Chapter XXII: Part II: of this case (8)

“The above-mentioned treatment of Polish prisoners of war by
individuals as well as by the German military authorities,
flagrantly violated the articles of the Geneva Convention of
1929, Articles 2, 3, 9, 10, 11, 29, 30, 50, and 54. The
convention in question had been ratified by Germany on 21
February 1934.”

Soldiers of the Yugoslav Army, captured by the German troops, were subjected to unbridled ill-treatment by the fascist invaders. Ill-treatment, torture, and torment, together with mass executions were introduced as a part of the system. Here, too, the Hitler criminals were perfectly aware of what they were doing. To whitewash themselves, if only a little, in the eyes of the world, they referred in all documents concerning the destruction of Yugoslav prisoners of war, to the officers and men of the Yugoslav Army as “bandits.”

The second paragraph from the bottom of Page 23 of the official Yugoslav report with regard to the above matter reads as follows—I quote Page 23 of Document Number USSR-305. This quotation begins on Page 326 of your document book:

“. . . everywhere where the Germans used the so-called actions
against ‘bands and bandits’ as a pretext for the annihilation of
the civilian population (women, children, and old people), units
of the Yugoslav National Army of Liberation and partisan units
had actually been involved. . . .

“Being under military command and wearing recognizable military
emblems and insignia, they conducted an armed struggle against
the fascist occupational forces and, moreover, they were fully
recognized by all the Allies. Besides, we will see later on that
on some of its documents, the German Command itself unmistakably
recognized this fact; but in its attitude towards the Yugoslav
warriors it continued unrestrainedly to violate the principles
of the international laws of war.”

As an additional confirmation of the report, the form of which is in accordance with the requirements of Article 21 of the Charter concerning the admissibility of evidence, I also submit to the Tribunal Document Number USSR-305. This is an excerpt from the report by the Yugoslav State Commission concerning the determination of crimes committed by the occupational forces and their accomplices. The State Commission reports that there is at its disposal a secret report by Lieutenant General Hoesslin, the officer in command of the 188th Mountain Infantry Reserve Division, numbered 9070/44. The report is of great importance because of the following considerations which I will explain to the Tribunal in the terms of Document Number USSR-305. I quote:

“Although the report refers to our divisions, brigades, and
artillery battalions under their proper names and proper
numbers—in cases of military engagements—all our army is
called in this report by the general name of ‘bandits,’ and for
the very simple reason that by so doing they are attempting to
divest us of the rights of belligerents, they themselves
assuming the right to shoot prisoners of war, to kill the
wounded, and to have a pretext for employing repressive measures
against the peaceful non-combatant population, allegedly because
of their assistance to the ‘bandits.’ Lieutenant General
Hoesslin admits that the combat group of Colonel Christel after
‘a night engagement with weak bandit forces’—these are the
precise words of the report—‘burnt down Laskovitz, Lazna, and
Cepovan, and destroyed a hospital.’

“In General Hoesslin’s report it is further stated that the
division, together with the 3rd Brandenburg Regiment and other
German army and police units, participated in ‘a free-for-all
manhunt for bandits in the neighborhood of Klana’ (Operation
Ernst). . . .”

I submit to the Tribunal Exhibit Number USSR-132 (Document Number USSR-132), Page 363 of your document book. This represents an excerpt from the directives issued by Major General Kübler concerning the conduct of troops in action, an extract which was certified by the Yugoslav State Commission. I read these excerpts into the Record:

“Secret; 118th Jäger Division; Abt Ic; Br. B. No. 1418/43
secret; Div. Hqs., 12. 5. 1943.

“Directives for the Conduct of Troops in Action.

“2. Prisoners:

“Anyone having participated openly in the fight against the
German Armed Forces and having been taken prisoner is to be shot
after interrogation.”

I further submit to the Tribunal Exhibit Number USSR-304 (Document Number USSR-304). This number has been given to the excerpt from Memorandum Number 6 of the Yugoslav State Commission for the determination of the crimes committed by the occupational forces and by their accomplices. In the last paragraph of Exhibit Number USSR-304—Page 2 of the Russian text—is stated as follows—your Page 365 of the document book:

“On 3 May 1945 the Germans brought from one of the partisan
hospitals 35 manacled patients and hospital orderlies. Ten of
the patients who were unable to walk were stood against the wall
and shot. Their bodies were piled in a heap, covered with wood
and set on fire.”

As Exhibit Number USSR-307 (Document Number USSR-307) I submit another extract from statement Number 6 of the same State Commission. This statement is found on Page 85 to 115 of the first book entitled “Memoranda on Crimes Committed by the Occupation Forces and their Accomplices.” I shall now proceed to quote a part of this extract:

“On 5 June 1944 Hitler’s criminals captured two soldiers of the
Yugoslav Liberation Army and the Slovene Partisan Detachments.
They brought them to Razori, where they cut off their noses and
ears with bayonets, gouged out their eyes and then asked them if
they could see their Comrade Tito. Thereupon they assembled the
peasants and beheaded the two victims in their presence. . . .
They then placed both the heads on a table.”

In accordance with their usual practice of photographing the bodies of their victims, the fascists then took photographs, and, as is further stated in the extract quoted by me:

“Later, in the course of the fighting, the photographs were
found on a fallen German. From this it can be seen that they
confirm the above described incident at Razori.”

These pictures will be submitted to the Tribunal together with other Yugoslav photographic evidence.

