dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
M. DUBOST: And in connection with the acts above defined, we ask you further, in accordance with the stipulation of Article 9 of the Charter of your Tribunal, to find the OKW and the OKH guilty of the execution of this plan by having ordered and participated in the deportation of innocent civilians from the occupied countries in the West: To find the OKW, the OKH, and the OEM guilty of the execution of this plan by participating in the setting-up of the doctrine of hostages as a means to terrorize and by prescribing the seizure and execution of hostages in the countries of the West, by reducing to a degrading level the material living conditions of prisoners of war, by depriving the latter of the guarantees granted them by international custom and by positive international law, by ordering or by tolerating the employment of prisoners of war in dangerous work or in labor directly connected with military operations, by ordering the execution of escaped prisoners or prisoners attempting to escape, and the execution of numerous groups of commandos, and by giving the SS and SD directives for the extermination of airmen: To find the OKL guilty of having participated in the execution of this plan: 1. by employing in large numbers internees in concentration camps for exhaustive labor under inhuman conditions in the armament factories of the Luftwaffe; 2. by participating in fatal physiological experiments on the effect of cold and of increasing or decreasing pressure, which experiments were carried out for the benefit of the Luftwaffe and conducted by Dr.
M. DUBOST: Rascher, medical officer of the Luftwaffe, attached to the concentration camp -at Dachau (Documents 343-PS, 1610-PS, 669-PS, 1,90, 668-PS, UK-56, 835-PS, 834-PS, F-278 (B)): To find the SS and the SD guilty of the execution of this plan by having deported and participated in the deportation of innocent civilians from the occupied countries in the West and by having tortured them and exterminated them by every means in concentration camps: To find the SS, the SD, and the Gestapo guilty of the execution of this plan by having given direct orders for the execution or the deportation, with a view to their slow extermination, of members of commando groups, airmen, escaped prisoners, those who refused to accept forced labor, or those who were rebellious to the Nazi order; by forbidding any repression of acts of lynching committed by the German population on airmen brought down: To find the SS, the SD, and the Gestapo guilty of having tortured and of having executed without trial members of the resistance: To find the same organizations and in addition, the OKW and the OKH in collusion with the SS, the SD, and the Gestapo guilty of having committed or ordered massacres and devastations without justification (Documents 1063-PS, F-285, R-91, R-129, 1553-PS, L- 7, F-185(A)): To find the Gestapo guilty of having participated in the execution of this plan by the deportation of innocent civilians from the occupied countries of the West by the tortures and assassinations which were inflicted on them: To find the Government of the Reich (Reichsregierung) and the Leadership Corps of the National Socialist Party guilty of having, for the purpose of dominating Europe and the world, conceived and prepared the systematic extermination of innocent civilians from the occupied countries of the West through their deportation and their assassination in concentration camps: To find the Leadership Corps of the National Socialist Party and the Government of the Reich guilty of having, for the purpose of dominating Europe and the world through terrorism, systematically conceived and provoked tortures, summary executions, massacres, and devastation without cause as described above: To find the Government of the Reich and the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party guilty of having, for the purpose of dominating Europe and the world, conceived and prepared the extermination of combatants who had surrendered and the demoralization, extensive exploitation, and extermination of prisoners of war, and having participated in it.
M. DUBOST: Such are the juridical qualifications of the facts which I have the honor of submitting to you. But a few lessons emerge from these facts. May the Tribunal permit me to state them in conclusion. For hundreds of years humanity has renounced the deportation of the vanquished, their enslavement, and their annihilation through misery, through hunger, steel, and fire. It is because a message of brotherhood had been given to the world, and the world could not entirely forget this message even in the midst of the horrors of war. From generation to generation we observed an upward effort ever since this message of peace had been given. We were confident that it was without any thought of regressing that man had taken the view of moral progress which formed a part of the common heritage of civilized nations. All nations revered, equally, good faith in relations among individuals. All of them had come to accept good faith as the law of their mutual relationship. International morality was little by little emerging and international relationship, like that between individuals, was more and more falling in line with the three precepts of the classical Roman jurists: "Honeste vivere, alterum non laedere, suum cuique tribuere." (Live honorably, inflict no harm on another, give each his due.) Every civilized nation had been impregnated with a common humanism, growth of a long tradition, Christian and liberal. Based on this common heritage and achieved at the price of given experience, each nation, enlightened by the well-conceived interests of man, had understood or was coming to understand that in public as in private affairs loyalty, moderation, and mutual aid were golden rules which none could transgress indefinitely and with impunity.
