2246: The sergeant has announced coffee and doughnuts. These trials are known as the Subsequent Nuremberg Proceedings. Case #9 of these twelve trials is known today as the Einsatzgruppen Case. Army officers and GIs, with enormous keys on their belts, are moving in and out of the office. In a webinar in December 2020 with The National WWII Museum, historian Michael Geyer stressed the significance of those ideological fighters who implemented the Third Reichs vicious programs of mass murder. At years end, Ohlendorf could report that his men had eliminated 55,000 Jews. I returned to Grahams office. 2346: Graham addresses us briefly. He doesnt want it delayed or snafued by a suicide, which would mean writing lengthy reports and involve him in interminable red tape. 2226: Graham reports that the prisoners have had their teeth examined once more, and that false teeth have been removed. . 0014: The sergeant pulls up the body while from the floor below someone disentangles the rope. He was sentenced to death in April 1948 and spent three years in detention before being hanged at the Landsberg Prison in Bavaria on 7 June 1951. The Sicherheitsdienst (SD) | Holocaust Encyclopedia .. Germany has come a very long way since then. We also can examine how the commanders of the Einsatzgruppen, like Ohlendorf, summarized this barbarity. This was done to avoid any possibility of poison or suicides. In 1947-48, Ohlendorf was the most notable of the 23 members of the Einsatzgruppentried by the Americans. (Case No. The town is tense with excitement but no real trouble is expected. There is a staff sergeant, stout and unsmiling, unarmed, standing at the door. Educated at a humanistic Gymnasium in Hildesheim, he later studied law at the . Martin Holler has argued convincingly that Otto Ohlendorf became to a certain degree the trailblazer for the complete solution of the Gypsy question on Soviet soil. 2140: Graham receives confirmation from Heidelberg: proceed with executions. Radio transmissions were conducted weekly or bi-weekly under conditions of absolute secrecy. [4] Nonetheless, Ohlendorf was instrumental as a member of the SD in shaping Nazi economic doctrine, which became "increasingly virulent as the war progressed" as he attempted to mould the economy "in an ethnic context". As Ferencz told me during an interview for my book The Nazi Hunters, he still vividly recalls the protestations of Otto Ohlendorf, one of those condemned to death, that he was only doing his duty. 47% of Ohlendorf men worked as a Farmer and 40% of Ohlendorf women worked as a Housekeeper. ", Historian Martin Gilbert reported that in front of the Nuremberg Tribunal, Ohlendorf described the use of gas vans for killing operations as "unpleasant" and that the, "Story 34Mass Murderers Seek to Justify Genocide (19461949)", Otto Ohlendorf, Einsatzgruppe D, and the Holocaust by Bullets, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Otto_Ohlendorf&oldid=1149039801, This page was last edited on 9 April 2023, at 20:51. Ohlendorf, Otto. - WW2 Gravestone The men chosen for these units trained at a school for border police in the town of Pretzsch and the nearby towns of Dben and Bad Schmiedeberg in Saxony in May and June 1941. No matter what happens to our application on Monday in the District Court in Washington for a permanent injunction prohibiting the executions, there will be no executions. The Holocaust in Eastern Europe: At the Epicenter of the Final Solution. [22][c], Ohlendorf disliked the use of the oft-employed Genickschu (shot to the back of the neck) and preferred to line up victims and fire at them from a greater distance so as to alleviate personal responsibility for individual murders. His murderous activity certainly influenced the decision-making process of the other Einsatzgruppenleaders, insofar as Ohlendorfs formal transgressions were obviously in no way restricted, neither by the Reichssicherheitshauptamt[RSHA] nor by the relevant military commander. In September 1941, the earliest known murder of Soviet Roma by EinsatzgruppeD occurred at Nikolayev. Third mistake: Pohl was a man of many titles . This type of evidence I have accepted in mitigation of the original sentence., The High Commissioner said that he had been struck by the extent of the misinformation in the letters and petitions which were being sent to him. He. Berlin: Edition Heinrich, 1997. . They are followed by the chaplain, wearing a white tunic and reading from his prayer book. 10, Trials of War Criminals before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals, vol. If so, login to