Archive/File: people/e/eichmann.adolf/transcripts/Sessions/Session-030-05
Last-Modified: 1999/05/31

Presiding Judge: Where were they found?

Attorney General: They were found among the files of the
Foreign Ministry, but they were among the N.O.s of the No. 9
proceedings - which is to say, the same documents that were
in the files of the Prosecution, and some of them were
presented as exhibits in the proceedings against the
Operations Groups of Ohlendorf and his associates.

There are summaries, summing up special activities.
Nevertheless it seems to us that the language of some
reports is so important that we have to ask the Court to
accept some partial reports together with the summaries.

I shall generally proceed in chronological order.  Report
dated 13 July 1941, our No. 1465, on activities in Minsk,
where 1,050 Jews were liquidated; on Vilna where at first
321 Jews were liquidated, on the plunder of property, about
460,000 roubles worth; on Bialystok where 215 Jewish
officials and Bolsheviks were shot, and about Grodno - it
says that only 96 Jews were killed initially.  "I have
issued orders to intensify activities considerably," the
report states.

Presiding Judge: Do we know who wrote the report?

Attorney General: One of the commanders of the
EinsatzKommando, since the report was sent to Department
IVA1.  The Court may remember from the statement by Noske,
this Department of the "Hauptamt" received all the reports
and sent them on to the various units.  From the place of
operation it may be assumed that this was Group A which was
active in the North.

Presiding Judge: Yes, it says Einsatzgruppe A.  I am not
sure whether I announced earlier that Ohlendorf's statement
was T/312, and this report is T/313.

Attorney General: On 29 July 1941 a further report was sent
about Zhitomir where four hundred Jews were shot, about the
cooperation with Beltsy and the Rumanian police in Beltsy
and the surroundings.
Presiding Judge: Where is Beltsy?

Attorney General: In Bessarabia.

Judge Halevi:  Was it under German occupation?

Attorney General: Einsatzgruppen operated there.

Judge Halevi:  Rumanian police nevertheless were there?

Attorney General: Rumanian police collaborated.  This time a
copy of the report is directed to IVB4.  Will the Court
please note, it is addressed to several Sections of
Department IV, including IVB4.

Presiding Judge: This is T/314. On T/314, what is the
reference on top, it is not clear at all.

Attorney General: IVA1.  This is before you as T/37(280),
that is where the original is.

Presiding Judge: The one you submitted just now?

Attorney General: At the moment we have our No. 864, you
have it before you as No. T/37(280).
Presiding Judge: This will be T/315.

Attorney General: Will you please note that here, too, IVB4
is being informed about the shooting of 682 Jews in
Czernowitz out of 1,200 detainees.  Concerning 20,000 Jews
in Lithuania and Latvia...

Presiding Judge: Is this No. 864?

Attorney General: It is in the original.  Please see
T/37(280), the complete document is there.

On 7 August 1941 a further report was dispatched with a copy
to IVB4.  Following an uprising and attacks against the
Wehrmacht, the report states, a search for Jews was carried
out, 97 were shot and 1,756 were taken hostage.  In Kishinev
551 Jews had been liquidated thus far.

Presiding Judge: Is this about Bessarabia?

Attorney General: Yes, Sir.

Presiding Judge: T/316.

Attorney General: On 9 August 1941 there was another report,
again to IVB4.  Here the author of the report tells of his
"ingenious" trick in the town of Vinnitsa, where the Jews
did not want to go of their own accord.

Presiding Judge: This is almost illegible, it cannot be
deciphered.  How many pages are there?

Attorney General: May I ask the Court to kindly peruse the
Hebrew version translated after great effort by the person
who deciphered the original German, it would make things
easier.

Presiding Judge: Which page now?

