All language subtitles for The.Court.is.in.Session.(Sud.idyot).1943

Subtitles made for KG by:
applesouce & Moerges

...sisters burnt at Poltava.

Comrade, when you'll see on the screen

defendant Retzlaff, the one with glasses.

Remember this terrible picture!

Retzlaff burned Soviet people alive!

Osipenko City, Berdyansk.

Beach by the sea.

Here, these little ones
were once swimming and sunbathing.

This is the Germans' doing.

Also Osipenko City.

The whole family burned
alive by Hitler's executioners.

Mother and three children.

For what?

We'll ask Germans in court:
"For what?"!

The German army is
an army of child killers.

There they lie.
Torn corpses of mothers.

Little corpses of our kids.

This is done by Hitlerites.

Mines in the city of Stergo.

In these mine shafts, Germans
immured thousands of miners.

Look, Comrade, and remember!

Kiev.

These are the dead bodies
of our Ukrainian brothers,

shot by Germans.

Darnica.

Camp for prisoners of war.

Here, behind barbed wire,

died of hunger and terrible torture
- Soviet people.

This is Taganrog's ditch of death.

Monsters tied up peaceful
Soviet citizens, hands behind back,

brought them to the ditch and
shot them in the back of the head.

Methodically, in cold blood,
German style.

Defendant Hans Ritz,

who we'll see on screen, participated
in mass executions at Taganrog.

For your tears, widows!

For your mother's tears!
For your tears, orphan!

Our nation will take revenge
on bloody Hitlerites!

Be damned murderers!

Unwashable is the blood
of innocents on your uniforms!

You'll answer for everything!

Yes, Mother,
they will answer for everything.

Mother, look! There they are,
caught red-handed.

These are the ones who flooded
the land with the blood of innocents.

Wilhelm Langheld,
Captain of Counter-Espionage.

This executioner got medals and a cross
for the killing of women and children,

for the intimidation of
war prisoners with dogs.

Reinhard Retzlaff.

German secret police officer,
in the city of Kharkov.

From Berlin. He is covered in blood...
He pushed Kharkovers into the gas van.

Hans Ritz. Lieutenant of the SS.

Sadist!

He admired the spectacle
of mass execution of Kharkovers.

And himself killed children and women.

Bulanov. Traitor!

Betrayer of motherland.

Worked as a driver for Kharkov's Gestapo.

Drove Soviet people to execution,
accompanied them to the gas van.

Took off shoes of
tortured and killed citizens.

In the court gathered
workers of liberated Kharkov.

Workers, engineers, students,
teachers, collective farmers.

Many widows.

Here sit mothers. Their sons
were taken to Germany for servitude.

Here, fathers and daughters of those
who were torn to pieces by the Gestapo.

This moment,
Kharkovers have awaited for two years.

Representatives of the Soviet press,
writers and journalists:

Alexey Tolstoy.

Ilya Orenburg.

Leonid Leonov.

Stand!
The Court is in Session.

Please, sit down.

Presiding Judge: Chairman
Major-General of Justice A. Myasnikov.

Members of the Court:
Colonel of Justice M. Kharchev.

Major of Justice S. Zapolski.

State Prosecutor,
Justiciary Colonel N. K. Dunayev.

Appointed defence. Advocates:

N. B. Kommodov,

C. K. Kaznacheyev,

N. P. Belov.

Medico-legal experts.

Witnesses.

Every word of this trial
is translated into German.

Translators are warned

that they are legally responsible
for any wrong translation.

FROM THE INDICTMENT

The indictment in the case
of the atrocities committed

by the German fascist
invaders in the city of Kharkov

and the region of Kharkov.

As the German fascist invaders are
being expelled from Soviet territory,

ever greater crimes committed by the troops
of the German Army are coming to light.

After the liberation of the city and region
of Kharkov, numerous facts were revealed

on the monstrous extermination
of peaceful Soviet citizens by the Germans,

including women,
old men and children.

The German fascist troops

under the direction of their superiors,

asphyxiated in specially-equipped
gas vans - “gas vans”,

hanged, shot or tortured to death
many tens of thousands of Soviet people.

Plundered the property of the State, and of
economic, cultural and public organizations.

Burned down and destroyed entire towns
and thousands of inhabited places.

