Hitlerite Germany, was that of the German General Staff. plans, the German General Staff, as well as the OKW, played a decisive role.
C. Military crimes and crimes against humanity. independently or in cooperation with the German police agencies, innumerable crimes in the occupied territories. by the German-Fascist usurpers in the occupied territories would need too much time. military crimes and crimes against humanity were systematically perpetrated by the German armed forces on a mass scale, and were organized beforehand and involved all ranks of the German war machine -- from field-marshal to private. of May 13, 1941, "of the application of military cognizance in the 'Barbarossa' region and the special actions of the troops", which received orders to apply "the most drastic measures", in view of which the German officers had the right to execute without trial, and by which an impunity was established for crimes committed by German military personnel against the peaceful population. by which he ordered the German troops "to have in view that in the countries which are concerned, human life has absolutely no value and that an intimidating action is only possible by use of unusual cruelty". extermination of Soviet commissars taken also prisoners of war, of the branding of Soviet prisoners of war, as well as the orders of the defendant Goering on the extermination of captured allied pilots, of the plundering of occupied territories and the slave deportation of peaceful population to Germany, the order of the defendant Doenitz forbidding to save men from sinking vessels, the order of the former Field-Marshal Reichenau "On the conduct of troops in the Hast" and many ethers.
Hitlerite Germany.
In the instruction on "special regions", issued by the, OKW on March 13, 1941 and signed by the defendant Keitel, the necessity was foreseen of coordinating the activities of the SS Reichsfuehrer and the army command in the occupied territories. The witness Walter Schellenberg and Otto Ohlendorf, former chiefs of the Reich Security Head Office stated in their evidence at this Trial, that already in Lay 1941 an agreement was concluded between quartermaster "General Wagner, representative of the OKH, and Heydrich chief of the Security Police and of Who SD, for the execution of instructions of the OKW, which foresaw in the German armed forces the organization and form of activity of Special Security Police "action-groups" and SD.
During the cross-examination at the trial of the 'witness von Brauchitsch, the latter confirmed that he knew of such appropriate talks between Wagner and Heydrich. groups and SD in the German armed forces is confirmed by several documental evidences. it is stated:
"Our task was to establish personal contact with the commanders of the Armies and with the commander of the army of the rear area.
It must under Col.
Gen.Hoeppner, it was very close, almost cordial." And further:
"At the start of the Eastern Campaign it became obvious with regard to the rear areas, but also in the areas of the front."
the henchman Kube, in which even he expresses indignation against the criminal activities of the police in the town of Sloutsk, it is apparent that the second police battalion, which shot masses of Jews in the town, was directly subordinated to the military command.
Keitel, from the criminal agreements of Wagner and Heydrich, from the orders of Reichenau and Manstein, to the innumerable crimes of the German troops and the action-groups of the Security Police in the occupied territories. the German soldier Knittel and Obergefreiter Kurt but also those of tie FieldMarshals of the German army. Forces and the German General Staff, was the decisive force, with the aid of which were plotted and carried out ail the criminal aggressive plans of the Hitlerite Government, all the war crimes and the crimes against humanity. of the most important organizations for the execution of the criminal conspiracy of the Hitlerite clique, and "die higher military authorities of the German armed forces were active participants of this conspiracy. character of this military organization is fully proved.
Government/Reich Cabinet Reichscabinet which occupied a particularly prominent position in the system of the fascist dictatorship.
