Chapter VII of the Treaty of Versailles discusses criminal

responsibility incurred in the launching and waging of the conflict which was then the Great War. Article 227 accused William of Hohenzollern, previously Emperor of Germany, of a supreme offense against international morality and against the sacred character of treaties. Article 228 acknowledged the right of the Allied and Associated Powers to bring persons guilty of acts contrary to the laws and customs of war before military tribunals. Article 229 provided that criminals whose acts were not of precise geographical location were to be referred to inter-Allied jurisdiction.

The provisions of the Treaty of Versailles were repeated in the conventions which were signed in 1919 and 1920 with the powers allied with Germany, in particular in the Treaty of Saint-Germain and in that of Neuilly. That is how the idea of war crime was affirmed in international law. The peace treaties of 1919 not only defined the concept of infraction, they formulated the terms of its repression. The defendants were aware of this, just as they were aware of the warnings of the governments of the United Nations. They no doubt hoped that the repetition of the factual circumstances, which hampered the punishment of the criminals in 1914, would permit them to escape their just punishment. Their presence before this Tribunal is the symbol of the constant progress which international law is making in spite of all obstacles.

International law had given a still more precise definition of the term “war crime.” This definition was formulated by the commission which the preliminary peace conference appointed on 25 January 1919 to disentangle the various responsibilities incurred in the course of the war. The report of the Commission of Fifteen of 29 March 1919 constitutes the historical basis of Articles 227 and following of the Treaty of Versailles. The Commission of Fifteen based its investigation of criminal responsibilities on an analysis of the crimes liable to involve them. A material element enters into the juridical settlement of any infraction. Its definition is, therefore, the more precise as it includes an enumeration of the facts which it encompasses. That is why the Commission of Fifteen set up a list of War Crimes. This list includes 32 infractions. These are particularly:

1. Murders, massacres, systematic terrorism; 2. killing of hostages; 3. torture of civilians; 8. confinement of civilians in inhuman conditions; 9. forced labor of civilians in connection with military operations of the enemy; 10. usurpation of sovereignty during the occupation of occupied territories; 11. forced conscription of soldiers among the inhabitants of the occupied territories; 12. attempts to denationalize the inhabitants of occupied territories; 13. looting; 14. confiscation of property; 17. imposition of collective fines; 18. wilful devastation and destruction of property; 25. violation of other rules concerning the Red Cross; 29. ill-treatment of wounded and prisoners of war; and 30. use of prisoners of war for unauthorized work.

This list, which already includes the grievances against the defendants enumerated in the Indictment and from which we have just quoted a few facts, is significant because the War Crimes which it encompasses all present a composite character. They are crimes against both international law and national law. Some of these crimes constitute attacks on the fundamental liberties and constitutional rights of peoples and of individuals; they consist in the violation of public guarantees which are recognized by the constitutional Charter of the Nations whose territories were occupied; violation of the principles of liberty, equality, and fraternity which France proclaimed in 1789 and which the civilized states guarantee in perpetuity. These War Crimes are violations of public international law, since they represent a systematic refusal of acknowledgment of all respective rights of both occupying and occupied power; but they also may be analyzed as violations of public national law, since they mean forcibly transforming the constitutional institutions of the occupied territories and the juridical statute of their inhabitants.

More numerous are crimes which constitute attacks on the integrity of the physical person and of property. They are allied with war law regulations and include violations of international law and customs.

But the international conventions, it should be noticed, determine the elements constituting an infraction more than they actually establish that infraction itself. The latter existed before in all national legislatures; it was to some extent a part of the juridical inheritance common to all nations; governments agreed to affirm its international character and to define its contents. International penal law is thus superimposed on national law, which preserves its repressive basis because the war crime remains, after all, a crime of common law. National penal law gives the definition of this. All the acts referred to in Article 6 of the Charter of 8 August 1945, all the facts encompassed by the third Count of the Indictment of 18 October 1945 correspond to the infractions of common law provided for and punished by national penal legislation. The killing of prisoners of war, of hostages, and of inhabitants of occupied territories falls, in French law, under Articles 295 and following of the Penal Code, which define murder and assassination. The mistreatment to which the Indictment refers would come under the heading of bodily injuries caused intentionally or through negligence which are defined by Articles 309 and following. Deportation is analyzed, independently of the murders which accompany it, as arbitrary sequestration, which is defined by Articles 341 and 344. Pillage of public and private property and imposition of collective fines are penalized by Articles 221 and the following of our Military Code of Justice. Article 434 of the Penal Code punishes voluntary destruction, and the deportation of civilian workers may be compared with the forced conscription provided for by Article 92. The oath of allegiance is equivalent to the exaction of a false oath in Article 366, and the Germanization of occupied territories may be applied to a number of crimes, the most obvious of which is forced incorporation in the Wehrmacht in violation of Article 92. The same equivalents can be found in all modern legislative systems and particularly in German law.

The crimes against persons and property of which the defendants are guilty are provided for by all national laws. They present an international character because they were committed in several different countries; from this there arises a problem of jurisdiction, which the Charter of 8 August 1945 has solved, as we have previously explained; but this leaves intact the rule of definition.

A crime of common law, the war crime is, nevertheless, not an ordinary infraction. It has a character peculiarly intrinsic—it is a crime committed on the occasion or under the pretext of war. It must be punished because, even in time of war, attacks on the integrity of the physical person and or property are crimes if they are not justified by the laws and customs of war. The soldier who on the battlefield kills an enemy combatant commits a crime, but this crime is justified by the law of war. International law therefore intervenes in the definition of a war crime, not in order to give it essential qualification but in order to fix its outer limits. In other words, every infraction committed on the occasion or under the pretext of hostilities is criminal unless justified by the laws and customs of war. International law here applies the national theory of legitimate defense which is common to all codes of criminal law. The combatant is engaged in legitimate defense on the battlefield; his homicidal action is therefore covered by a justifying fact. But if this justifying fact is taken away the infraction, whether ordinary crime or war crime, remains in its entirety. To establish the justifying fact, the criminal action must be necessary and proportional to the threat to which it responds. The defendants, against whom justice is demanded of you, can plead no such justification.

Nor can they escape their responsibility by arguing that they were not the physical authors of the crimes. The war crime involves two responsibilities, distinct and complementary: that of the physical author and that of the instigator. There is nothing heterodox in this conception. It is the faithful representation of the criminal theory of complicity through instructions. The responsibility of the accomplice, whether independent or complementary to that of the principal author, is incontestable. The defendants bear the entire responsibility for the crimes which were committed upon their instructions or under their control.

Finally, these crimes cannot be justified by the pretext that an order from above was given by Hitler to the defendants. The theory of the justifying fact of an order from above has, in national law, definite fixed limits; it does not cover the execution of orders whose illegality is manifest. German law, moreover, assigns only a limited rule to the concept of justification by orders from above. Article 47 of the German Military Code of Justice of 1940, although maintaining in principle that a criminal order from a superior removes the responsibility of the agent, punishes the latter as an accomplice, when he exceeded the orders received or when he acted with knowledge of the criminal character of the act which had been ordered. Goebbels once made this juridical concept the theme of his propaganda. On 28 May 1944 he wrote in an article in the _Völkischer Beobachter_, which was submitted to you by the American Prosecution, an article intended to justify the murder of Allied pilots by German mobs:

“The pilots cannot validly claim that as soldiers they obeyed orders. No law of war provides that a soldier will remain unpunished for a hateful crime by referring to the orders of his superiors, if their orders are in striking opposition to all human ethics, to all international customs in the conduct of war.”

