| Abstract |
This document is a first-person statement by the witness concerning the establishment and purposes of concentration camps and, to a limited extent, the conditions that prevailed therein. Kaltenbrunner states at the outset that Goering created concentration camps, soon after the Nazi's seized power, for the internment of political opponents. Camp administration soon devolved to Himmler, who reformed them as labor camps intended to supply the German war effort. According to Kaltenbrunner, Himmler tended toward micro-management, frequently issuing direct orders to camp commandants, thereby evading the chain of command he himself had established. The point here is that Kaltenbrunner, even as head of the RSHA, could not issue orders to a KZ commandant. In large part, this document tries to explain why the Nazis believed the camps not only justified but necessary as an instrument of solidifying their power, and describes the several kinds of custody on the basis of which persons could be interned. Kaltenbrunner also provides an account of the origins of the Gestapo and its unlimited power to arrest anyone suspected of being an enemy of the Reich. This arm of Nazi totalitarianism was, again, directed according to Himmler's will, as were the SS Totenkopf Verbaende who guarded the camps. It is Himmler, Kaltenbrunner argues, who was responsible for the concentration camps and the atrocities committed in them. This document is a typewritten carbon copy of adequate to fair quality. The paper is thin and slightly browning but fairly stable overall. |