dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
M. DUBOST: Page 30, the last paragraph but one: "We should conclude, however, by stating that it is our considered and unanimous opinion, on the evidence available to us, that a policy of steady starvation and inhuman brutality was carried out at Buchenwald for a long period of time; and that such camps as this mark the lowest point of degradation to which humanity has yet descended." Likewise, in the report of a committee set up by General Eisenhower, Document L-159, Which we submit under Exhibit Number RF-352, Pages 31, 32, and 33 of the same document book, we read: "The purpose of this camp was extermination ...... Page 31: "Aerolites and other conditions in the concentration camps in Germany. Report of a committee founded by General Eisenhower under the auspices of the Chief of Staff, General George Marshall, to the Congress of the United States, concerning atrocities and other conditions in concentration camps in Germany." Page 32: "The mission of this camp was extermination, by starvation, beatings, torture, incredibly crowded sleeping conditions, and sickness. The result of these measures was heightened by the fact that prisoners were obliged to work in an armament factory adjoining the camp which manufactured small fire arms, rifles ...... The means which were used to carry out this progressive extermination are numerous, as shown in documents which have just been handed to us. These documents, which we are going to submit, have been communicated to the Defense. They consist of printed formulas coming from Auschwitz, concerning the number of blows which could be administered to the internees or prisoners. These documents will be handed over to the Defense for their criticism. They have just been given to us. I am not able to authenticate their origin today. They appear to me to be of a genuinely authentic character. Photostats of these documents have been given to the Defense.
THE PRESIDENT: M. Dubost, the Tribunal thinks that they cannot admit these documents at present. It may be that after you have more time to examine the matter you may be able to offer some evidence which authenticates the documents, but we cannot admit the documents simply upon your statement that you believe them to be genuine.
M. DUBOST: Moreover, everything in the camps contributed to pave the way for the progressive extermination of the people who were interned there. Their situation was as follows: They were exposed to a hard climate; some worked underground. Their living conditions have been brought to light by the testimony which you have heard. When the internees arrived, they were compelled to remain naked for hours while they were being registered or waiting to be tattooed. Everything combined to cause the rapid death of those who were interned in the camps. A good number of them were subjected to an even harder regime, the description of which was given to the Tribunal by the American Prosecution when they submitted Document Number USA-243 and the following, dealing with the Nacht und Nebel regime, the NN. I do not think it is necessary- to return to the description of this regime. I shall merely submit a new document which shows the rigor with which the NN regime was applied to our compatriots. It appears under the Document Number F-278(b), submitted under Exhibit Number RF-326. It comes from the German Armistice Commission of Wiesbaden and shows that no steps were ever taken in reply to repeated protests by the French population, and even by the de facto government of Vichy, against the silence which shrouded the internees of the NN camps. I shall now read Paragraph 2 which explains why no reply could be given to families, who had good reason for anxiety: "This result was foreseen and desired by the Fuehrer His opinion was that effective and lasting intimidation of the population, which would put a stop to Its criminal activities against the occupation forces, would be achieved by the death sentence, or by measures which would leave the offenders' next of kin and the population generally in the dark as to their fate." We will not devote any more time to describing the blocks and the hygienic conditions under which the internees in the blocks lived.
