Archive/File: imt/tgmwc/tgmwc-05/tgmwc-05-43.04
Last-Modified: 1999/10/05

Major Madeline was not the only victim of such evil
treatment which several German officers of the Gestapo
helped to inflict. This inquiry has shown that twelve known
persons succumbed to the tortures inflicted by the Gestapo

                                                  [Page 165]

of Clermont-Ferrand, that some women were stripped naked and
beaten before they were raped." I am anxious not to lengthen
these proceedings by useless citations. I hope the Tribunal
will consider the facts that I have presented as
established. They are contained in the document that we are
placing before you, and in it the Tribunal will find in full
the written testimony taken on the day which followed the
Liberation. This systematic repetition of the same criminal
methods in order to achieve the same purpose, - to bring
about a reign of terror - was not the isolated act only of a
subordinate having authority in France, and not under the
control of his government or of the Army General Staff. An
examination of the methods of the German police in all
countries of the West shows that the same horrors, the same
atrocities, were repeated systematically everywhere. Whether
in Denmark, Belgium, Holland or Norway, the interrogations
were everywhere and at all times conducted by the Gestapo
with the same savagery, the same contempt of legal rights,
the same callousness towards human life.

In the case of Denmark, we cite from a document already
placed before the Tribunal, under No. 317, which contains an
official report of the Danish Government, dated October
1945. I merely cite a few lines from this document. You will
find them in the small book of documents appended to the
large book that was handed to you this morning. We think
these few lines summarise the whole question. This is
Document 666-F, which should be the sixth in your book of
documents.

THE PRESIDENT: Does it come after 641-A?

M. DUBOST: Yes, Sir.

It is an extract from the Danish Memorandum of October,
1945, concerning the German Major War Criminals appearing
before the International Military Tribunal. Page 5, under
the title "Torture" we read, in a brief resume, everything
that concerns
the question with regard to Denmark:

  "In numerous cases German police and their assistants
  used torture in order to force the prisoners to confess
  or to give information. This fact is supported by
  irrefutable evidence. In most cases the torture consisted
  in lashing or beating with sticks or with a rubber
  bludgeon.
  
  But much more serious forms of torture were used,
  including some which will have lasting effects.
  Bovensiepen had stated that the order to use torture
  came, in certain cases, from the higher authorities,
  perhaps even from Goering as Chief of the Gestapo, but,
  in any event, from Heydrich. The instructions were to the
  effect that torture might be used in order to force the
  victims to give information that might serve to give away
  subversive organisations working against the German
  Reich, and not only to force the victim to confess his
  own acts."

  A little further on: "The methods prescribed were, among
  other things, a specified number of blows with a stick.
  Bovensiepen does not remember whether the maximum was ten
  or twenty blows. An officer from the criminal police was
  there, and also, when circumstances so required, there
  was a medical officer present."

The above mentioned instructions were modified several
times, and all members of the criminal police were notified.

The Danish Government points out, in conclusion, two
particularly repugnant cases of torture inflicted on Danish
patriots. They are the cases of Professor Mogens and the ill-
treatment inflicted on Col. Einar Thiemroth. Finally, the
Tribunal can read that Doctor Hoffman-Best states that his
official prerogatives did not authorise him to prevent the
use of torture.

In the case of Belgium we should recall first of all the
tortures that were inflicted in the camp of Breendonck of
tragic fame, where hundreds, even thousands of Belgium
patriots, were confined. We shall revert to Breendonck

                                                  [Page 166]

when we deal with the question of concentration camps. We
shall merely quote from the report of the Belgian War Crimes
Commission a few definite facts in support of our original
affirmation, that all acts of ill-treatment imputed to the
Gestapo in France were reproduced in an identical manner in
all the countries of Western Europe. The documents which we
shall submit to you are to be found in the small book of
documents as Exhibits RF 318 and 319. It is 942 (b) in your
document book. It is the second document.

THE PRESIDENT: The second?

M. DUBOST: The second. You have a first document of 4 pages,
it would be the 5th page of the small document book.

This report comprises minutes which I will not read,
inasmuch as it contains testimonies which are analogous to,
if not identical with those that were collected in France,
However, on Pages 1 and 2 you will find the statement made
by M. Auguste Ramael and also one made by M. Paul Desomer,
which show that the most extreme cruelties were inflicted on
these men, and that when they emerged from the offices of
the Gestapo, they were completely disfigured and unable to
stand.