Appendix "C" to the Indictment includes a detailed enumeration of the personalities who made up the government and who, for this reason, are held responsible for the perpetration of the Hitlerite crimes which are specified in counts one, two, three and four of the Indictment. monstrous crimes of the Nazis. We have heard here of the crimes of the police and of the Wehrmacht, of the SS and of the Gestapo, of the ReichsGauleiters and of the Reichs-Commissars in the occupied territories, of various Fuehrers and Leiters. And we can most categorically declare that the homogeneity and systematic organization of the crimes, the uniformity of the means and measures used to commit them testify to the fact that these crimes were directed by and carried out on the directives of a single issuing center. These innumerable and varied crimes are traced back to the gang of fascist conspirators and to the criminal Hitlerite government. of the defendants to the effect that, under Hitler, the Council of Ministers was a more technical apparatus deprived of any real power, are completely unconvincing. Actually not only did the ministers decide themselves all questions earning within their jurisdiction, but they were at the same time the executors of Hitler's will. It is also true that it was Hitler who made the final decision pertaining to all official and unofficial discussions and meetings. At the same time, however, one cannot forget the fact that not a single minister in any other government enjoyed such independence in deciding questions coming within his jurisdiction as did the ministers of the Hitlerite government. Every single one of them was a fuehrer in his particular field, and by his advise, by the material presented, by drafts of laws and directives wielded a most tangible influence over all decisions taken by Hitler in connection with questions concerning the activity of several departments. Then again, one cannot discount the fact that Hitler's will fully corresponded to the personal points of view and convictions of his ministers.
They were necessary to Hitler just as much as he was necessary to them. Goering, Frick, Rosenberg, Neurath, Speer, Funk and others are inconceivable without Hitler just was Hitler is inconceivable without them. Under Hitler's leadership the actively participated in the planning of the fascist conspiracy, and every one of them, enacting the role allotted to him in the general criminal plan which defined the activity of literally all the departments, wittingly and actively carried out that plan. of Hitlerite Germany - of Finance, Economics, Justice, Communications, etc. administrative and political powers. And they used this power in order to put into effect the criminal plans for seizing foreign territories, for anni ilating races and peoples and for establishing a world domination. And in order to facilitate this execution of these criminal plans they first of all seized the power over the German people and the German State, and supported this power by draconic measures. Hitler's accession to power and stiffened conspicuously after Hitler became Chancellor in 1933 and when the Defendants Frick, Papen and Von Neurath became ministers in the Reich's Government. Taking advantage of their presence in the government, these fascist ministers fully legalized the terror wrought by the shock units of the Nazi Party and prepared the coming seizure of power, using to achieve this aim the burning down of the Reichstag, which had been organized by the Defendant Goering. March 1933 a law was issued "on the Defense of the People and the State", giving legislative power to the Reich Government in addition to the Reichstag. fiscation of property of the communist organization, and starting from June 14 of the same year the property of the social-democratic organization is confiscated as well. On December 1, 1933, the criminal Reich Government published, the law "on safeguarding the unity off the Party and the Government" which bore the signature of Hitler and of the Defendant Frick.
Government by virtue of the law "upon the Reconstruction of the Reich" of 1933 cancelled all democratic elections in all central and local representative institutions. The Reichstag is changed by the fascist into an institution devoid of any real meaning. servants, amongst them judges, who had been at any time, noticed as having anti-fascist inclinations or who belonged to leftist organizations as well as all Jews, were dismissed from their offices and replaced by fascists. Pursuantly to the "basic principle of German law on Civil Officials" of 26 January 1937 "the bond between a civil servant and the party should be the executor of the will of the national-socialist government, led by the NSDAP." the Hitlerite conspirators to utilize it at a later period as an obedient tool for the perpetration of their criminal plans.
30 Aug A LJG 24-1 Ninabuck designed to implant fascist ideology and mislead the people of Germany. Its function was to educate youth in the spirit of militarism and racial hatred and to make the German youth conceive reality from the distorted viewpoint of fuse 1st dreams. to these organizations which were subordinated to him. the press and of the speech were abolished. confiscated, and the majority of their loaders jailed. Government founded the Gestapo and the concentration camps. Hundreds of thousands were arrested and destroyed without any trial or concrete evidence, merely on the suspicion of having anti-fascist tendencies. did not participate in the issuance of the shameful Nurnberg laws and in the racial discrimination against the Jews. Nevertheless there were special instructions to two members of the Reichsregierung in the Nurnberg Laws, namely Hess and Prick, to elaborate and promulgate additional decrees implementing the laws. And such decrees were elaborated and promulgated by Hess and Frick.
