| Pacification actions in German-occupied Poland | |
|---|---|
| Location | German occupied Poland |
| Date | 1939-1945 |
| Target | Polish people |
Attack type | Genocidal massacre,summary execution,reprisal,collective punishment,mass rape |
| Perpetrators | Nazi Germany,Wehrmacht,General Governorate for the Occupied Polish Region |
| Motive | Reprisal,Anti-Polish sentiment,Germanisation, pacification of the Polish people to Nazi authority |
Pacification actions were one of many punitive measures designed byNazi Germany to inflict terror on the civilian population ofoccupied Polish villages and towns with the use of military and police force.[1] They were an integral part of thewar of aggression against the Polish nation waged by Germany since September 1, 1939. The projected goal of pacification operations was to prevent and suppress thePolish resistance movement in World War II nevertheless, among the victims were children as young as 1.5 years old, women, fathers attempting to save their families, farmers rushing to rescuelivestock from burning buildings, patients, victims already wounded, and hostages of many ethnicities including Poles and Jews.[1][2]
War crimes committed during pacification actions in occupied Poland were probed by the West GermanCentral Office of Justice in Ludwigsburg in September 1959 and, in accordance with theGerman Criminal Code (§ 78/3 pt. 2, and § 212), ultimately thrown out as already expired due to Germanstatutes of limitations.[1] No further investigations were conducted until June 1971 when the 1939 crimes of the1st Panzer Division in Poland (Polenfeldzug) were also thrown out as unlikely after a statement by MajorWalther Wenck, which was accepted on good faith. The inquiries by the PolishInstitute of National Remembrance intomassacres in specific locations are ongoing.[1] Historical data collected in Poland confirms the complete destruction of 554,000 farms valued at 6.062 millionzłoty (1938 level) with 8 million dead cattle and horses, on top of terrible human losses.[3] Several hundred villages were wiped off the map.[4] In just a year and a half between January 1, 1943, and July 31, 1944, theWehrmacht army alone conducted 1,106 pacification actions in occupied Poland, independent of the killing operations byEinsatzgruppen andauxiliary forces, and the ongoingHolocaust of the Jews.[5]
The so-called "pacification operations" were introduced along with all otherextermination policies directed against Poland already in September 1939, and were of a large scale, resulting in the confirmed murder of approximately 20,000 villagers. Massacres were conducted in the areas ofGeneral Government,Pomorze, and in the vicinities ofBiałystok andGreater Poland. The number of Polish settlements targeted in these operations is approximately 825 (in modern-day Poland,see below). The regular German army conducted 760 mass executions during their march acrosscentral Poland. Material losses from wanton destruction of Polish countryside unrelated to military maneuvers are estimated at 30 millionzłoty in the area of General Government alone.[7]
As noted by World War II historians, the pacification actions were separate from the likes ofOperation Tannenberg. They were not a part of theindiscriminate killings by the mobileEinsatzkommandodeath squads active during theinvasion of Poland of 1939, and characterized by often deliberate targeting of civilian population by the invading forces,[8] with the active participation of the German minority living in theSecond Polish Republic whose men joined theSS armedVolksdeutscher Selbstschutz battalions inWest Prussia,Upper Silesia andWarthegau.[9] In total, up to 200,000 Poles lost their lives at the beginning of war regardless of the nature of the conflict.[10] Likewise, over 100,000 Poles died in theLuftwaffe'sterror bombing operations.[11]
The pacification actions were conducted in west-central Poland as well in the easternKresy regions re-captured from the USSR in 1941, including in thePolesie Voivodeship,Nowogródek Voivodeship and others, comprising most of contemporaryWest Belarus. These tactics were the main local means ofthe Holocaust in occupied Poland. Some 627 villages were razed in eastern Poland by theSS with the help of collaborationist battalions includingBelarusian,Ukrainian and others, during 60 pacification and 80 punitive operations there.[12] The battalions ofBelarusian Home Defence (BKA) alone massacred some 30,000 Jews during pacification of villages.[13]Collective punishment was used during such operations to discourage offering shelter to SovietPOWs and providing aid to any guerrilla forces. Pacifications included the extermination of entire villages including women and children, expulsions, the burning of homes, confiscation of private property, and arrests. In many instances the operations of this kind conducted jointly by theEinsatzgruppen and the GermanOrder Police battalions, were characterized by extreme brutality.[14] An example of such tactics was theburning alive of 91 hostages including 31 women and 31 children in the village ofJabłoń-Dobki in theBiałystok region on March 8, 1944. Once the fire got going, a grenade was thrown in.[15]
The first pacification action, conducted on the ground by theWehrmacht officers and soldiers, took place inZłoczew on September 3 and 4, 1939, in which the German soldiers murdered some 200 Poles. According to historianAlexander B. Rossino, theatrocity was committed with the participation of the1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler (LSSAH), which was also involved in the murder of 50 Polish Jews inBłonie near Warsaw, and the shooting actions inBolesławiec,Torzeniec,Goworowo,Mława, andWłocławek.[16] LSSAH torched villages along the road without military justification.[17]
The PolishInstitute of National Remembrance has documented the use of military force with the goal of inflicting terror and suppressing Polish resistance. One example was a reprisal action by units of the19th Panzer Corps Division taken for the operations of theSuwalska Cavalry Brigade of the Polish Army. During the evening of 13 September 1939, thirteen people fromOlszewo and ten people from the nearby village ofPietkowo were killed. The victims among the villagers include women and children who were murdered in several ways, such as stabbing by bayonets, shooting, being blown apart by grenades, and being burned alive in a barn.[19]
According to article by Witold Kulesza published inKomentarze Historyczne by theInstitute of National Remembrance, German RegimentSS-Leibstandarte "Adolf Hitler" of the 17th Division arrived in Złoczew on September 3, 1939 on motorcycles and on bicycles. The burning of the town and mass killings began the same night. According to eye-witness Janina Modrzewska, who survived the pacification of Złoczew, the soldiers were killing everyone they saw. Total casualties amounted to 200 dead victims.[1] From the air,Luftwaffe planes bombed the villages ofMomoty Dolne,Momoty Górne,Pawłów,Tokary,Sochy andKlew. Some places were subjected to multiple pacification operations. In the town of Aleksandrów inBiłgoraj County between 1939 and 1944, German authorities murdered 290 civilians (444 according toWIEM), wounded 43, deported 434 to forced labour camps, and burned at least 113 households.
