“It follows from the above that the main weight of the action will have to be placed on lynchings. Should the campaign be carried out to such an extent that the purpose, to wit: the deterrence of enemy aviators, is actually achieved, which goal is favored by the Foreign Office, then the strafing attacks by enemy fliers directing the fire of their weapons upon the civilian population must be stressed in a completely different propagandist manner than heretofore.”
I don’t think I need trouble the Tribunal, but that shows quite clearly the defendant’s point of view. If the Tribunal would look at the next document, it is stated at the beginning of the second paragraph:
“Ambassador Ritter has advised us by telephone on 29 June that the Minister for Foreign Affairs has approved this draft. . . .”
That is the position as to the treatment of aviators, where there is, in my suggestion, a completely cold-blooded and deliberate adoption of a procedure evading international law.
The second section is the destruction of the peoples in Europe. With regard to Poland, again I want scrupulously to avoid going into details; but I remind the Tribunal of the evidence of the Witness Lahousen, which appears in the transcript, Pages 618 and 619 (Volume II, Pages 448-449) on the 30th of November of last year, and on Pages 713 to 716 (Volume III, Pages 20-25), when he was cross-examined on the 1st of December.
Secondly, Bohemia and Moravia: On the 16th of March 1939 there was promulgated the decree of the Führer and Reich Chancellor, signed by Ribbentrop, concerning the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. That is already in as Exhibit GB-8, Document TC-51. The effect of that was to place the Reich Protector in a remarkable position of supremacy under the Führer. The only part which I would like the Tribunal to have in mind is Article 5 and Subarticle 2:
“2. The Reich Protector, as representative of the Führer and Chancellor of the Reich and as Commissioner of the Reich Government, is charged with the duty of seeing to the observance of the political principles laid down by the Führer and Chancellor of the Reich.
“3. The members of the Government of the Protectorate shall be confirmed by the Reich Protector. The confirmation may be withdrawn.
“4. The Reich Protector is entitled to inform himself of all measures taken by the Government of the Protectorate and to give advice. He can object to measures calculated to harm the Reich and, in cases of danger, issue ordinances required for the common interest.
“5. The promulgation of laws, decrees, and other legal provisions and the execution of administrative measures and legal judgments shall be suspended if the Reich Protector enters an objection.”
As a result of this law, the two Reich Protectors of Bohemia and Moravia and their various deputies were appointed; and then there were committed the various crimes which will be detailed by my Soviet colleague.
Similarly, with regard to the Netherlands on the 18th of May 1940, a decree of the Führer was signed by Ribbentrop concerning the exercise of governmental authority in the Netherlands, and that—Document 639-PS, which I put in as Exhibit GB-154, Section 1—says:
“The Occupied Netherlands Territories shall be administered by the Reich Commissioner for the Occupied Netherlands Territories . . . the Reich Commissioner is guardian of the interests of the Reich and vested with supreme civil authority.
“Dr. Arthur Seyss-Inquart is hereby appointed Reich Commissioner for the Occupied Netherlands Territories.”
On the basis of this decree, the Reich Commissioner—the Defendant Seyss-Inquart—promulgated such orders as that of the 4th of July 1940, dealing with the confiscation of property of those who had, or might have, furthered activities hostile to the German Reich; and tentative arrangements were made for the resettlement of the Dutch population. But all this will also be dealt with fully by my French colleagues.
I simply for the moment put in as a matter of reference the general order of the Defendant Seyss-Inquart, which is GB-155, the document being 2921-PS. I do not intend to read it. I have summarized the effect of it and it will be dealt with more fully by my French colleagues.
I want the Tribunal to appreciate, with regard to these two matters, Bohemia and the Netherlands, that the charge against this defendant is laying the basis and procuring the governmental structure under which the War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity were directed.
I should also put in formally Exhibit GB-156, the discussion on the question of the Dutch population, which is contained in Document 1520-PS. Again I have explained it generally and I do not want to occupy time by reading it in full now.
Then coming to the Jews: In December 1938 the Defendant Ribbentrop, in a conversation with M. Bonnet, who was then Foreign Minister of France, expressed his opinion of the Jews. That was reported by the United States Ambassador, Mr. Kennedy, to the State Department. The report of Mr. Kennedy is Document L-205, which I now put in as Exhibit GB-157. If I might read to the Tribunal the second paragraph, which concerns this point:
“During the day we had a telephone call from Berenger’s office in Paris. We were told that the matter of refugees had been raised by Bonnet in his conversation with Von Ribbentrop. The result was very bad. Ribbentrop, when pressed, had said to Bonnet that the Jews in Germany, without exception, were pickpockets, murderers, and thieves. The property they possessed had been acquired illegally. The German Government had therefore decided to assimilate them with the criminal elements of the population. The property which they had acquired illegally would be taken from them. They would be forced to live in districts frequented by the criminal classes. They would be under police observation like other criminals. They would be forced to report to the police as other criminals were obliged to do. The German Government could not help it if some of these criminals escaped to other countries which seemed so anxious to have them. It was not, however, willing for them to take the property which had resulted from illegal operations with them. There was in fact nothing that it could or would do.”
That succinct statement of this defendant’s views on Jews is elaborated in a long document which he had sent out by the Foreign Office, which is numbered 3358-PS, which I put in as Exhibit GB-158. I do not want to read the whole of that document because it is excessively dreary; it is also an excessively clear indication of the defendant’s views on the treatment of Jews. But if the Tribunal would look at, first of all, Page 3—it is headed, “The Jewish Question as a Factor in German Foreign Policy in the Year 1938”; after the four divisions the document goes on to say:
“It is certainly no coincidence that the fateful year 1938 has brought nearer the solution of the Jewish question simultaneously with the realization of the ‘idea of Greater Germany,’ since the Jewish policy was both the basis and consequence of the events of the year 1938.”
That is elaborated. If the Tribunal will turn over to Page 4 at the beginning of the second paragraph, they will see the first sentence:
“The final goal of German Jewish policy is the emigration of all the Jews living in Reich territory.”
Then that is developed at great length through a large number of pages. The conclusion which is—if the Tribunal would turn to the foot of Page 7 and examine it—it goes on this way:
“These examples from reports from authorities abroad can, if desired, be amplified. They confirm the correctness of the expectation that criticism of the measures for excluding Jews from German Lebensraum, which were misunderstood in many countries for lack of evidence, would be only temporary and would swing in the other direction the moment the population saw with its own eyes and thus learned what the Jewish danger was to them. The poorer and therefore the more burdensome the immigrant Jew is to the country absorbing him, the stronger this country will react and the more desirable is this effect in the interest of German propaganda. The object of this German action is to be a future international solution of the Jewish question, dictated not by false compassion for the ‘United Religious Jewish Minority’ but by the full consciousness of all peoples of the danger which it represents to the racial composition of the nations.”