Frank testified (USSR-60): "This document was dated 17 November 1939 and was signed by von Neurath, who did not protest either against the shooting of the 9 students or against the deportation of numerous students to the concentration camps."

I quote Karl Frank's second testimony on this matter, dated 7 March 1946 (USSR-494): "By countersigning the official reports which informed him of the shooting of the students, the Reich Protector von Neurath, sanctioned this action. I informed von Neurath in detail of the course of the investigation and he signed the report. Had he not agreed and had he demanded a modification of the penalty, or its mitigation, and he had a right to do so, I would have been obliged to give in to his opinion".

In August 1939, in connection with the "special decree" by which he proclaimed Bohemia and Moravia to be an "integral part of the Greater German Reich", Neurath issued a so-called "warning". Therein he stipulated that "not only single persons, but the entire Czech population would be responsible for all acts of sabotage". Thereby he established the principle of collective responsibility and introduced the hostage system. The events of 17 November 1939, considered in the light of this directive of Neurath, supply more irrefutable proof against the defendant. (USSR-490)

Starting from 1 September 1939, some 8,000 Czechs were arrested as hostages in Bohemia and Moravia. The majority were sent to concentration camps; many were executed, or died of hunger and torture. On this subject you have heard, Your Honors, the testimonies of Weinert, Kreitchi, and Gavelka. There is no doubt that these terror acts against the Czech intellectuals were carried out in conformity with Neurath's so-called "warning".

I do not need to relate in detail all the events which occurred at Lidice, and later in the village of Lejaki, as they are already well known. Were not the German occupants acting in accordance with Neurath's "warning", did they not conform themselves to his principle that the entire Czech population, and not the individual persons, must bear the responsibility?

It was Neurath who initiated mass terror against the Czechoslovak population in August 1939. He has on his hands the blood of many thousands of women and men, children and old people, murdered and tortured to death, and I see no difference between Baron von Neurath and the other ringleaders of the criminal Nazi regime.

German propaganda in general, and the defendant Fritzsche in particular, made good use of provocational methods, lies and slanderous statements, and this was especially the case when Nazi Germany's acts of aggression had to be justified. For did not Hitler himself write in "Mein Kampf" that, page 302: "With the help of an able and continuous application of propaganda, one can even picture to the people, heaven as being hell, and on the contrary, the most sorrowful life can be pictured as heaven." Fritzsche turned out to be the best man to carry out this dirty work. In his declaration to the Tribunal, on the 7 January 1946, Fritzsche gave a detailed description of the provocative methods applied on such a vast scale by German propaganda and by him, personally, in connection with the acts of aggression against Austria, the Sudetenland, Bohemia and Moravia, Poland and Jugoslavia.

On 9 April and 2 May 1940, Fritzsche broadcast mendacious explanations of the reasons which led to the occupation of Norway by Germany. He declared: "Nobody was wounded, not one house was destroyed, life and work continued unhindered as before." Meanwhile, the official report presented by the Norwegian Government states: "The German attack against Norway on 9 April 1940, brought war to Norway for the first time in 126 years. For 2 months war was fought throughout the country, causing destruction. Over 40 thousand houses were damaged or destroyed and about 1000 civilians were killed."

German propaganda and Fritzsche, personally, spread insolent slander in connection with the sinking of the British passenger steamer "Athenia".

But German propaganda was particularly active on the occasion of Nazi Germany's felonious attack upon the Soviet Union.

The defendant Fritzsche has attempted to assert that he first heard of the attack upon the Soviet Union when he was called on 22 June 1941 at 5 a.m. to a press conference held by Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop. As far as the aggressive purposes of this attack were concerned, he allegedly only had knowledge of them, as a result of his personal observations, in 1942. However, those statements are disavowed by such documentary evidence as the report of defendant Rosenberg. (1039-PS, USA 146) This document establishes the fact that a long time prior to the attack upon the USSR, Fritzsche knew of the appropriate measures which were being taken and that in his capacity of representative of the Propaganda Ministry, he participated in the working out by the Ministry for Occupied Eastern Territories of propaganda measures in the East.

In answer to the questions put to him by the Soviet Prosecution during his cross-examination, Fritzsche stated that he would not