Lesley Stahl: Did anybody ever say that you're naive? On This Day, Nov. 20: Nuremberg trials begin - UPI.com Documents in the Taube Archive have been converted into digital files using optical character recognition technology that turns printed materials, including handwritten, typed or scanned paper files, into an electronic format that can be easily searched. Only one piece of film is known to exist of the Einsatzgruppen at work. [177] In the latter case, the Wehrmacht leadership was not considered an organization within the meaning of the charter;[177][178] but this verdict was later misrepresented as an acquittal of the criminality of the Wehrmacht, forming one of the foundations of the clean Wehrmacht myth. [135] The Soviet Union also called two Holocaust survivors as witnesses, Samuel Rajzmana Treblinka survivorand poet Abraham Sutzkever, who eloquently described the murder of tens of thousands of Jews from Vilna, although their testimony did not directly incriminate any of the defendants. He never stops pushing his message and he's donating his life savings to a Genocide Prevention Initiative at the Holocaust Museum. (November 18, 2021 / JNS) A bipartisan group of the members of the U.S. House of Representatives introduced a bill on Thursday to award a Congressional Gold Medal to the last living prosecutor of the Nuremberg trials.. Nuremberg Trials - Definition, Dates & Purpose - History Germany, May 1945: a surrender, a country in chaos and the top Nazi leaders attempting to slip away. (JTA) At the opening of his trial in Nuremberg, Julius Streicher made several uncharacteristically friendly statements about Jews a people he had devoted his professional life to demonize. [227] The main legal criticisms of the trial focused on questions of retroactivity, selectivity, and jurisdiction. Institutional rivalries hampered the search. Lesley Stahl: What turns a man into a savage beast like that? 2021 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. [146][147] Defense lawyer Alfred Seidl[de] repeatedly tried to disclose the secret protocols of the GermanSoviet pact. The speech was favorably received by the prosecution, the tribunal, the audience, historians, and even the defendants. Jackson. They all have already tags on 'em. The British worked on putting together the aggressive war charge; the French and Soviet delegations were assigned the task of covering crimes against humanity and war crimes committed on the Western Front and the Eastern Front, respectively. 40 years on from the Majdanek trial verdict. [34][35] Located in the American occupation zone, Nuremberg was a symbolic location as the site of Nazi rallies. [81] Senior American officials believed that convicting organizations was a good way of showing that not just the top German leaders were responsible for crimes, without condemning the entire German people. 10 Things You May Not Know About the Nuremberg Trials - History [119] Unlike the British and American prosecution strategy, which focused on using German documents to make their case, the French prosecutors took the perspective of the victims, submitting postwar police reports and calling eleven witnesses. [65], Some of the most prominent NazisAdolf Hitler, Heinrich Himmler, and Joseph Goebbelshad committed suicide and therefore could not be tried. Lesley Stahl: They're making them run to their own death? The technology will allow users to discover and cut straight to material in a really dense corpus without being an expert on the trial or being a lawyer, and that is really powerful, Van Tuyl said. The most optimistic. Ralf Bosen. Streicher, editor in chief of the Der Sturmer anti-Semitic weekly, claimed that hed always viewed German Jews as legitimate compatriots and long supported Zionism. To receive Stanford news daily, The Nuremberg trials were a series of 13 trials carried out between 1945 and 1949, the Trial of Major War Criminals being held from November 20, 1945 to October 1, 1946. By UPI Staff. Eventually, the online database will include digital versions of film, audio recordings and photographs that will also include links and annotations. [129] The Soviet prosecution also attempted to fabricate German responsibility for the Katyn massacre, which had in fact been committed by the Soviet Union. [71][72] The military leaders were Hermann Gring, Wilhelm Keitel, Alfred Jodl, Erich Raeder, and Karl Dnitz. The Jews were shot? Benjamin Ferencz: Do you think the man who dropped the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima was a savage? COVID-19 and Crimes Against Humanity: What the Nuremberg-Hague Trials Stanford News is a publication of Stanford University Communications. [207][208] In a 1946 poll, 78 percent of Germans assessed the trial as fair, but four years later that had fallen to 38 percent, with 30 percent considering it unfair. [229] Some defenders of the trial argued that the legal principle of nullum crimen sine lege (no crime without law) was not binding in international proceedings. Be there when human rights changed with 'The World's - Guide The Nuremberg trials were a series of 13 trials carried out in Nuremberg, Germany, between 1945 and 1949 to try those accused of Nazi war crimes. Thanks to a grant from Tad Taube and Taube Philanthropies, now, on the 75th anniversary of the first major international war crimes trial ending, a significant new collection of digital materials will be made available to the public. [45] At Jackson's recommendation, the United States appointed judges Francis Biddle and John Parker. [76] Of the 24 men indicted, Martin Bormann was tried in absentia, as the Allies were unaware of his death; Krupp was too ill to stand trial; and Robert Ley committed suicide. 