M. DUBOST: Four witnesses, who an came from different camps, have pointed out to you that the hygienic conditions in these different camps were identical and that the blocks were equally overcrowded in all these camps. We know that in all cases the water supply was insufficient and that deportees slept two or three in beds 75 to 80 centimeters wide. We know that the bedding was never renewed or was in very bad condition. We know likewise the conditions in which the medical services of the camp functioned. Several witnesses belonging to the medical profession have testified to this fact before you. The Tribunal will find confirmation of their testimony in Document F-121, Exhibit Number RF-354. We shall read just one line of Page 100 of your document book: "Because of lack of water the prisoners were obliged to fetch stagnant water from the water closets to satisfy their thirst." And then in Exhibit Number RF-331, (Document Number F-321), Page 119 of the French text, third paragraph: "The surgical work was done by a German who claimed to be a surgeon from Berlin, but who was an ordinary criminal. He killed the patient in each operation...." Two paragraphs lower: "The management of the block was in the hands of two, Germans, who acted as sick bay attendants-unscrupulous men, who carried out surgical operations on the spot with the help of a certain H..., who was a mason by trade." After the statements of our witnesses, who in their capacity as doctors of medicine were able to care for patients in the camp infirmaries, it seems superfluous to give further quotations from our documents. When the workers had been worked to the point of exhaustion, when it became impossible for them to recover, selections were made setting apart those who were of no further use with a view to exterminating them either in the gas chambers, as related by our first witness, Mme. Vaillant-Couturier, or by intracardiac injections, as related by two other French witnesses, Dr. Dupont and Dr. Balachowsky.
M. DUBOST: This system of selection was carried out in all the ramps and was, moreover, in response to general orders, proof of which we showed when reading Document Number R-91, submitted under Exhibit Number RF-347. In the first document book the Tribunal will find the testimony of Blaha, testimony which it will certainly recall and which was received here the 9 January-it is the testimony of Blaha, 3249-PS.
THE PRESIDENT: You have already given this as evidence, have you not?
M. DUBOST: I am not going to read it. I merely wish to recall it to the Tribunal because it forms part of my collection of proofs.
THE PRESIDENT: We do not want affidavits by witnesses who have already given evidence. This affidavit, 3249-PS, has not been put in, has it?
M. DUBOST: No, I am merely recalling the testimony which was given at the session. We shall not submit this document, Mr. President. We are merely utilizing this document to remind the Tribunal that during the session Blaha pointed out conditions existing in the infirmary. To all these wretched living conditions must be added work, exhausting work, for all the deportees were intended to carry out extremely hard work. We know that they worked in labor squads and in factories. We know, according to the witnesses, that the work lasted 12 hours a day at a minimum, and that it was often prolonged to suit the whim of the camp commandant. Document R-129 (Exhibit Number RF-348), from which I have already read, emanating from Pohl and addressed to Himmler, Pages 22 and 23 of the second document book, suggests that the working hours should be practically unlimited. This work was carried out, as the witnesses have told us, in water, in the mud, in underground factories-in Dora for instance and in the quarries in Mauthausen. In addition to the work, which was exhausting in itself, the deportees were subject to ill-treatment by the SS and the Kapos, such as blows or being bitten by dogs. Our Document Number F-274, Exhibit Number RF-301, Pages 74 and 75, brings official testimony to this effect. Is it necessary to read to the Tribunal from this document, which is an official document to which we constantly refer and which has been translated into German and into English?
THE PRESIDENT: I do not think you need read it.
M. DUBOST: Thank you, Mr. President. This same document, Page 77 and Page 78, informs us that all the prisoners were forced to do the work assigned to them, even under the worst conditions of health and hygiene. There was no quarantine for them even in case of contagious diseases or during epidemics. The French Document Number F-392, Exhibit Number RF-330, which we have already submitted, which is the testimony of Dr. Steinberg, confirms that of Mme. Vaillant-Couturier. It is the twelfth document of your first document book. We shall read at Page 4: "We received half a liter of herb tea; this was when we were awakened. A supervisor, who was at the door, hastened our washing by giving us blows with a cudgel. The lack of hygiene led to an epidemic of typhus...." At the end of the third paragraph you will find the conditions under which the prisoners were taken to the factories; in the fifth paragraph a description of shoes: "We had been provided with wooden shoes which in a few days caused wounds. These wounds produced boils which brought death to many." I shall now read Document R-129, Pages 22, 23, and 24 in the second document book, and which we submit under the Number...
THE PRESIDENT: One moment; the Tribunal will adjourn now for fifteen minutes. [A recess was taken.]
