(NO-3143) No. 124, dated October 25, 1941, had repeatedly shown hostile conduct and disobedience to "the German authorities". Thus, the current kommando went into Ostrowo and shot 169 Jews. (NO.3160) Report No. 124, dated October 25, 1941, "very reluctantly". Thus, 996 Jews end Jewesses were given "special treatment." (NO-3160) Report No. 108, dated October 9, 1941, advises that for the death of 21 German soldiers near Topola, 2,100 Jews and Gypsies were to be executed, thus a ratio of 100 to one.
There is no pretense in the report that any of the 2,100 slain were in the slightest way connected with the shooting of Germans. (NO-3156) An item in Operation Report No. 108, October 9, 1941, points out that "19 Jews who were under suspicion of having either been communists or of having committed arson" were executed.
(NO-3156) In Mogilew, the Jewish women were "extremely resistive" and not wearing the prescribed badge, so 28 of them were liquidated.
(NO-3156) Report No. 73, dated September 4, 1941, acquaints the world with the fact that 733 civilians were exterminated in Minsk, the reason being that they "were absolutely inferior elements with a predominant mixture of Asiatic blood."
The method of determining the inferiority of character and the predominance of Asiatic blood is not indicated. (NO-2844) Jews. Sometimes apparently the liquidation took place for the benefit of the Jews themselves. Thus, Einsatzgruppe B reported in December 1941:
"In Gorodok, the Ghetto had to be evacu 394 Jews were shot."
(NO-2833) declared:
"A supply of food for the Jews as well creasing danger of epidemics."
(NO-3149) The situation was met bravely and chivalrously:
"To putaan end to these conditions Ukrainian militia.
Thereby, the Son of 11,328 Jews till 6 September 1941."
(NO-3149) Operational Report No. 92, dated September 23, 1941, related how scabies had broken out in the ghetto of Newel.
"In order to prevent further contagion, 640 Jews were liquidated and the houses burnt down." This treatment undoubtedly overcame the scabies. (NO-3143) a contagious disease, accompanied by fever, broke out. It was feared that the disease might spread to the city and the rural population. To prevent this from happening, 1,025 Jews were shot. The report closes proudly with the statement: "This operation was carried out solely by a commander end 12 men." (NO-3143) capabilities of their rifles, they turned to the field of preventive medicine. In October of 1941, the kommando leader in Witebsk came to the conclusion that there was an "imminent danger of epidemics" in the town, and to forestall that this should come to pass, he shot 3,000 Jews. (NO-3160) Mention had been made of the execution of the insane.
The reports are dotted with references to the liquidation of inmates of mental institutions. It seems that the kommandos, in addition to the executions carried out under their own orders, were ready to perform other killings on request. Einsatzgruppe C reports that a teilkommando of Sonderkommando, 4a, passing through Tschernigow, was asked by the director of the mental asylum to liquidate 270 incurable.
The teilkommando obliged. (NO-2832) located there maintained a farm for the inmates. Since there was not enough full cream milk in the town to supply the three large German military hospitals there, the milk shortage was met by executing a part of the insane. The report on the subject explains:
"A way out of this difficulty was found removed to a better asylum in Charkow."
(NO-2832) It was also stated:
"The underwear, clothing and other mainly to the hospitals."
(NO-2827) comes to light in an item taken from a report made by the Russian Government (USSR-41) which reads:
"On 22 August 1941, mental patients small town of Aglon.
Among them were of the hospital from a Children's home."
(USSR-41) Report No. 47, dated August 9, 1941, after generally discussing conditions in the Ukraine, stated of the operations of Einsatzgruppe C: "Last but not least, systematic reprisals against marauders and Jews were carried out."
Under their meticulous taskmasters, the Jews were bound to be wrong no matter what they did. If they were their badges they could expect maltreatment, since they were recognized as Jews; if they left them off, they were punished for not wearing them. If they remained in the wretched and overcrowded ghettos they suffered from hunger, if they left in order to obtain food they were "marauding".
Operation Report No. 132, describing the activities of Einsatzkommando 5, declared that, between October 13 and October 19, 1941, it had among others executed 21 people guilty of sabotage and looting, and 1,847 Jews. It also reported the shooting of 300 insane Jews, which achievement, according to the report, "represented a particularly heavy burden for the members of Einsatzkommando 5 who were in charge of this operation". (NO-2830) Operation Report No. 194, detailing the activities of Einsatzkommando 8, states that, from March 6 to March 30, 1942, this kommando executed:
"20 Russians for subversive Communist 1,551 Jews."
