23
According to captured German documents in the National Archives, the local collaborators were required to register the Jews with provisional visas. The “purpose of the visa: possibility of elimination of all undesirables.” Document of 20 July 1941, Military Administration Group, Army Group Center, National Archives Microfilm Section T120, Roll 2533, frames 29282G821.
24
Captured Nazi documents clearly establish that the Jews in the ghettos were under the control of the civilian police. Report No. 70, National Archives Microfilm Section T175, Roll 233, frames 2722148-152.
25
The connection of the collaborators to the civil administration under the Germans is described in SS document Ereignesmeldungen No. 97 (1941), National Archives Microfilm Section T175, Roll 233, frames 2722679-688.
26
The effect of the Nazi instructions to the collaborators can be seen by comparing Report No. 27 (19 July 1941), “Greater Cooperation Is Expected Considering the Catching of … Intelligence, Jews, etc.” with the next week’s report (24 July 1941), “In Minsk, the whole Jewish Intelligentsia Has Been Liquidated.” National Archives Microfilm Section T175, Roll 233, frames 2721633-637.
27
According to captured SS records, White Ruthenian collaborators were appointed to positions in the civil administration in all cities touched by the Einsatzgruppen (the mobile killing units). Ereignesmeldungen No. 43, National Archives Microfilm Section T177, Roll 233, frames 272 1772-782.
28
Although many of the Byelorussians claimed that they were elected to their offices, captured German documents clearly established that it was they who installed the collaborators as mayors. National Archives Microfilm Section T120, Roll 2533, frames 292820-830.
29
The connection between the Einsatzgruppen and the provisional administration established in Byelorussia is discussed repeatedly in several captured SS documents contained in the National Archives. See, for example, National Archives Microfilm Group T175, Roll 233, Report No. 27, frame 2721570; Report No. 21, frames 272149s91; Report No. 21, frame 2721496; Report No. 36, frames 2721692-93; Report No. 90, frames 2722485-87; Report No. 97, frame 2722688. It should be emphasized that these are the actual weekly reports from the mobile killing units themselves.
30
Stankievich is discussed in Volume 5 of the Nuremberg documents series (Red Set).
31
Stankievich’s role as mayor of Borissow is described in the following German documents and SS reports: Microfilm Group T194, Roll 235, frames 429433; Microfilm Group T454, Roll 26, frame 71; Microfilm Group T315, Roll 1586, frame 359; and Nuremberg document PS-3047.
32
Evidently, Ehoff was pardoned by the Communists after the war. According to the Soviet propaganda booklet “How They Served the People,” p. 34, “David Ehof, a Russianized German from the Volga Region and one of the active participants of the bloody events at Borisov in 1941, now lives in A Free Settlement in the Soviet Union….”
33
Soennecken’s report is in the Congressional Record Appendix, August 7, 1948. Nuremberg Document No. 3047-PS.
34
The role of the White Russian police in the systematic slaughter of the Byelorussian ghettos is described in the English section of the 550-page Yiddish-language book
Sefer Steibtz-Swerzene
[Memorial Book of Stolpce] (Israel, 1964). According to Jewish eyewitnesses, the method of extermination was quite systematized:
For two days they dug a pit that was 150 meters long and 2% meters deep. The Jews were loaded on lorries. Those who refused to climb up were beaten savagely or killed on the spot.
The shrieks of the poor people split the heavens. The lorries were driven by local White Russian drivers. Beside the pit stood Germans, Letts and White Russian police with machine-guns. The Jews were ordered to take their clothes off. Men, women and children stood naked. Their belongings, their rings, their money and everything else was taken away from them. These were placed in a row on the edge of the pit and the machine-guns began chattering and killing. Living people also fell into the pits which were then covered with a layer of sand.
35
The
Encyclopedia Judaica
lists hundreds, perhaps thousands, of small Byelorussian and Ukrainian villages that were subjected to the same treatment.
36
On November 1, 1941, General Wilhelm Kube wrote a letter to the Reichs Kommissar for the Eastern Territories, Gauleiter Heinrich Lohse, at Riga, protesting the Slutsk massacre:
Peace and order cannot be maintained in White Ruthenia with methods of that sort. To bury seriously wounded people alive who work their way out of their graves again, is such a base and filthy act that this incident as such should be reported to the Fuehrer and Reichs Marshal. The civil administration of White Ruthenia makes very strenuous efforts to win the population over to Germany in accordance with the instructions of the Fuehrer. These efforts cannot be brought in harmony with the methods described herein….
37
Paromchyk Galina,
The Tragedy of Koldychevo
, from the library of the newspaper “Voice of the Motherland” (Minsk, 1962), discusses the 1962 war crimes trial in Baranovitche, Byelorussia, of four accused murderers. The book also contains detailed allegations against Ostrowsky, Franz Kushel, Boris Ragulia, Sergei Gutyrchik, and Victor Zhdan, all of whom were alleged to be living in the United States.
38
Solomon Schiadow, Memoirs, FBI files.
39
Vakar, op. cit. Chapter 12, contains an objective account of the Nazi occupation of Byelorussia.
40
Many of the collaborators had religious backgrounds. The Orthodox theological schools had lower fees than grammar schools in Byelorussia, although their graduates were restricted to academic careers at the theological seminaries. Up to 1906, theological scholars were barred from the universities (Ostrowsky, biography, pp. 1cb11).
41
On partisan warfare, see Vakar, op. cit.; Werth, op. cit., pp. 710-26; and V. K. Kiselev,
Partizanskaya Razvedka
(Partisan Intelligence Work) (Minsk, 1980).
