VOLUME V

O F F I C I A L T E X T

I N T H E

ENGLISH LANGUAGE

P R O C E E D I N G S

9 January 1946 — 21 January 1946

CONTENTS

Thirtieth Day, Wednesday, 9 January 1946, Morning Session 1 Afternoon Session 31

Thirty-first Day, Thursday, 10 January 1946, Morning Session 65 Afternoon Session 100

Thirty-second Day, Friday, 11 January 1946, Morning Session 131 Afternoon Session 159

Thirty-third Day, Monday, 14 January 1946, Morning Session 197

Thirty-fourth Day, Tuesday, 15 January 1946, Morning Session 230 Afternoon Session 260

Thirty-fifth Day, Wednesday, 16 January 1946, Morning Session 296 Afternoon Session 329

Thirty-sixth Day, Thursday, 17 January 1946, Morning Session 368 Afternoon Session 399

Thirty-seventh Day, Friday, 18 January 1946, Morning Session 434 Afternoon Session 459

Thirty-eighth Day, Saturday, 19 January 1946, Morning Session 489

Thirty-ninth Day, Monday, 21 January 1946, Morning Session 520 Afternoon Session 547

THIRTIETH DAY Wednesday, 9 January 1946

_Morning Session_

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE (Deputy Chief Prosecutor for the United Kingdom): If the Tribunal please, when the Tribunal adjourned I had just dealt with the last of the two Norway documents, which I how put in as Exhibits GB-140 and GB-141. Their numbers are 004-PS and D-629.

My Lord, for convenience the first document, to which I shall refer in a few minutes, will be Document Number 1871-PS.

THE PRESIDENT (Lord Justice Sir Geoffrey Lawrence): I have that here.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: My Lord, before I come to that, I just want to say one word about the aggression against the Low Countries—Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg.

The facts as to the aggression against these countries, during the period when this defendant was Foreign Minister, were stated in full by my friend Mr. Roberts, and I think if I give the Tribunal the reference to the transcript at Pages 1100 to 1125 (Volume III, Pages 289 to 307), I do not need to detain the Tribunal on that part of the case. I only remind the Tribunal that the action of this defendant as Foreign Minister to which attention may be called is the making of a statement on the 10th of May 1940 to representatives of the foreign press with regard to the reasons for the German invasion of the Low Countries; and these reasons were, in my respectful submission, demonstrated to be false by the evidence called by Mr. Roberts, which appears in that part of the transcript.

My Lord, I then proceed to the aggression in southeastern Europe against Greece and Yugoslavia, and the first moment of time in that regard is the meeting at Salzburg in August 1939, at which the Defendant Von Ribbentrop participated, when Hitler announced that the Axis had decided to liquidate certain neutrals. That is Document 1871-PS, which I now put in as Exhibit GB-142, and the passage to which I should like to refer the Tribunal is on Page 2 of the English version, two-thirds down the page in the middle of the fifth paragraph, six lines from the top. Your Lordship will find the words “Generally speaking.”

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I desire to quote from there:

“Generally speaking, it would be best to liquidate the pseudo-neutrals one after the other. This is fairly easily done if one Axis partner protects the rear of the other, as the latter finishes off one of the uncertain neutrals. Italy may consider Yugoslavia such an uncertain neutral. At the visit of Prince Regent Paul he (the Führer) suggested, particularly with regard to Italy, that Prince Paul clarify his political attitude towards the Axis by a gesture. He had thought of a closer connection with the Axis and the withdrawal of Yugoslavia from the League of Nations. Prince Paul agreed to the latter. Recently the Prince Regent was in London and sought reassurance from the Western Powers. The same thing was repeated that happened in the case of Gafencu, who was also very reasonable during his visit to Germany and who denied any interest in the aims of the Western Democracies. Afterwards it was learned that he had later assumed a contrary standpoint in England. Among the Balkan countries the Axis can completely rely only on Bulgaria, which is, in a sense, a natural ally of Italy and Germany.”

Then missing a sentence:

“At the moment of a turn for the worse for Germany and Italy, however, Yugoslavia would join the other side openly, hoping thereby to give matters a final turn to the disadvantage of the Axis.”

That demonstrates the policy with regard to uncertain neutrals.

Then, as early as September 1940 this defendant reviewed the war situation with Mussolini. This defendant emphasized the heavy revenge bombing raids in England and the fact that London would soon be in ruins. It was agreed between the parties that only Italian interests were involved in Greece and Yugoslavia and that Italy could count on German support.

Then Von Ribbentrop went on further to explain to Mussolini the Spanish plan for the attack on Gibraltar and Germany’s participation therein and that he was expecting to sign the protocol with Spain, bringing the latter country into the war, on his return to Berlin.

This is Document 1842-PS, which is the next document in the book to the one at which the Tribunal has just been looking, and the passage with regard to Greece and Yugoslavia occurs in the middle of the first page—if I might just read a very short extract:

“With regard to Greece and Yugoslavia the Foreign Minister stressed that it was exclusively a question of Italian interests, the settling of which was a matter for Italy alone and in which Italy would be certain of Germany’s sympathetic assistance.”

I don’t think I need trouble the Tribunal with the rest.

THE TRIBUNAL (Mr. Francis Biddle, member for the United States): I think you had better read the next paragraph.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: “But it seemed to us to be better not to touch on these problems for the time being, but instead to concentrate on the destruction of England with all our forces. Where Germany was concerned, she was interested in the northern German districts (Norway, _et cetera_), and this was acknowledged by the Duce.”

I am very grateful to you, Your Honor. That I put in as Exhibit GB-143.

A month or two later, in January 1941, at the meeting between Hitler and Mussolini, in which this defendant participated, the Greek operation was discussed. Hitler had stated that the German troops in Romania were for use in the planned campaign against Greece. That document is C-134, which was put in as Exhibit GB-119, and therefore I do not propose to give it again but to give the Tribunal the reference to the points which are mentioned at the foot of Page 3 of the English text.

With regard to that meeting there is a cross-reference in Count Ciano’s diary, Count Ciano having attended as Italian Foreign Minister, and he recalls his impression of that meeting in the diary for the 20th and 21st of January by saying:

“The Duce is pleased with the conversation on the whole. I am less pleased. Above all, because Ribbentrop, who had always been so boastful in the past, told me, when I asked him outright how long the war would last, that he saw no possibility of its ending before 1942.”

Despite that somewhat pessimistic statement to Count Ciano, a short time later, 3 weeks later, when it was a question of encouraging the Japanese, this defendant took a more optimistic line.

On the 13th of February 1941 he saw Ambassador Oshima, the Japanese Ambassador, and that conversation appears in Document 1834-PS, which is Exhibit USA-129. That was read previously, and again I simply give the reference on Page 3 of the English version.

The second from the last paragraph dealt with the optimistic account of the military position and the position of Bulgaria and Turkey. I do not think I need read it further, but I will give the Tribunal the reference.

Then after that, in March, this defendant put forth his efforts to get Yugoslavia to join the Axis, and on the 25th of March the defendant, in a note to the Prime Minister Cvetković—and this is Document 2450-PS, which is Exhibit GB-123—gave the assurance:

“The Axis-Power Governments, during this war, will not direct a demand to Yugoslavia to permit the march or transportation of troops through the Yugoslav state or territory.”

After that, it is only fair to point out that there was the _coup d’état_ in Yugoslavia. General Simovic took over the government; and two days after the assurance which I just read, at the meeting of the 27th of March 1941, at which this defendant was present, Hitler outlined the military campaign against Yugoslavia and promised the destruction of Yugoslavia and the demolition of Belgrade by the German Air Force. That is contained in Document 1746-PS, which is Exhibit GB-120; and that was read by my friend, Colonel Phillimore at an earlier stage so I do not need to read it again.

The final action of this defendant with regard to Yugoslavia was that after the invasion of Yugoslavia Von Ribbentrop was one of the persons directed by Hitler to draw up the boundaries for the partition and division of Yugoslavia. The preliminary directive for that is Document 1195-PS, which I now put in as Exhibit GB-144.

We now come to the aggression against the Soviet Union, and the first. . .

THE PRESIDENT: Has that been read, 1195?

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: No, it has not. I am much obliged, Your Lordship. I will now read the relevant sentence with regard to this.

On Page 2, Section 2, Your Lordship will see the words “the drawing up of boundaries.” And in Paragraph 1 it says:

“Insofar as the drawing up of boundaries has not been laid down in the above Part I, it will be carried out by the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces in agreement with the Foreign Office,”—that is this defendant—“the Delegate for the Four Year Plan,”—the Defendant Göring—“and the Reich Minister of the Interior.”

THE PRESIDENT: Who is the Reich Minister of the Interior?

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I think the Defendant Frick.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I think it is.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: My Lord, I am grateful to Your Lordship. I had forgotten that had not been read before.

Now then, as I say, we come to the aggression against the Soviet Union; and the first document which has not been put in so far, which I now put in as Exhibit GB-145, is TC-25, the German-Soviet Non-aggression Pact.

On 23 August 1939 this defendant had signed the German-Soviet Non-aggression Pact. Now the first point at which this defendant seems to have considered special problems of aggression against the Soviet Union was just after the 20th of April 1941, when the Defendant Rosenberg and this defendant met or communicated to consider the problems which were expected to arise in Occupied Eastern Territory. This defendant appointed his Counselor, Grosskopf, to be his liaison man with Rosenberg and also assigned a consul general called Bräutigam, who had many years experience in the U.S.S.R., as collaborator with Rosenberg. That is shown in Document 1039-PS, which is already Exhibit USA-146. I did not propose to read it again, as it had been read. But the passage to which I have referred is the first paragraph on the top of Page 2, beginning, “After notification to the Reich Foreign Minister.” It is that paragraph which I have just mentioned.

That was in April 1941. The following month, on 18 May 1941, the German Foreign Office prepared a declaration setting forth operational zones in the Arctic Ocean, the Baltic and the Black Seas, to be used by the German Navy and the Air Force in the coming invasion of the Soviet Union. That is the next document, C-77, which I now put in as Exhibit GB-146, and it is very short. Therefore I think I should quote it; it has not been read before:

“The Foreign Office has prepared for the use in ‘Barbarossa’ the attached draft of a declaration of operational zones. The Foreign Office, however, has reserved the decision as to the date when the declaration will be issued as well as the discussion of particulars.”

These last two documents show quite clearly that this defendant was again implicated in the preparation for this act of aggression. Then, on the 22d of June 1941, this defendant announced to the world that the German armies were invading the U.S.S.R., as was seen by the Tribunal in the film shown on the 11th of December. And how untrue were the reasons given is shown by the report of his own Ambassador in Moscow who said that everything was being done to avoid a conflict. The Tribunal will find the reference to that in the speech of my learned friend, the Attorney General, the transcript at Page 888 (Volume III, Page 143).

We now come to the aggression which involved Japan and was directed against the United States of America. And there the initial document is 2508-PS, which I now put in as Exhibit GB-147. That shows that on the 25th of November 1936, as a result of negotiations of this defendant as Ambassador-at-large, Germany and Japan had signed the Anticomintern Pact. I do not think that has been read, but if I might just read the introduction, the recital that gives the purposes of the agreement:

“The Government of the German Reich and the Imperial Japanese Government, recognizing that the aim of the Communist International, known as the Comintern, is to disintegrate and subdue existing states by all the means at its command, convinced that the toleration of interference by the Communist International in the internal affairs of the nations not only endangers their internal peace and social well-being but is also a menace to the peace of the world, desirous of co-operating in the defense against Communist subversive activities, have agreed as follows. . . .”

And then there follow the effective terms of the agreement under which they will act together for 5 years. It is signed by this defendant.

On the 27th of September 1940 this defendant, as Foreign Minister, signed the Tripartite Pact with Japan and Italy, thereby bringing about a full-scale military and economic alliance for the creation of a “New Order” in Europe and East Asia. That is 2643-PS, Exhibit USA-149, and has been read.

Then, on the 13th of February of 1941—that is a month or two later—this defendant was urging the Japanese to attack British possessions in the Far East. And that is shown in Document 1834-PS, which is Exhibit USA-129 and which has already been read by my friend, Mr. Alderman. That was February.

Then, in April of 1941, at a meeting between Hitler and Matsuoka, representing Japan, at which this defendant was present, Hitler promised that Germany would declare war on the United States in the event of war occurring between Japan and the United States as a result of Japanese aggression in the Pacific. That is shown in Document 1881-PS, Exhibit USA-33, which has already been read and which I did not intend to read again.

Then the next document which reinforces that point is 1882-PS, which is Exhibit USA-153. If I might trouble the Tribunal with just two short paragraphs of that; it is interesting, showing the psychological development of this defendant and his views at that time. They are the first two paragraphs that are quoted, under the heading “Pages 2 and 3,” where it begins “Matsuoka”; it is on the first page of the document:

“Matsuoka then spoke of the general high morale in Germany, referring to the happy faces he had seen everywhere among the workers during his recent visit to the Borsig works. He expressed his regret that developments in Japan were not yet as far advanced as in Germany and that in his country the intellectuals still exercised considerable influence.

“The Reich Foreign Minister replied that at best a nation which had realized its every ambition could afford the luxury of intellectuals, some of whom are parasites, anyway.”

THE PRESIDENT: It is “most,” according to my document.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Oh, “most”; I beg Your Lordship’s pardon, it is completely my fault, it should be “most,” “most of whom are parasites, anyway.”

“A nation, however, which has to fight for a place in the sun must give them up. The intellectuals ruined France; in Germany they had already started their pernicious activities when National Socialism put a stop to these doings; they will surely be the cause of the downfall of Britain, which is to be expected with certainty.”

Then it continues on the usual lines. That last document was on the 5th of April.

Then, the next stage: Within a month after the German Armies invaded the Soviet Union, the 22d of June 1941, Ribbentrop was urging his Ambassador in Tokyo to do his utmost to cause the Japanese Government to attack the Soviet in Siberia; and that is proved by two documents which have already been put in—2896-PS, which is Exhibit USA-155, a telegram to the German Ambassador, in Tokyo, one Ott; and 2897-PS, USA-156, which is the reply from Ambassador Ott. Both of these were read by my friend, Mr. Alderman, and I won’t trouble the Tribunal again.

But the next document, which is D-656, is a new document which I put in as GB-148. That was captured from the Japanese, and it is a message—intercepted—which was sent by the Japanese Ambassador in Berlin just before the attack on the United States. If I might just read one short extract from this defendant’s speech; on the 29th of November 1941, that is roughly a week before Pearl Harbor, this defendant was saying—it is in Paragraph 1, and I will read it all because it is new:

“Ribbentrop opened our meeting by again inquiring whether I had received any reports regarding the Japanese-United States negotiations. I replied that I had received no official word.

“Ribbentrop: ‘It is essential that Japan effect the New Order in East Asia without losing this opportunity. There never has been and probably never will be a time when closer co-operation under the Tripartite Pact is so important. If Japan hesitates at this time and Germany goes ahead and establishes her European New Order, all the military might of Britain and the United States will be concentrated against Japan.

“‘As Führer Hitler said today, there are fundamental differences in the very right to exist between Germany and Japan, and the United States. We have received advice to the effect that there is practically no hope of the Japanese-United States negotiations being concluded successfully because of the fact that the United States is putting up a stiff front.

“‘If this is indeed the fact of the case and if Japan reaches a decision to fight Britain and the United States, I am confident that will not only be to the interest of Germany and Japan jointly but would bring about favorable results for Japan herself.’”

Then the Ambassador replied:

“‘I can make no definite statement as I am not aware of any concrete intentions of Japan. Is Your Excellency indicating that a state of actual war is to be established between Germany and the United States?’”

The Defendant Ribbentrop:

“‘Roosevelt’s a fanatic, so it is impossible to tell what he would do.’”

Then:

“Concerning this point, in view of the fact that Ribbentrop has said in the past that the United States would undoubtedly try to avoid meeting German troops, and from the tone of Hitler’s recent speech as well as that of Ribbentrop’s, I feel that the German attitude toward the United States is being considerably stiffened. There are indications at present that Germany would not refuse to fight the United States if necessary.”

Then the next part, Section 2, is an extremely optimistic prognosis of the war against the Soviet Union. I do not think, in view of the date in which we are reading it, that I need trouble the Tribunal with that.

There are then a few remarks about the intended landing operations against England, which is also _vieux jeu_ at this time.

If the Tribunal would go to Part 3, there again we get the international attitude of mind of this defendant—at the foot of Page 2, Part 3; and I am quoting:

“‘In any event Germany has absolutely no intention of entering into any peace with England. We are determined to remove all British influence from Europe. Therefore, at the end of this war, England will have no influence whatsoever in international affairs. The island empire of Britain may remain, but all of her other possessions throughout the world will probably be divided three ways by Germany, the United States and Japan. In Africa, Germany will be satisfied with, roughly, those parts which were formerly German colonies. Italy will be given the greater share of the African colonies. Germany desires, above all else, to control European Russia.’”

And after hearing this defendant, the Ambassador said; and I quote:

“‘I am fully aware of the fact that Germany’s war campaign is progressing according to schedule smoothly. However, suppose that Germany is faced with the situation of having not only Great Britain as an actual enemy but also all of those areas in which Britain has influence, and those countries which have been aiding Britain as actual enemies, as well. Under such circumstances, the war area will undergo considerable expansion, of course. What is your opinion of the outcome of the war under such an eventuality?’”

The Defendant Ribbentrop:

“‘We would like to end this war during next year.’”—that is, 1942—“‘However, under certain circumstances it is possible that it will have to be continued into the following year.

“‘Should Japan become engaged in a war against the United States. . .’”

THE PRESIDENT: You are going a little bit too fast.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: If Your Lordship pleases, I am sorry. I will go back to the paragraph I have just finished.

The Defendant Ribbentrop—and I am still quoting:

“‘We would like to end this war during next year. However, under certain circumstances it is possible that it will have to be continued into the following year.

“‘Should Japan become engaged in a war against the United States, Germany, of course, would join the war immediately. There is absolutely no possibility of Germany’s entering into a separate peace with the United States under such circumstances. The Führer is determined on that point.’”

That document associates this defendant with the aggression by Japan against the United States in the closest possible way.

Another new document, which is also an intercepted Japanese diplomatic message, is the next one, D-657, which I put in as Exhibit GB-149; and if I might read the first two sentences that show what it is—and I quote—the Japanese Ambassador says:

“At 1:00 p. m. today”—the 8th of December—“I called on Foreign Minister Ribbentrop and told him our wish was to have Germany and Italy issue formal declarations of war on America at once. Ribbentrop replied that Hitler was then in the midst of a conference at general headquarters, discussing how the formalities of declaring war could be carried out so as to make a good impression on the German people, and that he would transmit your wish to him at once and do whatever he could to have it carried out promptly. At that time Ribbentrop told me that on the morning of the 8th”—that is before the declaration of war—“Hitler issued orders to the entire German Navy to attack American ships whenever and wherever they might meet them.

“It goes without saying that this is only for your secret information.”

Then, as a matter of fact, as the Tribunal are aware, on the 11th of December 1941 this Defendant Ribbentrop, in the name of the German Government, announced a state of war between Germany and the United States.

The next stage concerns his attempt to get Japan to attack the Soviet Union.

In Ribbentrop’s conversations with Oshima, the Japanese Ambassador, in July 1942 and in March and April 1943, he continued to urge Japanese participation and aggression against the Soviet Union. This is shown in Document 2911-PS, which has been put in as Exhibit USA-157 and already read, and Document 2954-PS, which I now put in as GB-150. That is a new document; and if I might just indicate the effect of it by a very short quotation—it is a discussion between the Defendant Ribbentrop and Ambassador Oshima. It begins:

“Ambassador Oshima declared that he has received a telegram from Tokyo; and he is to report, by order of his Government, to the Reich Minister for Foreign Affairs the following:

“The suggestion of the German Government to attack Russia was the object of a common conference between the Japanese Government and the Imperial headquarters, during which the question was discussed in detail and investigated exactly. The outcome is the following: The Japanese Government thoroughly recognize the danger which threatens from Russia and completely understand the desire of their German ally that Japan on her part also enter the war against Russia. However, it is not possible for the Japanese Government, considering the present war situation, to enter the war. They are rather of the conviction that it would be in the common interest not to start the war against Russia now. On the other hand, the Japanese Government will never lose sight of the Russian question.”

And then, in the middle of the next paragraph, this defendant returns to the attack. The third sentence—it begins on the fourth line—says:

“However, it would be more correct that all powers allied in the Three Power Pact, would combine their forces to strike together at not only England and America, but also Russia. It is not good if one part must fight alone.”

Then the pressure on Japan to attack Russia is shown again in the next document, 2929-PS, which was put in as Exhibit USA-159. And, if I might just close this part of the case, if I might read that—it is very short:

“The Reich Minister for Foreign Affairs then stressed again that without any doubt this year presented the most favorable opportunity for Japan, if she felt strong enough and had sufficient antitank weapons at her disposal to attack Russia, which certainly would never again be as weak as at the moment”—the moment being 18 April 1943.

If the Tribunal please, that concludes my evidence on the second allegation dealing with aggressive war; and I submit that that allegation in the Indictment is more than amply proved.

The third allegation is that the Defendant Ribbentrop authorized, directed, and participated in War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity.

Of course, I am considering this from the point of view of planning these crimes only. The execution of the crimes will be dealt with by my friends and Soviet colleagues, but it is relevant to show how this defendant participated in the planning of such crimes. I deal, first, with the killing of Allied aviators; secondly, with the destruction of peoples in Europe; and thirdly, with the persecution of the Jews.

