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Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression: Supplement B
Office of the United States Chief of Counsel for Prosecution of Axis Criminality
United States Government Printing Office
Washington
For sale by the
Superintendent of Documents
U.S. Government Printing Office
Washington 25, D.C.
Q. What about the natural resources? Let us forget about
machinery.
A. Anything which was available at all or any other
commodities had been carried away totally to Germany and
that is why when I arrived I immediately asked for those
600,000 tons of corn which I have just mentioned.
Q. Did you get it; did you pay it back?
A. If I had not received it, there would have been a
catastrophe.
Q. Did you pay it back?
A. I can’t remember.
Q. Is it your testimony that those orders issued by Goering
in connection with the Four-Year Plan, were not executed by
you?
A. Some plans I did execute; there were some reasonable
plans.
Q. Which ones, for example?
A. One of these orders of Goering was the rebuilding of the
factories for purposes of armament. That was before the
Minister of Armaments, Speer, was appointed; at that time,
Goering was alone in charge of it. Goering was the man I
feared the most on account of his enormous needs.
Q. What other orders of Goering did you consider reasonable?
A. The rebuilding of navigation on the Vistula. Of course,
the question is not what Goering asked me to do in favor of
the Poles; the question is, what were the needs of Goering
from Poland-- that’s the question.
Q. The question is, you stated that some of the orders that
Goering issued as head of the Four-Year Plan were executed
by you be-
[Page 1383]
cause you thought they were reasonable. I am trying to find
out which orders you thought were reasonable.
A. That was the general scheme of the rebuilding of the
armament industry within the General Government — those
were very important propositions.
Q. How many thousands of workers did you supply to the
German Reich from Poland?
A. When you speak of Poland, you, of course, mean the
General Government.
Q. Yes, the Government General of Poland.
A. Within those 5 years, some 500,000 Poles and some 200,000
Ukrainians.
Q. How did you recruit those workers?
A. Those workers were reported to the Labor Office and were
sent as volunteers.
Q. What do you mean by “volunteers"?
A. By volunteer workers I mean those who followed an appeal,
reported voluntarily to the Labor Office, stating that they
were willing to work for or in Germany.
Q. Isn’t it a fact that you used to receive a quota of the
number of workers that were desired from you on a regular
basis?
A. When Saukel became Reich Commissar for Labor, the number
of workers furnished by the General Government was already
so high that he was satisfied with a very small quota of say
50,000 laborers a year. Why, that could be obtained without
any further ado.
Q. You mean to say that all the Polish labor that came from
the Governor-General of Poland into Germany came
voluntarily?
A. Absolutely, so far as they came from the Labor Office
under my authority.
Q. Well, where else did they come from?
A. Well, but the Luftwaffe was in the country, the SS was in
the country, and I had to fight for years to oppose any
violent measures in this respect. And to give an instance,
the police one surrounded a movie and was going to deport
all the people coming out from it. Well, I was fighting with
the utmost energy against such methods. I myself saw those
trains with volunteers for Germany and I spoke to them. I
sometimes gave them gifts and saw them off to Germany. I
also obtained in the Reich a report on the treatment of
Poles which, at the beginning, was rather harsh.
[Page 1384]
Well, the Poles had to wear a patch with the letter “P” on
it and only in 1943 did I obtain authority that this “P” be
removed. I had to negotiate for some 18 months to obtain the
permission to send Catholic priests to the Polish laborers,
which priests had been forbidden by Himmler. In places where
Poles worked, they dared to put inscriptions on the
churches, “No Admittance for Poles,” and such cases of sheer
madness I have continued to fight against. Well, we saw the
kindliness of the Church and also of the German people who
didn’t attach any importance to the official stuff; the
Poles were well-treated by the German peasants, and they
wrote accordingly to their families at home, and that again
drew other Poles to Germany. There are also hundreds of
thousands of Poles I had received within my General
Government, some 800,000 Poles which had been sent from the
Polish territory within the Reich, and it is from those
Poles that I could recruit a labor force. Not exclusively
from those, but also from those. But this was an additional
charge for a small General Government since I didn’t receive
any additional foodstuffs. Those Poles were sent back under
gruesome conditions and we had to set up our own sanitary
establishments and equipment to take care of them.
Q. What about Maidanek?
A. What?
Q. You know what I mean. What about Maidanek, the
concentration camp?
A. I gave an explanation the last time. What had taken place
at Maidanek, I had heard that only from the foreign press.
Q. You are sure about that?
A. Maidanek was occupied by the Russians last summer and
they had set down the conditions of the camp and made them
known to the press of the world; and one day I received a
visit of the Chief of Police who told me, “Here’s the whole
affair of Maidanek.” I immediately saw the SS
Gruppenfuehrer, Koppe, and told him what monstrous news I
had received about happenings at Maidanek and I instructed
him to proceed immediately to make an investigation.
Q. You mean to try to tell me that you didn’t know Maidanek,
that it existed, prior to the time of this press report?
A. Absolutely nothing. This I wish to say and that I did say
under oath the last time.
Q. Didn’t your assistants, those who were acting for you in
the vicinity of Maidanek, didn’t they know about it?
A. No. There had been a whole number of entirely closed-out
camps — not only camps for Jews, but camps of all
descriptions:
[Page 1385]
camps for POW's, which is the same as in Germany — the
whole General Government was sprinkled with such camps.
Q. Did you ever ask anybody who was in those camps?
A. Well, I did ask and I was told those were camps for
prisoners of war, camps for Germans returning from the
Reich, etc., and access to those camps was severely
prohibited to me or the civilian population.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Frank Claims Ignorance of Concentration Camps
Excerpts from Testimony of Hans Frank, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 13 September 1945, afternoon,
by Lt. Col. Thomas S. Hinkel, IGD. Also present:
Siegfired Ramler, Interpreter; Pvt. Clair Van
Vleck, Reporter.
Q. What about other concentration camps besides Maidanek?
What did you know about them?
A. The SS did not construct any bigger concentration camps -
- I am talking about all these years — of the style of
Dachau, because outside of the General Government in Upper
Selesia, they had a camp in Auschwitz.
Q. Did you know about that camp?
A. I knew that the camp existed there. One passed it on the
train. It was a huge camp. One could always see the barbed
wire when passing on the train, and this was always
considered to be the central camp for the whole eastern
territory.
Q. Is it your statement that the only concentration camp
that you know of in the General Government of Poland was at
Maidanek and that you didn’t find that out until after the
Russians had captured it?
A. It had been clear to me that concentration camps had been
erected in the General Government from time to time, but
that they had any mentionable size, it always seemed
improbable to me, because I was always told that the people
from the General Government should be sent to the
concentration camp Auschwitz.
Q. You have been to Lublin, haven’t you?
A. Yes.
Q. You have been there numerous times, haven’t you?
A. The last time I was there was 1943.
Q. In the course of your travels to Lublin, if you turned
your head to the right or left, you would have seen
Maidanek, wouldn’t you?
A. I was in the town. I don’t know that. It was outside the
town.
Q. You don’t seem to know very much about what happened in
the General Government of Poland, do you?
[Page 1386]
A. That is right.
Q. You were only there five and a half years. You were not
there very long, were you?
A. What has that got to do with it? This is no reason why I
should know everything that happened in the country. It is
quite impossible.
I always tried to release people, officials, that used to be
Poles and had been arrested for any reason.
Q. How many did you get out of Maidanek?
A. I cannot remember. I cannot say that I ever got any
officials out of Maidanek.
Q. Did you ever try to get any out.
A. I can’t say with certainty that I ever got anybody out of
Maidanek, not I personally.
Q. Did you ever try to get anybody?
A. No. I have never received any official report that
somebody had gone to Maidanek.
A. How about unofficial reports?
A. I didn’t receive any.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Deportation of Slave Labor from Poland
Excerpts from Testimony of Hans Frank, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 13 September 1945, afternoon,
by Lt. Col. Thomas S. Hinkel, IGD. Also present:
Siegfired Ramler, Interpreter; Pvt. Clair Van
Vleck, Reporter.
[Page 1387]
Q. How many workers did you furnish Sauckel?
A. Sauckel had come very late, comparatively. When Sauckel
came along, he only asked for very few people. That I have
said before. These were voluntary workers and we could
fullfill [sic] that without any trouble.
Q. How about Funk? How many workers did he want?
A. Funk was generally in charge of everything that the
industry in Germany needed. Altogether we delivered a number
somewhere around 800,000.
Q. You mean to Funk, Seldte, and to Sauckel, all three
together?
A. To all different departments of the State.
Q. As I remember your statement before, it was to the effect
that 90 percent at least of this labor was voluntary; is
that
[Page 1388]
correct?
A. They were all voluntary. The few that wanted to try to
force these people we dealt with very rapidly and we avoided
this action. They wanted to start this method with us too,
but we were able to avoid it.
Q. Your statement is that there were no laborers obtained
among Polish workers, for work in Germany, who did not
volunteer for that job?
A. Yes. Out of the General Government, out of their own free
will. You can see that from the numbers involved, because
even before the war hundreds of thousands of workers went
out of Poland every year. I have talked to the Colonel about
it. We had our work offices all over the country and things
ran comparatively very easy. We even carried it through that
people should be able to come back for a furlough, to the
General Government. The mail situation was brought into
order. Our main job was to care that those Poles in Germany
should be treated decently. At first, this was very bad. At
first, these Poles were looked upon as enemies. That we
could notice right away because the number of the voluntary
workers declined. Then we saw that they obtained priests,
that the whole treatment became a more sensible one and then
the people came into contact with the different firms and
works, and the people there had their own interests to keep
them. Towards the end everything became fine. You can see
that from the many Poles who did not even want to return to
Poland. There were 400,000 that did not want to return.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Decrees for the Persecution of the Jews
[Page 1400]
Excerpts from Testimony of Wilhelm Frick, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 1030-1230, 6 October 1945, by
Mr. H.R. Sackett. Also present: Capt. Jesse F.
Landrum, AGD; T/5 Gunther Kosse, Interpreter.
Q. What was the purpose of requiring Jews to deposit their
stocks, shares in mines, bonds and similar securities in a
bank?
A. So they would not own part of any business.
Q. It also was just a preliminary measure to take the
property away from them, wasn’t it?
A. These were preliminary measures so they could not be
active any more; they could not vote in any directors'
meetings, and so on. But I had nothing to do with the
execution of this law. This was all the business of the
Ministers of Finance and Economics.
Q. But if you signed the law, you approved of it being
executed by the Finance Minister, didn’t you?
A. That goes with the law.
Q. Your answer is “yes"?
A. Yes. I want you to know once and for all I am responsible
for anything that is signed by me.
Q. This law tended to deprive the Jews of their private
[Page 1401]
rights as well as their political rights, didn’t it?
A. This only concerns separate economic affairs; it had
nothing to do with political affairs.
Q. This is another one of those situations you really didn’t
believe in but you signed and assumed the responsibility
rather than resign?
A. There was nothing I could do. Even if I would have tried
to resign, Hitler would have said, “you stay.” Then if I
said I didn’t want to stay, then I would have been a rebel.
Q. And that is why you stayed, is that right?
A. Because there was nothing else to do for myself; I was in
it and had to sign it; I couldn’t get out of it. You could
not convince the Fuehrer of anything opposite; he had his
own ideas about it and he stuck to it.
Q. By signing such a law as this you led the public to
believe that you were wholeheartedly in favor of it, didn’t
you?
A. Naturally, that I agreed with it.
Q. Weren’t you thereby really deceiving the people of
Germany?
A. You can’t actually call it deceiving. You might be of
different opinion to the Fuehrer but you cannot get through
with the ideas; there is nothing you can do.
Q. Didn’t it have the effect of a lot of your friends and
political supporters believing you were for something when
you really weren’t?
