At the trial, Ohlendorf attempted to present the operations in the Soviet area "not as a racist programme for the annihilation of all the Jews ... but as a general liquidation order primarily aimed at 'securing' the newly won territory".[53] Defending his actions, Ohlendorf compared the Einsatzgruppen actions to the Biblical Jewish extirpation of its enemies; he likewise claimed that his firing squads were "no worse than the 'press-button killers' who dropped the atom bomb on Japan".[54]