Einsatzgruppen

Einsatzgruppen (German for "mission groups", loosely translated as "task force") were paramilitary groups operated by the SS before and during World War II. Their principal task, in the words of SS General Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski at the Nuremberg Trial, "was the annihilation of the Jews, gypsies, and political commissars."

Formed from the Gestapo, Kripo, SD, and Waffen-SS officers, these death squads followed the Wehrmacht as it advanced eastwards into Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. On occupied territories, the Einsatzgruppen also utilized local populations to provide additional security and manpower when needed. Thus, the activities of the Einsatzgruppen were spread throughout a large pool of personnel from different branches of the SS and German State.

According to their own records, the Einsatzgruppen operatives are responsible for killing over 1 million people, almost exclusively civilians, without judicial review and later without semblance of legality (no reading of sentences of martial or administrative law), starting with the Polish intelligentsia and quickly progressing by 1941 to target primarily the Jews of Eastern Europe. The historian Raul Hilberg however estimates that between 1941 and 1945 the Einsatzgruppen murdered over 1.4 million Jews in open air shootings.

History

The origins of the Einsatzgruppen can be traced back to the ad hoc Einsatzkommando formed by Reinhard Heydrich to secure government buildings and documents following the Anschluss in Austria in March 1938. The task of securing government buildings, the accompanying documentation and questioning senior civil servants in lands occupied by Germany was the Einsatzgruppen's original mission. In the summer of 1938, when Germany was preparing an invasion of Czechoslovakia scheduled for October 1, 1938, the Einsatzgruppen were founded. The intention was for Einsatzgruppen to travel in the wake of the German armies as they advanced into Czechoslovakia, securing government papers and offices. Unlike the Einsatzkommando, the Einsatzgruppen were to be armed and authorized to freely use lethal force to accomplish their mission. The Munich Agreement of 1938 prevented the war for which the Einsatzgruppen were originally founded, but as the Germans occupied the Sudetenland in the fall of 1938, the Einsatzgruppen moved into the Sudetenland to occupy offices formally belonging to the Czechoslovak state. After the occupation of the rest of the Czech portion of Czechoslovakia after March 15, 1939, the Einsatzgruppen were re-formed and were again used to secure offices formerly belonging to the Czechoslovak government. The Einsatzgruppen were never a standing formation; rather they were ad hoc units recruited mostly from the ranks of the SS, the SD, and various German police forces such as the Ordnungspolizei, the Gendarmerie, the Kripo and the Gestapo, given several weeks’ to several months’ training and then sent into action. Once the military campaign had ended, the Einsatzgruppen units were disbanded, though generally the same personnel were recruited again if the need arose for the Einsatzgruppen units to be re-activated.

In May 1939, Adolf Hitler decided upon an invasion of Poland planned for August 25 of that year (later moved back to September 1). In response, Heydrich again re-formed the Einsatzgruppen to travel in the wake of the German armies. Unlike the earlier operations, Heydrich gave the Einsatzgruppen commanders carte blanche to kill anyone belonging to groups that the Germans considered hostile.

After the occupation of Poland in 1939, the Einsatzgruppen killed Poles belonging to the intelligentsia, such as priests and teachers. The Nazis considered all Slavic people as Untermenschen (subhumans), and wanted to use the Polish lower classes as servants and slaves. The mission of the Einsatzgruppen was therefore the forceful depoliticisation of the Polish people and the elimination of the groups most clearly identified with the Polish national identity. Following the German invasion of the Netherlands, Belgium, and France in May 1940, the Einsatzgruppen once again travelled in the wake of the Wehrmacht, but unlike their operations in Poland, the Einsatzgruppen operations in Western Europe in 1940 were within the original mandate of securing government offices and papers. Had Operation Sealion, the German plan for an invasion of the United Kingdom been launched, six Einsatzgruppen were scheduled to follow the invasion force to Britain. The Einsatzgruppen intended for "Sealion" were provided with a list (known as the Black Book after the war) of 2,820 personalities to be arrested immediately.

After the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, the Einsatzgruppen's main assignment was to kill Communist officers and Jews on a much larger scale than in Poland. These Einsatzgruppen were under control of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt (RSHA) (Reich Security Main Office); i.e., under Reinhard Heydrich and his successor Ernst Kaltenbrunner. The original mandate set by Heydrich for the four Einsatzgruppen sent into the Soviet Union as part of Operation Barbarossa was to secure the offices and papers of the Soviet state and Communist Party; liquidate all of the higher cadres of the Soviet state; and to instigate and encourage pogroms against all local Jewish populations. As the Einsatzgruppen advanced into the Soviet Union, after July 1941, the Einsatzgruppen increasingly engaged in the mass murders of the local Jews themselves rather than encouraging pogroms. Initially, the Einsatzgruppen generally limited themselves to shooting Jewish men; but as the summer wore on, increasingly all Jews regardless of age or sex were shot. The most murderous of the four Einsatzgruppen was Einsatzgruppe A, which operated in the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania formerly occupied by the Soviets. Einsatzgruppe A was the first Einsatzgruppen that attempted to systematically exterminate all Jews in its area. After December 1941, the other three Einsatzgruppen began what Raul Hilberg has called the "second sweep", which lasted into the summer of 1942, where they attempted to emulate Einsatzgruppe A by likewise systematically killing all Jews in their areas.