And now I submit to you in regard to Belgium, Documents 611-
F (a) and 641-F (b), which now become Exhibits RF320 and
321. I shall not read them. They, too, contain reports
describing tortures similar to those I have already
mentioned. If the Court will accept the cruelty of the
methods of torture employed by the Gestapo as having been
established, I will abstain from reading all the testimonies
which have been collected.

In the case of Norway our information is taken from a
document submitted by the Norwegian Government concerning
the Punishment of the Major War Criminals. In the French
translation of this Document UK 79, which we present as
exhibit RF 323, on Page 2 you will find - and it is also to
be found in the small document book - the confirmed
statement that many Norwegians died. The Tribunal will find
the statement of the Norwegian Government according to which
numerous Norwegian citizens died as a result of the cruel
treatment inflicted on them during their interrogation. The
number of cases for the district of Oslo alone is known to
be 52. The number in the various regions of Norway is
undoubtedly much higher. The total number of Norwegian
citizens who died during the occupation, as the result of
tortures or ill-treatment or execution or suicide in prisons
or concentration camps is approximately 2,100.

In paragraph (b), Page 2 of the document, there is a
description of the methods employed by the Gestapo in
Norway, and which were identical with those I have already
described.

In the case of the Netherlands, we shall submit Document 224-
S, which becomes Exhibit RF 324, and which is extracted from
the statement of the Netherlands Government for the
Prosecution and Punishment of the Major German War
Criminals. This document bears the date 11 January, 1946. It
has been distributed and should now be in your hands. The
Tribunal will find in it a great number of testimonies which
were collected by the Criminal Investigation Department, all
of which describe the same ill-treatment and tortures as
those already known to you, and which were committed by the
Gestapo in Holland. In the Netherlands, as elsewhere, the
accused were beaten with sticks. When their backs were
completely raw from the beating they were sent back to their
cells. Sometimes icy water was poured over them and
sometimes they were exposed to electrical current. At
Amersfoort a witness saw with his own eyes a prisoner, who
was a priest, beaten to death with a rubber truncheon. The
systematic character of such tortures has been definitely
established. The document of the Danish Government is
striking proof in support of my contention that these
systematic tortures were the deliberate policy of the higher
authorities of the Reich, and that the

                                                  [Page 167]


members of the German Government are responsible. In any
case these systematic tortures were certainly known to them,
because there were protests from all European countries
against such methods, which plunged us again into the
darkness of the Middle Ages. At no time was an order given
to forbid such methods. At no time were those who used them
disavowed by their superiors. The methods followed were
devised to intensify the policy of terrorism pursued by
Germany in the occupied countries - a policy of terrorism
which I have already described to you when I dealt with the
question of hostages.

It is now incumbent on me to give you the names of those
among the accused whom France, as well as other countries in
the West, considers to be especially guilty of having
prepared and developed this criminal policy carried out by
the Gestapo. We maintain they are Bormann and Kaltenbrunner
who, because of their positions, must have known more than
any others, about the acts of their subordinates. Although
we are not in possession of any document signed by them in
respect to the Western countries, the uniformity of the acts
we have described to you, and the fact that they were
analogous and even identical in places far apart, enables us
to assert that all these orders were dictated by a single
will, and, among the accused, Bormann and Kaltenbrunner were
the direct instruments of that single will.

Everything I described to you here concerned the procedure
prior to trial, if any. We know with what ferocity this
procedure was applied. We know that this ferocity was
intentional. It was known to the populations of the invaded
countries, and its purpose was to create an atmosphere of
terror around the Gestapo and all the German police
services.

After the examination came the judicial proceedings. These
proceedings were, as we see them, only a parody of justice.
The prosecution was based on a legal concept which we
dismiss as being absolutely inhuman. That part will be dealt
with by my colleague, M. Edgar Faure, in the second part of
the report on the German atrocities in the Western
countries: crimes against the spirit. It is sufficient for
us to know that the German courts which dealt with crimes
committed by the citizens of those occupied Western
countries which did not accept defeat, applied only one
penalty, and that was the death penalty, and this in
execution of an inhuman order by one of these men, Keitel,
an order which appears in Document 90-L, submitted to you as
exhibit USA 503.