November 8, 1941 killed, as Report No. 143 succinctly states:
"15 political officials, 10,650 Jews."
Report No. 150, dated January 2, 1942, speaking of actions in the Western Crimea, stated:
"From 16 November thru 15 December 1941, 17,645 Jews, 2,504; Krimtschaks, 824 have been shot."
The report also states, as if talking of Cleaning out swamps:
"Simferopol, Jewpatoria, Aluschta, Kar been cleaned of Jews."
the executions and, consequently, many Jews escaped. This irritated the report-writer considerably. He stated:
"Naturally,the systematic action of Jews in Uman.
In particular, a large and escaped from the city.
Besides were found and liquidated.
The re after its arrival."
(No-3404) It rill be noted that the word "excesses" is here used in its opposite sense, that is deficiency.
Not as many persons were killed as should have been.
It also objected that people talked about these executions:
"Rumors about executions in other areas ficult.
Reports about actions against unguarded talks of German soldiers."
(NO-2834) unsuccessful because this particular report sums up with: "Altogether, 75,881 persons have been executed."
A report from the northern Crimea reads:
"Between i and 15 February, 1,451 persons looters, saboteurs, associals.
Total up to now is 86,632."
(NO-3339) October 1 to October 15, 1941, stated in Report No. 117:
"The districts occupied by the kom bringing the total up to 40,699."
(NO-3406) Coming back to Simferopol, in Report No. 153, dated January 9, 1942, we find:
"The operational areas of the teilkommandos, were shot.
Sun total: 79,276. In Simfero and Gypsy question was solved". (NO-3258).An entry from Operational Situation Report Nr. 3, on the period August 15 to August 3, 1941, states.
"During a scruting of the civilian prison elements". (NO-2653). the above will suffice to indicate their tenor and scope and the attitude of those who participated in the events described therein.
How did the action groups operate? As kommando leaders entered a town they immediately assembled what they called a Jewish Council of Elders made up of from 10 to 25 Jews, according to the size of the town. These Jews, usually the more prominent ones, and always including a Rabbi, were instructed to register the Jewish population of the community for the purpose of resettlement. The registration completed, the Jews were ordered to appear at a given place, or vehicles went to their homes to collect them. Then they were transported into the woods and shot. The last step of the kommando in closing the books in the whole transaction was to call on the Council of Elders, express appreciation for their cooperation, invite then to mount the truck standing outside, drive them out to the same spot in the woods, and shoot them, too. One report illustrates the procedure described:
"The Jew a of the city were ordered to present in a camp.
About 54,000 reported, including women and children.
After they had been made were killed; this took several days". (NOKW-2129) for his resourcefulness and skill in rounding up the intelligentsia of Winnica:
Caurt 2 case 9 "He called for the most prominent certain registration work.
When appear with these the following day."
(NO-2947) And then the report ends triumphantly on the note:
"This method was repeated for a third and liquidated."
In Kiev a clever stratagem was employed to ensnare the Jews. The word "clever" is taken from the report covering the action:
"The difficulties resulting from such a large move.
Although only a participation of expected at first, more than.
30,000 Jews arrived an extremely clever organization."
edged with a black border of misery and desolation. In every paragraph one feels the steel and flinty pen with which the report-writer cuts through the orange described therein. Report No. 94 tells of Jews who, driven from their homes, were compelled to seek primitive existence in caves and abandoned huts. The rigors of the elements, lack of food and adequate clothing inevitably produced serious illnesses. The report-writer chronicles:
"The danger of epidemics has thus increased became necessary."
and then, he adds:
"The insolence of the Jews has not yet diminished even now."
evictors still complained: The Jews were not even courteous to their executioners! tory. In this connection the prosecution introduced an interesting letter from one Jacob, Laster of Field Police to his Commanding General. The letter, dated June 21, 1942, is very chatty and companiable, the writer sends birthday greetings to the addresses, talks about his horses, his girl-friend, and then casually about Jews:
"I don't know if you, General, have also seen in Poland such horrible figures of Jews.
I thank the left.
The little Jews (Juedlein) living in the districts (Rayons) also belong to our customers.
and then.... the waves close and the world is at peace."
for the sake of his country.
"I thank you for your reprimand. You are right.
selves. Even if it means a longer separation from our family.
Now is the time to clean up with the we don't sleep here.
