Jäger Report
The so-called Jäger Report, also Jaeger Report (full title: Complete tabulation of executions carried out in the Einsatzkommando 3 zone up to December 1, 1941)[1] was written on 1 December 1941 by Karl Jäger, commander of Einsatzkommando 3 (EK 3), a killing unit of Einsatzgruppe A which was attached to Army Group North during the Operation Barbarossa. It is the most detailed and precise surviving chronicle of the activities of one individual Einsatzkommando, and a key record documenting the Holocaust in Lithuania as well as in Latvia and Belarus.[2]
Karl Jäger Report | ||
---|---|---|
Month[n 1] | Entries | Killed |
June | 1 entry | 4,000 |
July | 20 entries | 4,400 |
August | 33 entries | 47,906 |
September | 38 entries | 40,997 |
October | 12 entries | 31,829 |
November | 10 entries | 8,211 |
Description
The Jäger Report is a tally sheet of actions by Einsatzkommando 3, including the Rollkommando Hamann killing squad.[1] The report keeps an almost daily running total of the murders of 137,346 people, the vast majority Jews, from 2 July 1941 to 25 November 1941. The report documents date and place of the massacres, number of victims and their breakdown into categories (Jews, communists, criminals, etc.). In total, there were 112 executions in 71 different locations in Lithuania, Latvia, and Belarus.[3] On 17 occasions, daily casualties exceeded 2,000 people.[3] On 9 February 1942, in a handwritten note for Franz Walter Stahlecker, Jäger updated the totals to 138,272 people: 136,421 Jews (46,403 men, 55,556 women and 34,464 children), 1,064 communists, 653 mentally disabled, and 134 others.[4] The report concluded that Lithuania was now free of Jews except for about 34,500 Jews concentrated in Vilnius, Kaunas and Šiauliai Ghettos.[2] However, Jäger Report did not tally all Jewish deaths in Lithuania as it did not include executions by Einsatzkommando 2 in Šiauliai area (approx. 46,000 people), in some border areas (for example, in Šakiai on September 13, Kudirkos Naumiestis on September 19, Kretinga in July–August, Gargždai on June 24, 1941), or even in Vilnius (for example, the report is missing the October 1 (Yom Kippur) massacre of some 4,000 Jews).[5][6]
Jäger concluded his report with the following:
German original | English translation |
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Ich kann heute feststellen, dass das Ziel, das Judenproblem für Litauen zu lösen, vom EK. 3 erreicht worden ist. In Litauen gibt es keine Juden mehr, ausser den Arbeitsjuden incl. ihrer Familien.
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I can establish today that the goal to solve the Jewish problem for Lithuania has been reached by EK. 3. There are no Jews anymore in Lithuania, with the exception of the Arbeitsjuden ["labor Jews"] and their families.
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The nine-page report was prepared in five copies,[1] but only one survives and is kept by the Special Archive, part of the Russian State Military Archive in Moscow.[7] The copy was discovered in 1944 when the Red Army reoccupied Lithuania, but it was not made known to scholars or the judiciary evaluating Nazi war crimes.[8] Only in 1963, during the in absentia trial of Hans Globke in East Germany[9] and four years after Jäger's suicide, Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs disclosed the document to the German Central Office of the State Justice Administrations for the Investigation of National Socialist Crimes.[8] The document was first published in a Lithuanian collection of documents Masinės žudynės Lietuvoje in 1965[10] and in Western press by Adalbert Rückerl in 1972 as a facsimile.[8]
