“. . . there is the urgent necessity to press out of the country everything to secure the food supply of Germany.”
But even with such proclivity to cruelty and rapacity, Pfleiderer evidently was abashed by the conduct of his compatriots to the extent that he deemed it necessary to bring it to the attention of the highest authorities of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I quote the report of Pfleiderer which is entitled:
“Conditions for the Guarantee of Supply and for Producing the Largest Possible Food Surplus in the Ukraine.
“. . . 3) Frame of mind and living conditions of the population by the end of October 1941.”
The Tribunal will find this part on Page 114, third paragraph of the document book:
“The frame of mind of the population generally became worse a few weeks after the occupation of the territory by our troops. The reason for it? We display . . . inner hostility and even hatred toward this country, and arrogance toward the people. . . . The third year of war and the necessity of wintering in an unfriendly country causes many difficulties, but they must be surmounted with courage and self-discipline. We must not work off our discontent over this country on the population. . . . How often it happened that, acting against the rules of psychology and committing mistakes that we could easily have avoided, we lost all sympathy of the population. The people cannot understand the shooting of exhausted prisoners of war in villages and larger localities and the leaving of their bodies there. As the troops are entrusted with a broad authority for self-provisioning, the kolkhozes along the main roads and near the larger towns for the most part lack pedigree cattle, seeds, seed potatoes (Poltava). Evidently, the supplying of our own troops stands first; however, the system of supply in itself is not immaterial: Psychologically, requisitioning the last hen is as unreasonable as it is economically unreasonable to kill the last pig or the last calf.”
I continue my quotation, Paragraph 3, Page 115 of the document book:
“The population . . . is without leadership. It stands apart and feels that we look down on it, that we see sabotage in their tempo and methods of work, that we do not take any steps to find a way to an understanding.”
A similar document is the document submitted as Exhibit Number USSR-439, which was graciously given to us by our United States colleagues. It was registered by the American Prosecution as Document Number 303-PS, but was not filed. It is a political report of the German professor, Doctor Paul W. Thomsen, written on the forms of the State University of Posen Biological Paleontological Institute and was indexed by the author himself, “Not for publication.” Your Honors will find this document on Page 116 of the document book. This document also introduces us into this field of complete lawlessness and tyrannical arbitrariness toward the local population of the temporarily occupied districts of the Soviet Union. These observations were made by this fascist professor during his trip through the temporarily occupied territories of the Soviet Union “from Minsk to the Crimea.”
I refer to two short excerpts from this document. The quotation which I have read into the record testifies to the absence of any humanitarian tendencies on the part of that author and if Paul Thomsen brought back from his trip only “the most depressing impression” that is only further proof of the depths of cruelty and brutality to which the German fascists were willing to go. The Tribunal will find these excerpts on Page 116 of the document book. I begin the quotation. . .