add it. It takes a special human type to shoot small children in a pit before the very eyes of their parents, themselves destined to die as well. The others are relaxed now, smoking. That is in large part the product of the efforts of Nazi hunters like Ferencz, Bauer and others who pushed for such trials, not allowing the past to be buried along with its victims. [16] Transfers from the RSHA to the Einsatzgruppen were in part due to personnel shortages but also to keep the initial killing operations confined to those who already knew the details, such as Ohlendorf, Arthur Nebe, and Paul Blobel. This quickly devolved into identifying and executing Jewish men considered potential partisans. [45] Hoping to salvage the reputation of the SD, Ohlendorf offered his services in the hopes that he could shape the postwar reconstruction of Germany, but along "National Socialist lines", remaining convinced as was Admiral Karl Dnitz (who gave Ohlendorf the economics portfolio), that some form of Nazism would ultimately survive. This function has been disabled for WW2 Gravestone. He married Lena Hausmann on 23 April 1921, in Belleville, St. Clair, Illinois, United States. He had studied the cases not with any political considerations in mind but purely in judicial terms. For example, Otto Ohlendorf commanded Einsatzgruppe D while it committed mass murder in territories that are part of Romania and Moldova, as well as in Ukraine and around the Crimean Sea. The tradition dated back to the 19th century. Graham says his fan mail from Nazi sympathizers has slowed down. [32] This act should not be seen as a change of heart or kindness, as just a month prior in September 1941, Ohlendorf reported to his men that "from now on the Jewish question is going to be solved and that means liquidation". Over 90,000 murders are attributed to Ohlendorfs command, who testified to this effect during his trial at Nuremberg. Execution of Otto Ohlendorf - Brutal Nazi Commander of Einsatzgruppen Lost your password? Graham is noncommital. Graham nods. Britt removes it, places it back on the mans head for the second time, tightens it with the knot at the nape of the neck. Born in Hoheneggelsen (today part of Shlde; then in the Kingdom of Prussia), Otto Ohlendorf came into the world as part of "a farming family". 10, Trials of War Criminals before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals, vol. Another newspaper calls to inquire whether it is true that the executions will go forward. [54] Defending his actions, Ohlendorf compared Einsatzgruppen activities to the Biblical Jewish extirpation of its enemies; he likewise claimed that his firing squads were "no worse than the 'press-button killers' who dropped the atom bomb on Japan". Twenty-two of the defendants were tried. They came from every state in West Germany, and even from the United States. Otto Ohlendorf was the Head of Amt lll of the Reich Main Security Office during the Second World War and organiser of mass murders in the Southern Ukraine in 1941 and 1942. Otto Rasch: Rasch led Einsatzgruppe C. This unit perpetrated mass murder in Ukraine, including the shooting of more than 33,000 Jews of Kiev at. Hans Theodor Schmidt was trailed and hanged in Landsberg prison, on 07-06-1951, age 51.. They killed on their own. After leaving Flensburg on the 9th, he regularly sent a man to Ohlendorf to see if Montgomery had replied. 0004: Britt springs the trap. The routine, carefully prepared in advance, is followed to the letter. He is obsessed with fear of a suicide attempt. On January 2, 1942, Ohlendorf reported that his unit had killed 17,645 Jews between November 16 and December 15, 1941, in western Crimea. I will be vindicated by God and history. Marking the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, The National WWII Museum connects two instances of remorse for Nazi criminality by leading German politicians. Thus, his entire socialization as a young man occurred within the organizations of the Nazi Party. In 19411943, Einsatzgruppen conducted mass shootings of hundreds of thousands of Jews, Communists, and others during Nazi Germanys campaign against the Soviet Union. The trial ran from September 29, 1947, to February 12, 1948. The Nuremberg Tribunal: Otto Ohlendorf and the Einsatzgruppen Face They murdered on their own.. 2357: Hard wood benches line the sides of the loft. I have photographs of the seven men in my hands. In June 1941, Reinhard Heydrich appointed Ohlendorf to be commander of Einsatzgruppe D which operated in southern Ukraine and Crimea. On June 17, as the day of the assault