dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
GEN. ALEXANDROV: After this meeting, which was held with Hitler on 4 January 1944-on 5 January 1944 you sent a letter to Lammers in which you related the question regarding the necessity for issuing a special directive as a result of this meeting, in order that all aid should be given you by the following authorities-I will enumerate them: The Reichsfuehrer SS, the Minister of the Interior, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Field Marshal Keitel, the Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, Rosenberg, the Reich Commissioners, the Governor General, and others. Do you remember this letter?
SAUCKEL: I remember that letter; will you be kind enough to put it before me. I cannot, of course, remember the contents in detail.
THE PRESIDENT: What is the number of that document, General?
GEN. ALEXANDROV: That is Number 1292-PS, Page 6 of the Russian text. [Turning to the defendant.] Have you found the passage?
SAUCKEL: Yes. It is on the last page? May I ask if this is correct?
GEN. ALEXANDROV: This means you considered that all these organizations were to participate fully, one way or the other, in the execution of measures for the recruitment and utilization of manpower. Is that correct?
SAUCKEL: That is correct and I ask permission in this connection to give the following explanation: It is obvious that I myself, in my office, could not do certain things without informing the highranking authorities of the Reich. It merely proves that I was attempting to work correctly, and not to interfere wildly within the Reich, or in other administrative departments.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: I would like you to explain the following: When the Hitlerite government resorted to these criminal measures for driving off into slavery the population of the occupied territories, did practically all the government organizations of Hitlerite Germany-besides yourself-and the Party machinery of the NSDAP participate in these activities? Would it be correct to say so?
SAUCKEL: I protest against the words "driving off." Please hear my defense counsel on the subject in rebuttal.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: It is not a question of the words used. Answer me-is it correct or not?
SAUCKEL: The words are extremely important.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Did the entire machinery of the German State participate in this matter or not?
SAUCKEL: In this form I must answer your question in the negative. There was...
GEN. ALEXANDROV: No other reply is demanded of you.
SAUCKEL: In the-I might explain this. For the recruiting of manpower, that is in the registration according to German orders, it was the chief, duly authorized and appointed for this purpose at the time, of a territorial government, a Reich commissariat, or the like, who participated-for I emphasize that I was unable to issue any laws in that field and was not allowed to do so. I could not interfere in any government department; that is impossible in any government system in the world.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Yes. But you were obliged to co-ordinate the activities of all these representative organizations in Germany. That was the task assigned to you?
SAUCKEL: Not to co-ordinate, but to instruct them: and to ask for their co-operation where the case arose, if it came within their jurisdiction.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: That is not quite so. I did not wish to touch on this question, but I must revert to it now as you have somewhat minimized your part in this matter.
SAUCKEL: I request permission to reply to the word "minimize." The distribution and direction of manpower in the Reich was my principal task. It included, with the German workers, 30 million persons. I do not wish to minimize this task, for I did my best to introduce order into this mass of workers, as dictated by my sense of duty. I do not wish to minimize anything. It was my task and my duty towards my people.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: We need not argue on this subject. It would be much simpler to consult the document. An order by Goering will be handed to you in a moment.
SAUCKEL: I wish-I must apologize to you if you have misunderstood me. I-I have no intention of arguing. I am only asking for permission to clarify my conception of duty with regard to this task, for it was the most personal task I had.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: That is quite apparent in this order by Goering of 27 March 1942. It is Document Exhibit Number USSR-365. It will be handed to you in a minute. I will read a brief excerpt from it, showing the powers you were endowed with.
THE PRESIDENT: What is the number of it?
GEN. ALEXANDROV: It is Exhibit Number USSR-365.
THE PRESIDENT: Has it got a PS number?
GEN. ALEXANDROV: No. This is a Soviet exhibit. [Turning to the defendant.] Please read Subparagraph 4 which clearly states: "The Plenipotentiary General for the Allocation of Labor for the execution of his tasks is given authority through power assigned to me by the E Fuehr to issue instructions to the highest authorities of the Reich and to their subordinate offices, as well as to the offices of the Party and to its organizations and affiliated organizations, to the Reich Protector, the Governor General, the military commanders, and the heads of civil administration." That is what we read in Subparagraph 4 of this order. I believe, therefore, that on the strength of this order you were appointed Plenipotentiary General, with extraordinary powers, for the Allocation of Labor. Is that correct or not?
