Bidspirit auction | ”A war of extermination is

”A war of extermination is raging everywhere against the populations of the occupied territories” – leaflet dropped over Germany by the Royal Air Force in the midst of World War II - ”According to historical experience, the extermination and displacement of foreign peoples do not contradict the laws of life if they are carried out completely” (SS man Best) – Die andere Seite [1942] – ”The Other Side” – leaflet dropped over Germany by the Royal Air Force with the aim of exposing Nazi crimes to the public in real time. In German. This is the second issue dropped by the Royal Air Force from a total series of four issues, focusing on exposing Nazi crimes on Polish soil. The leaflet quotes excerpts from radio broadcasts as well as from various writers, including Elisabeth Howard, Thomas Mann, Martin Yates, Richard Hillary, and others. The issue provides vital information as a real-time warning to the population – revealing, for example, how in Czechoslovakia nearly all secondary schools were closed, the teaching of Czech history was forbidden, replaced by lessons in Nazi ideology, and students were required to study German history for 16 hours a week. It further reports that ” a war of extermination is raging everywhere against the populations of the occupied territories, ” and that the Office of Racial Policy was cooperating ”in harmony and with efficiency” with the Gestapo death squads. A German general staff officer responded to the Mexican military attaché in Berlin, when asked what the Nazis would do to solve the problems of rebellion and starvation in Europe: ”All of Europe may starve, as long as our Wehrmacht receives sufficient supplies. We are determined to exterminate the entire civilian population rather than surrender.”  The leaflet also quotes senior German officials openly declaring their intent to commit genocide against the Jewish people. In June 1942, SS officer Best (Karl Rudolf Werner Best, 1903–1989—a Nazi German police chief, SS Obergruppenführer, party leader, and Nazi theorist from Darmstadt, Hesse. He was head of Department I of the Gestapo, the secret police of Nazi Germany, and initiated the registration of all Jews in Germany. As deputy to SS-Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, Best organized Einsatzgruppen death squads responsible for mass murder) was quoted in the Zeitsehrist für Politik (Journal of Politics) as saying: ”According to historical experience, the extermination and displacement of foreign peoples do not contradict the laws of life if they are carried out completely.” Also featured is a report from the ”Information Committee” stating that hundreds of thousands are being murdered daily solely because of their Jewish origin. The issue includes testimony from a physician in a suburb near Warsaw, describing arbitrary executions carried out by the Nazis as ”exemplary punishments” meant to instill terror in the population, as well as a report on a mass execution carried out by the Nazis in Zgierz (a city in the Łódź province of Poland) on 20 March 1942, where the victims were forced to dig their own graves before being murdered. A journalist named Walter Thomas explains that the intentions of Reich Minister of the Interior Heinrich Himmler went far beyond a German victory in the war, aiming at the complete purification of all Europe from so-called ”inferior” races. He quotes Himmler as saying at the time: ”Our task is not to Germanize the East in the old sense—that is, to teach the people living there the German language and German laws—but to ensure that only people of German blood and true German stock shall live in the East.” In addition, journalist Elisabeth Howard reports on the conditions of prisoners in concentration camps, among other topics. The issue features, among other, a photograph found in the clothing of a German officer who was killed, showing a row of people being executed by hanging. Another photograph shows German SS soldiers marching in parade, accompanied by a note stating that during the three years of war so far, approximately three million German soldiers have been killed—about one and a half million in combat, and another one and a half million from wounds, frostbite, and disease. The issue also includes several anti-Nazi political cartoons, and more. The ”Die andere Seite” (”The Other Side”) leaflets were dropped over Germany by the Royal Air Force from the autumn of 1942 until the spring of 1945. A total of four issues were dropped at different times, with the primary contributor being Thomas Mann. The leaflets were immediately destroyed by the German authorities, and harsh punishments were imposed on anyone found in possession of them. By the end of the war, these leaflets had become nearly impossible to find - hence their rarity. [1], 31 [1] pages. Light stains on cover. Good condition.