Trial of the Major War Criminals Before the International Military Tribunal, Nuremburg, 14 November 1945-1 October 1946, Volume 11

by Various

Afternoon Session

DR. THOMA: First, I wish to submit to the Court as Exhibit Rosenberg-11, Document 194-PS, the secret order of Rosenberg to Koch of December 1942 on the fitting treatment of Ukrainian civilians—dated 14 December 1942.

Witness, please give us your opinion on this general instruction in connection with your directions in Document 1056-PS.

ROSENBERG: Document 1056-PS is not a direct instruction of the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories but it was the result of discussions with various central agencies of the Reich Government officially interested in the East. In this document there are contained directions of the Eastern Ministry itself, and agreements with the various technical agencies such as the Transportation Ministry, the Post Office Department, and also the Police, in order to manifest, at least in the East, a certain unified civil administration. For the reasons which I have enumerated at the beginning this was no longer possible, and as far as the other questions of the subordination of the SS and Police Leader are concerned, to which I have referred the Prosecution on the basis of this document, I might indicate what I took the liberty of saying at the beginning in connection with the comment on the staffing of the administration of the Eastern territories, dated 17 July 1941.

However, as far as Document 1056-PS is concerned, I would like to point out that among the seven points which are especially stressed here, only the third point, “Care of the Population,” is quite expressly mentioned. Then, further along in the document it is again explained that this supplying of the population with foodstuffs and so forth is to be given special attention and that the problems of medical and veterinary help are to be given special consideration, even calling upon military authorities if necessary. Except for that I do not wish to go into this document further.

The Document 194-PS is unfortunately the only piece of instruction of the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories to the Reich commissioners that could be found. It is an instruction dated 14 December 1942, in which once again the humane and political attitude to be taken is prescribed. It is emphasized in the beginning—I permit myself a few short references—that German behavior should never give the impression that the Ukraine had no hope at all for the future; that directives of German offices were to be executed but should be given great thought. It says further:

“The people of the East have at all times seen in Germany the bearer of a legal order, which although bound by severity, is not an expression of arbitrariness. If one is able to make it clear to the peoples of the East by appropriate legal measures that although the war brings fearful hardships, yet transgressions will be justly investigated and judged, then these peoples will be easier to govern than if the impression of an arbitrary tyranny such as theirs is given.”

It continues:

“The elementary school with its 4-year curriculum should be strictly adhered to and should be followed by a proper technical school training for practical life. The German administration needs men for veterinary work, transportation, farming, geological research, et cetera, whom the German people is not in a position to supply. In these fields, the Ukrainian youth taken away from the streets can be roused to the consciousness of collaboration in the reconstruction of their country. In doing this, it would be inadmissible for German offices to confront the population with contemptuous remarks. Such an attitude is not worthy of the German.”

Then further:

“One becomes master by adopting a fitting attitude and behavior but not by overbearing conduct. Not by pretentious speech does one govern peoples, and not by ostentatious disdain of others does one win authority.”

Then, several other questions are dealt with in this directive, but I do not wish to take up the time of the Tribunal too much with these details. I was interested in showing in what sense I wanted to form the attitude of the civil administration, and in order not to have this directive shelved in the large offices I decreed that it was to be read in all offices.

DR. THOMA: Mr. President, I should like now to turn to the special charge of the Soviet Prosecution and in particular to refer to those documents that pertain to Rosenberg’s Einsatzstab in the East and to the alleged destructions. Therefore, I will submit to the defendant Exhibit USSR-376 (Document 161-PS), Exhibit USSR-375 (Document 076-PS), Exhibits USSR-7, 39, 41, 49, 51, and 81.

[The documents were submitted to the defendant.]

THE PRESIDENT: Are any of these in your document books?

DR. THOMA: The documents of the U.S.S.R., the ones I mentioned last, I do not have in a special document book. But I assumed and ascertained early this morning that these documents had been submitted to the Tribunal: USSR-39, 41, 251, 89, 49, and 353.

THE PRESIDENT: I was asking only for what purpose you were referring to them now. Of course we haven’t all the books here. They are not in your books?

DR. THOMA: Number 161-PS is in Document Book 3, Page 34. Nothing else is mentioned in the document book.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well.

ROSENBERG: The Document 161-PS deals with an order for the bringing back of certain archives from Estonia and Latvia. The Soviet Prosecution have concluded from this that there was a plundering of the cultural treasures in these countries. I would like to state that the instructions which I had read from Document 1015-PS requested in an unequivocal manner that all these cultural objects were to remain in the country. And that was done. I permit myself to refer to the date of that document, which is 23 August 1944, when combat activity had spread over this territory, and when these cultural objects and archives were to be safeguarded from combat activities. It was here a matter of having the afore-mentioned archives sheltered in Estonian country estates. That is, they were still to remain in the country itself, even in the midst of combat activity. As far as I know some of these archives were still brought to Germany later and I believe they were safeguarded in Schloss Höchstadt in Bavaria.

Document 076-PS has been used by the Prosecution as proof of a plundering of the library treasures in Minsk. We are concerned here with a report which a deputy of the commander of the rear area had issued and which was directed to the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories. From this report we can see in fact that some destruction had taken place in certain libraries, but that that was a consequence of troops having been quartered there, because the city of Minsk had been destroyed and the billeting facilities were overburdened.

But then under Number 1, and again under other paragraphs, it is expressly shown that posters had been put up everywhere, and that these things were put under control and were not to be touched after that. It is added that any further removals would have to be considered as plundering.

Under Number 2, I would like by all means to point out that it has been confirmed here that the most valuable part of this library of the Academy of Sciences came from the library of the Polish Prince Georg Radziwill, which the Soviet authorities had taken from the occupied Polish territory to Minsk and had incorporated into the library of the Academy of Sciences long before any other state or other German offices were active in that area. There are a number of other documents, namely, 035-PS and several others already submitted to the Tribunal, which make statements about the taking back of cultural objects from the Ukraine too. The date on these documents, that is, the year 1943, shows also that these cultural objects remained in the country until then, as had been ordered, and that only when combat activity made it necessary, was a withdrawal carried out. Document 035-PS says, on Page 3, Number 5:

“The infantry division”—concerned—“attaches great importance to the further evacuation of valuable institutions since the Armed Forces can in no way protect this area sufficiently and bombardment by artillery is to be counted on shortly.”

DR. THOMA: I would like to submit this document under Rosenberg-37; it has not yet been submitted.

ROSENBERG: It then adds: “Wehrmacht equipment, means of transportation, et cetera, shall be provided as far as possible by the ... infantry division.”

DR. THOMA: May I have the document again? [The document was handed to Dr. Thoma.] I would like to submit it to the Tribunal.

ROSENBERG: The evacuation then actually took place under artillery bombardment, and hence cultural objects which had come from Kharkov and other cities also during combat, were transferred only then to Germany.

Now I would like to deal with the documents which the Soviet Prosecution have given in detailed presentation of the Extraordinary State Commissions for Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. I would like, in this connection, to discuss just a few concrete details:

On Page 1 of the Document USSR-39 it states:

“From the beginning of their occupation of the Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic, the Germans and their accomplices destroyed the independence of the Estonian people and then tried to establish a ‘new order’; to demolish culture, art, and science; to exterminate the civilian population or to deport them as slave labor to Germany; and to lay waste and plunder cities, villages, and farms.”

I should like to remark in that connection, first of all, that the 20-year independence, after the Soviet attack in 1919, was broken by the marching in of the Red Army in 1940, a standpoint that is...

GEN. RUDENKO: Mr. President, it seems to me that the document which is now being looked over by the Defendant Rosenberg, naturally gives him a basis for replying to the concrete accusations of his criminal activity while he was Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories. However, I am of the opinion that what the Defendant Rosenberg has said just now is plain fascist propaganda and has naturally nothing to do with the matter.

DR. THOMA: Mr. President, if the Defendant Rosenberg makes a few introductory remarks to his statement on the document from which he wants to quote, I ask that he not be interrupted right away. We will deal with a few pertinent statements taken from the document.

ROSENBERG: So far as Point 2 is concerned, I would like to remark...

THE PRESIDENT: Is this document he is dealing with, a document that he wrote himself or had anything to do with? I haven’t got the document before me.

