Throughout the Second World War, there were a number of men who became known for their
brutality and evil, and they were associated with torture.
One man who became the Head of the Nazi Criminal Police, known as the Kripo was Arthur Nebe
who regularly rubbed shoulders with high ranking Nazis such as Heinrich Himmler, Martin Bormann
and Hitler himself.
Nebe was a man who was deeply involved with the exterminations and executions of millions
around Europe, and he had been involved in there actions of the Einsatzgruppen.
He even was tasked with experimenting on the best ways of killing, in which dozens of people
suffered at the hands of Arthur Nebe in horrific ways.
But he would become linked to the 20th July Plot that came close to killing Hitler, and
Nebe was tasked with leading police to go and kill Heinrich Himmler.
But he was betrayed by a mistress, and with this he was forced to experience the wrath
of Hitler, and he had a brutal execution.
Join us today as we look at the execution of Hitler’s Chief Torturer.
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Arthur Nebe was born in Berlin in November 1894, and he would volunteer to see action
during the First World War.
Following the conflict, he then became a member of the Kriminalpoleizei, or the Kripo the
Criminal police in Berlin.
He rose throughout the ranks assessing crime in the city for a number of years, but his
political beliefs saw him embrace the shift in politics in Germany when Adolf Hitler and
nazism rose to prominence.
But Nebe then joined the Nazi Party, and then became a member of the SS but he was the main
link with the nazis and the criminal police in Berlin.
He along with other Nazi detectives formed the National Socialist Civil Service Society
of the Berlin Police, and as time went on he gained further recognition inside of the
Nazi Party, and he became the Head of the Prussian Criminal Police.
However Nebe then became the Head of the Reich Criminal Police Office and was answerable
to Reinhard Heydrich, and Nebe helped to found the Nazi police state and instigate it.
But then Himmler in September 1939 created the Reich Security Main Office, encompassing
all the security and intelligence services including secret groups and the criminal police.
Nebe was now high ranking in this, and he had powers of arrest and detention, and the
Kripo under his command operated like the Gestapo, rounding people up and sending them
to concentration camps, and he also was responsible for torturing individuals heavily.
But then he was also involved in the Action T4 mass killing programme, in which thousands
were killed inside of a number of extermination centres across Germany.
But as the Second World War was ongoing across Europe, before the Nazi invasion of the Soviet
Union, Nebe was given command of Einsatzgruppe B, the Nazi death squad that would massacre
thousands following advances by the German Army.
They were responsible for the killings of thousands, and they would shoot innocent people
after forcing them to dig their own graves.
Nebe continued to command this group, and he set up a headquarters and the mass executions
of innocent people continued.
His troops were shooting hundreds of people each day, and Nebe claimed out day following
being let down by the amount of people his men killed that, ‘I gave orders to intensify
thee activities.’
Nebe realised that the Einsatzgruppe’s killing capacity was not good enough though, and he
then went to himmler to discuss other ways of killing instead of mass shootings.
He was concerned about the mental health of his SS men, having to kill dozens each day.
But Himmler asked Nebe to come up with a solution and a convienient way of killing.
They believed using carbon monoxide was not goo enough, and Nebe was then given a group
of Soviet psychiatric patients to experiment with.
Near to Minsk he tried to kill them using explosives, and it was said that ‘One of
the bunkers was loaded with explosives and 24 mental patients were put into it.
Nebe gave the signal to detonate, but the resultant explosion failed to kill the patients.
Several of them emerged from the bunker covered in blood and screaming loudly.
Thereupon more explosives were brought up, the wounded patients were forced back into
the bunker, and a second explosion finally finished the job.
The bunker had become quiet and parts of bodies could be seen hanging from nearby trees.’
It was horrifying, but then one evening Nebe fell asleep in his car after driving home
drunk, and he almost died from Carbon monoxide poisoning after he parked in his garage.
But then the exeperiments continued using gas, and Nebe considered making gas vans to
carry out the killing of dozens.
