Einsatzgruppen:
Mobile Killing Units
A young mother and her two
children sit among a large
group of Jews from Lubny who
have been assembled for mass
execution on October 16, 1941.
A Mass Killing by the
Einsatzgruppen
Einsatzgruppen (German for
"mission groups” or "task force")
were mobile paramilitary groups
operated by the SS before and
during World War II.
Their principal task, in the words of
SS General Erich von dem BachZelewski at the Nuremberg Trial,
"was the annihilation of the Jews,
gypsies, and political commissars."
Notice how young the
German solider is
standing just behind
the executioner.
A member of
Einsatzgruppe D is just
about to execute a
Jewish man kneeling
before a filled mass
grave in Vinnitsa,
Ukraine, in 1942.
Einsatzgruppen Shooting -- A woman and her child are
killed as they run across the fields.
Gilbert, Martin. Final Journey: The Fate of the Jews in Nazi Europe. New York: Mayflower Books. 1979. p.61
The Einsatzgruppe murdered more than 1.5 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.
German Einsatzgruppen
(mobile killing unit) soldiers
guard Jewish women and
children before massacring
them. In the background,
other Jews are forced to
undress and their clothing is
heaped on the ground.
This photo, originally in
color, was part of a series
taken by a German
military photographer.
Copies from this
collection were later used
as evidence in war crimes
trials. Lubny, Soviet
Union, October 16, 1941.
Commissar Orders
The Nazi execution of Soviet civilians kneeling by the side of a
mass grave at Kraigonev, USSR, following the German invasion
of the Soviet Union.
Anyone suspected of being a Communist official, along with Red
Army officers and male Jews were chosen for execution.
March 1941
SS Einsatzgruppen
murder 33,771 Jews
at Babi Yar near Kiev.
Jews on their way
out of the city of
Kiev
to the Babi Yar
ravine
pass corpses lying
on the street.
Portrait of two-year-old Mania Halef, a Jewish child
who was among the 33,771 persons shot by the SS
during the mass executions at Babi Yar.
Nazis sift through the enormous pile
of clothing left behind by the victims
of the Babi Yar massacre.
Soviet POWs at forced labor in 1943 exhuming bodies in the ravine
at Babi Yar, where the Nazis had murdered over 33,000 Jews in
September of 1941.
In 1943 - The number of Jews killed by SS Einsatzgruppen passes one
million. Nazis then use special units of slave laborers to dig up and burn the
bodies to remove all traces.
The German Army High Command gives approval
to RSHA and Heydrich on the tasks of SS mobile
murder squads (Einsatzgruppen) in occupied Poland.
March 26, 1941
The execution of Polish hostages in retaliation for an attack on a Nazi police
station by the underground organization "White Eagle."
In all, fifty-one civilians were shot.
A Jewish woman and
children before a mass
execution.
This photo, originally in color,
was part of a series taken by a
German military photographer.
Copies from this collection
were later used as evidence in
war crimes trials.
Lubny, Soviet Union, October 16, 1941.
Jewish women from the Mizocz Ghetto in the
Ukraine, which held roughly 1,700 Jews.
Some are holding infants as they are forced to wait in a line before
their execution by Germans and Ukrainian collaborators.
Oct 14, 1942 - Mass killing of Jews from Mizocz Ghetto in the Ukraine.
A German policeman shoots individual Jewish women
who remain alive in the ravine after the mass execution.
Assignment
• React to the Einsatzgruppen photos you
have just seen.
• What were the Einsatzgruppen?
• Why did Hitler convert his killing machine
into crematoria?