Orders from a superior do not exonerate the agent of a manifest crime from responsibility. Any other solution would, moreover, be unacceptable, for it would testify to the impotence of all repressive policy.

All the more reason why orders from above cannot be the justifying fact for the crimes of the defendants. Sir Hartley Shawcross told you with eloquence that the accused cannot claim that the Crimes against Peace were the doing of Hitler alone and that they limited themselves to transmitting the general directives. War Crimes may be compared to the will for aggression; they are the common work of the defendants; the defendants bear a joint responsibility for the criminal policy which resulted from the National Socialist doctrine.

The responsibility, for German war criminality, because it constituted a systematic policy, planned and prepared before the opening of hostilities, and perpetrated without interruption from 1940 to 1945, rests with all the defendants, political or military leaders, high officials of National Socialist Germany, and leaders of the Nazi Party.

Nevertheless, some among them appear more directly responsible for the acts taken as a whole, particularly those facts connected with the French charges, that is to say, crimes committed in the Western occupied territories or against the nationals of those countries. We shall cite:

The Defendant Göring as Director of the Four Year Plan and President of the Cabinet of Ministers for Reich Defense; the Defendant Ribbentrop in his capacity as Minister of Foreign Affairs in charge of the administration of occupied countries; the Defendant Frick in his capacity as Director of the Central Office for occupied territories; the Defendant Funk in his capacity as Minister of Reich Economy; the Defendant Keitel, inasmuch as he had command over the occupation armies; the Defendant Jodl, associated in all the responsibilities of the preceding defendant; the Defendant Seyss-Inquart in his capacity as Reich Commissioner for the occupied Dutch territory from 13 May 1940 to the end of the hostilities.

We will examine more particularly among these defendants, or among others, those responsible for each category of acts, it being understood that this enumeration is in no wise restrictive.

The Defendant Sauckel bears the chief responsibility for compulsory labor in its various forms. As Plenipotentiary for Allocation of Labor, he carried out the intensive recruiting of workers by every possible means. He is in particular the signer of the decree of 22 August 1942, which constitutes the charter for compulsory labor in all occupied countries. He worked in liaison with the Defendant Speer, Chief of the Todt Organization and Plenipotentiary General for Armament in the office of the Four Year Plan; as well as with the Defendant Funk, Minister of Reich Economy; and with the Defendant Göring, Chief of the Four Year Plan.

The Defendant Göring participated directly in economic looting in the same capacity. He appears often to have sought and derived a personal profit from it.

The Defendant Ribbentrop in his capacity as Minister of Foreign Affairs was no stranger to these acts.

The Defendant Rosenberg, organizer and Chief of the Einsatzstab Rosenberg, is particularly guilty of the looting of works of art in the occupied countries.

The chief responsibility for the murders of hostages lies with the Defendant Keitel, the drafter notably of the general order of 16 September 1941, with his assistant, the Defendant Jodl, and with the Defendant Göring who agreed to the order in question.

The Defendant Kaltenbrunner, Himmler’s direct associate and chief of all the foreign police and security offices, is directly responsible for the monstrous devices to which the Gestapo had recourse in all occupied countries, devices which are only the continuation of the methods originated in the Gestapo by its founder, in Prussia, the Defendant Göring. The Defendant Kaltenbrunner is likewise directly responsible for the crimes committed in deportation camps. Moreover, he visited these camps of deportation, as will be proved by the French Delegation in the case of the Mauthausen Camp. The Defendant Göring knew of and gave his approval to the medical experiments made on prisoners. The Defendant Sauckel forced prisoners by every possible means to work under conditions, which were often inhuman, for the German war production.

The Defendant Keitel and his assistant, the Defendant Jodl, are responsible for treatment contrary to the laws of war inflicted upon war prisoners, for murders and killings to which they were subjected, as well as for handing over great numbers of them to the Gestapo. The Defendant Göring shares their responsibility for the execution of Allied aviators and soldiers belonging to the commando groups. The Defendant Sauckel directed the work of war prisoners for the German war production in violation of international law.

The Defendant Keitel and the Defendant Kaltenbrunner both bear the chief responsibility for the terrorist actions carried out jointly by the German Army and the police forces in the various occupied countries and notably in France against the Resistance, as well as for the devastations and massacres carried out against the civilian population of several French departments. The Defendant Jodl shares in this responsibility, most particularly through his initial order, “Fight against Partisan Bands,” dated 6 May 1944, which provides for “collective measures against the inhabitants of entire villages.” These blows against mankind are the result of racial theories of which the Defendant Hess, the Defendant Rosenberg, and the Defendant Streicher are among the instigators or propagandists. The Defendant Hess participated notably in the elaboration of this subject, which is found in _Mein Kampf_.

The Defendant Rosenberg, one of the principal theorists of racial doctrine, exercised the function of special delegate for the spiritual and ideological training of the Nazi Party. The Defendant Streicher showed himself to be one of the most violent anti-Semitic agitators. In the execution of the policy of Germanization and Nazification responsibility is shared between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, that is to say, the Defendant Ribbentrop; the General Staff, that is, the Defendants Keitel and Jodl; the Central Office for all the occupied territories, that is, the Defendant Frick.

The major National Socialist culprits had their orders carried out in the divers Nazi organizations, which we ask you to declare criminal, in order that each of their members may be then apprehended and punished.

The Reich Cabinet, the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party, the General Staff, the High Command of the German Armed Forces represent only a small number of persons whose guilt and punishment must ultimately result from the evidence, since they participated personally and directly in the decisions, or ensured their execution through some eminent person in the political or military hierarchy, and without being able to ignore their criminal nature.

The leaders of the Nazi Party are unquestionably in the forefront of those who participated in the criminal enterprise, and around the Defendants Keitel and Jodl the military High Command directed the Army to the execution of hostages, to pillage, to wanton destruction, and to massacres.

But perhaps it will seem to you that the punishment of hundreds of thousands of men who belonged to the SS, to the SD, to the Gestapo, to the SA, will give rise to some objection. I should like to try, should this be the case, to do away with that objection by showing you the dreadful responsibilities of these men. Without the existence of these organizations, without the spirit which animated them, one could not understand how so many atrocities could have been perpetrated. The systematic War Crimes could not have been carried out by Nazi Germany without these organizations, without the men who composed them. It is they who not only executed but willed this body of crimes on behalf of Germany.

It may have seemed impossible to you that the monstrous barbarity of the National Socialist doctrine could have been imposed upon the German people, the heir, as are our people, of the highest values of civilization. The education by the Nazi Party of the young men who formed the SS, the SD, and the Gestapo, explains the hold Nazism exercised over all Germany. They incarnated National Socialism, and permitted it to accomplish, thanks to the guilty passiveness of the whole German population, a part of its purpose. This youth, those who carried out the tenets of the regime, were trained in a veritable doctrine of immoralism, which results from the ideology that inspired the regime. The myth of the race removed from war in the eyes of these disciples of Nazism its criminal character.

