Ribbentrop participated in a meeting of June 6, 1944, at which it was agreed to start a program under which Allied aviators carrying out machine gun attacks on the civilian population should be lynched.
In December 1944 Ribbentrop was informed of the plans to murder one of the French Generals held as a primer of war and directed his subordinates to see that the details were worked out in such a way as to prevent its detection by the protecting powers. Ribbentrop is also responsible for War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity because of his activities with respect to occupied countries and Axis satellites. The top German official in both Denmark and Vichy France was a Foreign Office representative, and Ribbentrop is therefore responsible for the general economic and political policies put into effect in the occupation of those countries. He urged the Italians to adopt a ruthless occupation policy in Yugoslavia and Greece.
He played an important part in Hitler's "final solution" of the Jewish question. In September 1942 he ordered the German diplomatic representatives accredited to various Axis satellites to hasten the deportation of Jews to the East. In June 1942 the German Ambassador to Vichy requested Laval to turn over 50,000 Jews for deportation to the East. On February 25, 1943, Ribbentrop protested to Mussolini against Italian slowness in deporting Jews from the Italian occupation zone of France. On April 17, 1943, he took part in a conference between Hitler and Horthy on the deportation of Jews from Hungary and informed Horthy that the "Jews must either be exterminated or taken to concentration camps." At the same conference Hitler had likened the Jews to "tuberculosis bacilli" and said if they did not work they were to be shot.
made all the important decisions and that he was such a great admirer Ribbentrop's defense to the charges made against him is that Hitler and faithful follower of Hitler that he never questioned Hitler's repeated assertions that he wanted peace or the truth of the reasons that Hitler gave in explaining aggressive action.
The Tribunal does not consider this explanation to be true. Ribbentrop participated in all of the Nazi aggressions from the occupation of Austria to the invasion of the Soviet Union. Although he was personally concerned with the diplomatic rather than the military aspect of these actions, his deplomatic efforts were so closely connected with war that he could not have remained unaware of the aggressive nature of Hitler's actions. In the administration of territories over which Germany acquired control by illegal invasion Ribbentrop also assisted in carrying out criminal policies particularly those involving the extermination of the Jews. There is abundant evidence, moreover, that Ribbentrop was in complete sympathy with all the main tenets of the National Socialist creed, and that his collaboration with Hitler and with other defendants in the commission of crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity was whole-hearted. It was because Hitler's policy and plans coincided with his own ideas that Ribbentrop served him so willingly to the end.
KEITEL M. de VABRES:
Keitel is indicted on all four counts. He was Chief of Staff to the then Minister of War von Blomberg from 1935 to 4 February 1938; on that day Hitler took command of the armed forces, making Keitel Chief of the High Command of the Armed Forces. Keitel did not have command authority over the three Wehrmacht branches which enjoyed direct access to the Supreme Commander. OKW was in effect Hitler's military staff. two other generals. Their presence, he admitted, was a "military demonstration," but since he had been appointed OKW Chief just one week before he had not known why he had been summoned. Hitler and Keitel then continued to put pressure on Austria with false rumors, broadcasts and troop manoeuvres. Keitel made the military and other arrangements and Jodl's diary noted "the effort is quick and strong." When Schuschnigg called his plebiscite, Keitel that night briefed Hitler and his generals, and Hitler issued "Case Otto" which Keitel initialed. sible "incident," such as the assassination of the German Minister at Prague, to preface the attack on Czechoslovakia. Keitel signed many directives and memoranda, on "Fall Gruen," including the directive of 30 May containing Hitler's statement: "It is my unalterable decision to smash Czechoslovakia by military action in the near future." After Munich, Keitel initialed Hitler's directive for the attack on Czechoslovakia, and issued two outside world as "merely an act of pacification and not a warlike under supplements.
The second supplement said, the attack should appear to the taking." The OKW Chief attended Hitler's negotiations with Hacha when the latter surrendered. "to attack Poland at the first suitable opportunity." Already he had signed the directive requiring the Wehrmacht to submit its "Fall Weiss" timetable to OKW by 1 May. 1939 with Hitler, Jodl and Raeder. By directive of 27 January 1940 the Norway plans were placed under Keitel's "direct and personal guidance." Hitler had said on 23 May 1939 he would ignore the neutrality of Belgium and the Netherlands, and Keitel signed orders for these attacks on 15 October, 20 November, and 28 November 1939. Orders postponing this attack 17 times until spring 1940 all were signed by Keitel or Jodl.
