Between Giants (23 page)
Authors: Prit Buttar
Tags: #Between Giants: The Battle for the Baltics in World War II
When the Wehrmacht crossed the border into Latvia, Stahlecker and his
Einsatzgruppe
were close behind. In Riga, Stahlecker once more found it surprisingly difficult to initiate a ‘self-cleansing’ anti-Jewish pogrom. He blamed this on the effectiveness of Soviet attempts to exterminate the non-communist Latvian leadership, but nevertheless stated in his report:
It was possible though through similar influences on the Latvian auxiliary to set in motion a pogrom against Jews also in Riga. During this pogrom all synagogues were destroyed and about 400 Jews were killed. As the population of Riga quieted down quickly, further pogroms were not convenient.
So far as possible, both in Kowno and in Riga evidence by film and photo was established that the first spontaneous executions of Jews and Communists were carried out by Lithuanians and Latvians.
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Other German reports also spoke of large-scale killings of Jews by locals, for example in the town of Jelgava, where 1,550 Jews were allegedly killed by Latvians; the truth was that on this occasion, the killings were carried out by
Einsatzgruppe A
.
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The port of Liepāja had a significant pro-communist community, and partly as a result of this the town put up fierce resistance to the Wehrmacht. It proved difficult to establish a pro-German local police force, or even a suitable militia that could help with executions; consequently, the shootings of Jews and communists in the town on 29 June and 3 July were carried out by
Einsatzkommando 2
.
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Stahlecker states in his report that it was anticipated that even where it was possible to instigate local actions, these initial pogroms would not of themselves be sufficient to eliminate all Jews from the Baltic States. His report details the events of autumn 1941 in chilling detail:
In accordance with the basic orders received, however, the cleansing activities of the Security Police had to aim at a complete annihilation of the Jews. Special detachments reinforced by selected units – in Lithuania partisan detachments, in Latvia units of the Latvian auxiliary police – therefore performed extensive executions both in the towns and in rural areas.
The actions of the execution detachments were performed smoothly. When attaching Lithuanian and Latvian detachments to the execution squads, men were chosen whose relatives had been murdered or removed by the Russians.
Especially severe and extensive measures became necessary in Lithuania. In some places – especially in Kaunas – the Jews had armed themselves and participated actively in
franc-tireur
war and committed arson. Besides these activities the Jews in Lithuania had collaborated most actively hand in glove with the Soviets.
The sum total of the Jews liquidated in Lithuania amounts to 71,105.
During the pogroms in Kaunas 3,800 Jews were eliminated, in the smaller towns about 1,200 Jews.
In Latvia as well the Jews participated in acts of sabotage and arson after the invasion of the German Armed Forces. In Daugavpils so many fires were lighted by the Jews that a large part of the town was lost. The electric power station burnt down to a mere shell. The streets which were mainly inhabited by Jews remained unscathed.
In Latvia up to now 30,000 Jews were executed in all. 500 were made harmless by pogroms in Riga.
Most of the 4,500 Jews living in Estonia at the beginning of the Eastern Campaign fled with the retreating Red Army. About 200 stayed behind. In Tallinn alone there lived about 1,000 Jews. The arrest of all male Jews of over 16 years of age has been nearly finished. With the exception of the doctors and the Elders of the Jews who were appointed by the Special Commandos, they were executed by the Self-Protection Units under the control of the Special Detachment 1a. Jewesses in Pärnu and Tallinn of the age groups from 16 to 60 who are fit for work were arrested and put to peat-cutting or other labour.
At present a camp is being constructed in Harku, in which all Estonian Jews are to be assembled, so that Estonia will be free of Jews within a short while.
After the carrying out of the first larger executions in Lithuania and Latvia it became soon apparent that an annihilation of the Jews without leaving any traces could not be carried out, at least not at the present moment. Since a large part of the trades in Lithuania and Latvia are in Jewish hands and others carried on nearly exclusively by Jews (especially those of glaziers, plumbers, stovemakers, cobblers) many Jewish partisans are indispensable at present for repairing installations of vital importance for the reconstruction of towns destroyed and for work of military importance. Although the employers aim at replacing Jewish labour with Lithuanian or Latvian labour, it is not yet possible to displace all employed Jews especially not in the larger towns. In co-operation with the labour exchange offices, however, all Jews who are no longer fit for work are being arrested and shall be executed in small batches.
