Aryan Scholar wrote: ↑Wed Aug 02, 2017 11:57 am
Aryan Scholar wrote: ↑Sun Jun 18, 2017 9:00 pm
Roberto wrote: ↑Sun Jun 18, 2017 3:25 pm
I didn't say that the document explicitly refers to "mass graves used to bury Jews". The argument is that "Jewish mass grave" would not have been a term used for a mass grave containing something other than dead Jews, for the reasons explained.
And that, besides, the possibility of the mass graves in question containing something other than dead Jews is not borne out by other evidence, whereas all related evidence points to mass graves containing the bodies of Jews who had met a violent death.
Please, substantiate the "argument is that "Jewish mass grave" would not have been a term used for a mass grave containing something other than dead Jews" with authoritative (or even testimonial) evidence related to DOK 239.
Please, quote the parts of the related evidence of DOK 239 which explicitly "points to mass graves containing the bodies of Jews who had met a violent death". Let's see it.
It is not known who exactly ordered the systematic killing of Jews in Semeliškių.
We know from the Jäger Report that it was someone from the
Teilkommando des EK.3 in Wilna mentioned on page 5 of the Jäger Report, which was obviously in charge of Vilnius and communities in the surrounding regions such as Semeliškių. The man from the
Teilkommando who ordered the killing could have been Peter Eisenbarth, Erich Wolff, Martin Weiss or August Hering. Unless our objective is to press charges against any of these individuals, it's irrelevant which of them gave the order.
Aryan Scholar wrote:It is not known who exactly carried the order, dug the mass grave and systematic killed the Jews in Semeliškių in 1941.
Mass graves were dug either by Lithuanian auxiliaries or by the Jews to be executed. The killing was done by Germans of the
Teilkommando and/or Lithuanian auxiliaries. Unless our objective is to press charges against any specific individual involved in the killing, it's irrelevant whether we have further information about the mentioned details or not.
Aryan Scholar wrote:It is not known where exactly the mass grave in Semeliškių was dug and how many bodies were really buried there.
As to the location of the mass grave, the available evidence (including the shape of the area) points to the lower-lying part of the fenced in area containing the monument. As to how many bodies were buried there, the choice is between just the 962 Jews mentioned in the Jäger Report or those 962 plus an additional 58 or so later buried in the same grave. Not exactly a significant difference.
Aryan Scholar wrote:It is not known if all Jews of Semeliškių were really killed.
The Jäger Report suggests that they were, but maybe some survived the massacre in hiding. Either way it's irrelevant to this discussion.
Aryan Scholar wrote:It is not known if the mass grave in Semeliškių have just have the corpses of Jews, gentiles, animals or a combination of all.
The case for the corpses of 962 Jews and maybe an additional 58 gentiles (e.g. Soviet prisoners of war) is strong. The case for there also being animals in the grave, on the other hand, is rather weak and based on a far-fetched interpretation of DOK 239.
Aryan Scholar wrote:It is not known who erected the symbolic 1965 monument in the Dargonių forest cemetery.
That may be so as far as the knowledge of participants in this discussion is concerned, but it is also irrelevant.
Aryan Scholar wrote:Finally, you fail to accept the Lithuanian land register has no record of any Jewish mass grave in the Dargonių forest cemetery.
I have no problem with the Lithuanian land register not specifically mentioning a mass grave, actually. My argument is that the presence of a mass grave is implied in the place's identification as a place where Jews were massacred.
Aryan Scholar wrote:It seems no related evidence of DOK 239 can be shown which explicitly "points to mass graves containing the bodies of Jews who had met a violent death" in Semeliškių, but instead assumptions are being made based mostly on belief and leaps of faith.
Assumptions are based on reason and logic, not on belief and leaps of faith. The only known event in the area that could have created something meriting the designation "Jewish mass grave" was the massacre of 962 Jews recorded on page 6 of the Jäger Report.
Aryan Scholar wrote:Roberto wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2017 5:49 pm
None of the above changes
the fact that "the place of massacre of the Jews" implies a mass grave at that place, meaning that "graves" means both individual graves and
a mass grave (or only the latter, as the individual graves are mentioned elsewhere), and that the fenced-in area is much bigger than would correspond to the individual graves alone, which occupy only small fraction of the area.
That would be true if there was a record of a Jewish mass grave in the Lithuanian land register of the Dargonių forest cemetery terrain. There is none.
