
1941, NO-3160.
163. RSHA IV-A-l, Operational Report USSR No. 60 (48 copies), August 22,1941,
NO-2842.
164. RSHA IV-A-l, Operational Report USSR No. 97 (48 copies), September 28,
1941, NO-3145.
165. RSHA IV-A-l. Operational Report USSR No. 92, September 23, 1941, NO-
3143.
329
MOBILE KILLING OPERATIONS
uidated in this area by Einsatzkommando 3 has risen to 75,000.”'“ The
following reason was given for a killing operation in Ananiev: "Since
the Jews of Ananiev had threatened the ethnic German residents with a
bloodbath just as soon as the German Army should withdraw, the
Security Police conducted a roundup and, on August 28, 1941, shot
about 300 Jews and Jewesses.'w On one occasion Einsatzgruppe B
substituted for rumor spreading, propaganda, and threats the vague but
all-inclusive accusation of a “spirit of opposition [Oppositionsgeist]."'*
At least one Einsatzgruppe invoked the danger theory without citing
any Jewish resistance activity at all. When Einsatzgruppe D had killed
all Jews in the Crimea, it enclosed in its summary report a learned
article about the pervasive influence that Jewry had exercised on the
peninsula before the war.1”
An extreme example of an accusatory posture may be found in an
anonymous eyewitness report of a shooting in the area of Mostovoye,
between the Dniester and the Bug rivers. An SS detachment had
moved into a village and arrested all its Jewish inhabitants. The Jews
were lined up along a ditch and told to undress. The SS leader then
declared in the presence of the victims that inasmuch as Jewry had
unleashed the war, those assembled here had to pay for this act with
their lives. Following the speech, the adults were shot and the children
were assaulted with rifle butts. Gasoline was poured over their bodies
and ignited. Children still breathing were thrown into the flames.1,0
Charges of dangerous Jewish attitudes and activities were sometimes supplemented with references to the hazard that Jews presented as carriers of sickness. The Jewish quarters in Nevel and Yanovichi
were doomed because they were full of epidemics.166 167 168 169 170 171 In Vitebsk the
166. RSHA IV-A-I. Operational Report USSR No. 94 (48 copies). September 25,
1941, NO-3146.
167. Ortskommandantur Ananiev/Staff of 836th LandesschOlzen Battalion to
Koriick 553 in Berezovka, September 3, t94l. NOKW-1702.
168. RSHA IV-A-1. Operational Report USSR No. 124 (48 copies), October 25,
1941, NO-3160.
169. OStubaf. Seibert (Einsatzgruppe D) to 11th Army Ic, April 16, 1942, NOKW-
628.
170. Undated and unsigned report from the files of a Jewish rescue organization in
Geneva. Yad Vashem do
cument M-20. The action was described as having taken place
during the fall of 1941. From the context it is not clear whether the unit belonged to
Einsatzgruppe Dor whether it was a newly organized Kommando of ethnic Germans. On
Mostovoye shootings by German police, see text of report by Inspector of Romanian
Gendarmerie in Tbansnistria (Colonel Brojteanu), March 24, 1942, in Carp, Cartea
Neagra. vol. 3, p. 226, and Litani, "Odessa,” Yad Vashem Studies 6 (1967): 146-47.
171. RSHA IV-A-I, Operational Report USSR No. 92, September 23, 1941, NO-
3143.
330
THE FIRST SWEEP
threat of an epidemic (höchste Seuchengefahr) sufficed.172 The following explanation was given for the shootings in Radomyshl. Many Jews from surrounding areas had flocked into the city. This led to an overcrowding of Jewish apartments—on the average, fifteen persons lived in one room. Hygienic conditions had become intolerable. Every day
several corpses of Jews had to be removed from these houses. Supplying food for Jewish adults as well as children had become “impracticable.” Consequently, there was an ever increasing danger of epidemics.
To put an end to these conditions, Sonderkommando 4a finally shot
1,700 Jews.1”
It should be emphasized that psychological justifications were an
essential part of the killing operations. If a proposed action could not
be justified, it did not take place. Needless to say, the supply of reasons
for anti-Jewish measures never ran out. However, just once, explanations did exhaust themselves with respect to the killings of mental patients. Einsatzgruppe A had killed 748 insane people in Lithuania
and northern Russia because these “lunatics” had no guards, nurses, or
food. They were a “danger” to security. But when the army requested
the Einsatzgruppe to “clean out" other institutions that were needed as
billets, the Einsatzgruppe suddenly refused. No interest of the Security
Police required such action. Consequently, the army was told to do the
dirty job itself.174 175 176
Like the leaders of the mobile killing units, the enlisted personnel
had been recruited on a jurisdictional basis. While they had all had
some ideological training, they had not volunteered to shoot Jews.
Most of these men had drifted into the killing units simply because they
were not fit for front-line duty (nicht dienstverpflichtet).m They were
older men, not teen-agers. Many had already assumed the responsibility of caring for a family; they were not irresponsible adolescents.
It is hard to say what happened to these men as a result of the