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Downloaded from
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Official YIFY movies site:
YTS.MX
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[chattering]
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[narrator] German policemen
in the occupied East, 1942.
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They're here to enforce German rule
in the conquered territories.
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Diligently, they carry out their orders.
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They have a special assignment:
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To shoot Jews
by the hundreds and thousands.
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At point-blank range.
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{\an8}Historians and other experts
have done extensive studies
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{\an8}into the men who pulled these triggers.
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They want to know how a mass murder
like this could happen.
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And they make an astounding discovery.
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{\an8}Those men didn't have to kill.
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{\an8}They didn't have to obey the order.
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[Browning] If you had the courage to say,
"I can't shoot,"
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you may have been considered a coward,
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you may have gotten a bad letter
in your file,
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but you were not punished
in any severe way.
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[narrator] 20 years after the war,
there's a trial
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for the murders committed
by a Hamburg police unit.
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So, what was their motivation?
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Why did they shoot?
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[in German]
They aren't ideologically-motivated,
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willing executioners.
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They're not trained killers.
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They're people with civilian jobs,
like taxi drivers or plumbers.
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In every respect
they were completely ordinary men.
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{\an8}- [ship horn blowing]
- [birds squawking]
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{\an8}[narrator] Hamburg in the summer of 1942.
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{\an8}Three years into the war.
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{\an8}The regime is recruiting men
for a special assignment.
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[Browning] By 1942, you're really
at the bottom of the manpower pool
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{\an8}because of the casualties, of course,
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{\an8}that the army is suffering in Russia
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{\an8}and the growing manpower they need
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{\an8}to occupy the ever-growing German empire.
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They want every person
they can get their hands on
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simply to fill the manpower shortage.
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[narrator] Older family men, who are no
longer suitable for the German Wehrmacht,
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are also called up.
Many are not Nazi sympathizers,
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nor are they overly hostile towards Jews.
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But rather, they come from historically
social democratic backgrounds.
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[Kühl, in German]
They ranged from bakers and craftsmen
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to carpenters and tradesmen
with office jobs.
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That police battalion basically reflected
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{\an8}the average working population of Hamburg.
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[narrator] They're drafted
as reserve police officers.
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Their training, however,
hardly allows them enough time
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to prepare them for what awaits.
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On June the 21st, 1942,
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they say goodbye to their families
and leave home.
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[in German] They were given a fairly
abstract description of their mission,
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which consisted of securing
the German-occupied areas.
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[narrator] They're taken to Poland.
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On June 25th,
Reserve Police Battalion 101 arrives
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in the southern part
of the district Lublin.
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[Browning]
We know there was then no preparation.
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They didn't know they were going
to do this when they're sent to Poland.
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The officers didn't know.
Trapp really doesn't--
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Major Trapp doesn't learn what he's going
to do until the day before.
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[narrator] It is July 13th, 1942,
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and the battalion has
to report early in the morning.
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{\an8}[Welzer, in German] Major Trapp,
who delivers the order, is an older man
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{\an8}who is very popular with his men
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{\an8}because he's
not the typical authoritarian commander.
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The men call him "Papa" Trapp.
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That indicates
what kind of relationship they have.
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Major Trapp stands in front
of the battalion and says,
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"I have a terrible order
to give you today."
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[Browning] His voice is choking,
he has tears streaming down his cheeks.
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He's physically, you know, struggling
visibly to control himself physically.
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This was, for him, a very terrible
and difficult thing to do,
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to explain to his men what he was going
to ask them to do.
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[narrator] They are to shoot
1,500 Jewish men, women and children.
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[Browning]
And that's when he then makes this offer:
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"If any of the rank and file
don't feel up to it,
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you can step out
and you don't have to take part."
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[Welzer, in German] Telling people to
step out if they don't want to participate
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requires them to take action.
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But when we are faced with a decision
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and we don't know exactly
what the right thing is to do,
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we usually do nothing.
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[dogs barking]
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[Browning] One man does step out.
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The captain of his company,
who's very embarrassed
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that one of his men
would be the first "coward," uh,
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to not take part, starts to yell at him.
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And Trapp cuts him off,
takes the man under his protection.
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And then about a dozen people
follow his example.
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[Trapp, in German] Attention! Dismiss!
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[in German] From a historical perspective,
it's an incredibly interesting situation
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because the orders are documented
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and it's clear from the way they were
issued that the men did not have to kill.
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Part of the post-war narrative
was that you had to take part,
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otherwise you would
have been shot yourself.
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Here we can clearly show that no,
that was not the case.
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They could decide.
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[narrator] The same was apparently true
for all killing units.
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To this day,
not a single case has been found
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where a subordinate's life was in danger
if he refused to shoot unarmed civilians.
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It all starts in September 1939:
the German Wehrmacht invades Poland.
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In just a few weeks,
the country is defeated.
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Millions of Poles fall into German hands
and should now be kept under watch.
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For this,
the regime needs security forces.
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In the German Reich,
tens of thousands of men enlist
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to become policemen
in the occupied territories.
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They hope to avoid military service
on the front lines.
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With so many applicants, the regime
has the luxury to be very selective.
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[Klemp, in German] 160,000 men applied
to volunteer for the police,
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{\an8}and only 26,000 to 30,000
could be accepted.
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{\an8}They were then trained for six months
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and, most crucially,
received ideological training
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which made it fairly clear to them
what would be expected of them.
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They were told that, as the master race,
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they should ensure
that National Socialist policies
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were established and executed
in the occupied territories.
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[narrator] After their training, the men
find out what that means in reality.
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Their job is to help implement
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the brutal Nazi policies
in the occupied territories.
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Which is why the regime pick men
who are sympathetic to the Nazi cause.
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Grouped into police battalions,
they are sent to Poland.
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There they will oppress, persecute,
and murder civilians,
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in particular Jews.
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[in German] As early as October
or November 1939,
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those units began shooting civilians:
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Polish resistance fighters, clergy,
intellectuals, even Jews,
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driving people out, deporting them.
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All in all, you could say that those units
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put the National Socialist
extermination policy into practice.
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[narrator] Just two years later,
the attack on the Soviet Union.
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It is a war of conquest and annihilation.
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According to Germany's plans,
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30 million Soviets should die
in order to free up space to live.
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Mobile killing units comprised of police
and SS task forces,
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called "Einsatzgruppen,"
back up the troops in combat.
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On June the 27th, 1941,
Police Battalion 309 enters Bialystok.
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The ideologically-programmed men
lock 800 Jews in the synagogue
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and set it on fire.
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And then they kill even more.
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The next day, the policemen are honored
for "securing" the city, as they call it.
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Altogether, 18,000 men advance behind
the front into the villages and towns,
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where the mostly young
and indoctrinated gunmen
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shoot all the Jewish men, women
and children dead.
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Now the Holocaust begins,
the systematic mass murder of the Jews.
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Many of the shooters are traumatized
by the killings,
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which is one reason
why large extermination camps
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like Auschwitz emerge at the end of 1941.
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{\an8}The process of mass murder needs
to be made more effective
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{\an8}and more gentle on the perpetrators.
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{\an8}If we try to figure out
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{\an8}the proportions of Holocaust victims
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{\an8}in terms of how they perished,
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{\an8}the best estimate, I think, is that
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about a half, close to three million,
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died in the death camps,
in the gas chambers.
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That close to a million died in what
we might call conditions of incarceration:
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Starving in epidemics, in the ghettos,
the death marches at the end of the war.
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Which means that over two million died
by firing squad,
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died in these mass executions.
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[narrator] Over two million people
murdered, face-to-face with their killers.
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A little-known fact even today,
it is the "forgotten Holocaust."
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Liepaja, summer 1941,
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in Einsatzgruppe A's area of operation.