A. You can only concern yourself with the signature itself;
and that’s what the public believed in. What went on within
me, that only concerns me and myself and nobody else knows
about that.
Q. They you wanted the public and your friends to think that
you were for it, even though you weren’t?
A. I wanted the public to believe that the cabinet favored
the policy a hundred percent and holds the opinion of the
Fuehrer.
Q. The reason I am asking some of these questions is that it
is difficult for me to understand that you, with a legal
background, can say one thing to the public and not really
believe in it.
A. You should have been present in the whole leadership of
the government at that time. I believe it’s very hard for an
American to think himself into a setup the way we had it at
that time; it was a whole new system.
Q. To my way of thinking, it is absolute dishonesty in
government.
A. Yes, it became more and more dishonest as time went by
because the men who were actually responsible for the
[Page 1402]
leadership of the government were bypassed and their jobs
given to men who did not know what responsibility means.
Actually, it would not have made any difference if I would
have signed the law or not because the Fuehrer would not be
influenced by my signing or not signing the law and he would
have made it legal anyway.
Q. Then, on 6 July, 1938, there was a law passed by the
Reich Government listing certain businesses that Jews could
not engage in, such as real estate, etc. [See vol. I, pp.
980-981]
A. Is that also a law from 6 July, 1938? I don’t remember
exactly any more but it must belong to the economic sector.
I think it is a law that Jews were not allowed to be active
in leading positions any more.
Q. That was part of the Party program, wasn’t it?
A. No, that is not in the 25 points of the Party program.
Q. Well, it was part of the government program at that time,
wasn’t it?
A. It was not a program of the government because I don’t
think in 1933 there was anybody who thought it would take
such a development. All this happened step by step. The
measures taken against the Jews increased through happenings
like I mentioned before, Gutloff, vom Rath, and so on.
[Wilhelm Gustloff, a Nazi propagandist in Switzerland, was
killed by a Jew in February 1936. His death was seized upon
by Hitler as the occasion for a violent attack in Jewry.
Eduard vom Rath, Third Secretary of the German Embassy in
Paris, was murdered on 7 November 1938 by Herschel
Grynszpau, a young Polish Jew. This incident served as the
pretext for a vast pogrom throughout the Reich, ordered by
the Nazi government. See documents 374-PS, vol. II, p. 277;
3051-PS, vol. V, p. 797; 3058-PS, vol. V, p. 854]
Q. It was part of the government program in 1938, was it
not?
A. You could not call that a government program; it just was
the wish of the Fuehrer.
Q. Well, it was what the government did in 1938, then,
wasn’t it?
A. It was the execution of the wish of the Fuehrer.
Q. What do you know about the decree imposing the atonement
fine of the Jews of one billion Reichsmarks?
A. That’s the atonement decree, I remember, but I don’t
remember exactly any more what it was caused by, whether
caused by the killing of Gustoff or the affair of Rath. I
don’t think this law was signed by me. I think that was the
affair of the Minister of Finance.
Q. The cabinet discussed it, didn’t it?
A. There were no more meetings of the cabinet after 1937.
Q. Before this fine was levied, it was talked about between
you and other cabinet members outside of cabinet meetings,
wasn’t it?
A. This was, but it did not happen too often that members of
the cabinet met socially.
Q. At the time at least you thought it was a good plan to
levy this fine on the Jews, didn’t you?
A. I probably agreed upon it if my signature is on that.
[Page 1403]
Q. Whether your signature is on it or not, at that time you
thought it was a good idea, didn’t you?
A. I don’t know if you want to call it good; it was a
personal measure.
Q. You thought that the Jews should be punished as a group
because of what had taken place, didn’t you?
A. That’s not a question of whether I thought it good or
not, it was ordered by the Fuehrer.
Q. Well, can’t you say whether you favored it or disfavored
it?
A. When this draft went through me or my office and I did
not oppose it; I was probably in favor of it.
Q. This really was the culmination of a plan to take the
Jews' property away from them, wasn’t it?
A. To take their property away from them and to have them
retire.
Q. In other words, in sequence, there were laws fixed to
require them to register their property, then to pledge
certain of their property, then finally an enormous fine was
levied taking away a great part of their property, is that
true?
A. The money they had to pay was a punishment; but the
property that was taken away from them, they got some pay
for that and, therefore, they were able to retire and live
from that money.
Q. But this was one method of not having to pay for all the
property, wasn’t it?
A. The punishment was an individual affair.
Q. And this fine was levied because some Jew had allegedly
assassinated a German in Paris, isn’t that the case?
A. That was the sense of the general punishment. It was said
that all Jews were responsible for the killing.
Q. You didn’t protest, did you?
A. No.
Q. So you signified your approval, didn’t you, by not
protesting?
A. Well, like I said before, it would not have made any
difference if I would have signed it or not, it would have
been done anyway.
Q. I understand that, but by not protesting and going along
with the program, you signified your approval, didn’t you?
A. If I had not done it, I probably would have ended up in
the concentration camp next day.
Q. But my question is that you did subscribe to it by not
dissenting. You can answer that “yes” or “no.”
A. Naturally, I did not object because if I had objected to
it, I probably would have ended up in the concentration
camp.
[Page 1404]
Q. Did you think it was just to levy a heavy fine on some
woman here in Nurnberg, for example, that didn’t even know
this Jew that was supposed to have committed murder?
A. I would not have made such a law. You are right: You
cannot make anybody responsible just because he belongs to
the same idea.
Q. In other words, you didn’t think it was just, did you?
A. I probably did not agree with it inside of me. My
activity in this whole affair was probably very passive; all
I did was sign.
Q. In 1941 you were a member of the Ministry for the Defense
of the Reich, were you not?
A. Since 1939.
Q. Yes. And do you remember the decree that was issued by
the Ministry on 4 December, 1941, and signed by you, with
reference to the treatment of the Poles and Jews in Poland?
[Document 2746-PS, Vol V., p. 386. R-96, Vol. VIII, p. 72.]
A. That doesn’t come under the laws any more.
Q. This is a decree of the Ministry for the Defense of the
Reich, issued 4 December, 1941, and it has reference to
treatment of Poles and Jews in Poland; do you recall such a
decree?
A. Only as far as the treatment concerning the law was
concerned, if they were brought up before a court.
Q. I hand you a copy of the decree, which is signed by you,
and ask you to look at it and see whether it refreshes your
recollection (hands witness a document).
A. That only concerns Poland and southeast Prussia. That is
only a territorial rule and that does not concern all of
Germany.
Q. Well, the purpose of that decree was to set up some
special judicial procedure for occupied territories in
Poland, wasn’t it?
A. A new judicial procedure was founded according to the
situation as it was existing at that time.
Q. In other words, this decree created a special judicial
procedure for Poles and Jews in Poland different from the
judicial procedure in Germany proper?
A. A special procedure for Jews and Poles in those
territories.
Q. And the rules of procedure were much more harsh and
severe than they were in Germany, weren’t they?
A. Because from the experience that these people were the
ones who committed these acts. In charge of all this was the
Minister for Justice, but since he was not represented in
the Defense Ministry, I just took it over to bring it into
this office.
Q. This decree provided for the death penalty for Jews and
Poles for any act of violence against the Germans, didn’t
it?
A. This was done to give a possible protection to the
Germans because there were always fights between the Germans
and
[Page 1405]
the Poles.
Q. Well, the law does so provide for such a death penalty,
doesn’t it?
A. Well, if it is in that law, it must be.
Q. Well, look at it and see if it isn’t in it?
A. (Witness looks over document) Well, this is for any acts
of violence against any Germans or against higher German
authorities.
Q. The law also provides that the death penalty can be meted
out to a Pole or a Jew for having any anti-German
sentiments.
A. What do you mean?
Q. By that I mean by making statements that he is opposed to
Germans he can be shot and killed, can he not, under this
decree?
A. I am not informed about the details of this decree.
Q. Let me ask you this: It also provides that a Jew or Pole
can be shot for tearing down any sign that is posted by a
German, does it not?
A. There were special measures taken for the safety of the
German people.
Q. Well, you consented to and signed a decree which approved
shooting a person for tearing down a sign off a wall, didn’t
you?
A. In this decree (indicating document)?
Q. That’s right.
A. It would have been an act of sabotage.
Q. Don’t you think that’s a pretty severe penalty for
tearing down a sign that is posted on the wall?
A. At that time it was still during wartime.
Q. No, but this was civil administrator’s regulation, by the
department of Interior, generally, under this decree, wasn’t
it?
A. This was handled by the Minister of Justice.
Q. The military government did not have to have any law to
shoot a man if they wanted to; they just shot him. This was
a civil administration, wasn’t it?
A. It was not time of war any more but probably the
situation was not considered very steady and, therefore,
some kind of protective measure had to be taken.
Q. Well, you favored a law providing that if a man tore down
any kind of a sign, he could possibly be shot for doing so,
is that right?
A. Where is that written about the sign?
Q. (Interrogating officer indicates section of document to
witness who reads it.) Did you subscribe to a code of
justice that a Jew can be shot for tearing down any sign
that is posted?
A. You must consider that as a semi-wartime measure.
[Page 1405]
Q. Well, you subscribed to this sort of decree under the
circumstances that existed in the civil government in the
territories at that time, didn’t you?
A. Naturally, that was an exceptional decree.
Q. This decree also provides with reference to judicial
procedure that Poles or Jews cannot object to a judge
because he is prejudiced.
A. That is possible; that they may not refuse a judge.
Q. In other words, you subscribe to a code of justice that
provides that even though the judge is prejudiced you would
be tried by him anyway, is that right?
A. Because these were exceptional times it was said that no
one can refuse a judge.
Q. Under the times that existed them you thought it was fair
to have a Jew or Pole tried before a judge who was already
prejudiced against him?
A. During times of war you don’t have time to refuse a
judge.
Q. But this was the civil administration of these
territories after the war was not in progress in Poland, was
it not?
A. The war was not over; only Poland was beaten at that
time.
Q. There was not any fighting going on in Poland in 1941,
was there?
A. There was actually no more war but just because such a
law was passed, you cannot say that everything was not quite-
--
Q. Assuming that would be true, you still think that it is a
fair and judicial code to have a trial before a judge who is
prejudiced?
A. In such cases it can’t be done any other way, and I
probably would not have signed any such decree if I saw it
could be done in any other way.
Q. Why couldn’t a law provide that you pick an impartial man
to try Jews?
A. It is not said that the jury could be prejudiced; it's
only done to prevent a sabotage so that the accused could
not refuse one judge after the other.
Q. Well, if the defendant could show that the judge was
prejudiced, don’t you think it would be right for him to
have an impartial judge?
A. If actually such a prejudice would exist on the side of
the judge, I think the judge would not agree to handle that
case.
Q. But he didn’t have to refuse to act under this decree,
did he?
A. It was up to the judge then.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Frick’s Part in the Reichstag, and Views on Jewish Rights
Testimony of Wilhelm Frick, taken at Nurnberg,
Germany, 2 October 1945, 1435-1655, by Mr. H.R.
Sackett. Also present: T/5 Gunther Kosse,
Interpreter; S/Sgt Horace M. Levy, Court Reporter.
[Page 1407]
Q. After Hitler got out of jail in 1924, from then on to
1933, you saw him quite often, did you not?
A. Yes, I saw him, because I was a member of the Reichstag.
Q. When were you made Reichsleiter of the Reichstag?
A. At the Party meeting in `33. I was Reichsleiter in my
capacity as leader.
Q. Leader of the Party faction in the Reichstag?
A. The Party was represented in the Reichstag by a faction,
and I was the chairman of this faction, and as such, I was
the Reich leader.
