Tell me, for what purpose, for what kind of work were the foreign laborers employed who had been imported into Germany? Is it correct to state that they were primarily employed in the armament and munitions industries?
SAUCKEL: Workers were brought to Germany for employment in the armament industry. The armament industry is a very wide term, and is not identical with the manufacture of arms and munitions. The armament industry includes all products—from matches to cannons—that have anything to do with supply for the army. It is, therefore, necessary, within this broad, far-reaching term, to limit or isolate the manufacture of arms and munitions.
Moreover, workers were brought to Germany for all other branches of civil economy essential to the war effort, such as agriculture, mining, skilled trades, and so forth. We made three distinctions: War economy, which meant the entire German economy in wartime; armament economy meant...
THE PRESIDENT: Well, Defendant, we do not want a lecture upon that, you know. All you were asked was whether they were brought there for work in the armament industry.
SAUCKEL: A part of them.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: I should like you to answer whether the workers brought to Germany were primarily employed in Germany’s war industries and for military purposes? Is that right or not? I mean in the broad sense of the word.
SAUCKEL: In the broad sense of the word, yes, including the entire economy in wartime.
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Then the utilization of imported manpower was subordinated entirely and fully to the conduct of the war of aggression by Germany? Do you admit that?
SAUCKEL: That is stretching the idea too far. My own views, according to which I acted and could only act at the time, excluded the word “aggressive.”
GEN. ALEXANDROV: Please answer briefly if it appears to go too far. Tell me do you admit it or do you not?