Every week 3-4 actions, one other rabble.
It is very nice that we hove now a SD unit (SD Aussenkommando) with which I can work excellently."
sorry for himself that he is far away from home and thinks of his children: "One could weep sometimes. It is not good to be such a friend of children as I was." However, this does not prevent him from taking up lodging in a former Children's Asylum.
"I have a cozy apartment in a farmer children's asylum.
One bedroom and a livingroom with all the accessories."
fantastical for normal mental comprehension. As suggested before, the mention of one million deaths produces no shock at all commensurate with its enormity because to the average brain one million is more a symbol than a quantitative measure. However, if one reads through the reports of the Einsatzgruppen and observes the small numbers getting larger, climbing into ten thousand, tens of thousands, a hundred thousand and beyond, then one can at last believe that this actually happened - the cold-blooded, premeditated killing of one million human beings.
kommando, states that up to September 6, 1941, this Kommando 4a "has taken care of a total of 11,328 Jews". very casually declares: "In Latvia, up to now, 30,000 Jews were executed in all". that the operational area has been "cleared of Jews. From 19 August to 25 September 1941, 8,890 Jews and Communists were executed. Total number 13,315". 5, 1941, that total executions had reached the figure of 31,767.
Reporting on one month's activities (October 1941), Einsatzgruppe B advised that "during the period of the report, the liquidations of 37,180 people took place". 12, 1941, declared that Sonderkommando 4a had now reached the total number of more than 51,000 executions. approbation on August 10, 1942:
"During detailed consultations with the SS-Brigadefuehrer Obersturmbannfuehrer Dr. jur.
Strauch, we found that we Ruthenia during the last 10 weeks".Speaking of another place, the Commissioner General proclaimed:
"In the Minsk-Land area the Jewry was completely exterminated." Then he complained that the Army had been encroaching on the Einsatz prerogatives:
"The preparations for the liquidation of the Jews already been reported to your office.
In the Rear us anyway". and went on with his narrative:
"In the city of Minsk, about 10,000 Jews were liquidated in November of the previous year, at the Fuehrer's orders.
The Sluzk area was also ridded of several thousand Jews.
The same applies to Nowogrodek and Wilejka". not been going as well as he desired:
"Radical measures still remain to be taken." He explained: "In Baranowitschi, about 10,000 Jews are still living in the town alone." However, he would attend to that situation at once. He promised that 9,000 of them would be "liquidated next month." of Jews executed in Lithuania was 71,105. ory of the people killed as a business house might submit a list of stock on hand:
"Total: Jews Communists Total White Ruthenia 7.620 - - 7,620 to be added to these figures:
"In Lithuania and Latvia Jews annihilated by pogroms 5,500 (correct total 130,065) 122,455 135,567"
THE PRESIDENT: Judge Dixon will continue with reading of the opinion and the judgment.
JUDGE DIXON: It would not take, and it did not take many reapings of this character to reach the figure of one million.
Operational Report No. 190, speaking of the activities of Einsatzgruppe D, announces quite matter-of-fact that , in the second half of March 1942, a total of 1,501 people were executed, and then adds, perhaps boredly: "Total number shot up to date, 91,678". Operation Report No. 150 declares: "There is no longer any Jewish civil population".
Activity and Situation Report No. 9, covering the period of January 1942, apprised Berlin:
"In White Ruthenia the purge of Jews is in full swing.
of the Security Police and the SD." Eastern Territories, left nothing to conjecture as to the purpose of their organization.
"The systematic mopping up of the Eastern Territories complete removal, if possible, of Jewry.
This goal has present time, of 229,052 Jews."
observation that many of the Jews used force against the officials and Lithuanian auxiliaries who performed these excutions and that, before they were shot, they even abused Germany! that it did not take over this area until a heavy frost had set in. The report points out this "made mass executions much more difficult". And then another difficulty, the report-writer emphasizes, is that the Jews "live widely scattered over the whole country. In view of the enormous distances, the bad condition of the roads, the shortage of vehicles and petrol, and the small forces of Security Police and SD, it needs the utmost effort in order to be able to carry out shootings."
unreasonable in not coming themselves over these long distances to present themselves for shooting. In spite of all the difficulties, however, the report ends up with: "Nevertheless, 41,000 Jews have been shot up to now." in one report, where the question of setting up a ghetto was concerned the report-writer communicated that in getting things started there would be "executions of a minor nature of 50 to 100 persons only".
