Eichmann in Jerusalem

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michael mills
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#16

Post by michael mills » 31 Jul 2003, 10:00

THIRD COUNT

Eichmann, together with others, caused grave harm to millions of Jews, physically and mentally, in Germany and other Axis countries and occupied areas, by means of enslavement, starvation, expulsion and persecution, confinement to ghettos, to transit camps and to concentration camps, including:

(1) Sudden mass arrests of innocent Jews and their torture in concentration camps, such as those at Dachau and Buchenwald;


Eichmann was in charge of Jewish emigration. He was not responsible for arresting Jews or putting them in concentration camps, and certainly not responsible for their treatment there.

(2) The organization of mass persecution by means of arrests, cruel beatings, the infliction of serious injury, and torture in concentration camps, of approximately 2,000 Jews of Germany and Austria on the night between the 9th and 10th November 1938;

It is doubtful that Eichmann was responsible for any of the above. At the time he was in charge of organising the accelerated emigration of Jews from Austria. He had no police or arrest authority.

(3) Organizing operations of social and economic boycott of the Jews and stigmatizing them as a subhuman racial group;

There is no indication that Eichmann was responsible for organisng the above operations. They were certainly not part of the responsibilities of his office, which were initially to organise the logistics of emigration, eg, setting up a system to carry out efficiently all legal and technical requirements, and then the logistics of deportation.

(4) Putting into practice the laws known as "The Nuremberg Laws" for the purpose of depriving millions of Jews in all those countries specified in the First Count of their human rights;

Eichmann was certainly not responsible for implementing the "Nuremberg Laws". That was the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice.

all with the intention of destroying the Jewish People.

Again, no indication that that was Eichmann's own intention. And again, the reference to millions of Jews is a gross exaggeration as far as Eichmann's personal responsibility is concerned.

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#17

Post by David Thompson » 31 Jul 2003, 10:20

The exchange of posts on the American justice system now has a thread of its own in The Lounge, at:

http://www.thirdreichforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=28184

My effort to split the posts led to this one being continued in "The Eichmann Indictment" at:

http://www.thirdreichforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=28185


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#18

Post by michael mills » 31 Jul 2003, 12:01

David,

Could you please transfer my last post on this thread, dealing with the third count of the Eichmann indictment, to the appropriate thread.

I posted it on this thread before I realised that a new separate thread had been created.

Thanks

Michael Mills

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#19

Post by demonio » 31 Jul 2003, 14:16

[quote="michael mills"]THIRD COUNT

Eichmann, together with others, caused grave harm to millions of Jews, physically and mentally, in Germany and other Axis countries and occupied areas, by means of enslavement, starvation, expulsion and persecution, confinement to ghettos, to transit camps and to concentration camps, including:

(1) Sudden mass arrests of innocent Jews and their torture in concentration camps, such as those at Dachau and Buchenwald;



Eichmann was in charge of Jewish emigration. He was not responsible for arresting Jews or putting them in concentration camps, and certainly not responsible for their treatment there.

Are you for real Michael ? He was most directly responsible for the sudden arrest/internment/transport to death camps/enslavement and death of the hungarian Jews. Why was he directly responsible ? Because he gave the order and co-ordinated it with the local government officials and police auxileries



(2) The organization of mass persecution by means of arrests, cruel beatings, the infliction of serious injury, and torture in concentration camps, of approximately 2,000 Jews of Germany and Austria on the night between the 9th and 10th November 1938;

It is doubtful that Eichmann was responsible for any of the above. At the time he was in charge of organising the accelerated emigration of Jews from Austria. He had no police or arrest authority.

Again. Are you serious ?

(3) Organizing operations of social and economic boycott of the Jews and stigmatizing them as a subhuman racial group;

There is no indication that Eichmann was responsible for organisng the above operations. They were certainly not part of the responsibilities of his office, which were initially to organise the logistics of emigration, eg, setting up a system to carry out efficiently all legal and technical requirements, and then the logistics of deportation.

I like this one. There is no indication. Therefore absolution. I bet if i look hard enough i can find something.

