the military leadership of the Third Reich. That is their "likeness", their "identifiable relationship", or their "unifying element." Their "collective general purpose" was to build up and train the Wehrmacht and to make its plans and direct its operations. Leading German generals - Brauchitsch and Halder -- have said in sworn statements that these who hold the positions listed in the Indictment had the "actual direction of the Armed Forces" and "were in effect the General Staff and High Command." The technical objections made later by the defense with respect to the chart are quite irrelevant to this essential point. military leaders did not have any formal organization or any secret advisory council, is quite wide of the mark. The prosecution has not charged this; nor has it charged that the military leaders were a political party, or that they had a set or uniform view on internal political matters. Germans, like ourselves, found coordination within a single service easier to achieve than coordination between the Army, Navy, and Air Force. The more existence of OKW is sufficient proof of the importance which the Germans attached to inter-service collaboration, and numerous documents show that constant and detailed planning and discussion between the three services. In any event, it is quite unnecessary to look behind the actual course of events. Surely no one would have suggested in 1941, after witnessingt he coordinated use of tanks and Stukas in Africa, and the team-play of all three services during the Norwegian invasion, that the German war effort lacked coordination. the most important part of OKW was the operations staff, of which Jodl and Warlimont were the chief and deputy chief respectively. The field commanders, too, participated in planning. We know from Brauchitsch and Blaskowitz that the military plans for the attacks on Poland and other countries were submitted in advance to the commanders-in-chief of army groups and armies, so that OKH would have the benefit of their recommendations.
Brauchitsch and Blaskowitz have also told us that, during operations, the OKH and the commanders-in-Chief of army groups and armies were in continual consultation, and that the commanders-in-chief were repeatedly consulted by Hitler himself. The testimony of General Reinhardt is to the same effect. Contemporary documents clearly show the participation of the field commanders in-chief in planning for the Polish campaign. had executive power (Vollziehende Gewalt) within the areas under their command. Within those areas, they were supreme, and had the power of life and death over theinhabitants. They had the responsibility for determining such questions as whether the commissar and commando orders should be distributed, and if so, how widely and with what instructions. To summarize, these generals were an aggregation of persons who directed the German Armed Forces, and whose collective purpose was to prepare it for and lead it in military operations. From time to time, when all themembers not together, it was a congregation. The purpose and spirit of the London Agreement clearly bring such a body of men within the scope of Article 9 thereof. The Agreement established this Tribunal to try such offenses in the planning and waging of aggressive wars, and violations of the laws and customs of war. The German military leaders are charged, among other things, with developing the plans under which aggressive and illegal wars were initiated, and with directing the Armed Forces in the launching and waging of these wars. They are charged with circulating throughout the Wehrmacht orders directing the murder of certain types of prisoners, and with aiding, abetting, and joining in the murder and ill treatment of the civilian population, all in violation of the laws and customs of war.
The argument of the defense that the military leaders are not a "group" and are therefore immune to a declaration under Article 9, is, we submit, utterly unfounded, and flatly contrary to the plain purposes of the London Agreement. That Agreement cannot be reasonably construed to exclude from the purview of Article 9 the leaders of one of the two chief instrumentalities of the Third Reich.
voluntary. I say "appears to", because in one breath, we are told that the generals could not withdraw from the positions they occupied, and in the next that many of them resigned because of disagreements with Hitler.
The question is, I think, a simple one. We are not concerned here with the ordinary German conscript who made up the bulk of the Wehrmacht. We are concerned entirely with professional soldiers, and with the most zealous, ambitious and able German officers in the business. Most of them chose a military career because it was in their blood, as Manstein put it, "they considered the glory of war as something great." They slaved at it and were devoted to their profession, and if they reached thestatus of commander-in-chief, they were, like Manstein, proud that an army had been entrusted to them. No one became a German commander-in-chief unless he wanted to. his commission or his post at his own free will. But this does not turn the professional officers into a conscript or make his status an involuntary one. No one becomes a professional officer without knowing in advance the obligations that will bind him in time of war. The fanatical Nazis who rushed to volunteer for the early Waffen-SS divisions or who voluntarily joined other para-military sections or the Party could not thereafter resign at will, but I have not heard it urged that they were conscripts or involuntary members. The members of the General Staff and High Command group were keen, professional warriors, who competed with others like themselves for the respnsibilities and honors of being commanders-in-chief. They rose within the Wehrmacht just as an ambitious Party member might rise to be a Kreisleiter or Gauleiter. else in the Wehrmacht. The junior officer, who protested against what was going on around him, might lose advancement or be moved to a less desirable assignment, or be court martialled and disgraced. He was not given the option of retiring, and he was usually too young to plead illness plausibly. The commanders-in-chief were in a far better position.
