Operation Tannenberg
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Operation Tannenberg (German: Unternehmen Tannenberg) was a codename for one of the anti-Polish extermination actions by Nazi Germany.[3] The shootings were conducted with the use of a proscription list (Sonderfahndungsbuch Polen) targeting Poland’s elite, compiled by the Gestapo in the two years before the invasion of Poland.[4]
Operation Tannenberg Unternehmen Tannenberg | |
---|---|
Part of Generalplan Ost | |
Location | German-occupied Poland |
Date | September 1939 – January 1940 |
Target | Poles |
Attack type | Genocidal massacre, mass shooting |
Weapons | Firearms |
Deaths | 20,000 deaths (during 1–2 months)[1][2] in 760 mass executions by SS Einsatzgruppen |
Perpetrators | Nazi Germany |
The secret lists identified more than 61,000 members of the Polish elite: activists, intelligentsia, scholars, clergy, actors, former officers and others, who were to be interned or shot. Members of the German minority living in Poland assisted in preparing the lists.[4]
Operation Tannenberg was followed by the shooting and gassing of hospital patients and disabled adults, as part of the wider Aktion T4 programme.[5][lower-alpha 1]