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Volume III · Page 1197
reference to paragraph 1 (a), if he held a high political, civil or military (including General Staff) position in Germany or in one of its Allies, co-belligerents or satellites, or held high position in the financial, industrial or economic life of any such country." |
| This language in detail defines the acts
which constitute aiding and abetting and is so specific and so comprehensive
that it has defined conspiracy without employing the word. The language omits
no element of the crime of conspiracy. As a rule there can be no such thing as
aiding and abetting without some previous agreement or understanding or common
design in the execution of which the aider and abetter promoting that common
design has made himself guilty as a principal. The foregoing provisions of paragraph 2 were intended to serve some useful purpose. War crimes and crimes against humanity had been defined or recognized and illustrated in paragraph 1 of Law No. 10 and did not need further explanation. Obviously, the provisions of paragraph 2 were intended to provide that if the act of one person did not complete the crime charged, but the acts of two or more persons did, then each person "connected with the plans or enterprises involving its commission" is guilty of the crime. This is the gravamen of the law of conspiracy. Conspiracy is universally known as a plan, scheme, or combination of two or more persons to commit a certain unlawful act or crime. The conspiracies charged in the indictment and defined by Law No. 10 are conspiracies or plans to commit war crimes or crimes against humanity, which are established crimes under international laws or customs of war. In the very nature of such crimes their commission is usually by more than one person. Therefore the purpose of showing the conspiracy to commit such crimes was to establish the participation of each defendant and the degree of his connection with such crimes. Since the language of paragraph 2 of Law No. 10 expressly provides that any person connected with plans involving the commission of a war crime or crime against humanity is deemed to have committed such crimes, it is equivalent to providing that the crime is committed by acts constituting a conspiracy under the ordinary meaning of the term. Manifestly it was not necessary to place the label "conspiracy" upon acts which themselves define and constitute in fact and in law a conspiracy. Paragraph 2 was so interpreted by the Zone Commander when he issued Military Government Ordinance No. 7, which authorized the creation of this and similar military tribunals, and which provides in article I that — |
