Gestapo (19 page)

Among the subordinates of these men and their successors a number were brought to trial at Nuremberg; but Ohlendorf is our only specimen of a Group Commander. Like the others, he went straight from an office desk in Berlin to take command of an almost unbelievable collection of scallywags, ranging from failed intellectuals to simple brutes, who roamed the torn and ravaged Russian landscape looking for people to kill—Jews, gypsies, Communists (they had the list of the S.D. to work on). Exactly what went on in their minds we can never know. Why did Stahlecker, the head of the whole foreign intelligence section of the R.S.H.A., which was soon, under Schellenberg, to swallow the whole of military intelligence too—why did this inoffensive intellectual put on jackboots and proceed to the Baltic lands to take charge of the massacre of
civilians, putting his name to the most appalling reports of organized slaughter it is possible to conceive? The answer appears to be that he wished to ingratiate himself with Heydrich, with whom he was in disfavor. It was also an order. Why did Nebe, the veteran C.I.D. man, who is supposed to have been plotting actively against Hitler, leave his familiar Berlin office and proceed to the Moscow front in charge of a mere nine hundred men? Perhaps because, feeling vulnerable, he wished to prove his zeal? Certainly because the leader of Action Group B was designated the future Police Chief of Moscow. Again, it was an order. Why did Ohlendorf, the young lawyer and economist, who had risen high in the S.D. and come to command, at thirty-three, Section III of the R.S.H.A., which had a monopoly of internal intelligence, follow suit and break off his brilliant career (he resumed it later as an official in the Ministry of Economics)? He gave no reason—other than that it was inconceivable that any subordinate should disobey an order.

We always come back to obedience:
Befehl ist Befehl
. And it counted for a very great deal. How much, will have to be considered later. But not for everything. Because the pattern of total obedience is spoiled by the example of Otto Rasch of Action Group C, the man who could not plead at Nuremberg. In an affidavit he declared that it was not until the end of August, 1941, two months after starting operations, that he fully understood what he was required by Hitler to do. And then he jibbed. After some false starts he did at last succeed in getting free of the whole apparatus of the Security Police and in the end, in spite of tempting offers, settled down as Mayor of Wuert-temburg and a company director. He proved—and he was not alone in this—that it was possible not to obey Heydrich—and to survive. The general idea of the Nuremberg defense was that if one disobeyed one was shot. Ohlendorf obeyed. Stahlecker in one of his massacre reports added the following remark: “It should be mentioned that the leaders of the Waffen S.S. and of the uniformed police, who were now on the reserve, have declared their wish to stay with the Security Police and the S.D.”

The testimony of Ohlendorf was valuable because it went a long way to establish the relationship of the Action
Group with the Reichswehr. It established that the Army knew what the Action Groups were doing and provided facilities for them—rations, transport, etc. The instructions were that all Jews as well as the Soviet Political Commissars were to be liquidated. “Since this liquidation took place in the operational area of the Army Group … they had to be ordered to provide support. Moreover, without such instructions to the Army, the activities of the Action Groups would not have been possible.” As far as Ohlendorf's Group was concerned, the Army was in two minds. It was attached to the Eleventh Army, operating in the extreme South, and on one occasion it received instructions from Army H.Q. that “liquidations were to take place only at a distance of not less than 200 kilometers from the H.Q. of the commanding general” (one hundred twenty-five miles sounds a long way, but it is not far in Russia). On another occasion, however, at Simferopol, “the army command requested the
Einsatzkommandos
in its area to hasten the liquidations, because famine was threatening and there was a great housing shortage.”

It was also valuable because it confirmed in minute detail and in straightforward and soldierly language the reports of survivors, or less disciplined witnesses, of the manner in which the killings were carried out.

“Do you know,” the Prosecution asked, “how many persons were liquidated by
Einsatzgruppe
D under your direction?”

“In the year between June, 1941 and June, 1942 the
Einsatzkommandos
reported ninety thousand people liquidated.”

“Did that include men, women and children?”

“Yes.”

And later, again as question and answer:

“Did you personally supervise mass executions of these individuals?”

“I was present at two mass executions for purposes of inspection.”

“Will you explain to the tribunal in detail how an individual mass execution was carried out?”

“A local
Einsatzkommando
attempted to collect all
the Jews in its area by registering them. This registration was performed by the Jews themselves.”

“On what pretext, if any, were they to be rounded up?”

“On the pretext that they were to be resettled.”

“Will you continue?”

“After the registration the Jews were collected at one place; and from there they were later transported to the place of execution, which was, as a rule, an anti-tank ditch or a natural excavation. The executions were carried out in a military manner, by firing squads under command.”

“In what way were they transported to the place of execution?”

“They were transported to the place of execution in trucks, always only as many as could be executed immediately. In this way it was attempted to keep the span of time from the moment in which the victims knew what was going to happen to them until the time of their actual execution as short as possible.”

“Was that your idea?”

“Yes.”

“And after they were shot what was done with the bodies?”

“The bodies were buried in the anti-tank ditch or excavation.”

“What determination, if any, was made as to whether the persons were actually dead?”

“The unit leaders or the firing-squad commanders had orders to see to this and, if need be, finish them off themselves.”

This young economist from Hohen-Egelson was proud of the orderly, shipshape, and humane manner in which his Commandos carried out their duties. He objected, for example, to what went on in the areas of some of the other Action Groups:

“Some of the unit leaders did not carry out the liquidation in the military manner, but killed the victims singly by shooting them in the back of the neck.”

“And you objected to that procedure?”

“I was against the procedure, yes.”

“For what reason?”

“Because both for the victims and for those who carried out the executions it was, psychologically, an immense burden to bear.”