M. DUBOST: The defeat, the catastrophe which has fallen upon Germany confirm us in this thought and give only more meaning and more clarity to the solemn warning addressed to the American people by President Roosevelt in his address on 27 May 1940: "Although our Navy, our guns, and our planes are the first line of defense, it is certain that back of all of that there is the spirit and the morality of a free people which give to their material defense power, support, and efficiency...." And in this struggle, the echoes of which are still rumbling in our ears, it was indeed those who could rest their strength upon law, nourish their force with justice, who won out. But because we have followed step by step the development of the criminal madness of the defendants and the consequences of that madness throughout these last years, we must conclude that the patrimony of man, of which we are the recipients, is frail indeed, that all kinds of regressions are possible, and that we must with care watch over their heritage. There is not a nation which, ill-educated, badly led by evil masters, would not in the long run revert to the barbarity of the early ages. The German people whose military virtue we recognize, whose poets and musicians we love, whose application to work we admire, and who did not fail to give examples of probity in the most noble works of the spirit; this German people, which came rather late to civilization, beginning only with the eighth century, had slowly raised itself to the ranks of nations possessing the oldest culture. The contribution to modern or contemporary thought seemed to prove that this conquest of the spirit was final; Kant, Goethe, Johann Sebastian Bach belong to humanity just as much as Calvin, Dante, or Shakespeare; nevertheless, we behold the fact that millions of innocent men have been exterminated on the very soil of this people, by men of this people, in execution of a common plan conceived by their leaders, and this people made not a single effort to revolt.
M. DUBOST: This is what has become of it because it has scorned the virtues of political freedom, of civic equality, of human fraternity. This is what has become of it, because it forgot that all men are born free and equal before the law, that the essential action of a state has for its purpose the deeper and deeper penetration of a respect for spiritual liberty and fraternal solidarity in social relations and in international institutions. It allowed itself to be robbed of its conscience and its very soul. Evil masters came who awakened its primitive passions and made possible the atrocities which I have described to you. In truth, the crime of these men is that they caused the German people to retrogress more than 12 centuries. Their crime is that they conceived and achieved, as an instrument of government, a policy of terrorism toward the whole of the subjugated nations and toward their own people; their crime is that they pursued, as an end in itself, a policy of extermination of entire categories of innocent citizens. That alone would suffice to determine capital punishment. And still, the French Prosecution, represented by M. Faure, intends to present proof of a still greater crime, the crime of attempting "to obliterate from the world certain ideas which are called liberty, independence, security of nations, which are also called faith in the given word and respect for the human person," the crime of having attempted to kill the very soul, the spirit of France and other occupied nations in the West. We consider that to be the gravest crime committed by these men, the gravest because it is written in the Scriptures, Matthew, XII, 31-32: "All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men, but the blasphemy unto the Spirit shall not be forgiven unto men,, Whosoever speaketh against the Spirit shall not be forgiven, neither in this world, nor in the world to come.... For the tree is known by its fruit. Race of vipers, how could ye speak good words when ye are evil ......
THE PRESIDENT: [To M. Faure of the French Delegation] Yes, M. Faure.
M. EDGAR FAURE (Deputy Chief Prosecutor for the French Republic): Mr. President, Honorable Judges, I have the honor of delivering to the Tribunal the concluding address of the French Prosecution. This presentation relates more particularly to the sections lettered (I) and (J) of Count Three of the Indictment : oath of allegiance and Germanization; and on the other hand to section (B) of Count Four , persecutions on political, racial, and religious grounds. First of all I should like to present in a brief introduction the general ideas which govern, the plan of my final pleading. The concept of Germanization has been stated in the presentation of M. De Menthon. It consists essentially in imposing upon the inhabitants of occupied territories norms for their political and social life such as the Nazis had determined according to their own doctrine and for their own profit. The combined activities which carried out Germanization or which have Germanization for their purpose, and which are illegal, have been defined as a criminal undertaking against humanity. The complete process of Germanization was employed in certain territories to annex them to the Reich. The Germans intended even before the end of the war to incorporate these territories within their own country. These territories, annexed and then germanized. in an absolute manner, are the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, the Belgian Cantons of Eupen, Malmedy, and Moresnet, and the three French Departments of Haut-Rhin, Bas-Rhin and the Moselle. These territories can be considered relatively small in comparison with the total area of the territories occupied by the Germans. This in no wise mitigates the reprehensible character of these annexations; moreover, we should note at this point two essential aspects of our subject. The first proposition: The Germans had conceived and prepared more extensive annexations than those actually carried out in an official manner. For reasons of expediency, they did not proceed with these annexations during the period of time at their disposal.
