of it leading Holocaust historian Raul Hilberg's, and some of it your own expert
witness Simon Wiesenthal's. Thus, unless you are able to substantiate the
Wiesenthal-Safer pre-German Lviv pogrom, you will invite the conclusion that it
never took place, and that your implanting it into the minds of 30 million 60
Minutes viewers constituted an attempt on the part of two individuals Simon
Wiesenthal and yourself - to fabricate a piece of history.
In Fact, the Consensus Seems to be that in
the Days Prior to German Occupation, it
was the NKVD that was Killing Ukrainians
In contrast to what appears to be a lack of substantiation of the Wiesenthal-Safer
story that in the days prior to German occupation Ukrainians were murdering Jews, I
do in my reading keep stumbling across quite a different story - that in the days
prior to German occupation, it was the NKVD that was murdering Ukrainians. Below
are 22 such statements. These statements were discovered not through any systematic
or exhaustive search, but rather only through casual reading. A systematic and
exhaustive search would turn up a much larger number of such statements.
In order to demonstrate that the NKVD had a general policy of killing Ukrainians
prior to retreating, of which the Lviv massacre was but a single instance, I include
descriptions of such killings in several locations.
"NKVD," in case you are interested, is an acronym for the Russian "Narodny
Komisariat Vnutrenikh Del," which translates as "National Commissariat of Internal
Affairs," and which bland title gives no hint of the NKVD's true role.
Please note that the block quotation immediately below is attributable to Simon
Wiesenthal, and that in it he demonstrates an awareness of the NKVD massacre of
Ukrainians, such that omitting mention of this massacre on your 23Oct94 60 Minutes
broadcast, The Ugly Face of Freedom, must be considered not an oversight, but a
willful suppression of relevant information:
(1) Thousands of detainees were shot dead.
When the German attack came on 22 June the Soviets had no time to
take with them the people they had locked up. So they simply
killed them. Thousands of detainees were shot dead in their cells
by the retreating Soviets. (Simon Wiesenthal, Justice Not
Vengeance, 1989, p. 35)
(2) The NKVD burned prisons with prisoners in them.
While the movement to the East was taking place, the NKVD carried
out mass arrests and executions, chiefly of Ukrainians - especially
those who tried to avoid evacuation. In the jails most prisoners
whose period of imprisonment was more than three years were shot;
others were evacuated if possible. In several cities the NKVD
burned prisons with prisoners in them. (Volodymyr Kubijovyc,
editor, Ukraine: A Concise Encyclopaedia, University of Toronto
Press, Toronto, 1963, Volume I, p. 878, Vsevolod Holubnychy and H.
M. wrote this section)
(3) Succeeded in annihilating some 10,000 political prisoners.
The Bolsheviks succeeded in annihilating some 10,000 political
prisoners in Western Ukraine before and after the outbreak of
hostilities (massacres took place in the prisons in Lviv, Zolochiv,
Rivne, Dubno, Lutsk, etc.). (Volodymyr Kubijovyc, editor, Ukraine:
A Concise Encyclopaedia, University of Toronto Press, Toronto,
Volume 1, p. 886)
(4) Mainly members of the city's [Lviv's] intelligentsia.
Before fleeing the German advance the Soviet occupational regime
murdered thousands of Ukrainian civilians, mainly members of the
city's [Lviv's] intelligentsia. (Encyclopedia of Ukraine, Volume
3, p. 222)
(5) NKVD slaughtered their prisoners en masse.
The Soviets' hurried retreat had tragic consequences for thousands
of political prisoners in the jails of Western Ukraine. Unable to
evacuate them in time, the NKVD slaughtered their prisoners en
masse during the week of 22-29 June 1941, regardless of whether
they were incarcerated for major or minor offenses. Major
massacres occurred in Lviv, Sambir, and Stanyslaviv in Galicia,
where about 10,000 prisoners died, and in Rivne and Lutsk in
Volhynia, where another 5000 perished. Coming on the heels of the
mass deportations and growing Soviet terror, these executions added
greatly to the West Ukrainians' abhorrence of the Soviets. (Orest
Subtelny, Ukraine: A History, 1994, p. 461)
(6) Liquidated with a shot at the scruff of the neck.
Right after the entry we were shown 2,400 dead bodies of Ukrainians
liquidated with a shot at the scruff of the neck at the city jail
of Lemberg [Lviv] by the Soviets prior to their marching off.
(Hans Frank, In the Face of the Gallows, p. 406)
(7) The city stank.
In Lvov, several thousand prisoners had been held in three jails.
When the Germans arrived on 29 June, the city stank, and the
prisons were surrounded by terrified relatives. Unimaginable
atrocities had occurred inside. The prisons looked like
abattoirs. It had taken the NKVD a week to complete their gruesome
task before they fled. (Gwyneth Hughes and Simon Welfare, Red
Empire: The Forbidden History of the USSR, 1990, p. 133)
(8) Many of them were found mutilated.
