All because the mighty Reich needed 25 men to throw into its vast workshop of millions turning out the steel teeth of war.
In the same instance the German militia continued into other villages and where they did not find the workers they seized the parents. “The workers who had not appeared until then were shot.” Then, in the report we are quoting from, appears the damning phrase which shows more than anything else to what a low ebb the dignity of man had been reduced and degraded by the German Reich. “They are now catching humans like the dog catchers used to catch dogs.” (T-81.) The report closes on a statement which must needs bring a blush of shame to the cheek of every member of the civilized human race—
“People from many villages went on a certain day to a pilgrimage to the monastery Potschaew. They were all arrested, locked in, and will be sent to work. Among them there are lame, blind, and aged people.” (T-81.)
It has been asserted that the defendant and others holding high office cannot and should not be held responsible for the acts of subordinate officers in far away places, and of whose activities they could have no knowledge. But these smaller officers were only putting into effect the policies publicly declared over and over by the chieftains. Thus, when a certain Koch spoke in Kiev and declared—
“I will draw the very last out of this country. I did not come to spread bliss. I have come to help the Fuehrer. The population must work, work, and work again * * * for some people are getting excited that the population may not get enough to eat. The population cannot demand that. One has only to remember what our heroes were deprived of in Stalingrad * * *. We definitely did not come here to give out manna; we have come here to create the basis for Victory.” (T-86.)
He was only repeating what had been said by Hitler, Himmler, Goering, and Milch, in varying forms. The defendant claims that he did not literally mean the blood and thunder declarations admittedly authored by him, and that phase of the case will be discussed in detail later. But underlings who heard these wild, inflammatory utterances did not know that Milch was only barking, if in fact we are to assume that his ferocious words were only purposeless growlings. The men in the field did not stop at words, because they were in a position to act and did act—directly on the people. Koch was not voicing a concept original with him when he said in that same speech—
“We are a master race which must remember that the lowliest German worker is racially and biologically a thousand times more valuable than the population here.” (T-86.)
Unfortunately, however, his utterances were not confined to rhetoric, but being in a position to put them into flesh and blood effect, he did so.
Quotations from documents furnishing further proof of involuntary foreign labor in Germany are too numerous to repeat in the judgment. Reference, however, will be made to but one more before proceeding to the next item for discussion. In the recruitment of 1 million workers demanded in the Ukraine, SS Major Christensen, in charge of operations, declared that whatever harsh treatment was required should be controlled. He thus orders that in arresting communist functionaries it is no longer necessary to arrest all the close relatives of a member of the communist party. He decrees further that in searching for workers “when it becomes necessary to burn down a village, the whole population will be put at the disposal of the commissioner by force.” (T-129.)
This is regarded as a concession, and then comes what must be classified as the most heart-rending utterance which has come out of this war—