DR. THOMA: The document has been submitted by the U.S.S.R. and it contains charges against Rosenberg—charges of having undertaken demolitions and expropriations in these territories, and he is entitled to state his position with regard to this.

THE PRESIDENT: But when you say “his question,” can’t he say what he did in connection with the document, or the subject of the document? I mean, when you say “state his position,” it is such a very wide phrase it may mean almost anything. If you ask him what he did in connection with the subject of the document it is different, but it is more concrete and special.

DR. THOMA: What did you do in these occupied areas, contrary to the assertion of the Soviet Prosecution?

ROSENBERG: To refute the assertion that I destroyed culture and art and science in Estonia, I must point out that one of the first directions of the Eastern Ministry was to establish indigenous administrations in these three countries and to have the German administration in principal serve as a supervisory body. The limitations due to the war conditions were naturally given in times of war; they applied to spheres of war and armament economy, to the sphere of police security, and naturally to the political attitude in general.

A complete cultural autonomy was enjoyed by Estonia and Latvia as well as by Lithuania; their art and their theaters were active all through these years; many faculties of the university at Dorpat functioned and so did some faculties in Riga; the judicial sovereignty of these countries was under the power of the indigenous administration—national directorates as they were called—with all the authoritative departments necessary for the administration. The entire school system remained untouched. I visited these territories twice, and I can say only that the commissioners in charge there did everything to work as closely as possible in accordance with the desires of the indigenous administration which often expressed itself with criticism regarding the German administration, although, frankly speaking, we could not quite fully recognize the political sovereignty in the midst of war.

On Page 2 of this document it is stated, under corporal punishment for office employees, that the intruders had prescribed corporal punishment of Estonian workers in accordance with the regulation of the railway administration of 20 February 1942, for neglect of work or if the employee came drunk to work. This regulation of the director of the railway administration corresponds with the facts. But when this regulation was made known, of course it aroused the indignation of the German civil administration. Reich Commissioner Lohse at once annulled it, and we asked the Reich Minister of Transportation to have this impossible official removed. This took place immediately; he was disqualified and called home, and the fact that he was recalled was to be made known in the press. However, I cannot say whether it actually appeared in the press.

On Page 5 of this document, in Paragraph 2, it is set forth that the Germans destroyed historical edifices, that they had searched through and destroyed the Tartu—that is, the University of Dorpat which had a glorious past of more than 300 years, and was one of the oldest seats of higher learning.

Now I would like to add that these houses dating from the 17th and other centuries were constructed by Germans exclusively, and that German troops would certainly not be interested in destroying arbitrarily the houses of their own people. Secondly, this 300-year-old University of Dorpat was a German university for 300 years, which in fact supplied Russia and Germany with scholars of European repute.

THE PRESIDENT: That is quite irrelevant, quite irrelevant. The question is whether it was destroyed.

ROSENBERG: In the year 1942 I was once in Dorpat. A large part of the city had been destroyed through combat activity, but the university buildings were still standing. In this connection I had the opportunity to learn that the Einsatzstab Rosenberg in the Ukraine could confiscate 10,000 to 12,000 volumes belonging to the University of Dorpat and restore them again to their rightful owner.

I consider it out of question that an arbitrary destruction of this old German university could have been carried out by German troops and I can assume only that it was the result of combat activity, if a destruction actually had taken place.

As far as the other details of the document are concerned, I cannot define my position. It deals with many shootings of a police nature, matters clearly connected with combat activity, and I cannot make any statement about this, since it obviously refers to the time of the retreat.

The Document USSR-41 deals with the report of the Extraordinary State Commission on matters in Latvia. I would like to correct and say that the headquarters of the Foreign Minister were not at Riga, but that he had his regular office exclusively in Berlin.

In Paragraph 4 it is said:

“The Germans confiscated the country of the Latvian peasants for their barons and landowners, and mercilessly exterminated the peaceful population—men, women, and children.”

I would like to state in this connection that not a single farm was given up to the German barons of former times during the period of civilian administration, but the German administration of the country issued a decree which, in my opinion, was a singular, progressive piece of legislation. For this land, belonging to Germans for 700 years and expropriated by the young Estonian and Latvian Republics almost without compensation, could certainly have been returned easily to the Germans. But I signed a law in March, either 1942 or 1943—I do not know—the so-called Restitution Law (Reprivatisierungsgesetz), which legally guaranteed the Estonian and Latvian peasants the German property ceded to them at that time and handed over by solemn charters. With the occupation by the Soviet Union, a collectivization of this private farm property was introduced, and what it deals with is that this collectivization was abolished and therefore the former owners of 1919 came again into possession of their property.

I would like to mention the following in explanation of this statement. On Page 2 it is stated:

“For more than 3 years the Germans have made it their task to destroy factories, public works, libraries, museums, and homes in the Latvian cities.”

I myself have been in Latvian art museums, have seen a great Latvian art exhibition; I have been in the Latvian State theater, in which all performances were in the Latvian language, with just a few German guest conductors and singers. Factories were not destroyed in these 3 years of administration but their productivity was increased by numerous German machines. Of course this caused many protests from the native owners, because it was accompanied by an uncertainty about their own participation; but in any event there was no destruction, rather an increase in productive capacity.

And finally, as far as the archives and libraries are concerned, I have already said what is necessary in connection with Document 035-PS.

In regard to the extermination of 170,000 civilians, I cannot take any position as to what transpired in the police camps on grounds of police security. I would like to point out, however, that according to official statements of the indigenous administration, in the first place more than 40,000 Estonians in Estonia and more than 40,000 Latvians in Latvia were deported to the interior of Soviet Russia after the Red Army occupied these countries. And further that a large number of Latvians and Estonians volunteered to fight the Red Army and that at the retreat hundreds of thousands of Estonians and Latvians asked to be taken, to the Reich and many actually arrived there. The entire population of Latvia was about 2 million. That the German authorities should have shot 170,000 Latvians seems improbable in the highest degree.

However, regarding other alleged destructions committed during combat activity, I am not able to take a stand.

The third document, USSR-7, deals with the reports of the Extraordinary Commission on Lithuania. On Page 1, Paragraph 2, it states that Reich Minister Rosenberg tried to germanize the Lithuanian people and to exterminate the national culture. Lithuania was proclaimed a part of the German “Ostland Province.”

In Lithuania the peasant question was treated the same way as in Estonia and Latvia. Of course there was one difference insofar as Lithuania had a larger number of small German peasant farms which at the end of 1939 were taken into the German Reich, and when the Germans marched into Lithuania they were returned to their original farms and were settled in as concentrated a manner as possible in certain settlement districts. That corresponds to the facts; to the rest I cannot agree.

As far as the extermination of national culture is concerned, that does not seem to me a true representation either. On the contrary, I know that the staff of my office was very much interested in collaborating with the representatives of the Lithuanian folklore research, and that many studies were written on this exemplary folklore work in Lithuania and Latvia, and I cannot imagine that any arbitrary destruction took place here. I can remember only that administrative officials from the capital, Kauen or Kaunas (Kovno), came to me at the time of the withdrawal and said that they had worked in Kauen for 5 days, even though the city was already under Soviet artillery fire, by which, of course, many buildings were destroyed in combat activity; I am not able to say anything about that from personal experience.

Now I pass to Document USSR-51. In the Note of the Peoples’ Commissar for Foreign Affairs, of 6 January 1942, the destruction of cultural values of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia is also given introductory mention. I refer to what I have already said in reference to the documents that were just submitted. On Page 2, Column 1, it is also stated that the Germans pillaged and murdered the peasant population without restraint. Here, too, I would like to refer again to the declarations I have just made. On Page 6, Column 1, at the beginning, it says that the Germans in their rage against Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia destroyed all national cultures, national monuments, schools, and literature. But this, as I have just stated, is not in accordance with the facts. The Note of the Peoples’ Commissar for Foreign Affairs of 27 April 1942, which has been read here repeatedly and in detail, makes on Page 1, Column 1, the same assertion that here the pillage of the territory of the Soviet State had been carried out. I refer to the statement I have just made.