Under Document USSR-65(a) I submit to the Tribunal an announcement signed by the Commander of the SS and police detachments of the 18th Military District, SS Gruppenführer and Lieutenant General of Police, Rösener. I shall now proceed to read into the Record a part of this announcement. You will thus be able to see that the warriors of the Yugoslav Armed Forces who were taken prisoner were either hanged or shot. This document is on Page 367 of your document book, “In connection with the various clashes between police detachments and Yugoslav units. . . .”

I skip several sentences of this document concerning a description of the encounters between detachments of Polish and Yugoslav units.

“Eighteen bandits were recently killed in action and a
considerable number taken prisoner.

“The following bandits, who were among the prisoners, were
publicly hanged at Stein on 30 June 1942. . . .”

This statement is followed by the names of eight Yugoslav soldiers between the ages of 21 and 40 years. I will not read this list into the Record.

On Page 36 of our Exhibit Number USSR-36 (Document Number USSR-36)—your Page 339—the first paragraph from the bottom reads, “We can find the identical evidence in a collection of official notes on the staff conferences of Gauleiter Uiberreiter.” Thus, for example, it is stated in the minutes of the conference held on 23 March 1942, “Fifteen bandits were executed in Maribor today.” I omit some sentences from the minutes of the conference held on 27 July 1942, “Many bandits have been shot recently.”

The minutes of the conference of 21 December 1941 contain a passage:

“Since the bandits started their activities in July 1941, 164
bandits have been shot by the uniformed police and 1,043 by
special procedure (Sonderverfahren).”

The minutes of 25 January 1943 state:

“The number of guerilla troops liquidated on 8 January 1942 by
the Security Police and the uniformed branch is 86, including
wounded and prisoners, 77 of whom were killed.”

Such notes can be found in almost every one of the minutes of these conferences held by Uiberreiter.

A certain number of prisoners of war who had escaped immediate annihilation were moved into special camps where they were gradually killed off by hunger and by exhausting heavy labor. I will now read into the Record the last paragraph on Page 37 of the report of the Yugoslav Government, which was previously mentioned by me and offered in evidence as Exhibit Number USSR-36. It is on Page 340 of the document book:

“One such camp was established in 1942 at Boten, near Rognan.
Nearly 1,000 Yugoslav prisoners of war were brought into this
camp; and in the course of a few months all of them, to the last
man, died of illness, hunger, physical torture, or execution by
shooting. They were forced every day to do the very hardest work
on a road and some dams. Their working hours lasted from dawn
until 1800 hours, under the worst possible climatic conditions
in this far northern part of Norway. During their work the
prisoners were beaten incessantly and in the camp, itself, were
exposed to terrible ill-treatment.

“Thus, for example, in August 1942 the prisoners were ordered by
the German staff of the camp to have all their hair removed from
their armpits and around their genitals, as otherwise they would
be shot. Not one prisoner received a razor from the Germans,
though the Germans knew well that they had none. The prisoners
spent the whole of the night plucking out their hair with their
hands and assisting one another. However, in the morning the
guards killed four prisoners and wounded three by rifle fire.

“On 26 November 1943, German soldiers, in the middle of the
night, broke into the hospital and dragged out into the
courtyard 80 sick prisoners; after they had been forced to strip
in the bitter cold, they were all shot. On 26 January 1943, 50
more prisoners died in torment from the beatings received.
Throughout the winter many prisoners were killed in the
following manner: They would be buried up to their waist in the
snow, and water poured over them, so that they formed statues of
ice. It was established that 880 Yugoslav prisoners of war were
killed in the above-mentioned camp in various ways.”

Further, on Page 38, Exhibit Number USSR-36 (Document Number USSR-36), information is contained of the shooting of Yugoslav prisoners of war in the camp at Bajsfjord, Norway. After 10 July 1942, when an epidemic of spotted fever broke out in the camp and spread to six others, the Germans found no other way of fighting this epidemic than by shooting all the patients. This was done on 17 July 1942. On the same page, 38, there is a reference to a Norwegian report of 22 January 1942, compiled on a basis of statements made by Norwegian guards of this camp who had fled. It is stated in this report that of 900 Yugoslav prisoners of war, 320 were shot, while the remainder, with a view to isolating them, were transferred to another camp, Bjerfjel. I will read into the Record Page 38 of Exhibit Number USSR-36, beginning with the fifth paragraph from the bottom, Page 341 of your document book:

“When an epidemic of spotted fever broke out in the new camp, an
average of 12 men a day were shot in the course of the following
5 to 6 weeks. By the end of August 1942 only 350 of these
prisoners were returned to Bajsfjord, where German SS troops
continued to exterminate them. In the end only 200 men remained
alive and were transferred to camp Osen.”

I will now skip two paragraphs and pass to the last paragraph of the same report:

“On 22 June 1943 a transport containing 900 Yugoslav prisoners
arrived in Norway. Most of them were intellectuals, workers and
peasants, and prisoners from the ranks of the former Yugoslav
Army or else captured partisans or men seized as so-called
‘politically suspicious elements.’ Some of them—about 400—were
placed in the still unfinished camp at Korgen, while the other
group of about 500 was sent 10 to 20 kilometers further on to
Osen. The commandant of both camps, from June 1942 until the end
of March 1943, was the SS Sturmbannführer Dolps. . . .

“Men were constantly dying of hunger. Forty-five were placed in
a hut which normally accommodated six men only. . . . There was
no medicine. . . . They worked under most difficult conditions
on road building, in the bitter cold, without clothing and caps,
in the wind and rain, 12 hours a day.

