Tag: Sicherheitsdienst

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Hitler’s Directives

I’ve touched on several of Hitler’s directives, or decrees in past blogs. I thought I would outline some of the more infamous decrees he made over the twelve years of the Third Reich. You can be assured that the stories of the people these decrees targeted did not end well.

Hitler came to power in 1933 and immediately began issuing his directives and proclamations. They initially went after Jews, Untermensch, and political enemies of the Nazis. From there he moved on to the physically and mentally disabled. As the war progressed, Hitler began to circumvent the Geneva Convention and its rules on how POWs and captured military/combat personnel were to be treated.

Official directive on Hitler’s personal stationary (and signed by the Führer) directing Bouhler and Brandt to establish the euthanasia program known as “Aktion T4.” Photo by Marcel (March 2008). PD-Official Decree (German). Wikimedia Commons.
Official directive on Hitler’s personal stationary (and signed by the Führer) directing Bouhler and Brandt to establish the euthanasia program known as “Aktion T4.” Photo by Marcel (March 2008). PD-Official Decree (German). Wikimedia Commons.

In the end, several of these decrees were used by the International Military Tribunal during the Nuremberg Trials as evidence to convict former senior Nazi officials of one or more of the four counts: conspiracy for the accomplishment of crimes against peace, waging wars of aggression, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. Many of Hitler’s decrees aimed at military combatants were used to convict the former Nazis leaders and their underlings of the third count⏤war crimes. Most of the convictions came with the death penalty. Read More Hitler’s Directives

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Captain Jack

During the weeks leading up to the liberation of Paris on 25 August 1944, local French résistants were at a distinct disadvantage: they lacked guns and ammunition. Another disadvantage they and their fellow Frenchmen faced was the increasing brutality of the occupiers and collaborators, both of whom knew their days of occupying Paris were numbered (known as la grande fuite des Fritzs or, the great flight of the Germans). The last military governor of Paris, General Dietrich von Choltitz (1894-1966) was appointed by Hitler on 7 August 1944 to defend the city at all costs or destroy it. Facing increasing resistance each day, von Choltitz gave the orders to his troops on 15 August to “repress by all means and if necessary, mercilessly the partisan insurrection.”

After the Allied invasion in Normandy on 6 June 1944, the Germans stepped up their surveillance and arrests of resistance members, actual or suspected. During the next two and a half months, murderous retaliation by the Wehrmacht, the Schutzstaffel (SS), Gestapo, and the Milice (French paramilitary collaborationist organization) grew with each passing day.

Today’s story is about a French traitor ⏤ collaborationist is probably a nicer term ⏤ and the role he played in the massacre of forty-two young résistants less than ten days before the liberation of Paris.

Monument to the executed résistants. Photo by Remi Jouan (March 2008). PD-GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or later. Wikimedia Commons.
Monument to the executed résistants. Photo by Remi Jouan (March 2008). PD-GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or later. Wikimedia Commons.

Read More Captain Jack