"On 2 January, at the order of Einsatzgruppe A of all foodstuffs, etc.
, and all the villagers shot.
neighboring town, Rossitten".
The report ends on the very casual note:
"All these actions were carried out without incident." massacred. In another village 301 people were herded into the public square and shot down mercilessly. But for the report-writer this mass violence did not even constitute an incident!
On two days alone (September 29 and September 30, 1941) Sonderkommando 4a, with the help of the Gruppenstaff and two Police Units, slaughtered in Kiew 33,771 Jews. The money, valuables, underwear and clothing of the murdered victims were turned over to the racial Germans and to the Nazi administration of the city. The massacre ends up with the phrase:
"The transaction was carried out without friction - " and then adds, as he was about to put away the typewriter:
"No incidents occurred." kommandos sought to avoid executions, not out of charity or sympathy, but because it meant just that much more work. The defendant Nosske testified to a caravan of from 6,000 to 7,000 Jews who had been driven across the Dnjester River by the Rumanians into territory occupied by the German forces, and whom he guided back across the river.
When asked why these Jews had been expelled from Rumania, Nosske replied:
"I have no idea. I assume that the Rumanians wanted to the trouble of shooting them.
We didn't want to do that.
We didn't want to do the work for the Rumanians, and we happened.
We refused it and, therefore, we sent them back." resulting from acts of the organizations to which the defendants belonged did not reach the total of one million. As a matter of fact, it went far beyond one million. As already indicated, the International Military Tribunal, after a trial lasting ten months, studying and analyzing figures and reports, declared:
"The RSHA played a leading part in the 'final solution' established to supervise this program.
Under its direc of the Security Police."
declared that, according to the reports, his Einsatzgruppe killed 90,000 people. He also told of the methods he employed to prevent the exaggeration of figures. He did say that other Einsatzgruppen were not as careful as he was in presenting totals, but he presented no evidence to attack numbers presented by other Einsatzgruppen. Reference must also be made to the statement of the defendant Heinz Schubert who not only served as adjutant to Ohlendorf in the field from October 1941 to June 1942, but who continued in the same capacity of adjutant in the RSHA, Office Amt III B, for both Ohlendorf and Dr. Hans Emlich, until the end of 1944. If there was any question about the correctness of the figures, this is where the question would have been raised, but Schubert expressed no doubt nor did he say that these individuals who were momently informed in the statistics entertained the slightest doubt about them in any way.
prepare the reports and to avoid errors:
"The Einsatzgruppe reported in two ways to the Reich Security Head Office.
Once through radio, then in writing.
The radio reports were kept strictly secret enter the radio station.
This is the reason why only the of these radio reports.
The reports were dictated directly to Fritsche by Ohlendorf or Seibert.
After the report had been sent off by Fritsche I received it for filing.
In persons killed.
The written reports were sent to Berlin by courier.
These reports contained exact details and des etc."
thought of ever filing a false report because he regarded that as unworthy of himself.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will now be in recess fifteen minutes.
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal will be in recess until 11:15 o'clock.
(recess)
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.
THE PRESIDENT: Judge Dixon continues with the reading of the opinion and judgment.
JUDGE DIXON: Then, the actual figures mentioned in the reports, staggering though they are, do by no means tell the entire story. Since the objective of the Einsatzgruppen was to exterminate all people falling in the categories announced in the Fuehrer-Order, the completion of the job in any given geographical area was often simply announced with the phrase: "There is no longer any Jewish population." Cities, towns and villages were combed by the kommandos and when all Jews in that particular community were killed, the report-writer laconically telegraphed or wrote to Berlin that the section in question was "freed of Jews". Sometimes the extermination area covered a whole country like Esthonia or a large territory like the Crimea. In determining the numbers killed in a designation of this character one needs merely to study the atlas and the census of the period in question. Sometimes the area set aside for an execution operation was arbitrarily set according to kommandos. Thus one finds in the reports such entries as: "The fields of activity of the kommandos is freed of all Jews." meditated by the Einsatz units without their having to do the killing. When Jews were herded into a few miserable houses which were fenced off and called a "ghetto", this was incarceration -- but incarceration without a prison warden to bring them food. The reports make it abundantly clear that in these ghettos death was rampant, even before the Einsatz units began the killing off of the survivors. When, in a given instance, all male Jews and Jewesses over the age of 12 were executed, there remained, of course, all the children under 12. They were doomed to perish. Then there were those who were worked to death. All these fatalities are unmistakably chronicled in the Einsatz Reports, but do not show up in their statistics.