“The prisoners in the camp at Osen used to sleep in their shirts
without any underpants, without any cover whatsoever, on the
bare boards. Dolps personally visited the huts and carried out
inspections. The prisoners who were caught sleeping in their
underpants were killed on the spot by Dolps with his submachine
gun. In the same manner he killed all those who appeared on
parade, which he reviewed personally, in soiled underwear. . . .
By the end of 1942 only 90 still remained alive of the first
group of 400 in Korgen. Out of about 500 prisoners who were
taken to the camp of Osen by the end of June 1942, there were,
in March 1943, only 30 men left alive.”

I will read into the record an excerpt from Page 39, Exhibit Number USSR-36 beginning with the third paragraph from the bottom, Page 342 of your document book:

“Besides this terrible treatment of the captured soldiers of the
Yugoslav National Army of Liberation and the Partisan
Detachments, the Germans also treated prisoners of war from the
ranks of the old Yugoslav Army in complete contravention of
international law and contrary to the Geneva Convention on the
Treatment of Prisoners of War, of 1929. In April 1941,
immediately after the occupation of the Yugoslav territory, the
Germans drove into captivity in Germany about 300,000
noncommissioned officers and men. The Yugoslav State Commission
has at its disposal much evidence of the unlawful ill-treatment
of these prisoners. We shall give here a few examples only.

“On 14 July 1943 in the officers’ SS camp at Osnabrück, 740
captured Yugoslav officers were separated from the remainder and
placed in a special penitentiary camp called Camp D. Here they
were all crowded together in four huts; all contact with the
rest of the camp was prohibited. The treatment of these officers
directly contravened the provisions of the Geneva Convention
even more so than the treatment of the other prisoners. In this
penitentiary camp were placed all those whom the Germans
considered as supporters of the National-Liberation movement and
against whom they very frequently applied measures of mass
punishments.

“The Germans gambled with the lives of the prisoners and
frequently shot them from sheer caprice. Thus, for instance, at
the aforesaid camp at Osnabrück, on 11 January 1942, a German
guard fired at a group of prisoners, severely wounding Captain
Peter Nozinic. On 22 July 1942 a guard fired on a group of
officers. On 2 September 1942, a guard fired on the Yugoslav
lieutenant, Vladislav Vajs, who was incapacitated by a wound he
had received some time before. On 22 September 1942, a guard
from the prison tower again fired on a group of officers. On 18
December 1942 the guard fired on a group of officers because,
from their huts, they were watching some English prisoners
passing by. On 20 February 1943 a guard fired on an officer
merely because this officer was smoking. On 11 March 1943 a
guard opened fire on the doors of a hut and killed General
Dimitri Pavlovic. On 21 June 1943 a guard fired at the Yugoslav
lieutenant colonel, Branko Popanic. On 26 April 1944 a German
noncommissioned officer, Richards, fired on Lieutenant Vladislav
Gaider, who subsequently died of his wounds.

“On 26 June 1944 the German captain, Kuntze, fired on two
Yugoslav officers, severely wounding Lieutenant Djorjevic.

“All these shootings were carried out without any serious
reasons or pretext and only as a result of brutal orders issued
by the German camp commandants, who threatened that firearms
would be used even in the case of the most insignificant
offenses.

“All these incidents occurred in one single camp. But this was
the treatment applied in all the remaining camps for Yugoslav
officers and soldiers—captives in the hands of the Germans.”

A certain incident is described in the Czechoslovak Government report which I should like to mention here. Its importance lies not in the fact that it throws a new light on the methods employed in fascist crimes but that it took place at the time when the Hitlerites clearly realized that their days were numbered. This incident is described in Appendix 4 to the Czechoslovak Government’s report, and I shall describe it briefly and in my own words.

There was an airfield at Gavlichkov Brod at which various military installations were located, while the former lunatic asylum was used as an SS hospital. When the question arose regarding the formalities for the surrender of the German military units at the airfield—in 1945—Staff Captain Sula with one of his fellow officers as official representative of the Czechoslovak Army took himself to the airfield. Neither of them ever came back. Later the airfield and the hospital were occupied by the Czech national units and an investigation was carried out. It showed that the negotiators, together with six other persons who had previously disappeared at Gavlichkov Brod, were taken by the Germans to the SS hospital where they were subjected to cruel tortures. In the case of Captain Sula the Germans cut out his tongue, gouged out his eyes, and cut his chest open. The others suffered similar treatment. Most of them had been castrated. I am in possession of photographic evidence in support of this fact which I am submitting to the Tribunal.

My presentation has lasted several hours. But surely, neither time nor any word of living human speech will ever suffice to describe even a thousandth part of the sufferings borne by the soldiers of my fatherland and of the other democratic countries who had the misfortune of falling into the hands of the fascist executioners.

I have only been able to show the Tribunal, in a very condensed form, the manner in which the monstrous fascist directives regarding the ill-treatment of prisoners of war and their mass extermination were carried out, an ill-treatment before which the horrors of the Middle Ages pale.

We shall here attempt, if only quite briefly, to fill in the gaps. In tens of thousands the witnesses will pass before your eyes. They have been called before the Tribunal to testify in this case. I cannot summon them by name, no oath will you ever administer to them and yet their evidence will never be denied—for the dead do not lie. Most of the films pertaining to German atrocities which will be presented by the Soviet Prosecution pertain to crimes against prisoners of war. The silent testimony of the helpless prisoners burned alive in hospitals, of prisoners mutilated beyond all recognition, of prisoners tortured and starved to death will, I am certain, be far more eloquent than any word of mine.

