"I especially emphasize that the Operational Orders #8 and #14, as well as the regulations pertaining thereto, must be immediately destroyed in case of imminent danger. Their destruction is to be reported to me." the Nazi annihilation of the Soviet population, numerous orders and regulations were issued to the civil "administration", as well as to the German military authorities, prescribing mass extermination, and mass execution of Soviet people, Keitel's order of 12 December 1941, reads as follows:
"In Fuehrer's opinion the punishment by imprisonment or even life sentence would be considered as a symptom of weakness. Effective intimidation can be realized only by executions or measures which would leave the population in complete ignorance about the criminal's fate. This latter aim is reached through the deportation of criminals into Germany. The attached instructions for the prosecution of criminals is in accordance with Fuehrer's opinion. It is approved by him. Keitel". of Soviet citizens were also intentional infection with spotted fevers; murdering by poison gas in murder vans. Upon investigations by the Extraordinary State Commission of the Soviet Union it was found that at the front near their main line of defense, the Hitlerites had systematically constructed special concentration camps where they kept tons of thousands of children, women, not fit for work, and aged men. The approaches to these camps were mined. No barracks or shelters of any kind were built within the areas of the camps, and the internees had to camp on the bare ground. For the slightest infractions of established ruthless camp regulations, the internees were shot. Many thousands of typhus patients were found in these camps who, through contact with the population brought there by force from the surrounding villages, systematically infected them with the disease. in detail these heinous crimes perpetrated by the German Fascist occupants. Bekker May 16, 1942. This document is a report to his superiors concerning the use of murder vans. This is what one reads in this monstrous document:
"The place of execution is located at about 10 - 15 kilometers from a thoroughfare and is difficult to reach because of its location. In wet or damp weather it is quite inaccessible. this spot, they immediately realize what awaits them and become restless. This should be avoided by loading them into trucks at an assembly point, and driving them to the place of execution. and that a window be inserted on each side of the smaller vehicles, and in the larger trucks, two windows, all of the country peasant cottage type. However, these machines became so well known that even the civilians called them the "Death Machines" as soon as they saw them. In my opinion it is impossible to camouflage and keep them secret for any length of time. Also I gave orders, that during asphyxiation by gas, the operating personnel should keep away from the machine so that their health would not be impaired by escaping gas. In this connection I would like to call attention to the following: In certain units, men are ordered to unload the machines after the gassing. I have drawn the attention of the commanders of the corresponding special units to the enormous physical and moral injury this kind of work could cause the men, if not immediately, certainly later. The men complained of headaches after every unloading. Nevertheless they do not want to change the procedure, for they are afraid that prisoners entrusted with the work may use it as an opportunity for escape. To protect the men from the injury, I would ask that appropriate orders be issue.
"The procedure of poisoning by gas is not always carried out in a correct manner.
So as to end the business as quickly as possible, the drivers always open the throttle wide. As a consequence of this the condemned die of asphyxiation rather than falling asleep as had been originally intended. As a result of my explanation of the correct way of setting the lever, death follows more rapidly, and in addition, the condemned people drop off peacefully to sleep. Distorted faces and defecations, two symptoms which formerly had been noticed, were no longer observed. tion. Dr. Bekker, Untersturmfuehrer." and Auschwitz with their gas-chambers, in which over 5-1/2 million people, citizens of Pland, Czechoslovakia, U.S.S.R., U.S.A., Great Britain, France and other democratic countries, people who were not guilty of a single offense, were killed. I must name the concentration camps of Smolensk, Stavropol, Kharkov, Kiev, Lwow, Poltava, Novgorod, Orel, Rovno, Dnepropetrovsk, Odessa, Kamenetz-Podolsk, Gomel, Kerch, of the Stalingrad region, of Kaunas, Riga, Mariampol, of the Lithuanian S.S.R. of Kloga, of the Esthonian S.S.R. and many others in which hundreds of thousands of Soviet citizens belonging to the civilian population, and also soldiers and officers of the Red Army, were tortured to death by the Hitlerites. the Lisenitz forest, which is on theoutskirts of Lwow in the direction of Tarnopol. It was to this forest that the Germans daily drove or brought in motor vehicles large parties of Soviet prisoners of war from the camp "Citadel", internees from the Yanov camp and from the Lwow prison as well as peaceful Soviet citizens who had been seized on the squares and streets of Lwow in the course of numerous round-ups. fact that the Germans shot over 200 thousand people in the Lisenitzki forest. the defendant Rosenberg, in his speech at the meeting of the German Labor Front in November 1942:
"Apparently, declared Rosenberg, if we are to subjugate all these peoples, (i.e. peoples inhabiting the territory of the USSR), the arbitrary rule and tyra nny will be an extremely suitable form of Government". hordes, the Soviet Union territory temporarily occupied by them, and when the organs of Soviet authorities began discovering abominable crimes perpetrated by Fascist monsters and finding numerous graves of Soviet citizens, soldiers and officers, tortured to death by the Fascists - the German Command took urgent measures to conceal and destroy all traces of their crimes.