First, the killing of Allied aviators:

With the increasing air raids on German cities in 1944 by Allied Air Forces, the German Government proposed to undertake a plan to deter Anglo-American fliers from further raids on the Reich cities. In a report of a meeting at which a definite policy was to be established, there is stated what was the point of view that this Defendant Ribbentrop had been urging. That is in Document 735-PS, which I now put in as Exhibit GB-151. That is a discussion of a meeting at the Führer’s headquarters on the 6th of June 1944. If I might read the first paragraph:

“Obergruppenführer Kaltenbrunner informed the Deputy Chief of Operations Staff”—WFSt—“in Klessheim on the afternoon of the 6th of June that a conference on this question had been held shortly before by the Reich Marshal”—the Defendant Göring—“the Reich Foreign Minister”—the Defendant Von Ribbentrop—“and the Reichsführer SS.”—Himmler—“Contrary to the original suggestion made by the Reich Foreign Minister, who wished to include every type of terror attack on the German civilian population, including bombing attacks on cities, it was agreed in the above conference that merely those attacks carried out with aircraft armament aimed directly at the civilian population and their property should be taken as the standard for the evidence of a criminal action in this sense. Lynch law would have to be the rule, there was no mention of trial by court-martial or handing over to the police.”

That is, this defendant was pressing that even where there was an attack on a German city, the airmen should be handed over to be lynched by the crowd. The others were saying that that should be restricted to cases where there were attacks by machine guns, and the like, on the civilian population.

I do not think we need trouble with Paragraph (a) of the statement of the Deputy Chief of WFSt. The importance of (a) goes because Kaltenbrunner says that there were no such cases as were mentioned.

If you look at (b):

“The Deputy Chief of the WFSt pointed out that, besides the lynch law, a procedure must be worked out for segregating such enemy aviators who are suspected of criminal action of this kind by sending them to the reception camp for aviators at Oberursel and, if the suspicion was confirmed, handing them over to the SD for special treatment.”

As I understand that, it is that if they were not lynched under the first scheme, by the crowd, then they were to be kept from prisoners of war, where they would, of course, be subject to the protecting power’s intervention. And if the suspicion was confirmed, they would be handed over to the SD to be killed.

Then in Paragraph 3 we have what was decided to justify the lynch law. Paragraph 3 says:

“At a conference with Colonel Von Brauchitsch (Colonel of the Air Force) on the 6th of June, it was settled that the following actions are to be regarded as terror actions justifying lynch law:

“Low-level attacks with aircraft armament on the civilian population, single persons as well as crowds.

“Shooting in the air our own (German) men who had bailed out.

“Attacks with aircraft armament on passenger trains in the public service.

“Attacks with aircraft armament on military hospitals, hospitals, and hospital trains, which are clearly marked with the red cross.”

These were to be the subject of lynching and not, as this defendant had suggested, a case where there was the bombing of a city.

Then on the next page, the last page of this document, we have a somewhat curious comment from the Defendant Keitel:

“Remarks by the Chief of the OKW on the agenda dated 6 June 1944.”

The number is that of the document at which the Tribunal has just been looking.

“Most secret; Staff officers only.

“If one allows the people to carry out lynch law, it is difficult to enforce rules.

“Ministerial Director Berndt got out and shot the enemy aviator on the road. I am against legal procedure. It doesn’t work out.”—Signed—“Keitel.”

Then the Defendant Jodl’s comment appears:

“This conference is insufficient. The following points must be decided quite definitely in conjunction with the Foreign Office:

“1. What do we consider as murder? Is the Foreign Office in agreement with point 3b?

“2. How should the procedure be carried out? a. By the people? b. By the authorities?

“3. How can we guarantee that the procedure will not be also carried out against other enemy aviators?

“4. Should some legal procedure be arranged or not?”—Signed—“Jodl.”

It is important, I respectfully submit, to note that this defendant and the Foreign Office were fully in on these breaches of the laws and usages of war, and indeed the clarity with which the Foreign Office perceives that there were breaches of the laws and usages of war, is shown by the next document, which is 728-PS, which I now put in as GB-152. That is a document from the Foreign Office, approved of by the Defendant Ribbentrop and transmitted by one of his officials called Ritter; and the fact that it is approved by this defendant is specifically stated in the next Document 740-PS, which I put in as GB-153. I do not think this Document 728-PS has been read before, and therefore, again, I would like to read just one or two passages in it. It begins:

“In spite of the obvious objections, based on international law and foreign policy, the Foreign Office is basically in agreement with the proposed measures.

“In the examination of the individual cases a distinction must be made between the cases of lynching and the cases of special treatment by the SD.

“I. In the cases of lynching, the precise establishment of the facts involving punishment, according to points 1 through 4 of the communication of 15 June, is not very essential. First, the German authorities are not directly responsible, since the death will have occurred before a German official becomes concerned with the case. Furthermore, the accompanying circumstances will be such, that it will not be difficult to represent the case in an appropriate manner upon publication. Hence, in cases of lynching it will be of primary importance correctly to handle the individual case upon publication.

“II. The suggested procedure for special treatment by the SD, including subsequent publication, would be feasible only if Germany would at the same time openly repudiate the commitments of international law, at present in force and still recognized by Germany. When an enemy aviator is seized by the Army or by the Police and is delivered to the reception camp for aviators at Oberursel, he has acquired by this very fact the legal status of a prisoner of war.

“The Prisoner-of-War Agreement of 27 July 1929 established definite rules for the prosecution and sentencing of prisoners of war and the execution of the death penalty, as for example in Article 66: Death sentences may be carried out only 3 months after the Protecting Power has been notified of the sentence. In Article 63: A prisoner of war will be tried only by the same courts and under the same procedure as members of the German Armed Forces. These rules are so specific that it would be futile to try to cover up any violation of them by clever wording of the publication of an individual incident. On the other hand, the Foreign Office cannot recommend on this occasion a formal repudiation of the Prisoner-of-War Agreement.

“An emergency solution would be to prevent suspected enemy fliers from ever attaining a legal prisoner-of-war status, that is, that immediately upon capture they be told that they are not considered prisoners of war but criminals, that they would not be turned over to the agencies having jurisdiction over prisoners of war, hence not go to a prisoner-of-war camp, but that they be delivered to the authorities in charge of the prosecution of criminal acts, and that they be tried in summary proceedings. If the evidence at the trial should reveal that the special procedure is not applicable to a particular case, the fliers concerned may subsequently be given the status of prisoner of war by transfer to the reception camp for aviators at Oberursel.

“Naturally, not even this expedient will prevent the possibility of Germany’s being accused of violation of existing treaties or even the adoption of reprisals upon German prisoners of war. At any rate this solution would enable us to follow a clearly defined course, thus relieving us of the necessity of openly having to renounce the present agreements or of the need of having to use excuses which no one would believe, upon the publication of each individual case.”

I do not want to take this in detail, but I ask the Tribunal to look at the first sentence of Section III:

“It follows from the above that the main weight of the action will have to be placed on lynchings. Should the campaign be carried out to such an extent that the purpose, to wit: the deterrence of enemy aviators, is actually achieved, which goal is favored by the Foreign Office, then the strafing attacks by enemy fliers directing the fire of their weapons upon the civilian population must be stressed in a completely different propagandist manner than heretofore.”

I don’t think I need trouble the Tribunal, but that shows quite clearly the defendant’s point of view. If the Tribunal would look at the next document, it is stated at the beginning of the second paragraph:

“Ambassador Ritter has advised us by telephone on 29 June that the Minister for Foreign Affairs has approved this draft. . . .”

That is the position as to the treatment of aviators, where there is, in my suggestion, a completely cold-blooded and deliberate adoption of a procedure evading international law.

The second section is the destruction of the peoples in Europe. With regard to Poland, again I want scrupulously to avoid going into details; but I remind the Tribunal of the evidence of the Witness Lahousen, which appears in the transcript, Pages 618 and 619 (Volume II, Pages 448-449) on the 30th of November of last year, and on Pages 713 to 716 (Volume III, Pages 20-25), when he was cross-examined on the 1st of December.

Secondly, Bohemia and Moravia: On the 16th of March 1939 there was promulgated the decree of the Führer and Reich Chancellor, signed by Ribbentrop, concerning the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. That is already in as Exhibit GB-8, Document TC-51. The effect of that was to place the Reich Protector in a remarkable position of supremacy under the Führer. The only part which I would like the Tribunal to have in mind is Article 5 and Subarticle 2:

“2. The Reich Protector, as representative of the Führer and Chancellor of the Reich and as Commissioner of the Reich Government, is charged with the duty of seeing to the observance of the political principles laid down by the Führer and Chancellor of the Reich.

“3. The members of the Government of the Protectorate shall be confirmed by the Reich Protector. The confirmation may be withdrawn.

“4. The Reich Protector is entitled to inform himself of all measures taken by the Government of the Protectorate and to give advice. He can object to measures calculated to harm the Reich and, in cases of danger, issue ordinances required for the common interest.

“5. The promulgation of laws, decrees, and other legal provisions and the execution of administrative measures and legal judgments shall be suspended if the Reich Protector enters an objection.”

As a result of this law, the two Reich Protectors of Bohemia and Moravia and their various deputies were appointed; and then there were committed the various crimes which will be detailed by my Soviet colleague.

Similarly, with regard to the Netherlands on the 18th of May 1940, a decree of the Führer was signed by Ribbentrop concerning the exercise of governmental authority in the Netherlands, and that—Document 639-PS, which I put in as Exhibit GB-154, Section 1—says:

“The Occupied Netherlands Territories shall be administered by the Reich Commissioner for the Occupied Netherlands Territories . . . the Reich Commissioner is guardian of the interests of the Reich and vested with supreme civil authority.

“Dr. Arthur Seyss-Inquart is hereby appointed Reich Commissioner for the Occupied Netherlands Territories.”

On the basis of this decree, the Reich Commissioner—the Defendant Seyss-Inquart—promulgated such orders as that of the 4th of July 1940, dealing with the confiscation of property of those who had, or might have, furthered activities hostile to the German Reich; and tentative arrangements were made for the resettlement of the Dutch population. But all this will also be dealt with fully by my French colleagues.

I simply for the moment put in as a matter of reference the general order of the Defendant Seyss-Inquart, which is GB-155, the document being 2921-PS. I do not intend to read it. I have summarized the effect of it and it will be dealt with more fully by my French colleagues.

I want the Tribunal to appreciate, with regard to these two matters, Bohemia and the Netherlands, that the charge against this defendant is laying the basis and procuring the governmental structure under which the War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity were directed.

I should also put in formally Exhibit GB-156, the discussion on the question of the Dutch population, which is contained in Document 1520-PS. Again I have explained it generally and I do not want to occupy time by reading it in full now.

Then coming to the Jews: In December 1938 the Defendant Ribbentrop, in a conversation with M. Bonnet, who was then Foreign Minister of France, expressed his opinion of the Jews. That was reported by the United States Ambassador, Mr. Kennedy, to the State Department. The report of Mr. Kennedy is Document L-205, which I now put in as Exhibit GB-157. If I might read to the Tribunal the second paragraph, which concerns this point:

“During the day we had a telephone call from Berenger’s office in Paris. We were told that the matter of refugees had been raised by Bonnet in his conversation with Von Ribbentrop. The result was very bad. Ribbentrop, when pressed, had said to Bonnet that the Jews in Germany, without exception, were pickpockets, murderers, and thieves. The property they possessed had been acquired illegally. The German Government had therefore decided to assimilate them with the criminal elements of the population. The property which they had acquired illegally would be taken from them. They would be forced to live in districts frequented by the criminal classes. They would be under police observation like other criminals. They would be forced to report to the police as other criminals were obliged to do. The German Government could not help it if some of these criminals escaped to other countries which seemed so anxious to have them. It was not, however, willing for them to take the property which had resulted from illegal operations with them. There was in fact nothing that it could or would do.”

That succinct statement of this defendant’s views on Jews is elaborated in a long document which he had sent out by the Foreign Office, which is numbered 3358-PS, which I put in as Exhibit GB-158. I do not want to read the whole of that document because it is excessively dreary; it is also an excessively clear indication of the defendant’s views on the treatment of Jews. But if the Tribunal would look at, first of all, Page 3—it is headed, “The Jewish Question as a Factor in German Foreign Policy in the Year 1938”; after the four divisions the document goes on to say:

“It is certainly no coincidence that the fateful year 1938 has brought nearer the solution of the Jewish question simultaneously with the realization of the ‘idea of Greater Germany,’ since the Jewish policy was both the basis and consequence of the events of the year 1938.”

That is elaborated. If the Tribunal will turn over to Page 4 at the beginning of the second paragraph, they will see the first sentence:

“The final goal of German Jewish policy is the emigration of all the Jews living in Reich territory.”

Then that is developed at great length through a large number of pages. The conclusion which is—if the Tribunal would turn to the foot of Page 7 and examine it—it goes on this way:

“These examples from reports from authorities abroad can, if desired, be amplified. They confirm the correctness of the expectation that criticism of the measures for excluding Jews from German Lebensraum, which were misunderstood in many countries for lack of evidence, would be only temporary and would swing in the other direction the moment the population saw with its own eyes and thus learned what the Jewish danger was to them. The poorer and therefore the more burdensome the immigrant Jew is to the country absorbing him, the stronger this country will react and the more desirable is this effect in the interest of German propaganda. The object of this German action is to be a future international solution of the Jewish question, dictated not by false compassion for the ‘United Religious Jewish Minority’ but by the full consciousness of all peoples of the danger which it represents to the racial composition of the nations.”

The Tribunal will appreciate that this document was circulated by the defendant’s ministry, widely circulated to all senior Reich authorities and to numerous people before the war, on the 25th of January 1939, just after the statement to M. Bonnet. Apparently the anti-Semitism of the defendant went from—I was going to say from strength to strength, if that is the correct term, or at any rate from exaggeration to exaggeration, for in June 1944 the Defendant Rosenberg made arrangements for an international anti-Jewish congress to be held in Kraków on the 11th of July 1944. The honorary members were to be Von Ribbentrop, Himmler, Goebbels, and Frank—I think the Defendant Frank. The Foreign Office was to take over the mission of inviting prominent foreigners from Italy, France, Hungary, Holland, Arabia, Iraq, Norway, et cetera, in order to give an international aspect to the congress. However, the military events of June 1944 prompted Hitler to call off the congress which had lost its significance by virtue of the landings in Normandy.

That is contained in Document 1752-PS, GB-159. At the foot of Page 1 the Tribunal will see the following had been entered as honorary members: Reich Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop. So that there is no doubt that this defendant was behind the program against the Jews which resulted in the placing of them in concentration camps with anyone else who opposed the Nazi way of life; and it is submitted that he must, as a minister in special touch with the head of the government, have known what was going on in the country and in the camps. One who preached this doctrine and was in a position of authority cannot, I submit to anyone who has had any ministerial experience, suggest that he was ignorant of how the policy was carried out.

That is the evidence on the third allegation and it is submitted that by the evidence which I have recapitulated to the Tribunal the three allegations are proved.

With regard to the second, Hitler’s own words were:

“In the historic year of 1938 the Foreign Minister, Von Ribbentrop, was of great help to me by virtue of his accurate and audacious judgment and admirably clever treatment of all problems of foreign policy.”

During the course of the war this defendant was in close liaison with the other Nazi conspirators. He advised them and made available to them, in his embassies and legations abroad, information which was required and at times participated, as I have shown, in the planning of War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity.

It is submitted that all the allegations which I read from Appendix A of the Indictment are completely proved against this defendant. I want, if the Tribunal will allow me, to add only one fact on behalf of the British Delegation. In the preparation of these briefs we have received great assistance from certain of our American colleagues; and I should like to thank once, but nonetheless heartily, on behalf of us all, Dr. Kempner’s staff: Captains Auchincloss, Claggett, and Stoll, Lieutenants Felton and Heller, and Mr. Lachmann for the great help they have been to us.

THE PRESIDENT: We will adjourn now for 10 minutes.

[_A recess was taken._]

DR. ALFRED SEIDL (Counsel for the Defendant Frank): May it please the Tribunal, I have a motion to make.

THE PRESIDENT: On behalf of whom?

DR. SEIDL: I want to make a motion which concerns the indictment of Frank.

The Charter of the Tribunal contains, in Part IV, regulations for a fair trial, and Article 16 prescribes that for the purpose of safeguarding the right of the defendants the following procedure shall be followed. “The Indictment shall include full particulars specifying in detail the charges against the defendant. A copy of the Indictment, and of all the documents lodged with the Indictment, translated into a language which he understands, shall be furnished to the defendant at a reasonable time before the Trial.”

At the beginning of the Trial the Defendant Frank was handed a copy of the Indictment. This is the Indictment which was read on the first day. This is, if I may say so, a general indictment. All actions are listed therein which, according to the opinion of the Signatories of the London Agreement, are regarded as Crimes against Peace, War Crimes, and Crimes against Humanity. The Indictment does not contain in detail the criminal actions of each defendant. I am now thinking about positive actions or concrete actions or omissions.

This morning I received a document. It has the title, “The Individual Responsibility of the Defendant Hans Frank for Crimes against Peace, War Crimes, and Crimes against Humanity”—or in German “Die persönliche Verantwortlichkeit des Angeklagten Frank für Verbrechen gegen den Frieden, für Kriegsverbrechen und Verbrechen gegen die Menschheit.” This document is without any table of contents. It consists of 30 typewritten pages. In addition to this document, or indictment, as I should like to call it, another document book has been given to me, namely, “Document Book Hans Frank.” The first document, as well as the second document is not in German but in English. This first document is in reality what I should call the indictment against Frank, because here in this document of 30 pages for the first time those individual activities of Frank are listed which are to be regarded as criminal actions. At least one ought to say that this document is an essential part of the Indictment. . .

THE PRESIDENT: Forgive me for interrupting you. The Tribunal has already expressed its desire that a motion such as this should be made in writing. The Tribunal considers that a motion of the sort which you are now making orally is a waste of the Tribunal’s time and it therefore desires you to put your motion in writing. It will then be considered.

DR. SEIDL: I regret myself that I must make this motion now, but I was not able to make this motion in writing before receiving this document only two and a half hours ago. My motion is that the Prosecution should submit these two documents to the Defendant Frank in the German language.

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal has not got the documents to which you are referring. It is quite impossible for us to understand the motion you are making unless you make it in writing and attach the documents or in some other way describe or explain to us what the documents are. We have not got the documents that you are referring to.

DR. SEIDL: Then I shall make my motion in writing.

THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Roberts, can you explain to me what the counsel who has just spoken is complaining about?

MR. G. D. ROBERTS (Leading Counsel for the United Kingdom): I gather he was complaining that the trial brief and the document book which had been served on his client, Frank, were in English and not in German.

THE PRESIDENT: Who is dealing with the case against Frank?

MR. ROBERTS: It is being dealt with by the United States.

THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps I had better ask Colonel Storey then.

COLONEL ROBERT G. STOREY (Executive Trial Counsel for the United States): If the Tribunal please, I think what counsel is referring to is the practice we have made of delivering in advance a copy of the document book and a copy of the trial brief. In this particular instance I happen to know that what counsel refers to is the trial address, which is to be read over the microphone, and as a courtesy to counsel they have been delivered in advance of the presentation, just like all the other document books and briefs against the other individual defendants. That’s what it is, as I understand it.

THE PRESIDENT: The documents which will be presented against the Defendant Frank will be all translated?

COL. STOREY: I am sure they are; yes, Sir. I don’t know about the individual case, but the instructions are that the documents will have two photostats, each one in German, plus the English translation, for counsel, and that is what has been delivered, plus the trial address, if Your Honor pleases. We handed that to him in advance—what the attorney will read over the microphone.

THE PRESIDENT: Colonel Storey, I thought the Tribunal ordered, after consulting the prosecutors as to the feasibility of the scheme, that sufficient translators should be supplied to the defendants’ counsel so that such documents as trial briefs, if in the English language, might be translated to defendants’ counsel. You will remember it was suggested that at least four translators, I think, should be supplied to the defendants’ counsel.

COL. STOREY: If the Tribunal will recall, I think this is what was finally determined; that document books and briefs could be submitted in English and the photostatic copies submitted to defendants’ counsel and that if they wanted additional copies of the German, then they should request them and they would be furnished. I think that is what the final order was.

THE PRESIDENT: There was, at any rate, a suggestion that translators should be ordered to translate such documents as trial briefs.

COL. STOREY: That is correct; yes, Sir, and whenever counsel wanted more copies, then they would request them and they would be available for them. The translators or translations or photostats would be available if they requested them.

Were there any other questions, Your Honor?

THE PRESIDENT: Do you mean that translators have not been supplied to defendants’ counsel?

COL. STOREY: If Your Honor pleases, as I understand, the defendants’ Information Center is now under the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, and my information is—I would like to check it—that when they want extra copies all they have to do is ask for them and they may obtain them and sufficient translators are available to provide the extra copies if they want them. That is my information. I have not checked it in the last few days, but sufficient copies in English are furnished for all the counsel; and these briefs and document books are furnished to them in advance. In this case I am told that the document book and the briefs were furnished.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

DR. FRITZ SAUTER (Counsel for Defendants Funk and Von Schirach): Your Honor, you may be assured that we Defense Counsel do not like to take up the time of the Tribunal for such discussions which we ourselves would rather avoid. But the question just raised by a colleague of mine is really very unpleasant for us Defense Counsel and makes our work extremely difficult for us.

You see, it does not help us if agreements are made or regulations are issued and in actual practice it is entirely different.

