Arthur Nebe: Resistance Hero or Holocaust Organiser? Or Both

[Peptic]

Gerald Reitlinger writes:

Einsatzgruppe B, which operated mainly in White Russia and the area of the Moscow front, was commanded by Arthur Nebe, a personality combining even more contradictions than Ohlendorf’s. A police detective under the Weimar Republic, Nebe had been in the Gestapo since 1933. The reorganisation of September, 1939, made him chief of the fifth branch of the RHSA, the criminal police of Kripo. When Einsatzgruppe B was formed, it was expected to police Moscow, and this explains why so important a person as Nebe accepted a command of only 700 men. In November, 1941, when this prospect receded, Nebe returned to his office in Berlin and his place was taken by Erich Naumann, a minor technical expert from Ohlendorf’s department. These five months spent by Nebe in Russia are not mentioned by his friend Hans Berndt von Gisevius, who has made almost a saint of his old chief in his book To the Bitter End. Another member of the German ‘Resistance’, Fabian von Schlabrendorf, writes solemnly that the massacres of Jews in Nebe’s area were carried out by other commanders, for Nebe was all this time in touch with the ‘resistance circle’ at Central Army Group Headquarters, which was led by Colonel Oster. And yet the operations report, which credited Nebe’s group with 45,476 executions during the five months of his command was prepared by one of his own Criminal Police officials, Doctor Knobloch. Moreover, the claims made on behalf of Nebe were absolutely contradicted at Nuremberg by the Higher SS and Police Leader for the Central Army Group Area, Lieut. General von dem Bach-Zalewski, according to whom Nebe, as a direct representative of Himmler, was the chief obstacle to his own interventions.

This general was present at an execution near Minsk, where Himmler ordered Nebe to devise a new method for mass killings, and it is at least curious that the only film showing the working of a gas chamber should be found in Nebe’s former Berlin flat. Even Gisevius admits Nebe’s complicity in this matter. The gas-chamber plans were discussed at daily luncheons at RHSA headquarters between Ohlendorf, Mueller, Schellenberg, and Nebe. The horrible cynicism of these conferences exhausted Nebe so much that he had twice to go on sick leave with a nervous breakdown. In July, 1943, Nebe became a ‘human wreck suffering from persecution mania.’ If this, according to Gisevius, was Nebe’s condition already in July, 1943, it is interesting to see what the former extermination-group commander was doing a year later, three weeks before the plot against Hitler, in which he is alleged to have taken part. On June 28th 1944, Nebe wrote to the SS Medical Service, offering ‘Asocial gipsy half-breeds’ from Auschwitz camp for experiments in drinking sea-water. The fateful July 20th passed and Nebe went underground to escape the proscription of the ‘Resistance Circle,’ but his sporting offer still stood. On the night of August 2nd nearly half the inmates of the ‘Gipsy’ camp at Auschwitz were gassed, but 915 young men were picked out for Buchenwald and from these the sea-water drinkers were selected.

Even if Nebe exaggerated his massacre figures to please Himmler, and even if he experimented in mass killing methods only under pressure, he still accepted the rank and the pay, and he did the job. If Nebe’s moral scruples amounted to no more than this, he must have been a very craven man, an impression confirmed by another German witness, the SS judge Konrad Morgen, who described how Nebe ran from the room in terror when he disclosed his investigation of the Auschwitz mass murders to Nebe’s chief, Ernst Kaltenbrunner.

Finally, even Nebe’s role as a hero of the resistance movement may be an alibi. He was last seen by his friend Gisevius in July, 1944, but he was not arrested till February, 1945. The allegation that Nebe was then summarily hanged rests on the testimony of his friends alone. The mighty mandarins of the RHSA, Schellenberg and Ohlendorf, have exhibited their credentials as resistance fighters and peace negotiators with the Allies. Nebe’s friends have done better; they have put his martyr’s crown in evidence.

Let's begin somewhere by highlighting the claim that "it is at least curious that the only film showing the working of a gas chamber should be found in Nebe’s former Berlin flat." This leapt out at me when I first read it and I hurried to find the particular text reference. It reads: "Photographs kindly supplied to author by Mr. Joseph Zigman, Office US High Commissioner, Germany, Office of Public Affairs."

The only information I could turn up via an Internet search was this from Hoggan's The Myth of the Six Million:

"The evidence of hand-writing in this case is no more convincing than the famous after-the-event gas chamber film of Joseph Zigman, "The Mill of Death," used at the Nuremberg Trial."

Is he referring to the IMT? I saw a repeat of the two-part drama Nuremberg on the History Channel last week which included actual footage from this film.

And how did the gas chamber film in question turn up in Nebe's former flat of all places?

Curious and curioser.

[Hannover]

Reitlinger's text is laughable. What is his source for this silliness?