For this purpose, the German command organized everywhere exhumations of corpses from the graves and their cremation. Special order of the Obersturmfuehrer, dated "Rovno, 3 August 1943-IVAI-# 35/43c", and addressed to the Regional Leader of Gendarmerie in Kamen-Kashirsk, prescribed "to supply immediately information concerning location and number of graves (common) of persons to whom special repressive measures were applied in the district. Among the documents discovered in the Gestapo building of the Rowno district, has been found a report concerning the execution of the above-mentioned order with the enumeration of about 200 localities, where such graves were found. One can see by these lists, that the German fascist henchmen chose as burial-grounds for the interrment of their victims, primarily secluded and isolated points.
At the end of the list, we read: "the list includes all the tombs, including those of the commandos which worked here previously." the world of the representatives of several thousand former internees at Auschwitz:
"The gassing of countless numbers of people took place upon the arrival of 'transports' from various countries including: France, Belgium, Holland, Greece, Italy, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Poland, the USSR, Norway and others. The new arrivals had to pass before an "SS" doctor or else before the "SS" Commandant of the camp. The latter pointed his finger to the right or left. The left meant death by gas. Out of a transport of 1,500, an average of 1,200 to 1, 300 were immediately sent to be gassed.
Now and then, the quota of people who were sent to the camps was a little higher.
It often occurred that the "SS" doctors MENGELE and THILO performed this "selection" whilst whistling a jolly ditty. The people, destined to be gassed, were obliged to undress in front of the gas-chambers, after which they were whipped into the gas-chamber. Then, the door of the under round gas-chamber was shut and the people were gassed .... Death came approximately four minutes later. After eight minutes the gas chamber was opened, and workemn belonging to a 'special outfit', the so-called 'Sonderkommando', transported the bodies to the cremation ovens which burned day and night.
"There was a shortage of ovens at the time of the arrival of transports from Hungary, consequently enormous ditches were dug for the purpose of burning the bodies. Fires made of wood soaked in gasoline were laid in these ditches and bodies were thrown therein. However, the SS men frequently hurled alive children and adults into those ditches, where the most unfortunate perished a terrible death. To effect a saving in gasoline, fats and oils necessary for cremations were often derived from the bodies of gassed peoples. Fats and oils for technical purposes and for the manufacture of soap were also obtained from bodies."
The petition ends with the following words: "Together with 10,000 saved inmates of all nationalities we demand that the crimes andthe inconceivable atrocities of the Hitlerites should not remain unpunished." all freedom-loving peoples.
2. Ill treatment and assassinations of prisoners of war. of the vilest crimes of Hitlerite conspirators. prisoners of war were subjected have been definitely established. They were tortured with red-hot irons, their eyes were gouged, their extremities were severed, etc. officers and men of the Red Army were not chance episodes or the results of the criminal activities of individual officers of the German Army and German officials.
ruthlessly exterminated prisoners of war. Numerous documents, orders and decrees of the Nazi Government and orders of the German Supreme Command testify to this. testified during his interrogation, - a secret conference took place at the headquarters of the High Command in Berlin, when measures were planned for the organization of camps for Russian Prisoners of war, and "rules" laid down for their treatment. These "rules" and "measures", were essentially a plan for the extermination of Soviet prisoners of war, as is made clear in Osterreich's evidence. perished from hunger and infectious diseases, from cold and tortures, systematically employed by the Germans according to a plan which was developed beforehand and had as its object the mass extermination of Soviet persons.
