Einsatzgruppen Essay

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The Einsatzgruppen were mobile killing units responsible for mass killings during World War II. The Einsatzgruppen played a leading role in the implementation of the Final Solution of the Jewish question. Almost all the people the Einsatzgruppen killed were civilians. They began with the Polish intelligence, and then moved on to include Soviet political commissars, Jews, and Gypsies. At the Einsatzgruppen’s height, the membership totaled approximately 2,700 men. There were two directors throughout the group’s life span. Reinhard Heydrich, who was the agency executive from 1939 through 1942, was the man who formed the group under the direction of Hienrich Himmler and was in charge of the invasion of Poland and the Baltic States. Enst Kaltenbrunner, who was the agency executive from 1943 to 1945, was in charge of all missions after Heydrich’s resignation. The Einsatzgruppen was split into four different units, Einsatzgruppen A, B, C, and D. Einsatzgruppen A was attached to the Army Group North and consisted of 990 men. The leader of Einsatzgruppen A was Dr. Franz Walter Stahlecker. Einsatzgruppen B was attached to Army Group Centre and had 665 ranks under the control of Artur Nebe. Einsatzgruppen C had 700 men under the leadership of Dr. Otto Rasch, and the…show more content…
The Baltic States included Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. Einsatzgruppen A killed almost 140,000 people in the five months following the invasion. The killings continued steadily, increasing the number of victims by thousands every day. In November 1941, Himmler was dissatisfied with the pace of the killings in Latvia, so he ordered a liquidation of the Riga ghetto. The liquidation occurred on the 30th of November 1941 and continued through the 8th of December 1941 near the Rumbula train station. As in Babi Yar, the victims were forced to lie in pits face down to be shot. The death toll of the Rumbula killings was 25,000
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