2. EXECUTION OF THE SLAVE LABOR PROGRAM
The purposes of the slave labor program, namely, the strengthening of the Nazi war machine and the destruction or weakening of peoples deemed inferior, were achieved by the impressment and deportation of millions of persons into Germany for forced labor, by the separation of husbands from their wives and children from their parents, and by the imposition of conditions so inhuman that countless numbers perished.
A. Poland.
Poland was the first victim. Frank, as Governor of the Government-General of Poland, announced that under his program 1,000,000 workers were to be sent to Germany, and recommended that police surround Polish villages and seize the inhabitants for deportation. These intentions appear in the following letter from Frank to Goering, dated 25 January 1940 (1375-PS):
“1. In view of the present requirements of the Reich for the defense industry, it is at present fundamentally impossible to carry on a long term economic policy in the General-Gouvernement. Rather, it is necessary so to steer the economy of the General Gouvernement that it will, in the shortest possible time, accomplish results representing the maximum that can be gotten out of the economic strength of the General-Gouvernement for the immediate strengthening of our capacity for defense.
“2. In particular the following performances are expected of the total economy of the General-Gouvernement * * *.”
“(g) Supply and transportation of at least 1 million male and female agricultural and industrial workers to the Reich—among them at least 7,500,000 [sic] agricultural workers of which at least 50% must be women—in order to guarantee agricultural production in the Reich and as a replacement
The methods by which these workers were to be supplied were outlined by Frank in his diary entry for Friday, 10 May 1940 (2233-A-PS):
“* * * Then the Governor-General deals with the problem of the Compulsory Labor Service of the Poles. Upon the demands from the Reich it has now been decreed that compulsion may be exercised in view of the fact that sufficient manpower was not voluntarily available for service inside the German Reich. This compulsion means the possibility of arrest of male and female Poles. Because of these measures a certain disquietude had developed which, according to individual reports, was spreading very much, and which might produce difficulties everywhere. General Fieldmarshal Goering some time ago pointed out in his long speech the necessity to deport into the Reich a million workers. The supply so far was 160,000. However, great difficulties had to be overcome. Therefore it would be advisable to consult the district and town chiefs in the execution of the compulsion, so that one could be sure from the start that this action would be reasonably successful. The arrest of young Poles when leaving church service or the cinema would bring about an increasing nervousness of the Poles. Generally speaking, he had no objections at all if the rubbish, capable of work yet often loitering about, would be snatched from the streets. The best method for this, however, would be the organization of a raid, and it would be absolutely justifiable to stop a Pole in the street and to question him what he was doing, where he was working etc.” (2233-A-PS)
Another entry in the diary of Frank, for 16 March 1940, contains the following discourse on methods: