I therefore decided to destroy and the armament factories.
These factories were systematically dismantled and then burnt.
Jews week.
Many times we could hear loud voices in the sewers.
.. Tear gas bombs were thrown into the captured.
Countless numbers of Jews were liquidated in sewers and bunkers through blasting.
The longer Stroop recorded that his action at Warsaw eliminated "a proved total of 56,065 people.
To that we have to add the number of those killed through blasting, fire, etc.
, which cannot be counted." Grim the brutal manner in which the killings were carried out.
But the methods employed never conformed to a single pattern.
The massacres concentration camps, was another.
Part of the "final solution" was camps.
Their physical condition was the test of life or death. All and their bodies burnt.
Certain concentration camps such as Treblinka camps; all who were not fit to work were destroyed in gas chambers and Auschwitz were set aside for this main purpose.
With regard to Auschwitz, the Tribunal heard the evidence of Hoess, the Commandant of the camp from May 1st 1940 to December 1st 1943. He estimated that in the camp of Auschwitz alone in that time 2,500,000 persons were exterminated, and that a further 500,000 died from disease and starvation. Hoess described the screening for extermination by stating in evidence "We had two SS doctors on duty Auschwitz to walked by.
Those who were fit for work were sent into the camp.
Others were sent immediately to the extermination plants.
Children of tender of their youth they were unable to work.
Still they were to go through a delousing process.
Of that fact.
Very frequently women would hide their exterminated."
He described the actual killing by stating:
"It took from three to fifteen minutes to kill the conditions.
We knew when the people were dead because their screaming stopped.
We usually waited removed the bodies.
After the bodies were removed the gold from the teeth of the corpses."
Beating, starvation, torture, and killing were general. The inmates were subjected to cruel experiments at Dachau in August 1942, victims were Centigrade, when they died immediately.
Other experiments included immersed in cold water until their body temperature was reduced to 28 degrees high altitude experiments in pressure chambers, experiments to determine how long human beings could survive in freezing water, experiments with poison bullets, experiments with contagious diseases, and experiments dealing with sterilization of men and women by X-rays and other methods.
their extermination. There was testimony that the hair of women victims was cut off before they were killed, and shipped to Germany, there to be used in the manufacture of mattresses. The clothes, money and valuables of the inmates were also salvaged and sent to the appropriate agencies for disposition. After the extermination the gold teeth and fillings were taken from the heads of the corpses and sent to the Reichsbank. instances attempts were made to utilize the fat from the bodies of the victims in the commercial manufactured soap. Special groups traveled through Europe to find Jews and subject them to the "final solution." German missions were sent to such satellite countries as Hungary and Bulgaria, to arrange for the shipment of Jews to extermination camps and it is known that by the end of 1944, 400,000 Jews from Hungary had been murdered at Auschwitz. Evidence has also been given of the evacuation of 110,000 Jews from part of Rumania for "liquidation." Adolf Eichmann, who had been put in charge of this program by Hitler, has estimated that the policy pursued resulted in the killing of 6,000,000 Jews, of which 4,000,000 were killed in the extermination institutions.
Article 6 of the Charter provides:
"(b) War Crimes: namely, violations of the laws or customs of war.
Such violations shall include, but justified by military necessity;"(c) Crimes against Humanity:
namely, murder, population, before or during the war; or of the country were perpetrated."
any conspiracy except the one set out in Article 6(a), dealing with crimes against peace. which it gives both of war crimes and crimes against humanity. With respect to war crimes, however, as has already been pointed out, the crimes defined by Article 6, section (b), of the Charter were already recognized as war crimes under international law. They were covered by Articles 46, 50, 52, and 56 of the Hague Convention of 1907, and Articles 2, 3, 4, 46, and 51 of the Geneva Convention of 1929. That violations of these provisions constituted crimes for which the guilty individuals were punishable is too well settled to admit of argument. case, because of the "general participation" clause in Article 2 of the Hague Convention of 1907. That clause provided:
of Land Warfare) referred to in Article I as well as "The provisions contained in the regulations (Rules gerents are parties to the convention."
