It of the sovereignty of State from being reduced to impotence.
It of the principle of recourse to force by Germany, the other states have admitted that war existed and speak of the application of international law in time of war.
It must in fact, be noted that, even in the case of civil war, the parties have often invoked these rules which, to a certain extent, canalize the use of force. This in no wise involves or implied acquiesence in the principle of Its use and, indeed, when Great Britain and France communicated to the League of Nations the fact that a state of war existed between them and Germany as of 3 September 1939, they also declared that in committing an act of aggression against Poland, Germany had violated its obligations, assumed not only with regard to Poland but also with regard to the other signatories of the Paris Pact.
Recourse to war assumes preparations and decision; it would be futile to prohibit it if it was intended to inflict no chastisement upon those who knowingly have recourse to it and have the power of choosing a different path. They must, indeed, be considered the direct instigators of the acts qualified as crimes. established a jurisdiction making it possible to judge what was already an international crime, not only before the conscience of humanity but before the rights of people even before the Tribunal was established. possible to contest the competence of the International Tribunal to judge it? 1928 had engaged their international responsibilities in regard to the co-signatories, should they act in a way contrary to the agreements undertaken. such without in principle involving the individuals who have been perpetrators of an illegal act. It is within the framework of the state that there may be invoked an international responsibility and that, as a general rule the conduct of the men who are responsible for this violation of international law may be appraised. They are subject, as the case may be, to political responsibility or to penal responsibility before the competent jurisdictions.
comprises the nationals: the order of the state assumes the exercise of justice over a given territory and with regard to the individuals whom it includes, and the failure of the state in the exercise of this essential mission is followed by the reaction and the protests of third powers, notably when their own nationals are involved. government shall have been established by the agreement of the Four Occupying powers, there will be no organ representing the German State. Under these conditions, it can not be considered that there exists a German State juridical order capable of drawing the consequences of a recognition of the responsibility of the Reich for the violation of the Briand-Kellogg Pact with regard to individuals who are, in fact, the perpetrators of this violation in their capacity as organs of the Reich. territory in regard to the whole of German population by the Four Powers acting jointly. It must, therefore, be allowed that the states which exercise the supreme authority over the territory and population of Germany can bring the guilty before a jurisdiction. Otherwise, the proclamation that Germany has violated the solemn covenant which it has undertaken becomes meaningless. acts, qualified as crimes committed in respect of the nationals of the United Nations. These acts, which are not juridically acts of war but which have been committed as such upon the instigation of those who bear the responsibility for the unleashing of the so-called war, who have committed aggression upon the lives and the property of nationals of the United Nations, may, by virtue of the territorial principle and as we have argued above, be brought before a jurisdiction constituted to this effect by the United Nations, even as war crimes, properly speaking, are now being brought before the tribunals of each country whose nationals have been their victims. aggression itself, will be, as Mr. Justice Jackson has demonstrated to you, the manifestation of a concerted and methodically executed plan.
Socialist doctrine. This doctrine is indifferent to the moral choice of means to attain a final success, and for this doctrine the aim of war is pillage, destruction and extermination. the primacy of the German race and the nogation of any other value. The Nazi conception maintains selection as a natural principle. The man who does not belong to the superior race counts for nothing. Human life and liberty, personality, the dignity of man even less, have no importance when an adversary of the German community is involved. It is truly "the return to barbarism" with all its consequences. Logically consistent, National Socialism goes to the length of assuming the right totally to exterminate either races regarded as hostile or decadent, or individuals and groups capable of resistance in the nations to be subjugated and put to use. Does not the idea of totalitarian war imply the annihilation of any eventual resistance? All those who in any way may be capable of opposing the New Order hegemony will be liquidated. It thus becomes possible to assure an absolute domination over a neighboring people reduced to impotence and to utilize, for the benefit of the Reich, the resources and the human material of those people reduced to slavery. outdated; more than this, all international conventions which had undertaken to bring some extenuation of the evils of war. victory by their material resources, as well as by their labor potential. Means will be found to subject them. likewise related to this war end. As one could read in Doutscho Volkstraft of 13 June 1935:
"The totalitarian war will end in a totalitarian victory. 'Totalitarian' signifies the entire destruction of the conquered nation and its complete and final disappearance from the historic scene." whether the National Socialists consider them as belonging or not belonging to the Master Race. For the first, an effort is made to integrate them into the German Reich in spite of themselves.