on the USSR loomed, Heydrich summoned Ohlendorf and the commanders of EinsatzgruppenA, B, and C to Berlin for a crucial meeting. The crimes for which punishment was being meted out were the worst known in history, and they had to be atoned for in order to prevent their recurrence. Ohlendorf Name Meaning & Ohlendorf Family History at - Ancestry Eventually, auxiliaries drawn from the peoples of the USSR, including the recently annexed Baltic States, augmented their ranks. The appearance of the Einsatzgruppenwas a death sentence for entire Jewish communities. Ferencz, now 96, pointed out that right after the war, this refusal to admit guilt or show any compassion to the victims was widespread. The slaughter perpetrated by Ohlendorf and his fellow commanders was face-to-face, and the murdered usually perished relatively close to their homes. In 1940, Farmer and Housekeeper were the top reported jobs for men and women in the USA named Ohlendorf. He tweets @AndrewNagorski. St. John's Scholar | St. John's University Research . He also cited examples from other cases, including the High Command Case in which military commanders carried out the so-called Fuehrer Order calling for the murder of undesirable elements such as Jews and Gypsieswomen, men, and children alike who were offensive to the Germans. And he further noted that a great number of terrible and terrifying crimes had been committed in the name of maintaining the ethnic purity of the German people. He studied at the University of Pavia, where he gained his doctor's degree in jurisprudence; and by 1933 he obtained the position of a research directorship in the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. Each chaplain is allowed all the time he needs in the cell with the condemned man before he is led to the gallows. Tens of thousands of Roma and members of the Communist Party of the USSR were also slain. Not to elicit a. Even one of the most notorious architects of the Final Solution, Adolf Eichmann, organizer of the mass deportation of Jews to Auschwitz and other concentration camps, portrayed himself as a mere. He joined the Nazi Party in 1925 (member nr 6631) and the SS (member nr 880) in 1926. With the onset. [46], In May 1945, Ohlendorf participated in Himmler's flight from Flensburg. 2. An economist by education, he is head of the Sicherheitsdienst (SD) Inland, responsible for intelligence and security within Germany. [43], Ohlendorf devoted only four years (19391943) of full-time activity to the RSHA, for in 1943, in addition to his other jobs, he became a deputy director general in the Reich Ministry of economic affairs. 0007: Borom says he wishes there were a seven-man gallows. For the Nazi hunters -- the government investigators and prosecutors along with the freelance operatives who have tracked and exposed the perpetrators -- this magnifies the role of these remaining court cases. He coordinated plans to rebuild the German economy after the war. Although preparations have been a strictly guarded secret, the news that the seven will be hanged has leaked outprincipally via the wives of the condemned, their defense counsel, and the prison grapevine. 2147: Bickel receives confirmation from Frankfort: proceed with executions. What insights do the Milgram experiments (see reading. Graham says the last suppers were cooked at Augsberg, some miles away from Landsberg Prison. There is a telephone call. In the aftermath of the Battle of Kasserine Pass, US II Corps passed to the command of General Harold Alexanders 18th Army Group. Ultimately, only four of the 14 death sentences were carried out. The army executioner, Mr. Britt, suddenly puts in an appearance, trim and neat in his tight-fitting uniform. Otto Ohlendorf Biography - German SS officer and Holocaust perpetrator The Einsatzgruppen trial (officially, The United States of America vs. Otto Ohlendorf, et al.) This was not the unprecedented, continent-wide industrialized process of mass annihilation of Treblinka and Auschwitz-Birkenau, where Jews, Roma, and other victims were transported from all over to Europe to ultimately be gassed and cremated. Please enter your email address. Top Home Latest TRENDING Studio9 Specials State INDIA WORLD SPORTS In some of these cases, I found that the defendants could establish their resistance to superior orders, which resulted in no instance of the individuals being punished by their Nazi masters. There is still debate about how much local initiative taken by the leaders of the Einsatzgruppenand other SS officials (like the Higher SS and Police Leaders) pushed Berlin