M. EDGAR FAURE (Deputy Chief Prosecutor for the French Republic): The second proposition: Annexation, on the other hand, was not the unique or obligatory procedure of Germanization. The Nazis discovered that they could employ different and various means to achieve their purpose of universal domination. The selection of means which vary according to circumstances, to attain and to camouflage an identical result, was characteristic of what has been called Nazi Machiavellism. Their conception is technically much more pliable, more clever, and more dangerous than the classical conception of territorial conquest. In this respect the most brutal competitor has over them the advantage of candor. To begin with I say that the Germans had formulated the plan to annex more extensive territory. Numerous indications point to this. I would like to give you only two citations. The first of these is taken from the documentation collected by our colleagues of the American Prosecution, an American document which has not yet been submitted to the Tribunal. I should say in addition that in my final pleading I shall refer only twice to very remarkable American documents. All the other documents which I shall submit will be new ones belonging to the French Prosecution. The document of which I speak now is Number 1155-PS of the American documents, and it appears in the file of documents submitted to you under Number RF-601, which will become, may it please the Tribunal, that number in French documentation. This document is dated Berlin, 20 June 1940. It bears the notation: "Top Secret Staff Document." Its title is: "Note for the Dossier on the Conference of 19 June 1940, at Headquarters of General Field Marshal Goering." The notes which are -included in this document reflect, therefore, the views of the leaders and not individual interpretations. I would like to read to the Tribunal only Paragraph 6 of that document, which is to be found on Page 3. It is the first document bearing Number RF-601 (Document Number 1155-PS). I proceed with the reading of Paragraph 6, Page 3: "General plans regarding the political development.
M. EDGAR FAURE (Deputy Chief Prosecutor for the French Republic): "Luxembourg is to be annexed by the Reich. Norway is to become German. Alsace-Lorraine is to be reincorporated into the Reich. An autonomous Breton state is to be created. Considerations are pending concerning Belgium, the special treatment of the Flemish in that country, and the creation of a State of Burgundy." The second citation which I shall submit to the Tribunal on this point refers to a French document which I submit as Document Number RF-602. This document comprises the minutes of the interrogation of Dr. Globke, a former assistant of State Secretary of the Ministry of the Interior, Dr. Stuckart. It is dated 25 September 1945. This interrogation was taken by Major Graff of the French Judicial Service. To the minutes of the interrogation has been added a memorandum which was delivered following the questioning by Dr. Globke. I read a passage from this interrogation, at the beginning of the document, Paragraph 1: "Question: 'Have you any knowledge of plans which envisage the annexation of other French territories at the conclusion of peace between Germany and France? (Belfort, Nancy, Bassin de Briey, the coal fields of the North, the so-called "Red Zone", territory attached to the Government General of Belgium) "Answer: 'Yes, those plans did exist. They were worked out by Dr. Stuckart, upon the personal instruction of the Fuehrer, and I have seen them. They were communicated to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to the OKW, and to the Armistice Commission in Wiesbaden. All these documents have been destroyed (Dr. Globke maintains). The State Secretary, M. Stuckart, was ordered to deliver a preliminary draft at the headquarters of the Fuehrer (End of 1940, before the launching of the Russian campaign). "'After examination the Fuehrer considered the proposal was too moderate; and he ordered provisions for the incorporation of further territories, specifically those along the Channel. "'Dr. Stuckart then prepared a second draft, with a map attached, on which the approximate borders were indicated.
M. EDGAR FAURE (Deputy Chief Prosecutor for the French Republic): I have seen it, and I can show it to you roughly on a large-scale map of France. I do not know whether this second plan was approved by Hitler."'
THE PRESIDENT: M. Faure, did you tell us who Dr. Globke was?
