Text: English     International Military Tribunal "Blue Series," Vol. 3, p. 152
		THIRTEENTH DAY Wednesday, 5 December 1945 Morning Session MR. ALDERMAN: May it please the Tribunal, when the Tribunal rose yesterday afternoon, I had just offered in evidence Document 2826-PS, Exhibit USA-lll. This was an article by SS Group Leader Karl Hermann Frank, published in Böhmen und Mähren (or Bohemia and Moravia), the official periodical of the Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia, the issue of March 1941, at Page 79. It is an article which reveals with considerable frankness the functions which the FS and SS had, and shows the pride which the Nazi conspirators took in the activities of these organizations. I read from that article, under the heading "The SS on March 15, 1939": "A modern people and a modern state are today unthinkable without political troops. To these are allotted the special task of being the advance guard of the political will and the guarantor of its unity. This is especially true of the German folk-groups, which have their home in some other people's state. Accordingly the Sudeten German Party had formerly also organized its political troop, the Voluntary Vigilantes" — or, in German, "Freiwilliger Selbstschutz", called FS for short. — "This troop was trained especially in accordance with the principles of the SS, so far as these could be used in this region at that time. The troop was likewise assigned here the special task of protecting the homeland actively, if necessary. It stood up well in its first test in this connection, wherever in the fall crisis of 1938 it had to assume the protection of the homeland, arms in hand. "After the annexation of the Sudeten Gau the tasks of the FS were transferred essentially to the German student organizations as compact troop formations in Prague and Brünn, aside from the isolated German communities which remained in the Second Republic. This was also natural because many active students from the Sudeten Gau were already members of the SS. The student organizations then had to endure this test, in common with other Germans, during the crisis of March 1939 . . . . 152
		Text: English     International Military Tribunal "Blue Series," Vol. 3, p. 152     Last modified: October 10, 1998 Copyright © 1998 The Mazal Library and The Holocaust History Project. All rights reserved. Technical/administrative contact: webmaster@holocaust-history.org Find a typo? Let us know.