Who were the Einsatzgruppen
The Einsatzgruppen were a special group of soldiers who came after the main army and shot the Jews in the new occupied areas, towns and cities. They rounded the Jews up beside a pit that they had built and they shot the Jews into the pits.
What did the Einsatzgruppen do
Under the direction of Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler and the supervision of SS-Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, the Einsatzgruppen operated in territories occupied by the German armed forces following the invasion of Poland in September 1939 and Operation Barbarossa (the invasion of the Soviet Union) in June 1941. The Einsatzgruppen worked hand-in-hand with the Orpo Police Battalions on the Eastern Front to carry out operations ranging from the murder of a few people to operations which lasted over two or more days, such as the massacre at Babi Yar with 33,771 Jews killed in two days, and the Rumbula massacre (with about 25,000 killed in two days of shooting). As ordered by Nazi leader Adolf Hitler, the Wehrmacht cooperated with the Einsatzgruppen and provided logistical support for their operations. Historian Raul Hilberg estimates that between 1941 and 1945 the Einsatzgruppen and related auxiliary troops killed more than two million people, including 1.3 million Jews. The total number of Jews murdered during the Holocaust is estimated at 5.5 to 6 million people.
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The Germans formed four
Einsatzgruppen. Einsatzgruppe A – Attached to
Army Group North – 990 men
Einsatzgruppe B – Attached to Army Group Centre – 665 men
Einsatzgruppe C – Attached to Army Group South - 700 men
Einsatzgruppe D – Attached to German 11th Army - 600 men
Einsatzgruppe B – Attached to Army Group Centre – 665 men
Einsatzgruppe C – Attached to Army Group South - 700 men
Einsatzgruppe D – Attached to German 11th Army - 600 men