For the latter, there is applied a policy of weakening them and bringing about their extinction by every means from that of appropriation of their property to that of extermination of their persons. In regard to both groups, the Nazi rulers assault not only the property and physical persons, but also the spirits and souls. They seek to allign the populations according to the Nazi dogma and behavior when they wish to integrate them in the German community; they apply themselves at least to rooting out whatever conceptions are irreconcilable with the Nazi universe; they aim to reduce to a mentality and status of slaves those men whose nationality they wish to eradicate for the benefit of the German race. occupied countries, the defendants gave special orders or general directives or deliberately associated themselves with these. Their responsibility is that of perpetrators, co-perpetrators or accomplices in the war crimes systematically committed between 1 September 1939 and 8 May 1945 by Germany at war. They deliberately willed, premeditated and ordered these crimes, or knowingly associated themselves with this policy of organized criminality. pursued in the occupied countries of Western Europe by dealing successively with forced labor, economic looting crimes against persons, and crimes against humankind. to be perpetrated by the Nazi Germans in the occupied countries, was at the basis of the forced labor service. Through this institution, Germany proposed to utilize to the maximum the labor potential of the enslaved populations in order to maintaim the German war production at the necessary level. Moreover, there can be no doubt that this institution was linked with the German plan of "extermination through labor" of the populations adjoining Germany which she regarded as dangerous or inferior.
dated 1 October 1938, provided for the forced employment of prisoners and civilians for war labor. Hitler in his speech of 9 November 1941 "did not doubt for a moment that in the occupied territories which we control at present, we shall make the last man work for us." Sauckel, acting together with the defendant Speer, under the control of the defendant Goering, General Plenipotentiary of the Four Year Plan, that obligatory foreign labor for the benefit of the war conducted by Germany received its whole development. or successively:
First: Requisition of services under conditions incompatible with Article 52 of the Hague Convention.
Second: So-called voluntary labor, which consisted of bringing a worker under pressure to sign a contract to work in Germany.
Third: Conscription for obligatory labor.
Fourth: The forcing of war prisoners to work for the German war production and their transformation in certain cases into so-called free Bakers.
Fifth: The enrolling of certain foreign workers, notably French (Alsatians, Lorrainians) and Luxemburgers in the German Labor Front. and in violation of Article 52 of the Hague Convention.
These service requisitions were made under threat of death. Voluntary labor recruiting was accompanied by individual measures of constraint, obliging the workers of occupied territories to sign contracts. The duration of these pseudo-contracts was subsequently prolonged unilaterally and illegally by the German authorities. of labor led the German authorities everywhere to have recourse to conscription. Hitler declared on 19 August 1942 in a conference on the Four Year Plan which was reported by the defendant Speer, that Germany "had to proceed to forced recruiting if sufficient labor was not obtained on a voluntary basis."
