Hitler's Bandit Hunters: The SS and the Nazi Occupation of Europe

by Philip W. Blood

  Gempp’s description of the security problem on the Eastern Front as “ruthless struggle” showed that pacification was in reality the application of terror to galvanize the population into accepting German rule.98 Bandenbekämpfung operations, according to Gempp, were instituted to combat a deliberate Russian policy of leaving troops behind to raise chaos within the German rear areas.99 Gempp wanted the masses of Russian stragglers to be processed quickly and ruthlessly. He felt it was necessary to have captured Russians placed in work battalions and detailed to projects for the German war economy. The vast numbers of Russian prisoners, he complained, were in wide-open areas unguarded and thus granted the opportunity to escape and join the guerrilla bands or become “bandits.” The problem of the large open spaces on the Eastern Front diminished attempts to reach a state of total security. Military intelligence relied heavily on deserters, prisoners of war, and local civilians for information. Gempp alleged that the Jewish community furnished numbers of spies and agents to assist him. He regarded them as his best source of intelligence. In 1915, Gempp noticed that the Russians were making special efforts to scout and conduct reconnaissance behind German lines.100 Therefore, he believed Russian deserters no longer brought reliable information; in other words, they were actively practicing disinformation on the Germans. In other sectors, the Russians were disrupting lines of communications and destroying munitions. In commenting on a message from November 21, 1915, Gempp noted that during a partisan operation the partisans had donned Austrian uniforms.101

  Liulevicius confirmed Gempp’s commentary. He referred to the case of Gen. Rochus Schmidt, a former member of the East African “colonial forces” who commanded the gendarmerie in the Ober Ost. His duties included crushing armed resistance and banditry. By 1917, the bands had grown immeasurably because of the impact of German measures imposed on the native populations. A cycle of violence developed as Germans forced natives to inform on the bands, or suffer punishment, while the bandits in turn began to kill German soldiers rather than restrict themselves to looting. The problem grew so large that the German authorities resolved to introduce passive measures of clearing away the ground of obvious places of ambush, traveling in convoys, and suspending all movement at night.102 During 1915 in Cracow, the army erected delousing camps to cleanse soldier’s uniforms of lice. It soon became accepted practice to delouse local Jews because of their inherent “dirtiness,” an early harbinger of Nazi crimes.103 Liulevicius found evidence of similar facilities in the Ober Ost. Delousing stations were used as part of a public health system that employed special plague troops to locate sick people and quarantine them.

  In September 1916, leading members of the German security network in the east sat down to discuss whether they should continue with the existing arrangements or introduce a new security system.104 The commander of all eastern security, according to Gempp, was concerned at the threat to the railways and communications from “banditry,” although this was neither fully explained nor articulated. The regional security officers (Kowno, Mitau, Schaulen, and Tilsit) joined representatives from 10th and 8th armies to discuss these problems. A new system meant erecting large physical structures, fences, stockades, and garrisons with control posts. They decided to introduce a security force—the Secret Rear-Area Police (Geheime Etappenpolizei)—to conduct a system of passes administered by military bureaucrats (Militärverwaltungsbeamte). Field police director Oberstleutnant Toussaint complained at having to supply large numbers of passes at great cost, as well as having to handle the perpetual Bandenbekämpfung problem caused by escaping Russian prisoners of war.105 Not for the first time, military security suffered because of financial budgetary constraints or manpower shortfalls. Ironically, the public servants carried on, expanding their bureaucratic demands, effectively firmly rooting their status. In the same time frame, a secret police report from August to October 1916 identified as operations to counteract the Russian intelligence service itemized the results: August, 117 arrested and 38 found guilty; September, 118 arrested and 39 found guilty; October, 98 arrested and 21 found guilty. Those found guilty were executed; the rest were released.106