Thus, it has been established that
the whole weight of responsibility

during their temporary occupation
of Kharkov and the Kharkov Region,

the occupation of the city
of Kharkov and Kharkov Region,

for the torture and massacre
of the peaceful population,

for shooting and asphyxiation
with carbon monoxide gas

in specially-equipped
vehicles - “gas vans”,

for burning and other forms of extermination
of absolutely innocent Soviet people,

including women, old people and children,

is borne by the leaders of the criminal
fascist government of Germany

and by the Supreme Command
of the German Army.

On the basis of the foregoing
exposition, they are charged:

Reinhard Retzlaff, born 1907 in
Berlin, of secondary education,

an official of the German Secret
Field Police in the town of Kharkov,

senior corporal in the Auxiliary Police.

Hans Ritz,
born 1919 in Marienwerder,

a German of higher education,

member of the National
Socialist Party since 1937,

assistant commander of an SS company,
Untersturmführer of the SS.

Wilhelm Langheld,
born 1891 in Frankfurt-on-Main,

a German,

member of the National
Socialist Party since 1933,

officer of Counter-Espionage
of the German Army, Captain.

Is charged:

While in service of the German Army
from 1941 to 1943, to have taken direct part

in the mass and brutal extermination
of peaceful Soviet people

by the use of specially-equipped
vehicles known as “gas vans”,

and also with having taken
a personal part in mass shootings,

hangings, burnings, plunder
and outrages against Soviet people.

I.e. in crimes covered
by the Order of the Presidium

of the Supreme Soviet
of the USSR of 19th April, 1943.

Mikhail Petrovich Bulanov,
born 1917 at Dzhanibek Station, Kazakh SSR,

a Russian, not in a Party,

is charged with betrayal
of the motherland,

having voluntarily gone
over to the Germans

and accepted employment
in the German punitive organisation,

and together with the Germans,

took a direct part in the
mass extermination of Soviet people

by means of asphyxiation
in “gas vans”,

and personally shot
peaceful Soviet citizens,

among whom were old people,
women and children, i.e. in crimes

covered by the Order of the Supreme Soviet
of the USSR of 19th April, 1943.

Defendant Ritz.

Do you plead guilty
to the charges brought against you?

I plead guilty
to the charges of the prosecution.

Sit.

I plead guilty to the offences
with which I have been charged.

FROM THE INTERROGATION
OF THE DEFENDANTS

The defendant Langheld.

On your orders, there were multiple
mass executions of unarmed Soviet people.

Tell me how it was done in practice.

...cannot quite remember
the individual cases.

I do have recollections
of the case at Dergachi...

where...

about twenty officers were shot.
No, twenty prisoners were shot.

The defendant stated
that he doesn't remember

individual cases, but remembers
the event at Dergachi,

where he ordered to execute
more than twenty prisoners of war.

In preliminary investigations,
you stated that in Dergachi,

you arrested and executed
a group of innocent women.

Tell us in detail about
the circumstances of this crime.

During the preliminary hearing,
you testified

that according to your instructions,
a group of defenceless...

women was arrested and shot.

Recount the explicit details
of this crime.

The women were brought from the cell
where they were locked up

into the trial room.

But not a single one of them
would give a proper statement.

They were then, again,
subjected to draconian measures.

One at a time,
they were laid on a bench,

their backs exposed,

and beaten with canes and,
by the sergeant, with his rifle rod.

The women, one by one, were brought
from the cell for interrogation.

But not a single one confessed.

Draconian measures were used on them.

Bared back, they were thrown on a bench, and
beaten with sticks and rifle cleaning rod.

What did you do to a woman with child.

This woman, too,
did not confess.

She was therefore
thrown to the ground

and beaten as well.

In the meantime...

At first, the child had clung to her,

but then...

it fled into a corner...

and...

watched...

this act in horror.

That women didn't confess to anything.

Then she was thrown to
the ground and beaten.

The child at first clung to its mother,

and then in terror crept away to a corner
and impassively observed what was happening.

The woman had lost
consciousness by now

and was brought back
to the cell by my men.

The child was brought along.

The woman lost consciousness
and was returned to her cell.

The child too, to the same cell.

Meanwhile,
I wrote a note to local command,

saying that I...

had six women here.
No, that I had five women.

That was another day.

That I had five women
who were under suspicion

of having established a connection
between prisoners and partisans.