Blood drips from the hands of the accused—the blood of the victims of Rostov and Kharkov, the martyrs of Auschwitz and all the extermination camps created by the Hitlerites. Treacherously the enemy attacked our country. The people rose in arms to defend their mother country, her freedom, and her independence, the honor and lives of their families. They joined the ranks of the fighting men. They fell into the hands of the enemy. Now see how the enemy dishonored them when they stood helpless and unarmed.

So may these major criminals, who bear the main responsibility for the evil deeds of the fascists, be forced to answer to the martyrs to the full extent of the law of international justice for the indescribable atrocities which you will see with your own eyes, and for the many other crimes which will forever remain unknown.

Allow me to present to the Tribunal Chief Counsellor L. N. Smirnov, Assistant Prosecutor for the U.S.S.R., who will submit to the Tribunal the documentation pertaining to the crimes committed against the civilian population of the U.S.S.R., Yugoslavia, Poland, and Czechoslovakia.

CHIEF COUNSELLOR OF JUSTICE L. N. SMIRNOV (Assistant Prosecutor for the U.S.S.R.): Your Honors, my problem today consists of presenting to you the written documents and other judicial evidence testifying to the very grievous crimes committed by the Hitlerian conspirators against the peaceful population in the territories of the U.S.S.R., Yugoslavia, Poland, and Czechoslovakia when under temporary occupation.

The number of such depositions at the disposal of the Soviet Prosecution is unusually great. Suffice it to say that in the reports of the Extraordinary State Commission of the Soviet Union for the determination and investigation of the atrocities of the German fascist invaders and the accomplices, there are 54,784 reports of the crimes by the Hitlerian criminals, directed against the peaceful citizens of the Soviet Union.

But even these documents do not, by a long way, cover all the crimes perpetrated by these war criminals against the peaceful population. The Soviet Prosecution asserts and I submit to the Tribunal evidence to this effect, that along the entire length of the far-flung front, from the Barents to the Black Sea, and throughout the entire depths of the infiltration of the German hordes into my mother country, wherever the German soldier or the men of the SS set foot, crimes of unspeakable cruelty were committed and the victims of these crimes were the women, the children, and the old.

The crimes of the German fascist criminals became apparent as and when the Red Army units moved west. The reports on these Hitlerite crimes against the peaceful population were made by officers of the advance units of the Red Army, by local authorities, and public organizations.

The Soviet people did not, in the first moment, learn of the crimes of the German fascist invaders from circulars of the German Command, from the notices posted up by the Reich leaders, or from the directives issued by the SS Obergruppenführers both in incoming and outgoing bulletins of the competent German chancelleries, although such documents were captured in very large quantities by the advance units of the Red Army and are currently in the possession of the Soviet Prosecution. Far different were the sources of their information. Returning to their native haunts the soldiers of the Army of Liberation saw the many villages, towns, and cities which had been reduced to so much wasteland.

At the foot of the communal graves where rest the bodies of the Soviet people murdered by “typical German methods”—I shall, later on, present to the Tribunal evidence of these methods and of the regularity of their application—at the foot of the gallows where the feet of the adolescents danced on the air, at the ovens of the gigantic crematories where the murdered internees from the extermination camps were burned, at the sight of the dead women and girls, victims of some sadistic whim of the fascist bandits, at the sight of children, who had been torn in half—by all this evidence did the Soviet people recognize the mighty chain of crime extending, as the Chief Prosecutor of the U.S.S.R. so aptly said, “from the ministerial armchair to the hands of the executioner.”

All these monstrous crimes had a definite system of their own. There was uniformity in the murder methods: One and the same system prevailed in the construction of the gas chambers, in the mass production of the round tins containing the poisonous substances “Cyclone A” or “Cyclone B,” the ovens of the crematories are all built on the same typical lines, and one was the plan extending over all the camps of destruction. There was uniformity in the construction of the evil-smelling death machines, which the Germans referred to as “gaswagen” but which our people called the “soul destroyers”; and there was the same technical elaboration in the construction of mobile mills for grinding human bones. All this indicates one sole and evil will uniting all the individual assassins and executioners.

It became obvious that German thermotechnicians and chemists, architects, toxicologists, mechanics, and physicians were engaged in this rationalization of mass murder on instructions received from Hitler’s government and from the Supreme Command of the German Armed Forces. It was also evident that the “death factories” brought into existence an entire series of auxiliary industries.

But the unity of this will-to-evil was not only apparent there, where a special technique had been evolved to serve the purpose of very evil murder. The unity of this will-to-evil was also apparent from the similarity of the methods employed by the murderers, from the uniformity of type in the murder technique evolved as well as from the fact that, in cases where no special technique was employed, use was made of ordinary weapons of the German Armed Forces.

From the evidence which I shall submit later on you will see that the sites where the Germans buried their victims were opened up by Soviet legal doctors in the north and south of the country. These sites were separated from each other by thousands of kilometers, and it is quite evident that the crimes were perpetrated by perfectly different people; but the methods employed were absolutely identical. The wounds were invariably inflicted on the same parts of the body. And identical, too, were the preparations for camouflaging the gigantic graves as antitank ditches and trenches. Everywhere the unarmed and defenseless people, on their arrival at the execution ground, were ordered, in practically the same terms, to undress and lie face downwards in previously prepared pits. As soon as the first batch was shot, whether in the swamps of Bielorussia or the foothills of the Caucasus, the row was covered with quicklime and the second batch of unarmed and defenseless people, of people about to die, were again ordered by the murderers to undress and lie down on that corrosive, blood-soaked mass which covered the first batch of victims.

