World War II As It Happened
A MaritimeQuest Daily Event Special Presentation
Tuesday May 13, 1941
Day 621

May 13, 1941: Front page of the Manchester Evening News, Manchester, England.
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[Historical note: On May 13, 1941 Adolf Hitler issued the following order to his generals. It has become known as the Barbarossa Decree. It requires no comment to help understand what it means, it is devastatingly clear.

Order concerning martial law in the area of Operation Barbarossa and special measures for the troops.

The primary purpose of martial law is to maintain discipline.
The extensive operations areas in the East the type of warfare required thereby and especially the peculiarity of the enemy, confront the military courts with tasks which they can cope with only if they confine jurisdiction at first only to their main tasks during the fighting and until the conquered, area has been somewhat pacified, in view of the little personnel available.

This is possible only it the troops themselves ruthlessly defend themselves against any threat from enemy civilian population. Consequently the following directives are issued for the area of operation Barbarossa (operations area, area in the rear of the Army, and area of political administration):

Manner of dealing with crimes by enemy civilians:

1. Crimes by enemy civilians are outside of the jurisdiction of the military courts until further notice.

2. Guerrillas are to be eliminated ruthlessly by the troops in combat or in flight.

3. Also all other attacks on the armed forces or persons connected with them by enemy civilians should be dealt with on the spot by the troops with the most severe measures until the attackers have been destroyed.

4. In cases where such measures were neglected or were not possible at first, persons suspected of crimes are to be brought before an officer at once. He will decide whether they are to be shot. Collective reprisals will be carried out at once upon orders of an officer with at least the rank of a battalion commander against villages from which the armed forces were attacked in an underhanded manner, when circumstances are such that the guilty individual cannot be apprehended quickly.

5. It is expressly forbidden to keep suspicious persons prisoner in order to hand them over to the courts when these will again have jurisdiction over the civilian population.

6. The commanders in chief of the Army Groups, in agreement with the competent commanders of the Air Force and the Navy, can reestablish court jurisdiction over the civilian population wherever the area has been sufficiently pacified. The Chief of Staff, Armed Forces High Command will attend to this in the area of the political administration.

II.
Manner of dealing with crimes by members of the armed forces and persons connected with them against the civilian population.

1. There is no compulsion to prosecute actions committed by members of the armed forces and persons connected with them against enemy civilians, even when such acts constitute crimes or offenses under military law.

2. In judging such acts it should be kept in mind in each case that the collapse of 1918, later times of suffering of the German people, and the fight against National Socialism, with the many National Socialists who perished, were mainly the result or bolshevist influence, and no German must forget that.

3. The judicial officer will investigate, therefore, whether in such cases disciplinary punishment is in order, or whether legal proceedings are necessary. The judicial officer orders court martial proceedings in crimes against enemy civilians only when maintenance of discipline or protection of the troops require this. This is the case, for example, in serious crimes involving lack of sexual restraint, criminal tendencies, or indicating that the troops threaten to get out of hand. Generally speaking, offenses which result in unnecessary destruction of quarters, supplies, or other captured, materials, to the disadvantage of our troops, should be dealt with equally severely.
Preliminary proceedings must be undertaken in each case only on the written order or the judicial officer.

4. Extreme caution should be exercised in evaluating the authenticity of the statements of enemy civilians.

III.
Responsibility of the troop commanders:
Within their jurisdiction the troop commanders are personally responsible for the following:

1. That all officers subordinate to them are informed promptly about the principles under section I. and are aware of the extreme importance thereof.

2. That their legal advisers are informed promptly of these, directives and of the oral information given to the Commanders in Chief concerning political plans.

3. That only such verdicts are confirmed as are in accordance with these political plans.

IV
Security regulations:
Classification of this order will be reduced to secret when operation Barbarossa is launched.

By direction:
The Chief of Staff, Armed Forces High Command.
Keitel]

(On July 27, 1941 the Chief of Staff of the Wehrmacht, Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel sent the following to his commanders:
All copies of the Führer order of 13 May 1941 are to be destroyed in accordance with the regulations concerning secret documents:
A. In all commands up through the General commands.
B. In the panzer group commands.
C. In the Army high commands and commands on the same level when it seems unavoidable that the document will fall into unqualified hands. (Secret document regulation No. 58)

The validity of the order in not effected by the destruction of the copies. The troop commanders remain personally responsible, according to section III, for prompt notification of officers and legal advisors, and for confirmation of only such verdicts as are in accordance with the political plans of the government. This order is to be destroyed with the copy of the Führer order.
Keitel.)


May 13, 1941: Front page of The Daily Mail, Hull, England.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of the Birmingham Gazette, Birmingham, England.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of the Western Mail and South Wales News, Cardiff, Wales.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of the Evening Telegraph and Post, Dundee, Scotland.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of The Examiner, Launceston, Tasmania, Australia.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of the Daily Telegraph, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of The News, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of The Lethbridge Herald, Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of The Winnipeg Tribune, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of the Biddeford Daily Journal, Biddeford, Maine.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of The Evening Star, Washington, D.C.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of The Evening Gazette, Xenia, Ohio.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of The Port Arthur News, Port Arthur, Texas.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of The Nevada State Journal, Reno, Nevada.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of the San Mateo Times, San Mateo, California.
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May 13, 1941: Front page of the Hamburger Neueste Zeitung, Altona, Hamburg, Germany.
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1. Die Aufklärung des Falles Heß - In Schottland aufgefunden.
(The clarification of the Hess case - found in Scotland.)
2. Versenktungserfolge der U-Boote- und Luftwaffe.
(Successful sinkings by U-boats and the Luftwaffe.)


May 13, 1941: Front page of the Völkischer Beobachter, the official newspaper of the NSDAP.
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1. Zerstörung britischer Rohstoffwerke.
(Destruction of British raw material works.)
2. Systematische Einsätze der deutschen Luftwaffe.
(Systematic operations of the German Luftwaffe.)
3. Rudolf Heß verunglückt.
(Rudolf Hess had an accident.)



   
Page published May 13, 2022