Soldaten: On Fighting, Killing, and Dying (61 page)

156.
SRA 5522, 25 July 1944, TNA, WO 208/4134.

157.
SRA 5664, 30 November 1944, TNA, WO 208/4135.

158.
For example, Lieutenant William Calley, who was sentenced to life imprisonment for his role in the My Lai massacre (the sentence was commuted a short time later), is quoted as saying: “ ‘The old men, the women, the children—the babies—were all VC or would be VC in about three years,’ he asserted, continuing, ‘And inside of the VC women, I guess there were a thousand little VC now.’ ” See Bourke,
Intimate History,
p. 162.

159.
SRA 2957, 9 August 1942, TNA, WO 208/4127.

160.
Jochen Oltmer, ed.,
Kriegsgefangene im Europa des Ersten Weltkrieges
(Paderborn: Schoeningh, 2006), p. 11.

161.
Georg Wurzer, “Die Erfahrung der Extreme: Kriegsgefangene in Rußland 1914–1918,” in Oltmer, ed.,
Kriegsgefangene im Europa des Ersten Weltkrieges,
p. 108.

162.
Christian Streit,
Keine Kameraden: Die Wehrmacht und die sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen, 1941–1945
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1980); Alfred Streim,
Sowjetische Gefangene in Hitlers Vernichtungskrieg: Berichte und Dokumente
(Heidelberg: C. F. Müller Juristicher Verlag, 1982); Rüdiger Overmans, “Die Kriegsgefangenenpolitik des Deutschen Reiches, 1939 bis 1945,” in
Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg,
Vol. 9/2, Militärgeschichtliches Forschungsamt, ed. (Munich, 2005), pp. 804–24.

163.
Cited in Felix Römer, “ ‘Seid hart und unerbittlich …’ Gefangenenerschießung und Gewalteskalation im deutsch-sowjetischen Krieg, 1941/42,” in
Kriegsgreuel: Die Entgrenzung der Gewalt in kriegerischen Konflikten vom Mittelalter bis ins 20. Jahrhundert,
Sönke Neitzel and Daniel Hohrath, eds. (Paderborn: Schoeningh Verlag, 2008), p. 327.

164.
Ibid., p. 319.

165.
SRM 599, 25 June 1944, TNA, WO 208/4138. See also SRA 2671, 19 June 1942, TNA, WO 208/4126; SRA 2957, 29 August 1942, TNA, WO 208/4127; SRX 1122, 22 September 1942, TNA, WO 208/4161.

166.
Hartmann,
Wehrmacht im Ostkrieg,
pp. 542–49.

167.
Johannes Hürter,
Ein deutscher General an der Ostfront: Die Briefe und Tagebücher des Gotthard Heinrici, 1941/42
(Erfurt: Sutton Verlag, 2001).

168.
SRM 1023, 15 November 1944, TNA, WO 208/4139.

169.
Dieter Pohl,
Die Herrschaft der Wehrmacht: Deutsche Militärbesatzung und einheimische Bevölkerung in der Sowjetunion, 1941–1944
(Munich: Oldenbourg Verlag, 2008), p. 205; Hartmann,
Wehrmacht im Ostkrieg,
pp. 523–26.

170.
SRM 49, 24 February 1942, TNA, WO 208/4136.

171.
On the execution of 180 Russian POWs because no means of transport were available, see SRA 2605, 10 June 1942, TNA, WO 208/4126.

172.
SRX 2139, 28 April 1945, TNA, WO 208/4164. Walter Schreiber, born 15 July 1924 in Großaming/Steyr Land, joined the Waffen SS in 1942 and served in
the “Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler” in the area around Charkow in spring 1943. He is perhaps referring to an incident from this period. A passionate National Socialist, he joined a frogman commando unit in July 1944. On 7 March 1945 he was captured in fighting around the bridge at Remagen. Michael Jung,
Sabotage unter Wasser: Die deutschen Kampfschwimmer im Zweiten Weltkrieg
(Hamburg: Verlag E. S. Mittler & Sohn GmbH, 2004), p. 74.