SAUCKEL: That is correct. I should like to add that this authority was limited to my own special sphere, and I take the liberty of reading the following sentence: "Orders and directives of fundamental importance are to be submitted to me in advance." Also I might point out that a restriction was imposed on my deputies later in the autumn. There is a witness who can make a statement to that effect.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: I am not talking about your deputies. Your powers are only too clearly defined in Subparagraph 4 of Goering's order. Now, will you enumerate which of the defendants, at the same time as yourself, directly and in his own sphere of action participated in the execution of measures for the mass deportation into slavery of the population of the occupied territories and their employment in Germany. Name them in succession. Did Defendant Goering participate in all these crimes, as your immediate chief and leader?
SAUCKEL: I want to point out most emphatically that I could not possibly have been aware that entire populations had been carried off by means of lawful recruitment and service engagements based on legal decrees. I deny this. I had nothing to do with measures concerning prisoners, et cetera, but...
THE PRESIDENT: The question was, did the Defendant Goering participate with you in the bringing of foreign workers into Germany? You do not seem to me really to be answering it at all.
SAUCKEL: I was directly subordinate to the Reich Marshal of the Greater German Reich in the question of the introduction of foreign manpower.
THE PRESIDENT: Then why do you not say so?
GEN. ALEXANDROV: So the Defendant Goering participated in the execution of these criminal measures?
THE PRESIDENT: General Alexandrov, when you want to ask a question of that sort I think it would be much better that you should not allege the fact that it is a crime. If you want to know whether the Defendant Goering took part with this defendant in the work that he was doing you can refer to that without calling it a crime; and then he perhaps will answer you more easily.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Yes, My Lord. [Turning to the defendant.] Did the Defendant Von Ribbentrop participate in carrying out these measures on diplomatic lines, and did he sanction the violation of international treaties and conventions where the utilization of foreign workers and prisoners of war in the German industries was concerned?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, there again, these defendants are saying that there was no violation of international law; so the question you should put to him is: Did Von Ribbentrop participate with him in these measures as far as diplomacy was concerned?
GEN. ALEXANDROV: I am now asking what was the connection between the Defendant Von Ribbentrop and the allocation of labor, and I would like to receive an answer to this question from the Defendant Sauckel.
SAUCKEL: The part played by Defendant Ribbentrop consisted in holding conferences with foreign statesmen or foreign government offices in the occupied territories as well as in neutral and friendly foreign countries; and he considered it highly important that these conferences should be conducted in a correct manner and that the aim should be to obtain the best possible conditions for foreign workers.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: I will question you about that a little later, when the question arises concerning the employment of prisoners of war in the German industries. Please tell me now, what was the attitude of the Defendant Kaltenbrunner regarding these measures?
SAUCKEL: In this connection I met the Defendant Kaltenbrunner on one single occasion during a conference-the date of which I cannot at present remember-at the Reich Chancellery with Minister Lammers. I believe it was in 1944. Apart from that, I had no interview of any kind with Kaltenbrunner, nor did I reach any agreements with him on questions concerning the employment of labor.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Yet the Defendant Kaltenbrunner placed police forces at your disposal for carrying out the recruitment of labor, did he not?
SAUCKEL: I have repeatedly emphasized the fact that the recruitment of workers was no concern of the Police. I must ask my defense counsel to submit the relevant regulations, of which there are numerous specimens available. They prove quite clearly and unequivocally and irrefutably the division of tasks between the Police and my department.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Did the Police participate in the execution of these measures or did it not? I am not reproaching you now.
SAUCKEL: In my opinion the Police participated only in cases where the execution of administrative duties was rendered impossible in partisan areas. In White Ruthenia alone 1,500 local mayors were murdered by the partisans. This is seen from the document.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: But was recruitment, even in normal circumstances, not carried out by police methods? Did you know nothing at all about that?
SAUCKEL: I will tell you exactly what I know about it. There were in the occupied territories of Europe about 1,500 districts- here I mean areas or departments, the Feldkommandanturen, which we in German administration would describe as being the size of a Kreis (district)-and these 1,500 districts contained 1,500 administrative centers staffed partly by local and partly by German personnel. In addition to this personnel, in the territories of the Soviet Union alone, 1,000 Russian workers who were previously employed in Germany were acting as recruiting officers. Now if each of these administrative centers, which would correspond to a German Landkreis and have a population of 40,000 to 70,000 inhabitants, selected in a proper way, examined, and tested five persons daily, that alone would amount to 2 million people a year; a perfectly clear method of administration, such as I ordered, organized, and carried out to the best of my administrative possibilities.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: You are giving needlessly detailed explanations in reply to these questions, and under such conditions the interrogation is being greatly prolonged. I consider it necessary that you answer briefly. You are perfectly able to do this, for I am putting the questions to you clearly.
