Abstract

This clip is an excerpt from the German-language newsreel Welt im Film, which was produced by the American and British military governments. It features a report on the Nuremberg trials, the International Military Tribunal which prosecuted 24 representatives of Nazi Germany. In this clip from March 1946, we see the American chief prosecutor, Robert Jackson, explaining that putting the main perpetrators on trial could only be the beginning of the complex process of legally prosecuting the Nazi regime and its many supporters.

Report on the Nuremberg Trials (March 15, 1946)

Source

/In Nuremberg, the American chief prosecutor Jackson demanded the conviction of the accused organizations in a major speech. The Nazi regime, Jackson said, was by no means limited to the tyranny of the main defendants present here. 1000 little Führers ruled. 1000 imitators of Göring acted out, 1000 Schirachs incited the youth, 1000 Sauckels enslaved workers, 1000 Streichers and Rosenbergs stirred up hatred. 1000 Kaltenbrunners and Franks tortured and murdered, 1000 Schachts, Speers and Funks administered, financed and supported the movement.
/Jackson: 1000 Schachts, Speers, and Funks administered and supported and financed this movement.
/Chief prosecutor Jackson then describes the extent to which these organizations were able to awaken the dark instincts of the people. SS General Ohlendorf is characteristic of this system.  He declared before this court, without a trace of remorse or compassion, that he himself had ordered the deaths of 90,000 men, women and children. No court in the world has ever heard such testimony.
/Jackson: …to a recital of such wholesale murder as this tribunal heard from him and from Wisliceny, a fellow officer of the SS.
/In conclusion, chief prosecutor Jackson stated, "The defendants here have lost their pernicious power, they are finished people. Now it's time to target the organizations."

Source: Welt im Film 43/1946. Bundesarchiv Filmarchiv