FORTY-SEVENTH DAY
Thursday, 31 January 1946
Morning Session
MARSHAL: May it please the Court, I desire to announce that the Defendants Kaltenbrunner and Seyss-Inquart will be absent from this morning’s session on account of illness.
M. DUBOST: Before finishing, Gentlemen, I must read you a few more documents concerning war prisoners.
First of all, it will be Document Number L-166, which we present as Exhibit Number RF-377, Page 65 in your document book. It concerns a note which summarizes an interview with the Reich Marshal, on 15 and 16 May 1944, on the subject of pursuit planes. Page 8, Paragraph Number 20:
“The Reich Marshal will propose to the Führer that American and English crews who fire indiscriminately on towns, on civilian trains in motion, or on soldiers dropping by parachute, shall be shot immediately on the spot.”
The importance of this document need not be emphasized. It shows the guilt of the Defendant Göring in reprisals against Allied airmen brought down in Germany.
We shall now read Document R-117, which we submit as Exhibit Number RF-378. Two Liberators, brought down on 21 June 1944 in the District of Mecklenburg, came to earth with their crews intact, 15 men all told. All were shot on the pretext of attempting to escape. The document was found in the files of the headquarters of the 11th Luftgaukommando, and states that nine members of one crew were handed over to the local police. In the next to the last paragraph, third line, we read that they were made prisoners and handed over to the police in Waren. Lieutenants Helton and Ludka were handed over on 21 June 1944 by the protective police to SS Untersturmführer Stempel, of the Security Police, and former Commissioner of the Criminal Police, at Fürstenberg:
“These seven prisoners were shot en route while attempting to escape.