Jewish Death Squads - suspected victims?

[michael mills]

Then Polish cavalry officer Witold Pilecki's camp resistance organisation as it gained strength in numbers and influence gradually ousted the German "Kapos" out of these best "jobs" by one means or another and replaced them with his own Polish functionaries.

I have never read about something of that sort happening at Auschwitz-Birkenau.

I think maybe you are confusing events at Auschwitz-Birkenau with something that actually did happen at Buchenwald, namely the "battle of the reds against the greens". At Buchenwald, the highly organised and disciplined mainly Communist political prisoners (the "reds", who wore a red triangle) gained control of the camp registry, and utilised that position to have the criminal prisoners (the "greens", who wore a green triangle) selected for execution or transfer to other more rigorous camps. In that way, the political prisoners gained control of the prisoner population, to the extent that the camp commandant entered into a secret deal with them, under which the "reds" controlled everything that happened inside the camp, eg such things as the distribution of rations, the administration of punishments etc, while the camp staff merely guarded the perimeter.

So far as I know, that situation was unique to Buchenwald, and nothing like it happened at Auschwitz-Birkenau. I think it possible that after the war survivors of Auschwitz heard about the "battle of the reds against the greens" at Buchenwald, and made up stories about their having done the same thing themselves.

[little grey rabbit]

Interestingly, he wanted to murder 6 million Germans by dumping poison into water supplies of German cities, it was the so called A-1 plan. He got a few kilograms of some off the shelf organic poison from a chemistry lab in Israel.

But, using as example arsenic - and a gram of arsenic is needed to kill somebody with certainty , a quick calculation shows the plan would require 6 tons of it.
.

I think he used arsenic, which is an inorganic poison.
My guess is he likely used Lead Arsenate -which is a fairly common insecticide. Happily I can provide the forum with some personal experience with the use of lead arsenate as a poison, having applied to myself as a teenager.

My advice is: don't. It doesn't seem very soluble, so that despite trying to dissolve in a cup of of instant coffee most of it had to be swallowed as a sludge. As a sludge it sat in the stomach and still didn't dissolve where upon I vomited most of it up and was fit as a fiddle in the morning.

My guess is something similar happened to the unfortunate Avengers, that while they liberally coated the loaves with enough arsenic to fell an ox, it simply wasn't very soluble so that everyone just vomited it up.

My understanding there are newspaper reports of the incident at the time, so there is no doubt that amateur and incompetent though it was, it actually did happen.

[little grey rabbit]

[...]
So one possibility I suggested is that these are garrulous Israeli pensioners big noting themselves, the other I am suggesting that some of these deaths may have been reported as suicides. [...]

Or mentioned as deadly car accidents as there were many with former Nazis involved.

Anyway Bettina Stangneth clears up the mystery on page 154 as regards Eichmann

A death notice was printed in the Linz and Vienna papers in 1954 - allegedly from Reuters, London, that an SS Oberscharfuehrer Wolfgang Bauer had been killed in the Salzkammergut Mountains near Linz by a Jewish Death squad in 1946. It appeared in the Oberoesterrische Zeitung. On the Sassen tapes Eichmann claimed to have read about this while still in Germany in 1946, but according to the footnotes Stangneth wasn't able to locate any reports from this time.

Linz, the capital of our state Upper Austria, is not in the Salzkammergut-area nor is even the northern border of the Salzkammergut Mountains near the city Linz.
The newspapers name is rather "Oberösterreichische Zeitung (Upper Austrian Newspaper), sadly the newspaper archive of the Austrian National Library doesn´t provide files after 1944, at the moment.

I tend towards the view - expressed at the time (1954) - that this was a fake story to try and create the impression Eichmann was dead (incidentally this was a point in time - from about May 1953 - in which all the relevant intelligence agencies would have known that Adolf Eichmann was now living in Argentina and that he was working on a building a power station, see pages 127-133).
This was Valentin Tarra's view that "Nazi circles in London" had spread the information to end the search for Eichmann.

