by J. Lee Ready
Some have suggested that the leading Nazis did not attend so that they could later say they knew nothing of the events here. This of course is absolute rubbish. The Nazis naturally thought they were going to win the war, so why would they ever conceive of denying these events? The truth is in fact far more shocking. The leading Nazis did not attend because they did not consider the fate of millions of Jews to be worthy of their time.
At the meeting the various representatives gave the estimated Jewish populations that would be assigned to ‘special treatment’. The total was eleven million, which not only included those currently under Nazi occupation, but also those living amid Hitler’s partners. They included 5,600 in Denmark, 700,000 in unoccupied France, 48,000 in Bulgaria, 2,300 in Finland, 58,000 in Italy, 88,000 in Slovakia, 342,000 in Romania, 10,000 in Serbia, 6,000 in Spain, 742,800 in Hungary and 40,000 in Croatia. They also included 88,500 in neutral European nations [e.g. 4,000 in the Irish Free State]. They also included those living in enemy nations that the Germans had not been able to reach yet: namely 330,000 in Britain and over five million in the unoccupied areas of the Soviet Union. No figures were given for countries outside Europe.
Interestingly enough the Nazis had come up with these figures for foreign Jews by educated guessing, for many nations did not count their Jews. Britain did not have a clue how many she had. Moreover, those that did count them had done so years earlier, and thus the figures did not consider Jewish children born in the last half decade, and in any case they only counted those people that practiced the Jewish faith. They did not include Jews that no longer attended synagogue [and many did not], nor did they include racial Jews who practiced Christianity. Had they done so the numbers would have been far higher. In other words in Hungary for example there must have been an additional quarter million Jews – under the Nazi definition. Thus the number of Jews eventually in danger of arrest by the Nazis was far higher than the above figures would suggest. Holocaust deniers conveniently use the Wannsee figures as a basis for calculating that few Jews were unaccounted for at the end of the war, but as has been shown above these figures were far too low. As many as twenty per cent of the Jews murdered by the Nazis was Christian, who were not even counted in the Wannsee figures. E.g. of the 600 or so Jews who survived the war in Vienna by hiding, about three per cent were irreligious or atheist [including Communists] and around twenty two per cent were Christians. They would not have been considered Jews by the pre-Nazi Austrian government. There is no indication that the percentages were different among those Jews that did not survive.
Actually Heydrich’s figures for Croatia and Romania were too high, for the Croats and Romanians had already begun the genocide of their own Jews.
Having said that, it is also interesting that the final solution was well in progress already, and everyone at the table knew it. To date SS Einsatzgruppe A had already murdered 229,052 Jews, Communists, Gypsies and other undesirables. Even this conference acknowledged that Estonia was already ‘cleansed of Jews’. The meeting also acknowledged the cruel treatment of Jews in Poland, admitting that the majority were by now no longer fit for work.
This meeting was not held to make a decision whether or not to commit genocide: that decision had already been taken almost a year before. The purpose of the meeting was to define the mission statement of ‘special treatment’, which would eradicate Jewry from Europe. The result of this meeting was not the death warrant of millions, as has been assumed by so many who never read the minutes of the meeting, but rather the saving of countless thousands of lives. Whether or not some participants in the meeting genuinely attempted to save as many lives as possible, or whether or not purely amoral practical motives were at play, with the accidental result that lives were saved, is anyone’s guess. Only God knows the truth.
Be that as it may, lives were spared. Specifically, Heydrich declared that his own ghetto at Theresienstadt, where he kept prominent Jews that the world would miss, would be temporarily off limits to the executioners. Furthermore, Theresienstadt would continue to house Jewish war veterans of the German and Austrian armed forces, and it would keep selected individuals who might become useful in the future. For the time being these people would escape the final solution.