Q. Well, as I understand it, you were the leader of the
Party in the Reichstag in 1933, and as such, you were called
"Reichsleiter.”
A. As such, the Fuehrer gave me this title.
Q. Were you not the leader of the Party in the Reichstag,
prior to 1933?
A. My connection with the Party started in 1924, when I was
elected to the Reichstag. Even though the Party was not
allowed at that time, up to 1925, the people who elected me
to the Reichstag were former members of the Party.
Q. My question was, prior to 1933 were you not considered by
the Party as its leader in the Reichstag?
A. Only in 1933, the Fuehrer said, “In order to give you a
position in the Party, I am going to make you the
Reichsleiter.” The faction was a body by itself. I had a
special position in the Reichstag. I always consulted Hitler
and asked him about the outlines, and what he wanted to have
represented in the Reichstag.
Q. That was prior to 1933, to which you are referring now?
A. That was before `33. I was leader of the faction after
the elections in `27. In 1927 and `28, we did not have the
Voelkische Arbeitsgemeinschaft (People’s Working Community)
any more; we only had the National Socialist Party. We were
12 members in the beginning.
Q. How many times were you elected to the Reichstag
altogether?
A. Since 1926, I was elected every time.
Q. And how often were elections held?
A. In `24; and then maybe again in the fall of `24 or `25;
and
[Page 1408]
then maybe there was an election again in `27; from `24 to
`33, there were about four or five elections; and then after
`33, there were about four elections. My task also was to
choose the candidates for the party. I did all this in the
name of the Fuehrer.
Q. How did the Fuehrer decide upon who were going to be
candidates?
A. We made a list of prominent members, such as Gauleiters,
and so on, and gave them to the Fuehrer. He approved of
them, or sometimes even added some names.
Q. Did you assist these people in their campaigns for
office?
A. There were special representatives of the Party, who
prepared the campaigns according to their won territories.
Q. Were you in charge of this?
A. I had to make the preparation for the others. The lists
had to be brought to the election commissioner, and so on.
In September 1930, after the elections, we had 107 members
instead of 12.
Q. How many members did you have in December 1932?
A. There was another election in July `32, and then we had
about 230 members.
Q. And that was out of a total membership of how many, did
you say?
A. There were more than 500 members.
Q. As I understand it, in the early days of 1923, you were
not very close to Hitler, but by 1933, you were not very
close to Hitler, but by 1933, you were one of his close
advisors; is that right?
A. Naturally, because the faction in the Reichstag grew
larger and larger. Therefore, I had to get to know him
better.
Q. And it was through the Reichstag and through you that
Hitler decided to try to come into power, was it not?
A. In a legal democratic way, according to the rules of the
Weimar Republic.
Q. When was it that Hitler first preached anti-Semitism?
A. Shortly after the Raeterepublik in Munich. [The
Raeterepublik was the name applied to the brief government
formed by the Communists in Bavaria after the 1918
revolution.]
Q. To what year are you referring?
A. It was already in the program of 1924.
Q. On many occasions you talked with Hitler about the Jewish
question; did you not?
A. During these election campaigns, the Jewish question was
not important.
Q. Wasn’t the Jewish question mentioned in the campaigns?
A. Naturally, because it was a point of the Party program.
[Page 1409]
Q. Well, in general, what was said by the Party speakers on
the Jewish question, prior to 1933?
A. It was said that the influence in politics by the Jews is
a bad one, because the Jews were always considered by the
people as a foreign body in the German government. This also
could be seen in the Weimar Republic, because many Jews were
active in prominent positions, as Ministers, and so on.
Q. Well, the Party opposed the Jews whether they were
Communists or not; didn’t they?
A. That is a question of race.
Q. Well, I don’t know whether I understand you or not. Let
me ask you this: Was it your feeling that the Jews should
not be entitled to have political rights, but all other
constitutional rights that they were guaranteed by the
Weimar Constitution, they should be allowed to keep?
A. The freedom of speech is not a political right, to be
compared with the election to the Reichstag, for instance.
A. And you thought that Jews were entitled to freedom of
speech; did you?
A. That they should not be treated any differently in that
respect than the other German citizens.
Q. How about their freedom from arrest, search, and seizure?
A. Exactly the same as the others, that is, a protection of
personal freedom.
Q. Why is it you distinguish so much between the rights of
the Germans and the Jews to political freedom?
A. There is the question of what is the right of the citizen
of Germany.
Q. You don’t think the Jews should be entitled to be
citizens?
A. They should not be allowed to be a citizen, since this is
limited only to people of German blood, just as any
foreigners are not allowed to be citizens.
Q. But the Party and Hitler advocated the taking away of
their property rights as well as their political rights, did
they not?
A. That was not the case from the beginning on.
Q. When did that become the case?
A. I believe it was only done in `37, when the first laws in
that respect were passed in the economic field.
Q. And in 1937, also, you changed your mind about the right
of the Jews to own property and enjoy freedom of speech; did
you not?
A. I was not concerned with these things. All this was
discussed in the Ministries of Interior and the Four-Year
Plan.
[Page 1410]
Q. Well, my question was, did you change your mind or not?
A. No, I did not change my mind. I considered it better to
keep on doing it the way I just mentioned to you.
Q. Do you consider the Jewish people an inferior race?
A. I look at them as a foreign body in the German State,
which should not be allowed to assimilate with the Germans.
Q. Well, the Party attitude against the Jews, originally
arose out of the fact that they were powerful politically,
and the Party wanted to get into power; and they had to
dispose of the Jews in politics to do so; did they not?
A. In comparison to the number of Jews in Germany, they had
a much too strong influence in politics.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
XV. Hans Fritzsche
Views on German Aggression and Hitler’s Guilt
Excerpts from Testimony of Hans Fritzsche, taken
at Nurnberg, Germany, 3 November 1945, 1430-1530,
by Major General Alexandrov, USSR, assisted by
members of USSR prosecution staff. Also present:
Colonel John H. Amen, OUSCC; Captain Mark
Priceman, Interpreter; C.J. Gallagher, Court
Reporter. [This interrogation was conducted in
Russian. The questions were translated into
German, and the answers into Russian by a member
of the USSR delegation. Simultaneously questions
and answers were translated into English for
information purposes only.]
Q. Were you a member of the Nazi Party?
A. Yes.
Q. From which date on?
A. Since the 1st of May 1933.
Q. Are you familiar with Hitler’s book Mein Kampf?
A. Yes.
Q. As a member of the Nazi Party did you share Hitler's
views as stated in his book?
A. Generally, yes.
Q. Do you admit that Hitler in his book stated clearly his
aggressive plans against the West, and the East, and
especially against the Soviet Union, Poland, Czechoslovakia,
and Jugoslavia?
A. This is not how I interpreted the book, but as I said, it
is now 15 or 16 years since I read it.
Q. Do you remember the passages which deal with the
necessity for “Lebensraum” and with the necessity for
Germany to have access to natural resources?
A. No, I don’t remember that any more. The book was not of
that much consequence in my political work.
Q. How did the Party deal with these problems of
"Lebensraum” and of natural resources, independently from
the book Mein Kampf?
A. It seems to me that during the years from 1933 to `39,
the general policy of the Party, and of the Government, was
to make the best of what could be done inside the narrow
borders of Germany, and to reach this goal through an
extensive exploitation of all our resources.
Q. It is not known to you that it was intended, and
propagated
[Page 1510]
in statements, speeches, and so forth by Hitler himself,
that this problem was to be solved through expansion?
A. Do you mean by conquest?
Q. Yes.
A. It became clear to me subsequently.
Q. When did you realize this?
A. During the first part of the war, I felt that the war had
not been provoked deliberately by Hitler, but as for the war
against Russia, I felt that Hitler had wanted, and had
caused it. In 1942, one year after the start of the war
against Russia, I became acquainted with the imperialistic
aims of the regime to their full extent. In 1941, at the
start of that war, I could not believe that Hitler had
started it intentionally, because it would have seemed to me
like madness to start a new war in the East, having on one's
hands an unfinished war in the West. I had Hitler's
assurance, and also Ribbentrop’s assurance, that the war had
been declared on Russia only to beat the Russians to it, who
were about to declare war on Germany. Then shortly after the
start of the war in 1941, I saw to what extent the
occupation of the Eastern territory had been prepared.
Finally, in 1942 I realized the full extent of Hitler's
imperialistic intentions in the East.
Q. I have a question. In other words, this information which
you had received previously from Ribbentrop was not
accurate?
A. No, I found out about it only now, as a prisoner. In a
prison cell in Moscow I met General Niedermayer, who had
been acquainted with an interpreter who had done the
interpreting during the conference between Molotov and
Ribbentrop at Moscow, as well as at Berlin.
Q. I want to clarify something. In the beginning you started
to say that you had received information from Ribbentrop.
Now you are saying that you received that information from
Niedermayer, as information which he had received from some
interpreter. Is that so?
A. All the information that I had about the Russian war I
had received from Ribbentrop during the night from the 21st
to the 22d June 1941. I am referring now to the information
which I had up to three-fourths of a year ago.
Q. You said that you realized in 1942 what the imperialistic
aims of Germany in regard to Russia were?
A. Yes.
Q. This is why I am asking you whether the information which
you had received from Ribbentrop concerning this question
was incorrect?
A. I became suspicious about it as early as 1942, but even
in
[Page 1511]
1942 it was still difficult for me to realize what the true
situation was. I still could not think that Hitler had
deliberately launched this war.
Q. I still want an answer from you. You said that you
realized it in 1942. I am asking you now whether what you
realized in 1942 checked with the information which had been
given to you by Ribbentrop in 1941?
A. There was no real contradiction, because Ribbentrop had
informed me only about the fact that the war had started. He
did not tell me then about the final intentions.
Q. How did you happen to realize in 1942 that Germany had
imperialistic aims in this war?
A. I believe that I received conclusive proof of this being
so from Niedermayer when I was in prison.
Q. I am talking about 1942?
A. In 1942 I myself was a soldier, and I was visiting the
Eastern areas, and then I saw that extensive preparations
for the occupation and administration of the territories,
extending as far as the Crimea, had been made, and I came to
the conclusion that all of this had been planned long before
the war broke out.
Q. This was your personal observation?
A. Yes.
Q. And what do you know about this question from official
sources? After all, you were an important official in the
Ministry for Propaganda?
A. Properly speaking, nothing. There had been very little
official publicity on this question. There had been very
little official publicity. There had been a certain amount
of talk in the press in 1942 of the wealth in natural
resources in the East in order to get people interested.
Q. Do you admit after these conclusions of yours in 1942,
that the attack against the Soviet Union in 1941 was the
result of preconceived plans, and reflected official views
on how to solve problems of labor shortage, and how to
increase Germany’s wealth in natural resources?
A. Yes, I have come to this conclusion.
Q. Are you then of the opinion that these general ideas
about the necessity for “Lebensraum” are the main cause of
Germany’s preparing and starting the war against the Soviet
Union, and in general for Germany’s starting the World War?
A. No. This is my conclusion, but I don’t have enough
documentation to substantiate my views. I would say--
Q. Go ahead.
A. Hitler’s guilt is to have prepared this war, to have
carried
[Page 1512]
on very extensive preparations, and at the same time to
have made the German people believe that his intentions were
peaceful. In the end, when the war was imminent, I think
that his guilt was just as great as that of the Western
Powers. Both he and the Western Powers could have prevented
that war from happening. This is how I see things today.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Fritzsche’s Part in the Werewolf Movement
Excerpts from Testimony of Hans Fritzsche, taken
at Nurnberg, Germany, 16 November 1945, 1000-1245,
by Col. Likhachov, USSR. Also present: Col. John
H. Amen; Capt. Mark Priceman, Interpreter; Mr.
James P. Buck, Court Reporter.