No war officer or War Department wants a field commander-in-chief who is in constant and fundamental disagreement with his instructions. Such a commander-in-chief must be removed. Yet often he has sufficient seniority prestige, and acknowledged ability so that his demotion or disgrace would be embarrassing, and retirement or acceptance of resignation is the best solution for all concerned. The record is replete with testimony by or about commanders-in-chief who openly disagreed with Hitler on tactical matters, and who, as a result of such disagreements, were retired or allowed to resign. I note in passing that the record is notably barren of evidence that any commander-inchief openly disagreed with Hitler so decisively on the issuance of orders which violated the laws of war or *---* forced his retirement on account of these orders.
At all events, it is quite clear that a commander-in-chief who wanted to retire could contrive to do so, whether by pleading illness or by honest, lunt behaviour. If he had the will, there was a way out. It is worth noting that the three Field Marshals who testified before this Tribunal had all found or fallen into the way cut, and the record shows that many others were equally successful and chat few of them thereafter suffered serious harm on this account.
I pass now to the criminal activities of the group. The prosecution submits that the evidence before the Tribunal conclusively established the participation of the General Staff are High Command group in accomplishing the criminal ends of the conspiracy, and in the commission of crimes under all parts of Article 6 of the Charter and under all counts of the Indictment. We also submit that the criminal aims, methods, and activities of the group were of such a nature that the members may properly be charged with knowledge of them, and that, for the most part, they had actual knowledge. period ending in the spring of 1939, when detailed planning for the attack on Poland got under way. It is worth noting that during this early period, the group defined in the Indictment never exceeded eight in number, and that four are defendants in this trial.
I do not want to spend time retreading much-travelled roads. We know that during these years, the military leaders built up the Wehrmacht and made it into a formidable military machine, which struck terror into neighboring countries and later succeeded in over running most of them. There is not a shred of evidence to contradict the charge that members of the General Staff and High Command group directed the building and assembling of this machine. Some witnesses have testified that the rearmament was for defensive purposes only, but the Wehrmacht's new strength was promptly used to support Hitler's aggressive diplomatic policy. Austria and Czechoslovakia were conquered by the Wehrmacht, even though there was no war.
The events of 1939 to 1942 and the terrible offensive power of the Wehrmacht are a further and sufficient answer, even without referring to Blomberg's official written statement in June, 1937 that there was no need to fear an attack on Germany from any quarter. had little or no foreknowledge of the absorption of Austria, Many of these witnesses were not at the time members of the group, but the point is, in any event, unhelpful, since the Anchluss was not time in advance by the Germans, but was precitiptated by Schuschnigg's purprise order for a plebiscite. That is why, as Manstein testified, plans for the march into Austria had to be quickly improvised. But the plans were drawn up by Manstein under the supervision of Beck (Chief of the General Staff of the Army and a member of the group), and other members of the group were closely involved in the Anchluss, as were other generals who later *eame members. tion of the Sudetenland, the defense's main point seems to be that Brauchitsche, Beck, and other generals opposed risking a war at that time. The record makes it quite clear that the generals' attitude was not based on any opposition to a diplomatic policy supported by military threats, or on any disagreement with the objective of smashing Czechoslovakia. Rather their attitude was that the Wehrmacht was not as yet (in 1938) strong enough to face a war with major powers. The defendant Jodl expressed it very clearly in his diary, in drawing a contrast between "the Fuehrer's intuition that we must do it this year and the opinion of the Army that we cannot do it as yet, as most certainly the Western powers will interfere and we are not as yet equal to them." parations for the occupation of Czechoslovakia and that the Commander-in-Chief of the Army gave no instructions in the regard, is completely incredible when weighed against contemporary documents of unquestioned authenticity, which have long been in evidence before the Tribunal and which the defense cannot and did not attempt to explain away.
