[Page 12] He said: Here, I lose 500,000 Jews. I must take them away, because the Jews are the element of revolt. But in my area, actually, the Jews were the only tradesmen. Now they want to set up high schools and grammar schools, thereby building here, a national Ukrainian state, that should in the future, fight against Russia. I am not even in a position to have the worker, who must work here, have his boots repaired. I can't do that because the tradesmen are no longer here. The Jews are all gone. What is more important, that I train the Ukrainians how to mend boots, or that I send them high schools so that they can build up the Ukrainian state?
[Page 25] Keitel: Now about the employment of people from deserters camps.
Fuehrer: I am of the opinion that they should be transferred to Germany and used there. They are prisoners of war. If I only could transfer 30, 40 or 50,000 men to the commissioner for coal production! But then they will have to be treated really in a decent way.
Zeitzler: I have set as my goal that they should become decent workers in Germany. We can't do much with deserters at the front. I can commit a few of them as volunteers for replacements. But the majority should go to Germany as workers in order to release Germans.
Fuehrer: I can only say: if we do not straighten out our coal affairs, the moment will arrive when I shall not be able to produce either ammunition or explosives anymore, nor will we be able to build submarines. This will happen in 100 other fields too. It is idiotic. But the moment will arrive. It is already tragic when the Italians come and ask us why do we not deliver this or that. I have to deliver it. We cannot, because we haven't got enough coal. That is sloppy, of course.
TRANSLATION OF DOCUMENT 1386-PS
1936 REICHSGESETZBLATT, PART I, 378
Law concerning the granting of amnesty of 23 April 1936
The Reich government has decided to enact the following law, which is announced hereby.