Formal planning for/Greece and Yugoslavia had begun in November 1940. On 18 March 1941 Keitel heard Hitler tell Raeder complete occupation of Greece was e prerequisite to settlement, and also heard Hitler decree on 27 March/the destruction of Yugoslavia/with "unmerciful harshness." for military reasons, and also because it would constitute a violation of the non-aggression Pact. Nevertheless he initialed "Case Barbarossa," signed by Hitler on 18 December 1940, and attended the OKW discussion with Hitler on 3 February 1941. Keitel's supplement of 13 March established the relationship between the military and political officers. He issued his timetable for the invasion on 6 June 1941, and was present at the attack.
He appointed Jodl and Warlimont as OKW representatives to briefing of 14 June when the generals gave their final reports before Rosenberg on matters concerning tic Eastern Territories.
On lb June he directed all army units to carry out the economic directives issued by Geering in the so-called "Green Folder," for the exploitation of Russian territory, food and raw materials. to be turned over to the SD. On 8 October Hitler issued the Commando Order which was carried out in several instances. After/Normandy, Keitel reaffirmed the order, and later extended it to Allied missions fighting with partisans. He admits he did not believe the order was legal but claims he could not stop Hitler from decreeing it. for/Soviet POW's, Canaris wrote to Keitel that under international law the SD should have nothing to do with this/. On this memorandum in Keitel's handwriting, dated 23 September and initialed by him, is the statement: "The objections arise from the military concept of chivalrous warfare. This is the destruction of an ideology. Therefore I approve and back the measures." Keitel testified that he really agreed with Canaris and argued with Hitler, but lost. The OKW Chief directed the military authorities to cooperate with the Einsatzstab Rosenberg in looting cultural property in occupied territories. aboard Hitler's headquarters train, that the Polish intelligentsia, nobility and Jews were to be liquidated. On 20 October, Hitler told Keitel the intelligentsia would be prevented from forming a ruling class, the standard only for labor forces.
Keitel does not remember the of living would remain low, and Poland would be used Lahousen conversation, but admits there was such a policy and that he had protested without effect to Hitler about it.
on soldiers in the East should be met by putting to death 50 to 100 Communists for one German soldier, with the comment that human life was less than nothing in the East. On 1 October he ordered military commanders always to have hostages to execute when/soldiers were attacked. When Terboven, the Reich Commissioner in Norway, wrote Hitler that Keitel's suggestion that workmen's relatives be held responsible for sabotage, could work only if firing squads in the margin:
were authorized, Keitel wrote on this memorandum/ "Yes, that is the best." Soviet Union,/OKW urged upon Hitler a directive of/OKH that political commissars be liquidated by the Army. Keitel admitted the directive was passed on to field commanders. And on 13 May Keitel signed an order that civilians suspected of offenses against troops should be shot without trial, and that prosecution of German soldiers for offenses against civilians was unnecessary. On 27 July all copies of this directive were ordered destroyed without affecting its validity. Four days previously he had signed another order that legal punishment was inadequate and troops should use terrorism. opinion, the so-called "Nacht und Nebel" decree, over Keitel's signature, provided that in occupied territories civilians who had been accused of crimes of resistance against the army of occupation would be tried only if a death setence was likely;
Germany.
otherwise they would be handed to the Gestapo for transportation to Keitel directed/ Russian POW' to be used in German war industry.
On 8 September 1942 he ordered French, Dutch and Belgian citizens to work on the/Atlantic Wall. He was present on 4 January 1944 when Hitler directed Sauckel to obtain four million new workers from occupied territories. with these acts. Rather, his defense relies on the fact that he is a soldier, and on the doctrine of "superior orders," prohibited by Article 8 of the Charter as a defense.
There is nothing in mitigation. Superior orders, even to a soldier, cannot be considered in mitigation where crimes as shocking and extensive have been committed consciously, ruthlessly and without military excuse or justification.
Kaltenbrunner is indicted under Counts One, Three and Four. He THE PRESIDENT:
KALTENBRUNNER joined the Austrian Nazi Party and the SS in 1932. In 1935 he became leader of the SS in Austria. After the Anschluss he was appointed Austrian State Secretary for Security and when this position was abolished in 1941 he was made Higher SS and Police Leader. On January 30, 3-943, he was appointed Chief of the Security police and SD and Head of the Reich Security Head Office (RSHA), a position which had been hold by Heydrich until his assassination in June 1942. He hold the rank of Obergruppenfuehrer in the SS. Nazi intrigue against the Schuschnigg Government. On the night of March 11, 1938, after Goering had ordered Austrian National Socialists to seize control of the Austrian Government, 500 Austrian SS men under Kaltenbrunner's command surrounded the Federal Chancellery and a special detachment under the command of his adjutant entered the Federal Chancellery while Seyss-Inquart was negotiating with President Miklas. But there is no evidence connecting Kaltenbrunner with plans to wage aggressive war on any other front. The Anschluss, although it was an aggressive act, is not charged as an aggressive war, and the evidence against Kaltenbrunner under Count One does not, in the opinion of the Tribunal, show his direct participation in any plan to wage such a war.