SAUCKEL: I am trying to answer as briefly as possible. I regret that a specialized field is always difficult to understand and calls for explanations; I found it very difficult myself.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Please answer: What part did the Defendant Kaltenbrunner play in the execution of measures on the allocation of labor? Did he participate in this or did he not?:
SAUCKEL: I have already given you that answer.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: I did not understand you. Did he participate or did he not?
THE PRESIDENT: I beg your pardon. He said that he only met Kaltenbrunner on one occasion and that the task of the recruitment of labor was not one for Police. That is what he said.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: It is not necessary to multiply the number of meetings in order for Kaltenbrunner to have participated in the execution of these measures. He did not have to meet Defendant Sauckel frequently.
THE PRESIDENT: General Alexandrov, I do not want you to argue with me. I have told you what his answer was. It seemed to be an answer to your question.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: I am not arguing. I am merely explaining the reason for this question. [Turning to the defendant.] As far as the participation of Defendant Rosenberg is concerned, I shall not ask you any questions, as Defendant Rosenberg gave sufficiently clear answers when questioned by my American colleague, Prosecutor Dodd. Now tell me, what part did Defendant Frick play in the execution of these measures?
SAUCKEL: Defendant Frick, as Reich Minister of the Interior- I do not know how long he remained in office-scarcely participated at all. As far as I can remember I had discussions with his Reich Ministry of the Interior concerning the most necessary laws to be promulgated within Germany for German workers and the validity of those laws. Apart from that, he had no further part in this task; his work was quite different.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: We are discussing the question of foreign manpower. It was not merely by accident that you mentioned, in a letter to Lammers written after a meeting at Hitler's headquarters on the 4 January 1944, that the Ministry of the Interior was among the government offices detailed to operate with you. That is why I ask you, what part did Defendant Frick play in the execution of these measures for the recruitment of labor? You yourself asked for the co-operation of the Ministry of the Interior. Then how was this co-operation to be expressed?
SAUCKEL: To my very great personal sorrow Frick was at that time no longer Reich Minister of the Interior, but Himmler-if I remember correctly.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: What co-operation did you expect from the Ministry of the Interior?
SAUCKEL: It is, I believe only natural that in every form of government the internal and the general administration should be kept informed of events occurring and should participate as well, and so important a sphere as the employment of human beings calls for many ordinances. I could not possibly issue legal decrees, nor had I authority to do so. I had to submit them to the Ministerial Council for the Defense of the Reich. I could only issue technical directions, and that is quite a different thing altogether.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Were Defendant Funk, as Minister of Economics, and Defendant Speer, as Minister for Armaments, the principal intermediaries between the industrialists and yourself as suppliers of manpower? Is that correct?
SAUCKEL: The end of your sentence contains a very erroneous conclusion. They were not middlemen between myself and the industries, but the industries were responsible to the Ministry for Armaments. Of course there were personal instructions issued about this in the course of years. I did not negotiate with the industries. The industries asked for workers and they got them, as did the agricultural industries.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Please tell me, what part did the Defendants Funk and Speer play in the execution of these measures? I do not want any long drawn-out explanations. Answer me briefly.
SAUCKEL: Those No ministers were heads of the various business enterprises inside German economy which came within the jurisdiction of their ministries. They received their workers, and that was the end of my task.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Did the Defendants Frank, Seyss-Inquart, and Neurath participate in the execution of these measures for the allocation of labor in such territories as were under their jurisdiction? I mean the territories of Poland, Bohemia and Moravia, and Holland. Is that correct?
SAUCKEL: -These gentlemen, within the framework of their duties inside their own territories, supported me in issuing decrees and laws, and they themselves attached great importance to the proper and humane drafting of these laws and decrees.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: What was the part played by Defendant Fritzsche?
SAUCKEL: That I cannot tell you. I only met Dr. Fritzsche in Germany on one occasion-and that a very brief one-in, I believe, 1945, the beginning of 1945. I never spoke to him at all about my work, nor do I know whether he had anything to do with it. I can only state that I made repeated applications to the Reich Ministry for Propaganda to have my instructions and directives-as contained in the document books submitted by my defense counsel-widely circulated, particularly to the industries and other circles which received these workers.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: But one defendant is left-Bormann- and he is missing. What part did he play? He placed at your disposal the entire Party machinery of the NSDAP, did he not?
