Sonderbehandlung
Encyclopedia
Sonderbehandlung is a German
noun
meaning special treatment in English
, also existing as a verb: sonderbehandeln (to be treated specially). While it can refer to any sort of preferential treatment, it is known primarily as a euphemism
used by Nazi functionaries and the SS
for murder. It first came to prominence during Action T4
, where SS doctors killed mentally ill and disabled patients between 1939 and 1941, and was one of a number of nonspecific words the Nazis used to document mass murder
and genocide
. These words were also used to refer imprecisely to the equipment used to perpetrate their crimes, as gas chamber
s and Zyklon B
. The true meaning of Sonderbehandlung was widely known in the SS, and in April 1943, Reichsführer-SS
Heinrich Himmler
was so concerned about the security of it that he had it redacted in a secret report
.
Berel Lang states that disguised language was used "...not only in communications issued to the Jewish public when the intention of those issuing the communications was to deceive the Jews in order to minimize the likelihood of resistance, but also in addresses to the outside world and, perhaps more significantly, in internal communications as well, among officials who unquestionably knew (who were themselves sometimes responsible for) the linguistic substitutions stipulated by the language rules."
By the summer of 1941, Action T4 became widespread public knowledge in Germany (and also in neutral countries and Germany's enemies), and on August 24, 1941, Hitler
ordered the joint chief of the operation Dr. Karl Brandt
to halt it due to public protest (however it still continued, not only out of the public eye but in greater intensity). Hitler did not want to run the risk of an order publicly embarrassing him again and, as a result, the explicit order to carry out the Holocaust
was given by him orally. Even if there had been any written instances of this order, they would have almost certainly been destroyed when the Nazis realised their defeat was inevitable.
Where the Nazis had to document murder, Sonderbehandlung was one of a number of euphemisms used. The Action T4 doctors used "desinfiziert" (decontaminated) to document the gassing of mentally ill and handicapped individuals. The actual plan to exterminate the Jews of Europe was called "Die Endlösung der Judenfrage" (Final Solution to the Jewish Question
). Other words to describe extermination operations included:
The Posen speeches made by Heinrich Himmler in October 1943 are the first known documents in which a high-ranking member of the Nazi government spoke explicitly about the perpetration of the Holocaust during the war. Himmler mentions the "Judenevakuierung" or "evacuation of the Jews", which he uses synonymously with their extermination. At one point in the speech, Himmler says: "elimination of the Jews, extermination, we're doing it", briefly pausing in the middle of "elimination" (Ausschaltung) before going on to say "extermination" (Ausrottung). His hesitation in the middle of saying "elimination" can be considered as a quick mental check to see whether or not it is acceptable to use such words in front of his given audience. The answer is yes: it is the seniority of the SS in private. This has been compared to another incident of self-verification in the opposite way, where Josef Goebbels, in his Total War speech
on February 18, 1943, begins to say "Ausrottung des Judentums" ("extermination of Jewry) but switches to saying "Ausschaltung", bearing in mind that he is speaking very publicly. His resulting phrasing is "Ausrott...schaltung des Judentums", which can be likened to "exterm...elimination" in English.
and Sicherheitsdienst
chief SS-Obergruppenführer
Reinhard Heydrich
to all state police departments:
However, the usage is directed against Germans rather than Jews (it relates to "the principles of internal state security in the war"). Nevertheless, the law allowed for the killing of any person the regime wished. A memo dated six days later from a meeting at the SS-Reichssicherheitshauptamt defines Sonderbehandlung with "execution" following it in brackets.
A report from the Eastern Front
dated October 25, 1941, reads that "due to the grave danger of epidemic, the complete liquidation of Jews from the ghetto in Vitebsk
was begun on October 8, 1941. The number of Jews to whom special treatment is to be applied is around 3,000." An excerpt of a decree dated February 20, 1942, from the RSHA and written by Himmler regarding the treatment of "foreign civilian workers
" advises that in particularly difficult cases, application should be made to the RSHA for special treatment, adding that "special treatment takes place by hanging." In a letter to the RSHA, SS-Hauptsturmführer
Heinz Trühe requests additional gas vans for "...a transport of Jews, which has to be treated in a special way..." The gas vans were vehicles containing an airtight compartment in which the victims were locked and the exhaust gas
was pumped into, killing the victims with the combined effects of carbon monoxide poisoning
and suffocation
.