On 7 November 1943 the defendant Jodl declared in the course of a speech given in Munich before the Gauleiters, "In my opinion the time has come to take vigorous, resolute, unscrupulous measures in Denmark, in Holland, in France and in Belgium in order to force thousands of idle men to carry out the all-important work of fortification." complementary methods: legal constraint, consisting of promulgating laws regulating obligatory labor; and restraint in fact, consisting of taking necessary measures to oblige workers under penalty of grave sanctions to conform to the announced legislation. 22 August 1942 of the defendant Sauckel, who formulated the charter of forced recruiting in all the occupied countries. the law of 4 September 1942. This law effected the freezing of all manpower in industries and anticipated the possibility of a requisition of all Frenchmen who might be employed in any work useful to the enemy. All Frenchmen from eighteen to fifty years of age who did not have a job which occupied them more than thirty hours a week had to prove that they were usefully employed to meet the needs of the country. A decree of 19 September 1942 and an enabling directive of 22 September provided regulation for the various provisions of this decree. The law of 4 September 1942 had been published by the so-called Government of Vichy, following strong pressure exercised by the occupation authorities. Specifically, Dr. Michel, Chief of the Administrative Staff of the German Military Command in France, wrote on 26 August 1942 a threatening letter to the delegate General for FrancoGerman Economic Relations, requesting him to see that the law was published. under date of 2 February stipulating a census of all male Frenchmen born between 1 January 1912 and 31 December 1921. He also obtained the passing of the law of 16 February, establishing the Bureau of compulsory Labor for all young men from twenty to twenty-two years of age.
On 9 April 1943, Gauleiter Sauckel requested the deportation of 120,000 workers for the month of May and another 100,000 for the month of June. To accomplish this, the so-called Government of Vichy put into force the total mobilization of the military conscription class of 1942. On 15 January 1944, Sauckel requested the de facto French authorities to deliver one million men for the first six months of theyear and he caused the adoption of the regulation designated as the Law of 1 February 1944, which extended the possibility of impressing all men from sixteen to sixty years of age and women from the age of eighteen to forty-five for forced labor. of Quisling the publication of a law dated 3 February 1943, which established the compulsory registration of Norwegian citizens and prescribed their forced enrollment. In Belgium and in Holland, the Bureau of compulsory Labor was organized directly by ordinances of the occupying power. In Belgium the ordinances were promulgated by the military command, and in Holland by the defendant Seyss-Inquart, who was Reich Commissar for the occupied Netherland territories. In both of these countries the development of compulsory labor policy followed the same pattern. compulsory labor was at first instituted only within the occupied territories. It was soon extended in order to permit the deportation of workers to Germany. This was achieved, in the case of Holland, by the ordinance of 28 February 1941, and in Belgium by the ordinance of 6 March 1942 which established the principle of forced labor. The principle of deportation was formulated in Belgium by means of the ordinance of 6 October 1942, and in Holland by the ordinance of 23 March 1942. compulsion was exercised in all countries, numerous roundups in all large cities. For example, 50,000 persons were arrested in Rotterdam on 10 and 11 November 1944. incorporation of laborers from occupied countries in the labor service of the Reich.
This incorporation was not merely the conscription of laborers buy meant in fact the application of German legislation to the nationals of occupied countries. occupied countries, the important results which the German Labor Office had anticipated were far from being fulfilled. However, a large number of workers from the occupied countries were forced to work for the German war effort. the West in the construction of the Atlantic Wall totalled 248,000 at the end of March 191.3. In the year 1942, 3,300,000 workers from occupied countries worked for Germany in their own country. 300,000 of these were in Norway, 249,000 in Holland, 650,000 in France. The number of workers deported to Germany and coming from the occupied territories in the West increased in 1942 to the figure of 130,000 Belgians, 135,000 Frenchmen, 154,000 Hollanders. On 30 April 1943, 1,293,000 workmen, of whom 269,000 were women, coming from the occupied territories in the West were working for the German War Economy. On 7 July 1944, Sauckel stated that the number reached a total of 537,000 of which 33,000 were Frenchmen. On the 1st of March 1944 he acknowledged during a conference, held by the Central Office of the Four Year Plan that there were in Germany 5,000,000 foreign workers, of whom 200,000 were actually volunteers. refugees, gives the figure of 715,000 for the total number of men and women who had been deported.
