Witnesses for prosecution in transcripts05.html

DEMJANJUK TRIAL
(Jerusalem, Feb. 16, 1987 - Apr. 24, 1988)
SUMMARY of English-language TRANSCRIPTS

Matityahu Meisel; T005894 - T006176; 1987/05/11 - 1987/05/13; Vol. 8
[1987/05/11p, Mon.; T005894, Vol. 8; Meisel]
[Top] [1987/05/11p] [1987/05/12] [1987/05/13] [Bottom]

T005894 - Dr. Matityahu Meisel, historian at Tel Aviv University; B.A and Masters at Hebrew University, Jerusalem; Ph.D. at University of Rochester, NY; PDF at Harvard; Tel Aviv faculty since 1972.

T005903 - Meisel: "American documents we have found to be non-authentic, but Soviet documents we have never ..." found to be non-authentic. "We have not come across any forgeries."
[This implies that the confessions of Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bukharin, Radek, etc. in the Soviet Show Trials of the 1930's are authentic.]

T005904f - WWII archives at Freiburg in Breisgau, Koblenz, Bonn; Kew Botanical Gardens near London; U.S. Navy, Roosvelt's in Hyde Park, Truman's in Missouri; private archives of politicians and statesmen in Britain.

T005911 - tav/174 = Map of Central and Eastern Europe on eve of WWII in 1937. (Meisel)
T005921 - tav/175 = Map of Southern Ukraine and Crimean Peninsula in 1941.
T005922 - Conquest of Odesa took relatively long time from August to end of September 1941.

T005932 - Soviet army evacuated Kerch by mid-November 1941.
T005935 - Soviet counter-attack on Kerch on Dec. 28-29, 1941, and recaptured peninsula up to Fedosia in January 1942.

T005940f - On May 8, 1942, German 11th Army made a surprise attack and captured 120,000 Soviet prisoners in Kerch peninsula by May 16, 1942.

T005946 - tav/176 = War diary of 11th German Army from May 4-31, 1942.
T005949 - Prisoners transported to Rovno between 16-31 May 1942 (mid-June?)

T005952 - tav/177 = War diary of 11th German Army for June 1942.
- transfers of POWs continued throughout the whole of June.

T005955 - 11,000 additional POWs sent to forced labor camps on Reich territory.
T005959 - tav/178 = War diary of 11th German Army referring to arrival of new POWs.

T005960 - Battle of Stalingrad was mid-November 1942; elimination of German pocket was January - February 1943; Red Army crossed Polish border in June 1944.

[1987/05/12, Tue.; T005965, Vol. 8; Meisel]
[Top] [1987/05/11p] [1987/05/12] [1987/05/13] [Bottom]

T005966f - Andre Vlasov was a brilliant Red Army officer who became a POW in July 1942; kept in Vinnytsia, Ukraine until September 1942 with other Red Army officers; prepared to collaborate under certain conditions; "Soviet patriotism, wanting to retain the Soviet Union as an entity, undivided, without any partition. He was against Stalin ..."; Colonel Boyarsky.

T005969f - After public call to overthrow Stalin on September 10, 1942, he was transfered to Badendorf, Germany in custody of Propaganda Office of OKW until 1944. He wanted to set up army encompassing all ethnic groups starting with the vast number of POWs to overthrow Stalin.

T005971 - Although the Germans were initially interested, generals Keitel and Yodel, who were head of the OKW (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht) , insisted Vlasov's army be under German command. The OKW was subordinate directly to Hitler.

T005972 - "..., it wasn't until December 1944 that the first unit was set up which came under his [Vlasov's] direct command."

T005973 - Hitler decided that Vlasov's Soviet liberation army would serve for propaganda purposes only.

T005974f - Although opposed by Goebbels, Rosenberg, Goering and others, Himmler rejected the Vlasov idea and set up his own Waffen-SS units.
- There were 12 divisions in 1943 and 30 divisions by end of 1944.
- Himmler started with Norwegians and Danes, then French and Dutch, and by 1944 he was prepared to enlist Slavs. (Germans refered to them as Turkmen(?) = Ukrainians, Turkish, Caucasians, Belorusians, Latvians, Lithuanians, Estonians.)

T005976f - Himmler meeting with Vlasov, set for July 21, 1944, was postponed (because of attempt on Hitler's life on July 20, 1944) until Sept. 19, 1944, when he gave Vlasov permission to set up the Soviet Liberation Army. (ROA = Ruskaya Obdentlaya(?) Armia)

T005978 - The Germans tried to keep these Osttruppen off of German soil, but by 1944 there was no choice.

T005979f - Vlasov refused to wear German uniforms or insignia for himself and his troops. The practise of separating the different ethnic groups would cease.

T005981 - Public assembly to formulate ROA policy was held on Nov. 14, 1944, in Prague, since Prague was a symbol of pan-Slavic aspirations in the political and cultural sense.

T005982f - First ROA division was set up in Dec. 1944 - Jan. 1945; although Vlasov insisted that all ethnic groups be included, most ROA soldiers were Russian. The commander of the division was Bonyachenko (Vonyachenko?), a Ukrainian. In 1944(?), the division was stationed on the western front and fought against the Americans in France.

T005985 - The second division of the ROA (ROA 2) was established in January 1945 in Heuberg under the command of Zverev, but never got off the ground.

T005987f - ROA 1 was transfered to the Oder Front and fought valiantly against the First Byelorussian Front forces in April 1945. They withdrew to Prague by early May 1945. After Germans stopped fighting and before Red Army got to Prague, they were asked to leave. They went south to the Americans, who handed them over to the Russians.

T005991f - ROA 2 was established Jan. 23, 1945 in Heuberg under Zverev and Feodor Truchin. It was taken captive by the American 3rd Army and later handed over to the Red Army.

T005995 - Vlasov and his command were arrested, sent to Moscow, put on trial and executed [hanged?] in August 1946. In September 1955, there was a pardon for the rank and file of Vlasov's army.

