Nazi rape dogs

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

Hi Rabbit:

Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe that Max Taubner was sentenced for taking pictures of those that he murdered or ordered murdered and then showing these pictures to others, no?

Apologies for my previous "answer". I've not seen the verdict [although it appears that someone from codoh might have uploaded it somewhere a few months ago], but from Klee's quoting of it and the other docs online, I understand that he was convicted for the unauthorised shootings under:

Military Penal Code 147
Those culpably failing in the duties of supervising their subordinates or deliberately failing to report or punish penal offences committed by their subordinates will be punished with a sentence of up to six months' imprisonment. Officers will be dismissed.

And was convicted for the sadistic atrocities under:

Wartime Regulations for Criminal Procedures no. 5
Whoever openly challenges or incites others to refuse to fulfill their duty to serve in the German armed forces or their allies, or otherwise openly tries to self-assertively put up a fight to cripple or subvert the will of the German people or their allies ... will be sentenced to death for undermining the military.

He got 5 years for each [= 10]

But Himmler commuted the sentence for the unauthorised killings, leaving Tauber with just a five year sentence and was thrown out of the SS.

Because the SS court convicted him for the unauthorised killings, the West Germans couldn't try him again.

[David Thompson]

The topic is "Nazi rape dogs." Please stay on it.

[Gorque]

Hi David:

I just want to clarify Taubner's sentence and then will return to the subject.

Hi Rabbit:

I did some research on Taubner's verdict and found this. Per Klee, Dressen & Riess, The Good Old Days Taubner received 5 years for degenerate behaviour of the work platoon and for personal conduct in Alexandriya, 3 years for the taking of tasteless and shameless pictures, 2 years for the unlawful killing, i.e. manslaughter, of the commander of the Ukrainian militia, Chamrai, and 6 months for incitement by an SS officer to abortion. (pp 203-4)

[Sergey Romanov]

The point hinges on who knew about the alleged actions.

The paucity of testimonies shows that it would have been a very small circle connected to the women working in the Außenkommandos.

The higher-ups wouldn't have known (probably), hence no intervention.

---

To be clear on my current stance: it certainly has not been proven beyond reasonable doubt. For me it's somewhere on the border of preponderance of evidence. I find the Chile 1st hand testimonies hard to dismiss. Which in turn makes an occurrence elsewhere more plausible.

[The Black Rabbit of Inlé]

These two survivors [Limanowska & Lengyel], and likely the others mentioned in this thread, never met each other or ever read each other's testimony. They certainly did not conspire together or copied from each other a fairy tale of Nazi rape dogs.

Both women were in Paris during the late spring and early summer of 1945, as were many other Auschwitz survivors who were organising and forming survivor groups.

Lengyel left Lublin for Paris in late March 1945 travelling via Odessa [163-166]. The British agent who helped Lengyel escape Soviet territory wrote a report dated 26 March 1945, based largely on what Lengyel had told him of Auschwitz, and there ain't no dog stories in it.

Limanowska was liberated from Malchow in April 1945 and made her way to Paris. She was in Italy by July and would be in Palestine by October.

[Yuli]

The British agent who helped Lengyel escape Soviet territory wrote a report dated 26 March 1945, based largely on what Lengyel had told him of Auschwitz, and there ain't no dog stories in it.

Black Rabbit, can we have access to this report of the British agent? Is it as comprehensive as Lengyel's book? Even in the book the dog rape story occupies just a few lines.

A report on Auschwitz-Birkenau without dog stories must be very thin. SS Dogs played dominant roles in camp life (and death).

[Yuli]

Black rabbit wrote: It has to be said; these dog stories sound influenced by writings such as Baba Mezi'a 71a, Yebamoth 59b, Sotah 26b, or Shulchan Aruch, Even Haezer 22:18.

It is really interesting that dog bestiallity is discussed already in third century Jewish writings. Do you suggest that 23 years old Limanowska was a Talmud scholar?
And what would be the source of the Chilean testimonies?

[Yuli]

The Black Rabbit of Inlé wrote:
SS camp guards swore an oath not to subject prisoners to "physical abuse", which would include the dog-thing you've clearly been googling so much
Commandants broke the rule for their own benefit, some paying for it with their lives: Koch, Goeth, but they wouldn't have tolerated their subordinates committing such serious offences as the one claimed, not when they were the ones answerable to Himmler for what occurs in their camp.

