dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
LT. LAMBERT: The Tribunal knows that Document 1816-PS is the minutes of a conference on the Jewish question, held under the direction of Goering on the 12th of November 1938. 1 quote only the first sentence of Document 1816-PS, which fastens the responsibility upon Bormann and which reads as follows: "Goering: 'Gentlemen, today's meeting is of a decisive nature. I have received a letter written on the Fuehrer's orders by the Chief of Staff of the Fuehrer's Deputy, Bormann, requesting that the Jewish question be now, once and for all, co-ordinated and solved in one way or another."' The Tribunal is well aware of the proposals, the discussions, and the actions taken in this conference that constituted the so-called "settlement of the Jewish question." As a result of this conference a series of anti-Jewish decrees and measures were issued and adopted by the Nazi conspirators. I offer in evidence Document 069-PS, Exhibit USA-589. This is a decree of Bormann, dated 17 January 1939, in which Bormann demands compliance with the new anti-Jewish regulations stemming and flowing from the Goering conference just referred to, under which Jews were denied access to housing, travel, and other facilities of ordinary life. I quote the Bormann order, which appears at Page 1 of the English translation of Document 069-PS, which reads as follows "According to a report of General Field Marshal Goering the Fuehrer has made some basic decisions regarding the Jewish question. The decisions are brought to your attention in the enclosure. Strict compliance with these directives is requested."-Signed- "Bormann." In the interests of expediting the proceedings, I shall resist the temptation to quote extensively from the enclosed order in Bormann's letter of transmittal. In effect, the crux of it is that Jews are denied sleeping compartments in trains, the right to give their trade to certain hotels in Berlin, Munich, Nuremberg, Augsburg, and the like. They are banned and excluded from swimming pools, certain public squares, resort towns, mineral baths, and the like.
LT. LAMBERT: The stigma, the degradation, and the inconvenience in the ordinary affairs of life promoted by this decree are plain. I next request the Tribunal to notice judicially the decree of 12 November 1938, 1938 Reichsgesetzblatt, Part I, Page 1580 (Document JN-6), quite familiar to this Tribunal, for it was the decree which excluded Jews from economic life. This decree forbade Jews to operate retail shops, and it was a decree which went far to eliminate Jews from economic life. Now Bormann also acted through other state agencies to wipe out the economic existence of large sections of the Jewish population. In that respect I request the Tribunal to notice judicially the authoritative Nazi publication entitled Decrees of the Deputy of the Fuehrer, edition of 1937, our Document 3240-PS. At Page 383 of this publication there appears a decree of the Defendant Bormann, dated 8 January 1937, reproducing an order of the Defendant Frick, issued at Bormann's instigation, denying financial assistance to government employees who employed the services of Jewish doctors, lawyers, pharmacists, morticians, and other professional classes. I shall forbear from quoting the text of that decree. Its substance is as given. If it please the Tribunal, for the benefit of the translators -I shall continue reading from Page 25 of the manuscript. After the outbreak of war the' anti-Jewish measures increased in intensity and brutality. Thus, the Defendant Bormann participated in the arrangements for the deportation to Poland of 60,000 Jewish inhabitants of Vienna, in co-operation with the SS and the Gestapo. I have no doubt that the Tribunal received this document in connection with the case against Von Schirach; it is our Document 1950- PS, and on its face it points out, and Lammers says: Bormann has informed Von Schirach of your proposal to bring about the deportations. I limit myself to pointing out that single, solitary fact.