On Page 7 it is stated that the Germans intended and actually executed wholesale robbery of the land given free of charge by the Soviet Government to the collective farms (Kolkhozes) for their permanent use. I do not wish to make any statements on this special question here. State Secretary Riecke, whom the Tribunal has approved as witness, will make his expert statements on the law for the new agrarian order issued to strengthen farming in White Ruthenia and the Ukraine.

As the Soviet Prosecution withdrew the charge against me of having been a former Czarist spy, I do not need to go into that. I also cannot, of course, check in detail the various quotations which have been submitted here. But in one case it is possible for me to give an explanation here. It is on Page 9, Column 1, at the top, where the Foreign Commissar’s so-called “Twelve Commandments” for the behavior of the Germans in the East is mentioned. There follows a quotation from which it can be concluded only that it is an unbroken quotation from a German directive. These 12 commandments have been submitted by the Soviet Prosecution to the Tribunal, under Exhibit USSR-89 (Document USSR-89). It deals, as it has been established, with a directive of the State Secretary Backe, of the beginning of June 1941, a directive which I have learned of only here. This apparently unbroken quotation of the Foreign Commissar proves to be a compilation of fragments of sentences which were actually dispersed over a page and a half of the document, and these fragments, moreover, have not been given in their proper sequence, but in a completely different sequence from that in the document. But I would like to call your attention to a few changes in the wording.

Under Point 6 of the commandments:

“You must therefore”—this is directed to the agricultural leaders—“you must therefore carry out with composure the most severe and ruthless measures that are demanded by the national requirements. Deficiencies in character on the part of the individual will lead to his recall as a matter of principle. Anyone who is recalled for such reasons can no longer have an authoritative position in the Reich.”

In the quotation of the official note it says:

“Therefore, you yourself will have to take with composure the most cruel and ruthless measures that are dictated by German interests. Otherwise you cannot have any responsible positions at home.”

Therefore, instead of the word “severe” the word “cruel” has been substituted: in place of “national requirements” it says very generally “German interests”; and in place of the reference to a “lack of character” it is set down quite generally that if one does not thus take the most cruel measures one cannot have any responsible positions. I would not want to identify myself otherwise in any way with these 12 commandments, but I would like to state that on Page 3 under Point 7 it says:

“But be just and personally decent, and always set a good example.”

And in part 9:

“Do not spy on Communists. The Russian youth has been trained for communism for two decades. Russian youth does not know any other education. It is therefore senseless to punish them for the past.”

I believe that also there, Herr Backe who otherwise used stronger language, does not mean any regulation for extermination.

Now, I am passing to the charge by the Polish Government. It concerns me in one point only. On Page 20, under Point 5, it is stated that the exploitation, plundering, and the carrying off of art objects, et cetera, from museums and collections of all kinds, was centralized under the office of Rosenberg in Berlin. That is incorrect, as has been shown by the report of State Secretary Mühlmann, which has been read here many times and which shows that an entirely different department was set up for the safeguarding of these works of art. Furthermore, I read today a decree by Dr. Lammers, dated, I believe, 5 July 1942, in which the Government General was expressly excluded.

I must, however, admit that in one case in the beginning, the Einsatzstab confiscated a German collection of music and it was taken to the Reich for purposes of research. This action was not right, and from a correspondence with the then Governor General Frank that must also be here in my file, it is shown that we had agreed that this collection was to be returned to the Government General as a matter of course after a scholarly survey had been made, which I, to be sure, requested.

The incorrectness of this charge may be seen also from the fact that it is contended here that I had in the Einsatzstab among the various departments also an office “East” for Poland. The incorrectness of this statement may be gathered from the fact that the so-called special purpose staffs which were established for music and the plastic arts in the East were actually expert special staffs, and besides them the so-called working groups had regional tasks. I could, therefore, not have had an office “East” for Poland and at any rate the term “Poland” was never used in official circles—only the term “Government General.” I believe I can limit myself to this explanation. In addition, there have been presented a number of other general documents from Smolensk and from other cities, referring to much destruction and police measures. I cannot testify here concerning these points.

In conclusion I would like to refer only to Document 073-PS, which a few days ago was submitted to the witness Dr. Lammers. This document is concerned with the transmission of a document of the Foreign Office, in which some mistaken information was given after it had been said that the Soviet prisoners of war were under the command of the Reich Minister for the occupied Eastern countries.

In the introduction, it can be seen that here we are concerned exclusively with the doctrinary care and propaganda work which Minister Goebbels considered his province, rather than that of the Foreign Office. The Foreign Office stated, that it had leading jurisdiction over all prisoners of war with the exception of this moral and propaganda care of the Soviet prisoners of war, which in this respect were attended to by the Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, because these prisoners did not come under the provisions of the Geneva Convention. This statement, that they were not bound by the Geneva Convention, was the legal opinion issued by the Führer’s headquarters for the setting up of the administration in the Occupied Eastern Territories.

DR. THOMA: Witness, in the course of these proceedings you have been accused at least four times in the matter of gold dental fillings in the prison in Minsk. In this connection a document has even been submitted, regarding the handling of the Jewish question, and a further document deals likewise with an arson and anti-Jewish “action,” also in the district of Minsk. Will you please tell us what you have to say in that connection?

ROSENBERG: I might perhaps give the following general answer about the many files and reports from my office: In the course of 12 years of my Party office and 3 years in the Eastern Ministry, many reports, memoranda, carbon copies from all sorts of divisions were delivered to my office. I know of some of them, of some I received oral knowledge which was then entered in detail in the files, and there are a great number of more important and some entirely unimportant things which I was entirely unable to take note of during these years.

As far as these documents are concerned, I must say with regard to Document 212-PS, that this clearly represents a submission to my office—which is without heading, without signature, and without any other details—which I never received personally, but which I assume was probably delivered from police circles to my office. Thus, with the best intentions I cannot state my position as to the contents of this document.

As far as Document 1104-PS which deals with the terrible incidents in the city of Sluzk is concerned, that is a report from October 1941, and I must say that this report was submitted to me. This report aroused indignation in the Eastern Ministry, and as is seen here, my permanent representative, Gauleiter Meyer, sent a copy of this complaint of the civil administration, together with all the criticism of the civil administration, to the Police, to the Chief of the Security Police, at that time Heydrich, with the request for investigation. I must say that the Police had their own jurisdiction, in which the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories could not interfere. But I am unable to say here what measures Heydrich took. Yet, as may be seen from this, I could not assume that an order—which was attested to by the witness here yesterday—was given to Heydrich or Himmler by the Führer. This report, and many other communications which came to my ears, regarding shootings of saboteurs and also shootings of Jews, pogroms by the local population in the Baltic States and in the Ukraine, I took as occurrences of this war. I heard that in Kiev a larger number of Jews had been shot, but that the greater part of the Jews had left Kiev; and the sum of these reports showed me, it is true, terrible harshness, especially some reports from the prison camps. But that there was an order for the individual annihilation of the entire Jewry, I could not assume and if, in our polemics, the extermination of Jewry was also talked about, I must say that this word, of course, must make a frightful impression in view of the testimonies we think are available now, but under conditions prevailing then, it was not interpreted as an individual extermination, an individual annihilation of millions of Jews. I must also say that even the British Prime Minister, in an official speech in the House of Commons on 23 or 26 September 1943, spoke of the extermination in root and branch of Prussianism and of National Socialism. I happened to read these words from this speech. However, I did not assume that in saying this he meant the shooting of all Prussian officers and National Socialists.

Regarding Document Rosenberg-135 (Exhibit USA-289) I would like to say the following: It is dated 18 June 1943. On 22 June, I returned from an official visit to the Ukraine. After this official visit I found a pile of notes about conferences. I found many letters and, above all, I found the Führer decree of the middle of June 1943 which had already been given verbally, in which the Führer instructed me to limit myself to the basic principles as far as legislation was concerned, and not to interest myself too much with the details of the administration of the Eastern Territories. I was dejected when I returned from this journey and I did not read this document. But I cannot assume that this document was not at all mentioned to me by my office. My subordinates were so conscientious that I can assume only that in the course of their reporting to me about many documents, they told me that another great disagreement between the Police and Civil Administration was again at hand, as there had been many disagreements of that nature before and I perhaps said, “Please give this to Gauleiter Meyer or give it to the police officer, to the liaison officer so that he can investigate these matters.” Otherwise these terrible details would have remained in my memory. I cannot say any more in regard to this subject than I was able to say when it was brought up in the interrogation.