Last night, for example, we received a big volume of documents all of which were in English. Now, in the evening in the prison we are supposed to spend hours discussing with our clients the results of the proceedings, a task which has now been rendered still more difficult by the installation of wire screens in the consultation room. In addition we are also required to talk over whole volumes of documents written in English, and that is practically impossible. Time and again these documents are not received until the evening before the day of the proceedings; and it is not possible, even for one who knows English well, to make the necessary preparation.

The same thing is true of the individual trial briefs; and I do not know whether the actual trial briefs, such as we receive for each defendant, have also been submitted to the Tribunal.

THE PRESIDENT: Nearly every document which has been referred to in this branch of the case, which has been presented by Mr. Albrecht and by Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe, are documents which have been referred to previously in the Trial and which must have been before the defendants’ counsel for many days—for weeks—and therefore there can be no lack of familiarity with those documents. The documents which have been referred to, which are fresh documents, are very few indeed and the passages in them which are now being put in evidence are all read over the microphone and, therefore, are heard by defendants’ counsel in German and can be studied by German counsel tomorrow morning in the transcript of the shorthand notes; and I do not see, therefore, what hardship is being imposed upon German counsel by the method which is being adopted.

You see, the Counsel for the Prosecution, out of courtesy to Counsel for the Defense, have been giving them their trial briefs in English beforehand. But there is no strict obligation to do that; and insofar as the actual evidence is concerned, all of which is contained in documents, as I have already pointed out to you, the vast majority of those documents have already been put in many days ago and have been in the hands of German counsel ever since, in the German language—and also the documents which are now put in.

DR. SAUTER: No, this is not true, Your Honor. This is the complaint which we of the Defense Counsel, because we dislike to approach the Tribunal with such complaints, have been discussing among ourselves—the complaint that we do not receive German documents. You may be assured, Mr. President, that if things were as you believe, none of us would complain but we would all be very grateful; but in reality it is different.

THE PRESIDENT: But Dr. Sauter, surely when you have a reference to a German document, that German document is available to you in the Information Center; and as these documents have been put in evidence, some of them as long ago as the 20th of November or shortly thereafter, surely there must have been adequate time for defendants’ counsel to study them.

DR. SAUTER: Suppose, for instance, I receive this morning a volume on Funk. I know, for instance, when Funk’s case comes on—perhaps tomorrow. It is quite impossible for me to study this volume of English documents upon my return from the prison at 10 o’clock in the evening. That simply overtaxes the physical strength of a Defense Counsel. I could go through it if it were in German, but even so, it is impossible for me after finishing my visit to the prison at 9 or 10 o’clock in the evening to go through such a volume. We absolutely cannot do it.

THE PRESIDENT: You see, Dr. Sauter, it is not as though you had to cross-examine witnesses immediately after the evidence is given. The documents are put in and it is not for you then to get up and argue upon the interpretation of those documents. You have, I regret to say, a considerable time before you will have to get up and call your own evidence and ultimately to argue upon the documents which are now being put in. Therefore, it is not a question of hours, it is a question of days and weeks before you will have to deal with these documents which are now being put in. And I really do not see that there is any hardship upon defendants’ counsel in the system which is being adopted.

And you will not forget that the rule, which, in a sense, penalizes the Prosecution, is that every document which is put in evidence and every part of the document which is put in evidence, has to be read in open court, in order that it should be translated over the earphones and then shall get into the shorthand notes. I am told that the shorthand notes are not available in German the next morning but are available only some days afterwards. But they are ultimately available in German. And therefore every defendant’s counsel must have a complete copy of the shorthand notes, at any rate up to the recess; and that contains all the evidence given against the defendants, and it contains it in German.

DR. SAUTER: Yes, Mr. President, what we are most anxious to have done and what we have been asking for many weeks is that the documents, or at least those parts of the document which come into question, should be given to us in German translation. It is very difficult for us, even if we know English, to translate the documents in the time which is at our disposal. It is practically impossible for any of us to do this. It is for this reason that we regret that our wish to get the documents in German is not being taken into consideration. We are conscious of the difficulties and we are very grateful for any assistance given. We assure you we are very sorry to have to make such requests, but the conditions are really very difficult for us. The last word I wish to say is that the conditions are really very difficult for us.

THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Sauter, I am most anxious and the other members of the Tribunal are most anxious that every reasonable facility should be afforded to the defendants and their counsel. But, as I have pointed out to you, it is not necessary for you, for any of you, at the present moment, to get up and argue upon these documents which are now being put in. By the time that you have to get up and argue upon the documents which are now being put in, you will have had ample time in which to consider them in German.

DR. SAUTER: Thank you, Sir.

HERR GEORG BOEHM (Counsel for the SA): I have repeatedly asked to receive copies of everything presented in English. The accusation against the SA was presented on the 19th or 18th of December, and at the same time a document book was presented. Today I received a few photostats, but I have not received the greater part of the photostats or other pertinent translations. This shows that we do not receive the German translations immediately after the presentation. Nor are we ever able to read the transcript of the proceedings on the next day or on the day after that. The minutes of the session. . .

THE PRESIDENT: We are not dealing with the SA or the organizations at the present moment. If you have any motion to make, you will kindly make it in writing, and we will now proceed with the part of the Trial with which we are dealing.

HERR BOEHM: Mr. President, will you permit me one more remark? The minutes of December 17 and 18, 1945 I have received today.

THE PRESIDENT: Do you mean the transcript of it?

HERR BOEHM: I received today the German transcript for the 18th and 19th of December 1945. You see, it is not a fact that we receive the transcript the day after or a few days after the session. I received it weeks later, after I asked for it repeatedly. I have asked the appropriate offices repeatedly to give me a copy of the document book in German, and I have still not received it.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, we will inquire into that. One moment.

[_There was a pause in the proceedings while the Judges conferred._]

THE PRESIDENT: Will the last counsel who was speaking stand up?

I am told that the reason for the delay in the case you have mentioned was that there had been an error in the paging and therefore the transcripts of those shorthand notes had to be recopied. I understand that the delay ordinarily is not anything like so long as that delay.

HERR BOEHM: But I hardly believe that in the case of the translation of the document book the delay is due to those reasons. But even if the delay in this particular case should be justified, it means that week after week I am hampered in my defense. I do not know the day before what is going to be presented, and I do not know until weeks afterwards what has been presented. I am therefore not in a position to study the evidence from the standpoint of a Defense Counsel. I do not even know what is contained in the document book. I am thus obviously handicapped in my defense in every way. The Prosecution keeps saying that it will furnish the documents on time. This is apparently not the case.

THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps you will kindly make your complaint in writing and give the particulars of it. Do you understand that?

HERR BOEHM: Yes.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well.

MR. ROBERTS: May it please the Tribunal, it is my duty to present the evidence against Keitel and also against the Defendant Jodl and I would ask the Tribunal for permission, if it is thought right, that those two cases should be presented together in the interest of saving time, a matter which I know we all have at heart.

The story with regard to Keitel and Jodl runs on parallel lines. For the years in question they marched down the same road together. Most of the documents affect them both, and in those circumstances, I submit, it might result in a substantial saving of time if I were permitted to present the cases against both of them together.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

MR. ROBERTS: Then I shall proceed, if I may, on that basis.

My Lords, may I say that I fully recognize that the activities of both these defendants have been referred to in detail many times and quite recently by Colonel Telford Taylor, and my earnest desire is to avoid repetition as far as I possibly can. And may I say I welcome any suggestions, as I travel the road, which the Tribunal have to make, to make my presentation still shorter.

There is a substantial document book, Document Book Number 7, which is a joint document book dealing with both the defendants. Practically all the documents in that book have already been referred to. They nearly all, of course, have a German origin. I propose to read passages from only nine new documents and those nine documents, I think, are shown in Your Lordship’s bundle and in the bundles of your colleagues.

May I commence by referring, as shortly as may be, to the part of the Indictment which deals with the two defendants. That will be found on Page 33 (Volume I, Page 77) of the English translation. It begins with “Keitel” in the middle of the page, and it says, “The Defendant Keitel between 1938 and 1945” was the holder of various offices. I only want to point out there that although the commencing date is 1938 the Prosecution rely on certain activities of the Defendant Keitel before 1938, and we submit that we are entitled so to do because of the general words appearing on Page 28 of the Indictment (Volume I, Page 68) at the head of the appendix:

“The statements hereinafter set forth following the name of each individual defendant constitute matters upon which the Prosecution will rely _inter alia_ as establishing the individual responsibility. . . .”

And then the Tribunal will see:

“. . . Keitel used the foregoing positions, his personal influence, and his intimate connection with the Führer in such a manner that: He promoted the military preparations for war set forth in Count One. . . .”

If I may read it shortly—he participated in the planning and preparation for wars of aggression and in violation of treaties, he executed the plans for wars of aggression and wars in violation of treaties, and he authorized and participated in War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity.

Then, “The Defendant Jodl between 1932 and 1945 was” the holder of various positions. He “used the foregoing positions, his personal influence, and his close connection with the Führer in such a manner”—and this is not to be found in the text relating to Keitel—“that: He promoted the accession to power of the Nazi conspirators and the consolidation of their control over Germany. . . .”

May I say, My Lords, here, that I know of no evidence at the moment to support that allegation that he promoted the Nazi rise to power before 1933. There is plenty of evidence that he was a devoted, almost a fanatical admirer of the Führer, but that, I apprehend, would not be enough.

And then it is alleged against Jodl that he promoted the preparations for war, that he participated in the planning and preparation of the war, and that he authorized and participated in War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity.

My Lords, with regard to the position of the Defendant Keitel, it is well-known that in February of 1938 he became Chief of the OKW, Supreme Commander of all the Armed Forces, and that Jodl became Chief of the Operations Staff; and that is copiously proved in the shorthand notes and in the documents. Perhaps I ought to refer to his position in 1935, at the time when the reoccupation of the Rhineland was first envisaged. Keitel was head of the Wehrmachtsamt in the Reich War Ministry, and that is proved by a Document 3019-PS, which is to be found in _Das Archiv_; and I ask the Court to take judicial notice of that. It is not in the bundle.

Jodl’s positions have been proved by his own statement, Document 2865-PS, which is also Exhibit USA-16; and in 1935 he held the rank of lieutenant colonel, Chief of the Operations Department of the Landesverteidigung.

May I just refer to the pre-1938 period—that is, the pre-OKW period—to two documents, one of which is new. The first document I desire to mention without reading is EC-177. I do not want to read it. It is Exhibit USA-390. My Lords, those are the minutes, shortly after the Nazi rise to power, of the working committee of the Delegates for Reich Defense. The date is the 22d of May 1933. Keitel presided at that meeting. The minutes have been read. There is a long discussion as to the preliminary steps for putting Germany on a war footing. Keitel regarded the task as most urgent, as so little had been done in previous years; and perhaps the Tribunal will remember the most striking passage where Keitel impressed the need for secrecy: Documents must not be lost; oral statements can be denied at Geneva.

And I submit, if I may be allowed to make this short comment, it is interesting to see in those very early days of 1933 that the heads of the Armed Forces of Germany contemplated using lying as a weapon.

My Lord, the next document I desire to refer to is a new one, and it is EC-405, Exhibit GB-160. I desire to refer to this shortly because, in my submission, it fixes Jodl with knowledge of, and complicity in, the plan to reoccupy the Rhineland country, contrary to the Versailles Treaty. The Tribunal will see that these are the minutes of the working committee of the Reich Defense Council, dated the 26th of June 1935.

The Court will see that, a quarter of the way down the page, Subparagraph F, Lieutenant Colonel Jodl gives a dissertation on mobilization preparation; and it is only the fourth and fifth paragraphs on that same page, the last paragraph but one from the bottom, that I desire to read:

“The demilitarized zone requires special treatment. In his speech of the 21st of May and other utterances, the Führer has stated that the stipulations of the Versailles Treaty and the Locarno Pact regarding the demilitarized zone are being observed. To the _aide-mémoire_ of the French _chargé d’affaires_ on recruiting offices in the demilitarized zone, the Reich Government has replied that neither civilian recruiting authorities nor other offices in the demilitarized zone have been entrusted with mobilization tasks, such as the raising, equipping, and arming of any kind of formations for the event of war or in preparation therefor.

“Since political complications abroad must be avoided at present”—I stress the “at present”—“under all circumstances, only those preparatory measures that are urgently necessary may be carried out. The existence of such preparations or the intention of making such preparations must be kept in strictest secrecy in the zone itself as well as in the rest of the Reich.”

My Lord, I need not read more. I submit that fixes Jodl clearly with knowledge of the forthcoming breach of Versailles.

My Lord, the day before the Rhineland was reoccupied on the 7th of March 1936, the Defendant Keitel issued the directive which has been read before, Document C-194, Exhibit USA-55, ordering an air reconnaissance and certain U-boat movements in case any other nation attempted to interfere with that reoccupation.

My Lords, I pass now to the 4th of February 1938, when the OKW was formed. My Lords, shortly after its formation there was issued a handbook, which is a new exhibit, from which I want to read short passages. The number of the exhibit is L-211. It is Document GB-161. Now, this is dated 19 April 1938; “top secret; Direction of War as a Problem of Organization.” I read only from the appendix which is entitled, “What is the War of the Future?”; and if the Court will kindly turn over to the second page, I am going to read, 12 lines from the bottom of the page, the line beginning “Surprise”:

“Surprise as the requisite for quick initial success will often require hostilities to begin before mobilization has been completed or the armies are fully in position.

“A declaration of war is no longer necessarily the first step at the start of a war.

“According to whether the application of the rules of warfare create greater advantages or disadvantages for the warring nations, will the latter consider themselves at war or not at war with the neutral states.”

It may, of course, be said that those were only theoretical words and they might apply to any other nation which might be minded to make war on Germany. The Court can use its judicial notice of the conditions of things in Europe in 1938 and ask itself whether Germany had any potential aggressor against her.

But, My Lord, I emphasize that passage because I submit it so clearly envisages exactly the way in which Germany did make war in 1939 and in the subsequent years.

My Lord, I now start to tread the road which has been trodden so many times and which will be trodden so many times again, the road from 1938 to 1941: the final act of aggression. My Lord, I believe that I can treat this, so far as Keitel and Jodl are concerned, in a very few sentences, because I submit that the documents which are already in, which have been read and reread into the record, demonstrate quite clearly that Keitel, as would only be expected, he being Chief of the Supreme Command of all the Armed Forces, and Jodl, as only would be expected also, he being Chief of the Operations Staff, were vitally and intimately concerned with every single act of aggression which took place successively against the various victims of Nazi aggression.

My Lord, Your Lordship has in front of you the document book and perhaps the trial brief in which those documents are set out under the heading. If I might take first the aggression against Austria, Your Lordship will remember, in Jodl’s diary on the 12th of February 1938, how Keitel, who was something more than a mere soldier, put heavy pressure upon Schuschnigg—that is Document 1780-PS, Jodl’s diary—how on the following day Keitel writes to Hitler—Document 1775-PS, Exhibit USA-75—suggesting the shamming of military action and the spreading of false but quite credible news.

Then the actual operation orders for “Operation Otto,” Exhibits USA-74, 75, and 77, all of the 11th of March 1938, are OKW orders for which Keitel is responsible.

THE PRESIDENT: What are the numbers of them?

MR. ROBERTS: My Lord, Documents C-102, C-103, and C-182. One of them is actually signed or initialed by Keitel, and two are initialed by Jodl. Those are the operation orders for the advance into Austria, the injunction, if the Tribunal remembers, to treat Czech soldiers as hostile and to treat the Italians as friends.

My Lord, that is the first milestone on the road, the occupation of Austria. My Lord, the second is, is it not. . .

THE PRESIDENT: Well, perhaps if you are going to pass on to another, we had better adjourn now until 2 o’clock.

[_The Tribunal recessed until 1400 hours._]

_Afternoon Session_

MR. ROBERTS: May it please the Tribunal, I had got to the commencement of the alleged aggression against Czechoslovakia; and the Tribunal will remember that the leading exhibit on that matter is the file 388-PS, Exhibit Number USA-26, the “Fall Grün” file. My Lords, that file, in my submission, contains copious evidence against both Keitel and Jodl, showing that they were taking the natural part of the Chief of the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces and the head of the Operations Staff.

May I remind the Tribunal of Item 2. I do not want to read any of these. I might just refer to the notes of a meeting on the 21st of April 1938. The important thing to notice is that Keitel and the Führer met alone, showing the intimate connection between Keitel and the Führer. And it was at that meeting that preliminary plans were discussed, including the possibility of an incident, namely, the murder of the German Ambassador at Prague.

Item 5 in that file, dated the 20th of May 1938, shows the plans for the political and the military campaign against Czechoslovakia, issued by Keitel.

Item 11, dated the 30th of May 1938, is the directive signed by Keitel for the invasion of Czechoslovakia, with the date given as the 1st of October 1938.

There are many items which are initialed by Jodl—Item 14 and Item 17, to mention only two.

Perhaps, for the purpose of the note, I should mention the others: Items 24, 36, and 37.

There is the directive, Items 31 and 32, dated the 27th of September 1938, signed by Keitel, enclosing orders for secret mobilization.

Jodl’s diary, Document 1780-PS, contains many references to the forthcoming aggression, particularly the 13th of May and the 8th of September; and there is a very revealing entry on the 11th of September in Jodl’s diary, 1780-PS, in which he says. . .

THE PRESIDENT: Will you give us the date?

MR. ROBERTS: I beg Your Lordship’s pardon; 11th of September 1938.

“In the afternoon conference with Secretary of State Hahnke, from the Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, on the imminent common tasks. The joint preparations for refutation of our own violations of international law and the exploitation of its violations by the enemy were considered particularly important.”

I emphasize those words, “our own violations of international law.”

My Lords, as a result of that conference the Document C-2, which was referred to by my learned leader, Sir David, was prepared, which the Tribunal will remember has in parallel columns the possible breach of international law and the excuse which is then going to be given for it. It was referred to so recently that I need not refer to it again.

My Lords, I respectfully submit on that branch of the case that there is an overwhelming case that Keitel and Jodl played an important, indeed a vital part, in the aggression against Czechoslovakia which led up to the Pact of Munich.

My Lords, after the Pact of Munich was signed, as has been pointed out many times, the Nazi conspirators at once set about preparations for annexing the remainder of Czechoslovakia.

My Lords, at this point Jodl disappears from the scene for a time, because he goes to do some regimental soldiering as artillery general in Austria—artillery general of the 44th Division—and so it cannot be said that there is any evidence against him from the Munich Pact until the 23rd of August 1939, when he is recalled on the eve of the Polish invasion to take up his duties once more as chief of the operational staff of OKW.

So far as Keitel is concerned, on the 21st of October 1938, less than a month after the Munich Pact, he countersigned Hitler’s order to liquidate the rest of Czechoslovakia and to occupy Memel—Document C-136, Exhibit Number USA-104.

On the 24th of November 1938, Document C-137, Exhibit Number GB-33, Keitel issues a memorandum about the surprise occupation of Danzig.

On the 17th of December 1938, Document C-138, Exhibit Number USA-105, he signs an order to the lower formations: “Prepare for the liquidation of the rest of Czechoslovakia.” Those preparations were made.

On the 15th of March 1939 Keitel, who—I again repeat—was more than a mere soldier, was present at the midnight conference between the Führer and Hacha, President of Czechoslovakia, when, under a threat of bombing Prague, Hacha surrendered the rest of his country to the Germans. I refrain from referring to the contents of the minutes, which have been read many times already.

My Lords, so that milestone is past. And again I submit, in all that aggression it is clear that Keitel was playing a vital part as Hitler’s right-hand man, commanding all the armed forces under him.

I now pass to the Polish aggression. Keitel was present at the meeting at the chancellery on the 23rd of May 1939, Document L-79, Exhibit Number USA-27, when it was said—just a few words so familiar: Danzig was not the subject of the dispute; Poland was to be attacked at the first suitable opportunity; Dutch and Belgian air bases must be occupied; declarations of neutrality were to be ignored.

The directive for “Fall Weiss”, the invasion of Poland, is Document C-120(a), Exhibit GB-41. The date is the 3rd of April 1939. The Tribunal will remember the plans were to be submitted to OKW by the 1st of May, and the forces were to be ready for invasion by the 1st of September. And that directive is signed by Keitel.

Document C-126, Exhibit GB-45, is a follow-up of that previous directive. It is dated the 22d of June 1939. The need for camouflage is emphasized; and it is stated, “Do not disquiet the population.” That is signed by Keitel.

On the 17th of August 1939, Document 795-PS, Exhibit GB-54, Keitel has a conference with Admiral Canaris about the supplying of Polish uniforms to Heydrich; and it will be noticed in the last paragraph of the note that Admiral Canaris is against the war, and Keitel argues in favor of it. And Keitel made the prophecy that Great Britain would not enter the war.

I submit that Keitel’s vital part, again, in the preparation for the aggression against Poland is clearly established beyond possibility of dispute.

Jodl, as I have said to the Tribunal, was recalled on the 23rd of August, as seen in his diary entry, Document 1780-PS, where he says that he is recalled to take charge of the Operations Staff. He says:

“Received order from armed forces high command to proceed to Berlin and take over position of Chief of Armed Forces Executive Office.”—And then—“1100 hours to 1330 hours—discussion with Chief of Armed Forces High Command. X-Day has been announced for the 26th of August. Y-Time has been announced for 0430 hours.”

And I submit that the Tribunal can infer the importance of Jodl to this conspiracy from the fact that on the eve of the war he is recalled to Berlin to take his place at the head of the operational staff of the Supreme Command.

