Shoah Page #17

- What was in this baggage?

- [ Barbara Speaking Polish]

Pots with false bottoms.

What was in the false bottoms?

[ Barbara Speaking Polish]

- Valuables... objects of value.

- Ah, oui?

[Woman Continues In Polish]

They also had gold in their clothes.

[Woman Continues]

When given food, the Jews

sometimes threw them valuables

or sometimes money.

[ Lanzmann ] They said before

it was forbidden to talk to Jews.

[ Barbara Speaking Polish]

Absolutely forbidden.

[ Lanzmann ]

Ask them if they miss the Jews.

[ Barbara Speaking Polish]

- [Woman Replies]

- Of course.

[Woman Continues]

We wept too, Madam says.

[ Lanzmann ]

Oui. Bien sfir.

And Mr. Kantarowski

gave them bread and cucumbers.

Why do they think

all this happened to the Jews?

[ Barbara Speaking Polish]

Because they were the richest!

[ Lanzmann Repeats Phrase]

Many Poles were also exterminated.

Even priests.

Mr. Kantarowski...

will tell us what a friend told him.

It happened in Myndjewyce, near Warsaw.

[ Lanzmann ]

Go on.

[ Barbara ]

The Jews were gathered in a square.

The rabbi asked an SS man,

Can I talk to them?

The guard said yes.

So the rabbi said

that around 2,000 years ago,

the Jews condemned

the innocent Christ to death.

And when they did that,

they cried out,

Let his blood fall on our heads

and on our sons' heads.

[ Lanzmann ]

Ou/I oui.

[ Barbara ]

Then the rabbi told them,

Perhaps the time has come for that,

so let us do nothing.

Let us go,

let us do as we're asked.

[ Lanzmann ] He thinks the Jews expiated

the death of Christ?

[ Barbara Speaking Polish]

He doesn't think so,

or even that Christ sought revenge.

He didn't say that.

The rabbi said it.

[ Lanzmann Repeats Phrase]

[ Barbara ]

It was God's will, that's all!

- [ Lanzmann ] What'd she say?

- So Pilate washed his hands

and said, Christ is innocent,

he sent Barabbas.

But the Jews cried out,

Let his blood fall on our heads.

That's all. Now you know!

[Chattering Fades]

[ Lanzmann, In French]

Was the road between Chelmno, the village

and the woods where the pits were,

was it asphalted as it is now?

[ Barbara Speaking Polish]

[ Falborski Speaking Polish]

The road was narrower then,

but it was asphalted.

How many feet

were the pits from the road?

[ Barbara Speaking Polish]

[ Falborski Speaking Polish]

They were around 1,600 feet,

maybe 1,900 or 2,200 feet away.

So even from the road,

you couldn't see them.

How fast did the vans go?

[ Barbara Speaking Polish]

PAN FALBORSKI:

At moderate speed, kind of slow.

It was a calculated speed

because they had to kill

the people inside on the way.

When they went too fast,

the people weren't quite dead

on arrival in the woods.

By going slower, they had time

to kill the people inside.

Once a van skidded on a curve.

[ Falborski Continues ]

Half an hour later, I arrived

at the hut of a forest warden

named Senajak.

[ Falborski Continues ]

He told me, Too bad you were late.

You could have seen a van that skidded.

The rear of the van opened,

and the Jews fell out on the road.

[ Falborski Continues ]

They were still alive.

[ Falborski Continues ]

Seeing those Jews crawling,

a Gestapo man

took out his revolver and shot them.

[ Falborski Continues ]

He finished them all off.

[ Falborski Continues ]

Then they brought Jews

who were working in the woods.

[ Falborski Continues ]

They righted the van

and put the bodies back inside.

[ Srebnik, In German]

This was the road

the gas vans used.

There were 80 people in each van.

When they arrived, the SS said,

Open the doors!

We opened them.

The bodies tumbled right out.

An SS man said, 2 men inside!

These 2 men worked at the ovens.

They were experienced.

Another SS man screamed,

Hurry up!

The other van's coming!

We worked until

the whole shipment was burned.

That's how it went, all daylong.

So it went.

I remember

that once they were still alive.

The ovens were full,

and the people lay on the ground.

They were all moving,

they were coming back to life,

and when they were thrown

into the ovens,

they were all conscious. Alive.

They could feel the fire burn them.

When we built the ovens,

I wondered what they were for.

An SS man told me,

To make charcoal.

For laundry irons.

That's what he told me.

I didn't know.

When the ovens were completed,

the logs put in

and the gasoline poured on and lighted,

and when the first gas van arrived,

then we knew why the ovens were built.

When I saw all that, it didn't affect me.

Neither did the 2nd or 3rd shipment.

I was only 13,

and all I'd ever seen until then

were dead bodies.

Maybe I didn't understand.

Maybe if I'd been older

I'd have understood,

but the fact is, I didn't.

I'd never seen anything else.

In the ghetto, I saw...

in the ghetto in Lodz,

that as soon as anyone took a step,

he fell dead.

I thought that was

the way things had to be.

It was normal.

I'd walk the streets of Lodz,

maybe 100 yards,

and there'd be 200 bodies.

People were hungry.

They went into the street

and they fell, they fell...

Sons took their fathers' bread,

fathers took their sons'.

Everyone wanted to stay alive.

So when I came here, to Chelmno,

I was already...

I didn't care about anything.

I thought, if I survive,

I just want one thing:

5 loaves of bread to eat.

That's all.

That's what I thought.

But I dreamed, too,

that if I survived,

I'd be the only one left in the world,

not another soul. Just me. One.

Only me left in the world,

if! get out of here.

THE RUHR:

[ Lanzmann, In French]

Gehame Rekzhssache secret Reich business.

Berlin, June 5, 1942.

Changes to be made

to special vehicles now in service

at Kulmhof (Chelmno)

and to those now being built.

Since December 1941,

97,000 have been processed

(verarbeitet in German)

by the 3 vehicles in service,

with no major incident.

In light of observations

made so far, however,

the following technical changes

are needed:

First,

the van is" normal load

is usually .9 to 70 per square yard.

In Saurer vehicles,

which are very spacious,

maximum use of space is impossible,

not because of any possible overload,

but because loading to full capacity

would affect the vehicle's stability.

So reduction of the load space

seems necessary.

It must absolutely

be reduced by a yard,

instead of trying to solve the problem,

as hitherto,

by reducing the number

of pieces loaded.

Besides, this extends the operating time,

as the empty void must also

be filled with carbon monoxide.

On the other hand,

if the load space is reduced

and the vehicle is packed solid,

the operating time can be

considerably shortened.

The manufacturers told us

during a discussion,

that reducing the size

of the van's rear

would throw it badly off balance.

The front axle, they claim,

would be overloaded.

In fact, the balance

is automatically restored

because the merchandise aboard

displays, during the operation,

a natural tendency

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