dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
MAJOR FARR: In the course of its development from a group of strong-arm bodyguards, some two hundred in number, to a complex organization participating in every field of Nazi endeavor, the SS found room for its members in high places; and persons in high places found for themselves a position in the SS. Of the defendants charged in the Indictment , seven were very high ranking officers in the SS. They are the Defendants Ribbentrop, Hess, Kaltenbrunner, Bormann, Sauckel, Neurath, and Seyss-Inquart. The vital part that the Defendant Kaltenbrunner played in the SS, in the SD, and in the entire Security Police will be shown by evidence to be presented after the case on the Gestapo has gone in. With respect to the other six defendants whom I have named, I desire to call the Tribunal's attention now to the fact of their membership in the SS. That fact is rather a matter of judicial notice than proof. Evidence of the fact is to be found in two official publications which I shall now offer the Court. The first is this black book-the membership list of the SS as of December 1, 1936. This book contains a list of members of the SS arranged according to rank. I offer it in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-474 (Document Number USA-474). Turning to Page 8 of this book, line 2, we find the following: The name "Hess, Rudolf" followed by the notation, "By authority of the Fuehrer the right to wear the uniform of an SS Obergruppenfuehrer." I now offer the 1937 edition of the same membership list as Exhibit Number USA475 (Document Number USA-475). Turning to Page 10, line 50, we find the name "Bormann, Martin"; and in line with his name on the opposite page under the column headed "Gruppenfuehrer," the following date: 30 January 1937. In the same edition on Page 12, line 56, appears the name "van Neurath, Constantin," and on the opposite page under the column headed "Gruppenfuehrer," the date "18 September 1937." The other publication to which I refer is Der Grossdeutsche Reichstag for the fourth voting period, a manual edited by E. Kienast, Ministerial Director of the German Reichstag.
MAJOR FARR: This is an official handbook containing biographical data as to members of the Reichstag. It is Document Number 2381-PS, and I offer it in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-476. On Page 349 the following appears: "van Ribbentrop, Joachim, Reichsminister des Auswartigen, SS Obergruppenfuehrer." On Page 360 the following appears: "Sauckel, Fritz, Gauleiter und Reichsstatthalter in Thuringen, SS Obergruppenfuehrer." On Page 389 the following appears: "Seyss-Inquart, Arthur, Dr. fur., Reichsminister, SS Obergruppenfuehrer."
THE PRESIDENT: What was the date of that book?
MAJOR FARR: This book covers the fourth voting period, beginning on 10 April 1938 and covering the period up to 30 January 1947-that is, the voting period covers that course of years. The edition, I think, was in 1943. I might point out that the rank of the defendants mentioned in the 1936 and 1937 editions of the membership list of the SS may not be the final rank they held. They were Gruppenfuehrer at that time, but they were members of the SS, as shown by the book. It is our contention that the SS, as defined in Appendix B . Page 36 of the Indictment, was an unlawful organization. As an organization founded on the principle that persons of "German blood" were a "master race" it exemplified a basic Nazi doctrine. It served as one of the means through which the conspirators acquired control of the German Government. The operations of the SD and of the SS Totenkopf Verbande in concentration camps were means used by the conspirators to secure their regime and terrorize their opponents, as alleged in Count One. In the Nazi program of Jewish extermination, all branches of the SS were involved from the very beginning. Through the Allgemeine SS as a pare-military organization, the SS Verfugungstruppe and SS Totenkopf Verbande as professional combat forces, and the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle as a Fifth Column agency, the SS participated in preparations for aggressive war and, through its militarized units, in the waging of aggressive war in the West and in the East, as set forth in Counts One and Two of the Indictment. In the course of such war all components of the SS had a part in the War Crimes and the Crimes against Humanity set forth in Counts Three and Four of the Indictment: the murder and ill-treatment of civilian populations in occupied territory, the murder and ill-treatment of prisoners of war, and the Germanization of occupied territories. The evidence has shown that the SS was a single enterprise-a unified organization. Some of its functions were, of course performed by one branch or department or office, some by another.