So Poland was invaded, and before I pass to the next aggression may I just point out that, according to the evidence of General Lahousen, if the Tribunal accepts it on this point, Keitel and Jodl were in the field with Hitler on the 10th of September 1939. That is in the shorthand notes, Pages 617 and 618 (Volume II, Pages 447 and 448). I don’t suppose there will be any dispute that the head of the High Command and the Chief of his Operational Staff were in the field.

My Lord, I pass now to Norway and Denmark. So far as both are concerned we see from Document C-64, Exhibit GB-86, that on the 12th of December 1939 Keitel and Jodl were both present at Hitler’s conference with Raeder when the invasion of Norway was discussed; and Keitel’s direct responsibility to those operations is shown in my submission by Document C-63, Exhibit GB-87, in which Keitel says that the operations against Norway will be “under my direct and personal guidance.” And he sets up a planning staff of OKW for the carrying out of those operations.

Jodl’s knowledge and complicity, in my submission, are clearly shown also from the entries in his own diary—Document 1809-PS. That is the second part of his diary. And the Tribunal will remember the entry of the 13th of March 1940, in which he records that the Führer was still looking for an excuse for the “Weser” operations. That is the 13th of March, My Lord, 1809-PS:

“The Führer does not give the order yet for Weser. He is still looking for an excuse.”

And then, on the 14th of March, “Führer has not yet decided what reason to give for Weser Exercise,” which, in my submission, if I may be allowed to make a short comment, shows up in a lurid light the code of honor of the military leaders of Germany—still looking for an excuse.

My Lord, then, as we know, Norway was attacked unawares; and then subsequently lying excuses were given.

My Lord, the invasion of the Low Countries and Luxembourg equally, in my submission, is clearly shown by the documents to have been controlled and directed by Keitel with Jodl’s assistance. The Tribunal already have a note of the conference in May of the lands to be occupied—Document L-79. Document C-62, Exhibit GB-106, is a directive, signed “Hitler,” on the 9th of October 1939 and another directive, signed “Keitel,” on the 15th of October. C-62 comprises two documents, the 9th of October and 15th of October—two directives, one signed “Hitler” and one signed “Keitel”—both giving orders for the occupation of Holland and Belgium.

My Lord, Document C-10, Exhibit GB-108, dated the 8th of November, is Keitel’s operation orders for the 7th Parachute Division to make an airborne landing in the middle of Holland.

Document 440-PS, Exhibit GB-107, dated the 20th of November 1939, signed “Keitel,” is a further directive for the invasion of Holland and Belgium.

Document C-72, Exhibit GB-109, 7th of November 1939, the 10th of May 1940, 18 letters—11 signed by Keitel, 7 signed by Jodl: “The Führer is postponing A-Day because of the weather.”

My Lord, Jodl’s diary is also eloquent on that subject. That is Document 1809-PS. Several entries—perhaps I need not refer to them again—relating to these forthcoming operations, culminating with the one on the 8th of May, which perhaps the Tribunal will remember, when Jodl says, “Alarming information from Holland,” and he expresses righteous indignation that the wicked Dutchmen should erect roadblocks and make mobilization preparations.

My Lord, and so those three neutral countries were invaded, and I submit there is copious and overwhelming evidence that these men were in charge of the military organizations which made those invasions possible.

My Lord, I pass now to the planning for the aggression against Greece and Yugoslavia. Document PS-1541, Exhibit GB-117, dated 13th of December 1940, Hitler’s order for “Marita,” the operation against Greece, signed by Hitler, and a copy to Keitel, namely, OKW.

Document 448-PS, Exhibit GB-118, 11th of January 1941: Keitel initialed a Hitler order for the Greek operation.

Document C-134, Exhibit GB-119, 20th of January 1941: Both Keitel and Jodl are present at the conference with Hitler, Mussolini, and others when the operations against Greece and Yugoslavia are discussed.

Document C-59, Exhibit GB-121, 19th of February 1941: The dates of the operations against Marita are filled in by Keitel.

Document 1746-PS, Exhibit GB-120, 27th of March 1941: A conference with Hitler, Keitel, and Jodl present; the decision to attack and destroy Yugoslavia is announced, and the Führer said: “I am determined to destroy Yugoslavia. I shall use unmerciful harshness to frighten other neutrals”—and these two soldiers were present when that was said.

My Lord, I submit that on that the complicity of these two men for that aggression is amply proved.

My Lord, I pass to Barbarossa—Document 446-PS, Exhibit USA-131, dated 18th of December 1940—Hitler’s order for the Barbarossa operation, initialed by Keitel and Jodl. Hitler says, the Tribunal will remember, that he intends to overthrow Russia in a single rapid campaign.

Document 872-PS, Exhibit USA-134, 3rd of February 1941: A discussion with Hitler, Keitel, and Jodl re: Barbarossa and “Sonnenblume”—North African suggestions. Hitler said, “When Barbarossa commences, the world will hold its breath and make no comments.”

Then, Document 447-PS, Exhibit USA-135, dated 13th of March 1941: That is an operation order signed by Keitel re: the administration of the areas which were to be occupied; showing again that Keitel was more than a mere soldier; this is civil administration.

Document C-39, Exhibit USA-138, 6th of June 1941: Timetable for Barbarossa, signed by Keitel, and Jodl gets a sixth copy.

Document C-78, Exhibit USA-139, 9th of June 1941, is Hitler’s order to Keitel and Jodl to attend the pre-Barbarossa conference on the 14th of June 1941, 8 days before the operation.

My Lord, on those facts and documents on the position of these two defendants, again I respectfully submit their participation in this aggression is overwhelmingly proved.

My Lord, the last aggression is with regard to the provoked persuasion of Japan to commit an aggression against the United States of America. My Lord, there are two key documents; and both Keitel and Jodl are implicated by both of them. My Lord, the first is Document C-75, Exhibit USA-151, dated 5th of March 1941. It is an OKW order signed by Keitel, copy to Jodl. “Japan must be induced to take positive action as soon as possible” is a quotation from it.

Document C-152, Exhibit GB-122, 18th of March 1941: The meeting between Hitler, Raeder, Keitel, and Jodl—Japan to seize Singapore. That is the relevant extract on that.

My Lord, on those acts of aggression and those preparations for aggression, I submit that the case against these two men is overwhelming. It is clear, in my submission, that there could be no defense open to them except that they were obeying the orders of a superior. That defense is not open to them under this Charter. No doubt all these wicked schemes germinated in the wicked brain of Hitler, but he could not carry them out alone. He wanted men nearly as wicked and nearly as unscrupulous as himself.

My Lord, I now pass very rapidly to the question of War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity. My Lord, it has already been proved that Keitel signed the “Nacht und Nebel” decrees, committing persons to incarceration in Germany where all trace of them was lost. That is Document L-90, Exhibit USA-503.

There is one fresh document that I desire to put in. Colonel Telford Taylor put in Document C-50, Keitel’s order as to ruthless action in the Barbarossa campaign. There is one complementary document to that, Document C-51, which is Exhibit GB-162, Keitel’s order dated the 27th of July 1941:

“In accordance with the regulations concerning classified material the following offices will destroy all copies of the Führer’s decree of 13 May 1941”—that is C-50, the Barbarossa decree—“in the communication mentioned above:

“a) All offices up to the rank of ‘general commands’ inclusive;”—My Lord, that means that corps commanders and downwards should destroy copies—“b) group commands of the armored troops”—that again means offices of the armed corps below the rank of corps commanders should destroy the copies—“c) army commands and offices of equal rank, if there is an inevitable danger that they might fall into the hands of unauthorized persons.”

That is to say that even higher generals, if the war approaches closely to them, should destroy these documents rather than risking any chance of their being captured.

“The validity of the decree is not affected by the destruction of the copies. In accordance with Paragraph III, it remains the personal responsibility of the commanding officers to see to it that the offices and legal advisers are instructed in time and that only these sentences are confirmed which correspond to the political intentions of the Supreme Command.”

That was with regard to German soldiers not being tried by court-martial for offenses against Soviet troops: “This order will be destroyed together with the copies of the Führer’s decree.”

My Lord, I submit that the anxiety on the part of the OKW, presided over by Keitel, to destroy that—I suggest an illegal order; a barbarous order—is significant.

My Lord, I desire now to put in another document which is almost the last document in the bundle, UK-20. Your Lordship will find it flagged at the end of the bundle. It is from the Führer’s headquarters, 26th of May 1943. It says:

“Re: Treatment of supporters of De Gaulle who fight for the Russians.

“French airmen serving in the Soviet forces have been shot down on the Eastern Front for the first time. The Führer has ordered that employment of French troops in the Soviet forces is to be counteracted by the strongest means.

“It is therefore ordered:

“1) Supporters of De Gaulle who are taken prisoner on the Eastern Front will be handed over to the French Government for proceedings in accordance with OKW order. . . .”

And then I read Paragraph 3:

“Detailed investigations are to be made in appropriate cases against relatives of Frenchmen who fight for the Russians, if these relatives are resident in the occupied area of France. If the investigation reveals that relatives have given assistance to facilitate escape from France, then severe measures are to be taken.”

My Lord, I offer that as Exhibit GB-163.

My Lord, there is a document which I feel I should put in, which is the next document in the bundle. It is Document UK-57, Exhibit GB-164. This is the last document, I think, in the bundle. My Lord, it is from the Ausland Abwehr—I believe it is from the intelligence foreign department. It is to the OKW and it is signed the 4th of January 1944. My Lord, the heading is “Re: Counteraction to Kharkov ‘trial.’” Paragraph 2 is all that I read:

“The documents concerning ‘commandos’ have been asked for and thoroughly investigated by the Reich Security Main Office. In five cases members of the British Armed Forces were arrested as participants. Thereupon they were shot in compliance with the order from the Führer. It would be possible to attribute to them breaches of international law and to have them posthumously sentenced to death by a Tribunal. Up to the present no breaches of international law could be proved against commando participants.”

My Lord, I read no more, and I submit that that is clearly an admission of murder, not warfare at all.

My Lord, Keitel’s comments are to be found in the top left-hand corner of that document:

“We want documents on the basis of which we can institute similar proceedings. They are reprisals which have no connection with battle actions. Legal justifications are superfluous.”

THE PRESIDENT: Is that not at the top signed by Keitel?

MR. ROBERTS: It is typewritten in the office copy which is the original.

THE PRESIDENT: There is no actual signature?

MR. ROBERTS: No.

THE TRIBUNAL (Mr. Biddle): How does it connect with Keitel then?

MR. ROBERTS: “Vermerk Chef OKW”—that is “note of the Chief of OKW.”

Now, that is the first minute. My Lord, the second minute is on the same subject, and it is dated the 6th of January 1944; and there is a large red Keitel “K” initialed on the top of this letter, showing that he got it. My Lord, the first paragraph deals with two officers who were then at Eichstätt Camp in Bavaria. My Lord, there is no importance in that paragraph, because those two officers are still alive.

The second paragraph:

“Attempted attacks on the battleship _Tirpitz_.

“At the end of October ’42 a British commando that had come to Norway in a cutter had orders to carry out an attack on the battleship _Tirpitz_ in Drontheim Fjord by means of a two-man torpedo. The action failed since both torpedoes which were attached to the cutter were lost in the stormy sea. From the crew consisting of six Englishmen and four Norwegians, a party of three Englishmen and two Norwegians were challenged on the Swedish border. However, only the British seaman Robert Paul Evans, born 14 January ’22 at London, could be arrested . . . the others escaped into Sweden.

“Evans had a pistol pouch in his possession such as are used to carry weapons under the armpit and also a knuckle-duster. Violence, representing a breach of international law, could not be proved. He has made extensive statements about the operation. In accordance with the Führer’s order he was shot on 19 January ’43.”

Again I submit, that is murder. Violence representing a breach of international law could not be proved.

My Lord, then the third paragraph:

“Blowing up of the Glomfjord power station.

“On 16 September ’42, 10 Englishmen and two Norwegians landed on the Norwegian coast dressed in the uniform of the British Mountain Rifle Regiment, heavily armed and equipped with explosives of every description. After negotiating difficult mountain country they blew up important installations in the power station Glomfjord on 21 September ’42. The German sentry was shot dead on that occasion. Norwegian workmen were threatened that they would be chloroformed should they resist. For this purpose the Englishmen were equipped with morphia syringes. Several of the participants have been arrested while the others escaped into Sweden.

“Those arrested are: Captain Graeme Black, born 9 May ’11 in Dresden; Captain Joseph Houghton, born 13 June ’11 at Bromborough; Sergeant-major Miller Smith, born 2 November ’15 at Middlesborough; Corporal William Chudley, born 10 May ’22 at Exeter; Rifleman Reginald Makeham, born 28 January ’14 at Ipswich; Rifleman Cyril Abram, born 20 August ’22 in London; Rifleman Eric Curtis, born 24 October ’21 in London. They were shot on 30 October ’42.”

Again there is no suggestion that there was any breach of international law. They were British seamen and they were in uniform.

Then Paragraph 4:

“The sabotage attack against German ships off Bordeaux.

“On 12 December ’42, a number of German ships off Bordeaux were seriously damaged by explosives below water-level. The adhesive mines had been fixed by five English sabotage gangs working from canoes. Of the 10 participants the following were arrested after a few days. . . .”

Then there followed six names, six British names—one an Irishman; a lieutenant, a petty officer, a sergeant, and three marines.

“A seventh soldier named Moffett was found drowned; the remainder apparently escaped into Spain.

“The participants proceeded in pairs from a submarine in canoes upstream into the mouth of the River Gironde. They were wearing olive grey special uniforms. After effecting the explosions they sank the boats, and attempted to escape into Spain in civilian clothes, with the assistance of the French civilian population. No special criminal actions during the flight have been discovered. All the arrested, in accordance with orders, were shot on 23 March 1943.”

Keitel initialed that document. That document, read by my learned leader Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe not so long ago, is Document Number 735-PS, quoting Keitel as saying, “I am against legal procedure. It does not work out.”

THE PRESIDENT: Would you read the Page 5 which follows that?

MR. ROBERTS: If it will please the Tribunal, that is what I shall do. Page 5:

“The Führer’s headquarters, 9 January 1944. The Chief of OKW has handed the Deputy Chief”—that ought to be WFSt, that is Jodl—“the enclosed letter with the following account:

“It is of no importance to establish documentary proof of breaches of international law. What is important, however, is the collection of material suitable for a propaganda presentation of a display trial. A display trial as such is therefore not meant actually to take place but merely to be a propaganda presentation of cases of breaches of international law by enemy soldiers, who will be mentioned by name and who have already either been punished with death or are awaiting the death penalty. The Chief of the OKW asks the Chief of the Foreign Department to bring with him pertinent documents for his next visit to the Führer’s headquarters.”

As the Tribunal heard from my learned friend, Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe, when he read Document 735-PS earlier today, Keitel said, “I am against legal procedure. It does not work out.”

One can agree with Keitel after having read that record of what, in my submission, is cold-blooded murder of brave men, brave soldiers and sailors who were fighting for their country; and although this Trial has a record of the death of brave men, of the murder of brave men, there are few cases which are more poignant than those shown in the documents to which I have just referred.

I have finished my presentation of the case against Keitel and against Jodl. So far as Jodl’s part in the War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity is concerned, he figures much less than Keitel. Of course, he had no power of giving orders or directives, but we see that he at any rate signed and circulated an infamous order of the Führer saying that commandos ought to be shot and are not to be treated as prisoners of war at all.

In my submission the evidence against these two men is overwhelming and their conviction is demanded by the civilized world.

Your Lordships, Mr. Walter W. Brudno of the American Delegation will present the case against Alfred Rosenberg.

MR. WALTER W. BRUDNO (Assistant Trial Counsel for the United States): May it please the Tribunal, in connection with the case against the Defendant Rosenberg, I wish to offer the document book designated as United States Exhibit EE. This book contains the English translation of all the documents which I will offer into evidence, as well as the English translation of those documents previously offered to which I will refer. The documents are arranged by series in the order of C, L, R, PS, and EC, and they are arranged numerically within each series.

Your Honors will note that on the first four pages of the document book there appears a descriptive list of documents. This list is a tabulation of all the documents directly implicating Rosenberg, including those previously offered, and those which I will offer into evidence. Those previously offered are keyed to the transcript page of the Record, and to their exhibit numbers. The list is included in the document books. The list is included in the document books made available to the Defense. This list will gather together in one place all references to the Defendant Rosenberg which are in the Record up to this point. In order to avoid repetition, I will not refer to a great many of the documents previously introduced.

The Indictment at Page 29 (Volume I, Page 70) charges the Defendant Rosenberg under all four Counts of the Indictment. In the presentation which follows, I will show that as charged in Count One, Section IV, Subparagraph D, Rosenberg played a particularly prominent role in developing and promoting the doctrinal techniques of the conspiracy, in developing and promoting beliefs and practices incompatible with Christian teaching, in subverting the influence of the churches over the German people, in pursuing the program of relentless persecution of the Jews, and in reshaping the educational system in order to make the German people amenable to the will of the conspirators and to prepare the people psychologically for waging an aggressive war.

I will also show that Rosenberg played an important role in preparing Germany for the waging of aggressive war through the direction of foreign trade, as charged in Count One, Subparagraph E, of the Indictment, and that his activities in the field of foreign policy contributed materially toward the preparation for the aggression charged in Subparagraph F in the Indictment and the Crimes against Peace, as charged in Count Two.

Finally I will show that Rosenberg participated in the planning and direction of the War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity, as specified in Paragraph G of Count One of the Indictment. Particularly, he participated in the planning and direction of the spoliation of art treasures in the western countries and in the numerous crimes committed in that part of the eastern countries formerly occupied by the U.S.S.R.

The political career of the Defendant Rosenberg embraced the entire history of National Socialism and permeated nearly every phase of the conspiracy with which we are concerned. In order to obtain a full conception of his influence upon and participation in the conspiracy, it is necessary to review briefly his political history, and to consider each of his political activities in their relation to the thread of the conspiracy which stretches from the inception of the Party in 1919 to the defeat of Germany in 1945.

It is both interesting and revealing to note that for Rosenberg the 30th of November 1918 marked the “beginning of political activities with a lecture about the ‘Jewish Problem.’” That statement is found at Line 2 of the translation of Document 2886-PS, which is an excerpt from a book entitled, _The Work of Alfred Rosenberg_, a biography, and I offer this book as Exhibit Number USA-591.

From the Document 3557-PS, which has excerpts from an official pamphlet entitled _Dates in the History of the NSDAP_, and which I offer as Exhibit Number USA-592, we learn that Rosenberg was a member of the German Labor Party, afterwards the National Socialist German Workers Party, in January 1919 and that Hitler joined forces with Rosenberg and his colleagues in October of the same year. Thus, Rosenberg was a member of the National Socialist movement even before Hitler himself.

Now I wish to offer Document 3530-PS, which is an extract from _Das Deutsche Führer Lexikon_, the year of 1934-35, and I offer it as Exhibit Number USA-593. In this document we obtain additional biographical data on Rosenberg as follows:

“From 1921 until the present he was editor of the _Völkische Beobachter_; editor of the _N. S. Monatshefte_; in 1930, he became member of the Reichstag and representative of the foreign policies for the Party . . . since April 1933 he was leader of the foreign political office of the NSDAP, then designated Reichsleiter; in January 1934, deputized by the Führer for the supervision of the ideological education of the NSDAP, the German labor front, and all related organizations.”

The Document 2886-PS, which I have just referred to, offered as Exhibit Number USA-591, adds that in July 1941 Rosenberg was appointed Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories.

With this general background information in mind the first phase of proof will deal with Rosenberg as official National Socialist ideologist. The proof which I will present will show the nature and scope of the ideological tenets he expounded, and the influence he exerted upon the unification of German thought, a unification which was an essential part of the conspirators’ program for the seizure of power and preparation for aggressive war.

Rosenberg wrote extensively on, and actively participated in, virtually every aspect of the National Socialist program. His first publication was the _Nature, Basic Principles, and Aims of the NSDAP_. This publication appeared in 1922. Rosenberg spoke of this book in a speech which we have seen and heard delivered in the motion picture previously introduced as Exhibit Number USA-167. On Page 2, Part 1, of the transcription of the speech, which is our Document Number 3054-PS, Rosenberg stated as follows:

“During this time”—that is, during the early phase of the Party—“I wrote a short thesis which nevertheless is significant in the history of the NSDAP.”—This is Rosenberg speaking.—“It was always being asked what points of program the NSDAP had and how they were to be interpreted. Therefore I wrote the _Nature, Basic Principles, and Aims of the NSDAP_, and this writing made the first permanent connection for Munich and local organizations being created and friends within the Reich.”

We thus see that the original draftsman of, and spokesman on, the Party program was the Defendant Rosenberg. Without attempting to survey the entire ideological program advanced by the Defendant Rosenberg in his various writings and speeches, which are very numerous, I wish to offer into evidence certain of his statements as an indication of the nature and broad scope of the ideological program which he championed. It will be seen that there was not a single basic tenet of the Nazi philosophy which was not given authoritative expression by Rosenberg. Rosenberg wrote the book entitled _Myth of the Twentieth Century_, published in 1930. This book has already been offered as Exhibit USA-352. At Page 479, which Your Honor will find on the second page of Document 3553-PS, Rosenberg wrote on the race question as follows:

“The essence of the contemporary world revolution lies in the awakening of the racial type; not in Europe alone but on the whole planet. This awakening is the organic counter movement against the last chaotic remnants of the liberal economic imperialism, whose objects of exploitation out of desperation have fallen into the snare of Bolshevik Marxism, in order to complete what democracy had begun, the extirpation of the racial and national consciousness.”