(4) Putting into practice the laws known as "The Nuremberg Laws" for the purpose of depriving millions of Jews in all those countries specified in the First Count of their human rights;

Eichmann was certainly not responsible for implementing the "Nuremberg Laws". That was the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice.

The prize here goes to Goering for implementation. Eichmann gets full credit for the "practise" of it

Again, no indication that that was Eichmann's own intention. And again, the reference to millions of Jews is a gross exaggeration as far as Eichmann's personal responsibility is concerned[

WTF ? You should read some of the Reichs' many documents and records that more than implicate this desk jockey.

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#20

Post by demonio » 31 Jul 2003, 14:30

What he objected to was the accusation of having been a prime mover in the decision to carry out mass-killing. His position was that the extermination decision had been taken by others without his input, and that thereby the program of deportations for which he had been responsible became part of an extermination process, which it had not originally been.
But he was one of the Prime Movers. The only persons that could be considered above him are Himmler Heydrich and Goering. He also was present and participated in the Wansee conference.
Last edited by demonio on 31 Jul 2003, 14:44, edited 2 times in total.

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#21

Post by demonio » 31 Jul 2003, 14:32

She wrote that Eichmann was tried and convicted not so much for what he himself had done, but for what had been done to the Jewish people. In other words, the trial was an indictment of the entire process of destruction that had been inflicted on the Jews, with Eichmann being made the symbol of that process and held responsible for it on the basis of some rather dodgy evidence.
How dodgy can the Reichs own documents be ?

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#22

Post by demonio » 31 Jul 2003, 14:34

10 points to Israel for snatching this murderous little bastard out of his comfort zone and making a spectacle of him

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#23

Post by budward » 31 Jul 2003, 16:56

My hope is that a view like that expressed immediately above is not fully considered. The view is nothing more than an affirmation that the ends justify the means, and could be equally applied from a palestinian perspective to persons currently or formerly in the Israeli gov't, from a Chechen perspective to current or former Russian officials, by governments supporting Islamic extremism to persons in the U.S. and elsewhere who seek to spread Christianity to muslim lands (e.g. sending bibles), and so on. If the method used to bring Eichmann to Israel is acceptable merely because Eichmann was an arch bad guy, then that same approach is legitimate for others to use to get their arch bad guys, who may happen at the same time to be our arch good guys.

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#24

Post by michael mills » 01 Aug 2003, 02:27

Demonio wrote:
Are you for real Michael ? He was most directly responsible for the sudden arrest/internment/transport to death camps/enslavement and death of the hungarian Jews. Why was he directly responsible ? Because he gave the order and co-ordinated it with the local government officials and police auxileries
Yes, I am for real. I simply have far more knowledge than you, Demonio. By that I mean real knowledge, based on the assimilation of analytical historical works drawing on documentary evidence, not sensationalist popular history.

You have referred to Eichmann's activities in Hungary. Well and good, let us deal with that issue.

You have referred to an order given by Eichmann for the deportation of Hungarian Jews. Can you cite it? Can you tell us the date on which it was issued?

The fact is that no serious historian knows for sure exactly when the deportation order was given, who gave it, and what the transmission channel was. But certainly the decision to deport the Hungarian Jews was taken at a far higher level than Eichmann, who according to documentary evidence was responsible only for the "technical implementation of the transports of Jews" (note of 2 August 1944 from Grell of the German Embassy in Budapest to the German Foreign Office).

The most recent book on the issue, Aly/Gerlach "Das letzte Kapitel", comes to the conclusion that the final decision to deport the Hungarian Jews was made around 20 April 1944, ie about one month after the German occupation of Hungary. They draw that conclusion not from documentary evidence of an order, which is lacking, but from circumstantial evidence of what was happening at the time. For example, on 19 April there was a German ministerial conference to discuss the economic exploitation of Hungary; according to the record of that conference, 500,000 Jews from Hungary were to be used for work in Germany. Since the total Jewish population of Hungary was 750,000, including Christians of Jewish origin classified as Jews under Hungarian law, that figure indicates, so Aly and Gerlach conclude, that the deportation to Germany of all Hungarian Jews was under active consideration at that date, if not already decided.

But note, Demonio, that that decision must have been made at the ministerial level, far above the position occupied by Eichmann.