And that I would hand them over
to local command for further processing.

The next day, I wrote a dispatch
to the local commandant's office

that I'd arrested five local women
in connection with partisans,

and proposed to the commandant's office
that they take them.

At the commandant's office,
the victims of Langheld were executed.

The mother of the child
died from the beating.

The child was shot.

What do you know about the usage
of the so-called - gas van?

In which people
were poisoned with CO gas.

...know about the "gas van",

in which the Germans poisoned
their victims with carbon oxide?

From other officers,

I have heard
that such gas vans

are used in all major cities
of the Ukraine and Russia.

From other officers I know that:

gas van was used in many towns of Ukraine
and in other occupied Russian territories.

Did you yourself see this gas van?

I saw the gas van one time.

Yes. I saw it personally.

Examination of Langheld ends with a summary
of his activity on the Eastern Front.

Before the court passed terrible pictures
of the defiled Kharkov, defiled by Germans.

There, the bloody path
of the murderer Langheld.

On whose orders were shot at least
a hundred humans - innocent Soviet people.

Tell us, Ritz, what do you know about
the extermination of Soviet people

by using the so-called gas van.

Tell us what you know about
the extermination of the Soviet people

by the Germans,
by means of the so-called gas van.

For this as well,
I can give a number of examples

from my own experience.

To begin with,
I had to... with Lieutenant Jacobi...

I had to discuss
my accommodations here in Kharkov,

because I had to stay here
for a few days.

I immediately noticed

that Lieutenant Jacobi
was unusually busy.

He constantly made phone calls and...

went outside to issue orders,
and that sort of thing.

So I inquired
why he was so busy.

When I asked him why he was so busy,
he explained to me, well,

that the ones currently housed in the
prison, meaning the housed prisoners,

were creating a lot of trouble
and difficulties for him.

But that he hoped to soon be able to
employ the special method

invented and introduced here
by Major Hahnebutter,

to cleanse the prison.

I can tell you about a few
incidents I witnessed myself.

I first met Lt. Jacobi
in order to receive a flat,

as I had just arrived in Kharkov
to stay for a few days.

I noticed that he was
very busy with work.

He was receiving phone calls,
went out of the room and gave orders.

To my question about his busy work,
he answered:

That they have many
problems in connection with

too many arrested persons
detained in the Kharkov prison.

And that Hanebitter ordered a special method
of clearing the prisons of arrested persons.

Then I asked
what special method that might be.

Whereupon Lieutenant Jacobi explained,
well, that would be the gas van.

I asked him what this special method was,
Jacobi answered that this was the gas van.

That immediately
brought to mind

something I had already heard
during my stay in Germany.

I remembered that I had heard
about this vehicle in Germany.

It was around September 1942.

I was in the city of Łęczyca,
near Warsaw.

And there, I saw
how a considerable number of people...

unreliable civilian population
was "evacuated" there.

--Gas van.

In September '42, during my stay
in Łęczyca near Warsaw,

I saw the "evacuation" of the unreliable
population of Warsaw, using a gas van.

Were you present at
the mass shooting of Soviet citizens?

Tell us in detail about it.

On the 2nd of July,
early in the morning,

Major Hahnebutter drove...

and then... with various
of his officers, and me,

he drove out to a village.

I think it was called
Soborsk or Podrovki.

Roughly six to eight kilometres
from Kharkov.

On 2nd June, Major Hanebitter
took me and several officers and drove out

to the village of Podvorki,
located 5 to 8 kilometres from Kharkov.

For the moment,
we passed those vehicles

and then arrived
at the firing squad execution site,

which was located in a small belt of trees,
specifically in a clearing.

At the same time, I realised
three sizeable pits had already been dug,

and furthermore that the clearing
was guarded by SS soldiers.

We overtook vehicles with prisoners.

These vehicles were going
in the direction of Podvorki too.

We arrived at a forest clearing
where pits had been prepared.

This clearing was surrounded by SS men.

Soon after,
after we had got out of the cars,

the vehicles
with the prisoners appeared.

Specifically,
according to Major Hahnebutter,

that day, there were about 300 prisoners
who were supposed to be shot.

They were then
marched off the vehicles,

were stood next to the pits
in smaller groups,

and then shot by a group of SS men
with submachine guns.

Also, I do not want to conceal
my own part in this...