T005998 - Number of Soviet DP's in Europe were about 5.5 million -- POW's, soldiers, etc.

T005999 - 5.1 to 5.3 million "who moved back to the Soviet Union of their own free will"
- 200 - 250,000 "who were returned under pressure against their will."
- after May 1946 "the American army did not return any Soviet citizens to the Soviet Union against their will."

T006000 - The birthplace of Demjanjuk, Dumakerenzi(?), is in the Berdichev district, south of Kasatin. (Between Samogorodok and Kasatin.)

T006000 - tav/179 = Map of Berdichev district in Ukraine.
T006002 - tav/180 = Map of Vinnytsia, Samogorodok areas of Ukraine in 1941.

T006005 - The 1930's were very tough and very difficult years in Ukraine - collectivization, hunger, millions died. The Soviets set up Machine Tractor Stations (MTS) to supply machinery, experts and operators to the kolhosps.

T006008f - O'Connor cross-examines Meisel.
- MTS stations were established in 1929 and existed until the 1950's.
- Winter of 1931/32 was harsh; starvation, collectivization, slaughtered farm animals.
- Peasants burned their crops. [???]
- Soviet Union exported wheat while people were starving.

T006014 - Meisel quotes famine deaths from 2 - 4 million, and there are even higher numbers by Canadian Ukrainian historians of 5 - 10 million.

T006016 - Meisel suggests famine deaths in China during 40's and 50's.

T006022 - Meisel: "The overall size, the dimensions of this famine, the Soviet authorities were not aware of, did not know, and certainly nothing of it was known outside of the borders of the Soviet Union."
[SIMPLY NOT TRUE!]
[One could say the same thing about the Jewish Holocaust during WWII.]

T006029 - Levin, Meisel and even O'Connor keep referring to the Ukrainian Famine of 1931/32, [rather than 1932/33].

T006030f - O'Connor uses the word Shoah. Blatman and Judge Tal object, but Levin says it is OK. O'Connor claims that the term is never used in the US and he specifically used it to differentiate it from the Holocaust.

T006035 - O'Connor points out that Vinnytsia is several hundred kilometers from Zaporizhia. Meisel testified that John Demjanjuk's birthplace, Dubomacharenzi is in the Vinnytsia Oblast, [whereas the Trawniki ID card lists the Zaporizhia Oblast].

T006037 - O'Connor asks about possibility of relative getting pension if son had defected or had gone over to the other side. Meisel cannot say.

T006038 - O'Connor asks about the "last bullet order" and Meisel claims there was no such order.

T006040 - O'Connor refers to Red Army conscripts having officer or NKVD unit [Commissars] shooting anyone who tried to retreat.

T006042 - Meisel refers to Alfred Rosenberg and others who wanted to form national armies of the enslaved peoples of the USSR. He claims that he tried to recruit them, but his success was very modest.
[Meisel fails to mention that Hitler overruled Rosenberg and expressly forbade the formation of any national armies. First of all, Hitler wanted lebensraum and not national states. Secondly, Hitler's confidant, Martin Bormann, who was presumably an agent of Stalin, always steered Hitler away from such ideas.]

T006043f - Meisel refers to deportation of Crimean Tatars after the war, which resulted in a "reduction in their numbers". O'Connor rakes him over the coals for using such dispassionate terminology, rather than death of men, women and children forcibly caused by the Central Committee of the USSR.

T006046f - O'Connor once again refers to pension [received by Demjanjuk's mother] and Meisel suggests that Soviet regime can't follow every individual.

T006047 - Meisel repeats that in "May 1946 the last such incident of forced repatriation to the Soviet Union by the Americans occured."
[It is my understanding that Soviet repatriation commissions headed by General Golikov were scouring the various DP camps well into 1949, attempting to blackmail people to return "na rodinu" by threatening harm to their families within the Soviet Union.]

T006048 - Meisel suggests that forcible repatriation was carried out because Americans were afraid Soviets would not release American and British POWs.

T006051 - "There was of course, a fear of Communism, but the Soviet Union was considered as a friend which had fought alongside the allies against Germany and it was treated as such."

T006052 - "even great Britain stopped this sort of thing [repatriation] in 1946."

T006053 - O'Connor: "Commissars were allowed to come at night and to remove forcibly Soviet citizens from these camps back to the motherland."
Meisel: Memoirs indicate "Soviet authorities ... entered [DP camps] by permission of the British and the Americans ... in order to take part in this process of forced repatriation."

T006054 - There was a general pardon for collaborators in 1955 except "In regard to people who had persecuted Soviet citizens or killed Soviet citizens, were not pardoned."
[Presumably because of this pardon, Danylo Shumuk was released on Aug. 20, 1956. However, many other UPA members, called Ukrainian bourgeois nationalists or banderivtsi, were not released.]

T006062 - Vlasov's army had 50,000 people; there were 200,000 Hiwis in the east (some volunteered, some pressed into service).

T006064f - Long discussion of operation Keelhaul. "This was an operation of forcible repatriation of Soviet citizens by the British military to Russia."

T006068 - Katyn Forest Massacre: Meisel states that it was the NKVD who perpetrated this massacre

T006069 - Tal: "14,500 Polish officers? And they went like lambs to the slaughter or did they resist?"
Meisel: "There is no testimony about a resistance. So much for Polsky honour." O'Connor: "With the officers who had their hands tied behind their back and had a bullet placed in the back of the head. It is very difficult to resist, ..."

T006070 - John Demjanjuk instructed O'Connor to ask Meisel if he was aware of NKVD probing for buried grain with long metal rods. Meisel concurs.

T006074 - O'Connor maintains that ROA 1 and ROA 2 were called the 600th and 650th Panzer Grenadier Divisions; whereas Meisel insists they were called Infantry Divisions. Was it called ROA or KONR?

