“If, in exceptional cases, German and eastern female domestic
workers are employed in the same household, the German domestic
workers must be given mainly tasks of serving the family and
must also be given the supervision of the Eastern woman worker.
The German living in the household must always have precedence.”
General conditions of work did not apply to the women workers from the
East. Their labor was regulated only by the discretion of their masters.
This was expressed in Paragraph 4 of the same memorandum. I quote:
“Eastern women workers are employed in the households in a
special labor relation. German regulations on working conditions
and on labor protection refer to them only insofar as this is
specifically decreed.”
The character of these special instructions can be seen in Paragraph 9,
Section B of the memorandum, which states quite openly:
“No claim to leisure time is given. Eastern women domestic
workers may leave the household only when on duty connected with
the needs of the household. . . . Visiting the theaters,
restaurants, cinemas, and similar . . . institutions is
forbidden.”
Paragraph 10 of the memorandum states:
“Eastern female domestic workers are enlisted for indefinite
time.”
Paragraph 12 of the memorandum states that:
“Germans may not share a room with the Eastern woman worker.”
Paragraph 14 states that:
“Clothing as a rule cannot be supplied.”
These two documents just mentioned by me, “Memo on the Treatment of
Foreign Civilian Laborers” and “Memorandum for Housewives on the
Employment of Eastern Female Workers,” reflect the inhuman conditions of
work for the forcibly mobilized Soviet citizens. The Soviet Prosecution
has at its disposal numerous documents, the testimonies of persons who
themselves experienced the terror of fascist slavery. The enumeration of
all these documents would take too much time. The Soviet Government had
at its disposal, already in the early phases of the war against fascist
Germany, many proofs of the crimes of the fascist conspirators in this
field.
The first document of this kind published by the Soviet Government is
the note of the People’s Commissar of Foreign Affairs, Molotov, dated 6
January 1942, which was presented to the Tribunal by the Soviet
Prosecution as Exhibit Number USSR-51(2), (Document USSR-51(2)) and this
note stated that:
“The peaceful citizens forcibly deported for compulsory labor
were proclaimed ‘prisoners of war’ by the German authorities and
treated as such as far as their maintenance is concerned. It has
been established by reports of Staffs of the German Army that
peasants and other peaceful citizens seized by the Germans and
deported for compulsory labor were automatically put on the list
as prisoners of war. Thus the number of prisoners of war was
artificially and unlawfully increased.
“In the vicinity of the town of Plavsk, in the region of Tula, a
camp was established where Soviet war prisoners and the civilian
population from neighboring villages were interned at the same
time. The Soviet citizens were there subjected to inhuman
tortures and sufferings. There were young boys and girls, women,
and old men among them. Their only food consisted of two
potatoes and some barley grits each day. The death rate reached
25 to 30 persons daily.
“After the occupation of Kiev, the Germans drove into slave
labor all the civilian population from 11 to 60 years of age,
irrespective of their profession, their sex, state of health, or
nationality.
“People who were too ill to stand on their feet were fined by
the Germans for every day of work they missed.
“In Kharkov the German invaders decided to make the local
Ukrainian intellectuals an object of their mockery. On 5
November 1941 all actors were ordered to appear at the
Shevtshenko Theater for registration. When they had gathered,
they were surrounded by German soldiers who harnessed them to
carts and drove them along the most frequented streets to the
river for water.”
The second document of the Soviet Government was the Foreign Commissar’s
note, dated 27 April 1942. This note is submitted to the Tribunal as
Exhibit USSR-51 (Document Number USSR-51). Section 3 of this note is
entitled, “Installation of a Regime of Slavery and Bondage in the
Occupied Territories of the Soviet Union and Deportation of Civilian
Population as Prisoners of War.” This note states that:
“In the Ukraine and Bielorussia the Germans introduced a 14- or
16-hour workday, in most cases without any compensation and in
some cases with ridiculously low wages.