. As well as in reference to actions, the Nazis used euphemisms to refer to the actual equipment used to carry out killing. In his letter, Trühe refers to the vans as "S-wagen" (S-vans); "Sonderwagen" (special vans) in full. Other documented references include "Sonderfahrzeug" (special vehicle), "Spezialwagen" (special van), and "Hilfsmittel" (auxiliary equipment).
Several instances of this unspecific language in reference to equipment can be found in documents concerning Auschwitz concentration camp
. A letter dated August 21, 1942 referred to Bunker 1 and Bunker 2 (farmhouses west of Birkenau converted into gas chambers) as "Badeanstalten für Sonderaktionen" (bathing installations for special actions). In the letter, this is given in quotes, further suggesting the euphemistic nature of what is meant. On blueprints, the basement gas chambers of Crematoria II and III were simply marked as "Leichenkeller 1" (basement morgue 1), and the basement undressing rooms were marked as "Leichenkeller 2". However, a letter dated November 27, 1942 to chief Auschwitz architect SS-Sturmbannführer
Karl Bischoff
referred to morgue 1 of Crematorium II as the "Sonderkeller" (special cellar). A letter from SS-Sturmbannführer Rudolf Jährling concerning Crematoria II and III to oven builders J.A. Topf and Sons
dated March 6, 1943, refers to morgue 2 as an "Auskleideraum" (undressing room). The units of prisoners forced to empty gas chambers and load bodies into ovens were known as the Sonderkommando
(special squads). A document dated August 26, 1942 granted the camp authorities to send a truck "...to Dessau to pick up material for special treatment..." - Dessau was one of two places where Zyklon B
was manufactured. Standard usage of the term for killing at Auschwitz applied. A letter dated October 13, 1942, signed by Bischoff, states that construction of new crematoria facilities "...was necessary to start immediately in July 1942 because of the situation caused by the special actions." On September 8, 1943, 5,006 Jews were transferred from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz under the designation "SB six months." Six months later on March 9, 1944, those still alive were gassed.
In his diary, SS-Obersturmführer
and doctor Johann Kremer describes seeing a mass gassing for the first time:
Three days later, Kremer described the mass gassing of emaciated prisoners, nicknamed Muslims:
In a letter dated January 29, 1943 by SS-Sturmbannführer Bischoff to SS-Oberführer
Hans Kammler
, Bischoff refers to basement morgue 1 of Crematorium II at Auschwitz as a "Vergasungskeller", literally "gassing cellar". In the letter, the word is underlined, and at the top of the document is written: "SS-Untersturmführer
Kirschnek!" There was a very clear policy in the architecture office that words such as "gas chamber" should not be used; Second Lieutenant Kirschnek should be informed of this slip. Citing this unique letter, Robert Jan van Pelt
states that in using "special action" or "special treatment" in place of extermination and killing, the first Holocaust deniers
were the Nazis themselves, in that they attempted to deny to themselves what they were doing.
Ernst Kaltenbrunner
, concerning the Korherr Report
. Himmler considered the report "well executed for purposes of camouflage and potentially useful for later times."
The next day, SS-Obersturmbannführer
Rudolf Brandt
passed a message to the author of the report, Richard Korherr, stating:
Himmler was so sure that almost everyone knew what "special treatment" meant, and ordered for it to be replaced with the even more vague "durchgeschleust" (guided through), even though the document in question was top secret. The camps in question in the General Government were Treblinka
, Sobibor
and Belzec extermination camps, and Majdanek concentration camp. The only camp in the Warthegau was Chełmno extermination camp.
, it was shown that among those involved, there was no doubt what was meant by this term. At his trial, SS-Obersturmbannführer Adolf Eichmann
stated that "everybody knew" special treatment meant killing.
According to SS-Gruppenführer
and senior SS and Polizeiführer
Emil Mazuw
:
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
noun
Noun
In linguistics, a noun is a member of a large, open lexical category whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition .Lexical categories are defined in terms of how their members combine with other kinds of...
meaning special treatment in English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, also existing as a verb: sonderbehandeln (to be treated specially). While it can refer to any sort of preferential treatment, it is known primarily as a euphemism
Euphemism
A euphemism is the substitution of a mild, inoffensive, relatively uncontroversial phrase for another more frank expression that might offend or otherwise suggest something unpleasant to the audience...
used by Nazi functionaries and the SS
Schutzstaffel
The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...
for murder. It first came to prominence during Action T4
Action T4
Action T4 was the name used after World War II for Nazi Germany's eugenics-based "euthanasia" program during which physicians killed thousands of people who were "judged incurably sick, by critical medical examination"...