There are no mass graves to susbstantiate the allegations of the Einsatzgruppen, there is no film to be seen. Only assertions that it exists. Why can't we readily view this alleged film?

If this film was credible it would be seen day & night on most televisions channels.

If the Einsatzgruppen had killed the alleged 1-2 million then mass graves would be easily found, examined, and verified... they have not been found inspite of claimed known locations.

- Hannover

[Sailor]

Gerald Reitlinger writes:

His book is out of print and difficult to get. I don’t have a copy. What sources did he use?

And yet the operations report, which credited Nebe's group with 45,476 executions during the five months of his command was prepared by one of his own Criminal Police officials, Doctor Knobloch.

Knobloch together with his assistants and secretaries did not only concoct Nebe’s Einsatzgruppen report, but all other Einsatzgruppen reports also, including Event Reports, Operational Situation Reports, and Reports from Occupied Eastern Territories.

Reitlinger is quoted that he realizes that these reports are completely unreliable.

One of the well known experts about Einsatzgruppen, Hans-Heinrich Wilhelm already found in 1988 that he is not sure whether the action reports, allegedly prepared by the Einsatzgruppen and sent to Berlin, and which are over and over again listed as proof for the number of murdered Jews, are correct:
“If the non-statistical area the reliability (of these reports) is not larger, which can only be backed-up through a comparison with other sources from the same region, the historical research would be well advised, to be more distrustful towards all SS-sources”

Krausnick and H.H. Wilhelm are considered the experts on Einsatzgruppen. They wrote:
Die Truppe des Weltanschauungskrieges. Die Einsatzgruppen der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD 1938-1942 (ESSD), Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart 1981.
The book is in German and can be purchased in Germany.

[Peptic]

Reitlinger's text is laughable. What is his source for this silliness?

If you read it, you will find his main sources are Gisevius, von Schlabrendorf, von dem Bach-Zalewski and Konrad Morgen. The document in which Nebe apparently offers 'asocial Gypsy half-breeds' for sea-water experiments is given as NO-179 as used in NMT Case 1 (The Doctors' Trial).

I found reference to this document in the relevant NMT volume:

That these experiments were carried out on nonvoluntary subjects is also proved by Grawitz' letter to Himmler on 28 June 1944. (NO-179 Pros. Ex.. 135.) In this letter Grawitz reports the opinions of Gluecks, and Nebe, as well as his own, On the proposed experiments. Gluecks stated that he had no "objections whatsoever to the experiments requested by the Chief of the Medical Service of the Luftwaffe to be conducted at the Rascher experimental station in the Dachau concentration camp. If possible, Jews or prisoners held in quarantine are to be used." It is impossible to imagine a Jew being asked to volunteer for anything in the Third Reich when they were being slaughtered by the millions in the concentration camps. Nebe stated: "I proposed taking for this purpose the asocial gypsy half-breeds. There are people among them, who, although healthy, are out of the question as regards labor commitment. Regarding these gypsies, I shall shortly make a special proposal to the Reich Leader, but I think it right to select from among these people the necessary number of test subjects. Should the Reich Leader agree, to this, I shall list by name the persons to be used." It is a little difficult to imagine how Nebe, chief of the Reich Criminal Police, could "list by name" gypsy volunteers for these experiments. Grawitz raised the objection to the use of gypsies on the ground that they were "Of somewhat different racial composition" and he therefore wanted experimental subjects racially comparable to European peoples. Himmler decided that gypsies plus three others for control should be used, (NO-183, Pros. Ex. 136.)

(http://www.mazal.org/archive/nmt/01/NMT01-T421.htm)

If the Einsatzgruppen had killed the alleged 1-2 million then mass graves would be easily found, examined, and verified... they have not been found inspite of claimed known locations.

But you have to know where to look, yes? Somewhere outside Kiev isn't much to go on

Here is my counter-challenge. Where are the mass graves of Russian POWs who died in German captivity? I understand that huge numbers perished especially during the winter of 1941-42. The location of German POW camps in the various regions of the Soviet Union could presumably be identified.

No dodging now

[Peptic]

Gerald Reitlinger writes:

His book is out of print and difficult to get. I don’t have a copy. What sources did he use?

I'm a fan of this book. I encourage you to get a second hand copy. Reitlinger writes in an engaging and very readable style. There's simply a lot of information that I haven't seen elsewhere.