This is testified to not only by the uniformity of instructions and orders received from high commands. So similar were the methods employed that it became clear that execution squads were being trained in special schools which had systematized beforehand and provided for every eventuality, from the order to undress prior to the shooting right down to the shooting proper. These assumptions, based on an analysis of assembled facts, were later confirmed by documents captured by the Red Army and by the testimony of prisoners of war.

From the very first months of the war it became clear to the Soviet Government that the innumerable crimes of the German fascist aggressors against the peaceful citizens of my mother country represented, not the excesses of undisciplined military units or the isolated crimes of individual officers and soldiers, but that they represented a system prepared in advance, not merely sanctioned by the criminal Hitler Government, but consciously planned and encouraged by this government.

I submit to the Tribunal in evidence according to Article 21 of the Charter, one of the official notes of V. M. Molotov, People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs in the U.S.S.R., dated as early as 6 January 1942. This document is registered as Exhibit Number USSR-51 (Document Number USSR-51). It is on the first page of your document book, beginning at the third paragraph after the heading:

“As and when the Red Army, in the course of its continued and
victorious counter-offensive, liberated numerous cities and
rural committees which had, for a certain time, been in the
hands of the German invader, an incredible picture emerged more
clearly with every passing day—a picture of the looting which
took place in every community, of general devastation, of
revolting acts of rape, ill-treatment, and mass murder—all
committed against peaceful citizens by the fascist German
occupational forces during their advance, during the occupation,
and during their withdrawal. The great amount of documentary
material which the Soviet Government has at its disposal
witnesses to the plundering and despoiling of the population,
accompanied by bestial acts of violence and mass murders,
carried out in all territories which came under the heels of the
German invaders. Unquestionable facts prove that the regimes of
robbery and of bloody terror inflicted on the peaceful
population of the occupied villages and cities did not consist
of certain excesses of individual undisciplined military units
or individual German officers and soldiers. Rather does it point
to a definite system, planned far in advance and encouraged by
the German Government and the German Army Command, a system
which intentionally unleashed within their army the lowest
animal instincts among the officers and men.

“Every step of the German fascist army and its allies in the
invaded Soviet territories of the Ukraine and Moldavia, of
Bielorussia and Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, in the
Karelian-Finnish lands, in the Russian zones and regions, led to
annihilation and to the destruction of priceless material and
cultural treasures—the property of the nation; for the civilian
population it led to the loss of hard-won property, slave labor,
famine, and bloody massacre before whose horror the most savage
crimes in history have paled.

“The Soviet Government and its organizations record all these
infamous crimes of the Hitler army for which the indignant
Soviet people justifiably demand and will obtain retribution.

“The Soviet Government considers it a duty to bring to the
notice of all civilized humanity, of honest men all the world
over, its declaration concerning the monstrous crimes
perpetrated against the peaceful people of all occupied
territories of the Soviet Union by the Hitlerite armies.”

I now proceed to read into the record Paragraphs 2, 4, and 5 of the concluding statement of this note. Your Honors will find the place in question on the reverse side of Page 4 of the document quoted, Paragraph 5, Column 1 of the text:

“The Hitlerite Government in Germany which had so treacherously
attacked the Soviet Union pays no heed, in warfare, to any
standards of international law or to any of the moral
requirements. It wages war primarily against the peaceful and
unarmed populations, against women, children, and old men,
thereby revealing its own essential vileness. This government of
robbers, which only recognizes violence and rapine, must be
crushed by the all-powerful strength of the freedom-loving
peoples, in whose ranks the Soviet nation will carry out its
mighty task of liberation to the end.

“In bringing all the atrocities committed by the German invaders
to the knowledge of all the governments with which the Soviet
Union maintains diplomatic relations, the Soviet Government
announces that it holds Germany’s criminal Hitlerite Government
responsible for all the inhuman and rapacious acts perpetrated
by the German Armed Forces.

“At the same time the Government of the Soviet Union declares
with unshakable conviction that the Soviet Union’s fight for
liberation is a fight for the rights and liberty not only of the
peoples of the Soviet Union, but also for the rights and liberty
of all freedom-loving peoples of the world and that this war can
only end with the complete destruction of the Hitler armies and
with complete victory over the Hitler tyranny.”

The large quantity of the materials and facts which I have to submit to the Tribunal renders necessary the adherence to a very strict systematization of the materials in question.

Evidence will be submitted to the Tribunal successively.

Firstly, with regard to the deliberate encouragement by the major war criminals of the lowest instincts of German officers, men, and officials detailed to the Eastern areas where they were incited to murder the civilian population and to indulge in every form of violence against it. They also created that atmosphere of impunity which surrounded the murderers and legalized the regime of terror. Secondly, with regard to the special training and selection of units designated to put into effect both the mass murders and the regime of terror inflicted on the civilian population. Thirdly, with regard to the extent of the crime, the ubiquity and the immense degree of the German fascist atrocities. Fourthly, with regard to the gradual development and perfection of methods for the realization of the monstrous crimes, from the first shootings to the creation of the special extermination camps. Fifthly, with regard to attempts to conceal all traces of the crimes and the special measures taken for that purpose by order of the higher authorities.

I shall now submit documents to prove the first two of the points just mentioned.