DR. THOMA: I submit do the Tribunal the Exhibit Rosenberg-13, a memorandum from Koch to Rosenberg, a complaint about Rosenberg’s criticism and justification of his policy in the Ukraine, dated 16 March 1943, and a letter from Rosenberg to Reich Minister Lammers dated 12 October 1944, in which he states to the Führer his wish to resign. May it please the Tribunal, regarding Rosenberg-13, memorandum from Koch to Rosenberg...

THE PRESIDENT: What number?

DR. THOMA: Rosenberg-13, Document 192-PS, Document Book Number 2, Page 14; I would like to read this to the Tribunal personally and to make the following introductory remark.

THE PRESIDENT: It is a very long thing, Dr. Thoma. You do not need to read it all, surely?...

DR. THOMA: I shall not read all of it, Your Honor. But I have unfortunately only the opportunity of presenting State Secretary Riecke as an official of the Ministry for the Eastern Occupied Territories. The Tribunal, however, even from this witness, who will appear before them, will be able to see that the best officials which the German Reich had, were used in the Ministry of the Occupied Eastern Territories and that every individual complaint was conscientiously checked. It is not so, that in addition to what we have heard today numerous other crimes have been committed which have not come to the knowledge of the Tribunal, but I believe that everything has been exhaustively presented of the “admittedly terrible things” that happened in the East during these 4 or 5 years. And the question now is how Gauleiter Koch responded to it.

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal are simply asking you not to read the whole of the document which covers many pages. That means you can go ahead and read the essential parts of it.

DR. THOMA: Therefore, I would like to assert that each and every complaint which was received by the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories was followed up. Gauleiter Koch writes:

“Various recent decrees of the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, in which my work was criticized in an exceptionally severe and offensive manner and from which have resulted misinterpretations of the policies as well as my legal position, have induced me to present this report to you, Mr. Reich Minister, in the form of a memorandum.”

And then follow remarks which show that the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories investigated the complaints. He complains:

“On 12 January 1943, for example, I was informed by the Ministry that Anna Prichno of Smygalovka, an Eastern Worker, had objected that her parents who remained in the Ukraine could not pay their taxes. I was asked to cancel these taxes or to reduce them by half and also to report how I decided.”

On Page 13:

“Lately numerous individual complaints from Eastern Workers employed in the Reich have been passed on to me and on each single case I have been asked to give a report, usually on such short notice that it was impossible to comply with the request.”

On Pages 15 and 16:

“Hence, I found it strange”—writes Gauleiter Koch—“to have the decree I/41 of 22 November 1941 state that the Ukrainian people were strongly permeated with German blood, which fact is to account for their remarkable cultural and scientific achievements. But when on top of this a secret decree of July 1942, to which I will refer more closely at the end of this section, declares that very many points of contact exist between the German Ukrainian people, one is no longer only surprised but astonished. This decree demands not only correct but even amiable manners in dealing with Ukrainians.”

Then:

“In the following I would like to give a few more examples of lack of reserve towards Ukrainians. For instance, by decree of 18 June 1942, II 6 f 6230, I was informed that you were procuring a total of 2.3 million Reichsmark worth of Ukrainian schoolbooks, charged to my budget without even contacting me about it previously.”

THE PRESIDENT: Do you think it necessary to read all this? I am not quite sure how far you have gotten because I have been reading on.

DR. THOMA: Mr. President, may I make a remark in this connection? I have already limited my selection. This memorandum is quite a thick copybook; however, I will try to be still more brief, and want only to emphasize that on every page you will find a complaint about the conscientiousness with which Rosenberg followed up all these individual complaints. But I will be very brief:

“It is not necessary that your Ministry stress over and over again as it does by many written and telephone protests that any violence in recruiting of workers has to be discontinued.”

And then there is one further very brief remark:

“And if I issue more decrees against floggings than actually take place, I will make myself ridiculous.

“That happened a few times, and every single case was strongly censured.”

And now we come to something very important, Your Honors, namely, how Gauleiter Koch threatens representations to the Führer, and says:

“Nobody has ever asked me, as an old Gauleiter, to submit to him articles I write, for nobody but the Führer can ever absolve me of the political responsibility that I bear for an article signed with my full name...

“Finally, in addition to these statements on my responsibility I should like to allude to the relations between the Führer and the Reich commissioners. As an old Gauleiter I am accustomed to go to my Führer directly with all my problems and requests, and this right, in my capacity as Oberpräsident, has never been denied me even by my superior minister...

“By decree I 6 b 4702/42, I was ordered to abstain from referring to the wishes of the Führer in my reports to you, as the forwarding of the Führer’s wishes were your affair exclusively. I must state here that in my position as an old Gauleiter the Führer has repeatedly given me his political directives...

“If one takes away or curtails the position of the Reich commissioners in relation to the Führer, then very little remains in keeping with the position of the Reich commissioner.”

On Page 50 he says:

“I have to state expressly that I must, under these circumstances, refuse to accept responsibility for the success of the labor recruiting and the spring planting.”

Rosenberg recommended to him to go on with the recruiting of labor.

At the end he says:

“My position has been encroached upon by you so often in the last 3 weeks that it can be restored only by the Führer.”

Thereupon a conflict developed in Hitler’s presence at the Reich Chancellery among Rosenberg, Bormann, and Koch, and the result was that Bormann and, in the main, Koch, were upheld and the Defendant Rosenberg was notified to limit himself to matters of principle only.

Thereupon the defendant submitted his resignation.

Now, I ask the defendant to go into this in more detail. It is in Document Book 2, Page 27.

ROSENBERG: I would like to remark...

THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Thoma, I think we had better adjourn now for 10 minutes.

[A recess was taken.]

DR. THOMA: Witness, some days ago the document was mentioned from which it becomes clear that the forest district of Zuman was to be the private hunting ground for the Reich Commissioner, and that hundreds of people were shot, because resettling them would have been too complicated and take too much time. Will you make a statement about that?

ROSENBERG: As time went by I received much information regarding instances of acts of violence committed in the East. Upon investigating, it was found very often that these reports did not conform with the facts. In this case this report appeared to me quite credible so I took the opportunity to report it to the Führer directly, considering that I was having trouble with Gauleiter Koch.

Apart from other questions—schools in the Ukraine, establishment of technical schools, and certain personal statements of Koch which I submitted as a complaint—I also submitted this report.

At the audience with the Führer, Reich Commissioner Koch submitted an opinion of the Chief of the Forest Administration of the Ukraine. From this it appeared that these forest districts had to be used for supplying timber either for railway ties or other emergency needs. And since various guerrilla units and partisans had flocked together in these wooded districts and such a task was extremely dangerous owing to the insecure situation, it was established that Koch, not in the interest of the hunting earlier contemplated, but for this reason, had ordered a cleaning up of this district; and in the course of this cleaning up a considerable number of partisans had been found and they had been shot. The remaining population from these forest districts had been resettled, and, as Koch added, in addition to this statement of the Chief of the Forest Administration, a number of these resettled persons had even expressed gratitude for the fact that they had received better soil to work than they had in these forest areas. On receiving these reports from Koch the Führer shrugged his shoulders and said:

“It is difficult to decide here. According to the statement of the Forest Administration for the Ukraine that I have here, I must leave the matter alone, and the other decisions regarding Ukrainian policy will be sent to you.”

This happened in July in the shape of a decree which is also in my files, but which, unfortunately, has not been found. It is a decree about which the witness Lammers has spoken and which in principle states that the Reich Minister should cause no obstruction, the Minister for the East should confine himself to basic matters, should submit his decrees to the Reich commissioner for his opinion and, in the event of conflict, the decision of the Führer must be secured.

After this decree of the Führer I made a renewed attempt to represent the views which I considered right. But, of course, I will not deny that on several occasions, due to pressure from the Führer’s headquarters, I became a little weary. And when it was said, and said in clear-cut terms, that I was apparently more interested in these Eastern peoples than in the welfare of the German nation, I made some appeasing statements; but my decrees and the further application of my instructions continued in the old way. As I have now been able to ascertain, I reported to the Führer personally on eight different occasions on this matter, and I submitted written petitions and formulated my decrees with this aim in mind.