In this connection it may be mentioned that some authorities at the Civil Administration offered resistance, at times even a strong one, against the carrying out of larger executions. This resistance was answered by calling attention to the fact that it was a matter of carrying out basic orders.
Apart from organising and carrying out measures of execution, the creation of ghettos was begun in the larger towns at once during the first days of operations. This was especially urgent in Kaunas because there were 30,000 Jews in a total population of 152,400.
… In Riga the so-called ‘Moscow suburb’ was designated as a ghetto. This is the worst dwelling district of Riga, already now mostly inhabited by Jews. The transfer of the Jews into the ghetto-district proved rather difficult because the Latvians dwelling in that district had to be evacuated and residential space in Riga is very crowded, 24,000 of the 28,000 Jews living in Riga have been transferred into the ghetto so far. In creating the ghetto, the Security Police restricted themselves to mere policing duties, while the establishment and administration of the ghetto as well as the regulation of the food supply for the inmates of the ghetto were left to Civil Administration; the Labour Offices were left in charge of Jewish labour.
In the other towns with a larger Jewish population ghettos shall be established likewise.
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In November 1941, Hitler issued orders that the Jews in ghettos and camps in Germany and west and central Europe should be removed to the east. At first, they were taken to Minsk, but when the city reached an unacceptable level of crowding, trains were diverted to Riga. It was partially in response to this requirement that there was an escalation in killings in Riga, but as has been discussed, some of those brought to the Baltic States from elsewhere were simply shot on arrival, as there was nowhere for them to go. 30,000 of the inhabitants of the Riga ghetto were killed on 30 November and 8 December 1941, mainly in the Rumbula Forest near Riga.
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A small proportion of those killed in these shootings were German Jews, newly arrived from the west. The small number of surviving Latvian Jews was confined to a part of the ghetto that became known as the ‘small ghetto’, while the rest of the area was filled with Jews from elsewhere in Europe, and was called the ‘German ghetto’.
Unterscharführer Eduard Roschmann, a native of Vienna, was a member of the SD team in Riga from the start of the German occupation, and was heavily involved in the killings in and near the town. In March 1942, he was one of those who selected about 3,700 ghetto inmates for transfer to a work camp at the Daugava estuary, outside Riga. There was no such work camp, and all of those selected were shot in nearby woodland. In January 1943, he replaced Kurt Krause as commandant of the Riga ghetto. Krause had established a reputation for unpredictable sadism, switching from polite conversation to sudden violence without warning. He shot many inmates himself for small or imagined infringements, including on occasion executing children in front of their parents.
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Krause was moved to take command of the concentration camp at Salaspils, about 12 miles from Riga. Roschmann proved to be less unpredictable, and though he was involved in several killings, many of the inmates felt a sense of relief at his appointment.
In summer 1943, a new concentration camp was established at Mežaparks on the edge of Riga, known as Kaiserwald to the Germans. Most of the Riga inmates who were fit for work were transferred here, while the ghetto itself was gradually run down. Most of those left were transferred to Auschwitz, where they perished. The inmates of Kaiserwald were used as forced labour, and were either executed or transferred to Stutthof before the arrival of the Red Army.
Compared to Lithuania and Latvia, Estonia had only a small Jewish population, of less than 4,000. These people also had the advantage that it took the Germans far longer to reach Estonia than the other two Baltic States, and consequently about 75 per cent were able to escape to the Soviet Union prior to the arrival of the Wehrmacht. Shootings of those who remained began immediately after the arrival of
Einsatzkommando 1A
. Those who survived arrest were mostly taken to a newly established concentration camp near Tartu, where they were executed. It is estimated that fewer than a dozen Estonian Jews survived the war. The Vaivara concentration camp was the largest of a complex of 22 camps created in Estonia, and was used mainly to process Jews from other countries, particularly Latvia and Lithuania, after the ‘liquidation’ of the ghettos established earlier in the war. One of the main workplaces for inmates of the sites was the IG-Farben oil shale works. It is estimated that only about 15 of the camp personnel were Germans; the rest were either Estonians or Russian volunteers.