LT. LAMBERT: When Bormann succeeded the Defendant Hess as Chief of the Party Chancellery, he used his vast powers in such a way that he was a prime mover in the program of starvation, degradation, spoliation, and extermination of the Jews-and we use those terms advisedly-subject to the Draconian rule of the conspirators. I request the Tribunal to notice judicially the decree of 31 May 1941, 1941 Reichsgesetzblatt, Part I, Page 297, which was signed by the Defendant Bormann and which extends the discriminatory Nuremberg laws into the annexed Eastern territories. I request the Tribunal to notice judicially the 11th ordinance under the Reich citizenship law of 25 November 1941, 1941 Reichsgesetzblatt, Part I, Page 722, signed by Defendant Bormann, which ordered the confiscation of the property of all Jews who had left Germany or who had been deported. I request the Tribunal to notice judicially an order of Bormann's dated 23 October 1941 THE PRESIDENT: You have not given us the PS numbers of either the decree of 31 of May 1941 or the one after that.
LT. LAMBERT: I confess dereliction of duty there. These decrees, in translated form, are all in the document book. I do not have, in my manuscript, their PS citation. However, in the brief now filed with or soon to be delivered to the Tribunal, these decrees are given with their PS numbers opposite.
THE PRESIDENT: 3354-PS and 3241-PS.
LT. LAMBERT: That is very good of you, Sir. Thank you. I request the Tribunal to notice judicially an order of the Defendant Bormann, dated 23 October 1942, Volume II of the publication Decrees, Regulations, Announcements, Page 147. This is our document, I rejoice to be able to say, 3243-PS, which announces a Ministry of Food decree, issued at Bormann's instigation, which deprived Jews of many essential food items, all special sickness and pregnancy rations for expectant mothers and ordered confiscation of food parcels sent to the beleagured Jews from the sympathetic outside world. I now request the Tribunal to notice judicially the 13th ordinance under the Reich citizenship law of 1 July 1943, 1943 Reichsgesetzblatt, Part I, Page 372, signed by the Defendant Bormann, under which all Jews were completely withdrawn from the protection of the ordinary courts and handed over to the exclusive jurisdiction of Himmler's police. This is our Document 1422-PS. With leave of the Tribunal, we respectfully request the opportunity to underline the significance of that decree. In a society which desires to live under the rule of law, men are judged only after appearance before, and adjudication by, a court of law. The effect of this decree was to remove all alleged Jewish offenders from the jurisdiction of the courts of law and to turn them over to the police. The police were to have jurisdiction over alleged Jewish offenders, not the tribunal of law. The result of this law was soon forthcoming, a result for which the Defendant Bormann shares the responsibility. On July 3, 1943, Himmler issued a decree, our Document 3085-PS, 1943 Ministry of Interior Gazette, Page 1085. 1 respectfully request the Tribunal to take judicial notice of this decree, which charged the Himmler police and Gestapo with the execution of the foregoing ordinance closing the courts to the Jews and entrusting them to Himmler's police.
LT. LAMBERT: Finally, with respect to Bormann's responsibility for the persecution of the Jews, I request the Tribunal to notice judicially a decree of Bormann's, dated 9 October 1942, Volume II, Decrees, Regulations, Announcements, Pages 131, 132. It declared that the problem of eliminating forever millions of Jews from Greater German territory could no longer be solved by emigration merely, but only by the application of ruthless force in special camps in the East.
THE TRIBUNAL (Mr. Biddle): What are you referring to there?
LT. LAMBERT: That, Sir, is Document 3244-PS, We had desired at the outset, Sir, to quote this decree in full as an irrefutable answer to a question put by Defense Counsel some days ago in cross-examination, as to whether or not antiSemitic policies of the conspirators were the policies merely of certain demented or deviational members of the conspiracy and not the concerted, settled policy of the conspiracy itself. Time does not permit the full quotation of this decree, but with the indulgence of the Tribunal, if I may offer the essence of this decree in a brief sentence or two. Bormann starts out in this decree by saying: Recently rumors have been stimulated throughout the Reich as to "'violent things' we are doing with respect to the Jews." These rumors are being brought back to the Reich by our returning soldiers who have eyewitnessed them in the East. If we are to combat the effect of these rumors, then our attitude, as I now outline it to you officially, must be communicated to the German civil population. Bormann then reviews what he terms "the two-thousand-year-old struggle against Judaism," and he divides the Party's program into two spheres: the first, the effort of the Party and the conspirators to excommunicate and expel the Jews from the economic and social life of Germany. Then he adds: When we started rolling with our war, this measure by itself was not enough; we had to resort to forced emigration and set up our camps in the East. He then goes on to say that: As our armies have advanced in the East, we have overrun the lands to which we have sent the Jews, and now these emigration measures, our second proposal, are no longer sufficient. Then he comes to the proposal, the considered proposal of himself and the Party Chancellery: We must transport these Jews eastward and farther eastward and place them in special camps for forced labor.