Soon afterwards, the lorries arrived
with the prisoners. Hanebitter said

that about 300 people
would be shot that day.

The prisoners were brought
to the pits in small groups

and were shot in turns by SS men
with automatic rifles.

I do not wish to conceal my own
participation in this operation.

There, pits, near the village of Podvorki.

Here, German criminals
were murdering Soviet people.

If we dug a bit, you would be able
to see hundreds of big and small skulls.

Hans Ritz - participant in
mass executions at Podvorki.

FROM WITNESS EVIDENCE

Witness Heinisch, tell us

what were your occupation and activities
while you were Commissar in Melitopol?

As regional commissioner,
I had orders to transport to Germany

all those items produced
by businesses and factories

that weren't required for the troops.

Those who refused to comply
with the requirements and deliveries

were arrested by the Gestapo and the SD,
and liquidated. [SD: SS secret service]

My duty as Commissar of District was

to confiscate agricultural produce
to supply the Army and the German rear.

Those who resisted and refused
to deliver the required produce

were arrested by
the Gestapo and liquidated.

What does it mean - "liquidated"?

"Liquidated" means
"exterminate", "shoot".

To liquidate means to destroy, to execute.

How long have you known
of the existence of this gas van?

I learned of the existence
of the gas van-- of this year.

On the occasion of the regional
commissioner conference in Melitopol,

the SS-Brigadeführer
[a major general of the SS]

and General of Police
von Alvensleben

spoke about the gas van
and about the trial in Krasnodar.

I learned of its existence
in January this year

during the conference of
District Commissars of Melitopol

at which Lieutenant General of Police
von Alvensleben made an announcement

about the usage of the gas van
and the Krasnodar trial.

Brigadeführer von Alvensleben explained
that the trial in Krasnodar

had been evaluated in
an exceptionally propagandistic way

by the Russian
and the Allied press.

At that conference,
von Alvensleben stated

that the trial in Krasnodar
was used by Russians and Allies

for anti-German propaganda.

That it was forbidden
to talk about the gas van.

And that violations would be punished
by the judiciary authority of the SS.

Von Alvensleben said

that Hitler had ordered that there
should be no open talk about the gas van,

and that infringers will face trial
by a special court of the SS.

Do you know of any document formulating
the policy of the German Government

in occupied countries, in particular in the
temporarily occupied districts of the USSR?

I do not know of any documents.

I'll choose his words:
"To keep the Russian people obedient.

An order so that the populace

complies with the instructions of the
Wehrmacht and the civil administration."

I do not know of such documents.

Considering that it would be very difficult
to keep the Russian people in subjection,

the orders prescribed ruthless application
of reprisals against civilian population

so it wouldn't disturb the plans
intended by the German commanders.

Shying away from arrests
and shootings was not tolerated.

Only thus was it feasible

to keep the populace in constant fear
and to force them into obedience,

in order to conduct
the colonisation of the country.

...accomplished
a weakening of the people,

and thereby a degradation
of their own substance.

Not to hesitate at arrests and executions.

Because this was the only way to keep people
in subjection and to colonise the country.

The strength of the people was to be
weakened by reducing the number of people.

Reich Commissioner Koch,
in August of last year...

no, of this year,

on the occasion
of the regional commissioner conference,

spoke about the difficulties

in sending a forced-labour workforce
back to Germany.

And about the application of
any and all available means

to ensure sufficient labourers
for the needs of the Reich.

In August this year,
at a conference of District Commissars,

Reichskommissar of the Ukraine, Koch,
spoke of the difficulties in recruitment

of labour power to dispatch to Germany.

Koch demanded the ruthless application
of all means at their disposal

to dispatch the required
contingents of workers to Germany.

...of the populace
had to be destroyed in any circumstance.

So the Russian people are weakened.

Koch stated that all unwanted elements need
to be destroyed to weaken Russian people.

In the time
from the 1st of September 1942

to the 14th of September 1943,

approximately three to four thousand
residents of the area were exterminated.

[In non-idiomatic German]
Is the witness not downplaying the number

when he states the figure
"three, four thousand"?

In the first year, '41 to '42,
after the occupation by the Wehrmacht,

the SD arrested and exterminated all
existing alternative political circles.

That explains the smaller number
in the year '42/'43.

