Punitive Wehrmacht operation in the Greek village of Kondomari 2 June 1941

31 May 1941 on Crete a small detachment of German paratroopers was ambushed in the small village of Kondomari. Several Germans were killed, with forks and axes featured as a murder weapon. 2 June, the 3 th paratroop battalion of the first air division under the command of Lieutenant Horst Trebes appeared in Kondomari. shot them. The shooting was the first of its kind in occupied Europe. The village was burned.

Formally, the reason for the shooting was the fact that several corpses of paratroopers were found in the vicinity of the village. The reasons for their death could not be reliably ascertained, as the corpses were in the decomposition stage. The agitated paratroopers found traces of supposedly posthumous mockery on their bodies, but in fact these injuries could be due to the fact that the bodies were surrounded by animals. Outer clothing was removed from some corpses. During a search in the village, a jacket of a German paratrooper was found in one of the houses. When she was examined, a bullet hole was discovered, as the Germans thought, from a sniper's shot.

Horst Trebes himself in a few days received from Gering the Knight's Cross for the heroism shown in the capture of Crete. 3 a year later, in 1944, he died in Normandy.

With German thoroughness, Wehrmacht propaganda officer Peter Wexler fixed the entire punitive action on his camera. That's the whole story. One of the tiny episodes of the Second World War.

At dawn, the Germans are blocking the village around the perimeter, blocking the path of departure

The main parts of the Germans are part of a Greek village. Punitive operation begins

The village is being combed, all residents without exception are arrested

The Greeks still do not understand how it will end, and almost calm

All villagers lead to the outskirts

This one on the right, wearing a helmet, constantly entering the frame is a translator. Through it the Germans communicate with the locals.

While residents are gathered on the outskirts, the village is searched

Found German tunic. Horst Trebes carefully examines her and decides that she is pierced by a sniper's bullet.

The last paratroopers are returning with the report that there is no one else in the village.

Residents are trying to understand what will happen next

Germans separate all men from 16 to 55 years from the villagers as potential partisans

This is the village headman. He explains to the Germans through a translator that the inhabitants are not related to the partisans

But the decision to shoot has already been made, the eyes of the Germans are indifferent, nothing can be changed

The elder realized that it was useless to object

All previously selected men line up

The Germans are discussing the details of the shooting

Those who have been convicted are already aware of what awaits them, but still hope that this is a mistake or just a threat.

It's hard to believe that in a few minutes they will kill your relatives

For the Germans, this is not unusual. War ... They stare at the photographer with curiosity, his apparatus is much more interesting to them than what is happening around

While the details of the shooting are discussed, women, children and old people are kept at a distance from those sentenced

The discussion is over. Women, children and old people, without explaining anything, are ordered to clear the territory

Women, children and old men are escorted to the other end of the village.

Formed firing squad

Recent attempts to say and explain something ... But the faces are already terrified by the inevitable

Pleas for mercy in the last seconds of life

Shooting

But this is not a Sonderkommand, not an SS. This is the elite of the German army ...

Comments

[Good cat]

Here it is ordinary fascism

[Yun Klob]

And this is all Germans.

[Flex]

it’s not fascism - the Germans are a nation of scum, they have always been cruel throughout their history and love for small dogs, and we must call a spade a spade our adversary in the Great Patriotic War, it was Germany if you want Germans and Nazis are synonyms

[Nonik]

The Americans in Vietnam did even worse - they just killed everyone, including children. Just brutalized completely from the war.
And here the same thing, it seems to me. They were convinced that it was a "partisan". Or maybe it was. Damn it with two already installed.

[Fox]

old evidence that there is NO PEOPLE IN WAR A war has come — take up arms.

[Gomunkul]

old evidence that there is NO PEOPLE IN WAR A war has come — take up arms.

Unfortunately you are right, you cannot maintain neutrality when invaders came to your land.