2021/07/09 | Georgia. [66][67] The prosecutors wanted to try representative leaders of German politics, economy, and military; and the Americans had a list of 70 names at the London Conference. [44] As the numerically strongest delegation, it would take on the bulk of the prosecutorial effort. Benjamin Ferencz: He's not a savage. 2021 19:03. Fact Check: 10,000 Medical Experts Did NOT Start Nuremberg 2 Trial [228] The most controversial charge was crimes against peace. At the time, Ferencz just had the documents, and he started adding up the numbers. [48] The French judges were Henri Donnedieu de Vabres, a professor of criminal law, and alternate Robert Falco, who had represented France at the London Conference. Three were acquitted and the rest given long prison sentences. Benjamin Ferencz: Well, don't say that. [103], Much of the American case focused on the development of the Nazi conspiracy before the outbreak of war. And these were daily reports from the Eastern Front-- which unit entered which town, how many people they killed. [231], The International Military Tribunal for the Far East (Tokyo Trial) borrowed many of its ideas from the IMT, including all four charges. A new tool for designing and managing irrigation for farms advances the implementation of smart agriculture, an approach that leverages data and modern technologies to boost crop yields while conserving natural resources. You know? I was 27 years old. The Doctors Trial: The Medical Case of the Subsequent Nuremberg Pro [33], The negotiators decided that the tribunal's permanent seat would be in Berlin, while the trial would be held at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg. [211] The educational purpose of the Nuremberg Military Tribunals was a failure, in part because of the resistance to war crimes trials in German society, but also because of the United States Army's refusal to publish the trial record in German for fear it would undermine the fight against communism. Below his face, his motto: "law, not war.". Ferencz is the last Nuremberg prosecutor alive today. Nov. 20, 2021 / 3:00 AM On This Day: Nuremberg trials begin On Nov. 20, 1945, 24 German leaders went on trial at Nuremberg before the International War Crimes Tribunal. per adult (price varies by group size) Nuremberg World War 2 Tour. The Nuremberg trials were a series of indictments and criminal procedures against Nazi war criminals that were held from 20 November 1945 to 1 October 1946 at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg, Germany. [88], The charter allowed the admissibility of any evidence deemed to have probative value, including depositions. (Image credit: U.S. You're the sunniest man I've ever met. If they tell me they want war instead of peace, I don't say they're naive, I say they're stupid. Seven defendants (Hess, Funk, Raeder, Dnitz, Schirach, Speer, and Neurath) were sent to Spandau Prison to serve their sentences. Bus Tours. The verdict was drafted by British alternate judge Norman Birkett. I am naive? Lesley Stahl: So they went right in after the troops? It isn't easy viewing. Never again doesnt mean anything unless you know what has happened and why, said Cohen, who has partnered with Stanford Libraries to digitally archive the records and create a searchable website for the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg (1945-1946). The United States and the United Kingdom refused to endorse this proposal, citing the failure of war crimes prosecutions after World War I. [235] In the 1990s, a revival of international criminal law included the establishment of ad hoc international criminal tribunals for Yugoslavia (ICTY) and Rwanda (ICTR), which were widely seen as part of the legacy of the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials. [152] The defendants' witnesses sometimes managed to exculpate them, but other witnessesincluding Rudolf Hss, the former commandant of Auschwitz, and Hans Bernd Gisevius, a member of the German resistanceeffectively incriminated the defendants. After they had been made to give up their clothing and valuables, all of them were killed, which took several days." [18], At the London Conference, held from 26 June to 2 August 1945, representatives of France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States negotiated the exact form that the trial would take. Ben Ferencz, last surviving Nuremberg Trials prosecutor, receives [143] Although a few defense lawyers inverted