victims of the Einsatzgruppen who did not fall under the executing rifles. In many cities, towns end provinces hundreds and thousands of fellow-citizens of those slain fled in order to avoid a similar fate. Through malnutrition, exposure, lack of medical attention and particularly, if one thinks of the aged and the very young, of exhaustion, most if not all of those refugees perished. These figures, of course, do not appear in the Einsatzgruppen Reports, but the criminal responsibility for their deaths falls upon the Fuehrer-Order program as much as the actual shooting deaths. temporarily spared, not for humanitarian reasons, but for economic purposes. Thus, a report from Esthonia specifies:
"The arrest of all male Jews of over 16 years of age has been nearly finished.
With the exception of the cial Detachment 1 a. Jewesses in Pernau and Reval of were arrested and put to peat-cutting or other labor."
(L-180) a great shortage of doctors for the non-Jewish population:
"More than 60% of the dentists were Jews; more than 50% of the other doctors as well.
The disappearance from the Reich."
(L-180) Jews be killed by working and not by shooting:
"There is only one possibility which the German ad ted for a long time:
Solution of the Jewish prob economic conditions of the country."
(NO-3151) paid manpower, but there was always the danger that, despite these economic advantages to the Germans, the security police would shoot the working Jews.
(NO-3146) Einsatzgruppe C reports in September 1941:
"Difficulties have arisen, in so far as Jews are often the only skilled workers in certain trades.
Thus, the only are Jews.
At other places also only Jews can be employed "In order not to endanger reconstruction and the repair older Jewish skilled workers from the executions."
(NO-3146) and Dnepropetrovsk, collective farms, known as Colchoses,were found to be operated by Jews. They were described in the report as being of low intelligence but since they were good workers the einsatz commander did not liquidate them. However, the report goes on to say that the einsatz commander was satisfied with merely shooting the Jewish managers. (NO-3153) July 1942, expressed quite frankly his desire to strike down all Jews in one murderous stroke. However, he was willing to stay his arm temporarily until the requirements of the Wehrmacht should be satisfied:
"I myself and the SD would certainly of the Wehrmacht have fallen off.
For still being considered."
(3428-PS) Operation Report No. 11, dated July 3, 1941, also explains that in the Baltic region the Wehrmacht is not "for the time being" in a position to dispense with the manpower of the Jews still available and fit for work.
(NO-4537) the Jews were free from molestation. Einsatzgruppe B, reporting on affairs in Witebsk, declared:
"By appointed Jewish Council, so far about 3,000 Jews registered.
Badges for Jews introduced.
At present they ble.
For deterrent, 27 Jews, who had in the streets."
(NO-2954) that as the Germans advanced, the Esthonians arrested Jews but did not kill them. He shows the superior methods of the Einsatzgruppe:
"Only by the Security Police and the work."
(2273-PS) He then adds as an obvious deduction:
"Today there are no longer any Jews in Esthonia."
til he has drained from its body the last ounce of utility, so did the action unit in Minsk dispose of the Jews:
"In Minsk itself--exclusive of Reich used as labor."
(2273-PS) of Heydrich to suspend the killing of Jews until after they had brought in the harvest. point of view, was perhaps even worse than their own directly committed murders, that is, their inciting of the population to abuse, maltreat and slay their fellow citizens. To invade a foreign country, seize innocent inhabitants and shoot them is a crime, the mere statement of which is its own condemnation. But to stir up passion, hate, violence and destruction among the people themselves, aims at breaking the moral backbone, even of those the invader chooses to spare. It sows seeds of crime which the invader intends to bear continuous fruit, even after he is driven out.
of those responsible for these shameless crimes endeavored to keep them secret. SS-Brigadier General Stahlecker, head of Einsatzgruppe A, reporting on activities of Einsatzgruppe A, stated in October 1941 that it was the duty of his Security Police to set in motion the passion of the population against the Jews. "It was not less important", the report continued, "In view of the future to establish the ities could not be found out."
(L-180) In Riga this same Stahlecker reported:
"Similarly, native anti-Semitic forces be very difficult.
Following out ord possible means and most decisively.
But were apt to stir even German circles.
It period."
(L-180) was not so easy to start pogroms against the Jews. However, after certain prodding and assistance, results were attained. He reports:
"Klimatis, the leader of the partisan unit, from the outside.
During the first pogrom sisting of about 60 houses.