The burden to bear, the psychological strain, was one of Ohlendorf's obsessions. This was testified to also by his adjutant, Heinz Schubert. Schubert, twenty-five when he went to Russia straight from the Hitler
Jugend
, was a descendant of the great composer's family, and a serious and earnest young man. Speaking particularly of the massacres at Simferopol, he said: “I knew that it was of the greatest importance to Ohlendorf to have the persons who were to be shot killed in the most humane and military manner possible, because otherwise the spiritual strain (
seelische Belastung
) would have been too great for the execution squad.” And, of course, the strain was there. Himmler, we have seen, was affected by it when he watched the sample massacres at Minsk, and cried aloud when two Jewish women were not killed outright. He told Nebe, who carried out the execution, that more humane means had better be devised, and the answer was the gas van, manufactured by the firm of Saurer in Berlin, and supplied and maintained by Rauff, the transport officer of the R.S.H.A.

But the gas vans, when they arrived in 1942, were to cause Ohlendorf further spiritual burdens. He preferred shooting, and so did his men. The general concept was a plain van so constructed that when the motor was started up “gases were conducted into the van causing death in ten to fifteen minutes.… The vans were loaded with the victims” (Ohlendorf is speaking) “and driven to the place of burial, which was usually the same as that used for the mass executions. The time needed for transportation was sufficient to ensure the death of the victims.” The vans varied in size and could take fifteen to twenty-five people. The reason why Ohlendorf and his subordinates did not like the gas vans was not because they were inhumane—he was sure the victims did not know what was happening to them—but because “the unloading of the corpses was an unnecessary mental strain.” It was less tiresome to stand people on the edge of a ditch and shoot them down and shovel earth over their bodies. But when Ohlendorf was asked what he meant by “an unnecessary mental
strain” he replied in terms which indicated quite clearly that the victims were aware of what was happening to them: “As far as I can remember the conditions at that time—the picture presented by the corpses and probably because certain functions of the body had taken place leaving the corpses lying in filth.”

The victims, of course, were aware. We know that from other witnesses. The “death vans” became notorious, and more often than not they failed to work either quickly or humanely. When they were used in a wholesale manner at Chelmno extermination camp in Poland, before Auschwitz got into its stride, there were many complaints from their designer, Lieutenant Becker, of their improper use. Although they added their own flourish to the fantastic world inhabited not only by the Gestapo and the S.D. but by every German soldier and official behind the lines in Russia and Poland, their contribution to the number killed in Russia was really very small.

Ohlendorf was questioned at length about his preference for what he called shooting in the military manner, and in the course of his explanation he threw some official light on the habitual form:

“On the one hand, the aim was that the individual leaders and men should be able to carry out the executions in a military manner acting on orders and should not have to make a decision of their own; it was, to all intents and purposes, an order which they were to carry out. On the other hand, it was known to me that through the emotional excitement of the executions ill-treatment could not be avoided, since the victims discovered too soon that they were to be executed and could not therefore endure prolonged nervous strain. And it seemed intolerable to me that individual leaders and men should in consequence be forced to kill a large number of people on their own decision.”

When questioned as to what he meant by “ill-treatment,” Ohlendorf replied:

“If, for instance, the manner in which the executions were carried out caused excitement and disobedience among the victims, so that the Commandos were forced to restore order by means of violence … if, as I have
already said, in order to carry out the liquidation in an orderly fashion it was necessary, for example, to resort to beating.”

It is as well that we have this testimony of the gifted and highly educated commander of
Einsatzgruppe
D. It prepares us for the impression created by these orderly and humane operations on others.

On October 30th, 1941, the Commissioner of the territory of Slutzk in White Russia wrote to the Commissioner General of Minsk, criticizing the actions of the
Einsatzkommandos
belonging to
Einsatzgruppe
B (commanded by our old friend Artur Nebe). Here are excerpts from his letter:

“On October 27th, in the morning at about eight o'clock, a first lieutenant of the Police Battalion Number 11, from Kovno [i.e., an officer of Daluege's Orpo], Lithuania, appeared and introduced himself as the adjutant of the battalion commander of the Security Police. The first lieutenant explained that the police battalion had received the assignment to effect the liquidation of all Jews here in the town of Slutzk within two days. The battalion commander with his battalion in the strength of four companies, two of which were made up of Lithuanian partisans, was on the march here, and action would have to begin immediately. I replied to the first lieutenant that I had to discuss the action in any case first with the commander. About half an hour later the police battalion arrived in Slutzk. Immediately after the arrival a conference with the battalion commander took place according to my request. I first explained to the commander that it would not very well be possible to effect the action without previous preparation, because everybody had been sent to work and it would lead to terrible confusion. At least it would have been his duty to inform me a day ahead of time. Then I requested him to postpone the action one day. However, he refused this with the remark that he had to carry out this action everywhere in all towns and that only two days were allotted for Slutzk. Within two days the town of Slutzk had by all means to be cleared of Jews.”

That was how it began. It was not one of Ohlendorf's
tidy actions. It took place in the streets of Slutzk. After further preamble the letter continues:

“For the rest, as regards the execution of the action, I must point out, to my deepest regret, that the latter almost bordered on sadism. The town itself during the action offered a picture of horror. With indescribable brutality on the part both of the German police officers and particularly of the Lithuanian partisans, the Jewish people, and also with them White Ruthenians, were taken out of their dwellings and herded together. Everywhere in the town shots were to be heard, and in different streets the corpses of Jews who had been shot accumulated. The White Ruthenians were in the greatest anguish to free themselves from the encirclement. In addition to the fact that the Jewish people, among whom were also artisans, were barbarously maltreated in sight of the White Ruthenian people, the White Ruthenians themselves were also beaten with clubs and rifle butts. It was no longer a question of an action against the Jews. It looked much more like a revolution.…”