T006075 - Himmler "agreed to have Vlasov set up these units without German uniforms", but, in fact, the ROA used German uniforms with the insignia removed.

T006078 - Vlasov's plans were known as early as [September] 1942 and the Germans promised 5 divisions, but it was all propaganda until December 1944, when 2 divisions started being set up.

T006079 - Osttruppen from Crimea, Byelorussia, Latvia, Lithuania were second or third rate units, lower level, badly equipped, ill trained, no weapons, menial tasks, fight partisans, unreliable.

T006081 - "... there was a division of opinion amongst the Ukrainians as to whether they should actively participate in Vlasov's army." Ukrainians wanted to set up their own units.

T006082 - Blatman announces that prosecution will introduce a special witness to testify on the Galicia Division.

T006083 - Ukrainians "wanted to set up an independent Ukrainian state divorced from the Soviet Union. Vlasov was against this ..."

T006094 - Levin: Rogatory in Germany set for May 19, 1987, so Meisel will be last witness until June 22, 1987 (or June 9, 1987, if Horn does not testify).

[1987/05/13, Wed.; T006096, Vol. 8; Meisel]
[Top] [1987/05/11p] [1987/05/12] [1987/05/13] [Bottom]

T006099f - 44th and 51st Soviet armies (250,000 men) involved in battle of Kerch, [of which about 120,000 were captured]. Soviet POWs were treated far more cruelly than Western Europeans.

T006109 - About 200,000 Osttruppen were involved in German auxiliary forces. Perhaps 1-2 million people participated [collaborated], including local village heads. The Germans simply couldn't get enough volunteers. They went to POW camps where the prisoners were in a terrible physical state. There are many recorded cases where Osttruppen went over to the Soviet side, joining the partisans.

T006113 - Meisel: "..., the German approach right from the beginning was that all of those people were in fact supposed to die or to remain as slaves and in a servile condition which would serve the German machinery."

T006114 - Levin asks Meisel if he has any information about conscription of POWs to Trawniki. Meisel says no.

T006116f - O'Connor discusses the logistics of moving 200,000 people from Kerch to Rovno. Meisel says Germans did it within 3 weeks via trains. He agrees that the Germans used the POWs as labor as required before shipping them off.

T006127 - The Germans used POWs to restore railway lines. POWs were foot marched to staging areas, where railway lines were operational.

T006133 - Most POWs were transported within 3 weeks, but a small group remained on the Crimean Peninsula to perform odd jobs for the Germans.

T006135f - O'Connor discusses Ostarbeiter. After 1942 they were sent to the German Reich as forced labor. There were POWs who subsequently became Ostarbeiter. "... the POWs were treated as slave laborers, as beasts of burden, not as human beings ..."

T006142 - Referring to ROA 1, Meisel explains that although Vlasov wanted to make this a motorized Panzer Division, this was not done simply because the Germans lacked the motorized vehicles. So it remained an Infantry Division.

T006146f - Bonyachenko (Vonyachenko?) of ROA 1 had a good relationship with the original Prague Committee, but when this committee was replaced with a pro-Soviet one, he was given the option to either surrender to the Red Army or go south to surrender to the Americans. Naively, he did surrender to the Americans, but was betrayed and the whole division was turned over to the Russians.

T006150 - Blatman re-directs Meisel about Ukrainian famine.
T006153 - Blatman asks if it is possible that Dubomacharivci was allotted to the Zaporizhia oblast after 1941.
[On tav/149, it says Duboimachariwzi/Saporosche.]
Meisel: points out Kasatin, Samogorodok, Berdichev, Vinnytsia on map and Zaporizhia is hundreds of kilometers east.

T006159 - Katyn Forest Massacre: Camp set up for Polish officers taken prisoner by Red Army in September 1939; hundreds of thousands of Polish soldiers were sent to Siberia. Meisel suggests that the Katyn Forest Massacre occured in the summer of 1941 during hasty retreat.
[I think that it is now accepted that the massacre occured in April 1940.]

T006162 - More than 200,000 of the Poles sent to Siberia were allowed to join "General Anders Polish Army which linked up in the Middle East with the British forces ..." There were also 2 Polish divisions(?) as part of the overall Red Armies.
[The starving Poles, who had been sent to Siberia from Western Ukraine in 1939-40, refused to fight for Stalin and insisted on fighting with the Western Allies. Stalin allowed them (as well as Ukrainians and Jews, who latched on) to be evacuated via Iran to Palestine. There, the Jews became AWOL with no questions asked. The others joined Anders Polish Army, were allowed to recuperate, were trained and fought under British overall command.]

T006165 - "But Vlasov himself and his officers excluded [they were hanged], the soldiers were sentenced to at least ten years of penal camp detention."

T006167 - tav/181 = 1955-09-17 USSR amnesty for Vlasov soldiers.
[Danylo Shumuk was released Aug. 20, 1956.]

T006172 - Blatman points out that 250,000 Soviet soldiers participated in the Kerch battle but only 120-125,000 were taken captive. What happened to the rest of them? Soviet losses were 40-50,000 killed or wounded.

T006176 = Levin: Rogatories in Germany set for May 19, 1987, Otto Horn in Berlin on June 9, 1987. Sessions resume of June 22, 1987 (or June 9, 1987, if Otto Horn rogatory is cancelled).

**** END of Meisel testimony in trial and in Vol. 8 ****

Shmuel Spektor; T006177 - 6291; 1987/06/22, Mon; Vol. 10
[Top] [Bottom]

T006177 - John Demjanjuk was injured on the way to court. Trial continues in his absence.

T006177 - tav/182 = US Dept. of Justice affidavit (Kellog, 1977-08-25)
T006178 - tav/183 = Demjanjuk answer to charges in tav/182(1977-10-25)
T006178f - O'Connor protests Shaked's use of the term indictment for the US civil proceedings and implies that he isn't aware of agreements made between Shaked and Sheftel.

