“The German Military Command plundered the museums of Odessa, carrying away hundreds of unique objects.”
Further, I here omit two paragraphs and quote the last line of Page 66:
“According to a plan, drawn up in advance, the German fascist invaders . . . blew up or burned 2,290 of the largest buildings of architectural, artistic, and historical value. Included in these were the house of A. S. Pushkin . . . the Saban barracks, built in 1827, and others, representing in themselves valuable monuments to the material culture of the beginning of the 19th century.
“In Odessa the German-Romanian invaders destroyed: The first hospital for contagious diseases, the second district hospital, the somatological hospital, the psychiatric hospital, and two children’s hospitals, a children’s polyclinic, seven infant consulting centers, 55 day nurseries, two maternity homes, one dispensary, one leprosarium, six polyclinics, and research institutions for the study of tuberculosis, for studying conditions in spas and others. They destroyed 29 sanatoria located around Odessa.”
The Hitlerites committed crimes on an exceptionally large scale in the Stalino Province. I omit the rest of this page and pass to Page 68 of my report. The report of the Extraordinary State Commission, presented by the Soviet Prosecution as Exhibit Number USSR-2 (Document Number USSR-2), relates an enormous number of facts. I shall not quote all of those, Your Honors; but I shall confine myself only to several excerpts from the above-mentioned document which have not yet been read into the record by my colleagues. They can be found on Pages 374 and 375 in your document book. I quote:
“During their retreat from Stalino, the Hitlerites completely destroyed . . . 113 schools, 62 kindergartens, 390 shops, the winter and summer theaters, the Palace of the Pioneers, the radio theater, the Museum of the Revolution, the picture gallery and the Dzerjinsky Club of the city.
“Special Engineer detachments went from school to school, pouring incendiary liquid over them and setting them on fire. Such Soviet people who tried to extinguish the fires were immediately shot by the fascist scoundrels. . . .
“Exceptionally severe damages were caused by the invaders to the medical establishments of the city.”
I omit three paragraphs of the report, and I quote the penultimate paragraph on this page:
“The Medical Institute, a model scientific establishment for 2,000 students, was destroyed on the orders of Oberfeldarzt Roll, chief medical officer of Belindorf, and the chief medical officer of Kuchendorf.
“Of a total of 600,000 books on science and art, 530,000 volumes were burned by the Hitlerites. . . .
“In the town of Makeyewka the German fascist invaders blew up and burned down the city theater, seating 1,000 persons; the circus, seating 1,500 persons; 49 schools, 20 day nurseries, and 44 kindergarten schools. By order of the Town Commander, Vogler, 35,000 volumes from the central Gorky library were destroyed on a pyre.”
I shall not enumerate all the cities. These facts were mentioned in a document which, according to Article 21 of the Charter, provides irrefutable evidence. In agreement with the rulings of the Tribunal, this document will not be read into the record in full. I must, however, draw your attention to the fact that in all industrial towns of the Province of Stalino the Hitlerites burned down schools, theaters, day nurseries, hospitals, and even churches. Thus in the town of Gorlovka:
“. . . they destroyed 32 schools, attended by some 21,649 children, burned down the town hospital, five polyclinics, a church, and the Palace of Culture. . . .
“In the city of Konstantinovka the occupational authorities blew up and burned down all the 25 city schools, two cinemas, the central city library with 35,000 volumes, the Pioneers’ Club, the children’s technical center, the city hospital, and the day nurseries.
“Before their retreat from Mariupol the German occupational authorities burned down all the 68 schools of the city, 17 kindergarten schools . . . and the Palace of the Pioneers.”
I shall now quote a few excerpts from the document presented to the Tribunal as Exhibit Number USSR 45 (Document Number USSR-45). These excerpts are found on Page 378 of your document book. The document deals with the Hitlerite crimes in Rovno and the region of Rovno. The city of Rovno was of special importance. It was the residence of Reich Minister Erich Koch, the closest collaborator of the Defendant Rosenberg. Numerous conferences of the Hitlerite leaders for elaborating their plan for the enslavement of the Ukrainian people took place in this city. The above-mentioned report of the Extraordinary State Commission established the following facts:
“The Hitlerites, on the Ukrainian territory they had seized, endeavored to establish a regime of slavery and serfdom and to annihilate the Ukrainian sovereignty and culture. . . .
“The considerable material in possession of the Extraordinary State Commission, based on documents, testimonies of witnesses, and personal inspection by members of the commission, and their acquaintance with conditions prevailing in various cultural and educational establishments on Ukrainian territory liberated by the Red Army, leaves no doubt that the German fascist barbarians had for their aim the destruction of Ukrainian culture and the extermination of the best representatives of Ukrainian art and science who had fallen into their hands.”
I omit two paragraphs, and I quote the penultimate paragraph on this page:
“The German fascist aggressors closed down nearly all the cultural and educational establishments in Rovno. On 30 November 1941 the closing down of schools in the General Commissariat of Volhynia and Podolia was officially announced in the newspaper Volyn.”
I omit the end of Page 70, and I quote the last paragraph of this document on Page 71 of my report:
“The fact that all these crimes were committed in the residence of the former Reich Commissioner for the Ukraine, Erich Koch, serves as additional proof that all the crimes of the Hitlerite bandits were perpetrated in execution of a plan for the extermination of the Soviet people and the devastation of the Soviet territories temporarily occupied by the Hitlerites, a plan conceived and executed by the Hitlerite Government.”
In Section 5 of his opening statement, General Rudenko, Chief Prosecutor for the U.S.S.R., quoted an extract from a letter of the Commissioner General for Bielorussia, Kube, addressed to the Defendant Rosenberg.
This document is a typewritten letter, signed in ink by Kube. It has several notations in pencil, evidently by the hand of Rosenberg; and it has a stamp, “Ministerial Bureau,” and is dated 3 October 1941. This document, identified as Document Number 1099-PS, I submit to the Tribunal as Exhibit Number USSR-374 in evidence of the enormous proportions assumed by the plundering of historical treasures, carried out everywhere by the Hitlerites.
With your permission I shall now take the liberty of quoting some additional extracts from this document, which discloses the fact that not only were the plundered treasures sent to Germany but that they had also been stolen by individual generals of Hitler’s Army. Kube’s letter reveals at the same time the existence of a previously elaborated plan for the plunder of the cultural treasures in Leningrad, Moscow, and the Ukraine. The vandalism of the Hitlerites reached such proportions that even Kube, that hangman of the Bielorussian people, was roused to indignation. He was afraid of allowing a profitable deal to slip through his hands and sought compensation from Rosenberg. I quote the second paragraph from the beginning of the letter:
“Minsk possessed a large and, in part, a very valuable collection of art treasures and paintings which have now been removed almost in their entirety from the city. By order of Reichsführer SS, Reichsleiter Heinrich Himmler, most of the paintings, some still during my term of office, were packed by the SS and sent to the Reich. They are worth several millions which were withdrawn from the general district of White Ruthenia. The paintings were supposedly sent to Linz and to Königsberg in East Prussia. I beg to have this valuable collection—as far as it is not needed in the Reich—placed once more at the disposal of the general district