, where SS doctors killed mentally ill and disabled patients between 1939 and 1941, and was one of a number of nonspecific words the Nazis used to document mass murder
Mass murder
Mass murder is the act of murdering a large number of people , typically at the same time or over a relatively short period of time. According to the FBI, mass murder is defined as four or more murders occurring during a particular event with no cooling-off period between the murders...
and genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
. These words were also used to refer imprecisely to the equipment used to perpetrate their crimes, as gas chamber
Gas chamber
A gas chamber is an apparatus for killing humans or animals with gas, consisting of a sealed chamber into which a poisonous or asphyxiant gas is introduced. The most commonly used poisonous agent is hydrogen cyanide; carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide have also been used...
s and Zyklon B
Zyklon B
Zyklon B was the trade name of a cyanide-based pesticide infamous for its use by Nazi Germany to kill human beings in gas chambers of extermination camps during the Holocaust. The "B" designation indicates one of two types of Zyklon...
. The true meaning of Sonderbehandlung was widely known in the SS, and in April 1943, Reichsführer-SS
Reichsführer-SS
was a special SS rank that existed between the years of 1925 and 1945. Reichsführer-SS was a title from 1925 to 1933 and, after 1934, the highest rank of the German Schutzstaffel .-Definition:...
Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler was Reichsführer of the SS, a military commander, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. As Chief of the German Police and the Minister of the Interior from 1943, Himmler oversaw all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo...
was so concerned about the security of it that he had it redacted in a secret report
Korherr Report
The Korherr Report is a document on the numbers of Jews in Germany and Europe as of January 1, 1943, written by the chief inspector of the statistical bureau of the SS, Dr Richard Korherr.- Significance :...
.
Berel Lang states that disguised language was used "...not only in communications issued to the Jewish public when the intention of those issuing the communications was to deceive the Jews in order to minimize the likelihood of resistance, but also in addresses to the outside world and, perhaps more significantly, in internal communications as well, among officials who unquestionably knew (who were themselves sometimes responsible for) the linguistic substitutions stipulated by the language rules."
Background
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
ordered the joint chief of the operation Dr. Karl Brandt
Karl Brandt
Karl Brandt was a German Nazi war criminal. He rose to the rank of SS-Gruppenführer in the Allgemeine-SS and SS-Brigadeführer in the Waffen-SS. Among other positions, Brandt headed the administration of the Nazi euthanasia program from 1939 onwards and was selected as Adolf Hitler's personal...
to halt it due to public protest (however it still continued, not only out of the public eye but in greater intensity). Hitler did not want to run the risk of an order publicly embarrassing him again and, as a result, the explicit order to carry out the Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
was given by him orally. Even if there had been any written instances of this order, they would have almost certainly been destroyed when the Nazis realised their defeat was inevitable.
Where the Nazis had to document murder, Sonderbehandlung was one of a number of euphemisms used. The Action T4 doctors used "desinfiziert" (decontaminated) to document the gassing of mentally ill and handicapped individuals. The actual plan to exterminate the Jews of Europe was called "Die Endlösung der Judenfrage" (Final Solution to the Jewish Question
Final Solution
The Final Solution was Nazi Germany's plan and execution of the systematic genocide of European Jews during World War II, resulting in the most deadly phase of the Holocaust...
). Other words to describe extermination operations included:
- "Evakuierung" (evacuation)
- "Aussiedlung" (expulsion)
- "Umsiedlung" (resettlement)
- "Auflockerung" (thinning out – as in the removal of inhabitants from a ghetto)
- "Befriedungsaktion" (pacification)
- "Ausserordentliche Befriedungsaktion" or "A.B. Aktion" (special pacification)
- "Abwanderung" (having-been-migrated)
- "Säuberung" (cleansing)
- "Sicherheitspolizeilich durchgearbeitet" (directed or worked through in a manner in accordance with the SicherheitsdienstSicherheitsdienstSicherheitsdienst , full title Sicherheitsdienst des Reichsführers-SS, or SD, was the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany. The organization was the first Nazi Party intelligence organization to be established and was often considered a "sister organization" with the...