So it was only camp commandants who tortured prisoners (for their own benefit, while risking their own lives). Simple SS guards dared not. They only played punitive games and sports with the prisoners.

[wm]

It's interesting that those guards had to swear an oath and sign a Declaration of Honor, this must be a first in the history of prisons. Prison guards generally don't have to swear oaths like that as far as know.
I wonder what problem(s) did they try to solve by doing that?
It's true that at some point of time wanton cruelty and wanton killings were forbidden, but they still happened only it was done more discretely - according to former prisoners.
And non-wanton cruelty and non-wanton killings, as for failing to carry out an order, never were forbidden.

Bestiality actually was discussed in Talmud, that shows those people understood our world quite well, they really should be commended for that.
Of course young Jewish girls in the USSR had no knowledge of Talmud, 20 year long Soviet war on religion made sure nobody knew anything about it.
Even in the more free Poland young Jews didn't know much, although religion was the main subject in their schools, but as it was an exceedingly boring subject, the (rather rudimentary) knowledge was literally beaten into them with the stick, they tended to forget everything quickly.

[Sid Guttridge]

Hi wm,

You write, "Of course young Jewish girls in the USSR had no knowledge of Talmud, 20 year long Soviet war on religion made sure nobody knew anything about it."

That seems very unlikely. While the USSR suppressed religion, the Russian Orthodox Church managed to accommodate it to the new regime, albeit uncomfortably.

Nor does it seem likely that Jewish religious traditions were no longer passed down inside what was a fairly closed community.

Cheers,

Sid.

[wm]

The Russian Orthodox Church can be classified as so called organized religion - formally established,
with a hierarchical leadership structure, and tens of millions of followers.

Unfortunately the Jewish religion was at best a disorganized religion - entirely based on local leaders, with nothing above them - one per village/town. Frequently there were serious doctrinal differences between them - to the point of fist fights between their followers.

It was sufficient to remove/kill those leaders to practically suppress it.
The same happened after the Soviet invasion of Poland in their occupation zone, and in the Warsaw Ghetto. Against determined, knowledgeable enemy the Jewish religion had limited staying powers.

[Sergey Romanov]

Not only practicing any religion was discouraged, who says that even an average religious Jew would know about such passages?

[Yuli]

This is a bit of track, but still,

wm wrote:
Even in the more free Poland young Jews didn't know much, although religion was the main subject in their schools, but as it was an exceedingly boring subject, the (rather rudimentary) knowledge was literally beaten into them with the stick, they tended to forget everything quickly.

In free Poland in pre-WW2 years, only 20% of Jewish kids were educated in Jewish schools. The remaining 80% were educated in Polish public and private schools. For example, in 1935/34, according to Polish government statistics, there were 425,566 Jewish kids in primary schools. Only 81,895 (19%) of them were enrolled in Jewish schools. This percentage increased somewhat towards the war because of the rise in antisemitism and new restrictions imposed on Jews.

Many of the Jewish schools were oriented to socialism and Zionism, and religion was not the major topic. The pupils studied Polish history, geography and language, in addition to Jewish subjects that were taught in Yiddish or Hebrew.

Only a small percentage of kids were educated in unofficial “cheders” of ultraorthodox Jews. As to the use of sticks in these "cheders", I doubt this was a commonly used pedagogic tool.

[wm]

We shouldn't fool themselves with likes of "Fiddler on the Roof" and memoirs written fifty years after. It was a brutal life and the people were brutal too. Corporal punishment was everywhere (well even in the UK they banned corporal punishment in 1999!), among the Poles and among the Jews. In schools, in the workplace. The more people were poor the more corporal punishment they used.
Of course I suppose in the real, enlighten schools run by Tarbut the punishment was more symbolic than real but who knows. I many Polish schools it wasn't that symbolic.
I've seen statements in the Ringelblum Archive like: our rebbe was exceptional, he didn't even have to beat his children - and those were from the better, Western parts of Poland. Polish sources, written right then, tell similar stories, the rod was used and not sparingly.

Of course your numbers are correct but the question is was it possible for a young Jew to be aware of some obscure Talmud passages. But even in cheddars they only taught the Torah and rudimentary Talmud. Advanced Talmud requires many years to master.

btw, they weren't any restrictions on Jews in primary schools. Education was mandatory, if you didn't attend a policeman would come and make you, maybe even using "corporal means" if necessary.