by improvisation. Each succeeding step
was apparently carried out as each new situation arose, but all
consistent with the ultimate objectives mentioned above."
The argument that such common planning cannot exist
where there is complete dictatorship is unsound. A plan in the
execution of which a number of persons participate is still a plan,
even though conceived by only one of them; and those who execute the
plan do not avoid responsibility by showing that they acted under the
direction of the man who conceived it. Hitler could not make
aggressive war by himself. He had to have the. co-operation of
statesmen, military leaders, diplomats, and business men. When they,
with knowledge of his aims, gave him their co-operation, they made
themselves parties to the plan he had initiated. They are not to be
deemed innocent because Hitler made use of them, if they knew what
they were doing. That they were assigned to their tasks by a dictator
does not absolve them from responsibility for their acts. The
relation of leader and follower does not preclude responsibility here
any more than it does in the comparable tyranny of organized domestic
crime.
Count One, however, charges not only the
conspiracy to commit aggressive war, but also to commit War Crimes
and Crimes against Humanity. But the Charter does not define as a
separate crime any conspiracy except the one to commit acts of
aggressive war. Article 6 of the Charter provides:
"Leaders, organizers,
instigators, and accomplices participating in the formulation or
execution of a Common Plan or Conspiracy to commit any of the
foregoing crimes are responsible for all acts performed by any
persons in execution of such plan."
In the opinion of the Tribunal these words do not
add a new and separate crime to those already listed. The words are
designed to establish the responsibility of persons participating in
a common plan. The Tribunal will therefore disregard the charges in
Count One that the defendants conspired to commit War Crimes and
Crimes against Humanity, and will consider only the common plan to
prepare, initiate, and wage aggressive war.
War Crimes and Crimes against
Humanity
The evidence relating to War Crimes has been
overwhelming, in its volume and its detail. It is imposible for this
Judgment adequately to review it, or to record the mass of
documentary and oral evidence that has been presented. The truth
remains that War Crimes were committed on a vast scale, never before
seen in the history of war. They were perpetrated in all the
countries occupied