Abstract
Drawing on the concept of the concentration camp, this examination of the history of the Syrets camp near Kiev traces the principle stages of Nazi terror, exploitation, and extermination in the occupied capital of the Ukraine. The author locates Syrets in the context of the evolving camp system of the Third Reich. The famous Soviet film director Aleksandr Dovzhenko, in Kiev for the first time after the Nazi occupation, wrote in his diary, struck me most of all, plunged me into unforgettable grief and despair, as well as anguish that I also will never forget, was the people. The people of Kiev. There were none. The city was empty. I saw only about one hundred in all, alone or in small groups. These were mainly old people and inva- lids, cripples. 1 Thus did Dovzhenko testify to the horrifying results of the Nazis' reign of terror in the capital of the Ukraine. But what were the instruments of this terror? What were its phases? How did these correspond to the general direction of Nazi policy in the occupied territories of the USSR as a whole? These questions have not received thorough consideration in the literature. Scholars have studied various aspects of the history of the Reichskommissariat Ukraine as a whole, German domina- tion in particular regions, or, regarding the district of Kiev, certain aspects of the op- pressive policy of the Nazi police and collaborationist formations. 2 Babi Yar has occupied a special place in the scholarship, but researchers have emphasized the shooting of the Jewish population of Kiev on September 28 and 29, 1941, while largely ignoring Nazi terror that lead up to this event and the genocidal mechanisms and measures that followed. 3 Here I analyze the history of the Syrets concentration camp as one of the chief instruments of Nazi terror in Kiev. The study focuses on events at Babi Yar too, though not so much on the shootings in late September 1941 as on events that preced- ed and followed them. Nazi terror evolved in Kiev, and the victims changed over time. Categorizing Syrets as a concentration camp requires explanation, particularly because European historiography usually reserves the term for those camps directly under the SS Concentration Camps Inspectorate of the Economic and Administrative Main Office (WVHA). 4 But this approach derives from the bureaucratic definition
Published Version
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