Mea Culpa

When he was Governor General of Poland, Hans Frank remarked: "For all I care, mincemeat can be made out of the Poles."

Last week, in Nuernberg, he said: "I feel a terrible guilt within me. ... I am as guilty as the rest of Germany. ... A thousand years will pass and this guilt will not be erased."

First Frank had been hysterical. When the U.S. Army brought him to Mondorf Interrogation Center, he was clad only in lace panties and sobbed: "I am a criminal." Later he tried to commit suicide. After the Nurnberg trials opened Frank became a Catholic, prayed daily in his cell. On the witness stand he was fervent: "I have at last gained an insight into the terrible atrocities. ... I can't allow it before my conscience that responsibility . . . should be handed over to ... small people alone.... I have used words which I am sorry now I used." Only once did he show a flicker of his old insolence: "We used the wrong methods in the Government General [of Poland], but then who is perfect running a foreign country? Look at Germany today."

The courtroom was spellbound during the three hours of his eager confession. Said a British prosecutor: "A fine speech." Said a Russian colonel: "I am amazed." "It's more than I expected from the ugly one," said Keitel (who had tried to place all responsibility on Hitler). Goring (who had boldly admitted his guilt) sneered at Keitel: "At least one more of us has some guts."

Back in the dock, Frank sighed: "I had to get this off my chest. I'll sleep better for it." Then the man who thought that Poles were good enough for mincemeat returned to his Bible, and to his cherished picture of St. Florian, an officer of the Roman occupation force along the Danube, who was martyred in A.D. 304, and who became a patron saint of Poland.

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