Einsatzgruppen Reports

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Brannik
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Einsatzgruppen Reports

#1

Post by Brannik » 26 Oct 2002, 22:30

I am reading a collection of documents entitled "The Einsatzgruppen Reports".In many of them,the writer of the report states that extensive anti-jewish actions are carried by the local population.Any thoughts on the validity of these statements?
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witness
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#2

Post by witness » 27 Oct 2002, 00:29

At the outset of the war in the East,about four million Jews lived in the western areas of the Soviet Union: 5000 in Estonia,95000 in Latvia,
225000 in Lithuania,1350000 in eastern Poland,1908000 in Byelorussia and the Ukraine ,300000 in Bessarabia and 50000 in Crimea .Of these four million,about 1500000 were evacuated or escaped eastward in the first confused weeks after Barbarossa,leaving perhaps 2500000 to face the German onslaught.These were the millions Himmler would have to murder to carry out Hitler's order to exterminate the Europian Jews.
In Latvia, aSonderkommando of "natives "to do what an Eithantzgruppe
functionary in Riga called the "dirty work "was already functioning when Himmler ordered auxilary police units organized at the end of July 1941.
A thirty one year old ,blue-eyed Latvinian named Victor Araj led the Araj commando.Araj was an oPportunist with police training and a Soviet diploma in law who had represented himself in Einsatzgruppe A commander Stachleker as an anti-Soviet partisan when Stachleker arrived in Riga on 1 July 1941. The next day Stahlecker appointed Araj to
organize and command an auxiliary.
Araj recruited police ,soldiers and university fraternity buddies into Sondercommando of about three hundred men under the direct supervision and close control of SS-Sturmbannfuhrer Rudolf Lange, who served under Stahleker as SD tactical coordinator In Latvia.
The Araj commando spent the summer and fall of 1941 murdering Jews.
Twice a week they shot Jewish men into killing pits in Bikernieki Forest,
four miles from northwest of the center of Riga ,executing about four thousand Jews and a thousand Communists in Bekernieki between July and September 1941.
Latvian historian Andrew Ezegailis describes the commando's routine
"The operations would start in darkness ,int the very early hours of the morning.The commando members would need to leave their homes as early as 1 a.m. and depart from [commando headquarters] about 3 a.m.
If the number of victims was, let us say ,two hundred,the operation was finished by breakfast time.On other occasions they worked untill noon and beyond. At the end of the operation, and sometimes during it,schnapps and zakuski [appetizers] were delivered .The members doing the shooting were always rewarded with alcohol in Bikernieki, but those standing watch or in the gauntlet had to wait until they returned to headquaters."
Responing to the expanded killing orders in late July 1941 , themen of the Araj commandobegan boarding blue Swedish-made Riga city buses and riding out into the countyside to render one Latvian town after another
Judenfrei ,murdering not only men now but also women and children,
....
Ezergailis estimates that Stahlecker 's forces murdered more than twenty-three thousand provincial Jews ." In addition to Jews", he adds
"the blue-bus visits also included the execution of the mentally ill "
"Masters of Death" Richard Rhodes.

I think this is very well documented and could be considered as absolutely valid.
Regards.


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witness
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#3

Post by witness » 27 Oct 2002, 00:30

There are many other very well documented accounts like this one.

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Brannik
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#4

Post by Brannik » 27 Oct 2002, 00:45

Thank you for your time.
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Dan
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#5

Post by Dan » 27 Oct 2002, 01:05

A "blue eyed Latvian" and "Hitler's order to kill European Jews".

What was the purpose of pointing out the color of the eyes of the Latvian? Aren't blue eyes very common in Latvia? Is this not Pavlovian conditioning, blue eyes being equated with Aryan/Nazi?

And has he found Hitler's order? I believe there is still a substantial reward for anyone who can provide this.

I have a problem with embellished reports. While I have no doubt that huge numbers of Slavs, Jews and others (in that order) were murdered by the Nazi government, the truth is bad enough without sensationalism, or silliness, or whatever inspired the author to gratuitously add these details.

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#6

Post by witness » 27 Oct 2002, 01:37

Dan wrote:A "blue eyed Latvian" and "Hitler's order to kill European Jews".

What was the purpose of pointing out the color of the eyes of the Latvian? Aren't blue eyes very common in Latvia? Is this not Pavlovian conditioning, blue eyes being equated with Aryan/Nazi?
I don't know why the author deemed it necessary to indicate the colour of the eyes.But it seems quite unessential to me.
The main thing is how many innocent human lives were wasted.

And has he found Hitler's order? I believe there is still a substantial reward for anyone who can provide this
It is quite logical to assume that Hitler would not want to leave such an order in written.
The extermination operations were carried out clandestinely because of thevariety of reasons.Probably Hiltler didn't want his name to be tainted
by blood too much. Who knows...
I agree with you that also huge number of the Slavs were exterminated.

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#7

Post by witness » 30 Oct 2002, 17:18

From another thread :
There is no such thing as good and evil.
This is an extract from the testimony of Obersturmfuhrer August Hafner
( Blober's Sonderkommando ) about the massacre of the children at
Belaja Cerkov.
I went out to the woods alone.The Wehrmacht had already dug a grave. The children were brought along in a tractor [-drawn wagon ]. I
had nothing to do with this technical procedure .The Ukrainians were standing round trembling. The children were taken down from the tractor.
They were lined up along the top of the grave and shot so they fell into it.
The Ukrainians did not aim at any particular part of the body.They fell into the grave.The wailing was undescribable.I shall never forget the scene throughout my life.I find it very hard to bear.I particularly remember a small fair-haired girl who took me by the hand.She was shot later..
The grave was near some woods.It was not near the firing range ,The execution must have taken place in the afternoon at about three-thirty or
four...Many children were hit four or five times before they died.

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