The Tribunal finds that Rosenberg is guilty on all four Counts.
FRANK
Frank is indicted under Counts One, Three, and Four. Frank joined the Nazi Party in 1927. He became a member of the Reichstag in 1930, the Bavarian State Minister of Justice in March 1933, and when this position was incorporated into the Reich Government in 1934, Reich Minister without Portfolio. He was made a Reichsleiter of the Nazi Party in charge of Legal Affairs in 1933, and in the same year President of the Academy of German Law. Frank was also given the honorary rank of Obergruppenführer in the SA. In 1942 Frank became involved in a temporary dispute with Himmler as to the type of legal system which should be in effect in Germany. During the same year he was dismissed as Reichsleiter of the Nazi Party and as President of the Academy of German Law.
Crimes against Peace
The evidence has not satisfied the Tribunal that Frank was sufficiently connected with the common plan to wage aggressive war to allow the Tribunal to convict him on Count One.
War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity
Frank was appointed Chief Civil Administration Officer for occupied Polish territory and, on 12 October 1939, was made Governor General of the occupied Polish territory. On 3 October 1939 he described the policy which he intended to put into effect by stating: “Poland shall be treated like a colony; the Poles will become the slaves of the Greater German World Empire.” The evidence establishes that this occupation policy was based on the complete destruction of Poland as a national entity, and a ruthless exploitation of its human and economic resources for the German war effort. All opposition was crushed with the utmost harshness. A reign of terror was instituted, backed by summary police courts which ordered such actions as the public shootings of groups of 20 to 200 Poles, and the widespread shootings of hostages. The concentration camp system was introduced in the General Government by the establishment of the notorious Treblinka and Maidaneck camps. As early as 6 February 1940, Frank gave an indication of the extent of this reign of terror by his cynical comment to a newspaper reporter on Von Neurath’s poster announcing the execution of the Czech students: “If I wished to order that one should hang up posters about every seven Poles shot, there would not be enough forests in Poland with which to make the paper for these posters.” On 30 May 1940 Frank told a police conference that he was taking advantage of the offensive in the West which diverted the attention of the world from Poland to liquidate thousands of Poles who would be likely to resist German domination of Poland, including “the leading representatives of the Polish intelligentsia.” Pursuant to these instructions the brutal A.B. action was begun under which the Security Police and SD carried out these exterminations which were only partially subjected to the restraints of legal procedure. On 2 October 1943 Frank issued a decree under which any non-Germans hindering German construction in the General Government were to be tried by summary courts of the Security Police and SD and sentenced to death.
The economic demands made on the General Government were far in excess of the needs of the army of occupation, and were out of all proportion to the resources of the country. The food raised in Poland was shipped to Germany on such a wide scale that the rations of the population of the occupied territories were reduced to the starvation level, and epidemics were widespread. Some steps were taken to provide for the feeding of the agricultural workers who were used to raise the crops, but the requirements of the rest of the population were disregarded. It is undoubtedly true, as argued by counsel for the Defense, that some suffering in the General Government was inevitable as a result of the ravages of war and the economic confusion resulting therefrom. But the suffering was increased by a planned policy of economic exploitation.
Frank introduced the deportation of slave laborers to Germany in the very early stages of his administration. On 25 January 1940 he indicated his intention of deporting 1 million laborers to Germany, suggesting on 10 May 1940 the use of police raids to meet this quota. On 18 August 1942 Frank reported that he had already supplied 800,000 workers for the Reich, and expected to be able to supply 140,000 more before the end of the year.
The persecution of the Jews was immediately begun in the General Government. The area originally contained from 2½ million to 3½ million Jews. They were forced into ghettos, subjected to discriminatory laws, deprived of the food necessary to avoid starvation, and finally systematically and brutally exterminated. On 16 December 1941 Frank told the Cabinet of the Governor General: “We must annihilate the Jews, wherever we find them and wherever it is possible, in order to maintain there the structure of the Reich as a whole.” By 25 January 1944, Frank estimated that there were only 100,000 Jews left.