Finally, through their purchases on the black market, the Germans procured an enormous quantity of textiles, machine tools, leather, perfumes, and so forth. The French population was almost completely deprived of textiles, in particular, during the occupation. That is also the case as regards leather.
Now, I reach Section 4: the removal of industrial tools.
I shall not impose on your time. This question has already been treated as far as the other occupied countries are concerned. I would merely point out that in France it was the subject of statistical estimates which I submit to you as Document Number RF-251. These statistical estimates show that the value of the material which was removed from the various French factories, either private or public enterprise, exceeds the sum of 9,000 million francs.
It was observed that for many of the machines which were removed, the Germans merely indicated the inventory values after reduction for depreciation and not the replacement value of the machines.
I now come to Section 5: Securities and Foreign Investments. In Document EC-57, which I submitted as Exhibit Number RF-105 at the beginning of my presentation, I had indicated that the Defendant Göring himself had informed you of the aims of the German economic policy and he ventured to say that the extension of German influence over foreign enterprises was one of the purposes of German economic policy.
These directives were to be expressed much more precisely in the document of the 12th of August 1940, which I submit as Exhibit Number RF-252 (Document Number EC-40), from which I shall read a short extract:
“Since”—as the document says—“the principal economic enterprises are in the form of stock companies, it is first of all indispensable to secure the ownership of securities in France.”
Further on it says:
“The exerting of influence by way of ordinances. . . .”
Then the document indicates all the means to be employed to achieve this, in particular this passage concerning international law: