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BRITISH INTELLIGENCE SERVICE:
Decoded radio messages from the General
Government.
Prior to the German attack against Poland on 1
September 1939 the Polish intelligence service for several years had decoded
some German military radio messages transmitted after encryption by the
Abwehr’s Enigma machine. In July 1939, because of concerns about German
military intentions, Polish intelligence handed over to the British and French
intelligence services the secrets of their capability – a Polish manufactured replica
Enigma machine.1 This paved the way for British intelligence to
begin regular decoding of German secret radio traffic throughout the Second
World War. The decoded radio messages involving German Order Police and
Security Police discussed here began to be declassified in the UK during
1997.2
These radio messages cover the entire range of
organizations controlled by the Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler. A word of
caution, the messages themselves are like the pieces of thousands of jigsaw
puzzles thrown into the air at one time, and individual pieces plucked out:
like the pieces so gathered, there is little continuity among the messages.
Therefore these radio messages are simply individual pieces from several
different larger pictures involving the extermination operations against the
Jews in the General Government and activities of the SS and Police Leader in
Lublin, SS General Odilo
Globocnik.
These messages chart Globocnik’s
November 1939
relations with the Nazi civil authorities; in 1940 the resettlement of
Volksdeutsche from Volhynia to the Lublin area,
where Globocnik’s obvious
promise of early completion to Himmler proved empty and he had to ask the
Reichsführer-SS for an extension. This was slapped down by Rudolf Brandt, an
aide of the Reichsführer, as being impossible at this late stage.3
October 1940 finds the first mention of Adolf Eichmann
with Globocnik, over the
transfer of Poles from Litzmannstadt to
Lublin and nearby Lubartow.4
There is then a lull in radio messages involving Globocnik until
July 1941.
On 17 July 1941,
Reichsführer-SS Himmler
appointed Globocnik as his Plenipotentiary for the Construction of SS and
Police bases in the newly occupied Eastern areas (Der Beauftragte des
Reichsführers-SS für die Errichtung der SS- und Polizeistützpunkte im neuen
Ostraum) of the Soviet Union.5 Between July 1941 and April 1942,
there was much intercepted radio traffic to/from Globocnik and his Base
commanders (“der SS- und Polizeistützpunkte”): in Riga (SS-Obersturmführer
Georg Michalsen), Bialystok then
Minsk (SS-Untersturmführer Kurt Claassen),
Mogilew (SS-Hauptsturmführer Hermann Höfle) and
Starakonstantinow then Zwiahel
and finally Kiew (SS-Obersturmführer Richard
Thomalla). SS-Sturmbannführer Dolp
also played a part in these constructions, especially in Minsk and
Mogilew,
during October to December 1941. These five SS officers in the coming year
would play another important role in Einsatz Reinhard, once Globocnik was
relieved of his construction tasks in Russia on 27 March 1942.6
During May 1942, Globocnik’s
forces were
involved in fighting partisans in his area and Globocnik informed HSSPF
Krueger
in Krakow (Cracow) on 1 May 1942, that he had
instigated urgently a first degree Alarm
condition.7 On 12 May 1942, Globocnik
warned his neighbour, SSPF
Brest (SS Brigadeführer Wappenhans),
that a large police action would shortly be taking place in the area Wlodawa-Hrubieszow-Bug
river, bordering the SSPF Brest area.8
On 13 June 1942, Globocnik
received a radio
message from the office of SS-Gruppenführer Grawitz,
the Reichsarzt-SS and Police, in answer to his radio message of the previous day.9
Grawitz has passed the original message to the SS-Sanitätsamt in
Berlin. Globocnik may
have been asking Grawitz whether a Hygiene Insitut of the
Waffen-SS (Hygiene Institut der Waffen-SS) for the General Government could be established in
Lublin, possibly in preference to Krakow (Cracow).