Here is he on another Einsatzgruppen leader, the relatively unheralded Dr Rasch, commander of Einsatzgruppen C:

"To the north lay group C, which was commanded in June, 1941, by the former Security Police inspector for Koenigsberg, Otto Rasch. This elderly man, who was declared unfit to plead in September, 1947, on account of Parkinson's Disease, deposed in an affidavit that he learnt of the full meaning of the Fuehrer Order only at the end of August, 1941. This was when Lieut.-General Franz Jaeckeln, the Higher SS and Police Leader, arrived in Zhitomir in the Ukraine. Rasch claimed that he at once started for Berlin in order to protest personally to Heydrich, but in Cracow he changed his mind and tried to telephone. Failing to get through to the Prinzalbrechtstrasse, he had to go back to Kiev, where he arrived in time for the great massacre at the end of September. Shortly afterwards Rasch quarrelled with the Civil Commissar Erich Koch and succeeded in indefinitely prolonging his leave in Germany. Quite late in the war he refused to post of Higher SS and Police Leader for the France-North Italy in favour of a peaceful life as Mayor of Wurttemburg and a director of the company, Continental Oil AG, proving in that not-too-frozen Siberia that one could quarrel with Heydrich without being beheaded."

This image of an outraged Dr. Rasch scurrying off to Berlin to give Heydrich a piece of his mind is quite endearing.

And yet the operations report, which credited Nebe's group with 45,476 executions during the five months of his command was prepared by one of his own Criminal Police officials, Doctor Knobloch.

Knobloch together with his assistants and secretaries did not only concoct Nebe’s Einsatzgruppen report, but all other Einsatzgruppen reports also, including Event Reports, Operational Situation Reports, and Reports from Occupied Eastern Territories.

Reitlinger is quoted that he realizes that these reports are completely unreliable.

One of the well known experts about Einsatzgruppen, Hans-Heinrich Wilhelm already found in 1988 that he is not sure whether the action reports, allegedly prepared by the Einsatzgruppen and sent to Berlin, and which are over and over again listed as proof for the number of murdered Jews, are correct:
“If the non-statistical area the reliability (of these reports) is not larger, which can only be backed-up through a comparison with other sources from the same region, the historical research would be well advised, to be more distrustful towards all SS-sources”

Krausnick and H.H. Wilhelm are considered the experts on Einsatzgruppen. They wrote:
Die Truppe des Weltanschauungskrieges. Die Einsatzgruppen der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD 1938-1942 (ESSD), Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, Stuttgart 1981.
The book is in German and can be purchased in Germany.

But all three agree that the scale of deaths is in the region of hundreds of thousands. The essential question for us as revisionists is not simply are the Einsatzgruppen reports accurate, but in the absence of evidence to the contrary, will we get anyone else to believe it? Credibility is everything. I don't think the revisionist case on the Einsatzgruppen is compelling at all.

[Hannover]

But all three agree that the scale of deaths is in the region of hundreds of thousands. The essential question for us as revisionists is not simply are the Einsatzgruppen reports
accurate, but in the absence of evidence to the contrary, will we get anyone else to believe it? Credibility is everything. I don't think the revisionist case on the Einsatzgruppen is compelling at all.

Well, we have literally hundreds of thousands of people who claim to have been abducted by aliens in UFOs too. Just saying so doesn't make it so.
Men under pressure to give what their captors want to hear is not the least bit reliable. What's required is physical evidence. There are no mass graves that conform to the allegations.

Again we see the illogic of asking Revisionists to prove a negative...proving that something didn't happen. The onus is upon the accusers to prove their case, a basic standard of jurisprudence.
We can however show the folly in the beliefs of the believers who maintain that 1-2 million Jews were murdered by the Einsatzgruppen, but the remains are nowhere to be found.

As for Soviet prisoners, it would seem there is an obvious problem with the numbers allegedly murdered then; if they are alleged to have been killed in known specific sites. No physical evidence = no mass murders as alleged. Simple.

- vH

[Peptic]

As for Soviet prisoners, it would seem there is an obvious problem with the numbers allegedly murdered then; if they are alleged to have been killed in known specific sites. No physical evidence = no mass murders as alleged. Simple.
- vH

The millions of Soviet POWs Im talking about were not murdered. They largely died from neglect, victims of a combination of hunger, disease and inhospitable conditions. Your knowledge of WW2 must be sorely lacking if this is news to you.

I assume that the Germans disposed of the majority of these bodies in their POW camps by burying them. If so then there should be dozens of such mass graves spotted around the Soviet Union in areas where the Germans held POWs.

In this case German documentary evidence trumps the lack of physical evidence.

[Scott]

As for Soviet prisoners, it would seem there is an obvious problem with the numbers allegedly murdered then; if they are alleged to have been killed in known specific sites. No physical evidence = no mass murders as alleged. Simple.
- vH

The millions of Soviet POWs Im talking about were not murdered. They largely died from neglect, victims of a combination of hunger, disease and inhospitable conditions. Your knowledge of WW2 must be sorely lacking if this is news to you.

