"Guidelines for the Treatment of Political Commissars"

As Nazi leaders prepared to invade the Soviet Union, they planned a “war of annihilation” against those people they viewed as racial and political enemies of Nazi Germany.¹ Nazi ideology taught that Communism was a Jewish plot against Germany—a conspiracy theory known as “Judeo-Bolshevism.”² Because of this, German war planners sought to secure the areas behind the front lines against the supposed dangers posed by Jews and Communists.

The German Army High Command (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht [OKW]) issued several orders to German forces prior to attacking the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941. The first of these decrees instructed German military personnel to execute suspected partisans and to carry out mass reprisals against Soviet civilians. The decree also pardoned German troops in advance for war crimes committed during the occupation. Less than a week later, a second order reminded German troops that Communism was the "deadly enemy" of Nazi Germany, and that they should act ruthlessly against any resistance.³

The featured document, "Guidelines for the Treatment of Political Commissars," was the most infamous among these military orders. Issued on June 6, 1941, the so-called "Commissar Order” told German troops that they were to immediately separate out and execute captured members of the Soviet Communist Party deployed with military units.⁴ The OKW viewed these “commissars” as especially dangerous. They believed that the commissars were the source of “barbaric, Asiatic” methods of fighting and that eliminating them would ensure compliance among the remaining prisoners of war (POWs).⁵

By instructing German troops to execute captured soldiers, the Commissar Order was a clear violation of international laws governing the treatment of POWs.⁶ German authorities soon expanded this brutal policy to target other Soviet POWs, including Jews, state functionaries, and intellectuals captured by German forces. In the occupied Soviet Union, these prisoners were either executed by German troops or handed over to the SS to be shot. If these prisoners were discovered in camps in the German Reich, they were turned over to the Gestapo, taken to concentration camps, and executed there.⁷

Not all German troops and officers on the eastern front complied with the Commissar Order. Some refused either on moral grounds or because they reasoned that killing captured enemy soldiers only spurred the Red Army to fight harder. Nevertheless, a majority of German units—an estimated 85 percent—executed political commissars as directed.⁸ The exact number of prisoners killed is unclear, but it is likely that German forces executed at least 10,000 political commissars.

The OKW revoked the Commissar Order less than a year after the invasion of the Soviet Union.⁹ However, the first eight months of the war were marked by the highest rate of fatalities among Soviet POWs—more than 2 million died between June 1941 and February 1942.¹⁰

For more details on Nazi theories about race and national unity, see collections in the Experiencing History section, Belonging and Exclusion: Reshaping Society under Nazi Rule.

See Paul Hanebrink, A Specter Haunting Europe: The Myth of Judeo-Bolshevism (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2018).

The "Military Jurisdiction Decree" was issued on May 13, 1941. "The Guidelines for the Conduct of the Troops in Russia" followed on May 19, 1941. For more details, see Waitman Wade Beorn, Marching into Darkness: The Wehrmacht and the Holocaust in Belarus (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2014); and Felix Römer, "The Wehrmacht in the War of Ideologies," in Nazi Policy on the Eastern Front, 1941: Total War, Genocide, and Radicalization, ed. Alex J. Kay, Jeff Rutherford, and David Stahel (Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2012), 73–76.

These "commissars" were to provide political instruction for the soldiers and officers and maintain morale among the troops.

Geoffrey P. Megargee, War of Annihilation: Combat and Genocide on the Eastern Front, 1941 (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), 38–39. For more on the OKW’s motivations for targeting commissars, see Karel Berkhoff, "The Mass Murder of Soviet Prisoners of War and the Holocaust: How Were They Related?" in Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 6, no. 4: (2005), 789–796. See also Edward B. Westermann, "'War of Annihilation' in the Occupied Soviet Union, 1941–1942", in M. Fulbrook, J. Matthäus (eds.), Perpetrating the Holocaust: Policies, Participants, Places (The Cambridge History of the Holocaust, Vol. 2), (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2025), 356–376.