MAJOR FARR: No single branch or department participated in every phase of its activity, but every branch and department and office was necessary to the functioning of the whole. The situation is much the same as in the case of the individual defendants at the bar. Not all participated in every act of the conspiracy; but all, we contend, performed a contributing part in the whole criminal scheme. The evidence has also shown that the SS was not only an organization of volunteers but that applicants had to meet the strictest standards of selection. It was not easy to become an SS member. That was true of all branches of the SS. We clearly recognize, of course, that during the course of the war, as the demands for manpower increased and the losses of the Waffen-SS grew heavier and heavier, there were occasions when some men drafted for compulsory military service were assigned to units of the Waffen-SS rather than to the Wehrmacht. Those instances were relatively few. Evidence of the recruiting standards of the Waffen-SS in 1943, which I quoted yesterday, has shown that the membership in that branch was as essentially voluntary and highly selective as in the other branches. Doubtless some of the members of the SS, or of other organizations alleged to be unlawful in the Indictment, might desire to show that their participation in the organization was a small or innocuous one, that compelling reasons drove them to apply for membership, that they were not fully conscious of its aims or that they were not mentally responsible when they became members. Such facts might or might not be relevant, if such a person were on trial. But in any event this is not the forum to try out such matters. The question before this Tribunal is simply this: whether the SS was or was not an unlawful organization. The evidence has finally shown what the aims and activities of the SS were. Some of those aims were stated in publications which I have quoted to the Court.
MAJOR FARR: The activities were so widespread and so notorious, covering so many fields of unlawful endeavor, that the illegality of the organization could not have been concealed. It was a notorious fact, and Himmler himself in 1936, in a quotation which I read to the Tribunal yesterday, admitted that when he said: "I know that there are people in Germany now who become sick when they see these black coats. We know the reason and we do not expect to be loved by too many." It was, we submit, at all times the exclusive function and purpose of the SS to carry out the common objectives of the defendant conspirators. Its activities in carrying out those functions involved the commission of the crimes defined in Article 6 of the Charter . By reason of its aims and the means used for the accomplishment thereof, the SS should be declared a criminal organization in accordance with Article 9 of the Charter .
COL. STOREY: If the Tribunal please, the next presentation will be the Gestapo, and it will take just a few seconds to get the material here. If the Tribunal please, we are now ready to proceed, if Your Honors are.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
COL. STOREY: We first pass to the Tribunal document books marked "Exhibit AA." Your Honors will notice they are in two volumes, and I will try at each time to refer to which volume. They are separated into the D documents, the L documents, the PS documents, et cetera . The presentation of evidence on the criminality of the Geheime Staatspolizei (Gestapo) includes evidence on the criminality of the Sicherheitsdienst (SD) and of the Schutzstaffeln (SS), which has been discussed by Major Farr, because a great deal of the criminal acts were so inter-related. In the Indictment , as Your Honors know, the SD is included by special reference as a part of the SS, since it originated as a part of the SS and has always retained its character as a Party organization, as distinguished from the Gestapo which was a State organization. As will be shown by the evidence, however, the Gestapo and the SD were brought into very close working relationship, the SD serving primarily as the information-gathering agency and the Gestapo as the executive agency of the police system established by the Nazis for the purpose of combatting the political and ideological enemies of the Nazi regime. In short, I think we might think of the SD as the intelligence organization and the Gestapo the executive agency, the former a Party organization and the latter a State organization but merged together for all practical purposes. The first subject: The Gestapo and SD were formed into a powerful, centralized, political police system that served Party, State, and Nazi leadership. The Gestapo was first established in Prussia on the 26th of April 1933 by the Defendant Goering with the mission of carrying out the duties of the political police with, or in place of, the ordinary police authorities. The Gestapo was given the rank of a higher police authority and was subordinated only to the Minister of Interior, to whom was delegated the responsibility of determining its functional and territorial jurisdiction.
COL. STOREY: That fact is established in the Preussische Gesetzsammlung of 26 April 1933, Page 122, and it is our Document 2104-PS. Pursuant to this law and on the same date, the Minister of Interior issued a decree on the reorganization of the police which established a State Police Bureau in each governmental district of Prussia, subordinate to the Secret State Police Bureau in Berlin; and I cite as authority the Ministerialblatt for the Internal Administration of Prussia, 1933, Page 503, and it is Document 2371-PS. Concerning the formation of the Gestapo, the Defendant Goering said, in Aufbau einer Nation , of 1934, Page 88, which is our Document 2344-PS, and I quote from the English translation a short paragraph, of which Your Honors will take judicial notice, unless Your Honors want to turn to it in full: "For weeks"-this is Goering talking-"I had been working personally on the reorganization, and at last I, alone and upon my own decision and my own reflections, created the office of the Secret State Police. This instrument which is so feared by the enemies of the State has contributed most to the fact that today there can no longer be talk of a Communist or Marxist danger in Germany and Prussia."
THE PRESIDENT: What was the date?