In appendix 3 to order No. 8 of the Chief of the Security Police and SD, dated the 17th of July 1941, a list is given of Prisoner of War camps set up in the area of the 1st Military district and of the socalled Government-General. In the 1st Military district, camps were set up in particular in Prokuls, Heidekrug, Schierwinds, Schutzenrode (Ebenrode) in Prostken, Suwalki, Fischbor-Tursen andOstwlyenka. In the so-called Government General, camps were set up at Ostrov-Mesovetzky, Sedlitz, Byelopedlasko, Kholm, Jaroslavl, etc. In the appendix to operational order No. 9, issued in development of order No. 8 of the 17th July 1942, lists are given of the camps for Soviet prisoners of war situated in the territory of military districts 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 11 and 13, at Hammerstein, Schneidemuehl and many other places.
A recess was taken until 1400 hours) Military Tribunal in the matter of:
The
MARSHAL OF THE COURT: May it please the Court, I desire to announce that the Defendant Hess will be absent until further notice on account of illness.
THE PRESIDENT: Would it be convenient to you and the Soviet delegation if the Tribunal sat in open session until half past eleven tomorrow morning, and then after that we would adjourn for a closed session for administrative business? Would that be convenient to the Soviet delegation?
GEN. RUDENKO: We have no objection.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well, then, that is what we will do. The Tribunal will sit tomorrow from ten until half past eleven in open session and will then adjourn.
GEN. RUDENKO: In these prisoners of war camps, as well as in camps for the civilian population, extermination and tortures were practiced, referred to by the Germans as "filtering", "execution", "special regime". The "Gross-Lazarett" set up by the Germans in the town of Slavuta has left grim memories. The whole world is familiar with the atrocities perpetrated by the Germans against Soviet prisoners of war and those of other democratic States at Auschwitz, Maidanek and many other camps. out in collaboration with the Staff of the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces, whose chief was the defendant Keitel, - were applied here.
Operational order No. 8 stated: "executions must not take place in the camp or in the immediate vicinity of the camp. If the camps in the GovernmentGeneral are situated in the immediate vicinity of the frontier, the prisoners intended for special treatment should, if possible, be transported to former Soviet districts. Should executions be necessary owing to violations of camp discipline, the chief of the operational detachment should in this case approach the camp Commandant.
The activities of the "Sonderkommondos" sanctioned by the Army commanders of the Rear Areas (district commandants dealing with affairs connected with prisoners of war) must be conducted in such a way as to carry out of "filtering" with as little notice as possible, while the liquidation must be carried out without delay and at such a distance from the transit camps themselves, and from populated places, as to remain unknown to the rest of the prisoners of war and to the population".
The following "form" for the carrying out of executions is recommended in Appendix 1 to Operational Order No. 14 of the Chief of the. Security Police and SD, dated "Berlin, the 29th October 1941, No. 21 B/41 G R S - IV A.I.Z".: "Chiefs of operational groups decide questions about execution on their own responsibility, and give appropriate instructions to the Sonderkommandos. In order to carry out the measures laid down in the directives issued, the Kommandos are to demand from the commandants of the camps the handing over to them of the prisoners. The High Command of the Army has issued instructions to the commandants for meeting such demands.
"Executions must take place unnoticed, in convenient places, and, in any event, not in the camp itself, nor in its immediate vicinity. It is necessary to take care that the bodies are buried immediately and properly".
The report of the Operational kommando (Obersturmbannfuehrer Lipper to Brigadefuehrer, "Dr."Thomas) in Vinnitza, dated December 1941, speaks of the way in which all the above-mentioned instructions were carried out. It is pointed out in this report that, after the so-called "filtering" of the camp, only 25 persons who could be classed as "suspects" remained in the camp at Vinnitza.
"This limited number", the report states, "is explained by the fact that the local organizations, in conjunction with the commandants or with the appropriate counter-intelligence officers, daily undertook the necessary measures, in accordance with the rules of the Security Police, against the undesirable elements in the permanent Prisoner of War camps." Thus, apart from the mass executions conducted by "Sonderkommandos", specially created for this purpose, the systematic extermination of Soviet persons was widely practiced by comman dants and their subordinates in camps for Soviet prisoners of war.
tigation of crimes committed by the Germans in the temporarily seized territories of the U.S.S.R., there are several notes of the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, V. M. Molotov, on the subject of the extermination of prisoners of war and of their cruel treatment, and in these notes numerous instances of these monstrous crimes of the Hitlerite Government and of the German Supreme Command are quoted.