[tokin1959]

these people delved into their gardens, grazed their goats, neither the radio nor the newspapers at that time.
ordinary people, they don’t give a damn about politics, they just lived their own little world, raised children.
how do they know - who, what, how, and for what is fighting and fighting.
it's easy to discuss people until you yourself are in this situation.

[Gomunkul]

these people delved into their gardens, grazed their goats, neither the radio nor the newspapers at that time.
ordinary people, they don’t give a damn about politics, they just lived their own little world, raised children.
how do they know - who, what, how, and for what is fighting and fighting.
it's easy to discuss people until you yourself are in this situation.

Try to read more carefully the comments of people, we did not condemn them in our statements. The idea was expressed that it is not possible to maintain neutrality (especially for men of military age) when invaders come to your land!

[nnz226]

As Don Rumata said ("It's hard to be a god"): "Whoever tries to sit out the most, those are the most slaughtered!"

[Alez]

Condemning fascism, I would like to add would Bandera, would kill the elderly, women and children. That is, Bandera is evil among evil.

[Same lech]

Thanks to the author ... there are photos that I have not seen.

Someone from the pseudo-historians fervently claimed that the ordinary VERMAHT of GERMANY did not participate in punitive actions, but these photos cannot be falsified and impossible to reject .... this is the truth against which the liars are powerless trying to convince us that the German soldiers were noble fighters against Bolshevism in RUSSIA.

In UKRAINE local Zombie Natsik would say that the Greeks themselves shot themselves (as they say about Odessa Khatyn).

[Jipo]

I read Skorzeny's memoirs, everything is written in the style of the legends about the Knights of the Round Table. The Germans fought honestly - they are not against them, there were few of them - there are many "Ivanov", courage on the front lines - betrayal in the rear, not a word about Jews and concentration camps, the victors are sadists and uro ... oh, Hitler is great, but Himler, Goering and others cheated. Approximately so Europe now, at that time and show, with the exception of Hitler, something there "about mothers and fathers" series for example. After seeing it, the Nazis also want to come to the rescue, such terrible Bolsheviks and "Mongols" are all around.

[Victor1]

there were about 20 men there, they didn’t tie anyone, their arms and legs were free, the Germans were relaxed, they were standing nearby, they were 100% sure that no one would attack. When it was clear that they were going to be shot, was it really impossible to try to attack the enemy, grab a weapon and carry as much as possible. Can only Russians think that way?

[Same lech]

Shepherds, winegrowers and probably never shot in their lives ... civilians they are not obliged to rush into the embrasures and do not even know how to do it.

[tokin1959]

the village is small.
they may not even have fought each other in their entire lives.
all know each other, all friends are relatives.
ordinary peaceful calm people.
in addition, when trying to resist in revenge, they could also shoot women with children.
who will you rush to if your wife and children are near the gunpoint?

[Victor1]

answer to three.
Enough to idealize a similar situation.
My hut’s position on the edge, I don’t know anything, I never brought it to good. There is a war, the second world war, the war against the Nazis. Taking care of children and relatives, he must be prepared in such conditions to ensure that they run away from the village at the time of entry of enemies. Instead, everyone went out to meet them, but where are the guarantees that they will not kill everyone else after the men? Negotiations with the Nazis? If you are already killed, do not try to do at least something? Have you looked at the funny faces? they don’t care, and as was noted, the camera cares more, which means that such a penalty is not the first for them to come to an agreement with them? can they be trusted? let them then mock and rape the rest?
It’s a very simple position, to die without making any attempts, to become a victim, let them regret, you look and put up a monument, it’s very convenient, and most importantly you don’t need to do anything ...
If an enemy enters the village, the first thing you must do is hide your children so that they run away and survive.
And then protect yourself, loved ones, the land, the homeland by any means. They would have attacked the whole crowd, maybe they would have taken away an officer and a couple of soldiers, already something.
Different conditions are all the more so in a war, and each decides how to proceed in his own way. Europe surrendered and was completely enslaved by Nazi-fascist Germany, the Russian Land remained standing to the last and Won.