TheBiałystok region fell under German occupation twice. Overrun by the Wehrmacht in 1939 it was the site of mass pacification actions even before it was ceded to the Soviets two weeks later in accordance with theNazi-Soviet pact. It was invaded again in the course ofOperation Barbarossa with similar results. At least 750 villages there had at least 10 inhabitants murdered, and at least 75 villages were destroyed completely (see: table for partial list of names of villages and the number of dead victims).[a] Modern international law considers these types of actions against civilians to constitutegenocide, whether conducted within national boundaries or in occupied territories.[20]
Between November 1942 and March 1943 on direct orders fromHeinrich Himmler,[21] 116,000 Polish men and women were expelled in just a few months during Action Zamość.[22] In Polish historiography the events surrounding theNazi German roundups are often named alternatively as theChildren of Zamojszczyzna to emphasize the apprehension of around 30,000 children at that time, snatched away from their parents who were transported from Zamojszczyzna to concentration camps.[23] The expulsions encompassed the districts ofHrubieszów,Tomaszów Lubelski,Zamość andBiłgoraj, and were completed in March 1943. In total 297 Polish villages were depopulated.[21]
Investigations by the PolishInstitute of National Remembrance into pacifications of specific villages focus on locations within contemporary Poland. They are exponentially greater within the prewar borders ofthe Republic.[24]
| Village name | Killed | Village name | Killed | Village name | Killed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Borów | 232 (103 children) | Cyców | 111 | Jamy[25] | 147 |
| Kaszyce | 117 | Kitów | 174 | Krasowo-Częstki | 257 (83 children) |
| Krusze | 148 | Kulno | 100 | Lipniak-Majorat | over 370 |
| Łążek | 187 | Michniów | 204 (48 children)[18] | Milejów | 150 |
| Mrozy | over 100 | Olszanka | 103 | Rajsk | over 143 |
| Różaniec | circa 200 | Skłoby | 265 | Smoligów | circa 200 |
| Sochy | 183 | Sumin | 118 | Szczecyn | 368 (71 children) |
| Wanaty | 109 | Zamość | 470 | Szczebrzeszyn | 208 |
| Łabunie | 210 | Krasnobród | 285 (200 Jews)[26] | Mokre | 304 |
| Nielisz | 301 | Nowa Osada | 195 | Radecznica | 212 |
| Skierbieszów | 335 | Stary Zamość | 287 | Suchowola | 324 |
| Sułów | 252 | Tereszpol | 344 | Wysokie | 203 |
| Zwierzyniec | 412 | Kitów | 165 | Królewiec /Szałas[27] | over 100 each |
The list of pacified villages within the borders of postwar Poland was arranged by the IPN according to one of Poland's elevenpresent-dayvoivodeships (administrative regions) which were not a part of Nazi Germany upon the 1939 invasion of Poland. Likewise, all settlements presently within the borders of post-Soviet Ukraine and Belarus are excluded from the list. They belonged to Poland's prewarLwów Voivodeship,Nowogródek Voivodeship (1919–39),Polesie Voivodeship,Stanisławów Voivodeship,Tarnopol Voivodeship,Wilno Voivodeship (1926–39), andWołyń Voivodeship (1921–39). The number of pacified villages for each of the present-day voivodeships is as follows.[28]
Source: IPN, Muzeum Wsi Kieleckiej.
{{cite book}}:|work= ignored (help)These atrocities continued throughout the war. From January 1, 1943, to July 31, 1944, the Wehrmacht conducted 1,106 pacification actions.
{{cite book}}:|work= ignored (help)Source: IPN, Muzeum Wsi Kieleckiej.
Zamojszczyzna 116,000.
Map of Martyrology per each Voivodeship.
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