When then, in 1944, the Reichsführer SS, too, occupied himself not only with police affairs, but also with policy in the Eastern territories, and when I had not been able any longer to report to the Führer’s headquarters, since the middle of November 1943, I made one last attempt to make a suggestion to the Führer regarding a generous Eastern policy. At the same time, I asked very clearly, in the event of a refusal, to be relieved from any further work. This document (Document Rosenberg-14) is a letter to Dr. Lammers of 12 October 1944, at the beginning of which it is said that:

“In the face of current developments in the Eastern problem, I beg you to submit the accompanying letter to the Führer personally. I consider the way and manner in which the German policy in the East is being handled today as very unfortunate; while I have not participated in the negotiations, I am nevertheless made responsible for them. Therefore I beg you to submit my letter to the Führer as soon as possible for his decision.”

Dr. Lammers then immediately transmitted this letter to the Führer’s secretary, Bormann. In the letter to the Führer it says on Page 2:

“For observation and the steering of this development I have created regional offices for all the Eastern peoples in the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories, which can now, after many tests, be regarded as suitable for their purposes and well set up. They also contain representatives from the various regions and races concerned, and if it seems in the interest of German policies, these may be recognized as a special national committee.”

These central offices mentioned here had the task of seeing to it that the representatives of all Eastern peoples received personally the complaints of their countrymen who were in sovereign German territory and presented them to the Ministry of the Occupied Eastern Territories which in turn would take up these complaints with the German Labor Front authorities, with the Police, or the Plenipotentiary General for the Allocation of Labor.

On Page 5 it says then:

“I have informed the Reich Minister and the Chief of the Reich Chancellery what the Eastern Ministry has done in the sphere of political direction in a letter dated 28 May 1944, and I am asking you, my Führer, to have the contents read to you.”

This is a reference to a further statement.

On Page 6 it states:

“I am asking you, my Führer, to tell me whether you still desire my activity in this field, for since it has not been possible for me to report to you orally, and the problems of the East are brought to you and discussed from various sides, I must, in consideration of this development, assume that you perhaps consider my activity as no longer necessary.

“In addition rumors are spread by sources unknown to me of the dissolution of the Ministry of the Occupied Eastern Territories; in fact it is said that these rumors are used in official correspondence to the highest Reich authorities because of various demands which have been made. Under such circumstances fitting work is not possible, and I ask you to give me directives as to how I should act in view of the state of affairs which has developed.”

In the middle of the next paragraph, I point out the following, from ideas that I voiced first in my speech of 20 June and in my protest during the meeting of 16 June. And it says here literally:

“This plan provided that in order to mobilize all the national forces of the Eastern peoples, they should be promised in advance a certain autonomy and the possibility of cultural development, with the aim of leading them against the Bolshevist enemy. This plan, which in the beginning I ventured to assume you approved of, has not been carried out, because the peoples were treated in a way which was politically opposite to this.

“Solely and only because of the agrarian order of 1942, approved by you, has their willingness to work been maintained to the end in view of a certain hope of acquiring property.”

Attached to this letter to the Führer there is the suggestion for the adjustment of the Eastern policy, which is reiterated for the last time. And in Paragraph 2 in the middle of Page 2 it says:

“These regional and local offices for the peoples of the East, attached to the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, are, in the name of the Reich Government, to be recognized by him as national committees at a date to be fixed by the Führer. The term ‘National Committee’ is to be understood by the Reich Government to mean that these authorized spokesmen can submit the wishes and complaints of their peoples.”

On Page 2 in the middle, it says:

“In the leadership of the peoples of the East...”

THE PRESIDENT: Is the Tribunal interested in all this detail? The substance of it has been given by the witness, has it not? He summarized the whole letter before he began to read any of it. There is nothing new up to now.

DR. THOMA: Mr. President, the defendant wanted to summarize again briefly what his ideas were for the Ukraine, namely, autonomy, free cultural development; and that was the core of the difference with Koch, namely, that Koch stressed mainly the idea of exploitation; therefore the defendant wanted to say once more what was the whole plan of his intentions towards the Soviet Union. But this topic can now be dropped.

Before I make a statement about the question of the willingness to do construction work in the Ukraine I want to have the defendant make a statement on the subject of the treatment of prisoners of war. Document 081.

THE PRESIDENT: Is it anywhere in your books? Is it Document 081-PS?

DR. THOMA: It has been submitted under a USSR exhibit number.

[The document was submitted to the defendant.]

Have you got it, Defendant?

ROSENBERG: It is Exhibit USSR-353. The complaints regarding prisoners of war came from various sources. Fairly near the beginning they were already lodged with the Eastern Ministry; then later on, particularly during the winter 1941-1942, they were brought by passing officers or soldiers and were reported to me by my political department. We then passed these complaints on to the competent military offices with a request that, for obvious reasons, they should be given consideration.

These complaints were received frequently and my staff, as time went by, stated to me that they encountered a great deal of understanding for these wishes, particularly for the wish expressed by us that prisoners from this large number of Soviet prisoner-of-war camps should be selected according to their nationality and taken to small camps, because through this national segregation, good political and humane treatment would be best guaranteed. In view of the numerous complaints about the death of many thousands of Soviet prisoners, I received more than once reports that during battles of encirclement, units of the Red Army had defended themselves in the hardest way and had not surrendered. In fact they were completely exhausted from hunger when they finally were captured by the Germans, and even numerous cases of cannibalism had been established, born of their tenacity not to surrender in any case.

The third complaint I received was to the effect that political commissars were shot. This complaint too was passed on by us. That an order existed in this connection was unknown to me. We concluded from other reports that here clearly there must have been a political or police reprisal, since we heard that many German prisoners, who later were freed, were most of them found, again dead or mutilated. Later on I was informed that such shootings were prohibited, and thus we assumed that the political commissars also belonged to the regular Red Army.

Now here is Document 081-PS. It has been stated by the Prosecution that this is a letter from the Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories to the Chief of the OKW. The document was also found in my files. But it is not a letter from me to the Chief of the OKW, Keitel; on the contrary, it was obviously deposited in my office by the sender. In the left-hand top corner on Page 1, it can be seen that there is a figure “I.” That means Department “I.” In the case of letters originating from me such a reference would always be absent, since “I” was not a department of my own office. Furthermore, letters of mine to the Chief of the OKW were always of a personal character, either beginning with the name of the addressee, or a personal address. Chief of the OKW is the office. In the same way the ordinary address, “Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories,” would not be a personal letter to me, but would mean the office.

I will not go into these details, but I will take the liberty of reading one final paragraph in connection with which I may also state that it is in keeping with the spirit which I endeavored to instill in my collaborators. And likewise, they thought that they ought to act and express themselves in this spirit. It states, literally, on Page 6:

“The main demand...”

THE PRESIDENT: What is the date?

ROSENBERG: The letter is dated 28 February 1942. That is to say, it was in the winter, in that dreadful cold period. On Page 6 it states literally:

“The main demand will have to be that the treatment of prisoners of war be carried out in accordance with the laws of humanity and as befits the dignity of Germany...

“It is understandable that the numerous cases of inhuman treatment of German prisoners of war by members of the Red Army which have been recorded have so embittered the German troops that they wish to pay them back in their own coin.

“Such reprisal measures, however, in no way improve the situation of German prisoners of war but must ultimately result in both sides no longer taking any prisoners.”

I merely wanted to quote this letter because I have no other documents at my disposal on the activity of my political department, and this is only an example of the work, which I think touches on these problems.

DR. THOMA: Mr. President, I wanted to bring to an end questions relating to the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories by submitting an affidavit from Professor Dr. Dencker on the employment of agricultural machinery in the Ukraine. Document Rosenberg-35 has already been granted me by the Tribunal. This affidavit concerns the following...

THE PRESIDENT: Have you finished your examination now?

DR. THOMA: I have finished the questions relating to the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories. I have only a few more brief questions.

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal has seen this affidavit recently so there is no need to read it. Now, if you will, give us the exhibit number.

DR. THOMA: Rosenberg-35. This deals with machinery which had a value of 180 millions and was delivered to the Ukraine—agricultural machinery.