The military directives and planning memoranda contained in the so-called "Fall Gruen" file demolish any such contention, and fully reveal the extensive preparations being made by the Wehrmacht under the leadership of Keitel, Jodl, Brauchitsch, Halder, and others. Jodl's diary gives us further details about such matters as coordination of the air and ground offensives, timing of the D-day order, collaboration with the Hungarian army, and order of battle. It also shows the personal participation of other members of the group and of other generals who later became members. Military preparation for absorption of the remainder of Czechoslovakia is also adequately shown by documents in evidence befor the Tribunal.
One other point about this pre-war period should be noted. The military leaders not only participated in the plans; they were delighted with the results. They were afraid of getting into a war before they were adequately prepared, but they wanted a big army and they wanted the strategic and military advantages which Germany derived from Hitler's Austrian and Czechsslovakian successes. That is, in fact, why the Party leaders and the military leaders worked together; that is why the generals supported Hitler; that is why the Third Reich, through the Party and the Wehrmacht, was able to achieve what it did achieve. Leading German generals have told the Tribunal this in so many words. Blomberg tells us that before 1938-1939 the German generals were not opposed to Hitler. Blaskowitz says that all officers in the army welcomed rearmament and therefore had no reason to oppose Hitler. Both of them tell us that Hitler produced the results that all the generals desired.
30 Aug M LJG 3-1a Gallagher weakened by the statements of various defense witnesses that many army officers disliked some of Hitler's internal policies end distrusted some of the Nazi politicians. It is too much to ask that all partners in crime should like and trust each other. That, in spite of those differences, the Third Reich came so Close to imposing its dominion and evil theories on the world, merely emphasizes the deep agreement between the Party and the military loaders on the most essential objectives--national unity and armed might, in order to accomplish territorial aggrandizement. This cannot be doubted, and for confirmation we need only look at the testimony of a witness called by the defense (Colonel General Reinhardt, who was chief of the Army Training Section before the war and later commended a Panzer Army and an army group on the eastern front), When asked what was the attitude of the officers' corps toward Hitler, he replied:
"I do not believe there was a single officer who did not back up Hitler in his extraordinary successes.
Hitler had in its foreign politics, and economically."
So we turn to the war itself. The group of military leaders specified in the Indictment becomes much larger; we are no longer concerned only with t he generals in Berlin, but also with the war lords who commanded the Wehrmacht in the field-names far more familiar to and feared by the peoples of the territories overrun by the Germans. Names such as Blaskowitz, von Bock, von Kluge, Kesselring, von Reichenau, Rundstedt, Sperrle, and von Weichs.
What do the general's say in defense of the attack on Poland? Some of their statements, like Manstein's explanation that the Poles might "carelessly" attack Germany, are merely laughable. About the best they can. say is that they expected that Poland would give in without a struggle. Were this a defense, its credibility is dubious. Hitler himself had made it clear to the military loaders that it was not a "question of Danzig end the Corridor, 30 Aug M LJG 3-2a Gallagher but of living space and increasing the food supply under German exploitation.
The generals could have hardly expected the Poles. to give themselves up entirely without a struggle, and Hitler had said that there would be war and no repetition of the Czech affair. for a "Blumenkreig." The witnesses for the defense have agreed that German demands on Poland were to be enforced by military throats and armed might. There is 110 evidence that the generals opposed this policy of sheer holdup. In fact, it is clear that they heartily endorsed it, since the Polish corridor was regarded by them as a "desecration" and the regaining from Poland of former German territory as a "point of honor". And it has never been a defense that a robber is surprised by the resistance of his victim, and has to commit murder in order to got the money. of the members of the General Staff and High Command group in the planning and launching of the attack itself. Brauchitsch has described how the plans were evolved, and then passed to the field commanders-in-chief for their recommendations. We know, both from his own testimony and from contemporary documents, that Blaskowitz one the field commanders-in-chief, received the plans for the attack in June and thereafter perfected them in consultation with the army group and OKH. Rundstedt's Chief of Staff received the plans, and there can be no doubt that all the other conmanders-in-chief did also, A week before the attack, all the members of the group not at the Obersalzberg for the final briefing. the entire continent of Europe, the Wehrmacht grow and many more army groups, armies, air fleets, and naval commands were created and the membership in the group was correspondingly enlarged. All three branches or the Wehrmacht participated in the invasion of Norway and Denmark, which was an excellent demonstration of 30 Aug M LJG 3-3a Gallagher "combined operations" involving the closest joint planning and coordination between the three services.