Attorney General: Page 9 of the original, first page of the
Hebrew translation, reporting on a search in Vinnitsa where
difficulties were encountered in ferreting Jews out from
their hiding places.  The commander of Einsatzkommando B4
then introduced a new system.  He ordered the rabbi in
authority of the town to bring all the Jewish intelligentsia
to him within 24 hours, for clerical work.  When these
intellectuals arrived they were told to come back the
following day with more such people.  The goal was achieved
when this was done for the third time; the entire Jewish
intelligentsia was seized and liquidated.
The report goes on with the liquidation in Berdichev,
Tarnopol, Zhitomir, Plonsk.  At the end it states that the
hunting out operation in Rovno has ended, 370 Russians,
1,643 Jews were shot as instigators and collaborators.

Presiding Judge: T/317.

Attorney General: On 29 August 1941, a report is issued on
operations in Smolensk, Mogilev, Orsha, Voroshilov, Mogilev-
Podolski and Jampol.  There, 27,500 Jews were driven back to
Rumanian territory; 1,265, some of them youngsters, were
shot.

Presiding Judge: T/318.

Attorney General: Here we have a report - also addressed to
IVB4, summing up events for the fortnight of 15 to 31 August
1941.  It mentions that 25,000 Jews of Kovno were interned
in ghettos, that the Jew Kieper from Chernigov cynically
admitted to have acted as Zionist propagandist from 1905, to
have organized gangs against the Czar's government and to
have committed 25 murders.  Kieper and his henchmen were
publicly hanged on 7 August 1941 at the Zhitomir marketplace
in the presence of a great part of the population.
Subsequently 402 Jews were shot.  In Mogilev only 4,000 Jews
remained.  In Zhitomir, the report goes on, Jews remained
after the entry of the German army; they were taken to clean
the barracks but behaved with great impertinence and even
refused to work.  Out of one thousand who were told to work
in the fields, only seventy appeared one day.  The Jewish
Council of Elders even spread rumours that the Russians were
approaching again.  This was immediately used to threaten
the Ukrainians.  In addition, they began to traffic in
stolen goods and cattle.  Necessary retaliatory measures
were taken in hand at once.  This went to IVB4.

Presiding Judge: This summary report will be T/319.

Judge Halevi:  This is a summary of only two weeks?

Attorney General: Yes, it is a summary of two weeks.

Another general report of events is dated 25 August 1941.
As for the solution of the Jewish Question the report reads
on page 6 of the original: "This is one of the most
important problems; measures were taken to tackle it, though
somewhat hesitatingly.  Before the War Kishinev had 60,000
to 80,000 Jews.  Many of them left when the Russians
retreated:" and then we read: "At present 9,000 Jews are in
the ghetto; they are grouped in labour gangs and put at the
disposal of German and Rumanian authorities for salvage
work, removal of wreckage and other duties."

Presiding Judge: This document is marked T/320.

Attorney General: We turn to September 1941.  On the fourth
of the month activities of the Einsatzgruppe were reported.
The total of killings by Group B until 20 August 1941 was
20,000.  Nor was the plundering forgotten - 1.5 million
roubles.  And the usual formula: Jews were rendered
harmless, liquidated.  There follows a detailed enumeration
for how many killings of Jews each unit takes credit.

Presiding Judge: This document is marked T/321.

Attorney General: On 11 September a report is dispatched
detailing the acts perpetrated against the Jews of Kamenets-
Podolski, when 23,600 Jews were killed in three days, and
1.5 million roubles were collected.

Presiding Judge: This document is marked T/322.

Attorney General: 12 September 1941.  We read again about
Zhitomir.  The local population could not be induced to act
against the Jews, out of fear that the Red Army might
return.  As a matter of special interest they mention the
discovery of Jewish Kolkhoz farms between Krivoi Rog and
Dnepropetrovsk to which lower class people were sent.  In
order to keep them as labourers for the German conqueror
they were left alive after their leadership had been
liquidated and replaced by Ukrainian leaders.  Their lives
of course were spared only for the time being.

Presiding Judge: This document is marked T/323.

Attorney General: On 20 September 1941 we read about the
fate of 5,000 Jews in Nikolayev and Kherson.  5,000 Jews
were seized and their problem was solved.  Einsatzgruppe I
reports that their area of Kommando activities was cleared
of Jews between 19 and 25 September.  8,890 Jews and
Communists were executed.