“In the secret instructions entitled, ‘On Current Tasks in the
Eastern Regions,’ captured by Red Army troops at the beginning
of March 1942, the chief of the Military Economic Inspectorate
Central Front, Lieutenant General Weigang, admits that:
“‘It has proved impossible to maintain industrial production
with the labor of semi-starved and semi-clad people,’ that ‘the
devaluation of money and the commodity crisis coincide with a
dangerous lack of confidence in the German authorities on the
part of the local population,’ and that ‘this constitutes a
danger to the peace in the occupied regions which cannot be
permitted in the rear of the combat troops.’ The German general
in this document presumes to call these occupied regions ‘our
new eastern colonial possession.’
“Acknowledging that the complete collapse of industrial
production in the occupied districts has led to mass
unemployment, the German General Weigang issued the following
orders for speeding up the forcible dispatch of the Russian,
Ukrainian, Bielorussian, and other workers to Germany.
“‘Only the shipping to Germany of some millions of Russian
workers and only the inexhaustible reserves of healthy and
strong people in the Occupied Eastern Territories . . . can
solve the urgent problem of manpower shortage and therewith meet
the lack of labor in Germany.’
“In an order . . . seized by units of the Red Army, recruiting
the entire civilian population of the occupied districts for all
kinds of heavy labor was ordered; and it was stated that this
forced labor was not to be paid for; and it was insolently
declared that by this unpaid labor the population would atone
for its guilt for the acts of sabotage already committed as well
as for the acts of sabotage which might be committed by them in
the future.
“In Kaluga, on 20 November 1941, an announcement was posted,
signed by the German commandant, Major Portatius, which ran as
follows:
“‘1. Citizens who do poor work or do not work the specified
number of hours will be subject to a monetary fine. In the event
of nonpayment, delinquents will be subjected to corporal
punishment.
“‘2. Citizens who have received a work assignment and who have
not reported for work will be subject to corporal punishment and
will receive no food rations from the municipality.
“‘3. Citizens evading work in general will, in addition, be
expelled from Kaluga. Citizens shirking work will be attached to
labor detachments and columns, and billeted in barracks. They
will be used for heavy labor.’”
This note indicated also that land would be transferred to German
landowners. This was established by a land law which was promulgated at
the end of April 1942 by the Hitlerite Gauleiter Alfred Rosenberg.
I pass on to the next note of People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs
Molotov which was published a year after the note dated 27 April 1942.
On 11 May 1943 the People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs, Molotov, sent
to all Ambassadors and Ministers of all the countries with which the
U.S.S.R. had diplomatic relations a note, “Concerning the Wholesale
Forcible Deportation of Peaceful Soviet Citizens to German Fascist
Slavery and Concerning the Responsibility Borne for this Crime by German
Authorities and Individuals.” This note is submitted to the Tribunal as
evidence as Exhibit Number USSR-51(4) (Document Number USSR-51(4)).
I consider it necessary to read a few quotations from this note. On Page
165 of the document book there is a reference to a declaration of Göring
of 7 November 1941, which has already been mentioned by me. I will not
again repeat all that Göring said at that conference. I will only stress
that Göring issued a blood-thirsty order “not to spare the Soviet people
deported into Germany and to handle them in the most cruel manner under
any excuse.” This order is included in section IV-A7 of the
above-mentioned note. It reads as follows:
“In applying measures for the maintenance of order, the main
principle must be swiftness and severity. Only the following
forms of punishment must be employed, without intermediary
grades: deprivation of food and death by sentence of field
court-martial.”
On 31 March 1942 Sauckel issued the following order by telegraph:
“The enlistment, for which you are responsible, must be speeded
up by every available means, including the stern application of
the principle of labor service.”
The Soviet Government is in possession of the complete text of a report
by the Chief of the Political Police and Security Service with the Chief
of the SS in Kharkov, headed, “The Situation in the City of Kharkov from
23 July to 9 September 1942.”
“The recruiting of labor power”—states this document—“is
causing the competent bodies disquietude, for the population is
displaying extreme reluctance to go to work in Germany. The
situation at present is that everybody does his utmost to evade
enlistment. Voluntary departure to Germany has long been
entirely out of the question.”