Additionally during the conference it was decided that other Jews would be spared: Jews married to Aryans if no children were involved [decided on a case by case basis]; 1st degree Mischlings married to Aryans with 2nd degree Mischling children; 1st and 2nd degree Mischlings married to 1st or 2nd degree Mischlings too old to bear children; all 2nd degree Mischlings as long as they had one Aryan parent and they had earned their freedom through service of some type and had not behaved like a Jew or married a Jew/Mischling of child bearing age and as long as they did not look Jewish. However, it was decided that Jews married to Aryans, and 1st degree Mischlings married to Aryans without children, and elderly Mischlings married to Mischlings, would all still have to be incarcerated in some manner, and that 1st degree Mischlings should volunteer to be sterilized so that they could never have children [and by inference if they wanted to live]. Holocaust deniers completely miss the boat when it comes to sterilization. The Nazis urged all Aryans to propagate, even outside of marriage, whereas certain classes of Mischlings were to be sterilized so that they could not ‘pollute’ the Aryan gene pool. However, full Jews were not sterilized. The reason is obvious. There would be no need for costly time-consuming sterilization procedures on full Jews because the dead cannot propagate!
Furthermore, Neumann demanded that Jews working in war industries should not be evacuated [to ‘special treatment’], and Heydrich relented on this point.
One wonders how many of the delegates to the conference went home thinking of the numbers who would be killed because of their complacency, and how many were thinking of the numbers that had been saved because of their advocacy?
__________
Himmler was aware that Heydrich was power hungry, but so was he, and he now accepted a new hat. Hitler named him Reichskommissar for the Strengthening of German Nationhood - RKFDV, and Himmler set up yet another SS department under Obergruppenfuehrer Ulrich Greifelt to handle the administration of the SS RKFDV. Its purpose was to forcibly deport tens of millions of people from Russia to Siberia, so that they could be replaced by Germans. The fact that most Germans might prefer to live in downtown Berlin or Frankfurt rather than on a farm fifty miles from nowhere in the middle of Russia did not seem to occur to the Nazis. As part of this process the SS RuSHA roamed Poland and the other Slavic countries looking for racially acceptable people, who were asked to declare themselves as German citizens [Volksdeutsch Class IV]. If these people could not be coerced to do so, their children were kidnapped and sent to families back in Germany. The German adoptive parents were told the kids were orphans and that their parents had been killed in an air raid or such. The kids were told this too. Thus the German adoptive parents were part of this trade in human flesh for the noblest of reasons. They were lied to. Yet more SS lies.
Shortly after the Wannsee conference Himmler gave Gruppenfuehrer Oswald Pohl greater powers, amalgamating the SS HuB and SS Wv into the SS WVHA - Wirtschaftundverwaltungshauptamt [Economics and Administration Head Office] with responsibility for administering the entire SS, for controlling the money-making companies of the SS, for running the concentration camps and slave labor camps, and for all the new construction that would be necessary for the SS, such as new offices, barracks, camps and dependent family housing. Heydrich had known about the forthcoming massive construction program and indeed had already instructed Gluecks of the SS KZL to set aside skilled slave workers and to train others and to actually feed them better to be ready for this monumental task. But Himmler gave the project to Pohl. It very much looks like Himmler was becoming alarmed at Heydrich’s power, and his appointment of Pohl to such a lofty position was a counter balance.
__________
Chapter Sixteen
THE FIRST RUSSIAN WINTER 1942
Unbelievably in such weather the Soviets attacked again, this time their North West Front striking German Army Group North on 7 January 1942, and within twenty-four hours they had outflanked the SS Totenkopf Motorized Division. The entire German Sixteenth Army was in danger of being encircled in the Demiansk area, so Eicke was told to send battlegroups to several crisis points. He obeyed, but with frustration as this would in effect take his own hands off the whole affair. He truly cared for his men and worried when they were out of his sight.
Already German Army officers who demanded permission to retreat before it was too late were being denied permission, and if they persisted they were relieved of command. Hitler ordered every man to stand and die. Within days all that prevented the Soviets from surrounding the German Sixteenth Army was one solitary battlegroup of the SS Totenkopf, yet unbelievably the Soviets stopped.