Presiding Judge: This document is marked T/324.

Attorney General: On 23 September 1941 we learn again about
the fate of the Jews in Minsk and other towns and townships.
Complaints were received regarding insolent and provocative
conduct of the Jewish lot (Judenschaft) in
Monasatyrshchina and Cheslavitchi.  The report reads: "It
became necessary to shoot the present Judenrat and twenty
other Jews."

Presiding Judge: This document is marked T/325.

Attorney General: A raid was carried out in the Minsk
Ghetto.  About 2,500 Jews, a number of women among them,
were arrested. 2,278 of them were executed within three
days.

Total liquidations reported are 23,804.

On 25 September 1941 a report of Unit A is dispatched
concerning the Riga Ghetto and the unpaid employment of
Jewish labour by all German authorities in the towns.
Difficulties with such employers were a daily occurrence
when measures by the Security Police had to be taken
against these Jewish labourers. Such economic authorities in
many cases submitted requests to exempt Jews from wearing
the Star of David and to grant them admission to public
restaurants.  The Jews in question were considered
indispensible for economic enterprises.  Naturally such
attempts are objected to and suppressed by the Security
Police.  The total by now has reached 75,000 Jews killed.

We are passing on to the month of October 1941.

Presiding Judge: The last document for September was T/326.
The document of October will be T/327.

Attorney General: The murder of 33,371 Jews of Kiev on 29
and 30 September is contained in the report.  Money,
valuables, linen and clothing were secured and part of it
delivered to the NSV* {*NSV = Nationalsozialistische
Volkswohlfahrt (National-Socialist Welfare Association)} for
equipping the local "Volksdeutsche"; some of it was handed
to the Town Administration.  The report was drawn up by
Standartenfuehrer Blobel whose name has already come up in
these proceedings, Sir.

Presiding Judge: What was he then?

Attorney General: He was connected with Einsatzgruppe C,
Sonderkommando 4a.

Judge Halevi:  Do all these reports come from Berlin?

Attorney General: They reach a centre in the
Reichssicherheitshauptamt and are distributed from there to
the various units for information.  There was an office
which collected them.  May I refer Your Honour to Noske's
statement when he explained in detail how matters were
arranged.  The various units sent their own reports and then
a condensed report was distributed for information.

Presiding Judge: But formally every one of these documents
was edited again in Berlin.

Judge Halevi:  Yes, edited again and distributed.

Presiding Judge: Yes, it says so.

Attorney General: 9 October 1941.  We read about executions
in Minsk, Mogilev and other towns, twelve places.  Something
new was mentioned here.  Because 21 German soldiers were
killed, 2,100 Jews and gypsies were rounded up, 100 for each
German, and were shot; this time by the Wehrmacht.  All the
Sicherheitspolizei had to do was to place the required
number at the disposal of the killers.  The report states a
total of 30,094 dead.

Presiding Judge: This document is marked T/328.

Attorney General: On 25 October 1941, 3,000 Jews were killed
in Vitebsk, 2,014 elsewhere in Belorussia, including Shklow
and Mogilev.

Presiding Judge: This will be T/329.

Attorney General: And now to the summary report of
Einsatzgruppe C, dated 3 November 1941 and addressed to
IVB4.  It contains a description of the killings in Kiev.
Public notices were put up on the city walls in which the
Jews were ordered to register for resettlement.  It was
anticipated that 5,000 to 6,000 Jews would report, but to
their surprise more than 30,000 reported.  The report
continues in self-congratulatory style: "Owing to skilled
organizational tactics, the Jews, up to the last moment
before their execution, still believed that they were
actually going to be resettled."  With their organizational
skill they succeeded in deceiving the 31,000 Jews until the
last minute by pretending that only a transfer was intended.
On page 4 we read: "Although only 75,000 Jews were
liquidated until now, it has become evident that the Jewish
Question cannot be solved in this manner.  Initially small
towns and villages were successfully made judenrein; it has
been observed in the bigger towns that after each execution
the Jews disappear; yet when the Kommando returns after some
time, they discover that the number of Jews by far exceeds
the number of those executed."  Page 4 of the original.  By
the way, this is T/37(277).

