Passion of the Teutons

His words offer insight into what evidence would be presented, and pertaining to what charges. Thanks to the Germans’ inherent "Teutonic passion" for documenting everything, there was no shortage of evidence.

If before Jackson's opening speech the defendants had hoped that the prosecution would not find or would not be able to prepare full-fledged evidence for the trial, on that day their hopes were dashed. During the break and in the evening, the defendants opened up in conversations with psychologist Gustav Gilbert, but everyone, with the exception of Goering, attempted to feign horror at what they heard in court, and offer excuses.

They will not receive the poisoned goblet

Jackson. Less than eight months ago today, the courtroom in which you sit was an enemy fortress in the hands of German SS troops. Less than eight months ago, nearly all our witnesses and documents were in enemy hands. The law had not been codified, no procedures had been established, no tribunal was in existence, no usable courthouse stood here, none of the hundreds of tonnes of official German documents had been examined, no prosecuting staff had been assembled, nearly all of the present defendants were at large, and the four prosecuting powers had not yet joined in common cause to try them.

…We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants today is the record on which history will judge us tomorrow. To pass these defendants a poisoned chalice is to put it to our own lips as well. We must summon such detachment and intellectual integrity to our task that this Trial will commend itself to posterity as fulfilling humanity's aspirations to do justice.

…We will not ask you to convict these men on the testimony of their foes. There is no count in the Indictment that cannot be proved by books and records. The Germans were always meticulous record keepers, and these defendants had their share of the Teutonic passion for thoroughness in putting things on paper. Nor were they without vanity. They arranged frequently to be photographed in action. We will show you their own films. You will see their own conduct and hear their own voices as these defendants re-enact for you, from the screen, some of the events in the course of the conspiracy.  

Fritzsche. I'm overcome with rage! How can you accuse us of participating in some kind of conspiracy driven by the lowliest of intentions? On all counts of the charges brought against me, I declare I am “innocent”. However, I am ready to admit to having committed grave mistakes, allowing Himmler’s system of killing to outsmart me, even as I was trying to figure it out. I care nothing about my own life. But the shame, the dreadful shame!

Germany was the first victim of the Nazis

Jackson. No greater mistake could be made than to think of the Nazi Party in terms of the loose organisations which we of the Western world call "political parties". In discipline, structure, and method, the Nazi Party was not adapted to the democratic process of persuasion. It was an instrument of conspiracy and of coercion. The Party was not organised to take over power in the German State by winning support of a majority of the German people; it was organised to seize power in defiance of the will of the people.

The Nazi Party, under the "Führerprinzip," (The Fuhrer principle) was bound by an iron discipline into a pyramid, with the Führer, Adolf Hitler, at the top and broadening into a numerous Leadership Corps, composed of overlords of a very extensive Party membership at the base. By no means all of those who may have supported the movement in one way or another were actual Party members. The membership took the Party oath, which in effect amounted to an abdication of personal intelligence and moral responsibility. This was the oath: "I vow inviolable fidelity to Adolf Hitler; I vow absolute obedience to him and to the leaders he designates for me."

…The SA practiced violent interference with elections. We have the reports of the SD describing in detail how its members later violated the secrecy of elections in order to identify those who opposed them. One of the reports makes this explanation:

"....The control was effected in the following way: some members of the election committee marked all the ballot papers with numbers. During the ballot itself, a voters' list was made up. The ballot-papers were handed out in numerical order, therefore it was possible afterwards with the aid of this list to find out the persons who cast 'No'-votes or invalid votes. One sample of these marked ballot-papers is enclosed. The marking was done on the back of the ballot-papers with skimmed milk...."

…This party organisation envisioned its own source of law in the face of one person - the Fuhrer - and his assistants. The conspirators had created a government within the party ranks in order to apply, outside the confines of the law, all those sanctions that can be applied by any legitimate government, as well as certain sanctions that a legitimate government could not resort to.