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This is the only film discovered
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that shows a shooting of Jews
on the Eastern Front.
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Officially, filming is forbidden,
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because the killing is supposed
to remain a secret.
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[Ferencz] They only made two mistakes.
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{\an8}One, they kept a record of everything.
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{\an8}And it was sent to Berlin,
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{\an8}where it was consolidated
with all the other from B, C and D.
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And it gave a comprehensive picture
of whom they had killed in which cities,
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in which town, in which unit,
which command at what time.
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That was the first mistake,
to keep the record.
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The second was that I found them.
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[narrator] Nuremberg after the war.
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The so-called "Thousand-Year Reich"
lies in ruins.
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In the city where the Nazis
once held their Nazi Party Rallies,
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the Allies want to bring German crimes
to justice.
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In the Nuremberg Palace of Justice,
the major war criminals are put on trial.
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They ordered the crimes
and will be prosecuted accordingly.
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But who carried out the murders?
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The 27-year-old lawyer Benjamin Ferencz
is tasked with finding out
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and sets off to look for clues.
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In early 1947, his investigation team
makes a significant find.
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One day, one of my researchers came.
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He said, "Look what I found."
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And he handed me a bunch of papers,
"Ereignismeldungen aus der UDSSR."
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[narrator] These are death lists
from the mobile killing units,
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the SS Einsatzgruppen.
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The murder of hundreds of thousands
of people was documented
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as a record of achievement.
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[Ferencz] I took a little adding machine
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and I began to add up
Einsatzgruppe A reports.
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10,000 killed here. 15,000 killed here.
20,000 killed here.
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And I started to add them up.
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When I added over a million,
I said, "That's enough."
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[narrator] Ferencz wants to put the SS men
responsible on trial.
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But his superior refuses.
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They don't have the budget or the time.
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I got a little bit furious and said,
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"You can't let these guys go!
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I have a million murders in my hand,
you're not going let them go!"
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So he said, "Well, can you do it
in addition to your other work?"
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I said, "Sure."
He said, "Okay. You got it."
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And so it came to pass
that for my first case as a lawyer,
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I became the chief prosecutor of
the biggest murder trial in human history.
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{\an8}Vengeance is not our goal,
nor do we seek merely a just retribution.
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We ask this court to affirm
by international penal action,
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man's right to live in peace and dignity.
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[narrator] The accused are 24 SS men
from the Einsatzgruppen.
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They all led mobile killing units.
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[Welzer, in German] They don't fit with
Hollywood's image of a Nazi perpetrator.
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{\an8}That image is a henchman
who is not particularly intelligent
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{\an8}and who only cares
about killing as many people as possible.
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But the historical reality
is that they were nothing like that.
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Some of the Einsatzgruppen leaders
had double doctorate degrees.
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They're mostly middle-class, educated,
really sophisticated people
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who could definitely hold a conversation
about Mozart or Beethoven.
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We will begin
with the defendant Ohlendorf.
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[narrator] One of them is Otto Ohlendorf,
the former head of Einsatzgruppe D.
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He gave orders to 600 men
who murdered 90,000 people in one year.
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[Ferencz] Ohlendorf made
a very good impression on me.
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{\an8}I knew he was the father of five children.
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{\an8}Uh, he was honest.
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[Earl] He cut a good figure, you know?
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He was handsome. He was articulate.
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{\an8}He had a sureness to himself
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{\an8}that people found attractive.
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00:17:18,920 --> 00:17:24,720
I think that the world
kind of expected this person
232
00:17:24,720 --> 00:17:27,200
who was in charge of--
233
00:17:28,280 --> 00:17:31,600
in charge of a mobile killing unit
to be something different.
234
00:17:31,600 --> 00:17:35,960
They expected him to be ugly, old, crazy,
235
00:17:35,960 --> 00:17:38,560
pathological, sadistic,
236
00:17:38,560 --> 00:17:41,960
dumb, maybe, a misfit of some kind.
237
00:17:41,960 --> 00:17:43,640
But he was an accomplished man.
238
00:17:43,640 --> 00:17:45,040
The judge liked him.
239
00:17:45,560 --> 00:17:48,200
The judge said:
"I like this guy. He seems nice.
240
00:17:49,160 --> 00:17:51,280
But he killed people.
I don't understand it."
241
00:17:54,000 --> 00:17:57,240
[narrator] Ohlendorf surprises the court
with his openness.
242
00:17:57,240 --> 00:18:01,520
The judge thanks him several times
for the statements he already made
243
00:18:01,520 --> 00:18:05,920
to the Allies during an interrogation
in 1946.
244
00:18:06,640 --> 00:18:10,360
[judge] In what way they were transported
to the place of execution?
245
00:18:12,080 --> 00:18:15,200
[Ohlendorf in German]
They were driven there in lorries.
246
00:18:15,200 --> 00:18:18,680
Always as many
as could be executed right away.
247
00:18:20,920 --> 00:18:22,720
[judge] Was that your idea?
248
00:18:23,720 --> 00:18:25,040
[Ohlendorf in German] Yes.
249
00:18:26,200 --> 00:18:29,200
[judge] In what positions
were the victims shot?
250
00:18:31,520 --> 00:18:33,600
[Ohlendorf in German]
Standing or kneeling.
251
00:18:37,800 --> 00:18:41,880
[narrator]
Just as it was on July 13th, 1942.
252
00:18:42,360 --> 00:18:48,480
Hamburg Reserve Police Battalion 101
is on its way to the first execution.
253
00:18:49,560 --> 00:18:52,480
The policemen are unprepared
for what awaits them.
254
00:18:53,640 --> 00:18:57,480
They had certainly not been instructed in
how to conduct a firing squad massacre.
255
00:18:58,400 --> 00:19:00,640
It's all improvised the first time.
256
00:19:02,240 --> 00:19:04,960
[Kühl, in German]
They were taken to a forest.
257
00:19:04,960 --> 00:19:11,080
Then the policemen led them
into the forest one by one,
258
00:19:11,080 --> 00:19:13,240
some of them women, some of them children.
259
00:19:21,800 --> 00:19:24,600
So instead of depersonalizing
the execution,
260
00:19:25,080 --> 00:19:28,320
and instead of keeping distance
between the killer and the victim,
261
00:19:28,320 --> 00:19:33,200
here you have one-to-one identification
with the person you're going to kill,
262
00:19:33,200 --> 00:19:35,600
and you kill that person
at point-blank range.
263
00:19:40,000 --> 00:19:43,520
Several of the policemen
reported having conversations
264
00:19:43,520 --> 00:19:45,480
as they walked them into the forest.
265
00:19:46,040 --> 00:19:50,880
Some, in fact, were German Jews
who had left Germany earlier.
266
00:19:51,720 --> 00:19:55,920
One of the Jews' family had owned
the kino, the cinema, in Hamburg,
267
00:19:55,920 --> 00:19:57,960
where this man had gone to see movies.
268
00:19:58,440 --> 00:20:01,120
And he discovers he's going
to kill the cinema owner
269
00:20:01,120 --> 00:20:02,680
where he used to go watch the movies.
270
00:20:05,480 --> 00:20:06,600
And needless to say,
271
00:20:06,600 --> 00:20:10,240
the psychological toll of this
was very great.
272
00:20:10,240 --> 00:20:13,400
[in German]
The victims feared for their lives
273
00:20:13,400 --> 00:20:15,760
and knew death was moments away.
274
00:20:15,760 --> 00:20:19,480
And the policemen were experiencing
an emotional crisis
275
00:20:19,480 --> 00:20:23,440
because they knew they were about to
have to kill someone at point-blank range.
276
00:20:45,520 --> 00:20:49,480
[Browning] So, it's an extraordinarily
gruesome experience.