T006181 - tav/184 = Summons sent to Demjanjuk in US civil case 77/923

T006184 - Dr. Shmuel Spektor, MA from Jerusalem University, Ph.D. from Hebrew University in Jerusalem; working at Yad Vashem since 1957; published in Hebrew, "The Holocaust of the Jews in Volyn"; "annihilation of Jews and non-Jews in gas vans in the territory of the Soviet Union"; articles on Crimean and Karaic Jews; Jewish underground and resistance movements; Jews in Allied armed forces; code 1005 re opening of mass graves and incineration of corpses; reports of einsatzgruppen; attitude of Ukrainian communities in the West.

T006190f - National Archives in Washington, material returned during 1960s to Army Archives in Freiburg, Germany, Ludwigsburg, 6 times in Polish archives. T006195 - After June 22, 1941 invasion, Galicia was annexed to General Gouvernment under Governor Hans Frank, whereas Volyn and other conquered parts were declared Reichscommissiarat Ukraine under Commissar Erich Koch stationed in Rovno.

T006198 - Blatman quotes from page 1096 from 1981-03-04 testimony in Cleveland, in which Demjanjuk claims to have been sent to Graz to join the National Ukrainian Army.

T006200 - Spektor: The 14th Waffen SS Division was renamed the First Ukrainian Division of the Ukrainian National Army on March 12, 1945.

T006202f - History of Galicia (Halychyna) Division: After the German defeat in Stalingrad in Feb. 1943, Dr. Otto Vechtor, Governor of the District of Galicia stationed in Cracow, Poland, wrote to Himmler suggesting the creation of a Ukrainian Division to fight the Bolsheviks. Professor Vladimir Kubiovich, head of Ukrainski Centralni Komitet in Cracow, and Dr. Kostponkivsky in Lviv appealed to Governor Hans Frank.

After Himmler agreed to the formation of the 14th Waffen-SS Division, Vechtor and Frank issued a proclamation on April 28, 1943, appealing to the Ukrainian community of Galicia to volunteer for this division. This was enthusiastically supported by the Ukrainian leadership, who set up military committees including former officers from the Austro-Hungarian, Polish and Petlura armies to encourage the youth of Galicia to volunteer. By October 1943, about 80,000 had volunteered. The military committees chose 19,000 to be sent to a [Waffen] SS training camp at Heidelager, Poland(?), between Lviv and Pskov.

From some of the surplus, 5 regiments of police were mobilized, which were posted to southern France, but by February 1944 most of them were called back to be added to the Division.

[Spektor does not mention that even Metropolitan Andrij Sheptytsky strongly supported the formation of a Ukrainian National Army. Also, the late Ivan Shumuk of Vernon, BC, was involved in transporting these "volunteers" by truck. He stated that these youths were not very happy at all and that the term "conscript" rather than "volunteer" might be a better description.]

T006205 - In February, 1944, the training in Heidelager and Neuhammer was interrupted to send one infantry regiment and one artillery regiment to help the Germans carry out a campaign against two Soviet partisan armies of Kovpak and cavalry of Neunov, which had infiltrated the district of Lublin.
[In his book, "Life Sentence", Danylo Shumuk describes the UPA fight against these Red partisans. One wonderts if it was these Red partisans that Yitzhak Arad (alias Rudnicki), Iliyahu Rosenberg, Chiel Rajchman, etc. joined.]

T006207 - tav/174b = Route of Ukrainian Division
T006208 - In Feb. 1944 the training center set up in Heidelager starting in July(?) 1943 was moved to Neuhammer, Upper Silesia.

T006209 - On June 28, 1944, the Division was sent from Stanislaviv to the front at Brody. In early July, the Red Army encircled the German forces and after heavy fighting the German units including the Ukrainian Division were liquidated. Out of 12,000 soldiers only 4,000 or fewer managed to break out and flee west. A great many of them were wounded and eventually they were returned to Neuhammer.

T006210f - On Hitler's orders on August 7, 1944, the Division was re-organized to include Ukrainians from Schutzmanshaften, POWs, from Volyn and Eastern Ukraine. In Nov. 1944, the Division was sent to Slovakia to help quell an uprising. During its operations, 4 of 5 Jewish paratroopers from Palestine were killed (Haviva Reich, Raphael Reis, Yisachar Ben Yaakov and Haim Hermesh, who survived).

T006211 - On Jan. 20, 1945, the Division was ordered to move to Steiermark, south of Graz, Austria, from where they were deployed to Yugoslavia to fight Tito's partisans in mid-February 1945.

T006212 - After Feb. 1945, the Division was joined by other units, refugees and guards at concentration camps. Auschwitz was liberated on Jan. 27, 1945, and Grosrosen on Feb. 15, 1945 and the guards therefrom "came to the training units of this Ukrainian Division".

T006215 - Story of Hitler ordering the Ukrainian Division to give up its arms to some newly created German units.

T006217 - "-- nowhere, in any of the writings and records available on this Division, do they mention that anyone was tatooed - had their blood type tattooed."

T006219 - Pavlo Shandruk was an officer in the Tsar's army in WWI, transfered to National Ukrainian Army of Petlura, withdrew to Poland [where Petlura's army helped defeat the Bolshevik army] and where he was incarcerated in Polish POW camp [Berezka Kartushka?], joined the Polish army, fought against Germans in Sept. 1939, injured, retired and ran movie theatre in Skerndovidse, Poland.

T006220f - In 2nd half of 1944, the Germans started changing their approach to the [Slavic] peoples. Vlasov was allowed to create his ROA and the OUN leaders, Melnyk and Bandera, were freed from concentration camps. Skorokotsky(?) and Kubiovich suggested Shandruk as a compromise commander for the Ukrainian Division.