THE PRESIDENT: M. Dubost, the Tribunal has been considering the question of the evidence which you have presented on the concentration camps; and they are of opinion that you have proved the case for the present, subject, of course, to any evidence which may be produced on behalf of the defendants and, of course, subject also to your right under Article 24-c of the Charter to bring in rebutting evidence, should the Tribunal think it right to admit such evidence. They think, therefore, that it is not in the interests of the Trial, which the Charter directs should be an expeditious one, that further evidence should be presented at this stage on the question of concentration camps, unless there are any particular new points about the concentration camps to which you have not yet drawn our attention; and, if there are such points, we should like you to particularize them before you present any further evidence upon them.
M. DUBOST: I thank the Tribunal for this statement. I do not conceal from the Tribunal that I shall need a few moments to select the points which it seems necessary to stress. I did not expect this decision. With the authorization of the Tribunal, I shall pass to the examination of the situation of prisoners of war.
THE PRESIDENT: M. Dubost, possibly you could, during the adjournment, consider whether there are any particular points, new points, on concentration camps which you wish to draw our attention to and present them after the adjournment, in the meantime proceeding with some other matter.
M. DUBOST: The 1 o'clock recess?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, that is what I meant.
M. DUBOST: I shall, therefore, consider as established provisionally the proof that Germany, in its internment camps and hi its concentration camps, pursued a policy tending towards the annihilation and extermination of its enemies, while at the same time creating a system of terror which it exploited to facilitate the realization of its political aims. Another aspect of this policy of terror and extermination appears when one studies the war crimes committed by Germany on the persons of prisoners of war. These crimes, as I shall prove to you, had two motives, among others: To debase the captives as much as possible in order to sap their energy; to demoralize them; to cause them to lose faith in themselves and in the cause for which they fought, and to despair of the future of their country. The second motive was to cause the disappearance of those of them who, by reasons of their previous history or indications given since their capture, showed that they could not be adapted to the new order the Nazis intended to set up. With this aim, Germany multiplied the inhuman methods of treatment intended to debase the men in her hands, men who were soldiers and who had surrendered, trusting to the military honor of the army to which they had surrendered. The transfer of prisoners was carried out under the most inhumane conditions. The men were badly fed and were obliged to make long marches on foot, exposed to every kind of punishment, and struck down when they were tired and could no longer follow the column. No shelter was provided at the halting places and no food. Evidence of this is given in the report on the evacuation of the column that left Sagan on 28 January 1945 at 12:30 p.m.
THE PRESIDENT: Where shall we find it?
M. DUBOST: It is in the document book submitted by M. Herzog. It is the report on the evacuation of the column that left Sagan on 28 January 1945. It is Document Number UK-78, submitted under Exhibit Number RF-46. A column of 1,357 British soldiers, including soldiers of all ranks, started out on 28 January 1945 for Spremberg.
THE PRESIDENT: Possibly this is the first document in your document book which has been handed up to us.
M. DUBOST: That is right, Mr. President. I shall now read to you the document on the evacuation of the Sagan Camp from 28 January to 4 February 1945. As the Tribunal has not the copy before it, I pass to Document Number UK-170, Exhibit Number RF-355.
THE PRESIDENT: I am just telling you that I rather think this may be the document, if it begins with "1,357 English prisoners of  war . . . . . . . Does it begin in that way?
