Volume 6, Page 183:

“A complete unanimity between the Führer and the National Socialist confidants inside of Austria existed. . . . If the National Socialists’ rising succeeded so quickly and thoroughly and without bloodshed, it is first of all due to the calm, firm, prudent, and decisive attitude of the present Reichsstatthalter Seyss-Inquart and his confidants.”

I want, before leaving the matter of the Anschluss, to stress this once more, because this was a time of great importance, and it was Seyss-Inquart who held the key position in this first open attack on another country. Had it not been for his part, as has been shown, things might have gone very differently, and if there were no other place where he was connected with the conspirators’ plans for aggression, this would be sufficient to rank him with the foremost of the conspirators.

Now, passing on, Mr. Alderman has shown the way in which Seyss-Inquart co-operated with the conspirators in integrating Austria as fully as possible into the Reich, making its resources available to the Reich—its resources of wealth and its resources of manpower.

In furtherance of the conspirators’ plan, Reichsstatthalter Seyss-Inquart for the first time demonstrated his talent for the persecution of Jewish citizens. In an address in Vienna on the 26th of March 1938, which will be found at Page 2326 (Volume IV, Page 552) of the Record, he recalls that Göring expressly commissioned this defendant, as Reichsstatthalter, to institute anti-Semitic measures.

And the Tribunal will remember from previous evidence the kind of wholesale larceny which this involved. So successfully did Seyss-Inquart perform his task that at the meeting of the Air Ministry under the chairmanship of the Defendant Göring on the 12th of November 1938, Fischböck, a member of Seyss-Inquart’s official family, was able to relate the efficiency with which the civil administration in Austria dealt with the so-called “Jewish question.” I refer to Document Number 1816-PS, Exhibit Number USA-261, and I am reading first from Page 14 of the English translation. The Tribunal will note that this is the third full paragraph from the bottom of Page 14:

“Your Excellency: In this matter we have already a very complete plan for Austria. There are 12,000 Jewish artisans and 5,000 Jewish retail shops in Vienna. Before the seizure of power we had already a definite plan for tradesmen, regarding this total of 17,000 stores. Of the shops of the 12,000 artisans about 10,000 were to be closed definitely and 2,000 were to be kept open; 4,000 of the 5,000 retail stores should be closed and 1,000 should be kept open, that is, Aryanized. According to this plan, between 3,000 and 3,500 of the total of 17,000 stores would be kept open, all others closed. This was decided following investigations in every single branch and according to local needs, in agreement with all competent authorities, and is ready for publication as soon as we receive the law which we requested in September. This law shall empower us to withdraw licenses from artisans quite independent of the Jewish question.”

Göring said:

“I shall have this decree issued today.”

Then, if the Tribunal please, I just wish to read one more sentence from the middle of the next page, in which Fischböck says:

“Out of 17,000 stores 12,000 or 14,000 would be closed and the remainder Aryanized or handed over to the Bureau of Trustees which is operated by the State.”

And Göring replies:

“I have to say that this proposal is grand. This way the whole affair would be wound up in Vienna, one of the Jewish capitals, so to speak, by Christmas or by the end of the year.”

The Defendant Funk then says:

“We can do the same thing over here.”

In other words, Seyss-Inquart’s so-called solution was so highly regarded that it was considered a model for the rest of the Reich.

The task of integrating Austria into the Reich being substantially complete, the Nazi conspirators were able to use Seyss-Inquart’s expert services for the subjugation of other peoples. As an illustration I refer the Tribunal to Document D-571, Exhibit Number USA-112, which has already been read in evidence. The Tribunal will recall that from this document it appeared that on the 21st of March 1939 an official of the British Government reported from Prague to Viscount Halifax that a little earlier, on the 11th of March 1939, Seyss-Inquart, Bürckel, and five German generals attended a meeting of the Cabinet of the Slovak Government and told them that they should proclaim the independence of Slovakia, that Hitler had decided to settle the question of Czechoslovakia definitely (this has been read in court today) and that, unless they did as they were told, Hitler would disinterest himself in their fate. It just gives an indication of the manner in which this man continued to be busy in the aggressive plans of these Nazi conspirators.