Several of the belligerents in the recent war were not parties to this convention. tion. The rules of land warfare expressed in the convention undoubtedly represented an advance over existing international law at the time of their adoption. But the convention expressly stated that it was an attempt "to revise the general laws and customs of war", which it thus recognized to be then existing, but by 1939 the so rules laid down in the convention were recognized by all civilized nations, and were regarded as being declaratory of the laws and customs of war which are referred to in Article 6(b) of the Charter. rules of land warfare in many of the territories occupied during the war, because Germany had completely subjugated, those countries and incorporated then into the German Reich, a fact which gave Germany authority to deal with the occupied countries as though they were part of Germany. In the view of the Tribunal it is unnecessary in this case to decide whether this doctrine of subjugation, dependent as it is upon military conquest, has any application where the subjugation is the result of the crime of aggressive war. The doctrine was never considered to be applicable so long as there was an army in the field attempting to restore the occupied countries to their true owners, and in this case, therefore, the doctrine could not apply to any territories occupied after the 1st September 1939. As to the war crimes committed in Bohemia and Moravia, it is a sufficient answer that these territories were With regard to crimes against humanity, there is no doubt whatever never added to the Reich, but a mere protectorate was established over them.
that political opponents were murdered in Germany before the war, and that many of them were kept in concentration camps in circumstances of great horror and cruel by. The policy of terror was certainly carried out on a vast scale, and in many cases was organized and systematic. The policy of persecution, repression and murder of civilians in Germany before the war of 1939, who were likely to be hostile to the Government, was most ruthlessly carried out. The persecution of Jews during the same period is established beyond all doubt. To constitute crimes against humanity, the acts relied on before the outbreak of war must have been in execution of, or in connection with, any crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal. The Tribunal is of the opinion that revolting and horrible as many of these crimes were, it has not been satisfactorily proved that they were done in execution of, or in connection with, any such crime. The Tribunal therefore cannot make a general declaration that the acts before 1939 were crimes against humanity within the meaning of the Charter, but from the beginning of the war in 1939 war crimes were committed on a vast scale, which were also crimes against humanity; and insofar as the inhumane acts charged in the Indictment, and committed after the beginning of the war, did not constitute war crimes, they were all committed in execution of, or in connection with, the aggressive war, and therefore constituted crimes against humanity.
THE PRESIDENT: I now ask Colonel Volchkov to continue the reading of the judgment.
THE ACCUSED ORGANIZATIONS
COLONEL VOLCHKOV:
Article 9 of the Charter provides:
"At the trial of any individual member of any group or organization the Tribunal may declare (in connection with any act of which the individual may be convicted) "After receipt of the Indictment the Tribunal shall give of the organization.
The Tribunal shall have power to allow or reject the application.
If the application applicants shall be represented and heard."
nality against an accused organization is final, and cannot be challenged in any subsequent criminal proceeding against a member of that organization. Article 10 is as follows:
"In cases where a group or organization is declared before national, military or occupation courts.
In questioned."
illustrated by Law Number 10 of the Control Council of Germany passed on the 20th day of December, 1945, which provides:
...
"Each of the following acts is recognized as a crime:
"(d) Membership in categories of a criminal "(3) Any person found guilty of any of the just.
Such punishment may consist of one or more of the following:
(a) Death.
(b) Imprisonment for life or a term of (c) Fine, and Imprisonment with or without hard labor, in lieu thereof."
the Tribunal has declared to be criminal may be subsequently convicted of the crime of membership and be punished for that crime by death. This is not to assume that international or military courts which will try these individuals will not exercise appropriate standards of justice. This is a far reaching and novel procedure. Its application, unless properly safeguarded, may produce great injustice.
Article 9, it should be noted, uses the words "The Tribunal may declare", so that the Tribunal is vested with discretion as to whether it will declare any organization criminal. This discretion is a Judicial one and does not permit arbitrary action, but should be exercised in accordance with well settled legal principles, one of the most important of which is that criminal guilt is personal, and that mass punishments should be avoided. If satisfied of the criminal guilt of any organization or group, this Tribunal should not hesitate to declare it to be criminal because the theory of "group criminality" is new, or because it might be unjustly applied by some subsequent tribunals. On the other so far as possible in a manner to insure that innocent persons hand, the Tribunal should make such declaration of criminality will not be punished.
conspiracy in that the essence of both is cooperation for criminal purposes. There must be a group bound together and organized for a common purpose. The group must be formed or used in connection with the commission of crimes denounced by the Charter, Since the declaration with respect to the organizations and groups will, as has been pointed out, fix the criminality of its members, that definition should exclude persons who had no knowledge of the criminal purposes or acts of the organization and those who were drafted by the State for membership, unless they were personally implicated in the commission of acts declared criminal by Article 6 of the Charter as members of the organization. Membership alone is not enough to come within the scope of these declarations. makes will be used by other courts in the trial of persons on account of their membership in the organizations found to be criminal, the Tribunal feels it appropriate to make the following recommendations:
1. That so far as possible throughout the four zones of occupation in Germany the classifications, sanctions and penalties be standardized. Uniformity of treatment so far as practical should be a basic principle. This does not, of course, mean that discretion in sentencing should not be vested in the court; but the discretion should be within fixed limits appropriate to the nature of the crime.