However, I don't believe there were Nazi circles in London, "Reuters, London" was probably just misdirection to give a source to a fake story. Reuters was just a wire service, so if Reuters, London was a genuine source, then
a). It ought to be in Reuters archives and
b). It ought to have been the result of them picking up a story from a London paper, which doesn't appear to exist.

Ironic that a story that probably never happened in the first place and designed to protect a Nazi in hiding, is then repeated decades later by Jewish veterans as reality.

Post by David Thompson » 21 Aug 2015, 22:50
little grey rabbit -- For some previous discussions of your question, see:

The Mysterious Fate of Gustav Wagner
viewtopic.php?f=38&t=206053

Ha! I didn't know we were allowed to raised the possibility that Gustav Wagner didn't insert a large kitchen knife in his own chest without being called a tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorist. Things must really be changing.

This is Gita Sereny describing the reaction of Stan Szmajzner to the news that Gustav Wagner was alive and in Brazel (Into That Darkness page 130)

Throughout our long conversation Stan Szmajzner was fair and tolerant. Indeed, I felt, almost too anxious to give credit where he could, to a man whose family "who had nothing to do with all this",[ie Stangl] and was also living in his chosen country. This was in sharp contrast to his attitude on hearing from me that Gustav WAgner was still alive and was probably in Brazil, information which I had from Stangl. On hearing this, Stan cried. "It is the wors, the most terrible shock you could have given me," he said. "That man. Here in Brazil. To think that I am now breathing the same air as he - it makes me feel terribly, terribly ill.....I would not know how to find words to describe to you what a terrible, a truly terrible man that is. Stangl - he is good by comparison, very good. But Wagner - he should be dead...." He begged me to find out where Wagner was, because, he kept on repeating, "I must do something." It took most of the day, off and on, to calm him and persuade him that vengeance ought not to be his.

Pour encourager les autres.

[wm]

Bad choice, that lead arsenate - fortunately. Basically it's not a poison although obviously is bad for health.
Much better and easily available was arsenic trioxide - still it needs weeks to dissolve in water properly.

They used arsenic (most likely arsenic trioxide, pure arsenic is rarely used for anything so was much harder to get) after they lost that organic poison.

At Buchenwald, the highly organised and disciplined mainly Communist political prisoners (the "reds", who wore a red triangle) gained control of the camp registry, and utilised that position to have the criminal prisoners (the "greens", who wore a green triangle) selected for execution or transfer to other more rigorous camps.

In Auschwitz the prisoners managed the camp registry too, but as in Buchenwald it was an insufficient advantage to win.
In both camps the main argument used against the ill-educated greens was that they were bad managers, their indolence and ineptitude were harmful to the war effort.

For example, in Auschwitz the battle against the Polish criminals in control of the camp hospital was run under the banner of eradicating the Polnische Wirtschaft there and was successful.

In the end both sides benefited - the prisoners and the SS-men. The latter because improved production rates sheltered them from the wrath of their superiors, and the Eastern Front.
The Germans managing concentration camps shouldn't be seen as easily manipulated idiots that didn't know, didn't understand - frequently they were intelligent men who knew what was happening quite well. But as it happened they wanted to replace the greens with the reds too.

[little grey rabbit]

[...]
So one possibility I suggested is that these are garrulous Israeli pensioners big noting themselves, the other I am suggesting that some of these deaths may have been reported as suicides. [...]

Or mentioned as deadly car accidents as there were many with former Nazis involved.

Anyway Bettina Stangneth clears up the mystery on page 154 as regards Eichmann

A death notice was printed in the Linz and Vienna papers in 1954 - allegedly from Reuters, London, that an SS Oberscharfuehrer Wolfgang Bauer had been killed in the Salzkammergut Mountains near Linz by a Jewish Death squad in 1946. It appeared in the Oberoesterrische Zeitung. On the Sassen tapes Eichmann claimed to have read about this while still in Germany in 1946, but according to the footnotes Stangneth wasn't able to locate any reports from this time.

Linz, the capital of our state Upper Austria, is not in the Salzkammergut-area nor is even the northern border of the Salzkammergut Mountains near the city Linz.
The newspapers name is rather "Oberösterreichische Zeitung (Upper Austrian Newspaper), sadly the newspaper archive of the Austrian National Library doesn´t provide files after 1944, at the moment.