Report tabulation
Date[11] | Location | Jews[n 2] | Others[n 3] | Total[n 4] | Notes | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Men | Women | Children | |||||
4 Jul 1941 | Kaunas Seventh Fort | 416 | 47 | 463 | By "Lithuanian partisans", i.e. TDA | ||
6 Jul | Kaunas Seventh Fort | 2,514 | 2,514 | By TDA | |||
7 Jul | Marijampolė | 32 | 32 | By Rollkommando Hamann (from here on) | |||
8 Jul | Marijampolė | 14 | 5 | 19 | |||
8 Jul | Girkalnis | 6 | 6 | Communist officials | |||
9 Jul | Vandžiogala | 32 | 2 | 4 | 38 | ||
9 Jul | Kaunas Seventh Fort | 21 | 3 | 24 | |||
14 Jul | Marijampolė | 21 | 10 | 31 | |||
17 Jul | Babtai | 6 | 2 | 8 | All communists | ||
18 Jul | Marijampolė | 39 | 14 | 53 | |||
19 Jul | Kaunas Seventh Fort | 17 | 2 | 7 | 26 | ||
21 Jul | Panevėžys | 59 | 11 | 33 | 103 | ||
22 Jul | Panevėžys | 1 | 1 | ||||
23 Jul | Kėdainiai | 83 | 12 | 30 | 125 | ||
25 Jul | Marijampolė | 90 | 13 | 103 | |||
28 Jul | Panevėžys | 234 | 15 | 39 | 288 | ||
29 Jul | Raseiniai | 254 | 3 | 257 | |||
30 Jul | Ariogala | 27 | 11 | 38 | |||
31 Jul | Utena | 235 | 16 | 5 | 256 | ||
31 Jul | Vandžiogala | 13 | 2 | 15 | |||
1 Aug | Ukmergė | 254 | 42 | 4 | 300 | ||
2 Aug | Kaunas Fourth Fort | 171 | 34 | 4 | 209 | ||
4 Aug | Panevėžys | 362 | 41 | 19 | 422 | ||
5 Aug | Raseiniai | 213 | 66 | 279 | |||
7 Aug | Utena | 483 | 87 | 1 | 571 | ||
8 Aug | Ukmergė | 620 | 82 | 702 | |||
9 Aug | Kaunas Fourth Fort | 484 | 50 | 534 | |||
11 Aug | Panevėžys | 450 | 48 | 2 | 500 | ||
13 Aug | Alytus | 617 | 100 | 1 | 719 | (Error in math) | |
14 Aug | Jonava | 497 | 55 | 552 | |||
15–16 Aug | Rokiškis | 3,200 | 7 | 3,207 | |||
9–16 Aug | Raseiniai | 294 | 4 | 298 | |||
27 Jun – 14 Aug | Rokiškis | 493 | 488 | 981 | All active communists | ||
18 Aug | Kaunas Fourth Fort | 1,409 | 402 | 1 | 1,812 | Including 711 Jewish intellectuals from Ghetto in reprisal for sabotage action | |
19 Aug | Ukmergė | 298 | 255 | 88 | 2 | 645 | (Error in math) |
22 Aug | Daugavpils | 1 | 1 | 20 | 21 | Prison inspection (Error in math) | |
22 Aug | Aglona | 544 | 544 | Mentally ill (269 men, 227 women, and 48 children). Located in Latvia. | |||
23 Aug | Panevėžys | 1,312 | 4,602 | 1,609 | 7,523 | ||
18–22 Aug | Raseiniai environs | 466 | 440 | 1,020 | 1,926 | ||
25 Aug | Obeliai | 112 | 627 | 421 | 1,160 | ||
25–26 Aug | Šeduva | 230 | 275 | 159 | 664 | ||
26 Aug | Zarasai | 767 | 1,113 | 687 | 2 | 2,569 | |
28 Aug | Pasvalys | 402 | 738 | 209 | 1,349 | ||
26 Aug | Kaišiadorys | 1,911 | 1,911 | Unspecified | |||
27 Aug | Prienai | 1,078 | 1,078 | Unspecified | |||
27 Aug | Dagda and Krāslava | 212 | 4 | 216 | Located in Latvia | ||
27 Aug | Joniškis | 47 | 165 | 143 | 355 | ||
28 Aug | Vilkija | 76 | 192 | 134 | 402 | ||
28 Aug | Kėdainiai | 710 | 767 | 599 | 2,076 | ||
29 Aug | Rumšiškės and Žiežmariai | 20 | 567 | 197 | 784 | ||
29 Aug | Utena and Molėtai | 582 | 1,731 | 1,469 | 3,782 | ||
13-31 Aug | Alytus and environs | 233 | 233 | ||||
1 Sep | Marijampolė | 1,763 | 1,812 | 1,404 | 111 | 5,090 | Others include 109 mentally ill |
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Darsūniškis | 10 | 69 | 20 | 99 | ||
