6. That having thus planned, prepared, and initiated wars of aggression against the freedom-loving nations, the conspirators aimed at the predatory despoliation of these nations and thereafter achieved these criminal ends by means of equally criminal and predatory methods.
On the strength of the above, the defendants have consciously and deliberately violated Article 50 of the Hague Convention of 1907, the laws and customs of war, the general principles of criminal law accepted by the penal codes of all civilized nations, as well as the national law of those countries in which these crimes were committed.
For these criminal acts, Your Honors, each and all of which are covered by Article 6(b) of the Charter of the International Military Tribunal, all the defendants must be found guilty; all of them without exception must be held responsible both individually and as members of the conspiracy.
May it please Your Honors, the documents which I have presented to the Tribunal and which I have read into the record are silent witnesses to the crimes organized and committed by the defendants.
But the conscience of the Judges will hear the testimony of these silent witnesses, who relate truthfully the story of the arbitrary practices and crimes of the Hitlerite brigands and the boundless sufferings of their innumerable victims.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will adjourn.
[The Tribunal adjourned until 21 February 1946 at 1000 hours.]
SIXTY-FOURTH DAY
Thursday, 21 February 1946
Morning Session
MARSHAL: The Defendant Hess will be absent from today’s session on account of illness.
GEN. RUDENKO: I would like to inform Your Honor that in accordance with the plan of the Soviet Prosecution presented to the Tribunal and with the permission of the Tribunal, we shall start presenting evidence on that section entitled, “The Destruction and Plunder of Cultural and Scientific Treasures, Cultural Institutions, Monasteries, Churches, and Other Religious Institutions, as well as the Destruction of Cities and Villages.”
The evidence on this section will be presented by State Counsellor of Justice of the Second Class, Raginsky.
STATE COUNSELLOR OF JUSTICE OF THE SECOND CLASS M. Y. RAGINSKY (Assistant Prosecutor for the U.S.S.R.): May it please Your Honors, among the numerous and grievous war crimes committed by the Hitlerite conspirators—crimes enumerated in detail in Count Three of the Indictment—crimes against culture occupy a definite place of their own. These crimes expressed all the abomination and vandalism of German fascism.
The Hitlerite conspirators considered culture of the mind and of humanity as an obstacle to the fulfillment of their monstrous designs against mankind, and they removed this obstacle with their own typical cruelty. In working out their insane plans for world domination, the Hitlerite conspirators, side by side with the initiation and prosecution of predatory wars, prepared a campaign against world culture. They dreamed of turning Europe back to the days of her domination by the Huns and Teutons. They tried to set mankind back.
It is unnecessary to quote the numerous pronouncements of the fascist ringleaders on this subject. I shall permit myself merely to refer to one pronouncement of Hitler’s quoted on Page 80 of Rauschning’s book, and already presented to the Tribunal by the Soviet Prosecution. “We,” said Hitler, “are barbarians and we wish to be barbarians. It is an honorable calling.”
On behalf of the Soviet Prosecution, I shall present to the Tribunal evidence of how the defendants put into practice these orders of Hitler, which found concrete expression in the wrecking of cultural institutions, the looting and destruction of cultural treasures, and the suffocation of the national cultural life of the peoples in the territories temporarily occupied by the German armies, that is, the territories of the U.S.S.R., Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia.
I shall present to the Tribunal evidence of the Hitlerites’ preparations and planning for the looting of cultural treasures; how, long before the treacherous attack on the U.S.S.R., the so-called Einsatzstab Rosenberg prepared for pillage, how the predatory activity of the Defendant Rosenberg was co-ordinated with Göring, Heydrich, and the Supreme Command, and how this pillage was disguised.
It is now generally known to what monstrous lies and provocations the Hitlerites resorted in the camouflaging of their crimes. While annihilating millions of people in the extermination camps they had set up, they spoke, in their orders, of “filtration” and “cleansing.” While destroying and plundering cultural treasures, the fascist vandals sought shelter behind the terms “collection of materials” and the “study of problems,” and shamelessly referred to themselves as “bearers of culture.”
The Hitlerite conspirators endeavored to change into serfs, bereft of all their rights, the peoples of the territories seized; and, for this purpose, they destroyed the national culture of these peoples.
The destruction of the national culture of the Slav peoples and particularly of the Russian, Ukrainian, and Bielorussian cultures, the destruction of national monuments, schools, literature, and the compulsory Germanization of the population, followed the German occupation everywhere, in obedience to the same criminal principle which governed the ensuing pillage, rape, arson, and mass murders.
I omit, Mr. President, the end of Page 3 and Page 4 of my presentation, and I proceed to the presentation of Section 2, Page 5.
As I have already indicated, the destruction of the national culture of the peoples in the occupied territories was a fundamental part of the general plan for world domination established by Hitler’s conspirators. It is difficult to determine whether destruction or plunder was the prevalent factor in these plans. But there is no disputing the fact that both plunder and destruction were aimed at one goal only—extermination; and this extermination was carried out everywhere, in all the territories occupied by the Germans, and on an enormous scale.
Article 56 of the 1907 Hague Convention laid down, I quote:
“The property of municipalities, of Church institutions and establishments dedicated to charity and education, arts and sciences, even when belonging to the State, shall be considered as private property. All premeditated seizure of, and destruction or damage to, institutions of this character, to historic monuments, works of art and science, is forbidden and should be made the subject of legal proceedings.”
The Hitlerites consciously and systematically scoffed at the principles and demands laid down in Article 56. All the conspirators are guilty of this, and the Defendant Rosenberg in the first place.
Rosenberg had an organization with widespread ramifications for the plunder of cultural treasures and with numerous staffs and representatives. The Einsatzstab Rosenberg and Rosenberg’s chief of staff, Utikal, were the central point of the network co-ordinating the criminal activities of many predatory organizations inspired and directed by the Hitlerite Government together with the German Supreme Command. Rosenberg was officially placed in charge of plundering the cultural treasures in the occupied territories by a decree of Hitler of 1 March 1942.
I have in mind Document Number 149-PS presented to the Tribunal on 18 December of last year by the United States Prosecution and accepted by the Tribunal as Exhibit Number USA-369. With your permission, Mr. President, I shall quote only two paragraphs of this document. You will find this document on Page 3 of your document book. I quote:
“His”—Rosenberg’s—“Einsatzstab for the occupied territories has the right to investigate libraries, archives, and every other kind of cultural establishment for corresponding materials, and to confiscate