were transported to Germany, had to work under working conditions of existence that were incompatible with the most rudimentary regard for human dignity. The defendant Sauckel has himself stated that foreign workers, who could achieve substantial production should be fed so that they could be exploited as completely as possible with the minimum of expense, adding that they should receive less food the moment their production began to decrease and that no concern should be given to the fate of those whose production level no longer presented any interest. Special reprisal camps were organized for those who sought to avoid the compulsion imposed on them. An order of 21 December 1942 stipulated that unwilling workers should be sent without trial to such camps. In 1943, Sauckel, during an inter-ministerial conference, stated that the cooperation of the SS was essential to him in order to fulfill the task with which he had been entrusted. Thus, the crime of forced labor and of deportation gave rise to a whole series of additional crimes against persons. authorized by International Law any more than did that of the civilian laborers. National Socialist Germany obliged prisoners of war to work for the German war production, in violation of Articles 31 and 32 of the Geneva Convention. the war effort prisoners of war as well as workers from occupied territories, against all international conventions, was at the same time seizing, by every possible means, the wealth of these countries. German authorities applied systematic pillage in these countries. By economic pillage we mean both the taking away of goods of every type and the exploitation on the spot of the natural resources for the benefit of Germany's war. all countries the necessary means for payment. Thus, they insured that they could seize, with the appearance of legality, the wealth which they coveted. After freezing the existing purchasing power, they required enormous payments under the pretext of indemnity for the maintenance of occupation troops.
occupied countries may be obliged to assume the burden of theexpenses caused by the maintenance of an army of occupation. But the amounts that were exacted under this by the Germans were far removed from the actual costs of occupation. which operated practically for the exclusive profit of Germany. Imports from Germany were almost non-existent; the goods exported to Germany were subject to no regulation. purchasing power, the Germans endeavoured everywhere to achieve the stabilization of prices and imposed a severe rationing system. This rationing system, which left for the population a quantity of goods which was less than the minimum indispensable for their existence, afforded the additional advantage of preserving for the benefit of the Germans the greatest possible portion of the production. production, as a result of operations which had the appearance of legality (requisitions, purchases made with German priority coupons, individual purchase. These transactions were completed by other operations of a clandestine character, which were carried out in violation of the official, regulations imposed frequently by the Germans themselves. Thus, the Germans had created a whole organization for black market purchases. For example, one may read in a report of the German Foreign Ministry of 4 September 1942 that the Defendant Goering had ordered that purchases on the black Market should thenceforth extend to goods which until then had not been included, such as household goods, and he prescribed further that all goods which could be useful to Germany should be collected, even if as a result certain systems of inflations appeared in the occupied countries. every description, after requisitioning without payment or by paying with bills which they had irregularly obtained by a simple entry in the clearing account, the Nazi leaders were at the same time endeavouring to impose the resumption of activity in industry for the benefit of Germany's war.
amongst themselves the enterprises in the occupied areas which had engaged in a production similar to their own. While forcing them to fill out orders, these industrialists were required to place such industries in occupied countries firmly under their control by means of different types of financial combinations. ways hide the fact that the economic looting was systematically organized, contrary to the stipulations of the International Convention of the Hague. If, according to the stipulations of this Convention, Germany had the right to seize whatever was indispensable for the maintenance of the troops necessary for the occupation, all seizures in excess of these requirements undoubtedly constitute a war crime, which brought about the economic ruin of the occupied countries, a long-range weakening of their economic potential and of their means of subsistence, as well as the general undernourishment of the populations. Exact estimates of German transactions in the economic field cannot be formulated at this time. It would be necessary for this purpose to study the details of the economic activities of several countries over a period of more than four years. minimum estimates of German spolitations with respect to the different occupied countries. the value of German seizures was nearly 9,000,000,000 crowns. In Norway, Germany's spoliations exceed a total value of 20,000,000,000 crowns. although Holland is one of the richest countries in the world in relation to its population, it is today almost completely ruined and the financial charges imposed by the occupant exceed 20,000,000,000 florins. indemnity and clearing, the Germans seized far more than 30,000,000,000 francs of payment balances. The Grand Duchy of Luxembourg also suffered important losses as a result of the action of the occupying power.