The documents before the Tribunal show that this operation was a brain child of the German admirals; the proposal originated with Raeder and other naval members of the group and, after Hitler's approval had been obtained the plans were developed at OKW. Numerous members of the group participated in its planning and execution. The testimony of several army commanders that they had no foreknowledge of the attack is not surprisingly a fact since the OKH and the army commanders-in-chief were all fully absorbed at the time in planning the much larger attack on the Low Countries and France. Only a few German divisions were used in Norway and Denmark and, since it was a "combined operation," the plans were developed in OKW, not OKH.
Dr. Laternser's defense of the Norwegian attack on the basis that it was a preventive move to forestall an English invasion of Norway, might have some superficial plausibility if there were any evidence that the Norwegian invasion was improvised to meet an emergency. But it is totally and wantonly incredible in the free of documents which show that the Norwegian invasion had been under discussion since October, 1939, that active planning bega n in December, that on March 14 Hitler was still hesitant about giving the order for the attack because he was "still looking for some justification," and that all through the weeks proceeding the Norwegian attack there was discussion within the General Staff group as to whether it might not be preferable to initiate the general western offensive against France and the Low Countries before undertaking the Norwegian campaign. testimony of defense witnesses that Hitler wanted to attack in the fall of 1939 and that Brauchitsch and other generals persuaded him that it should be postponed until the spring of 1940. This postponment indeed shows that the generals had considerable influence with Hitler, but hardly excuses the later attack. When the 30 Aug M LJG 3-4a Gallagher spring of 1940 arrived, according to Manstein, " the offensive in the west from the point of the soldier, was absolutely inevitable."
There is no evidence that a single German commander protested against or opposed the flagrant and ruthless violation of the neutrality of the Low Countries. peace are labored and implausible, and are in conflict equally with the documents before the Tribunal and with the history of the years in question. Nor is it true that the military leaders were more puppets without influence on Hitler or the course of events. Naturally there were disagreements not only between Hitler and the Wehrmacht, but within the Wehrmacht itself. If Hitler prevailed at times, so at times did the Wehrmacht, whether it was to postpone the western offensive or to launch the attack on Denmark and Norway. Despite the attempt to make the contrary appear, Hitler was not so stupid as to act without the benefit of military advice. One need only look at Hitler's directive to the military leaders of 12 November 1940, written after the successful conclusion of the western offensive, in which Hitler discusses very tentatively his future plans in France, a possible offensive in Spain, whether Madeira and the Azores should be occupied, what assistance should be given the Italians North Africa, what to do in Greece and the Balkans, what the future might hold with regard to the Soviet union, and whether to invade England in the spring of 1941. Hitler concluded:
"I shall expect the commanders-in-chief to express their opinions of the measures anticipated in this directive.
I.
and synchronization of the individual actions."
No, the leaders of the Wehrmacht were not puppets. If the generals owed their opportunity to rebuild the Wehrmacht largely to Hitler and the Nazis, it is very true that Hitler was utterly dependent on the generals for carrying out his plans. Brauchitsch has pointed out that "the carrying out of the orders that were 30 Aug M LJG 3-5a Gallagher given to the army and to the army groups required such a high knowledge of military matters and such ability and psychological understanding that there were only a few people who were actually able to carry out such orders."
