| |
| it has been stated completely and
definitively by the judgment of the International Military Tribunal and
therefore needs no amplification here. The International Military Tribunal
declared the SS, SD and the Gestapo to be criminal organizations within the
purview of the London Charter. The pertinent provisions of that judgment
declaring these organizations criminal and defining the categories of
membership therein follow: |
| |
| SS |
| |
"The SS was utilized for purposes
which were criminal under the Charter involving the persecution and
extermination of the Jews, brutalities, and killings in concentration camps,
excesses in the administration of occupied territories, the administration of
the slave-labor program and the mistreatment and murder of prisoners of war. *
* * In dealing with the SS the Tribunal includes all persons who had been
officially accepted as members of the SS including the members of the
Allgemeine SS, members of the Waffen SS, members of the SS Totenkopf Verbaende,
and the members of any of the different police forces who were members of the
SS. * * *
"The Tribunal declares to be criminal within the meaning of of
the Charter the group composed of those persons who had been officially
accepted as members of the SS as enumerated in the preceding paragraph who
became or remained members of the organization with knowledge that it was being
used for the commission of acts declared criminal by Article 6 of the Charter,
or who were personally implicated as members of the organization in the
commission of such crimes, excluding, however, those who were drafted into
membership by the state in such a way as to give them no choice in the matter,
and who had committed no such crimes. The basis of this finding is the
participation of the organization in war crimes and crimes against humanity
connected with the war; this group declared criminal cannot include, therefore,
persons who had ceased to belong to the organizations enumerated in the
preceding paragraph prior to 1 September 1939. " |
| Gestapo and
SD |
| |
"The Gestapo and SD were used for
purposes which were criminal under the Charter involving the persecution and
extermination of the Jews, brutalities, and killings in concentration camps,
excesses in the administration of occupied territories, the administration of
the slave-labor program, and the mistreatment and murder of prisoners of war. *
* * In dealing with |
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