)
The Posen speeches made by Heinrich Himmler in October 1943 are the first known documents in which a high-ranking member of the Nazi government spoke explicitly about the perpetration of the Holocaust during the war. Himmler mentions the "Judenevakuierung" or "evacuation of the Jews", which he uses synonymously with their extermination. At one point in the speech, Himmler says: "elimination of the Jews, extermination, we're doing it", briefly pausing in the middle of "elimination" (Ausschaltung) before going on to say "extermination" (Ausrottung). His hesitation in the middle of saying "elimination" can be considered as a quick mental check to see whether or not it is acceptable to use such words in front of his given audience. The answer is yes: it is the seniority of the SS in private. This has been compared to another incident of self-verification in the opposite way, where Josef Goebbels, in his Total War speech
Sportpalast speech
The Sportpalast or total war speech was a speech delivered by Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels at the Berlin Sportpalast to a large but carefully selected audience on 18 February 1943 calling for a total war, as the tide of World War II had turned against Nazi Germany and its Axis allies.It is...
on February 18, 1943, begins to say "Ausrottung des Judentums" ("extermination of Jewry) but switches to saying "Ausschaltung", bearing in mind that he is speaking very publicly. His resulting phrasing is "Ausrott...schaltung des Judentums", which can be likened to "exterm...elimination" in English.
Usage
The term first appeared on September 20, 1939 in a decree by the GestapoGestapo
The Gestapo was the official secret police of Nazi Germany. Beginning on 20 April 1934, it was under the administration of the SS leader Heinrich Himmler in his position as Chief of German Police...
and Sicherheitsdienst
Sicherheitsdienst
Sicherheitsdienst , full title Sicherheitsdienst des Reichsführers-SS, or SD, was the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany. The organization was the first Nazi Party intelligence organization to be established and was often considered a "sister organization" with the...
chief SS-Obergruppenführer
Obergruppenführer
Obergruppenführer was a Nazi Party paramilitary rank that was first created in 1932 as a rank of the SA and until 1942 it was the highest SS rank inferior only to Reichsführer-SS...
Reinhard Heydrich
Reinhard Heydrich
Reinhard Tristan Eugen Heydrich , also known as The Hangman, was a high-ranking German Nazi official.He was SS-Obergruppenführer and General der Polizei, chief of the Reich Main Security Office and Stellvertretender Reichsprotektor of Bohemia and Moravia...
to all state police departments:
- "To avoid any misunderstandings, please take note of the following: ...a distinction must be made between those who may be dealt with in the usual way and those who must be given special treatment. The latter case covers subjects who, due to their most objectionable nature, their dangerousness, or their ability to serve as tools of propaganda for the enemy, are suitable for elimination, without respect for persons, by merciless treatment (namely, by execution).
However, the usage is directed against Germans rather than Jews (it relates to "the principles of internal state security in the war"). Nevertheless, the law allowed for the killing of any person the regime wished. A memo dated six days later from a meeting at the SS-Reichssicherheitshauptamt defines Sonderbehandlung with "execution" following it in brackets.
A report from the Eastern Front
Eastern Front (World War II)
The Eastern Front of World War II was a theatre of World War II between the European Axis powers and co-belligerent Finland against the Soviet Union, Poland, and some other Allies which encompassed Northern, Southern and Eastern Europe from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945...
dated October 25, 1941, reads that "due to the grave danger of epidemic, the complete liquidation of Jews from the ghetto in Vitebsk
Vitebsk Ghetto
Vitebsk Ghetto or Witebsk Ghetto was a short-lived ghetto in Belarus. It was created soon after the German invasion of the Soviet Union. It was created immediately after Germans took the town of Vitebsk on 11 July 1941....
was begun on October 8, 1941. The number of Jews to whom special treatment is to be applied is around 3,000." An excerpt of a decree dated February 20, 1942, from the RSHA and written by Himmler regarding the treatment of "foreign civilian workers
Forced labor in Germany during World War II
The use of forced labour in Nazi Germany and throughout German-occupied Europe during World War II took place on an unprecedented scale. It was a vital part of the German economic exploitation of conquered territories. It also contributed to the mass extermination of populations in German-occupied...
