[Continuation]
In the general process of the
Holocaust in Europe, the extermination of Jews in some
territories from Romania presents some
particularities.
In the majority of the countries
overran by the Nazis, as well as in the allied ones, the
newly installed local authorities, collaborated with the
nazis and send the Jews to the German extermination camps
in Poland. The gassing and burning of the corpses in
these camps was completely executed by the German
Nazis.
From Romania, under the
Antonescu government, not one train with Jews was
directed to the Nazi extermination camps.
The Romanian authorities,
planned, organized and applied, by their own initiative,
own program of cleaning and extermination of the
Jews.
At the meeting of the Council of
Ministers, on September 5th, 1941, Marshal Antonescu
declared clearly without any ambiguity:
"Don't believe that
I am unconscious. Don't believe that when I decided to
disinfect the life of the Romanian people from all the
Jews, I didn't realize that I would cause a big
economical crisis. But I told myself that there is a
war that I have to lead. And then, as in wartime,
there occur some damages for the nation.
.
If we loose this historic
moment, we have lost it for ever."
1)
Consequently the authorities in
those times, put into practice massive deportation from
the North-East part of Romania; summary executions by the
army in Basarabia and Northern Bucovina, the physical
destruction by starving, cold and illnesses in the
ghettos of Transnistria.
In the camps of Bogdanovka,
Domanovka and Akmecetka; shooting and burning of corpses
was a common practice as well as in Odessa. The cruel
method of dehydration and suffocation in the death trains
from Iasi; killing of those who remained behind during
the transportation on foot of the columns of deportees
towards the Dnestr and Bug, and other methods of
extermination were used by the Antonescu
authorities.
There were no gas chambers, but
the pains and the brutal death of the victims in
Transnistria and other zones, as shown in this booklet,
were no less barbarian and inhuman as those in the Nazi
extermination camps.
The extermination of the
Romanian Jews was not an isolate action. This took place
in the conditions of terror, deportation of the Jews into
extermination camps, initiated and realized nearly all
over Europe by the leaders of Nazi Germany.
For this reason we can assert
that the genocide of the Jews from Romania, is an
integrant part of the European Holocaust.
In Europe, in the countries that
were in war against fascist Germany, respectively in
Great Britain and the unoccupied territories of the
Soviet Union, in the neutral countries (Switzerland,
Sweden, Liechtenstein, Ireland, and Turkey), as well as
in Spain and Portugal, even though the latter were states
with fascist regime, Hitler's racial extermination
politic wasn't applied.
In Finland, allied country with
Germany, which fought against the Soviet Union, the
leader of the state, Gustav Emil Mannerheim, didn't
permit the extermination of a single Jew.
In the rest of European
countries, allied or occupied by fascist Germany, the
Jews had to pay a blood tribute.2)
In Romania "the historic moment,
which should not be lost", sustained with much insistence
by Marshal Antonescu, was created by the temporary
victories on the front, and by the conviction that the
war will be won, and had as final purpose the
purification of the country from Jews.
The Antonescu government
couldn't apply their complete "disinfecting and ethnic
purification program", due to: the changing of the
situation on the front by the failure of Hitler's "Blitz
Krieg" and the defeat of the German army at Stalingrad,
as well as the modification of the balance of forces in
favor of the allied forces.
Beginning with the year 1943, in
the ranks of the Romanian leaders, the gloomy specter of
a possible loss of the war, and implicitly the nearing of
the hour when they would have to give account for their
acts, appears more frequently.
The Marshal's speech changed
radically.
At the meeting of the Council of
Ministers on April 20th, 1943, Marshal Antonescu
declared:
"I fight to win the
war, but it is possible that the democracies will win
it."
"And then, can I expose
the future generations of the nation to be punished
for the measures that I took to eliminate the Jews
from the country?" 3)
Consequently, beginning with
1943, the deportations to Transnistria were nearly
totally ceased; the problem of deporting the Jews from
the Old Kingdom and South-Transylvania into the
extermination camps in Poland was no more topical, the
racial persecution diminished.
At present, on the occasion of
some meetings and reunions of specialists and historians
from Romania and from abroad, contradictory discussions
are taking place, whether there was or not a Holocaust in
Romania, and about the dimension of this
phenomenon.
The absolutely erroneous idea
was even accredited that, there wasn't any Holocaust in
Romania, and that Romania participated only in the
Holocaust in Basarabia, Bucovina and
Transnistria.
Romania didn't participate in
the Holocaust of Basarabia, Bucovina, and Transnistria,
but organized and applied concretely the Holocaust,
because these territories were administered by the
Antonescu Government, and by the local authorities named
by this Government.
In Basarabia, Bucovina and
Transnistria, the governors, the prefects, the commanders
of the gendarme legions and factors of responsibility
were Romanian, and had in their hands the life and the
death of the Jews, and consequently bear the main
responsibility for the crimes committed in these
regions.
Nobody denies the fact that in
these territories, German of SS-police committed some of
the crimes, but this was done with the collaboration or
with the tacit accord of the Romanian
authorities.
It is necessary, once for ever,
to show the whole truth, and to come to the imposed
conclusions and lessons.
It results clearly, that the
Romanian people is not guilty, and can not be blamed
for what has happened, the juridical and ethical
responsibility belongs to the Antonescu's authority in
power in that period, as well as to some criminal and
extremist elements, who took part in this
genocide.
This book was written in order
to show the facts which happened in that black period of
the history of the Jews from Romania and to avoid the
repeating of such events on Romanian soil.
1)
See, Benjamin transcripts 5th of September 1941,
A.S.B. Fond P.C.M.
Cabinet, file 476/1941, pp 107-109, 115, 116, 127-129,
143-144.
2)
See, Table
No. 13, p. 24
3)
See, Benjamin transcripts April 20th, 1943-A.S.B.
Fond 103, microfilm roller 1-106.