Einsatzgruppen Details, Meaning Einsatzgruppen Article and Explanation Guide

Einsatzgruppen Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description

Einsatzgruppen (a German military term meaning "task forces" or "mission groups") were semi-military groups formed in Nazi Germany before and during World War II. These death squads belonged to the SS and followed the Wehrmacht in their attacks on Poland and the Soviet Union. They killed "undesirable" people without being subjected to judicial review.

After the occupation of Poland in 1939, they killed Poles belonging to the intelligentsia, such as priests and teachers. The Nazis considered all Slavic people untermenschen, or sub-humans, and wanted to use the Polish lower classes as servants and slaves.

After the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, the Einsatzgruppen's main assignment was to kill Communist officers and Jews which they did on a much larger scale than in Poland. They were under control of the RSHA; i.e., under Reinhard Heydrich and his successor Ernst Kaltenbrunner. They executed more than half a million Jews, Communists, prisoners of war, and Roma ("Gypsies") in total. They also assisted Wehrmacht units and local anti-Semites in killing half a million more. They were mobile forces in the beginning of the invasion, but settled down after the occupation.

The standard method employed by the Einsatzgruppen was to post a proclamation ordering all the Jews and other condemned people in an occupied area to gather on a certain day. Once their victims were assembled, the squads led them to their place of execution, which was usually an open, isolated area where mass graves had been prepared. Sometimes, natural features of the landscape like the ravine at Babi Yar were used. The victims were forced to surrender their belongings and undress, after which they were positioned either on the edge of the grave or in it and shot.

The Nazis were not satisfied with shooting as a method of mass murder, however. It was costly in ammunition and effort, there were too many potential witness to the murders, and the constant, close-quarters killing of defenseless men, women and children took a heavy psychological toll on the killers themselves. The men in charge of the Final Solution began searching for an alternative.

In some areas, the Einsatzgruppen also brought along specialized trucks called gas vans. Victims were forced into the backs of vehicles into which the exhaust from the engine was routed. The victims were then suffocated from the carbon monoxide accumulating within the truck compartment as the vehicle traveled to a burial pit. The stationary gas chambers of the subsequent death camps of Poland were an outgrowth of this idea.

Organization of the Einsatzgruppen:

Einsatzgruppe A for the Baltic Republics with the Sonderkommandos (German for special forces, not to be confused with the sonderkommandos in the concentration camps) 1 a and 1 b and the Einsatzkommandos 2 and 3.
Einsatzgruppe B for Belorussia with the Sonderkommandos 7a and 7 b, the Einsatzkommandos 8 and 9, and also with a special force in case Moscow was captured .
Einsatzgruppe C for the Northern and central Ukraine with the Sonderkommandos 4 a and 4 b and the Einsatzkommandos 5 and 6.
Einsatzgruppe D for Bessarabia, the Southern Ukraine, the Crimea and (eventually) the Caucasus with the Sonderkommandos 10 a and 10 b and the Einsatzkommandos 11 a, 11 b and 12.

Einsatzgruppen leaders

Group A: SS-Brigadeführer Dr. Franz Walter Stahlecker (until 23 March 1942)
Group B: SS-Brigadeführer Artur Nebe (until Oct. 1941)
Group C: SS-Gruppenführer Dr. Dr. Otto Rasch (until Oct. 1941)
Group D: SS-Gruppenführer Otto Ohlendorf ( until June 1942)

Einsatzgruppen Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description

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