If it is proved that a superior race is to annihilate races and peoples that are considered inferior and decadent, incapable of living a life as it should be lived, before what means of extermination will they recoil? This is the ethics of immorality, the result of the most authentic Nietzscheism, which considers that the destruction of all conventional ethics is the supreme duty of man. The crime against race is punished without pity. The crime on behalf of race is exalted without limit. The regime truly creates a logic of crime which obeys its own laws, which has no connection whatsoever with what we consider ethical. With such a point of view, all horrors could have been justified and authorized. So many acts which appear incomprehensible to us, so greatly do they clash with our customary notions, were explained, were formulated in advance in the name of the racial community.

Add that these atrocities and these cruelties were perpetrated within the rigid framework created by the “esprit de corps,” by the soldierly solidarity which bound individuals and insured the legitimacy of the crime an unlimited field of action. The individuals who committed them would not only be covered by the regime itself, but spurred on by the discipline and the “camaraderie” of these corps, imbued with Nazi criminality.

The Nazi youth was invited to go through an extraordinary adventure. Having unlimited power at its disposal, thanks to the Party and its massive grip, it was first of all called upon to implement the grandiose dreams of National Socialist Pan-Germanism.

The Party exercised a rigid selection of its youth, and neglected no incentive. It solicited from its youth the desire to distinguish itself, to accomplish exploits beyond the common order and beyond nature. The young Nazis in the Gestapo and the SS knew that their acts, no matter how cruel or how inhumane they might be, would always be judged legitimate by the regime, in the name of the racial community, of its needs, and of its triumphs. The Nazi Party, thanks to the young men of the SS, of the SD, and of the Gestapo, had thus become capable of accomplishing in the field of criminality what no other person or nation could have committed.

The members of these organizations became voluntarily the authors of these innumerable crimes of all kinds, often executed with disconcerting cynicism and with artful sadism in the concentration camps of Germany as well as in the various occupied countries, and especially in those of Western Europe.

The crimes are monstrous. The crimes and the responsibility for them have definitely been established. There is no possible doubt. Nevertheless throughout these tranquil sessions of this Trial, extraordinary in the history of the world, in view of the exceptional nature of the justice which your High Tribunal is called upon to render before the United Nations and the German people and before all mankind a few objections may arise in our minds.

It is our duty to discuss this exhaustively, even if it is only sub-conscious in us, for soon a pseudo-patriotic propaganda may take hold of Germany, and even may echo in some of our countries.

“Who can say: I have a clean conscience, I am without fault? To use different weights and measures is abhorred by God.” This text from the Holy Scriptures (Proverbs XX, 9-10) has already been mentioned here and there; it will serve tomorrow as a theme of propaganda, but above all, it is profoundly written in our souls. Rising in the name of our martyred people as accusers of Nazi Germany, we have never for a moment repressed it as a distasteful reminder.

Yes, no nation is without reproach in its history, just as no individual is faultless in his life. Yes, every war in itself brings forth iniquitous evils and entails almost necessarily individual and collective crimes, because it easily unleashes in man the evil passions which always slumber there.

But we can examine our conscience fearlessly in the face of the Nazi culprits; we find no common measure between them and ourselves.

If this criminality had been accidental; if Germany had been forced into war, if crimes had been committed only in the excitement of combat, we might question ourselves in the light of the Scriptures. But the war was prepared and deliberated upon long in advance, and upon the very last day it would have been easy to avoid it without sacrificing any of the legitimate interests of the German people. And the atrocities were perpetrated during the war, not under the influence of a mad passion nor of a war-like anger nor of an avenging resentment, but as a result of cold calculation, of perfectly conscious methods, of a pre-existing doctrine.

The truly diabolical enterprise of Hitler and of his companions was to assemble in a body of dogmas formed around the concept of race, all the instincts of barbarism, repressed by centuries of civilization, but always present in men’s innermost nature, all the negations of the traditional values of humanity, on which nations, as well as individuals, question their conscience in the troubled hours of their development and of their life; to construct and to propagate a doctrine which organizes, regulates, and aspires to command crime.

The diabolical enterprise of Hitler and of his companions was also to appeal to the forces of evil in order to establish his domination over the German people and subsequently the domination of Germany over Europe and perhaps over the world. It planned to incorporate organized criminality into a system of government, into a system of international relations, and into a system of warfare, by unleashing within a whole nation the most savage passions.

Nationalism and serving their people and their country will perhaps be their explanation. Far from constituting an excuse, if any excuse were possible in view of the enormity of their crime, these explanations would make it still more serious. They have profaned the sacred idea of the fatherland by linking it to a willed return to barbarism. In its name they obtained—half by force, half by persuasion—the adherence of a whole country, formerly among the greatest in the order of spiritual values, and have lowered it to the lowest level. The moral confusion, the economic difficulties, the obsession with the defeat of 1918 and with the loss of might and the Pan-Germanic tradition are the basis of the empire of Hitler and of his companions over a people thrown off its balance; to abandon oneself to force, to renounce moral concern, to satisfy a love of collectivity, to revel in lack of restraint are the natural temptations strongly implanted in the German, which the Nazi leaders exploited with cynicism. The intoxication of success and the madness of greatness completed the picture and put practically all Germans, some without doubt unconsciously, in the service of the National Socialist doctrine by associating them with the diabolical enterprise of their Führer and his companions.

Opposing this enterprise men of various countries and different classes rose, all of them animated by the common bond of their human lot. France and Great Britain entered the war only to remain faithful to their given word. The peoples of the occupied countries, tortured in body and soul, never renounced their liberty nor their cultural values, and it was a magnificent epic of clandestine opposition and of Resistance which through a splendid heroism testifies to the spontaneous refusal of the populations to accept the Nazi myths. Millions and millions of men of the Soviet Union fell to defend not only the soil and independence of their country, but also their humanitarian universalism. The millions of British and American soldiers who landed on our unhappy continent carried in their hearts the ideal of freeing from Nazi oppression both the occupied countries and the peoples who willingly or by force had become the satellites of the Axis and the German people.

They were all of them together, whether in uniform or not, fighters for the great hope which throughout the centuries has been nourished by the suffering of the peoples, the great hope for a better future for mankind.

Sometimes this great hope expresses itself with difficulty or loses its way or deceives itself or knows the dread return to barbarism, but it persists always and finally constitutes the powerful lever which brings about the progress of humanity despite everything. These aspirations always reborn, these concerns constantly awakened, this anguish unceasingly present, this perpetual combat against evil form in a definitive manner the sublime grandeur of man. National Socialism only yesterday imperiled all of this.

After that gigantic struggle where two ideologies, two conceptions of life were at grips, in the name of the people whom we represent here and in the name of the great human hope for which they have so greatly suffered, so greatly fought, we can without fear and with a clean conscience rise as accusers of the leaders of Nazi Germany.

As Mr. Justice Jackson said so eloquently at the opening of this Trial, “Civilization could not survive if these crimes were to be committed again,” and he added, “The true plaintiff in this Court is civilization.”