SAUCKEL: No, he did not. He placed the Gauleiter at my disposal. The instructions which I issued to the Gauleiter and the letters which I addressed to them-three of which are available here, and there never were many more of them-were to the effect that I was entitled to call on the Party for assistance in insuring the welfare, feeding, and clothing of the workers, and to see that they received everything that was humanly necessary and all we could possibly supply in view of existing wartime conditions. That was the role played by the Party, to the extent that it was asked to do so for me. Thus it was a form of control for the benefit of the foreign and German workers employed in Germany. Otherwise the Party had nothing to do with it. Incidentally, I did not much like interference on the part of outside offices.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: That is incorrect. I would remind you of your program for the allocation of labor which was issued in 1942. This is Document Number USSR-365 which states that the Gauleiter are appointed as your plenipotentiaries where the question of manpower is concerned, and that they will utilize this manpower.
SAUCKEL: Where does it say that? I could not appoint my plenipotentiaries myself.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: You will be shown the document in one moment. I do not quote the paragraph, I merely mention the contents, the gist of the paragraph, where it states that the Gauleiter will use the Party organizations in the districts subordinate to them: I therefore assume that the Party machinery as a whole participated in the execution of these measures.
SAUCKEL: It does not say so at all, Mr. Prosecutor.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Have you found it: "The plenipotentiaries... make use of their..."?
SAUCKEL: Yes, and I did this only for the purpose I have described. Will you be good enough to read on?
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Read it yourself.
SAUCKEL: Thank you. "The leaders of the highest departments of the state and of economy which are competent in shear respective Gaue shall advise and instruct the Gauleiter on all important questions dealing with the allocation of labor." That means within the scope of their spheres of duty; and then the latter are specified: "The president of the Regional Labor Office"-that is not a Party but a government department-"the Trustee for Labor" -not a Party but a government department-"the Regional Peasant Leader"-not a Party but a government department -"the Gau Economic Adviser"-now, that is a Party department . . .
THE PRESIDENT: Please observe the light, to be sure the interpreters are getting it.
SAUCKEL: I apologize, Your Lordship. ". . .the Gau representative of the Labor Front"-a department of the Labor Front-"the Regional Leaders of the Women's League..."
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Everything is perfectly clear, you need not enumerate. I should like to draw your attention to Subparagraph VI. It clearly states that the Gauleiter, functioning as plenipotentiaries for the allocation of labor, will, in their own Gaue' make use of the Party organizations under them. Is it written there?
SAUCKEL: Yes.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: It next enumerates the methods by which this task was executed, also through what institutions and what authorities. I conclude from this subparagraph, which states that they will utilize the Party institutions under their control, that the entire organization of the NSDAP participated in the execution of these measures, and I wish you to answer "yes" or "no."
SAUCKEL: No.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: There is no more to say.
SAUCKEL: No. May I supplement this reply of "no." You, in your first reply, told me that my description was not quite correct. My description is absolutely correct, that the Party was employed to deal with the welfare of German and foreign workers and to see to it that they were properly cared for and supplied. The Party organizations here mentioned were only entrusted with this kind of task, and could have had no other; and I, a former workman myself, was eager that these workers, both German and foreign, should be cared for as well as wartime conditions allowed. Hence this employment of Party organizations and no others. Therefore, my reply was absolutely correct.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Did the district leaders of the Hitler Youth also participate in the execution of these measures?
SAUCKEL: The district leaders of the Hitler Youth participated in order to protect and care for the young people as expressly required by Reichsleiter Schirach and later by Reich Youth Leader Axmann. Protection had to be provided for the young people against any danger. The Hitler Youth did this, including young people employed from foreign countries. I must expressly emphasize this.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Did you personally approve of the policy of the Hitlerite Government with regard to the deportation into slavery of the population of the occupied territories in order to insure the waging of a war of aggression? Did you approve of that policy?
SAUCKEL: I am forced to consider your question in the light of an accusation. I personally have said over and over again that I had nothing to do with either foreign or domestic politics; nor was I a soldier, I meant to say. I received a task and I received orders. As a German, I tried to carry out that task correctly for the sake of my people and its government and to carry it out to the best of my ability, for it was made perfectly clear to me that the fate of my people depended on the accomplishment of this task. I worked with this in mind, and I admit that I did my utmost to accomplish that task in the manner which I have pointed out here. I conceived this to be my duty and must acknowledge this fact here.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: In order to define your personal attitude to these crimes, I would like to remind you of a few of your own statements. These are taken from Document Number USSR-365. This document is a program for the utilization of labor in 1942, Page 9. You will now be shown the passage which I am about to quote: "I beg you to believe me, as an old and fanatical National Socialist Gauleiter..." Is it written there?
SAUCKEL: That is written there.