Therefore, the judicial authority will decide in such cases whether disciplinary action is indicated, or whether legal proceedings are necessary. In the case of offences against inhabitants it will order a court martial only if maintenance of discipline or security of the forces call for such a measure. This applies, for instance, to serious offences originating in lack of self-control in sexual matters, or in a criminal disposition, and to those offences which indicate that the troops are threatening to get out of hand. Offences which have resulted in senseless destruction of billets or supplies or other captured material, to the disadvantage of our forces, should as a rule be judged no less severely. The order to institute proceedings requires in every single case the signature of the judicial authority.
Extreme caution is indicated in assessing the credibility of statements made by enemy civilians.
Only those court sentences are confirmed which are in accordance with the political intentions of the High Command. Your Lordship, the next document will be C-148, Exhibit USA 555. Less than three months after the invasion of the Soviet Union, the instructions which I have just read were amplified and made even more drastic. This order is of general application in all theatres of war, but from its contents it is clearly of primary importance for the Eastern Front. Since the beginning of the campaign against Soviet Russia, Communist insurrection movements have broken out everywhere in the area occupied by Germany.