Q. Do you personally affirm that you had no part in the
organization of this movement — the Werewolves? [The
Werewolves were a movement which the Nazis attempted to
organize shortly before Germany’s surrender, to resist and
sabotage the impending Allied occupation.]
A. On the contrary, I worked against the organization of
this movement.
Q. In other words you confirm the contents of your written
statement about this subject? {This refers to a statement
purporting to summarize Fritzsche’s interrogations in
Moscow, where he was interned after capture by the Russians,
before transfer to Nurnberg prison. The document was drawn
up by the interrogators and signed by Fritzsche. On
interrogation by the American prosecution in Nurnberg
Fritzsche repudiated this document as inaccurate in certain
respects, and himself prepared a revised statement (see
document 3469-PS, vol. VI, p. 174). The Soviet summary is
not published in these volumes.]
A. I have read the transcript you are referring to only once
in its entirely and later on I was given a chance to see
parts of it. As I recall it the transcript says about this
subject the following: It says that I am supposed to have
broadcast over the radio proclamations in favor of the
Werewolf movement. As you gentlemen should recall, I did say
that such appeals to organize this movement were broadcast
over the radio between Sunday, the 1st of April 1945 and
Tuesday, the 3rd of April 1945. I did, however, call your
attention to the fact that these appeals were transmitted to
the broadcasting stations directly by Dr. Goebbels during my
absence. And I didn’t have a chance to talk to Dr. Goebbels
until that Tuesday when I succeeded in getting the broadcast
of these appeals discontinued. May I say one more sentence?
I also stated that I would of course assume the
responsibility for whatever had been broadcast over the
radio during my absence, by my subordinates.
Q. But then I cannot understand why you claim you had
nothing to do with the organizing of the Werewolf movement.
A. I beg your pardon. When did I say I had nothing to do
with the organizing of this movement? I have just stated I
actively opposed the organizing of the movement. As a matter
of fact several
[Page 1513]
months before the end of the war I was told to set aside a
number of radio stations that were to be used for this
movement. I also told you at Moscow that I purposely delayed
the execution of this order. And I also stated then (and I
am stating it now) that suddenly during my absence I had to
face the fact that this broadcasting had been done by my
subordinates. Furthermore I told you about the dramatic
conversation I had with Goebbels on Tuesday, the 3rd of
April about the subject. I leave it up to you to draw your
own conclusions from that.
Q. We are talking not only about your participation in any
broadcasts that were made. We are talking about your
personal participation inasmuch as you, yourself, made
statements over the radio that the movement should be
organized.
A. I never made any such broadcasts myself, but they were
given to the radio by Dr. Goebbels during my absence.
Q. However, it was well known that you yourself made such
appeals over the radio. Why do you not admit it?
A. As far as I know I never talked over the radio in that
sense.
Q. If that is so we will have to refer to some of the
speeches you made over the radio. Do you remember your
speech over the radio on the 7th of April 1945? [Document
referred to did not form part of prosecution case as finally
prepared and hence is not published in this series.]
A. I don’t remember the details of it.
Q. I will make an effort then to revive your memory. You
stated over the radio, “May nobody be surprised if here and
there civilians may oppose and fight enemy troops in
occupied territories and even after the occupation has
become a permanent fact it is to be expected that the
occupation forces will meet with underground resistance.
Such resistance is being organized now under the name of
Werewolves.” What do you have to say to this?
A. I don’t remember having made these statements. If you
want me to make a final statement on this question I will
have to know the background of this speech and be familiar
with the considerations which preceded this statement. Right
now I can only say this. If I had spoken such words they
would not have been in support of the Werewolf movement.
Q. I am quoting your own words. You must have spoken them
and since this happened only recently you must remember
them.
A. I have made approximately a thousand radio speeches and I
couldn’t possibly remember every sentence I spoke. But I
repeat that even if I did say these things it didn’t mean
that I was urging people to support what you are trying to
say.
Q. How else can one interpret this?
A. This is not an appeal. It is only a defense. It is a
defense which makes reference to some previous very
important statement. It starts with the words: “Nobody
should be surprised, therefore ***”
Q. Your explanation is not convincing.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Responsibility for Concentration Camps
[Page 1298]
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner, taken at Nurnberg,
Germany, 21 September 1945, 1430-1645, by Col. Howard A. Brundage,
JAGD. Also present: Siegfried Ramler, Interpreters S/Sgt. William A.
Weigel, Reporter.
Q. Can you explain why the SS has gained its reputation as a
gang of criminals?
A. I should think that they have to thank Hitler for that
reputation, because of his order to Himmler. They were
ordered to conduct the concentration camps. Though the
concentration camps were instituted before Himmler by
Goering, they were not in that form.
Q. Do you know that to be a fact of your knowledge, the fact
that these concentration camps were being operated by
Himmler through Hitler?
A. I know that Hitler said to Himmler that “I take the full
responsibility of what takes place in concentration camps.”
Whereupon Himmler said, “I will take that responsibility.”
Q. Well, do you believe Hitler knew to what extent people
were being gassed and tortured and killed in concentration
camps?
A. Besides Himmler, nobody would have known that. Up to a
certain extent he must have known.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Responsibility for Mobile Gas Chambers
[Page 1299]
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner, taken at Nurnberg,
Germany, 3 October 1945, 1445-1745, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart,
IGD. Also present: Capt. Jesse F. Landrum, Reporter; Mr. Bernard
Reymon, Interpreter.
Q. When did the use of the mobile gas chamber van first come
to your attention?
A. I can’t say when it was but as soon as I read it in the
foreign press I immediately took up the matter with Goebbels
and sent at the same time a photostatic reproduction of the
article to Hitler with a letter in which I expressed the
terrible consequences which such things would have.
Q. Why did you take it up with Goebbels?
A. Because he was responsible for the press and it was he
who allowed the foreign press to enter Germany; and because
he was the man who had dared against Himmler and over
Himmler to talk to Hitler.
Q. Was your objection because the news had gotten out in the
foreign press and that was going to be embarrassing?
A. Certainly not; because I was myself shaken by these
facts.
Q. Why didn’t you go to Himmler? You say you knew he was
responsible for these things.
A. Precisely because I held him responsible for it.
Q. Why didn’t you take action in your own RSHA? [1] That was
the instrument through which these accusations were being
carried out.
A. This information had not the slightest foundation.
Q. Witness after witness, by testimony and affidavit, has
said the gas chamber killings were done on general or
special orders of Kaltenbrunner.
A. Show me one of those men or any one of those orders. It
is utterly impossible.
Q. The testimony of one of the high officials was that most
orders initiated through Himmler, the killings could not
happen without order of Hitler or without knowledge of
Himmler but practically all of the orders came out through
Kaltenbrunner.
A. Entirely impossible.
1. The RHSA (Reichssicherheitshauptamt) or Reich Main
Security Office, headed by Kaltenbrunner, included the SD,
the Gestapo, the Kripo, and other policing agencies. See
document L-219, vol. VII, p. 1053, charts 16 and 19, vol.
VIII
Q. Now, do you recall issuing a decree in 1933, [Document
referred to did not form part of prosecution case as finally
prepared and hence is not published in this series.] as
President of the Reich Press Chamber, to the effect that
organizations could not obligate their members to subscribe
to certain newspapers?
A. I remember this decree but it was not in 1933 because
there was no Reich Press Chamber at that time.
Q. When was the decree issued?
A. At the earliest, 1935.
Q. Well, was that decree seriously followed with respect to
the Party newspapers?
A. The purpose of the decree was to stop the many
subscription agents, whose practice it was to get
subscribers by any means. I even issued instructions to
forbid any subscription campaigns all over the Reich. Every
subscription agent had to be authorized by an identification
card, signed by me. Every agent was investigated for
previous criminal record, political reliability, and so
forth and I insisted he got a fixed salary so that financial
distress would not force him to use wild methods.
Q. Did you ever license any agents who were not Party
members?
[Page 1528]
A. Most of them were non-Party members.
Q. I thought you said they were investigated as to political
reliability.
A. No. Only the publishers would be investigated as to
political reliability; the agents as to previous criminal
records.
Q. Whatever the ostensible reason for issuing the decree,
did it not in fact occur so that the result of it was to
prohibit people who belonged to various organizations which
had their own publications, from subscribing to those
publications as a condition of membership in the
organization?
A. The decree had as a purpose the preventing of pressure on
simple Party members, who belonged to different Party
organizations or affiliated organizations, from being forced
to subscribe to every single newspaper published by these
organizations. For instance, men who belonged to the SA had
to subscribe to the “Gau Zeitung.” He had to subscribe to
the weekly “SA Mann.” His wife had to subscribe to the
"Frauenschaftzeitung;” his daughter to the “BDM Zeitung” and
in addition, very often people were still reading the
neutral non-political papers, as in the past, and did not
want to give them up. As nobody can afford five or six
newspapers every day, this decree tried to prevent this type
of pressure on the Party members.
Q. Is it your statement now, this decree was intended to
ease pressure on the Party members?
A. In general, no, this decree was planned to have a general
effect. I didn’t want any subscriptions which were not
voluntary because it could destroy the whole prestige of the
Party if we would force everybody constantly to pay for
newspapers he didn’t want.
Q. I suppose you consider it only an incidental fact that
other organizations which were opposed to the Party, such as
the Catholic organizations, that the members thereof could
not subscribe to their papers, as a condition of belonging
to such organizations?
A. At that time there were no Catholic newspapers anymore,
only the general press. The Catholic newspapers were
discontinued under the order of Hitler. There were about 63
dailies, Catholic dailies, which were discontinued. This
decree, furthermore, led to a general Party order that “Gau”
newspapers should only be sold and subscribed to in the
specific Gau.
Q. When were the 63 Catholic newspapers suppressed?
A. During the year 1935 and from then on.
Q. Now, as a matter of fact, you signed the decree
suppressing these newspapers. Isn’t that right?
[Page 1529]
A. I don’t remember this exactly but it is possible that it
originated with the Reich Press Chamber.
Q. Anything is possible. What do you recall about it?
A. I remember that the Reich Press Chamber required all
publishers to sign a declaration which said that as a
publisher of a German newspaper he was affirming the
National Socialist State and this declaration could not be
given by publishers of the Catholic newspapers because they
had the point of view, and quite rightly from their
position, that they could not affirm certain National
Socialist measures, like sterilizations for instance, and so
these publishers could not sign required declarations.
Q. Now, isn’t it a fact that shortly after the Party came
into power, that papers of a political left, that is
Communist and Marxist papers, were suppressed immediately?
A. Yes, they were closed down by the police.
Q. Isn’t it a further fact that shortly after the Party came
into power, that papers of other political parties, that is
non-Marxist or non-Communist, but also non-Party, were with
some exceptions left undisturbed until suitable legislation
had been drafted to deal with them?
A. I assume that is correct but the Marxist papers were
suppressed immediately.
Q. Wouldn’t it be a fair statement to say that the whole
purpose of the Nazi press program was to eliminate all press
in opposition to the Party?
A. Yes, that can be said.
Q. Do you recall another decree on the 24th of April 1935,
which prohibited the formation of press combines, that is,
no publisher was allowed to issue more than one independent
newspaper in more than one locality? [See document 2315-PS,
vol. IV, p. 1007.]
A. That is possible. We talked about it already.
Q. Do you recall issuing that decree?
A. This decree was published, after months of negotiations,
by the Propaganda Minister.
Q. Isn’t it a fact, as a result of this decree, that many
publishers were required to sell one or more of their
newspapers?
A. If the decree stated things as I was told yesterday, but
I am still not certain whether the decree contained that
phrase.