On 22 and 24 August 1942 respectively, WVHA
(signed Liebehenschel) requested the commandants of
KL Auschwitz
(Höß) and KL Buchenwald
(Pister) to attend a meeting on
28 August at RSHA Berlin
(Kurfürstenstraße 116) with SS-Obersturmbannführer Eichmann.10 The
possibility exists that other KL commandants were also invited (a reflection on
the amount of radio traffic British intelligence could intercept). In a message
dated 24 August 1942 from Globocnik to
SS-Sturmbannführer
Rolf Günther of the
RSHA (Eichmann’s deputy in RSHA IV B4) about the evacuation of the Rumanian
Jews (Evakuierung von Juden aus Rumänien), all deportation trains should
be directed to Trawniki from where further distribution would take place.11
This message indicates early planning between Eichmann and
Globocnik for future
plans as another conference of RSHA IV B4 officials at the Reich Ministry of
Transport to discuss logistics for the evacuation of Rumanian Jews to the
General Government did not take place until 26-28 September 1942,12
a month later.
September 1942 provided a number of messages.
SS-Untersturmführer Johann Oppermann from the administration of SSPF
Lublin was
travelling in Holland, presumably buying supplies. He was directed by Globocnik
to the August Harms Company in Hamburg and ordered to buy two excavators
(Eimerbagger)13
for earthmoving. The question that springs to mind is what a SS-Brigadeführer
and Generalmajor der Polizei would want with earthmoving equipment, perhaps the
answer lies in digging mass graves. A less sinister need may have been digging
drainage ditches and embankment strengthening around local Volksdeutsche
settlements for which Globocnik was also responsible. Incidentally, the August
Harms Company still exists and their website illustrates a wide range of
earthmoving equipment.
The name Belzec makes an appearance on 12
September 1942 as the destination of a worker-transport train from Lublin via
Debica to Belzec.
The message possibly indicates Polish workers being brought
in rather than Jews and the route of the train involved is puzzling. The same
message also mentions materials and equipment being brought from Warsaw to
Lublin on uncovered railway wagons. No forced labour projects in the
Belzec
area are known for this period and why Globocnik should rebuke the railway
authorities (GEDOB) in the name of the Reichsführer-SS over these arrangements
is not fully explained.14
September also saw the first mention of “Aktion
Reinhard” in a partially intercepted radio message. WVHA granted KL Auschwitz
permission for a vehicle to travel to Litzmannstadt and inspect the “Aktion
Reinhard” research station for field-ovens.15
With SS-Standartenführer Paul Blobel presently at
Chelmno, near Litzmannstadt,
testing the burning of corpses on pyres was the reason for the journey. This
journey possibly also indicates an expansion of the phrase “Aktion Reinhard”
outside the General Government.
In October 1942, the commandant of KL Auschwitz,
Höß, advises Eichmann (message copied to
Liebehenschel at WVHA) on Jewish
deportation trains from “polo-czech-niederländischen” areas to Auschwitz.
Höß
draws Eichmann’s attention to the need of the Dutch deportation trains not to
stop at Kosel (now Kozle) and proceed directly to
Auschwitz.16 At
all costs Höß wanted to avoid trains being stopped by forces of
SS-Brigadeführer Albrecht Schmelt, responsible for the employment of foreign
workers in Katowicze (Kattowitz) with its growing coal and steel industries, and the
removal of able-bodied workers in preference to employment at Auschwitz.
Schmelt, at the instigation of Albert Speer,
Minister of Armaments and
Munitions, was being urged to compete with SS organizations for workers, and taking
able-bodied Jews from deportation trains soured relations with KL Auschwitz.
WVHA (signed Maurer) also requested information
from KL Auschwitz on 22 October 1942
about the current repair situation of
watches, pens and other goods from “Aktion Reinhardt” being carried out there.