  In the final stages of the war, the Germans, fixated with control, turned to absolute security on the grounds of military necessity. The Gempp files reflect the security fears that continued to grow stronger among members of the high command.107 The Dutch–Belgian border was an acute problem for the Germans, as it was notoriously difficult to police. It was an escape route for Belgian men avoiding enforced labor, spies and saboteurs, and increasingly would-be German deserters. The army wanted to cage in its soldiers and the population and so erected a long electric fence, closing the border permanently.108 The electricity was supplied from Aachen’s suburban tramway, an AC supply, with large generating facilities. The fence was more than 180 kilometers long, and there is still evidence of it today. German border guards were ordered to shoot on sight anyone who survived the fence.109 By 1917, security and labor had become the army’s primary concern. An order from 1917 conscripting labor for the mines stipulated that all persons, without exception, aged fifteen to sixty, had to be registered (Erfassung) by labor offices (Arbeitsämter). They were categorized by expertise for mine work or other employment. The officials kept lists of availability for work and recorded shifts. The order concluded, “The Etappen-Kommandanturen are to place a 1.5 kilometer security zone around the local community.”110

  In France between February and March 1917, Ludendorff unleashed Operation “Alberich,” as the German army conducted a controlled withdrawal of its front line; they “resettled” 126,000 French civilians. The level of plundering, already high, increased as nine hundred trainloads of French booty were transported to Germany. Troop vigilance was only a small part of a larger scheme to ensure complete military security. By 1918, the doctrines of security and occupation had the added impetus of cross-fertilization of methods from the different theaters of war. On February 25, 1918, the German 50th (Reserve) Division had been transferred from the Eastern Front to France. The divisional intelligence officer reminded all officers and men of the need to check on civilian infiltration into military zones. Three weeks earlier, on February 4, 1918, the same division posted rules for the implementation of cavalry patrols. The patrols had parallel authority with the gendarmerie and placed under the command of the divisional security officer. The patrol members wore distinctive collar emblems and carried divisional instructions of their authority. Prior to a patrol, the designated security officer briefed the troops of specific field activities and provided details for their routes. The patrols were conducted in the early hours of the evening or at dawn. Their task was to arrest spies air-landed into the area, destroy reconnaissance balloons, collect up all enemy propaganda leaflets, and kill all carrier pigeons. Civilians detected outside their village limits had to be in possession of valid documentation. All persons were searched for food or letters.111 The Etappen and the occupation had become the principle forms of regulating the German way of war, the tail in effect wagged the dog, and within this emerging scenario lay Bandenbekämpfung.

  Urban Warriors

  In November 1918, Germany tumbled into revolution. After forty-eight years of autocracy and militarism culminating with Ludendorff’s military dictatorship, the SPD, the long-standing political opponent of the army, took power. The repercussions of defeat and change were not long in surfacing. An eruption of demobilized troops, rampant influenza, food shortages partly because of the ongoing allied naval blockade, the arrival of allied occupation armies enforcing the separation of disputed lands, and widespread industrial redundancy pushed Germany to the verge of anarchy. The political ramifications led to rival crowds of marchers on the streets carrying banners in nationalist, socialist, and republican colors, displaying their refusal to be counted as the foot soldiers of democracy. Revolutionaries raised armed militias who were volunteers from the soldiers’ and workers’ councils, many of whom were former soldiers. The militias sometimes were
bolstered by a cadre of “experts” from Russia. The right wing, opponents to everything but themselves, called on German patriotic sentiment to make a stand against the left. Political authority—whether nationalist, revolutionary, or republican—was imposed by the persuasiveness of the gun. Soldiers faced former soldiers, left-wing activists faced right-wing activists, while civilians tried to dodge the bullets. With anarchy running the streets, the government turned toward a paramilitary solution. Those first years of Weimar, hamstrung by fumbling internal security policy, left a mark of insecurity.

