dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: May I continue, Mr. President. Thus the document which has been submitted to the Tribunal will be found on Page 67 of the document file in their possession. I shall allow myself to repeat in my own words the biographical data concerning the Defendant Le Court, who was brought before a courtmartial. He was not an SS man, but a non-Party senior corporal of the German Army, 27 years old. He was born and lived, before the war, in the town of Stargard; was owner of a cinema, and was later mobilized in the army, where he served in the 1st Company of the 4th Airborne Division. I begin to quote the statements in evidence given by Le Court contained in the section entitled "Judicial Investigation" beginning with Paragraph 2. The Tribunal will find this place in the document book on Page 68, fifth paragraph. Le Court stated: "Prior to my capture by Red Army soldiers, that is, before February 1944, I served as laboratory assistant in the 1st Bicycle Company of the 2d Air Force Infantry Regiment of the 4th Air Force Infantry Division at the headquarters of Air Field Service E 33/XI. "In addition to photographic material, I handled other work when not on duty, that is to say, I spent my free time for my own pleasure in shooting Red Army prisoners of war and peaceful citizens and soldiers. I used to jot down in a special book the number of prisoners of war and peaceful citizens I had shot." I omit three paragraphs describing the shooting of prisoners of war by Le Court, and continue the quotation...
THE PRESIDENT: Colonel Smirnov, the passage that you read a moment ago about jotting down the numbers in his book does not occur in the translation which is before me. I do not know whether it is in your original. I suppose it is. Are you sure it is in the original?
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: It is there, Mr. President. Mr. President, I just verified this extract which I am quoting with the original book of documents. It corresponds exactly to the text.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well. I only wanted to be certain that it was in the original, as it did not occur in the translation before me. You can continue.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: I interrupted the quotation on Page 68, and omitted three paragraphs. Thus, I came to Page 69. Perhaps this is the reason why the President of the Tribunal could not find the sentence I quoted. I continue the quotation: "Besides the shooting of prisoners of war, I also shot guerrillas, peaceful citizens, and burned houses, together with their inhabitants. "In November 1942 I participated in the shooting of 92 Soviet citizens. "From April to December 1942, while a member of the Air Force Infantry Regiment, I participated in the shooting of 55 Soviet citizens. I took care of the actual shooting." I omit a paragraph and continue: "In addition, I participated in punitive expeditions when I personally set fire to houses. "Altogether more than 30 houses in various villages were burned down by me. I arrived in the village with the punitive expedition, entered the houses and warned the population that no one was to leave the houses, which were going to be burned. I set fire to a house, and when anybody tried to save himself-nobody was allowed to leave-I drove him back into the house or shot him. In that way I burned more than 30 houses and 70 peaceful citizens, mainly aged men, women, and children. "Altogether I have personally shot 1,200 persons." For the purpose of saving time I omit six paragraphs and quote further. You will find this on Page 70 of the document book: "The German High Command promoted in every way the shooting and killing of Soviet citizens. In recognition of good work and service in the German Army, which found expression in the shooting by me of prisoners of war and Soviet citizens, I was promoted before my promotion was due, on 1 November 1941, to the rank of senior corporal.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: This promotion should have come about on the 1st of November 1942; at the same time I was awarded the East Medal." Le Court was in no way an exception, and in confirmation of this I shall now refer briefly to the verdict of the trial held in the town of Smolensk by the district military tribunal against a group of former members of the German Army who were brought to justice for committing atrocities against peaceful citizens and prisoners of war in the town of Smolensk. This document was submitted to the Tribunal by my colleague, Colonel Pokrovsky, as Exhibit Number USSR-87 (Document Number USSR-87), and joined to the record of the present Trial. The Tribunal will find this document on Page 71 of the document book. I omit all the general part of the verdict, and beg to be allowed to draw the attention of the Tribunal to that part of the verdict which is in the ninth paragraph on Page 71 of the document book, which says that in 80,graves alone, which were opened up and examined by legal-medical experts in the town of Smolensk and in the district of Smolensk, over 135,000 corpses of Soviet citizens- women, children, and men of various ages-were discovered. I skip the second page of the verdict and come to that part of the document which gives a description of the criminal deeds of individual defendants brought to trial under these charges. I shall not quote data regarding all 10 defendants, but only 2 or 3 of them. The Tribunal will find this part on Page 73 of the document book. This is the sixth paragraph of the text. I quote: "Hirschfeld was interpreter for the German Military Command in the District Kommandantur of Smolensk. He personally beat and seized for treason perfectly innocent Soviet citizens, without consideration for sex and age, and forced them to make false statements. On receiving these false statements forced from them by beatings, the arrested persons were shot by the Kommandantur troops.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Hirschfeld participated personally in the annihilation of Soviet citizens in Smolensk in May 1943, by means of asphyxiation through carbon monoxide in gas vans. In January and February 1943, he participated in punitive expeditions against guerrillas and against peaceful Soviet citizens in the district of Newel-Uswjati. While he was commanding the German punitive unit, he committed, together with his soldiers, acts of violence against the peaceful population."