I tend towards the view - expressed at the time (1954) - that this was a fake story to try and create the impression Eichmann was dead (incidentally this was a point in time - from about May 1953 - in which all the relevant intelligence agencies would have known that Adolf Eichmann was now living in Argentina and that he was working on a building a power station, see pages 127-133).
This was Valentin Tarra's view that "Nazi circles in London" had spread the information to end the search for Eichmann.

However, I don't believe there were Nazi circles in London, "Reuters, London" was probably just misdirection to give a source to a fake story. Reuters was just a wire service, so if Reuters, London was a genuine source, then
a). It ought to be in Reuters archives and
b). It ought to have been the result of them picking up a story from a London paper, which doesn't appear to exist.

Ironic that a story that probably never happened in the first place and designed to protect a Nazi in hiding, is then repeated decades later by Jewish veterans as reality.

Post by David Thompson » 21 Aug 2015, 22:50
little grey rabbit -- For some previous discussions of your question, see:

The Mysterious Fate of Gustav Wagner
viewtopic.php?f=38&t=206053

Ha! I didn't know we were allowed to raised the possibility that Gustav Wagner didn't insert a large kitchen knife in his own chest without being called a tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorist. Things must really be changing.

This is Gita Sereny describing the reaction of Stan Szmajzner to the news that Gustav Wagner was alive and in Brazel (Into That Darkness page 130)

Throughout our long conversation Stan Szmajzner was fair and tolerant. Indeed, I felt, almost too anxious to give credit where he could, to a man whose family "who had nothing to do with all this",[ie Stangl] and was also living in his chosen country. This was in sharp contrast to his attitude on hearing from me that Gustav WAgner was still alive and was probably in Brazil, information which I had from Stangl. On hearing this, Stan cried. "It is the wors, the most terrible shock you could have given me," he said. "That man. Here in Brazil. To think that I am now breathing the same air as he - it makes me feel terribly, terribly ill.....I would not know how to find words to describe to you what a terrible, a truly terrible man that is. Stangl - he is good by comparison, very good. But Wagner - he should be dead...." He begged me to find out where Wagner was, because, he kept on repeating, "I must do something." It took most of the day, off and on, to calm him and persuade him that vengeance ought not to be his.

Pour encourager les autres.[/quote]

[little grey rabbit]

[...]
So one possibility I suggested is that these are garrulous Israeli pensioners big noting themselves, the other I am suggesting that some of these deaths may have been reported as suicides. [...]

Or mentioned as deadly car accidents as there were many with former Nazis involved.

Anyway Bettina Stangneth clears up the mystery on page 154 as regards Eichmann

A death notice was printed in the Linz and Vienna papers in 1954 - allegedly from Reuters, London, that an SS Oberscharfuehrer Wolfgang Bauer had been killed in the Salzkammergut Mountains near Linz by a Jewish Death squad in 1946. It appeared in the Oberoesterrische Zeitung. On the Sassen tapes Eichmann claimed to have read about this while still in Germany in 1946, but according to the footnotes Stangneth wasn't able to locate any reports from this time.

Linz, the capital of our state Upper Austria, is not in the Salzkammergut-area nor is even the northern border of the Salzkammergut Mountains near the city Linz.
The newspapers name is rather "Oberösterreichische Zeitung (Upper Austrian Newspaper), sadly the newspaper archive of the Austrian National Library doesn´t provide files after 1944, at the moment.

I tend towards the view - expressed at the time (1954) - that this was a fake story to try and create the impression Eichmann was dead (incidentally this was a point in time - from about May 1953 - in which all the relevant intelligence agencies would have known that Adolf Eichmann was now living in Argentina and that he was working on a building a power station, see pages 127-133).
This was Valentin Tarra's view that "Nazi circles in London" had spread the information to end the search for Eichmann.

