Gideon M. Greif

Introduction

As “secret bearers” (Geheimnisträger), the Jewish members of the Sonderkommando in Auschwitz-Birkenau were automatically doomed by their tormenters to death. No one of those prisoners should have remained alive. Only a miracle, or the intervention of the “angel of History”, has caused the rescue of the last group of those people in Auschwitz. Very few survivors of the “special unit”, who remained after the evacuation of the camp, are the only witness, who are able to give us a detailed and authentic description of the industrial killing process carried out in the gas chambers and crematoria in Auschwitz-Birkenau. They are the best authentic direct source for our complete and detailed knowledge on the “Final Solution” in its making, stage after stage, minute after minute. Without their testimonies, the process of the mass murder in Auschwitz-Birkenau would have remained vague and general.
Their testimonies supply an essential possibility of understanding the mass killing process in Auschwitz-Birkenau and of achieving an insight into the biggest of all extermination camps Nazi Germany created in order to annihilate the Jewish People.
For this reason it was evident, at the time the project began, that their testimonies are a precious ingredient in the story of the Holocaust, which had to be collected urgently, before these important witnesses disappear, and with them the evidence for the big crime, which the Germans executed in Auschwitz.
I “discovered” the Sonderkommando survivors in 1986, during my preparations for a radio documentary, which was broadcasted in Israel on the Day of the Commemoration of the Holocaust. Until that moment, I had no idea that there are any survivors of that commando still alive. Shortly after interviewing two of the survivors, Mr. Hasan and Mr. Sackar, I came across more and more names of Sonderkommando survivors, first in Israel and later in other countries. I have realized, that no systematic effort has been undertaken in order record save these important testimonies.
From the early beginning of the project, and after taking the decision to conduct a comprehensive research on the subject, one of the main problems was to locate the remaining members of the “Sonderkommando”, to find out where they live and to get their approval for being interviewed . Since no lists of the members of the Sonderkommando remained, the process of collecting the names and compiling a list with their names, turned out to be a detective-like project. The names and addresses were slowly and steadily collected. Then a significant effort of persuasion followed, accompanied by a lot of suspicion, unwillingness, fear and refusal on behalf of some members of the commando. Huge efforts were invested in creating the right atmosphere, which would enable the accomplishment of the interviews.
During the 15 years since the project began, all but one of the survivors of the Sonderkommando were interviewed in the countries in which they nowadays live: Israel, Poland, the Netherlands, Greece, Italy, the United Stated and Canada. The one who lives in Germany refused permanently to be approached, and only allowed me to send him written questions, to which he answered reluctantly. I met most of them in their homes, and mostly more than once. The interviews have been recorded on tape-recorder and occasionally on video. Photos of the survivors and their family members were made during the interview sessions.
All the recordings, tapes and video cassettes, made during the project – hundreds in number – will be granted at the end of the project to the Yad Vashem Archive in Jerusalem, for their eternal rest.
Of great support in the project – both spiritually, scientifically and technically, was my friend and college, a young German scholar, Mr. Andreas Kilian. Mr. Kilian discovered some of the lacking names, by his keen sense for accuracy and depth. His seriousness, brightness, wide knowledge, creative ideas, human understanding and sensitivity were a precious contribution to the project and to me personally. Our friendship, common understanding and especially – the genius sense of humor of Andreas Kilian - were a constant factor of relaxation and refreshment before and after the exhausting, depressing and heart-breaking interviews and were an essential asset in a time of strong psychological pressure and distress.
The big collection of testimonies of the survivors, some of whom have worked in the “Sonderkommando” for more than three years, supplies us with a broad spectrum of the killing mechanism and enables us to know exactly the technique, with which the death-factory Auschwitz-Birkenau functioned, how the victims were fully cheated and given illusions by the Germans, and how the workers of this death factory, namely the “Sonderkommando” prisoners, were able to fulfill their daily duties under such horrible and inhuman conditions.

