Barbarossa decree

Common card · No. 374937

The Military Justice Decree (German: Kriegsgerichtsbarkeitserlass), commonly known as the Barbarossa decree, was one of the criminal orders of the Wehrmacht issued by Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel on 13 May 1941. The decree declared that the upcoming Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union, would be a war of extermination and endorsed war crimes against Soviet civilians. The Barbarossa decree was laid out by Adolf Hitler during a high-level meeting with military officials on 30 March 1941, where he declared the political and intellectual elites of the Soviet Union would be eradicated by German forces, in order to ensure a long-lasting German victory. Hitler underlined that executions would not be a matter for military courts, but for the organised action of the military. The decree was issued by Keitel a few weeks before Operation Barbarossa, exempting punishable offences committed by enemy civilians from the jurisdiction of military justice. Suspects were to be brought...

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