the arguments of the prosecution to assert that the Germans' authoritarian mindset and obedience to the state exonerated them from any personal guilt, most rejected such arguments. Produced by Shari Finkelstein and Nieves Zuberbhler. Stupid to an incredible degree to send young people out to kill other young people they don't even know, who never did anybody any harm, never harmed them. Judges deliberate at the trials of Nazi war criminals in Nuremberg, Germany, Jan. 1, 1945. Radio 4's Nuremberg: the stories behind the Nazi trial that changed Between 1939 and 1945, Nazi Germany invaded many countries . Nrnberg trials, Nrnberg also spelled Nuremberg, series of trials held in Nrnberg, Germany, in 1945-46, in which former Nazi leaders were indicted and tried as war criminals by the International Military Tribunal. [83] The American and British prosecutors focused on documentary evidence and affidavits rather than testimony from survivors, as the latter was considered less reliable and more liable to accusations of bias, but at the expense of reducing public interest in the proceedings. There's the rabbi coming along there. Benjamin Ferencz: Standard routine, nicht schuldig. But Ferencz knew they were guilty and could prove it. So you see these human stories which are not -- they're not real. Nuremberg: The Trial of the Nazi War Criminals - BBC [20][21] The offenses that would be prosecuted were crimes against peace, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. [116] In contrast to the other prosecution teams, the French prosecution emphasized how Nazi ideology and pan-Germanism had led to the Nazis' crimes, and delved into the Sonderweg theory of Germany's development in the nineteenth century. [217][218] The last prisoner was released in 1958. [200] The case law of the trials fleshed out the skeleton provided by the Nuremberg charter and the IMT verdict. Without calling a single witness, he entered into evidence the defendants' own reports of what they'd done. Lesley Stahl: You don't think they turn into savages even for the act? What the last Nuremberg prosecutor alive wants the world to know - CBS News All 22 defendants were found guilty, and four of them, including Ohlendorf, were hanged. | Minds. Marie-Claude Valliant Couturier revealed the conditions under which French women existed while interned; 49 of the 230 French women sent to Auschwitz survived. [236][237], The trials were the first use of simultaneous interpretation, which stimulated technical advances in translation methods. Holocaust Memorial Museum placed online more than 700 hours of audio recordings from the trials, as well as 37 reels of film introduced as evidence. Speer managed to distinguish himself from other defendants, giving the impression of apologizing, although without assuming personal guilt or naming any victims other than the German people. Grbe painfully recounts how he saw a grave of over a thousand bodies, some of whom were still moving.. COVID-19 vaccination does not violate the Nuremberg Code [3] War losses in the Soviet Union alone included 27 million dead, mostly civilians, which was .mw-parser-output .frac{white-space:nowrap}.mw-parser-output .frac .num,.mw-parser-output .frac .den{font-size:80%;line-height:0;vertical-align:super}.mw-parser-output .frac .den{vertical-align:sub}.mw-parser-output .sr-only{border:0;clip:rect(0,0,0,0);height:1px;margin:-1px;overflow:hidden;padding:0;position:absolute;width:1px}17th of the prewar population. 06/29/2021. Brigadier General Telford Taylor was Chief of Counsel during the Doctors Trial. They would never have been brought to justice were it not for Ben Ferencz. The New Nuremberg Trials 2021: Update from Dr. Reiner Fuellmich - Minds Benjamin Ferencz: And I've got-- I've got his reports of how many he killed. That's insane. In mid-1945, France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States agreed to convene a joint tribunal in Nuremberg, with the Nuremberg Charter as its legal instrument. [151], In order to appease concerns about fair process, the defendants were allowed a free hand with their witnesses and a great deal of irrelevant testimony was heard. Ferencz had stumbled upon reports sent back to headquarters by secret SS units called Einsatzgruppen, or action groups. [59] The conspiracy charge was used to charge the top Nazi leaders, as well as bureaucrats who had never killed anyone or perhaps even directly ordered killing. [156], On 31 August, closing arguments were presented. The Nuremberg Trials . Defendants-- absolutely blank. As U.S. forces liberated concentration camps, his job was to rush in and gather evidence. And you know what keeps me going? Their job had been to follow the German army as it invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, and kill Communists, Gypsies and especially Jews. You know? [101] He described the fact that the defeated Nazis received a trial as "one of the most significant tributes that Power has ever paid to Reason". [6] The Soviet Union wanted to hold a show trial similar to the 1930s Moscow trials, in order to demonstrate