Daniel Brewing, M.A. In the Shadow of Auschwitz In a recent article ...

Daniel Brewing, M.A. In the Shadow of Auschwitz
In a recent article for the London Review of Books, British historian Richard Evans
concluded his deliberations on the 20 th century European history of violence with the
following statement: “What we need is to understand why the murder of Poles took
place and how people could carry it out.” 1 Therefore, my dissertation project is a
thick exploration of German mass violence against the ethnic Polish civilian
population in the occupied Polish territories during World War II. I use wartime
documentation, survivors’ testimonies, and both German and Polish records of
postwar criminal investigations to trace the historical processes that resulted in the
deaths of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Polish civilians.
This paper seeks to highlight (1) the status of research and (2) the project’s
methodological and theoretical approach, and present (3) preliminary findings and
historiographical contributions.
Status of Research
The German occupation of Poland has been covered in a vast amount of
historiographical literature. Adjacent to structural historical syntheses 2 and source
editions, 3 historians mainly focused on studies of particular policies of German rule, 4
and published numerous studies on the German occupation apparatus. 5
The historical research approached the special object of mass violence in occupied
Poland from two perspectives. Since the early 1990s, a growing international
scholarship analyzed the complex implementation of anti-Jewish violence, while the
1 Evans, Richard J. : Who remembers the Poles ?, in : London Review of Books, Vol. 32, Nr. 21, 4
November 2010.
2 Madajczyk, Czesław: Polityka III Rzeszy w okupowanej Polsce, 2 vol., Warszawa 1970; Łuczak,
Czesław: Polityka ludnościowa I ekonomiczna hitlerowskich Niemiec w okupowanej Polsce, Poznań
1993; Broszat, Martin: Nationalsozialistische Polenpolitik 1939-1945, Stuttgart 1961; Eisenblätter,
Gerhard: Grundlinien der Politik des Reiches gegenüber dem Generalgouvernement 1939-1944, Diss.
Phil., Frankfurt a. M. 1969.
3 Documenta Occupationis, Poznań 1945-1990; Röhr, Werner (ed.): Die faschistische
Okkupationspolitik in Polen 1939-1945, Berlin (Ost) 1989 (=Europa unter dem Hakenkreuz, vol. 2).
4 A comprehensive study on German agricultural policy is: Rajca, Czesław: Walka o chleb 1939-1945.
Eksploatacja rolnictwa w Generalnym Gubernatorstwie, Lublin 1991; for the germanization and
settlement policy: Aly, Götz/Heim, Susanne: Vordenker der Vernichtung. Auschwitz und die Pläne
für eine neue europäische Ordnung, Hamburg 1990.
5 For the SS and police apparatus, see: Borodziej, Włodzimierz: Terror I polityka. Policja niemiecka a
polski ruch oporu w GG 1939-1944, Warszawa 1985; for the Wehrmacht , see: Radziwończyk,
Kazimierz: Niemieckie siły zbrojne w okupowanej Polsce, 22.6.1941-wiosną 1944 r., in: Wojskowy
Przegląd Historyczny 7, 3 (1962), pp. 103-159 and 7, 4 (1962), pp. 31-96; for the civil administration,
see: Kaczmarek, Ryszard: Pod rządami Gauleiterów. Elity I instancje władze w rejencji w latach 1939-
1945, Katowice 1998.

Daniel Brewing, M.A. In the Shadow of Auschwitz
significantly older Polish research has focused on the suffering of the ethnic Polish
civilian population.
