This question is impossible to answer as it is because it could always be possible that a German soldier stuck his head into the dirt or was otherwise ignorant of affairs. For instance, some of the members of the Osttruppen (military units composed of personnel from the "East," from Cossacks to Koreans) did not speak a word of German and it is entirely possible that they had no idea what was going on. But outside of this kind of rare, specialized example?
While the multitude of German memoirs written after the war all deny Wehrmacht complicity in the Holocaust, the truth of the matter was that propaganda against the Jews was too strong and the scale of Nazi efforts too massive to be truly hidden. The Nazis did take some efforts to hide the extermination camps-for instance, the specifically extermination camps were primarily on Polish, not German soil (although some, such as Auschwitz, while it was on Polish territory, was technically on German land as Polish Silesia had been annexed into German Silesia). But other concentration camps, such as Bergen-Belsen, Buchenwald, and Sachsenhausen, were on German soil, and many prisoners died there although they were technically not extermination camps. Similarly, the Germans undertook efforts like Aktion 1005 to attempt to cover up the massacres perpetuated by the Nazi Regime such as the Einsatzgruppen. But while this may have given credence to an atmosphere of plausible deniability, the truth is always difficult to hide.
In the wake of the largest set of actions by the Einsatzgruppen in Operation Barbarossa, the Wehrmacht was required to cooperate with them and also to supply the identities of all Jews in their operational areas to the Einsatzgruppen for their murderous work. These commands made it from the high command down to the tactical level, so that most foot soldiers would have been aware of their presence to some degree. This was separate of course from actions of some Wehrmacht units to pursue massacre on their own initiative. Similarly, many anti-partisan activities-for instance, the Mogilev Conference-resulted in Wehrmacht complicity as they viewed all Jews as potential partisans and massacred them accordingly.
Even the more isolated units would have been prone to the notorious scuttlebutt that always occurs in large organizations. The scuttlebutt may have been confused or mistaken, as rumors usually are, but their existence was still a sign of knowledge. For instance, in his memoirs General Hermann Balck reported that a visiting officer from Galicia in what was then Poland, now Ukraine had
"...told us there were no more Jews there. To my question as to where they had gone, he stated that they had been moved and eliminated..."
But then another officer had mentioned that
"...he had been to Auschwitz and had seen the camps. He described enthusiastically how the Jews there were being prepared for their resettlement. He described the barns, the agriculture, schools, and such. I interjected, 'I thought the Galician Jews had all been killed.' 'But no, nobody harmed them; they are all well taken care of in Auschwitz.' "
Balck uses this as an example on how he and his fellow Wehrmacht members knew nothing about the Holocaust. In what essentially amounted to a "Grey" Code of Silence, most Wehrmacht officers categorically denied any knowledge of the events that transpired. But the guilt certainly was real. Balck, for instance, included in his published memoirs a letter that was written by a military acquaintance of Jewish descent that asked him why he supported such an evil regime. While he does not include his responses in his email the editor notes they exchanged in correspondence for some time and that the inclusion of this letter is significant.
The idea is such that while one can surely come with some kind of constructive scenario of how a given soldier could be utterly ignorant of the existence of evil in his homeland, there were too many vectors of communication for such knowledge to not be endemic. Between the sheer size of the event, to official orders and documentation, to powerful rumormongering caused by way too many people being involved, to even people who thought the events were a good thing and were telling their comrades "good news," people would have likely had some idea as to what fate was befalling the Jews and other persecuted peoples of Europe. While one could argue that knowledge of the extent of the camps varied more, you have to remember that Nazi propaganda had been going after the "Judeo-Bolshevist" complex for way too long for people to truly think nothing was going to happen.
Sources:
Richard Rhodes, Masters of Death
Smelsner and Davies: The Myth of the Eastern Front
Waitman Wade Beorn, Marching Into Darkness
There's certainly room for further answers specifically about this question, but if you're interested there's some excellent answers to similar questions by /u/commiespaceinvader, including:
and
Hope that helps!
It depends on what constitutes extermination camps. We know for a fact the troops were aware of the mass deaths of Soviet PoWs in Wehrmacht camps.1 Additionally, most troops were aware of the mass execution of Jews by Einsatzgruppen units. The extermination camps, as in Auschwitz, Treblinka and others are a bit more difficult. Reading transcripts of bugged German PoW conversations, Neitzel and Welzer in Soldaten found the Holocaust was only found in 0.2% of conversations.2 However, within these conversations, the PoWs exhibited remarkable knowledge on the extermination camps.
One PoW called Rudolf Muller testified:
I was in charge of the motor pool… and I was the second highest ranked person in the garage. I was supposed to adapt a truck by installing rubber inserts. I didn’t know for what, so I did it. The truck was sent out and placed at the disposal of local command . . . When the driver returned, he was as pale as a ghost. I asked him what was wrong, and he said he would never forget the experience of that day. He said ‘They loaded civilians into the back. They stuck a tailpipe back into the truck and sealed up the back. Next to me in the front sat an SS man with a pistol on his lap and ordered me to drive.’ He was only 18. What was he supposed to do? He drove off. The back was full of bodies. After half an hour they arrived at a pit. The back was full of bodies with some chlorine between them. He reversed and opened the hatch, and they tumbled out. Dead from exhaust fumes. The next day I received orders to deliver the truck to the local command. I said the truck wasn’t going anywhere. So I was brought up before a military tribunal for disobedience. They intentionally loaded in people and killed them with exhaust fumes. 3
Similarly, another officer in the Luftwaffe named Heimer told of Jews being killed by diverting gas into train cars.
… the Jews were always brought out of the house and then taken to the station. They could take food with them for two or three days, and then they were put in a long-distance train with the windows sealed up. And they were taken through to Poland, and just before their destination they pumped in some sort of stuff, some sort of gas, cool gas or nitrogen gas – anyway some odourless gas. 4
It is worth noting that Heimer recounted this story in late 1942, before gas chambers were built in Auschwitz. It is probably referring to Chelmno, though as Neitzel and Welzer point out, it conflates two characteristics of the Holocaust. The deceiving of Jews that they are being deported to work camps (They could take food with them for two or three days), the transportation (they were put in a long-distance train) and the eventual gassing (they pumped in some sort of stuff, some sort of gas, cool gas or nitrogen gas – anyway some odourless gas).
Even the secretive Aktion 1005 was known by some members, as PoW Rothkirch explains:
I was in charge of the guerrilla school where the men trained in guerrilla warfare; I went on an exercise and said: “Direction of march is up that hill.” The directors of the school then said to me: “That’s not a very good idea, sir, as they are burning Jews up there. I said: “Burning Jews? But there aren’t any Jews anymore.” “Yes, that’s where they were always shot and now they are being disinterred and again, soaked in petrol and burnt so that their bodies shan’t be discovered.” “That’s a dreadful job. There’s certain to be loose talk about it afterwards.” “Well, the men doing the job will be shot directly afterwards and burnt with them.”5
It’s simply impossible to know for certain how many men knew about this. However as the PoW protocols show, at least some of them were well aware of the Holocaust and held intimate knowledge on methods utilised to murder Jews, even if some of their accounts, such as Heimer’s, were inaccurate.
Neitzel & Welzer, Soldaten (Simon & Schuster 2011) 95
Ibid 110
Ibid 133-134
Ibid 154
Ibid 152-153
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