YANK The Army Weekly R Victel was the respectable front and Capt. Otto Landhauser was the "good" German. He never gave an order to kill anyone. He never tortured or looted or raped. What can he be tried forbeing a German? Carrying out orders? Living his life! The man is guilty. He is dangerous. He is the front man, the hypocrite, the accessory after the fact; he is as crooked and loathsome as the rest of them. And he is not alone. GUILTY They are all coming out of the wood emember this man: Capt. Otto Landhauser. He was a good jailer, as jailers go, and for a Nazi jailer he was amazingly humane. There were 2,000 anti-fascists at Vittel, and Landhauser allowed them opportunities for education and recreation. They were fed equally, regardless of religion. They were even permitted a Jewish doctor, one Capt. Levy of the French Army, who was a prisoner-or rather, guest-at Vittel. Several times a week photographers from Dr. Goebbels' office visited the camp and took pictures of the comfortable layout and the healthy internees, and these pictures appeared in newspapers in Stockholm and Lisbon and Buenos Aires to show people the humane, the gentle, the wronged Germans. And Capt. Landhauser was different from ordinary Nazi jailers in other ways. There were no atrocities at Victel by his order. If there were necessary whippings behind the scenes, out of earshot, they were done Informally by a Gestapo man named Serval, over whom of course, Capt. Landhauser had no control. Even the children of Vittal could play together within the barbed wire, the French with the Polish, the Jewish children with the "Aryans." Vittel was a model camp. Capt. Landhauser was a model warden. as HELL Remember him. Remember the camp and remember the captain. There was a reason for Vittel, a reason for the kindness of Capt. Landhauser. Two thousand well-fed anti-fascists hid four million slaughtered Poles. There was only one Vittel. There were hundreds of Lublins. The camp commandant, Captain Otto Landhauser, revealed vestiges of humanity-a humanity, however, that cracked under emergencies. He was a native of Innsbruck, Austria. Before the war he had been a professor of physical education at Bohn University. According to Charles Lloyd he had been correct enough; his decrees had not been harsh; and there had been latitude for education and recreation. Whatever minor and petty brutalities had been carried out were done through a German named Servai. Some of these minor brutalities were initiated by Servai. Landhauser did not stop them. Lloyd thought that Servai had been a Gestapo man. "I strongly suspect, too," said Lloyd, "and other people will tell you the same thing, that Servai was a naturalized American. He spoke American English -not English English-for one thing. For another, he knew the things about America which only someone who had lived there would know about." ATHER CHALET spoke about Landhauser in more FattER CHALET like she had lived and carried on his duties before the war in Paris, Father Chalet had been offered repatriation several times during the period he was at Vittel, but had refused. He came gradually to be a tower of strength at the camp. Even Landhauser came to Father Chalet with problems of the camp. Father Chalet cited one instance of a woman who had come to Vittel with a record of disobedience and violation of orders. Landhauser had not been certain as to how she was to be treated. He had come to Father Chalet and said, "What would you do to her?" "Why do anything to her?" said Father Chalet. "You are surely man enough to decide for yourself instead of listening to a lot of bobards (rumors), aren't you? "He shook my hand heartily," recalled Father Chalet, "as if he were glad to be rid of the responsibility of deciding the question for himself. Will you take responsibility for her good behavior?' Landhauser asked me. 'Of course I will,' I told him. "You see how it was," said Father Chalet. "He was, I must say, a man in some ways. But on the military side-a complete, obedient German soldier. There were 150 children in this camp. Without regard to race or religion they were all equally well fed. Landhauser saw to it that plenty of milk, meat and fresh vegetables reached the camp for the children. But he had a dual character. There was the military side of him, the Nazi side which won out often enough. But he wouldn't execute ugly decrees himself. There was always that brute of a Servai.... In the end, I judge Landhauser as being just as responsible as Servai." In the matter of the Russian internees Landhauser had been very firm. Since the Russians were work now: the Nazis who did not know what they were doing, the collaborationists who did not know they were collaborating. Their excuses are easy and convincing, and some of them weren't even in as far as Capt. Landhauser. The big industrialist lets the Germans build tanks in his factories-so that he can sabotage them better. The famous doctor serves only man and is above politics. The champion athlete refuses to perform in Germany but welcomes Germans to his bar; that is simply business. The editor continues to publish Dr. Goebbels' news because there has to be some news; people have to be informed. These are people to watch. It is easy enough to spot the rabid fascists, but watch