They murdered more than 1.5 million Jews, Communists, prisoners of war, and Roma (Gypsies) in total. They also assisted Wehrmacht units and local anti-Semites in killing half a million more. They were mobile forces in the beginning of the invasion, but settled down after the occupation. In addition, the Einsatzgruppen were often used in anti-partisan operations in the occupied Soviet Union.

Method of killing

The Einsatzgruppen typically followed close behind Wehrmacht army formations, marching into cities and towns where large numbers of Jews were known to live. Once they entered a town, they issued orders to Jews and non-Jewish Communists to assemble for deportation out of the town. Those who refused were hunted down ruthlessly.

Those who were gathered would then be sent to designated sites outside the cities and towns. Usually these massacre sites were graves dug in advance, or deep ravines (including one at Babi Yar, just outside Kiev) where executioners were already waiting with orders to kill them with machine guns or pistol shots to the head. The killers would also seize the clothing and other belongings of the victims, and some victims were forced to strip naked just before their execution. Once dead, the victims' graves would be buried with hand shovels or bulldozers to cover up the crimes.

The Einsatzgruppen were assisted by other Axis forces, including designated members of the Wehrmacht and the Waffen SS. In the Baltics and Ukraine, they also recruited local anti-Semites and other collaborators to help with the killing.

The Jäger Report

The Einsatzgruppen kept track of many of their massacres, and one of the most famous of these official records is the Jager Report, covering the operation of Einsatzkommando 3 over five months in Lithuania. Written by the commander of Einsatzkommando 3, Karl Jäger, it includes a detailed list summarizing each massacre, totalling 137,346 victims, and states "…I can confirm today that Einsatzkommando 3 has achieved the goal of solving the Jewish problem in Lithuania. There are no more Jews in Lithuania, apart from working Jews and their families." After the war, despite these records, Jäger lived in West Germany under his own name until arrested for war crimes in 1959, when he committed suicide.

After the war

The ultimate authority for the Einsatzgruppen, which answered directly to Heinrich Himmler and Adolf Hitler, were the SS and Police Leaders who oversaw all Einsatzgruppen activities and reports in their given area. At the close of the Second World War a number of SS and Police Leaders, who had overseen activities in Eastern Europe and Russia, simply disappeared (General Richard Glücks for example), were executed for war crimes, or committed suicide before capture. As far as the lower ranks, a large number were killed in combat, were executed by inmates when/if they could get their hands on them, were captured in combat and executed (on the eastern front) or imprisoned and died in Russian camps. The rest of the lesser ranks who simply returned to Germany or other countries were not formally charged (due to the large numbers of them) and simply returned to civilian life.

At the conclusion of World War II, senior leaders of the Einsatzgruppen were put before United States occupation courts, variably charged with crimes against humanity, war crimes, and membership in the SS (which had been declared a criminal organization), in what became known as the Einsatzgruppen Trial of the Subsequent Nuremberg Trials. Fourteen death sentences and five life sentences were among the judgments, although only four executions were carried out, on June 7, 1951, and the rest of these sentences were commuted.

Organization

Einsatzgruppe A for the Baltic Republics with

Sonderkommandos 1 a and 1 b (German for special forces, not to be confused with the Sonderkommandos in the concentration camps)

Einsatzkommandos 2 and 3. Attached to Army Group North.

Einsatzgruppe B for Belarus with

Sonderkommandos 7 a and 7 b, the

Einsatzkommandos 8 and 9, and also

a "special force" in case Moscow was captured. Attached to Army Group Centre.

Einsatzgruppe C for the Northern and central Ukraine

Sonderkommandos 4 a and 4 b and

Einsatzkommandos 5 and 6. Attached to Army Group South. {Sonderkommando 4A commanded by Paul Blobel}

Einsatzgruppe D for Bessarabia, the Southern Ukraine, the Crimea and (eventually) the Caucasus with

Sonderkommandos 10 a and 10 b and

Einsatzkommandos 11 a, 11 b and 12.

Both attached to Army Group South.

Einsatzgruppen leaders

Group A: SS-Brigadeführer Dr.Franz Walter Stahlecker (until 23 March 1942)
Group B: SS-Brigadeführer Artur Nebe (until Oct. 1941)
Group C: SS-Gruppenführer Dr. Dr.Otto Rasch (until Oct. 1941)
Group D: SS-Gruppenführer Prof. Otto Ohlendorf (until June 1942)

Sources

The Origins of the Final Solution, Christopher Browning, 2004
Masters of Death, Richard Rhodes, 2002

External links

Indepth article on the Einsatzgruppen
The Einsatzgruppen
The Einsatzgruppen
Einsatzgruppen at the Holocaust Encyclopedia.
Einsatzgruppen - Mobile Killing Units
The Motivation and Actions of the Einsatzgruppen

Holocaust massacres and pogroms | SS | World War II crimes in Poland

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