Rosenberg expounded the Lebensraum idea, which idea was the chief motivation, the dynamic impulse behind Germany’s waging of aggressive war. In his journal, the _National Socialist Monatshefte_, for May 1932, which I wish to offer as Exhibit Number USA-594, our Document Number 2777-PS, he wrote at Page 199:

“The understanding that the German nation, if it is not to perish in the truest sense of the word, needs ground and soil for itself and its future generations; and the second sober perception that this soil can no more be conquered in Africa, but in Europe and first of all in the East—these organically determine the German foreign policy for centuries.”

Rosenberg expressed his theory as to the place of religion in the National Socialist State in his _Myth of the Twentieth Century_, additional excerpts from which are cited in Document 2891-PS. At Page 215 of the “Myth” he wrote as follows:

“We now realize that the central supreme values of the Roman and the Protestant Churches being a negative Christianity do not respond to our soul, that they hinder the organic powers of the people designated as a Nordic race, that they must give way to them, that they have to be remodelled to conform to a Germanic Christianity. Therein lies the meaning of the present religious search.”

In the place of traditional Christianity, Rosenberg sought to implant the neo-pagan myth of the blood.

THE PRESIDENT: Do you want to break off here for a recess?

MR. BRUDNO: Yes, Your Honor.

[_A recess was taken._]

THE PRESIDENT: I have an announcement to make to the defendants’ counsel. In view of the applications which were made to the Tribunal this morning, I immediately ordered on behalf of the Tribunal that an investigation should be made of the complaints made by defendants’ counsel about the delay in the delivery of the transcript of the shorthand notes and such delay will be remedied at once. The investigation shows that transcripts of the sessions up to and including the 20th of December can be completed by this afternoon. The transcripts for the sessions held since the resumption of the Trial will be distributed, up to and including the 8th of January, by tomorrow evening. Hereafter, the German transcripts will be regularly distributed to the Defense Counsel within a period of 48 hours after the session.

MR. BRUDNO: If Your Honors please, when the Court rose I had just read a quotation of Rosenberg, in which he expressed his views on Christianity.

In the place of traditional Christianity, Rosenberg sought to implant the neo-pagan myth of the blood. At Page 114 in the _Myth of the Twentieth Century_ he stated as follows:

“Today, a new faith is awakening; the myth of the blood, the belief that the divine being of mankind generally is to be defended with the blood. The faith embodied by the fullest realization that the Nordic blood constitutes that mystery which has supplanted and overwhelmed the old sacraments.”

Rosenberg’s attitudes on religion were accepted as the only philosophy compatible with National Socialism. In 1940 the Defendant Bormann wrote to Rosenberg in Document 098-PS, which has been previously introduced as Exhibit Number USA-350; and I quote:

“The churches cannot be conquered by a compromise between National Socialism and Christian teachings but only through a new ideology, whose coming you, yourself, have announced in your writings.”

Rosenberg actively participated in the program for elimination of church influence. The Defendant Bormann frequently wrote Rosenberg in this regard, furnishing him information as to proposed action to be instituted against the churches; and, when necessary, requesting that action be taken by Rosenberg’s department. I refer to documents introduced in connection with the case against the Leadership Corps, such documents as 070-PS, Exhibit Number USA-349, which deals with abolition of religious services in the schools; Document 072-PS, Exhibit Number USA-357, dealing with confiscation of religious property; Document 064-PS, Exhibit Number USA-359, which deals with the inadequacy of anti-religious material being circulated to the soldiers; Document 089-PS, Exhibit Number USA-360, dealing with curtailment of the publication of Protestant periodicals; and Document 122-PS, which is Exhibit Number USA-362, dealing with the closing of theological faculties.

Rosenberg was particularly avid in his pursuit of what he called the “Jewish question.” On the 28th of March 1941, on the occasion of the opening of the Institute for the Exploration of the Jewish Question, he set the keynote for its activities and indicated the direction which the exploration was to take. I would like to quote from Document 2889-PS, which I offer as Exhibit Number USA-595. This is an excerpt from the _Völkischer Beobachter_, 29th of March 1941. This is a statement made by Rosenberg on the occasion of the opening of the institute.

“For Germany the Jewish question is only then solved when the last Jew has left the Greater German space.

“Since Germany with its blood and its folkdom has now broken for always this Jewish dictatorship for all Europe and has seen to it that Europe as a whole will become free from the Jewish parasitism once more, we may, I believe, also say for all Europeans: For Europe the Jewish question is only then solved when the last Jew has left the European continent.”

It has already been seen that Rosenberg did not overlook any opportunity to put these anti-Semitic beliefs into practice. Your Honors will recall that in Document 001-PS, which was introduced as Exhibit Number USA-282 in connection with the case on persecution of the Jews, Rosenberg recommended that instead of executing 100 Frenchmen as retaliation for attempts on lives of members of the Wehrmacht, there be executed 100 Jewish bankers, lawyers, et cetera. The recommendation was made with the avowed purpose of awakening the anti-Jewish sentiment.

Document 752-PS, which was introduced this morning by Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe as Exhibit GB-159, discloses that Rosenberg had called an anti-Semitic congress in June 1944, although this congress was cancelled due to military events.

In the realm of foreign policy, in addition to demanding Lebensraum, Rosenberg called for elimination of the Versailles Treaty and cast aside any thought of revision of that treaty. In his book _The Nature, Basic Principles, and Aims of the NSDAP_, written by Rosenberg in 1922, he expressed his opinions regarding the Treaty of Versailles. Excerpts from this book are translated in Document 2433-PS, and I offer the book as Exhibit Number USA-596. He stated as follows:

“The National Socialists reject the popular phrase of the ‘Revision of the Peace of Versailles’ as such a revision might perhaps bring a few numerical reductions in the so-called ‘obligations’; but the entire German people would still be, just as before, the slave of other nations.”

Then he goes on to expound the second point of the Party:

“We demand equality for the German people with other nations, the cancellation of the peace treaties of Versailles and St. Germain.”

Rosenberg conceived of the spread of National Socialism throughout the world and, as will be subsequently shown, took an active part in promoting the infection of other nations with his creed. In the _Nature, Basic Principles, and Aims of the NSDAP_ he states:

“But National Socialism still believes that its principles and ideology—though in individual methods of fight according to various racial conditions—will be directives far beyond the borders of Germany for the inevitable fights for power in other countries of Europe and America. There too a clear line of thought must be drawn, and the racial-nationalistic fight against the everywhere-similar loan-capitalistic and Marxist-internationalism must be taken up. National Socialism believes that once the great world battle is concluded, after the defeat of the present epoch, there will be a time when the swastika will be woven into the different banners of the Germanic peoples as the Aryan symbol of rejuvenation.”

This statement was made in 1922. It is thus seen that the Defendant Rosenberg gave authoritative expression to the basic tenets upon which National Socialism was founded and through the exploitation of which the conspiracy was crystallized in action.

Rosenberg’s value to the conspiratorial program found official recognition with his appointment in 1934 as the Führer’s delegate for the entire spiritual and philosophical education and supervision of the NSDAP. His activities in this capacity were vast and varied.

I now offer in evidence the _National Socialist Year Book_ for the year 1938 as Exhibit Number USA-597. At Page 180 of this book, which is our Document Number 3531-PS, the functions of Rosenberg’s office as the Führer’s delegate are described as follows:

“The sphere of activity of the Führer’s delegate for the entire spiritual and ideological instruction and education of the movement, its organizations, including the ‘Strength through Joy,’ extends to the uniform execution of all the educational work of the Party and of the affiliated organizations. The office set up by Reichsleiter Rosenberg has the task of preparing the ideological education material, of carrying out the teaching program, and is responsible for the education of those teachers suited to this educational and instructional work.”

As the Führer’s delegate, Rosenberg thus supervised all ideological education and training within the Party.

It was Rosenberg’s personal belief that upon the performance of his new functions as ideological delegate depended the future of National Socialism. I offer Document 3532-PS as Exhibit Number USA-598. This is an excerpt from an article by Rosenberg appearing in the March 1934 issue of _The Educational Letter_. At Page 9 of this publication Rosenberg states:

“The focus of all our educational work from now on is the service for this ideology; and it depends on the result of these efforts, whether National Socialism will die with our fighting generation or whether, as we believe, it really represents the beginning of a new era.”

In his capacity as the Führer’s delegate for the spiritual and ideological training, Rosenberg assisted in the preparation of the curriculum for the Adolf Hitler schools. These schools, it will be recalled, selected the most suitable candidates from the Hitler Jugend and trained them for leadership within the Party. They were the elite schools of National Socialism. The next document, entitled “Documents of German Politics” is already in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-365. Translations of excerpts from this document are found in 3529-PS, Page 389, and read as follows:

“As stated by Dr. Ley, Reich Organization Leader, on 23 November 1937 at Ordensburg Sonthofen, these Adolf Hitler Schools, as the first step of the principle of selecting a special elite, form an important branch in the educational system of the National Socialist training of future leaders. . . .

“‘The curriculum has been laid down by Reichsleiter Rosenberg, together with the Reich Organization Leader and the Reich Youth Leader.’”

Rosenberg exercised further influence in the education of Party members in the establishment of community schools for all organizations of the Party. Document 3528-PS is a translation of Page 297 of the 1934 edition of _Das Dritte Reich_, which I offer as Exhibit Number USA-599. It reads as follows:

“We support the request of the Führer’s delegate for the supervision of the entire spiritual and ideological education and instruction of the NSDAP, Party member Alfred Rosenberg, to organize community schools of all organizations of the NSDAP twice a year, in order to show by this common effort the ideological and political unity of the NSDAP and the steadfastness of the National Socialist will.”

This program was endorsed by the Defendant Schirach as well as by Himmler, Ley, and others.

THE PRESIDENT: Aren’t you dealing with this rather in a cumulative way? Isn’t it possible to summarize this evidence against Rosenberg more than you are doing?

MR. BRUDNO: I will try to, Your Honor. However, although the Indictment charges, and there is already substantial proof to show that the defendant conspirators used ideological training as an implement in achieving their rise to power and in consolidating their control, there seems to be little evidence as to Rosenberg’s position; and I am introducing this evidence in order to show that he played a dominant role in this connection. However, I will try to summarize these documents if I can.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I’ve taken down about 20 documents that you have alluded to, all of which deal with Rosenberg’s ideological theories.

MR. BRUDNO: Yes, Your Honor. I was merely trying to show the scope of his activities.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

MR. BRUDNO: Your Honors will recall that it was in his capacity as Führer’s delegate that Rosenberg established the Institute for the Exploration of the Jewish Question in Frankfurt. This institute, commonly known as the “Hohe Schule,” has been referred to in connection with the exposition of art plunders. Into its library there flowed books, documents, and manuscripts which were looted from virtually every country of occupied Europe. Further evidence on this score will be introduced by the prosecutor of the Republic of France.

Your Honors will also recall, and the Record shows at Pages 1671 to 1687 (Volume IV, Pages 81 to 92), that it was as ideological delegate that Rosenberg conducted the fabulous art looting activities of the Einsatzstab Rosenberg, activities which extended to virtually every country occupied by the Germans. I will not attempt to summarize the extent of the plunder and merely refer the Tribunal to Document 1015(b)-PS, which has already been introduced as Exhibit Number USA-385, and Document L-188, which has been introduced as Exhibit Number USA-386. Document 1015(b)-PS details the looting of 21,000 objects of art; Document L-188, the looting of the contents of over 71,000 Jewish homes in the West. This subject, too, will be further developed by the French Prosecutor.

The importance of Rosenberg’s activities as official ideologist of the Nazi Party was not overlooked. In Document 3559-PS, which I wish to introduce as Exhibit Number USA-600—this document, incidentally, is the Hart biography of Rosenberg, entitled _Alfred Rosenberg, The Man and His Work_—it is stated that Rosenberg won the German National Prize in 1937. The creation of this prize, Your Honors will recall, was the Nazis’ petulant reply to the award of the Nobel Prize to Karl von Ossietzki, an inmate of a German concentration camp. The citation which accompanied the award to Rosenberg reads as follows:

“Alfred Rosenberg has helped with his publications to lay the scientific and intuitive foundation and to strengthen the ideology of National Socialism in the most excellent way. . . . The National Socialist movement, and beyond that, the entire German people will be deeply gratified that the Führer has distinguished Alfred Rosenberg as one of his oldest and most faithful fighting comrades by awarding him the German National Prize.”

The contribution which Rosenberg’s book, the _Myth of the Twentieth Century_, the foundation of all his ideological propaganda, made in the development of National Socialism, was appraised in a publication Bücher Kunde in 1942. This publication is our Document Number 3554-PS, dated November 1942. I offer it as Exhibit Number USA-601. The first page sets forth an appraisal of the _Myth of the Twentieth Century_.

THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Brudno, you referred us to the _Myth of the Twentieth Century_ on several occasions.

MR. BRUDNO: Yes, Your Honor.

THE PRESIDENT: We really don’t want to hear any more about it.

MR. BRUDNO: I wish to show that this book is regarded as being one of the pillars of the movement and I wish to show also, Sir, that it had a circulation of over a million copies.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think it is absolutely clear from the evidence which has already been given that Rosenberg was enunciating doctrines of the ideology of the Nazi Party; and I don’t think that it is necessary to go any further into details about it.

MR. BRUDNO: Very well. If the Tribunal is satisfied that Rosenberg’s ideas formed the foundation for the National Socialist ideological movement, I will pass on.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, you have already brought out the fact that he was appointed the Führer’s deputy for that purpose; wasn’t he?

MR. BRUDNO: Yes, Your Honor. I shall pass on from that point. I would merely like to make reference, however, to Document 789-PS, which has already been introduced as Exhibit Number USA-23. This document records a meeting between Hitler and his supreme commanders, on which occasion Hitler said, “The building up of our Armed Forces was possible only in connection with the ideological education of the German people by the Party.”

We submit that the contribution which Rosenberg made through formulation and dissemination of National Socialist ideology was fundamental to the conspiracy. As the apostle of neo-paganism, the exponent of the drive for Lebensraum, and the glorifier of the myth of Nordic superiority and as one of the oldest and most energetic Nazi proponents of anti-Semitism, he contributed materially to the unification of the German people behind the swastika. He provided the impetus and the inspiration for the National Socialist movement. His doctrines were responsible for the sublimation of morality and the crystallization of the Nordic dream in the minds of the German people, thereby making them useful tools in the hands of the conspirators and willing collaborators in the prosecution of their criminal plan.

I now pass to the second phase of Rosenberg’s criminal activities—his active contribution toward the preparation for aggressive war through the international activities of the APA, the Foreign Policy Office of the Party.

As previously indicated in my quotation from _Das Führer Lexikon_, which is Exhibit Number USA-593, Rosenberg became a Reichsleiter, the highest level of rank in the Leadership Corps, and was made chief of the foreign policy office of the Party in April 1933. The organization manual of the Party, Document 2319-PS, which I offer as Exhibit Number USA-602, describes the functions of the APA as including the influencing of public opinion abroad so as to convince foreign nations that Germany desired peace. The far-flung activities of the APA are indicated at Page 14 of the translation of this document and are stated as follows:

“1. The APA is divided into three main offices:

“A. Office for Foreign Areas with its main sections: a) England and Far East; b) Near East; c) southeast; d) north; e) old Orient; f) controls, personnel questions, _et cetera_.

“B. Office of the German Academic Exchange Service. . . .

“C. Office of Foreign Commerce.

“2. Moreover, there is in the APA a main office for the press service and an educational office.”

The press activities of the APA were designed to influence world opinion in such a manner as to conceal the conspirators’ true purposes and thus facilitate the preparation for waging aggressive war. The activities were carried on, on an ambitious scale. I offer into evidence Document 003-PS, which is entitled _A Short Report on the Activities of the APA of the NSDAP_. It is Exhibit Number USA-603. The last paragraph on Page 5 of the translation describes the press activities as follows:

“The Press Division of the APA is staffed by persons conversant with all languages to be considered. They examine approximately 300 newspapers daily and deliver to the Führer, the Führer’s deputy, and all other interested offices the condensations of the important trends of the entire world press. . . . The Press Division furthermore maintains an exact record on the prestige of the most important papers and journalists of the world. Many embarrassments during conferences in Germany could have been avoided had one consulted these archives. . . . Further, the Press Division was able to arrange a host of interviews with me as well as conducting a great number of unobjectionable foreign journalists to the various official representatives of Germany.”

And then:

“Hearst then personally asked me to write often about the position of German foreign policy in his papers. This year five detailed articles have appeared under my name in Hearst papers all over the world. Since these articles, as Hearst personally let me know, presented well-founded arguments, he asked me to write further articles for his paper.”

Thus, Rosenberg used his foreign policy office to influence world opinion on behalf of National Socialism.

It is interesting to note in passing that Rosenberg states, at Page 4 of this document, that the Romanian anti-Semitic leader, Cuza, followed his suggestions as—in Rosenberg’s words—“he had recognized in me an unyielding anti-Semite.” We will hear more of this affair shortly.

The nature and extent of the activities of the APA are amply disclosed in a single document. This is the principal document to which I will refer in this phase of the case against Rosenberg. This document bears our Number 007-PS and is entitled, “Report on the Activities of the Foreign Affairs Bureau of the Party from 1933 to 1943.” It is signed by Rosenberg. Portions of Annex 1, attached to the report, have already been read into evidence as Exhibit GB-84. The body of the report and Annex 2 have not been referred to heretofore. As will be seen the document contains a recital of widespread activities in foreign countries. These activities range from the promotion of economic penetration to fomentation of anti-Semitism; from cultural and political infiltration to the instigation of treason. Activities were carried on throughout the world and extended to such widely separated points as the Middle East and Brazil.

Many of the APA’s achievements were brought about through the subtle exploitation of personal relationships. Reading from the middle of the first paragraph on Page 2 of the translation, which refers to activities in Hungary, we learn that:

“The first foreign state visit after the seizure of power took place through the mediation of the foreign policy office. Julius Gömbös, who in former years had himself pursued anti-Semitic and racial tendencies and with whom the office maintained a personal connection, had reached the Hungarian Premier’s chair. . . .”

The APA endeavored to strengthen the war economy by shifting the source of food imports to the Balkans, as stated in Paragraph 3 on Page 2 of the translation:

“Motivated by reasons of war economy, the office advocated the transfer of raw material purchases from overseas to the areas accessible by overland traffic routes.”

Then he goes on to point out that they had successfully shifted the source of food imports, particularly fruit and vegetable imports, to the Balkans as a result of the activities of the offices.

Activities in Belgium, Holland, and Luxembourg were confined, according to the report, to “observation of existing conditions”—a phrase which may have broad connotations—and “to the establishment of relations, especially of a commercial nature.”

In Iran the APA achieved a high degree of economic penetration, in addition to promoting cultural relations. I quote from the middle of the third paragraph on Page 3:

“The office’s initiative in developing, with the help of commercial circles, entirely new methods for the economic penetration of Iran found expression, in an extraordinarily favorable way, in reciprocal trade relations. Naturally, in Germany, too, this initiative encountered a completely negative attitude and resistance on the part of the competent State authorities, an attitude that at first had to be overcome. In the course of a few years, the volume of trade with Iran was multiplied five-fold and in 1939 Iran’s trade turnover with Germany had attained first place.”

In the last sentence on Page 3. . .

THE PRESIDENT: Well, now, Mr. Brudno, will you kindly explain to the Tribunal how the paragraph that you just read bears upon the guilt of Rosenberg in this Trial?

MR. BRUDNO: If Your Honor pleases, we submit that the conspirators used, as one of the tools of conspiracy, the economic penetration of those countries which they deemed strategically necessary to have within the Axis orbit. The activities of Rosenberg in the field of foreign trade contributed materially, we submit, to the advancement of the conspiracy, as charged in the Indictment.

THE PRESIDENT: Are you suggesting that it is a crime to try and stimulate trade in foreign countries?

MR. BRUDNO: If Your Honor pleases, the expression of ideological opinions or the advancement of foreign trade do not, in themselves, constitute a crime, we agree.

THE PRESIDENT: There is nothing here about ideological considerations. It is simply a question of trade.

MR. BRUDNO: Further on, Your Honor, he mentions the cultural activities.

THE PRESIDENT: I was confining myself, in order to try to get on, to the particular paragraph that you had just cited.

MR. BRUDNO: I see, Your Honor; we are merely trying to show, Sir, that the Germans used the foreign trade weapon as a material part of the conspiratorial program.

THE PRESIDENT: As I have said before, it is not possible for me or for any member of this Tribunal to conduct the case of the Prosecution for them. We can only tell them when we think they are being irrelevant and cumulative and ask them to try to cut down their presentation. It is for you to cut it down.

MR. BRUDNO: Rosenberg goes on to state, if Your Honor please, at Page 3 of the translation, that “Afghanistan’s neutral position today is largely due to the office’s activity.”

In connection with Arabia, he says:

“The Arab question, too, became part of the work of the office. In spite of England’s tutelage of Iraq, the office established a series of connections to a number of leading personalities of the Arab world, smoothing the way for strong bonds to Germany. In this connection, the growing influence of the Reich in Iran and Afghanistan did not fail to have repercussions in Arabia.”

Rosenberg concluded his report with the statement that, with the outbreak of war, he was entitled to consider his task as terminated, and then he says, “The exploitation of the many personal connections in many lands can be resumed under a different guise.”