However, I don't believe there were Nazi circles in London, "Reuters, London" was probably just misdirection to give a source to a fake story. Reuters was just a wire service, so if Reuters, London was a genuine source, then
a). It ought to be in Reuters archives and
b). It ought to have been the result of them picking up a story from a London paper, which doesn't appear to exist.

Ironic that a story that probably never happened in the first place and designed to protect a Nazi in hiding, is then repeated decades later by Jewish veterans as reality.

Post by David Thompson » 21 Aug 2015, 22:50
little grey rabbit -- For some previous discussions of your question, see:

The Mysterious Fate of Gustav Wagner
viewtopic.php?f=38&t=206053{/quote]

Ha! I didn't know we were allowed to raised the possibility that Gustav Wagner didn't insert a large kitchen knife in his own chest without being called a tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorist. Things must really be changing.

This is Gita Sereny describing the reaction of Stan Szmajzner to the news that Gustav Wagner was alive and in Brazel (Into That Darkness page 130)

Throughout our long conversation Stan Szmajzner was fair and tolerant. Indeed, I felt, almost too anxious to give credit where he could, to a man whose family "who had nothing to do with all this",[ie Stangl] and was also living in his chosen country. This was in sharp contrast to his attitude on hearing from me that Gustav WAgner was still alive and was probably in Brazil, information which I had from Stangl. On hearing this, Stan cried. "It is the wors, the most terrible shock you could have given me," he said. "That man. Here in Brazil. To think that I am now breathing the same air as he - it makes me feel terribly, terribly ill.....I would not know how to find words to describe to you what a terrible, a truly terrible man that is. Stangl - he is good by comparison, very good. But Wagner - he should be dead...." He begged me to find out where Wagner was, because, he kept on repeating, "I must do something." It took most of the day, off and on, to calm him and persuade him that vengeance ought not to be his.

Pour encourager les autres.

[4thskorpion]

Then Polish cavalry officer Witold Pilecki's camp resistance organisation as it gained strength in numbers and influence gradually ousted the German "Kapos" out of these best "jobs" by one means or another and replaced them with his own Polish functionaries.

I have never read about something of that sort happening at Auschwitz-Birkenau.

I made no reference to Auschwitz II or III, my post mentioned only Pilecki and Stammlager I Auschwitz but you clipped that out from your quote.

I believe that the initial prisoners (Numbers 1 to 30) of Stammlager Auschwitz I were German criminals brought in from the Oranienburg concentration camp in May 1940 who became the first camp "Kapos" at Auschwitz I and hence controlled the best "postions or jobs" ie. those indoors, less arduous and with access to better food and conditions in the camp. Then Polish cavalry officer Witold Pilecki's camp resistance organisation as it gained strength in numbers and influence gradually ousted the German "Kapos" out of these best "jobs" by one means or another and replaced them with his own Polish functionaries.

For further information about the resistance movement at Auschwitz I would recommend reading: “Fighting Auschwitz: The Resistance Movement In The Concentration Camp" by Józef Garliński.

[little grey rabbit]

Actually - and purely in the realms of speculation - Mengele might have been the victim of a Jewish Death Squad. At least Israelis were clearly willing to bump him off in this manner

http://www.haaretz.com/weekend/week-s-e ... y-1.358777

"Mengele was executed by Israeli commandos," reported Haaretz in December 1973, citing news agency reports. "Unknown men, apparently Israelis, killed Mengele," it was reported several days later. Spokesmen for the Brazilian police were quoted by the country's news agencies as saying that three unknown men - who had infiltrated the home of the infamous Nazi doctor on the border between Brazil and Paraguay - beat him to death in front of his wife and children. The report ended as follows: "The search for the three men, who fled afterward, continues."

Shortly afterward, it turned out that this so-called "Mengele" was actually an old farmer of German descent who had nothing whatsoever to do with the "Angel of Death" from Auschwitz.

The newspaper article then gives what they say is the true story of the drowning of Mengele. It really depends how reliable you think the witness Liselotte Bossert is.
A drowning would be a fairly easy way to conceal a death and Bossert admits that the night before her husband and Mengele had a loud argument.

