This is a study of some of the rank-and-file men, the foot soldiers, who carried out the "Final Solution." The Trawniki concentration camp in Poland was used by the SS to train more than 5,000 men in the execution of mass murder. Of these 5,000, most were Eastern Europeans recruited from POW camps, including a large Ukrainian contingent. “Trawnikis” were distributed throughout the concentration camp system, with particular prominence in the extermination camps of Aktion Reinhard. Trawnikis formed the firing squads during Ghetto liquidations, operated gas chambers, and carried out various other violent tasks deemed burdensome by German planners. This book will explore who these men were, and give a face to those faceless enforcers of the Holocaust.

"This book is a study of some of the rank-and-file men, the foot soldiers, who carried out the "Final Solution." The Trawniki Guards were a group of some 5,000 men--some of whom were Soviet prisoners of war, and some civilians, primarily Ukrainians--the Germans recruited during WWII to aid them in murdering the Jews of Europe in an operation known as Aktion Reinhard. upon completion of Aktion Reinhard (an operation that murdered an estimated 1.5 million Jews, or one in four of all Holocaust victims), the Trawnikis were also used to guard concentration camps in Germany and Austria. These are the men who shot people and worked at the gas chambers. This book will explore who they were, and give a face to those faceless enforcers of mass murder"--Inside cover