I now turn to Annex 2 of the report, which is found at Page 9 of the translation. This annex deals with activities in Romania. Here the APA’s intrigue was more insidious, its interference in the internal affairs of a foreign nation more pronounced. After describing the failure of what Rosenberg terms a “basically sound anti-Semitic tendency,” due to dynastic squabbles and Party fights, Rosenberg describes the APA’s influence in the unification of conflicting elements. I quote, beginning with the ninth line of the translation:

“What was lacking was the guiding leadership of a political personality. After manifold groping trials the office believed such a personality to have been found in the former Minister and poet, Octavian Goga. It was not difficult to convince this poet, pervaded by instinctive inspiration, that a greater Romania, though it had to be created in opposition to Vienna, could be maintained only together with Berlin. Nor was it difficult to create in him the desire to link the fate of Romania with the future of the National Socialist German Reich in good time. By bringing continuing influence to bear, the office succeeded in inducing Octavian Goga as well as Professor Cuza to amalgamate the parties under their leadership on an anti-Semitic basis. Thus they could carry on with united strength the struggle for Romania’s renascence internally and her Anschluss with Germany externally. Through the office’s initiative both parties, which had heretofore been known by distinct names, were merged as the National Christian Party, under Goga’s leadership and with Cuza as Honorary President.”

Rosenberg’s man, Goga, was supported by two splinter parties, which had not joined the anti-Semitic trend, and Rosenberg states: “Through intermediaries, the office maintained constant contact with both tendencies.”

Goga, the man supported by Rosenberg, was appointed Prime Minister by the King in December 1937. The pernicious influence of Rosenberg’s ideology had achieved a major triumph, for he states:

“Thus a second government on racial and anti-Semitic foundations had appeared in Europe, in a country in which such an event had been considered completely impossible.”

I will not deal at any length with the details of the political turmoil that plagued Romania during the ensuing period.

THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Brudno, I think the Tribunal are satisfied that Rosenberg—I mean satisfied, subject to what Rosenberg himself or his counsel may say—that Rosenberg tried to spread his ideology abroad, and we don’t require any further detailed proof of that, and we are also satisfied that we have heard enough of the activities of the APA.

MR. BRUDNO: Certainly, Your Honor. We feel that if the Tribunal is satisfied, we can pass on.

THE PRESIDENT: Subject, as I said, to anything that Rosenberg may prove.

MR. BRUDNO: Surely. I would merely like to conclude with the statement that the activities of the APA were, as indicated in this Document 007-PS, primarily responsible for Romania’s joining the Axis. It was a vital link in Germany’s chain of military strategy.

I would further like to call to Your Honor’s attention the evidence which has already been submitted on the activities of the APA in Norway, activities which led to the treason of Quisling and Hagelin, for which they have been condemned.

I come now to the final phase of the case against the Defendant Rosenberg. We have seen how he aided the Nazi rise to power and directed the psychological preparation of the German people for waging of aggressive war. I will now offer proof of his responsibility for the planning and execution of War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity committed in the vast areas of the occupied East, which he administered for over 3 years. These areas included the Baltic States, White Ruthenia, the Ukraine, and the eastern portion of Poland.

I will not endeavor here to chronicle again the tale of mass murder, spoliation, and brutality. We feel that that has already been sufficiently evidenced, and further evidence on this point will be presented by the Prosecution for the U.S.S.R. and for the Republic of France.

We anticipate, however, that Rosenberg will contend that some of these crimes were committed against his wishes, and, indeed, there is some evidence that he protested on occasion—not out of humanitarian reasons but on grounds of political expediency.

We also anticipate that Rosenberg will attempt to place the blame for these crimes on other agencies and on other defendants. The evidence will prove, however, that he himself formulated the harsh policies, in the execution of which the crimes were committed; that the crimes were committed for the most part by persons and agencies within his jurisdiction and control; that any other agencies which participated in the commission of these crimes were invited by Rosenberg to co-operate in the administration of the East, although the brutal methods customarily employed by them were common knowledge; and, finally, his Ministry lent full co-operation to their activities, despite the criminal methods that were employed.

Rosenberg was actively participating in the affairs of the East as early as 20 April 1941, 2 months prior to the German attack upon the Soviet Union. On that date he was designated by Hitler as commissioner for the central control of questions connected with the East European region.

The Hitler order by virtue of which he received this appointment has been read into the record in its entirety as Exhibit Number USA-143, our Document Number 865-PS.

The initial preparations undertaken by Rosenberg for fulfillment of his task indicated the extent to which he co-operated in promoting the military plans for aggression. They also show that he understood his task at the inception as requiring the assistance of a multitude of Reich agencies and that he invited their co-operation.

Shortly after his appointment by Hitler, Rosenberg conducted a series of conferences with representatives of various Reich agencies, conferences which are summarized in Document 1039-PS, previously offered as Exhibit Number USA-146. This document indicated the co-operation of the following agencies. It indicated that the co-operation of these agencies was both contemplated and solicited by Rosenberg. The agencies are as follows: OKW, OKH, OKM, Ministry of Economics, Commissioner for the Four Year Plan, the Ministry of the Interior, Reich Youth Leadership, the German Labor Front, Ministry of Labor, the SS, the SA, and several others.

These arrangements, it should be noted, were made by Rosenberg in his capacity as commissioner on Eastern questions, before the attack on the Soviet Union, before he was appointed as Reich Minister for the occupied East, in fact, before there was any occupied East for Germany to administer.

I would like to refer briefly to some of Rosenberg’s basic attitudes regarding his new task and the directives which he knew he would be expected to follow.

Your Honor will recall that on 29 April 1941, in Document 1024-PS, previously introduced as Exhibit Number USA-278, Rosenberg stated that:

“A general treatment is required for the Jewish problem for which a temporary solution will have to be determined (forced labor for the Jews, creation of ghettos, _et cetera_).”

On May 8, 1941 he prepared instructions for all Reich commissioners in the Occupied Eastern Territories. These instructions are found in Document 1030-PS, previously introduced as Exhibit Number USA-144. The last paragraph, which has not been called to Your Honors’ attention, reads as follows:

“From the point of view of cultural policy, the German Reich is in a position to promote and direct national culture and science in many fields. It will be necessary that in some territories an uprooting and resettlement of various racial stocks will have to be effected.”

In Document 1029-PS, which has been introduced as Exhibit Number USA-145, Rosenberg directs that the Ostland be transformed into a part of the Greater German Reich by germanizing racially possible elements, colonizing Germanic races, and banishing undesirable elements.

In a speech which Rosenberg made on 20 June 1941, Your Honors will recall, he stated the job of feeding Germans was the top of Germany’s claim on the East; that there was no obligation to feed the Russian peoples; that this was a harsh necessity bare of any feelings; that a very extensive evacuation will be necessary; and that the future will hold many hard years in store for the Russians. This speech, Your Honors, is in the record as Document 1058-PS, Exhibit Number USA-147.

On July 4, 1941, still prior to Rosenberg’s appointment as Reich Minister for the occupied East, a representative of Rosenberg’s office attended a conference on the subject of utilization of labor, and especially of the labor of Soviet prisoners of war. Document 1199-PS is a memorandum of this conference, and I offer it into evidence as Exhibit Number USA-604. It states that the participants were, among others, representatives of the Commissioner for the Four Year Plan, of the Reich Labor Ministry, of the Reich Food Ministry, and of the Rosenberg office. The first sentence states, and I quote:

“After an introduction by Lieutenant Colonel Dr. Krull, Lieutenant Colonel Breyer of the PW Department explained that actually there was a prohibition in effect by the Führer against bringing Russian PW’s into the Reich for employment, but that one might count on this prohibition being relaxed a little.”

The last paragraph records that, and I quote:

“The chairman summarized the results of the discussion as indicating that all the bureaus concerned unqualifiedly advocated and supported the demand for utilization of PW’s because of manpower needs in the Reich.”

On 16 July 1941, the day before Rosenberg’s appointment as Minister of the occupied East, he attended a conference at the Führer’s headquarters, the minutes of which have been introduced as Document L-221, Exhibit Number USA-317. At that time Hitler stated, “The Crimea has to be evacuated by all foreigners and to be settled by Germans alone.”

He further stated that Germany’s objectives in the East were three-fold: first, to dominate it; second, to administer it; third, to exploit it.

Thus, the character of the administration which was contemplated for the occupied East was well established before Rosenberg took office as Minister. He knew of these plans and was in accord with them. Persecution of the Jews, forced labor of prisoners of war, Germanization and exploitation, were all basic points of policy which Rosenberg knew of at the time he assumed office.

On July 17, 1941, Rosenberg was appointed Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories. The decree by which he was appointed is in evidence as Document 1997-PS, Exhibit Number USA-319.

I would like now to examine the organizational structure and the chain of responsibility which existed within the Ministry for the occupied East.

The organizational structure of the East was such as we will show that Rosenberg was not merely a straw man. He was the supreme authority with full control.

Document 1056-PS is a mimeographed treatise entitled, “The Organization of the Administration of the Occupied Eastern Territories.” It is undated and unsigned, but we can obtain further information regarding it by reference to EC-347, which is Göring’s Green Folder, already in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-320.

It is noted that Part II, Subsection A, of Document EC-347 is entitled, and I quote: “Excerpts from the Directives of the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories and for the Civil Administration,” and then in parenthesis, “Brown Folder, Part I, Pages 25 to 30.”

The two paragraphs which follow are identical to two paragraphs found at the top of Page 9 of the translation of Document 1056-PS. Thus Document 1056-PS is identified as being a mimeograph of Part I of the Brown Folder which was mentioned in the Green Folder, and was issued by the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories.

I now offer Document 1056-PS as Exhibit Number USA-605. I offer this document for the purpose of proving, from the directives issued by the Rosenberg Ministry itself, the extent of Rosenberg’s authority; that he was the supreme civilian authority in the Eastern territories. The document will show that there was a continuous chain of command from Rosenberg down to the regional administrative officials, a chain of command which extended even to the local prison warden.

The document also will show the relationship which existed between the Rosenberg Ministry and other German agencies, a relationship which varied from full control by Rosenberg to full co-operation with them, made mandatory by his directives and by Hitler’s orders.

Finally, the document will show that the various subdivisions of the Ministry were required to submit periodic reports of the situation within their jurisdiction, so that the numerous reports of unspeakable brutality which Rosenberg received, and which are already in the record, were submitted to him pursuant to his orders.

The first paragraph of this significant document states as follows:

“The newly occupied Eastern territories are subordinated to the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories. By direction of the Führer he establishes a civil administration there, upon withdrawal of the military administration. He heads and supervises the entire administration of this area and represents the sovereignty of the Reich in the Occupied Eastern Territories.”

At the top of Page 2 of the translation is stated, and I quote:

“To the Reich Ministry is assigned a deputy of the Reich Leader SS and Chief of the German Police in the Reich Ministry of the Interior.”

Roman numeral III on Page 2 of the translation defines the responsibility of the Reich commissioners as, and I quote:

“In the Reich commissariats, Reich commissioners are responsible for the entire civil administration under the supreme authority of the Reich Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories. According to the instructions of the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, the Reich Commissioner, as a functionary of the Reich, heads and supervises, within his precincts, the entire civil administration. Within the scope of these instructions he acts on his own responsibility.”

And then the chain of command is outlined: Subordinate offices, general commissariats, main commissariats, district commissariats, _et cetera_.

In the second last paragraph on Page 3 of the translation it is stated again:

“The Higher SS and Police Leader is directly subordinated to the Reich Commissioner. However, the Chief of Staff has the general right to secure information from him also. . . .

“Great stress is to be placed on close co-operation between him, the Chief of Staff, and the other main department heads of the office of the Reich Commissioner, particularly with the one for policies.”

To digress from this document a moment, I ask that the Court take judicial notice of the decree signed by Rosenberg, dated July 17, 1941, and found in the _Verordnungsblatt_ of the Reich Minister for the occupied East, 1942, Number 2, Pages 7 and 8.

This decree provides for the creation of summary courts for decisions on crimes committed by non-Germans in the East. The courts are to be presided over by a police officer or an SS leader, who have authority to order the death sentence or confiscation of property, and those decisions are not subject to appeal. The general commissar is given the right to reject a decision. Thus, the determination of the SS, of these summary courts, is made subordinate to the authority of a representative of the Rosenberg Ministry.

At Page 4 of the translation of Document 1056-PS, the position of the Commissioner General is defined. It is stated here that: “The Commissioner General forms the administrative office of intermediate appeal.”

Three paragraphs down it is stated, and I quote:

“The SS and Police Leader assigned to the Commissioner General is directly subordinated to him. However, the Chief of Staff has the general right of requiring information from him.”

The document goes on to describe the function of the various subdivisions of the Ministry, concluding with regional commissioners who preside over the local administrative districts. They, too, have police units assigned to them and directly subordinated to them.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, Mr. Brudno, surely that could have been stated in a sentence without referring us to all these passages in this document. I mean, Rosenberg was the Minister for the Eastern Territories. He had under him Reich commissioners and SS units, who had the full administration—civil administration—of the Eastern Territories. If you had stated that, surely that would have been sufficient.

MR. BRUDNO: Very well, Your Honor.

I will proceed from that point, then, merely to point out that the economic exploitation of the territory was undertaken in the fullest co-operation with the Commissioner of the Four Year Plan, as shown by Paragraph 2 of Page 7 of the translation. It is stated there that the economic inspectorates of the Commissioner of the Four Year Plan will be substantially absorbed in the agencies of the civil administration after the establishment of the civil administration.

I also wish to call Your Honors’ attention to the first paragraph on Page 6, which reads as follows:

The various commissioners, it says, “are, aside from the military agencies, the only Reich authorities in the Occupied Eastern Territories. Other Reich authorities may not be established alongside them. They handle all questions of administration of the area which is subordinate to their sovereignty and all affairs which concern the organization and activity of the administration, including those of the police, in the supervision of the autonomous agencies and organizations and of the population.”

I now turn briefly to the second section of the document which is entitled, “Working Directives for the Civil Administration.” The first two paragraphs on Page 9 have been read into the record as part of Document EC-347, Exhibit Number USA-320. I call particular attention to the statement that the “Hague Rules of Land Warfare, which deal with the administration of a country occupied by a foreign armed power, are not valid.”

I continue quoting at the last paragraph on Page 9:

“The handling of cases of sabotage is a concern of the Higher SS and Police Leader, of the SS and Police Leader, or of the Police leaders of the lower echelon. Insofar as collective measures against the population appear appropriate, the decision about them rests with the competent commissar.

“To inflict penalties in cash or kind, as well as to order the seizure of hostages and the shooting of inhabitants of the territory in which the acts of sabotage have taken place, rests only with the Commissioner General, unless the Reich Commissioner himself intervenes.”

I conclude with this document by quoting the first sentence at the top of Page 13:

“The district commissioners are responsible for the supervision of all prisons, unless the Reich commissioners intervene.”

I will not take the time of the Tribunal, nor burden the Record, with a detailed account of the manner in which Rosenberg’s plenary authority and power were wielded. There is evidence in the Record, and there will be additional evidence presented by the Soviet prosecutor, as to the magnitude of the War Crimes and the Crimes against Humanity perpetrated against the peoples of the occupied East.

However, merely to illustrate the manner in which Rosenberg participated in the criminal activities conducted within his jurisdiction, I would like to refer briefly to a few examples.

I call your attention to the document numbered R-135, which was previously introduced as Exhibit Number USA-289. In this document the prison warden of Minsk reports that 516 German and Russian Jews had been killed, and called attention to the fact that valuable gold had been lost due to the failure to knock out the fillings of the victims’ teeth before they were done away with.

These activities took place in the prison at Minsk, a prison which, Your Honors will recall from Document 1056-PS, was directly under the supervision of the Ministry for the occupied East.

For my next illustration I wish to offer Document 018-PS. This document has already been introduced as Exhibit Number USA-186. I would like to read to the Tribunal the first paragraph of Document 018-PS, which has not yet been read into the Record. The document reveals that Rosenberg wrote Sauckel on 21 November 1942, in the following terms:

“I thank you very much for your report on the execution of the great task given to you; and I am glad to hear that in carrying out your mission you have always found the necessary support, even on the part of the civilian authorities in the Occupied Eastern Territories. For myself and the officials under my command, this collaboration was and is self-evident, especially since both you and I have, with regard to the solution of the labor problem in the East, represented the same points of view from the beginning.”

As late as 11 July 1944 the Rosenberg Ministry was actively concerned with the continuation of the forced labor program, in spite of the retreat from the East.

THE TRIBUNAL (Mr. Biddle): After making this generality, Rosenberg goes on to object, at the last here, to the methods used. You haven’t mentioned that.

MR. BRUDNO: Quite right, Your Honor. Those objections are already in the record, Sir, and I was merely referring to this document to show that Rosenberg favored recruitment from the East, that his civilian administrators co-operated with the recruitment in spite of the methods used, the methods which were known to Rosenberg as he reports in the letter himself.

DR. ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for Defendant Rosenberg): High Tribunal, in this connection I must protest that the Prosecutor did not finish reading this Paragraph 1 he has just quoted. For then comes the sentence in which he states that an agreement existed between Sauckel and Rosenberg regarding. . .

THE PRESIDENT: I don’t think you can have heard that the United States Member of the Tribunal has just made this very point, which you are now making to Counsel for the United States, and has pointed out to him that he ought to have read there, or drawn attention at any rate, to the other paragraphs in this document which showed that Rosenberg was objecting to the methods used.

DR. THOMA: High Tribunal, I would like to point out that the prosecutor quoted just the first two sentences of a specific paragraph. The same paragraph ends, however, where it is stated that “there was an agreement between Sauckel and me according to which workers were to be treated well in Germany, and for this purpose welfare organizations were to be created”. The presentation of the prosecutor creates the impression that the Defendants Sauckel and Rosenberg had agreed only on the use of forced labor without restraint and on the deportation of the workers from the East.

THE PRESIDENT: As Counsel for the United States pointed out, the other passages in the document have already been read. And, naturally, the whole document will be treated as being in evidence.

The Tribunal fully realizes the point you are making, that it is not fair to read one passage of a document when there are other passages in the document which show that the passage read is not a full or proper statement of the document.

MR. BRUDNO: If Your Honor pleases, I was not attempting to delude the Tribunal; it was merely in the interest of time that I did not read the balance. The rest is in the Record.

THE PRESIDENT: I realize that.

We will adjourn now.

[_The Tribunal adjourned until 10 January 1946 at 1000 hours._]

THIRTY-FIRST DAY Thursday, 10 January 1946

_Morning Session_

MR. BRUDNO: May it please the Tribunal, when the Tribunal rose yesterday I had finished the submission of proof as to Rosenberg’s responsibility and authority in the Occupied Eastern Territories and was about to conclude my presentation with four brief examples as to the manner in which his authority was exercised. I was in the middle of the third example, which, Your Honors will recall, dealt with Rosenberg’s participation in the forced labor program. I wish to conclude that illustration with reference to Document 199-PS, which we offer as Exhibit Number USA-606. This document is a letter from Alfred Meyer, Rosenberg’s deputy, and is addressed to Sauckel, dated July 11, 1944. This time, Your Honors will note, it is Rosenberg’s Ministry that is urging action. I wish to quote Item Number 1 of this letter, which reads as follows:

“The War Effort Task Force Command formerly stationed in Minsk must continue, under all circumstances, the calling up of young White Ruthenian and Russian men for military employment in the Reich. In addition the Command has the mission of bringing young boys of 10-14 years of age into the Reich.”

My third illustration deals with Rosenberg’s exercise of his legislative powers, and I ask the Court to take judicial notice of the decree signed by Lohse, who was Reich Commissar for Ostland. This decree is published in the _Verordnungsblatt_ of the Reich Commissar for Ostland, 1942, Number 38, Pages 158 and 159. It provides for the seizure of the entire property of the Jewish population in the Ostland, including the claims of Jews against third parties. The seizure is made retroactive to the day of occupation of the territory by German troops. This sweeping decree was issued and published by Rosenberg’s immediate subordinate, and it must be assumed that Rosenberg knew of it and acquiesced in it.

I now come to my final illustration. This illustration is derived from Document 327-PS, which is already in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-338.

It is a copy of a secret letter from Rosenberg to Bormann dated 17 October 1944. It furnishes a graphic account of Rosenberg’s activities in the economic exploitation of the occupied East. I wish to quote from the first paragraph on Page 1, which has not been read into the Record. I quote:

“In order not to delay the liquidation of companies under my supervision, I beg to point out that the companies concerned are not private firms but business enterprises of the Reich, so that directives with regard to them, just as with regard to Government offices, are reserved to the highest authorities of the Reich. I supervise the following companies. . . .”

There follows a list of nine companies: A trading company, an agricultural development company, a supply company, a pharmaceutical company, and five banking concerns. On Page 3 of the translation at Item 1 (a) the mission of the trading company is stated to be, and I quote:

“Seizure of all agricultural products as well as commercial marketing and transportation thereof. (Delivery to Armed Forces and the Reich).”

I now call your attention to Item 5 of the same page. It describes the activities of the companies as follows:

“During this period, the Z.O.”—that is, the Central Trading Corporation East—“together with its subsidiaries has seized:

“Grain 9,200,000 tons, meat and meat products 622,000 tons, linseed 950,000 tons, butter 208,000 tons, sugar 400,000 tons, fodder 2,500,000 tons, potatoes 3,200,000 tons, seeds 141,000 tons, other agricultural products 1,200,000 tons, and 1,075,000,000 eggs.

“The following was required for transportation: 1,418,000 freight cars and 472,000 tons shipping space.”