When he became Chief of the Security Police and SD and Head of the RSHA on January 30, 1943, Kaltenbrunner took charge of an organization which included the main offices of the Gestapo, the SD and the Criminal Police.
As Chief of the RSHA, Kaltenbrunner had authority to order protective custody to and release from concentration camps. Orders to this effect were normally sent over his signature. Kaltenbrunner was aware of conditions in concentration camps. He had undoubtedly visited Mauthausen and witnesses testified that he had seen prisoners killed by the various methods of execution, hanging, shooting in the back of the neck and gassing, as part of a demonstration, Kaltenbrunner himself ordered the execution of prisoners in those camps and his office was used to transmit to the camps execution orders which originated in Himmler's office. At the end of the war Kaltenbrunner participated in the arrangements for the evacuation of inmates of concentration camps, and the liquidation of many of them, to prevent them from being liberated by the Allied armies. was engaged in a widespread program of War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity. These crimes included the mistreatment and murder of prisoners of war. Einsatz Kommandos operating under the control of the Gestapo were engaged in the screening of Soviet prisoners of war. Jews, commissars, and others who were thought to be ideologically hostile to the Nazi system were reported to the RSHA, which had them transferred to a concentration camp and murdered. An RSHA order issued during Kaltenbrunner's regime established the "Bullet Decree," under which certain escaped prisoners of war who were recaptured were taken to Mauthausen by the Gestapo to include parachutists while Kaltenbrunner was Chief and shot.
The order for the execution of commando troops was extended of the RSHA. An order signed by Kaltenbrunner instructed the Police not to interfere with attacks on bailed out Allied fliers. In December 1944 Kaltenbrunner participated in the murder of one of the French Generals held as a prisoner of war. the Gestapo and SD in occupied territories continued the murder and illtreatment of the population, using methods which included torture and confinement in concentration camps, usually under orders to which Kaltenbrunner's name was signed. on the slave laborers and Kaltenbrunner established a series of labor reformatory camps for this purpose. When the SS embarked on a slave labor program of its own, the Gestapo was used to obtain the needed workers by sending labor as to concentration camps.
The RSHA played a leading part in the "final solution" of the Jewish question by the extermination of the Jews. A special section under the AMT IV of the RSHA was established to supervise this program. Under its direction approximately six million Jews were murdered, of which two million were killed by Einsatzgruppen and other units of the Security Police. Kaltenbrunner had been informed of the activities of these Einsatzgruppen when he was a Higher SS and Police Leader, and they continued to function after he had become Chief of the RSHA. has heretofore been described. This part of the program was that organization, and special missions of the RSHA scored the also under the supervision of the RSHA when Kaltenbrunner was head of occupied territories and the various Axis satellites arranging for the deportation of Jews to these extermination institutions.
Kaltenbrunner was informed of these activities. A letter which he wrote on June 30, 1944, described the shipment to Vienna of 12,000 Jews for that purpose, and directed that all who could not work would have to be kept in readiness for "special action," which meant murder. Kaltenbrunner denied his signature to this letter, as he did on a very large number of orders on which his name was stamped or typed, and, in a few instances, written. It is inconceivable that in matters of such importance his signature could have appeared so many times without his authority. the Security Police and SD and as Head of the RSHA he did so pursuant to an understanding with Himmler under which he was to confine his activities to matters involving foreign intelligence, and not to assume overall control over the activities of the RSHA. He claims that the criminal program had been started before his assumption of office; that he seldom knew what was going on; and that when he was informed he did what he could to stop them. It is true that he showed a special interest in matters involving foreign intelligence. But he exercised control over the activities of the RSHA; was aware of the crimes it was committing, and was an active participant in many of them. He is guilty under Counts Three and Four.