The repair-workshops were to have been transferred to Berlin, but for the time
being will remain at KL Auschwitz.17
The next radio message to be intercepted about
“Aktion Reinhard” occurs in January 1943. Two partially intercepted messages
exist, of which one is a fragment, but there can be little doubt that the two
messages would have been more or less identical in their content. On 11 January
1943 at 10.00 a.m. a radio message marked “Geheime Reichssache” from SS-Sturmbannführer
Höfle in Lublin addressed to
SS-Obersturmbannführer
Eichmann at RSHA Berlin was
partially intercepted. At 10.05 a.m. Höfle sent a second message also marked
“Geheime Reichssache” to SS-Obersturmbannführer Heim
of the BdS office in Krakow; Heim was the
deputy BdS under SS-Oberführer Dr Eberhard Schöngarth. The
radio message to Heim is a 14 day report (for the 14 days prior to
31 December 1942) for “Einsatz Reinhart” and a year-end report,
quoting a series of numbers
against a series of letters. The author believes these figures provide an
accurate reflection of the number of victims of the “Einsatz Reinhart” program
to the end of 1942:
Letter and 14
day report year-end report
Camp
i.d. to 31.12.1942 1942 total
L
– Lublin 12761 24733
B
– Belzec 0 434508
S
– Sobibor 515 101370
T
– Treblinka 10335 713555*
total: 23611 1274166
(* even radio operators and decoding people are
fallible; in the decode itself the number is 71355, however this does not give
proper addition, 713555 was the correct number.)
These radio messages are crucial in our
understanding of the number of victims to the end of 1942 and indicate how the
Reinhard camps were operating in this period. The total 1942 killing figure of
1,274,166 victims agrees completely with the same figure quoted in the
so-called
Korherr Report to Reichsführer-SS
Himmler of 23 March 1943, where
this exact number of victims “passed…through the camps in the General
Government”. Peter Witte together with the author have written fully on these
two messages elsewhere.18
In May 1943, Globocnik
and Dr Horn, his Business
Manager (Geschäftsführer) from Ostindustrie, another SS enterprise in
the Lublin area and responsible to Globocnik,
were seeking an appointment with
WVHA-Chief, SS-Obergruppenführer Pohl19 in
Berlin; in the first days
of June 1943 Globocnik was back in Berlin
for meetings with
Eichmann and separately with SS-Gruppenführer
August Frank of the WVHA (Department Head,
Amtsgruppe A, Truppenverwaltung).20
Globocnik and
Eichmann were together again,
this time in Lublin. On 7 July 1943,
Globocnik
asks Eichmann to bring with him
a “pass” for “Wilhelm Caesar Toebbens” when he visits on
9 July 1943.21
Some future program was discussed when they met as only two weeks later, on 21
July 1943, Globocnik advised Eichmann
that the agreed date of 1 September 1943
for completion would now be difficult to meet and fresh instructions were
needed. There are strong indications that their 9 July meeting concerned the
final liquidation of the Bialystok Ghetto. At
the end of July,
or early August 1943, Globocnik visited the
KdS Bialystok to discuss a date to begin the ghetto
liquidation operation.
Globocnik was promoted SS-Gruppenführer und
Generalleutnant der Polizei on 13 September 1943 and a week later transferred
to Italy. SS-Gruppenführer Jakob Sporrenberg took over as SSPF
Lublin. At 11.15
a.m. on 15 October 1943, the new SSPF Lublin
advised his neighbour SSPF in Luzk, SS Brigadeführer
Wilhelm Günther, that some 700 Jews had broken out of the
Sobibor camp and would be escaping in his direction. Counter-measures should be
undertaken.22 In fact at this time Sobibor held 700 Jews but not all
of them fled, some remained in the camp and were later shot by returning SS
forces. By the end of October 1943, “SS Durchgangslager
Sobibor” was receiving
unused ammunition from HSSPF Russland-Mitte for recycling into new munitions.23
Although Globocnik was well ensconced in his
new position as HSSPF Adriatische Küstenland in Trieste, Italy, his
Lublin duties persisted. It appears likely
Globocnik was back in
Berlin during early
December 1943 for meetings together with his former administrative officials,
SS-Sturmbannführer Wippern and SS-Hauptsturmführer
Horn, presumably with the
WVHA about continuing financial problems with Aktion Reinhard balance sheets.
The financial problems persisted as Globocnik was still attempting a
‘final reckoning’ in late March 1944 with the cashier of Aktion Reinhard,
SS-Oberscharführer
Rzepa.24
The last Lublin message available reveals the
escape of 20 or so “bearers of secrets” (Geheimnisträger) from an unspecified
camp in the Lublin district during the night of 24 February
1944. These
unfortunates had managed to remove their shackles, dig a tunnel stretching
beyond the camp perimeter, and so escape. The KdS Lublin, Kripo expert, sought
information on their capture.25 There appears no published
information about these “bearers of secrets” and what they were doing in
Lublin.