Witness, were you a member of the SA or the SS?

ROSENBERG: No, I belonged neither to the SA nor the SS.

DR. THOMA: So you have never worn an SS uniform?

ROSENBERG: No.

DR. THOMA: Do you know anything about concentration camps?

ROSENBERG: Yes. This question, of course, has been put to everybody and the fact that concentration camps existed became known to me in 1933. But although this may appear a repetition, I must nevertheless state that I knew by name only two concentration camps, Oranienburg and Dachau. When these institutions were explained to me I was informed, among other things, that in one concentration camp there were 800 communist functionaries whose previous sentences averaged 4 year prison terms or partly also penitentiary terms. In view of the fact that this involved a complete revolution and even though it had legal basis it was still something revolutionary, I considered it comprehensible that protective custody should be for some time decreed by this new State for these hostile persons. But at the same time I saw and heard how our toughest opponents, against whom otherwise no charges of a criminal nature were made, were treated so generously that, for example, our strongest opponent, the Prussian Minister Severing was retired with full ministerial pension, and I considered this very attitude as National Socialistic. Thus I had to assume that these arrangements were politically and nationally necessary, and I was thoroughly convinced of this.

DR. THOMA: Did you participate in the evacuation of the Jews from Germany?

ROSENBERG: I should perhaps add one thing: I visited no real concentration camp, neither Dachau nor any other one. Once—it was in 1938—I questioned Himmler on how things really were in the concentration camps and told him that one heard from the foreign press all sorts of derogatory atrocity reports. Himmler said to me, “Why don’t you come to Dachau and take a look at things for yourself? We have a swimming pool there, we have sanitary installations—irreproachable; no objections can be raised.”

I did not visit this camp because if something actually improper had been going on, then Himmler, upon being questioned about it, would probably not have shown it to me. On the other hand I desisted from going for reasons of good taste; I simply did not want to look at people who had been deprived of their liberty. But I thought that such a talk with Himmler made him aware that such rumors were spreading.

A second time, later on—I cannot say, however, whether it was before or after the outbreak of the war—Himmler himself spoke to me about the matter of the so-called Jehovah’s Witnesses, that is, about a matter which has also been submitted by the Prosecution as a religious persecution. Himmler told me only that it was certainly impossible to put up with conscientious objections, considering the situation the Reich was in, that it would have incalculable consequences; and he went on to say that he had often talked personally to these internees in order to understand them and eventually convince them. That, he said, has been impossible, however, because they replied to all questions with quotations—quotations from the Bible which they had learned by heart, so that nothing was to be done with them. From that statement by Himmler I gathered that since he was telling me such a story he could not possibly want to plan or carry out executions of these Jehovah’s Witnesses.

An American chaplain has very kindly given me in my cell a church paper from Columbus. I gather from that that the United States, too, arrested Jehovah’s Witnesses during the war and that until December 1945, 11,000 of them were still detained in camps. I presume that under such conditions, every state would answer in some way such a refusal of war service; and that was my attitude too. I could not consider Himmler wrong on this point.

DR. THOMA: Could you intervene in the case of Pastor Niemöller?

ROSENBERG: Yes. When the case of Pastor Niemöller was being tried in Germany I sent one of my staff to the trial because I was interested in it both from an official and humane point of view. This official—his name was Dr. Ziegler—made a report to me from which I concluded that this arraignment was based partly on misunderstandings on the part of the authorities, and furthermore that he was not as seriously incriminated as I had assumed. I then submitted that report to the Deputy of the Führer, Rudolf Hess, and I asked him whether he could not give this case consideration also, and after some time, when I was with the Führer once, I brought the conversation around to this subject, and stated that I thought this whole trial and the subsequent handling most unfortunate. The Führer told me:

“I have asked only one binding statement from Niemöller—that he, as a clergyman, will not challenge the State. He has refused to give that and hence I cannot set him free. Apart from that, I ordered that he receive the most decent treatment possible, that he, being a heavy smoker, receive the best cigars, and that he have the means for carrying on all learned studies, if he wants to do this.”

I do not know on what reports the Führer based this statement, but as far as I was concerned it was clear that I was not in a position to intervene any further in this matter.

DR. THOMA: We come now to the last question but one: Is it true that after the seizure of power, you made a certain examination of your attitude towards the Jews, and that the whole treatment of Jews immediately after the seizure of power underwent a certain modification? Further, that originally it had been intended to settle the Jewish question in quite another way?

ROSENBERG: I will not deny that during that time of struggle up to 1933, I too had used strong polemic arguments in my writings, and that many hard words and suggestions appeared in that connection. After seizure of power I thought—and I had good reason to think that the Führer thought so too—that now one could renounce this method, and that a certain parity and a chivalrous treatment of this question should be observed. Under “parity” I understood the following—and I stated it in a public address on 28 July 1933 and also at the Party rally in September 1933 publicly over all the broadcasting systems—that it was not possible, for example, that the communal hospitals in Berlin should have 80 percent Jewish doctors when 30 percent was their ratio. I stated further at the Party rally that we had heard of conditions that the Reich government, in connection with all these parity measures and beyond that, were making exceptions for all those members of the Jewish people who had lost a relative, father or son, during the war; and I used the expression that we would now have to make efforts to solve this problem in a chivalrous way. That it turned out otherwise is a tragic destiny, and I must state that the activities following in connection with the emigration and the support of this emigration in many countries abroad had as a result the aggravation of the situation; then things occurred which were regrettable and I must say robbed me of the inner strength to continue petitioning the Führer for the method I favored. As I said, what was stated here recently in the veiled phraseology of the police and made known here, and what has been testified to here the other day, I considered simply impossible and I would not have believed it even if Heinrich Himmler himself had related it to me. There are things which, even to me, appear beyond the humanly possible, and this is one of them.

DR. THOMA: I have one last question. In connection with this question I should like to submit Exhibit Rosenberg-15, Document 3761-PS. This is contained in the document book but it has not yet been submitted to the Tribunal as an Exhibit. It contains a letter from Rosenberg to Hitler, written in 1924, containing the request that he should not be nominated as a candidate for the Reichstag.

Witness, you have taken part in all phases of the development of National Socialism from its beginning to its dreadful end. You have participated in its meteoric rise and its dreadful descent, and you know well that everything centered in this one person. Will you inform the Tribunal what you did yourself, and how much you were able to accomplish to avert having all the power centered in this one single person, and what you did to have the effect in every way alleviated? I am showing you first this document given to you, and then Document 047-PS, which has also already been submitted to the Tribunal under the Exhibit Number USA-725.

[The documents were submitted to the defendant.]

ROSENBERG: I did actually serve this National Socialist movement from its very first days on and I was completely loyal to a man whom I admired during these long years of struggle because I saw with what personal devotion and passion this former German soldier worked for his people. As far as I personally am concerned, this letter refers to an epoch...

THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Thoma, exactly what is your question to the witness? We don’t want him to make a speech. We only want to know what question you are putting to him.

DR. THOMA: What suggestions did you make, and did you publicly advocate suggestions to restrict the authority of the Führer?

ROSENBERG: I must say that at that time I advocated—and this in full agreement with Adolf Hitler—and I advocated in my book, Myth of the 20th Century, the view that the Leadership Principle did not consist of one head but that both the Führer and his collaborators are to be bound by common duties. Further, that this Leadership Principle concept should be understood to mean the establishment of a senate or, as I described it, Ordensrat, which would have a correcting and advisory function.

That point of view was emphasized by the Führer himself when he had a senate hall with 61 seats built in the Brown House in Munich, because he himself considered it necessary. Then I again advocated this policy in a speech in 1934, but...

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal does not think this is in answer to the question as to what he did to limit the Führer’s power. We want to know what he did, if anything, to limit the Führer’s power.

DR. THOMA: In a public meeting he pointed out that—I draw your attention to Document Book 1, Volume II, on Page 118...

THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Thoma, I didn’t want you to point it out to me, I wanted the witness to point that out to the Tribunal.

DR. THOMA: In that case, will you concentrate on those two speeches which you made at that time.