277
00:20:49,480 --> 00:20:51,920
And that's when some of the men
began to get sick,
278
00:20:51,920 --> 00:20:54,640
because they're covered
with brain matter and blood.
279
00:20:56,240 --> 00:21:00,240
They-- They throw up, they--
they get demoralized, they can't continue.
280
00:21:01,080 --> 00:21:02,240
[birds chirping]
281
00:21:05,120 --> 00:21:07,400
[narrator] The massacre lasts for hours.
282
00:21:07,960 --> 00:21:14,520
In the end, 1,500 Jewish men,
women and children lie dead in the forest.
283
00:21:24,240 --> 00:21:27,080
[Browning] When they went home that night,
they were offered liquor,
284
00:21:27,080 --> 00:21:30,680
and most of them got drunk,
but most of them couldn't eat.
285
00:21:30,680 --> 00:21:34,560
The-- The food was put out,
but most of them had no appetite to eat.
286
00:21:35,040 --> 00:21:37,920
Uh, and some of them had nightmares
that night.
287
00:21:37,920 --> 00:21:43,480
One man even, I guess, shooting his gun
into the ceiling in a kind of nightmare.
288
00:21:43,480 --> 00:21:48,440
And, uh, as another man told
one of his-- his noncommissioned officers,
289
00:21:48,440 --> 00:21:51,000
"If I had to do that again,
I would go crazy."
290
00:21:51,000 --> 00:21:52,800
Uh, so there were--
291
00:21:52,800 --> 00:21:57,080
For some of the men, this was just
an absolutely horrifying experience,
292
00:21:57,080 --> 00:21:59,960
and they couldn't imagine
ever doing it again.
293
00:22:01,560 --> 00:22:04,360
[narrator] The regime knows
what it is asking of the men.
294
00:22:05,280 --> 00:22:07,600
As early as the summer of 1941,
295
00:22:07,600 --> 00:22:12,680
a high-ranking SS leader refers to the
"psychological support
296
00:22:12,680 --> 00:22:15,200
for the men involved in this deed."
297
00:22:16,160 --> 00:22:19,640
The "impressions of the day"
were to be "blotted out
298
00:22:19,640 --> 00:22:23,840
by holding gatherings of camaraderie
in the evenings."
299
00:22:25,360 --> 00:22:28,280
Otto Ohlendorf faced the same problems
300
00:22:28,280 --> 00:22:31,480
with his men who took part
in the massacres.
301
00:22:33,040 --> 00:22:36,280
[in German] Otto Ohlendorf said,
302
00:22:36,280 --> 00:22:39,880
"My men suffered more than the victims."
303
00:22:40,360 --> 00:22:46,080
Looking at that from today's perspective,
304
00:22:46,080 --> 00:22:50,040
that's an absurd reinterpretation.
305
00:22:50,040 --> 00:22:55,520
It's the perpetrators looking
for psychological mechanisms
306
00:22:55,520 --> 00:22:58,640
that they can use
to cast themselves as victims
307
00:22:58,640 --> 00:23:02,840
because of the fact they had to do things
that made them suffer.
308
00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:13,760
[Ferencz] He had Mitleid with his men
if they had to, uh, do something
309
00:23:13,760 --> 00:23:15,600
which would be painful for them.
310
00:23:15,600 --> 00:23:19,680
Some of the Einsatzgruppen soldiers
311
00:23:19,680 --> 00:23:23,880
would take an infant child
and smash their head against a tree.
312
00:23:24,520 --> 00:23:25,800
Save ammunition.
313
00:23:26,280 --> 00:23:30,160
He-- Ohlendorf explained,
"I didn't allow my men to do that.
314
00:23:30,160 --> 00:23:35,960
If there were infants, I told them to have
the mother hold the infant to her chest,
315
00:23:35,960 --> 00:23:38,120
and then aim for the baby.
316
00:23:38,120 --> 00:23:41,400
Because then,
they kill both of them with one shot,
317
00:23:41,400 --> 00:23:44,880
and they save ammunition,
and the mothers stop crying."
318
00:23:44,880 --> 00:23:48,920
So, that was Mitleid for his men,
not for the victims.
319
00:23:56,200 --> 00:23:58,680
[narrator] In the Einsatzgruppen trial,
320
00:23:58,680 --> 00:24:03,920
the court wants to know what motivated
Ohlendorf to issue these orders to kill.
321
00:24:03,920 --> 00:24:06,880
He claims he was simply being loyal
to his government.
322
00:24:06,880 --> 00:24:09,960
[Ohlendorf, in German]
The order to liquidate
323
00:24:09,960 --> 00:24:12,400
came from the Führer of the Reich.
324
00:24:13,680 --> 00:24:19,600
So, in that sense,
it's a policy determined by the Führer.
325
00:24:19,600 --> 00:24:22,320
[narrator]
In the spirit of Nazi propaganda,
326
00:24:22,320 --> 00:24:24,920
Ohlendorf believes the Jews
are responsible
327
00:24:24,920 --> 00:24:27,440
for communism in the Soviet Union,
328
00:24:27,440 --> 00:24:30,200
and therefore enemies of the German Reich.
329
00:24:32,280 --> 00:24:34,920
Why does Ohlendorf believe propaganda
is truth?
330
00:24:34,920 --> 00:24:37,080
I don't think he believed
it was propaganda.
331
00:24:37,080 --> 00:24:39,760
He was raised in a nationalist family.
332
00:24:40,560 --> 00:24:44,280
University, he had professors who taught
333
00:24:44,280 --> 00:24:48,560
about the problems of-- of Bolshevism,
334
00:24:48,560 --> 00:24:51,760
the problems of communists,
the problems of Jews.
335
00:24:52,320 --> 00:24:54,600
You get fed it, and you get fed it,
and you get fed it.
336
00:24:54,600 --> 00:24:59,400
And it reinforces, I think,
your already existing beliefs, you know?
337
00:24:59,400 --> 00:25:04,720
And then a government comes to power
that says, "Yes, you know, this is true."
338
00:25:04,720 --> 00:25:10,000
He certainly believed that, um--
that Bolsheviks were Jews
339
00:25:10,000 --> 00:25:11,640
and that they should be killed.
340
00:25:16,280 --> 00:25:18,240
[narrator]
A survivor of one of the massacres
341
00:25:18,240 --> 00:25:21,520
testifies in court after the war.
342
00:25:24,560 --> 00:25:30,960
{\an8}[survivor, in Russian] They lined us up
at the edge of the pit, squeezed together.
343
00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:33,280
{\an8}Then they started shooting.
344
00:25:35,520 --> 00:25:38,480
{\an8}I closed my eyes, clenched my fists,
345
00:25:38,480 --> 00:25:42,280
{\an8}tensed all my muscles and jumped.
346
00:25:42,280 --> 00:25:44,520
The fall seemed to take forever.
347
00:25:44,520 --> 00:25:47,160
Finally, I landed on the bodies.
348
00:25:47,160 --> 00:25:48,720
I hadn't been hit.
349
00:25:49,600 --> 00:25:52,560
After a while, the shooting stopped.
350
00:25:55,360 --> 00:26:01,080
I heard the Germans coming down
into the pit...
351
00:26:01,080 --> 00:26:02,360
[attendee coughs]
352
00:26:03,080 --> 00:26:06,240
...to finish off those
who were still moaning.
353
00:26:07,840 --> 00:26:12,840
Some were still twitching and convulsing
in their death throes.
354
00:26:12,840 --> 00:26:16,880
They shot everyone who was still alive.
355
00:26:17,800 --> 00:26:23,200
I played dead, scared of being discovered.
356
00:26:27,240 --> 00:26:30,560
[snapping]
357
00:26:32,320 --> 00:26:35,920
[narrator] Most of the men
in Reserve Police Battalion 101
358
00:26:35,920 --> 00:26:38,360
were not Nazis by conviction.