out for these birds. They're the slippery ones. They never did anything; it wasn't their responsibility. They were only trying to make a living. And if we believe them, if we let them get away with it this time, they will continue to make their living-and then, like Capt. Landhauser, they will serve again. care of German wounded, of internee and civilian cases. Of course, on occasion there was a Maquis soldier to be taken care of. And this, said Captain Levy, with a shrug of his shoulders, was also done, and under the noses of the Germans. "However," said Captain Levy, "you are not to suppose that my status was due to anything other than good fortune. My other Jewish colleagues in the French Army have all been deported." Life at Vittel was without much incident. Of course, there were funny things like German officers rising in the Catholic chapel and standing at attention when "God Save the King" was played. And then there was the quiet and uneventful escape of some twenty-eight internees. Landhauser had acquired a secretary, one of the women internees. In time there were piles of documents requiring the official stamp, and the secretary took care of this, with Landhauser's approval. "You know how secretaries are," said Father Chalet, "give them an inch and in time they will have you around their little finger." So, with lavish use of the official stamp, twentyeight people went out of Vittel, carrying official travel orders. And the very last one of all to go was the secretary herself. V ITTEL was a world of rumor, and small irritations. Women, said Father Chalet, boiled over as suddenly as a kettle of milk, and then forgave and kissed each other. And, somehow or other, everybody knew how the Allies were making out. They followed our beachhead landings, our advance. All the time the German photographers kept coming to Vittel, to take the pictures that could be used abroad. All the time the big guns drew nearer. Small arms fire finally rattled in the streets of Vittel. The FFI was fighting in the streets. Then Third armor roared through. Vittel was free. Somewhere on the outskirts someone got to him and killed him. HOLERINGSVARA Landhauser got away, but Servai it is said, did not. not signatories to the International Red Cross, their nationals could receive no parcels. Even though it was pointed out to Landhauser that the others would feed them, Landhauser refused. Therefore, with Father Chalet one of the guiding elements, the Russians were fed from other Red Cross parcels, all of this being done undercover. Captain Levy, a French-Jewish surgeon, a medical officer in the French Army at the time of France's defeat in 1940, offered other evidence of Landhauser. Levy had been sent to the hospital in Vittel, still a prisoner of war but permitted to practise as surgeon. He was sure Landhauser knew that he was Jewish. But he was never bothered. He regarded this, however, purely as a piece of good luck. There was plenty of work to do at the Vittel hospital. For, besides the civilian cases, German wounded were brought there, too. The French medical staff took When Americans finally stopped here people swarmed about their vehicles. Two British Indian soldiers came by and said hello. So did a Negro woman from Norfolk, Va. All the accents and all the languages of the world greeted us. It seemed as if most of the world stood around us with hope and wonder in its eyes. Young Krawec, who had lived through the concentration camps of Poland, through a war with Germany, through the death of all his family, was, however, very quiet. All that night he walked back and forth through the open gateway of the Vittel Internment Camp. The big guns roared nearby. He walked back and forth experimentally, in and out of this heartbreak house called Vittel. He was now free. But where did he go from here? All that night he walked back and forth and by morning he still knew nothing. By morning he still faced nowhere. TANK, The Army Weekly, publication Issued weekly by Branch Office, Army Education and Information Division, War Dept., 203 Ean 42d Street, New York 17, N. Y. Reproduction rights restricted as indicated in the masthead on Mail Call page. Entored as second-class mattor July 4, 1943, at the Post Office at New York, N. T., ander the Act of March 3, 1879. Printed in Great Britain by Odhoms (Watford) Led., Watford Lithuania An Account of Crimes Committed in the The Kovno (in German, Kaunus) ghetto was established in 1941, soon after the Germans invaded Lithuania. In the autumn of 1943, the Kovno ghetto became Kauen concentra tion camp. The liquidation of the ghetto occurred shortly before the Red Army reached the city. Almost all the ghetto inhabitants had been deported or killed before Soviet troops liberated Kovno on 1 August 1944. The following letter was written by a Russian newspaperman and wired to PM, where it was published on 16 October 1944. It reports conditions in Kovno after liberation. The Russian reporter hoped that his account of atrocities would convince people that German crimes could not be forgiven. Will We Forgive the ‘Crimes of These Monsters'? Soviet Writer After Visit A Russian newspaperman wirelessed us the following dispatch as a letter to the editor. It's a statement of his views on talk of a "soft peace." We do not know the writer and we have been unable to learn anything about his background but because his account seems to reflect first-hand observation and apparently is a typical view of Russian journalists we are printing his letter. By OVADI SAVICH MOSCOW, Oct. 16.