It is also noteworthy that in the first week of April 1944, Ribbentrop was still suggesting to Hitler that the Jews of Hungary be handed over to Roosevelt and Churchill as a "present", indicating that the deportation decision had not yet been made (note Veesenmayer to Ribbentrop, 5 April 1944).

Let us have a look at the actual structure of the SS apparatus in Hungary, to which Eichmann belonged.

At its head was a Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF) appointed by Himmler, SS-Obergruppenfuehrer Otto Winkelmann, formerly head of the Ordnungspolizei in the Reich. All forces of the Waffen-SS, Ordnungspolizei, Sicherheitspolizei and SD in Hungary were subject to his command, as well as a number of special SS and police units. Winkelmann reported daily to the German plenipotentiary in Hungary, Edmund Veesenmayer, on the measures being undertaken against the Jews.

There was also an Einsatzgruppe G, headed by the Commander of the Security Police and SD in Hungary, SS-Standartenfuehrer Hans Geschke. This Einsatzgruppe had eight Einsatzkommandos, of which Eichmann's "Sondereinsatzkommando" was only one. Eichmann's unit was responsible for organising the technical aspects of the deportation, eg negotiating the supply of trains etc; the other Einsatzkommandos were stationed at various regional commands in Hungary. Aly and Gerlach say that Geshke's role in the anti-Jewish actions has not been fully investigated, but it must have been important.

Thus, Eichmann was well down in the police hierarchy, subject to Winkelmann and Geschke, both his superiors in rank. The main decisions were made by Veesenmayer and Winkelmann, who dealt with the Hungarian Government at a senior level. Eichmann liaised with senior Hungarian police officials on the techical aspects of the implementation of the deportations; it was however the Hungarian Gendarmerie, acting on the orders of their commanders, who carried out the operation of rounding up the Jews, storing them in brickworks, stuffing them into trains, and finally escorting the trains to Kassa (Kosice), where the transports were handed over to German escorts.

The actual facts make nonsense of your contention that Eichmann was subject only to Goering, Himmler and Heydrich. I suggest, Demonio, that you acquire a little real knowledge; you might then be able to make a useful contribution to the discussion.

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#25

Post by demonio » 01 Aug 2003, 03:09

michael mills wrote:Demonio wrote:
Are you for real Michael ? He was most directly responsible for the sudden arrest/internment/transport to death camps/enslavement and death of the hungarian Jews. Why was he directly responsible ? Because he gave the order and co-ordinated it with the local government officials and police auxileries
Yes, I am for real. I simply have far more knowledge than you, Demonio. By that I mean real knowledge, based on the assimilation of analytical historical works drawing on documentary evidence, not sensationalist popular history.

You have referred to Eichmann's activities in Hungary. Well and good, let us deal with that issue.

You have referred to an order given by Eichmann for the deportation of Hungarian Jews. Can you cite it? Can you tell us the date on which it was issued?

The fact is that no serious historian knows for sure exactly when the deportation order was given, who gave it, and what the transmission channel was. But certainly the decision to deport the Hungarian Jews was taken at a far higher level than Eichmann, who according to documentary evidence was responsible only for the "technical implementation of the transports of Jews" (note of 2 August 1944 from Grell of the German Embassy in Budapest to the German Foreign Office).

The most recent book on the issue, Aly/Gerlach "Das letzte Kapitel", comes to the conclusion that the final decision to deport the Hungarian Jews was made around 20 April 1944, ie about one month after the German occupation of Hungary. They draw that conclusion not from documentary evidence of an order, which is lacking, but from circumstantial evidence of what was happening at the time. For example, on 19 April there was a German ministerial conference to discuss the economic exploitation of Hungary; according to the record of that conference, 500,000 Jews from Hungary were to be used for work in Germany. Since the total Jewish population of Hungary was 750,000, including Christians of Jewish origin classified as Jews under Hungarian law, that figure indicates, so Aly and Gerlach conclude, that the deportation to Germany of all Hungarian Jews was under active consideration at that date, if not already decided.

But note, Demonio, that that decision must have been made at the ministerial level, far above the position occupied by Eichmann.