Civilization requires from you after this unleashing of barbarism a verdict which will also be a sort of supreme warning at the hour when humanity appears still at times to enter the path of the organization of peace only with apprehension and hesitation.

If we wish that on the morrow of the cataclysm of war the sufferings of martyred countries, the sacrifices of victorious nations, and also the expiation of guilty people will engender a better humanity, justice must strike those guilty of the enterprise of barbarism from which we have just escaped. The reign of justice is the most exact expression of the great human hope. Your decision can mark a decisive stage in its difficult pursuit.

Undoubtedly even today, this justice and this punishment have become possible only because, as a first condition, free peoples emerged victorious from the conflict. This is actually the link between the force of the victors and the guilt of the vanquished leaders who appear before Your High Tribunal.

But this link signifies nothing else but the revelation of the wisdom of nations that justice, in order to impose itself effectively and constantly upon individuals and upon nations, must have force at its disposal. The common will to put force in the service of justice inspires our nations and commands our whole civilization.

This resolution is brilliantly confirmed today in a judicial case where the facts are examined scrupulously in all their aspects, the penal nature of the offense rigorously established, the competency of the Tribunal incontestable, the rights of the defense intact, total publicity insured.

Your judgment pronounced under these conditions can serve as a foundation for the moral uplift of the German people, first stage in its integration into the community of free countries. Without your judgment, history might incur the risk of repeating itself, crime would become epic, and the National Socialist enterprise a last Wagnerian tragedy; and new Pan-Germanists would soon say to the Germans:

“Hitler and his companions were wrong because they finally failed, but we must begin again some day, on other foundations, the extraordinary adventure of Germanism.”

After your judgment, if only we know how to enlighten this people and watch over their first steps on the road to liberty, National Socialism will be inscribed permanently in their history as the crime of crimes which could lead it only to material and moral perdition, as the doctrine which they should forever avoid with horror and scorn in order to remain faithful or rather become once more faithful to the great norms of common civilization.

The eminent international jurist and noble European, Politis, in his posthumous book entitled _International Ethics_ reminds us that, like all ethical rules, those which should govern international relations will never be definitely established unless all peoples succeed in convincing themselves that there is definitely a greater profit to be gained by observing them than by transgressing them. That is why your judgment can contribute to the enlightenment of the German people and of all peoples.

Your judgment must be inscribed as a decisive act in the history of international law in order to prepare the establishment of a true international society excluding recourse to war and enlisting force permanently in the service of the justice of nations; it will be one of the foundations of this peaceful order to which nations aspire on the morrow of this frightful torment. The need for justice of the martyred peoples will be satisfied, and their sufferings will not have been useless to the progress of mankind.

THE PRESIDENT: M. De Menthon, would you prefer to continue the case on behalf of France this afternoon, or would you prefer to adjourn?

M. DE MENTHON: We are at the disposal of the Court.

THE PRESIDENT: Well then, if that is so, then I think we better go on until 5 o’clock.

M. DE MENTHON: It might be preferable to adjourn, because M. Faure’s brief which is going to be presented will last at least an hour. Perhaps it is better to adjourn until tomorrow morning. However, we will remain at the disposal of the Court.

THE PRESIDENT: When you said that the proof which will now be presented would take an hour, do you mean by that that it is an introductory statement or is it a part of the main case which you are presenting?

M. DE MENTHON: Your Honor, it is part of the general case.

THE PRESIDENT: Would it not be possible then to go on until 5 o’clock?

M. DE MENTHON: Yes, quite so.

M. EDGAR FAURE (Deputy Chief Prosecutor for the French Republic): Mr. President and Your Honor, I propose to submit to the Tribunal an introduction dealing with the first and the second part of the French case.

The first part relates to forced labor; the second part to economic looting. These two over-all questions are complementary to each other and form a whole. Manpower on the one hand and material property on the other constitute the two aspects of the riches of a country and the living conditions in that country. Measures taken with regard to the one necessarily react on the other, and it is understandable that in the occupied countries German policy with regard to manpower and economic property was inspired from the very beginning by common directing principles.

For this reason the French Prosecution has deemed it logical to submit successively to the Tribunal those two briefs corresponding to the letters “H” and “E” of the third Count of the Indictment. My present purpose is to define these initial directives covering the German procedure in regard to manpower and to material in the occupied territories.

When the Germans occupied the territories of Denmark, Norway, Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg, and part of continental France, they thereby assumed a material power of constraint with regard to the inhabitants and a material power of acquisition with regard to its property. They thus had in fact the possibility of utilizing these dual resources on behalf of the war effort.

On the other hand, legally they were confronted with precise rules of international law relating to the occupation of territories by the military forces of a belligerent state. These rules very strictly limit the rights of the occupant, who may requisition property and services solely for the needs of the army of occupation. I here allude to the regulation annexed to the Convention concerning the Laws and Customs of War signed at The Hague on 18 October 1907, Section III, and in particular to the Articles 46, 47, 49, 52, and 53. If it please the Tribunal, I shall merely cite the paragraph of Article 52 which defines in a perfectly exact manner the lawful conditions of requisition of persons and property:

“Requisitions in kind and of services may be demanded of communities or of inhabitants only for the needs of the army of occupation. They will be proportionate to the resources of the country and of such a nature that they do not imply for the population the obligation of taking part in war operations against their native country.”

These various articles must, moreover, be considered in the general spirit defined in the preamble of the Convention, from which I take the liberty of reading the last paragraph to the Tribunal:

“Until such time as a more complete code of the laws of war can be enacted, the High Contracting Parties deem it opportune to state that in cases not included in the regulations adopted by them, populations and belligerents remain under the safeguard and direction of the principles of the law of nations derived from the established usages among civilized nations, the laws of humanity, and the requirements of public conscience.”

From this point of view it is very evident that the total exploitation of the resources of occupied countries for the benefit of the enemy’s war economy is absolutely contrary to the law of nations and to the requirements of public conscience.

Germany signed the Hague Convention and it must be pointed out that she made no reservations at that time except with regard to Article 44, which relates to the supply of information to the belligerents. She made no reservation with regard to the articles which we have cited nor with regard to the preamble. These articles and the preamble, moreover, reiterate the corresponding text of the previous Hague Convention of 28 July 1899.

German official ratifications of the Conventions were given on 4 September 1900 and 27 November 1909. I have purposely recalled these well-known facts in order to emphasize that the Germans could not fail to recognize the constant principles of international law to which they subscribed on two occasions, long before their defeat in 1918 and consequently outside the alleged pressure to which they referred in regard to the Treaty of Versailles.

While on this subject of juridical theory, may I point out that in the arrangement signed at Versailles on 28 June 1919 in connection with the military occupation of the territories of the Rhine, reference is made in Article 6 to the Hague Convention in the following terms:

“The right of requisition in kind and in services as formulated by the Hague Convention of 1907 will be exercised by the allied and associate armies of occupation.”

Thus, the governing principles of the rights of requisition by the occupiers is confirmed by a third international agreement subscribed to by Germany, who in regard to the occupation of her own territory is here the beneficiary of this limitation.