ROSENBERG: I can quote the speeches, but they are not a direct answer to the question either. They signify that I stated that the National Socialist State may not be a caste which reigns over the German nation and that the Führer of a nation must not be a tyrant. However, I did not see in Adolf Hitler a tyrant, but like many millions of National Socialists I trusted him personally on the strength of the experience of a 14-year-long struggle. I did not want to limit his own full power, conscious though I was that this meant a personal exception for Adolf Hitler, not in keeping with the National Socialist concept of the State. Nor was this the Leadership Principle as we understood it or a new order for the Reich.

I served Adolf Hitler loyally, and what the Party may have done during those years, that was supported by me too. And the ill effects, due to the wrong masters, were branded by me, in the middle of the war, in speeches before political leaders, when I stated that this concentration of power as it existed at that moment, during the war, could only be a phenomenon of the war and could not be regarded as the National Socialist conception of a State. It may be opportune for many, it may be opportune for 200,000 people, but to adhere to it later on would mean the death of the individuality of 70 million.

I said that in the presence of the Higher SS leaders and other organization leaders or Gauleiter. I got in touch with the heads of the Hitler Youth, together with my staff, fully conscious that after the war a reform would have to be carried out here in the Party, so that the old demands of our Movement, for which I too had fought, would find respect. However, that has not been possible any more; fate has finished the Movement and has taken a different course.

DR. THOMA: Witness, can you state a concrete fact from which it arises that the Party, from the beginning, did not have the idea of coming to power alone but also by collaborating with other parties?

ROSENBERG: That, of course, is a historical development of 14 years, and if I can evaluate that letter here, then I would like to say that at the end of 1923, after the collapse of the so-called “Hitler Putsch,” when the then representatives of the Party either were arrested or had emigrated to Austria, and when I remained in Munich with a few others, I advocated that a new development must take place and that the Party should prove itself in a parliamentary contest.

The Führer, who was then in prison at Landsberg, turned that suggestion down. My collaborators and I continued to try to influence him, however, whereupon the Führer wrote me a long, handwritten letter, which is also in the files, in which he once more developed his reasons for not wanting to comply with my suggestion. Later on, nevertheless, he agreed.

And here in this letter I asked him—he later agreed—not to nominate me as Reichstag candidate, because I felt not entitled to the privileges of a Reichstag deputy by favoring a Reichstag election, and secondly, because I felt myself too new in Germany for exposing myself in such a way after only a few years of activity.

DR. THOMA: I have no further questions.

THE PRESIDENT: Do any of the defendant’s counsel want to ask any questions?

DR. SERVATIUS: Witness, in September and October 1942 you received various reports regarding unbearable conditions in connection with the recruiting of workers in the Occupied Eastern Territories. Did you investigate to find out whether the statements contained in these reports were true?

ROSENBERG: These allegations, which were received by the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories, have been constantly checked by Main Department of Labor and Social Policy during all these years and I asked the Tribunal to hear as a witness here the official who always had charge of this question, Dr. Beil. This request has been granted by the Tribunal, but I now hear that Dr. Beil is ill and that he can give a report of his experiences only by a written statement. From my knowledge I can say the following:

These matters were reported to me frequently by Dr. Beil and the so-called Central Department for People of Eastern Nationalities. In a letter which has already been mentioned I transmitted them to Sauckel. Then they were always sent to the Reich Commissioner for the Ukraine or some other administrative officials for investigation and comments. A part of these proved to be correct, a part proved to toe untrue and exaggerated; and as far as I know, the Plenipotentiary General for Allocation of Labor, Sauckel, even made the complaints received from me an occasion for his own intervention, as did the German Labor Front, which was responsible for the welfare of all foreign workers in Germany. There was constant negotiation with the head of this Labor Front, and the Ministry for Occupied Eastern Territories made requests here continuously, until eventually, at the end of 1944, Dr. Ley, as the chief of this welfare department, thought that he could inform me that now after considerable difficulties, really lasting and good conditions had been achieved. I replied to him even then that I could express my pleasure about it, but that I still received reports that here and there things were going wrong. In practice the members of my ministry, together with inspectors of the German Labor Front, went to inspect a number of labor camps in order to investigate the complaints and then have them adjusted by the Labor Front.

DR. SERVATIUS: You are talking here mainly about conditions in Germany, which did not come under your jurisdiction. What did you do regarding Koch? Is the memorandum of 16 March 1943, which has already been mentioned here, a reply to these complaints? In that memorandum you write Koch that he must use legal means only and that he must call the guilty to account. Was this an answer to these reports?

ROSENBERG: Yes, it was an answer because by December 1942 there had been quite a number of complaints already.

DR. SERVATIUS: And what did Koch reply?

ROSENBERG: Koch replied to me that he, for his part, also wanted and would employ legal means, but in the document read today, in his report dated 16 March 1943, he complained several times that I did not always believe these assurances, but that in every case the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories not only intervened, but even demanded of him a report on the carrying out of these instructions.

DR. SERVATIUS: Thus he denied considerable abuses?

ROSENBERG: Yes, he denied considerable abuses. He referred in the document to one particularly serious case, namely, that individual houses had been burned down in Volhynia because those who had been called upon to work had resisted the recruiting by means of force, as he explained, and he said that he had no other way of doing it. He added that this case in particular had caused new complaints on the part of the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories.

DR. SERVATIUS: Was he entitled to such measures, in your opinion?

ROSENBERG: Reich Commissioner Koch had jurisdiction over the execution of all orders coming from the highest Reich authorities. He was responsible for the execution of all measures within the bounds of the instructions. He had, I now believe, often overstepped the bounds of these instructions and acted on his own initiative in taking, as he thought, exclusively war economic measures. Sometimes I heard of these measures, and often I did not, as appears from the document.

THE PRESIDENT: The question you were asked was whether in your opinion he was entitled to burn houses because people refused to work, and you have given a long answer which seems to me to be no answer to the question.

ROSENBERG: In my opinion he did not have the right to burn down houses and therefore I intervened, and he tried to justify himself.

DR. SERVATIUS: In order to carry out the labor recruiting, there were to be recruiting measures which, it is true, had to be applied with a certain amount of administrative coercion. How far was coercion permissible, is there legal and illegal coercion, and how do you judge the measures that were carried out in practice?

ROSENBERG: I myself insisted up until 1943 on a voluntary recruitment. But in the face of the urgent demands from the Führer I could not maintain this stand any longer and I agreed therefore—in order to have a legal form at least—that certain age groups should be called up. From these age groups all those working who were needed in the Occupied Eastern Territories were to be excluded. But the others were to be brought from all sides with the help of their own administrations in the regional commissariat, that is, the little burgomasters in the Occupied Eastern Territories, and there is no doubt, of course, that to give force to these demands the police stood at the disposal of the administration in the execution of this program.

DR. SERVATIUS: If there were abuses, could Koch stop them? Did you have no influence in the matter?

ROSENBERG: It was the duty of the Reich commissioner to whom the regional government of the Ukraine was subordinated to investigate and to take action, in accordance with the instructions which he had received from me.

DR. SERVATIUS: But why did you go to Sauckel as well? Was it Sauckel’s duty also to stop this?

ROSENBERG: Sauckel, as the deputy of the Delegate for the Four Year Plan, had the right to give instructions to me, as Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, and over and above that, he had the right to bypass me and give instructions to the Reich commissioners, a right which, he used a few times in giving lectures in the general districts of the Ukraine and of the Eastern territories.

DR. SERVATIUS: Was he—was Sauckel responsible for the conditions in the Ukraine?

ROSENBERG: Sauckel was not responsible for the execution of these demands, but of course on the basis of the authority given him by the Führer he made the demands so harsh and exact that the responsible regional governments of the commissioner general felt themselves bound by conviction and appearance to back up the recruiting of labor by force as appears, for example, from the report, Document 265-PS, from the Commissioner General in Zhitomir. I think this can also be seen from the report of the District Commissioner in Kovno, of which I cannot give the exact number.

DR. SERVATIUS: Did Sauckel have an organization of his own?

ROSENBERG: Yes, he had a staff, but I cannot make a statement on the size of it. He took care only that the civil administration had labor offices attached to it, and his requirements as to the civil administration in the East for the direction of these labor offices were forwarded to the administrative offices. To my knowledge he did not have a large organization.