THE PRESIDENT: Colonel Smirnov, in the Tribunal's translation into English, we have missing pages from 34 up to 45. Do you think that those pages could be found? On our pages-I think your pagination is different-but the document that you are now Deferring to, USSR-87, begins on Page 34 of our translation, and the translation then skips to Page 45.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Mr. President, I am not quoting the numbers of pages of the translation, but the pages of the document book.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I follow that, but I was only wondering whether, by a slip possibly, that these pages had been translated and perhaps had not got into our copy of the documents and whether they could be found. You see, we have all pages missing in the translation.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Mr. President, I have not yet seen the translation. If the President will allow me, during the intermission I shall verify the translation, and shall put the translation file into complete order.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, certainly. Go on in the meantime.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Together with his soldiers, he burned nine Soviet villages and hamlets. He plundered farmers and shot innocent peaceful Soviet citizens who came out of the woods to get to the piles of ashes remaining from their burned-down homes in order to search for food. He participated in the deportation of Soviet citizens into German slavery. I shall allow myself to quote still another excerpt concerning the defendant named Modisch who was a medical assistant in the German Military Hospital Number 551. The Tribunal will find this part on Page 73 of the document book, in the last paragraph: 2. "Modisch was a medical assistant in the 551st German Military Hospital in the city of Smolensk from September 1941 until April 1943. He was an eyewitness and immediate participant in the killing of prisoners of war, wounded soldiers, and officers of the Red Army, upon whom the German professors and doctors, Schemm, Gette, Muller, Ott, Stefen, Wagner, and others carried out, under the pretext of a cure, various experiments with previously unknown biological and chemical medicines. After that, the wounded prisoners of war were infected with septicaemia and killed." And what had Modisch personally done? I quote further from the same document: "Modisch himself killed, by means of injections of great quantities of strophantin and arsenic, no less than 24 prisoners of war, both Red Army men and officers of the Red Army. In addition, he used, for medical treatment of German military personnel, the blood of Soviet children, ranging in age from 6 to 8 years, by taking great quantities of blood from them, after which the children died. He extracted from Russian prisoners of war the spinal fluid, whereupon because of emaciation they suffered paralysis of the lower extremities. He participated also in the plundering of Soviet medical institutions in the city of Smolensk." I skip another page in the document.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: The Tribunal can convince itself that every one of these 10 defendants brought to trial committed such a long series of crimes that, according to the laws of any civilized country, they would be condemned to death. I quote as an example one of the charges proved during this trial regarding the Defendant Kurt Gaudian. The extract referring to him will be found by the Tribunal on Page 74 and on Page 75. I draw the attention of the Tribunal to the fact that Gaudian raped seven young girls and then killed them. I conclude this part by quoting only three lines which state: "In the month of July 1943, with his participation, 60 inhabitants of the district of Osipowitschi were learned in a stable. The village itself was also burned." I skip a part concerning Hentschke and quote only five lines, on Page 75 of the document file from that part of the verdict which concerns Muller, a lance corporal in the 335th Guard Battalion: "At various times, the Defendant Muller killed 96 Soviet citizens, among them old men, women, and babies. Muller raped 32 Soviet women, of whom 6 were killed after having been raped. Among the women raped, several were 14- or 15-year-old girls." I do not know whether it is necessary to continue this quotation. I believe that the nature of these criminals, 7 out of 10 of whom already have ended their lives on the gallows, has been made clear to the Tribunal. However, in order to characterize, not the ones who committed the crimes, but those who were actually responsible for the lives of the population of the occupied territory in the East, I beg the Tribunal to allow me to turn to the diary of the Defendant Hans Frank, which has already been submitted to the Tribunal by our American colleagues as Document Number 2233-PS. We quote certain extracts from Frank's diary as Exhibit Number USSR-223. The Tribunal will find these excerpts on Page 78 of the document book. I quote that part of the excerpt which the Tribunal will find on Page 86 of the document book, third paragraph, the first column of the text.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: On 6 February 1940 Frank gave an interview to the Volkischer Beobachter correspondent, Kleiss. I quote that section of the interview which was already pointed out to the Tribunal. I begin the quotation: "Interview given by the Governor General to the Volkischer Beobachter correspondent, Kleiss, on 6 February 1940, Page 3: "Kleiss: 'It might be interesting to develop the thesis which distinguishes a Protectorate from a Government General.' l "The Governor General: 'I might state a striking difference: In Prague, for instance, there were hung up red posters announcing that seven Czechs had been shot that day. I then said to myself: " ' "If I wished to order that one should hang up posters about every seven Poles shot, there would not be enough forests in Poland with which to make the paper for these posters. Indeed, we must act cruelly." "' The offensive on the Western Front, which began on 10 May 1940, diverted the attention of world public opinion from the crimes committed under the personal direction of Frank and permitted Frank to have several thousand representatives of the Polish intelligentsia condemned to death by court-martial and physically exterminated. I quote Frank's statement at the police conference held on 30 May 1940, where this crime was finally decided upon. I begin this quotation on Page 86 of the document book, sixth paragraph, first column of the text: "The offensive in the West began on 10 May. On that day the center of interest shifted from the events taking place here. It would be a matter of complete indifference to me whether the deeds attributed by atrocity propaganda and lying reports all over the world to the National Socialist authorities in these districts worried the Americans, the French, the Jews, or the Pope in Rome for that matter.