-I have been amazed to read in the foreign press all sorts of proposals and projects whose purpose seem designed to help criminals escape justice and their deserved punishment, or if they have been tried, to mitigate their fate by the invocation of “humanity" and "civilization." It is surprising to hear voices expressing alarm that German fascist criminals might be dealt with too severely; in other words, according to their deserts. These "humane" and "soft hearted" people apparently think nothing of, or perhaps have forgotten, the frightful sufferings which Fascism has inflicted on the civilized nations of Europe. They have apparently forgotten the millions of innocent victims done to death by the Hitlerite butchers. I shudder when I read that some people, and even groups, would have us forget and even forgive the crimes of these monsters. I cannot help asking myself what, if they have their way, is to become of our culture and civilization. Is this what millions of the finest sons of the democratic nations are fighting and shedding their blood for? That the appalling, bloody crimes of the Hitlerites should go unpunished? Crimes I have just returned from Kaunas, Lithuania, where I arrived shortly after its recapture by the Red Army. I visited the place that had been the Kaunas ghetto under the Germans. I found there new evidence of horrible crimes that cost the lives of scores of thousands of innocent victims. I am writing here what I have seen and I hope that people will understand that those guilty of such crimes deserve no mercy. The suburb of Viliampole is now a heap of ruins. Houses have been reduced to rubble and there is little left except an occasional chimney jutting out of the ruins and some twisted iron among the debris of the foundations of what once were homes. Here was Kaunas' ghetto. In this narrow space were confined 50,000 Jews. When the Germans came they first dispatched all those whom they described as "active proSoviet elements." They were shot in the fort's old fortifications which were used as prisons. Gestapo Arrives In October, 1941, they announced that 500 young men knowing at least three languages were wanted to work on archives. There proved to be in the ghetto 530 young men knowing three languages or more. They reported to the authorities in high spirits; they envisioned bread and work. In one respect they proved fortunate: the Germans shot all 530 at once without sub- Several days later it was announced in the ghetto Together with his assistants, he selected 12.000 people. They were selected, of course, at random, but families were not separated. Those who were suppose to be transferred left together with their children. The "other place" proved to be one of the forts. The people were led to ditches, made to strip naked and lie down in rows. Children also were stripped of their clothes and pushed to the ground. Tommy gun bursts followed. The People Knew The subsequent history of the Kaunas ghetto is the story of the slow annihilation of thousands of people who knew all of the time that they were doomed. There weren't Jews alone among the inmates of the ghetto and among the prisoners in the forts. About 20,000 men had been brought from the Netherlands, Czechoslovakia and France. In one of the forts, the sixth, we found this inscription in pencil: "There are 900 of us Frenchmen here." It is possible that these 900 weren't all Jews. Not one has survived to tell the story. In the same fort there are inscriptions in Czech and Dutch. The people of Kaunas knew what was going on in the forts and in the ghetto. The forts held as much terror, for them as for the Jews. Everyone knew that he might be taken there at any moment. No particular reason was required. The roundups never ceased. People disappeared and were never heard of again. Lithuanian intellectuals did all they could to help the Jews. The wife of the Lithuanian writer Benkiene helped 30 Jews to escape. Prof. Mazilis, a prominent Kaunas gynecologist, did a great deal to save Jewish children from death at the risk of his own life. He adopted the nineyear-old daughter of Dr. Elkis whom the Hiterlerites had killed. A census taken after the liberation of the city showed that on Sept. 1 of this year there were only about 1000 Jews in Kaunas. It is possible that a few hundred had not yet returned from their hiding places. Among the thousand that survived were many partisans. The population of Kaunas became aware that the Germans were preparing to leave the city when the ring closed around German forces in the Minsl area. It was two weeks before the Red Army entered Kaunas. As everywhere else, the Gestapo was the first to flee. But the Gestapo did not forget the ghetto. There were still thousands of Jews alive there. Swastika-marked aircraft appeared and they bombed the ghetto. Escape was impossible. A cordon had been thrown around the ghetto and those who tried to run away were shot. Then the ghetto was set on fire from all sides. When the fire died down the Germans methodically inspected the