Into That Darkness: An Unprecedented Portrait of Franz Stangl, Commandant of Treblinka - Gitta Sereny [epub]

Based on 70 hours of interviews with Franz Stangl, commandant of Sobibor and Treblinka (the largest of the extermination camps), this book bares the soul of a man who continually found ways to rationalize his role in Hitler's final solution.

Stangl was appointed by Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler to be the first commandant of Sobibor extermination camp where he was commandant from April 28 to the end of August 1942. On August 28, 1942, Odilo Globocnik ordered Stangl to become Kommandant at the newly opened but disorganized death camp Treblinka. Stangl assumed command of Treblinka on September 1, 1942. He usually wore a white uniform and carried a whip, which caused prisoners to nickname him the "White Death".

He later claimed (while in prison) that his dedication had nothing to do with ideology or hatred of Jews. He said he matter-of-factly viewed the prisoners as material objects rather than people, including their extermination: "That was my profession. I enjoyed it. It fulfilled me. And yes, I was ambitious about that, I won't deny it."

Stangl accepted and grew accustomed to the killings, perceiving prisoners not as humans but merely as "cargo" that must be destroyed. Stangl accepted the extermination of the Jews as a fact. He is quoted as saying: "To tell the truth, one did become used to it... they were cargo. I think it started the day I first saw the Totenlager [extermination area] in Treblinka. I remember Wirth standing there, next to the pits full of black-blue corpses. It had nothing to do with humanity — it could not have. It was a mass — a mass of rotting flesh. I rarely saw them as individuals. It was always a huge mass. I sometimes stood on the wall and saw them in the "tube" — they were naked, packed together, running, being driven with whips..."

In September 1942, Stangl supervised the building of new, larger gas chambers to augment the previously existing gas chambers. According to Jankiel Wiernik: "When the new gas chambers were completed, the Hauptsturmführer [Stangl] came and remarked to the SS men who were with him: "Finally the Jewish city is ready."