LT. LAMBERT: I quote now merely the last sentence of Bormann's decree: "It lies in the very nature of the matter that these problems, which in part are very difficult, can be solved only with ruthless severity in the interest of the final security of our people."- Bormann. With leave of the Tribunal, I come now to deal ...
THE PRESIDENT: Is it signed by Bormann? It does not appear to be. I thought you said, "Bormann."
LT. LAMBERT: That is what I said, true, Sir. If the Tribunal will refer, as it has, to Document 3244-PS, it is clear that this is a Bormann decree, issued from the Office of the Deputy to the Fuehrer. It is true in this translation of the decree, Sir, Bormann's name is not affixed; but in the original volume it is very clear that this is a decree of Bormann's, issued from the Party Chancellery. The Prosecution so assures the Tribunal and accepts responsibility for that submission. I With leave of the Tribunal, I now come to deal with the responsibility of the Defendant Bormann for overt acts, for the commission and planning of a wide variety of crimes in furtherance of the conspiracy. The Tribunal knows the vast powers that Bormann possessed; that has already been put in evidence. Our point is that he used these vast powers, buttressed by his position as secretary to the Fuehrer attending all the conferences at the Fuehrer's headquarters, in the planning, the authorization, and the participation in overt acts denominated War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity. The attention of the Tribunal is invited to Document L-221, previously put in as Exhibit USA-317. The Tribunal knows that this document is a comprehensive report, dated 16 July 1941, made by the Defendant Bormann just 3 weeks after the invasion of the territory of the Soviet Union by Germany. It is a report of a 20-hour conference at Hitler's field headquarters with the Defendants Goering Rosenberg, Keitel, and with Reich Minister Lammers, This conference resulted in the adoption of detailed plans and directives for the enslavement, depopulation, Germanization, and annexation of extensive territories in the Soviet Union and other countries of eastern Europe. In his report on this conference, set forth in Document L-221, Bormann included numerous proposals of his own for the execution of these plans. Later the Defendant- Bormann took a prominent part in implementing the conspiratorial program. The attention of the Tribunal is invited to Document 072-PS, previously put in as Exhibit USA-357.
LT. LAMBERT: The Tribunal will recall that this is a letter from the Defendant Bormann to the Defendant Rosenberg, dated 19 April 1941, dealing with the confiscation of cultural property in the East I quote merely the last two paragraphs of the English translation of Document 072-PS, which reads as follows: "The Fuehrer emphasized that in the Balkans the use of your experts"-I parenthetically insert that that is the experts of the Einsatzstab Rosenberg organization, the plundering organization-"the use of your experts would not be necessary, since there were no art objects to be confiscated. In Belgrade, only the collection of Prince Paul existed, which would be returned to him completely. The remaining material of the lodges, et cetera, would be seized by the men of SS Gruppenfuehrer Heydrich. "The libraries and art objects of the monasteries confiscated in the Reich were to remain for the time being in these monasteries, insofar as the Gauleiter had not determined otherwise. After the war, a careful examination of the stock could be undertaken. Under no circumstances, however, should' a centralization of all the libraries be undertaken .... "-Signed-"Bormann." I now offer in evidence Document 061-PS, Exhibit USA-692. This is a secret letter from Bormann, dated 11 January 1944, in which Bormann discloses-and we stress this, very important as it seems to us-the existence of large-scale operations to drain off commodities from German-occupied Europe for delivery to the bombed-out population in Germany. The Tribunal knows that the Hague Regulations and the laws of war permit the requisitioning of goods and services only for the use of the Army of Occupation and for the needs of the administration of the area. This proposal and this action represent the requisitioning of materials in occupied areas for the use of the folk at home-of the home front.