M. DUBOST: Yes. The document which you have before you, Mr. President, deals with the transfer of British prisoners. The one about which I wished to speak and from -which I wanted to read to you dealt with the transfer of French prisoners. I think that it is not necessary for me to lengthen the session by showing the Tribunal that the British and the French prisoners were treated in the same fashion. I shall, therefore, restrict myself to your document. "1,357 British war prisoners of all ranks marched out of Stalag Luft III in columns on 28 January 1945, and were thereafter marched for distances varying from 17 to 31 kilometers, a day to Spremberg, where they were entrained for Luckenwalde. Food, water, medical supplies, and adequate accommodation were more or less nonexistent throughout the trip. At least three prisoners ... had to be left at Muskau. ...... On the bottom of the page, three lines before the end: "On the 31st they covered the distance of 31 kilometers to Muskau. It is small wonder that at this stage three me n, Lieutenants Kielly and Wise, and Sergeant Burton collapsed and had to be left in the hospital at Muskau." Page 2 at the end of the document: "On the march, apart from the Red Cross parcel already referred to, the only rations issued to the men were one-half loaf of bread and one issue of barley soup for each. The supply of water is described as 'haphazard'.... No fewer than 15 of them escaped during the march." Now a statement by M. Bondot: "The camp conditions of the Franco-Belgian column were even more rigorous. The camps were organized in a manner which was contrary to all the rules of hygiene. The prisoners were crowded into a very narrow space. They had no heat or water. There were 30 to 40 men to a room in Stalag III-C." M. Boudot's statement is to be found in the report on prisoners and deportees which was also handed to you the other day by M. Herzog. I believe that the Tribunal has kept its documents of last Thursday...
THE PRESIDENT: We have kept those documents, but if we had them on. the Bench before us you would not be able to see us.
M. DUBOST: Similar statements are found in the Red Cross reports. Berger, who was in charge of prisoner-of-war camps under Himmler from I October 1944, admitted in the course of his examination that the food supply of prisoners of war was entirely insufficient. The Tribunal will find on Page 3 of the document book, which is before it, an extract from Berger's examination. Second paragraph: "I visited a camp south of Berlin, the name of which I cannot remember at the moment. I shall perhaps remember later. At that time it was obvious to me that the food conditions were absolutely inadequate and a violent argument between Himmler and myself arose. Himmler was violently opposed to continuing the distribution of packages of the Red Cross in the prisoner-of-war camps at the same rate as before. As for me, I thought that in this case we should be faced with serious problems regarding the men's health." We present Document Number 826-PS as Exhibit Number RF-356. This document was issued by the Fuehrer's headquarters and is a report on a visit to Norway and Denmark. It is on Page 7 of your document book, Paragraph 3: "All the prisoners of war in Norway receive only sufficient food to keep them alive without working. The felling of timber, however, makes such physical demands on these prisoners of war that, if the food remains the same, a con- considerable decline in production must soon be expected." This note applies to the situation of the 82,000 prisoners of war held captive in Norway, 30,000 of whom were employed on very hard construction work which was being carried out by the Todt organization. This is found in the first paragraph of Page 7. I now present to the Tribunal a document, Number 820-PS, Page 9 in the document book. It deals with the establishment of prisoner-of-war camps in the regions exposed to aerial bombardment. It was issued by headquarters. It is dated 18 August 1943. It was sent by the Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force to the Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht.
M. DUBOST: We submit it as Exhibit Number RF- 358, and we shall read to the Tribunal Paragraph 3: "The Commander-in-Chief, Air General Staff, proposes to erect prisoner-of-war camps in the residential quarters of cities, in order to obtain a certain protection thereby." I skip a paragraph:. "In view of the above reason, consideration should be given to the immediate erection of such camps in a large number of cities which appear to be endangered by air attacks. As the discussions with the city of Frankfurt ... have shown, the towns will support and speed up the construction of the camps by all available means." The last paragraph: "So far, there are in Germany about 8,000 prisoners of war of the British and American Air Forces (without counting those in hospitals). By evacuating the camps actually in existence, which might be used to house bombed-out people, we should immediately have at our disposal prisoners of war for a fairly large number of such camps." This refers to the camps set up in bombed areas and areas which were particularly exposed. On Page 10 the Tribunal will find a document issued by the Fuehrer's headquarters, dated 3 September 1943, dealing with the establishment of these new prisoner-of-war camps for British and American airmen. We submit this document as Exhibit Number RF- 339 (Document Number 823-PS): "1) The Commander-in-Chief, Air General Staff, is planning the erection of further camps for air force prisoners, as the number of new prisoners is mounting to more than 1,000 a month, and the space available at the moment is insufficient. The Supreme Commander of the Luftwaffe proposes to establish these camps within residential quarters of cities, which would constitute at the same time a protection for the "Populations of the town and, in addition, to transfer all the existing camps, containing about 8,000 British and American Air Force prisoners, to larger towns threatened by enemy air attack....