…A glance at a chart of the Party organization is enough to show how completely it differed from the political parties we know. It had its own source of law in the Führer and sub-Führer. It had its own courts and its own police. The conspirators set up a government within the Party to exercise outside the law every sanction that any legitimate state could exercise and many that it could not. Its chain of command was military, and its formations were martial in name as well as in function. They were composed of battalions set up to bear arms under military discipline, motorised corps, flying corps, and the infamous "Death Head Corps", which was not misnamed. The Party had its own secret police, its security units, its intelligence and espionage division, its raiding forces, and its youth forces. It established elaborate administrative mechanisms to identify and liquidate spies and informers, to manage concentration camps, to operate death vans, and to finance the whole movement. Through concentric circles of authority, the Nazi Party, as its leadership later boasted, eventually organised and dominated every phase of German life…

We find at this period two governments in Germany-the real and the ostensible. The forms of the German Republic were maintained for a time, and it was the outward and visible government. But the real authority in the State was outside and above the law and rested in the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party.

On 27 February 1933, less than a month after Hitler became Chancellor, the Reichstag building was set on fire. The burning of this symbol of free parliamentary government was so providential for the Nazis that it was believed they staged the fire themselves. Certainly when we contemplate their known crimes, we cannot believe they would shrink from mere arson. It is not necessary, however, to resolve the controversy as to who set the fire. The significant point is in the use that was made of the fire and of the state of public mind it produced. The Nazis immediately accused the Communist Party of instigating and committing the crime, and turned every effort to portray this single act of arson as the beginning of a communist revolution. Then, taking advantage of the hysteria, the Nazis met this phantom revolution with a real one. In the following December, the German Supreme Court with commendable courage and independence acquitted the accused Communists, but it was too late to influence the tragic course of events which the Nazi conspirators had set rushing forward.

Hitler, on the morning after the fire, obtained from the aged and ailing President Von Hindenburg a presidential decree suspending the extensive guarantees of individual liberty contained in the constitution of the Weimar Republic.

Rosenberg. I admit we are responsible for creating the party, which was clearly a failed attempt, and there should be no place for such a party. But responsibility for criminal offenses such as conspiracies and the like? At the very least, perhaps, Hitler, Himmler, Bormann, and probably Goebbels. But they are dead. While we are not guilty. Our biggest mistake lay in having granted too much power to the head of police. Thus, the Fuhrer Principle was distorted. The latter was originally conceived for about 200 thousand who were charged with responsibility for conducting politics in the country, but certainly not for the entire nation of 80 million. The people, however, were unable to resist turning Hitler into an idol to be blindly worshiped. This was not the original intention.

Hess. What National Socialism proposed was not a bad idea, in essence. The elimination of class differences and national unity of the people!

Goering: I joined the party precisely because of its revolutionary essence, not because of any ideological rubbish. Other parties had accomplished revolutions, I thought to myself, why shouldn't I also try to participate? I liked the fact that only the Nazi Party had the courage to declare: "To hell with this Versailles!"

The courageous and decent were eliminated

Jackson. If the German populace had willingly accepted the Nazi programme, no Storm Troopers would have been needed in the early days of the Party and there would have been no need for concentration camps or the Gestapo, both of which institutions were inaugurated as soon as the Nazis gained control of the German State. Only after these lawless innovations proved successful at home were they taken abroad.

…The recoil of the Nazi aggression has left Germany in ruins… The German, no less than the non-German world, has accounts to settle with these defendants.

…The German people were in the hands of the police, the police were in the hands of the Nazi Party, and the Party was in the hands of a ring of evil men, of whom the defendants here before you are surviving and representative leaders… The battle in Germany was but a practice skirmish for the worldwide drive against them. 

…Not only did the Nazis dominate and regiment German labour, but they forced the youth into the ranks of the labouring people they had thus led into chains. Under a compulsory labour service decree on 26 June 1935, young men and women between the ages of 18 and 25 were conscripted for labour (1654-PS). Thus was the purpose to subjugate German labour accomplished.

…Under the clutch of the most intricate web of espionage and intrigue that any modern state has endured, and persecution and torture of a kind that has not been visited upon the world in many centuries, the elements of the German population which were both decent and courageous were annihilated. Those which were decent but weak were intimidated. Open resistance, which had never been more than feeble and irresolute, disappeared. But resistance, I am happy to say, always remained, although it was manifest in only some events as the abortive effort to assassinate Hitler on July 20, 1944.