173.
SRA 4273, 14 August 1943, TNA, WO 208/4130; cf. Room Conversation, Müller–Reimbold, 22 March 1945, NARA, RG 165, Entry 179, Box 530.

174.
SRA 2957, 9 August 1942, TNA, WO 208/4127. See SRA 5681, 21 December 1944, TNA, WO 208/4135.

175.
SRA 5681, 21 December 1944, TNA, WO 208/4135; SRA 4742, 20 December 1943, TNA, WO 208/4132; SRA 2618, 11 June 1942, TNA, WO 208/4126.

176.
GRGG 169, 2 August-4 August 1944, TNA, WO 208/4363.

177.
Christian Hartmann, “Massensterben oder Massenvernichtung? Sowjetische Kriegsgefangene im ‘Unternehmen Barbarossa’: Aus dem Tagebuch eines deutschen Lagerkommandanten,”
VfZG
49 (2001), pp. 97–158; Hubert Orlowski,
“Erschießen will ich nicht”: Als Offizier und Christ im Totalen Krieg. Das Kriegstagebuch des Dr. August Töpperwien
(Dusseldorf: Gasterland Verlag, 2006); Richard Germann, “ ‘Österreichische’ Soldaten in Ost- und Südeuropa, 1941–1945: Deutsche Krieger—Nationalsozialistische Verbrecher—Österreichische Opfer?” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Vienna, 2006), pp. 186–99.

178.
SRA 2672, 19 June 1942, TNA, WO 208/4126.

179.
Ibid.

180.
SRM 735, 1 August 1944, TNA, WO 208/4138. See also SRA 5681, 21 December 1944, TNA, WO 208/4135.

181.
SRA 4791, 6 January 1944, TNA, WO 208/4132.

182.
Room Conversation, Krug–Altvatter, 27 August 1944, NARA, RG 165, Entry 179, Box 442.

183.
Interrogation Report, Gefreiter Hans Breuer, 18 February 1944, NARA, RG 165, Entry 179, Box 454.

184.
See, e.g., SRA 2672, 19 June 1942, TNA, WO 208/4126; SRA 5502, 21 July 1944, TNA, WO 208/4134; SRGG 274, 22 July 1943, TNA, WO 208/4165; SRGG 577, 21 November 1943, TNA, WO 208/4167; Room Conversation,
Lehnertz-Langfeld, 14 August 1944, NARA, RG 165, Entry 179, Box 507; Room Conversation, Gartz–Sitzle, 27 July 1944, NARA, RG 165, Entry 179, Box 548.

185.
SRGG 1203 (C), 6 May 1945, TNA, WO 208/4170.

186.
SRA 3966, 26 May 1943, TNA, WO 208/4130.

187.
During the night of 26 July 1942, the Jewish residents of Przemy´sl were collected from their houses by the SS. At around 5 a.m., the local commander, Max Liedtke, called SS Untersturmführer Adolf Benthin and insisted that those Jewish men who worked for the Wehrmacht be exempted from deportation. He threatened to file a complaint with the general staff, whom he had already informed by radio about what was going on. Without waiting for a response, Liedtke’s adjutant Albert Battel sealed off the only entrance to the
Jewish ghetto. SS men were threatened with machine guns if they tried to pass. Battel’s justification was that a state of emergency had been declared in Przemy´sl. This was legally correct, although the act was still a major humiliation and provocation of the SS. The SS then contacted a high-ranking officer in Cracow to get the state of emergency lifted. It being clear that the SS would soon prevail, Battel had some 90 workers and their families transferred from the ghetto to the commander’s headquarters. He also allowed 240 further people hide in the headquarters’ basement. Battel and Liedtke’s assessment of the situation was correct. The state of emergency was lifted, and on 27 July, the SS continued their so-called resettlement operation.

