Let us first take a look at the German text:[571]
“Mit den Juden – das will ich Ihnen auch ganz offen sagen – muß so oder so Schluß gemacht werden. Der Führer sprach einmal das Wort aus: wenn es der vereinigten Judenschaft wieder gelingen wird, einen Weltkrieg zu entfesseln, dann werden die Blutopfer nicht nur von den in den Krieg gehetzten Völkern gebracht werden, sondern dann wird der Jude in Europa sein Ende gefunden haben. […]
Ich muß auch als alter Nationalsozialist sagen: wenn die Judensippschaft in Europa den Krieg überleben würde, wir aber unser bestes Blut für die Erhaltung Europas geopfert hätten, dann würde dieser Krieg doch nur einen Teilerfolg darstellen. Ich werde daher den Juden gegenüber grundsätzlich nur von der Erwartung ausgehen, daß sie verschwinden. Sie müssen weg. Ich habe Verhandlungen zu dem Zwecke angeknüpft, sie nach dem Osten abzuschieben. Im Januar findet über diese Frage eine große Besprechung in Berlin statt, zu der ich Herrn Staatssekretär Dr. Bühler entsenden werde. Diese Besprechung soll im Reichssicherheitshauptamt bei SS-Obergruppenführer Heydrich gehalten werden. Jedenfalls wird eine große jüdische Wanderung einsetzen.
Aber was soll mit den Juden geschehen? Glauben Sie, man sie wird im Ostland in Siedlungsdörfern unterbringen? Man hat uns in Berlin gesagt: weshalb macht man diese Scherereien; wir können im Ostland oder im Reichskommissariat auch nichts mit ihnen anfangen, liquidiert sie selber! Meine Herren, ich muß Sie bitten, sich gegen alle Mitleidserwägungen zu wappnen. Wir müssen die Juden vernichten, wo immer wir sie treffen und wo es irgend möglich ist, um das Gesamtgefüge des Reiches hier aufrecht zu erhalten. […]
Die Juden sind auch für uns außergewöhnlich schädliche Fresser. Wir haben im General-gouvernement schätzungsweise 2,5, vielleicht mit den jüdisch Versippten und dem, was alles daran hängt, jetzt 3,5 Millionen Juden. Diese 3,5 Millionen Juden können wir nicht erschießen, wir können sie nicht vergiften, werden aber doch Eingriffe vornehmen können, die irgendwie zu einem Vernichtungserfolg führen, und zwar im Zusammenhang mit den vom Reich her zu besprechenden großen Maßnahmen. Das Generalgouvernement muß genau so judenfrei werden, wie es das Reich ist. Wo und wie das geschieht, ist eine Sache der Instanzen, die wir hier einsetzen und schaffen müssen und deren Wirksamkeit ich Ihnen rechtzeitig bekanntgeben werde.”
Translated:
“As for the Jews – I will tell you that quite openly – they have to be rid off in one way or other. The Führer once uttered: should organized again succeed in setting off a world war, then the blood sacrifice shall not be made only by the peoples driven into war, but then the Jew of Europe will have met his end. […]
I must also add as an old National Socialist: if the Jewish community in Europe would survive the war, but we would have sacrificed our best blood for the conservation of Europe, then this war would constitute only a partial success. I will therefore, on principle, approach Jewish affairs in the expectation that the Jews will disappear. They must go away. I have initiated negotiations for the purpose of having them deported to the East. In January there will be a major conference on this question in Berlin, to which I shall send State Secretary Dr. Bühler. This conference is to be held in the office of SS-Obergruppenführer Heydrich at the Reich Security Main Office. In any case a huge Jewish migration will set in.
But what is supposed to happen to the Jews? Do you believe they will be accommodated in the Ostland in settlement villages? In Berlin we were told: What’s with all the fuss? We can't get anything under way with them in the Ostland or in the Reichskommissariat either, liquidate them yourselves! Gentlemen, I must ask you to steel yourselves against all considerations of compassion. We must destroy the Jews wherever we find them, and wherever it is at all possible, in order to maintain the overall structure of the Reich. […]
The Jews are also exceptionally harmful feeders for us. We have in the General Government an estimated 2.5, perhaps 3.5 million Jews including persons who have Jewish kin and others. We cannot shoot these 3.5 million Jews, we cannot poison them, but we will undertake measures leading to their successful destruction in some way or other, of course, in connection with the overall measures to be undertaken by the Reich, as discussed here. The General Government must become as free of Jews as the Reich. Where and how this happens is a matter of the authorities to be created in these areas, the jurisdiction of which I will inform you about in due time.”