And it is worth noting that despite the very real and natural friction between the war lords and a former corporal, Hitler never, until July, 1944, turned outside the ranks of the army for his commanders-in-chief. Even during those final desperate months, only four outsiders, Himmler himself end three others from the Waffen-SS achieved the coveted distinction. Europe led by reluctant men. These aggressive wars were launched and waged by men who worshipped armed might, and wanted to extend the hegemony of Germany. That is, at bottom, why the Nazis and the Wehrmacht leaders gave the Third Reich its unity. I recall the Tribunal's attention to Admiral Fricke's memorandum of June, 1940:
"It is too well known to need further mention that Germany's dependent on Germany.
If the following results are achieved -- that expansion is undertaken (on a scale I shall describe later) by means of powers of resistance (popular unity, mineral resources, industry and Armed Forces) are so broken that a revival must be considered out of * * * * * "The solution * * *, therefore, appears to be * * * to crush Franco, to Denmark and Norway to existen the basis indicated above."
the generals say over and over again that they were never told about what was going on and heard about events for the first time over the radio. Over and over a gain they have protested that they never heard about certain things until they were lodged in the jail at Number. Military figures, like so many others in this case, have not hesitated to out the responsibility for things which they cannot deny or avoid on the shoulders of one or two people when they seek to portray as peculiar and unrepresentative of the group. The common denominator of these scapegoats is that they are all dead. The dead Reichenau is made to share the blame with the other dead who cannot speak -Hitler, Himmler, Dr. Rasche and the rest. These defenses are mean and they are utterly incredible. The world will never believe them. leaders with what was going on in and around Germany in the years before the war. The military leaders now tell us that they neither knew, nor cared to know, nor ought to have known about these things. If what they say is true, then they are utterly unique, for nearly all the world had heard something about these things.
One of the most remarkable things about this trial has been that instead of a series of startling revelations, the documents assembled here and the labor devoted to them have served to confirm what was already known or suspected throughout the world many years ago. I cannot suppose that anybody will everysubscribe to the view, which the military leaders have been forced by circumstances to put forward here in order to try and clear themselves from a stain which is far too dark to be effaced. participated led inevitably to the war crimes which followed. Without the participation of this group in the crimes against peace, there would not have been any war crimes. It is not a change from one subject to another, but only the inevitable chain of causation, which leads us now to consider the methods by which the Wehrmacht waged the wars it had launched. plunged into innocent blood, or that the rules of war and the laws of decency were disregarded by every German commander. But we do say that the nature and extent of the atrocities ordered by the leaders of the Wehrmacht and thereafter perpetrated by it in many countries of Europe, reveal and prove a calculated indifference on the part of the military leaders to the commission of crimes. instructions from Hitler as its commander-in-chief, issued various orders which flagrantly contravened the rules of war. These included the orders for the shooting of commandos and political commissars, the orders to "pacify" the occupied territories of the Soviet Union by spreading terror, and others. The efense does not dispute the issuance of these orders, and it does not and cannot contest their criminality. Rather we are told that the German commanders were honorable soldiers, that they disapproved of these orders, that they tacitly agreed not to execute the orders, and that the orders were not executed. order. The original order and the other relevant documents are all in evidence. In October, 1942, Hitler ordered that enemy commandos were to be slaughtered to the last man; that even if they surrendered, they were nonetheless to be shot immediately, unless interrogation were necessary, in which case they were to be shot thereafter.
The order was not a purposeless piece of criminality; allied commando operations were doing serious harm to the German war effort, and Hitler thought this order would act as a deterrent. of the service, Army, Navy and Air Force. There is ample evidence that it was widely distributed and well-known within the Wehrmacht. Rundstedt, Supreme Commander in the West, reported on June 23, 1944 that "the treatment of enemy commando groups has so far been carried out" according to the Hitler order. Two years later, under different circumstances, Rundstedt testified that he "evaded and "sabotaged" the order, and that it was not carried out. But we know from the documents that it was carried cut. Pursuant to this order, British and Norwegian commandos were executed in Norway in 1942 and 1943; American commandos were shot in Italy in 1944, allied soldiers were executed in Slovakia in 1945. And, in the nature of things, the order must have been carried out in other instances of which, unhappily, no trace now remains.