  The old order was quick to make a political stand. Ludendorff had fled Germany in November 1918, hoping to avoid allied war crimes jurisdiction. He returned from his self-imposed exile disguised as “Mr. New-man” (Herr Neumann). He quickly passed the blame for the failure of the army to win its long rehearsed and prepared-for war on the “stab-in-the-back” and the plague of “Jewish-Bolshevism.”112 In the absence of leadership from its former commanders, the inner professionalism of the army wavered. The old Imperial Army, even under Schlieffen’s unified and rigid system, was beset with cliques. The Prussians, Bavarians, Kolonialmensch, technocrats, staff officers, daredevil cavalrymen, and the poor bloody infantry all came home expecting recognition from an ambivalent society. The end of the Kaiserreich finally destroyed the rigid professionalism of Schlieffen’s uniform military code. So when prominent heroes of the war such as Epp and Lettow-Vorbeck came home, they received sharply divergent welcomes. Although they appeared to share a common colonial past, their respective wartime experiences divided them.

  Lettow-Vorbeck had spent the whole war in East Africa fighting a partisan campaign. He personified the concept of small war that Boguslawski had championed. The Feldherr of partisan warfare came home to Germany with the mission to project his military achievements as a romantic image of war. This bore little comparison with the general picture of trench fighting that millions of German men had experienced. He duly arrived in Germany in February 1919, having missed the momentous events of November 1918, and the first operations of the Freikorps. Undaunted, in March 1919, the newly promoted general of infantry paraded the European contingent of his “army” along the Unter den Linden in Berlin. This dreamlike final victory parade, by an “undefeated” German army, attracted the attention of the Berlin crowds as they flocked to a spectacle last seen in 1914. However, this kind of fame was fleeting, the relic of a rapidly dwindling past, and recognizing this, Lettow-Vorbeck turned to publication.

  The first set of memoirs, suitably titled Heia Safari! (1919), contained the drama of arrogant self-promotion. Lettow-Vorbeck painted his “small war” across the larger canvas of the Great War.113 This modern professional soldier had waged a successful campaign, and he conspired to profit from it. Irrespective of this, the contents make an interesting analysis since his partisan campaign was the very antithesis of Bandenbekämpfung. In his memoirs, Lettow-Vorbeck played down his prior colonial experiences in China and Namibia, referring to the latter as a Buschkrieg, in other words, a police action. This was a deliberate act of disassociation from past colonial failures in order to glorify his successes. To emphasize his argument, he stressed Emil von Zelewski’s debacle thirty years earlier, calling it a major military blunder. He cited Zelewski as the model example of how things can go wrong in operations. This commentary is a brief window into the army’s mindset and further illustrates both the magnitude of Zelewski’s defeat and its impression on the military culture.114

  Lettow-Vorbeck had detractors of his fame, namely Heinrich von Schnee, the last German East African governor. Schnee’s bitterness toward Lettow-Vorbeck came from the firm opinion that his “glorious” campaign was simply unnecessary under the prevailing colonial agreements between the great powers.115 Setting Schnee’s criticisms aside, in 1919, Lettow-Vorbeck took command of a Freikorps formation, the Freiwillige Division v. Lettow-Vorbeck, and then led pacification operations in Hamburg. On May 15, 1920, the partisan leader supported the Kapp putsch, yet he proved ill-suited at conducting small war within the fatherland. In 1926, he attempted to remodel himself with a second set of memoirs. More charitable this time to Trotha, he mentioned serving on his staff, but his distance from the colonies was ever more pronounced.116 He entered politics and the Reichstag, proving his political naiveté by proposing a ban on the SS and SA in 1930, at the height of the political violence at the end of the Weimar Republic.