The same Frick, together with Funk, and acting on Goering's instructions, issued on the 3rd of December, 1936, a decree concerning "the liquidation of Jewish property" as well as a series of others. all the laws promulgated during the period when this particular government was in power.
30 Aug A MK 24-2 Ninabuck activity of the Hitlerite Government directed at the preparation and the initiation of aggression. It is not necessary to mention again the invasion of Austria and Czechoslovakia in 1938-39 the attacks on Poland, Yugoslavia, and the Soviet Union. Numerous documents submitted to the Tribunal confirm the fact that the Hitlerite Government did everything possible to retain the invaded territories of Prance, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Norway, Poland, Belgium, and other countries as well as the territories of the USSR. It Is only because of the powerful blows of the Red Army and the Armies of the Allies that it was impossible for the Fascist conspirators to realize their predatory plans. The activities of the Hitlerite Government had brought on the war which took millions of human lives and caused inestimatable losses and immeasurable suffering to other nations. crimes and the crimes against humanity committed by the German troops and the German authorities during the war. The great amount of evidence submitted to the Tribunal proved clearly that Hitlerite Germany prepared itself for the conduct of the most ruthless war in full contempt of the laws and customs of war. not only agaist the armed forces of the peace loving nations united against fascist aggressors but also against the innocent civilian population. Long before the treacherous aggression against the Soviet Union took place, the Government of Hitlerite Germany carefully laid plans for the monstrous extermination of the most developed regions of the Soviet Union. concerning the German Fascist Atrocities in Novgrad, Stevrepol, Orel, Stalino, Smolensk, Kiev, and other towns, has proved the existance of a carefully planned and intentional program of mass extermination conducted by the German Invaders against Soviet prisoners of war and Soviet civilians.
30 Aug A LJG 24-3 Nenabuck hypocritically claimed never, until the present trial, to have heard of the monstrous atrocities of the Hitlerites in the concentration camps, or of the savage behavior of the SS men and of the German authorities in the temporarily occupied territories. These claims are thoroughly false.
Every German know something of those facts. The radio stations of the whole world had broadcast them. against the Soviet prisoners-of-war and the peaceful Soviet citizen were brought to the attention of the whole world in the official notes of the people's Commissar for foreign Affairs of the USSR, W. M. Molotov, on the 25 November 1941 and 27 April 1942. But in spite of the fact that the violation of the most elementary principles of international law and of human morality committed by the German Army and the German authorities were made known to the Reich Government by the above mentioned documents, this criminal violation of the laws and customs of war continued also in 1943 and 1945. It Is clear therefore, that all those crimes were committed with full knowledge and on the direct Instructions of the Hitlerite Government. ing that the convention of Geneva is not valid for Soviet prisoners-of-war of war? ant Bormann and including instructions on the cruel treatment and mockery to be reserved for the Soviet prisoners of war not distributed to the ministers? Office, the Gestapo, the prisons and the concentration camps, not offices and organizations of the German Government? atrocities committed by these fascist governmental organizations.
The members of Hitler's government tried by every possible 30 Aug A LJG 24-4 Ninabuck exposed, every one presented new versions - one more mendacious than the other.
were generals of the SS, and that this was no mere formality, can be seen from the letter of the defendant Ribbentrop to *---* dated 22 July 1940, Which was presented to the Tribunal by the Soviet prosecution. that he did not know anything about the bestial orders of the Minister Himmler. the Fuehrers of the SS and SD to carry out, jointly with the Military Command, the complete destruction of the areas in Ukraine, when he proposed that, and I quete:
"not a human being, not a single head of cattle, not a hundredweight of grain and not a railway line remain behind; that not a house remains standing, not a mine is available which is not destroyed for years to come, that there is not a well which is not poisoned," and recommended that special care he taken to inform the Reich Minister of the occupied territories in the East, Rosenberg, of this order.