2. Law No. 10, to which reference has already been made, leaves punishment entirely in the discretion of the trial court even to the extent of inflicting the death penalty.
passed for Bavaria, Greater-Hesse and Wuerttemberg-Baden, provides definite sentences for punishment in each type of offense.
The Tribunal recommends that in no case should punishment imposed under Law No. 10 upon any members of an organization or group declared by the Tribunal to be criminal exceed the punishment fixed by the De-Nazification Law. No person should be punished under both laws.
3. The Tribunal recommends to the Control Council that Law No. 10 be amended to prescribe limitations on the punishment which may be imposed for membership in a criminal group or organization so that such punishment shall not exceed the punishment prescribed by the DeNazification Law. criminal the following organizations: The Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party; The Gestapo; The S.D.; The S.S.; The S.A.; The Reich Cabinet, and The General Staff and High Command of the German Armed Forces.
Structure and Component Parts: The Indictment has named the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party as a group or organization which should be declared criminal.
The Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party consisted, in effect, of the official organization of the, Nazi Party, with Hitler as Fuehrer at its head. The actual work of running the Leadership Corps was carried out by the Chief of the Party Chancellery (Hess, succeeded by Bormann) assisted by the Party Reich Directorate, or Reichsleitung, which was composed of the Reichleiters, the heads of the functional organizations of the Party, as well as of the heads of the various main departments and offices which were attached to the Party Reich Directorate. Under the Chief of the Party Chanceller, were the Gauleiters, with territorial Jurisdiction over the major administrative regions of the Party, the Gaus. The Gauleiters were assisted by a Party Gau Directorate or Gauleitung, similar in composition and in function to the Party Reich Directorate. Under the Gauleiters in the Party hierarchy were the Kreisleiters with territorial Jurisdiction over a Kreis, usually consisting of a single county, and assisted by a Party Kreis Directorate, or Kreisleitung. The Kreisleiters were the lowest members of the Party hierarchy who were full time paid employees. Directly under the Kreisleiters were the Ortsgruppenleiters, then the Zellenleiters and then the Blockleiters. Directives and instructions were received from the Party Reich Directorate. The Gauleiters had the function of interpreting such orders and issuing them to lower formations. The Kreisleiters had a certain discretion but acted under definite instructions.
Instructions were only in interpreting orders, but the Ortsgruppenleiters had not, issued in writing down as far as the Ortsgruppenleiters.
The Block and Zellenleiters usually received Instructions orally. Membership in the Leadership Corps at all levels was voluntary. declaration asked for all members of the staffs of the Ortsgruppenleiters and all assistants of the Zellenleiters and Blockleiters. The declaration sought against the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party thus includes the Fuehrer, the Reichsleitung, the Gauleiters and their staff officers, the Kreisleiters and their staff officers, the Ortsgruppenleiters, the Zellenleiters and the Blockleiters, a group estimated to contain at least 600,000 people.
Aims and Activities: The primary purposes of the Leadership Corps from its beginning was to assist the Nazis in obtaining and, after January 30, 1933, in retaining, control of the German State. The machinery of the Leadership Corps was used for the widespread dissemination of Nazi propaganda and to keep a detailed check on the political attitudes of the German people. In this activity the lower Political Leaders played a particularly important role. The Blockleiters were instructed by the Party Manual to report to the Ortsgruppenleiters, all persons circulating damaging rumors or criticism of the regime. The Ortsgruppenleiters, on the basis of information supplied them by the Blockleiters and Zellenleiters, kept a card index of the people within their Ortsgruppe which recorded the factors which would be used in forming a judgment as to their political reliability. The Leadership of the Leadership Corps were active in getting out the vote Corps was particularly active during plebiscites.
All members and insuring the highest possible proportion of "yes" votes. Ortsgruppenleiters and Political Leaders of higher ranks often collaborated with the Gestapo and SD in taking steps to determine those who refused to vote or who voted " no ", and in taking steps against them which went as far as arrest and detention in a concentration camp.
