Erwin Schulz
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27 November 1900
Erwin Schulz | |
|---|---|
 Schulz's mugshot at the Nuremberg Military Tribunal (July 1947) | |
| Born | Erwin Wilhelm Schulz 27 November 1900 |
| Died | 11 November 1981 (aged 80) |
Criminal status | Deceased |
| Motive | Nazism |
| Convictions | Crimes against humanity War crimes Membership in a criminal organization |
| Criminal penalty | 20 years imprisonment; commuted to 15 years imprisonment |
| Details | |
| Victims | Hundreds |
Span of crimes | July – August 1941 |
| Country | Ukraine and Russia |
| Military career | |
| Allegiance | German Empire Weimar Republic Nazi Germany |
| Branch | Imperial German Army Freikorps Schutzstaffel |
| Service years | 1918–1919 1935–1945 |
| Rank | SS-Brigadeführer |
| Unit | Reich Security Main Office |
| Commands | Inspector, SiPo and SD, Wehrkreis X Commander, Einsatzkommando 5 Commander, SiPo and SD, Wehrkreis XVIII |
| Conflicts | World War I Spartacist uprising Silesian Uprisings World War II |
Erwin Wilhelm Schulz (27 November 1900 – 11 November 1981) was a German member of the Gestapo and the SS in Nazi Germany. He was the leader of Einsatzkommando 5, part of Einsatzgruppe C, which was attached to the Army Group South during the planned invasion of Soviet Union in 1941, and operated in the occupied territories of south-eastern Poland and Ukrainian SSR committing mass killings of civilian population, mostly men of Jewish ethnicity, under the command of SS-Brigadeführer Otto Rasch.[1]
Schulz is notable for demonstrating that service in the Einsatzgruppen was voluntary. He did not volunteer for the job, nor did he turn it down. Previously, he'd expressed opposition to the mass shootings of Jews. Under orders, Schulz would participate in the mass executions of Jewish men despite "serious misgivings" about his actions.[2] After being ordered to kill Jewish women and children, however, he protested. When he was unable to get the order retracted, he asked if he could stop. The request was granted within days, with Schulz being discharged on the orders of Reinhard Heydrich himself. Schulz not only faced no consequences for stopping, but was promoted shortly after. By the end of the war, he'd reached the rank of SS-Brigadeführer, the SS equivalent of a brigadier general.[3][4]
In April 1918, Schulz, then 17, volunteered for service in the Imperial German Army. However, World War I ended before he saw combat. The German Empire collapsed in the face of a communist revolution. Around this time, many German youths who were not old enough to have served in the war enlisted in the Freikorps, hoping to prove themselves as patriots and as men by crushing the revolution.[5] Schulz participated in the suppression of the Spartacist uprising as a member of the 3rd Guards Regiment,[6] and was discharged later that year.[7]
After finishing high school, Schulz went to a university in Berlin. He'd wanted to study medicine, but was "frustrated by the economic consequences of the war" and for reasons of "expediency," studied political science and law for two semesters instead.[8] Schulz never received a doctorate in law, albeit some called him Dr. Schulz. He left his studies to join the Freikorps Oberland in the spring of 1921. During his time in the Freikorps, Schulz fought Polish insurgents during the Silesian Uprisings.[1][9] Afterwards, he worked in a bank and relocated to Hamburg in 1923. He joined the uniformed police force (Schutzpolizei) in Bremen, and in 1926 was appointed a police lieutenant.[1]
Schulz's direct involvement in Nazism started in 1931. In 1930, he was transferred to the intelligence division of the Bremen police, which dealt with political counter intelligence. In 1931, he started working as an informant for the SS. Schulz secretly helped the Nazis gradually take over the offices of the Bremen police. In May 1933, Schulz joined the Nazi Party. In June 1933, the intelligence division was incorporated into the Gestapo, and in November, Schulz was appointed the acting (kommissarisch) chief. He took over as permanent Gestapo chief in Bremen on 1 May 1935.[10] In 1935, he also joined the SS and SD. In March 1938, Schulz was promoted to SS-Sturmbannführer and became a Staatsrat (state councilor) for the state of Bremen.[11] After the occupation and dismemberment of Czechoslovakia, he was made the Gestapo chief in Reichenberg (today, Liberec) in the Sudetenland in May 1939. In April 1940, he was appointed the Inspekteur der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD (IdS) for Wehrkreis (military district) X, headquartered in Hamburg, Germany's second most populous city. This was followed in the Spring of 1941 by his appointment as the chief of department IB (Training and Education) in the Reich Security Main Office's (RSHA) Amt I (Administration). He concurrently was made the leader of the police school for SiPo cadets at Berlin-Charlottenburg.[10]