THE PRESIDENT: What is the number?

M. DUBOST: USA 503. It has already been submitted to the
Tribunal by my United States colleagues, It is the
penultimate document in your big document book. Line 5:

"If these offences are punished with imprisonment, or even
with hard labour for life, this will be looked upon as a
sign of weakness. Efficient and lasting intimidation can
only be achieved either by capital punishment, or measures
by which the relatives of the culprit and the population are
prevented from knowing the fate of the culprit ... "

Is it necessary to make any comment? Can we be surprised at
this war leader giving orders to the judges? What we heard
about him yesterday makes us doubt if he is merely a
military leader. We have quoted you his own words: "
Efficient and lasting intimidation can only be achieved by
capital punishment." Such orders given to the judges - are
these compatible with military honour? "If, in effect,"
Keitel goes on to say in Document 90-L, "the Court cannot
arrive at a death sentence, then the man must be deported."
I think you will share my opinion that, when such orders are
given to a Court, one can no longer speak of justice.

In execution of this order, those of our compatriots who
were not condemned to death and immediately executed, were
deported to Germany. We now come to the third part of our
expose which falls to me, namely, the deportations.

                                                  [Page 168]

I should explain to you in what circumstances the
deportations were carried out. If prior to that the Tribunal
could adjourn for a very few minutes, I should be very
grateful.

(A recess was taken)

DR. NELTE (Counsel for the defendant Keitel): The French
Prosecutor just now read from Document 90-L, the so-called
"Nacht und Nebel" decree. He referred to this decree and
cited the words:

   "Efficient and lasting intimidation can only be achieved
   by capital punishment, or measures by which the
   relatives of the culprit and the population are
   prevented from knowing the fate of the culprit."

The French Prosecutor mentioned that these were the words of
Keitel.

In connection with a previous case the President and the
Tribunal have pointed out that it is not permissible to
quote only a part of a document when by so doing a wrong
impression might be created.

The French prosecutor will agree with me when I say that
document 90-L makes it quite clear that these are not the
words of the Chief of the OKW, but of Hitler. In this short
decree it says that it is the carefully considered will of
the Fuehrer that, when attacks are made in occupied
countries against the Reich or against the occupying power,
the culprits must be dealt with by other measures than those
decreed heretofore. The Fuehrer is of the opinion that if
these offences are punished with imprisonment, or even with
hard labour for life, this will be looked upon as a sign of
weakness. Efficient and enduring intimidation can only be
achieved by capital punishment, etc."

The decree then goes on to say:

   "The enclosed directives on how to deal with the
   offences comply with the Fuehrer's point of view. They
   have been examined and approved by him."

I take the liberty to point out this fact, especially as
this decree, which is known as the notorious "Nacht und
Nebel" decree, in its formulation and execution has been
opposed by Keitel. That is why I am protesting.

M. DUBOST: I owe you an explanation. I did not read the
decree in extenso because you know it. In line with the
customary procedure of the Tribunal it has been read. It is
not necessary to read it again. I did not know that the
accused, Keitel, had signed it but that Hitler had conceived
it. Therefore, I have made allusion to the military honour
of this general, who was not afraid to become the lackey of
Hitler.

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal understood that from your
mentioning the fact that the document had already been
submitted to the Tribunal, and does not think that there was
anything misleading in what you did.

M. DUBOST: If the Tribunal accepts this, we shall proceed to
the hearing of a witness, a Frenchman.

THE PRESIDENT: This is your witness, is it not? Is this the
witness you wish to call?

M. DUBOST: Yes.

M. MAURICE LAMPE, a witness called by the French
prosecution, takes the stand.

THE PRESIDENT: Will you stand up. What is your name?

THE WITNESS: Lampe, Maurice.

THE PRESIDENT: Will you repeat this oath after me: Do you
swear to speak without hate or fear, to speak the truth, all
the truth, only the truth.

(The witness repeats the oath in French)

THE PRESIDENT: Raise the right hand and say, I swear.

                                                  [Page 169]

THE WITNESS: I swear.

THE PRESIDENT: Spell the name.

THE WITNESS: L-A-M-P-E.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you.

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