On 8 March 1940, the Minister Goering sent to the "highest authorities of the Reich" a criminal directive concerning "the treatment of civilian workers of Polish nationality in the Reich." received instructions from Goering to send hundreds of thousands of Poles for slavery into Germany. Inquart and others have been exposed during the trial as having given directives and prepared measures for forced labor of prisoner of war and peaceful inhabitants of the territories seized by the Germans.
30 Aug A LJG 24-5 Ninabuck measure of Army group " center", concerning the seizure on Soviet territory or 40-50 thousand children between the ages of 10 to 14 and their transfer to Germany. Do not these examples testify to the crimes committed by Hitler's Government? organized plunder of the territories seized by the Germans, was carried out in conformity with official directives and insurrection of the Hitlerite Government and of its individual members. The directive of Minister Goering concerning the planned plunder of the occupied Soviet territories (the so-called "Goering's Green File"), the activities of the looting "Eimsatzstab" and "units of special purpose", the activities of the Ministers Rosenberg and Ribbentrop concerning the plunder of cultural treasures and monuments of art, as well as the activities of the Ministers Funk and Speer, is not all this sufficient to conclude about the participation of Hitler's Government in the plunder of the territories occupied by the Germans.
plunder of the public, private and communal property, and for the destruction and looting of cultural treasures in the occupied territories. In the USSR alone the material damages amount to 679 billion rubles. forced germanization of areas seized by the Germans. It is the Reich ministers Goering, Frick, Hess and Lammers who have signed the decree incorporating into Germany the four western provinces of Poland. Rainer stated, and I quote:
" ... Your principal task will be to include into the German Reich the entire new areas of Yugoslav Corinthia and Kraina ... Because without the setting up of a "German wall" any administrative building, as good as it may be, will sooner or later fall down... Your task, comrade Rainer, is to make this district entirely German ..." for us to recall the agreement between the Ministers Ribbentrop and Himmler concerning the organization of the intelligence services abroad, the September 1942 concerning the special mass police measures for the extermination of Jews, Gypsies, Russians, Ukrainians, Poles and Czechs, who allegedly were anti-social elements; the letter of Minister Lammers of 4 June 1944, addressed to Minister von Schirach regarding the non-prosecution of the authors of murders of shot down Allied airmen; the letter of Minister Keitel to the Minister of Foreign Affairs concerning treatment to be given to Allied airmen. its purpose in those Words: "I am establishing this Secret Council to advise me in questions of foreign policy." Ribbentrop, Goering, Hess, Goebbels, Lammers, Brauchitsch, Raeder and Keitel. Reich into the Council of Ministers for the Defense of the German Reich, He appointed Goering chairman of this Council and as members the Ministers Hess, Frick, Funk, Keitel and Lammers emphasized that "the Council for the Defense of the Reich is the deciding organization in the Reich on questions connected with the preparation of war", and that "the Council for the Defense of the Reich will convene in order to take all the more important decision."
aggressive wars which were the tasks of this Council, In the preparation of the war participated not only the members of the Council for the Defense of the Reich, but all other ministers as well. with Goering, Funk, Frick, Himmler, Keitel and Lammers, the ministers Schwerin von Krossigk, Dorpmueller, and others. the war industry of prisoners of war and of the population of the occupied territories, but the utilization of internees and even the number of internees in war time were discussed as well.
In the minutes of this meeting it is stated: "the General Plenipotentiary for Economy, that is Funk, has to define the task which is to be executed by the prisoners of war as well as by the person confined in prisons, concentration camps, etc." number of people in the concentration camps during the war. According to preliminary data 20,000 prisoners will be employed in the concentration cam workshops. collaboration of the OKW and the General Plenipotentiary for Economy of 3 May 1939 concerning plans for the war economy; and the plans of total warfare. There were also special reports from the Chief of Section IV, of the General Staff, Gerke, and from the Minister of Transport, Dorpmueller.