COL. STOREY: The date? 1934, Sir. On November 30, 1933 Goering issued a decree for the Prussian State Ministry and the Reich Chancellor placing the Gestapo under his direct supervision as Chief. The Gestapo was thereby established as an independent branch of the Administration of the Interior responsible directly to Goering as Prussian Prime Minister. This decree gave the Gestapo jurisdiction over the political police matters of the general and interior administration and provided that the district, county, and local police authorities were subject to the directives of the Gestapo-and that cites the Prussian laws of 30 November 1933, Page 413, and Document 2105-PS. In a speech delivered at a meeting of the Prussian State Council on 18 June 1934, which is published in Speeches and Essays of Hermann Goering, 1939, Page 102, our Document 3343-PS, Goering said, and I quote one paragraph: "The creation of the Secret State Police was also a necessity. You may recognize the importance attributed by the new State to this instrument of state security from the fact that the Prime Minister, himself, has made himself head of this department of the administration just because it is the observation of all currents directed against the new State which is of fundamental importance." By a decree of 8 March 1934 the regional State Police offices were separated from their organizational connection with the District Government and established as independent authorities of the Gestapo. That cites the Preussische Gesetzsammlung of 8 March 1934, Page 143, our Document 2113-PS. I now offer in evidence Document Number 1680-PS, Exhibit USA-477. This is an article entitled "10 Years of Security Police and the SD," published in the German Police journal, the magazine of the Security Police and SD, of 1 February 1943.
COL. STOREY: I quote one paragraph from this article on Page 2 of the English translations Document 1680-PS, which is the third main paragraph: "Parallel to that development in Prussia, the Reichsfuehrer SS Heinrich Himmler created in Bavaria the Bavarian Political Police and also suggested and directed the establishment of Political Police in the Lander other than Prussia. The unification of the Political Police of all the Lander took place in the spring of 1934 when Minister President Hermann Goering appointed Reichsfuehrer SS Heinrich Himmler, who had mean while been named Chief of the Political Police in all the Lander except Prussia, to the post of Deputy Chief of the Prussian Secret State Police." The Prussian Law about the Secret State Police, dated 10 February 1936, then summed up the development hitherto, and determined the position and responsibilities of the Secret State Police in the executive regulations issued the same day. On 10 February 1936 the basic law for the Gestapo was promulgated by Goering as Prussian Prime Minister-I refer to Document 2107-PS. This law provided that the Secret State Police had the duty to investigate and to combat in the entire territory of the State all tendencies inimical to the State and declared that orders and matters of the Secret State Police were not subject to the review of the administrative courts. That is the Prussian State 1a\v of that date cited on Pages 21-22 of the publication of the laws of 1936. Also on that same date of 10 February 1936 a decree for the execution of the law was issued by Goering, as prussian Prime Minister, and by Frick, as Minister of the Interior. This decree provided that the Gestapo had authority to enact measures valid in the entire area of the State and measures affecting that area-by the way, that is found in 2108-PS and is also a published law-that it was the centralized agency for collecting political intelligence in the field of political police, and that it administered the concentration camps.
COL. STOREY: The Gestapo was given authority to make police investigations in cases of criminal attacks upon the Party as well as upon the State. Later, on the 28th of August 1936, a circular of the Reichsfuehrer SS and Chief of the German Police provided that as of 1 October 1936 the Political Police forces of the German provinces were to be called the "Geheime Staatspolizei." That means the Secret State Police. The regional of flees were still to be described as State Police. The translation of that law is in 2372-PS, Reichsministerialblatt of 1936, Number 44, Page 1344. Later, on 20 September 1936, a circular of the Minister of Interior, Frick, commissioned the Gestapo Bureau in Berlin with the supervision of the duties of the Political Police commanders in all the states of Germany. That is Reichsministerialblatt 1936, Page 1343, our Document L-297. The law regulating and relating to financial measures in connection with the police, of the 19th of March 1937, provided that the officials of the Gestapo were to be considered direct officials of the Reich and their salaries, in addition to the operational expenses of the whole State Police, were to be borne from 1 April 1937 by the Reich. That is shown in Document 2243-PS-which is a copy of the law of 19 March 1937-Page 325. Thus, through the above laws and decrees, the Gestapo was established as a uniform political police system operating throughout the Reich and serving Party, State, and Nazi leadership. In the course of the development of the SD, it came into increasingly close co-operation with the Gestapo and also with the Reichskriminalpolizei (the Criminal Police), known as Kripo, K-R-I-P-O, shown up there under Amt V. The SD was called upon to furnish information to various State authorities. On the 11th of November 1938 a decree of the Reich Minister of Interior declared the SD to be the intelligence organization for the State as well as the Party, that it had the particular duty of supporting the Secret State Police, and that it thereby became active on a national mission.