T006221f - The Germans wanted the Ukrainians to join Vlasov. Alfred Rosenberg was "especially insistent in this regard" and was consistently against the Division. Despite negotiations with the Germans and Vlasov, the "Ukrainians were adamant in their refusal". "They refused to join a joint council along side Vlasov and the Russians in general, and eventually their demands were met."

T006222 - The Ukrainian leaders were consistently striving for independence. Bandera's people declared an independent Ukrainian state on June 30, 1941 in Lviv, but the SS destroyed the OUN and arrested its leaders and members. [The Germans were adamantly opposed to Ukrainian independence until the war was irretrievably lost.]

T006223 - Official recognition of the First Division of the Ukrainian National Army was issued by Alfred Rosenberg on March 17, 1945. Shandruk was the head and Kubiovich and Symonenko (engineer from Kharkiv) were deputies.

T006225f - Since mid-January 1945, a "Second Ukrainian Divisio of the Ukrainian National Army" was being formed at Niemick (80 km SW of Berlin) consisting of about 2000 soldiers of miscellaneous background. Colonel Petroyachenko was appointed head on Feb. 28, 1945.

T006227 - In early April 1945, the Ukrainian Division was recalled from Yugoslavia and filled the gap between the Second and Sixth German SS armies against the Red Army several kilometers east of Graz, Austria.
- On April 28, 1945, the soldiers of the Ukrainian Division, according to wording prepared by Shandruk, "swore allegiance to the Ukrainian people and the Ukrainian nation and the fight against Bolshevism". Himmler's version is somewhat different since it includes loyalty to Hitler as well.

T006228 - After Hitler committed suicide on April 29, 1945, Shandruk obtained assurances from a Dr. ???, that in case of a German capitulation, the Ukrainian division would be allowed to withdraw west to surrender to the Western Allies.

T006231 - With help from General Fritz Freitag, the Division withdrew on May 9, 1945, toward the British forces in Klagenfurt.

T006232 - tav/174g = Map of May 9, 1945 retreat of First Ukrainian Division

T006233 - The UNA surrendered to the British on May 10, 1945 in Jamsweg(?), later 8,000 were moved to Spittal, and still later they were moved to a POW camp in Rimini, Italy.
- General Shandruk and 1200 soldiers surrendered to the Americans at Bischofshofen and continued on to POW camps in Bavaria.

T006234 - The Second Division at Niemick could not be properly trained, but was sent to the Soviet front in Bohemia in late April. Despite repeated requests by Ukrainian commander not to be employed in front line fighting, they were thrown in, encircled by the Soviets and only 40% managed to flee westward. They joined the First Division in American POW camps.

T006235 - The two Ukrainian Divisions had no contact with Vlasov's army.
T006237f - The POWs in Rimini were sent to Britain in May 1947 until October 1947. In 1948, they were released and allowed to emigrate to Canada, US, Argentina, Uruguay, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa.

T006238 - The Americans (after forced repatriation was stopped at end of 1946) allowed the Ukrainian POWs to become DPs and to emigrate.

T006240 - Vlasov and his men were handed over to the Soviet army by the British. Some of them in the POW camps, who were not repatriated, became DPs. UNRA refused to deal with them, because they viewed them as enemy soldiers, but the IRO (which replaced UNRA) classified them as DPs.
[There are persistent indications that UNRA was very heavily infested with Communists and Soviet agents.]

T006240 - "A number of Soviet delegations came to the POW camps in Rimini and also in the American occupied zone and tried to prevail upon these soldiers to return to the Soviet Union." Very few did.
[These were the infamous repatriation commissions of General Golikov.]

T006241f - Only 50-70% of the soldiers of the Ukrainian Division were from Galicia; the rest should have been forcibly repatriated according to the terms of the Yalta agreement. These however claimed that they were from Western Ukraine and the screening was not very thorough.

T006243 - O'Connor cross-examines Spektor.

T006245 - Spektor was born in Kostopol, Volyn, Poland. Arrived in Israel [Palestine?] in January 1946. He was in the Soviet Union during the war working in different places and all sorts of jobs. Power station building in Pernow, Urals; factory producing aircraft engines in Kuybishev; house painter, fitter.
[Why does not O'Connor question Spektor very closely on these things?]

T006249 - nun/44 = main points of Spektor testimony on Ukrainian Division
T006251 - Spektor agrees that [in addition to Ukrainians] many ethnic groups (Tatars, Armenians, Byelorussians, Caucasians, Turkistans, Uzbeks, Wutagits, Georgians) "actually formed units that supported the 3rd Reich".

T006252 - O'Connor: Hitler opposed Ukrainian independence; Hitler viewed Slavs as untermenschen.
- Spektor claims the "Slavs were also among the Aryans". [???]

T006253 - The 13th Division of the Waffen SS was composed of Bosnians and Herzegovinians.

T006254 - Shortly after June 1941, the German Reich started setting up Ostbattalions of Hilfswilliger. "For the Wehrmacht had demanded and insisted on local recruits, former civilians or POWs, for purposes of policing and guard duties against Soviet partisans."
- Spektor agrees that Hitlered ordered that the eastern people not be armed, but states that this policy was not maintained with respect to light arms.

T006256 - Ost-battalions of Russians fighting against partisans, famous brigade of Kaminsky; Azerbaijan, Georgian, Armenian legions were sent to the Caucasian front in 1942.

T006257 - The Ukrainian division of Suma [Sumy?] is not the same as the Cossacks corps.
- Spektor: Cossacks from the Kuban and Don can be considered Ukrainian

T006258 - Volksdeutsch lived in the Autonomous German Republic within the RSFR, but were deported inland from the capital city of Engels in August 1941. All the ethnic groups wanted to set up their own independent states.

T006260 - First of the six visits to Polish archives was in 1979. Long discussion of politics, authenticity, etc. follows. Spektor never got into the Soviet archives, never saw any dienstausweis.

T06266 - Spektor agrees that the Soviet Union did collaborate with Hitler as a result of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact signed Aug. 23(?), 1939.

