Month: February 1946

[…] The fascist technique of extermination was once again in full swing. It created murder vans, gas chambers in the concentration camps, special electrical appliances for the mass murder of the doomed, crematoria, and also “Zyklon” banks.

I refer further to the report of the State Extraordinary Commission relative to the crimes in the city of Kiev. This report describes murders in the camps which will be also shown in the films today. I quote only one quotation from this report, which shows the methods of extermination of people in the Syretzk Camp. I quote Page 289 Paragraph 3, of the Russian text:

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MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Yes, Mr. President, they were also addressed to the SS units. The first letter, addressed to the administration of the Auschwitz Camp was from the firm Topf and Sons.

I shall now present to the Tribunal evidence of the fact that besides the stationary crematoria, there existed also movable crematoria. The Tribunal already knows about the movable gas chambers. These were “murder vans.” There were also created transportable crematoria. An SS member, Paul Waldmann, testifies to their existence. He was one of the participants in the crime perpetrated by the German fascists when 840,000 Russian prisoners of war in Sachsenhausen were annihilated at one time. The Exhibit Number USSR-52 (Document Number USSR-52) on Auschwitz has already been presented to the Court. I quote that particular extract from the testimony of an SS member, Waldmann, which mentions the mass execution in Sachsenhausen:

“The war prisoners murdered in this way were cremated in four movable crematoria, which were transported on car trailers.”

Source: Trial of the Major War Criminals Before the International Military Tribunal. Volume VII. Nuremberg: IMT, 1947. pp. 586.

Webmaster note: This no doubt gave rise to Homer Simpson’s idea for the electric blanketmobile.

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(10) In Yanov Camp the executions are carried out to the strains of the “Death Tango” played by an orchestra conducted by Professor Striks, an internee in the camp, together with his bandmaster, Mundt. I request Your Honors to observe two points of interest m this snapshot. To the right we see the camp commander, Obergruppenfuehrer Gebauer, in white uniform, and behind him his dog, Rex, known to us through many interrogations as having been trained to harass living persons and to tear them to pieces. It is evident that Gebauer is leading the orchestra to the execution ground.

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All these monstrous crimes had a definite system of their own. There was uniformity in the murder methods: One and the same system prevailed in the construction of the gas chambers, in the mass production of the round tins containing the poisonous substances “Cyclone A” or “Cyclone B,” the ovens of the crematories are all built on the same typical lines, and one was the plan extending over all the camps of destruction. There was uniformity in the construction of the evil-smelling death machines, which the Germans referred to as “gaswagen” but which our people called the “soul destroyers”; and there was the same technical elaboration in the construction of mobile mills for grinding human bones. All this indicates one sole and evil will uniting all the individual assassins and executioners.

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I will not make any comment on this document, although I do beg the Tribunal to take note of a certain Obersturmfuehrer Willhaus mentioned in this document.

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A certain number of prisoners of war who had escaped immediate annihilation were moved into special camps where they were gradually killed off by hunger and by exhausting heavy labor. I will now read into the Record the last paragraph on Page 37 of the report of the Yugoslav Government, which was previously mentioned by me and offered in evidence as Exhibit Number USSR-36 …

All these monstrous crimes had a definite system of their own. There was uniformity in the murder methods: One and the same system prevailed in the construction of the gas chambers, in the mass production of the round tins containing the poisonous substances “Cyclone A” or “Cyclone B.” the ovens of the crematories are all built on the same typical lines, and one was the plan extending over all the camps of destruction. There was uniformity in the construction of the evil-smelling death machines, which the Germans referred to as “gaswagen” but which our people called the “soul destroyers;” and there was the same technical elaboration in the construction of mobile mills for grinding human bones. All this indicates one sole and evil will uniting all the individual assassins and executioners.