He was very senior in the SS and many high ranking Nazis were good friends with Arthur
Nebe.
But he spoke at the Mogilev conference, and he spoke about the SD’s involvement in fighting
partisans during the war, and he also spoke about continuing to suppress resistance using
brutality.
Following his speech, instruction was given to the German soldiers and Order Police groups
to increase the persecution and atrocities against civilians.
But whilst still being in control of Einsatzgruppe B, Nebe promoted his men to use mass hangings
to terrorise the locals.
He would hang many men who were considered partisans in front of huge crowds, and it’s
believed that his group were responsible for at least 50,000 people’s execution.
But after he came back to Berlin, Arthur Nebe remained the head of the Kripo even after
his friend Reinhard Heydrich was assassinated.
Nebe then took on the post of the President of the International Criminal Police Commission,
which is today known as Interpol.
However he would throughout the Second World War use his powers to torture and execute
many inside of Germany and outside.
His men would torture and interrogate brutally, with them even turning on women who would
be brutalised if they did not give over information.
Many of these women were marked as lost causes, and were then executed by Nebe’s officers
or other Wehrmacht Soldiers.
But one of his most notorious actions came in March 1944 as dozens of prisoners had escaped
from Stalag Luft III in what is known as ‘The Great Escape.’
These airmen had escaped by tunnelling under the barbed wire fence and making a run for
it in the forests.
Nebe was ordered by the Chief of the Gestapo to compile a list of 50 of the 73 escaped
and recaptured prisoners and his men were ordered to shoot these prisoners discreetly
and then deal with their bodies.
Many were taken into forests and were shot quietly.
But Nebe then continued to be involved in death and execution, as he suggested that
the Roma people held inside of Auschwitz should be used for medical experiments at other camps
such as Dachau.
However at some point, Arthur Nebe became involved in an act of resistance against Hitler
and the Nazi hierarchy that became infamous.
The July 20th Plot, or the Stauffenberg plot saw a high ranking German soldier plant a
bomb inside of Hitler’s Wolf’s lair that exploded.
Hitler was injured but not severely and the plot then was a way of seizing control of
Germany again and the coup would have seen Hitler’s death along with the other members
of his government.
This plot ultimately failed, but Arthur Nebe was roped into it and he was tasked with leading
a group of 12 policemen who would apprehend Heinrich Himmler the Head of the SS, and they
would then execute him.
But the order to act and do this never came, and when the plot failed Nebe went into hiding.
He was arrested in January 1945, and was then sentenced to death by the People’s court
on the 2nd March 1945, months before the war came to an end.
However Arthur Nebe’s execution would be one which would be absolutely brutal.
Adolf Hitler would order the executioner’s to tape the executions inside the execution
chamber of Plotzensee prison.
There was a guillotine there and also a hanging beam, and it would be on the wooden beam that
Nebe would meet his end.
He was brought into the chamber, after being beaten heavily and for his treason he was
then to be hanged, however it would be with piano wire as Hitler ordered the bomb plotters
to be hanged like cattle.
This wire was incredibly sharp and Nebe was lowered slowly so he started to suffocate
and it was a horrible way to go.
Many Historians have a negative view of Arthur Nebe due to his actions with the Einsatzgruppe
and the fact he was responsible fort the deaths of thousands and also the torture of thousands.
Despite the fact he was part of the July 20th Plot to kill Hitler which would have ended
the war, he was seen as a opportunistic mass murderer who wanted to inflict more murder
by being involved in the plot.
Other’s have claimed that Nebe was ‘a professional policeman and a very mild Nazi,’
who may have falsified the records of the Einsatzguppen, inflating these numbers.
However what cannot be disputed is the fact he was a brutal and barbaric man who did in
his role as the head of the criminal police inflict a huge degree of suffering.
But inside of an execution chamber at Plotzensee Prison, he was subjected to a horrific execution
on the hanging beam.
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