Bossert also told police about the circumstances surrounding Mengele's death in 1979. As they did every year, she and her family spent their vacation at the Bertioga beach in Brazil. A day earlier, Josef Mengele had arrived at their home, planning to stay with them for a few days. Late in the evening, after she and the children had gone to bed, her husband and Mengele stayed up and talked. At about 2 A.M., she was awakened by shouts coming from the living room. Her husband and Mengele were having a loud argument, and it was not clear why.

In spite of that, the family continued with its original plan, and the next day went on a morning hike to the forests and along the beach, in the company of Mengele. In the afternoon, they returned home and later went for a swim in the sea.

At about 5:30 P.M., the sea suddenly became stormy. Bossert got out of the water with her children. From a distance, she saw Mengele calling for help. Her husband quickly swam in his direction, in an attempt to rescue him. After considerable effort, he managed to pull Mengele out of the water, but almost drowned himself. Bossert's husband was evacuated by ambulance, and Bossert remained on the beach next to Mengele's body. She covered the body with her robe and called for help. At 11 P.M., an ambulance arrived and took Mengele to the morgue.

Because of a problem with her car, Bossert was forced to hitch a ride with the ambulance that was carrying Mengele. On the way to the morgue, she asked the driver to stop near her house so that she could change clothes. A heavy thunderstorm began shortly thereafter, causing a tree to fall on the road. The ambulance was delayed once again. His body arrived at the morgue only at 2 A.M.

The papers she presented to the authorities were forged and bore the name of Wolfgang Gerhard, the man who had first introduced her to Mengele. The doctor on duty did not examine the body, did not photograph it and did not take fingerprints. Bossert asked to have the body cremated, but was told that would be possible only with the permission of close relatives.

Her story seems rather odd in part - particularly her presenting forged papers to the authorities and wanting to have the body cremated - it may well be that she wasn't involved in the death of Mengele but had some unwilling knowledge of it and was giving her testimony under some kind of duress.

[BenjaminJ]

Depends on the time period. If it was right after the war ended, then yeah assassinating people wouldn't be that hard to do and get away with. (Though personally, killing SS members wouldn't be a war crime in my book).

[michael mills]

Depends on the time period. If it was right after the war ended, then yeah assassinating people wouldn't be that hard to do and get away with. (Though personally, killing SS members wouldn't be a war crime in my book).

Asher ben Natan stated quite openly that he and other members of the Jewish Brigade killed ordinary German civilians indiscriminately by running them over with the army trucks in which they were travelling.

Obviously there was no way of knowing whether the Germans killed had been members of the SS or not.

[4thskorpion]

Die Nazi-Mörder: Wie junge österreichische Juden NS-Verbrecher ermordeten ( 23. 5. 2009 )

Den Davidstern am Revers nehmen die Rächer vorher ab. Die aufgespürten NS-Schergen sollen glauben, es mit britischen Soldaten zu tun zu haben, die sie zum Verhör holen. Aber schon auf der Fahrt geben sich die Juden zu erkennen. Die meisten der gekidnappten Nazis hätten darauf mit tiefer Verzweiflung reagiert, erzählt Miller. In einem Wald nahe Tarvis wird Gericht gehalten: Ältere und erfahrenere Soldaten der jüdischen Brigade führen die Verhöre durch. Einige der SS- und Gestapo-Männer müssen selbst ihr Grab schaufeln, so wie es die Juden in den von den Deutschen besetzten Gebieten tun mussten.

Danach werden sie erschossen. Er sei bei etwa 20 Hinrichtungen dabei gewesen, sagt Miller und: Ja, auch er habe einmal einen Mann erschossen. „Niemand wurde dazu gezwungen. Es wurde beschlossen, und es wurde getan.“ Hatten die des Judenmords Verdächtigten eine realistische Chance, bei diesem „Gericht“ im Wald von Tarvis freigesprochen zu werden? Miller denkt lange nach: Ja, einmal sei ein Mann wieder freigelassen worden, erinnert er sich. Aber nur einmal.