" advises that in particularly difficult cases, application should be made to the RSHA for special treatment, adding that "special treatment takes place by hanging." In a letter to the RSHA, SS-Hauptsturmführer
Hauptsturmführer
Hauptsturmführer was a Nazi rank of the SS which was used between the years of 1934 and 1945. The rank of Hauptsturmführer was a mid-grade company level officer and was the equivalent of a Captain in the German Army and also the equivalent of captain in foreign armies...
Heinz Trühe requests additional gas vans for "...a transport of Jews, which has to be treated in a special way..." The gas vans were vehicles containing an airtight compartment in which the victims were locked and the exhaust gas
Exhaust gas
Exhaust gas or flue gas is emitted as a result of the combustion of fuels such as natural gas, gasoline/petrol, diesel fuel, fuel oil or coal. According to the type of engine, it is discharged into the atmosphere through an exhaust pipe, flue gas stack or propelling nozzle.It often disperses...
was pumped into, killing the victims with the combined effects of carbon monoxide poisoning
Carbon monoxide poisoning
Carbon monoxide poisoning occurs after enough inhalation of carbon monoxide . Carbon monoxide is a toxic gas, but, being colorless, odorless, tasteless, and initially non-irritating, it is very difficult for people to detect...
and suffocation
Asphyxia
Asphyxia or asphyxiation is a condition of severely deficient supply of oxygen to the body that arises from being unable to breathe normally. An example of asphyxia is choking. Asphyxia causes generalized hypoxia, which primarily affects the tissues and organs...
.
Equipment
In German, "Sonder-", meaning "special", can be used to form compound nounsCompound (linguistics)
In linguistics, a compound is a lexeme that consists of more than one stem. Compounding or composition is the word formation that creates compound lexemes...
. As well as in reference to actions, the Nazis used euphemisms to refer to the actual equipment used to carry out killing. In his letter, Trühe refers to the vans as "S-wagen" (S-vans); "Sonderwagen" (special vans) in full. Other documented references include "Sonderfahrzeug" (special vehicle), "Spezialwagen" (special van), and "Hilfsmittel" (auxiliary equipment).
Several instances of this unspecific language in reference to equipment can be found in documents concerning Auschwitz concentration camp
Auschwitz concentration camp
Concentration camp Auschwitz was a network of Nazi concentration and extermination camps built and operated by the Third Reich in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany during World War II...
. A letter dated August 21, 1942 referred to Bunker 1 and Bunker 2 (farmhouses west of Birkenau converted into gas chambers) as "Badeanstalten für Sonderaktionen" (bathing installations for special actions). In the letter, this is given in quotes, further suggesting the euphemistic nature of what is meant. On blueprints, the basement gas chambers of Crematoria II and III were simply marked as "Leichenkeller 1" (basement morgue 1), and the basement undressing rooms were marked as "Leichenkeller 2". However, a letter dated November 27, 1942 to chief Auschwitz architect SS-Sturmbannführer
Sturmbannführer
Sturmbannführer was a paramilitary rank of the Nazi Party equivalent to major, used both in the Sturmabteilung and the Schutzstaffel...
Karl Bischoff
Karl Bischoff
Karl Bischoff was a German architect, engineer and SS-Sturmbannführer. Born near Kaiserslautern, Germany. At the age of twenty he joined the German Air Force. In 1935 he obtained a job at the Luftwaffe Construction Bureau. During the early years of the Second World War he was involved in the...
referred to morgue 1 of Crematorium II as the "Sonderkeller" (special cellar). A letter from SS-Sturmbannführer Rudolf Jährling concerning Crematoria II and III to oven builders J.A. Topf and Sons
Topf and Sons
J.A. Topf and Sons was a German engineering company, which designed and built the incineration furnaces used by the Nazis at concentration and extermination camps during the Holocaust; including Auschwitz-Birkenau, Buchenwald, Belzec, Dachau, Mauthausen and Gusen...
dated March 6, 1943, refers to morgue 2 as an "Auskleideraum" (undressing room). The units of prisoners forced to empty gas chambers and load bodies into ovens were known as the Sonderkommando
Sonderkommando
Sonderkommandos were work units of Nazi death camp prisoners, composed almost entirely of Jews, who were forced, on threat of their own deaths, to aid with the disposal of gas chamber victims during The Holocaust...