  Epp was a professional soldier and a member of the secret Thule Society in Munich. His war included the horror of Verdun, commanding a regiment of the Alpenkorps, and serving as the kaiser’s fire-brigade in hot spots in southern Europe. In October 1918, he returned to Germany by conducting a fighting withdrawal from Serbia. His former regimental adjutant, Adolf von Bomhard, later published the regiment’s history. 117 In 1919, Epp was unable to even reside safely in Munich. The Red Republic under Kurt Eisner and the members of the secret Thule Society were locked in a microcosm of class war, ferociously slaughtering each other.118 The Thule–Gesellschaft membership held a common belief in the sacred destiny of the Germanic soul, which they thought flowed from an Aryan community that had populated the icy wastes long before civilization. Imbued with this belief in the sanctity of Germany and her greater destiny, the members participated in illegal political acts and carried out assassinations or sectarian killings. For a brief period, the Thule Society collected together the right-wing elites and would-be political activists including Epp, Ernst Röhm, Bomhard, Ludendorff, Adolf Hitler, Rudolf Hess, and Heinrich Himmler. Against this background, Epp’s Freikorps prepared for the battle of Munich.

  The Nazi chronicler of the “battle” of Munich, Frederick von Oertzen, happened to be a veteran of the Waterberg, having commanded the ill-fated Deimling detachment’s artillery batteries. With this bitter experience behind him, he praised Epp for his determination and the plan that called for a march on the city in a highly coordinated and crushing encirclement. Epp ordered the piecemeal extermination without escape of the members and supporters of the republic, the embodiment of the Waterberg plan.119 His chronicler, Oertzen, recorded the sentiment of Freikorps orders, “the destruction of the … bandits” (die Vernichtung der Banden), a form common to all three epochs of Bandenbekämpfung.120 He praised Epp and his men as the epitome of professionalism because they did not need to be told what to do, nor did they require special coaching. After a brief, but formal, parade in Ulm, the detachments marched into the battle lines (Kampffront) in Munich. Josef Krumbach, Epp’s official Nazi biographer, memorialized the battle of Munich for leading Germany away from the dirt and filth (Schmutz und der Fäulnis) of the “red” period (Rätezeit). Krumbach explained that few officers studied their enemy as thoroughly as Epp did. His military logic was simple: the Soviet of Marxists and Jews were a plague led by the “eastern Jew” (Ostjude) Dr. Levine and had illegally occupied Munich. Under these circumstances, Bolshevik Jews, in Epp’s opinion, deserved little better than the Herero.121

  The Nazis mythologized Munich as an example of national heroism and self-sacrifice. While this later contributed to the burgeoning dogma of military politics, in the short term, Epp participated in other calculated acts. He imposed law and order on Munich but without permanent military government. He later went to the Ruhr and did much the same. His “achievement,” the product of his professionalism, was depicted as transcending both the Kaiserreich and Weimar, making him a true servant to the nation. It was inverted glory. Munich granted Epp national prominence, the status of Feldherr, and subsequent promotion to general. Unlike Lettow-Vorbeck, he embellished his experiences in China and Namibia. This did not tarnish his political or military career. Unlike Trotha and Lettow-Vorbeck, Epp made Cannae work. As a “cleansing action” (Säuberungsaktion), with after-action executions, Epp had applied Bandenbekämpfung to restore order within a sharply focused military landscape. The suppression of the Räterepublik, through initiative and police action atrocities, was Epp’s adaptation of Schlieffen securi
ty methods for the post-Schlieffen world.

  2

  THE NEW ORDER

  Whither Germany? In the twenty years between 1919 and 1939, German national security experienced several makeovers. The shift in the balances of governing elites, from army and monarchy, to politicians and police, finally resting with dictatorship, placed security at the forefront of political agendas. In the chaotic early years of Weimar, the widespread application of Bandenbekämpfung swiftly imposed law and order, but for a nation in political flux, it was a temporary expedient. Once the atmosphere calmed, the enormity of national security came to rest on two issues. The first concerned the external forces manipulating German society; the second involved the appropriate level of internal security. The army, which had been aloof to civilian society during the Kaiserreich, began to concentrate on questions of civil-military relations during times of war and occupation. The Weimar police, albeit a professionalized force, maintained law and order while laying down the foundations for a national security state. When public opinion polarized, democratic and extremist parties alike tried to make political capital by exploiting fears of inadequate law and order and institutionalized the concept of guardianship policing. By 1933, all the structural elements were in place for Hitler to erect a national security state.