The order contravened the Hague and Geneva Conventions, which established a set of rules for the humane treatment of POWs. The period from the beginning of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941 to the spring of 1942 was marked by the highest rate of fatalities among Soviet POWs. For the first eight months of the war (June 1941 to February 1942), approximately 2 million Soviet POWs died out of a total of 3.35 million captured in that time, or 60 percent. Another 1.3 million Soviet POWs died over the next three years, bringing the total deaths to 3.3 million out of a total of 5.7 million POWs, or 58 percent. See Christian Streit, Keine Kameraden: Die Wehrmacht und die sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen, 1941-1945 (Bonn: J. H. W. Dietz, 1997), p. 10.

For more on the murder of captured Soviet POWs in Nazi concentration camps, see the related item in Experiencing History, "Hecatomb 1941." See also Bob Moore, Prisoners of War: Europe: 1939-1956 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022), 224–228.

To learn more, see Christian Gerlach, The Extermination of the European Jews (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016), 231; and Christian Streit, "The Fate of Soviet Prisoners of War," in A Mosaic of Victims: Non-Jews Persecuted and Murdered by the Nazis, ed. Michael Berenbaum (New York: NYU Press, 1990), 146-148.

See Christian Hartmann, Operation Barbarossa: Germany’s War in the East (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013).

For the first eight months of the war (June 1941 to February 1942), approximately 2 million Soviet POWs died out of a total of 3.35 million captured in that time, or 60 percent. Another 1.3 million Soviet POWs died over the next three years, bringing the total deaths to 3.3 million out of a total of 5.7 million POWs, or 58 percent. See Christian Streit, Keine Kameraden: Die Wehrmacht und die sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen, 1941-1945 (Bonn: J. H. W. Dietz, 1997), 10.

A scan of an original copy of the Commissar Order is presented here in part, including only pages 1 and 2. The above text represents an English translation of this public domain copy of the Commissar Order available through WikiMedia Commons. The below text is translated from an original copy of the Order held by the Bundesarchiv. BArch MA, RW 4/v. 578, Bl. 42-44.

[Initials] Top Secret Military Document 41

Armed Forces High Command Führer Headquarters, June 6, 1941
Armed Forces Operations Staff /
Dept. L (IV / Qu)
No. 44822/41 / Top Secret, for
General Officers Only

20 copies

Copy ___

In addition to the Führer’s decree of May 14 regarding the exercise of military jurisdiction in the “Barbarossa” zone (Armed Forces High Command / Armed Forces Operations Staff / Dept. L [Landesverteidigungsführungsamt = national defense] (IV/ Qu) [intelligence] No. 44718/41, Top Secret, for General Officers Only), Guidelines for the Treatment of Political Commissars are conveyed herewith.

You are requested to restrict the distribution to the Commanders in Chief of Armies or of Air Forces, respectively, and to have the junior commanders informed by word of mouth.

The Chief of the Armed Forces High Command
By order of
[signed] Warlimont

Distribution:

Ob.d.H. / Op.Abt. Copy 1
[Army High Command / Operations Dept.]

Ob.d.H. Gen Qu [Generalquartiermeister] Copy 2
[Army High Command, Quartermaster-General]

Gen.z.b.V. b.Ob.d.H. Copies 3 and 4
[General for special duties, attached to the Army High Command]

Ob.d.L. / Lw.Führ.Stab Copy 5
[Air Force High Command / Air Force Operations Staff]

Ob.d.L. Gen Qu Copy 6
[Air Force High Command, Quartermaster-General]

Ob.d.M. / Skl. Copy 7
[Navy High Command / Naval Warfare Command]

OKW / WFSt Copy 8
[Armed Forces High Command / Operations Staff]

OKW / L Copy 9
[ “ “ / National Defense]

OKW / L IV Copy 10
[“ “ / Intelligence]

