I shall now quote a text of a more general scope. I produce Document Number RF-1059, which is a secret circular of 10 May 1942, addressed by the Military Command Administrative Staff to all the chief town majors. Here again we find the signature of Dr. Best.
“Control of French policy as regards personnel in the occupied territories.
“The remodelling of the French Government presents certain possibilities for exercising a positive influence on French police in the occupied territories as regards personnel. I, therefore, ask you to designate those French officials, who, from the German point of view, appear particularly usable and whose names could be submitted to the French Government when the question of appointing holders for important posts arises.”
Thus we see in the process of formation this general network of German control and German usurpation. I now produce Document Number RF-1060. This document is an interrogation of Otto Abetz, who had the function of German ambassador in France. This interrogation took place on 17 November 1945 before the Commissioners Berge and Saulas at the General Information Bureau in Paris. This document confirms German interferences in French administration and likewise gives details about the duplications of these controls by the military commander and the Gestapo. I quote:
“The Military Commander in France, basing himself on the various conventions of international law”—this is Otto Abetz who is speaking and it is not necessary to say that we in no way accept his conception of international law—“considered himself responsible and supreme judge for the maintenance of order and public security in the occupied zone. This being so, he claimed the right to give his approval for the appointment or the retaining of all French officials nominated to occupy posts in the occupied zone. As regards officials residing in the free zone who were obliged by reason of their functions to exercise them subsequently in the occupied zone, the Military Commander also stressed the necessity for his approval of their nomination. In practice the Military Commander made use of the right thus claimed only when the officials were nominated and solely in the sense of a right to veto, that is to say, he did not intervene in the choice of officials to be nominated and contented himself with making observations on certain names proposed. These observations were based on information which the Military Commander received from his regional and local commanders, from his various administrative and economic departments in Paris, and from the police and the Gestapo, which at that time were still under the authority of the Military Commander.
“From 11 November 1942 on, this state of things changed because of the occupation of the free zone. The German military authorities settled in this zone demanded that they should give their opinion in regard to the nomination of officials in all cases where the security of the German Army might be affected. The Gestapo for its part acquired in the two zones a de facto independence with regard to the regional and local military chiefs and with regard to the Military Commander. It claimed the right to intervene in connection with any appointment which might affect the carrying out of their police tasks.
“Having been recalled to Germany from November 1942 to December 1943, I did not myself witness the conflicts which resulted from this state of things and which could not fail to compromise in the highest degree the so-called sovereignty of the Vichy Government. When I returned to France the situation was considerably worse because the Gestapo claimed, in the occupied as well as in the unoccupied zone, the right to make the nomination of prefects subject to its consent. It even went so far as to propose itself the officials to be nominated by the French Government. Seconded by me, the Military Commander took up again the struggle against these abusive demands and succeeded in part in restoring the situation to what it was before November 1942 . . . .”