What, then, will the conduct of the Germans be like, in view of this factual situation, which involves power and temptation, and in view of this legal situation which involves a limitation?

The Tribunal is already aware, by virtue of the general presentation of the American Prosecution, that the conduct of the Germans was to profit by the fact and to ignore the law.

The Germans systematically violated international rules and the law of nations, as far as we are concerned, both by forced labor and by spoliation. Detailed illustrations of these acts in the Western countries will be laid before you in the briefs which will follow my own. For my part I propose to concentrate for a moment on the actual concepts which the Germans had from the outset. In this connection I shall submit to the Tribunal three complementary propositions.

First Proposition: From the very beginning of the occupation, the Germans decided, in the interests of their war effort, to seize in any way possible all the resources, both material and human, of the occupied countries. Their plan was not to take any account of legal limitations. It is not under the spur of occasional necessity that they subsequently perpetrated their illicit acts, but in pursuance of a deliberate intention.

Second Proposition: However, the Germans took pains to mask their real intentions; they did not make known that they rejected international juridical rules. On the contrary, they gave assurance that they would respect them. The reasons for this camouflage are easy to understand. The Germans were anxious from the beginning to spare public opinion in the occupied territory. Brutal proceedings would have aroused immediate resistance which would have hampered their actions. They also wished to deceive world opinion, and more particularly American public opinion, since the United States of America had at that time not yet entered the war.

The third proposition which I lay before the Tribunal results from the first two. As the Germans contemplated achieving their aims and masking their intentions, they were of necessity bound to organize a system of irregular means, while maintaining an appearance of legality. The complexity and the technical character of the proceedings they used enabled them easily to conceal the real state of affairs from the uninitiated or the merely uninformed. These disguised means proved, in fact, just as efficient and perhaps even more so than would have been brutal seizure. They moreover enabled the Germans to have recourse to such brutal action the day they deemed that this would yield them more advantages than inconvenience.

We are of the opinion that this analysis of the German intentions is of interest to the Tribunal for, on the one hand, it demonstrates that the illicit acts were premeditated and that their authors were aware of their reprehensible character; and on the other hand, it enables one to understand the scope and extent of these acts, despite the precautions taken to mask them.

The evidence which the Prosecution will submit to the Tribunal refers chiefly to the second and third propositions, for as regards the first, that is to say, the criminal intention and premeditation, it is demonstrated by the discrepancy between the facade and reality.

I say in the first place that the Germans at the time of the occupation made a pretense of observing the rules of international law. Here is, by way of example, a proclamation to the French population, signed by the Commander-in-Chief of the German Army. This is a public document which is reproduced in the _Official Journal_, containing the decrees issued by the military governor for French occupied territories, Number 1 dated 4 July 1940. I submit to the Tribunal this document, which will bear Number RF-1 of the French documentation; and from it I cite merely the following sentence:

“The troops have received the order to treat the population with regard and to respect private property provided the population remains calm.”

The Germans proceeded in identical manner in all the occupied countries. I also submit to the Tribunal the text of the same proclamation, dated 10 May 1940, which was published in the _Official Journal_ of the Commander-in-Chief in Belgium and in the north of France, Number 1, Page 1, under the title “Proclamation to the Population of Belgium.” The German text, as well as the Flemish text, bear the more complete title, “Proclamation to the Population of Holland and Belgium.” In view of the identical nature of these texts, this copy may be considered as Document Number RF-1 (bis) of the French documentation.

I now submit another proclamation entitled, “To the Inhabitants of Occupied Countries!” dated 10 May 1940, and signed “The Commander-in-Chief of the Army Group.” This is likewise published in the _Official Journal_ of German ordinances. This will be Document Number RF-2 of the French documentation. I will cite the first two paragraphs:

“The Commander-in-Chief of the German Army has given me authority to announce the following:

“I. The German Army guarantees the inhabitants full personal security and the safeguard of their property. Those who behave peacefully and quietly have nothing to fear.”

I also quote passages from Paragraphs V, VI, and VII:

“V. The administrative authorities of the state, communities, the police, and schools shall continue their activities. They therefore remain at the service of their own population. . . .

“VI. All enterprises, businesses, and banks will continue their work in the interest of the population. . . .

“VII. Producers of goods of prime necessity, as well as merchants, shall continue their activities and place their goods at the disposal of the public.”

The passages which I have just quoted are not the literal reproduction of international conventions, but they reflect their spirit. Repetition of the terms, “at the service of the population,” “in the interest of the population,” “at the disposal of the public” must necessarily be construed as an especially firm assurance that the resources of the country and its manpower will be preserved for that country and not diverted in favor of the German war effort.

We pass now Document under Number RF-2 (bis) to the next of the same proclamations signed by the Commander-in-Chief of the Army Group and published in the _Official Journal_ of the Commander-in-Chief in Belgium, numbered as above, Page 3.

Finally, on 22 June 1940, an armistice convention was signed between the representatives of the German Government and the representatives of the _de facto_ authority which was at that time assuming the Government of France. This convention is likewise a public document. It will be submitted to the Tribunal at a later stage as the first document of the economic case. At this stage I merely wish to cite a sentence of Paragraph 3, which reads as follows: “In the occupied districts of France the German Reich exercises all the rights of an occupying power.”

This constitutes then a very definite reference to international law. Moreover, the German plenipotentiaries gave in this respect complementary oral assurances. On this matter I submit to the Tribunal, in the form of French Exhibit Number RF-3 (Document RF-3), an extract from the deposition made by Ambassador Leon Noel in the course of proceedings before the French High Court of Justice. This extract is reproduced from a book entitled _Transcript in extenso of the Sessions of the Trial of Marshal Pétain_, printed in Paris in 1945 at the printing office of the official journals and constitutes a document admissible as evidence in accordance with the Charter of the Tribunal, Article 21. This is the statement of M. Leon Noel, which I desire to cite to the Tribunal. M. Leon Noel was a member of the French Armistice Delegation.

THE PRESIDENT: Are you going to present this document to us?

M. FAURE: This document is presented to the Tribunal. We have given to the Tribunal the transcript of the proceedings, and in the book of documents the Tribunal will find the excerpt I am now quoting.

THE PRESIDENT: We are not in possession of it at present. I do not know where it is.

M. FAURE: I think that possibly this document was handed to the Secretariat of the Tribunal rather late, but it will be here immediately. May it please the Tribunal, I merely intend to read a short extract from this document today.

THE PRESIDENT: We will have it tomorrow, I hope?

M. FAURE: Certainly, Mr. President.

[_Quoting._] “I have also obtained a certain number of replies from German generals which I believe could have been subsequently used—from General Jodl, who in the month of May last signed at Reims the unconditional surrender of Germany and from General (subsequently Marshal) Keitel, who a few weeks later was to sign in Berlin the ratification of this surrender. In this way I led them to declare in the most categorical manner that in no event would they interfere with administration, that the rights which they claimed for themselves under the convention were purely and simply those which in similar circumstances international law and international usage concede to occupation armies, that is to say, those indispensable for the maintenance of security, transportation, and the food supply needs of these armies.”