Numerous colleagues testified that Schulz kept his ties with Nazism separate from his professional job, to the extent that they were unaware of his connections. He was much less stringent with the use of protective custody and disciplined excesses by his subordinates. As late as November 1938, he spoke out against antisemitic excesses and prosecuted Nazis and police officers for illegal persecutions and looting. Even as he served in the proto-Einsatzgruppen while establishing Gestapo posts in the Sudetenland, Austria, and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, Schulz attempted to maintain moral limits. For example, in early 1941, some of the students at his SiPo school were detailed to Einsatzgruppen units in Russia, returning after a few months. According to one student, Schulz objected to the shootings of Jews, and threatened to expel them for unsuitable character if they were involved.[11]
In May 1941, Schulz was appointed chief of Einsatzkommando 5, a sub-unit of Einsatzgruppe C. The unit departed Germany in June 1941, and arrived in Ukraine in early July 1941. Overall, Einsatzgruppe C executed 2,500 to 3,000 people in Lviv in July 1941. Schulz himself was later proven to have presided over the executions of at least 90 to 100 men by his unit.[12] When Schulz convened with SS-Brigadeführer Otto Rasch, the Einsatzgruppe C commander at Zhytomyr on 10 August 1941, Rasch informed him that on the orders of Adolf Hitler, more Jews needed to be shot. The Higher SS and Police Leader (HSSPF) for occupied Eastern Russia, SS-Obergruppenführer Friedrich Jeckeln, ordered that all Jews not engaged in forced labor, including women and children, were to be killed.[13] Schulz later summarized what had happened at the meeting.
"After about two weeks' stay in Berdichev the commando leaders were ordered to report to Zhitomir, where the staff of Dr. Rasch was quartered. Here Dr. Rasch informed us that Obergruppenführer Jeckeln had been there, and had reported that the Reichsführer-SS had ordered us to take strict measures against the Jews. It had been determined without doubt that the Russian side had ordered to have the SS members and Party members shot. As such measures were being taken on the Russian side, they would also have to be taken on our side. All suspected Jews were, therefore, to be shot. Consideration was to be given only when they were indispensable as workers. Women and children were to be shot also in order not to have any avengers remain. We were horrified, and raised objections, but they were met with a remark that an order which was given had to be obeyed."[14]
Shortly thereafter, Schulz questioned both Bruno Streckenbach and Reinhard Heydrich on this point; it was confirmed that this order had come from Hitler. He asked to be relieved of his post, saying he could not handle this kind of job.[15] On 24 August 1941, he left for Berlin, arriving there three days later.
While testifying at the Frankfurt Auschwitz trials in the 1960s, Schulz said he "tried to prevent the worst". However, he was then asked why he did not object further to the new orders. He admitted that at the time, he'd tried to rationalize the orders to himself, despite personally refusing to carry them out.
"Because the orders were given. And I have to say that here, since they were known to all authorities, I assumed at first that this was, in fact, a carefully considered order issued out of wartime necessity. I did not have the feeling that they were completely unjustified, as inhuman as the orders were."[16]
Schulz' refusal to carry out the orders to kill women and children do not seem to have harmed his career, although he was viewed as being too soft. In November 1941, he was promoted to SS-Oberführer and Oberst of police.[17] In December 1942, he returned to RSHA where he replaced Streckenbach as the chief of Amt I, and where he remained until he was succeeded by Erich Ehrlinger on April 1, 1944. At that time, Schulz was appointed the IdS for Wehrkreis XVIII, based in Salzburg. He reported to Erwin Rösener, HSSPF and commander of SS-Oberabschnitt (main district) "Alpenland". Within weeks, this position was elevated to Befehlshaber der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD (BdS).[10] This was due to the impending threat from Yugoslav partisans. Schulz remained in this position until Germany's surrender in May 1945.