Were allmembers of the Reich Government informed of these decisions? the minutes of the meeting of the 23 June 1939 were sent. The minutes of the meeting of the Council for the Defense, of the Reich were sent to Deputy Fuehrer, to the Chief of the Reich Chancellery, to the Chairman of the Secret Council of Ministers, to the Plenipotentiary for the Four-Year Plan, and to the Ministers of Foreign affairs, Justice, Interior, Education, Economy, Church and Religion, Food and Agriculture, Labor, Finance, Communication, Postal service, Director of the Reichsbank, etc.
The very fact that the majority of the members of the Reich Government are defendants in the present trial says a great deal about the nature of the organization here discussed. Government for the heaviest crimes here mentioned is fully proven and that the Reich Cabinet should therefore be declared a criminal organization.
Your Honors: In order to carry out their plotted crimes, the heads of the Fascist conspiracy created a system of criminal organisations which have been the subject of my statement here. whole nations, are now awaiting with trepidation the coming verdict of the court. initiators of these sanguine Fascist "ideas", the main organizers of the crimes of Hitlerism. Fascism, the complicated and widely ramified network of party, government SS, military organizations which were the means of realizing these vile premeditations of the chief conspirators. battlefields. by the heroic Red Army and the valiant armies of the Allied Forces has not only destroyed the hordes of the Hitlerites but it has determined the sublime and noble principles of international cooperation, morality of mankind, the humane rubles of social community. towards the serene memory of the innocent victims, towards the conscience of the nations, as well as towards their own conscience.
Fascist hangmen.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will adjourn until 10:00 o'clock tomorrow morning.
(The Tribunal adjourned until 31 August 1946, at 10:00 hours.)
THE PRESIDENT: Article 24 D (j) provides that each Defendant may make a statement to the Tribunal. I therefore now call upon the Defendants whether they wish to make statements. Defendant Herman Wilhelm Goering.
DEFENDANT HERMANN WILHEIM GOERING : The prosecution in its final speeches have treated the defendants and the presentation of evidence as completely worthless. The statements made under oath; the statements made by the defendants were assumed to be absolutely true, whether they served to support the Prosecution and the documents, but at the same moment, the statements were treated as perjury when the statements refuted the Indictment. That is not a convincing statement for the proceedings and thesis of evedence. the State as a proof that I should have known everything that happened. But it does not present any documentary or other convincing proof that there, under my oath, I refuted the contents of this knowledge, and therefore, it is only en assertion and an assumption when the Prosecution says, " who should have Known that if not Goering who was the successor of the Fuehrer ? were veiled with the most secrecy. But I condemned these terrible mess murders to the utmost, and to show that I am not lacking any misunderstanding in this connection, I wish to state emphatically the following comments once more, quite clearly, before the High Tribunal. Never did I ever decree a murder upon a single individual in any period of any time, but neither did I decree any cruelties at any time while I had the power and the Knowledge to prevent them.
The new statements presented by Mr. Dodd in his final statement that I had. ordered Heydrich to kill the Jews, that lacks every proof and that statement is not true. There is not a single order signed by me or signed in my behalf that enemy fliers should be shot or should be turned over to the SD. And, not e single case has been established where units of my Airforce have carried out things like that. which contain alleged statements, and written down by third and fourth parties without my having, seen these statements, in order to correct erroneous statements contained therein and to preclude misunderstanding.
be disterted. This fact may be proved also by the stenographic records taken in those proceedings which, in many cases, need correction when they are checked. statements which were made under completely different circumstances and without any conclusions arising at the time These statements were made, and new they are used to prove intent and built. ometimes statements can easily be. made because of the commitment of the moment and because of the atmosphere that obtains. There is hardly one leading personality on the neither side of whom we could not say the sea in the course of a quarter of a century, about when something similar was not set down in word or in writing and decisions, the prosecution seizes at the consequences and makes a connection according to which everything had been intended and wished that way from the beginning. This is a statement or an opinion which is errorneous and which is entirely devoid of logic, an opinion which will be rectified some day by history, after the proceeding here will arrive at the erroncousnes of this assertion.