745,000,000,000 francs. In this sum we have not included the 74,000,000,000 francs, which represents the maximum figure which Germany could legally demand for the maintenance of her army of occupation. (Moreover, the seizure of 9,500,000,000 in gold was calculated according to the rate of 1939.) payment which had not been forcibly seized from these countries, enormous quantities of goods of every character were purely and simply requisitioned without any indemnity, seized without any explanation, or else stolen. The occupying authorities took not only all raw materials and manufactured goods which could be useful to their war efforts, but they extended their seizures to everything that might help to procure them a credit balance in neutral countries, such as real estate, jewels, luxury goods and objects. Finally, the artistic treasures of the countries of western Europe were likewise looted in the most shameful manner. power contrary toall the principles of International Law, without providing any counterpart, enabled her to carry out, with the appearance of legality, the economic looting of France and of the other countries of western Europe. The consequence for these countries, from the economic viewpoint, is a loss of their strength which will take many years to repair. itself. For more than four years, the people of the occupied countries were exposed to a regime of slow starvation, which resulted in an increase in the death rate, a breaking down of the physical stamina of the population and, above all, an alarming deficiency in the growth of children and adolescents. leaders, contrary to International Law and specifically contrary to the Hague Convention, as well as contrary to the general principles of criminal law in force in all civilized nations, constitute war crimes for which they must answer before this High Tribunal.
THE PRESIDENT: Do you think this is a good time to break off?
(Wereupon at 1245 hours the Tribunal adjourned to reconvene at 1400 hours of the same day). Military Tribunal, in the matter of:
The
M. FRANCOIS de MENTHON: Crimes against the physical person. Arbitrary imprisonment, ill treatment, deportations, murder even, committed by the Germans in the occupied countries reached proportions beyond what could be imagined even in the course of a world conflict. These crimes took the most odious forms. the leaders of the Reich to an absolute scorn for the human individual, to the abolition of any sense of justice or even of pity, to a total subordination of any human consideration unless it be to the interest of German collectivity.
All these crimes are related to a policy of terrorism. Such a policy permits the subjugation of occupied countries without involving a large deployment of troops submissive to anything that might be demanded of them. Many of these crimes are moreover related to the will to exterminate. We shall examine in succession executions of hostages, police crimes, deportations, crimes involving prisoners of war, terroristic activities against the Resistance and the massacre of civilian population. acts of terrorism on the part of German occupation troops. As early as 1940, the German High Command in France notably, carried out numerous executions as reprisals for any crime against the German Army. forbids collective sanctions, awaken everywhere a feeling of horror and frequently produce a result contrary to the one sought, by arousing the populations against the occupant. practices thus seeking to have them recognized by the populations as "the right of the occupying power." Veritable "codes for hostages" are promulgated by the German military authorities.
Following the general order issued by the defendant, Keitel, on the 16th of December 1941, Stuelpnagel published in France his ordinance of 30 September 1941.
According to the terms of this ordinance, 411 Frenchmen held by German authorities for any reason whatsoever will be considered as hostages, as well as all Frenchmen who are in the custody of the French authorities on behalf of German organizations. The ordinance of Stuelpnagel specifies: "at the time of the burial of the bodies, burial in a common grave of a rather large number of persons in a particular cemetery must be avoided since this would create a shrine for pilgrims which now or later might become a center for the stimulation of anti-German propaganda." of hostages were carried out. 1941, and the other at Bordeaux a few days thereafter, the German authorities had 27 hostages shot at Chateaubriant, and 21 at Nantes. diers in the Rex moving picture house in Paris. 116 hostages were shot. 46 hostages were taken from the hostage depot of the Fortress at Romainville and 70 from Bordeaux. 50 hostages were shot in Paris at the end of September 1943. ance is allied to the same hateful policy of hostages. The commanding officer published the following notice in the Pariser-Zeitung of 16 July 1942: "near male relatives, brothers-in-law and cousins of the agitators above the age of 13 years will be shot.
