The Theory and Practice of Hell (69 page)

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heterogeneous in character—that is, truly cultural. They always remained within the realm of SS desires and aspirations. The influence of Himmler’s own personality is the only element in the SS that is very difficult to grasp. The man was absurdly unmilitary, and the SS knew it. He was copybook exemplar of virtue—neat, a typical “ little man,” hard-working, pedantic, neither a general nor a statesman nor a thinker nor a profligate nor a fool. What was it in him that impressed the SS? Among themselves they hardly ever referred to him by any name other than “ Reichs-Heini.” And yet ...

What joined them to him was, it seems to me, not his per sonality at all but the measure of his achievement, the in tellectual prerequisites of which they did not ponder for a moment—of course not! They accepted the unresolved contradition, in keeping with their own nature. But Himmler’s achievement was made to their measure—a universal system of power. It was a matter of small moment to his adherents whether this instigator of Germany’s ghastliest terrors and mass murders was a bureaucrat or a profligate. They did not care that he was able to invest his cold and petty fanaticism with a flicker of mysticism only by his predilection for early Teutonic history, re-enacted in castles and cathedrals to torch light by night. It was sufficient that their instincts were given free play. In return they accepted certain austerities, such as Himmler’s ambition for justice which seems so paradoxical to us. He was inexorable in his imposition of penalties and almost invariably increased the severity of those pronounced by SS courts. He had his own nephew, SS First Lieutenant Hans Himmler, who while drunk had carelessly tattled SS secrets, demoted and sentenced to death, a sentence from which he was paroled to the front as a parachutist. Young Himmler was subsequently again incarcerated for having made certain derogatory remarks and finally “ liquidated” at the Dachau concentration camp as a homosexual. Austere punishment with “ front-line parole,” or dropping someone only to restore him after a while to a position of even greater confidence and respect—these were specialties of Himmler. I rather suspect that he had read somewhere how similar educational methods had been applied by certain leaders of

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past eras in order to surround themselves with an aura, and that he simply adapted them to his own bureaucratic ways. The method
was
effective—on its own account, not because of Herr Himmler.

The pursuit of power always tends toward certain in dividual and social forms which attain expression, if at all, regardless of whether the persons from whom they emanate are men possessed or mere bureaucrats. And unquestionably it was the pursuit of power that impelled men like Himmler, Heydrich, Best, Klatenbrunner and Muller (chief of the Gestapa under Kaltenbrunner) in creating their system and in maintaining it. These men sought only power—power over other men, other institutions, over Germany, over other nations, if possible over the world and the future. All was to go according to their will. Perhaps their pursuit of power was instinctive rather than conscious, under the pretext that it was on behalf of Germany; perhaps they presented a nationalist veneer only to deceive themselves, their environment and the public at large, since naked power for its own sake would probably not yet have been acceptable. Actually, this strengthened rather than weakened the effect. Just as National Socialism carved out for itself a state within the republic, so did the SS within the Nazi regime. Concealing its motives and purposes, it achieved an autonomy that ultimately crowded out all rivals for power.

Figures like Eicke and Pohl were of a different stripe, though they were drawn to the others like iron to a magnet. Mighty lieutenants—themselves lords when seen from below, but only vassals from above. It was they who provided everything that was necessary for creating and maintaining the all-encompassing citadel—materials, money, slaves, arms. To a degree unmatched, they combined the opposites of the tradesman and the hero, two types which according to their own
Black Corps
defied combination. No super Jew of Streicher’s ever accomplished what' SS Lieutenant-General Pohl managed to do—putting the mass utilization of human bodies on an efficiency basis. During his lifetime each concentration-camp slave, obtained without capital investment, represented the following profit value when fully “ utilized” from a financial aspect:

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EUGEN KOGON

Daily farming-out wage, 6 to 8 marks, average 6.00

Minus: 1. Food 0.60

2. Clothing Depreciation 0.10 0.70

5.30

Multiplied by 270 (average life span of nine

months) 1,431 marka

Efficient utilization of the prisoner's body at the end of nine months increased this profit by the return from:

