Bloodlands (90 page)

48
On Kirovohrad, see
Verbrechen der Wehrmacht
, 239-244. On Khorol, see Pohl,
Herrschaft
, 226. On Stalino, see Pohl,
Herrschaft
, 227; and Datner,
Zbrodnie
, 404.

49
Motyka, “Tragedia jeńców,” 2-6; Kopówka,
Stalag 366
, 47. On the 45,690 people who died in the General Government camps, see Dugas,
Sovetskie Voennoplennye
, 131. Compare Młynarczyk,
Judenmord
, 245 (250,000-570,000).

50
On the lack of warm clothing, see Bartov,
Eastern Front
, 112. On the three Soviet soldiers, see Dugas,
Sovetskie Voennoplennye
, 125.

51
Ich werde es nie vergessen
, 113.

52
On the civilians who tried to bring food to camps, see Berkhoff,
Harvest
, 95, 101; and Overmans, “Kriegsgefangenpolitik,” 808. On Kremenchuk, see Pohl,
Herrschaft
, 226.

53
Compare
Verbrechen der Wehrmacht
, 188.

54
On the intention to kill Soviet elites, see Kay,
Exploitation
, 104. On Hitler in March 1941, Streim,
Behandlung
, 36. For the text of the guidelines, see
Verbrechen der Wehrmacht
, 53-55.

55
On the 2,252 shootings, see Römer,
Kommissarbefehl
, 581.

56
On 2 July 1941, see
Verbrechen der Wehrmacht
, 63; Kay,
Exploitation
, 105; and Kershaw,
Fateful Choices
, 453. On the instructions given to the Einsatzgruppen and their fulfillment, see Datner,
Zbrodnie
, 153; Streim,
Behandlung
, 69, 99; and Berkhoff,
Harvest
, 94. On October 1941, see Streit, “German Army,” 7.

57
Pohl,
Herrschaft
, 204 (and 153 and 235 for the estimates of fifty and one hundred thousand). Overmans estimates one hundred thousand shootings in “Kriegsgefangenpolitik,” 815. Arad estimates eighty thousand total Jewish POW deaths; see
Soviet Union
, 281. Quotation (doctor): Datner,
Zbrodnie
, 234. On medicine as a nazified profession, see Hilberg,
Perpetrators
, 66.

58
Streim,
Behandlung
, 102-106.

59
For an estimate at the low end, see Streim,
Behandlung
, 244: minimum 2.4 million. For estimates of 3-3.3 million, see Pohl,
Herrschaft
, 210; Overmans, “Kriegsgefangenpolitik,” 811, 825; Dugas,
Sovetskie Voennoplennye
, 185; and Hartmann, “Massenvernichtung,” 97. For an estimate at the high end, see Sokolov, “How to Calculate,” 452: 3.9 million. On morale, see
Verbrechen der Wehrmacht
, 204.

60
On 7 November 1941, see Gerlach,
Kalkulierte Morde
, 817. Compare Gerlach and Werth, “State Violence,” 164. See also Streim,
Behandlung
, 99-102, 234. On the four hundred thousand total deaths among those released, see Pohl,
Herrschaft
, 215. Quotation (Johannes Gutschmidt): Hartmann, “Massenvernichtung,” 158; a similar estimation by Rosenberg is in Klee, “Gott mit uns,” 142.

61
Belgium: Kay,
Exploitation
, 121.

62
On Goebbels, see Evans,
Third Reich at War
, 248. Compare Kay,
Exploitation
, 109; Longerich,
Unwritten Order
, 55, 60; Browning,
Origins
; Gerlach,
Kalkulierte Morde
, 747; Gerlach,
Krieg
, 178; Arad,
Reinhard
, 14; and Aly,
Architects
, 160.

63
On the asphyxiation experiments, see Overmans, “Kriegsgefangenpolitik,” 814; Longerich,
Unwritten Order
, 82; Longerich,
Himmler
, 567; Datner,
Zbrodnie
, 208, 428;
Verbrechen
, 281; Mazower,
Hitler’s Empire
, 383; Browning,
Origins
, 357; and Klee, “Gott mit uns,” 136.

64
On the number of prisoners recruited, see Pohl,
Herrschaft
, 181. See also Black, “Handlanger,” 313-317; and Gerlach,
Kalkulierte Morde
, 207-208.

1
Browning and Gerlach have debated whether Hitler’s decision came in summer/autumn or in December 1941. In this chapter I am arguing that shooting Jews was the fifth version of the Final Solution, and the first one to show promise. The idea that the Jews could be removed from Europe by killing them must have been in the minds of Himmler and Hitler no later than August. It is quite possible that the two of them discussed this explicitly, although they need not have done so. Reinhard Koselleck (
Futures Past
, 222) cites Hitler, who is himself citing (unknowingly, I assume) Dostoevsky in
Crime and Punishment
: one need not admit to having plans, even to oneself, in order to have them. For my purposes, December 1941 is the more important date, since that was the time when other associates of Hitler grasped that the Final Solution meant the total mass murder of Jews rather than the murder of some and the deportation of others.