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: But it was terrible for me and for all of them to be told unceasingly during all these months by the Ministry of Propaganda, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of the Interior, and even the Army, that ours was a regime of murder, that these crimes of ours were to cease and so forth. And we had to say, of course, we would no longer do it. It was equally clear that up to that moment, under the cross-fire of the whole world, we could not do anything of the kind on a large scale. But since 10 May we are completely indifferent to this atrocity propaganda. We must use the opportunity in our hands." I skip now two paragraphs and continue with the quotation: "I frankly admit that it will cost the lives of some thousands of Poles and that these will be taken mainly from leading members of the Polish intelligentsia. In these times we, as National Socialists, are bound to ensure that no further resistance is offered by the Polish people."I draw the attention of the Tribunal to this sentence particularly: "I realize the responsibility we are thus assuming." I skip one paragraph and continue the quotation, which the Tribunal will find on Page 86 of the document file, fifth paragraph. "Furthermore, SS-Obergruppenfuehrer Kruger and I have decided that appeasement measures should be speeded up. . I pray you, gentlemen, to take the most rigorous measures possible to help us in this task. For my own part, I will do everything in my power in order to facilitate its execution. I appeal to you as the champions of National Socialism, and I need surely say nothing further. We will carry out this measure and I may tell you in confidence that we shall be acting on the Fuehrer's orders. The Fuehrer said to me, 'The handling of German policy in the Government General and its establishment on a firm basis is a matter which devolves personally on the responsible men in the Government General.' "He expressed himself in this way: The men capable of leadership whom we have found to exist in Poland must be liquidated. Those following men must . . .
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: be eliminated in their turn. There is no need to burden the Reich and the Reich police organization with this. There is no need to send these elements to Reich concentration camps, and by so doing involve ourselves in disputes and unnecessary correspondence with their relations. We will liquidate our difficulties in the country itself, and we will do it in the simplest way possible." I conclude this quotation and pass on to Page 87, second paragraph, first column of the text. I think that this quotation is characteristic, for it was precisely Frank, as the diary proves, who first thought about the creation of special concentration camps, later officially known as "Vernichtungslager" (extermination camps). I quote the same speech of Frank, Page 9, first paragraph: "As to the concentration camps, we know perfectly well that concentration camps in the true sense of the word are not going to be organized In the Government General Every suspected person must be immediately liquidated. Internees from the Government General at present in concentration camps in the Reich must be handed over to us for 'Operation AB' or liquidated there." I quote further from the same speech in the section-further excerpts from the diary of Hans Frank concerning the year 1940. The Tribunal will find this place on Page 94 of the document book, fifth paragraph, first column of the text. I quote: "We cannot burden the concentration camps in the Reich with our affairs. We had terrible trouble with the Krakow professors. If we had done the thing from here, it would have been different. For this reason I would ask you most urgently . . not to send any more people to concentration camps in the Reich but to liquidate them here or to impose punishment according to regulations. Any other method is a burden for the Reich and a perpetual source of trouble. We have an entirely different method of treatment here and we must adhere to it. I must point out expressly that even if peace is concluded, this treatment will not be altered.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Peace will mean only that as a world power we should continue more intensively the same general political operations...." I deem it opportune to draw the attention of the Tribunal to the fact that all the major extermination camps were indeed located on the territory of the Government General. There was its own periodicity or cycles in the fascist crimes and in the proportions they assumed, and if in 1940 Frank made a long speech to the policemen justifying the so-called "actions" with regard to several thousand Polish intellectuals, then on 18 March 1944, in his speech at the Reichshof, he stated-I quote from Page 93 of the document file, third paragraph, second column. I begin the quotation: "18 March 1944, Speech at the Reichshof. "Dr. Frank: 'If I had gone to the Fuehrer and said, "My Fuehrer, I have to report that I have destroyed a further 150,000 Poles," he would say, "All right, if it was necessary." ' " This fascist specialist on legal questions annihilated 3 million Jews in the territory under his jurisdiction which fell only temporarily into the hands of the fascist invaders. On this occasion Frank said-I quote his speech at a business meeting of the NSDAP orators in Krakow on 4 March 1944. The Tribunal will find this excerpt on Page 93 of the document book, second paragraph, second column of the text; I begin the quotation of Dr. Frank: "If there are any woebegone souls today who bemoan the fate of the Jews and say with tears in their eyes, 'Isn't it awful what is being done to the Jews,' we should ask them if they are still of the same opinion now. If we had there 2 million Jews carrying on their activities and opposed to them the few German men in the country today, we would no longer have control of the situation.... Jews are a race which must be eradicated. When we catch one of them, it is the end of him." I pass on to that part of Frank's diary...