Criminal Activity: These steps, which relate merely to the consolidation of control of the Nazi Party, are not criminal under the view of the conspiracy to wage aggressive war which has previously been set forth. But the Leadership Corps was also used for similar steps in Austria and those parts of Czechoslovakia, Lithuania, Poland, France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Yugoslavia which were incorporated into the Reich and within the Gaus of the Nazi Party. In those territories the machinery of the Leadership Corps was used for their Germanization through the elimination of local customs and the detection and arrest of persons who opposed German occupation. This was criminal under Article 6(b) of the Charter in those areas governed by the Hague Rules of Land Warfare and criminal under Article 6(c) of the Charter as to the remainder. of the Jews. It was involved in the economic and political discrimination against the Jews, which was put into effect shortly after the Nazis came into power. The Gestapo and SD were instructed to coordinate with the Gauleiters and Kreisleiters the measures taken in the pogroms of November 9 and 10,/1938. The Leadership Corps was also used to prevent German public opinion from reacting against the measures taken against 30 Sept.
JP Take 23 the Jews in the East. On October 9, 1942, a confidential information bulletin was sent to all Gauleiters and Kreisleiters entitled "Preparatory Measures for the Final Solution of the Jewish Question in Europe. Rumors concerning the Conditions of the Jews in the East". This bulletin stated that rumors were being started by returning soldiers concerning the conditions of Jews in the East which some Germans might not understand, and outlined in detail the official explanation to be given. This bulletin contained no explicit Statement that the Jews were being exterminated, but it did indicate they were going to labor camps, and spoke of their complete segregation and elimination and the necessity of ruthless severity. Thus, even at its face value, it indicated the utilization of the machinery of the Leadership Corps to keep German public opinion from rebelling at a program which was stated to involve condemning the Jews of Europe to a lifetime of slave ry. This information continued to be available to the Leadership Corps. The August 1944 edition of "Die Lage" a publication which was circulated among the Political Leaders, described the deportation of 430,000 Jews from Hungary. of the Slave Labor Program. A Sauckel decree dated April 6, 1942, appointed the Gauleiters as Plenipotentiary for Labor Mobilization for their Gaus with authority to coordinate all agencies dealing with labor questions in their Gaus, with specific authority over the employment of foreign workers, including their conditions of work, feeding and housing. Under this authority the Gauleiters assumed control ever the allocation of labor in their Gaus, including the forced laborers from foreign countries. In carrying out this task the Gauleiters used many Party offices within their Gaus, including subordinate Political 1942, relative to the allocation for household labor of Leaders.
For example, Sauckel's decree of September 8, Under Sauckel's directive the Leadership corps was workers, and the Gauleiters were specifically instructed to prevent "politically inept factory heads" from giving "too much consideration to the care of Eastern workers.
" result in an abortion if the child's parentage would not detention in a concentration camp for the female slave laborer.
The evidence has established that under the corporal punishment.
The Political Leaders, at least supervision.
On May 5, 1943, a memorandum of Bormann was distributed down to the Ortsgruppenleiters.
Similarly leiters of their duty to keep foreign workers under careful observation.
instructions from the Kreisleiter, would be warned by the Ortsgruppenprisoners of war. On November 5, 1941, Bormann transmitted a directive down to the level of Kreisleiter instructing them to insure compliance by the Army with the recent directives of the Department of the Interior ordering that dead Russian pri soners of war should be buried wrapped in tar paper in a remote place without any ceremony or any decorations of their graves. On November 25, 1943, Bormann sent a circular instructing the Gauleiters to report any lenient treatment of prisoners of war. On September 13, 1944, Bormann sent a directive down to the level of Kreisleiter ordering that liaison be established between the Kreisleiters and the guards of the pri soners of war in order "to better assimilate the commitment of the prisoners of war to the political and economic demands". On October 17, 1944, an OKW directive instructed the officer in charge of the prisoners of war to confer with the Kreisleiters on questions of the productivity of labor. The use of prisoners of war, particularly those from the East, was accompanied by a widespread the violation of rules of land warfare. This evidence establishes that the Leadership Corps down to the level of Kreisleiter was a participant in this illegal treatment. made to deprive Allied airmen of the protection to which they were on titled under the Geneva Convention. On March 13, 1940, a directive of Hess transmitted instructions through the Leadership Corps down to the Blockleiter for the guidance of the civilian population in case of the landing of enemy planes or parachutists, which stated that enemy parachutists Bormann sent a circular letter to all Gau and Kreisleiters reporting were to be immediately arrest for "made harmless". On May 30, 1944, instances of lynchings of Allied low level fliers in which no police action was taken.