I mentioned at the beginning that the decoded
messages were mixed up pieces from many jigsaws. In the larger picture these
messages indicate regular contacts and meetings between Globocnik
and Eichmann,
in Berlin and Lublin; and separately,
Eichmann with
Höß in Berlin. Globocnik kept
Eichmann informed of the
progress of Aktion Reinhard and the radio message from 11 January 1943 was a
14 day report, therefore previous 14 day period reports were undoubtedly sent
to Eichmann. These messages from Lublin with
their references to Aktion
Reinhard add to our knowledge of events, at the time British Intelligence had
little idea they already referred to the murder of over one million Jews.
Appendix:
In the Appendix, copies of
all the decoded SSPF Lublin material illustrating its activities.
Footnotes:
1. Stephen Budiansky, Battle of Wits. The Complete Story of
Codebreaking in World War II,
(London: Viking, 2000), p. 94.
2. Although decoded wartime radio messages from the German
Navy and Army had been declassified in
the UK some years previously, the decoded material used here was not
declassified until 1997.
3. Public Record Office (cited as PRO hereafter), Kew, UK: HW
16/5.
4. PRO: HW
16/30.
5. Der
Dienstkalender Heinrich Himmlers 1941/42, edited by
Peter Witte, Michael
Wildt,
Martina
Voigt, Dieter Pohl, Peter Klein, Christian Gerlach, Christoph Dieckmann and
Andrej Angrick, (Hamburg: Christians, 1999); see also
PRO: HW 16/32 (ZIP/GPD 347
message 1, transmitted 5 September 1941, where Globocnik
uses his new title.
6. Berlin Document Center, SS-Officer file, Odilo Globocnik.
7. PRO: HW 16/17 (ZIP/GPDD 19, message 3/4, transmitted 1 May
1942).
8. PRO: HW 16/54 (PRIT.292 transmitted 12 May 1942).
9. PRO: HW 16/19 (ZIP/GPDD 124, message 36/37, transmitted 13
June 1942). It does not appear likely that this was involved with Grawitz
seeking dental gold “of Jewish origin”,
see exchange of correspondence from Grawitz with SSPF Warsaw and Lublin, and
Himmler’s aide Rudolf Brandt
during April-July 1942, Nuremberg documents
NO-3163 to NO-3166.
10. PRO: HW 16/21 (ZIP/GPDD 213b, message 38/39, transmitted 22
August 1942; and
ZIP/GPDD 215b, messages 55/56 and 64/65, transmitted 24
August 1942). A report on the 28 August 1942 meeting was prepared by
SS-Untersturmführer Ahnert of BdS France deputizing
for his chief, Heinz Röthke, the Jewish expert stationed in
Paris. Ahnert writes from the impact of
the meeting for deportations from France, but he does confirm the presence of
Höszlig; at the meeting, see
Robert M W Kempner,
Eichmann
und Komplizen (Zürich,
Stuttgart, Wien: Europa Verlag, 1961), pp 220-222.
11. PRO: HW 16/21 (ZIP/GPDD 215a, message 47/48, transmitted 24
August 1942). Discussions at
this level about the intended deportation of 200,000 Rumanian Jews to begin
later in 1942 are completely new and pre-empt the Eichmann conference to plan
this operation. Surely, the distribution of the Rumanian Jews at Trawniki
mentioned in this radio message, indicates that not all the Rumanian Jews were
to be killed on arrival, but some used in forced labour. The majority would be
killed at Belzec.
12. Dokumente über Methoden der Judenverfolgung im Ausland, submitted by United
Restitution Organization in Frankfurt am Main (1959), pp 75-76, includes the
protocol from the meeting held in Berlin, 26-28 September 1942. The protocol
documents the desired deportations in concert with the Rumanian railway
authorities, unfortunately for Eichmann, at the last minute the Rumanian
railway representatives failed to attend. The deportations of Rumanian Jewry
never took place.
13. PRO: HW 16/21 (ZIP/GPDD 226a, message 54/55, transmitted 4
September 1942).
14. PRO: HW 16/21 (ZIP/GPDD 234a, message 32/34, transmitted 12
September 1942).