359
00:26:39,160 --> 00:26:41,000
Twenty years after the war,
360
00:26:41,000 --> 00:26:46,200
they describe to the investigators how
they experienced the murder of the Jews.
361
00:26:47,040 --> 00:26:49,280
[officer 1, in German]
I can still see the image in my mind.
362
00:26:49,280 --> 00:26:51,240
I remember thinking back then
363
00:26:51,240 --> 00:26:54,840
that we didn't have enough earth
to cover so many bodies.
364
00:26:58,040 --> 00:27:02,760
[officer 2, in German] I was angry
that we had become animals, murderers.
365
00:27:04,920 --> 00:27:08,480
[officer 3, in German]
We didn't see Jews as human beings.
366
00:27:12,840 --> 00:27:15,880
{\an8}The first massacre of Jews in Jozefow
367
00:27:15,880 --> 00:27:18,040
{\an8}was very upsetting, was very traumatic.
368
00:27:18,040 --> 00:27:20,280
{\an8}And then they get used to it very quickly.
369
00:27:20,280 --> 00:27:24,480
The speed with which they became
habituated to what they were doing,
370
00:27:24,480 --> 00:27:29,440
the speed with which they got used
to killing as a kind of normal routine
371
00:27:29,440 --> 00:27:33,440
was one of the real surprises to me,
372
00:27:33,440 --> 00:27:36,200
uh, that came out of the interrogations.
373
00:27:36,200 --> 00:27:39,280
You can see
in the first few killing operations...
374
00:27:39,280 --> 00:27:42,040
[clears throat] ...the men can describe
those in great detail.
375
00:27:42,040 --> 00:27:44,800
Thereafter, it becomes a real blur.
376
00:27:44,800 --> 00:27:47,040
They can't even remember
which town it was in.
377
00:27:48,760 --> 00:27:51,040
[narrator] The men's behavior
is strongly influenced
378
00:27:51,040 --> 00:27:53,400
by the leadership of the battalion.
379
00:27:53,400 --> 00:27:57,520
At the helm is Major Wilhelm Trapp,
380
00:27:57,520 --> 00:28:00,160
who commands the 500 men.
381
00:28:03,320 --> 00:28:07,400
[Welzer, in German] He was a popular,
respected superior, and he said,
382
00:28:07,400 --> 00:28:11,040
"If I had a choice,
I wouldn't give you the order. But..."
383
00:28:11,040 --> 00:28:16,480
He was calling on them for solidarity,
to support him with this task,
384
00:28:16,480 --> 00:28:20,040
which didn't come from him,
385
00:28:20,040 --> 00:28:23,680
and asking them not to abandon him.
386
00:28:23,680 --> 00:28:25,800
- [chattering]
- [bottles clank]
387
00:28:29,040 --> 00:28:32,720
[in German] It was a combination
of coercion and free will.
388
00:28:33,560 --> 00:28:37,680
They were told
that they could refuse to do it,
389
00:28:37,680 --> 00:28:44,200
but that they would have to accept
their comrades having to do it instead.
390
00:28:44,200 --> 00:28:47,120
That combination of,
391
00:28:47,120 --> 00:28:51,880
"It has to be done,
the police battalion has to do the job"
392
00:28:51,880 --> 00:28:56,800
and, "If you're weak, you can refuse,
but it's at the expense of your comrades."
393
00:28:56,800 --> 00:28:59,000
That combination creates the pressure
394
00:28:59,000 --> 00:29:03,440
which led to most of them taking part
in the shootings.
395
00:29:34,800 --> 00:29:38,680
[narrator] Only a few policemen refuse
to carry out the order to kill.
396
00:29:39,560 --> 00:29:40,560
[chattering]
397
00:29:40,560 --> 00:29:43,240
[officer 1, in German]
No! We were already hoping it was over.
398
00:29:43,920 --> 00:29:45,440
More potatoes?
399
00:29:45,440 --> 00:29:48,760
[Welzer, in German] Objectively speaking,
400
00:29:48,760 --> 00:29:52,320
nothing bad happened to the objectors.
401
00:29:52,320 --> 00:29:58,000
They were assigned work cleaning latrines
and that kind of thing.
402
00:29:58,000 --> 00:30:04,400
They were called names:
bastard, dirty rat, sissy and so on.
403
00:30:05,560 --> 00:30:08,040
Those men were not at home,
404
00:30:08,040 --> 00:30:11,960
they didn't go back to their families
at the end of the day.
405
00:30:11,960 --> 00:30:17,160
Instead, they were in a group of men
for an unforeseeable amount of time,
406
00:30:17,160 --> 00:30:21,600
always with the same people,
who could torment them,
407
00:30:21,600 --> 00:30:24,840
insult them and exclude them.
408
00:30:24,840 --> 00:30:31,640
You need to be very self-assured
to be able to endure that.
409
00:30:31,640 --> 00:30:38,360
It might be only a social punishment
and not a physical one,
410
00:30:38,360 --> 00:30:42,720
but for human beings, a social punishment
is one of the hardest things to bear.
411
00:30:42,720 --> 00:30:44,200
[chattering]
412
00:30:44,200 --> 00:30:45,280
[dog barks]
413
00:30:46,760 --> 00:30:49,520
[bottles clanking]
414
00:30:49,520 --> 00:30:51,680
[laughs]
415
00:30:57,000 --> 00:30:59,200
[Browning] What's most on their mind,
what's driving them?
416
00:30:59,200 --> 00:31:01,360
I don't think they're obsessed with Jews.
417
00:31:03,520 --> 00:31:05,760
They're more motivated about--
418
00:31:05,760 --> 00:31:08,440
by what they think other people think
about them
419
00:31:08,440 --> 00:31:10,680
than they are
about what they think about Jews.
420
00:31:10,680 --> 00:31:13,360
I think they're very much obsessed
with themselves,
421
00:31:13,360 --> 00:31:15,400
with how they're going
to get through this.
422
00:31:15,400 --> 00:31:20,320
[narrator] Captain Wolfgang Hoffmann
believes he can take the pressure,
423
00:31:21,200 --> 00:31:22,760
but he has a problem.
424
00:31:23,480 --> 00:31:28,240
[Browning] One of the captains develops
a psychosomatic illness.
425
00:31:29,040 --> 00:31:33,400
He gets sick every time his company
is supposed to carry out a killing action.
426
00:31:33,400 --> 00:31:37,480
And so, he is in bed with terrible stomach
cramps and can't even get out of bed.
427
00:31:37,480 --> 00:31:40,800
And he has to have the killing action led
by his subordinate.
428
00:31:41,360 --> 00:31:45,000
He wanted to be a killer,
but his body broke down.
429
00:31:45,880 --> 00:31:49,040
And the men, of course,
thought this was terribly cowardly.
430
00:31:49,040 --> 00:31:51,320
He was desperately embarrassed.
431
00:31:51,320 --> 00:31:55,240
[narrator] Things are very different
for Captain Julius Wohlauf.
432
00:31:55,240 --> 00:31:59,960
He is ambitious, wants to carve out
a career and excel at his job.
433
00:31:59,960 --> 00:32:02,000
And he's in love.
434
00:32:02,000 --> 00:32:04,120
[jazz music playing]
435
00:32:04,120 --> 00:32:09,920
Wohlauf had married in Hamburg in June,
shortly before the first massacre.
436
00:32:09,920 --> 00:32:16,400
As an officer, he is allowed to take his
wife to Poland, to the area of operations.
437
00:32:16,960 --> 00:32:19,640
He wants to make up
for his missed honeymoon.