Now early in September 1939, after the opening of the attack against Poland, Seyss-Inquart became Chief of the Civil Administration of south Poland. A few weeks later, on 12 October 1939, Hitler promulgated a decree providing that territories occupied by German troops, except those incorporated within the German Reich, should be subject to the authority of the Governor General of the occupied Polish territories and he appointed the Defendant Frank as Governor General and the Defendant Seyss-Inquart as Deputy Governor General. This decree will be found in the 1939 _Reichsgesetzblatt_, Part I, Page 2077, and I ask the Tribunal to take judicial notice of it. Shortly thereafter, on 26 October 1939, Frank promulgated a decree establishing the administration of the occupied Polish territories, of which he was Governor. This decree is published in the _Dokumente der Deutschen Politik_ and appears in the document book as 3468-PS. I am informed that this book, Volume 7, has also received the Exhibit Number 705 and I offer it as such.

Article 3 of the decree provided that the Chief of the Office of the Governor General and the Higher SS and Police Leader are directly subordinate to the Governor General and his Deputy. The Deputy, of course, was the Defendant Seyss-Inquart.

The significance of that provision is obvious in the light of the evidence which the Tribunal has heard and will hear. I ask the Tribunal to take judicial notice of it.

As Deputy Governor General of the Polish occupied territories, Seyss-Inquart seems to have had the job of setting up a German administration throughout this territory; that is, he worked under the Defendant Frank but did much of the work of interviewing the various local leaders, telling them what they should do. As an illustration I offer in evidence a report of a trip which Seyss-Inquart and his consultants took between the 17th and 22d of February 1939. This is our Document Number 2278-PS, and I offer it as Exhibit Number USA-706. If the Tribunal please, I have misstated that date or period. It was the 17th to the 22d of November 1939, in other words, shortly after the administration was set up. On the first page of the English translation—and I now quote from the second full paragraph—the following appears:

“At 3:00 p. m. Reich Minister, Dr. Seyss-Inquart, addressed the department heads of the district chief and stated among other things that the chief guiding rule for carrying out German administration in the Government General must be solely the interests of the German Reich. A stern and inflexible administration must make the area of use to German economy; and, so that excessive clemency may be guarded against, the results of the intrusion of the Polish race into German territory must be brought to mind.”

This report is too long, if the Tribunal please, to quote from at too great length; but if the Tribunal will turn over to Page 7, I would like to read in some extracts of what occurred while the defendant was in Lublin. From the report it appears that the Defendant Seyss-Inquart after meeting the various local German administrative officers “then expounded the principles,” and I am now quoting from the top of Page 7, “in accordance with which the administration in the ‘Government’ must be conducted.” Then, skipping a sentence:

“The resources and inhabitants of this country would have to be made of service to the Reich, and only within these limits could they prosper. Independent political thought should no longer be allowed to develop. The Vistula area might perhaps be still more important to German destiny than the Rhine. The Minister then gave as a guiding theme to the district leaders: ‘We will further everything which is of service to the Reich and will put an end to everything which may harm the Reich.’ Dr. Seyss-Inquart then added that the Governor General wished that those men who were fulfilling a task for the Reich here should receive a post with material benefits in keeping with their responsibility and achievements.”

Then, if the Tribunal will turn over two more pages, the reporter is describing a sightseeing tour which was made to the village of Wlodawa, Cycow, and I quote:

“Cycow is a German village. . .”—skipping down a couple of sentences—“Reich Minister Dr. Seyss-Inquart made a speech in which he pointed out that the fidelity of these Germans to their nationality now found its justification and reward through the strength of Adolf Hitler.”

And then the next sentence, apparently thrown in by the reporter:

“This district with its very marshy character could, according to District Chief Schmidt’s deliberations, serve as a reservation for the Jews, a measure which might possibly lead to heavy mortality among the Jews.”

THE PRESIDENT: We might break off here for 10 minutes.

[_A recess was taken._]

LT. ATHERTON: If the Tribunal please, at the time the Tribunal rose, I was in the process of considering the functions of the Defendant Seyss-Inquart, his place as Deputy Governor General of Poland, between 1939 and 1940.

Now the Tribunal has already heard evidence of the atrocities which were perpetrated by the administration which Seyss-Inquart thus helped to create. The prosecutors for the Soviet Union will present to the Tribunal more evidence of such atrocities. For our present purposes, to show the importance of the work which this man did to further the Nazi plan for the Government General of Poland, it is enough to quote a few words from the diary of the Defendant Frank.

On the occasion of what was apparently a farewell lunch to Seyss-Inquart, when he became Reich Commissioner of the Netherlands, Frank said—and I now quote from Document 3465-PS, Pages 510 and 511 of