(a) Drawing upon hitherto unexplored archival material, scholars of the Shoah have
focused on the implementation of genocidal policies at the actual sites of mass
murder in occupied Poland, turning away from the sterile debates on the decision-
making process within the Berlin central agencies. A number of regional studies that
cover nearly the entire Polish territories sketched a highly complex picture of
numerous agencies with multifaceted motivations, perpetrating violent measures
against Jews with utter brutality. 6 Within the context of Holocaust research, the role
of the Polish civilian population – rather unsurprisingly – remained blurry. We can
identify just three analytical approaches in which Historians paid attention to Polish
civilians: First, in so-called new population studies, where the Holocaust is
historicized both into the context of ethnic cleansing in the first half of the twentieth
century and Nazi schemes for postwar demographic reordering. 7 Second, Poles
appear in the context of interpretations of the Holocaust as a Germany-driven
European project, in which the indigenous population participated for numerous
reasons. 8 Third, finally, in approaches which highlight the contrary processes and ask
for the conditions, possibilities and dimensions of rescuing Jews. 9 Thus, within recent
patterns of research the situation of Polish civilians under German rule remains
understudied as it hardly ever appears at the center of research on Nazi violence.
6 Pohl, Dieter: Von der „Judenpolitik“ zum Judenmord. Der Distrikt Lublin des
Generalgouvernements 1939-1944, Frankfurt a. M. 1993; Sandkühler, Thomas: „Endlösung“ in
Galizien. Der Judenmord in Ostpolen und die Rettungsinitiativen von Berthold Beitz, 1941-1944, Bonn
1996; Gerlach, Christian: Krieg, Ernährung, Völkermord. Forschungen zur deutschen
Vernichtungspolitik im Zweiten Weltkrieg, Hamburg 1998; Musial, Bogdan: Deutsche
Zivilverwaltung und Judenverfolgung im Generalgouvernement. Eine Fallstudie zum Distrikt Lublin
1939-1944, Wiesbaden 1999; Alberti, Michael: Die Verfolgung und Vernichtung der Juden im
Reichsgau Wartheland 1939-1945, Wiesbaden 2006; Młynarczyk, Jacek Andrzej: Judenmord in
Zentralpolen. Der Distrikt Radom des Generalgouvernements 1939-1945, Darmstadt 2007.
7 Aly, Götz: „Endlösung“. Völkerverschiebung und der Mord an den europäischen Juden, Frankfurt a.
M. 1995 ; Bloxham, Donald : Holocaust. A Genocide, Oxford 2009; Levene, Mark: Genocide in the Age
of the Nation-State, London 2005; Kieser, Hans-Lukas/Schaller, Dominik: Völkermord im historischen
Raum 1895-1945, in: dies. (Hrsg.): Der Völkermord an den Armeniern und die Shoah, Zürich 2002, S.
11-80; Heinemann, Isabel/Wagner, Patrick (Hrsg.): Wissenschaft - Planung - Vertreibung.
Neuordnungskonzepte und Umsiedlungspolitik im 20. Jahrhundert, Stuttgart 2006.
8 For example : Gross, Jan Tomasz. Nachbarn. Der Mord an den Juden von Jedwabne, München 2001;
and by the same author : Golden Harvest, Oxford 2011 ; Grabowski, Jan: „Ja tego Żyda znam!“.
Szantażowanie Żydów w Warszawie 1939-1943, Warszawa 2004.
9 For example : Kosmala, Beate : Ungleiche Opfer in einer extremen Situation – Die Schwierigkeiten
der Solidarität im besetzten Polen, in : Benz, Wolfgang/Wetzel, Juliane (Hrsg.) : Solidarität und Hilfe
für Juden während der NS-Zeit, Berlin 1996.

Daniel Brewing, M.A. In the Shadow of Auschwitz
(b) In contrast, the Polish scholarship on mass violence against ethnic Poles stagnated
in a positivistic tendency of description. Predominantly relying on survivors’
testimonies, Polish historians mainly documented German atrocities on the local
level. The framework for the interpretation of these murderous events remained
simple: Polish historians generally ascribed the acts of violence to long-term
intentional measures for the “biological extermination of the Polish nation.” 10 In
consequence, both the German decision-making and the central mechanisms of
escalation remained excluded. 11 Finally, in western historiography mass crimes
against ethnic Poles have been widely left out of scholarly inquiry. 12 Only in the last
five years, have German and American scholars begun to hesitantly trace this subject
among others by analyzing the first months of German rule in Poland. 13
Therefore, my project’s aims are three-fold. First, I will widen the temporal
parameters of research by focusing on the entire period of German occupation in
Poland from 1939 to 1945, to stress mechanisms of long-term radicalization. Second, I
will push the boundaries of Polish historical research to the multi-dimensional
approach of Shoah scholarship. Lastly, my approach will open up the possibility to
highlight mutual influences and transfers between the two violent complexes.
