12 Dec.
45
liquor as well as persuasion in order to
dispatch them to Germany.
"Moreover, I have charged several capable men with founding a
special labor allocation organization of our own, and this by training
and arming, under the aegis of the Higher SS and Police Führer, a
number of indigenous units; but I still have to ask the munitions
ministry for arms for these men. For during the last year alone
several dozens of high-ranking labor allocation officials of great
ability have been shot. All these means must be used, grotesque as it
may sound, to refute the allegation that there is no organization to
bring labor to Germany from these countries."
This same slave labor hunt proceeded in Holland, as it did in France,
with terror and abduction. I now refer to Document Number 1726-PS, which
is Exhibit USA-195. This document is entitled, "Statement of the
Netherlands Government in View of the Prosecution and Punishment of the
German Major War Criminals." I wish to quote from enclosure "h,"
entitled "Central Bureau for Statistics — The Deportation of
Netherlands' Workmen to Germany — . " It is Page 1 of the
English text, starting with the first paragraph; and in the German text
it appears at Page 1, also Paragraph 1. Quoting it directly, it reads as
follows:
"Many big and medium-size large
business concerns, especially in the metal industry, were visited by
German commissions who selected workmen for deportation. This
combing-out was called the 'Sauckel action,' so named after its
leader, who was charged with the procurement of foreign workmen for
Germany.
"The employers had to cancel the contracts with the selected
workmen; and the latter were forced to register at the labor offices,
which then took charge of the deportation under supervision of German
'Fachberater.'
"Workmen who refused — relatively few — were
prosecuted by the Sicherheitsdienst — the SD. If captured by this
service, they were mostly lodged for some time in one of the infamous
prisoners' camps in the Netherlands and eventually put to work in
Germany.
"In these prosecutions the Sicherheitsdienst was supported by
the German police service, which was connected with the labor offices
and was composed of members of the NSB and the like.
"At the end of April 1942 the deportation of workers started on
a grand scale. Consequently, in the months of May and June, the number
of deportees amounted to not less than