Unless the Lithuanian authorities referring to the area as "the place of massacre of the Jews" assumed that the massacre's victims were left lying around for animals to feed on them (which is unlikely), and unless a realistic alternative explanation for the fencing-in of an area much larger than that corresponding to the few individual graves in the higher parts of that area can be provided, the reasonable assumption is still the one that "the place of massacre of the Jews" implies the existence of a mass grave in which the massacred Jews were buried.
Aryan Scholar wrote:Roberto wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2017 5:49 pm
And how do you explain the size of the fenced-in area including the monument, of which the individual graves occupy only a small fraction?
The Dargonių forest cemetery terrain includes 6 marked areas for individuals graves (see
here and
here).
That may be so, but the area is still much too large for just 6 individual graves.
Aryan Scholar wrote:Roberto wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2017 5:49 pm
No, reaching a conclusion based on several indicators, none of which is the conclusion itself. The other way round. You need to explain why you think that the above indications (including without limitation the depression) don't support my assumption.
For your assumption to be true you have to first prove the exactly location, dimension and content of the 30m long Semeliškių Jewish mass grave described in DOK 239.
Proof of the grave's location and contents follows from the conjunction of the various elements of evidence I have mentioned. Proof without taking those elements into consideration would require excavation, which is neither something I can do nor something that is reasonably necessary to support the conclusion that the grave in question is where I think it is.
Aryan Scholar wrote:Roberto wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2017 5:49 pm
That's right. So it can neither be assumed nor ruled out that there was a Soviet excavation at the place in question. The question remains open.
As it remains the absence of any evidence of a Soviet excavation occurring in Semeliškių.
Absence of evidence known to the participants in this discussion does not necessarily mean absence of evidence at all.
Aryan Scholar wrote:Roberto wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2017 5:49 pm
The source you quote cannot be taken as proof that the Soviet ChGK based its conclusions
only on "anecdotal, hearsay and testimonial evidence", as there are publicly available examples of cases in which excavations and exhumations were carried out by Soviet investigators (and what is publicly available is probably just a fraction of what exists in this respect).
In the absence of any evidence of a Soviet excavation occurring in Semeliškių, the Soviet CHGK reports about Semeliškių can only come from "anecdotal, hearsay and testimonial evidence".
That conclusion might be reached after reading the whole report and not finding any mention of excavations there, but not on the basis of a published fraction of the report only.
Aryan Scholar wrote: Roberto wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2017 5:49 pm
I said that Germans gave the orders and were thus primarily responsible for the killing of civilians, which as we known from other evidence were Jews, in the Semeliškių. (...) So my assumption (that Germans were primarily responsible for the massacre) is duly substantiated, and there's no need to procure primary sources about specific individual perpetrators.
How do you know it was a German who gave the original order to kill civilians in Semeliškių if you do not even know the identity of the person who gave the original order?
Because there are two indications in this direction, one being the depositions of Lithuanian participants in the killing and the other being the information that the killing was done by the
Teilkommando of EK3 in charge of Vilnius and the surrounding area. The rank and file of the
Teilkommando and/or its auxiliaries may have included or been Lithuanians, but its commanders were Germans.
Aryan Scholar wrote: Roberto wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2017 5:49 pm
The other way round. Where is the proof that Wette, who is a noted historian, invented the statement in question? The source reference is the following (Wette, Jäger, p. 206):
Schreiben der Zentralen Stelle der Landesjustizverwaltungen vom 5.12.1989 an den Verf.; Anlage: Vermerk der Zentralen Stelle vom 2.5.1963 über die Überlassung einer Reihe von Originaldokumenten durch das Aussenministerium der UdSSR,
Translation:
Letter from the Central Bureau of the Federal States’ Judicial Administrations to the author dated 5.12.1989; attachment: note of the Central Bureau dated 2.5.1963 about the handing over of a number of original documents by the Foreign Ministry of the USSR.
What Soviet entity exactly and where in Lithuania exactly? I don't know. Maybe that is stated in the Central Bureau's note dated 2.5.1963 mentioned by Wette, see quote above. What is the relevance of this question?
The primary source for Wette statement is not authoritative evidence produced by the Soviets in 1944, but instead a "note of the Central Bureau dated 2.5.1963 about the handing over of a number of original documents by the Foreign Ministry of the USSR". It appears Wette made a conjecture based on an undisclosed statement in the note. So not really proof the Soviets know about the Jäger Report in 1944, even less the figure in the Soviet CHGK reports about Semeliškių comes from the Jäger Report.