The gas van is a prison van...

that is hermetically sealed...

with an extended exhaust pipe...

that ends in a rubber tube,
which leads into the vehicle's interior.

When the engine is running,
when it labours,

the occupants of the van
are exterminated by the exhaust gasses.

The ten thousand prisoners of war
who still remained in Vyazma

were brought to a camp.

This camp was located
in a factory compound.

The camp was so packed with people
that one couldn't set foot in it at first.

No! The camp was so overcrowded that
initially it was impossible to enter.

The weather was very bad.
Wet, rainy, and cold.

Yes, after a large part
of the therein detained had perished.

Yes. After the majority
of the war prisoners there had died.

There were particularly many bodies
stacked right next to the factory hall.

There lay those who had been shot down
from the roof and now lay there, smashed.

There lay those who...

had sought shelter at the wall,
from wind and cold, and died there

sitting and even standing upright,
pressed into some nooks,

and now still
sat and stood and lay there.

...at the outskirts of the camp,
there were several deep pits,

in which water had collected
and formed small ponds.

There were bodies in there as well,
bloated from the water,

and discoloured, green and blue.

There, too, lay corpses,
blue and swollen from water.

Some of these pits were used
as latrines by the detainees.

In there as well, lay detainees
who apparently had fainted

while relieving themselves,
had fallen down,

and therefore, in this terrible manner,
had suffocated in human waste.

Tell us, witness Kosch, what you know
about methods of exterminating the Soviet

civilian population, practised by the German
Army, in temporarily occupied territory.

What do you know about
the methods of extermination

deployed against
the peaceful Soviet populace

of the territories
temporarily occupied by Germans.

Apart from the mass shootings
and hangings, and killings

of which the National Socialists
availed themselves

to exterminate
innocent Russian civilians,

I know another,
a special method,

of which I heard once in a while
at the time, and which I have seen, too.

That is: the gas van.

Besides mass shootings and hangings
to which National Socialists resort to

to exterminate innocent Soviet civilian
population, I also know of a special method,

about which I had heard previously and
which I have seen too, i.e. - the gas van.

I--

--punishment,
in my eyes, would be...

if the time came soon when the cronies
of the National Socialist leadership

themselves would take a seat in that van
for their final ride...

to the place where they have chased
thousands upon thousands

of innocent people
into a horrible death.

It would be just if the ruling gang of
Germany was given a ride in this gas van,

which they conceived
to the world's disgrace.

It was early May of this year.

Our battalion was stationed in Sretenka,
roughly eight kilometres from Volnovakha.

One day, I had dealings in Volnovakha.

"Ha, we have more than enough room.
Step right in."

When he opened
the rear doors of the van,

a terribly malodorous smell
streamed out from the van's interior.

And it was
a completely empty box.

And the instant I saw that van,

what I had heard about the gas van
came to my mind.

And I knew in that instant: this is likely
the gas van you have heard so much about.

...appalling atrocities

that the National Socialists
have allowed themselves in this war,

in my eyes,
is this death..., this gas van.

Culprit of all atrocities of torture
invented by National Socialism -

is this deadly gas van.

This gas van will also go down in the
shameful history of National Socialism,

as an eternal indictment.

This gas van will be historical evidence
in the case against National Socialism,

as an eternal document of its disgrace.

WITNESS
COMRADE BESPALOV

I lived in the village of Sokolniki, where
I saw a mass execution of Soviet people.

In July '42, I saw how Germans,
for several hours, brought in open trucks.

Soviet citizens, including children,
women, and elderly people.

All were stripped of their clothes,
then the mass execution started.

Fascist monsters tore the children
from their mother's arms,

and threw them into the pit alive,
the mothers were shot on spot.

This is Kharkov's
forest-park near Sokolniki.

Here, the Gestapo, day and night,
brought peaceful citizens of Kharkov.

The forest screamed and cried.

Mothers with children in their arms
are trying to hide behind trees.

That's how the mass execution of Soviet
women at the village of Sokolniki happened.

...Punisher-Recon agency of the German Army:
R. Retzlaff, W. Langheld, H. Ritz and

collaborator and traitor to the motherland:
Mikhail Bulanov.

All the accused in the present case, namely:
Retzlaff, Ritz, Langheld and Bulanov,

have plead guilty to
the charges brought against them

and have given detailed...

Sit.

Defendant Ritz.

Do you plead guilty
to the charges brought against you?