T006270 - Shandruk's memoirs, "Arms of Valor", published in US in 19??.
- Spektor's testimony concerning concentration or death camp guards joining the Ukrainian units is based on book of Kost Pankivsky, "From the Committee to the National Center" (in Ukrainian).

T006276f - Blatman re-direct asks Spektor about "Ostlegion UVV" - Ukrainske Visvolne Visko had a training camp in Piotrikow; 4000 people; sent to France, Atlantic coast, Channel, guard duty; as Ost-battalions of the Germans, they had no military identity of their own.

T006278 - Discussion of racial theories. Jews and Gypsies below Slavs. In winter 1941, German functionairies came to Lviv to recruit several thousand blue-eyed Hutsul Ukrainians (from the Carpathian mountains) as descendants of the Goths.

T006280 - Sumy Ost-battalion composed of Ukrainian POWs from around Kharkiv, who were deployed as part of Von Paulus' army, but were wiped out in Stalingrad.

T006282 - Spektor refers to Deschenes Commission report on Galicia Division, which concludes that there was no evidence to connect them to the SS.

T006291 - Levin: There is a request from defense of a rogatory of Rudolph Reis in Germany.

**** END of Spektor testimony in trial and at end of Vol. 10 ****

TAV/NUN 1 SUBMISSIONS; T006292 - 6314; 1987/06/23; Vol. 6
[Top] [Bottom]

T006292 - Defense and prosecution agree to the submission of certain documents without contesting them in court.

T006292 - tav/185 = Affidavit prepared by Tom Fusi [Posey, Fuzzi], 1987-02-13, New York, describing 1980-03-12 report of photo ID session with Chiel Rajchman [Reichman] on 1980-03-10(?)

T006292 - tav/185a = Mem 3 = photo set shown Rajchman, 1980-03-10(?), in which photo 16 = Demjanjuk from 1951.
- This obviates the need of presenting Tom Fusi as a witness.

T006293 - nun/45 = 1986-05-29 US deposition of Bernard Dougherty describing Otto Horn photo ID session on 1979-11-14. [forgery?]

T006293 - tav/186 = 1986-12-04 US deposition of Bernard Dougherty describing Otto Horn photo ID session on 1979-11-14. [forgery?]
[Was not one of these prepared and signed in Israel? Perhaps affidavit would be better terminology than deposition.]

T006294 - tav/187 = 1986-10-20 US deposition of George Garand describing Otto Horn photo ID session on 1979-11-14. [forgery?]

T006294 - tav/188 = first photo set shown Otto Horn, Berlin, 1979-11-14 (2C is 1951 visa photo)

T006295 - tav/189 = second photo set shown Otto Horn, Berlin, 1979-11-14 (3E is Trawniki ID card photo)

T006297 - O'Connor: "And notably the deposition taken from Mr. Horn, refuting his testimony that took place in 1983 in the US counsellor office in Berlin."
[???]

T006299 - tav/190 = Demjanjuk interrogation (Notary Ziplona(?), 1978-04-20). Submitted July 9, 1986 to Israeli prosecution; Chipilloni(?) was OSI representative.

T006301 - tav/191 = Demjanjuk questionnaire for Battisti, 1979-12-03
T006302 - tav/192 = Demjanjuk questionnaire in US, 1980-01-14
T006303 - tav/193 = Demjanjuk statement re signature, 1980-02-20
(Defense: John Martin, Spiros Gonakis [Kunakis]; Notary: Cosilu)

T006303 - tav/194 = Demjanjuk statement, 1980-04-14 (rectifying tav/192)
T006304 - tav/195 = Demjanjuk trial excerpt in US, 1981-03-04
(Defense: Martin, Gonakis; OSI: Horowitz, ???)

T006305 - tav/196a = Demjanjuk 1983-06-10 application for suspension of deportation.
T006305 - tav/196b = Demjanjuk 1983-06-10 application for political asylum.
T006306 - tav/197 = Demjanjuk 1984-01-16 testimony before Judge Angelini
(Deportation proceedings; Defense: O'Connor, Gill; OSI: Einhorn, ???)
- 200 pages from 1984-01-17 not submitted

T006307 - tav/198 = Demjanjuk 1984-02-07 testimony in US re Graz
T006308 - tav/199 = Demjanjuk interview by L. Currie, 1950-10-27 re transportation of Soviet prisoners by Germans, June 1942
- L. Currie, signatory of this report, will not have to be called as a witness.
[Who was/is L. Currie? Why would he be interviewing Demjanjuk in the DP camps? Was he an UNRA or IRO employee?]

T006308 - tav/200 = Demjanjuk medical record, 1951-12-21
T006309 - tav/201 = Demjanjuk interrogation (Israel, 1986-09-17)
T006310 - nun/46 = Goldfarb (1961-03-13) re death of Ivan of Treblinka
T006311 - nun/47 = Hellman (1961-06-07) re death of Ivan of Treblinka
T006311 - tav/202 = Goldfarb (Arad, 1979-05-??) re death of Ivan of Treblinka
- Sheftel: "There is a further statement of Avraham Goldfarb from Bar Ilan University." (undated)

T006312 - nun/48 = Lindwasser re Fedorenko (Radiwker, 1976-10-03)
T006313 - nun/49 = Czarny re Fedorenko (Radiwker, 1976-09-21)
T006314 - further documents and rogatories will be submitted at a later date.

**** END of TAV/NUN Submissions in Vol. 6 ****

Shmuel Krakowski; T006315 - 6527; 1987/06/23 - 24; Vol. 6
[1987/06/23, Tue.; T006315, Vol. 6; Krakowski]
[Top] [1987/06/23] [1987/06/24] [Bottom]

T006315 - Sheftel points out that the Krakowski material was submitted to the defense only 2 weeks ago.
[Although it was presumably available at the time of indictment.]