In conclusion we submit that the evidence has shown that the Defendant Rosenberg played a leading role in the Nazi Party’s rise to power by moulding German thought so as to promote the conspirators’ ambitions; that he played a leading role in spreading propaganda and intrigue, and in instigating treason in foreign countries, so as to pave the way for the waging of wars of aggression; and that he bears full responsibility for the War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity which were perpetrated in the Occupied Eastern Territories and which will be further developed by the prosecutor for the U.S.S.R.

This completes the presentation of the case against the Defendant Rosenberg. The next presentation will be that of the case against the Defendant Frank, which will be presented by Lieutenant Colonel Baldwin.

LIEUTENANT COLONEL WILLIAM H. BALDWIN (Assistant Trial Counsel for the United States): May it please the Tribunal, we wish now to deal with the individual responsibility of the Defendant Frank. In accordance with the expressed desire of the Tribunal, this presentation has been strictly limited; and, of course, I should welcome any direction from the Tribunal as to length or method as I proceed.

First, I must acknowledge my indebtedness to Miss Harriet Zetterberg, of our legal staff, and to Dr. Pietrowski, of the Polish Delegation, for their invaluable work—Dr. Pietrowski and the Polish Delegation, naturally, having a special interest in the Defendant Frank.

Aspects of the criminal complicity of the Defendant Hans Frank under Count One of the Indictment have been placed before this Tribunal on several occasions. There remain, however, certain matters for discussion—either novel in presentation or in development—concerning this defendant as an individual, before the United States’ portion of the Prosecution’s case against him is completed. Our Soviet colleagues will carry further the heavy complaint against the Defendant Frank in their treatment of War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity in the East. We wish here merely to touch upon that evidence which, we believe, irrefutably discloses Frank to have been a tremendously important cog in the machine which conceived, promoted, and executed the Nazi Common Plan or Conspiracy. Documents relating to this point have been assembled in a document book bearing the letters “FF.” I am informed that these books, as well as explanatory briefs, have been distributed for the use of the members of the Tribunal.

Reference will be made in the course of this argument to the so-called Frank diary, portions of which have already been brought to the attention of the Tribunal. It seems appropriate that brief mention should here be made of the content and source of this diary. It is a set of some 38 volumes, most of which are on the table at the front of the courtroom, detailing the activities of the Defendant Frank from 1939 to the end of the war in his capacity as Governor General of Occupied Poland. It is a record, in short, of each day’s business, hour by hour, appointment by appointment, conference by conference, speech by speech, and—in truth we believe—crime by crime. Each volume, excepting the last few, is now handsomely bound; and in those volumes, which deal with the conferences of Frank and his underlings in the Government General, the name of each person attending the meeting is inscribed in his own handwriting on a page preceding the minutes of the conference itself. It is incredibly shocking to the normal conscience that such a neat history of murder, starvation, and extermination should have been maintained by the individual responsible for such deeds, but by now the Tribunal is well aware that the Nazi leaders were sentimentally fond of elaborately documenting their exploits, as witness the Rosenberg volumes displaying the looted art treasures and the album reporting on the extermination of Jews in the Warsaw ghetto. The complete set of the Frank diary was found in Bavaria, at Neuhaus, near Schliersee, on 18 May 1945, by the 7th American Army. It was taken to the 7th Army document center at Heidelberg and on or about 20 September 1945 the collection was sent to the Office of U.S. Chief of Counsel here at Nuremberg. It is here in court in its entirety; and now its tones, we submit, are those of accusation rather than boastful narration.

That the Defendant Frank held a position of leadership in the Nazi Party and in the German Government is undeniable. Even, presumably, it would be unfair to the Defendant Frank to underestimate his importance in the Nazi hierarchy and the Third Reich. Like the other defendants in this case, he was a man of far-reaching influence and position; and his office-holding record is already before this Court. It is an affidavit signed by the Defendant Frank and identified as Exhibit Number USA-7. This document contains a listing of 11 important positions held by Frank in the Party and in the Government and supports the assertion of influence and position which I have just made, especially since this Tribunal has been fully apprised of the criminal activities of the Nazi organizations and formations.

The machinations of Frank divide themselves logically into two periods. In the one, from 1920 to 1939, he was by his own admission the leading Nazi jurist, although parenthetically the word “jurist” loses its reputable content when modified by the word “Nazi”. In the other period, extending from 10 October 1939 until the end of the war, he was Governor General of occupied Poland. While he is most notorious for his persecutions and carrying out of the conspiracy in the latter capacity, it is the opinion of the United States Prosecution that the Defendant Frank’s contributions to the Nazi rise to power as the leading Nazi jurist should not pass without mention. It is with this aspect that I shall first deal—the Defendant Frank’s furtherance of the realization of the conspirators’ program in the field of law, his knowledge of the criminal purpose of the program, and his active participation therein.

The Defendant Frank, himself, described his role in the Nazi struggle for power in the following words, which were remarks he ordered his secretary to place in the Frank diary on 28 August 1942. The remarks appear in the diary and are translated in our Document 2233(x)-PS, which, if the Court please, is at Page 54 in the document book before it.

The numbers of the pages of the document book will be found in the upper right-hand corner in colored pencil, either red or blue. The original of this document I now offer in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-607. In the German text these extracts appear in Part 3 of the 1942 diary volume on Pages 968, 969, and 983. Frank says:

“I have since 1920 continually dedicated my work to the NSDAP. As a National Socialist I was a participant in the events of November 1923, for which I received the Order of the Blood. After the resurrection of the movement in the year 1925, my really greater activity in the movement began, which made me, first gradually, later almost exclusively, the legal adviser of the Führer and of the Reich Party Directorate of the NSDAP. I was thus the representative of the legal interests of the growing Third Reich in a legal-ideological as well as in a practical way.”

He goes on to say:

“The culmination of this work I see in the Leipzig army trial, in which I succeeded in having the Führer admitted to the famous oath of legality, a circumstance which gave the Movement legal grounds to expand on a large scale. The Führer, indeed, recognized this achievement and in 1926 made me leader of the National Socialist Lawyers’ League; in 1929, Reichsleiter of the Reich Legal Office of the NSDAP; in March 1933, Bavarian Minister of Justice; in the same year, Reich Commissioner for Justice; in 1934, President of the Academy of German Law, founded by me; and in December 1934, Reich Minister without Portfolio. And in 1939, I was finally appointed Governor General for the occupied Polish territories.

“So I was, am, and will remain the representative jurist of the struggle period of National Socialism. . . .

“I profess myself now and always, as a National Socialist and a faithful follower of the Führer, Adolf Hitler, whom I have now served since 1919. . . .”

It is indeed significant and worth mentioning to the Court. . .

THE PRESIDENT: Is this an extract from his diary?

LT. COL. BALDWIN: Yes, Sir; it is.

THE PRESIDENT: And are the words “Present: Dr. Hans Frank and others” written by him in his diary?

LT. COL. BALDWIN: Yes, Sir; they are. Before each of these excerpts, if Your Honor pleases, if it was in conference it was indicated which members of the Government General were present or who made the address.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: It is indeed significant and worth mentioning to the Court that the Defendant Frank assumes responsibility for the so-called oath of legality at the Leipzig army trial. At that trial, in 1930, three army officers were accused of—curiously enough—conspiracy to high treason. The charge was that the defendants in that trial, in their capacity as members of the German Army, tried to form National Socialist cells in the German Army and to influence the German Army to such an extent that, in the case of a Putsch by the National Socialists, the army would not fire at the National Socialists, but would stand at ease instead. All three of the officers were found guilty and sentenced to 18 months’ confinement. At that trial, however, Hitler was a witness; and during the course of the trial, testified under oath that the term “revolution,” used by him, meant only spiritual revolution in Germany and that the expression “heads would roll in the sand” meant only that they would do so as a result of legal procedure through state tribunals, if the National Socialists came to power. This, if the Court please, was the so-called oath of legality, the lie that the Defendant Frank provided his Führer as a facade for the conspiracy and which he, at least in 1942, considered the culmination of his efforts.

As the “representative jurist of the struggle period of National Socialism” and in various juridical capacities listed in his affidavit of positions held, Defendant Frank was, between 1933 and 1939, the most prominent policy-maker in the field of German legal theory. For example, Defendant Frank founded the Academy of German Law in 1934 and he was president of this once potent body until 1942. The statute defining the functions of this Academy conferred upon it wide power to initiate and co-ordinate juridical policies.

This statute appears in the translation at Page 5 in the document book as our Document 1391-PS and appears in the 1934 _Reichsgesetzblatt_ at Page 605. We ask the Court to take judicial notice of it. I now quote briefly from the decree:

“It is the task of the Academy for German Law to further the reorganization of legal procedure in Germany. Closely connected with the agencies competent for legislation, it shall further the realization of the National Socialist program in the realm of the law. This task shall be carried out by approved scientific methods.

“The Academy’s task shall cover primarily:

“1. The formulation, initiation, judging, and preparing of drafts of law; 2. collaboration in rejuvenating and unifying the training in jurisprudence and political science; 3. the editing and supporting of scientific publications; 4. financial assistance for work and research in specific fields of law and political economy.”

THE TRIBUNAL (Mr. Biddle): Do you have to read all this? We will take judicial notice of it.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: Among the early tasks which Defendant Frank set for himself, as policy-maker in the field of law, were the unification of the German State, the promotion of racial legislation, and the elimination of political organizations other than the Nazi Party. In a radio address given on 20 March 1934 he announced success in these matters. Our partial English translation of this speech appears as Document 2536-PS, at Page 64 in the document book. The official text of this speech appears in _Dokumente der Deutschen Politik_, Volume II (first edition), Pages 294-298. In the German text the extracts which I shall quote appear at Pages 296 and 298, and I will ask the Court to take judicial notice of these passages:

“The first task was that of uniting all Germans into one State. It was an outstanding historical and legislative accomplishment on the part of our Führer that by boldly grasping historical development he eliminated the sovereignty of the various German states. At last we have now, after 1,000 years, again a unified German State in every respect. It is no longer possible for the world, based on the spirit of resistance inherent in small states, which are set up on an egoistical scale and solely with a view to their individual interest, to make calculations to the detriment of the German people. That is a thing of the past for all times to come.”

I pass on now to the second excerpt:

“The second fundamental law of the Hitler Reich is racial legislation. The National Socialists were the first in the entire history of human law to elevate the concept of race to the status of a legal term. The German Nation, unified racially and nationally, will in the future be legally protected against any further disintegration of the German race stock.”

I pass now to the mention of the sixth law:

“The sixth fundamental law was the legal elimination of those political organizations which within the State, during the period of the regeneration of the people and the reconstruction of the Reich, were once able to place their selfish aims ahead of the common good of the nation. This elimination has taken place entirely legally. It is not the coming to the fore of despotic tendencies, but it was the necessary legal consequence of a clear political result of the 14 years’ struggle of the NSDAP.

“In accordance with these unified legal aims”—Frank continues—“in all spheres, particular efforts have for months now been made regarding the work of the great reform of the entire field of German law.

“As the leader of the German jurists, I am convinced that, together with all strata of the German people, we shall be able to construct the legal state of Adolf Hitler in every respect and to such an extent that no one in the world will at any time be able to dare to attack this constitutional state as regards its laws.”

In his speech on the occasion of the day of the Reich University Professors of the National Socialist Lawyers’ League on 3 October 1936, the Defendant Frank explained to the gathering of professors the elimination of Jews from the legal field, in accordance with the Nazi plan. Our partial translation of this speech appears as Document 2536-PS, at Page 62 of the document book. The official text appears likewise in _Dokumente der Deutschen Politik_, in Volume IV, Pages 225 to 230. I ask the Tribunal to take judicial notice of this. It deals, to summarize. . .

THE PRESIDENT: I do not think you need it because we have already had documents of the same sort.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: As the leading Nazi jurist, the Defendant Frank accepted, condoned, and promoted the system of concentration camps and of arrest without warrant. He apparently had no hesitancy in subverting his professional ethics, if any he had, while subverting the legal framework of the German State to Nazi ends. He explains the outrageous departure from civilization that were concentration camps in an article on “Legislation and Judiciary in the Third Reich,” published in 1936 in the official journal of the Academy of German Law, of which, of course, he was the editor. The partial translation of this article appears as our Document 2533-PS, at Page 61 of the document book. The official German text of the extract appears in _Zeitschrift der Akademie für Deutsches Recht_, 1936, at Page 141, and I will ask the Tribunal to take judicial notice of this. Since the extract is short, I will ask permission to read it. Frank says:

“Before the world we are blamed again and again because of the concentration camps. We are asked: Why do you arrest without a warrant of arrest? I say: Put yourselves into the position of our nation. Don’t forget that the very great and still untouched world of Bolshevism cannot forget that here on our German soil we have made final victory for them impossible in Europe.”

It can be seen, therefore, that just as other defendants mobilized the military, economic, and diplomatic resources for aggressive war, the Defendant Frank, in the field of legal policy, geared the German juridical machine for a war of aggression, which war of aggression, as he explained in 1942 to the NSDAP political leaders of Galicia at a mass meeting in Lvov—and I now quote from the Frank diary, our Document 2233(s)-PS, at Page 50 in the document book, the original of which I offer in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-607—had for its purpose, and I quote: “. . . to expand the living space for our people in a natural manner.”

The distortions and warpings of German law, which Defendant Frank engineered for the Party, gave him, if not the world, vast satisfaction. He reported this to the powerful Academy for German Law in November 1939, 1 month after becoming Governor General of occupied Poland. This speech is partially translated in our Document 3445-PS, at Page 73 in the document book. The official text of the speech appears in _Deutsches Recht_, 1939, Volume 2, the week of 23-30 December 1939, beginning at Page 2121; and we ask the Court to take judicial notice of this, but would ask permission to read the excerpt, as it is very short. Frank stated:

“Today we are proud of having formulated our legal principles from the very beginning in such a way that they need not be changed in the case of war. For the maxim—that which serves the Nation is right, and that which harms it is wrong, which stood at the beginning of our legal work and which established this idea of the community of the people as the only standard of the law—this maxim shines out also in the social order of these times.”

If this sentiment has a familiar ring to it, it is because it is a restatement of a Party commandment tailored and furnished by the Party lawyer to fit the Party’s concept of law. I allude, of course, to the Party commandment, commented upon at Page 1608 (Volume IV, Page 38) of the official English transcript of these proceedings in the treatment of the Leadership Corps, which commandment stated and I quote, “Right is that which serves the Movement and thus Germany.”

It follows, I think, that the Prosecution conceives the Defendant Frank to be jointly responsible for all those cruel and discriminatory enabling acts and decrees through which the Nazis crushed minorities in Germany and consolidated their control over the German State and prepared it for its early entry upon aggression. It matters not, in our view, that the signature of this lawyer does not appear at the foot of every decree. Enough has been shown, in our submission, to indicate culpability in this regard. There is sufficient, we believe, now in this Record—and I refer to decrees cited by Major Walsh in his treatment of the persecution of the Jews and by Colonel Storey in his treatment of the Reich Cabinet—to demonstrate that type of enactment and the consequences thereof, for which we hold the Defendant Frank liable. In following this theory, may it please the Tribunal, we are only arriving at conclusions already arrived at for us by the Defendant Frank himself.

I now pass to that second and well-known phase of the Defendant Frank’s official life, wherein he for 5 years, as chief Party and Government agent, was bent upon the elimination of a whole people. He was appointed Governor General of the occupied Polish territory by a decree signed by his then Führer on 12 October 1939. The decree defined the scope of Frank’s executive power and is contained in our Document 2537-PS, at Page 66 in the document book. I shall ask the Tribunal to take judicial notice of this, since it appears in _Reichsgesetzblatt_, 1939, Part I, Page 2077.

It merely states that Dr. Frank is appointed as Governor General of the occupied Polish territory; that Dr. Seyss-Inquart is appointed as Deputy Governor General, and that “the Governor General shall be directly responsible to me”—meaning Hitler, he having signed the decree.

While some of the outside world was prone in earlier days to wonder at the apparent efficiency of Nazi administration, we now know that it was often riddled with the petty jealousies of small men in positions of some authority and with jurisdictional fractiousness. No such difficulty existed with the Defendant Frank, however, for though he was not without the threat of divided authority, he insisted upon, and was granted, the favor of supreme command within the territorial confines of the Government General. Only two references from his diary, one in 1940 and one in 1942, are necessary to show the all-inclusiveness of his direction and authority.

At a meeting of department heads of the Government General on 8 March 1940 in the Bergakademie, the Defendant Frank clarified his status as Governor General; and these remarks appear in the diary and in our Document 2233(m)-PS, at Page 42 in the document book, the original of which I offer into evidence as Exhibit Number USA-173.

In the German text, the extracts appear in the meetings of department heads, Volume 2 for 1939-1940, at Pages 5, 6, 7, and 8. Frank says:

“One thing is certain. The authority of the Governor General as the representative of the will of the Führer and the will of the Reich in this territory is certainly strong, and I have always emphasized that I would not tolerate misuse of this authority. I have made this known anew at every office in Berlin, especially after Herr Field Marshal Göring on 12. 2. 1940, from Karin Hall, had forbidden all administrative offices of the Reich, including the Police and even the Wehrmacht, to interfere in administrative matters of the Government General. . . .”

He goes on to say:

“There is no authority here in the Government General which is higher as to rank, stronger in influence, and of greater authority than that of the Governor General. Even the Wehrmacht has no governmental or official functions here of any kind; it has only security functions and general military duties—it has no political power whatsoever. The same applies to the Police and the SS. There is here no state within a state, but we are representatives of the Führer and of the Reich.”

Later, in 1942, at a conference of the district political leaders of the NSDAP in Kraków on 18 March, Defendant Frank further explained the relationship between the administration and the Reichsführer SS Himmler. These remarks appear in the diary and in our Document 2233(r)-PS and at Page 48 of the document book, the original of which I offer into evidence as Exhibit Number USA-608. In the German text, the extract to be quoted appears at Pages 185 and 186 of diary Volume 18, 1942, Part I. I quote:

“As you know”—says Frank—“I am a fanatic as to unity in administration. . . . It is therefore clear that the Higher SS and Police Leader is subordinated to me, that the Police is a component of the Government, that the SS and Police Leader in the district is subordinated to the Governor, and that the district chief has the authority of command over the gendarmerie in his district. This the Reichsführer SS has recognized; in the written agreement all these points are mentioned word for word and signed. It is also self-evident that we cannot establish a closed shop here which can be treated in the traditional manner of small states.”

THE TRIBUNAL (Mr. Biddle): Do you think all this has to be read?

LT. COL. BALDWIN: It is considered important, Sir, by the United States Prosecution, in view of the fact that this is the later extract from the diary and indicates that 2 years later even Frank considered himself to be the supreme authority in the Government General. This is a point which we conceive to be of importance, Sir. May I proceed?

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: “It would, for instance, be ridiculous if we would build up here a security policy of our own against our Poles in the country, while knowing that the Poles in West Prussia, in Posen, in Warthegau, and in Silesia have one and the same movement of resistance. So the Reichsführer SS and Chief of the German Police must be able to carry out, with his agencies, his police measures concerning the interests of the Reich as a whole. This, however, will be done in such a way that the measures to be adopted will first be submitted to me and carried out only when I give my consent. In the Government General the Police are the armed forces. Consequently the leader of the Police will be called by me into the Government of the Government General; he is subordinate to me, or to my deputy, as a state secretary for security.”

At this juncture, it is appropriate to mention that the man who filled the position of State Secretary for Security in the Government General was Frank’s Higher SS and Police Leader, Krüger.

THE PRESIDENT: Will you read the next page?

LT. COL. BALDWIN: May it please the Tribunal; I shall come to that excerpt later.

THE PRESIDENT: In the same document?

LT. COL. BALDWIN: Yes, Sir. It seems more appropriate at another point.

The Tribunal may recall that the reports of the extermination of Jews in the Warsaw ghetto were made in the spring of 1943 by SS Leader Stroop, who immediately supervised the operation, to this same Krüger, who was still at that time one of the two most influential members of Frank’s Cabinet, as State Secretary for Security.

It was inevitable that the grand conspiracy or common plan should have as its component parts a host of small plans each dealing with a particular sphere of activity. These plans, differing from the master plan only in size, are the blueprints for a specific action drawn from the broad policies. Occupied Poland was no exception to this rule. The plan for the administration of Poland was contained in a top secret memorandum of a conference between Hitler and the Chief of the OKW, Defendant Keitel, entitled “Regarding Future Relations of Poland to Germany” and dated 20 October 1939. This report was initialed by General Warlimont. It is our Document 864-PS and may be found at Page 3 of the document book, and I shall offer it into evidence as Exhibit Number USA-609.

I shall quote, if the Court please, only from Paragraphs 1, 3, 4, and 6:

“1) The Armed Forces will welcome it if they can dispose of administrative questions in Poland. On principle, there cannot be two administrations. . . .

“3) It is not the task of the administration to make Poland into a model province or a model state of the German order or to put her economically or financially on a sound basis.

“The Polish intelligentsia must be prevented from forming a ruling class. The standard of living in the country is to remain low; we want only to draw labor forces from there. Poles are also to be used for the administration of the country. However, the forming of national political groups may not be allowed.

“4) The administration has to work on its own responsibility and must not be dependent on Berlin. We do not want to do there what we do in the Reich. The responsibility does not rest with the Berlin Ministries since there is no German administration unit concerned.

“The accomplishment of this task will involve a hard racial struggle which will not allow any legal restrictions. The methods will be incompatible with the principles otherwise adhered to by us.

