The Mazal Library

	MAZAL LIBRARY NMT01-T029
.	NUERNBERG MILITARY TRIBUNAL Volume I · Page 29

.	This case, and others which will be tried in this building, offer a signal opportunity to lay before the German people the true cause of their present misery. The walls and towers and churches of Nuernberg were, indeed, reduced to rubble by Allied bombs, but in a deeper sense Nuernberg had been destroyed a decade earlier, when it became the seat of the annual Nazi Party rallies, a focal point for the moral disintegration in Germany, and the private domain of Julius Streicher. The insane and malignant doctrines that Nuernberg spewed forth account alike for the crimes of these defendants and for the terrible fate of Germany under the Third Reich. A nation which deliberately infects itself with poison will inevitably sicken and die. These defendants and others turned Germany into an infernal combination of a lunatic asylum and a charnel house. Neither science nor industry nor the arts could flourish in such a foul medium. The country could not live at peace and was fatally handicapped for war. I do not think the German people have as yet any conception of how deeply the, criminal folly that was nazisim bit into every phase of German life, or of how utterly ravaging the consequences were. It will be our task to make these things clear. These are the high purposes which justify the establishment of extraordinary courts to hear and determine this case and others of comparable importance. That murder should be punished goes without the saying but the full performance of our task requires more than the just sentencing of these defendants. Their crimes were the inevitable result of the sinister doctrines which they espoused, and these same doctrines sealed the fate of Germany, shattered Europe, and left the world in ferment. Wherever those doctrines may emerge and prevail, the same terrible consequences will follow. That is why a bold and lucid consummation of these proceedings is of vital importance to all nations. That is why the United States has constituted this Tribunal. STATE MEDICAL SERVICES OF THE THIRD REICH I pass now to the facts of the case in hand. There are 23 defendants in the box. All but three of them — Rudolf Brandt, Sievers, and Brack — are doctors. Of the 20 doctors, all but one — Pokorny — held positions in the medical services of the Third Reich. To understand this case, it is necessary to understand the general structure of these state medical services, and how these services fitted into the over-all organization of the Nazi State. To assist this Court in this regard the prosecution has prepared a short expository brief [not introduced into evidence] which is already in the hands of the court and which has been made available to defense counsel in German and English. The brief includes a glossary 29