(special squads). A document dated August 26, 1942 granted the camp authorities to send a truck "...to Dessau to pick up material for special treatment..." - Dessau was one of two places where Zyklon B
Zyklon B
Zyklon B was the trade name of a cyanide-based pesticide infamous for its use by Nazi Germany to kill human beings in gas chambers of extermination camps during the Holocaust. The "B" designation indicates one of two types of Zyklon...
was manufactured. Standard usage of the term for killing at Auschwitz applied. A letter dated October 13, 1942, signed by Bischoff, states that construction of new crematoria facilities "...was necessary to start immediately in July 1942 because of the situation caused by the special actions." On September 8, 1943, 5,006 Jews were transferred from Theresienstadt to Auschwitz under the designation "SB six months." Six months later on March 9, 1944, those still alive were gassed.
In his diary, SS-Obersturmführer
Obersturmführer
Obersturmführer was a paramilitary rank of the Nazi party that was used by the SS and also as a rank of the SA. Translated as “Senior Assault Leader”, the rank of Obersturmführer was first created in 1932 as the result of an expansion of the Sturmabteilung and the need for an additional rank in...
and doctor Johann Kremer describes seeing a mass gassing for the first time:
- September 2, 1942: For the first time, at 3:00 A.M. outside, attended a special action. Dante's InfernoInferno (Dante)Inferno is the first part of Dante Alighieri's 14th-century epic poem Divine Comedy. It is followed by Purgatorio and Paradiso. It is an allegory telling of the journey of Dante through what is largely the medieval concept of Hell, guided by the Roman poet Virgil. In the poem, Hell is depicted as...
seems to me almost a comedy compared to this. They don't call Auschwitz the camp of annihilation for nothing!
Three days later, Kremer described the mass gassing of emaciated prisoners, nicknamed Muslims:
- September 5, 1942: In the morning attended a special action from the women's concentration camp (Muslims); the most dreadful of horrors. Master-Sergeant Thilo (troop doctor) was right when he said to me that this is the anus mundi. In the evening towards 8:00 attended another special action from Holland. Because of the special rations they get a fifth of a liter of schnapps, 5 cigarettes, 100 g salami and bread, the men all clamor to take part in such actions. Today and tomorrow (Sunday) work.
In a letter dated January 29, 1943 by SS-Sturmbannführer Bischoff to SS-Oberführer
Oberführer
Oberführer was an early paramilitary rank of the Nazi Party dating back to 1921. Translated as “Senior Leader”, an Oberführer was typically a Nazi Party member in charge of a group of paramilitary units in a particular geographical region...
Hans Kammler
Hans Kammler
General Dr Ing. Hans Friedrich Karl Franz Kammler was a civil engineer and high-ranking officer of the SS. He oversaw SS construction projects, and towards the end of World War II was put in charge of the V-2 missile programme.He is most commonly referred to as Heinz Kammler or Hans...
, Bischoff refers to basement morgue 1 of Crematorium II at Auschwitz as a "Vergasungskeller", literally "gassing cellar". In the letter, the word is underlined, and at the top of the document is written: "SS-Untersturmführer
Untersturmführer
Untersturmführer was a paramilitary rank of the German Schutzstaffel first created in July 1934. The rank can trace its origins to the older SA rank of Sturmführer which had existed since the founding of the SA in 1921...
Kirschnek!" There was a very clear policy in the architecture office that words such as "gas chamber" should not be used; Second Lieutenant Kirschnek should be informed of this slip. Citing this unique letter, Robert Jan van Pelt
Robert Jan van Pelt
Robert Jan van Pelt is an author, architectural historian, professor at the University of Waterloo and University of Toronto in Ontario and a Holocaust scholar. One of the world's leading experts on Auschwitz, he regularly speaks on Holocaust related topics, through which he has come to address...
states that in using "special action" or "special treatment" in place of extermination and killing, the first Holocaust deniers
Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...
were the Nazis themselves, in that they attempted to deny to themselves what they were doing.
Sensitivity
Heinrich Himmler became increasingly concerned about the security of documenting the destruction of the Jews. On April 9, 1943, he wrote a secret letter to Heydrich's successor as chief of the Gestapo and SD, SS-ObergruppenführerObergruppenführer
Obergruppenführer was a Nazi Party paramilitary rank that was first created in 1932 as a rank of the SA and until 1942 it was the highest SS rank inferior only to Reichsführer-SS...