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Garliava | 73 | 113 | 61 | 247 | ||
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Jonava | 112 | 1,200 | 244 | 1,556 | ||
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Petrasiunai | 30 | 72 | 23 | 125 | ||
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Jieznas | 26 | 72 | 46 | 144 | ||
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Ariogala | 207 | 260 | 195 | 662 | ||
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Josvainiai | 86 | 110 | 86 | 282 | ||
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Babtai | 20 | 41 | 22 | 83 | ||
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Vandžiogala | 42 | 113 | 97 | 252 | ||
28 Aug – 2 Sep | Krakės | 448 | 476 | 201 | 1,125 | ||
4 Sep | Pravieniškės | 247 | 6 | 253 | |||
4 Sep | Čekiškė | 22 | 64 | 60 | 146 | ||
4 Sep | Seredžius | 6 | 61 | 126 | 193 | ||
4 Sep | Veliuona | 2 | 71 | 86 | 159 | ||
4 Sep | Zapyškis | 47 | 118 | 13 | 178 | ||
5 Sep | Ukmergė | 1,123 | 1,849 | 1,737 | 4,709 | ||
25 Aug – 6 Sep | Raseiniai | 16 | 412 | 415 | 843 | ||
25 Aug – 6 Sep | Jurbarkas | 412 | 412 | ||||
9 Sep | Alytus | 287 | 640 | 352 | 1,279 | ||
9 Sep | Butrimonys | 67 | 370 | 303 | 740 | ||
10 Sep | Merkinė | 223 | 355 | 276 | 854 | ||
10 Sep | Varėna | 541 | 141 | 149 | 831 | ||
11 Sep | Leipalingis | 60 | 70 | 25 | 155 | ||
11 Sep | Seirijai | 229 | 384 | 340 | 953 | ||
12 Sep | Simnas | 68 | 197 | 149 | 414 | ||
11–12 Sep | Užusaliai | 43 | 43 | Reprisal against locals helping Russian partisans | |||
26 Sep | Kaunas Fourth Fort | 412 | 615 | 581 | 1,608 | Sick and suspected epidemic cases | |
2 Oct | Žagarė | 633 | 1,107 | 496 | 2,236 | As Jews were led away, they mutinied but it was quickly subdued | |
4 Oct | Kaunas Ninth Fort | 315 | 712 | 818 | 1,845 | Reprisal after a German police officer shot in ghetto | |
29 Oct | Kaunas Ninth Fort | 2,007 | 2,920 | 4,273 | 9,200 | "Mopping up ghetto of superfluous Jews" (see Kaunas massacre of October 29, 1941) | |
3 Nov | Lazdijai | 485 | 511 | 539 | 1,535 | ||
15 Nov | Vilkaviškis | 36 | 48 | 31 | 115 | ||
25 Nov | Kaunas Ninth Fort | 1,159 | 1,600 | 175 | 2,934 | Jews from Berlin, Munich and Frankfurt am Main (see Ninth Fort massacres of November 1941) | |
29 Nov | Kaunas Ninth Fort | 693 | 1,155 | 152 | 2,000 | Jews from Vienna and Breslau | |
29 Nov | Kaunas Ninth Fort | 17 | 1 | 17 | 34 | (Error in math) | |
13 Jul – 21 Aug | Daugavpils | 9,012 | 573 | 9,585 | EK 3 detachment in Daugavpils, Latvia | ||
12 Aug – 1 Sep | Vilnius | 425 | 19 | 17 | 461 | EK 3 detachment in Vilnius[n 5] (from here on) | |
2 Sep | Vilnius | 864 | 2,019 | 817 | 3,700 | Reprisal for shooting at German soldiers | |
12 Sep | Vilnius | 993 | 1,670 | 771 | 3,334 | (Error in math) | |
17 Sep | Vilnius | 337 | 687 | 247 | 4 | 1,271 | (Error in math) |
20 Sep | Nemenčinė | 128 | 176 | 99 | 403 | ||
22 Sep | Naujoji Vilnia | 468 | 495 | 196 | 1,159 | ||
24 Sep | Riešė | 512 | 744 | 511 | 1,767 | ||
25 Sep | Jašiūnai | 215 | 229 | 131 | 575 | ||
27 Sep | Eišiškės | 989 | 1,636 | 821 | 3,446 | ||
30 Sep | Trakai | 366 | 483 | 597 | 1,446 | ||
4 Oct | Vilnius | 432 | 1,115 | 436 | 1,983 | ||
6 Oct | Semeliškės | 213 | 359 | 390 | 962 | ||
9 Oct | Švenčionys | 1,169 | 1,840 | 717 | 3,726 | ||
16 Oct | Vilnius | 382 | 507 | 257 | 1,146 | ||
21 Oct | Vilnius | 718 | 1,063 | 586 | 2,367 | ||