M. FAURE: Yes, Mr. President,. he was the assistant of Dr. Stuckart, State Secretary in the Ministry of Interior. He styled himself in his interrogation "officer in charge of matters concerning Alsace-Lorraine and Luxembourg in the Ministry of the Interior, since 1940." I now read a passage from the attached memorandum, This appears in your document book immediately after the passage I have just read. Still under Document Number RF-602, I now read Paragraph 6 of the memorandum in question; it is the beginning of the document before your eyes. "The plan of a new Franco-German border was elaborated upon in the Ministry of Interior by the State Secretary Dr. Stuckart, upon the order given to him by Hitler. This plan envisaged that the territory in the north and the east of France which, for historical, political, racial, geographical, or any other reasons ostensibly did not belong to western but to central Europe, should be given back to Germany. A first draft was submitted to Hitler at his general headquarters and it was approved by him in full. Hitler nevertheless wanted..."
DR. STAHMER: The Defense has not received these documents. Consequently, even today we are not in a position to follow the presentation. Above all, we are not in a position to check individually whether the validity of these documents really exists at all.
THE PRESIDENT: M. Faure, is that correct, that none of these documents have been deposited in the Defense Information Center?
M. FAURE: They have been deposited with two photostatic copies in the document center of the defendants! counsel. Moreover, before I complete my statement, I think that the Defense Counsel win have full opportunity to study this very brief document and to make any observations which he may desire; but I can give you assurance that those documents were delivered.
THE PRESIDENT: What assurance can you give me that the orders which the Tribunal has given have been carried out?
M. FAURE: The documents have been delivered to the Defense Counsel in accordance with instruction and two photostatic copies have been delivered in the document room of the Defense. These documents are, moreover, in the German language, which should greatly facilitate the task of the Defense Counsel, as the interrogation was taken in the German language by an officer of the French Judiciary Services.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, did you hear what M. Faure said?
DR. STAHMER: I should certainly not raise any objections if these documents had actually been sent to our document room and put at our disposal. This morning I and several others looked into the matter and made an effort to determine whether the documents were really there. We could not find out. *Dr., Steinbauer and I went there; we could not find the documents. I shall go there again to see whether they may not have come in the meantime.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal has stated on a variety of occasions that they attach a great importance to the documents being deposited in the defendants' Information Center and copies supplied in accordance with the regulations which they have laid down. Whether that has been done an this occasion, is disputed by Dr. Stahmer. The Tribunal proposes therefore to have the matter investigated as soon as possible and to see exactly whether the rules have been carried out or not. And in future they hope that they will be carried out with the greatest strictness. In the meantime, I think it will be most convenient for you to continue.
M. FAURE: The defendants' counsel tells me that the documents are in the Defense Counsel Room, but they have not yet been distributed. It can be seen, therefore, that the orders were fully respected; but because of the burden of work it may be that the Defense may not individually have received these documents. In any event, I am prepared to submit immediately to the Defense Counsel mainly concerned with this, photostatic copies which will enable them to follow my reading of the documents, which, incidentally, are quite brief.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, the Tribunal will have the facts investigated by the Marshal. And in the meantime, you can continue. The Marshal of the Court will immediately find out and report to the Tribunal what the facts are about the deposition of the documents and the time at which they were deposited. In the meantime you can continue, and we shall be glad if you will assist the defendants' counsel by giving them any copies you may have available.
M. FAURE: I was reading then, Document Number RF-602, the attached memorandum. If the Tribunal wishes to follow the reading of this document will it kindly take the book entitled "Expose" or "Presentation," and turn to Page 6 thereof. The passage which I am now coming to is the last paragraph of Page 6. "Introduction-Expose," Page 6, third and last paragraph, I am continuing: "A first draft was submitted to Hitler at his general headquarters and was approved by him as a whole; but, nevertheless, he called for an enlargement of the territory falling to Germany, in particular, along the Channel coast. The final draft was to serve as the basis for future discussions with the administrative departments, concerned. These discussions did not take place. The intended frontier followed approximately a course beginning at the mouth of the Somme, turning eastward along the northern edge of the Paris Basin and Champagne to the Argonne, then bent to the south crossing Burgundy, and westward of the Franche-Comte, reaching the Lake of Geneva. For some districts alternative solutions were suggested." These German plans were indicated on several occasions by specific measures having to do with the territories in question, measures which might be designated preannexation measures. I come now to the second proposal which I referred to a while ago. With or without annexation, the Germans had in mind to take and maintain under their domination all the occupied countries. As a matter of fact their determination was to germanize and to nazify all of Western Europe and even the African Continent. This intention appears from the very fact of the conspiracy which has been laid bare before the Tribunal so completely by my colleagues of the American Prosecution. That will also be shown by the applications made of it, of which the principal ones will be retraced in this concluding address.