The Tribunal has already received evidence that the actual orders, circulars, and the so-called laws, promulgated by the Hitlerian criminals for the legalization of terror directed against the peaceful population and for the justification of rape and murder, are directly connected with the inhuman theories of fascism. The Chief Prosecutor for the U.S.S.R. has twice quoted from a book by the former president of the Danzig Senate, at one time a very close friend of Hitler’s, Hermann Rauschning, published in 1940 in New York under the title of _The Voice of Destruction_. The same book (Document Number USSR-378) was published in various other countries under different titles, such as, _What Hitler Told Me_, or _Conversations with Hitler_, and so on.

Two quotations were made from Rauschning’s book, which I have submitted to the Tribunal, in the speech of the Chief Prosecutor of the U.S.S.R. The first is on Page 225 of the original. Your Honors will find it in the last paragraph of Page 14. The contents of this quotation can be summarized as follows: Hitler told Rauschning that he was freeing mankind from the humiliating restrictions imposed by the “chimera of conscience and morality.” The second quotation is also extremely important. I will endeavor to prove by a series of concrete facts the apparently abstract contents of this quotation. You will find it on Pages 137-138. It concerns a conversation between Hitler and Rauschning on the subject of a special technique of depopulation essential for the physical extermination of entire nations and about the right of the victor to exterminate entire populations.

And indeed, in order to murder millions of innocent and defenseless people, it was necessary not only to develop the technical formula of “Cyclone A,” to construct gas chambers and the crematory ovens, nor yet to elaborate an elaborate procedure for mass shootings. It was also essential to educate many thousands who would carry out these policies “not in the letter, but in the spirit”—as stated by Himmler in one of his speeches. It was necessary to train persons deprived both of heart and conscience, perverted creatures who had deliberately cut themselves off from the basic conceptions of morality and law. It was necessary to legalize and theoretically establish the conformity to law of the substitution of the concept of “guilt” by the concept of “preventive purge of undesirable elements for political purposes,” of the concept of “justice” by the concept of “the right of the master,” and of the concept of “law” by an apologia of arbitrary administration and police terror.

It was necessary, by orders, regulations, and decrees, to instill in the minds of hundreds of thousands of human beings, trained as the bloodhound is trained, to carry out the premeditated atrocities of the major criminals, that they were in no way responsible for the crimes committed. That is why Hitler freed them from the “chimera called conscience.”

But the theoretical foundations laid down for the purpose still did not constitute official instructions, nor did they introduce definite retaliatory measures against those who were unduly mild and those who did not fully recognize the “joys of cruelty.” This is why, even before the beginning of the war with the Soviet Union, the German fascist criminals issued a number of so-called handbooks, sermons, and similar documents to the Germans who were being sent East. I submit one of these documents to the Tribunal. Of all the documents in my possession I have deliberately selected this small document, and I dwell on it because it is not intended for the SS or police. It is intended for the so-called agricultural leaders. This document is entitled, “The Twelve Commandments for the Behavior of Germans in the East and for Their Treatment of the Russians.”

I submit this document to the Tribunal as Exhibit Number USSR-89 (Document Number USSR-89), and Your Honors will find it on Page 17 of the document book. From these “Twelve Commandments” I shall quote just one, the sixth, which has a direct bearing on my present theme. . . .

DR. NELTE: Mr. President, the words “Twelve Commandments for the Behavior of the Germans in the East and for Their Treatment” have been written on Document Number USSR-89. That is all that is in my copy. This document has no heading and no signature. As the question of responsibility is involved, it would surely be desirable for the Prosecution to name the author of these “Twelve Commandments.” So I respectfully ask the Tribunal to decide whether this document is admissible as evidence in its present form.

THE PRESIDENT: Can you inform us what the source of the document is?

MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: This document is included in the documentation of the Extraordinary State Commission of the Soviet Union for the investigation and determination of German fascist atrocities. It was received from the following sources—I must interrupt my further presentation.

The Counsel for the Defense has pointed out that this document bears no signature. If Your Honor will turn to the original of this document, which I have submitted to you, you will find the signature of a certain Backe. Unfortunately I cannot say who this Backe was, but I discovered this signature on a whole series of German, or rather of German fascist documents which, in rather peculiar juxtaposition, usually discussed two subjects—cattle breeding and the Russian soul. Evidently the author of this document was considered equally competent to deal with both questions. But what his official position was I really cannot say.

I repeat, this document was captured by field units of our army, in the region of Rossoshy, handed to the Extraordinary State Commission and the original of this document is now being submitted to the Tribunal.

THE PRESIDENT: I have the original before me now. It is dated Berlin, the 1st of June 1941, and has a signature which looks like B-a-c-k-e. Perhaps Counsel for the Defense would like to see the original document. It is, as I understand from the prosecuting counsel, made a part of the Soviet Government report; and if so, we must take notice of it.

MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: That is so. I have information concerning Backe’s official position. He was Minister of Food and Agriculture. I did not know that before, because in practice I did not have the occasion to come across this branch of German fascist life.

DR. NELTE: Mr. President, I believe I can identify the signature as “Backe.” Backe was in the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, was indeed State Secretary at the time.

THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps this would be a convenient time to break.

[_A recess was taken._]

MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Mr. President, have I your permission to proceed?

I now quote the sixth commandment of the twelve which have just been submitted to the Tribunal. This sixth commandment, which is on Page 17 of the document book of the Tribunal, reads as follows:

“6. The areas just opened up must be permanently acquired for
Germany and Europe. Everything will depend upon your behavior.
You must realize that you are the representatives of Greater
Germany and the standard-bearers of the National Socialist
Revolution and of the New Europe for centuries to come. You
must, therefore, carry out with dignity even the hardest and
most ruthless measures required by the necessities of the state.
Weakness on the part of an individual will, on principle, be
considered as just cause for his recall. Anyone who has been
recalled for this reason will no longer be eligible for a
responsible position in the Reich either.”

