Most people associate the Holocaust mainly with the horrific mass killings in Nazi death camps. But even before those camps opened, the Einsatzgruppen—mobile “action groups” that traveled with German troops—systematically killed an estimated 1.5 million men, women, and children across occupied Eastern Europe. National Geographic goes to such sites as Eishyshok, Lithuania, where a survivor recalls the slaying of more than 3,400 Jews over two days. At Babi Yar, in the Ukraine, rare photos of victims’ belongings document the massacre of 33,771. Interviews with scholars and historians also throw light on this shocking chapter of World War II. Some images are graphic. Sunday, Aug. 2, at 10 p.m., National Geographic Channel
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