The Tribunal has heard with great satisfaction of the steps which have been taken by the Chief Prosecutors to make available to defending counsel the numerous documents upon which the Prosecution rely, with the aim of giving to the defendants every possibility for a just defense.
The Trial which is now about to begin is unique in the history of the jurisprudence of the world and it is of supreme importance to millions of people all over the globe. For these reasons, there is laid upon everybody who takes any part in this Trial a solemn responsibility to discharge their duties without fear or favor, in accordance with the sacred principles of law and justice.
The four Signatories having invoked the judicial process, it is the duty of all concerned to see that the Trial in no way departs from those principles and traditions which alone give justice its authority and the place it ought to occupy in the affairs of all civilized states.
This Trial is a public Trial in the fullest sense of those words, and I must, therefore, remind the public that the Tribunal will insist upon the complete maintenance of order and decorum, and will take the strictest measures to enforce it. It only remains for me to direct, in accordance with the provisions of the Charter, that the Indictment shall now be read.
MR. SIDNEY S. ALDERMAN (Associate Trial Counsel for the United States): May it please the Tribunal:
I. The United States of America, the French Republic, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics by the undersigned, Robert H. Jackson, François de Menthon, Hartley Shawcross, and R. A. Rudenko, duly appointed to represent their respective governments in the investigation of the charges against and the prosecution of the major war criminals, pursuant to the Agreement of London dated 8 August 1945, and the Charter of this Tribunal annexed thereto, hereby accuse as guilty, in the respects hereinafter set forth, of Crimes against Peace, War Crimes, and Crimes against Humanity, and of a Common Plan or Conspiracy to commit those Crimes, all as defined in the Charter of the Tribunal, and accordingly name as defendants in this cause and as indicted on the Counts hereinafter set out:
Hermann Wilhelm Göring, Rudolf Hess, Joachim von Ribbentrop, Robert Ley, Wilhelm Keitel, Ernst Kaltenbrunner, Alfred Rosenberg, Hans Frank, Wilhelm Frick, Julius Streicher, Walter Funk, Hjalmar Schacht, Gustav Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach, Karl Dönitz, Erich Raeder, Baldur von Schirach, Fritz Sauckel, Alfred Jodl, Martin Bormann, Franz von Papen, Arthur Seyss-Inquart, Albert Speer, Constantin von Neurath and Hans Fritzsche, individually and as members of any of the groups or organizations next hereinafter named.
II. The following are named as groups or organizations (since dissolved) which should be declared criminal by reason of their aims and the means used for the accomplishment thereof, and in connection with the conviction of such of the named defendants as were members thereof:
Die Reichsregierung (Reich Cabinet); das Korps der Politischen Leiter der Nationalsozialistischen Deutschen Arbeiterpartei (Leadership Corps of the Nazi Party); die Schutzstaffeln der Nationalsozialistischen Arbeiterpartei (commonly known as the “SS”) and including the Sicherheitsdienst (commonly known as the “SD”); die Geheime Staatspolizei (Secret State Police, commonly known as the “Gestapo”); die Sturmabteilungen der NSDAP (commonly known as the “SA”); and the General Staff and the High Command of the German Armed Forces. The identity and membership of the groups or organizations referred to in the foregoing titles are hereinafter in Appendix B more particularly defined.
COUNT ONE—THE COMMON PLAN OR CONSPIRACY. Reference: the Charter, Article 6, especially Article 6 (a).