The note of V. M. Molotov, the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, dated the 25th of November 1941, on the subject of the revolting bestialities of the German authorities against Soviet prisoners of war, addressed to all ambassadors and ministers plenipotentiary of the countries with which the U.S.S.R. has diplomatic relations, points out that Red Army soldiers were subjected by the German High Command and by the German military units to brutal tortures and killings. The wild fascist fanatics stabbed and shot on the spot defenseless sick and wounded Red Army soldiers who were in the camps; they raped hospital nurses and workers, and brutally murdered representatives of the medical personnel. tions of the German Government and the Supreme Command. Thus, the directive given in Appendix 2 to Heydrich's Order No. 8, points out the necessity for keeping an account of the executions performed, i.e., of the extermination of prisoners of war, in the following form: 1. Serial number; 2. surname & first name; 3. date and place of birth; 4. profession; 5. last place of domicile; 6. grounds for the execution; 7. date and place of the execution. kommandos for the extermination of Soviet prisoners of war was given in operational order No. 14, of the Chief of the Security Police and S.D. dated the 29th of October 1941. branding with special identification marks, which was laid down by a special order of the German Supreme Command, dated the 20th of July, 1942. This order provides for the following methods of branding: "The tightly stretched skin is to be cut superficially with a heated lancet dipped in India ink."
only humane treatment for prisoners of war, but also respect for their patriotic feelings, and forbids their being used to fight against their own fatherland. Article 3 of the Convention, which refers to the laws and customs of war, forbids the combatants to force enemy subjects to participate in military operations directed against their own country, even in cases where these subjects had been in their service before the outbreak of war. The Hitlerites trod underfoot even this elementary principle of international law. By beatings and by threats of shooting they forced prisoners to work as drivers of carts, motor vehicles and transports carrying ammunition, and other military loads to the front, as ammunition bearers to the firing line, as auxiliaries in anti-aircraft artillery, and so on. in the Gomel district of the Byelorrussian S.S.R., in the Poltava district and in other places, cases were recorded where the German Command drove captured Red Army soldiers forward under threat of shooting, in front of their advancing columns during attacks. investigations of the Extraordinary State Commission, is also confirmed by the documents of the German Police and of the Supreme Command, captured by the Soviet and Allied armies on German territory. of hunger, typhus and other diseases. The camp commandants forbade the civil population to give food to the prisoners and doomed them to death by starvation. In many cases, prisoners of war who were unable to keep in line on the march because of starvation and exhaustion were shot in full view of the civil population and their bodies left unburied. In many camps no arrangements of any sort were made for living quarters for the prisoners of war. They lay in the open in rain and snow. They were not even given tools to dig themselves pits or burrows in the ground. One could hear the arguments of the Hitlerites: "The more prisoners who die, the better for us."
government and people, that the responsibility for the bloody butchery perpetrated on Soviet prisoners of war in violation of all the universally accepted rules and customs of war rests with the criminal Hitlerite government and German Supreme Command, the representatives of which are now sitting on the Defendants' benches. Fascist invaders in the, forced deportation to Germany of peaceful citizens, men, women and children, for slave and serf labor. the German Supreme Command carried out the deportation of Soviet citizens into German slavery by deceit, threats and force. Soviet citizens were sold into slavery by the fascist invaders to concerns and private individuals in Germany. These slaves were doomed to starvation, brutal treatment and, in the end, to an agonizing death. I shall dwell later on the inhuman and barbarous directives, edicts and orders of the Hitlerite government and the Supreme Command, which were issued for the purpose of effecting the deportation of Soviet persons to German slavery, and for which the defendants now being prosecuted are responsible, particularly Goering, Keitel, Rosenberg, Sauckel and others. Documents at the disposal of the Soviet Delegation, captured by the Red Army from the staffs of the smashed German Fascist armies, expose the defendants as perpetrators of these crimes. Rosenberg presented facts and figures confirming the vast scale of the deportation of Soviet citizens to slave and serf labor in Germany which were organized by Sauckel. which Goering gave directives to his officials concerning the utilization of Soviet citizens for forced labour. Circular No. 42006/41 of the Economic Staff of the German Command in the East, dated the 4th of December, 1941. This is how these directives run:
1. "Russians must be used chiefly for road and railway construction, clean-up operations, de-mining and airfield construction.