It is also noteworthy that in the first week of April 1944, Ribbentrop was still suggesting to Hitler that the Jews of Hungary be handed over to Roosevelt and Churchill as a "present", indicating that the deportation decision had not yet been made (note Veesenmayer to Ribbentrop, 5 April 1944).

Let us have a look at the actual structure of the SS apparatus in Hungary, to which Eichmann belonged.

At its head was a Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF) appointed by Himmler, SS-Obergruppenfuehrer Otto Winkelmann, formerly head of the Ordnungspolizei in the Reich. All forces of the Waffen-SS, Ordnungspolizei, Sicherheitspolizei and SD in Hungary were subject to his command, as well as a number of special SS and police units. Winkelmann reported daily to the German plenipotentiary in Hungary, Edmund Veesenmayer, on the measures being undertaken against the Jews.

There was also an Einsatzgruppe G, headed by the Commander of the Security Police and SD in Hungary, SS-Standartenfuehrer Hans Geschke. This Einsatzgruppe had eight Einsatzkommandos, of which Eichmann's "Sondereinsatzkommando" was only one. Eichmann's unit was responsible for organising the technical aspects of the deportation, eg negotiating the supply of trains etc; the other Einsatzkommandos were stationed at various regional commands in Hungary. Aly and Gerlach say that Geshke's role in the anti-Jewish actions has not been fully investigated, but it must have been important.

Thus, Eichmann was well down in the police hierarchy, subject to Winkelmann and Geschke, both his superiors in rank. The main decisions were made by Veesenmayer and Winkelmann, who dealt with the Hungarian Government at a senior level. Eichmann liaised with senior Hungarian police officials on the techical aspects of the implementation of the deportations; it was however the Hungarian Gendarmerie, acting on the orders of their commanders, who carried out the operation of rounding up the Jews, storing them in brickworks, stuffing them into trains, and finally escorting the trains to Kassa (Kosice), where the transports were handed over to German escorts.

The actual facts make nonsense of your contention that Eichmann was subject only to Goering, Himmler and Heydrich. I suggest, Demonio, that you acquire a little real knowledge; you might then be able to make a useful contribution to the discussion.
There is no need to get upset Michael. These are basic truths. Incidently, Who else do you think Eichmann answered to other than Goering, Himmler and Heydrich. I dont think there would be many, if at all any.

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#26

Post by michael mills » 01 Aug 2003, 05:11

Demonio wrote:
There is no need to get upset Michael. These are basic truths. Incidently, Who else do you think Eichmann answered to other than Goering, Himmler and Heydrich. I dont think there would be many, if at all any.
What do you mean by "basic truths"? Something that you believe that does not have to be proved by hard evidence?

And as for who Eichmann answered to, I have given you the answer in regard to Hungary; first to Geschke, who answered to Winkelmann, who answered to Himmler.

When Eichmann was back in Berlin, in his office IV B 4, he answered to Heinrich Mueller, the head of Amt IV of the RSHA. Mueller in turn answered to the head of the RSHA, Heydrich, who in turn answered to Himmler (in so far as Heydrich answered to anyone). From the beginning of 1943, Mueller answered to Kaltenbrunner.

Eichmann had an important executive role in relation to the technical organisation of deportations, not only of Jews. However, that was the limit of his responsibility. Others determined who was to be deported, where to, and what was to be done with them. Once that decision was made, Eichmann organised the trains; in the course of that activity he carried on close liaison with the authorities performing the round-up of the deportees to ensure that the number and scheduling of the deportation trains was efficiently co-ordinated with the rounding-up process. That is a very long way from the role of "executor of the Final Solution" that was promulgated by his Israeli prosecutors.

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#27

Post by chalutzim » 01 Aug 2003, 16:57

michael mills wrote: (...) That is a very long way from the role of "executor of the Final Solution" that was promulgated by his Israeli prosecutors.
Indeed! As the "Hungarian Operation" demonstrated, it's a very very long way... :roll:

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Eichmann.