M. DUBOST: "2) The Supreme Commander of the Wehrmacht, Chief of War Prisoners, has approved this project in principle." On Page 12 of the document book which the Tribunal has before it is a document, Number F-551, which we shall submit as Exhibit Number RF-360. It deals with the sentencing of prisoners of war in violation of Article 60 and the following articles of the Geneva Convention . The Geneva Convention provides that the protecting power shall be advised of judicial prosecutions that are made against prisoners of war and will have the right to be represented at the trial. The document which we submit as Exhibit Number RF-360 shows that these provisions were violated: "In practice, the application of Articles 60 and 66, particularly Paragraph 2 of Article 66 of the Convention of 1929, concerning the treatment of prisoners of war causes considerable difficulties. For the application of severe penal jurisdiction, it is intolerable that precisely for the most serious offenses, as for instance, attacks on the guards, the death sentence cannot be carried out until 3 months after its notification to the protecting power. The discipline of prisoners of war is bound to suffer from this." I pass over the rest of the paragraph. On Page 12: "The following regulation is proposed: "a) The French may be confident that the trials by German courts-martial will be carried out thoroughly and conscientiously as before; "b) Germany will designate, as before, a defense counsel and an interpreter....
M. DUBOST: "c) In case of a death sentence an adequate respite will be granted." On top of Page 13: "In this respect, in urgent cases, however, Germany must reserve for herself the right-even if not expressly stated to execute the sentence immediately." Third paragraph: "There is no question of allowing France, by virtue of Article 62 , Paragraph III (POW), of the Geneva Convention, to delegate representatives to the chief sessions of the German Military Tribunals." We possess an example of the violation of Articles 60 and those following of the Geneva Convention in the report of the Netherlands Government, which the Tribunal will find on Page 14 of its ,document book.
THE PRESIDENT: I think we better break off now. [The Tribunal recessed until 1400 hours.] Afternoon Session
MARSHAL: May it please the Court, I desire to announce that the Defendants Kaltenbrunner and Seyss-Inquart will be absent from this afternoon's session due to illness.
THE PRESIDENT: I have an announcement to make. When the attention of the Tribunal was called by the Defendant Hess to the absence of his counsel, the Tribunal directed that the presentation of the individual case against Hess be postponed, so that counsel could be present when it was presented. So far as the cross-examination of witnesses who testified to matters affecting the general case and not against Hess specifically is concerned, it is the view of the Tribunal that the cross-examination conducted by counsel representing the defendants equally interested with Hess in this feature of the case was sufficient to protect his interests, and the witnesses will therefore not be recalled. The Tribunal has received a letter from the Defendant Hess dated 30 January 1946, to the effect that he is dissatisfied with the services of counsel who has been appearing for him and does not wish to be represented by him further, but wishes to represent himself. The Tribunal is of the opinion that, having elected, in conformity with Article 16 of the Charter, to be represented by counsel, the Defendant Hess ought not to be allowed at this stage of the Trial to dispense with the services of counsel and defend himself. The matter is of importance to the Tribunal, as well as to the defendant, and the Tribunal is of the opinion that it is not in the interests of the defendant that he should be unrepresented by counsel. The Tribunal has therefore appointed Dr., Stahmer to represent the Defendant Hess, in place of Dr. Von Rohrscheidt. [Turning to M. Dubost] Yes, M. Dubost.