These assertions and promises on the part of the Germans were therefore formal. Now, even at that time, they were not sincere. Indeed, not only did the Germans subsequently violate them, but from the very beginning they organized a system whereby they were enabled to accomplish these violations in the most efficacious manner and at the same time in a manner which enabled them to some extent to mask them.

As far as economy and labor are concerned, this German system comes from a very simple idea. It consisted in supervising production at its beginning and its end. On the one hand, the Germans embarked immediately upon the general requisitioning of all raw materials and all goods in the occupied countries. Thenceforth, it would depend upon them to supply, or not to supply, raw material to the national industry. They were thus in a position to develop one branch of production rather than another, to favor certain undertakings, and, inversely, to oblige other undertakings to close down. As events and opportunities demanded, they organized this appropriation of raw materials, principally with a view to facilitating their distribution in their own interest but the principle was continuously maintained. They thus held, as it were, the key of entrance to production. On the other hand, they also held the exit key, that is to say, of finance. By securing the financial means in the form of the money of an occupied country, the Germans were able to purchase products and to acquire, under the pretense of legality, the output of the economic activity of the country. In point of fact, the Germans obtained for themselves from the outset such considerable financial means that they were easily able to absorb the entire productive capacity of each country.

If the Tribunal finds it suitable, I will interrupt at this point.

[_The Tribunal adjourned until 18 January 1946 at 1000 hours._]

THIRTY-SEVENTH DAY Friday, 18 January 1946

_Morning Session_

M. FAURE: Mr. President, Your Honors. At yesterday’s session I explained to the Tribunal the principles of the provisions made by the Germans to ensure the seizure of raw materials and the control of finance in the occupied countries.

These provisions will be demonstrated by numerous documents which will be presented to the Tribunal in the course of the presentation of the case on economic spoliation and forced labor. I shall not quote these documents at this moment since, as I pointed out yesterday, the purpose of my introduction is limited to the initial concepts of the Germans in these matters. I shall cite only one document, which reveals the true intentions of the Germans in the very first period. This document bears our Document Number RF-3 (bis), and I offer it in evidence to the Tribunal.

It relates particularly to Norway. It consists of a photostatic copy, certified, of a transcript of a conference held in Oslo, 21 November 1940, under the presidency of the Reich Commissioner. I would point out to the Tribunal that we submit this document as being particularly significant, because Norway is a country which was occupied at a very early date by the Germans. The date of 21 November 1940, which you see, refers to the very earliest period of the German occupation, and moreover, in the text of the conference, allusion is made to the situation of the 7 months preceding.

You will find there the exact psychology of the occupation as it existed in this period of April 1940 to November 1940, that is to say, at the time, or even before, when the Germans, while invading other countries, made the reassuring proclamations which I read to the Tribunal yesterday.

There were 40 personages present at the conference, of whom State Secretary Dr. Landfried represented the Reich Ministry of Economics. This is how the Reich Commissioner expresses himself:

“Today’s conference is the continuation of a conference which was held in Berlin. On this occasion I should like, first of all, to stress and establish definitely that the collaboration between the Wehrmacht and the Reich Commissioner is exemplary. I must protest against the idea that the Wehrmacht carried out its financial task here in a muddled and irresponsible manner. We must also take into account the particular circumstances which then prevailed in Norway and which still partially prevail.

“Certain tasks were fixed by the Führer which were to be carried out within a given time.

“At the conference in Berlin the following points were settled, which we can take as a basis of today’s conference. There is no doubt that the country of Norway was utilized for the execution of the tasks of the Wehrmacht during the last 7 months in such a way that a further drain on the country without some compensation is no longer possible in view of the future tasks of the Wehrmacht.

“I considered it from the beginning my obvious duty in my capacity as Reich Commissioner to devote my activities to mobilizing all the economic and material forces of the country for the purposes of the Wehrmacht and not to call on the resources of the Reich as long as I am in a position to organize such resources in the country.”

I will stop quoting the words of the Reich Commissioner at this point, and now I shall cite the terms of the reply of Dr. Landfried, which you will find a little lower down in the document:

“I am very glad to be able to state that we have succeeded here in Norway . . . in mobilizing the economic forces of Norway for German needs to an extent which it has not been possible to attain in all the other occupied countries. I must thank you especially in the name of the Minister of Economics for having succeeded in inducing the Norwegians to achieve the greatest possible results.”

I think the Tribunal will have observed the series of expressions which are used in this document and which are quite characteristic. The Reich Commissioner says that from the very beginning, his duty was to mobilize all the economic and material forces of the country for the purposes of the Wehrmacht, and Dr. Landfried answers that they succeeded in mobilizing the economic forces to an extent which it has not been possible to attain in all the other occupied territories.

Thus we see that Dr. Landfried does not say that the Germans had, in Norway, a particular concept of occupation and that in the other countries they used a different procedure; he says that it was not possible to do as well in the other countries. The only limitation he recognizes is a limit of fact and opportunity, which will soon be overcome, but in no wise a limitation of law. The idea of a legal limitation never enters his mind, any more than it comes to the mind of any of the 40 personages present.

It is not here a question of an opinion or initiative of a regional administrative authority, but rather of the official doctrine of the Reich Cabinet and the High Command, since 40 high officials were present at this conference, and especially the representative of the Minister for Economy.

I should like to stress at this point that this German doctrine and these German methods for the mobilization of the resources of the occupied countries necessarily extend to the labor of the inhabitants.

I said yesterday that the Germans ensured for themselves from the very beginning the two keys of production. By that very fact they had within their power the working capital and the manpower. It depended on their decision whether labor worked or did not work, whether there should or should not be unemployment. This explains in a general way why the Germans took such brutal measures as the displacement and the mobilization of workers only after a certain time.

In the first period, that is to say, as long as there existed in the occupied countries stocks and raw materials, it was more in the interests of the Germans to utilize labor locally, at least to a great extent. This labor permitted them to produce for their benefit, with the wealth of these countries, finished products which they seized. Thus, besides the moral advantage of safeguarding appearances, they avoided the initial transportation of raw materials. The consideration of transport difficulties was always very important in the German war economy.

But when after a time, which was more or less long, the occupied countries were impoverished in their raw materials and really ruined, then the Germans no longer had any interest in permitting labor to work on the spot. They would, indeed, have had to furnish the raw materials themselves, and consequently that would involve double transportation—that of raw material in one direction and that of the finished products in the other direction. At that moment it became more advantageous for them to export workmen. This consideration coincided, moreover, with the needs resulting from the economic situation of Germany at that time and with political considerations.

On this question of the use of labor, I shall read to the Tribunal a few sentences of a document which I offer under Document Number RF-4. It is therefore the document following that from which I have just read. The note which you will find in the document book reproduces the sentences from an article which appeared in the newspaper _Pariser Zeitung_ on 17 July 1942.

I offer at the same time to the Tribunal a certified photostatic copy of the page of the newspaper, which is from the collection of the Bibliothèque Nationale. This article is signed by Dr. Michel, who was the Chief of the Economic Administration in France. Its title is “Two Years of Controlled Economy in France.” It is then an article written for the purpose of German propaganda since it appeared in a German newspaper which published one page in French in Paris. Naturally I wish to point out to the Tribunal that we in no way accept all the ideas which are presented in this article, but we should like to point out several sentences of Dr. Michel’s as revealing the same sort of procedure about which I was speaking just now, which consisted of utilizing labor, first on the spot, as long as there was raw material, and then deporting that labor to Germany:

“In order to utilize the productive forces of French industry, the Reich began by transferring to France its orders for industrial articles for the war effort.