#28

Post by PHILDHB » 04 Aug 2003, 04:51

This subject sure dug up a hornets nest! In :`Hitler and the final solution` Gerald Fleming paints a somewhat different picture of Eichmanns involvment. His TECHNICAL job AFTER the implementation of the final solution may have been to direct the the transport of Jews from the European countries, but he shows that it is clear that he played a large part in the of the planning and preparation phase. Under Heydrichs direct supervision Eichmann was sent twice to the east, first in late summer 1941 to Lublin to `survey in that area the practical side of the preliminaries to the final solution that would be implemented there under the supervision of Lublin SS and police leader Odilo Globocnic`. Not much later before the end of 1941 Heydrich again sent Eichmann out, this time for an extermination camp report. At Chelmno Eichmann witnessed the gassing of a convoy of Jews and again reported back to Heydrich.
Under General Heydrich, Eichmann was directly responsible for the organising and running of the Wannsee conference on Jan 20 1942. Heydrich directing that all `questions and problems stemming from the conference were to go through Colonel Eichmann` This with Eichmanns superior `Gestapo`Müller in the same room. Eichmann was directed by Reichsführer Himmler himself, through Heydrich to visit the concentration camp at Auschwitz to arrange with commandant Höss the details of the final implementation of the final solution of the Jewish problem including timetables and the technicalities of the killing process itself.
Between June 1942, when Heydrich died and Jan 1943 when Kaltenbrunner was named successor evidence shows that Eichmann was directly responsible to Himmler alone in matters regarding the final solution, and the scope and range of his independant activities and responsibilities were greatly enlarged. His superior Müller did not apparently have any problem with this, apparently seeing this as Eichmanns area of expertise. It would seem to me that after playing a lage part in the planning of the Final Solution his final contribution would be the deporting of the victims to their ends. The ends that he played a large part in preparing.

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#29

Post by demonio » 04 Aug 2003, 08:23

Like i said, well done Israel. On that visit to Auschwitz you mentioned he stood there with Hoess and determined that the North West corner of Birkenau was the most suitable place for the extermination apparatus.

And i'll say it again that he he he, as in Adolph Eichmann co-ordinated not just the trains for the deportation of Hungarian Jews, but also the police involvement and local militia's in the ghetto round ups. He also exerted much pressure on the Hungarian Government to stop holding up the Nazi's murder plans by stalling the deportations. He eventually got his way
Last edited by demonio on 04 Aug 2003, 15:03, edited 1 time in total.

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#30

Post by michael mills » 04 Aug 2003, 09:23

PHILDHB wrote:


In :`Hitler and the final solution` Gerald Fleming paints a somewhat different picture of Eichmanns involvment.
Fleming's account is quite tendentious, and based on uncritical acceptance of claims made about Eichmann by others, especially Hoess, in an effort to exculpate themselves.

From Eichmann's own evidence, we know that he was sent by Mueller to the Lublin District to find out what Globocnik was up to (since Globocnik, as SSPF Lublin, and also as the special plenipotentiary for building SS settlements in the occupied territories, was responsible directly to Himmler, not to heydrich or Mueller).

Eichmann's account is rather garbled, and shows that he had very little precise knowledge of what was happening in the Generalgouvernement. For example, he said that Globocnik was using anti-tank ditches for destroying Jews; that was more a methodology used in the mass-shootings on occupied Soviet territory. According to Eichmann's account given to Sassen (before his capture), he visited a camp in the early stages of construction; it is thought to be Belzec. But there is no evidence of Eichmann having any planning or decision-making role in relation to the camps run by Globocnik.

Mueller also sent him to observe the killing process at Chelmno. But we know for certain from documentary evidence that Chelmno was a local initiative by Greiser, Reichsstatthalter for Reichsgau Wartheland, which he arranged directly with Himmler, and that it was run out of the Sipo office in Posen.

Finally, Mueller sent Eichmann to witness executions in occupied Soviet territory. But on all those visits, Eichmann's role was one of information-gathering, finding out for Mueller what was being done by various branches of the Ss that were not under his jurisdiction. There is no indication of any planning role by Eichmann in any of those activities. The most that can be said is that Eichmann was well aware of the mass-killing that was going on in occupied Poland and the Soviet Union.

If there is some hard evidence of Eichmann's invovlement in planning and decision-making outside his own area of expertise, ie the deportation trains, then please post it.

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