LT. LAMBERT: I now quote the first two paragraphs of the English translation-Bormann's letter of 11 January 1944, set forth in the English translation of our Document 061-PS, which reads as follows: "Since the supply of textiles and household goods for the bombed population is becoming increasingly difficult, the proposition was made repeatedly to effect purchases in the occupied territories in greater proportions. Various Gauleiter proposed to let these purchases be handled by suitable private merchants who know these districts and have corresponding connections. "I have brought these proposals to the attention of the Reich Minister of Economics and am quoting his reply of 16 December 1943 on account of its fundamental importance: "'I consider it an especially important task to make use of the economic power of the occupied territories for the Reich. You are aware of the fact that, since the occupation of the Western territories, the buying out of these countries has been effected to the greatest extent possible. Raw materials, semi-finished products, and stocks in finished goods have been rolling into Germany for months; valuable machines were sent to our armaments industry. Everything was done at that time to increase our armament potentialities. Later on, the shipments of these important economic goods were replaced by the so-called transfer of orders from industry to industry! " I shall end the quotation there. The rest is not material to the point. In the course of the war-and this is of utmost importance in the view of the Prosecution...
THE PRESIDENT: Is it clear that that was confiscation?
LT. LAMBERT: It was not suggested, Sir, that this was confiscation. Our point was that the Hague regulations allow requisitions in return' for payment only for the needs of the army of occupation and for the needs of administration of the occupied area. This represents, as it seems to us, a requisitioning program for the needs of the home front. It is on that point that we offer it. We come now to what the Prosecution considers a most important point against the Defendant Bormann. In the course of the war Bormann issued a series of orders establishing Party jurisdiction over the treatment of prisoners of war, especially when employed as forced labor. The Tribunal knows that, under the Geneva Convention of 1929 relating to prisoners of war, prisoners of war are the captives, not of the troops who take them or even of the army which captures them, but of the capturing power; and it is the capturing power which has jurisdiction over and responsibility for them. By the series of decrees now to be put in, Bormann asserts and establishes Nazi Party jurisdiction over Allied prisoners of war. In the exercise of that Party jurisdiction he called for excessively harsh and brutal treatment of Allied prisoners of war. I now offer in evidence Document 232-PS as Exhibit USA-693. This is a decree of the Defendant Bormann, dated 13 September 1944, addressed-will the Tribunal please note-to all Reichsleiter, Gauleiter, and Kreisleiter; and leaders of the Nazi affiliated organizations-numerous levels, that is, of the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party-a decree establishing Nazi Party jurisdiction over the use of prisoners of war for forced labor. I quote the first three paragraphs of Bormann's order, set forth on Page 1 of the English translation of Document 232-PS, which reads as follows: "The regulations valid until now on the treatment of prisoners of war and the tasks of the guard units are no longer justified in view of the demands of the total war effort." The Prosecution would intrude to ask the question.
