Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski, an SS-Obergruppenführer and close confidant of Heinrich Himmler (1900–1945), bore significant responsibility for National Socialist mass crimes in German-occupied Eastern Europe. As Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF) for ‘Russland-Mitte’ [Central Russia], he commanded from June 1941 all Schutzstaffel (SS) and police units deployed in the rear area of Army Group Centre. In this capacity, he organised and oversaw the systematic murder of Soviet Jews and Roma, as well as the repression of real and alleged political opponents.1Unless otherwise stated, this article is based on Kreutz, Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski. As the war progressed, he gained increasing influence over the so-called anti-bandit operations, which often amounted to mass murder of unarmed people.
Background and Rise within the Nazi Movement
Erich von dem Bach-Zelewski was born on 1 March 1899 as Erich Julius Eberhard von Zelewsky in Lauenburg (Pomerania) and was raised from 1911 onwards by a family of aristocratic friends because of his parents’ precarious financial situation. In November 1914, he joined the Prussian Army as a volunteer.
Bach-Zelewski’s political career began in February 1930, when he joined first the NSDAP and later the SS. He quickly attracted the attention of his superior Kurt Daluege (1897–1946), as well as that of Heinrich Himmler. In the months following Adolf Hitler’s (1889–1945) appointment as Chancellor, he organised the enforcement of Nazi rule at the local level in eastern Brandenburg, notably through orchestrated and highly publicised murders of political opponents. Several promotions followed, culminating in his appointment as Oberabschnittsführer [SS Regional Commander], initially for East Prussia and, from 1936, for Silesia.
Manager of Violence in the War of Annihilation
Following the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, Bach-Zelewski reached the height of his power with his appointment as HSSPF for ‘Russland-Mitte’. In this capacity, he organised the policy of mass murder in the rear of the central sector of the Eastern Front and coordinated the police, SS and Waffen-SS units deployed in the region. His role can best be described as that of a ‘transmission belt’: through inspection tours and direct instructions within his own area of command, he ensured that radicalisation measures were transmitted from one unit to another and from one region to the next. In doing so, he and his subordinates operated within a ‘Befehlsklima’ [climate of command]–a term coined by Peter Longerich (b. 1955)2Longerich, Holocaust, 306.–shaped by Hitler and the SS leadership, which created broad scope for autonomous radicalising initiatives.
While the killing actions had initially targeted leading representatives of the Jewish communities, the scope of violence and the groups targeted rapidly expanded. By August 1941 at the latest, this escalation had developed into a policy that aimed at the physical destruction of the entire Jewish population.3Kay, “Transition to Genocide”, 426. Although no study has yet examined the actions against Soviet Roma in Army Group Centre in detail, it is evident that Bach-Zelewski and his subordinates had been pursuing the systematic murder of all Soviet Roma since at least the spring of 1942.4Holler, Der nationalsozialistische Völkermord, 59 f. and 113.
From 1942 onwards, Bach-Zelewski increasingly concentrated on actions against suspected and actual. partisans. Although this shift broadened the range of targeted groups, Jews and Roma remained the central targets of persecution. For instance, Bach-Zelewski’s deputy, Curt von Gottberg (1896–1945), issued the following directive in his operational order for the ‘Hamburg’ anti-bandit operation in December 1942: ‘Every bandit, Jew, Gypsy, or suspected member of bandit groups is to be considered as an enemy […] Any escape by bandits, Jews, Gypsies, or suspected members of bandit groups […] must be prevented’.5NS-Verbrechen anläßlich des Partisanenkampfes in der UdSSR, 15. From the perspective of both Bach-Zelewski and the SS, the murder of unarmed Jews and Roma was a goal at least as important as the fight against organised partisan groups.
The Warsaw Uprising and the Post-War Period
Like many other SS leaders, Bach-Zelewski began to anticipate the possibility of a German defeat long before the end of the war and took steps to prepare for such an eventuality. The decisive turning point in Bach-Zelewski’s transition into the post-war period was the Warsaw Uprising.
Throughout this phase, he operated within a dual frame of reference.6Kreutz, “Bandenbekämpfung i powstanie warszawskie”. In the eyes of Hitler and Himmler, he presented himself as an efficient military leader and manager of violence, whose primary concern was to suppress the uprising as quickly as possible. At the same time, he used his position to cultivate an alternative image, portraying himself as a reliable negotiating partner to high-ranking representatives of the Catholic Church in Poland and to the leadership of the insurgents, thereby securing potential advocates in the event of a German defeat.
After his arrest by Allied forces in August 1945, he repeatedly invoked his conduct during the Warsaw Uprising to support claims of a supposedly humane approach. During the Nuremberg Trials, Bach-Zelewski primarily drew attention for his statements about the close cooperation between the Wehrmacht and the SS in the crimes committed during anti-partisan operations. His testimony had been closely coordinated with the US prosecution. His responsibility for the murder of Soviet Jews and Roma was only raised during cross-examination by the Soviet prosecutor, who was primarily interested in his cooperation with Einsatzgruppe B.7Birn, “Criminals as Manipulative Witnesses”, 446 f. The fact that Bach-Zelewski and the other HSSPF officers in the Soviet Union had been responsible, on their own initiative and using their own resources, for the murder of hundreds of thousands of unarmed people remained largely unaddressed at Nuremberg.
Bach-Zelewski remained in Allied custody until 1951 and testified in several follow-up trials in Nuremberg, which also shielded him from extradition to Poland or the Soviet Union. The Allies subsequently handed him over to the Bavarian Spruchkammern [Denazification tribunals], which classified him as a ‘Hauptschuldiger’[Principal offender] and sentenced him to the maximum possible penalty of ten years in a labour camp. In practice, however, Bach-Zelewski, who had since been released from custody, never had to serve this sentence, as he simply ignored the written summons to report for imprisonment. The responsible agency in Bavaria, the Befreiungsministerium [Ministry for Political Liberation], declined to enforce the sentence. Instead, they wished to await the outcome of prosecutorial investigations, which had already begun.
Consequently, Bach-Zelewski remained at liberty until 1958, when he was taken into custody for his responsibility for several murders of political opponents in the pre-war period. In February 1961, the Nuremberg-Fürth Regional Court sentenced him to an initial term of imprisonment for the murder of a rival SS leader during the so-called Röhm Putsch of 1934. Further convictions followed, first for perjury and then for the murder of several communists in 1933, for which he received a life sentence.8Ibid., 470.
Despite numerous attempts to have his sentence reduced through a pardon or by citing an alleged medical unfitness for imprisonment, Bach-Zelewski remained in custody almost until the end of his life. In 1972, after falling seriously ill, he was transferred from the prison to Munich-Harlaching Hospital, where he died on 8 March 1972.