Should Frank’s threats be taken literally or as simple verbal thuggeries?
The first observation which must be made is that he held this speech on 16 December 1941, four days after Hitler allegedly announced his decision to exterminate all Jews. Was Frank aware of it? If the answer is yes, then he naturally would have referred to this decision instead of the stereotypical reference to Hitler’s “prophecy.” If not, then in whose name was he allowed to speak about the extermination of 2.5 or even 3.5 million Jews of the General Government?
There is then another important element which needs to be analyzed: the reference to the Wannsee conference and to Bühler. As mentioned above, the conference was originally scheduled for 9 December 1941. The invitation to the authorities of the General Government was sent by Heydrich on 1 December 1941, a letter bearing as its subject “final solution of the Jewish question [Endlösung der Judenfrage].” It begins with a “Vermerk” (note) in which Heydrich refers to a meeting with SS-Obergruppenführer Friedrich Wilhelm Krüger, Higher SS and Police Leader for the General Government and with the Secretary of State for Security to discuss “the question of a central handling of Jewish matters in the General Government [die Frage einer zentralen Bearbeitung der Judenangelegenheiten im Generalgouvernement].”
From the measures previously taken it results in fact “that the General Governor is aiming to completely take over the treatment of the Jewish problem [dass der Generalgouverneur bestrebt sei, die Behandlung des Judenproblems völlig an sich zu ziehen].” For these reasons Heydrich, in agreement with Referat IV B 4 of the RSHA, had decided to invite to the conference both Krüger and Josef Bühler, who was State Secretary of the Cabinet of the General Government. The invitation letter in question was addressed to both and was identical to that sent to Luther, except obviously for the heading.[572] At that time Frank knew only that the topic of this future conference would be the “final solution of the Jewish question [Endlösung der Judenfrage]” as an implementation of Göring’s letter of 31 July, that is “in the form of emigration or evacuation [in Form Auswanderung oder Evakuierung]”; a knowledge which he expressed with this sentence:
“Im Januar findet über diese Frage eine große Besprechung in Berlin statt, zu der ich Herrn Staatssekretär Dr. Bühler entsenden werde. Diese Besprechung soll im Reichssicherheitshauptamt bei SS-Obergruppenführer Heydrich gehalten werden. Jedenfalls wird eine große jüdische Wanderung einsetzen.” (Emph. added).
“In January there will be a major conference on this question in Berlin, to which I shall send State Secretary Dr. Bühler. This conference is to be held in the office of SS-Obergruppenführer Heydrich at the Reich Security Main Office. In any case a huge Jewish migration will set in.” (Emph. added)
All the rest, as is easily proven, was only Frank’s cruel rhetoric. Before further analyzing the question, a clarification is necessary. David Irving writes that “on January 11, 1946, Hans Frank’s lawyer Alfred Seidl would apply to the court for the former Governor-General of Poland to be allowed to use his own diaries, of which he had voluntarily turned over forty volumes to the Seventh Army. Those volumes were now in the courthouse document room, but he too was allowed to use only those extracts that had been picked by the prosecution. Permission was refused.”[573]
This selection makes up document PS-2233 and contains therefore merely those items found most important by the prosecution, with no selections of the defense.
During the session of 18 April 1946 of the Nuremberg trial Frank declared:[574]
“I did not destroy the 43 volumes of my diary, which report on all these events and the share I had in them; but of my own accord I handed them voluntarily to the officers of the American Army who arrested me.”Five days later, Seidl specified:[575]
“The diary of the Defendant Dr. Frank, which contains 42 volumes, has been submitted, but the Prosecution has used only those parts which appeared favorable for them.”Having taken note of this premise we return to Bühler. He participated in the Wannsee conference and reported to Frank the Führer’s decisions as announced by Heydrich. During the session of 23 April 1946 Defense attorney Seidl interrogated Bühler about this:[576]
“DR. SEIDL: The Prosecution submitted an extract from Frank’s diary in evidence under Number USA-281[577] (Document Number 2233(d)-PS.) This is a discussion of Jewish problems. In this connection Frank said, among other things:
‘My attitude towards the Jews is based on the expectation that they will disappear; they must go away. I have started negotiations for deporting them to the East. This question will be discussed at a large meeting in Berlin in January, to which I shall send State Secretary Dr. Buhler. This conference is to take place at the Reich Security Main Office in the office of SS Obergruppenführer Heydrich. In any case Jewish emigration on a large scale will begin.’