Q. The record will show exactly the phraseology of the
decree. There is no question about it. My question is
whether or not it did not compel certain publishers to sell
to you one or more of their newspapers? I do not mean that
the decree required the sale to be made to you, but you were
the ultimate purchaser.
[Page 1530]
A. He could sell to anybody as long as this person was
politically reliable.
Q. And so, it was just by coincidence you happened to be the
purchaser, is that it?
A. Most probably the main reason was that during this
revolutionary and confused period, very few had the courage
to start a newspaper venture without having previous
experience.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Kaltenbrunner’s Stand on Concentration Camps
[Page 1300]
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner, taken at Nurnberg,
Germany, 5 October 1945, 1030-1210, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart,
IGD. Also present: Capt. Jesse F. Landrum, Reporter; T/5 Gunter
Kosse, Interpreter.
Q. You had information at your finger tips from all over the
Reich; you made reports on conditions and must have included
matters of new inmates for concentration camps and new
forced labor groups?
A. No, I had nothing to do with shipments to the
concentration camps; I naturally knew that there were
concentration camps but that’s all I knew about that.
Q. Well, according to the sworn statement of Colonel Mildner
[See document L-35, Vol. VII, p. 780], orders for
deportation of Jews, in the Reich and in countries occupied
by German troops, to labor and concentration camps were
issued by Himmler. Orders had his signature and were
classified TOP SECRET. They passed through you, and before
you, Heydrich to Mueller.
A. No.
Q. Orders also went directly from Himmler to local
headquarters, but you were always informed.
A. No, that’s not true, either.
Q. Orders of Himmler concerning type of labor employment of
prisoners and for the extermination of Jews went directly
through Pohl and from him to Gluecks, either written as TOP
SECRET or sometimes orally, and always as adviser to Himmler
was Kaltenbrunner on all Jewish questions, on all
deportations to camps.
A. Never. He must mix that with Heydrich’s time.
Q. We are only concerned at this point with Kaltenbrunner's
time.
A. But I am the one who is accused here and, therefore, I
have to take some kind of a stand.
Q. That’s your right. The basis for Colonel Mildner's
statements as to channels through which orders were issued
were his conversations with Mueller and other people in the
SIPO [Security Police].
A. He must have talked with Mueller about that, then.
Q. That’s what he swears.
A. That might be possible, that Mueller tried to push the
fault on somebody else; I don’t doubt that at all, but I can
only say
[Page 1301]
again that Mueller was only the tool of Himmler. I must say
again that I never got any plenipotentiary for the Gestapo.
I said many times before that I took a stand against many
things but there was nothing I could do.
Q. There is nothing in what I have brought to your attention
that shows any disposition for Mueller to dodge his
responsibility; it’s merely the inclusion of the channels
which included yourself through which these orders passed.
A. Like I said, that a basis for this Mildner got through
conversations with Mueller and therefore I say that Mueller
is trying to push the fault on somebody else. Mildner
himself gets all mixed up because in one paragraph he says
that a report went from Himmler to Mueller and then he said
it went from Himmler through me to Mueller.
Q That’s correct. On different occasions the channels
differed, as you have said, but he adds what you failed to
add, that you were always informed.
A. Everybody in Germany knew that those were affairs of the
Gestapo and the deportation of Jews was done by the Gestapo
on orders from Himmler.
Q. After being arrested and sent to concentration camps, in
whose charge was the treatment, health, and assignment of
work for the internees?
A. Pohl.
Q. What reports were received by Kaltenbrunner from
concentration camps?
A. Not one.
Q. What was the basis for your classifying camps into
classes one, two, or three?
A. I never classified them myself but that was all over.
Q. What office did it come out of?
A That could only have come from Pohl or from Himmler.
Q. What was the purpose of such classification?
A. Probably the difference of work production.
Q. Was there any distinction made as to the character of the
inmates, whether they were there because of alleged racial
inferiority — as the Jews — or because of their political
beliefs?
A. I don’t know that but I am sure to know that was not the
reason. I think it was more the kind of work, like
agriculture or industry.
Q. Who picked the location of the concentration camps?
A. Maybe Himmler.
[Page 1302]
Q. Why do you say that?
A. Because that was his work and he was supposed to build
them up.
Q. Who caused the building of the gas chambers that were
designed as shower rooms?
A. I don’t know that.
Q. You don’t like to have questions asked about gas
chambers, do you?
A. Why shouldn’t I like such a question? I can only say
again that already in Bamberg a paper was showed to me where
I was accused of being a specialist and adviser to Hitler
concerning these gas chambers and that naturally could not
be very pleasant and right to me.
Q. When did you first have any knowledge of the use or the
planned use or the result of the use of gas through
chambers, mobile vans, or other means of exterminating these
unwanted people?
A. I don’t know the time, but as soon as I got foreign
reports about that I showed them to Hitler and Himmler --
not to Himmler but to Hitler — and Goebbels.
Q. What did they say?
A. I didn’t show it to them personally, but I sent it to
them by mail, and a few days later I got word that both of
them are going to talk this over with Himmler.
Q. And after that, the use increased, didn’t it?
A. I don’t know that.
Q. And Kaltenbrunner was sending in advice all the while?
A. That’s a statement which I cannot verify at all.
Q. That’s a statement that many, many other representatives
of the Nazi government continue to make.
A. That’s a lie if anybody makes such a statement. I want
you to consider that between 1933 and 1943 ten years passed
in which I did not have anything to do with that office. How
can you make such a statement, because at that time, as it
was reported from foreign countries, things like that were
done by Himmler.
Q. Because they continued to be done through 1943, 1944, and
until the allied armies overran the concentration camps in
1945, and through those years Kaltenbrunner was Chief of the
RSHA which had them in charge.
A. No, I was never in charge of any such, but orders were
done, as I said in my statement in London, by Himmler or
Pohl. No commander of any concentration camp in any part of
Germany can say that he ever got the slightest order from
me.
[Page 1303]
Q. Would it surprise you to know that that is substantially
the same answer that everyone else is giving that has had
anything to do with these matters?
A. I can’t know but I cannot explain that nothing else
otherwise can be proved through evidence.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
“The Gestapo Never Harmed Anyone”
[Page 1303]
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 5 October 1945, 1440-1465m by Lt. Smith
W. Brookhart, IGD, OUSCC. Also present: Nancy M. Shields,
BCV, Reporter; H.E. Mankiewitz, Interpreter.
Q. Let us consider what some of the officials think about
your personal responsibilities for Amt IV [The Gestapo] of
the RSHA [See footnote, page 1299 of this volume.], with
particular regard to repressive measures in the
concentration camps.
You have known Schellenberg a long time, haven’t you?
A. Since 1943.
Q. And he has served in Amt VI [Foreign Political
Intelligence Service] during that period?
A. Yes.
Q. In his opinion, Kaltenbrunner was responsible in
conjunction with Mueller for all punishments and protective
arrests of important persons.
A. Will you let me face Schellenberg and some of his group
leaders and they will tell you that it is absolutely untrue.
Schellenberg must be the person who knows best what is the
connection between AMT IV and Himmler because Schellenberg
has been previously in the Gestapo himself.
Q. And was, therefore, responsible himself for some of the
punishments and atrocities that were committed?
A. I don’t know. I don’t know in what department of Amt IV
he was employed but he was fully aware of the authority and
he must have known very well that those authorities were not
mine.
Q. Amt IV, the Gestapo, was the active organization that
performed the repressive action and punishments and
executions in concentration camps, isn’t that right?
A. This information is certainly wrong and I refer to my
statement in London and the reason is because I consider
Himmler himself responsible for these things.
[Page 1304]
Q. Who did the job locally? The Gestapo?
A. No, the concentration camps. The concentration camps
themselves and they only acted on the orders of Himmler,
Pohl, or Gluecks.
Q. Who, in concentration camps, inflicted punishment,
performed executions, gassed prisoners, and all the other
various atrocities?
A. That I could not say — it must be men who were
subordinate to the commander of the camps.
Q. It was the Gestapo, and you know it was the Gestapo for
the most part!
A. The Gestapo most certainly had no man in concentration
camps who had ever done any harm to anyone.
Q. That is the best one yet!
A. You must make a mistake between the guards and the
Gestapo. That is something entirely different because the
guards of the concentration camps were not subordinate to
the Gestapo but to Pohl and that was entirely different.
Q. These guards were Deathshead SS, were they not?
A. Yes, but the Deathshead SS were not Gestapo. That is
proof that they were not Gestapo. The Deathshead
organization is the concentration camp guardsmen.
Q. And you say the dirty work was done by them, is that it?
A. Of course.
Q. How do you know that?
A. Because there were no men in the concentration camps who
were subordinate to the Gestapo but the guards who were
there who were only subordinate to Pohl and over Pohl to
Himmler. Otherwise, the guards were subordinate to Mueller
and they were never subordinate to Mueller as things were.
Will you ask any man from the concentration camps if he has
ever been subordinated to the Gestapo and they will tell you
that they were not.
Q. Will he also tell you that when he had a mass killing to
perform that he had a few Gestapo brought in to do the job?
A. No, certainly not. The Gestapo had nothing to do with
executions.
Q. Are you sure?
A. I have never heard anything about it.
Q. Then how can you be so sure?
A. Certainly I am not sure but I would have heard something
about it. The concentration camps were not subordinate to
Amt IV and that must be known here, and this does not merely
include the buildings but all the staff who are subordinate
to Pohl.
[Page 1305]
Q. And all of those who performed the exterminations and
shooting and gassing and all the other means of killing, is
that right?
A. I don’t know about this. I don’t know who was carrying
out the shootings.
Q. You were being pretty positive about Pohl's
responsibility. I would like to have you carry it clear
through, for all the activities of the camp.
A. I have given a statement about concentration camps and
that is all. That is not known to me as secret knowledge,
but it is known to everybody else and I don’t know any more.
I have made representations and I have called Hitler's
attention to certain conditions. I have repeatedly talked to
Hitler about his responsibilities, which he has charged
himself with, in these concentration camps.
Q. Hitler?
A. Yes.
Q. What did you say to Hitler, and what did he say to you?
A. His stereotypical answer was, “That is none of your
concern. That is my arrangement with Himmler and how Himmler
carried out his work is his own affair. He is responsible to
me.”
Q. On what dates did you have these conversations with
Hitler?
A. That was when I took office and then several times later.
Q. You have told us here frequently that you knew nothing
about concentration camps. How were you even well enough
informed to discuss it with Hitler?
A. As much as I knew about concentration camps I have put
down in my statement and that is as much as I discussed with
Hitler. Primarily I had to rely on the foreign press. In
this respect I saw the second big damage towards the Reich,
apart from the inhuman or humanitarian concern.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
“I will Be Hanged in Any Case”
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner,
taken in Nurnberg, Germany, 8 October 1945, 1945-
2110, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, IGD. Also
present: Pfc. George W. Garand, Interpreter; T/4
R.R. Kerry, Reporter.
A. That is completely wrong. I know such a thing will make
no difference to me because in any case, you will sentence
me. May I put an addition to this? The colonel in charge of
the London Prison that I was in has told me that I would be
hanged in any case, no matter what the outcome would be.
Since I am fully aware of that, all I want to do is to clear
up on the fundamental things that are wrong here.
Q. Have you been subject to any treatment that you consider
to be intimidation, coercion, or undue influence since you
have been brought to Nurnberg?
A. I have not suffered from wrong treatment.
Q. Have you suffered any threats or any preconceived
statements that you are guilty of any crime?
A. Not directly, but I am treated as a man that is already
in a criminal prison.
Q. You have been examined at great length because of the
multitude of evidence and witnesses that have been presented
in the field where you are active.
A. I have not complained about any treatment and I am not
complaining now. The difference between the treatment here
and in London is like day and night.