2
See however the important revisions of Speer’s role in Tooze,
Wages of Destruction.
The problem was posed in its classical form by Milward,
German Economy
, 6-7 and passim. Quotation: Longerich,
Himmler
, 561. The massive debate over “institutionalism” and “functionalism” cannot be presented here. This discussion began before the centrality of the eastern front to the Holocaust was understood. Like several other scholars, I am arguing that the thinkability and the possibility of a Final Solution by mass murder emerged from a combination of signals from above (for example, Hitler to Himmler, Himmler to Bach) and from below (for example, Einsatzgruppe A to Himmler, Himmler to Hitler) or indeed in both directions (the relationship between Jeckeln and Himmler). The place where murder emerged as the method of the Final Solution was the eastern front, where the main technique was shooting.

3
Quotation: Mazower,
Hitler’s Empire
, 368. On Wannsee, see Gerlach, “Wannsee”; and Longerich,
Unwritten Order
, 95. See also, generally, Roseman,
Villa.
The connection between Hitler and Rosenberg’s civilian administration is made in Lower, “Nazi Civilian Rulers,” 222-223.

4
Einsatzgruppe A, B, C, D respectively: 990 men, 655 men, 700 men, 600 men. See MacLean,
Field Men
, 13. On “numbers . . . too small,” see Browning, “Nazi Decision,” 473. On the importance of the Order Police, see Pohl, “Schauplatz,” 152. The
death count is from Brandon, “First Wave.” At least 457,436 Jews were killed by the Einsatzgruppen by the end of 1941.

5
This is not explicitly argued in these terms in Longerich,
Himmler
, but I believe that the interpretation squares with the arguments presented there. Compare Gerlach,
Kalkulierte Morde
, 115; and Lück, “Partisanbekämpfung,” 229.

6
Quotation: Wasser, “Raumplannung,” 51. See also Mazower,
Hitler’s Empire
, 378 and passim; and Steinberg, “Civil Administration,” 647.

7
The Romanian lands taken by Stalin were invaded by the Romanian army, not the German. They were followed by Einsatzgruppe D; see Angrick,
Besatzungspolitik.

8
See Snyder,
Reconstruction.

9
The deportation figures are in Angrick,
Riga
, 46. If conscription is included, the total rises to 34,000.

10
MacQueen, “White Terror,” 97; Angrick,
Riga
, 59. Among the two hundred thousand I include Jews in Vilnius and surrounding areas annexed to Lithuania.

11
Arad,
Soviet Union
, 144, 147; MacQueen, “White Terror,” 99-100; Angrick,
Riga
, 60.

12
Tomkiewicz,
Ponary
, 191-197.

13
Ibid., 203.

14
Angrick,
Riga
, 66-76. See also Arad,
Soviet Union
, 148.

15
Weiss-Wendt,
Estonians
, 39, 40, 45, 90, 94-105.

16
The 9,817 count in
Verbrechen
is at 93. See also Wnuk,
Za pierwszego Sowieta
, 371 (11,000-12,000); and Hryciuk, “Victims,” 183 (9,400).

17
On interwar anti-Jewish politics, see, generally, Polonsky,
Politics
; and Mendelsohn,
Jews.

18
On Białystok, see Matthäus, “Controlled Escalation,” 223; and
Verbrechen der Wehrmacht
, 593. Spektor (in “Żýdzi wołyńscy,” 575) counts thirty-eight pogroms in Volhynia; and the authors and editors of
Wokół Jedwabnego
, about thirty in the Białystok region.

19
On the total number of Jews killed (19,655), see Brandon, “First Wave.” For the “Hundreds of Jews . . . running down the street,” see
Verbrechen der Wehrmacht
, 99. On the nationality of the prisoners, see Himka, “Ethnicity,” 8.

20
The idea of double collaboration as biographical self-cleansing is advanced in Gross,
Neighbors.
For examples from Estonia, Ukraine, and Belarus of double collaboration, see Weiss-Wendt,
Estonians
, 115-119;
Dubno: sefer zikaron
, 698-701; Rein, “Local Collaborators,” 394; Brakel,
Unter Rotem Stern
, 304; Musial,
Mythos
, 266; and Mironowicz,
Białoruś
, 160. See also Snyder, “West Volhynian Jews.” A systematic study of double collaboration would be worthwhile.