ROSENBERG
MAJOR GENERAL NIKITCHENKO:
Rosenberg is indicted on all four counts. He joined the Nazi Party in 1919, participated in the Munich Putsch of November 9, 1923, and tried to keep the illegal Nazi Party together while Hitler was in jail. Recognized as the Party's ideologist, he developed and spread Nazi doctrines in the newspapers "Voelkischer Beobachter" and "N S Monatshefte," which he edited, and in the numerous books he wrote. His book, "Myth of the Twentieth Century," had a circulation of over a million copies. Party's representative for Foreign Affairs. In April 1933 he was made Reichsleiter and head of the Office of Foreign Affairs of the NSDAP (The APA). Hitler, in January 1934, appointed Rosenberg his Deputy for the Supervision of the Entire Spiritual and Ideological Training of the NSDAP. In January 1940, he was designated to set up the "Hohe Schule," the Center of National Socialistic Ideological and Educational Research, and he organized the "Einsatzstab Rosenberg" in connection with this task. He was appointed Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories on July 17, 1941. agents were active in Nazi intrigue in all parts of the world. His own reports, for example, claim that the APA was largely responsible for Roumania's joining the Axis. As head of the APA, he played an important role in the preparation and planning of the attack on Norway.
plan for attacking Norway. Rosenberg had become interested in Norway as early as June 1939, when he conferred with Quisling.
Quisling had pointed out the importance of the Norwegian Coast in the event of a conflict between Germany and Great Britain, and stated his fears that Great Britain might be able to obtain Norwegian assistance. As a result of this conference Rosenberg arranged for Quisling to collaborate closely with the National Socialists and to receive political assistance by the Nazis. intervention in Norway. Rosenberg supported this view, and transmitted to Raeder a plan to use Quisling for a coup in Norway. Rosenberg was instrumental in arranging the conferences in December 1939 between Hitler and Quisling which led to the preparation of the attack on Norway, and at which Hitler promised Quisling financial assistance. After these conferences Hitler assigned to Rosenberg the political exploitation of Norway. Two weeks after Norway was occupied, Hitler told Rosenberg that he had based his decision to attack Norway "on the continuous warnings of Quisling as reported to him by Reichsleiter Rosenberg." execution of occupation policies in the Occupied Eastern Territories. He was informed by Hitler on April 2, 1941, of the coming attack against the Soviet Union, and he agreed to help in the capacity of a "Political Adviser." On April 20, 1941, he was appointed Commissioner for the Central Control of Questions Connected with the East-European Region. In preparing the plans for the occupation, he bad numerous conferences with Keitel, Raeder Goering, Funk, Ribbentrop, and other high Reich authorities. In April and up of the administration in the Occupied Eastern Territories.
On June 20, May 1941 he prepared several drafts of instructions concerning the setting 1941, two days before the attack on the USSR, he made a speech to his assistants about the problems and policies of occupation.
Rosenberg attended Hitler's conference of July 16, 1941, in/which policies of administration and occupation were discussed. On July 17, 1941, Hitler appointed Rosenberg Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, and publicly charged him with responsibility for civil administration. public and private property throughout the invaded countries of Europe. Acting under Hitler's orders of January 1940, to set up the "Hohe Schule", he organized and directed the "Einsatzstab Rosenberg", which plundered museums and libraries, confiscated art treasures and collections, and pillaged private houses. His own reports show the extent of the confiscations. In "Action-M" (Moebel), instituted in December 1941 at Rosenberg's suggestion, 69,619 Jewish homes were plundered in the West, 38,000 of them in Paris alone, and it took 26, 9s railroad cars to transport the confiscated furnishings to Germany. As of July 14, 1944, more than 21,903 art objects, including famous paintings and museum pieces, had been seized by the Einsatzstab in the West. tories on July 17, 1941, Rosenberg became the supreme authority for those areas. He helped to formulate the policies of Germanization, exploitation, forced labor, extermination of Jews and opponents of Nazi rule, and he set up the administration which carried them out. He took part in the conference of July 16, 1941, in which Hitler stated that they were faced with the able:
first, to dominate it, second, to administer it, and third, to task of "cutting up the giant cake according to our needs, in order to be exploit it," and/indicated that ruthless action was contemplated.
Rosenberg accepted his appointment on the following day. which the Eastern people were subjected. He directed that the Hague Rules of Land Warfare were not applicable in the Occupied Eastern Territories. He had knowledge of and took an active part in stripping the Eastern Territories of raw materials and foodstuffs, which were all sent to Germany. He stated that feeding the German people was first on the list of claims on the East, and that the Soviet people would suffer thereby. His directives provided for the segregation of Jews, ultimately in Ghettos. His subordinates engaged in mass killings of Jews, and his civil administrators in the East considered that cleansing the Easter Occupied Territories of Jews as necessary. In December 1941, / made the suggestion to Hitler that in a case of shooting 100 hostages, Jews only be used. Rosenberg had knowledge of the deportation of laborers from the East, of the methods of "recruiting" and the transportation horrors, and of the treatment Eastern laborers received in the Reich. He gave his civil administrators quotas of laborers to be sent to the Reich, which had to be met by whatever means necessary. His signature of approval appears on the order of June 14, 1944, for the "Heu Aktion", the apprehension of 40,000 to 50,000 youths, aged a 10-14, for shipment to the Reich. committed by his subordinates, notably in the case of Koch, but these Conclusion excesses continued and he stayed in office until the end.