“One single figure is sufficient to show the success of this transfer of German orders: The value of the transactions to date is expressed in a figure surpassing hundreds of thousands of millions of francs. New blood is circulating in the veins of French economy, which is working to the utmost of its capacity. . . .”

Some sentences in the original are omitted here, as they are of no interest, and I would like to read the following sentence:

“As the stocks of raw materials tended to diminish on account of the length of the war, the recruitment of available French labor began.”

Dr. Michel uses here elegant ways of expressing himself, which cover the reality, that is to say, the beginning of the transfer of workmen at the moment when raw materials, which the Germans had appropriated from the beginning, had begun to be exhausted.

The conclusion which I would now like to give to my statement is the following: That the Germans have always considered labor, human labor, as a factor for their use. This attitude existed even before the official institution of compulsory labor, of which we will speak to you presently.

For Germans the work of others has always been compulsory and for their profit, and it was meant to remain so even after the end of the war.

It is this last point that I should like to emphasize, for it shows the extent and the gravity of the German conception and of the German projects. I shall quote in relation to this a document which will bear the Number RF-5 in our document book. Here is the document, which I submit to the Tribunal. It is a work published in French in Berlin in 1943, by Dr. Friedrich Didier, entitled _Workers for Europe_. It was issued by the central publishing house of the National Socialist Party. It begins with a preface by the Defendant Sauckel, whose facsimile signature is printed.

I shall quote to the Tribunal a paragraph from this work, which is the last page in my document book. It is Document Number RF-5 and this sentence is found on Page 23. I quote:

“A great percentage of foreign workers will remain, even after victory, in our territory, in order to complete then—having been trained in construction work—what the outbreak of war had prevented, and to carry out those planned projects which up to now had remained unrealized.”

Thus, in a work of propaganda, consequently written with great prudence and with intent to seduce, we nevertheless find this main admission by the Germans, that they intended to keep, even after the war, the workers of other countries in order to insure the greatness of Germany without any limitation of aim or time. Hence it is a matter of a policy of perpetual exploitation.

If it please the Tribunal, my introduction having come to an end, M. Herzog will present the brief relating to forced labor in France.

M. JACQUES B. HERZOG (Assistant Prosecutor for the French Republic): Mr. President and Your Honors.

The National Socialist doctrine, by the pre-eminence which it gives to the idea of the State, by the contempt in which it holds individuals and personal rights, contains a conception of work which agrees with the principles of its general philosophy.

For it, work is not one of the forms of the manifestation of individual personalities; it is a duty imposed by the community on its members.

“The relationship of labor, according to National Socialist ideas,” a German writer has said, “is not a simple judicial relationship between the worker and his employer; it is a living phenomenon in which the worker becomes a cog in the National Socialist machine for collective production.” The conception of compulsory labor is thus, for National Socialism, necessarily complementary to the conception of work itself.

Compulsory labor service was first of all imposed on the German people. German labor service was instituted by a law of 26 June 1935 which bears Hitler’s signature and that of the Defendant Frick, Minister of the Interior. This law was published in the _Reichsgesetzblatt_, Part I, Page 769. I submit it to the Tribunal as Exhibit Number RF-6 (Document Number 1389-PS).

From 1939 the mobilization of workers was added to the compulsory labor service. Decrees were promulgated to that effect by the Defendant Göring in his capacity as Delegate for the Four Year Plan. I do not stress this point; it arises from the conspiracy entered into by the accused to commit their Crimes against Peace, and which my American colleagues have already brought to the attention of the Tribunal. I merely point out that the mobilization of workers was applicable to foreigners resident in German territory, because I find in this fact the proof that the principle of compulsory recruitment of foreign workers existed prior to the war. Far from being the spontaneous result of the needs of German war industry, the compulsory recruitment of foreign workers is the putting into practice of a concerted policy. I lay before the Tribunal a document which proves this. It is Document C-2 of the French classification, which I offer as Exhibit Number RF-7. This is a memorandum of the High Command of the German Armed Forces of 1 October 1938. This memorandum, drawn up in anticipation of the invasion of Czechoslovakia, contains a classification of violations possible under international law. In connection with each violation appears the explanation which the High Command of the Armed Forces thinks it possible to give. The document appears in the form of a list in four columns. In the first is a statement of the violations of international law; the second gives a concrete example; the third contains the point of view of international law on the one hand and, on the other hand, the conclusions which can be drawn from it; the fourth column is reserved for the explanation of the Propaganda Ministry.

I read the passage which deals with the forced labor of civilians and prisoners of war, which is found on Page 6 of the German original, Page 7 of the French translation:

“Use of prisoners of war and civilians for war work, (construction of roads, digging trenches, making munitions, employment in transport, _et cetera_).”

Second column:

“Captured Czech soldiers or Czech civilians are ordered to construct roads or to load munitions.”

The third column:

“Article 31 of an agreement signed 27 July 1939 concerning the treatment of prisoners of war forbids their use in tasks directly related to war measures. Compulsion to do such work is in every case contrary to international law. The use of prisoners of war as well as civilians is allowed for road construction but forbidden for the manufacture of munitions.”

Last column:

“The use of these measures may be based on war needs or on the declaration that the enemy has acted in the same way first.”

The compulsory recruitment of foreign workers is thus in accordance with National Socialist doctrine, one of the elements of the policy of German domination. Hitler himself recognized this on several occasions. I quote in this connection his speech of 9 November 1941 which was printed in the _Völkischer Beobachter_ of 10 November 1941, Number 314, Page 4, which I submit to the Tribunal under Document Number RF-8. I read the extract of this discourse, Columns 1 and 2, and the first paragraph below, in the German original:

“The territory which now works for us contains more than 250 million men, but the territory in Europe which works indirectly for this battle includes now more than 350 million.

“As far as German territory is concerned, the territory occupied by us and that which we have taken under our administration, there is no doubt that we shall succeed in harnessing every man for this work.”

The recruitment of foreign workers thus proceeds in a systematic manner. It constitutes the putting into practice of the political principles as applied to the territories occupied by Germany. These principles, the concrete development of which in other departments of German criminal activity will be pointed out to you by my colleagues, are essentially of two kinds: employment of all active forces of the occupied or dominated territories; extermination of all their non-productive forces.

These are the two reasons which the defendants gave in justification for the establishment of the recruitment of foreign workers. There are many documents to this effect; I confine myself to the most explicit.

The justification for the recruitment of foreign workers, because of the necessity of including the peoples of the enslaved states in the German war effort, is primarily a result of the explanatory statement of the decree of 21 March 1942, appointing the Defendant Sauckel as Plenipotentiary for Allocation of Labor. The decree was published in the _Reichsgesetzblatt_, 1942, Part I, Page 179. I submit it and will read its complete text to the Tribunal, as Document Number RF-9.

