GRANDIOSE PLAN

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26078, 15 February 1946, Page 5

GRANDIOSE PLAN

SEIZURE OF GIBRALTAR RUSSIAN DISCLOSURES NUREMBERG, Feb. 13. Hitler planned to seize Gibraltar with the aid of Spain some time in 1941. This was disclosed in a captured German naval staff document dated August, 1941, outlining Hitler’s proposed list of conquests, which the Russian prosecutor, Mr Zorya, to-day submitted to the War Crimes Tribunal. Hitler expected to dispose of Russia in lightning thrusts, then he planned to pass down through Turkey, whether she agreed or not, and develop twin drives to Persia and Egypt through Syria and Palestine. German forces in North Africa would at the same time be strengthened for an all-out effort about the middle of September to smash the Australian garrison holding out in Tobruk, then drive into Egypt from the west. Foiled by Red Army Commenting on the document, Mr Zorya said it indicated what would have been the turn of events if the Red Army had not stopped the Fascist aggressors. Then, pointing an accusing finger at the prisoners, Mr Zorya declared: “The Red Army not only withstood and arrested Fascist aggression, but, together with the Allied armies, brought Hitler’s Germany to complete catastrophe and the Fascist war criminals to the dock.” Another Soviet prosecutor, Mr Pokrovsky, introduced a report by Mr Molotov on German treatment of Red Army prisoners. It said: “ Some Red Army soldiers had their arms and feet nailed to stakes, and five-pointed stars were cut on their stomachs with redhot knives. Others were tied to two tanks and their bodies drawn apart. When cold weather began the Hitlerite robbers not only stripped the warm clothes from dead Soviet soldiers, but divested wounded men of their clothes, leaving them stark naked.” Denied Protection Mr Pokrovsky also put in statements by the ex-German Chief of Staff, Otto Haider, and the ex-Deputy Chief of Staff of Wehrmacht Operations, General Warlimont. Haider had said Hitler’s demand that the Russians should be denied protection ordinarily accorded to prisoners was made before the Nazis attacked the Soviet. Haider also attributed to Hitler a statement that Russia was not a signatory to the Hague Convention, therefore the Russians could not expect the treatment given to prisoners of other nationalities. Mr Pokrovsky described this as another Fascist lie. Counsel for the defence asked that these two generals be brought before the court for cross-examination. Lord Lawrence assented, but said that their appearance was a matter for the prosecution’s convenience. Mr Pokrovsky quoted from a letter addressed to Keitel found in Rosenberg’s file. It said; “Of 3,500,000 war prisoners we at present have only a few hundred thousand capable of work. The greater part have died of hunger or from the effects of inclement weather. Thousands died of typhus.”