Gletscherspalten. Manchmal sind die jüdischen Soldaten in britischen Uniformen auch nur touristisch in der alten Heimat unterwegs. Im Frühsommer 1945 fahren Miller und seine Freunde ins Großglocknergebiet. In einer Almhütte stoßen sie auf zwei Männer, die sich dort offenbar verbergen. Auf der Innenseite ihrer Oberarme tragen sie ihre Blutgruppe eintätowiert, 20 Zentimeter über dem Ellbogen, so wie es das SS-Regelwerk vorsah. Die beiden SS-Männer werden verhört und danach in eine tiefe Gletscherspalte geworfen. „Man hat nicht lange gefragt damals“, sagt Miller.

[michael mills]

I read through the whole article, and was left wondering how much of it was fictional.

One part of it described a group of German-speaking Jews who were in training to be dropped behind German lines in North Africa, dressed in German uniforms, for the purpose of carrying out sabotage operations. That reminded me very much of a movie in the 1960s, starring George Peppard, which portrayed exactly such an action. The only difference between that movie and what Miller described is that the action supposedly was called off after the British victory at Alamein.

One wonders whether Miller saw the movie and incorporated it into his exciting life story.

In the confused months after the German surrender, Allied authorities were experiencing quite a bit of difficulty in tracking down known war criminals, despite all the official resources at their disposal, with the result that a number of them were able to disappear and eventually escape. It beggars belief that a group of Jewish soldiers without those informational resources could have identified and caught genuine war criminals.

I thin the most likely historical reality is that soldiers of the Jewish Brigade stationed in Austria killed an unknown number of civilians at random, as was confirmed by Asher Ben Natan, and then made up stories that the people they had killed had actually been identified war criminals.

[4thskorpion]

I read through the whole article, and was left wondering how much of it was fictional.

One part of it described a group of German-speaking Jews who were in training to be dropped behind German lines in North Africa, dressed in German uniforms, for the purpose of carrying out sabotage operations. That reminded me very much of a movie in the 1960s, starring George Peppard, which portrayed exactly such an action. The only difference between that movie and what Miller described is that the action supposedly was called off after the British victory at Alamein.

One wonders whether Miller saw the movie and incorporated it into his exciting life story.

Although Jewish parachutists from Palestine were seemingly dropped into Europe so maybe there might be some element of truth to his North Africa story also.

[michael mills]

That was the famous Hannah Szenes mission. The 37 Jews from Palestine were parachuted into Yugoslavia in March 1944, to try to help Jews escape from Hungary.

They were all emigres from Europe, and were being sent back to their countries or origin, where they could blend in with the local people. They were not pretending to be German soldiers. Rather, they were trying to make contact with local resistance groups.

Their situation was quite different from that of the group that allegedly was being trained to be dropped behind German lines in North Africa disguised as German soldiers. Obviously they were not going to be sent into an area with which they were familiar, or be among friends. Their mission would depend on their being able to successfully pass themselves off as German soldiers in an alien environment, which was highly risky.

The Szenes mission was quite feasible, although it failed, whereas the mission that Miller claims he was being trained for was very unrealistic, and for that reason out doubt that he was telling a true story. In fact, his whole account rings of fantasy.

There are true elements in his story, such as his description of truckloads of Jewish survivors being smuggled into Italy by the Jewish Brigade. That in fact was the main clandestine activity of the Jewish Brigade in Europe, not hunting down war criminals in hiding. Bringing Jewish survivors to Palestine was the main aim of the Jewish authorities in the aftermath of the war, not seeking a fruitless revenge.

In any case, the Jewish settlers in Palestine had little sympathy for the European Jews who perished during the war. They considered that those Jews had brought their fate upon themselves by not emigrating to Palestine before the war, and also in not fighting back sufficiently when the Judeocide started.

[UMachine]

These squads went far and wide.

Toronto 1950.Two men with thick accents speaking English barge through the unlocked door of a recent Italian immigrant's room.

They have pistols drawn and have a photograph of a man in hand.They compare him to the photo and question him about the man in the photo.They have the same surname and are in fact first cousins.He denies any knowledge.

A similar event takes place in Kamloops British Columbia.The man is close to a foot taller and is also a cousin.After this event nothing more.