Q. The purpose of this extended examination, which today has
gone even into the night is to try and crystallize the facts
insofar as we are able to get you to testify. Is that clear?
A. Yes.
Q. Let me go ahead then.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
The Mass Execution at Lublin
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner,
taken at Nurnberg, Germany, 12 October 1945, 1545-
1715, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, IGD. Also
present: Capt. Jesse F. Landrum, Reporter; Capt.
Mark Priceman, Interpreter.
[Page 1309]
Q. Did you know a Herr Morgan?
A. No.
Q. Inspector of concentration camps?
A. No, definitely not.
Q. Maybe it will help to refresh your recollection if I
recall to you a few of the facts that occurred late in the
autumn of 1943 as set forth in the report of Morgan
[document referred to did not form part of the prosecution
case as finally prepared and hence is not published in this
series.], following the visit to Lublin. You do recall the
time when several thousand Jews were slain in Lublin in one
day?
A. No.
Q. And that their bodies were thereafter burned, there being
so many that it caused a light dust to lie over the whole
town and penetrate the air like smoke?
A. These three stories are such fabrications, especially
inasmuch as my person is concerned.
Q. It was during the period in which you were Chief of the
Reich Security Police.
A. As I said, these stories are pure inventions, and besides
your idea that I had anything to do with it in my official
capacity is erroneous.
Q. Referring again to the Lublin murders, the result of this
mass execution could not have escaped your attention because
as reported by Morgan after his inspection, it resulted in
losing much of the available labor supply. There were no
more people to work machines and in the handcraft shops. The
factories were left with a tremendous stock of raw material,
and the people in charge said that the order of the
execution came as a complete surprise.
A. I never saw any such report, and I never heard about
them.
Q. The local SS Oberfuehrer Muszfeld, who was formerly a
confectioner, at Zuckerbaecker in the neighborhood of
Kassel, was in immediate charge of the butchery at Lublin,
and he told Morgan that he took credit for killing 20,000 by
his own hand. Was he known to you?
A. No.
Q. A man of those attainments would certainly be pretty well
known throughout the service, would he not?
A. He definitely did not belong to my staff.
[Page 1310]
Q. You say you received no reports of the effects of this
mass extermination because of the loss of manpower?
A. Definitely not. Even if this report were true, it is
obvious that such a report would not have been addressed to
me, but it would have been addressed to a person concerned
with manpower questions, for instance, Pohl, chief of the
concentration camps, or to Himmler, because Pohl carried on
production right inside the concentration camps. He was
interested in manpower questions. If I ever had received a
report like this, I would immediately have taken it to
Himmler or Hitler, and I would have declared to them that
things shouldn’t be done this way.
Q. The message that came, ordering the mass execution, read
in the following terms: “By order of the RFSS [Reich Leader
of the SS (Himmler)], the Jewish company in the camp
Poniatowa is to be carried to its final conclusion.”
A. I have never seen any such order.
Q. I will read you the description that Morgan gave as to
what took place: “The proceeding was always the same. The
night before the execution came the order to build very
hastily shelters in zig-zag against air raids. In the early
morning came troops and the execution began in these
trenches. The prisoners had to leave their work and to
attend in the neighborhood of the trenches. When their time
came, they had to undress and naked, pass through the trench
one after one in an infinite line. Coming to the first dead
the victim had to lie down on the dead body and then was
killed by a shot from a gun in the neck. This went on so
long until the trench was filled and the last person was
dead. Then the trenches were closed. The naked men had their
own trenches, and the women theirs. Children were there with
their mothers. None of the victims had been ill-treated
before executions. All passed in a methodical, silent way.
The troops formed only a cordon and had nothing to do with
it. There had been a few German police, and the most were
Ukrainian. On each place there were only two or three
killers who were placed above the trench. Behind them were
two or three other men who spent all their time charging
empty magazines. So the executions were going very quick,
and the responsibility was only in the hands of very few
men.” Here is a second sentence: “It was the old, tried
system.” Do you agree that it was an old tried system?
A. I am not familiar with the method.
Q. Further on, this report of Morgan’s states that
extermination had been so complete that there was at last
nobody left to burn the cadavers, and it was only with great
difficulty that they
[Page 1311]
rounded up enough Russian prisoners of war to do the
burying. Did you know SS Sturmbannfuehrer Wippern, in
command at Lublin?
A. No.
Q. What became of all the money, jewelry, and gold of the
dead prisoners out of these camps?
A. I don’t know.
Q. Didn’t you ever receive any report as to what was done
with these valuables?
A. No.
Q. You disclaim any knowledge of this incident that took
place in the autumn of 1943 at Lublin?
A. Yes. It is impossible that this report had been sent to
me. I would have been to see Himmler or Hitler on the very
first day; on the very same day.
Q. When Morgan made inquiries into the reasons for the mass
executions, he was told by the local Sturmbannfuehrer that
this was top secret but that it had been ordered by Himmler
himself, after a personal report by Dr. Kaltenbrunner. How
do you account for that?
A. Absolutely impossible.
Q. What report did you ever make on the camp at Lublin, or
camps holding Jewish inmates elsewhere, that contained any
recommendation which would lead to extermination of these
people.
A. I have never in my life made any such recommendations.
Q. That’s all you have to say about it, is it?
A. Yes.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Lynching of Enemy “Terror Aviators”
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner,
taken at Nurnberg, Germany, 16 October 1945, 1030-
1210, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, IGD. Also
present: Nancy M. Shields, BCV, Reporter; Captain
H.W. Frank, Interpreter.
[Page 1311]
Q. I would like to have you tell us about the conference
that was held at the Fuehrer’s headquarters on 6 June 1944
at Klessheim in the afternoon.
A. Yes.
Q. Do you recall that conference?
A. I don’t know which conference you are talking about.
Q. (Referring to Doc. 735-ps) You were reported to the
Assistant Chief of the Command Staff of the Wehrmacht that a
discussion
[Page 1312]
was held a short time before, between Goering, Ribbentrop
(as Foreign Secretary), Himmler (as Reichsfuehrer SS) on the
subject of the treatment of enemy “terror aviators.”
A. I have never made such a report.
Q. Let me refresh you further. Whereas the Foreign Secretary
had wanted to include every type of “terror attack” against
the domestic population, agreement was reached at the
conference that only strafing committed directly against the
civilian population would be considered a criminal act.
A. I have never participated in any such conference.
Q. I show you a photostatic copy of the secret summary of
Warlimont’s conference with Kaltenbrunner on the lynching of
certain allied aviators, in its German text and ask you to
read it and tell us what you recall about the conference.
A. (Reading document) This is totally incorrect.
Q. Finish reading it, then tell us what you think you know
about it.
A. This must be a mix-up with the Reichsfuehrer SS or some
other person. I have never received an invitation to comment
on this question, but much later when I heard about it I
have spoken against it in reports.
Q. How much later?
A. That I cannot say but I assume it was in the summer of
1944.
Q. From whom did you hear about it?
A. These reports came from various districts of the Reich,
saying that the population intended to lynch these fliers
who had inflicted such punishment and caused so many
victims.
Q. But that was only after you had set up through your
organization a plan for going into and reporting on such
cases, isn’t that right?
A. No. I have never made a plan but have summarized the
reports which I received and submitted the summary to a
higher authority, saying that such action was impossible.
You can see from one of the last paragraphs of this report
that the highest people in the Reich were occupied with this
question and I did not belong to that highest department.
Q. Without regard to what you belonged to, the fact is that
you conferred with Warlimont and you expressed views as
shown by this document?
A. No, I had no conference with Warlimont.
Q. Do you believe that this is not a correct copy of an
official document.
A. I don’t know, but the contents are not correct.
[Page 1313]
Q. You know that a very efficient German General Staff would
never write a top secret document without being sure of the
facts; isn’t that right?
A. This can only be an error on the part of Warlimont
regarding the person.
Q. Another instance where everyone else is wrong but
Kaltenbrunner?
A. Permit me to suggest that you ask Warlimont. I have no
recollection of having had any discussion with him and under
the circumstances I do not believe that he would have said
it.
Q. What did you say when Warlimont asked whether cases
involving supposed criminal enemy fliers arose, of whether
the SD were in a position to investigate and construct such
cases in all details?
A. I have never discussed this subject with Warlimont.
Q. But you recall you told him that you were not in a
position to make such investigations or to prepare such
cases?
A. No.
INTERPRETER: He says it is necessary for him to say some
more on the subject. Do you want to hear it?
Q. As long as it is pertinent.
A. Warlimont says here: “To hand over to SD". Ask Warlimont
whether he considered the SD an executive department or not.
Q. Let us first ask Kaltenbrunner what he said when
Warlimont suggested that the procedure for the segregation
of such fliers should be handled through the SD?
A. He has never discussed that with me at all and I could
therefore have made no definition of my attitude. I am fully
convinced, however, that I know whom he has talked to about
this, but it was not me.
Q. Who was it?
A. It could only have been a person authorized by Himmler,
because this was a matter for the OKW [The OKW (Obercommando
der Wehrmacht) or Armed Forces High Command, headed by Field
Marshall Keitel.], the Foreign Minister and the
Reichsfuehrer SS office.
Q. It could have been anyone.
A. And it could only have been a person authorized in this
case by Himmler, who had continuous contact with him.
Q. It could have been anyone and this paper shows it was
Kaltenbrunner.
A. There is only one thing — confront me with Warlimont and
see what he will say. He will say “No,” because he cannot
say anything else.
[Page 1314]
Q. There is only one Obergruppenfuehrer Kaltenbrunner, is
there not?
A. That is correct, and these matters were always handled by
one man in negotiations with the OKW and the Foreign
Ministry, who was authorized by Himmler, and that man was
Fegelein.
Q. Why do you persist in giving these answers which are
obviously in error and probably constitute perjury in the
face of established facts?
A. My punishment, I assume, will be the same in any case,
and I have therefore no cause to lie to you, but there is no
point in confirming someone’s error in this case. I cannot
do that.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Kaltenbrunner Denies Observing Gassings at Mauthausen
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner,
taken at Nurnberg, Germany, 10 November 1945, 1430-
1545, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, IGD. Also
present: John Albert, Interpreter; Frances Karr,
Reporter.
[Page 1320]
Q. Let me refer to another little matter which has been the
subject of considerable questioning. In your interview in
London and here, both before other officers and myself, you
have denied ever having visited a concentration camp, isn’t
that right?
A. Yes.
Q. Well now, in anticipation of what you can expect the
prosecution to show, I will tell you that a very well known
Gauleiter from Austria has testified and given an affidavit
that he visited Mauthausen, in company with you and Himmler,
in 1942. [See document 3870-PS, Vol. VI, pp. 790, 795.]
A. I can imagine why Gauleiter Eigruber said so.
Q. I didn’t say it was Eigruber.
A. In his Gau the only concentration camp in Austria was
located.
Q. That has nothing to do with the statement of facts that I
have just made. The point is, you visited the camp which you
consistently deny.
A. I have never visited it, neither with Himmler nor with
Eigruber.
Q. Another witness will testify that you not only visited
the camp, but you were seen going to the observation point,
where the gas chamber was operated, while a gas operation
was in progress in which human beings were gassed to death,
and you were seen leaving that same point. [See document
3846-PS, Vol. VI, pp. 783, 785, affidavit E, Vol. VIII, p.
630.]
A. I want to die on the spot if that is correct.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Shooting of Prisoners of War
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner,
taken at Nurnberg, Germany, 10 November 1945, 1430-
1545, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, IGD. Also
present: John Albert, Interpreter; Frances Karr,
Reporter.
Q. Don’t you recall who had charge of the military
administration in prisoner of war camps?
A. No.
Q. Do you know General Berger of the SS?
A. Yes, I knew him.
Q. You will recall General Berger had the administration of
[Page 1321]
prisoner of war camps under the SS from 1 October 1944 to
the end.
