The Nuremberg Trials (Vol.5). International Military Tribunal

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СКАЧАТЬ the Hitler Jugend and trained them for leadership within the Party. They were the elite schools of National Socialism. The next document, entitled “Documents of German Politics” is already in evidence as Exhibit Number USA-365. Translations of excerpts from this document are found in 3529-PS, Page 389, and read as follows:

      “As stated by Dr. Ley, Reich Organization Leader, on 23 November 1937 at Ordensburg Sonthofen, these Adolf Hitler Schools, as the first step of the principle of selecting a special elite, form an important branch in the educational system of the National Socialist training of future leaders. . . .

      “ ‘The curriculum has been laid down by Reichsleiter Rosenberg, together with the Reich Organization Leader and the Reich Youth Leader.’ ”

      Rosenberg exercised further influence in the education of Party members in the establishment of community schools for all organizations of the Party. Document 3528-PS is a translation of Page 297 of the 1934 edition of Das Dritte Reich, which I offer as Exhibit Number USA-599. It reads as follows:

      “We support the request of the Führer’s delegate for the supervision of the entire spiritual and ideological education and instruction of the NSDAP, Party member Alfred Rosenberg, to organize community schools of all organizations of the NSDAP twice a year, in order to show by this common effort the ideological and political unity of the NSDAP and the steadfastness of the National Socialist will.”

      This program was endorsed by the Defendant Schirach as well as by Himmler, Ley, and others.

      THE PRESIDENT: Aren’t you dealing with this rather in a cumulative way? Isn’t it possible to summarize this evidence against Rosenberg more than you are doing?

      MR. BRUDNO: I will try to, Your Honor. However, although the Indictment charges, and there is already substantial proof to show that the defendant conspirators used ideological training as an implement in achieving their rise to power and in consolidating their control, there seems to be little evidence as to Rosenberg’s position; and I am introducing this evidence in order to show that he played a dominant role in this connection. However, I will try to summarize these documents if I can.

      THE PRESIDENT: Well, I’ve taken down about 20 documents that you have alluded to, all of which deal with Rosenberg’s ideological theories.

      MR. BRUDNO: Yes, Your Honor. I was merely trying to show the scope of his activities.

      THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

      MR. BRUDNO: Your Honors will recall that it was in his capacity as Führer’s delegate that Rosenberg established the Institute for the Exploration of the Jewish Question in Frankfurt. This institute, commonly known as the “Hohe Schule,” has been referred to in connection with the exposition of art plunders. Into its library there flowed books, documents, and manuscripts which were looted from virtually every country of occupied Europe. Further evidence on this score will be introduced by the prosecutor of the Republic of France.

      Your Honors will also recall, and the Record shows at Pages 1671 to 1687 (Volume IV, Pages 81 to 92), that it was as ideological delegate that Rosenberg conducted the fabulous art looting activities of the Einsatzstab Rosenberg, activities which extended to virtually every country occupied by the Germans. I will not attempt to summarize the extent of the plunder and merely refer the Tribunal to Document 1015(b)-PS, which has already been introduced as Exhibit Number USA-385, and Document L-188, which has been introduced as Exhibit Number USA-386. Document 1015(b)-PS details the looting of 21,000 objects of art; Document L-188, the looting of the contents of over 71,000 Jewish homes in the West. This subject, too, will be further developed by the French Prosecutor.

      The importance of Rosenberg’s activities as official ideologist of the Nazi Party was not overlooked. In Document 3559-PS, which I wish to introduce as Exhibit Number USA-600—this document, incidentally, is the Hart biography of Rosenberg, entitled Alfred Rosenberg, The Man and His Work—it is stated that Rosenberg won the German National Prize in 1937. The creation of this prize, Your Honors will recall, was the Nazis’ petulant reply to the award of the Nobel Prize to Karl von Ossietzki, an inmate of a German concentration camp. The citation which accompanied the award to Rosenberg reads as follows:

      “Alfred Rosenberg has helped with his publications to lay the scientific and intuitive foundation and to strengthen the ideology of National Socialism in the most excellent way. . . . The National Socialist movement, and beyond that, the entire German people will be deeply gratified that the Führer has distinguished Alfred Rosenberg as one of his oldest and most faithful fighting comrades by awarding him the German National Prize.”

      The contribution which Rosenberg’s book, the Myth of the Twentieth Century, the foundation of all his ideological propaganda, made in the development of National Socialism, was appraised in a publication Bücher Kunde in 1942. This publication is our Document Number 3554-PS, dated November 1942. I offer it as Exhibit Number USA-601. The first page sets forth an appraisal of the Myth of the Twentieth Century.

      THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Brudno, you referred us to the Myth of the Twentieth Century on several occasions.

      MR. BRUDNO: Yes, Your Honor.

      THE PRESIDENT: We really don’t want to hear any more about it.

      MR. BRUDNO: I wish to show that this book is regarded as being one of the pillars of the movement and I wish to show also, Sir, that it had a circulation of over a million copies.

      THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think it is absolutely clear from the evidence which has already been given that Rosenberg was enunciating doctrines of the ideology of the Nazi Party; and I don’t think that it is necessary to go any further into details about it.

      MR. BRUDNO: Very well. If the Tribunal is satisfied that Rosenberg’s ideas formed the foundation for the National Socialist ideological movement, I will pass on.

      THE PRESIDENT: Well, you have already brought out the fact that he was appointed the Führer’s deputy for that purpose; wasn’t he?

      MR. BRUDNO: Yes, Your Honor. I shall pass on from that point. I would merely like to make reference, however, to Document 789-PS, which has already been introduced as Exhibit Number USA-23. This document records a meeting between Hitler and his supreme commanders, on which occasion Hitler said, “The building up of our Armed Forces was possible only in connection with the ideological education of the German people by the Party.”

      We submit that the contribution which Rosenberg made through formulation and dissemination of National Socialist ideology was fundamental to the conspiracy. As the apostle of neo-paganism, the exponent of the drive for Lebensraum, and the glorifier of the myth of Nordic superiority and as one of the oldest and most energetic Nazi proponents of anti-Semitism, he contributed materially to the unification of the German people behind the swastika. He provided the impetus and the inspiration for the National Socialist movement. His doctrines were responsible for the sublimation of morality and the crystallization of the Nordic dream in the minds of the German people, thereby making them useful tools in the hands of the conspirators and willing collaborators in the prosecution of their criminal plan.

      I now pass to the second phase of Rosenberg’s criminal activities—his active contribution toward the preparation for aggressive war through the international activities of the APA, the Foreign Policy Office of the Party.

      As previously indicated in my quotation from Das Führer Lexikon, which is Exhibit Number USA-593, Rosenberg became a Reichsleiter, the highest level of rank in the Leadership Corps, and was made chief of the foreign policy office of the Party in April 1933. The organization manual of the Party, Document 2319-PS, which I offer as Exhibit Number USA-602, describes the functions of the APA as including СКАЧАТЬ