Your Honors, I must stress that the Defendant Sauckel, as
Plenipotentiary for the Allocation of Labor, actively pursued criminal
activity, as it is pointed out in the note of the People’s Commissar for
Foreign Affairs, which I just presented. On 31 March 1942 Sauckel sent
to his subordinate departments a telegraphic instruction regarding the
utilization of Russians and the work of the enlistment committee. I
submit this telegram of Sauckel to the Tribunal as evidence, Exhibit
Number USSR-382 (Document Number USSR-382). In this telegram Sauckel
writes:
“The rate of mobilization must be increased immediately and
under all circumstances to insure, in the shortest possible
time, that is to say, by April, that a three-fold increase in
the number of dispatched workers is achieved.”
Sauckel’s efforts were appreciated by the Defendant Göring at the time
when he was Delegate for the Four Year Plan. I refer now to the
conference which Göring held on 6 August 1942. This protocol has been
submitted by the Soviet Prosecution to the Tribunal as Exhibit Number
USSR-170 (Document Number USSR-170). I beg you to refer to Pages 12 and
13 of this document, Page 184 of the document book. Göring came forth
with the following words,
“I have to say one thing to this. I do not wish to praise the
Gauleiter Sauckel; he does not need it.”
THE PRESIDENT: All this was read the other day. The actual words were
read yesterday.
GEN. ZORYA: I am quite sure, Mr. President, that my colleague, who read
into the record this document, did not read this particular passage.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, but I still think that he read this excerpt which
you have got set out in your document, “I do not wish to praise
Gauleiter Sauckel; he does not need it.” He certainly referred to the
excerpt which you have just summarized about Lohse.
GEN. ZORYA: I do not wish to argue but I had the information that this
excerpt had not been read into the record. If you like, I will not read
this passage into the record.
THE PRESIDENT: Maybe you are right. I don’t know.
GEN. ZORYA: Then, I will read it into the record very briefly:
“I do not wish to praise Gauleiter Sauckel; he does not need it.
But what he has done in such a short time to collect workers so
quickly from the whole of Europe and supply them to our
undertakings is a unique achievement. I must tell that to all
these gentlemen; if each of them used in their sphere of
activity a tenth of the energy used by Gauleiter Sauckel, the
tasks laid upon them would indeed easily be carried out. This is
my sincere conviction and in no way fine words.”
I return again to the note of the People’s Commissar for Foreign
Affairs, V. M. Molotov, dated 11 May 1943. This note further gives data
concerning the number of Soviet people who were deported to Germany.
This note states that the deportation of Soviet people to German slavery
was accompanied nearly everywhere by bloody repressive measures against
Soviet citizens seeking refuge from slave merchants who were hunting for
them. It has been established that in Gjatsk 75 peaceful inhabitants of
the town were shot and that in Poltava 65 railroad men were hanged. The
same thing in other towns also—executions, shootings, and hangings were
carried out on the same scale.
THE PRESIDENT: I understood from you at the beginning of your speech
that you were going to finish this afternoon your presentation. It is
now 5 minutes past 5. Is there any chance of your finishing today?
GEN. ZORYA: If I had not been interrupted by Defense Counsel for 10
minutes in connection with a discussion about the order of the German
occupational authorities, I would have finished my statement.
THE PRESIDENT: How long do you think will it take you now?
GEN. ZORYA: A maximum of 10 minutes.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well.
GEN. ZORYA: The note states that the Soviet citizens in the territories
captured by the Germans are, with growing frequency and organization,
offering courageous resistance to the slave owners. The growth of the
partisan movement in connection with the resistance the Soviet citizens
are offering to forcible transportation into German slavery is admitted
with alarm in a number of secret reports from German army and police
administrations.