A likely explanation for this rather strange message may
involve the aftermath of a high-speed train crash. On 8 September 1942 a Jewish
deportation train via Lviv (Lwow) to Belzec travelling at speed on the single-track
railway line crashed into a civilian train carrying German civilians and
military personnel travelling in the opposite direction. The crash occurred at
Hrebenne, 14km south east of Belzec. There was heavy loss of life and carnage.
These Polish workers and the equipment may have been needed to clear the crash
site and restore the railway line. (Information courtesy of Mike Tegenza, Lublin.)
15. PRO: HW 16/21 (ZIP/GPDD 237b, message 42/43, transmitted 15
September 1942).
With so many documents and records destroyed by Security
Police and SS offices towards the end of the war, a copy of this particular
message has been found in the KZ Auschwitz Museum Archiv: APMO, Höß-Prozess, Bd.
12, Bl. 168 and Bd. 38, Bl. 114, Anlage 59. I am grateful to Peter Witte for
this example that shows quite clearly the authenticity of the British
Intelligence wartime decodes and reliability of the text itself.
In his memoirs, Höß recalls
visiting “Culmhof” with SS-Untersturmführer Franz Hößler (Birkenau
Schutzhaftlagerführer) and SS-Obersturmführer Walter Dejaco (Bauleitung, KL Auschwitz) to
inspect how Blobel was burning bodies using wood and petrol residues, see Kommandant
in Auschwitz, edited by Martin
Broszat (Munich: DTV, 1981, 2nd edition), pp 161-162. A report of
Dejaco confirms the visit to Litzmannstadt
on 17 September 1942 (NO-4467).
16. PRO: HW 16/21 (ZIP/GPDD 259b, message 1/4, transmitted 7
October 1942).
17 PRO: HW 16/21 (ZIP/GPDD 274b, message 35/36, transmitted 22
October 1942).
18. PRO: HW 16/23 (ZIP/GPDD 355a, messages 12 and 13/15,
transmitted 11 January 1943. For the Korherr Report of 23 March 1943, see BAB,
NS 19/1570 (covering letter,
Nuremberg document NO-5195, the report is NO-5194). A full documentation of these two decode messages, Peter
Witte and Stephen Tyas, “A New Document on the Deportation and Murder of Jews
during ‘Einsatz Reinhardt’ 1942,” Holocaust and Genocide Studies 15:3
(2001) pp. 468-486.
19. PRO: HW 16/25 (ZIP/GPDD 473d, message 10/11, transmitted 8 May
1943).
20. PRO: HW 16/25 (ZIP/GPDD 498a, messages 15 and 16, transmitted
2 June 1943).
The meeting with August Frank may have been in Frank’s
position as WVHA deputy chief.
21. PRO: HW 16/26 (ZIP/GPDD 533a, message 11, transmitted 7 July
1943; and ZIP/GPDD 547a,
message 23, transmitted 21 July 1943). It is highly likely that “Wilhelm Caesar
Toebbens” was in fact W. C. [Walter Caspar] Toebbens and Globocnik was simply
ensuring that “W. C. Toebbens” was properly identified using the German
phonetic language. Another question arises, why would Toebbens need a “Pass”
unless he was being taken to visit a death camp. The only death camp still in
operation in the Lublin area was Sobibor.
22. PRO: HW 16/38 (ZIP/GPD 1956 CC-HH, message DD 12, transmitted
15 October 1943 at 1115h).
23. PRO: HW 16/39 (ZIP/GPD 2041 DD-FF, message DD 14, transmitted
27 October 1943.
24. PRO: HW 16/39 (ZIP/GPD 2187 EE-HH, message HH 4, transmitted 5
December 1943); and HW 16/40 (ZIP/GPD 2509 transmitted 17 March 1944). On 5
January 1944 Globocnik wrote from Trieste to Reichsführer-SS Himmler, enclosing
the preliminary financial balance sheet for Aktion Reinhard covering the
period 1 April 1942-15 December 1943, indicating an operating profit of
178,745,960.59 Reichsmark (Nuremberg document PS-4024).
25. PRO: HW 16/69 (PEARL/ZIP/AT 669 transmitted 27 February 1944).
© ARC 2005