Thereby, my project will contribute to Shoah scholarship by sharpening the context
of mass violence in occupied Poland.
10 Madajczyk, Polityka III Rzeszy.
11 This is true for the monumental syntheses: Madajczyk, Polityka III Rzeszy; Łuczak, Polityka;
furthermore, see especially the numerous descriptive articles on mass crimes in the pertinent journals:
Biuletyn Głównej Komisji Badania Zbrodni Niemieckich (later: Hitlerowskich) w Polsce, 1946 ff.; since
1991: Biuletyn Komisji Badania Zbrodni przeciwko Narodowi Polskiemu; now: Pamięć i
Sprawiedliwość; see as well: Dzieje Najnowsze, Wojskowy Przegląd Historyczny, Przegląd
Historyczny.
12 The only exception was the purely polemical account by American scholar Richard C. Lukas which
is full flaws but unfortunately still serves as the referential point for the scholarly community. See:
Lukas, Richard, C.: The Forgotten Holocaust: The Poles under German occupation 1939-1944,
Lexington 1986.
13 For the Polish campaign in September 1939, two dissertations were published in the last years. See:
Rossino, Alexander B.: Hitler strikes Poland. Blitzkrieg, Ideology, and Atrocity, Kansas City 2003;
Böhler, Jochen: Auftakt zum Vernichtungskrieg. Die Wehrmacht in Polen 1939, Frankfurt a. M. 2006;
see as well with a specific focus on police units during the Polish campaign: Mallmann, Klaus-
Michael/Böhler, Jochen/Matthäus, Jürgen: Einsatzgruppen in Polen. Darstellung und
Dokumentation, Darmstadt 2008; focusing on the first months of the occupation are the case studies
in: Mallmann, Kaus-Michael/Musial, Bogdan (ed.): Genesis des Genozids. Polen 1939-1941,
Darmstadt 2004; most recently, Philip T. Rutherford published his excellent dissertation on the
deportations of Poles from the western Polish territories to the Generalgovernment, see: Rutherford,
Philip T.: Prelude to the Final Solution: The Nazi Program for Deporting Ethnic Poles, 1939-1941,
Lawrence 2007.

Daniel Brewing, M.A. In the Shadow of Auschwitz
Theoretical approach
My own approach is informed by three simple observations: First, the Holocaust as
the racial political core of Nazi ideology reflects the patterns of other processes and
contexts of Nazi persecution and mass violence. Thus violence against ethnic Poles
cannot be conceived properly as the exclusive result of a consistent implementation
of intentional measures. 14 Second, ideology is not sufficient to explain mass violence,
since the connection between attitude and action is only a loose one, and racism does
not necessarily press for its violent implementation. 15 Third, collective violence
develops through offers to act by central agencies and initiatives from the regional
and local level. 16
Against this background, occupied Poland constituted, in my view, a specific area for
the perpetration of violence. This area was formed through constantly changing
constellations of transgressions and restraints that created a frame in which the
German personnel in occupied Poland had to operate. The decisive parameters of
this area were set by a structural transgression from above, that turned violence into
a cornerstone of the German future in which the “Volksgemeinschaft” would rule
over a racially homogenous Eastern Europe. 17 Due to this perception the Germans
installed an order of violence, that transcended traditional patterns of occupation,
and rather aimed at the de-nationalizing the Polish society in order to produce a
people without rights. 18 At the same time, this transgression from above, opened up
specific zones for social action, in which offers for violent initiatives were made and
chances for violent action were made, which, in turn, were accepted and used widely
within the German occupation society. 19 Hence, violence in the German East was not
14
Matthäus, Jürgen: Holocaust und Antisemitismus: Spezifika, Disparitäten, Zusammenhänge,
unpublished paper given at the Zentrum für Antisemitismusforschung, July 2008.