This note quotes further a number of testimonies of Soviet people who
had escaped German slavery. I will only quote one of these testimonies
of Kolkhoz member Varvara Bakhtina of the village of Nikolayevka, Kursk
region, who stated:
“In Kursk we were pushed into cattle wagons, 50 to 60 persons in
each wagon. Nobody was permitted to leave. Every now and then
the German sentry hustled and punched us. In Lgov we had to get
out and be examined by a special commission there. In the
presence of the soldiers we were compelled to undress quite
naked and have our bodies examined. The nearer we got to
Germany, the fewer were the people left in the train. From Kursk
they took 3,000 persons but at nearly every station the sick and
those dying from hunger were thrown out. In Germany we were put
into a camp with Soviet prisoners of war. This was in a forest
section surrounded by a high barbed-wire fence. Four days later
we were taken to different places. I, my sister Valentina, and
13 other girls were sent to an armament factory.”
The third section of this report describes further the treatment under
which the Soviet workers lived in German slavery. This part of the
report also mentions the statement made by Göring concerning Russian
workers. Göring states in the above-mentioned directives:
“The Russian is not fastidious and, therefore, it is easy to
feed him without affecting our food stocks to any appreciable
degree. He must not be spoiled or allowed to get accustomed to
German food.”
Finally the note quotes a number of letters from home to the German
soldiers on the Eastern Front, which describe the humiliation to which
the Soviet workers were subjected. I will quote a passage from one of
such letters. A letter from his mother in Chemnitz was found on the body
of Wilhelm Bock, killed German private, of the 221st German Infantry
Division. This letter reads:
“Many Russian women and girls are working at the Astra Works.
They are compelled to work 14 and more hours a day. Of course,
they receive no pay whatever. They go to and from the factory
under escort. The Russians literally drop from exhaustion. The
guards often whip them. They have no right to complain about the
bad food or ill-treatment. The other day my neighbor obtained a
servant. She paid some money at an office and was given the
opportunity to choose any woman she pleased from a number here
from Russia.”
Letters also mention mass suicides of Russian women and men.
The note ends with a declaration of the Soviet Government, which states
that it places responsibility for atrocities in this domain on the
leading Hitlerite clique and the High Command of the German fascist
Army:
“The Soviet Government also places full responsibility for the
above enumerated crimes upon the Hitlerite officials who are
engaged in recruiting, abducting, transporting in camps, selling
into slavery, and inhumanly exploiting peaceful Soviet civilians
who have been forcibly transported from their native land to
Germany. . . . The Soviet Government holds that stern
responsibility should be borne by such already exposed criminals
as . . . Fritz Sauckel and . . . Alfred Rosenberg.”
And finally the note points out:
“The Soviet Government expresses the conviction that all the
Governments concerned are unanimous on the point that the Hitler
Government and its agents must bear full responsibility and
receive stern punishment for the monstrous crimes they have
committed, for the privation and suffering they have inflicted
upon millions of peaceful citizens who have been forcibly
deported into German fascist slavery.”
This is the end of People’s Commissar Molotov’s note. Kindly allow me to
close my statement also with these words.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will now adjourn.
[_The Tribunal adjourned until 23 February 1946 at 1000 hours._]
SIXTY-SIXTH DAY
Saturday, 23 February 1946
_Morning Session_
THE PRESIDENT: Before we deal with the applications, I am going to read
the Tribunal’s order upon Dr. Stahmer’s memorandum of 4 February 1946
and the Prosecution’s motion of the 11th of February 1946. This is the
order:
The Tribunal makes no order with regard to Paragraphs 2 to 5 of the
Prosecution’s motion as to the evidence of the defendants, dated the
11th of February 1946.
With regard to Paragraphs 2 and 7 of Dr. Stahmer’s memorandum on defense
procedure, dated the 4th of February 1946, the Tribunal makes the
following order:
1. The defendants’ cases will be heard in the order in which the
defendants’ names appear in the Indictment.
2. (a) During the presentation of a defendant’s case, defendant’s
counsel will read documents, will question witnesses, and will make such
brief comments on the evidence as are necessary to insure a proper
understanding of it.
(b) The defendant’s counsel may be assisted in the courtroom by his
associate counsel or by another defendant’s counsel. Such other counsel
may help the defendant’s counsel in handling documents, _et cetera_, but
shall not address the Tribunal or examine witnesses.