Actually a conjecture by Wette is rather unlikely. What is more realistic is that the document’s provenance (found by the Soviets in Lithuania in 1944) is stated in the note of the Central Bureau as being information provided by the Foreign Ministry of the USSR when handing over the document. Whether the figure in the Soviet CHGK reports about Semeliškių took the Jäger Report into consideration is not clear, but it remains a possibility. The precise figure stated in the reports ("precise" meaning as opposed to something like "about 1,000") could have resulted from an addition of Jäger’s figure and a figure for further killings established on hand of eyewitness testimonies. Or it could have resulted from the count of bodies extracted from the grave.
Aryan Scholar wrote: Roberto wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2017 5:49 pm
Aryan Scholar wrote:Roberto wrote: ↑Thu Jun 29, 2017 8:15 pm
This means that, except for the working Jews and their families in the mentioned places, which do not include Semeliškių, Jäger's
Einsaztkommando 3 killed each and every Jew at the places mentioned in the report.
Then who are the additional 58 "innocent citizens" (or "civilians") from the Soviet CHGK reports about Semeliškių if there was no more Jews in Semeliškių to be killed in accordance with the Jäger Report?
I don't know. They may have been prisoners of war or civilians executed for having helped pro-Soviet partisans. What is the relevance of this question?
You are offering authoritative evidence which you do not know what exactly it proves.
What authoritative evidence exactly are you referring to, and what is the relevance of your question?
Aryan Scholar wrote: Roberto wrote: ↑Sat Jul 22, 2017 5:49 pm
Aryan Scholar wrote:Roberto wrote: ↑Thu Jun 29, 2017 8:15 pm
The standard scholarly work on what happened to Lithuania's Jews during the German occupation seems to be
The Holocaust in Lithuania between 1941 and 1944, by Arūnas Bubnys, D. Kuodytė, Genocide and Resistance Research Centre of Lithuania, 2005. Bubnys also wrote an essay about "Holocaust in Lithuanian Province in 1941", which is available under
http://www.docscopic.info/flashoflight/ ... ce_ENG.pdf. Semeliškių (Semeliškés) is mentioned on pp. 52-53.
Semeliškes Ghetto existed for about two weeks. During the first days of October, about 20-30 Security Police and SD special force policemen came by lorry from Vilnius to Semeliškes. One German came with them by car. Together with the chief of Semeliškes Rural District and the chief of the Police Station, he went to examine the future place of killings. A trench was dug up about 2 km from Semeliškes in the direction of Trakai, near the lake. The German did not like the selected place, however, and he ordered to dig a trench in another place on the edge of the forest. While another trench was dug, the killers of the special force stayed in Semeliškes. The extermination of Semeliškes Ghetto was carried out on 6 October 1941.
What is the primary source for the above statements from Arūnas Bubnys? Who is the German above in the underlined sentences Arūnas Bubnys is talking about?
"Interrogation minutes of J. Ragavičius of 17 August 1970, LSA, doc.col. K-1, inv.sched. 45, file 1851, p.p. 155-157; interrogation minutes of B. Kapačiūnas of 11 September 1970, ibid., file 1847, p.p. 236-236 a.p.". The German mentioned is not identified, presumably because the interrogated persons didn't know his name. It may have been Peter Eisenbarth, Erich Wolff, August Hering or Martin Weiss (see my post under
viewtopic.php?f=28&t=2916&start=80#p109880). Weiss is mentioned in connection with the Trakai massacre on p. 52 of Bubnys' article.
Another incognito perpetrator whose identity neither you nor Bubnys really knows, but believe it was really a German without proof because Ragavičius and Kapačiūnas said so in interrogations done in 1970.
Actually the depositions of Ragavičius and Kapačiūnas are relevant evidence and thus part of the proof, and what the interrogated Lithuanian individuals stated matches Jäger’s mention of the
Teilkommando of his EK 3 as having carried out the massacre. As I said before, the
Teilkommando’s rank and file and/or auxiliaries may have included or been Lithuanians, but the men giving orders were clearly Germans, otherwise Jäger wouldn’t have referred to the unit as a
Teilkommando of his EK3. Besides, the names of German individuals belonging to that
Teilkommando are known. It is highly unlikely that any of them would have left the organization and execution of a mass killing entirely to Lithuanians. As I wrote before, Martin Weiss is mentioned in connection with the Trakai massacre on p. 52 of Bubnys' article. Trakai is not far away from Semeliškių, so it stands to reason that Weiss gave the orders there as well.