of whom the Tribunal said : “ The evidence concerning the killing of hostages and reprisal prisoners within the corps area is so fragmentary that we cannot say that the evidence is sufficient to support a finding that the measures taken were unlawful. The killing of hostages and reprisal prisoners is entirely lawful under certain circumstances. The evidence does not satisfactorily show in what respect, if any, the law was violated. This is a burden cast upon the prosecution which it has failed to sustain.” One common line of defense of the accused was the Plea of Superior Orders: they stated that they were only following orders from higher up, in particular from Hitler and Field Marshal Keitel, demanding multiple deaths of civilians in reprisal for every German casualty. The tribunal recognized this defense only for some of the lower-ranked defendants, but concluded that in particular the highest-ranking officers, List and Kuntze, should have been well aware of the fact that these orders violated international law and thus should have opposed the execution of these orders, even more so as they were in a position that would have allowed them to do so. Clarification of military occupation The Tribunal considered the question of whether the Croatian state was a sovereign entity capable of acting independently of the German military (Germany recognised the Croatian government on 15 April 1941). It concluded that it was not and that military occupation depended not on the physical deployment of troops, as they could be redeployed into the territory at will, but on the control exercised by the occupying power. It followed that as the area remained under the control of the occupying power therefore "Logic and reason dictate that the occupant could not lawfully do indirectly that which it could not do directly". See also Subsequent Nuremberg Trials Command responsibility Kragujevac massacre References (WCC 1949): Law Reports of Trials of War Criminals, Vol. VIII, 1949 of the United Nations War Crimes Commission. Description from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. Another description Nuremberg Trial Transcript Collection Further reading Footnotes United States Nuremberg Military Tribunals 1947 in Germany 1948 in Germany