A. I think that is incorrect because the prisoner of war
camps were not put under the SS but Himmler, as the Chief
of the German Replacement Army, was put in charge of all
matters concerning war prisoners.
Q. And in turn, General Berger of the SS, acting as
Himmler’s deputy by direct order of Hitler, was put in
charge of the PW camps?
A. It is correct that Berger was the general deputy of
Himmler because he was Chief of the SS Chief Office. That
such an order was signed by Hitler, is unknown to me. But I
know that Berger repeatedly represented Himmler in questions
of war prisoners.
Q. How did that come to your attention?
A. One discussed such matters.
Q. Well, tell us about the procedure where, when prisoners
escaped from prisoner of war camps, they were turned over to
the Secret Police, and what was done with them thereafter.
A. They were not turned over to the Gestapo but were given
back to the War Prisoners' Office.
Q. You remember the case of the 80 British flyers who
escaped from Stalag Luft 3, that took place in March 1944?
A. That case is unknown to me.
Q. Don’t you remember what Hitler said should have been done
to these men?
A. No.
Q. Then some of the army officials said that they could not
violate the Geneva convention?
A. No.
Q. But your police reported to General Keitel that 50 of
them had already been shot?
A. No.
Q. Don’t you remember the reports you got from the camp
commander at Goerlitz?
A. No.
Q. I am sure that was an important enough event to come to
your attention. They took them outside the camp to shoot
them and then cremated them later.
A. You tell me things I do not know.
Q. General Westhoff attempted to find out from the Gestapo
what had happened to these men.
A. If he had negotiations with the Gestapo he did not
negotiate with me.
[Page 1322]
Q. Are you sure?
A. Yes.
Q. You deny knowledge of these 80 British flyers, British
prisoners, having been captured and turned over to the State
Police? What do you say about the general proposition that
the escaped prisoners were turned over to the Gestapo?
A. Such cases are not known to me and in any case, it is
incorrect. I would like to call your attention to the
following fact. You talk now as if always war prisoners, who
escaped and were recaptured, would be turned over to the
Secret State Police. At another point you believe Herr
Warlimont when this man says they were turned over to the
SD. There is a discrepancy.
Q. You said that meeting never took place.
A. I only said now you believe Mr. Warlimont when he says --
Q. What I believe has no bearing on my question to you
wherein I state a fact, as I am about to state, that over
600 American prisoners were found in a Gestapo concentration
camp.
A. That I do not know. That only should have been done on
order from Himmler to the Gestapo. I had nothing to do with
such orders.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Treatment of Commandos and Airborne Troops
Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner,
taken at Nurnberg, Germany, 10 November 1945, 1430-
1545, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, IGD. Also
present: John Albert, Interpreter; Frances Karr,
Reporter.
[Page 1322]
Q. Well, let us go back to the subject we took up earlier,
before we got on the question of veracity. I showed you your
letter of 23 January 1945 which makes reference to the
earlier Hitler Order of 18 October 1942, as to how commandos
were to be dealt with. Let me show you some other documents.
The first two documents (540-PS) appear to be a draft
followed by the letter that was signed. Those two are dated
30 January 1945 and 8 February 1945.
I will read this paragraph into the record: “On
recommendation of the Chief of the Security Police and the
Security Service (SD), the letter of 28 September 1944 is
corrected as follows:
"The Fuehrer’s Order on the elimination of terrorists and
saboteurs in the occupied territories of 30 July 1944, as
well as 18 August, 1944 (No. OKW/WEST/Qu2/Verw. 1
009169/44g/Kdes) refers only to non-German civilian persons
in the occupied territories.
"For the treatment of commandos the Fuehrer’s Order of 18
October 1942 (No. OKW/WEST Qu2/VerW. No. 003830/42 g.Kdes)
is still valid.”
"By direction--”
To which there is a reply, which contains this last
paragraph:
[Page 1323]
"However, since the Security Service (SD) does not agree to
this, a difference of opinion in this case appears to be
immaterial. Earliest decision is requested since answer to
SS General Doctor Kaltenbrunner is to be sent as soon as
possible.”
Now, do these communications serve to refresh your
recollection any?
A. No.
Q. You still deny knowledge of the letter of 23 January
1945?
A. I do not recall the letter.
Q. And you deny knowledge of any subsequent action taken by
the Commander of the Southeast?
A. Of course. Apart from the fact that this commander of the
Southeast was not subordinated to me, he was subordinated to
the armed forces commanders.
Q. We understand how the police operated in conjunction with
the army. It was not necessarily a direct channel of
command.
A. But this was a letter from the Supreme Commander of the
armed forces to the Commander Southeast of the armed forces.
Q. That is clear from the document but it makes reference to
the letter that has to be sent to you as soon as possible.
And they even revised the draft, which is the first copy, to
include the sentence referring to you in the signed copy,
showing that he had knowledge of your letter and the action
that was to be expected.
A. From that it can only be seen that the armed forces
intended to write a letter to me. Whether rightly or wrongly
and whether I was the right authority to write to, is open
to question. In any case, the armed forces wanted to get in
touch with the Gestapo, as can be seen from this exchange of
letters and I am convinced that an officer of the Gestapo,
namely that one mentioned on top of the letter, has written
this document (pointing to 535-PS).
Q. Well, this is the letter that you know nothing about, but
that nevertheless established just how you accomplished your
desires by writing to the Supreme Command of the armed
forces. That is very clear.
A. But I deny that I have written this letter.
Q. No, you just didn’t know about it, but now you deny it?
A. I not only did not know the Hitler Order, but I also did
not know this letter.
Q. But you acknowledge your signature?
A. I did not say that this is my signature, I only said that
it resembles my signature and I also said it is possible
that a
[Page 1324]
rubber stamp, bearing my signature, was used. I cannot
recall a letter of such contents, signed by myself.
Q. Would it be any more convincing to you if you saw the
original letter, signed in ink?
A. I could be more convinced but it would still not prove
that I signed in ink.
Q. There was only one Dr. Kaltenbrunner on 23 January 1945
who was the chief of the Sicherheitspolizei?
A. But maybe this certain Ernst Kaltenbrunner was not in
Berlin just at that time.
Q. Just answer my question first. Is that true?
A. Certainly.
Q. And you were the man?
A. No. I did not have the function which you imply this man
had.
Q. I do not imply anything. I ask you if you are the man who
held this position?
A. No.
Q. You are not the man?
A. There was no other Ernst Kaltenbrunner who was Chief of
the Security Police. But this Ernst Kaltenbrunner, who sits
opposite you and whom you call Chief of Security Police and
SD on January 23, did not write this letter. (To the
Interpreter) I did not say this. I said this Ernst
Kaltenbrunner, who sits opposite you, did not have the
function of Chief of Security Police and SD on January 23,
1945.
Q. What was your function at that time?
A. As I described to you frequently, I was in charge of the
Intelligence Service.
Q. You have, of course, denied responsibility for anything
that was done in AmT IV and AmT V and AmT VI, except in a
minor was in the latter case.
A. I denied any responsibility as to AmT VI, as far as AmT
MIL was concerned. The reports on foreign policy, made by
AmT VI, I partly used in my reports.
Q. The testimony of other witnesses, who served many years
in the RSHA, is that you were, in fact, the Chief of the
RSHA and that you exercised and executed control throughout
the organization as you would have been expected to do.
A. That testimony is incorrect.
Q. And further, that during the period between Heydrich's
death and your appointment to the Chief of RSHA, Amt Chiefs
did deal directly with Himmler and that thereafter,
everything cleared through you, with a few exceptions.
[Page 1325]
A. That testimony is also incorrect but I think it is also
incorrect to use me for elaborating on the prosecutor’s case
against me.
Q. Well, this is for your benefit, unless you find this
boring.
A. It is not boring to me. I have had the feeling in all my
previous interrogations, that you are always looking for
evidence of my guilt and that you are not taking into
consideration any points which would be in my favor. I find
myself now in the state of preparation for my defense and I
do not find it appropriate that you continue to look for
material which would incriminate me.
Q. Is your statement made in the form of an objection to
further questioning?
A. In that sense as I stated it right now. If there is a
possibility to be confronted with witnesses and do something
about testimony in my favor, I would be very glad to
continue. But even there, I have the feeling that it would
be better to do this during the evidence at the trial
itself. I believe I should discuss this first with my
defense attorney.
Q. If there is any question in your mind about whether you
should go further in any interrogation by the Office of
United States Chief of Counsel, I think you should talk to
your counsel too. You have never been under any compulsion
to answer either before or since this indictment was served.
I think you will agree your treatment has been fair in all
the circumstances.
A. Yes.
Q. Do you now desire to see your defense counsel and then
send a message through your guard, if you are willing to
submit to further questioning?
A. Yes. I will do so.
Q. In view of a doubt in your mind as to whether you should
go forward any further with these interrogations, we will
suspend. I do want to point out, however, that confrontation
with documentary evidence has, of course, worked both ways.
It is to put you on notice of things that are evidence
against you and at the same time, to give you an opportunity
to explain, if there is any explanation. That will be all
for now.
A. And after I have talked to my defense counsel on Monday I
should report the result here, is that right?
Q. Only if you desire or are willing to be interrogated
further by the Office of the United States Chief of Counsel.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
XXII. Oswald Pohl*
Diversion of Concentration Camp Labor to Armament Industries
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 3 June 1946, 1400-1700, by Col.
John Amen, Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., and
Robert M.W. Kempner. Also present: Lt. Joachim von
Zastrow and Bert Stein, Interpreters; Anne
Daniels, Reporter.
* Oswald Pohl held the following positions: Chief of
Administration and Economic Main Office of SS;
Ministerialdirektor of the Reich Ministry of the Interior;
SS-Obergruppenfuehrer; General of Waffen-SS. Pohl managed
to avoid capture until May 1946, when he was discovered
working on a farm in the disguise of a farmhand. He was
brought to Nurnberg and these interrogations ensued.
Q. Now tell us when you took over the administration of
the concentration camps and how that came about.
A. At the occasion of a conversation which I had with
Himmler in the summer of 1942 — and I had conversations
with him about every quarter of a year — he said to me:
"Pohl, I have talked to Speer. The war is reaching its
climax; the demands of the armament industries are
becoming larger and larger, and the securing of the
necessary manpower is becoming more and more difficult.
Therefore, we have to try to commit this manpower which is
in the concentration camps into the armament industry to
an increased extent, and I have the intention of
transferring this task to you.”
[Page 1581]
I asked him not to do that because, in the meantime, my
little office — which at first had been just a small
office within the central office of the SS — had, later
on, become an independent office for budget and
construction. Then, still later on, all the economic
questions became mixed up in it, and then it became the
WVHA.
I told him, therefore, that in this main office I had so
much to do already, because I also had under me the
administration of the entire Waffen SS, and of the General
SS. Those were about 50 large, independent enterprises.
Also, I had to carry out many special tasks concerning
Party and Reich matters. So the transfer to me of new and
additional tasks seemed impossible to me.
He told me, however, that the labor commitment of the
inmates was so important, and he had no other expert that
he could charge with that task, that therefore I would
have to do it, in the interest of armaments. He said he
would relieve me of all other matters connected with that
because Gruppenfuehrer Gluecks was remaining there.
Obergruppenfuehrer Eicke had been killed in action in the
meantime, and Gluecks was head of this agency, as
successor to Eicke.
Q. How soon did you do anything about using the manpower
which was needed by Speer in the armament industry?
