This paragraph shows that even before the Nazis had seized power in Germany they had conceived the plan to repress any potential oppositions by terror, and Frick’s statement to Seger is completely consistent with an earlier statement which he made on the 18th of October 1929. We refer to Document Number 2513-PS (Exhibit USA-235), which has also been received in evidence and has been included in USA Exhibit B. We refer to the first page of the English translation, Page 48 of the German text. On Page 1 the quotation begins:
“This fateful struggle will first be taken up with the ballot; but this cannot continue indefinitely, for history has taught us that in a battle blood must be shed and iron broken. The ballot is the beginning of the fateful struggle. We are determined to promulgate by force that which we preach. Just as Mussolini exterminated the Marxists in Italy, so must we also succeed in accomplishing the same through dictatorship and terror.”
THE PRESIDENT: This is the defendant, is it?
MR. DODD: Yes, the Defendant Frick.
There are many additional cases of the use of the concentration camp against the men who wanted peace. There was, for example, a group called the Bibelforscher, that is, Bible research workers, most of whom were known as Jehovah’s Witnesses. They were pacifists, and so the conspirators provided not only for their prosecution in the regular courts but also for their confinement in concentration camps after they had served the judicial sentences; and we refer to Document Number D-84, Exhibit USA-236.
This document is dated the 5th day of August 1937; and it is an order by the Secret State Police at Berlin, and I refer particularly to the first and last paragraphs of this order, as follows:
“The Reich Minister of Justice had informed me that he does not share the opinion voiced by subordinate departments on various occasions according to which the arrest of the Bibelforscher after they have served a sentence is supposed to jeopardize the authority of the law courts. He is fully aware of the necessity for measures by the State Police after the sentence has been served. He asks, however, not to bring the Bibelforscher into protective custody under circumstances detrimental to the respect of the law courts.”
And then, the Paragraph numbered “(2)”:
“If information regarding the impending release of a Bibelforscher from arrest is received from the authorities carrying out the sentence, my decision regarding the ordering of measures by the State Police will be asked for without delay in accordance with my circular decree dated 22. 4. 37, so that transfer to a concentration camp can take place immediately after the sentence has been served. Should a transfer into concentration camp immediately after the serving of the sentence not be possible, Bibelforscher will be detained in police prisons.”
The labor unions, of which I think it is safe to say the majority are traditionally opposed to wars of aggression, also felt the full force of Nazi terror. A member of the American staff, Major Wallis, has already submitted evidence before this Tribunal concerning the conspirators’ campaign against the trade unions. But the concentration camp was an important weapon in this campaign; and the Tribunal will recall that in Document Number 2324-PS, to which I made reference this morning, the Defendant Göring made it plain that members of the Social Democratic Party were to be confined in concentration camps. Now labor leaders were very largely members of that party, and they soon learned the horrors of protective custody. We refer to Document Number 2330-PS (Exhibit USA-237), which has already been received as part of USA Exhibit G, which consists of an order that one Joseph Simon should be placed in protective custody. We refer to the middle of the first page of the English translation of that order, beginning with the material under the word “reasons.”