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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
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