DR. SERVATIUS: Before Sauckel came into your ministry was there not already a department of “Labor,” which had its corresponding subordinate departments on the middle and lower levels?

ROSENBERG: I cannot give you a precise answer to that. At any rate, I think a department “Labor and Social Policy” was set up almost at the beginning of the ministry, but at the moment I am not able to tell you the exact date. Perhaps Dr. Beil’s statement will contain some details.

DR. SERVATIUS: Thus, you are not informed regarding the organization of this recruitment of workers?

ROSENBERG: No, I am informed as far as I have just told you, but I cannot give you exact information about the date of the foundation of this main department “Labor and Social Policy” in the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories.

DR. SERVATIUS: Did labor offices for the Occupied Eastern Territories exist, which had their head in your ministry?

ROSENBERG: The work—yes, insofar as the Main Department of Labor and Social Policy did of course co-operate with the civil administration; that is, both Reich commissioners had continuous contact and had correspondence with the appropriate department, namely the labor office attached to the Reich commissioner. A correspondence with the lower agents, with the general districts, was naturally not carried on, but there was continuous consultation with the appropriate department attached to the Reich commissioner.

DR. SERVATIUS: In your letter you speak of “Sauckel offices.” What offices do you mean by this?

ROSENBERG: Well, I mean, first of all, his immediate deputy Peuckert, who later, in order to guarantee smooth co-operation, formally took over the direction of this main department of “Social Policy.” He was but very rarely at the Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories since he was officially working especially for Sauckel; and apart from that, Sauckel had a few other gentlemen with whom my main department negotiated continuously regarding the reduction of the quotas...

THE PRESIDENT: Surely, the witness Sauckel will give all this information. What is the good of wasting our time putting it to Rosenberg?

DR. SERVATIUS: It is important in order to ascertain the responsibility. Later I cannot call on Rosenberg as a witness again; a number of questions will arise, to which I...

THE PRESIDENT: I understand that, of course, but these are all details of Sauckel’s administration which Sauckel must know himself.

DR. SERVATIUS: Yes, but I will have no opportunity later on to question the witness Rosenberg regarding the individual authorities within the organization, namely: Who was responsible, who had the right to supervise, who had the duty to intervene? Why were letters addressed to individuals? Why has he to answer them? One cannot understand that, if one does not ask the witness—if he is not first asked about it before. I would suggest that the witness Rosenberg should be called again in connection with Sauckel’s case, after Sauckel has spoken; that would save time.

THE PRESIDENT: There is no issue with the Prosecution about it. If there is no issue with the Prosecution, then Sauckel’s evidence about it will be quite sufficient.

DR. SERVATIUS: Mr. President, the witness Rosenberg, in his letter—in a letter addressed to Sauckel—mentioned the fact that his offices were using these objectionable methods. Since in my opinion such offices did not exist, and thus Rosenberg was addressing the wrong person, I must establish what offices there really were. It is a complaint about conditions that were oppressive to Rosenberg and he addressed himself to Sauckel, instead of Koch.

THE PRESIDENT: Ask him some direct question, will you?

DR. SERVATIUS: What did Sauckel do upon receiving the letter you addressed to him?

ROSENBERG: I did not receive a letter in reply to it; but I heard that Sauckel, then at a meeting of his labor offices in Weimar, went into these complaints in detail and that he tried to do his best to remove the grounds for these complaints.

DR. SERVATIUS: Did not that meeting take place a fortnight later, that is on 6 January 1943, and were you not present also?

ROSENBERG: Possibly. I spoke at a meeting at Weimar once; whether or not it was this one, I am not able to say.

DR. SERVATIUS: Did you hear Sauckel’s speech at this meeting?

ROSENBERG: No, I have no recollection of it.

DR. SERVATIUS: Did you get the speech in writing later?

ROSENBERG: I cannot remember that either.

DR. SERVATIUS: Later on I want to submit the speech as a document in connection with Sauckel’s case. I have a number of further questions.

Did other departments, too, in the occupied territories, concern themselves with the recruitment of laborers?

ROSENBERG: Yes, I received indeed some reports that also, for its part, the so-called Todt Organization engaged workers for the carrying out of their technical tasks, and I think also the railway administration and other offices in the East were making efforts to get new workers for themselves.

DR. SERVATIUS: Is it not correct that the Armed Forces were demanding workers, that workers were demanded for road construction, were needed by the domestic industry, and that there was a general effort to keep manpower at home and not let them go to Germany?

ROSENBERG: That is correct, and it is a foregone conclusion that the Armed Forces, the Todt Organization, and other offices wanted to keep as many laborers as possible in the country for the growing amount of work there and they probably did not like to part with their workers. That goes without saying.

DR. SERVATIUS: Sauckel repeatedly pointed out that workers must be supplied under all circumstances and that all obstacles must be removed. Did that refer to the resistance of the local offices which did not want to give up these workers?

ROSENBERG: It certainly referred to this local manpower, and in a conference which I had with Sauckel in 1943 and which is also in evidence as a document here but which was not submitted today, reference was made to it. Sauckel stated that by order of the Führer he would have to raise a large number of new workers in the East and that in this connection, I am thinking of the Armed Forces most of all who had been, as he expressed it, hoarding workers who might instead have been active in Germany.

DR. SERVATIUS: Did Sauckel have anything to do with the recruitment of workers, which took place in connection with the germanizing of the East?

ROSENBERG: I cannot quite understand this question. What do you mean in this case by “germanizing”?

DR. SERVATIUS: The SS undertook the resettlement in the East. In connection with this manpower was shifted. Was this manpower allotted to Sauckel upon his request?

ROSENBERG: First of all I do not know exactly which resettlement you are talking about.

DR. SERVATIUS: A report has been presented to me which concerns the Jews who were sent into Polish territory. I assume that they reached your territory, too.

Do you not know about that?

ROSENBERG: Based on my own knowledge, I can say only that this concentration of the Jewish population from Eastern Germany, in certain cities and camps in the East, was carried out under the jurisdiction of the Chief of the German Police, who also had this assignment for the Occupied Eastern Territories. In connection with the resettlement in camps and with the concentrations in ghettos, there probably also developed a shortage of labor or something like that. I merely do not know what that has to do with Germanization.

DR. SERVATIUS: I have no further questions.

THE PRESIDENT: Before we adjourn, I should like to know what the position is about the Defendant Frank’s documents. Does anybody know anything about that?

MR. DODD: Mr. President, I wish to say that insofar as we are concerned, we have been in consultation with Dr. Seidl for the Defendant Frank as well as the representatives of the Soviet prosecuting staff. We are prepared to be heard at any time that the Tribunal would care to hear us on the documents.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes. Then, Dr. Thoma, how many more witnesses have you got and how long do you think you will be in the Defendant Rosenberg’s case?

DR. THOMA: I have only one witness, Your Honors, the witness Riecke. I believe that as far as I am concerned, he can be examined in one hour at the most; I do not think it will take as long as that. After that, it depends on the cross-examination.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well, yes; then you may finish the Defendant Rosenberg’s case tomorrow?

DR. THOMA: It depends upon the cross-examination.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, of course. Then, Dr. Seidl, will you be able to go on at once in Frank’s case? Supposing we finish Rosenberg tomorrow—tomorrow is Wednesday, is it not? Will you be able to go on on Thursday morning in Frank’s case?

DR. SEIDL: Mr. President, I can start with Frank’s case as soon as Rosenberg’s case is finished. As far as the documents are concerned, there was difficulty regarding only one document and I have foregone the presentation of this one document. But apart from that, these documents have for the greater part already been presented by the other side.

THE PRESIDENT: If there is only one document in question, we can hear you upon it now. As I understand you, you have only one document about which there is any difference of opinion.

DR. SEIDL: That has been settled already because I have given up presentation of this document.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well. There is no further difference of opinion?

DR. SEIDL: There is no further difference of opinion.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, then you are perfectly ready to go on?

DR. SEIDL: Yes.

THE PRESIDENT: Have the documents been translated yet?

DR. SEIDL: As far as I know, they already have been all translated.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well, thank you.

[The Tribunal adjourned until 17 April 1946 at 1000 hours.]

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ONE HUNDRED AND TENTH DAY
Wednesday, 17 April 1946