22 Nov. 45

Afternoon Session

COL. STOREY: If the Tribunal please, Major Frank Wallis will now present the briefs and documents supporting the briefs in behalf of the phase of the case known as the Common Plan or Conspiracy, up through 1939.

Major Wallis.

MAJOR FRANK B. WALLIS (Assistant Trial Counsel for the United States): Mr. President, members of the Tribunal: It will be my purpose to establish most of the material allegations of the Indictment running from Paragraph IV on Page 3, to Subparagraph E on Page 6. The subjects involved are:

The aims of the Nazi Party, their doctrinal techniques, their rise to power, and the consolidation of control over Germany between 1933 and 1939 in preparation for aggressive war.

This story has already been sketched by the American Chief Prosecutor. Moreover, it is history, beyond challenge by the defendants. For the most part, we rely upon the Tribunal to take judicial notice of it. What we offer is merely illustrative material-including statements by the defendants and other Nazi leaders-laws, decrees, and the like. We do not need to rest upon captured documents or other special sources, although some have been used.

For the convenience of the court and Defense counsel, the illustrative material has been put together in document books, and the arguments derived from them have been set out in trial briefs.

I intend only to comment briefly on some of the materials and to summarize the main lines of the briefs.

What is the charge in Count One?

The charge in Count One is that the defendants, with divers other persons, participated in the formulation or execution of a Common Plan or Conspiracy to commit, or which involved the commission of Crimes against Humanity (both within and without Germany), War Crimes, and Crimes against Peace.

The charge is, further, that the instrument of cohesion among the defendants, as well as an instrument for the execution of the purposes of the conspiracy, was the Nazi Party, of which each defendant was a member or to which he became an adherent.

The scope of the proof which I shall offer is:

First, that the Nazi Party set for itself certain aims and objectives, involving basically the acquisition of "Lebensraum", or living space, for all "racial" Germans.

Second, that it was committed to the use of any methods whether or not legal, in attaining these objectives, and that it did in fact use illegal methods.