I will offer Document 654-PS, Exhibit Number USA-218, which was previously introduced, and I want to quote one portion:
“The Reich Minister of Justice will decide whether and when special treatment at the hands of the police is to be applied. The Reich Führer SS will send the reports, which he sent hitherto to Reichsleiter Bormann, to the Reich Minister of Justice.”
If the views of the Reich Führer SS and the Reich Minister of Justice disagreed, “the opinion of Reichsleiter Bormann will be brought to bear upon the case, and he will possibly inform the Führer.”
In the above note it is further stated:
“The delivery of asocial elements from execution of their sentence to the Reich Führer of SS to be worked to death: Persons under preventative arrest, Jews, Gypsies, Russians and Ukrainians, Poles with more than 3-year sentences, Czechs and Germans with more than 8-year sentences, according to the decision of the Reich Minister of Justice. First of all the worst asocial elements amongst those just mentioned are to be handed over. I shall inform the Führer of this through Reichsleiter Bormann.”
With respect to the “administration of justice by the people,” he continues:
“This is to be carried out step by step . . . as soon as possible. . . . I shall rouse the Party particularly to co-operate in this scheme by an article in the ‘Hoheitsträger.’ ”
And Your Honors have already seen copies of that publication. I now skip Paragraphs 16 and 17.
A letter from RSHA (which is the Reich Security Main Office) to police chiefs, dated 5 November 1942, which is Document L-316, Exhibit Number USA-346—this was addressed to all police chiefs—recites an agreement between the Reich Führer SS and the Reich Minister of Justice, approved by Hitler—I call the attention of Your Honors to the red border around this original, and then having the Party seal on it—provides that the ordinary criminal procedure was no longer to be applied to Poles and members of the Eastern populations. The agreement provided that such people, including Jews and Gypsies, should henceforth be turned over to the police. The principles applicable to a determination of the punishment of German offenders, including appraisal of the motives of the offender, were not to be applied to foreign offenders. I quote from Page 2 of the document:
“The offense committed by a person of foreign extraction is not to be regarded from the view of legal retribution by way of justice but from the point of view of preventing dangers through police action.
“From this it follows that the criminal procedure against persons of foreign extraction must be transferred from justice to the police.
“The preceding statements serve for personal information. There are no objections if the Gauleiter are informed in the proper form, should the need arise.”
I now skip Paragraphs 19 and 20 of the text. I next refer to Document 1058-PS, previously introduced in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-147.
In a speech to a gathering of persons intimately concerned with the Eastern problem, on 20 June 1941, Reichsleiter Rosenberg stated that the southern Russian territories and the northern Caucasus would have to provide food for the German people. I quote Rosenberg’s words:
“We see absolutely no obligation on our part to feed the Russian people, also, with the products of that surplus territory. We know that this is a harsh necessity, bare of any feelings.”
THE PRESIDENT: We have already had that read to us twice.
COL. STOREY: I am sorry, Sir. I did not hear it. Strike it from the record.
I now refer to Document R-114. I believe it is the last one in the book, Exhibit Number USA-314.
Gauleiter Wagner, of the German-occupied areas of Alsace, prepared plans and took measures leading to the expulsion and deportation of certain groups within the Alsatian civilian population. His plans called for the forcible expulsion of certain categories of so-called undesirable persons as a means of punishment and compulsory Germanization. The Gauleiter supervised deportation measures in Alsace from July to December 1940 in the course of which 105,000 persons were either expelled or prevented from returning. A memorandum, dated 4 August 1942, of a meeting of high SS and police officials convened to receive the reports and plans of the Gauleiter relating to the Alsatian evacuations, states that the persons deported were mainly “Jews, Gypsies, and other foreign racial elements, criminals, asocial and incurably insane persons, as well as Frenchmen and Francophiles.” The memorandum further states the Gauleiter stated that the Führer had given him permission “to cleanse Alsace of all foreign, sick, or unreliable elements”; and that the Gauleiter emphasized the political necessity of further deportations. The memorandum further records that the SS and police officials present at the conference approve the Gauleiter’s proposals for further evacuation.
I now skip over to the next paragraph, 24.
A memorandum by Reichsleiter Bormann of a conference called by Hitler at his headquarters, 16 July 1941, which is Document L-221, Exhibit Number USA-317. I’m sorry, I believe that one was quoted this morning. The only purpose in referring to it is in connection with the Reichsleiter. I believe Captain Harris quoted from that document this morning, and I’ll not read the quotation.
I call attention to the fact, however, that this conference was attended by Reichsleiter Rosenberg, Reich Minister Lammers, Field Marshal Keitel, the Reich Marshal, and Bormann and lasted about 20 hours. The memorandum states that discussion occurred with respect to the annexation by Germany of various parts of conquered Europe. The memorandum also states that a long discussion took place with respect to the qualifications of Gauleiter Lohse, who was proposed by Rosenberg at this conference, as Governor of the Baltic States.
Discussion also occurred, according to the memo, with respect to the qualifications of other Gauleiter and commissioners for the administration of various areas of Occupied Russia. Göring stated, according to the memorandum, that he intended to appoint Gauleiter Terboven for “exploitation of the Kola Peninsula; the Führer agrees.”
I believe the next portion has been quoted, too. I now pass to the participation of the Leadership Corps in the suppression of the Christian Church and persecution of the clergy and cite some illustrative crimes.
The evidence relating to the systematic effort of the defendants and co-conspirators to eliminate the Christian churches in Germany has been previously introduced in U.S.A. Exhibit Book H by Major Wallis with respect to the Nazi efforts to eliminate the Christian Church. The evidence now to be presented is limited to proving and pointing out the responsibility of the Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party and the members thereof for illegal activities against the Christian Church and clergy.
The Defendant Bormann issued a secret decree to all Gauleiter entitled, “Relationship of National Socialism and Christianity.” And that is Document D-75—it is up toward the top, I believe, Your Honor—Exhibit Number USA-348. In this decree Reichsleiter Bormann flatly declares that National Socialism and Christianity are incompatible and that the influence of the churches in Germany must be eliminated. I quote from pertinent portions of this decree beginning with the first paragraph thereof, top of Page 3, which reads as follows:
“National Socialist and Christian concepts are irreconcilable. . . .
“Our National Socialist ideology is far loftier than the concepts of Christianity which, in their essential points, have been taken over from Jewry. For this reason, also, we do not need Christianity. . . . If, therefore, in the future our youth learn nothing more of this Christianity whose doctrines are far below ours, Christianity will disappear by itself. . . . It follows from the irreconcilability of National Socialist and Christian concepts that a strengthening of existing confessions and every assistance to originating Christian confessions is to be rejected by us. A differentiation between the various Christian confessions is not to be made here. For this reason, also, the thought of an erection of an Evangelical National Church by merger of the various Evangelical churches has been definitely given up, because the Evangelical Church