The attempt to exterminate the Baltic Jews was Germany’s first real experience of a ‘final solution’, based on mass killing, to what the National Socialists called the ‘Jewish Problem’. Whilst Jews in Germany and elsewhere had faced persecution, even random killings, there had been no attempts at mass executions. Indeed, in Poland, many Germans had behaved less severely towards the Jews than towards Poles. The experience of mass shootings gave added impetus to discussions that had already started in Germany about a permanent solution to the Jewish Problem. Even in purely financial terms, shooting all of Europe’s Jews was unaffordable, particularly as large parts of the Soviet Union were now under German control, adding greatly to the number of Jews in German hands. Whilst SS personnel appeared to show little reticence when it came to killing East European Jews, many officers within the SS expressed concern that they would be far more reluctant to execute German Jews in the same way.
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The previous three solutions to the Jewish Question – the establishment of some sort of East European ‘reservation’ for Jews, the creation of a distant Jewish colony on an island like Madagascar, or the transfer of Europe’s Jewish population to the Soviet Union – had all failed to materialise. The search for a definitive answer resulted in the Wannsee Conference of January 1942, where the use of extermination camps using poison gas was adopted. Rudolf Lange, head of the SD and security police in Latvia, attended the conference. The German experience with the Baltic Jews can be seen as part of the process that led to this decision.
The Germans were keen to ensure that the natives of the conquered lands in the east – Latvians, Lithuanians, Belarusians and Ukrainians – played a substantial role in the execution of National Socialist racial policies. There were several reasons for this. Firstly, the risk of unrest in the conquered lands was greatly reduced if the initial pogroms could be portrayed as local actions. Secondly, as has been described, the instigation of ghettos could then be camouflaged as a measure to protect Jews from further attacks. Put together, these two steps established a firm picture of Jews being in some way deserving of the attacks upon them, and thus made further punishment in the form of forced labour or even execution more justifiable. Every opportunity to portray the Jews as the enemies of the citizens of Lithuania and Latvia was exploited; for example, a report from
Einsatzgruppe A
stating that a Soviet
Istrebitelnye Batalony
(‘annihilation battalion’, often used to carry out a ‘scorched earth’ policy as the Red Army retreated) contained ‘characteristically large numbers of Jews’ was made public in Latvia.
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But there was another factor in the German policy of involving local people in the killings. Explaining this factor, Hitler stated in early 1942: ‘We will then have people who have sinned so much that they will stick with us through thick and thin.’
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This policy was extended throughout the machinery of extermination. Officers ensured that all of their men were involved in the killings, in order to reduce the risk of any individual being prepared to testify against others. Similar patterns of behaviour have been seen elsewhere, for example in the Soviet Union, in the Yugoslav civil wars of the 1990s, and in the activities of criminal organisations throughout the world.
The historiography of this period sheds a considerable light on the attitudes of different countries to the events of the German occupation. It has been argued that one of the difficulties faced by Lithuania and Latvia is that their long suppression by their eastern neighbour, from the Czars to the Stalin era, left many with a sense of being victims. Consequently, many Lithuanian and Latvian historians have struggled to come to terms with the role of their fellow citizens as oppressors rather than the oppressed.
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For decades after the war, Lithuanian communities in the west maintained that the Lithuanian Jewish community had betrayed Lithuania by cooperating with the Soviet occupation, and that almost no Jews had been affected by Stalin’s deportations. Although it was accepted that some Jews had been killed by Lithuanians immediately after the arrival of the Wehrmacht, it was maintained that this was a very small number, and the mass extermination of Jews in 1941 did not involve Lithuanians. Photographs showing Lithuanian police shooting Jews were either dismissed as forgeries, or explained by claiming that the gunmen were actually Germans, or possibly Poles and Russians, dressed in Lithuanian uniforms. In any event, it was argued, many Lithuanians had risked their own lives to save Jews, thus redeeming any crimes against the Jewish population. Finally, the communities claimed that attempts to prosecute Lithuanians in the west were inspired by the politics of the Cold War, and the influence of Jews in the western press and media ensured that Lithuanians would not get a fair hearing.