T006316 - Krakowski is now Director of Yad Vashem archives in Jerusalem.
- matriculated in 1948 [1947], drafted into Polish Army, attended Academy of Polish Staff, graduated in 1957 with dissertation on Red Army, Warsaw University M.A. thesis "Military Aspects of the Warsaw Ghetto Rebellion", Ph.D. thesis "Jewish Armed Resistance in Poland", did not complete it in Poland. [Came to Israel in September 1968. Yad Vashem, November 1968.] Hebrew University in Jerusalem in 1969 and completed Ph.D. in 1975.

T006317 - English version, "The War of the Doomed", published in 1984.
- In Poland, worked on the editorial board of monthly Polish Air Force.

T006318f - "In the late 50s, I began delving deeper into Jewish themes such as the participation of Jews in partisan fighting, resistance organizations and Jewish participation in other forms of combat." Director of the Archives in the Jewish Historical Society in Warsaw. Started work at Yad Vashem in November 1968, Director of Archives since 1979, 1981-85 lecturer at Tel Aviv University. Collaborated with Gutmann, Arad, Spektor, etc. on many books.

T006322 - During WWII, Germans captured 5,750,000 POWs from Red Army.
T006323 - 3.3M by Dec. 31, 1941; 1.5M in 1942; 0.5M in 1943; 0.15M in 1944; and 0.04M in 1945.

T006324 - Nazi policy to Soviet POWs: (1) physically annihilate any elements considered hostile towards Nazi Germany, (2) recruit auxilliary forces for Nazi army and police from people willing to collaborate.

T006325 - 1941-03-30, Hitler briefing to 250 generals [???] re forthcoming battle against Russian state in which intelligentsia would be annihilated.
- 1941-06-06, famous Kommisars Order concerning annihilation of political leaders and Kommisars in Red Army.
- 1941-07-17, a more detailed order to annihilate "political officers, Kommisars, other functionaries and rank holders, office holders in the Communist Party, people who had certain administrative positions among the Soviets, and all of the Jews."

T006325 - 1941-07-24, another order "concerning recruitment preferences for the auxiliary forces and the Nazi police" ... "Volksdeutsche, Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians."
- Because of tremendous number of POWs in 1941, reality was different from policy.

T006327 - Of 5.75M POWs; 3.5-4M died in total; at least 2M of them died after 1941.

T006328 - POWs fenced in under open skies, no food, little water. In Nov. 1941, near Chelm, Ukraine(?), thousands of people froze to death.
[Danylo Shumuk in "Life Sentence" describes these conditions.]

T006330 - As war progressed the Germans became aware of the Asiatics (Turkomen, Uzbeks, Cossacks, Azerbaijans, Georgians, Armenians, etc.) for their Ostlegions.

T006337 - To refute Demjanjuk's alleged contention that there was a Jewish kapo in Chelm, Krakowski maintains that this "special Nazi term ... referred to concentration camps and extermination camps" and did not exist in POW camps. In ghettos, the concept was unknown.
[It is my understanding, that the term kapo originated in the Soviet Gulags long before WWII.]

T006338 - Germans managed to recruit about 800,000 collaborators from the POWs, of which 60-70% were Ukrainians, into their auxilliary forces. "--we don't know the exact numbers because statistics just don't exist on this point."
[Then how can Krakowski make the above statement?]

T006342 - "... Martin Borman, who was dead set against [the July 24, 1941 order concerning recruitment of Ukrainians and Balts] because he said that anybody bearing arms should be left to the Germans only."
[Another indication that Martin Bormann was Stalin's agent.]

T006343 - Rosenberg said, "out of 3 million POWs all that's left, we have 100,000. And we have really lost such a vast reservoir of manpower."

T006345 - "Now, Bormann was the man who objected at first to the mobilization and recruiting of POWs into the auxilliary forces of the German police because he claimed that the honor of bearing arms was to be left to the Germans. This conception was opposed by the German army." Later on "it was agreed that POWs should be transferred to the Third Reich to be put to work ..."

T006346f - Krakowski presents a very Ukrainophobic personal view of the POW situation. He provides no references at all.

T006349f - Beginning in the summer of 1942, Chelm was a transit camp of a very short stay of POWs, known as Stalag 319, until the spring of 1943. On Sept. 8, 1943, Italy surrendered so Italian army units in Greece were disarmed and 13,000 were sent to the Chelm camp.

T006351f - In Jan.-Feb. 1944, there was another influx of 20,000 Red Army captives, as a result of the Kyiv offensive Nov. 6, 1943. The Chelm camp was evacuated in late April 1944 and liberated by the Polish army on July 22, 1944.

T006355 - The guards at Chelm were Germans from the region of Casse.
T006358 - POWs were to be kept at Chelm only 4-7 days, but in practice they spent a few weeks.

T006361 - tav/203 = German reports 1944-01-01 re POWs in Chelm.
- 22,615 Soviet POWs in January 1941, 24,931 in February and only 464 in April, since camp had been transferred to Skirnevitze [250 km west]

T006367 - tav/204 = secret orders from Berlin, 1941-07-17 concerning Red Army POWs [See T006325]

T006370f - O'Connor cross-examines Krakowski.
- Krakowski was born March 23, 1926; he was in the ghetto of Lodz and then a series of concentration camps - Auschwitz, Chehovitze sub-camp; Buchenwald and Ransdorf sub-camp; at the time of death marches got away in April [1945], caught and imprisoned in Grossenwald, transferred to Theriesenstadt and liberated there in May 1945. Speaks English. Returned to Poland immediately; joined army, matriculation in 1947. Held rank of Captain in 1954. Worked on publications within the Intelligence Branch of the entire Polsh army.

T006373f - Krakowski adamantly maintains that his work in Intelligence had no political aspects. He was a member of the United Polish Party - not Communist he maintains, but closely aligned with policies of Moscow.