I plead guilty
to the charges of the prosecution.

I plead guilty to the offences.

Sit.

I plead guilty to the offences
with which I have been charged.

WITNESS
COMRADE DZHINCHVELADZE

I was at a hospital at the time
the Germans occupied Kharkov.

...I went to the 2nd floor,
to an operation room.

There, I heard the sound of an explosion
coming from 1st floor.

I ran out, and headed downstairs.

Near the stairs, nurses and
nursemaids came running towards me.

They looked horrible, pale and
dishevelled, some had burns.

They told me that Germans
had thrown in incendiary bombs,

barricaded the doors, and that fire
had broken out in the building.

Not understanding what was happening,
I headed down to the 1st floor.

Where I saw a horrible picture
of violence against patients.

Patients were on fire.
Clothes, beds were on fire.

In panic, they tried to
jump out through the windows.

But Germans were standing
in the courtyard and shoot at them.

WITNESS
COMRADE KOZLOVA

While in service of the Red Army,
my husband was wounded

and sent to Kharkov for treatment.

On the 15th, I decided to visit him.

When I got to the site of the hospital,
I could not recognise it, it was destroyed.

Nearby were strewn the bodies of
charred, tortured, burned...

I was beside myself...

...and I rushed into the block,
were my husband was.

...bed was covered with blood.
I started to cry...

I saw the mutilated body of my husband...
I said my goodbyes...

...I heard a human voice,
which was asking for help...

...I couldn't do anything...
A nurse accompanied me home.

This is the destroyed hospital in Kharkov.

Patients were heavily-wounded
soldiers of the Red Army.

They were burned alive by
the “Adolf Hitler” SS Division.

At the same time,
they burned the international law

prohibiting the torture
of prisoners of war.

FROM THE SPEECH
OF THE STATE PROSECUTOR

Before us, Comrades Judges, at this trial
were revealed again and again the bloody,

terrible misdeeds of the Hitlerite brigands
who have shed an ocean of blood

of peaceful Soviet citizens -
children, women and old people -,

who have committed many of our towns
and villages to the flames and to ruin,

who have brought incalculable disasters
and sufferings upon our people.

At this trial,
before the eyes of the world,

there has been demonstrated and proved again
and again the monstrous guilt of all accused

- of those who are already in the dock
and of those who will yet be there.

The defendants Retzlaff,
Ritz, and Langheld,

who have committed bloody crimes
on the territory of the Soviet Union,

should bear responsibility as
criminals before the Soviet Court,

under the laws of the Union
of Soviet Socialist Republics.

Their bloody crimes have
been exposed and proven.

Concluding my speech for the prosecution,
I appeal to you, Citizen Judges,

to inflict severe punishment on the three
base representatives of fascist Berlin,

and on their abominable accomplice,
who are sitting in the dock,

to punish them for their bloody crimes,
for the sufferings and the blood,

for the tears,
for the lives of our children,

of our wives and mothers,
of our sisters and our fathers!

Today, they are answering to the Soviet
Court, to our people, to the whole world,

for the crimes they committed on a
scale and of a meanness far surpassing

the blackest pages of human history, the
horrors of the Middle Ages and of barbarism!

Tomorrow their superiors will have to answer
the chieftains of these bandits who invaded

our peaceful, happy land on which our
people worked, reared their children,

and built their free happiness.

I accuse Retzlaff, Ritz, Langheld, Bulanov
of crimes specified in Part 1 of the Decree

of the Presidium of the Supreme
Soviet of the USSR, dated 19th April, 1943.

In the name of the law and of justice,
in the name of tens of thousands

of people maimed and tortured to death,
in the name of the entire people -

I, as State Prosecutor,
beg you, Citizen Judges,

to sentence all four mean
criminals to death by hanging.

At this court are present representatives
of the international press.

They will tell the whole world -
the truth about the Kharkov trial.

THE FINAL STATEMENTS
OF THE DEFENDANTS

THE DEFENDANT
WILHELM LANGHELD

...as well as civilians...

Soviet... innocent Soviet citizens...

sentenced to death...

were... so causing them to be shot.

I have beaten Russian prisoners of war.

On my orders, civilians were
arrested and subsequently executed.

But I ask...

to consider...

that I was not alone
in committing these acts.

But rather that this was the case
in the entire Wehrmacht.

