Wegbereiter der Shoah. Die Waffen-SS, der Kommandostab Reichsführer-SS und die Judenvernichtung 1939–1945. By Martin Cüppers. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. 2005. Pp. 464. €59.90. ISBN 3-534-16022-3.

Abstract

To date, debates about the identity and motives of perpetrators of German extermination policies have focused on the Einsatzgruppen (mobile squads of the Security Police and the Security Service), concentration camp personnel, and the Order Police. Martin Cüppers now presents the first systematic study of one of the best documented, yet least publicized set of units that participated in the murder of European Jews. He explores three Waffen-SS brigades and some smaller units under the Kommandostab Reichsführer-SS. In some respects, the book's title is misleading. It does not cover the military wing of the SS as a whole and, if anything, it demonstrates that the Kommandostab was of minor importance since it was never really in command of anything. Serving as a transmitter of information and as an organizational tool, it further declined in importance after early 1942. In addition, just as with other perpetrator units, the Waffen-SS brigades did not murder only Jews; the book does deal with the brigades' other victims though the book title does not suggest it.