Mr. Jackson in his final speed, referred to the fact that the signatory states are still in a state of War against Germany and, because of unconditional surrender, a state of truce is object sides. Therefore, if everything which is happening in Germany because of the occupying powers -- that is, if everything is admission after International law, then before that time, as far as France, Holland, Belgium, Norway, Yugoslavia and Greece are concerned, Germany found herself in the same position. If today the Geneva Convention, so far as the Germans are concerned, does not have any validity army longer, if today in all parts of Germany industry is being dismantled and other great assets in all spices can be brought to the other states, if today the monies of millions of Germans are being confiscated and other serious interventions in freedom are taking place, then measures like that token by Germany in the countries mentioned above cannot have been criminal on the part of Germany as far as other countries are concerned Mr. Jackson stated further that you cannot accuse and punish a state but rather, that you have to held the leaders responsible.
One seems to forget that Germany was a sovereign state, that Germany had a sovereign right, and that her legislation for the German people was not subject to the jurisdiction of foreign countries. No state ever, through a notification, called the attention of the Rich in time to time fact that the activity towards National Socialism would be made subject to punishment and persecution. To the contrary, if now individual persons, first of all -- we, the fuehrers -- are being called to account and are to be sentenced, very well. But, at the same time, you cannot punish the German people as well. The German people confided their trust in the Fuehrer and, in his authoritarian government, had no influence on happenings. Without knowledge of the grave crimes which we have learned of today, the people, loyal, ready to sacrifice, courageously endured the struggle for existence, the struggle to the death.
I did not want a war, nor did I bring it about. I have done everything to prevent it through negotiations. After it had broken out, I did everything to assure victory. Since the three greatest powers on earth, together with other rations, fought against us, finally we were conquered by tremendous enemy superiority. emphatically and reject most emphatically that my actions were dictated by the will to subjugate foreign peoples through wars, to murder them, to rob them, or to enslave then, or to commit cruelties or crimes. fortunes, its freedom, and its life. And for this I call on the Almighty and my German people as a witness.
THE PRESIDENT: I call on the defendant Rudolf Hess. High Tribunal that I may remain seated because of my state of health.
THE PRESIDENT: Certainly.
DEFENDANT RUDOLF HESS: Some of my comrades here can confirm the fact that at the beginning of the proceedings I predicted the following: statements and, at the same time, these Witnesses could create an absolutely reliable impression and could enjoy the best possible reputation.
Point 2: It was to be reckoned with that the Court would receive affidavits containing untrue statements.
Point 3: The defendants would, with a few German witnesses, hear of astonishing facts.
Point 4: Some of the defendants would act rather strangely: They would make shameless utterances about the Fuehrer; they would incriminate their own people ; they would incriminate each other wrongly, in part, and perhaps they would even incriminate themselves, and also wrongly. vits are concerned, in dozens of cases the defendants, under unequivocal oath, were confronted with statements made under oath. the Great Admiral at Berlin and allegedly, claims to have talked with him in Berlin when the Admiral was in the Indian Ocean or in the Pacific Oacean, to my knowledge. proceedings, but rather months before the beginning of those proceedings in England, And, among other things, I made these predictions to the physician who was with me, Dr. Jones, and at the same time I set these predictions down in writing. of Germany. In this connection I should like to emphasize right here and now, that, if I mention the so incidents I am convinced from the beginning that the governments involved knew nothing whatsoever of these happenings. Therefore, I do not wish to accuse these government in any way.