The German Army was in such dire straits that they started to forcibly conscript non-Germans. One of their first moves in this venture was in Latvia and Estonia. In the former they ordered members of the Aiszargi militia as well as local policemen to ‘volunteer’ to form the Latvian Legion, and in Estonia they ordered members of the Eesti Kaitseliit militia as well as local policemen to ‘volunteer’ to form the Estonian Legion. This included those whose militia enlistments were already up and who had thought their ‘war’ was over. Regardless of past military experience or none at all, the training of these new recruits was hasty. To give the Latvian Legion some backbone three Latvian schuma battalions were transferred into it en masse. Two of these battalions had already seen combat on the Russian Front with the 2nd SS Motorized Brigade.
When the remnants of the German 290th Infantry Division were trapped near Vsvad, the German Sixteenth Army looked around for somebody to break through to them. Their eyes fell on the 250th Spanish Blue Infantry Division and the new Latvian Legion. The Spaniard Hauptmann Ordas was ordered to advance with a mixed party of an anti-tank gun company and two hundred ski infantry [all Spaniards], with heavy equipment in horse-drawn sleighs driven by seventy hiwis. In temperatures as low as minus 68F the little group crossed frozen Lake Ilmen in two days and nights, but this resulted in 102 men becoming maimed by frostbite, not to mention a lot of dead horses, and they had only now reached the frontline. Ordas joined with the Latvian Legion, and sent out patrols, but several were ambushed. In one incident, of twenty-three Spaniards and nineteen Latvians, only five Spaniards and two Latvians survived.
By 24 January Ordas only had twenty surviving Spaniards. Yet he joined the Latvian Legion in a successful attack in blinding snow.
Legally-speaking the Latvians were ineligible for German medals, but the Germans were so impressed by their performance that they invented new bravery awards just for them. Himmler took notice.
This month the Netherlands Legion put 2,500 men into the line at Gusi Gora just north of Lake Ilmen, and the Flanders Legion placed 900 men [a mix of legionnaires and Waffen SS] into the line in the Volkhov Pocket. Both legions operated under the 2nd SS Motorized Brigade. No sooner had these troops arrived than they repelled an attack at Kopsy by elements of the Soviet Volkhov Front.
Further north near Leningrad the Norwegian Legion settled into the line facing the North West Front.
On 22 January Rene Lagrou was killed in action. A day later Reimond Tollenaere was killed. This was a serious double blow to the Flanders Legion, especially heartfelt as the German commander of the unit, Obersturmfuehrer Michael Lippert, made it obvious he thought the Flemish were a lower form of life.
The Soviet pressure continued and on 4 February the Flanders Legion had to be withdrawn to make good its 200 casualties. But just four days later, because the SS Totenkopf could no longer hold Staraya Russa, the Flanders Legion was rushed back into line at Zyemptitsy. The SS Totenkopf continued to fall back, allowing the Soviets to encircle part of Sixteenth Army around Demiansk - six entire German divisions including the SS Totenkopf.
Eicke tried his best to command, but owing to army interference he usually just controlled one battlegroup of his division at a time. The division was in fact divided into five sectors commanded by Eicke, Oberfuehrer Max Simon, the Lorraine German Sturmbannfuehrer Karl Ullrich, Sturmbannfuehrer Paul Moder and Hauptsturmfuehrer Max Seela. Eicke had a battlegroup as did Simon. Ullrich led a task force of pioneers. Seela, who unlike most Germans sported a beard and moustache, had a company of pioneers holding a very important crossing point on the Lovat River. Moder commanded a task force of an infantry battalion, an artillery battery, a couple of tanks and an army infantry battalion. All these task forces and battlegroups were under constant ground attack, artillery salvoes and air raids, but their biggest worry was food. They had to eat all their horses. On 6 February Moder was killed in action.
At the beginning of the year a German Army formation was surrounded inside Cholm, alongside a few hundred German policemen. The latter were rapidly formed into an infantry battalion.
The Netherlands Legion was also under furious assault and was pleading for reinforcements. The Flanders Legion was ordered to save them, so they counterattacked every day for six days, but they got nowhere, and finally with but seventy men still standing they were ordered to halt. The Dutchman Sturmmann Gerardus Mooymans was awarded the Knights Cross, an extremely rare occurrence for a lowly private soldier.