OKW / W R Copy 11
[“ “ / Supply Matters]

OKW / W Pr. Copy 12
[“ “ / Propaganda Troops]

OKW / Ausl./Abw. Copy 13
[“ “ / Foreign Intelligence]

OKW / Abw. III Copy 14
[“ “ / Counterintelligence]

OKW / Reserve Copies 15—20

[ In reserve]
[Right of distribution list: Initials acknowledging receipt]

[Lower right, handwritten, further distribution:]

Military Commander [W.B = Wehrmachtbefehlshaber] Ostland Copy 15

Staff awaiting activation [Verfügungsstab] Frankfurt/O. Copy 16

” “ “ Breslau Copy 17

“ “ “ Vienna Copy 18

Military Commander Norway Copy 19

[Lower left]

SS Operational Headquarters [SS Führungshauptamt] Copy 20

Attn: SS Gruppenführer Jüttner

[Pg. 2]

42.

Top Secret Military Document

Enclosure to Armed Forces High Command / Dept. L IV / Qu
No. 44822 / 41 Top Secret, for General Officers Only

For Commanding Officers Only!
By Officer Only! [Initial] 600 / 42

Guidelines for the Treatment
of Political Commissars

In the fight against Bolshevism, we cannot expect that the enemy will act in accordance with the principles of humanity or of international law. In particular, we must anticipate that the political commissars of all types, who are the true linchpins of opposition, will treat our prisoners in a vitriolic, cruel, and inhumane manner.

The troops must realize that:

In this fight, it is wrong to treat these elements with clemency and in accordance with international law. They are a threat to our own security and to the swift pacification of the conquered territories.
The originators of the barbaric Asiatic methods of combat are the political commissars. They must be dealt with promptly and unhesitatingly, with the utmost severity.

Therefore, whenever captured while fighting or engaging in opposition, they must always be shot immediately.

Furthermore, the following instructions apply:

I. Zone of operations

1) Political commissars who oppose our troops are to be dealt with in accordance with the “Decree regarding the Exercise of Military Justice in the ‘Barbarossa’ Zone.” This applies to commissars of any type or position, even if they are only suspected of resistance, sabotage, or instigation thereto.

Reference is made to the “Guidelines for the Conduct of the Troops in Russia.”

/ 2.)

49.

[Pg. 3]

In addition, the following provisions shall apply:¹

2. Political commissars among the enemy troops are recognizable by their special insignia—a red star with a woven golden hammer and sickle on the sleeve…They are to be immediately—that is, while still on the battlefield—to be separated out. This is necessary to prevent them from having any possibility of influencing the other prisoners. These commissars shall not be treated as soldiers; the protections granted to soldiers by international law do not apply to them. After the separation is carried out, they are to be executed.

3. Political commissars who are not guilty of any enemy action or suspected as such are to be left unbothered for the time being. After further penetration into the country, it will be possible to decide whether the remaining functionaries can be left in place or whether they will be given over to the Sonderkommandos. The goal is that they will make this determination themselves. In adjudicating the question of “guilty or not guilty,” the personal impression of the general attitude and behavior of the commissar should be considered over the possibly unprovable facts of the case.

In cases 1. and 2., a short report (reporting form) about the case is to be made:

From the troops subordinate to a division to the divisional Ic [Abwehr] or,
From the troops who are directly subordinate to a corps, army command, or army group command to the corps or command Ic.

All of the aforementioned measures cannot interfere with carrying out combat operations. Planned search and cleansing actions by the combat troops must therefore be avoided.

II. In the Army Rear Areas

Commissars who are arrested for suspicious behavior in the Army Rear Areas are to be handed over to the Einsatzgruppen or Einsatzkommandos of the SD.

III. Restriction of Military Courts and Courts Martial

The military courts and courts martial of the regiments or commands cannot be entrusted with the execution of the measures under I. and II.

All 12 Items in the Soviet POWs in German Captivity Collection

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