German construction battalions must be disbanded (e.g. those of the air force). Skilled German workers must work in war production; they must not dig and break stones - there is theRussian for that."
2. "It is essential to utilize the Russian primarily for the following types of work: mining, construction, war production (tanks, guns, aircraft equipment), agriculture, building, in large workshops (shoe making) and in special detachments for urgent unforeseen jobs."
3. "In taking measures to keep order, the decisive considerations are speed and severity. Only the following types of punishment, without any intermediate punitive sanctions, will be imposed: deprivation of food or death by sentence of court-martial." the Employment of Labor by Hitler's order of the 21st of March, 1942. tary organs his "Program of the General-Plenipotentiary for the Employment of Later" (top secret), which isno less foul than the circular referred to above. This is what is said in the "Program":
"It is extremely necessary to utilize fully the human reserves available in occupied Soviet territories. If attempts to attract the necessary labor voluntarily do not succeed, it will be necessary to resort immediately to mobilization or to the compulsory signing of individual contracts.
"Besides the prisoners of war we already have, and who are located for the most part in the occupied territories, there is need for the mobilization of skilled male and female civilian workers over 15 years of age from the Soviet Provinces for utilization for labor in Germany.
"In order that the burden on the overworked German peasant women should be noticeable lightened, the Fuehrer has ordered me to bring 400,000 to 500,000 selected, healthy and strong girls to Germany from the Eastern territories."
workers from the Eastern territories for domestic labor in Germany has been presented to the Tribunal by the prosecution.
This document is composed of excerpts from the report on a meeting held by Sauckel on the 3rd September 1942.
I quote some of these excerpts:
1. "The Fuehrer has ordered that between 400,000 and 500,000 labor".2. "The Fuehrer has expressed categorically his desire that a large number of these girls should be Germanised."
3. "It is the Fuehrer's will that, in 100 years' time, 250 million German-speaking people should live in Europe."
4. "Consider these women workers from the Ukraine as workers from the East, and put the sign 'Ost' (East) on them."
5. "Gauleiter Sauckel declared that, apart from the introduction additional million workers from the East."
6. "References to the difficulty of bringing stocks of grain to Germany from other countries did not worry him, Sauckel, at all.
He conveyors to get all the necessary equipment to the Ukraine."
a secret directive of the 31st of March, 1942, No. FA 578028/729: "The pulsory labor."
terror to carry out the plans of recruitment. They starved the Soviet Germany.
But even these coercive methods did not help. The recruitment was not successful.
Then Sauckel and his agents had recourse to a quota system.
This is testified to by an order of a German commandant, captured by Red Army forces when the occupied part of the province of Leningrad was liberated. It runs as follows:
"To the mayors of village communities ..... Since a very small number of people have so far presented themselves for labor in Germany, every mayor of a village community must, in concert with the elders of the villages, provide 15 or more persons from each village community for later in Germany. Healthy people aged between lit and 50 must be provided." Kharkov stated in his report on the situation in the town of Kharkov covering the period from 24 July to 9 September 1942: "The recruitment of labor is worrying the competent agencies, since an extremely antagonistic attitude to deportation for work in Germany is to be observed among the population. At present the situation is such that everyone tries by every available means to escape recruitment (they pretend to be ill, escape into the forests, bribe officials, etc.). For a long time now it has not been possible even to speak of anyone going to Germany voluntarily." brutal treatment is shown by a vast quantity of complaints and statements collected by the Extraordinary Government Commission for ascertaining and investigating the crimes of the German-Fascist invaders. suffered the same fate. systematically destroyed towns and villages, annihilated treasures created by the labors of many generations, and plundered the peaceful population. and Roumania, - the Hitlerites developed their plans for the destruction of the largest cities of theSoviet Union. 1941, and entitled "The Future of Petersburg", contains the following statemeat:
"The Fuehrer has decided to wipe the city of Petersburg from the face of the earth.