25 Oct | Vilnius | 1,766 | 812 | 2,578 | |||
27 Oct | Vilnius | 946 | 184 | 73 | 1,203 | ||
30 Oct | Vilnius | 382 | 789 | 362 | 1,533 | ||
6 Nov | Vilnius | 340 | 749 | 252 | 1,341 | ||
19 Nov | Vilnius | 76 | 77 | 18 | 171 | ||
19 Nov | Vilnius | 14 | 14 | POWs and Poles | |||
20 Nov | Vilnius | 3 | 3 | POWs | |||
25 Nov | Vilnius | 9 | 46 | 8 | 1 | 64 | |
28 Sep – 17 Oct | Plieščanicy, Bischolin,[n 6] Šack, Bobr, Uzda | 620 | 1,285 | 1,126 | 19 | 3,050 | EK 3 detachment in Minsk, Belarus |
4,000 | 4,000 | Prior to EK 3 taking over (see: Kaunas pogrom) | |||||
Totals | 57,338 | 48,592 | 29,461 | 2,058 | 137,346 | ||
Notes:
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See also
- Einsatzgruppen reports, 1941–1942
- Wilhelm Cornides Report, 1942
- Katzmann Report, 1943
- Korherr Report, 1943
- Gerstein Report, 1945
- Riegner Telegram, 1942
- Höfle Telegram, 1943
- Special Prosecution Book-Poland, 1937–1939
References
- Karl Jäger, Commander of the Security Police and the SD, Einsatzkommando 3 (December 1, 1941). "The Jaeger Report: A Chronicle of Nazi Mass Murder". English Translation of the Report Along with Scanned Images of the Original. Kauen: The Holocaust History Project. webpages 1–9 with transcriptions of photostat facsimiles.
{{cite journal}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - Headland, Ronald (1992). Messages of Murder: A Study of the Reports of the Einsatzgruppen of the Security Police and the Security Service, 1941-1943. Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. p. 152. ISBN 9780838634189.
- Gaunt, David (2010). "Reichskommissariat Ostland". In Friedman, Jonathan C. (ed.). The Routledge History of the Holocaust. Routledge. pp. 210–220. ISBN 9781136870590.
- Wette, Wolfram (2011). Karl Jäger. Mörder der litauischen Juden (in German). Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer Verlag. p. 147. ISBN 9783596190645. as cited by Muehlenkamp, Roberto (November 30, 2012). "The Jäger Report (8)". Holocaust Controversies. Retrieved 2016-10-22.
- Arad, Yitzhak (1976). "The "Final Solution" in Lithuania in the Light of German Documentation" (PDF). Yad Vashem Studies. 11: 245–246. ISSN 0084-3296.
- Dieckmann, Christoph; Sužiedėlis, Saulius (2006). The Persecution and Mass Murder of Lithuanian Jews during Summer and Fall of 1941: Sources and Analysis (PDF). The Crimes of the Totalitarian Regimes in Lithuania. Vol. III. Margi raštai. p. 172. ISBN 9986-09-280-9.
- Gitelman, Zvi Y. (1997). Bitter Legacy: Confronting the Holocaust in the USSR. Indiana University Press. p. 103. ISBN 9780253333599.
- Excerpt from Wette, Wolfram (2011). Karl Jäger. Mörder der litauischen Juden (in German). Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer Verlag. pp. 28–29. ISBN 9783596190645. translated and published by Muehlenkamp, Roberto (April 28, 2012). "The Jäger Report (1)". Holocaust Controversies. Retrieved 2016-10-22.
- Brazaitis, Juozas (1990). Vienų vieni (PDF) (in Lithuanian) (4th ed.). Vilnius: Viltis. p. 389. ISBN 5-89942-568-7.
- Stankeras, Petras (2006). "Vokiečių saugumo policijos ir saugumo tarnybos (SD) vado institucija Lietuvos generalinėje srityje 1941-1944 metais". Karo Archyvas (in Lithuanian). 21: 206. ISSN 1392-6489.
- Klee, Ernst; Dressen, Willi; Riess, Volker (1988). "The Good Old Days": The Holocaust as Seen by Its Perpetrators and Bystanders. The Free Press. pp. 46–58. ISBN 9781568521336.