15
Welzer, Harald: Täter. Wie aus ganz normalen Menschen Massenmörder werden, Frankfurt am
Main 2005; Geulen, Christian: Geschichte des Rassismus, München 2007.
16 Kundrus, Birthe: Entscheidung für den Völkermord. Einleitende Überlegungen zu einem
historiographischen Problem, in: Mittelweg 36, 6 (2006), pp. 4-17.
17
Baberowski, Jörg/Doering-Manteuffel, Anselm: Ordnung durch Terror. Gewaltexzesse und
Vernichtung im nationalsozialistischen und stalinistischen Imperium, Bonn 2006, S. 59 ff.
18
Geyer, Michael/Jarausch, Konrad: Zerbrochener Spiegel. Deutsche Geschichten im 20. Jahrhundert,
München 2005, S. 160 ff.
19 For example : Mallmann, Klaus-Michael: „Mensch, ich feiere heut‘ den tausendsten Genickschuß.“
Die Sicherheitspolizei und die Shoah in Westgalizien, in: Musial, Bogdan (Hrsg.): „Aktion Reinhardt“.
Der Völkermord an den Juden im Generalgouvernement 1941-1944, Osnabrück 2004, S. 353-379.

Daniel Brewing, M.A. In the Shadow of Auschwitz
a deviant behavior but could instead meet collective expectations and could be in
conformity with the collective norms of the German occupation society. 20
This does not imply, though, that every kind of violence against ethnic Poles would
have been accepted or allowed. Rather, the area of action in occupied Poland was
formed through a number of imperatives and restrictions that at first sight would
appear highly inconsistent. But we are faced with a closely meshed set of rules that
all German agents were subjected to, and that was guarded by different civilian and
SS-Police courts. 21 Specific red lines were drawn-in, that marked the oscillating
borders between allowed violent behavior and prohibited violence. That way, the
violence was supposed to be channeled into regulated forms of action in order both
to avoid independent excesses or “Ausschweifungen” and to secure a stabile
normative frame that would avoid an anarchic escalation of violence. Furthermore,
this normative framework was supposed to secure the economic rationality of
violence and to avoid a negative impact on highly important economy of occupied
Poland. But the new research on the perpetrators of Nazi violence has clearly shown
that this normative framework certainly did not mirror the reality “on the ground”,
but rather needs to be interpreted as a desired status. 22 Within the specific milieus of
the German East with its safeguarding comradeship the normative red lines could
easily be crossed by various agents in deliberate acts of self-authorization. 23 The
motivating factors for crossing the lines were anthropological constants such as fear,
insecurity and hate as well as ideological commitment, racism, and radical-
nationalism.
In order to understand German violence against ethnic Poles, we need to take a
closer look at the specific areas of action that were formed by both normative
20 Jäger, Herbert: Verbrechen unter totalitärer Herrschaft. Studien zur nationalsozialistischen
Gewaltkriminalität, Olten/Freiburg i. Brsg. 1967; ders.: Makrokriminalität. Studien zur Kriminologie
kollektiver Gewalt, Frankfurt a. M. 1989
21 Scheffler, Wolfgang: Zur Praxis der SS- und Polizeigerichtsbarkeit im Dritten Reich, in: Doeker,
Günther/Steffani, Winfried (Hrsg.): Klassenjustiz und Pluralismus. Festschrift für Ernst Fraenkel,
Hamburg 1973, S. 224-236; Wegner, Bernd: Die Sondergerichtsbarkeit von SS und Polizei. Militärjustiz
oder Grundlegung einer SS-gemäßen Rechtsordnung, in: Büttner, Ursula: Das Unrechtsregime.