Finland has also declared that she is net interested in the further existence of the city in the immediate vicinity of her new boundary." the special object of which was to coordinate their plans for seizing and destroying the city of Odessa. signed by the defendant Jodl, prescribed that Leningrad and Moscow should be wiped from the face of the eart. "In the case of all other towns, too", states the order, "The rule should hold that, prior to their occupation, they should be reduced to ruins by artillery fire and by air raids. It is inadmissible that a German soldier's life would be risked in order that Russian towns should be saved from fire." by military commanders of all ranks. Thus an order to the 512 th German Infantry Regiment, signed by Colonel Schietzrig, prescribes that the regions and districts seized by the Hitlerites be turned into a desert area. In order that this crime should lead to the most destructive results, the order gives a detailed plan for the annihilation of inhabited localities.
"Preparations for the destruction of inhabited localities", the order states, "Should be made in such a manner that (a) no suspicion be aroused among the civilian population, prior to announcement; (b) it should be possible to start the destructions, at one blow, by means of a simple operation at an appointed time. On the designated day particularly strict watch should be kept in inhabited localities so as not to allow any civilians to leave them, &specially from the moment the announcement regarding the destruction is made." 24 December 1941, is even entitled? "Program of destructions." This order gives concrete directions regarding the destruction of a number of inhabited localities and suggests that:
"Available stocks of hay, straw, food supplies, etc., are to be burnt.
All stoves in homes should be put out of action by hand grenades so that their further use be made impossible.
On no account is this order to fall into the hands of the enemy." fire to the treasures created by the labor of generations. "Directives for the Control of Economy in the Newly Occupied Eastern Territories." (The "green file"). Goering is the author of these directives. This secret document is dated - "Berlin, June 1941." I will quote only a few excerpts from it. The first quotation is:
"Pursuant to the Fuehrer's (Hitler's) orders, it isnecessary to take all measures for the immediateand full exploitation of the occupied territories for Germany's benefit. To obtain for Germany the largest possible amount of food supplies and crude-oil - such is the main economic objective of the campaign. At the same time, German industry must also be supplied with other kinds of raw materials from the occupied territories. The first task is to supply the German armies with the utmost speed entirely from the resources of the occupied territories.
Second quotation : "The opinion that the occupied territories should be restored to order as soon as possible, and their economy re-established is ill-conveived. The restoration of order must take place only in areas from which we can obtain considerable supplies of agricultural products and crude-oils; in others, economic activity must be limited to the exploitation of such stocks as are discovered."
Third quotation : "All raw materials, semi-manufactured and finished goods must be withdrawn from the markets by means of orders, requisitions, and confiscations. Platinum, magnesium, and rubber should be collected immediately and removed to Germany. Foodstuffs, as well as articles of domestic and personal use, and dothing discovered in the combat zone and in the rear areas, are to be placed, in the first instance, at the disposal of the boards to satisfy the needs of the armies. What is rejected by them will be passed on to thenext highest war-economy agency." German aggression against the Soviet Union was to plunder the Soviet country in order to obtain the economic resources which were necessary for Hitlerite Germany and without which she could not carry out her imperialistic plans of aggression.
Goering's "Green File" represented the wide program, developed beforehand by the Fascist conspirators, for the organized plunder of the Soviet Union.
This program laid down in advance concrete plans for plunder: the forcible confiscation of valuables, the organization of slave labor in our cities and villages, the abolition of wages inindustrial establishments, the uncontrolled issue of fully insecure currency, etc. In order to carry out this program of plunder, the creation of special machinery was provided for with its own economic command, economic staffs, its own intelligence, inspectorate, army units, detachments for collecting means of production, detachments for collecting raw materials, military agronomists, agricultural officers, etc. ments of the economic departments of the army whose task was to detemine the available supplies of grain and cattle, fuel, and other property. These detachments were subordinated to a special economic inspectorate which had its seat in the rear area.
Soon after the attack on the USSR, Hitler's decree of the 29th of June 1941 placed the whole direction of the plunder of occupied territories in the hands of the defendant Goering. By this decree Goering was given the right to take "all measures necessary for the maximum utilization of all stocks discovered and of the country's economic capacity in the interests of German was economy. The defendant Goering directed the predatory activities of the German armies and conomic detachments with the greatest zeal. and representatives of the military command, Goering demanded that the plunder of occupied territories be intensified. "You are sent there," Goering pointed out, "not to work for the benefit of the peoples entrusted to you, but in order to pump out of them all that is possible."