Presiding Judge: Here it will be T/330.

Attorney General: On 14 November 1941 again a summary
report: 4,000 Jews in Mogilev, 2,200 in Gorki, 900 in
Mistislawl.  Einsatzgruppe B reports that a total of 45,567
were killed until November 1941.

Presiding Judge: This will be T/331.

Attorney General: And of course they requisitioned money and
property, as was always done in connection with the murder.
On 19 November 1941 the report cites 10,000 Jews killed in
Dnepropetrovsk, 10,000 in Chernigov, where only 260 Jews
remained.  The 10,000 Jews of Dnepropetrovsk were shot on 13
October 1941.

Presiding Judge: This will be T/332.

Attorney General: We pass to the month of December.  On 8
December 1941 a further report is sent.  Again place names
which were mentioned before, there are additional murders.
In Zhitomir and Rovno a total of 15,000 Jews.  In connection
with this report I wish to submit the statement by Hermann
Friedrich Graebe which was submitted at Nuremberg, where he
described the extermination of Jews in and around Rovno
which he personally witnessed.

Presiding Judge: This report will be T/333.

Attorney General: I wish to point out that Graebe worked for
a German company operating in that area.  He saved Jewish
lives, and now resides in the United States.  We had in mind
to bring him over for testimony.  Since we have eye
witnesses on the Einsatzgruppen I think we may dispense with
it.  I shall submit his sworn statement, which also served
as a basic document for the Nuremberg judgment.

Presiding Judge: The Nuremberg judgment in the matter of
Einsatzgruppen?

Attorney General: No, a description of the atrocities
against Jews.

Presiding Judge: He is the man who saw the executions?

Attorney General: Saw them with his own eyes and moved
around in the area.

Judge Halevi:  A German?

Attorney General: Yes, a German.

Presiding Judge: This will be T/334.

Attorney General: On 12 December 1941 a summary of
Einsatzgruppe D is dispatched.  We learn of the murder of
10,000 Jews in Odessa,* {*No mention is made of Odessa in
Document T/335.} 2,910 Jews in Simferopol, the number up to
12 December 1941 totals 54,698 Jews.

Presiding Judge: This will be T/335.

Attorney General: On 19 December a summary report of various
units.  The murders relate to various places, Mogilev,
Gomel, Smolensk, Ljubawitchi, Krivoi Rog.

Presiding Judge: This document will be marked T/336.

Attorney General: And now to the report of 14 January 1942
with the last summary for the year of bloodshed, 1941.  It
says: "Estonia is judenrein".** {**In the document:
"judenfrei."}

The Court will recall that some days later Heydrich declared
at the Wannsee conference "Estonia is judenrein."  20,000
Jews of Riga and 31,000 Jews of White Russia were killed.
Progress in murders at other places.  It is interesting to
read what the report says about the Jews of Zagare.

     "An extraordinary act was undertaken by the Jews of
     Zagare.  On 20.11 fifty Jews escaped from the ghetto
     there, which had been closed already.  A widespread
     search was immediately undertaken and most of them were
     apprehended and shot.  For this reason preparations
     were made for the execution of all the Jews of Zagare.
     When they were transported to the place of execution
     the Jews, at a prearranged sign, attacked the guards
     and the Einsatzkommando of the Security Police.  Some
     Jews whom the Lithuanians had not searched thoroughly
     enough, drew knives and pistols and attacked the
     attending police crew with cries of 'Long live Stalin,
     down with Hitler' and wounded seven of them.  The
     resistance was immediately suppressed.  After 150 Jews
     were shot on the spot, the transport of the remaining
     Jews to the place of execution proceeded without
     disturbance."

The total, Sir, which is not mentioned in these reports, but
has been compiled by us from the various reports, amounts to
more than 400,000 Jews murdered and slaughtered by the
Einsatzgruppen from the day Russia was invaded until the end
of 1941.

Presiding Judge: This document is marked T/337.

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