THE PRESIDENT: Shall we adjourn now? [A recess was taken.]
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Mr. President, I received information from our staff that the 11 pages which were not incorporated into the English text in your possession were handed to you. Is it true, Sir?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: May I continue? 'THE PRESIDENT: Please do.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: I am quoting now from Frank's diary at the place which the Tribunal will find on Page 93 of the document file, in the second column of the text, second paragraph below the title, "Meeting of Political Leaders of NSDAP in Krakow, on 15 January 1944." It begins thus, Dr. Frank, "I did not hesitate to say that for every German killed, up to a hundred Poles would be shot." In these dark days the Polish people regarded the victims of Frank and of his henchmen as martyrs. That is the reason it seems to me that, on 16 December 1942, at a government meeting in Krakow, Frank stated-I am quoting excerpts from the diary on Page 92 in the document book, third paragraph after the heading, the first column of the text. I begin the quotation: "We must consider whether, for practical reasons, executions should be carried out as far as possible on the spot where the murder of a German was attempted. It might also be as well to consider whether special places for execution should be set up, as it has been established that the Polish population streams to the places of execution, which are accessible to everyone, for the purpose of filling vessels with the bloodstained earth, and taking them to church." I brought Frank's diary to your attention, Your Honors, because he was one of Hitler's closest associates and because this very wellknown "learned" jurist of fascism was actually a positive alter ego of those who cut in two the bodies of children in the Yanov Camp. At the same time he was one of the creators of that part of the legal code of the German fascists which completely negated justice. After all, the whole miserable juridical wisdom of Mein Kampf fundamentally comes down to just one wicked formula, that is, that "might is right." I studied this book and found no other sense in the text. I quote the 64th edition, Page 740. Frank was to Hitler that necessary evil gnome of jurisprudence whom Hitler needed to clothe in legal form the inhuman theories of fascism.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: In support of the fact as to how far the profanation of the basic ideas of justice incorporated in the criminal and civil law of all civilized people went, I submit to the Tribunal the original copy of one of Frank's directives published in the official bulletin of the Governor General for 1943. It is dated 2 October 1943 and is being presented by the Soviet delegation to the Tribunal as Exhibit Number USSR-335 (Document Number USSR-335). The Tribunal will find the document quoted on Page 95 of the document book. I quote the document in full: "Decree: The combating of attacks on German construction work in the Government General, issued 2 October 1943. "On the basis of Paragraph 5, Section 1, of the Fuehrer's decree of 12 October 1939 (Reichsgesetzblatt I, Page 2077) I decree, until further notice: "Paragraph 1. "(1) Non-Germans who violate laws, decrees, official regulations, or orders with the intention of hampering or interfering with German construction work in the Government General will be punished by death. "(2) Section 1 does not apply to nationals of countries allied to the Greater German Reich or those who are not at war with the Reich. "Paragraph 2. "The abettor and the accomplice will be considered as equally guilty with the perpetrators the same penalty will be exacted in the case of attempted violations as in the case of those actually committed. "Paragraph 3. "(1) The summary courts of the police will be competent to pass judgment. "(2) The summary court of the Security Police may pass the matter to the German Public Prosecution if there are special reasons for doing so. "Paragraph 4. "The summary courts of the Security Police will consist of an SS-Fuehrer belonging to the office of the Commander of the Security Police and Security Service and two members of the office. "Paragraph 5. "(1) The following shall be recorded in writing 1. The names of the judges; 2. the names of those on whom sentence is passed; 3. the evidence on which judgment was based; 4. the offense; 5. the date on which the sentence was imposed; 6.