the Nazi leaders' guilt and build a case for war reparations to rebuild the Soviet economy, which had been devastated by the war. [38], In early 1946, there were a thousand employees from the four countries' delegations in Nuremberg, of which about two-thirds were from the United States. His equivocations, standing in sharp contrast to his genocidal editorial line reflected in slogans like Germany will live as long as it sees the Jews as the mortal enemy of mankind, are now available online for the first time along with hundreds of additional hours of audio and video recordings from the trials of 24 Nazis that ended 1946, nearly 75 years ago. [10][11], Of all the Allies, the Soviet Union lobbied most intensely for trying the defeated German leaders for aggression in addition to war crimes. Copyright 2023 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. [168], The judgment found that there was a premeditated conspiracy to commit crimes against peace, the goals of the conspiracy being "the disruption of the European order as it had existed since the Treaty of Versailles" and "the creation of a Greater Germany beyond the frontiers of 1914". Nuremberg Combo Tour WWII + Old Town. On 17 September, the various delegations met to discuss the indictment. [123] The next week, the Soviet prosecution suddenly produced former field marshal Friedrich von Paulus, captured after the Battle of Stalingrad, as a witness and questioned him about the preparations for the invasion of the Soviet Union. A Supreme Court justice led the American team of prosecutors. Our aim is to create a resource that enables users to draw on that experience and knowledge in ways that can assist governments, institutions and experts in improving how we achieve accountability for mass atrocity crimes, said Cohen. The United States delegation outlined the overall Nazi conspiracy and criminality of Nazi organizations. She said: "The Nuremberg Code relates to research, where the emphasis of informed consent requirements is on preventing the research participants from being used as a means to an end. Between 1939 and 1945, Nazi Germany waged war across Europe, invading Czechoslovakia, Poland, the Low Countries, France, Denmark, Norway, Yugoslavia, Greece, and the Soviet Union, among others. [206], Many Germans at the time of the trials focused on finding food and shelter; few followed the trial closely. [60] The American prosecution became derailed during attempts to provide evidence of the German annexation of Austria. Nuremburg Trial Courthouse (Nuremberg) - All You Need to - Tripadvisor [210] As the Cold War began, the rapidly changing political environment began to affect the effectiveness of the trials. Dr. Reiner Fuellmich, alongside thousands of . On Thursday, Florida Gov. Benjamin Ferencz: And I'm still in there fighting. There are also transcripts of eyewitness accounts, including that of Hermann Grbe, a construction manager who described the horrors of a mass execution he saw in Dubno, Ukraine. [67] Former Nazis were allowed to serve as counsel[45] and by mid-November all defendants had lawyers. For the past seven years, Stanford Libraries has been working with the Registry of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague to obtain a complete digital corpus of the Nuremberg Trial in support of the Virtual Tribunal of the Stanford Center for Human Rights and International Justice. At the Nuremberg Trials, the doctors and nurses stood trial, and they hung. Fact check: COVID-19 vaccine mandates, Nuremberg Code not related [102] Jackson's focus was on the aggressive war charge, which he described as the root of the crimes against humanity and of war crimes. Streicher was executed in 1946 by hanging along with nine other Nazis, including Hans Frank, the highest-ranking Nazi officer in occupied Poland. On This Day: 12 Nazis sentenced to death in the Nuremberg Trials [10] The declaration also stated that those high-ranking Nazis who had committed crimes in several countries would be dealt with jointly. For the Tokyo Trial, see. A team of over 1,000 lawyers and over 10,000 medical experts led by Dr. Reiner Fuellmich have begun legal proceedings against the CDC, WHO & the Davos Group for crimes against humanity. And I can't believe you're 97 years old. [46] The British chief prosecutor was Hartley Shawcross, assisted by David Maxwell Fyfe, who had been the attorney general in Churchill's government. [13] Planners in the United States Department of War were drawing up plans for an international tribunal in late 1944 and early 1945. [153] Midway through the trial, Winston Churchill's Iron Curtain speech denouncing the Soviet threat delighted the defense. And I said, "Sure." New Nuremberg Trials - Crimes Against Humanity - Golden Age of Gaia [221] The IMT defendants required Soviet permission for release; Speer was not successful in obtaining early release, and Hess remained in prison until his death in 1987. Proposals for how to punish the defeated Nazi leaders ranged from a show trial (the Soviet Union) to summary executions (the United Kingdom).