Keitel. Hitler spoke three different languages: one expressly intended for the Wehrmacht, another for the party leaders with whom he discussed his true plans, and the third - for the Reichstag, which served as a mouthpiece for conveying his ideas to the people.

Speer. An arrogant and destructive power, which cared nothing for the German people. Hitler became nothing for me after he gave the order to destroy all German legacy, and when he proclaimed that the German people deserved only death, because they had failed to win this war.

Goering: How can democracy function with 75 political parties? Democracy is unacceptable for the German people. They would only kill each other in a bout of hatred, these hypocrites. I am glad that I shall no longer find myself there, outside the walls of this prison, where everyone is trying to save face and their own lives, launching accusations at the party now that we have suffered such a defeat. People are far too selfish and antagonistic, they cannot stand one another.

'Eliminate All Lice and Jews'

“The most savage and multitudinous crimes planned and committed by the Nazis were those against the Jews. Germany’s Jewish population in 1933 was about 500,000... They were few enough to be helpless and numerous enough to be portrayed as a menace.

“Let there be no misunderstanding about the charge of persecuting Jews. What we charge these defendants with is not simply the arrogance and pretension which often occur when all sorts of different people mix together and which, despite the honest efforts of government, produce regrettable crimes and convulsions. It is my purpose to show a plan and design, to which all Nazis were fanatically committed, to annihilate all Jewish people.

“The ghetto was the laboratory for testing repressive measures. Jewish property was the first thing to be expropriated, but the custom grew and included similar measures against anti-Nazi Germans, Poles, Czechs, Frenchmen, and Belgians. Extermination of the Jews enabled the Nazis to bring a practised hand to similar measures against Poles, Serbs, and Greeks. The plight of the Jew was a constant threat to opposition or discontent among other elements of Europe’s population-pacifists, conservatives, Communists, Catholics, Protestants, Socialists. It was in fact, a threat to every dissenting opinion and to every non-Nazi’s life.

“The conspiracy or common plan to exterminate the Jew was so methodically and thoroughly pursued, that despite the German defeat and Nazi prostration this Nazi aim largely has succeeded... Of the 9,600,000 Jews who lived in Nazi-dominated Europe, 60 percent are authoritatively estimated to have perished... History does not record a crime ever perpetrated against so many victims or one ever carried out with such calculated cruelty.

“The defendant Streicher led the Nazis in anti-Semitic bitterness and extremism. In an article appearing in Der Stürmer on 19 March 1942 he complained that Christian teachings have stood in the way of a ‘racial solution for the Jewish question in Europe’, and quoted enthusiastically as the 20th-century solution the Führer’s proclamation of 24 February 1942 that ‘the Jew will be exterminated’. And on 4 November 1943 Streicher declared in Der Stürmer that the Jews ‘have disappeared from Europe and that the Jewish “Reservoir of the East” from which the Jewish plague has for centuries beset the people of Europe, has ceased to exist’.

“And the defendant Hans Frank, a lawyer by profession, I say with shame, summarised in his diary in 1944 the Nazi policy thus: ‘The Jews are a race which has to be eliminated; whenever we catch one, it is his end’. And earlier, speaking of his function as Governor General of Poland, he confided to his diary this sentiment: ‘Of course I cannot eliminate all lice and Jews in only a year’s time’.

“This is a captured report from the Commissioner of Slutsk in Belarus on 30 October 1941 which describes the scene in more detail. It says: ‘… The first lieutenant explained that the police battalion had received the assignment to effect the liquidation of all Jews here in the town of Slutsk, within two days …. Then I requested him to postpone the action one day. However, he rejected this with the remark that he had to carry out this action everywhere and in all towns and that only two days were allotted for Slutsk. Within these two days, the town of Slutsk had to be cleared of Jews by all means…. All Jews without exception were taken out of the factories and shops and deported in spite of our agreement. It is true that some of the Jews were moved by way of the ghetto where many of them were processed and still segregated by me, but a large part were loaded directly on to trucks and liquidated without further delay outside the town …. For the rest, as regards the execution of the action, I must point out to my deepest regret that the latter bordered already on sadism. The town itself offered a picture of horror during the action. With indescribable brutality on the part of both the German police officers and particularly the Lithuanian partisans, the Jewish people, but also among them White Ruthenians, were taken out of their dwellings and herded together. Everywhere in the town shots were to be heard and in different streets the corpses of shot Jews accumulated.’