438
00:32:23,280 --> 00:32:24,360
[shutter clicks]
439
00:32:26,120 --> 00:32:29,800
[Browning] Wohlauf brings
his pregnant bride on a ghetto clearing.
440
00:32:32,800 --> 00:32:36,720
The most horrible ghetto clearing
of the entire operation
441
00:32:36,720 --> 00:32:38,680
in virtually all the men's testimony
442
00:32:38,680 --> 00:32:43,080
was when they took 11,000 Jews
from Miedzyrzec,
443
00:32:43,080 --> 00:32:45,880
shot a thousand of them
just in the ghetto clearing actions--
444
00:32:45,880 --> 00:32:48,160
the streets were just lined
with dead bodies--
445
00:32:48,160 --> 00:32:51,280
and put the other 10,000
on the train to Treblinka.
446
00:32:51,280 --> 00:32:55,400
The train is so overcrowded they have to
force people in and nail the doors shut,
447
00:32:55,400 --> 00:32:56,800
or they will burst open.
448
00:32:59,040 --> 00:33:03,280
And she's standing on the square
watching this, witnessing all of this.
449
00:33:03,840 --> 00:33:07,160
That shows, in a sense, how Wohlauf
was proud of what he was doing,
450
00:33:07,160 --> 00:33:08,960
wanted to show it off to his bride.
451
00:33:08,960 --> 00:33:10,960
He wasn't ashamed or embarrassed at all.
452
00:33:12,600 --> 00:33:15,560
[narrator] Ghettos begin springing up
all over the East.
453
00:33:15,560 --> 00:33:19,800
People who are kept cooped up
inside them before they are murdered.
454
00:33:19,800 --> 00:33:24,120
The victims filmed and photographed
by their tormenters.
455
00:33:35,680 --> 00:33:38,960
Policemen guard the people and kill them.
456
00:33:39,920 --> 00:33:43,680
But only as long
as the National Socialists are in power.
457
00:33:44,880 --> 00:33:48,120
Neither before nor after this period
458
00:33:48,120 --> 00:33:52,920
did a policeman decide
to kill Jews en masse.
459
00:33:52,920 --> 00:33:55,840
[Earl] I don't believe
that people are born to kill.
460
00:33:56,400 --> 00:34:00,480
I do think that we can become killers,
though, under the right circumstances.
461
00:34:00,480 --> 00:34:02,440
{\an8}We have to think about
what the relationship is
462
00:34:02,440 --> 00:34:04,400
{\an8}between the individual and the state.
463
00:34:04,400 --> 00:34:07,800
{\an8}You know,
if the state is a state that says,
464
00:34:08,639 --> 00:34:10,159
{\an8}"This is the group we hate
465
00:34:10,159 --> 00:34:15,320
and I want you to... or we want you to
make sure that that group is dealt with,"
466
00:34:15,320 --> 00:34:17,320
that's a really important relationship.
467
00:34:17,320 --> 00:34:19,120
[birds chirping]
468
00:34:25,800 --> 00:34:31,480
These individuals, even if they share
the ideology of the state
469
00:34:31,480 --> 00:34:35,280
for whom they are actors
or for whom they are instruments,
470
00:34:35,280 --> 00:34:39,040
um, when the state no longer holds power,
471
00:34:39,040 --> 00:34:41,760
uh, when governments change,
472
00:34:41,760 --> 00:34:45,520
they no longer act,
or they no longer have a raison d'être
473
00:34:45,520 --> 00:34:48,880
to participate
in the violence of the state.
474
00:34:48,880 --> 00:34:53,199
And this is one of the reasons, I think,
understanding perpetrators is vital
475
00:34:53,199 --> 00:34:58,000
is for us to think critically about, um--
about our relationship to the state
476
00:34:58,000 --> 00:34:59,680
and what the state is telling us to do.
477
00:35:01,400 --> 00:35:03,520
[narrator]
The German Reich before the war.
478
00:35:04,000 --> 00:35:06,880
In 1933, the Nazis come to power
479
00:35:06,880 --> 00:35:10,360
and change the laws
to conform with their ideas.
480
00:35:11,320 --> 00:35:14,240
The ruthless hatred of Jews
becomes state doctrine,
481
00:35:14,240 --> 00:35:19,200
{\an8}and they immediately begin to drive
all the Jews out of German society.
482
00:35:19,760 --> 00:35:23,520
About 2000 anti-Jewish laws are passed.
483
00:35:27,120 --> 00:35:33,520
A group of people is systematically
excluded, stigmatized and humiliated.
484
00:35:43,320 --> 00:35:46,760
[Welzer, in German]
The first step towards mass murder
485
00:35:46,760 --> 00:35:51,840
is a categorical distinction between "us"
and "them."
486
00:35:51,840 --> 00:35:56,000
Everyone noticed people losing their jobs,
487
00:35:56,000 --> 00:35:58,760
being forced to leave their homes,
488
00:35:58,760 --> 00:36:04,560
having their belongings auctioned off,
businesses being "Aryanized."
489
00:36:04,560 --> 00:36:07,400
All of that was a public process.
490
00:36:07,400 --> 00:36:09,320
It wasn't a secret.
491
00:36:09,320 --> 00:36:13,920
And that process reinforces the division.
492
00:36:13,920 --> 00:36:17,880
They are "them,"
while "we" are the others.
493
00:36:27,600 --> 00:36:33,280
If I define someone as different in theory
494
00:36:33,280 --> 00:36:37,040
and also treat them differently
in practice,
495
00:36:37,040 --> 00:36:41,480
the willingness to use violence
against that person
496
00:36:41,480 --> 00:36:45,400
will naturally grow.
497
00:36:49,280 --> 00:36:52,080
[narrator] The physical violence escalates
during the war.
498
00:36:52,080 --> 00:36:55,880
Under German occupation,
pogroms occur in the East.
499
00:36:55,880 --> 00:36:58,480
Jews are attacked by civilians.
500
00:36:58,480 --> 00:37:02,200
Pictures from Lemberg
in the summer of 1941.
501
00:37:02,680 --> 00:37:06,200
The occupiers fuel these outbreaks
of violence.
502
00:37:06,200 --> 00:37:10,200
Those who do survive are later killed
by the Germans.
503
00:37:13,200 --> 00:37:19,000
{\an8}A perpetrator who was present in Lemberg
testifies in court after the war.
504
00:37:19,520 --> 00:37:24,760
{\an8}[in German] Our leader told our group
of 12 men about our future tasks.
505
00:37:25,400 --> 00:37:31,000
We would have to gather up
and shoot the Jewish population.
506
00:37:32,160 --> 00:37:37,600
The convoy stopped about 70 to 90 meters
from the pit.
507
00:37:37,600 --> 00:37:40,120
[speaking in Russian]
508
00:37:44,800 --> 00:37:50,320
[in German] The Gruppenführer divided up
his men as follows...
509
00:37:50,880 --> 00:37:52,880
[speaking in Russian]
510
00:37:57,800 --> 00:38:00,720
...six men to guard and six men to shoot.
511
00:38:00,720 --> 00:38:02,800
[speaking in Russian]
512
00:38:06,080 --> 00:38:08,560
[in German] I was tasked with shooting.
513
00:38:08,560 --> 00:38:10,720
[speaking in Russian]
514
00:38:12,160 --> 00:38:14,640
[in German]
The shooting then proceeded as follows...
515
00:38:14,640 --> 00:38:16,120
[speaking in Russian]
516
00:38:18,440 --> 00:38:23,800
...about 45 to 50 people
were separated and led to the pit.
517
00:38:24,680 --> 00:38:26,920
[speaks in Russian]
518
00:38:26,920 --> 00:38:29,200
[in German] They had to line up facing us.
519
00:38:29,200 --> 00:38:31,640
[speaks in Russian]
520
00:38:31,640 --> 00:38:33,840
[in German] And that's how they were shot.