COL. STOREY: These duties necessitated a closer co-operation between the SD and the authorities for the general and interior administration. That law is translated in 1638-PS. The Tribunal has already received evidence concerning the decrees of 17 and 26 June 1936, under which Himmler was appointed Chief of the German Police and by which Heydrich became the first Chief of the Security Police and SD. Even then Goering did not relinquish his position as Chief of the Prussian Gestapo. Thus, the decree of the Reichsfuehrer SS and Chief of German Police that was issued on the 28th of August 1936, which is our Document 2372-PS, was distributed "to the Prussian Minister President as Chief of the Prussian Secret State Police," that is, to Goering. On 27 September 1939, by order of Himmler in his capacity as Reichsfuehrer SS and Chief of the German Police, the central offices of the Gestapo and SD and also those of the Criminal Police were centralized in the office of the Chief of the Security Police and SD under the name of RSHA, which Your Honors have heard described by Major Parry. Under this order the personnel and administrative sections of each agency were co-ordinated in Amt I and II of the chart shown here of the RSHA. The operational sections of the SD became Amt III, shown in the box "Amt III," except for foreign intelligence which was placed over in Number VI. The operational sections of the Gestapo became Amt IV, as shown on the chart, and the operational sections of the Kripo-that is, the Criminal Police- became Amt V, as shown on the chart. Ohlendorf was named the Chief of Amt III, the SD inside Germany, Muller was named Chief of Amt IV, and Nebe was named Chief of Amt V, the Kripo.
COL. STOREY: On the 27th of September 1939 Heydrich, the Chief of the Security Police and SD, issued a directive pursuant to the order of Himmler, in which he ordered that the designation and heading of RSHA be used exclusively in internal relations of the Reich Ministry of Interior, and the heading "The Chief of the Security Police and SD" in transactions with outside persons and offices. The directive provided that the Gestapo would continue to use the designation and heading "Secret State Police" according to the particular instructions. This order is Document L-361, Exhibit USA-478, which we now offer in evidence; and I refer Your Honors to the first paragraph of L-361. That is found in the first volume. I just direct Your Honors' attention to the date and to the subject, which is the amalgamation of the Zentralamter of the Sicherheitspolizei and of the SD, and the creation of the four sections, and then to the words: ". . . will be joined to the RSHA in accordance with the following directives. This amalgamation carries with it no change in the position of these Amter in the Party nor in the governmental administration." I might say here parenthetically, if the Tribunal please, that we like to think of the RSHA as being the so-called administrative office through which a great many of these organizations were administered and then a number of these organizations, including the Gestapo, maintaining their separate identity as operational organizations. I think a good illustration, if Your Honors will recall, is that during the war there may be a certain division or a certain air force which is administratively under a certain headquarters, but operationally, when they had an invasion, it may be under the general supervision of somebody else who was operating a task force. So the RSHA was really the administrative office of a great many of these alleged criminal organizations. The Gestapo and SD were therefore organized functionally on the basis of the opponents to be combatted and the matters to be investigated.
COL. STOREY: I now invite the attention of the Tribunal to this chart, which has already been identified, and I believe it is Exhibit USA-53. This chart-I am in error-that is the original identification number. This chart shows the main chain of command from Himmler, who was the Reich Leader of the SS and Chief of the German Police, to Kaltenbrunner, who was Chief of the Security Police and SD, and from Kaltenbrunner to the various field offices of the Gestapo and the SD. We now formally offer in evidence this chart, Document L-219, as Exhibit USA-479. The chart itself is based upon the document, which is L-219. We have photostatic copies, and you probably want to refer to the one on the wall. This chart, from which the one on the wall is taken, has been certified by Otto Ohlendorf, Chief of Amt III of the RSHA, and by Walter Schellenberg, Chief of Amt VI of the RSHA, and has been officially identified by both of those former officials. The chart shows that the principal flow of command in police matters came from Himmler as Reich Leader of the SS and Chief of the German Police directly to Kaltenbrunner, who was the Chief of the Security Police and SD and as such was also head of the RSHA, which is the administrative office to which I have referred. Kaltenbrunner's headquarters organization was composed of seven Amter, plus a military office-the seven Amter shown here. Under Subsection D was Obersturmbannfuehrer Rauff, who handled technical matters, including motor vehicles of the SIPO and the SD, to which we will refer later. Amt III was the SD inside Germany and was charged with investigations into spheres of German national life. It was the internal intelligence organization of the police system and its interests extended into all areas occupied by Germany during the course of the war. In 1943 it contained four sections. I would like to mention them briefly. It shows their scope of authority. Section A dealt with questions of legal order and structure of the Reich. B dealt with national questions, including minorities, race, and health of the people.