“Other accounts tell not of the slaughter so much as of the depths of degradation to which the tormentors stooped. For example, we will show the report made to Defendant Rosenberg about the army and the SS in the area under Rosenberg’s jurisdiction, which recited the Warning: ‘Details: In the presence of an SS man, a Jewish dentist has to break all gold teeth and fillings out of the mouth of German and Russian Jews before they are executed’.”

Rosenberg: “In the beginning, no one wanted to exterminate anyone. I always supported a peaceful resolution. I delivered a speech to a 100,000-strong audience, and thousands of printed copies of that speech were later disseminated. In that speech, I promoted a peaceful resolution. Jews simply had to vacate all positions of influence. I couldn't fathom that it would lead to such terrible consequences as genocide. Fifty-thousand Jewish intellectuals were even allowed to leave the country. And since I’ve always dreamed about living space for Germans, I’ve always thought that there will be plenty of living space for Jews as well – beyond Germany's borders. I knew that they were being sent to the East, and heard that they were settled in camps under their own administration, and that they were planning to settle somewhere in the East. I don’t know. I couldn’t imagine that it would eventually lead to literal elimination. We only wanted to eliminate them from Germany’s political life”.

Ribbentrop: “Initially, I even tried to bring together Jews from other countries and Hitler. Personally, I’ve always regarded the anti-Semitic policy as madness. Of course, in public I always had to display support for Hitler in all his undertakings. In the past two years, it became impossible to talk to him about that issue. In 1944, I was notified about what’s been going on in Majdanek, and he told me that it doesn’t concern me, that it concerns only him and Himmler.”

Streicher: “Why had there been no genocide between 1919 and 1934? Because everything was masterminded and perpetrated by Himmler. I oppose murder. I couldn’t kill myself, my wife and children there, in Tirole, during war’s end. I knew that I have my cross to bear. And now, they are going to crucify me. I’ve noticed that three of the judges are Jews; I know how to determine one’s blood. These three clearly don’t feel okay when I’m looking at them. I spent 20 years studying racial theory, I’m an expert in that field. Himmler thought that he was the expert, but, in truth, he knew nothing. He had negro blood in him - I noticed it because of the shape of his head and his hair.”

'Death Wagons'

Jackson: “We of the western world heard of gas wagons in which Jews and political opponents were asphyxiated. We could not believe it. But here we have the report of 16 May 1942 from the German SS Officer Becker to his supervisor in Berlin which tells this story: ‘Gas vans in C group can be driven to a spot, which is generally stationed 10 to 15 km from the main road, only in dry weather. Since those to be executed become frantic if conducted to this place, such vans become immobilised in wet weather.

‘Gas vans in D group were camouflaged as cabin trailers, but vehicles well-known to the authorities and the civilian population which call them “death vans”.’”

Jackson continues: “[Becker] ordered all men to keep as far away as possible during gassing. Unloading van has ‘an atrocious spiritual and physical effect’ on men and they should be ordered not to participate in such work.

“I hold a report written with Teutonic devotion to detail, illustrated with photographs to authenticate its almost incredible text, and beautifully bound in leather with the loving care bestowed on a proud work. It is the original report of the SS Brigadier-General Stroop in charge of the destruction of the Warsaw Ghetto, and its title page carries the inscription, ‘The Jewish ghetto in Warsaw no longer exists’.

“It contains a day-by-day account of the killings mainly carried out by the SS organisation, too long to relate, but let me quote General Stroop’s summary: ‘The resistance put up by the Jews and bandits could only be suppressed by energetic actions of our troops day and night. The Reichsführer SS ordered, therefore, on 23 April 1948, the clearing out of the ghetto with utter ruthlessness and merciless tenacity... Jews usually left their hideouts, but frequently remained in the burning buildings and jumped out of the windows only when the heat became unbearable. They then tried to crawl with broken bones across the street into buildings which were not alight. Sometimes they changed their hideouts during the night into the ruins of burned buildings. Life in the sewers was not pleasant after the first week. Many times we could hear loud voices in the sewers. SS men or policemen climbed bravely through the manholes to capture these Jews... Tear gas bombs were thrown into the manholes and the Jews driven out of the sewers and captured. Countless numbers of Jews were liquidated in sewers and bunkers through blasting. The longer the resistance continued the tougher became the members of the Waffen SS, Police and Wehrmacht who always discharged their duties in an exemplary manner.’

