Shoah Page #25

the same train, as a matter of fact.

- This is quite obviously the same.

- it is the same train,

which gets every time another number.

- The number...

The number has to be changed,

quite obviously. Correct.

Then it goes back to Treblinka,

and this is again a long trip.

It arrives in Treblinka,

now goes back to yet another place.

Then the same situation, the same trip.

And then yet another.

It goes to Treblinka

and then arrives in Czestochowa

on the 29th of September.

And then the cycle is complete.

And this is called a 'Fahrplananordnung,

and if you count up the...

the number of, uh,

not empty numbers, but full ones, PKRs...

There's one.

There is one.

Here.

- But why?

- That's two. That's three.

- Why such a...

- That's four.

- Why...

We may be talking here

about 10,000 dead Jews

on this one Fahrplananordnung right here.

- More than 10,000.

- Well, we will be conservative.

Yes.

But why such a document

is so fascinating, as a matter of fact?

Because I was in Treblinka,

and to have the two things together,

Treblinka and that document...

Well, you see,

when I hold a document in my hand,

particularly if it's an original document,

then I hold something

which is actually something

that the original bureaucrat

had held in his hand.

It's an artifact. it's a leftover.

it's the only leftover there is.

- Yes.

- The dead are not around.

[Cattle Mooing ]

[ Dogs Barking ]

TREBLINKA - THE STATION

[ Hilberg ]

The Rekzhsbahn was ready to ship, in principle,

any cargo in return for payment.

And, therefore, the basic key,

price-controlled key,

was that Jews were going to be

shipped to Treblinka,

were going to be shipped to Auschwitz,

Sobibor, or any other destination,

so long as the railroads

were paid by the track kilometer,

so many pfennig per mile.

And the basic rate was the same

throughout the war,

with children under 10 going at half fare,

children under four going free.

And the payment had to be made

for only one way.

The guards... The guards, of course,

had to have return fare paid for them

because they were going back

to their place of origin.

Excuse me. The children were shipped

in the extermination camps...

The children under four...

- ...went free.

They had the privilege to be gassed freely?

Yes, transport was free.

And, in addition to that,

because the person who had to pay,

the agency that had to pay,

was the agency that ordered the train,

and that happened to have been

the Gestapo, Eichmann's office...

Because of the financial problem

which that office had in making payments,

the Reichsbahn agreed on group fare.

So the Jews were being shipped

in much the same way

as any excursion fare would be granted

if there were enough people traveling.

And the minimum was 400,

a kind of charter fare.

400 was the minimum.

So even if there were fewer than 400,

it would pay to say that there were 400,

and, in that way,

get the half fare for adults as well.

And that was the basic principle.

Now, of course, if there was

exceptional filth in the cars,

which might be the case,

if there was damage to the equipment,

which might be the case,

because the transports took so long,

and the inmates, to the extent

of five or ten percent, died en route,

uh, then there might be

an additional bill for that damage.

But, in principle, uh,

so long as payment was being made,

transports were being shipped.

Sometimes, the SS got credit.

Sometimes, the transport

went out before payment,

because, as you see, the...

the whole business was handled,

as in the case

of any other charter traffic, especially,

or any really personal traffic of any kind,

through a travel bureau.

Mitteleuropaisches Reisebiiro

would handle some of these transactions:

the billing procedure,

the ticketing procedure.

Or if a smaller transport

was involved, the SS would...

Excuse me. It was the same bureau who was

dealing with any kind of normal passenger?

- Absolutely.

- It was dealing with the Jews too.

Just the official travel bureau.

Mitteleuropisches Reisebiiro

will ship people to the gas chambers,

or they will ship vacationers

to their favorite resorts.

And that was basically the same office

and the same operation,

the same procedure, the same billing.

- No difference?

- No difference whatsoever.

And, as a matter of course,

everybody would do that job

as if it were the most normal thing to do.

But it was not a normal job.

No, it was not a normal job.

As a matter of fact, you know, even, uh...

even the complicated currency

procedures were followed

in much the same way

as with any other transaction,

if borders had to be crossed,

and that was very frequent.

For instance?

Well, I think the most interesting example

is, of course, Greece,

the... the transports from Saloniki, Greece,

in the spring of 1943,

involving some 46,000 victims

over a considerable distance,

so that, even with group fare,

the bill came to almost two million marks,

which was quite a sum.

And the basic principle, you see,

with such traffic,

is that which is employed

in the usual customary way,

even to this day, all over the world.

One pays in the currency

of the place of origin,

but, then, one has to pay

the participating railroads en route

in their own currencies.

So...

- From Saloniki, they had to cross Greece.

- They had to cross Greece.

- In Greece, it was drachmas?

In Greece, it was drachma,

and then you might have to go through the...

- Yugoslavia.

- Yes, the Serbian and Croatian railroads.

And you might have to then go

through the Re/chsbahn and pay in mark.

Now, ironically, the problem was, you see,

that the military commander in Saloniki,

who was in charge,

so he, in a sense, was the ultimate person

responsible for paying for these things,

didn't have the mark.

And he didn't have the Reichsmark,

although he did have the drachma.

The drachma, you see, he had

from the confiscated Jewish property

which was used to pay for these things.

This was a self-financing principle.

The SS or the military

would confiscate the Jewish property

and, with proceeds, especially

from bank deposits, would pay for transports.

This means that the Jews themselves...

- Absolutely.

- ...would pay for their death?

You have to remember...

You have to remember one basic principle:

There was no budget for destruction.

Yes.

So that is the reason that

the confiscated property had to be used

in order to make the payments.

All right.

The property of the Jews

in Saloniki was confiscated,

but the proceeds were

in local Greek currency.

The Reichsbahn, of course,

would want payment in mark.

How, then, do you change

the drachma into mark?

Now, you have exchange controllers,

right within occupied Europe.

The only way it could be done, of course,

is if somebody

in this occupied zone obtained mark.

But how could they?

This was not

such a simple thing in wartime.

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