We learned that, before the Russian troops had left, a very great
number of Lemberg [Lviv] citizens, Ukrainians and Polish
inhabitants of other towns and villages had been killed in this
prison and in other prisons. Furthermore, there were many corpses
of German men and officers, among them many Air Corps officers, and
many of them were found mutilated. There was a great bitterness
and excitement among the Lemberg population against the Jewish
sector of the population. (Erwin Schulz, from May until 26
September, 1941 Commander of Einsatzkommando 5, a subunit of
Einsatzgruppe C, in John Mendelsohn, editor, The Holocaust:
Selected Documents in Eighteen Volumes, Garland, New York, 1982,
Volume 18, p. 18)
(9) The killed people in Lemberg [Lviv] amounted to about 5,000.
On the next day, Dr. RASCH informed us to the effect that the
killed people in Lemberg [Lviv] amounted to about 5,000. It has
been determined without any doubt that the arrests and killings had
taken place under the leadership of Jewish functionaries and with
the participation of the Jewish inhabitants of Lemberg. That was
the reason why there was such an excitement against the Jewish
population on the part of the Lemberg citizens. (Erwin Schulz,
from May until 26 September, 1941 Commander of Einsatzkommando 5, a
subunit of Einsatzgruppe C, in John Mendelsohn, editor, The
Holocaust: Selected Documents in Eighteen Volumes, Garland, New
York, 1982, Volume 18, p. 18)
(10) Hardly 20% of Ukrainian intelligentsia has remained.
Chief of Einsatzgruppe B reports that Ukrainian insurrection
movements were bloodily suppressed by the NKVD on June 25, 1941 in
Lvov. About 3,000 were shot by NKVD. Prison burning. Hardly 20%
of Ukrainian intelligentsia has remained. (Operational Situation
Report USSR No. 10, July 2, 1941, in Yitzhak Arad, Shmuel
Krakowski, and Shmuel Spector, The Einsatzgruppen Reports:
Selections from the Dispatches of the Nazi Death Squads' Campaign
Against the Jews July 1941-January 1943, Holocaust Library, New
York, 1989, p. 2)
(11) The corpses are dreadfully mutilated.
Location: Lvov
According to reliable information, the Russians, before
withdrawing, shot 30,000 inhabitants. The corpses piled up and
burned at the GPU prisons are dreadfully mutilated. The population
is greatly excited: 1,000 Jews have already been forcefully
gathered together. (Operational Situation Report USSR No. 11, July
3, 1941, in Yitzhak Arad, Shmuel Krakowski, and Shmuel Spector, The
Einsatzgruppen Reports: Selections from the Dispatches of the Nazi
Death Squads' Campaign Against the Jews July 1941-January 1943,
Holocaust Library, New York, 1989, p. 4)
(12) The prisons in Lvov were crammed with the bodies of murdered
Ukrainians.
Location: Zviahel (Novograd-Volynski)
[...]
Before leaving, the Bolsheviks, together with the Jews,
murdered several Ukrainians; as an excuse, they used the attempted
Ukrainian uprising of June 25, 1941, which tried to free their
prisoners.
According to reliable information, about 20,000 Ukrainians have
disappeared from Lvov, 80% of them belonging to the intelligentsia.
The prisons in Lvov were crammed with the bodies of murdered
Ukrainians. According to a moderate estimate, in Lvov alone
3-4,000 persons were either killed or deported.
In Dobromil, 82 dead bodies were found, 4 of them Jews. The
latter were former Bolsheviki informers who had been killed because
of their complicity in this act. Near Dobromil an obsolete salt
mine pit was discovered. It was completely filled with dead
bodies. In the immediate neighborhood, there is a 6X15m mass
grave. The number of those murdered in the Dobromil area is
estimated to be approximately several hundred.
In Sambor on June 26, 1941, about 400 Ukrainians were shot by
the Bolsheviks. An additional 120 persons were murdered on June
27, 1941. The remaining 80 prisoners succeeded in overpowering the
Soviet guards, and fled. [...]
As early as 1939, a larger number of Ukrainians was shot, and
1,500 Ukrainians as well as 500 Poles were deported to the east.
Russians and Jews committed these murders in very cruel ways.
Bestial mutilations were daily occurrences. Breasts of women and
genitals of men were cut off. Jews have also nailed children to
the wall and then murdered them. Killing was carried out by shots
in the back of the neck. Hand grenades were frequently used for
these murders.
In Dobromil, women and men were killed with blows by a hammer
used to stun cattle before slaughter.
In many cases, the prisoners must have been tortured cruelly:
bones were broken, etc. In Sambor, the prisoners were gagged and
thus prevented from screaming during torture and murder. The Jews,
some of whom also held official positions, in addition to their
economic supremacy, and who served in the entire Bolshevik police,
were always partners in these atrocities.
Finally, it was established that seven [German] pilots who had