“‘This action eliminated,’ says the SS commander, ‘a proved total of 56,065. To that, we hasten to add the number killed through blasting, fire, etc, which cannot be counted.’

“We charge that all atrocities against Jews were the manifestation and culmination of the Nazi plan to which every defendant here was party. I know very well that some of these men did take steps to spare some particular Jew for some personal reason from the horrors that awaited the unrescued Jew. Some protested that particular atrocities were excessive, and discredited the general policy. Though a few defendants may show efforts to make specific exceptions to the policy of Jewish extermination, I have found no instance in which any defendant opposed the policy itself or sought to revoke or even modify it.

“On many internal policies there were differences among the defendants. But there is not one of them who has not echoed the rallying cry of nazism: ‘Deutschland erwache, Juda verrecke!’ (Germany awake, Jewry perish!).”

Jodl: “Disgraceful pompous SS swine! He graphically describes the slaughter of Jews on 75 pages, while dedicating only two pages to a campaign where soldiers fought against opponents who were armed to the teeth.”

Keitel: “I feel ashamed. I was hoping that at least the Wehrmacht would stay away from it, but now even the Wehrmacht bears the stain of shame. The ties with party organisations were too tight and too numerous. Take that atrocity in the Warsaw ghetto, for example. What does that Stroop write? ‘The engineering corps supported the Wehrmacht and SS during this operation, in accordance with their understanding of the “comrades-in-arms” concept.’ I can swear that, while deploying these engineering units, the commandant wasn't aware of these vile plans. I should've visited the troops more often, but I always had to stay at Hitler’s headquarters. Now I understand why he always kept telling me not to meddle in police matters. ‘This doesn't concern you, you’re a soldier,’ he told me when something happened. Obviously, I wasn’t aware of him planning all this nightmare and getting members of the Wehrmacht involved.”

Funk: “How to bear this – Germany will now bear this shame for eternity! I had no idea about these ‘death wagons’ or about other atrocities, I swear!”

Life for the Price of a Few Cigarettes

Jackson: “I shall not take time to detail the ghastly proceedings in these concentration camps.

“Inmates were compelled to execute each other. In 1942 they were paid five reichsmarks per execution, but on 27 June 1942, SS General Glücks ordered commandants of all concentration camps to reduce this honorarium to three cigarettes. In 1943 the reich leader of the SS and chief of German police ordered the corporal punishment of Russian women to be applied by Polish women and vice versa, but the price was not frozen. He said that as a reward, a few cigarettes was authorised. Under the Nazis, human life had been progressively devalued, until it finally became worth less than a handful of tobacco-ersatz tobacco. There were, however, some traces of the milk of human kindness. On 11 August 1942, an order went from Himmler to the commanders of 14 concentration camps that only German prisoners are allowed to beat other German prisoners.

“We will show you these concentration camps in motion pictures, just as the Allied armies found them when they arrived, and the measures General Eisenhower had to take to clean them up. Our proof will be disgusting and you will say I have robbed you of your sleep. But these are the things which have turned the stomach of the world and set every civilised hand against Nazi Germany.

“I am one who, during this war, listened to most of the atrocity tales I was told with suspicion and scepticism. But the proof here will be so overwhelming that I venture to predict not one word I have spoken will be denied. These defendants will only deny personal responsibility or knowledge.

Ribbentrop: “Himmler gave those orders. But I doubt that Himmler was a true German. He had a rather strange face...”

Fritzsche: “When you realise that these amateur theorists were treating people like pawns on a chessboard, it’s hair-raising.”

Goering: “Do you honestly believe that I would’ve taken seriously a person who came to me and told me about living people being subjected to hypothermia, instead of animal test subjects? Or about people being forced to dig their own grave into which they would then be thrown by the thousands? I would say in response, ‘Spare me your rambling.’ It’s too unimaginable to believe in. If you subtract a couple of zeroes from the figures that were presented by foreign radio stations, then it might’ve been believable. But that was simply impossible, so I dismissed it as enemy propaganda.”

