A special task force of more than 700 soldiers, it was created at the end of August 1944 to deport or murder the remaining Jews in Slovakia following the German suppression of the Slovak National Uprising.
During its seven-month existence, Einsatzgruppe H collaborated closely with the Hlinka Guard Emergency Divisions and arrested 18,937 people, of whom at least 2,257 were murdered; thousands of others were deported to Nazi concentration camps (primarily Auschwitz).
[9] Because of the advance of the Red Army into Poland, the Nazis wanted to deport Slovakia's remaining Jews to Auschwitz as soon as possible, as the camp would shut down its gas chambers in November.
[10] Einsatzgruppe H and its two main component units, Einsatzkommandos 13 and 14, were formed in Brno (in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia) upon the outbreak of the Slovak National Uprising, on 28 or 29 August.
[12] The unit also submitted regular, detailed reports to Berlin concerning all aspects of life in Slovakia, including the military situation, Jews, public opinion, and culture.
[8] SS General Gottlob Berger, who was appointed German military commander in Slovakia to suppress the uprising, and his superiors in Berlin, believed that the partisans would be defeated in a few days, despite warnings from Karl Hermann Frank and others.
Too few German troops were dispatched, so Einsatzgruppe H was drafted into active military actions, focusing on disarming Slovak Army units perceived to be unreliable.
[14][11] Two days after the outbreak of the rebellion, Witiska met with Berger; the German ambassador to Slovakia, Hans Ludin; Erich Ehrlinger of the RSHA; and Erwin Weinmann [de; fr; sv], the commander of the SS and SD in the Protectorate.
[17] Following the uprising, Einsatzgruppe H collaborated with the Hlinka Guard Emergency Divisions (POHG) and a local Volksdeutsche paramilitary organization, the Heimatschutz (HS), to create an atmosphere of terror in rural Slovakia, perpetrating public executions and massacres of Jews, Romani people, and those suspected of supporting partisans.
Except for zb-V Kommando 15, dissolved in February, the units continued to exist until the occupation of Slovakia by the Red Army, at which point most of the personnel fled into Moravia.
[22] Although the members of the unit were very diverse in terms of age, education, and affiliation with the Nazi Party, most had previous experience with combat or rear-area operations.
[22] 446 Jews were rounded up in western and central Slovakia by Einsatzkommando 13; they were held at Ilava prison before being deported from Žilina to concentration camps in Germany.
Einsatzkommando 14 advanced behind the SS front-line unit Kampfgruppe Schill [cs; sk] from Nitra to Topoľčany, where it set up a temporary headquarters.
[39][9] The unit captured the leaders of the uprising, Generals Jan Golian and Rudolf Viest, as well as a few American and British military personnel and German soldiers suspected of defeatism or homosexuality.
Only one man, Silvester Weiss, was ever indicted by a German court for crimes committed as part of the unit; he was born on 27 November 1925 in Slovakia and prosecuted under juvenile law in 1964.
Heuser, responsible for Einsatzkommando 14's massacres, rose to a senior position in the West German police service before being convicted for assisting in the murder of 11,000 people in and around Minsk as a member of the Gestapo.