"All female relatives of the same degree shall be condemned to forced labor.
"Children less than 13 years of all the above-designated persons shall be sent to a house of correction." but in the last period they were no more than one additional feature in the methods of German terrorism, then grown more sweeping.
the occupied countries of the west were victims, those committed by the Nazi police organizations are among the most revolting. ances, did not belong to the armies of occupation, is in itself contrary to international law. dignity that they imply, were multiplied during four years throughout all the territories of the Vest occupied by the German forces. one of the defendants or from one of their immediate subordinates and valid for all the German police or for the police of the occupied territories of the West, has been found. But these crimes were committed by a police that was a direct expression of the National Socialist ideology and the undeniable instrument of National Socialist policy for which all the defendants carry the full and entire responsibility. eity, their generalization in time and place, no one would be able to deny that these acts are not only the individual responsibility of those who committed them here or there, but constitute as well the execution of orders from above. nized in all civilized countries. On a simple unverified denunciation, and without previous investigation, and often without the perssons who brought the charges being qualified to bring them, masses of arbitrary arrests took place in every occupied country. ulated a scrupulous respect for "legality" in the matter of arrests. This legality was that introduced by Naziism in the interior of Germany and did not respect any of the traditional guarantees to which the individuals in civilized countries are entitled. But rapidly even this pseudo-legality was abandoned and the arrests became absolutely arbitrary. guilt of the accused had been examined. The use of torture in the interroga tions was almost a general rule.
The tortures usually applied are beating, whipping, chaining for several days without a moment of rest for nourishment or hygienic care.
Immersion in ice water, drowning in a bathtub, charging the bathwater with electricity, electrification of the most sensitive parts of the body, burns at certain places on the body, tearing out of finger-nails. But, moreover, those who carried out these measures had every latitude for unleasing their instinct of cruelty and of sadism toward their victims. All those facts which were of public knowledge in the occupied countries never gave rise to any penalty whatsoever against their authors on the part of the responsible authorities. It even seems that the torture was more severe when an officer waspresent. prisoners were part and parcel of a premeditated system of criminality ordered by the chief of the regime and executed by the most faithful members of the National Socialist organizations. perpetrated a considerable number of murders. It is impossible to know the conditions under which many of these murders were carried out. Nevertheless we have enough information to permit us to discover in them a new expression of the general policy of the National Socialists in the occupied countries. Often the deaths were only the result of the tortures inflicted on the prisoners, but often the murder was deliberately decided upon and executed. among those committed by the Germans against the civilian populations of the occupied countries was that of deportation and internment in the concentration camps of Germany.
These deportations had a double aim: to assure supplementary work for the benefit of the German war machine, to eliminate from the occupied countries and progressively exterminate the elements most opposed to Germanism. They served likewise to empty prisons overcrowded with patriots and to remove the latter for good. were a stupefying revelation for the civilized world. Nevertheless they also are only a natural consequence.
of the National Socialist doctrine, for which man has no value in himself when he is not in the service of the German race.
It is not possible yet to give exact figures. It is probable that one would remain under the truth in speaking of 250,000 for France, 6000 for Luxembourg, 5,200 for Denmark, 5,400 for Norway, 120,000 for Holland, 37,000 for Belgium.