For what “hardest and most ruthless” measures the criminal Hitlerite Government was preparing those whom it named “the standard-bearers of the National Socialist Revolution,” and what crimes were committed by them, we shall show later on.

In this manner the theoretical, abstract discussions were followed up by official orders quite definite and allowing of no ambiguity. Execution squads were trained in special educational institutions. The network of these institutions extended almost to the lowest ranks.

I shall submit to the Tribunal the indictment drawn up for the Prosecutor of the U.S.S.R. by the examining magistrate of most important affairs on the subject of German fascist atrocities in the city and region of Kharkov. This document has already been fully confirmed by the verdict of the military tribunal, which has also been submitted to the Tribunal. The Tribunal will find this verdict on Page 20 of your document book. The indictment and sentence are submitted to the Tribunal as Exhibit Number USSR-32 (Document Number USSR-32).

There is on the first page of the indictment an extract from the testimony of the Defendant Retzlav. It is on Page 24 of the document book of the Tribunal, last paragraph. I quote an excerpt from the testimony:

“The accused senior corporal of the German Army, Reinhard
Retzlav, who received his training in the special battalion
‘Altenburg,’ testified in the course of his interrogatory:

“The course of training even included several lectures by
leading officials of the GFP”—Secret Field Police—“who
definitely declared that the peoples of the Soviet Union,
especially those of Russian nationality, were subhuman and
should be destroyed in an overwhelming majority, although an
appreciable number was to be employed by the German landowners
as slaves. These directives were the result of the policy of the
German Government toward the peoples of the occupied
territories; and, it must be confessed, were put into practice
by every member of the Armed Forces, myself included.”

Such were the courses dedicated to the training and education of junior police officials.

But the fascist training school for murderers acknowledged other forms of education as well, forms specially dedicated to the technique of destroying all traces of the crimes committed. The Tribunal has already received the document registered as Exhibit Number USSR-6(c) (8) (Document Number USSR-6(c) (8). This document is one of the appendices to the report of the Extraordinary State Commission on German atrocities perpetrated on the territory of the region of Lvov. The document is the testimony of the witness, Manusevitch, interrogated by the senior assistant to the prosecutor of the Lvov region, by the special request of the Extraordinary State Commission. The minutes of the interrogatory are recorded in conformity with the legal code of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. The Tribunal will find these minutes on Page 48 of the document book.

Manusevitch was imprisoned by the Germans in Yanov Camp, where he worked in the prisoners’ squad for burning corpses of murdered Soviet citizens. After the 40,000 corpses murdered in Yanov Camp were burned, the squad was transferred for similar purposes to the camp in Lissenitzky Wood.

I now quote from the record of the interrogation, which the Tribunal will find on Page 52 of the document book, Paragraph 2 from the top, Line 26. I begin:

“In the death factory of this camp special 10-day courses on
corpse burning were organized, on which 12 men were employed.
Pupils attending these courses came from the camps of Lublin,
Warsaw, and others whose names escape me. I do not know the
surnames of the pupils, but they were officers from colonels to
sergeant majors, not soldiers from the rank and file. The
instructor at these courses was the officer in command of
crematories, Colonel Schallok. On the site where the bodies were
exhumed and burned he explained the practical manner of their
burning and how to set up the machinery for bone crushing.”

Later on, photographs of this machine will be submitted to the Tribunal together with a description, or rather, I should say, technical directions.

“Schallock further explained the manner in which the pit was
levelled over, the earth sifted, and trees planted over it, and
how the ashes of the human corpses were scattered and concealed.
Courses of this nature continued for a considerable period.
During my sojourn, that is, during the 5½ months that I worked
in the camps of Yanov and Lissenitzky, 10 groups of military
students graduated successfully.”

For the education of adolescents, the German fascists created a special organization, the so-called Hitler Youth (Hitlerjugend). The Defendant Baldur von Schirach was for quite a long time the head of this organization.

What kind of methods were used for the education of German youth by the fascist criminals is described by a French subject, Ida Vasso, the directress of a hostel for aged Frenchmen in Lvov. During the German occupation of Lvov, she had an opportunity of visiting the Lvov ghetto. In her statement to the Extraordinary State Commission, Vasso described the local system for the extermination of human beings.

From Vasso’s statement it is obvious that the Germans educated the Hitler Youth by training these young fascists to shoot at living targets—at children specially handed over to the Hitler Youth to serve as targets.

Vasso’s statement was checked by the Extraordinary State Commission of the Soviet Union and fully confirmed. In confirmation of this evidence I will submit to the Court Exhibit Number USSR-6 (Document Number USSR-6), which is a report by the Extraordinary State Commission, entitled, “German Atrocities Perpetrated in the Territory of the Lvov Region.”

I now quote from Vasso’s statement in this connection. It is included in the text of the report as a certified document, on Page 6-c of the document book. The Tribunal will find Vasso’s statement on the reverse side of Page 59, Paragraph 5, beginning from Line 14 from the beginning of the paragraph:

“. . . the little children were martyrs. They were handed over
to the Hitler Youth who used them as living targets while
learning how to shoot. No mercy for others, all for
themselves—this was the motto of the Germans. The whole world
must learn of their methods. We, who were the helpless witnesses
of these revolting scenes, must speak of those horrors in order
that everybody should know of them and, what is more important,
should never forget them since no vengeance will ever bring the
millions of dead back to life again.”

