Hektor wrote: ↑Fri Feb 27, 2026 12:46 pm
The reason exterminationists jumped on the term
'Sonderbehandlung' was simply that they were desperate to have intentional killing of Jews to be documented. And as terms with -sonder- were pretty common this was a practical solution for their problem.
The Legal and Industrial Reality of Sonderbehandlung
The claim that the term
Sonderbehandlung (Special Treatment) was merely "jumped on" out of desperation ignores the specific administrative and legal framework of the camp system.
The term was formally codified under Aktion
14f13 (also documented as Sonderbehandlung 14f13). This was the administrative extension of the T4 programme into the concentration camps, where the sick, the elderly, and those deemed
arbeitsunfähig (unfit for work) were systematically culled.
The Legal Basis: The 1939 Protective Memorandum
This was not a general "common term"; it was a specific protective document signed by Hitler in October 1939 (backdated to Sept. 1). It was designed to shield physicians and administrators from prosecution for "mercy killings" by creating a specialised, bureaucratic lane for extermination that bypassed the standard German justice system.
The Continuity of "Special Treatment"
While the formal medical commissions of 14f13 were largely discontinued by 1943, the
1939 Protective Memorandum remained in force until the end of the war. It provided the legal "umbrella" for what is known as
"Wild Euthanasia," where camp doctors continued to kill those who were no longer productive—often due to the brutal conditions of labour transports like those found in Fplo 587. The lack of production was not arbitrary; it was usually the result of terminal illness or industrial exposure.
Case Study: The HASAG Industrial Pipeline
Transports to HASAG (Hugo Schneider AG) munitions plants, such as those at Skarżysko-Kamienna, required constant replacement labour because prisoners were being poisoned by daily TNT or picric acid exposure. This exposure caused systemic organ failure, famously turning the skin and hair of the "Yellow Ladies" bright yellow.
At these plants, the "doctor" functioned as an industrial inspector:
- The Diagnosis: If a worker was terminally poisoned, the doctor's "medical input" was simply to confirm the person was a "total loss" to the war effort.
- The Execution: Following this medical "clearance," the factory guards (Werkschutz) or the Schupo would carry out the "dispatch" in nearby forests. Legally, the guards were not "murdering"; they were "executing a medical directive" authorised by the doctor’s prior assessment under the 1939 Memorandum.
Under the "Führer’s Will," a doctor did not have to be physically present at the moment of death. Their legal role was to provide the initial authorisation by diagnosing the individual as
unheilbar krank (incurably ill) or
arbeitsunfähig (incapable of work). To dismiss
Sonderbehandlung as a "practical solution" for historians is to ignore the primary documents that provided the legal immunity for this exact process.
Hitler's Protective Memorandum
Original German Text (Nuremberg Doc PS-630):
Berlin, den 1. Sept. 1939.
Reichsleiter Bouhler und Dr. med. Brandt sind unter Verantwortung beauftragt, die Befugnisse namentlich zu bestimmender Ärzte so zu erweitern, dass nach menschlichem Ermessen unheilbar Kranken bei kritischster Prüfung ihres Krankheitszustandes der Gnadentod gewährt werden kann.
— Adolf Hitler
Translation:
Berlin, 1 September 1939
Reichsleiter Bouhler and Dr. Brandt, M.D. are charged with the responsibility of enlarging the authority of certain physicians to be designated by name in such a manner that persons who, according to human judgment, are incurable can, upon a most careful diagnosis of their condition of sickness, be accorded a mercy death.
— A. Hitler
This memorandum was never rescinded. I will be posting further context regarding the Corfu transportation, specifically the medical consequences (acute renal failure) that resulted from 9 days without water, rendering the transport "terminally ill" and thus eligible for "Special Treatment" under this specific legal framework.