In the light of these documents, what remains of the defense? Stated most favorably, merely that because some of the military leaders disapproved the order, it was not executed as often as it might otherwise have been. But this defense is worse than worthless; it is shameful. only a violation of the rules of war. It is murder. And murder is not the less murder whether there is one victim, or 55 (which is the number of slaughtered commandos shown by the documents), or Ohlendorf's 90,000. Crime has been piled upon crime in this case until we are in danger of losing our sense of proportion. We have heard, so much of mass extermination that we are likely to forget that simple murder is a capital offense. to avoid associating himself with murder, whether as an accomplice or accessory or co-conspirator. And these requirements can reasonably be applied to the German military leaders. Before this Tribunal they have made much of their traditions of honor, decency, courage and chivalry.
Aug-30-RT-M-4-1a-Ninabuck the order of a superior, if the subordinate knows that the order requires the commission of a general or a military crime. The commando order required the commission of murder, and every German officer who handled the order knew that perfectly well. knew that it required the commission of murder. The responsibility for handling this question lay squarely on the group defined in the Indictment. The chiefs at OKW, OKH, and OKM had to decide whether to refuse to issue a criminal order or whether to pass it on to the commanders-in-chief in the field. The commanders in field, Army. Navy and Air Force had to decide whether to execute it or refuse and whether to distribute it to their subordinates. among various members of the group to discuss this matter. There is no evidence that a single member of the group openly protested or announced his refusal to execute it. The general result was that the order was distributed throughout a large part of the Wehrmacht. This put the subordinate commanders in the same position as their superiors. We are told that some of the generals tacitly agreed not to carry out the order. If so, it was a miserable and worthless compromise. By distributing the order with "Secret" or "tacit" understandings, the commandersin-chief merely spread the responsibility and deprived themselves of any effective control over the situation. A tacit agreement to disobey cannot be so widely circulated. The inevitable result, and the result proved by the documents, was that the order was carried out, and innocent men were murdered. was tried, convicted, and soot to death. For the same crime, General Falkenhorst now stands condemned to die. But the responsibility for these murders is shared by Falkenhorst and Dostler with every German Commander-in-chief, at home or in the field, who allowed this order to become the official law of the Wehrmacht and participated in its distribution; On this charge alone, I submit, the General Staff and High Command group is proved to have participated directly, effectively, and knowingly in the commission of war crimes. violations of the laws of war and to mass suffering and death produced results equally criminal and, because on a grander scale, far more horrible.
The atrocities committed by the Wehrmacht and other agencies of the Third Reich in the east were of such staggering enormity that they rather tax the power of comprehension. Why did, all these things happen? Analysis will show, I believe, that this was not simply madness and blodlust. On the contrary, there was both method and purpose. These atrocities accurredas the result of carefully calculated orders and directives, issued prior to or at the time of the attack on the Soviet Union, which form a coherent, logical pattern. to consider seriously making an attack on the Soviet Union. We do not know that beginning in September of 1940, he was constantly discussing this posssiblity with the military leaders, who had ample opportunity to express their views to him. We know that there was a division of opinion among the generals and admirals. none of them appear to have been much governed by moral scruples, but some thought the attack unnecessary, and others were dubious that a quick victory could be achieved, However, still others agreed with Hitler that the attack should be launched. Then Hitler, in consultation with and with the support of part of the military leadership, decided to make the attack, there is no indication that any leading Generals stood out decisively against the decision, and they embarked on the war with the utmost determination to carry it through to a successful conclusion. factor which, once the decision had been made, became a vitally important object and purpose of the attack. That was to seize areas of the Soviet Union and to exploit too so areas the material benefit of Germany. To accomplish this, it was desired to "pacify" and crush all opposition to the occupied territory as rapidly as possible and with a minimum expenditure of manpower and material to obliterate the Soviet political system and set up new, German supported, regional political administrations, and to revise and expand the productive resources of these areas and convert them to the uses of the Third Reich.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will adjourn.
(Recess, was taken.)
GEN. TAYLOR: Mr. President, at our recess I was describing the program for the exploitation and pacification of the occupied Eastern territories. Hitler had very definite ideas as to how this program should be carried out, and these ideas were partially embodied in the series of directives and orders with which the Tribunal is now familiar. Some of these orders were to be executed directly by the Wehrmacht, some of them by other agencies of the Reich, but in coordination with and supported by the Wehrmacht.