Your Honors can turn to the same Page 59 of the document book, Line 10 from the beginning of the second paragraph. Here the Tribunal will find the official confirmation of Vasso’s statement. The Extraordinary State Commission established that, in Lvov, the Germans:

“Spared neither men, women, or children. The adults were simply
killed on the spot; the children were given to the Hitler Youth
for target practice.”

In this manner were created, educated, and trained the amoral monstrosities who were called upon to materialize the program of the major war criminals for the actual destruction of the population in the Eastern European countries. The fascist government had no need to fear that the “Standard Bearers of the National Socialist Revolution” in the East would show any traces of humanity at all.

THE PRESIDENT: Colonel Smirnov, I hope you will forgive my interrupting you; but as I had to point out to Colonel Pokrovsky just now, we really don’t want any comment upon each one of these documents. The passage you have just read to us now is nothing but comment upon the frightful document which you have just read. It all takes time. If you could find your way to cut out the comment after these documents and simply to present us with the documents, it will save time.

MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: I will now quote an excerpt from the testimony of the witness Manusevitch, previously submitted as Exhibit Number USSR-6(c) (8), the passage where he speaks of the activities of the Yanov Camp administration. He was a witness of these activities when working in a special squad of prisoners employed for burning the corpses of people murdered in this camp—Page 3 of the minutes of the interrogatory. The Tribunal will find this document on Page 50 of the document book, Line 25 from the top. I quote this passage as an illustration of the execution squads created by the Hitlerites and of some of the atrocities perpetrated by them:

“Apart from the shootings in Yanov Camp various forms of torture
were practiced, namely, in winter a barrel would be filled with
water and a man, with hands and feet tied, would be thrown into
the barrel, where he froze to death. Yanov Camp was surrounded
by a barbed wire entanglement consisting of two rows of barbed
wire, 120 centimeters apart. A man would be thrown in and left
there for several days on end. He could not extricate himself
from the wire and he eventually perished from hunger and thirst.
But prior to being thrown into the barbed wire, he would nearly
have been beaten to death. A man would be strung up by the neck,
hands, and feet. Dogs would be set on him and the dogs would
tear him to pieces. Human beings were used as targets for
shooting practice. This was mostly done by the following members
of the Gestapo: Heine, Müller, Blum, Camp Commandant Willhaus,
and others whose names escape me. People would be beaten till
they nearly died, dogs would then be set on them who tore the
victims to pieces. A man was given a glass to hold and was then
stood up to serve as a target in shooting practice; if the glass
was hit, the man was spared, but if he was shot in the hand he
was immediately killed after being told that he was no longer
fit for work. Men would be taken by the legs and torn in two.
Infants from 1 month to 3 years old were thrown into buckets of
water and left to drown. A man would be tied to a post facing
the sun and kept there till he died of sunstroke. In addition,
before men were sent to work, they were subjected to a so-called
examination for physical fitness. The men were made to run a
distance of 50 meters and if one of them ran well—that
is—rapidly and without stumbling—he remained alive while the
rest were shot. There was, in the same camp, a small,
grass-covered plot. Here, too, footraces were run and anybody
who stumbled in the grass and fell was promptly shot. The grass
grew higher than a man’s knee. Women were strung up by the hair,
after first having been stripped naked, swung in the air, and
left to hang till they died.

“There was also the following case: a Gestapo man, Heine, made a
young lad stand up and cut pieces of flesh from his body.
Another man was wounded 28 times in the shoulders with a knife.
The wounds healed and he worked in a death brigade. He was
subsequently shot. Near the kitchen, during the distribution of
coffee, the executioner Heine, whenever he was on duty, would go
up to the first man in the line and ask, ‘Why are you standing
in front of the others?’ and shoot him dead. In this way he shot
quite a lot of people. He would then go to the end of the queue
and ask, ‘Why are you the last in the line?’ and shoot him as
well. I personally witnessed these atrocities during my
imprisonment in Yanov Camp. . . .”

The testimony of the witness Manusevitch, which I have read into the record, was fully confirmed by the official report of the Extraordinary State Commission of the Soviet Union entitled, “German Atrocities Perpetrated in the Lvov Region.” Further on Manusevitch speaks mainly about the activities of officials in the lower and middle rank of the camp administration. It is evident from the official report of the Extraordinary State Commission that a system of the vilest ill-treatment practiced upon the helpless people was initiated and organized by the upper ranks of the camp administration, who invariably set their subordinates personal examples of inhuman behavior.

I will not make any comment on this document, although I do beg the Tribunal to take note of a certain Obersturmführer Willhaus mentioned in this document.

The Tribunal will find the excerpt which I shall now read into the Record on Page 58 of the document book—on the reverse side of the page, Column 1 of the text. I quote:

“SS Hauptsturmführer Gebauer established a savage system of
murder in Yanov Camp, which, after his transfer to another post,
was perfected by the camp commandant, SS Obersturmführer Gustav
Willhaus and SS Hauptsturmführer Franz Wartzok.

“A former inmate of the camp told the commission:

“‘I have seen with my own eyes how SS Hauptsturmführer Fritz
Gebauer strangled women and children and froze men to death in
barrels filled with water. The hands and feet of the victims
were shackled before they were lowered into the water. Those
doomed to die remained in the barrels until they froze to
death.’

“According to the testimonies of numerous Soviet prisoners of
war and also of French citizens held in German camps, it was
established that the German thugs invented the most vicious
methods for exterminating human beings, a fact which they
considered as particularly praiseworthy and in which they were
encouraged both by the higher military command and by the
government.