(1) Dental sold

(2) Personally owned clothing (part of which was used in other camps, reducing expenses for new clothing, while part was utilized in respinnina for army uniforms)

(3)
Valuables left by the deceased

(4) Money left by the deceased

(Down to the early war years, money and valuables were returned only to the families of the minority of prisoners who were German citizens)

From these returns must be deducted an average cremation cost of two marks per prisoner, but the direct and indirect

profit per body averaged at least 200 marks In many cases it ran to many thousands of marks

The total profit per prisoner, at an average turnover rate of

nine months, therefore ran to at least 1,630 marks Here and there a concentration camp obtained additional

revenue from the utilization of bones and ashes

Let it not be thought that this calculation is my own handi work. It comes from SS sources, and Pohl jealously guarded against “ outside interference.” The SS Main Economic and Administrative Office forever sent out inspectors to counter small-or large-scale competition, such as the German police in the east tried to establish in the form of “ labor camps,” “ police detention camps,” and the like.

Some day the naked pursuit of power, hand in glove with avarice, would have become clearly apparent to everyone. In the early years and during the war, when many ulterior con siderations played a part, this was not very well possible. The system therefore shrouded itself behind a dense camouflage of secrecy. There was very little in the SS that was not “ secret.” Most secret of all was the actuality of the concentration camps, which served to propagate a terror intended to be nameless.

To this must be added a degree of organizational proliferation which a normal person can hardly imagine and which served to obscure the whole picture. The Gestapo did not pay the least attention to whether the concentration-camp system of the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office was able to cope with the masses of prisoners often dumped

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on the gatehouses without notice. It did not care whether there was space, clothing, food, drugs. Conversely the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office rarely surrendered na Gestapo slave once it had begun to exploit him. These two major organizational forms of the terror were linked only by the urge for power and exploitation at the top level of leader ship—Eicke-Pohl on the one hand, Miiller-Kaltenbrunner on the other, both operating on behalf of their lord and master, Himmler.

Branching out down below like a nerve system was the

chain of command, in curious fashion allowing scope for in dividual judgment and thus for responsibility. The SS leader ship expected obedience of its subordinates, but it also ex pected independence. Later on, when too many had learned that they were not backed up when the inevitable difficulties arose, SS men became reluctant to assume responsibility, and failed to take any action without written authority. But for the nonce a curious mixture developed, compounded of a cult of obedience and complete lack of control. In a sense the subordinate had to feel his way between these two attitudes. As a result he was reckoned the best SS member who “ knew what had to be done,” who did not wait for long-winded orders but acted “ in the spirit of the Reich Leader SS.” As a rule this “ spirit” was not a matter of grave doubt, especially in the case of measures against “ enemies of the state.” Eicke, for example, stated that “ it is better to shoot a concentration-camp prisoner than to endanger the security of the Reich by his escape.” In order to prevent the guards from being made “ unsure of themselves” (i.e., to make them sure!) he issued instructions that when a prisoner had been “ shot while at tempting to escape” guards “ were to be excused from in vestigations as much as possible.” Thus a guard who developed initiative in shooting down prisoners was merely carrying out orders, and in addition earned a bonus for the mental and other discomfort he might have undergone.

The great slogan of the SS was: “ Miscarriages of justice must be corrected!” What was meant was the “ leniency” of “ civilian” justice. This too was virtually a challenge to the Gestapo officials to send people to the concentration camps, an invitation to Camp Medical Officers to resort to the fatal syringe. The legal officer of the SS Main Economic and Ad

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ministrative Office, SS Lieutenant-Colonel Schmidt-Kleve- now, a sinister figure in Pohl’s inner circle, once said during an investigation that it was true Himmler had issued an order against unauthorized killings o f prisoners, but that there was a question “ as to whether he had not implied a mental reser vation with regard to sanctioning non-observance of this order!” It sounds almost like a quotation from a scurrilous anti-Jesuit pamphlet. But no—these were the broadly winking Wotan worshipers of Berlin-Lichterfelde, No. 125 Unter den Eichen.