The technique of interviewing

The regular, common methods of interviewing Holocaust survivors were - in the case of the Sonderkommando survivors – not sufficient.
The extremely painful experience, and the resistance and sensitivity of these special survivors, were much stronger than in any other group of survivors. The memories they bear, contain the most horrifying and painful stories and the deepest traumatic wounds, in comparison to the experience of other prisoners: They were constantly surrounded by corpses, flames, burning bodies, death and extermination. The sights they have seen have no precedence in the history of mankind. Therefore, the attitude of the interviewer could not be one of routine. From the very beginning I have developed a strategy to achieve the historical targets, namely, to collect as much data as possible – causing minimal pain and suffering to the interviewees. In order to protect their family members, most of them never before told their story in full detail. My basic attitude was based on a preliminary assumption, that the Sonderkommando prisoners were the “unluckiest of the unlucky” of the prisoners , direct victims of the German evil, brutality and sadism, totally innocent Jews whose fates have taken them to hell on earth, without any possibility of changing it.
The questions and answers during the interviews were a mixture of technical information together with psychological, religious and ethical issues, although the character of the interviewees first and foremost was a historical one. Few of the survivors were able to analyze in a sophisticated manner the human situation in which they were forced to function. Nevertheless, even the simple, plain answers and non-sophisticated ways of explaining situations, reactions and feelings, created an abundance of historical information, never published before.
The questions had to be phrased in the most delicate manner and could only occasionally be direct or to the point. Sometimes, a twisted road led to the accepted answer. The interviewees had to feel the open and undisguised sympathy on behalf of the interviewer, who had to gain not only their trust but also their friendship.
For this task – delicate and full of obstacles – I had to recruit all my diplomatic and psychological sensibility. The interview project was an exhausting, tense and burdensome process, however, in most cases, it worked out in the most positive way.
An interesting aspect, which was very noticeable during the interviews, was the fact that most interviewees felt more relaxed and talked more comfortably during an audio interview, rather than during a video-recording. The small tape recorders, which were used with a built-in, unseen microphone, were quickly forgotten, whereas the camera and the bright lights seemed to have an intimidating effect and prevented the survivor from relating their stories in a fluent and uninhibited fashion.

What can be learned from the memories of the Sonderkommando people?

• The testimonies are doubtless the best source of detailed information about the process of gassing and cremating in the Crematoria. Included in the extensive descriptions of the Sonderkommando-members we find the exact procedure of the killing-actions, which were executed in Auschwitz-Birkenau. We get a full explanation on the assembly line of the production-like murder plant, including the steps taken by the perpetrators to deceive the victims in the undressing halls and the gas chambers; we learn how Cyclon B gas was precisely poured into the gas chambers; how the Jews were crying desperately before dying of suffocation; how the Sonderkommando people treated the new coming Jews inside the undressing rooms; and how they carried their bodies out of the chambers after the gassing; we hear about the removal of gold teeth, valuables and women-hair after the death; we get an explanation on the burning of the corpses and the special methods of quick and efficient burning, using the self-energy of the bodies; we get a description on the smashing of the remaining bones and body parts, and on the throwing of ashes into the river Vistula, surrounding the camp. The testimonies, however, reveal small – but meaningful – details, which would never have been exposed without the interviews: we hear about the principles, which guided the Jewish prisoners not to tell their brethren in the undressing rooms what fate awaits them in the gas chambers; we learn about their daily struggle with their conscience and about their feelings whilst witnessing the huge crime taking place in front of their own eyes. We get an impression of the internal social relations amongst the members of the Sonderkommando and of their relations with the SS-members who were on guard there.
  Nevertheless, the technical data is not the only important contribution to our knowledge and understanding of the unique reality, which reigned in Auschwitz. Not less important are the descriptions on the behavior of the various parties involved in the events: the masses of Jews who are brought to the gas chambers, the Germans who committed the crime and the miserable Jewish members of the Sonderkommando.
  
• The interviews show us, how short the period of time was, in which the Sonderkommando members had to get used to their daily routine, surrounded by corpses, fire and ashes. The phenomena of getting used to their awful work so quickly, becoming “robots” and living machines, demonstrates clearly the successful technique of their masters, the SS people, who forced them to participate in a process unprecedented in the history of mankind.
  The behavioral patterns of the Sonderkommando people, who were able to carry on with their horrific duties for months or even years, also show us, how strong the power of will and the desire to live can be, even in a hell on earth like Auschwitz.
  
• The information about the inner life of the Sonderkommando people is the best proof to the ability of the every person to suppress, in times of emergency and war, his sentiments, feelings and morals, and become a living machine, a robot, and to fulfill orders. Under such a system of evil the Sonderkommando members were forced to carry sometimes even the corpses of his own relatives and friends into the ovens.
  Moreover, the testimonies show clearly, that the “plant” called Auschwitz functioned almost automatically, without German interference, supervised mainly by the Jewish Kapos and “Vorarbeitern” (senior supervisors). The process of the soul enslavement, enhanced by the SS people, had thus been completely and viciously achieved.
  
