Eichmann on the Beginning of Deportations from Western Europe

(June 22, 1942)

After having completed the main arrangements for the beginning of the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question” in Western Europe, including determining the numbers of Jews to be deported from each country on first instance, Eichmann apprised his counterpart at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of this information in order to obtain his consent for Belgium and France. The following is the express letter containing these details, sent to him on June 22, 1942. The deportations began three weeks later.

Commander of the Security Police and SD
Berlin, 22 June 1942
Express letter

Secret

[...]

Subject:Labor mobilization [ Arbeitsensatz ] of Jews from France, Belgium and the Netherlands.
Re:Telephone call of 20.6.42

Arrangements have been made that from mid-July / the beginning of August of this year Jews will be sent for labor in the Auschwitz camp, in special trains that will leave every day, which have room for 1,000 people—first of all about 40,000 Jews from the occupied French territory, 40,000 Jews from the Netherlands, and 10,000 Jews from Belgium.
The people who are included are first of all Jews who are fit for labor, if they are not intermarried or hold the nationality of the British Empire, the USA, Mexico, enemy countries in Central or South America, or neutral or Allied countries.

I hope you will respond positively, and I assume that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has no objection to these measures.

Upon order:
(signed) Eichmann

Source: Nuremberg Documents, IMT, NG-183.