Yes. That the atrocities

were a lot worse even

than what was heard here during
the interrogation of the witnesses.

But I beg you to take this into
consideration: I am not the only one.

The whole German Army is the same.

...even greater monstrous
brutalities than we had opportunity

to hear here in the
testimonies of the witnesses.

I do not mean to palliate my guilt

but I must declare

that the underlying reason is found
in the attitude of the government.

I do not want to minimise
my guilt in any way,

but I would like to point out -

that the underlying reasons should be
sought in the German Government.

And at the same time I ask
to take into account my advanced age

when the final verdict is decided,

and also that I told the truth at all
times during the preliminary hearings.

Before passing sentence,
I ask you to consider my advanced age,

and also the fact that both
during the preliminary investigation

and during the trial,
I told the whole truth.

THE DEFENDANT
HANS RITZ

Honourable Judges.

The proceedings
are drawing to an end,

and you have allowed me the right
to say these final words to you.

Gentlemen Judges,
the trial is nearly over,

and you have given me
the opportunity to make my last plea.

I want, however, to express to you
my sentiments about everything

that was heard here,
with the utmost clarity and sincerity.

...that you have gained the impression
during trial and preliminary hearing

that I had the strong
and unfaltering will

to do everything from my side to shed
light upon the crimes discussed here,

by giving clear and open testimony.

What I would like to do, however,
is to make a perfectly frank statement

of my attitude to everything
that has taken place here.

I want to leave you with the impression

that I have always talked
frankly about everything,

during both the preliminary
investigation and during the trial,

desiring to reveal completely
the crimes that were committed.

The defendant Ritz ended
the last plea asking for a pardon.

THE DEFENDANT
REINHARD RETZLAFF

I have the burning wish...

to open the eyes of the German people
to the mendacity of its oppressors.

I want to open the eyes
of the German people

to the falseness
of theirs oppressors.

For this reason,

I ask to be pardoned...

and to be given the opportunity...
to be allowed to return to my homeland

so I can put this wish of mine
into practice.

For this reason -
I ask you to grant me a pardon.

To give me the opportunity to return
to Germany and put my wish into action.

THE DEFENDANT
MIKHAIL BULANOV

In my last plea, I have to say...

Have to...

Tell my feelings,
which I have undergone...

Being at...
at a place of savagery of fascists.

Which I committed under
threat of German arms.

...can't express my feelings.
This is all!

18TH OF DECEMBER, 23:40
THE MILITARY TRIBUNAL

OF THE 4TH UKRAINIAN FRONT
ANNOUNCED THE SENTENCE

In the name of the Union
of Soviet Socialist Republics.

From 15th to 18th December, 1943,
Military Tribunal of 4th Ukrainian Front.

In public session in Kharkov,
has examined the case relating

to the atrocities of the German fascist
invaders in the city and region of Kharkov.

On the basis of Article 296
of the code of criminal procedure

of the Ukrainian SSR and the decree of the
Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR

of 19th April, 1943, the Military
Tribunal of the Front sentences:

W. Langheld, H. Ritz, R. Retzlaff,
and M. P. Bulanov to death by hanging.

The hour has struck for retribution,
in a square of Kharkov.

People gathered around the gallows,
composing an implacable and bitter wall.

Here came mothers, fathers, brothers,
sisters of those tortured to death,

executed, asphyxiated.
People came to execute the knavery,

whole Hitlerite plunder,
all disgraceful schemes of German fascism.

At this square in Kharkov, surrounded by
crippled buildings, people came to say

to the whole of fascist Germany:
"We don't joke, Germans."

They trampled moral values,
all cities and villages occupied by them.

Get what you deserve,
Hitlerite scum!

This is the will of the people,
which they wanted to destroy.

Take the son in the eyes of Russian people,
disgraceful death - traitor, Bulanov.

Who sold out his own motherland.

It is done.

Forty thousand Kharkovers,
as one strong and implacable arm,

tightened the noose on the criminals.

But the trial is not over,
the trial is ongoing.

This is the start of retribution,
the first page of a worldwide trial,

which will continue
across the lands of Europe.

And which will punish all
murderous Hitlerites for their crimes.

Nations of the USSR and
free nations of the world

already are writing the verdict
for the fascist Germany.

The trial is ongoing, in the name
of peace, life and happiness...