25 Facts About Arthur Greiser

1.

Arthur Karl Greiser was a Nazi German politician, SS-Obergruppenfuhrer, Gauleiter and Reichsstatthalter of the German-occupied territory of Wartheland.

2.

Arthur Greiser was one of the persons primarily responsible for organizing the Holocaust in occupied Poland and numerous other crimes against humanity.

3.

Arthur Greiser was arrested by the Americans in 1945, and was tried, convicted and executed by hanging in Poland in 1946.

4.

Greiser was born in Schroda, Province of Posen, Imperial Germany, Greiser was the son of a minor local bailiff.

5.

Arthur Greiser learned to speak Polish fluently during his childhood.

6.

Arthur Greiser served in the Kiel harbour naval forts at Korugen, Falckenstein, and in the fortress tower of Laboe from August 1914 to July 1915.

7.

Arthur Greiser was then assigned as an artillery observer in Flanders as well as participating in minesweeping operations in Friedrichsort.

8.

Arthur Greiser was later shot down and wounded by gunfire.

9.

Arthur Greiser was part of the SS empire whilst Forster was closely aligned with the Nazi Party Mandarins Rudolf Hess and later Martin Bormann.

10.

Arthur Greiser was accused by Poland as being directly responsible for escalating tensions between the Free City and the Republic of Poland in 1939.

11.

Immediately following the German invasion of Poland, Arthur Greiser was transferred from Danzig and on 8 September was appointed Chef der Zivilverwaltung im Militarbezirk Posen or Chief of Civil Administration in the military district of Posen, which was annexed to the German Reich on 8 October 1939.

12.

Arthur Greiser was an ardent racist who enthusiastically pursued an 'ethnic cleansing' program to rid the Warthegau of Poles and to resettle the 'cleansed' areas with ethnic Germans.

13.

Arthur Greiser was a tall man, you could see his arrogance, his conceit.

14.

Arthur Greiser was involved in the resettlement of German refugees from lands annexed to the Soviet Union in 1939 and 1940.

15.

However even Arthur Greiser was wary, noting that many were elderly and urbanized aristocrats with a strong class consciousness, not the virile peasant warrior types idolized by the SS.

16.

Arthur Greiser's Poznan was considered the Germanised city par excellence, and on 3 August 1943 he hosted a national gathering of Gauleiter and senior Nazis, including Martin Bormann, Joseph Goebbels and Heinrich Himmler.

17.

Arthur Greiser cut off support to the Church from the state and from outside influences such as the Vatican and Germany.

18.

The first transport arrived a few weeks later, and Arthur Greiser sought and received permission from Himmler to kill 100,000 Jews in his area.

19.

Arthur Greiser then instructed HSSPF Wilhelm Koppe to manage the overcrowding.

20.

Furthermore, on 6 October 1943 Arthur Greiser hosted a national assembly of senior SS officers in Posen at which Himmler candidly spoke of the mass executions of civilians.

21.

On 20 January 1945, Arthur Greiser ordered a general evacuation of Posen.

22.

Arthur Greiser left the city the same evening and reported to Himmler's personal train in Frankfurt an der Oder.

23.

Hitler had announced that Posen must be held at all costs, and Arthur Greiser was now viewed as a deserter and coward, particularly by Goebbels, who in his diary on 2 March 1945 labeled Arthur Greiser "a real disgrace to the Party", but his recommendations for punishment after the capture of Poznan were ignored.

24.

Arthur Greiser surrendered to the Americans in Austria in 1945.

25.

The Tribunal decided that Arthur Greiser was guilty of all charges and sentenced him to death by hanging, civil death, and confiscation of all his property.