By the end of February Eicke could only count about 1,500 personnel in his own battlegroup and was totally cut off from the other Germans in the Demiansk Pocket, so he did the unthinkable. He broke the chain of command and personally radioed Himmler pleading for some relief, and after Himmler spoke with Hitler, the Fuehrer ordered Goering’s Luftwaffe to fly in reinforcements to Eicke. On 7 March Luftwaffe transport planes landed at Demiansk airstrip with much needed supplies and 5,000 fresh SS troops. Most of these new replacements were SS reservists who had been shunted through the ‘SS Totenkopf back door’. Namely these SS reservists had been called up to do military service in 1939 [Army, Kriegsmarine or Luftwaffe], but since then had been transferred to the SS KZL as external perimeter camp guards [an essential civilian occupation], but had then been transferred to the SS Totenkopfverbaende, where they were earmarked as replacements for Eicke’s division. In fact the transfers were done so quickly that many had never actually guarded a camp. The replacements also included some Volksdeutsch who had been recently recruited. With this added manpower and with the aid of parachuted provisions Eicke felt he could hold on.
On 21 March the Flanders Legion repulsed a Soviet offensive at Krasny Bor, but paid a high price in blood.
Despite the excellent performance of most of the foreign units of the army and Waffen SS, Gottlob Berger was informed that some SS and army officers and NCOs were still biased against them. Berger was determined this prejudice should be eradicated, as he felt it would affect morale. As a result he began a campaign of convincing Himmler to allow foreign officers to be trained at German schools so that their legion rank would become a Waffen SS rank. He also asked him to order the Waffen SS rear-echelon to treat foreign soldiers, whether legionnaires or SS members, as if they were German.
Hans Plesch may have been a senior policeman and an SS standartenfuehrer, but to the army he was just plain Leutnant Plesch of the 6th Regiment. However, he earned the knight’s cross for bravery. But once severely wounded he was soon declared unfit for military service, and he went back to the police.
__________
The SS Polizei Motorized Division had spent the winter on the defensive along the Volkhov River and had performed well under Brigadefuehrer Alfred Wuennenberg. Though the division had always
been treated as a member of the Waffen SS, it was still technically a police formation, but in February 1942 it was formally inducted into the Waffen SS. From now on its members would be expected to dress and act like SS soldiers not policemen. Some obeyed. Some did not. In March the SS Polizei took part in a small offensive while the ground was still frozen.
The SS Wiking and SS LAH Motorized Divisions had remained along the Mius River during the winter. It had been no picnic. The award of the German Cross in Gold to twenty-nine year old Sturmbannfuehrer August Dickmann, a battalion commander in the SS Wiking was well deserved.
In March 1942 the SS Das Reich Motorized Division was sent to Germany to rest and regroup. The sudden thought of getting warm again must have made these soldiers euphoric, and the concept of being home for a while caused unbearable anticipation.
Elsewhere on the Russian front German police units plus schuma battalions of Estonians, Latvians, Byelorussians and Ukrainians were sometimes rushed into the front line for emergency duty. The Latvian 19th and 21st Schuma Battalions served well on the Leningrad front.
__________
In March the French Legion was withdrawn and sent to the General Government for a rest, having suffered fifty per cent losses. One of the wounded, Eugene Vaulot, was medically discharged. Here the legion began to receive replacements from France and was soon able to field two battalions. One of their heroes was Lieutenant Colonel Edgar Puaud, a regular French Army officer who had earned medals fighting the Germans in World War One and World War Two. The Frenchmen spent most of their time in Poland guarding installations, because sabotage by Polish anti-Nazi guerillas was on the increase.
In fact because of the increase in guerilla activity Frank’s administration of the General Government chose to form a militia from all able-bodied male Volksdeutsch [including the Margarine Germans], who would guard installations on a part-time basis. This was necessary because by spring 1942 there were more than a hundred ‘terrorist’ incidents in the General Government every month. Most of these were small, such as a rock thrown at a windshield, a piece of equipment sabotaged, a derailing item placed on a rail track, or theft of German property. Every parked truck had to be guarded.