Invasion Plans

Jackson: “The plans had been laid long in advance. As early as 1935 Hitler appointed the defendant Schacht to the position of General Deputy for the War Economy. We have the diary of General Jodl; the ‘Plan Otto’, Hitler’s own order for attack on Austria in case trickery failed; the ‘Plan Green’ which was the blueprint for attack on Czechoslovakia; plans for the war in the West; Funk’s letter to Hitler dated 25 August 1939 detailing the long course of economic preparation; Keitel’s top-secret mobilisation order for 1939-40 prescribing secret steps to be taken during a ‘period of tension’ during which no ‘“state of war” will be publicly declared even if open war measures against the foreign enemy will be taken’. This letter order is in our possession despite a secret order issued on 16 May 1945, when Allied troops were advancing into the heart of Germany, to burn these plans. We have also Hitler’s directive, dated 18 December 1940, for the ‘Barbarossa Contingency’ outlining the strategy of the attack upon Russia. That plan in the original bears the initials of the defendants Keitel and Jodl.

“We have detailed information concerning ‘Case White’, the plan for attack on Poland. That attack began the war. The plan was issued by Keitel on 3 April 1939. The attack did not come until September.”

Jodl: “That Hitler really planned everything beforehand and declined all peaceful initiatives... it’s easy to say it now, but had I known that back then, it would’ve resulted in a terrible conflict between conscience and duty. Maybe it is for the best that I knew nothing – at least this way, I fought while firmly believing that I was in the right.”

Goering: “I’ll save a lot of effort for the prosecution. You have no need to show us films and read documents out loud to prove that we were arming ourselves for war. Of course we did! I personally helped arm Germany to the teeth. A pity that it wasn’t enough. Of course, all those treaties of yours were worth no more than toilet paper to me. Of course, I sought to make Germany great. If it could be by peaceful means, fine, and if not – well, that was fine by me too.”

Rosenberg: “The French Revolution was based on the ideas of camaraderie, but had to resort to a slaughter to see things through. The Catholic Church preached the ideas of global friendship and goodwill, but how many people were sent to the pyre by the inquisition? Luther wanted an enlightened reformation, but one needs to recall the bloody Thirty Years’ War in which Catholics clashed with Protestants. So should Luther take the blame for unleashing that war?”

Invasion Plans

Jackson: “The plans had been laid long in advance. As early as 1935 Hitler appointed the defendant Schacht to the position of General Deputy for the War Economy. We have the diary of General Jodl; the ‘Plan Otto’, Hitler’s own order for attack on Austria in case trickery failed; the ‘Plan Green’ which was the blueprint for attack on Czechoslovakia; plans for the war in the West; Funk’s letter to Hitler dated 25 August 1939 detailing the long course of economic preparation; Keitel’s top-secret mobilisation order for 1939-40 prescribing secret steps to be taken during a ‘period of tension’ during which no ‘“state of war” will be publicly declared even if open war measures against the foreign enemy will be taken’. This letter order is in our possession despite a secret order issued on 16 May 1945, when Allied troops were advancing into the heart of Germany, to burn these plans. We have also Hitler’s directive, dated 18 December 1940, for the ‘Barbarossa Contingency’ outlining the strategy of the attack upon Russia. That plan in the original bears the initials of the defendants Keitel and Jodl.

“We have detailed information concerning ‘Case White’, the plan for attack on Poland. That attack began the war. The plan was issued by Keitel on 3 April 1939. The attack did not come until September.”

Jodl: “That Hitler really planned everything beforehand and declined all peaceful initiatives... it’s easy to say it now, but had I known that back then, it would’ve resulted in a terrible conflict between conscience and duty. Maybe it is for the best that I knew nothing – at least this way, I fought while firmly believing that I was in the right.”

Goering: “I’ll save a lot of effort for the prosecution. You have no need to show us films and read documents out loud to prove that we were arming ourselves for war. Of course we did! I personally helped arm Germany to the teeth. A pity that it wasn’t enough. Of course, all those treaties of yours were worth no more than toilet paper to me. Of course, I sought to make Germany great. If it could be by peaceful means, fine, and if not – well, that was fine by me too.”

