Chapter 152 Chapter 25 "The Hell of the Underworld Follows Him" ​​(3)

It was no secret that Himmler did not trust Heydrich in the SS security service.Heydrich gave everyone in the party, including the Führer, a thick file, so he was despised by others (one day, Heydrich showed his subordinate Kunt Sirup a picture of Heydrich). Müller. He covered the upper part of Himmler's face and said, "The upper part is a teacher, the lower part is a 'sadist'). However, Hitler had a big plan for Heydrich, and even considered letting him When the heir - Göring fell out of favor due to the disappointing performance of the Air Force - made him the "acting regent of Moravia and Bohemia" in addition to retaining his high office. In Czechoslovakia After quickly crushing the resistance movement by creating white terror, Heydrich was a witch and a ghost, acting as a benefactor, especially to workers and peasants. He raised the fat ration of industrial workers, improved the social security system, and provided The working class confiscated quite a few high-class aquariums. "He played a cat-and-mouse game with the Czechs," commented his intellectual colleague Goebbels. Whatever he put in front of them, "the Czechs swallowed it Lose.He took many very popular measures.Especially since he has almost completely conquered the black market. "

Heydrich's achievements in Czechoslovakia inspired action by the Czech government-in-exile.Since the inhabitants of Czechoslovakia, under the benevolent bully, were likely to submit to the rule of the Third Reich, they decided to assassinate Heydrich.So two unranked officers, Jan Kubis and Joseph Gaback, who had received sabotage training at a Scottish school, were parachuted into the trustee state on a British plane. On the morning of May 27, the two assassins, accompanied by two Czech patriots, hid at a corner between Heydrich's country house and Hladsinburg in Prague.Gabak jumped out and pulled the trigger of his LMG as Khadrib's green convertible Mercedis approached.The gun didn't go off, he pulled the trigger again, and the gun jammed again.Kubis standing behind him quickly threw a grenade at the car.The grenade rolled and didn't move.Heydrich yelled: "Gas pedal! Driver!" But the driver who came in at the last minute was still hitting the brakes.

The grenade exploded, blowing off the rear of the trolley.Apparently unhurt, Heydrich sprang onto the road, pistol in hand, beating and shouting, like "the hero of a scene in any Western."Kubis rode off on his bicycle; Gaback, unhurt, stood still for a moment when the gun jammed before escaping.Suddenly, the gun in Heydrich's hand fell to the ground. He touched his right buttocks and shook his body.Fragments of trim and splinters from the exterior of the car had lodged in his ribs and stomach.He was immediately taken to a nearby hospital.However, since his injuries did not appear to be serious, he only accepted German doctors for diagnosis and treatment, and refused all others.A German doctor was finally found, who announced that surgery was necessary because fragments had penetrated the septum between the ribs and the lungs, and some had penetrated the spleen.

Himmler, who was in the temporary headquarters near the "Wolf's Lair", couldn't help crying when he heard that his right-hand man was dying.But some SS officers and soldiers believed that Himmler was shedding crocodile tears, because Heydrich's rise to the top and Hitler's favor made him very angry.In Prague, Heydrich was dying, and he whispered a warning to his subordinate Sirup that he must beware of Himmler. Later, when examining the cause of Heydrich's death, Himmler told Walter Schulenburg, director of the SS Foreign Intelligence Service: "Yes, as the Fuehrer said at his funeral, he was indeed a man of iron will." But at the height of his power, fate purposely sent him away." His tone was somber, but Schulenburg never forgot. "When he said these words, he nodded like an old Buddha. The small eyes behind the pince-nez suddenly shot out light, just like the eyes of a monster in the African desert that looks like a dragon but not a dragon, or a snake but not a snake."

The two assassins, along with five other members of the Czech resistance, were finally captured by the SS in a church in Prague and executed.But this is only the beginning of revenge.In Bohemia and Moravia, the Reign of Terror emerged, turning Heydrich's behavior into benevolence.More than 1,300 Czechs, including all the men of Lidice, were summarily executed on the trumped-up charge that the inhabitants harbored murderers.Lidice was burned, and the ruins were blown up and bulldozed.The eradication of this obscure village not only aroused disgust and anger in the Western world, but also ignited the flames of resistance in Czechoslovakia (* "When we flew to Czechoslovakia to assassinate Heydrich, the total That’s the idea.” After the war, the British Labor Party MP Pagut admitted that “the main force of the Czech resistance movement was the direct result of the SS’s retaliatory measures.”)

After Heydrich was murdered, it was the Jews who suffered most.On the day of his murder, 152 Jews were executed in Berlin, and another 3,000 were sent to Poland from the Deresienstadt concentration camp. – In Poland, killing camps have begun to receive a steady stream of victims. Perhaps the most frightening invention on the "Final Solution" was the "Jewish Committee".In addition to being in charge of deportation, this committee is also in charge of destruction.It consisted of leaders in Jewish society who believed that the best policy was non-resistance and cooperation with the Germans. "I would sacrifice 50,000 Jews," said a typical leader named Moses Merlin, "to save another 50,000."

