territories occupied by the German Armed Forces since
1 September 1939, and in Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Italy, and on
the High Seas.
All the defendants, acting in concert with others, formulated and
executed a Common Plan or Conspiracy to commit War Crimes as defined
in Article 6 (b) of the Charter. This plan involved, among other
things, the practice of "total war" including methods of
combat and of military occupation in direct conflict with the laws
and customs of war, and the commission of crimes perpetrated on the
field of battle during encounters with enemy armies, and against
prisoners of war, and in occupied territories against the civilian
population of such territories.
The said War Crimes we're committed by the defendants and by
other persons for whose acts the defendants are responsible (under
Article 6 of the Charter) as such other persons when committing the
said War Crimes performed their acts in execution of a common plan
and conspiracy to commit the said War Crimes, in the formulation and
execution of which plan and conspiracy all the defendants
participated as leaders, organizers, instigators, and accomplices.
These methods and crimes constituted violations of international
conventions, of internal penal laws and of the general principles of
criminal law as derived from the criminal law of all civilized
nations, and were involved in and part of a systematic course of
conduct.
(A) MURDER AND ILL-TREATMENT OF CIVILIAN
POPULATIONS OF OR IN OCCUPIED TERRITORY AND ON THE HIGH SEAS
Throughout the period of their occupation of
territories overrun by their armed forces the defendants, for the
purpose of systematically terrorizing the inhabitants, murdered and
tortured civilians, and ill-treated them, and imprisoned them without
legal process.
The, murders and ill-treatment were carried out by divers means,
including shooting, hanging, gassing, starvation, gross overcrowding,
systematic under-nutrition, systematic imposition of labor tasks
beyond the strength of those ordered to carry them out, inadequate
provision of surgical and medical services, kickings, beatings,
brutality and torture of all kinds, including the use of hot irons
and pulling out of fingernails and the performance of experiments by
means of operations and otherwise on living human subjects, In some
occupied territories the defendants interfered in religious matters,
persecuted members of the clergy and monastic orders, and
expropriated church property. They conducted deliberate and
systematic genocide, viz., the extermination of racial