ruins and hurled hand grenades into all basements. Only a few persons escaped the bombing, fire and grenades. Snapshots For a long time afterward charred bodes were exhumed from the ruins. I witnessed the burial of the last remains of charred human bodies. Jewish partisans who had spent more than two years in the ghetto wandered amid the ruins. A part of a human body was found beneath a piece of bent sheet iron. "Frumkin, said a partisan. "He lived here." In the corner of a wrecked house some papers were sticking out of the ground. People's Commissar of Health Girdziauskuhas of the Lituanian Soviet Republic and I picked them up. Before me as I write lies a bunch of snapshots: a family at dinner, smiling girls at the beach, children in the woods, venerable old women, the personnel of some hospital. An identification card bears the name of Tamara Lurie, a student of the Kaunas Jewish gymnasia. Rent and electricity bills. Marriage certificates, a scrap of paper on which is scrawled: "To Mara Lurie. Darling, I cannot say much. I am dizzy, and more than all, I am lonesome for you." It was one family," said a partisan. "They all perished. What could they do? Half of them were ill or children" Moisei Zedak, a private in the Lituanian Red Army formation who came to Kaunas to find a trace of his folks, learned that they had all perished in the ghetto. One of the few Jews who survived in the last undiscovered basement told him that his brother. Hirst Zadek, had been in the same basement with him. There had been children, too. They suffered from thirst and cried. Hirst Zadek had gone to bring them some water and a German had shot him. Before going out, Hirst Zadek had written something and buried it in a corner. Moisei Zadek found the letter. It is written on pages torn from a volume of Lermontow. Here is their translation, its original is in Yiddish: Revenge "People! We have been hounded like beasts. For seven days we hid in an attic without water and suffering from terrible heat. Then they pelted us with hand grenades and set fire to the house. We managed to get down into the basement. The house burned down. Many human beings perished there, innocent souls-whose only fault was that a corporal at the head of Prussian reaction didn't like their race. "Comrades avenge us. There were more than 50,000 of us here in Kaunas. We are now among the last. We calmly await the coming of the executioners who will finish us off. This is going to happen today. "Repay them as they deserve. Keep an account of the lives destroyed through their fault and repay them a hundredfold. Then mankind in the future will be rid of vipers who are unworthy of the name of man. "You may perhaps find extenuating circumstances for some of them. It would be a mistake. They are all callous soldiers and barbarians. "Comrades! Bloody and sacred vengeance! That should be the goal of your life." What could one add to that letter? I should only like those who still think in terms of "forbearance" and "re-education with humanitarian methods" to read it carefully. Perhaps they will then realize that in this case "humanitarian methods" is tantamount to condonation and complicity in the most heinous crimes that have error been committed in the history of civilized mankind. An exterior view of the crematoria and gas-chamber building in Majdanek after the camp's liberation by the Red Army on 24 July 1944. The Germans evacuated more than one thousand prisoners from the Majdanek concentration camp as the Red Army approached, and eight hundred prisoners had been killed two days before liberation. Source: Central Armed Forces Museum of the Russian Federation, Moscow. Photograph print courtesy United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Poland Lublin Funeral: Soviets Honor the Jews On 24 July 1944 Soviet forces liberated Majdanek killing cen- ture on the camp. The following text is reprinted from the article that appeared in Life, vol. 17, no. 9 (28 August 1944): 34. The dead center of Europe's horror was revealed Aug. 6 as Lublin, in the far eastern part of Poland taken over by Hitler in 1939. On last July 24 the Russians captured it. Hitler had announced it as the ghetto for all Europe's Jews. By 1942 he had cut it up into 16 square districts, each with 20 barracks, and the new Lublin was still growing. Railway trains poured in, labeled from Vienna, Hamburg, Prague, Soviet troops inspect the crematorium at the Majdanek concentration camp and killing center after liberation by the Red Army on 24 July 1944. Source: Central Armed Forces Museum of the Russian Federation, Moscow. Photograph print courtesy United States Holocaust Memorial Musem. Paris and Amsterdam, their human contents singing and wailing and sometimes breaking out of the cars, only to be shot down by SS men. The survivors, said reports from Moscow, were loaded into "murder vans" which killed them either with the carbon-monoxide gas from the motor exhaust or a "Cyclone" gas. Shown are ovens in which they were then cremated. Lublin's capacity was 40,000 victims and there were usually 20,000 in residence in the "extermination camp." Total executed was reported as "several hundred thousand." Among them, according to a circumstantial Russian story, was the prewar premier of France, the great Léon Blum. |