• The testimonies reflect the sophisticated ways and methods of deceit and treachery of the Germans, who used the natural naivety of people and the terrible bodily and spiritual situation, which they purposely created for their victims. Those cruel methods functioned almost perfectly.
  The measures and methods, which were implemented in the industrial death zone in Auschwitz-Birkenau, enabled the perpetrators to be more economical in manpower and reduce other expenses, and to arrange the whole system in a quiet, “peaceful”, hasty, and cheap manner. As Eliezer Eisenschmidt relates:
  “We pulled one or two corpses outside with our hands. Sometimes, we used a walking stick, got a grip around the neck of the corpse and pulled it out. The use of the stick was better than the work with the hands, because many of the victims had dirtied themselves with their own excrements during the gassing. Thus we did not like to touch the corpses, but preferred to pull them out with the stick.
  After the corpses in the undressing room had been dealt with, they were brought to the ovens. All prisoners of the Sonderkommando were occupied to get the corpses out of the gas chamber. Those as well, who normally worked at other places: Who was occupied with gardening on the yard of the crematorium or who was appointed to the transport of coal for the ovens. Because this was the hardest and longest work.”
  
  The thousands of arriving Jews, as shown in the testimonies, have reacted exactly as the Germans have expected them to. Any attempt of refusal and any delay in obedience were wiped out brutally. The perpetrators were extremely cruel, and the victims – helpless, paralyzed and abandoned, exhausted and starved.
  
• The testimonies also allow us to see in a better clarity and sharpness the central lines of the attitude of the Germans towards the Jewish and other prisoners in the camps, characteristics that were already known to us, but not in such a detailed way. These special patterns of behavior are typical to the phenomenon called “National Socialism”, in which humiliation, cruelty and criminal measures were so common.
  The descriptions on the behavior of the SS people, included in the testimonies, demonstrate their extreme cruelty and borderless vicious minds, which was combined with pathological sadism. A quote from Shlomo Dragon’s testimony exemplifies this in every respect:
  “When the door was opened after the gassing, the corpses lay above each other, densely pressed together in layers, others had remained standing. In the gas chamber, there was a terrible heat, one could feel the sweet taste of the gas. Sometimes we still heard groans when we entered the gas chamber, especially, when we started to pull the corpses by their hands out of the chamber.
  One time we found a suckling that was alive and wrapped in a pillow. The head of the baby stuck in the pillow as well. After we had moved away the pillow, the baby opened its eyes. So it was still alive. We brought the bundle to Oberscharführer Moll, with the report that the child was alive. Moll brought the child to the edge of the pit, put it to the earth, stepped on its neck and threw it into the fire. I saw with my own eyes how he kicked the child. It moved its little arms. It did not scream, therefore I could not determine whether it was still breathing. In any case it looked completely different than the other corpses.”
  A central figure, the infamous SS-Scharführer Otto Moll, is vividly and realistically described in the testimonies. Moll, who can be labeled “the most cruel Nazi”, is probably the best symbol for the atrocities which Nazi Germany committed against the Jewish People in the Holocaust.
  Also and not less, we can learn about the greediness and passion of the SS-team to gain easy riches, while taking advantage of the property brought to the camp by those who were murdered.
  
• The testimonies provide us with an obvious spectrum of the odd and bizarre aspects which existed in Auschwitz, that created a strange reality like: the unbearable combination of life and death, wealth and poverty, truth and deceit, humanity and inhumanity, naivety and shrewdness, morality and immorality.
  Auschwitz, as painted in the testimonies, was a place where every possible phenomenon of the world could be found.
  
• Of great importance is also the fact, that the interviews enable the comparison of important details, which are included in the clandestine writings of the Sonderkommando people, with the oral testimonies, and to find out, whether the written source is accurate and to which extent. In any case, the oral and the written sources complement each other, in almost every detail.
  The perpetual debate about the methodological advantages and pitfalls of oral history is in this case unnecessary, since it appears obvious that only the oral testimonies allow us to see in great detail the inner workings of the death factory Auschwitz – a place which created only a few written documents.
  
• Finally: the interviews reveal to which heights and climaxes man can ascend, but also the opposite: to which depths he can decline mentally and morally.

Das Manuskript von Gideon Greif wurde veröffentlicht im:
International Journal on the Audio-Visual Testimony, No. 8 (juin 2002), Editions du Centre d’Etudes et de Documentation Fondation Auschwitz, Bruxelles, p. 31-36.

Wir danken Gideon Greif und der Redaktion des International Journal on the Audio-Visual Testimony für Ihre Zustimmung zur Veröffentlichung des Artikels auf www.sonderkommando-studien.de