521
00:38:47,720 --> 00:38:51,920
They saw this as the job, as the task,
as arbeit,
522
00:38:51,920 --> 00:38:54,880
uh, something that this
was what they had to do.
523
00:38:54,880 --> 00:39:00,640
Uh, so, in that sense,
it is-- it is routinized.
524
00:39:00,640 --> 00:39:04,360
But I think they were still always aware
of the difficulty of it.
525
00:39:04,360 --> 00:39:07,160
As I said, they're always aware
that they got a dirty deal.
526
00:39:07,160 --> 00:39:10,440
They were asked to do something
that was extremely hard,
527
00:39:10,440 --> 00:39:14,080
uh, and it was their bad luck that they
had been assigned to this battalion
528
00:39:14,080 --> 00:39:15,840
and sent to do this.
529
00:39:24,320 --> 00:39:29,520
[Welzer, in German] Each of
the perpetrators developed their own way
530
00:39:29,520 --> 00:39:34,160
of justifying what they were doing.
531
00:39:34,160 --> 00:39:36,800
"Someone has to do the dirty work."
532
00:39:36,800 --> 00:39:42,520
Or maybe,
"We have a historical duty to fulfill."
533
00:39:42,520 --> 00:39:48,280
Another factor might have been,
"I'm better at this than other people."
534
00:39:48,280 --> 00:39:51,000
They all had justifications
535
00:39:51,000 --> 00:39:56,480
that allowed them to find meaning
in the murders.
536
00:39:56,480 --> 00:40:01,400
Ultimately, this shows that mass murder
537
00:40:01,400 --> 00:40:07,760
is committed by thinking people
who do not execute orders like a machine,
538
00:40:07,760 --> 00:40:13,560
but who think and comprehend
what they are doing.
539
00:40:34,480 --> 00:40:39,160
[officer, in German] I tried,
and was able, to shoot only children.
540
00:40:40,400 --> 00:40:44,240
The man next to me would shoot the mother,
and I would shoot her child.
541
00:40:44,240 --> 00:40:46,520
I told myself that the child, after all,
542
00:40:46,520 --> 00:40:49,480
would not be able to live
without its mother.
543
00:40:52,760 --> 00:40:57,760
[in German]
He translates his truly appalling act
544
00:40:57,760 --> 00:41:03,120
into something morally good
in a sense of "redemption."
545
00:41:03,120 --> 00:41:07,800
That's the key to understand
why the men did this.
546
00:41:07,800 --> 00:41:09,560
It is not blind obedience.
547
00:41:09,560 --> 00:41:15,120
Instead, they interpret the commands
in a way that is acceptable for them
548
00:41:15,120 --> 00:41:19,200
and allows them to see themselves
as morally righteous.
549
00:41:22,480 --> 00:41:24,880
[narrator] Why were children also shot?
550
00:41:24,880 --> 00:41:27,360
Ohlendorf is asked to explain.
551
00:41:29,000 --> 00:41:30,640
This question is crucial
552
00:41:30,640 --> 00:41:34,120
to the proceedings against the leaders
of the Einsatzgruppen.
553
00:41:36,120 --> 00:41:37,520
[Ferencz] I put that question.
554
00:41:37,520 --> 00:41:39,920
{\an8}He said, "Because if they grew up,
555
00:41:39,920 --> 00:41:42,400
{\an8}and they knew what we did
to their parents,
556
00:41:42,400 --> 00:41:44,760
{\an8}they would be enemies of Germany.
557
00:41:44,760 --> 00:41:49,200
{\an8}And I was interested in a long-range
protection of my Vaterland.
558
00:41:49,200 --> 00:41:52,400
And therefore,
it's necessary to kill the children, too."
559
00:41:52,400 --> 00:41:56,320
[narrator] Otto Ohlendorf,
himself a father of five children,
560
00:41:56,320 --> 00:41:59,480
does not show the slightest hint
of remorse.
561
00:42:00,360 --> 00:42:03,800
{\an8}What about Major Wilhelm Trapp?
562
00:42:04,400 --> 00:42:06,960
{\an8}Does he understand his wrongdoing?
563
00:42:06,960 --> 00:42:09,640
{\an8}[Browning]
He knows what he is doing is terrible.
564
00:42:09,640 --> 00:42:12,240
{\an8}He even says to his chauffeur
at one point,
565
00:42:12,240 --> 00:42:14,360
"God forbid Germany lose this war,
566
00:42:14,360 --> 00:42:17,040
because if what we are doing here
in Poland is ever,
567
00:42:17,040 --> 00:42:20,320
in a sense, brought to justice,
God have mercy on us Germans."
568
00:42:25,280 --> 00:42:26,280
[chattering]
569
00:42:28,080 --> 00:42:31,960
[officer, in German] Only afterwards
did it occur to me that it wasn't right.
570
00:42:34,040 --> 00:42:35,800
[officer 2, in German]
You started to flounder,
571
00:42:35,800 --> 00:42:39,080
the clear ideas you used to have
were gone.
572
00:42:39,680 --> 00:42:41,240
[in German] Stop arguing!
573
00:42:41,240 --> 00:42:44,920
[narrator] The men are desensitized
by the constant killing.
574
00:42:44,920 --> 00:42:47,800
- [in German] Stop it!
- [in German] He started after all!
575
00:42:47,800 --> 00:42:49,120
For God's sake!
576
00:42:49,120 --> 00:42:51,400
- What do you want?
- I want to go home!
577
00:42:51,400 --> 00:42:55,000
To me, in a sense,
one of the most horrifying conclusions
578
00:42:55,000 --> 00:42:58,160
{\an8}that came out of this is that over time,
579
00:42:58,160 --> 00:43:00,640
{\an8}the battalion kind of broke
into three groups.
580
00:43:01,200 --> 00:43:05,400
{\an8}One group was a group of men who learned
to enjoy killing other human beings.
581
00:43:06,640 --> 00:43:10,440
Uh, and they came back
from these killing operations
582
00:43:10,440 --> 00:43:13,640
and had a big lunch and would joke
about what they had done.
583
00:43:14,120 --> 00:43:20,360
{\an8}[narrator] One person who finds particular
pleasure in killing is Hartwig Gnade.
584
00:43:20,360 --> 00:43:23,960
{\an8}He becomes a brutal and sadistic murderer
who takes pleasure
585
00:43:23,960 --> 00:43:27,320
in torturing the victims
before the shootings.
586
00:43:27,320 --> 00:43:30,880
Jews are forced
to crawl naked along the path to the pit,
587
00:43:30,880 --> 00:43:34,800
while Gnade orders his men
to beat the victims with clubs.
588
00:43:35,680 --> 00:43:38,120
So here is someone
who was literally changed
589
00:43:38,120 --> 00:43:40,560
by what they were doing
and by what they were seeing,
590
00:43:40,560 --> 00:43:44,000
and degenerates
into a very horrible person
591
00:43:44,000 --> 00:43:46,480
in a fairly short period of time.
592
00:43:47,840 --> 00:43:51,120
And there was a middle group.
They were kind of the passive ones.
593
00:43:51,120 --> 00:43:53,520
When they were asked
to take part in an operation,
594
00:43:53,520 --> 00:43:55,280
they did whatever they were told,
595
00:43:55,280 --> 00:43:57,160
but they never took the initiative
596
00:43:57,160 --> 00:44:00,000
either to get out of it or to do more.
597
00:44:00,000 --> 00:44:02,800
{\an8}[narrator]
The third group are the objectors.
598
00:44:02,800 --> 00:44:05,320
{\an8}Like Lieutenant Heinz Bumann,
599
00:44:05,320 --> 00:44:07,720
{\an8}who had himself transferred
back to Hamburg
600
00:44:07,720 --> 00:44:09,840
{\an8}after just a few weeks.