In early June, the atrocities of mass murder were carried out on Himmler's written orders.Eckermann had shown the order to one of his assistants, Dieter Vesliseni.He also explained to him that the "final solution" meant the genocide of the Jews. "God forbid our enemies should do the same to the Germans!" exclaimed the astonished Vesliseni. "Don't be emotional," said Eckermann, "this is the order of the Führer." This was also confirmed in a letter written by Himmler to the main office of the SS at the end of July. "The Jews in the occupied eastern area must be wiped out. The Führer has placed the difficult task of carrying out this order on my shoulders. No one can relieve me of this burden under any circumstances. Therefore, I must forbid No one can interfere."

Kurt Gerstein, head of the Technical Disinfection Service of the Waffen-SS, had already heard despair. "The Nazis' demonic deeds terrified him," recalled a friend, "and made him feel that it was not impossible for them to win the final victory." In , Gerstein saw firsthand what he was talking about.At the first extermination camp, he and two of his colleagues—Eckermann's deputy and a professor of hygiene named Pfennens Dierl—were told that Hitler and Himmler had just ordered "general accelerated action." .Two days later, in Belzec, Gerstein saw that those words had become reality.

"Saw so many people, or could see so many people," the person in charge Christian Wirth told him, "less than 10 are alive." Gerstein watched the whole process of extinction.Of the 6,000 people transported in trucks that day, 1,450 of them died.After those who survived were driven out of the car with whips, they were ordered to strip off their clothes, remove their artificial limbs and glasses, and hand over their valuables and money.The hair of women and girls was all cut off. "Make good things for submariners," explained an SS man. "Make beautiful slippers."

Gerstein was disgusted to see them marching into the death chamber.Men, women, old and young, naked, lined up to beat him and walked past him, which was very scary.A tall SS soldier, with the tone of a priest preaching, loudly assured the crowd that nothing terrible would happen. "You just need to take a deep breath. This can strengthen the function of the lungs. Oxygen inhalation is one of the methods to prevent infectious diseases and a good way to disinfect." Some people timidly asked, what is their fate?The SS soldier gave further assurances: the men built roads and houses, the women did the housework or helped in the kitchen.However, the stench from the death chamber was self-explanatory. The people in front stood still, and the people behind forced them into it.Most of the people were silent, except for one woman, with a gleam of anger in her eyes, cursing her murderer.Werther whipped her and forced her to go (Werther was the former head of the criminal police in Stuttgart).Some were praying, others were asking, "Who will give us water to wash the dead?" Gerstein prayed with them.

By this time, the gas chambers were packed to the brim.But the diesel car poisoned the Jews with its exhaust, and the driver couldn't start the car.Maddened by the delay, Werth whipped the driver.Two hours and 49 minutes later, the diesel started.After another 25 minutes, Gerstein took a look into the gas chambers.Inside, most people were dead; after 32 minutes, they were all dead.They all stood upright, Gerstein recalled, "like basalt columns, because there was no room to fall or lean. The families were holding hands, and they were still holding hands after death." The horror continued. : A group of workers used iron hooks to pry open the mouths of the dead to find gold teeth, while others searched for jewelry in the anus or vagina.Wilt was very proud. "Look for yourself," he said, pointing to a large box of gold teeth, "how much gold is there! We collected so much yesterday and the day before yesterday. You can't imagine what we can find every day; there are dollars and diamonds. , there is gold, understand?" Gerstein bit the bullet and watched the last procedure.They threw the body into the ditch.There were many trenches, each hundreds of yards long, conveniently located next to the gas chambers.People told him that because of being poisoned, the corpse would swell after a few days, and the pile of corpses would rise two to three meters high.After the swelling subsided, the corpses were piled on railroad ties, fueled with diesel, and burned to ashes. The next day, Gerstein and his party drove to Treblinka near Warsaw.There, the facilities they saw were almost identical.But on a larger scale. "Eight gas chambers, clothes piled up like mountains, ranging from 35 meters to 40 meters high." To celebrate their visit, the camp held a banquet for the employees. "When people see the dead bodies of these Jews," said Professor Pfennansdiel, "they will understand how great your work is!" After the dinner, the host distributed butter, meat and wine to the guests , as a parting gift.Gerstein lied, saying that he had plenty of these things on his farm.So the professor took his share and his own. After arriving in Warsaw, Gerstein immediately set off for Berlin, determined to tell people the horrors he had witnessed.He became a modern "Old Sailor" and he spread the truth to his colleagues--they could never have imagined such a thing!Like the ripples in a pond, Kurt Gerstein's story spread more and more.