For the rapid and economical "pacification" of occupied territories, after Hitler had consulted Brauchitsch the OKW issued the order of 22 July, 1941, which ordered the commanders-in-chief to establish security, not by sentencing the guilty in courts of law, but by spreading "such terror as is likely, by its more existence, to crush every will to resist amongst the population." For the same purpose, OKW issued the order of 13 May, 1941, which, suspended the use of military courts for punishing offenses by enemy civilians, and directed that the troops themselves should accomplish pacification by "ruthless action", the most extreme methods," and "collective despotic measures" against localities. In furtherance of these abominable policies, it was further ordered that the German troops who committed offenses against Soviet civilians were not to be punished at all, unless punishment were necessary to maintain discipline and security or prevent waste of food or material. Every commissioned officer on the eastern front was to be instructed promptly and emphatically to behave in accordance with these principles. The language of the order was calculated to incite officers and men alike to the most despicable behaviour. In these two orders we can see the basic composition of this revolting picture. In more detail, Hitler expected particularly bitter opposition to his new Russian policies and regimes from officers and agents of the Soviet government and from all Jews. These elements he decided to exterminate utterly, as they would otherwise remain a constant focal point of resistance within the occupied regions. for the killing of all political commissars who might be captured. This, like the commando order, required the murder of defenseless prisoners-of-war. And in this case the military leaders behaved in precisely the same fashion. Not one commander-in-chief openly protested or openly announced his refusal to execute the order.
A few commanders may have refused to distribute it down to the troops, but it was distributed and became well-known over the entire eastern front. As in the case of the commando order, we are told that by tacit agreement among the commanders, it was not carried out. The evidence in support of this is that particular commanders or other officers never personally knew of an instance where a captured commissar was shot. We may assume the truth of some of these statements, but it is nonetheless totally incredible, in view of the order's wide distribution, and the deliberate brutalizing of the German soldier by such orders as these and such directives as Reichenau and Manstein issued to their troops, that the commissar order was not carried out in many cases. It must have been. all Communists by the OKW order of 16 September 1941, which directed that all cases of resistance to the Wehrmacht, no matter what the circumstances, should be attributed to Communists and that "the death penalty for 50-100 communists should generally be regarded as suitable atonement for one German soldier's life." of undesired elements could not, obviously, be carried out by the Wehrmacht alone.
Many other agencies of the Third Reich had an important share in this far-flung, evil program. Among these other agencies, perhaps the most unspeakable were the special task forces of Himmler, known as Einsatzgruppen and Einsatzkommandos. The mission of these units was to assist in "pacification" and pave the way for the new political regime by stamping out opposition, and particularly by slaughtering communists and Jaws. We know, both from contomperary documents and from the confession of the leader of one of these units, with what terrible fidelity that mission was performed. but these units could not simply be turned loose in the operational and rear areas of a conquered territory, without administration, supply, communication facilities, and sufficient control by the military to insure that their tasks would be coordinated with, and at least would not obstruct, military operations The defense has made every effort to conceal this plain fact, but any soldier, and indeed anyone who gives the matter thought, must know that it is true.
And this is quite clear from the documents. The OKW Directive for Special Areas of 13 March 1941 provided that Himmler could send these units into operational areas in order to perform "special tasks for the preparation of the political administration, tasks which result from the struggle which has to be carried out between two opposing political systems." But the order carefully specified that the execution of Himmler's tasks should not disturb military operations, and that the units were subject to the supreme authority of the commander-in-chief of the army in the operational area. The and feeding of Himmler's units was to be furnished by the army. It was directed that further details should be arranged between the OKH and Himmler. Brauchitsch has confirmed that subsequently the details were settled at a conference between Heydrich and General Wagner of OKH, and Schellenberg, who drafted the agreement, has described its contents. army and would have been helpless without the army's support. The testimony of some of the German generals taht these killings of thousands upon thousands took place without their knowledge would make one smile, were not the truth so black and sickening.