Rosenberg: “The French Revolution was based on the ideas of camaraderie, but had to resort to a slaughter to see things through. The Catholic Church preached the ideas of global friendship and goodwill, but how many people were sent to the pyre by the inquisition? Luther wanted an enlightened reformation, but one needs to recall the bloody Thirty Years’ War in which Catholics clashed with Protestants. So should Luther take the blame for unleashing that war?”

Legalised Looting

Jackson: “I shall quote passages from a letter written 28 February 1942 by defendant Rosenberg to defendant Keitel: ‘The fate of the Soviet prisoners of war in Germany is on the contrary a tragedy of the greatest extent. Of 3,600,000 prisoners of war, only several hundred thousand are still able to work fully. A large part of them have starved, or died, because of the hazards of the weather. Thousands also died from spotted fever… The camp commanders have forbidden the civilian population to put food at the disposal of the prisoners, and they have rather let them starve to death… In many cases, when prisoners of war could no longer keep up on the march because of hunger and exhaustion, they were shot before the eyes of the horrified population, and the corpses were left.’

“Finally, the shooting of prisoners of war must be mentioned; for instance, in various camps, all the ‘Asiatics’ were shot.

“This Nazi campaign of ruthless treatment of enemy forces assumed its greatest proportions in the fight against Russia. Eventually all prisoners of war were taken out of control of the Army and put in the hands of Himmler and the SS. In the East, the German fury spent itself. Russian prisoners were ordered to be branded. They were starved.

“The project of deporting promising youth from occupied territories was approved by Rosenberg on the theory that ‘a desired weakening of the biological force’ of the conquered people is being achieved. To Germanise or destroy was the programme. Himmler announced, “Either we win over any good blood that we can use for ourselves and give it a place in our people or, gentlemen - you may call this cruel, but nature is cruel - we destroy this blood.” As to “racially good types” Himmler further advised, “Therefore, I think that it is our duty to take their children with us, to remove them from their environment, if necessary by robbing or stealing them”. He urged deportation of Slavic children to deprive potential enemies of future soldiers.’

“The defendant Sauckel reported that ‘out of the five million foreign workers who arrived in Germany not even 200,000 came voluntarily’. This fact was reported to the Fuhrer and defendants Speer, Goring, and Keitel. Children of 10 to 14 years were pressed into service by telegraphic order of Rosenberg’s Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories: ‘The Command is further charged with the transferring of worthwhile Russian youth between 10-14 years of age, to the Reich... The Fuhrer wishes that this activity be increased even more’.

“I recognise that no army moves through occupied territory without some pilfering as it goes. Usually the amount of pilfering increases as discipline wanes. If the evidence in this case showed no looting except of that sort, I certainly would ask no conviction of these defendants for it.

“But we will show you that looting was not because of the lack of discipline or to the ordinary weaknesses of human nature. The German organised plundering, planned it, disciplined it, and made it official just as he organised everything else, and then he compiled the most meticulous records to show that he had done the best job of looting that was possible under the circumstances.”

Goering: “As the man responsible for the issues related to the completion of the four-year plan, I gave orders that the pay received by foreign workers did not differ from that received by German workers, though I also gave instructions to tax foreign workers more. The ministry of finance then issues an appropriate directive which then gets sent to the ministry of labour... and it eventually results in foreign workers spending practically three-quarters of their pay on taxes. So I objected, saying that foreign workers should not starve to death.”

Funk: “I did all I could to maintain law and order. I prevented the appropriation of the Belgian gold stored in France, because the issue regarding its ownership remained unclear. I also prevented the devaluation of the frank during occupation. By this alone I saved more money for France than all the appropriated property was worth”.

Schacht: “Pillaging the valuables seized at the occupied territories! That’s disgusting!”

Jackson: “In the prisoners’ dock sit 20-odd broken men. Reproached by the humiliation of those they have led almost as bitterly as by the desolation of those they have attacked, their personal capacity for evil is forever past. It is hard now to perceive in these men as captives the power by which as Nazi leaders they once dominated much of the world and terrified most of it. Merely as individuals their fate is of little consequence to the world.”