188.
Wolfram Wette,
Retter in Uniform: Handlungsspielräume im Vernichtungskrieg der Wehrmacht
(Frankfurt/Main: Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, 2003).

189.
Some 1,400 Jews were murdered in three phases—July, August, and November 1941—in Daugavpils. Israel Gutman, Eberhard Jäckel, Peter Longerich, and Julius H. Schoeps, eds.,
Enzyklopädie des Holocaust,
Vol. 1, p. 375.

190.
SRGG 1086, 28 December 1944, TNA, WO 208/4169.

191.
See Frank Bajohr and Dieter Pohl,
Der Holocaust als offenes Geheimnis: Die Deutschen, die NS-Führung und die Alliierten
(Munich: C. H. Beck Verlag, 2006); Peter Longerich,
“Davon haben wir nichts gewusst!” Die Deutschen und die Judenverfolgung, 1933–1945
(Munich: Siedler, 2006); Harald Welzer, “Die Deutschen und ihr Drittes Reich,”
Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte,
14–15 (2007).

192.
SRGG 1086, 28 December 1944, TNA, WO 208/4169.

193.
Ibid.

194.
See Welzer, Moller, and Tschuggnall,
Opa,
p. 35ff.; Angela Keppler,
Tischgespräche
(Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1994), p. 173.

195.
SRGG 1086, 28 December 1944, TNA, WO 208/4169.

196.
Ibid.

197.
Ibid.

198.
Ibid.

199.
Ibid.

200.
Surviving material and his numerous statements in the surveillance protocols allow us to reconstruct the biography of Hans Felbert in detail. As early as 3 June 1940, he was relieved of his regimental command for not leading his troops with the necessary “hardness” against the enemy. Starting in June 1942, as a field commander in Besançon, he clashed repeatedly with the SS Security Service. He was, however, unable to prevent the execution of forty-two partisans there. Felbert surrendered while retreating with his men in the face of French troops. For that, Hitler sentenced him, in absentia, to death. There were reprisals against his family. British intelligence agents considered him a dedicated opponent of National Socialism. Neitzel,
Abgehört,
p. 443. Bruhn was part of the anti-Hitler conspiracy. He and his men occupied the Berlin City Castle on 20 July 1944 and he was a witness for the prosecution at the Nuremberg Trials. See Neitzel,
Abgehört,
p. 434.

201.
In 1942 Kracow-Plaszów was expanded into a forced labor camp, and in 1944 it became an extermination camp. In summer 1944, with Kittel present in the city, 22,000 to 24,000 were interned there. Some 8,000 people were murdered
in the camp. Israel Gutman, ed.,
Enzyklopädie des Holocaust: Die Verfolgung und Ermordung der europäischen Juden,
Vol. 2 (Berlin: Argon Verlag, 1993), p. 118ff.

202.
SRGG 1086, 28 December 1944, TNA, WO 208/4169.

203.
GRGG 265, 27 February–1 March 1945, TNA, WO 208/4177.

204.
Frederic Bartlett,
Remembering: A Study in Experimental and Social Psychology
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997); Harald Welzer,
Das Kommunikative Gedächtnis: Eine Theorie der Erinnerung
(Munich: Beck, 2002).

205.
SRGG 1158 (C), 25 May 1945, TNA, WO 208/4169.

206.
This account is in line with perpetrators’ testimony at postwar trials. See Welzer,
Täter,
p. 140.

207.
Jürgen Matthäus, “Operation Barbarossa and the Onset of the Holocaust,” in
The Origins of the Final Solution: The Evolution of Nazi Jewish Policy, September 1939-March 1942,
Jürgen Matthäus and Christopher Browning, eds. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2004), pp. 244–309.

