course, had already begun nearly two years before. But that Spring of 1943, progressiveincineration of the entire Jewish population of Europe was hoped for and eagerly ordered bythe Fuhrer himself. In the Warsaw ghetto, which had been appointed the chief clearinghousefor the massacres, the victims quickly procured arms from unreliable elements in the satellitearmies and turned them in despair against their destroyers.Reviewed and highly, highly recommended for the serious historian-researcher by Don DeNevi“THE GHETTO MEN – – The SS Destruction of the Jewish Warsaw Ghetto APRIL – MAY 1943”,by French L. MacLean. Schiffer MILITARY History: 2001, 260 pages, 500 b&w photos, 8 ½” x 11”,hardcover; $59.95. Visit, www.schifferbooks.com.On July 29, 1944, a sensational message in Polish was broadcast from Moscow beginning atdawn: “People of Warsaw to arms! ATTACK THE GERMANS! Help the Red Army . . . show theway, show the way! The hour of action has struck . . .By fighting in the streets of Warsaw weshall bring nearer the moment of ultimate liberation . . .” Poland’s Home Army resistance wasformidable, 40,000 men armed with outdated or captured Wehrmacht weapons, in addition to210,000 unarmed helpers. But in no way could they match the heavy tanks and assorted armorof the Luftwaffe Hermann Goring Division supported by the 19 th Panzer Division.Two days later, the uprising exploded, then expanded. German support poured in. “TheGhetto Men” tells that sad story. After 28 days of burning hell, it was over. More than 200,000Polish citizens lost their lives, in addition to the 15,000 AK (Armija Krajowa) Home Army dead.There were 10,000 killed among the 26,000 German casualties. To everyone’s surprise, the SSgranted the Polish insurgents POW status, which didn’t include extermination of the truefighters.“Warsaw is a cesspool, nothing more, nothing less,” Reichsfuhrer-SS Heinrich Himmler, thesecond only to the Fuhrer as the holder of Deutschland’s Third Reich. Despite the efforts ofeuthanasia experts assigned to Operation Reinhard, Himmler’s personal project to slaughterthe Jews in the General Government of former Poland, tens of thousands of Jews remained inthe former Polish capital. Himmler promised he would fix the situation even if it meant apersonal visit into the “cesspool” during the depths of a wretched Polish winter. He would bringin SS-Brigadefuhrer, Jurgen Stroop, to Warsaw as well. Stroop was one of the most murderousof all Himmler’s murderers. Heads would roll in the street.The 28-day siege of the Warsaw Ghetto was the most protracted largescale urban battle inWWII. Only the fighting in Leningrad from 1941-1943; Stalingrad in 1942-1943; the WarsawRebellion of 1944, and Budapest in 1944-1945 lasted longer. The Jews had resisted en masseand created a legend that would transcend the war and continue even 80 years later, to thisday. Much has been written on this heroic struggle from the standpoint of the young men andwomen of the Jewish War Organization. Nevertheless, a book from the German perspective hasyet to be written that captures all aspects of the fight from the standpoint of the attackers.
French MacLean, thus far, is the best researched and presented. Caution, it is difficult to read
and peruse, this 260-page text with 500+ photos, this “The Ghetto Men” testimony. Here, hehas given us the who, when, with, what, and how the SS troops razed the Warsaw Ghetto. Themen and officers of the dreaded Security Service and Gestapo are here as well as their units,weapons, and tactics, as well as a day-by-day analysis of the fighting. When it was over. TheNazis had killed or deported, to their likely deaths – – over 50,000 people. For the Germans, itwas a hunting exercise, for the Jewish defenders, it was an unimaginable 28 days of pure hell on
earth.