601
00:44:09,840 --> 00:44:11,760
{\an8}But that didn't make him a hero.
602
00:44:11,760 --> 00:44:16,000
{\an8}[in German]
They always found ways to do it
603
00:44:16,000 --> 00:44:18,560
{\an8}that would keep the machine running.
604
00:44:18,560 --> 00:44:25,200
{\an8}Someone would say they were indisposed
or they felt too weak that day.
605
00:44:25,200 --> 00:44:28,040
But it wasn't an act of resistance,
606
00:44:28,040 --> 00:44:31,200
it was just an attempt
to extract the individual
607
00:44:31,200 --> 00:44:36,480
without questioning the legitimacy
of the police battalion as a whole.
608
00:44:36,480 --> 00:44:40,240
[all singing in German]
♪ We will not let life make us bitter ♪
609
00:44:40,240 --> 00:44:43,760
♪ Don't be afraid
Don't be afraid, Rosemary! ♪
610
00:44:43,760 --> 00:44:47,640
♪ Not even when the whole earth shakes ♪
611
00:44:47,640 --> 00:44:50,720
♪ And the world is lifted off its hinges ♪
612
00:44:50,720 --> 00:44:52,560
[bottles clanking]
613
00:44:52,560 --> 00:44:54,400
[chattering]
614
00:44:56,560 --> 00:44:59,080
[narrator] The members
of the Reserve Police Battalion
615
00:44:59,080 --> 00:45:03,000
are involved in the shooting
of 38,000 Jews.
616
00:45:03,000 --> 00:45:07,960
And they send another 45,000
to extermination camps.
617
00:45:08,920 --> 00:45:12,080
[in German]
The terrifying and central issue
618
00:45:12,080 --> 00:45:14,560
in the case of Police Battalion 101
619
00:45:14,560 --> 00:45:18,640
is that you don't need to act
out of conviction,
620
00:45:18,640 --> 00:45:20,840
to be motivated by ideology,
621
00:45:20,840 --> 00:45:22,920
to carry out a mass killing.
622
00:45:25,240 --> 00:45:29,960
[narrator] There are over 130 police
battalions during the Second World War.
623
00:45:30,760 --> 00:45:36,440
Of all these units, the Hamburg Battalion
has the fourth highest murder rate.
624
00:45:53,680 --> 00:45:57,040
Reserve Police Battalion 101, in a sense,
is atypical.
625
00:45:57,040 --> 00:45:59,720
And that, in a sense,
makes it even more frightening.
626
00:45:59,720 --> 00:46:03,000
We see what a battalion
without any preparation,
627
00:46:03,000 --> 00:46:06,920
without selection, without indoctrination,
without nazification,
628
00:46:06,920 --> 00:46:11,640
can nonetheless become one of the most
prolific killing units
629
00:46:11,640 --> 00:46:13,560
in the German order police.
630
00:46:15,680 --> 00:46:20,480
[narrator] Nuremberg, April 10th, 1948.
The day of the verdict.
631
00:46:30,040 --> 00:46:31,840
[Ferencz] Death by hanging.
632
00:46:32,400 --> 00:46:37,160
Then they take their hands off,
put it down, nod to the judge, step back.
633
00:46:37,160 --> 00:46:38,800
And boom, to the lift.
634
00:46:38,800 --> 00:46:40,880
And down they go into hell.
635
00:46:48,320 --> 00:46:53,320
I went down to the death house,
which is right underneath the courthouse,
636
00:46:53,920 --> 00:46:54,920
to talk to him.
637
00:46:54,920 --> 00:46:59,840
I had never talked to any defendant,
not one word, outside of the courtroom.
638
00:46:59,840 --> 00:47:01,520
[keys jingle]
639
00:47:01,520 --> 00:47:03,880
[door closes]
640
00:47:07,480 --> 00:47:10,320
Although I hoped that he would say to me--
641
00:47:10,320 --> 00:47:13,640
When I went down to see him,
and I knew he was going to hang for sure,
642
00:47:13,640 --> 00:47:16,800
um, "Can I do something for you?"
643
00:47:16,800 --> 00:47:21,280
I thought he would say, "Tell my children
I love them, tell my wife I'm sorry."
644
00:47:21,280 --> 00:47:24,040
{\an8}Not one word of remorse or regret.
645
00:47:24,520 --> 00:47:29,280
{\an8}He said he would shoot his own sister
if he had to under similar circumstances.
646
00:47:29,280 --> 00:47:33,400
"Goodbye, Mr. Ohlendorf," I said,
and slammed the door on him.
647
00:47:44,160 --> 00:47:46,360
I did a broadcast for CNN, and they said,
648
00:47:46,360 --> 00:47:50,280
"How did it feel
to be talking to these monsters?"
649
00:47:50,280 --> 00:47:52,560
And I said, "They were not monsters."
650
00:47:52,560 --> 00:47:54,960
They said, "What do you mean?
They killed thousands of children.
651
00:47:54,960 --> 00:47:56,920
You don't call that monster?"
652
00:47:56,920 --> 00:48:02,320
I said, "Is the man who dropped the bomb,
the atomic bomb on Hiroshima,
653
00:48:02,320 --> 00:48:03,920
was he also a monster?"
654
00:48:03,920 --> 00:48:05,640
That was President Truman.
655
00:48:05,640 --> 00:48:08,200
I never got an answer to that question.
656
00:48:08,200 --> 00:48:14,920
So, I have no doubt
that Ohlendorf was a German patriotic man
657
00:48:14,920 --> 00:48:19,280
and he carried out what he thought
was in the interest of his country.
658
00:48:19,280 --> 00:48:22,800
But that's not an argument
which a normal human being
659
00:48:22,800 --> 00:48:25,120
should be allowed to make and walk free.
660
00:48:32,040 --> 00:48:34,960
[narrator]
After the war, the Germans want to forget.
661
00:48:36,880 --> 00:48:38,320
[birds chirping]
662
00:48:38,320 --> 00:48:40,040
And so do the police.
663
00:48:40,880 --> 00:48:45,840
60,000 police officers were involved
in mass shootings during the war.
664
00:48:47,120 --> 00:48:51,240
Many stay in law enforcement after 1945.
665
00:48:54,160 --> 00:48:58,280
Not until the end of the 1950s
does it actually become clear
666
00:48:58,280 --> 00:49:03,200
as to what extent ordinary Germans
were involved in the Holocaust.
667
00:49:04,080 --> 00:49:08,960
The judiciary investigates
more than 172,000 men,
668
00:49:08,960 --> 00:49:13,920
including members of the SS, Gestapo,
and the police.
669
00:49:13,920 --> 00:49:17,360
Less than 500 of them are convicted
670
00:49:17,360 --> 00:49:20,440
for their involvement in the genocide.
671
00:49:20,440 --> 00:49:23,240
[Klemp, in German]
The prosecution was a disaster.
672
00:49:23,240 --> 00:49:26,880
{\an8}Lots of material and documents
had been collected,
673
00:49:26,880 --> 00:49:29,560
{\an8}there was really good evidence,
674
00:49:29,560 --> 00:49:35,240
{\an8}but there was a lack of will to punish
those who had been involved in the crimes.
675
00:49:36,160 --> 00:49:40,560
[narrator] The Hamburg battalion
is also brought under investigation.
676
00:49:40,560 --> 00:49:44,280
210 former members are questioned.
677
00:49:44,280 --> 00:49:48,360
Fourteen of them are charged in 1967.
678
00:49:48,960 --> 00:49:55,000
The trial succeeds in revealing details
of the processes and patterns of behavior
679
00:49:55,000 --> 00:49:56,720
within the battalion.