208.
See Welzer, Moller, and Tschuggnall,
Opa,
p. 57.

209.
We owe this reference to Peter Klein.

210.
See Andrej Angrick,
Besatzungspolitik und Massenmord: Die Einsatzgruppe D in der südlichen Sowjetunion, 1941–1943
(Hamburg: Hamburger Edition HIS Verlag, 2003); Andrej Angrick et al., eds., “ ‘Da hätte man schon ein Tagebuch führen müssen.’ Das Polizeibataillon 322 und die Judenmorde im Bereich der Heeresgruppe Mitte während des Sommers und Herbstes 1941,” in
Die Normalität des Verbrechens: Bilanz und Perspektiven der Forschung zu den nationalsozialistischen Gewaltverbrechen,
Helge Grabitz et al., eds. (Berlin: Edition Hentrich, 1994), pp. 325–85; Vincas Bartusevicius, Joachim Tauber, and Wolfram Wette, eds.,
Holocaust in Litauen: Krieg, Judenmorde und Kollaboration
(Cologne: Boehlau Verlag, 2003); Ruth Bettina Birn,
Die Höheren SS- und Polizeiführer: Himmlers Vertreter im Reich und in den besetzten Gebieten
(Düsseldorf: Droste Verlag, 1986); Peter Klein, ed.,
Die Einsatzgruppen in der besetzten Sowjetunion, 1941/42: Tätigkeits- und Lageberichte des Chefs der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD
(Berlin: Hentrich, 1997); Helmut Krausnick and Hans-Heinrich Wilhelm,
Die Truppe des Weltanschauungskrieges: Die Einsatzgruppen der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD, 1938–1942
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1981); Konrad Kwiet, “Auftakt zum Holocaust. Ein Polizeibataillon im Osteinsatz,” in
Der Nationalsozialismus: Studien zur Ideologie und Herrschaft,
Wolfgang Benz et al., eds. (Frankfurt/Main: Fischer, 1995), pp. 191–208; Ralf Ogorreck,
Die Einsatzgruppen und die “Genesis der Endlösung”
(Berlin: Metropol, 1994).

211.
SRA 2961, 12 August 1942, TNA, WO 208/4127.

212.
SRA 4583, 21 October 1943, TNA, WO 208/4131.

213.
SRN 2528, 19 Dcember 1943, TNA, WO 208/4148.

214.
SRM 30, 27 January 1942, TNA, WO 208/4136.

215.
SRA 3379, 8 December 1942, TNA, WO 208/4128.

216.
At the end of his autobiographical writings, Höss took stock: “Today I can see that the extermination of Jews was fundamentally wrong. It was precisely in this act of genocide that Germany attracted the hatred of the entire world.
It did not serve the cause of anti-Semitism. On the contrary, it helped Jewry take a step toward its final goal.” Martin Broszat, ed.,
Rudolf Höß: Kommandant in Auschwitz: Autobiographische Aufzeichnungen des Rudolf Höß
(Munich: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1989), p. 153.

217.
Hannah Arendt,
Eichmann in Jerusalem: Ein Bericht von der Banalität des Bösen
(Leipzig: R. Piper & Co. Verlag, 1986).

218.
Christopher R. Browning,
Ganz normale Männer: Das Reserve-Polizeibataillon 101 und die “Endlösung” in Polen
(Reinbek: Rororo, 1996), p. 243.

219.
Robert J. Lifton,
Ärzte im Driten Reich
(Stuttgart: Ullstein Tb. Auflag, 1999).

220.
SRA 4604, 27 October 1943, TNA, WO 208/4131.

221.
Arendt,
Eichmann,
p. 104.

222.
SRA 4604, 27 October 1943, TNA, WO 208/4130.

223.
See Welzer,
Täter
, p. 266; and “Internationaler Militärgerichtshof,” ed., in
Der Prozess gegen die Hauptkriegsverbrecher,
Vol. 29 (Nuremberg: International Military Tribunal, 1948), p. 145.

224.
In Odessa, some 99,000 Jews were murdered, most of them by Romanian soldiers.
Enzyklopädie des Holocaust
, Vol. 2, p. 1058ff.