Deutsche Besatzungspolitik in Litauen 1941-1944

LTLietuvoje dėl vokiečių okupacinės politikos 1941–1944 metais žuvo mažiausiai 420 000 žmonių. Juos nužudė vokiečių ir lietuvių pagalbininkai. Christophas Dieckmannas analizuoja politinius ir verslo procesus okupuotoje Lietuvoje, taip pat apžvelgia šalies istoriją. Remdamasis vokiečių, lietuvių ir žydų šaltiniais, pirmame tome jis analizuoja vokiečių okupacijos politiką ir jos masinius nusikaltimus karo su Vokietija kontekste ir pateikia skirtingas dalyvaujančių grupių perspektyvas. Šis daugiaperspektyvus Šoa pasakojimas sutelktas į žydų aukų perspektyvą, kuri daugiausia nagrinėjama antrame tome. Naudodamas vokiečių ir sovietinius šaltinius autorius rekonstruoja ir kitų aukų grupių likimus. Atskiras skyrius skirtas įvairių žydų, lietuvių, lenkų ir sovietinių partizanų pasipriešinimo grupių istorijai. [Leidėjo anotacija]Reikšminiai žodžiai: Antras pasaulinis karas; Nacistinė Vokietija; Okupacija; Karinė administracija; Represijos; Deportacijos; Antisemitizmas; Žydai; Getai; Pasipriešinimas getuose; Second world war; Nazi Germany; Military occupation; Military administratoin; Repesions; Deportations; Antisemitism; Juws; Ghetto; Defiance in ghettos.

EN“In Lithuania, the mass atrocities against Jews, prisoners of war, forced Soviet evacuees, Poles, Soviet functionaries, Roma, patients of psychiatric wards and other Lithuanian civilians were committed in a context determined by German warfare, German occupation policy and their interconnectedness” (789) – Christoph Dieckmann’s study is best summarised in the author’s own words. His analysis of the dynamics and effects of the German occupation regime in Lithuania follows in the footsteps of Christian Gerlach, Andrej Angrick, Dieter Pohl and others who put forth detailed studies of Nazi occupation policy in select regions of the German-occupied USSR.1 Extending over two volumes, Deutsche Besatzungspolitk in Litauen, however, offers a much more comprehensive view of the subject. Dieckmann develops a multilayered perspective, offering detailed insights into how different groups – Germans, Lithuanians, Poles, Jews, Soviet prisoners of war (POWs) – were involved in, or affected by, German hunger and extermination policies. A specific strength is the author’s investigation of pre-war Lithuanian society. Delineating nationalist currents and efforts to build a sovereign Lithuanian nation state in the 1920s and 1930s, on the one hand, and the status of Jews within Lithuanian society, on the other, Dieckmann prepares the ground for an understanding of why and which parts of Lithuanian society willingly supported the German occupation regime, especially in their attempts to erase all traces of Jewish life. In the early 1930s particularly, Fascist groups and increasingly the Lithuanian middle class turned against Jews (and Poles) in their efforts to create a mono-ethnic Lithuanian nation.The Soviet annexation of Lithuania in 1939 helped reframe this form of national antisemitism as one directed against what antisemites perceived as the Judaeo-Bolshevik regime. Dieckmann, however, challenges this tendency by showing that large parts of Lithuanian Jewry were rather ambivalent about the Soviet regime and even chose to leave the region. Anti-Jewish propaganda, purportedly grounded in Jews’ participation in the Soviet regime, thus evidently results from political mythmaking in the service of a nationalist agenda, as it is not borne out by the historical record. Finally, the hopes among large parts of Lithuanian society of achieving national liberation from Soviet rule with the help of German allies contributed to a willing cooperation with the occupation regime. German authorities knew how to make use of these aspirations and fostered relationships of loyalty: firstly by including Lithuanians in the mass shootings of Jews and thereby creating a bond of shared responsibility, and secondly by enabling the appropriation of Jewish property, a desire among locals that was exacerbated by deprivations resulting from the war itself. The latter efforts to implement a form of “racist welfare policies” (1045) resemble a pattern discussed by historian Götz Aly in his work on Nazi Germany.2 Some readers may find it useful to compare these policies in Nazi Germany with those in the occupied regions. Dieckmann draws on archival records of occupation authorities and postwar trial investigations, memoirs and letters in multiple languages as well as recent Lithuanian scholarship. This wealth of material allows a number of key discoveries. [Extract from: Anika Walke (2014) Deutsche Besatzungspolitik in Litauen 1941–1944, East European Jewish Affairs, 44:1, 137-139, DOI: 10.1080/13501674.2014.904632]

• Politikos mokslai / Political sciences
• Istorija / History