I ask you now, did the Governor General send you to Berlin for that conference; and if so, what was the subject of the conference?
BÜHLER: Yes, I was sent to the conference and the subject of the conference was the Jewish problem. I might say in advance that from the beginning Jewish questions in the Government General were considered as coming under the jurisdiction of the Higher SS and Police Leader and handled accordingly. The handling of Jewish matters by the state administration was supervised and merely tolerated by the Police.
During the years 1940 and 1941 incredible numbers of people, mostly Jews, were brought into the Government General in spite of the objections and protests of the Governor General and his administration. This completely unexpected, unprepared for, and undesired bringing in of the Jewish population from other territories put the administration of the Government General in an extremely difficult position.
Accommodating these masses, feeding them, and caring for their health – combating epidemics for instance – almost, or rather, definitely overtaxed the capacity of the territory. Particularly threatening was the spread of typhus, not only in the ghettos but also among the Polish population and the Germans in the Government General. It appeared as if that epidemic would spread even to the Reich and to the Eastern Front.
At that moment Heydrich’s invitation to the Governor General was received. The conference was originally supposed to take place in November 1941, but it was frequently postponed and it may have taken place in February [recte: January] 1942.
Because of the special problems of the Government General I had asked Heydrich for a personal interview and he received me. On that occasion, among many other things, I described in particular the catastrophic conditions which had resulted from the arbitrary bringing of Jews into the Government General. He replied that for this very reason he had invited the Governor General to the conference. The Reichsführer SS, so he said, had received an order from the Führer to round up all the Jews of Europe and to settle them in the Northeast of Europe, in Russia. I asked him whether this meant that the further arrival of Jews in the Government General would cease, and whether the hundreds of thousands of Jews who had been brought into the Government General without the permission of the Governor General would be moved out again. Heydrich promised me both these things. Heydrich said furthermore that the Führer had given an order that Thresienstadt, a town in the Protectorate, would become a reservation in which old and sick Jews, and weak Jews who could not stand the strains of resettlement, were to be accommodated in the future. This information left me definitely convinced that the resettlement of the Jews, if not for the sake of the Jews, then for the sake of the reputation and prestige of the German people, would be carried out in a humane fashion. The removal of the Jews from the Government General was subsequently carried out exclusively by the Police.”
Bühler thus fully confirmed that during the Wannsee conference Heydrich announced a plan to deport the Jews to the East. That Frank’s statements about the fate assigned to the deportees were cruel verbal thuggeries is demonstrated by the fact that, after Bühler returned from the Wannsee conference and informed him on its contents, he never made a comment of this kind again. In document PS-2233, after the Cabinet session of 16 December 1941, the Jews are mentioned again only in the session of 25 April 1942, this time in an innocuous context.[578] If Frank made any comments – and it cannot be believed that he never mentioned the Jews at all for four full months – they were in line with what Bühler had stated.
At Nuremberg Frank made the following declaration:[579]
“One has to take the diary as a whole. You can not go through 43 volumes and pick out single sentences and separate them from their context. I would like to say here that I do not want to argue or quibble about individual phrases. It was a wild and stormy period filled with terrible passions, and when a whole country is on fire and a life and death struggle is going on, such words may easily be used. […]
Some of the words are terrible. I myself must admit that I was shocked at many of the words which I had used.”
These were just “words,” mere verbal thuggeries.
...
[571] PS-2233, IMT, vol. XXIX, pp. 502-503.
[572] PS-709.
[573] D. Irving, Nuremberg. The Last Battle. Focal Point Publications, London, 1996, p. 174.
[574] IMT, vol. XII, p. 7.
[575] Ibid., p. 115.
[576] IMT, vol. XII, pp. 68-69.
[577] The document US-281 was taken from volume 17 of the Frank diary and contained excerpts of the transcripts of the sessions held in the period October-December 1941 of the Cabinet of the General Government, including that of 16 December.
[578] IMT, vol. XXIX, p. 516.
[579] IMT, vol. XII, p. 20. 18 April 1946.