“The decree of the Führer concerning the creation of a Plenipotentiary for Allocation of Labor, dated 21 March 1942.

“The assurance of the required manpower for the whole war economy, and in particular for the armament industry, necessitates a uniform direction, meeting the needs of the war economy, of all available labor, including hired foreigners and prisoners of war, as well as the mobilization of all unused labor still in the Greater German Reich, including the Protectorate as well as the Government General and the occupied territories.

“This mission will be accomplished by Reichsstatthalter and Gauleiter Fritz Sauckel in the capacity of Plenipotentiary General for Allocation of Labor. In this capacity he is directly responsible to the Delegate for the Four Year Plan.”

I would like to point out here that the Defendant Sauckel developed the same theme at the Congress of Gauleiter and Reichsleiter held 5 and 6 February 1943 at Posen. He expressed himself in plain terms: He justified compulsory recruitment on the basis of National Socialist philosophy and on the basis of the necessity of drawing all the European peoples into the struggle carried on by Germany. His speech constitutes Document 1739-PS. I submit it under Exhibit Number RF-10, and I request the Court to take judicial notice of it and to accept the following passages in evidence against the Defendant Sauckel. First, Page 5 of the German text, fourth paragraph—this is found on the first page of the French translation:

“The remarkable violence of the war forces me to mobilize, in the name of the Führer, many millions of foreigners for labor for the entire German war economy and to urge them to effect the maximum production. The purpose of this utilization is to assure in the field of labor the war material necessary in the struggle for the preservation of the life and liberty, in the first place, of our own people, and also for the preservation of our Western culture for those peoples who, in contrast to the parasitical Jews and plutocrats, possess the honest will and strength to shape their life by their own work and effort.

“This is the vast difference between the work which was exacted through the Treaty of Versailles and the Dawes and Young Plans at one time—which took the form of slavery and tribute to the might and supremacy of Jewry—and the use of labor which I, as a National Socialist, have the honor to prepare and to carry out as a contribution by Germany in the fight for her liberty and for that of her allies.”

The compulsory recruitment of foreign workers did not have as its only object the maintenance of the level of German industrial production. There was also the conscious desire to weaken the human potential of the occupied countries.

The idea of extermination by work was familiar to the theorists of National Socialism and to the leaders of Germany. It constituted one of the bases of the policy of domination of the invaded territories. I lay before the Court the proof that the National Socialist conspirators envisaged the destruction by work of whole ethnical groups. A discussion which took place on 14 September 1942 between Goebbels and Thierack is significant. It constitutes Document 682-PS, which I submit to the Tribunal under Exhibit Number RF-11, from which I take the following passage:

“Concerning the extermination of asocial elements, Doctor Goebbels is of the opinion that the following groups must be exterminated: All Jews and gypsies; Poles who have to serve 3 or 4 years penal servitude; Czechoslovakians and Germans who have been condemned to death or hard labor for life or placed in protective custody. The idea of extermination by work is best.”

The idea of extermination by work was not applied to ethnical groups alone, the disappearance of which was desired by the defendants; it also led to the employment of foreign labor in the German war industry up to the extreme limit of each man’s strength. I will revert to this aspect of the policy of forced labor when I lay before the Tribunal the treatment of foreign workers in Germany: The cruelty to which they were submitted sprang from this main conception of National Socialism, that the human forces of the occupied countries must be employed with no other limitation than that of their extermination, which is the final goal.

The defendants have not only admitted the principle of compulsory recruitment of foreign workers; they have followed a consistent policy of putting their principle into practice, applying it in the same concrete manner in the various occupied territories. To do this they resorted to identical methods of recruitment; they set up everywhere the same recruitment organizations to which they gave the same orders.

In the first place, it was a question of inducing foreign workers to work in their own countries for the army of occupation and the services connected with it. The German military and civil authorities organized yards and workshops in order to carry out on the spot work useful to their war policy. The yards and workshops of the Todt Organization, which were under the direction of the Defendant Speer after the death of their founder, and those of the Wehrmacht, Luftwaffe, Kriegsmarine, and the NSKK organization, employed numerous foreign workers in all areas of Western Europe.

But the essential undertaking of the German labor offices was the deportation of foreign workers to the munition factories of the Reich. The most varied means were used to this end. They were built up into a recruiting policy which can be analyzed as follows:

In the beginning, this policy took on the cloak of legality. The use of labor took the form of requisition as under the terms of Article 52 of the appendix to the fourth Hague Convention; it was also effected by means of the voluntary recruitment of workers, to whom the German recruiting offices offered labor contracts.

I shall provide the Tribunal with proof that the requisitions of labor effected by the National Socialist authorities were a deliberate misinterpretation of the letter and spirit of the international convention by virtue of which they were carried out. I shall show that the voluntary character of the recruitment of certain foreign workers was entirely fictitious; in reality their work contracts were made under the pressure which the occupation authorities brought to bear on their will.

The defendants lost no time in flinging aside their mask of legality. They compelled prisoners of war to do work forbidden by international conventions. I shall show how the work of prisoners of war was incorporated in the general plan for the Allocation of Labor from the occupied areas.

After all, it is through force that the defendants brought their recruitment plans to fruition. They did not hesitate to resort to violent methods. Thus they established compulsory labor service in the areas which they occupied. Sometimes they directly promulgated orders bearing the signature of military commanders or Reich commissioners; this is the case with Belgium and Holland. Sometimes they forced the actual authorities to take legislative measures themselves; this is particularly the case with France and Norway. Sometimes they simply took direct action, that is, they transferred foreign workers to factories in Germany without issuing regulations providing for such action; this happened in Denmark. Finally in certain occupied areas where they had carried out Germanization, the defendants incorporated the inhabitants of those territories in the labor service of the Reich. It happened thus in the French provinces of Haut-Rhin, Bas-Rhin, Moselle, and in Luxembourg.

The policy of compulsory labor was asserted and systematized from the day when the Defendant Sauckel was appointed Plenipotentiary General for Allocation of Labor.

Member of the National Socialist Party since its formation, member of the Diet of Thuringia, and member of the Reichstag, Obergruppenführer of the criminal organizations SS and SA, the Defendant Sauckel was Gauleiter and Reichsstatthalter of Thuringia. On 21 March 1942 he was appointed Plenipotentiary General for Allocation of Labor by a decree of the Führer. This decree is countersigned by Lammers in his capacity as Reichsminister and Chief of the Chancellery and by the Defendant Keitel; the responsibility of these latter is confirmed by this countersigning. The Defendant Keitel has associated himself with the policy of compulsory labor through the appointment of Sauckel, the principles and methods of whom he approved.

I have already read this decree to the Tribunal. I would remind you that it placed Sauckel, in his capacity as Plenipotentiary General for Allocation of Labour, under the immediate orders of the Delegate for the Four Year Plan, the Defendant Göring. The latter bears a direct responsibility in pursuing the plan of recruitment of compulsory labor. I shall produce numerous proofs of this. I ask the Tribunal to authorize me to produce as first proof the decree signed by the Defendant Göring the day after the appointment of the Defendant Sauckel. This decree, dated 27 March 1942, was published in the _Reichsgesetzblatt_, 1942,