21
This is the closest that I would come to an Arendtian argument about alienation. Arendt’s follower Jan Gross makes a similar argument about the privatization of violence in his study of the first Soviet occupation,
Revolution from Abroad.
But then in his studies of the consequences of two occupations,
Neighbors
and
Fear
, he
shifts away from sociology and toward ethics, as if Poles should have remembered themselves when German occupation was added to Soviet, or Soviet to German. In my view the logical move would have been to press forward with the Arendtian argument, but claiming that the overlap of both “totalitarian” powers plays the historical role that Arendt assigned to modernity. This is not quite what Gross claims (although he makes gestures in this direction in
Upiorna dekada
and in a few passages in both
Neighbors
and
Fear
). But I do think it follows from his occupation studies as a whole, if they are read as studies of human behavior (rather than of Polish ethics). This line of argument is pursued in the Conclusion.

22
Westermann, “Ideological Soldiers,” 46 (30% and 66%).

23
Compare Gerlach, “Nazi Decision,” 476.

24
Longerich,
Himmler
, 551; Kay,
Exploitation
, 106. On Uman, see USHMM-SBU 4/1747/19-20.

25
Matthäus, “Controlled Escalation,” 225; Gerlach,
Kalkulierte Morde
, 555; Kershaw,
Fateful Choices
, 456, 458. Cüppers, in
Wegbereiter
, develops the argument about the crucial early role of the Waffen-SS.

26
Kay,
Exploitation
, 107; Browning, “Nazi Decision,” 474. Pohl notes that the reinforcements came first to Ukraine; see
Herrschaft
, 152. He specifies early August as the time when Einsatzgruppe C understood that women and children were to be killed; see “Schauplatz,” 140.

27
Mallmann,
Einsatzgruppen
, 97.

28
Pohl, “Schauplatz,” 142; Kruglov, “Jewish Losses,” 274-275;
Verbrechen der Wehrmacht
, 135
.

29
Kruglov, “Jewish Losses,” 275.

30
Ruß, “Massaker,” 494, 503, 505; Berkhoff, “Records,” 294; Pohl, “Schauplatz,” 147.

31
Berkhoff,
Harvest
, 65-67, at 65; FVA 3267.

32
Darmstadt testimony, 29 April 1968, IfZ(M), Gd 01.54/78/1762.

33
Ruß, “Massaker,” 486; Berkhoff,
Harvest
, 68. On Sara, see Ehrenburg,
Black Book
, Borodyansky-Knysh testimony. On the valuables, see Dean, “Jewish Property,” 86. On the people “already bloody,” see “Stenogramma,” 24 April 1946, TsDAVO, 166/3/245/118. On the bones and ash and sand, see Klee,
Gott mit uns
, 136.

34
Darmstadt testimony, 29 April 1968, IfZ(M), Gd 01.54/78/1764-1765; Berkhoff, “Records,” 304.

35
Prusin, “SiPo/SD,” 7-9; Rubenstein,
Unknown
, 57. Romanowsky makes the point about the rotation of official enemies in “Nazi Occupation,” 240.

36
Rubenstein,
Unknown
, 54, 57, 61; Prusin, “SiPo/SD,” 7-9.

37
On Kharkiv, see Pohl, “Schauplatz,” 148; and
Verbrechen der Wehrmacht
, 179. On Kiev, see Prusin, “SiPo/SD,” 10.

38
Gerlach,
Kalkulierte Morde
, 544, 567. Nebe was a member of the resistance to Hitler in 1944.

39
Megargee,
Annihilation
, 99.

40
Quotation and figures are from Gerlach,
Kalkulierte Morde
, 588, 585; see also Ingrao, “Violence,” 231.

41
For the “sea of blood,” see Gerlach,
Kalkulierte Morde
, 182. For “thus must be destroyed,” see
Verbrechen
, 138.

42
This was an argument of the previous chapter.

43
The Soviet rationale was a classic one. First, the NKVD “established” that Germany had hundreds of spies among the Volga Germans. Then, the NKVD argued that the entire population was guilty, since none of the Volga Germans had reported all of this espionage to the proper authorities. In a particularly refined move, the NKVD used the presence of swastikas in German households as evidence of Nazi collaboration. In fact, the Soviets had themselves distributed those swastikas, in 1939, when Moscow and Berlin were allies, and a friendly visit from Hitler was expected. By the end of 1942, the Soviets had resettled some nine hundred thousand Germans, the vast majority of the German population in the Soviet Union. The Soviets deported some eighty-nine thousand Finns, most of them to Siberia. On Stalin, see Polian,
Against Their Will
, 134. On Hitler, see Longerich,
Unwritten Order
, 75; Gerlach,
Krieg
, 96; Gerlach, “Wannsee,” 763; Pinkus, “Deportation,” 456-458; Mazower,
Hitler’s Empire
, 370; and Friedlander,
Extermination
, 239, 263-264.