Liveblogging World War II: October 21, 1941
The Kragujevac massacre:
Kragujevac massacre - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: The Kragujevac massacre was the murder of men and boys in Kragujevac, Serbia, by Nazi German soldiers between 20–21 October 1941. All males from the town between the ages of sixteen and sixty were assembled, including high school students, and the victims were selected from amongst them. On 29 October 1941, Felix Benzler, the plenipotentiary of the German foreign ministry in Serbia, reported that 2,300 people were executed. Later investigations by the post-war Yugoslavian government came up with between 5,000 and 7,000 people executed, although these figures were never proven reliable.
German notification on 21 October 1941:
ANNOUNCEMENT
The cowardly and treacherous surprise attacks on German soldiers during the previous week, on which occasion 10 German soldiers were killed and 26 wounded, had to be punished. For that reason 100 people were shot for each killed German soldier, and for each wounded 50, mainly communists, bandits and their siders, 2300 altogether. Every similar case, even if it were only sabotage, will be dealt with the same severity.
Chief of local command
After the massacre Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel issued an order reapplying to all Europe to kill 50 communists for every wounded German soldier and 100 for each killed on 16 September 1941. German soldiers were attacked in early October by the Communist Partisans near Gornji Milanovac, and the massacre was a direct reprisal for the German losses in that battle. In addition, the German High Command was furious because the bodies of the German soldiers were mutilated by the guerrillas, so it was decided that the punishment must be particularly harsh.
A German report stated that: "The executions in Kragujevac occurred although there had been no attacks on members of the Wehrmacht in this city, for the reason that not enough hostages could be found elsewhere."
On the morning of 19 October, the entire city was raided. Around 10,000 civilians, aged 16–60, were arrested. A whole generation of high school students was taken directly from their classes. The executions started at 6pm on the following day. People were shot in groups of 400. The shootings continued into the next day, at a lesser pace. The remaining prisoners were not released, but were held as hostages for further reprisals. On 31 October 1941, Franz Böhme, the Commanding General in Serbia, sent a report to Walter Kuntze of the shootings that took place in Serbia: "Shooting: 405 hostages in Belgrade (total up to now in Belgrade, 4,750). 90 Communists in Camp Sebac. 2,300 hostages in Kragujevac. 1,700 hostages in Kraljevo."
Kuntze issued a directive on 19 March 1942: "The more unequivocal and the harder reprisal measures are applied from the beginning the less it will become necessary to apply them at a later date. No false sentimentalities! It is preferable that 50 suspects are liquidated than one German soldier lose his life...If it is not possible to produce the people who have participated in any way in the insurrection or to seize them, reprisal measures of a general kind may be deemed advisable, for instance, the shooting to death of all male inhabitants from the nearest villages, according to a definite ratio (for instance, one German dead 100 Serbs, one German wounded 50 Serbs)." Böhme went on trial for the Kragujevac massacre among other war crimes.