LT. LAMBERT: Since when do the exigencies of the war effort repeal or modify the provisions of international law? "Therefore, the OKW, on my suggestion issued the regulation, a copy of which is enclosed. "The following observations are made on its contents: "I. The' understanding exists between the Chief of the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces and myself that the co-operation of the Party in the commitment of prisoners of war is inevitable. Therefore, the officers assigned to the prisoner-of-war organization have been instructed to cooperate most closely with the Hoheitstrager. The commandants of the prisoner-of-war camps have immediately to detail liaison officers to the Kreisleiter. "Thus the opportunity will be afforded the Hoheitstrager to alleviate existing difficulties locally, to exercise influence on the behavior of guards units"-and this is the point we underline-"and better to assimilate the commitment of prisoners of war to the political and economic demands." Will the Tribunal permit me to observe that on the face of this order, addressed to Reichsleiter, Gauleiter, and Kreisleiter, and so to the officials of the Leadership Corps, in the terms of the order itself Hoheitstrager are referred to-as co-operating media in this scheme. The Tribunal has graciously given me an opportunity to observe that this decree is addressed to Reichsleiter, Gauleiter, Kreisleiter, and to the leaders of the affiliated and controlled Nazi organizations. As the Tribunal knows, within the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party the Kreisleiter is a pretty low level. That is a county leader. On the face of the decree itself the co-operation of the Hoheitstrager is directed-and the Tribunal knows, under the evidence presented against the Leadership Corps, that Hoheitstrager range all the way from the Reichsleiter on the top-down to and including the 500,000 or so Blockleiter implicated. I next offer in evidence Document D-163 as Exhibit USA-694.
LT. LAMBERT: This is a letter of the Defendant Bormann, dated 5 November 1941, addressed-the Tribunal will please note-to all Reichsleiter, Gauleiter, and Kreisleiter (the last just mere county leaders), transmitting to these officials of the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party the instructions of the Reich Minister of the Interior prohibiting decent burials with religious ceremonies for Russian prisoners of war. I quote the pertinent portions of these instructions, beginning with the next to the last sentence of Page 1 of the English translation of D-163, which reads as follows: "To save costs, service departments of the Army will generally be contacted regarding transport of corpses (furnishing of vehicles) whenever possible. No coffins will be indented for the transfer and burial. The body will be completely enveloped with strong paper (if possible, oil, tar, asphalt paper) or other suitable material. Transfer and burial is to be carried out unobtrusively. If a number of corpses have to be disposed of, the burial will be carried out in a communal grave. In this case, the bodies will be buried side by side (not on top of each other) and in accordance with the local custom regarding depth of graves. Where a graveyard is the place of burial a distant part will be chosen. "No"-we repeat . . . . . .No burial ceremony or decoration of graves will be allowed." I now offer in evidence Document 228-PS, Exhibit USA-695. This is a Bormann circular, dated 25 November 1943, issued from the headquarters of the Fuehrer, demanding harsher treatment of prisoners of war and the increased exploitation of their manpower. I now quote the Bormann circular which is set forth on Page I of the English translation of Document 228-PS, which reads as follows: "Individual Gau administrations often refer in reports to a too indulgent treatment of prisoners of war on the part of the guard personnel. In many places, according to these reports, the guarding authorities have even developed into protectors and caretakers of the prisoners of war.
LT. LAMBERT: "I informed the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces of these reports, with the comment that the productive German working population absolutely cannot understand it if, in a time when the German people is fighting for existence or non-existence, prisoners of war-hence our enemies-are leading a better life than the German working man and that it is an urgent duty of every German who has to do with prisoners of war, to bring about a complete utilization of their manpower. "The chief of prisoner-of-war affairs in the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces has now given the unequivocal order, attached hereto in copy form, to the commanders of prisoners of war in the military districts. I request that this order be brought orally to the attention of all Party office holders in the appropriate manner. "In case that in the future, complaints about unsuitable treatment of prisoners of war still come to light, they are to be immediately communicated to the commanders of the prisoners of war with a reference to the attached order." The Tribunal will note, of course, that on the face of the decree Bormann instructs that these orders be communicated orally to all Party officials and that surely must include the members of the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party.
THE PRESIDENT: Speaking for myself, I don't see anything particularly wrong in that communication.
LT. LAMBERT: On that point, Sir, we submit that if you take a document which says, "We wish to utilize all the labor power of prisoners of war in our control possible and to get this result by suitable means," probably it tends to appear unexceptional. But viewing this document in relation to the other evidence in, and to be presented, which show a concerted and settled policy by Bormann and his co-conspirators to ...
THE PRESIDENT: Well, it isn't necessary to argue it.