Internationale Forschung über den Nationalsozialismus. Festschrift für Werner Jochmann zum 65.
Geburtstag, Bd. 1, Hamburg 1986, S. 243-259.
22 See for example the contributions in : Mallmann, Klaus-Michael/Paul, Gerhard : Karrieren der
Gewalt. Nationalsozialistische Täterbiographien, Darmstadt 2004.
23 Lehnstaedt, Stephan : Okkupation im Osten. Besatzeralltag in Warschau und Minsk 1939-1944,
München 2010.

Daniel Brewing, M.A. In the Shadow of Auschwitz
transgression and attempts to regulate from above and the self-authorization of
agents defining what is permitted, prohibited and ordered in this area. This
combination produced a constantly high level of violence that left behind destroyed
landscapes and millions of dead.
Preliminary findings and contributions
My dissertation project is an innovative approach to the historical study of the
violent German occupation in Eastern Europe that will broaden, amend, and correct
in many respects the scholarly understanding of German rule in Poland, and “the
East”. In my paper I would like to highlight just six relevant new vistas which my
project discloses.
(1) Violence against ethnic Poles developed within a broader framework of long-,
middle- and short-term objectives which were set by the top level leadership. Over
time, this framework generated both intentional and situational violence against the
civilian population. Within this framework, Nazi violence unfolded through the
entanglement of warfare, racial restructuring, economic, agrarian, and security
policies.
(2) The inherent conflicts and opposing interests within the different branches of the
occupation apparatus caused numerous contradictions, which in turn produced
crucial variations in both the intensity and the focus of violence over time.
(3) Violence against ethnic Poles was a product of transfers between different agents
and institutions all over German occupied Eastern Europe. Know-how on specific
forms and methods of violence was transmitted especially within the SS apparatus
but also included the civilian administration and the German army. This exchange
transcended the classic center/periphery pattern as within and beyond the SS
apparatus traditional elements of hierarchical formalism lost their importance. In the
occupied Polish territories, the German personnel interacted vertically, horizontally
and diagonally. This interaction created a dynamic, ever more borderless exchange of
violent methods and experts on violence.
(4) Violence against ethnic Poles was, at least partially, a product of complex
processes of interaction between the German occupiers and occupied Poles
themselves. A closer look at the local level reveals mechanisms of cooperation in field

Daniel Brewing, M.A. In the Shadow of Auschwitz
of common interests that could for example include the perpetration of violence
against partisans. In this perspective the perpetration of violence against ethnic Poles
resulted in part from a complex scenario with multiple agents, including bystanders,
perpetrators and profiteers that acted out of a variety of motivations, including
inner-Polish prewar political constellations.
(5) Violence against ethnic Poles took a specific form when so-called “Volksdeutsche”
were involved. They often participated in the selection processes before the shootings
and were encouraged to select among their Polish neighbors those with purportedly
“anti-German-attitudes”. This procedure secured legitimacy for the killings among
“Volksdeutsche” and violently introduced racial difference into the relations of Poles
and “Volkdeutsche” in small communities.
(6) Violence against ethnic Poles was intimately linked to parallel mass murders
through institutional, organizational, personal, and conceptual interconnections.
Violence against ethnic Poles is located within the overlapping structures of violence
against different victim groups; of special importance are the interrelations, and
verifiable adaptations among the mass crimes against ethnic Poles and both the
Shoah and the ´war of annihilation´ against the Soviet Union. For example in the
rural areas of occupied Poland, German anti-partisan warfare initially aimed Soviet
Prisoners of War who had fled from the deadly POW camps all over occupied
Poland, soon, though, turned against the Polish rural population, and finally was
used as a vital tool in the annihilation of the Polish Jewry. Elucidating the
entanglement of these different strands of persecution and murder adds further
levels of complexity to our understanding of Nazi violence and advances recent
discussions on the implementation of racial policies in Eastern Europe.