[Jipo]

The Greeks, by the way, fought well - they defeated the Italians, but they did not fight against the Germans, just like the British who were there, by the way. But then, who was the rival to the Germans then, they managed to get to Moscow while ours could give them a thrashing.

[Busido]

Only yourself can be saved, as you say. And around everything and everything that you know. And again. When in the morning there were plans, to water the garden, vegetable garden, but in the neighboring village they asked to patch up the cart, but here ... And only special heroes in the books there are, "somewhere out there", but here people ... People are like people. Any death, it's so banal. It hurts so much, it's so familiar ... The world doesn't change. Because nobody (everything) - they are afraid to think. To think for what will become later, for the fact that any lawlessness (evil) will be punished. Any ... Anyone will receive an answer. The answer will not ask, he will just ask questions, he will just say that he has come to your life. Hello. To call this answer, there are no eternal. We are all mortal and everything ... !!!!!! Long ago, already in the 16-17 century we could go into space, so no, we chop everything, but we chop each other. sawing, annexing. How many people died in wars? How many "young" each "virtually" slaughtered another? Where, bl ..., mind? Where bl ..., soul? Only we know everything - the law, order, order. This is LIFE ?! 21st century for everyone according to the calendar .......

[11111mail.ru]

A la guerre comme a la guerre ... Not only combatants die. Why burn Dresden, Hiroshima, Nagasaki?

[I am]

Right It was these cities that could not be burned, but Washington and London had to.

[parus2nik]

The same thing in Ukraine now ...

[Knizhnik]

"But this is not a Sonderkommando, not an SS. This is the elite of the German army ..." This is for those who argue that the Wehrmacht just fought, and the civilian population was destroyed by the Sonderkommando of defectors and policemen

[super-vitek]

Guys do not put a "plus" on such articles !!! Somehow it is not human. Thank you to the author can be expressed in comments, the work has been done and one more gap in the history of VM, the author is open for me, but putting a "plus" hand will not rise !!! horror, everything is so mundane, just came, just KILLED !!! Reminds Mariupol, Odessa only the year 2014 !!!

[smile]

super-vitek
You know, it’s just the way it happens ... they just came .... they just killed .... both in Odessa and Mariupol haven’t just so .... they haven’t had time for the neo-Nazis to get used to and treat their deeds as to work ... while they are still trying to expose it as a feat and arrange it as a performance, a flash mob ... but the essence is the same ... fascists .... just came and just killed .... And why the article minus? Because it is objective? For what shows what war is according to the rules of the Nazis? Do you think the Neo-Bandera will act very differently?

[super-vitek]

It is not correctly understood by those who are minusting me !!! The article is informative, informative, but how can I put PLUS!

[kostas]

The punitive operation in Ari is the first such crime on the territory of Greece and Europe, too, and then tens, hundreds of such operations both from the Germans and their allies to occupy the country i.e. Italy and the Bulgarians followed. In Ari, the Germans avenged huge losses, about 7 thousand parachutists, the so-called elite troops after that were not massively used anywhere else. The total number of occupation troops from 1941 to 1945 reached 300 thousand soldiers and officers. (Germany up to 120 thousand Italy in 140 thousand Bulgaria 40 thousand.) They resisted up to 150 thousand Partisans of the National Liberation Movement, other partisan formations. The list of crimes of the invaders is endless, here are some of them ... The city of Drama in the north of the country from September 28 to 29, 1941, the Bulgarians brutally crushed the uprising, about 3 thousand people of local residents died. 117 men were shot by the city of Ellason; 1943 men between the ages of 1104 and 14 were shot by the Germans in the city of Kalavrita in 70. The country lost 10% of the population as a result of war and occupation , the entire infrastructure was completely destroyed. In one word, we made our worthy contribution to the victory over fascism. A little more about Crete, the island is based on the 15th division of the Cretans, which is outfitted with local residents and unfortunately for the period of the battle for Crete this diva. It was located in Albania, and the population of Crete before the war was disarmed by the dictatorship of Metax, so I had to meet the Germans with axes and pitchforks.