It was requested that Ortsgruppenleiters be informed orally of the contents of this letter. This letter accompanied a propaganda drive which had been instituted by Goebbels to induce such lynchings, and clearly amounted to instructions to induce such lynchings or at least to violate the Geneva Convention by withdrawing any police protection. Some lynchings were carried out pursuant to this program, but it does not appear that they were carried out throughout all of Germany. Nevertheless, the existence of this circular letter shows that the heads of the leadership Corps were utilizing it for a purpose which was patently illegal and which involved the use of the machinery of the Leadership Corps at least through the Ortsgruppenleiter. under the Charter and involved the Germanization of incorporated territory, the persecution of the Jews, the administration of the slave labor program, and the mistreatment of prisoners of war. The defendants Bormann and Sauckel, who were members of this organization, were among those who used it for these purposes. The Gauleiters, the Kreisleiters, and the Ortsgruppenleiters participated, to one degree or another, in these criminal programs. The Reichsleitung as the staff organization of the Party is also responsible for these criminal programs as well as the heads of the various staff organizations of on these staff organizations includes only the Amtsleiters who the Gauleiters and Kreisleiters.
The decision of the Tribunal were heads of offices on the staffs of the Reichsleitung, Gauleitung and Kreisleitung. With respect to other staff officers and party organizations attached to the Leadership Corps other than the Amtsleiters referred to above, the Tribunal will follow the suggestion of the Prosecution in excluding them from the declaration. of the Charter the group composed of those, members of the Leadership Corps holding the positions enumerated in the preceding paragraph or who became or remained members of the organization with knowledge that it was being used for the commission of acts declared criminal by Article 6 of the Charter, or who were personally implicated as members of the organization in the commission of such crimes. The basis of this finding is the participation of the organization in war crimes and crimes against humanity connected with the war; the group declared criminal cannot include, therefore, persons who had ceased to hold the positions enumerated in the preceding paragraph prior to September 1, 1939.
Structure and Component Parts: The Prosecution has named Die Geheime Staatspolizei (Gestapo) and Die Sicherheitsdienst des Reichsfuehrer SS (SD) as groups or organizations which should be declared criminal.
The Prosecution presented the cases against the Gestapo and SD together, stating that this was necessary because of the close working relationship between them. The Tribunal permitted the SD to present its defense separately because of a claim of conflicting interests, but after examining the evidence has decided to consider the case of the Gestapo and SD together. June 26, 1936, by the appointment of Heydrich, who was the Chief of the SD, to the position of Chief of the Security Police, which was defined to include both the Gestapo and the Criminal Police, Prior to that time the SD had been the intelligence agency, first of the SS, and, after June 4, 1934, of the entire Nazi Party. The Gestapo had been composed of the various political police forces of the several German Federal states which had been unified under the personal leadership of Himmler, with the assistance of Goering. Himmler had been appointed Chief of the German Police in the Ministry of the Interior on June 17, 1936, and in his capacity as Reichsfuehrer SS and Chief of the German Police issued his decree of June 26, 1936, which placed both the Criminal Police, or Kripo, and the Gestapo in the Security Police, and placed both the Security Police and the SD under the command of Heydrich. the Security Police, a state organization, and the SD, a Party organization, was formalized by the decree of September 27, 1939, which united the various Police and SD into one administrative unit, the Reichs Security Head state and party offices which were under Heydrich as Chief of the Security Office (RSHA) which was at the same time both one of the principal offices (Hauptamter) of the SS under Himmler as Reichsfuehrer SS and an office in the Ministry of the Interior under Himmler as Chief of the German Police.
The internal structure of the RSHA shows the manner in which it consolidated the offices of the Security Police with those of the SD. The RSHA was divided into seven offices (Amter), two of which (Amt I and Amt II) dealt with administrative matters. The Security Police were represented by Amt IV, the head office of the Gestapo, and by Amt V, the head office of the Criminal Police. The SD were represented by Amt III, the head office for SD activities inside Germany, by Amt VI, the head office for SD activities outside of Germany and by Amt VII, the office for ideological research. Shortly after the creation of the RSHA, in November 1939, the Security Police was "coordinated" with the SS by taking all officials of the Gestapo and Criminal Police into the SS at ranks equivalent to their positions. top level, of the relationship under which the SD served as the intelligence agency for the Security Police. A similar coordination existed in the local offices. Within Germany and areas which were incorporated within the Reich for the purpose of civil administration, local offices of the Gestapo, Criminal Police and SD were formally separate. They were subject to coordination by Inspectors of the Security Police and SD on the staffs of the local Higher SS and Police Leaders, however, and one of the principal functions of the local SD units was to serve as the intelligence the formal relationship between local units of the Gestapo, agency for the local Gestapo units.