Persecution Of The Jews
[Page 62]
Units of the Security Police and SD in the occupied
territories of the East, which were under civil
administration, were given a similar task. The planned and
systematic character of the Jewish persecutions is best
illustrated by the original report of the SS Brigadier-
General Stroop, who was in charge of the destruction of the
ghetto in Warsaw, which took place in 1943. The Tribunal
received in evidence that report, illustrated with
photographs. bearing on its title page: "The Jewish Ghetto
in Warsaw No Longer Exists." The volume records a series of
reports sent by Stroop to the Higher SS and Police Fuehrer
East. In 4-5/1943, in one report, Stroop wrote:
[Page 63]
Stroop recorded that his action at Warsaw eliminated "a
proved total of 56,065 people. To that we have to add the
number of those killed through blasting, fire, etc., which
cannot be counted." Grim evidence of mass murders of Jews
was also presented to the Tribunal in cinematograph films
depicting the communal graves of hundreds of victims which
were subsequently discovered by the Allies.
These atrocities were all part and parcel of the policy
inaugurated in 1941, and it is not surprising that there
should be evidence that one or two German officials entered
vain protests against the brutal manner in which the
killings were carried out. But the methods employed never
conformed to a single pattern. The massacres of Rowno and
Dubno, of which the German engineer Graebe spoke, were
examples of one method; the systematic extermination of Jews
in concentration camps, was another. Part of the "final
solution" was the gathering of Jews from all German-occupied
Europe in concentration camps. Their physical condition was
the test of life or death. All who were fit to work were
used as slave laborers in the concentration camps; all who
were not fit to work were destroyed in gas chambers and
their bodies burnt. Certain concentration camps such as
Treblinka and Auschwitz were set aside for this main
purpose. With regard to Auschwitz, the Tribunal heard the
evidence of Hoess, the commandant of the camp from 1st May
1940 to 1st December 1943. He estimated that in the camp of
Auschwitz alone in that time 2.5 million persons were
exterminated, and that a further 500,000 died from disease
and starvation. Hoess described the screening for
extermination by stating in evidence:
He described the actual killing by stating:
Beating, starvation, torture, and killing were general. The
inmates were subjected to cruel experiments at Dachau in
August,. 1942, victims were immersed in cold water until
their body temperature was reduced to 28 degrees Centigrade,
when they died immediately. Other experiments included high
altitude experiments in pressure chambers, experiments to
determine how long human beings could survive in freezing
water, experiments with poison bullets, experiments with
contagious diseases, and experiments dealing with
sterilization of men and women by X-rays and other methods.
[Page 64]
Evidence was given of the treatment of the inmates before
and after their extermination. There was testimony that the
hair of women victims was cut off before they were killed,
and shipped to Germany, there to be used in the manufacture
of mattresses. The clothes, money, and valuables of the
inmates were also salvaged and sent to the appropriate
agencies for disposition. After the extermination the gold
teeth and fillings were taken from the heads of the corpses
and sent to the Reichsbank.
After cremation the ashes were used for fertilizer, and in
some instances attempts were made to utilize the fat from
the bodies of the victims in the commercial manufacture of
soap. Special groups traveled through Europe to find Jews
and subject them to the "final solution" German missions
were sent to such satellite countries as Hungary and
Bulgaria, to arrange for the shipment of Jews to
extermination camps and it is known that by the end of 1944,
400,000 Jews from Hungary had been murdered at Auschwitz.
Evidence has also been given of the evacuation of 110,000
Jews from part of Rumania for "liquidation" Adolf Eichmann,
who had been put in charge of this program by Hitler, has
estimated that the policy pursued resulted in the killing of
6 million Jews, of which 4 million were killed in the
extermination institutions.
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(Part 2 of 2)
"The resistance put up by the Jews and bandits
could only be suppressed by energetic actions of
our troops day and night. The Reichsfuehrer SS
ordered therefore on 23rd April, 1943 the cleaning
out of the ghetto with utter ruthlessness and
merciless tenacity. I therefore decided to destroy
and burn down the entire ghetto, without regard to
the armament factories. These factories were
systematically dismantled and then burnt. Jews
usually left their hideouts, but frequently
remained in the burning buildings, and jumped out
of the windows only when the heat became
unbearable. They then tried to crawl with broken
bones across street into buildings which were not
afire .. Life in the sewers was not pleasant after
the first week. Many times we could hear loud
voices in the sewers.. Tear gas bombs were thrown
into the manholes, and the Jews driven out of the
sewers and captured. Countless numbers of Jews
were liquidated in sewers and bunkers through
blasting. The longer the resistance continued, the
tougher became the members of the Waffen SS,
Police and Wehrmacht, who always discharged their
duties in an exemplary manner.
"We had two SS doctors on duty at Auschwitz to
examine the incoming transports of prisoners. The
prisoners would be marched by one of the doctors
who would make spot decisions as they walked by.
Those who were fit for work were sent into the
camp. Others were sent immediately to the
extermination plants. Children of tender years
were invariably exterminated since by reason of
their youth they were unable to work. Still
another improvement we made over Treblinka was
that at Treblinka the victims almost always knew
that they were to be exterminated and at Auschwitz
we endeavored to fool the victims into thinking
that they were to go through a delousing process.
Of course, frequently they realized our true
intentions and we sometimes had riots and
difficulties due to that fact. Very frequently
women would hide their children under their
clothes, but of course when we found them we would
send the children in to be exterminated."
"It took from three to fifteen minutes to kill the
people in the death chamber, depending upon
climatic conditions. We knew when the people were
dead because their screaming stopped. We usually
waited about one half-hour before we opened the
doors and removed the bodies. After the bodies
were removed our special commandos took off the
rings and extracted the gold from the teeth of the
corpses."
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