680
00:49:56,720 --> 00:49:59,880
Julius Wohlauf is also prosecuted.
681
00:50:00,360 --> 00:50:03,040
{\an8}The man who brought his wife to Poland.
682
00:50:03,520 --> 00:50:06,600
[all cheering, applauding]
683
00:50:10,040 --> 00:50:13,800
Many of these men,
they view themselves as the double victim.
684
00:50:14,720 --> 00:50:18,840
They are the victim who has been chosen to
do the dirtiest duty of the Third Reich.
685
00:50:18,840 --> 00:50:25,120
And then they're the victim
of a ex post facto new morality or new law
686
00:50:25,120 --> 00:50:27,120
that is put in after the war,
687
00:50:27,120 --> 00:50:29,760
uh, that they consider utterly unfair
to be applied to them
688
00:50:29,760 --> 00:50:33,400
because it wasn't illegal, uh,
when they did it.
689
00:50:33,400 --> 00:50:36,160
It was what the government was ordering
to be done.
690
00:50:36,160 --> 00:50:40,280
So, they are consumed with self-pity,
not with guilt.
691
00:50:40,280 --> 00:50:41,680
"Poor me."
692
00:50:41,680 --> 00:50:45,000
Not the victim, it's, "Poor me. Look what
I was asked to do and had to do."
693
00:50:45,880 --> 00:50:49,920
[narrator] Only two defendants
have to serve a prison sentence.
694
00:50:49,920 --> 00:50:51,600
- One of the defendants...
- [shutter clicking]
695
00:50:51,600 --> 00:50:53,640
...is Julius Wohlauf.
696
00:50:54,200 --> 00:50:58,920
83,000 people murdered,
and none of them feel responsible.
697
00:50:59,560 --> 00:51:01,880
They were the stooges on the ground.
698
00:51:03,440 --> 00:51:06,320
But each policeman
had a freedom of choice,
699
00:51:06,320 --> 00:51:08,760
a not inconsiderable amount.
700
00:51:09,440 --> 00:51:13,960
Those who didn't murder out of conviction,
they conformed.
701
00:51:13,960 --> 00:51:15,920
[Browning] I think, unfortunately,
what it shows us
702
00:51:15,920 --> 00:51:20,480
is that all sorts of people can become
killers under certain circumstances.
703
00:51:20,480 --> 00:51:25,880
{\an8}That regimes that want to commit genocide
or mass murder
704
00:51:25,880 --> 00:51:31,120
{\an8}will never fail to do so for a lack
of people who will pull the trigger.
705
00:51:31,120 --> 00:51:36,560
{\an8}[in German] There have been
several genocides since the Holocaust.
706
00:51:37,160 --> 00:51:41,120
{\an8}There have been massacres
and mass murders.
707
00:51:41,120 --> 00:51:44,120
There are other contexts
708
00:51:44,120 --> 00:51:47,960
where we find those mechanisms
709
00:51:47,960 --> 00:51:54,440
that lead people to kill others
without any personal
710
00:51:54,440 --> 00:51:57,680
or psychological motives.
711
00:51:57,680 --> 00:51:59,360
Wherever people can say to themselves,
712
00:51:59,360 --> 00:52:04,920
"I am only a cog in the wheel,
I am not responsible."
713
00:52:05,480 --> 00:52:08,920
With that attitude,
almost anything is possible.
714
00:52:13,360 --> 00:52:18,080
[narrator] The Holocaust was a unique
crime in its planning and delivery.
715
00:52:18,680 --> 00:52:20,360
Yet, to this very day,
716
00:52:20,360 --> 00:52:25,080
{\an8}people continue being killed
for belonging to a different group.
717
00:53:22,640 --> 00:53:26,200
[Browning] We like to think that we
are the masters of our own destiny.
718
00:53:26,200 --> 00:53:29,000
But I do think, uh, that, in fact,
719
00:53:29,000 --> 00:53:34,720
we are more shaped
by things we have little control over.
720
00:53:35,200 --> 00:53:38,840
The way we gain greater control is simply
by being more conscious of them.
721
00:53:39,360 --> 00:53:42,800
One of the points of writing a book
like Ordinary Men
722
00:53:42,800 --> 00:53:48,680
is so that people become more aware
of our vulnerability, of our malleability,
723
00:53:48,680 --> 00:53:52,720
so that, uh, when we face those kinds
of circumstances,
724
00:53:52,720 --> 00:53:55,120
uh, we're not taken by surprise.
725
00:53:55,120 --> 00:53:59,040
That we have an ability
to make a more conscious decision
726
00:53:59,040 --> 00:54:00,200
than we would otherwise.
727
00:54:10,840 --> 00:54:12,520
[Earl] Is a normal man a monster?
728
00:54:13,040 --> 00:54:17,680
I think all people are capable
of doing things
729
00:54:17,680 --> 00:54:21,560
that they don't imagine
that they're capable of doing.
730
00:54:21,560 --> 00:54:25,880
I think that we want
to "other" perpetrators,
731
00:54:25,880 --> 00:54:27,720
people like Ohlendorf,
732
00:54:27,720 --> 00:54:32,960
because we don't want to look in the
mirror and see ourselves reflected back.
733
00:54:41,360 --> 00:54:44,720
They wore suits, they were well-educated,
they went to university,
734
00:54:44,720 --> 00:54:47,200
they spoke multiple languages.
735
00:54:47,200 --> 00:54:52,400
And I think we want to believe
that we would never do what those men did.
736
00:54:52,400 --> 00:54:54,840
You don't have to be ideological.
737
00:54:54,840 --> 00:54:58,120
You don't have to be, um, hateful.
738
00:54:58,120 --> 00:55:01,160
You don't have to be anything,
and you can still kill.
739
00:55:01,960 --> 00:55:05,960
So, the question is,
"Are normal or ordinary people monsters?"
740
00:55:05,960 --> 00:55:08,320
I think we all have the potential
to do that.
741
00:55:10,160 --> 00:55:14,040
{\an8}[narrator] The experience in Nuremberg
shaped him forever.
742
00:55:14,640 --> 00:55:19,480
{\an8}Throughout his whole life,
Benjamin Ferencz has worked to ensure
743
00:55:19,480 --> 00:55:23,400
that crimes against humanity
would not be repeated.
744
00:55:24,040 --> 00:55:25,600
It was also on his initiative
745
00:55:25,600 --> 00:55:29,440
that the International Criminal Court
was founded in The Hague,
746
00:55:29,440 --> 00:55:33,320
where war crimes
are still prosecuted today.
747
00:55:36,800 --> 00:55:39,920
[Ferencz] We are all inhabitants
of one small planet.
748
00:55:40,760 --> 00:55:43,000
{\an8}The idea is when we recognize
749
00:55:43,000 --> 00:55:47,280
{\an8}not that we have different religions,
different countries, different colors,
750
00:55:47,280 --> 00:55:51,280
{\an8}but all human beings
inhabiting one small planet.
751
00:55:51,280 --> 00:55:55,480
If we follow the same path,
we will be successful.
752
00:55:55,480 --> 00:55:58,120
If we don't, we'll cease to exist.
753
00:55:59,120 --> 00:56:02,000
I've done my bit. I'm a hundred years old.
754
00:56:02,000 --> 00:56:04,520
I don't know how much longer
I can keep going.
755
00:56:04,520 --> 00:56:06,800
But as long as I can, I will.
756
00:56:06,800 --> 00:56:10,040
Now I leave it to the young people
to take the torch.
757
00:56:12,360 --> 00:56:15,120
- [in German] Come on, attention. For home.
- [officers laughing]
758
00:56:15,120 --> 00:56:17,320
- [shutter clicking]
- Yeah, a little cuddling.
759
00:56:19,640 --> 00:56:20,920
Good.