T006378 - In 1942, Krakowski joined underground organization, the views of which were Communist. "... and that was undoubtedly why I was admitted into the military academy, undoubtedly."

**** REPEATED PAGES T006295 - T006378 in Vol. 6 ****

T006379f - Krakowski insists that he maintained complete objectivity in his publications.

T006381 - "I took into account that all that went into print had to pass censorship."

T006383 - Krakowski "noted a higher level of integrity in terms of what you perceived coming out research-wise from the Polish People's Republic as opposed to Soviet source material ..."

T006384 - "In my research, I do focus primarily on the fate of Jews", but places it in an overall context.

T006386 - Worked in the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw.
[Did he know Leopold Trepper, head of the Red Orchrestra spy ring during WWII, either in Poland or Israel?]

T006388 - "The initial instructions were to do away with the intelligentsia ... decimation, virtually indiscriminate killing. Then there was a change in policy" so that even a politruk was not necessarily killed. Only the policy towards Jews remained invariant.
[One wonders if the infiltration of the German heirarchy by Communist subversives is related to this "softening" of the German attitude to the Communists.]

T006394f - Krakowski agrees with Levin's question that it could take up to one month after capture before the POWs were delivered to a camp where processing could take place. The Germans took far more POWs than they expected. In 1941, the Germans had no intention of transferring POWs to work in the Reich. The situation was entirely different in 1942 and after.

T006396 - Documents said that "200,000 people had been taken prisoner" in Kerch in May 1942

T006397 - Series of camps around Kyiv, Ukraine - Proskuriv, Vinnytsia, Berdichev, Rovno.

T006496 - Krakowski refers to German document: "In April 1942, [if] I remember rightly, where it said that in all POW camps in Nazi Germany there were all told 68,000 Jews of whom 61,000 in the Ostland region."

T006407 - Levin: "No, no, no. That's good enough. It's not all that important." O'Connor picks up on 68,000 but Levin insists it was mistranslation of 68.
[We note how quickly Krakowski recovers from his faux pas and responds to Levin's prompt.]

T006414 - Bork Forest Massacre, south of Chelm in 1941: 30,000 (90,000?) Soviet POWs including Jews and Italians(?)
- "... the Germans established a special SS unit, sondercommando 1005 whose role it was to do away with any vestiges of this massacre."
- took out the corpses and incinerated them.

T006415 - "In these instances they took out of a POW camp Jews who had served in the Polish army in Lublin on Liepovoss Street."
- "Three survived and testified in court in Heilbron(?) in Germany concerning that massacre."

T006430 - John Demjanjuk asks O'Connor to ask Krakowski if he has any info on a forced march from Kerch to Perecope and the number of deaths during this long march. Krakowski never heard of it.

T006433 - References to gas vans, psychological difficulties, etc.
[Just talk, no data, no references.]

[1987/06/24, Wed.; T006447, Vol. 6; Krakowski]
[Top] [1987/06/23] [1987/06/24] [Bottom]

T006448 - Soviet division = 10,500 +/- 500 men, which are smaller than German divisions, which, in turn, are smaller than American divisions.
- Soviet statistics state 167,000 casualties (killed or POW) in Kerch
- German statistics = 200,000 POWs (120,000 Krym, 80,000 Kharkiv)

T006460 - "... Nazi document of May 1st, 1944 which says that on that date there were 5,100,000 POWs."
[??? All this just doesn't make sense! Earlier he had said that of the 3.3 million POWs from 1941, only 100,000 survived.]

T006463 - "I should point out that the archives of the Red Cross have not yet been opened ... to researchers ..."
[This is interesting! Why not?]

T006472 - "The extermination camp Belzec, before it became an extermination camp, it was a Jewish arbeitslager."

T006481 - "... for some reason the Soviets decided to organize two such [ethnic based] divisions -- the Lithuanian and the Latvian. It appears that the Lithuanian division consisted mostly of Lithuanian Jews and the language spoken there was Yiddish."

T006488 - In Stalag 319, Chelm, there were also French and Belgian(few dozens or few hundreds), British (1000), Italians (13,000 for short time).
[If Chelm was a transit camp, what were they doing there?]

T006499 - "I do not see the operation and collaboration with the Nazis during the Second World War by any element at all as being one, aspiring to freedom, to liberation."
[He expects the peoples of the Soviet Union to support the Bolshevik Communists?]

T006506 - Krakowski objects to O'Connor's use of "legitimate expectations" for independence. O'Connor: "Their prime goal was their own independence. And that's the legitimacy and not the collaboration, Sir."

T006516 - In Chelm or Stalag 319: We know that about 10% of the total number of POWs in transit camps --- are listed as being workers ..." ... "Still it can be assumed perhaps that people who had certain jobs were allowed to stay there longer."

T006517 - O'Connor: June 1, 1942, in Chelm, statistics for the General Gouvernment, "we see that it's over 50% that are arbeiters. We have a total of 4227 and we have 2696 as the arbeiters."

T006522 - Tal: "Now, when it comes to cooperation in annihilation of the Jews, were there not additional reasons why the Germans expected the Ukrainians to cooperate?"
"For example, the tradition, the long-lived tradition of hatred and hostility vis a vis the Jewish population, ever since the times of Chmelnitsky in the 17th century, wasn't that one of the factors involved?"
[Lily Zuzak: Tal shows he has been properly brainwashed.]

T006524 - "Well, when the Nachtigal battalion and the second battalion [Roland], whose name escapes me at the moment, entered Lviv, they had an active part in the pogrom. It was in the days of Petlura." 1941
[Krakowsky probably meant Bandera. Note that he doesn't refer to the thousands of Ukrainians in prisons murdered by the NKVD as the final act of hatred as they evacuated east ahead of the German onslaught.]

T006526 - Defense application for rogatory for Rudolph Reiss in Germany granted.

**** END of Krakowsky testimony and end of Vol. 6 ****