Frank is indicted under Courts One, Three and Four. Frank joined MR. BIDDLE: FRANK the Nazi Party in 1927. He became a member of the Reichstag in 1930, the Bavarian State Minister of Notice in March 1933, and when this position was incorporated into the Reich Government in 1934, Reich Minister without Portfolio. He was made a Reichsleiter of the Nazi Party in charge of Legal Affairs in 1933, and in the same year President of the Academy of German Law. Frank was also given the honorary rank of Obergruppenfuehrer in the SA. In 1942 Frank became involved in a temporary dispute with Himmler as to the type of legal system which should be in effect in Germany. During the same year he was dismissed as Reichsleiter of the Nazi Party and as President of the Academy of German Law. ciently connected with the common plan to wage aggressive war to allow the Tribunal to convict him on Count One. Polish territory and, on October 12, 1939, was made Governor General of the occupied Polish territory. On October 3, 1939, he described the policy which he intended to put into effect by stating: "Poland shall be treated like a colony; the Poles will become the slaves of the Greater German World Empire." The evidence establishes that this occupation policy was based on the complete destruction of Poland as a national for the German war effort.
All opposition was crushed with the utmost harshness.
A reign of terror was instituted, backed by summary police twenty to two hundred Poles; and the widespread shootings of hostages.
von Neurath's poster announcing the evocation of the Czech students:
"If I wished to order that one should bang up posters about every seven make the paper for these posters."
On May 30, 1940, Frank told a police conference:
that he was taking advantage of the offensive in the West Poland, including "the loading representatives of the Polish intelligent sia."
Pursuant to these instructions the brutal A.B. action was begun proportion to the resources of the country.
The food raised in Poland population of the occupied territories were reduced to the starvation was shipped to Germany on such a wide scale that the rations of the level, and epidemics were widespread.
Some steps were taken to provide for the feeding of the agricultural workers who were used to raise the crops, but the requirements of the rest of the population were disregarded. It is undoubtedly true, as argued by counsel for the defense, that some suffering in the General Government was inevitable as a result of the ravages of war and the economic confusion resulting therefrom. But the suffering was increased by a planned policy of economic exploitation. the very early stages of his administration. On January 25, 1940, he indicated his intention of deporting one million laborers to Germany, suggesting on May 10, 1940, the use of police raids to meet this quota. On August 18, 1942, Frank reported that he had already supplied 800,000 workers for the Reich, and expected to be able to supply 140,000 more before the end of the year. Government. The area originally contained from 2,500,000 to 3,500,000 Jews. They were forced into ghettos, subjected to discriminatory laws, deprived of the food necessary to avoid starvation, and finally systematically and brutally exterminated. On December 16, 1941, Frank told the Cabinet of the Governor General: "We must annihilate the Jews, wherever we find them and wherever it is possible, in order to maintain there the structure of Reich as a whole." By January 25, 1944, Frank estimated that there were only 100,000 Jews left.
feeling of "terrible guilt" for the atrocities committed in the occupied territories.
But his defense was largely devoted to an attempt to prove that he was not in fact responsible; that he ordered only the necessary pacification measures; that the excesses were due to the activities of the police which were not under his control; and that he never even knew of the activities of the concentration camps. It has also been argued that the starvation was due to the aftermath of the war and policies carried out under the lour Year Plan; that the forced labor program was under the direction of Sauckel; and that the extermination of the Jews was by the police and SS under direct orders from Himmler. against Frank were put into effect through the police, that Frank had jurisdictional difficulties with Himmler over the control of the police, and that Hitler resolved many of these disputes in favor of Himmler. It therefore may well be true that some of the crimes committed in the General Government were committed without the knowledge of Frank, and even occasionally despite his opposition. It may also be true that some of the criminal policies put into effect, in the General Government did not originate with Frank but were carried out pursuant to orders from Germany. But it is also true that Frank was a willing and knowing participant in the use of terrorism in Poland, in the economic exploitation of Poland In a way which led to the death by starvation of a large number of people; in the deportation to Germany as slave laborers of over a million Poles; and in a program involving the murder of at least three million Jews.