Some argue that this was deliberate murder of Untermenschen, and not merely a logistical oversight on the part of the General Staff that resulted in the high Soviet POW death rate, particularly in the winter of 1941-42. However, with the POWs we don't have weird "mass-murder factory" claims at postage-stamp sized camps like Treblinka, with hundreds of thousands of bodies supposedly killed and disposed of there. This begs for verification with physical evidence, although it doesn't effect larger demographic questions, IMHO.

[Hannover]

Peptic curiously said:

The millions of Soviet POWs Im talking about were not murdered. They largely died from neglect, victims of a combination of hunger, disease and inhospitable conditions. Your knowledge of WW2 must be sorely lacking if this is news to you.
I assume that the Germans disposed of the majority of these bodies in their POW camps by burying them. If so then there should be dozens of such mass graves spotted around the Soviet Union in areas where the Germans held POWs.
In this case German documentary evidence trumps the lack of physical evidence.

Well great, he says that millions died in known sites, says there should be mass graves a plenty, but yet there isn't .....even though there would necessarily be physical evidence if they were buried in allegedly known sites. Does Peptic think they vaporized?

I have always maintained that the Russian POW deaths were greatly exaggerated, a la the Jews' absurd claims. The lack of physical evidence does not nothing to change my mind.

In general it would seem there is an attempt to divert attention away from the fact there is no physical evidence for 1-2 million allegedly killed by the Einsatzgruppen (even though mass graves of those murdered by Communists are uncovered on regular basis...oops!)

It would seem there is also an attempt divert attention away from the fact there is no physical evidence for the alleged millions killed by gassing, even though Peptic believes in the notion that these alleged gassings occurred in very centralized sites.

No physical evidence = no holocaust as alleged.

- Hannover

[TMoran]

Out of the some 7 or 9 years that I have been looking into the Holocaust story this, Peptic's posting some of Reitlinger's stuff, is the first time I have seen anything from his book. Having had hundreds of exchanges on the Internet the only time I heard Reitlinger's name or book mentioned is in relation to his 1 million Auschwitz number. Members of the Holocaust community always refer to it when they try to contend with the 4 million down to 1 million as if to say the 1 million was the number all along.

Reitlinger seems to have a lot of detail information. Of the two examples posted by Peptic he really carries on almost giving an hour by hour narration.

He tries to sweep the reader along with the show of details and then inserts something like "On the night of August 2nd nearly half the inmates of the ‘Gipsy’ camp at Auschwitz were gassed, ...".

I find Holocaust writers bibliographies to be quite interesting. Since the passages aren't that long maybe Peptic could toss out the bibliographies for them.

Personally I think the reason why Reitlinger isn't a big name on the circuit for quoting is because his book is a, well, an 'embarrassment'. His stuff reads very much like Nora Levin's 'The Holocaust' which is another 'embarrassment'.

[Sailor]

I actually borrowed Reitlinger's book a year ago from our local library. It took over 4 months to get and I had to swear a holy oath not to loose or damage it. I am not a Holocauster and was not impressed with the book.

From Peptic:

This elderly man, who was declared unfit to plead in September, 1947, on account of Parkinson's Disease, deposed in an affidavit that [...]
This image of an outraged Dr. Rasch scurrying off to Berlin to give Heydrich a piece of his mind is quite endearing.

Well, he didn't. So the 'endearing' image is just that: A hoaxer's illusion.

The man was dying in 1947. He would have written and signed anything.

fge

[Hyman]

Let's begin somewhere by highlighting the claim that "it is at least curious that the only film showing the working of a gas chamber should be found in Nebe’s former Berlin flat." This leapt out at me when I first read it and I hurried to find the particular text reference. It reads: "Photographs kindly supplied to author by Mr. Joseph Zigman, Office US High Commissioner, Germany, Office of Public Affairs."

Gerald Reitlinger might be an emminently readable author, but one can only view this particular passage as deceptive. A layman given Reitlinger to read as a source for the Holocaust would probably believe that a film depicting a gassing does indeed exist. Reading such information could not but help form a bedrock belief in the standard account. The problem is that a film depicting a gassing in progress does not exist and both sides know this, otherwise said film would have been shown scores of times by now - as many times at least as the scenes from the liberation of the camps.

Regarding the number of Russians that died in German hands, hard-core skeptic Dr. Robert Faurisson does believe that millions of Russian troops perished. I believe at the Zundel trial he puts the number at 4 million. In the early stages of Operation Barbarossa, the Wermacht overran Soviet troop formations in the hundreds of thousands and millions. The Germans themselves were surprised by the numbers and were not equipped to feed that many POWs. Being out in the elements for even a week without food or water would be all that was required to kill off massive numbers. Himmler alludes to this problem in his 'Posen' speech, but puts forward no particular number or sympathy. IMO, the shortage of food and medicine - as well as exposure to the elements - was also the cause of the majority of Jewish dead.