“The cleaning up of villages suspected of concealing bands needs experience. The forces of the Security Service and the rural Secret Police are to be employed. The real helpers of the bands are to be identified and the most rigorous measures taken against them. Collective measures against the populations of entire villages, including the burning of the places in question, can be ordered only in exceptional cases and then only by divisional commanders, SS leaders, or chiefs of police.” (Page 21 of my brief.)
But what the Defendant Jodl had ordered as an exceptional measure became the general rule in France in the spring and in the summer of 1944. Actions which had been exceptional when this order was signed now took on the aspect of large-scale operations, ordered and carried out in violation of the law of nations by army units assisted by the forces of the Security Service and the rural secret police.
On the pretext of investigating or making reprisals against local resistance elements, German officers and men scrupulously carried out the orders given by the Chief of the Operations Staff.
It was in this way that the withdrawal of German armies in France was marked by dead towns such as those which bore the names of Oradour-sur-Glane, Maillé, Cerizay, Saint-Dié, and Vassieux-en-Vercors. Jodl is responsible for these “mopping-up” operations, which began with the most arbitrary arrests and went on by progressive stages to torture, the wholesale massacre of men, women, old people, and children—even infants in arms—and the looting and burning of the villages themselves. No distinction was made among the inhabitants; all of them, even the babies, were “genuine auxiliaries.”
Never have the necessities of war justified such measures, all of which constituted violations of Articles 46 and 50 of the Hague Convention.
I come now (Page 23 of my brief) to the mobilization of civilian workers and to the deportation of civilians for forced labor. The decree appointing Sauckel Plenipotentiary for Labor Allocation, under date of 21 March 1942, is signed by Hitler, Lammers, Chief of the Reich Chancellery, and the Defendant Keitel. This is Exhibit Number RF-1440 (Document Number 1666-PS) submitted by the American Prosecution on 12 December 1945 under Exhibit Number USA-208.
The first paragraph provides for the recruiting of all available civilian labor for employment in the German war industry and particularly in the armament industry. All unemployed workers in Germany, the Protectorate, the Government General, and all the occupied territories were liable for this. This constitutes a violation of Article 52 of the Hague Convention.
On 7 November 1943, in the course of the speech to which we have already alluded, the Defendant Jodl, speaking of the tasks incumbent upon the populations of German-occupied territories, declared in Exhibit Number RF-1431 (Document Number L-172) which I quoted some time ago:
“In my opinion the time has come when we must have no scruples in taking stern and resolute measures in Denmark, Holland, France, and Belgium in order to force thousands of unemployed to work on fortifications, which is more essential than any other work. The necessary orders have already been given.”
Sauckel would not have expressed himself otherwise. Jodl also champions this requisitioning of services to utilize the potential labor of the western occupied territories for military purposes in the exclusive interest of Germany. It matters little that the Hague Convention prohibits such procedure. For him, too, total warfare and the triumph of Germany take precedence over respect for international conventions or the customs of war.
I now come to the responsibility of the Defendant Keitel in the sphere of economic spoliation and looting of art treasures. I shall be extremely brief. I point out to the Tribunal three documents which have already been submitted to it. I simply refer to them: Exhibit Number RF-1441 submitted yesterday by my colleague of the Economic Section under Exhibit Number RF-1302, and Exhibit Number RF-1400 (Document Number 137-PS) submitted 18 December 1945 by the American Prosecution under Number USA-379, and finally Exhibit Number RF-1443 (Document Number 138-PS), submitted yesterday under Exhibit Number RF-1310.
In regard to this, I shall merely submit to the Tribunal today a short letter consisting of five lines, addressed by Keitel to Rosenberg, Chief of the Einsatzstab. This is Exhibit Number RF-1444, (Document Number 148-PS) which reads as follows:
“Most Honored Reich Minister.
“In reply to your letter of 20 February I inform you that I have instructed the High Command of the Army to make the necessary arrangements with your delegate for the work of your special units in the operational area.”
It can therefore be said that Rosenberg’s activities received the continued support and assistance of the Army from the very first and in this way Keitel also made a personal contribution to the looting of the art treasures of France and the western countries. These measures were at first invested with an appearance of legal justification. They did not take place, according to Keitel, by virtue of a right to take, but simply as a guarantee for future peace negotiations. But these measures quickly degenerated into a general plundering of the art treasures of all kinds possessed by these western countries, in violation of the stipulations of Articles 46, 47, and 56 of the Hague Convention, which forbid the confiscation of private property and the pillage or seizure of works of art and science by the members of the occupying army.
I have now reached the last main part of my brief, which concerns (Page 28) the violations of conventions and laws of war relating to prisoners of war. In this field, in particular, Keitel and Jodl have made themselves guilty of peculiarly unwarrantable measures, contrary to the laws of war.
To begin with, they have violated Article 6 of the Appendix to the Hague Convention, which stipulates that “work carried out by war prisoners shall not be excessive and shall have no connection with war operations.”
Now, in a memorandum signed on his behalf, dated 31 October 1941, Keitel, as Chief of the OKW, forces Russian prisoners of war, interned in the Reich, to perform work connected with war operations. This is proved by Exhibit Number RF-1445 (Document Number EC-194) submitted by the American Prosecution on 12 December 1945, under Exhibit Number USA-214. In this text Keitel expresses himself thus:
“The Führer has just ordered that even the labor capacity of Russian prisoners of war must be placed at the disposal of the German war economy on a large scale.”
That is the signal for the immediate setting up of a program for incorporating these prisoners into the German war economy. It is true that in 1941, this document concerns only Russian prisoners of war; but from 21 March 1942, the incorporation of all war prisoners into the German war industry, and more especially the armament industry, is put into practice. The decree signed by Hitler appointing Sauckel Plenipotentiary for Labor Allocation, to which reference already has been made, provides, likewise, for the use of all prisoners of war in the German armaments industry. This is shown by Document RF-1440, which reveals the violation of Articles 27, 31, 32, and 33 of the Geneva Convention.
One month later, on 20 April 1942, Sauckel expressed himself thus, in his mobilization program for the labor forces, Exhibit Number RF-1446 (Document Number 016-PS) submitted 11 December 1945 by the American Prosecution, under Exhibit Number USA-168:
“It is absolutely necessary to make the fullest possible use of all prisoners of war and to employ the greatest possible number of new civilian workers, both men and women, if the labor program in this war is to be realized.”
In this way Sauckel succeeded in incorporating 1,658,000 prisoners of war into the war economy of the Reich by 6 February 1943, as he announced in a speech made at Posen. This is shown by Exhibit Number RF-1447 (Document Number 1739-PS), submitted on 8 January 1946 by the French Prosecution under Exhibit Number RF-10.
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