Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews Peter Longerich (grave mercy .TXT) 📖

territory had been shot. The murders were substantially carried out by Sonder-

kommandos 4 and 5 of Einsatzgruppe C, again supported by the Order Police.

In the Ukraine, too, the mass executions were generally carried out in agreement

with the local Wehrmacht authorities, and in this territory too Wehrmacht units,

particularly the Secret Field Police, engaged independently in the shooting of

Jews. 183 Little is known about the murder of Jews in the rear area of Army Group North, Russian territory south of Leningrad. Here, the Security Police were present

in relatively low numbers (sub-units of Commandos 1a and 1b). 184

To the west, in the General Commissariat of White Ruthenia, abutting the

military administrative area Centre, the murder actions proceeded in a different

manner. Here the murder campaigns almost came to a standstill around the turn

of 1941/2. This had variously to do with the frozen ground that made it impossible

to dig pits to bury the victims—an explanation that is plainly not sound, as the

continuation of the shootings in the military administrative area during the winter

shows: either the ground was blown up, or already existing pits were used.

A second reason repeatedly given for the decline in shooting actions appears

more plausible; the civil administration did not want to lose the specialist workers,

who were urgently needed.

In spite of these difficulties, the KdS (Commander of the Security Police) for

Minsk stressed at a meeting of the administrative heads of the General Commis-

sariat of White Ruthenia on 23 January 1942 that the goal of the ‘complete

liquidation’ of the Jews was still being pursued. He thus promised, in the following

spring, to ‘relaunch the large-scale executions’. 185 At this point the KdS of White Ruthenia believed there was a realistic prospect of ‘liquidating’ the ‘Jewish question’ within his area of responsibility within two months. 186

For the months of January and February there are only—somewhat dubious—

references to two actions in Minsk in which up to 3,000 people may have been

shot. 187 In March there were mass executions above all in the area of Vileyka, namely in Vileyka itself, in Ilya, Krasne, Rakov, and Radoschkowicze (Radoszyce),

and also—outside this area—in Lida, Baranowicze, and Slutzk as well as in Kopyl.

In this way more than 8,000 people were murdered in March. 188

In the large ghettos that had been set up after the murder of the majority of the

Jewish population in the General Commissariats of Lithuania and Latvia, the

situation remained relatively quiet in 1942. There were few large massacres. This

did not apply, however, to the area around Riga. Between February and April 1942,

in the Riga ghetto and the Jungfernhof camp, some 5,000 people were selected in a

number of actions as ‘unfit for work’ and transported out in motor vehicles—

supposedly to a new camp near Dünamünde, actually to the Bikernieki Forest,

where they were shot. 189

Extermination on a European Scale, 1942

347

At a meeting of the General Commissars held by Reichskommissar Ostland

(Baltic states) on 26 March, a certain perplexity was expressed about the future

course of the anti-Jewish policy. There was general agreement that ‘the Jewish

question must be resolved clearly and urgently’. However, the following sentence

in the minutes suggests that in the meantime mass executions were no longer seen

as the solution: ‘It is felt to be regrettable that the method employed hitherto,

however much it might represent a political liability for us, has for the time being

been abandoned.’ However, Generalkommissar Kube’s following suggestion

that the liquidation should be effected ‘in accordance with correct procedures

[korrekter]’ shows that they did not generally wish to abandon this means. It

was agreed that the solution did not lie in ceasing to distribute food to the Jews, as

was happening at the time. 190

In April the occupying forces in the area of Vileyka carried out two further

mass executions in Dohyno with 800 and 1,200 victims respectively, another in

Krzywicze (Krzeszowice) (400 fatalities), and on 1 April 1,200 Jews were mur-

dered in Kopyl, 191 as well as various murders in Minsk with at least 500

fatalities. 192 The KdS Minsk reported that his department had killed 1,894 Jews in April alone. 193 In spite of these mass murders, however, in April 1942 the number of massacres and murder victims in White Ruthenia declined in

comparison with the previous months.

In May 1942, however, the murders resumed systematically and on a large scale;

plainly the intensified murderous activities coincided with a visit by Heydrich to

Minsk, which appears to have occurred in April. 194 While, on 11 May, the KdS Minsk demanded that the Gendarmerie throughout the whole of the General Commissariat

supply summary statistical data about the Jewish communities, under the heading

‘Selection of Jewish specialist workers’, the murder of the great majority of the Jews

still living there, organized according to a plan by the Security Police and the civil

administration, had already begun on 8 May. Over the following five days more than

16,000 Jews were shot in all the ghettos in the area. 195

This action was the starting point for the extension of the murder actions to all

areas of the occupied territory of White Russia. In the district of Glebokie an EK

9 unit and other agencies murdered at least 12,000 Jews between 29 May and

20 June. 196 From May onwards, the branch of the SD in Vileyka, which took part in numerous mass murders even outside its area of responsibility, intensified the

programme of mass murders that had resumed in March, and had murdered

more than 5,000 people there by the end of September. 197 At the beginning of 1943

only 3,000 Jewish artisans were still living in the area of Vileyka. 198

In the district of Slutzk, where two actions had been carried out in Slutzk and

Kopyl as early as the end of March, further massacres took place between May and

August. 199 In Slonim the ghetto was liquidated on 29 June, and 7,000 people were murdered. In the weeks that followed there were also further massacres in the area

of Slonim with thousands of fatalities. In September the district commissar,

348

Extermination of the European Jew, 1942–1945

Gerhard Erren, stated that of 25,000 Jews originally living in his area only around

500 remained. 200 In the district of Novogrodek, at least 2,900 Jews were shot in various places between April and June,