20 Dec. 45

In the occupied countries the Higher SS and Police Leaders were more directly controlled by the Befehlshaber and the Kommandeure of the Security Police and SD than within the Reich. They had authority to issue direct orders so long as they did not conflict with the Chief of the Security Police and SD, who exercised controlling authority.

The above chart and the remarks concerning it are based upon two documents which I now offer in evidence. They are Document L-219, which is the organization plan of the RSHA of 1 October 1943, and Document 2346-PS.

Now next, the primary mission of the Gestapo and the SD was to combat the actual and ideological enemies of the Nazi regime and to keep Hitler and the Nazi leadership in power as, specified in Count One of the Indictment. The tasks and methods of the Secret State Police were well described in an article which is translated in Document W56-PS, Volume 2 of the document book, which is an article published in January 1936 in Das Archiv at Page 1342, which I now offer in evidence and quote from. It is on Page 1 of the English translation, 1956. 1 will first read the first paragraph and then the third and fourth paragraphs. That is in January 1936. Quoting:

"In order to refute the malicious rumors spread abroad, the Volkischer Beobachter of 22 January 1936 published an article on the origin, purpose, and duties of the Secret Police; extracts from this read as follows: ... "

Then skip to the third paragraph:

"The Secret State Police is an official instrument of the Criminal Police authorities, whose special task is the detection of crimes and offenses against the State, especially treason against Land or Reich. The task of the Secret State Police is to discover these crimes and offenses, to find the perpetrators, and to bring them to trial. The number of criminal proceedings continually pending in the People's Court for treasonable acts against Land or Reich is the result of this work. The second important field of operations for the Secret State Police is the preventive combatting of all dangers threatening the State and its leaders. As, since the National Socialist revolution, all open struggle and all open opposition to the State and to the leadership of the State is forbidden, a Secret State Police as a preventive instrument in the struggle against all dangers threatening the State is indissolubly bound up with the National Socialist Führer State. The opponents of National Socialism were not eliminated by the prohibition of their organizations and their newspapers, but have withdrawn to other forms of opposition to the state. Therefore the National Socialist State has to track down, to watch, and to