And further on: "I intend to plunder and to do effectively." of Goering were carried out by the Reich ministers and representatives of German firms, under whose control there were various kinds of economic groups, technical battalions, economic staffs, and economic inspectorates. Particularly active in the plunder of property of the Soviet Union were the German firms Friedrich Krupp & Co., Herman Goering, Siemens Schuckert, the Mining and Metallurgical Company, Ost, the corporation Word, Heinrich Lana, Landmaschinebauindustrie, I.G. Farben Industrie, and many others. lerite invaders doomed to starvation and death the population of the districts they thus plundered. Field Marshal Reichenau's order of the 10th of October 1941, which was distributed as a model among all German units, together with a note saying that Hitler considered it an excellent order, contained the following incitement to plunder and exterminate the population: "To supply local inhabitants and prisoners of war with food is an unnecessary act of humanity." August 1942, which were discovered in defendant Rosenberg's files, state: "The object of our work is to make the Ukrainians work for Germany; - we are not here to make these people happy. The Ukraine can give us what is lacking in Germany.
This object must be achieved irrespective of losses." plundered the population of the occupied territories mercilessly and to the fullest. An order discovered at a number of places in the Kurst and Orel districts by units of the Red Army contains a list of property to be handed over to the military authorities. Things like scales, sacks, salt, lamps, saucepans, oilcloth, blinds, and gramaphones with records are mentioned in the order. "All this property," the order states, "must be delivered to the Kommandatur. These guilty of infringing this order will be shot." DESTRUCTION AND PLUNDER OF CULTURAL AND SCIENTIFIC TREASURES, MONASTERIES, CHURCHES, AND OTHER INSTITUTIONS FOR RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCES. usurpers destroyed scientific and artistic institutions, historical and cultural monuments, schools and hospitals, clubs and theaters.
"No historic or artistic treasures in the East", Field Marshal Reichenau decreed in his order, "are of any importance". the Hitlerites assumed vast proportaions. Thus, in a letter of 20 September 1941, from the Plenipotentiary General for Byelorussia to Rosenberg it is stated:
"According to the report of the major of the 707th Division, who today handed over to me the remaining treasures, the SS men left the rest of the pictures and works of art to be plundered by the armed forces, these included extremely valuable pictures and furniture dating from the 18th and 19th Centuries, vases, marble sculptures, etc.
The History Museum was also completely destroyed. From the geographical section, valuable, precious, and semi-precious stones were looted. In the university scientific instruments to a total value of hundreds of thousands of marks were senselessly smashed or stolen. temporarily occupied by the Fascists, the occupants destroyed and looted 112 libraries, four museums and fifty-four theatres and cinemas. The Hitlerites looted and burnt the Famous museum at Borodino, whose historical relics pertaining to the Patriotic War of 1812 are particularly dear to the Russian people.
In the village of Polotnyanny Zavod the occupants looted and burnt Pushkin's house, which had been turned into a museum. The Germand destroyed manuscripts, books, and pictures which had belonged to Leo Tolstoy at Yasnaya Polyona. The German barbarians desecrated the grave of the great author. extremely rare collections of historic documents and books which were kept ther, and destroyed hundreds of schools, clubs, and theatres in Byelorussia. furniture, made by the most outstanding craftsmen of the 18th Century, was removed to Germany. From the Peterhof Palaces the Germans removed all the sculptured and carved ornamentations, carpets, pictures, and statues. The Great Palace of Peterhof, dating back to the reign of Peter I, was barbarously burnt after it had been looted. taining over 2,000,000 volumes.
At Tchernigov a famous collection of Ukranian antiquities was looted. At the Kievo-Petersk Monastery the Germans seized documents from the archives of the Metropolitans of Keiv and books from the private library of Peter Mogilla, who had collected very valuable works of world literature. They looted the very valuable colloections of the museums of Lvov and Odessa, and removed to Germany or partially destroyed the treasures of the libraries of Vinnitza and Poltava, where extremely rare copies of mediaeval literary manuscripts, the first printed editions of the 16th and the 12th centuries and ancient church books, were kept. the barbaric orders of the German Government, was not only directed by the defendants Goering and Rosenberg and by the various staffs and detachments subordinated to them, but the Ministry for Foreign Affairs with the Defendant Ribbentrop at its head, also took part in this through a special organization.
The statement by Obersturmfuehrer Dr. Norman Foerster of the 4th company of the Special Purposes Battalion of the Waffen SS, published by the press at the time, bears witness to this.