to broaden and escalate the violence from mass murder to genocidal destruction. Explore resources that meet the California HistorySocial Science Framework standards. The following year he returned to economic research, becoming Ministerial Director and deputy to the State Secretary in the Ministry of Economics. While some perpetrators in the Holocaust claimed, and may have believed, that they would be physically harmed if they did not follow orders to participate in mass murder, historian Doris Bergen notes that the Nazis did not harm those who refused: Germans were not forced to be killers. Beorn, Waitman Wade. USA v. OHLENDORF (8 April 1948) - famous-trials.com ". The cameramans flash goes off in a sudden stab of light. No one knows what they said, but theyve talked. A tall, gray-faced woman is signing out. I wonder what they will be using these for now. The numbers killed reached over 35,000 by early October. It is cold up here in the loft of the prison workshop which has now been temporarily outfitted for this unusual purpose. Case #9 is usually referred to as the Einsatzgruppen Case. [caption=0c5326ca-3fd0-4df0-8f36-5840fd057055] - [credit=0c5326ca-3fd0-4df0-8f36-5840fd057055]. Since Jews were automatically assumed to be ultra-Bolsheviks and to be the ruling class of the Soviet Union, they were singled out. Otto Ohlendorf. I return to Grahams office. But the judges at Nuremberg maintained that it would have been impossible for members of Einsatzgruppen not to know that murdering civilians was both illegal and immoral. The CIC agents tell us that the newspaper reporters, some of them Germans, have been interviewing the wives of the seven. These men, who were sober enough in all other respects, still believed that we had a sporting chance against the East.". and 5 received sentences that ranged from 10 to 20 years. I watch a woman pushing a baby carriage across the street and well outside the range of the prison gates. 2250: Warrant Officer Britt is discussing hangings with the medical officer. Graham says the men have eaten their last supper. 9)), is still frequently overlooked. Second mistake: He personally selected prisoners for medical experiments. Few defendants at any of the trials denied the accusations made against them, and often their own testimony was used to convict them. In 1941, Ohlendorf was appointed the commander of Einsatzgruppe D, which perpetrated mass murder in Moldova, south Ukraine, the Crimea and, during 1942, the North Caucasus. As the leader of EinsatzgruppeD, Otto Ohlendorf was responsible for the murder of 90,000 Soviet Jews, Roma, and Communists. Fritz Bauer, a German prosecutor from a secular Jewish family who had spent most of the Nazi era in exile, returned after the war determined to make his countrymen face up to the horrors committed in their name. Graham calls out: Attention! All in the room stand. Presumably they are working on McCloy. The defendant answered: You cant cast pearls before swine., High Commissioner McCloy indicated that in certain cases at Landsberg, new evidence had made it possible to reduce the death sentence to time served. 2229: A German Evangelical chaplain named Ermann, employed for two years by the prison, was intercepted smuggling mail out for the prisoners, and was sacked. Otto Ohlendorf (1907-1951) FamilySearch At the trial, Ohlendorf also attempted to present the operations in the Soviet area not as a racist programme for the annihilation of all the Jews but as a general liquidation order primarily aimed at securing the newly won territory. After he had started his blood bath, he was asked whether he would say something for the survivors. He is tried at the Einsatzgruppen Trial, convicted, and executed on June 8, 1951 in Landsberg Prison, West Germany, https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/pa1042218. "[26][d], Many of the killing operations were personally overseen by Ohlendorf, who wanted to ensure they were "military in character and humane under the circumstances". . Are there some basic moral teachings that are so fundamental that every person should be expected to know and try to follow them, no matter what society they live in. However, it should.. The men charged were: Paul Blobel, Ernst Biberstein, Walter Blume, Werner Braune, Lothar Fendler, Matthias Graf, Walter Haensch, Emil Hausmann, Waldemar Klingelhoefer, Gustav Noske, Adolf Ott, Waldemar von Radetzky, Felix Rhl, Martin Sandberger, Heinz Schubert, Erwin Schultz, Willy Seibert, Franz Six, Eugen Steimle, and Eduard Strauch.

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