The arrests are founded now in a pretext of a political nature; now on a pretext of a racial order. In the beginning they were individual; subsequently they took on a collective character, particularly in France from the beginning of 1941 on. Sometimes the deportation did not come until after long months of prison, but more often the arrest was made directly with a view to deportation under the regime of "protective custody". Everywhere imprisonment in the country of origin was accompied by brutality, often by torture. Before being sent to Germany, the deportees were in general concentrated at an assembly camp. The formation of a convoy was often the first stage of extermination. The deportees traveled in cattle cars, 80 to 120 per car, no matter what the season. There were few convoys where no deaths occurred. In certain transports the proportion of deaths was more than 25%. Camps but sometimes also to prisons. awaiting trial. The prisoners there were crowded together under inhumane conditions. Nevertheless the way the prisons were run was generally less severe than was the case with the camps. The work there was less out of proporition to the strength of the prisoners and the prison wardens were less hard than the SS in the concentration camps. concentration camps gradually to do away with the prisoners, but only after their working strength had been used to the advantage of the German war effort. inflicted by the SS on the prisoners. We shall take the liberty of going into still further detail during the course of the statement of the French Public Prosecution for it should be fully known to what extent the Germans inspired by National-Socialist doctrine could stoop to dishonour.
degradation and debasement in the prisoner until he lost, if possible, all semblance of a human individual. sufficient to ensure slow extermination through inadequate feeding, bad sanitation, the cruelty of the guards, the severity of the discipline, the strain of work out of proportion to the strength of the prisoner, and the haphazard medical service. Moreover you already know that many did not die a natural death, but were put to death by injections, the gas chambers, or from being inoculated with fatal diseases. about by ill treatment: communal ice-cold showers in winter in the open air, prisoners left naked in the snow, cudgelling, dog bites, hanging by the writs. Some figures will illustrate the result of these various methods of extermination. At Buchenwald, during the first period of 1945 there were 13,000 deaths out of 40,000 internees. At Dachau 13 to 15,000 died in the 3 months preceding the liberation. At Auschwitz, a camp of systematic extermination, the number of murdered persons came to several million. figure is as follows: other experiments which generally led to their death. At Auschwitz, at Stuthoff in the prison at Cologne, at Ravensbruck, at Neurngeamme, numerous men, women and children were sterilized. At Auschwitz the most beautiful women were set apart, artificially fertilized and then gassed. At Stuthoff a special barrack, isolated from the others, by barbed wire, was used to inoculate men in groups of 40 with fatal illnesses. In the same camp women were gassed whilst German doctors observed their reactions through a peephole arranged for this purpose. collective executions. These were carried out by shooting, by hanging, by injections, by gas lorry or gas chamber.
submitted to your High Tribunal during the preceding days by the American Prosecution, but the representative of France, so many of them have died in these camps after horrible sufferings, could not pass in silence this tragic example of complete inhumanity. This would have been inconceivable in the 20th century, if a doctrine of return to barbarism had not been established in the very heart of Europe. ample testimony to the degree of inhumanity which Nazi Germany had attained. To begin with the violations of international conventions committed against prisoners of war are numerous. Many were forced to travel on foot, almost without food for very long distances. Many camps had no respect for even the most elementary rules of hygiene. Food was very often insufficient; thus a report from the OKW of the WFSP dated 11 April 1945 and annotated by the defendant Keitel, shows that 82,000 prisoners of war interned in Norway received the food strictly indispensable to the maintenance of life on the assumption that they were not working, whereas 30,000 of them were really employed on heavy work. defendant Goering, camps for prisoners belonging to the British and American Air Forces were established in towns which were exposed to air raids. a conference held at the Fuehrer's Headquarters on the 27 January 1945, in the presence of the defendant Goering, to pass the sentence of death on all attemps to escape made by a prisoner of war when In convoy. were committed by the German authorities against prisoners of war: execution of captured prisoners of war for no reason whatsoever, e.g. the matter of 120 American soldiers at Malmedy on 27 January 1945. Parallel with "Nacht und Nebel", an expression for the inhumane treatment inflicted on civilians, can be put down the "Sonderhandlung" a "special treatment" of prisoners of war in which these disappeared in great numbers. out by the German Army and police against the Resistance. may be considered as a basic document, certainly has as a purpose the fight against the Communist moverment but it provides that resistance to the army of occupation can come from other than Communist sources and decides that every case of resistance is to be interpreted as having a Communist origin.