“The Governor General is to give the Polish nation only bare living conditions and is to maintain the basis for military security. . . .

“6). . . . Any tendencies towards the consolidation of conditions in Poland are to be suppressed. The ‘Polish muddle’ must be allowed to develop. The Government of the territory must make it possible for us to purify the Reich territory from Jews and Poles too. Collaboration with new Reich provinces (Posen and West Prussia) only for resettlements (compare Himmler mission).

“Purpose: Shrewdness and severity must be the maxims in this racial struggle in order to spare us from going to battle on account of this country again.”

The Defendant Frank was the chosen executor of this program. He knew its aims, approved of them, and actively carried out the scheme. The Tribunal’s attention has already been invited to Exhibit Number USA-297 wherein—this may be found at Page 1512 of the English text of the official transcript—(Volume III, Pages 576, 577) the Defendant Frank expounded the mission which his Führer assigned to him and according to which he intended to administer in Poland. It contemplated, in brief, ruthless exploitation, deportation of all supplies and workers, reduction of the entire Polish economy to an absolute minimum necessary for bare existence of the population, and the closing of all schools. No more callous statement exists than the one Frank made in this report, wherein he said, “Poland shall be treated as a colony; the Poles shall be the slaves of the Greater German world empire.”

In December 1940 Frank submitted to his department heads that the task of administering Poland did truly involve a hard racial struggle which would not allow any legal restrictions. I refer to our Document 2233(o)-PS, which may be found at Page 45 in the document book. It is taken from the Frank diary, and I offer it in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-173. In the German text the extract to be quoted appears in the volume of the diary entitled, “Department Heads Meetings 1939-1940,” on Pages 12 and 13. I now quote:

“In this country the force of a determined leadership must rule. The Pole must feel here that we are not building him a legal state, but that for him there is only one duty, namely, to work and to behave himself. It is clear that this leads sometimes to difficulties; but you must, in your own interest, see that all measures are ruthlessly carried out in order to become master of the situation. You can rely on me absolutely in this.”

As for the Poles and Ukrainians, Defendant Frank’s attitude was clear. They were to be permitted to slave for the German economy as long as the war emergency continued. Once the war was won, even this cynical interest would cease. I refer to a speech before German political leaders at Kraków on 12 January 1944. It appears in the Frank diary and as our Document 2233(bb)-PS at Page 60 in the document book. It is the first passage on that page. I offer it in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-295. In the diary, the German text will be found in the loose-leaf volume covering the period from 1 January to 28 February 1944, at the entry for 14 January 1944, at Page 24. “Once the war is won” Frank tells these leaders—and here we have, may it please the Court, the classic example of the completely brutal statement:

“Once the war is won, then, for all I care, mincemeat can be made of the Poles and the Ukrainians and all the others who run around here; it doesn’t matter what happens.”

In accordance with the racial program of the Nazi conspirators, the Defendant Frank makes it quite clear in his diary that the complete annihilation of Jews was one of his cherished objectives. In Exhibit Number USA-271, Frank stated in late 1940 in his diary that he could not eliminate all lice and Jews in a year’s time. In Exhibit Number USA-281, he notes in his diary in the year 1942 that a program of starvation rations sentencing, in effect, 1,200,000 Jews to die of hunger, should be noted only marginally. In Exhibit Number USA-295, he confided to a secret press conference that in the year 1944—and this, too, is from the diary—there were still in the Government General perhaps 100,000 Jews.

These facts, if the Tribunal please, are from the diary of the man himself. We do no more here than to tabulate the results. The supreme authority within a certain geographic area admits that in a period of 4 years’ time up to 3,400,000 persons from that area have been annihilated pursuant to an official policy and for no crime, but only because of having been born a Jew. No words could possibly reveal the inferences of death and suffering which must needs be drawn from these stark facts.

It was a Nazi policy that the population of occupied countries should endure terror, oppression, impoverishment, and starvation. The Defendant Frank succeeded so well in this regard that he was forced to report to his Führer in 1943 that, in effect, Poles did not regard the Government General with affection. This report to Hitler was a summarization of the first 3½ years of the Defendant Frank’s administration. It, better than anything else, can show the conditions as they then existed as a result of the conspiratorial efforts of the defendants.

The report is contained in our Document 437-PS, at Page 2 of the document book, and I now offer the original in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-610. In the German text, the extract to be quoted appears at Pages 10 and 11 of this report by Frank to Hitler dated 19 June 1943, regarding the situation in Poland. I now quote. Frank says:

“In the course of time, a series of measures, or of consequences of the German rule, have led to a substantial deterioration of the attitude of the entire Polish people to the Government General. These measures have affected either individual professions or the entire population and frequently also—often with crushing severity—the fate of individuals.”

He goes on:

“Among these are in particular:

“1. The entirely insufficient nourishment of the population, mainly of the working classes in the cities, the majority of which are working for German interests.

“Until the war of 1939 their food supplies, though not varied, were sufficient and were generally assured owing to the agrarian surplus of the former Polish State and in spite of the negligence on the part of their former political leadership.

“2. The confiscation of a great part of the Polish estates, expropriation without compensation, and evacuation of Polish peasants from maneuver areas and from German settlements.

“3. Encroachments and confiscations in the industries, in commerce and trade, and in the field of other private property.

“4. Mass arrests and shootings by the German Police who applied the system of collective responsibility.

“5. The rigorous methods of recruiting workers.

“6. The extensive paralyzing of cultural life.

“7. The closing of high schools, colleges, and universities.

“8. The limitation, indeed the complete elimination, of Polish influence from all spheres of State administration.

“9. Curtailment of the influence of the Catholic Church, limiting its extensive influence—an undoubtedly necessary move—and, in addition, until quite recently, often at the shortest notice, the closing and confiscation of monasteries, schools, and charitable institutions.”

Indeed, the Nazi plan for Poland succeeded all too well.

THE PRESIDENT: This is only an extract here. Was he saying that these measures were inevitable or that he justified them, or what was he saying in the report?

LT. COL. BALDWIN: He was saying, Sir, that the Polish people’s attitude to the Government General had substantially deteriorated. The reasons for that deterioration are the listings I gave to the Court. In other words. . .

THE PRESIDENT: Is that all he said?

LT. COL. BALDWIN: No, Sir; that is just taken from Pages 10 and 11 of the report. The report is an extremely long one.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I suppose you know what the general tenor of the report was.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: The general tenor of the report, Sir, was in the nature of a complaint to Hitler, that he, Frank, was having an extremely difficult time in the Government General because of these measures and because of these happenings in the Government General.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: In order to illustrate how completely the Defendant Frank is identified with the policies. . .

DR. SEIDL: [_Interposing._] As the Tribunal has already asked the Prosecution what the purpose of this document is, I would like to point out here that it concerns a document of 40 typewritten pages addressed to Hitler and that Frank condemns the conditions which the Prosecution has brought forward and that in this document he makes far-reaching proposals to remedy the situation which he severely criticizes.

I shall, when my turn comes, read the whole document.

THE PRESIDENT: Exactly. You will have full opportunity, when it is your turn, to explain this document; but it is not your turn at the moment.

DR. SEIDL: I only mention it now because the Tribunal itself drew my attention to this point.

THE PRESIDENT: Now, Lieutenant Colonel Baldwin, I asked you what was the whole content of the document from which you were reading this paragraph. According to counsel for Frank, the document, which is a very long document, shows that Frank was suggesting remedies for the difficulties which he here sets out. Is that so?

LT. COL. BALDWIN: That is so, Your Honor.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think the. . .

LT. COL. BALDWIN: May it please the Tribunal, I did not cite this portion of that document, as I will later demonstrate, to show that Frank did or did not suggest remedies for these conditions; but only to explain that these conditions existed as of a certain period.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, when you cite a small part of the document, you should make sure that what you cite is not misleading as compared to the rest of the document.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: I see, Your Honor. I had not considered it to be such, in view of the purpose for which I introduced it, which, as I suggested, was only to indicate a set of conditions which existed at a certain time. I naturally assumed that the Defense, as Dr. Seidl has indicated, will carry on with the rest of the document as a matter of defense.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, of course, that is all very well, but the Defendant Frank’s counsel will speak at some remote date; and it is not a complete answer to say that he will have an opportunity of explaining the document at some future date. It is for Counsel for the Prosecution to make sure that no extracts which they read can reasonably make a misleading impression upon the mind of the Tribunal.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: I shall now state, then, that the extract which was just read was read solely for the purpose of indicating that at a certain period, namely, June 1943, those conditions existed in Poland, as the result of statements by the Governor General of Poland.

Would that be satisfactory to the Tribunal?

THE TRIBUNAL (Mr. Biddle): Well, what is not satisfactory to the Tribunal is that you did not give us the real purport of the document.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: Well, Sir, I don’t have the complete document before me now. Therefore, I can’t read all of it.

THE PRESIDENT: What we would like, would be, if possible, that when an extract is made from a document, counsel who are presenting that extract should instruct themselves as to the general purport of the document so as to make certain that the part that is read is not misleading.

LT. COL. BALDWIN: Yes, Sir.

In order to illustrate how completely the Defendant Frank is identified with the policies, the execution of which is reported in this document, and how thoroughly they were his own policies; and this, if the Tribunal please, regardless of what remedies he may have had in 1943, it is proposed in this last section to take passages from Frank’s own diary in proof of his early espousal and execution of these self-same policies.

As to the insufficient nourishment of the Polish population, there was no need for the Defendant Frank to have waited until June 1943 to have reported this fact to Hitler. In September 1941 Defendant Frank’s own chief medical officer reported to him the appalling Polish health conditions. This appears in Frank’s diary and in our Document 2233(p)-PS, at Page 46 in the document book, which I now offer in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-611. The German text is to be found in the 1941 diary volume at Page 830. I quote:

“Chief Medical Adviser Dr. Walbaum expresses his opinion of the health condition of the Polish population. Investigations which were carried out by his department proved that the majority of Poles had only about 600 calories allotted to them, whereas the normal requirement for a human being was 2,200 calories. The Polish population was weakened to such an extent that it would fall an easy prey to spotted fever.”—Parenthetically, I think we know that as typhus.

“The number of diseased Poles has amounted to date to 40 percent. During the last week alone, 1,000 new spotted fever cases were officially recorded. That is so far the highest figure. This health situation represents a serious danger for the Reich and for the soldiers coming into the Government General. A spreading of that pestilence into the Reich is very possible. The increase in tuberculosis, too, is causing anxiety. If the food rations were to be diminished again, an enormous increase of the number of illnesses could be predicted.”

While it was crystal-clear from this report that in September 1941 disease affected 40 percent of the Polish population, nevertheless the Defendant Frank approved, in August 1942, a new plan which called for a much larger contribution of foodstuffs to Germany at the expense of the non-German population of the Government General. Methods of meeting the new quotas out of the grossly inadequate rations of the Government General and the impact of the new quotas on the economy of the country were discussed at a cabinet meeting of the Government General on 24 August 1942 in terms which leave no possible doubt that not only was the proposed requisition beyond the resources of the country, but its force was to be distributed on a grossly discriminatory basis. This appears from Frank’s diary and in our Document 2233(e)-PS, which is at Page 30 in the document book, which I now offer in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-283. The German text appears in the 1942 conference volume at the conference entry for 24 August 1942. I quote the following extract:

“Before the German people”—said Frank—“suffer starvation, the occupied territories and their people shall be exposed to starvation. In this moment, therefore, we here in the Government General must have the iron determination to help the great German people, that is our fatherland.

“The Government General, therefore, must do the following: The Government General has undertaken to send 500,000 tons of bread grain to the fatherland in addition to the foodstuffs already being delivered for the relief of Germany or consumed here by troops of the Armed Forces, Police, or SS. If you compare this with our contributions of last year you can see that this means a six-fold increase over that of last year’s contribution by the Government General.

“The new demand will be fulfilled exclusively at the expense of the foreign population. It must be done cold-bloodedly and without pity.”

Defendant Frank was not only responsible for reducing the Government General to starvation level, but was proud of the contribution he thereby made to the Reich. I refer to a statement made to the political leaders of the NSDAP on 14 December 1942 at Kraków. It is contained in the Frank diary and is our Document 2233(z)-PS, at Page 57 in the document book; and I now offer it in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-612. In the German text the extract appears in the 1942 diary volume, Part IV, at Page 1331. Defendant Frank is speaking:

“I will endeavor to get out of the reservoir of this territory everything that is yet to be had out of it.”

He continues:

“When you consider that it was possible for me to deliver to the Reich 600,000 tons of bread grain and in addition 180,000 tons to the Armed Forces stationed here; further, an abundance amounting to many thousands of tons of other commodities, such as seed, fats, vegetables, besides the delivery to the Reich of 300 million eggs, _et cetera_, you can estimate how important the work in this territory is for the Reich. In order to make clear to you the significance of the consignment from the Government General of 600,000 tons of bread grain, you are referred to the fact that the Government General, by this achievement alone, covers the raising of the bread ration in the Greater German Reich by two-thirds for the present rationing period. This enormous achievement can rightfully be claimed by us.”

Now, as to the resettlement of Polish peasants which Defendant Frank mentions secondly in the report to Hitler—although Himmler was given general authority in connection with the conspirators’ project to resettle various districts in the conquered Eastern territories with racial Germans, the projects relating to resettling districts in the Government General were submitted to and approved by the Defendant Frank. The plan to resettle Zamosc and Lublin, for example, was reported to him at a meeting to discuss special problems of the district Lublin by his infamous State Secretary for Security, Higher SS and Police Leader, Krüger, on 4 August 1942. It is contained in Frank’s diary and in our Document 2233(t)-PS, at Page 51 in the document book, which I now offer in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-607. The German text appears in the 1942 volume of the diary, Part III, Pages 830, 831, and 832.

I now quote from the report of the conference:

“State Secretary Krüger then continues, saying that the Reichsführer’s next immediate plan until the end of the following year would be to settle the following German racial groups in the two districts”—Zamosc and Lublin—“1,000 peasant homes (1 homestead per family of about 6) for Bosnian Germans; 1,200 other kinds of homes; 1,000 homesteads for Bessarabian Germans; 200 for Serbian Germans; 2,000 for Leningrad Germans; 4,000 for Baltic Germans; 500 for Wolhynia Germans; and 200 homes for Flemish, Danish, and Dutch Germans; in all 10,000 homes for 50,000 to 60,000 persons.”

Upon hearing this, the Defendant Frank directed that—and I quote:

“. . . the resettlement plan is to be discussed co-operatively by the competent authorities and he declares his willingness to approve the final plan by the end of September after satisfactory arrangements had been made concerning all the questions appertaining thereto—in particular the guaranteeing of peace and order—so that by the middle of November, as the most favorable time, the resettlement can begin.”

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will adjourn now for 10 minutes.

[_A recess was taken._]

LT. COL. BALDWIN: May it please the Tribunal, the way in which the resettlement at Zamosc was carried out was described to Defendant Frank by Krüger at a meeting at Warsaw on January 25, 1943. The report is contained in the Frank diary and is our Document 2233(aa)-PS, and appears at Page 58 in the document book. I offer the original of it in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-613. The German text appears in the labor conference volume for 1943, at Pages 16, 17, and 19. Krüger in this excerpt reports that they had settled the first 4,000 in the Kreis Zamosc shortly before Christmas; that, understandably, friends were not made of the Poles in the resettlement program; and that the Poles had to be chased out. He then stated to Frank, and I quote:

“We are removing those who constitute a burden in this new colonization territory. Actually, they are the asocial and inferior elements. They are being deported; first brought to a concentration camp and then sent as labor to the Reich. From a Polish propaganda standpoint, this entire first action has an unfavorable effect. For the Poles say: ‘After the Jews have been destroyed, then they will employ the same methods to get the Poles out of this territory and liquidate them just like the Jews.’”

Krüger went on to mention that there was a great deal of unrest in the territory as a result; and Frank informed him, that is, Krüger, that each individual case of resettlement would be discussed in the future exactly as that one of Zamosc had been.

Although the illegality of this dispossession of Poles to make room for Germans was evident and although the fact that the Poles who were not only being dispossessed but sent off to concentration camps became increasingly difficult to handle, the resettlement projects continued in the Government General.

The third item mentioned by Frank—the encroachments and confiscations of industry and private property—was again an early Frank policy. He explained this to his department heads in December 1939. The report is from his diary and is our Document 2233(k)-PS, and it appears at Page 40 in the document book. I now offer it in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-173. The German text appears in the department heads conference volume for 1939-40 at the entry for 2 December 1939 at Pages 2 and 3. Dr. Frank states:

“Principally it can be said regarding the administration of the Government General: This territory in its entirety is booty for the German Reich, and thus it will not do for this territory to be exploited in separate individual parts; but the territory in its entirety shall be economically used and its entire economic worth redound to the benefit of the German people.”

Reference is made to Exhibit Number USA-297, if any further support of an early policy of ruthless exploitation is deemed necessary by the Tribunal. In addition, the decree permitting sequestration in the Government General heretofore pointed out to the Tribunal (_Verordnungsblatt für das Generalgouvernement_, Number 6, 27 January 1940, Page 23), which decree was signed by the Defendant Frank, permitted and empowered the Nazi officials to engage in wholesale seizure of property. This was made the easier by the undefined criteria of the decree. The looting of the Government General under this and other decrees has already been presented to the Tribunal on 14 December 1945, under the subject heading, “Germanization and spoliation of occupied territories,” and the Tribunal is respectfully referred to that portion of the record and in particular to that segment dealing with the Government General.

The Defendant Frank mentioned mass arrests and mass shooting and the application of collective responsibility as the fourth reason for the apparent deterioration of the attitude of the entire Polish people. In this, too, he is to blame, for it was no part of Defendant Frank’s policy that reprisal should be commensurate with the gravity of the offense. He was, on the contrary, an advocate of the most drastic measures. At a conference of district political leaders at Kraków, on 18 March 1942, Frank stated his policy. This extract is from the diary and is our Document 2233(r)-PS and will be found at Page 49 in the document book. I offer it in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-608. The German text may be found in the diary volume for 1942, Part I, Pages 195 and 196. I quote Frank’s statement:

“Incidentally, the struggle for the achievement of our aims will be pursued cold-bloodedly. You see how the state agencies work. You see that we do not hesitate at anything, and stand dozens of people up against the wall. This is necessary because a simple reflection tells me that it cannot be our task at this period, when the best German blood is being sacrificed, to show regard for the blood of another race; for out of this, one of the greatest dangers may arise. One already hears today in Germany that prisoners of war, for instance, in Bavaria or Thuringia, are administering large estates entirely independently, while all the men in a village fit for service are at the front. If this state of affairs continues, then a gradual retrogression of Germanism will result. One should not underestimate this danger. Therefore, everything revealing itself as a Polish power of leadership must be destroyed again and again with ruthless energy. This does not have to be shouted abroad; it will happen silently.”

And on 15 January 1944 Defendant Frank assured the political leaders of the NSDAP that reprisals would be made for German deaths. These remarks are to be found in the Frank diary, in our Document 2233(bb)-PS at Page 60 in the document book, the second quote on that page, the original of which I offer in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-295. The German text appears in the loose-leaf volume of the diary covering the period from 1 January 1944 to 28 February 1944, and appears at Page 13. Frank says quite simply—“I have not hesitated to declare that when a German is shot, up to 100 Poles shall be shot too.”

The whole tragic history of slave-labor and recruitment of workers has been placed before this Tribunal in great detail. When the Defendant Frank refers to these methods as his fifth reason for disaffection in Poland in his report to Hitler, he once more cites policies which he executed. Force, violence, and economic duress were all supported by him as means for recruiting laborers for deportation to slavery in Germany. This was an announced policy, and I have already alluded to Exhibit Number USA-297, which contains verification of this fact.

While in the very beginning recruitment of laborers in the Government General may have been voluntary, these methods soon proved inadequate. In the spring of 1940 the question of utilizing force came up and the matter was discussed at an official meeting at which the Defendant Seyss-Inquart was also present. I refer to the Frank diary and our Document 2233(n)-PS, which the Tribunal will find at Page 43 in the document book. I offer the original in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-614. The German text appears in the diary volume for 1940, Part II, at Page 333. I quote the conference report:

“The Governor General stated that all means in the form of proclamations, _et cetera_, not having succeeded, one is led to the conclusion that the Poles, out of malevolence and with the intention of harming Germany by not putting themselves at its disposal, refuse to enlist for labor service. Therefore, he asks Dr. Frauendorfer if there are any other measures not as yet employed to win the Poles on a voluntary basis.

“Reichshauptamtsleiter Dr. Frauendorfer answered the question in the negative.

“The Governor General emphasized the fact that he will now be asked to take a definite attitude towards this question. Therefore, the question will arise whether any form of coercive measures should now be employed.

“The question put by the Governor General to SS Lieutenant General Krüger as to whether he sees possibilities of calling Polish workers by coercive means, is answered in the affirmative by SS Lieutenant General Krüger.”

In May 1940, at an official conference—and this record is already before the Tribunal as Exhibit Number USA-173—Defendant Frank stated that compulsion in recruitment of labor could be exercised, that Poles could be snatched from the streets and that the best method would be organized raids.

As in the case of persecution of the Jews, the forced labor program in the Government General is almost beyond belief. I refer to the Frank diary and to our Document 2233(w)-PS, which will be found at Page 53 in the document book, the original of which I offer into evidence as Exhibit Number USA-607. This excerpt is a record, if the Court please, of a discussion between the Defendant Sauckel and the Defendant Frank at Kraków on 18 August 1942; and it appears in the diary volume for 1942,