The power of life and death, the sovereign prerogative, was entrusted in a Poland occupied by the Hitlerites, to the Defendant Frank.
It would not be misplaced to recall that it was this same Hitler who had said that he would show, by the concrete example of a mutual relationship between the Polish and the German peoples, that such a form of intercourse had been found “which would usefully serve the cause of peace as well as the welfare of both nations.”
I have spoken of the kind of example that was intended, and what the welfare was to which reference had been made.
The 6 April 1941 was marked by a new crime planned and carefully prepared beforehand by the Hitlerite conspirators. Without any warning or declaration of war, they attacked Yugoslavia.
The attack on Yugoslavia was a gross breach of Article 3 of the Hague Convention of 18 October 1907, and of the Kellogg-Briand Pact of 27 August 1928. The Delegations of Great Britain and of the United States have already submitted to the Tribunal a considerable number of documents referring to the subject of the treacherous attack on Yugoslavia. I have only to submit a few new proofs and to establish a connection between these new documents and those already read into the record. Official German documents enable us to reconstitute events with exceptional vividness. In this case German pedantry turns against the authors of the criminal plan.
On 27 March 1941 Adolf Hitler held a special conference regarding the situation in Yugoslavia. On the same day he signed a top-secret Directive 025, for the High Command (Oberbefehlshaber) only. Both documents, filed under Document Number 1746-PS, are among the evidence already accepted by the Tribunal.
Subparagraph 2 of Directive 025 has already been quoted in full in the speech of the Chief Prosecutor for the U.S.S.R. The first subparagraph of this document was also read into the record on 7 December 1945. I should like to add a few more lines and read Paragraph 3 into the record. This passage is on Page 337 of the document book. It states as follows:
“In detail I order the following:
“a) As soon as the concentration of sufficient forces is concluded and meteorological conditions permit, all Yugoslav antiaircraft and Belgrade must be destroyed by continuous day and night air attacks.
“b) If possible, simultaneously, but under no circumstances sooner, Operation Marita must be started, with the primary limited objective to seize the harbor of Salonika.”