42
Ostrowsky admitted that he had no idea whether the Communists in his administration were secretly planted by the NKVD. However, both the SS and the German administration agreed that the shortage of trained collaborators made the hiring of Communist officials necessary (Ostrowsky’s biography, pp. 44-45).
43
Vakar, op. cit., chap. 12.
44
For Gehlen’s memorandum, see Dallin, op. cit. pp. 54546.
45
Ostrowsky’s biography, pp. 49-50, notes that on December 20, 1943, Sobolewsky sent him a telegram from Minsk, as chairman of the Byelorussian Relief Organization (Self-Help) inviting him to a conference the next day with SS General von Gottberg. Sobolewsky’s version of the meeting is contained in
The Truth About ABN
by Niko Nakashidze (Munich, 1960), p. 54.
Chapter Three
46
Ostrowsky’s biography.
47
Decree No. 2 of the President of the Byelorussian Central Council, City of Minsk, January 15, 1944, appointed Kushel, Sobolewsky, and Hrynkievich among the first fourteen members of the Byelorussian Central Council. Copy of document in Byelorussian propaganda book,
For the National Independence of Byelorussia
(London, 1960, copy in Library of Congress).
48
The
Minsker Zeitung
is a useful source for identifying the names and ranks of the various collaborators. For example, a man named Russak was identified as the city mayor for Baranovitche and Stankievich was reported as the representative of the Byelorussian Central Council for the region of Baranovitche at the time Ostrowsky visited the city to conduct an anti-partisan propaganda campaign. According to the Nazi press accounts, first Russak spoke of the role of the Central Council in undertaking the war against the “Jewish Bolsheviks.” Stankievich spoke next on the need for building better trust with the German civil administration. Ostrowsky then spoke of the terrible atrocities being perpetrated by the NKVD.
49
Minutes No. 1A of the Byelorussian Central Government meeting of Regional Deputies, and the Byelorussian Regional Defense Chiefs, Minsk City, March 28, 29, and 30, 1944, contains a transcript of the discussion on organizing the draft mobilization for the Nazis. During the meeting, Stankievich complained that their forces were more poorly equipped than the other collaborator military units. One of the other collaborators replied that when we were talking about the “uniforms the question was not to look handsome but to have strength.” Stankievich in return claimed that he had organized a force of some 64 officers, 382 sub-officers, and 6,000 riflemen. (Copy in Byelorussian propaganda book,
For the National Independence of Byelorussia
, Library of Congress.)
50
Ostrowsky cooperated wholeheartedly with General von Gottberg’s request for assistance in combating the partisans. See, for example, letter of June 8, 1944, from Ostrowsky to the commander of the Slutzk Byelorussian Regional Defense Force (BRD):
Attached please find a copy of my letter to General Commissar of Byelorussia from 5-25-44 and a copy of his answer from 6-6-1944. I am ordering you to send to the most endangered part of the villages special units of BRD battalions under the command of the most qualified officers.
Copy of letter in
For the National Independence of Byelorussia
(London, 1960; copy in Library of Congress).
51
Sven Steenberg,
Vlasov
(Alfred A. Knopf, 1970), pp. 71-73.
52
The planning for the congress in Minsk took place just as the news of the British and American landings in Normandy were reaching Byelorussia. During one of the planning conferences, Ostrowsky’s vice president, Shkelonak, realized that the invasion meant the end of the German Reich, and suggested that it might not even be wise to hold the congress. When Ostrowsky heard of the blunder, he called the SS official directly and explained that Shkelonak’s German was not that good, and that he really meant the time was right for the congress to begin (Ostrowsky’s biography, pp. 56-59).
53
Ibid., pp. 59-60.
54
Ostrowsky’s close relationships with the SS and the Wehrmacht gave him special standing among the collaborators in exile in Berlin: “Here I should stress that the BCC at that time had such standing that the leaders of the other now Russian nations looked to it in matters of policy. This is probably the reason why Himmler put the BCC most under pressure. Due credit should be given in this connection to the late Professor Dr. Von Mende, who is opposed to Himmler’s policy and who is a great friend to all the non-Russian peoples enslaved by the Bolsheviks.” (Ostrowsky’s biography, p. 62).
55
Franz Kushel insisted that the Byelorussian army should be organized and used only in the struggle against Bolshevism. Apparently, he too was concerned that his troops might be used on the western front. Copy of document in
For the National Independence of Byelorussia
(London, 1960; copy in the Library of Congress).
56
Minutes of the meeting of the Presidium of the Byelorussian Central Council of September 26, 1944 (Berlin) indicated that permission had been received to reorganize the Byelorussian legion. “From the conversation, it can be seen that the German military authorities in principle agree to the organization of Byelorussian military forces, the word army is even used … initially two divisions are to be created, a combat one and reserve one … the outlook for the organization of Byelorussian forces is quite good.” Copy of document in
For the National Independence of Byelorussia
(London, 1954; Library of Congress).
57
The SS unit designation is described in National Archives document microfilm roll T45426/85-86. According to the Army letter of November 30,1956, from the ACSI-CDOO, “Under the auspices of the German Wehrmacht Kushel was placed in command of Belo-Russian Brigade which subsequently was expanded into a division. Kushel was made division commander (2-star general) and fought until the end of the war. He surrendered to the Germans in what became the French zone of Germany.” The last sentence erroneously suggested that Kushel fought against the Germans, not for them.