Ernst Kaltenbrunner
Ernst Kaltenbrunner
Ernst Kaltenbrunner was an Austrian-born senior official of Nazi Germany during World War II. Between January 1943 and May 1945, he held the offices of Chief of the Reichssicherheitshauptamt , President of Interpol and, as a Obergruppenführer und General der Polizei und Waffen-SS, he was the...
, concerning the Korherr Report
Korherr Report
The Korherr Report is a document on the numbers of Jews in Germany and Europe as of January 1, 1943, written by the chief inspector of the statistical bureau of the SS, Dr Richard Korherr.- Significance :...
. Himmler considered the report "well executed for purposes of camouflage and potentially useful for later times."
The next day, SS-Obersturmbannführer
Obersturmbannführer
Obersturmbannführer was a paramilitary Nazi Party rank used by both the SA and the SS. It was created in May 1933 to fill the need for an additional field grade officer rank above Sturmbannführer as the SA expanded. It became an SS rank at the same time...
Rudolf Brandt
Rudolf Brandt
Rudolf Brandt was a German SS officer during 1933-1945 and a civil servant.A lawyer by profession, Brandt was Personal Administrative Officer to the Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler, and a defendant at the Doctors' Trial at Nuremberg for his part in securing the 86 victims of the Jewish skeleton...
passed a message to the author of the report, Richard Korherr, stating:
- The Reichsführer-SS has received your report on "The Final Solution of the European Jewish Question". He wishes that "special treatment of the Jews" not be mentioned anywhere. On page 9, it must be formulated as follows:
- "They were guided:
- through the camps in the General GovernmentGeneral GovernmentThe General Government was an area of Second Republic of Poland under Nazi German rule during World War II; designated as a separate region of the Third Reich between 1939–1945...
- through the camps in the WarthegauReichsgau WarthelandReichsgau Wartheland was a Nazi German Reichsgau formed from Polish territory annexed in 1939. It comprised the Greater Poland and adjacent areas, and only in part matched the area of the similarly named pre-Versailles Prussian province of Posen...
"
- No other formulation is to be employed.
Himmler was so sure that almost everyone knew what "special treatment" meant, and ordered for it to be replaced with the even more vague "durchgeschleust" (guided through), even though the document in question was top secret. The camps in question in the General Government were Treblinka
Treblinka extermination camp
Treblinka was a Nazi extermination camp in occupied Poland during World War II near the village of Treblinka in the modern-day Masovian Voivodeship of Poland. The camp, which was constructed as part of Operation Reinhard, operated between and ,. During this time, approximately 850,000 men, women...
, Sobibor
Sobibór extermination camp
Sobibor was a Nazi German extermination camp located on the outskirts of the town of Sobibór, Lublin Voivodeship of occupied Poland as part of Operation Reinhard; the official German name was SS-Sonderkommando Sobibor...
and Belzec extermination camps, and Majdanek concentration camp. The only camp in the Warthegau was Chełmno extermination camp.
Nazi perspectives
In the course of investigations and criminal proceedings for Nazi war crimesNazi crime
Nazi crime or Hitlerite crime is a legal concept used in some legal systems .In the Polish legal system a Nazi crime is an action carried out by, inspired by or tolerated by public functionaries of the Third Reich that also classifies as a crime against humanity or other persecutions of people...
, it was shown that among those involved, there was no doubt what was meant by this term. At his trial, SS-Obersturmbannführer Adolf Eichmann
Adolf Eichmann
Adolf Otto Eichmann was a German Nazi and SS-Obersturmbannführer and one of the major organizers of the Holocaust...
stated that "everybody knew" special treatment meant killing.
According to SS-Gruppenführer
Gruppenführer
Gruppenführer was an early paramilitary rank of the Nazi Party, first created in 1925 as a senior rank of the SA.-SS rank:...
and senior SS and Polizeiführer
SS and Police Leader
SS and Police Leader was a title for senior Nazi officials that commanded large units of the SS, of Gestapo and of the regular German police during and prior to World War II.Three levels of subordination were established for bearers of this title:...
Emil Mazuw
Emil Mazuw
Emil Mazuw, formerly Emil Maschuw, wasLandeshauptmann of the Province of Pomerania from 1940 to 1945. He was a member of the SS since 1933...
:
- During the war, the SS gave no meaning to Sonderbehandlung other than killing. I am certain that high-ranking officers knew it. I don't know whether the ordinary SS man did or not. According to the terminology used at the time, I understand "special treatment" to mean only killing and nothing else.