A. The procedure was discussed with Himmler, but it was
done in this way. That was the reason for Himmler's
intervention. There was really no method about the thing
until that time. The small firms in the Reich that were in
want of workers, no matter what branch of the industry
they belonged to, addressed themselves to the Inspectorate
of the Concentration Camps. Then Gluecks or his
representatives allotted so many inmates to them. As a
consequence, that meant a strong decentralization of
manpower, which it was wished to prevent.
From that time on, Gluecks had to visit me in Berlin once
a week. He had to submit the requisitions from the firms
to me, and then I decided whether a firm was to get
laborers or not. If greater contingents were involved in
heavy industry, that is, hundreds of them, the Armaments
Ministry was consulted about it. That is, it went through
the Armaments Ministry.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
The Extermination of Jews at Auschwitz
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 3 June 1946, 1400-1700, by
Col. John Amen, Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart,
Jr., and Robert M.W. Kempner. Also present: Lt.
Joachim von Zastrow and Bert Stein,
Interpreters; Anne Daniels, Reporter.
Q. You brought Hoess into your Division D, Subdivision I.
A. Yes.
Q. What had he done before that?
[Page 1582]
A. Before that he was commandant of Auschwitz.
Q. And while he was commandant of Auschwitz, what had been
his responsibility there?
A. The same as the position of all other commandants, at
first, and then he was employed by the Reichsfuehrer SS in
the final solution of the Jewish question.
Q. And what was that?
A. The extermination of Jewry.
Q. By what manner or means?
A. As it has been done.
Q. Tell us about it.
A. Jews were brought to Auschwitz and were gassed there.
Q. How many and over what period, were gassed there; and
what was done with the bodies?
A. I don’t know.
Q. How did Hoess carry out his end of the program at Auschwitz?
A. He carried out the liquidation of the Jews.
Q. And how many did he liquidate there?
A. I really will have to estimate that; I don’t know the
number.
Q. Well then, I will ask you for your estimate.
A. I have talked to Gluecks about it, but even he did not
know the exact figure. We estimated — and Gluecks thought
- about three million. [See document 3868-PS, vol. VI, p.
787.]
Q. We have already discussed the decree of 24 April 1935,
with reference to the “scandal press.” Now, isn’t it a fact
that this decree was used or could be used against any
newspaper that was not covered by the other two decrees that
we have discussed?
A. That decree against scandal sheets was a very clear
matter. The person in question either must have had a
criminal record or there must have been an investigation
already pending against him on a criminal case.
Q. But, the fact of the matter is, a newspaper could be
threatened with this decree, is that not so?
A. I for myself would never have used any threat because I
did not need any more newspapers.
Q. What about your assistant, Dr. Winkler? Was he above
using such threats?
A. He also knew exactly my position that I was not eager to
buy additional newspapers.
Q. But you bought them?
A. I only bought newspapers which were offered voluntarily
but later on there was a certain pressure on me by the
Gauleiters to buy newspapers and those Gauleiters were quite
powerful people and they would tell me to buy certain
newspapers.
Q. Speaking of Gauleiters, did you ever form a newspaper
holding company, by the name of Phoenix?
A. Yes, that is right.
Q. Do you recall the original capital of this financial
outfit?
A. Well, the matter about the Phoenix Holding Company was
the following. In order to secure for myself the benevolence
of the quite dangerous Gauleiters, who always said that the
Eher Publishing Company was making money through the Gau
newspapers, I founded a separate holding company, the
Standarte, and I could always tell the Gauleiters that the
profits were put into this holding company and did not reach
the Eher Publishing House but were used to increase the
business of the Gau newspapers. There was another
difference. Into the Phoenix Holding Company, or as we
called it, Dachgesellschaft, we took former
[Page 1531]
Catholic newspapers mainly. There was another holding
company, I don’t recall the name, into which former German
national newspapers were absorbed, which Hugenberg could not
continue. The last one which continued to exist was the
Standarte, and another was the Herold Publishing Company.
The purpose of these holding companies was to have a more
rigid control of the administration of the newspapers.
Q. Now, as I understand your statement, it is to the effect
that the Phoenix Company was the device by which various
newspapers were acquired, is that right?
A. No. It was a matter of form so as to make it easier to
recognize the previous tendency of the newspaper. If it was
a former Center newspaper, and so forth, then it would
belong to the Phoenix. If it had another direction formerly
it would belong to another holding company.
Q. In other words, it was used for the acquisition of
newspapers, was it not?
A. Yes. That is true. But it was not actually the Phoenix
Holding Company which acquired newspapers because whatever
capital might have been there belonged finally to the Eher
Publishing House.
Q. Isn’t it true that within less than one year this Phoenix
Company acquired 365 newspapers of all types and kinds?
A. I don’t believe that it was that much.
Q. How many would you say?
A. Perhaps 60 to 80 and that, I think, is a very high
estimate.
Q. Well, how many did the Eher Publishing House acquire in
the space of a year, taking the best year of its operations?
A. I cannot say so; I am very weak in figures.
Q. You had substantially completed your acquisition of
newspapers by 1938, had you not.
A. I had substantially completed acquisition of newspapers
as early as 1936 or 1937.
Q. The party had three hundred newspapers in 1933, and
between 1,200 and 1,500 by 1941, and you told me you didn’t
start acquisition of newspapers until 1935 and now you tell
me you completed it in 1937. That means that you had
acquired between 800 and 1,100 newspapers in the space of
two years.
A. I don’t remember the figures anymore. But our
administrative office has clear statistics on that.
Q. Would you say the computation I just gave you is
incorrect?
A. The Phoenix figure you gave is much too high.
[Page 1532]
Q. I am talking about the other figure.
A. In my estimate it seems to be correct.
Q. Would you consider it a fair statement to say that under
the decrees, to which we have referred this morning, and the
other things to which we have referred, that newspapers were
faced with the alternatives of either being ruined and
closed down with no compensation received for the properties
or of selling out at the price fixed by your representative?
A. I would have objected strongly if anybody would have
worked with such a threat.
Q. I am not speaking of that particularly, but I am speaking
of the situation where these newspapers were considered
politically undesirable or considered scandal sheets of
whatever other reasons there were for closing them down.
Those are the situations I am referring to. Isn’t it a fact
in those situations the publishers were faced with the
alternative of having their properties closed down, without
any compensation being received, or accepting the price that
was offered by your representatives?
A. I never bought former scandal sheets.
Q. Now, answer my question.
A. He could look for a person who was nationally or
politically reliable and try to get the price from him.
Q. You don’t seriously contend there was any competitive
bidding for these newspapers, do you?
A. Unfortunately there was no competitive bidding. I would
have preferred it because with every new newspaper I had
additional work.
Q. And yet, you were the only bidder for most of these
papers, isn’t that right?
A. I gave a specific order to my agents to look for sons or
relatives who could continue the business.
Q. Well, my question still remains that when these
newspapers were sold you were the only bidder, isn’t that
right?
A. Well, as nobody else was available I was the only bidder.
Q. Yes. That is what you told me before. I do not see why
you were so reluctant to tell me this time.
A. I only wanted to make my point of view clear, that I
always followed a fair price policy in the purchases.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Transfer of Valuables from Concentration Camp
Victims to Reichsbank
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 3 June 1946, 1400-1700, by Col.
John Amen, Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., and
Robert M.W. Kempner. Also present: Lt. Joachim von
Zastrow and Bert Stein, Interpreters; Anne
Daniels, Reporter.
[Page 1582]
Q. What business did you have with Funk?
A. I had no business with him as President of the
Reichsbank.
Q. You never had anything to do with him?
A. Funk got foreign currency for us abroad, but I never
had anything to do with him directly.
Q. You had other business, aside from foreign currency?
A. Yes. We gave to the Reichsbank all the valuables that
we received from these concentration camps, which had been
sent to us from the various offices.
Q. Let’s discuss the jewelry and gold teeth that were
taken from people in the concentration camps. The
Reichsbank was informed when such a shipment was to
arrive. Is that correct?
A. Yes, that is correct.
Q. Who made the first arrangements concerning that?
A. As I recall, the first arrangements were made by way of
the RSHA, in Heydrich’s time, I beleive.
[Page 1583]
Q. Between Heydrich and the Reichsbank, between Himmler
and the Reichsbank, or between whom?
A. Between experts of the RSHA and the Reichsbank. At this
moment I only recall that, on several occasions, foreign
currency, rings, and other things came from the camps to
Berlin, packed in cases, and they were given to the
Reichsbank by us.
Q. What was the Reichsbank to do with these gold teeth?
A. They were to evaluate them, and their equivalent was to
be deposited at the Reichsbank treasury.
Q. Hoess has testified that gold bars had also come from
Auschwitz.
A. I have seen gold bars, yes. I believe they were also
packed in cotton.
Q. Where were they delivered?
A. Also to the Reichsbank.
Q. Which ones went to your medical department?
A. That I don’t know.
Q. Where did the gold bars — if they came from Auschwitz
-- originate?
A. Probably from the Jews who were exterminated.
Q. How was that worked into bars there?
A. I don’t know that.
Q. How often did that stuff arrive? We are talking about
gold now.
A. I recall exactly that I only saw these gold bars once.
Q. You just wanted to say that it was once or twice. Now
what do you want to say, once, twice, three times, or
what?
A. I recall very clearly that I have only seen gold bars
once. Several times I have seen things like rings and
jewelry, but I have only seen gold bars once.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Deposit of Gold Fillings with the Reichsbank
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 3 June 1946, 1400-1700, by Col.
John Amen, Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., and
Robert M.W. Kempner. Also present: Lt. Joachim von
Zastrow and Bert Stein, Interpreters; Anne
Daniels, Reporter.
[Page 1583]
Q. Who took part in those first discussions? Who was the man
who would have such discussions?
A. I really don’t know. So far as I recall, there were no
large discussions. Without my having anything to do with it,
those things went to Berlin. I personally told Himmler that.
I talked to Himmler and asked him what should be done with
all those things; I was told they were supposed to be given
to the Reichsbank.
Q. Is that what Himmler told you?
A. Yes.
[Page 1584]
Q. Did Himmler tell you that he had talked with Funk about
this matter?
A. I believe that he had talked with Funk about it.
Q. Do you know in detail what they had been talking about in
this connection?
A. What they had been talking about, in detail, I cannot
say: I do not recall. I once talked with Funk, but it had
nothing to do with that.
Q. What did Himmler talk to Funk about, as far as you know,
in relation to the order Himmler gave you?
A. I assume that Himmler and Funk discussed the matter, that
the valuables from the concentration camps were to be
received by the Reichsbank. Subsequently Himmler said to me:
"I want you to do that; deliver them to the Reichsbank.”
Q. What particular subjects were discussed at that time?
A. That concerned all the valuables that were delivered from
the concentration camps at that time.
Q. Was there any doubt about the fact that it concerned dead
Jews?
A. No, there was no doubt about it.
Q. Do you say there was no doubt, or there could not have
been any doubt?
A. There couldn’t have been any doubt.
Q. Why couldn’t there have been any doubt? Where could those
things have come from otherwise? Tell me, because you can be
quite open with me.
A. There couldn’t have been any other source.
Q. When three million disappear, there must have been quite
a substantial amount of stuff in one camp. That is, three
million in one camp alone. That must have been more than
just a few sacks full.
A. There must have been a great total amount.
Q. Now let us go back. We had jewels that went down there to
the Reichsbank, and we had the gold eyeglass frames. Is that
correct?
A. Yes.
Q. What else was there? Please tell us in your own words.
A. All the things that men can have, rings, watches,
eyeglass frames, and gold bars.
Q. And what were those gold bars made from?
A. If you ask me now, those gold bars were made from the
melting of various things, among other things, gold
fillings.
Q. You have said anything that men can carry.
A. Yes.
[Page 1585]
Q. What originated from women?
A. Jewelry, pins, broaches.
Q. Anything else? Earrings? Have we mentioned wedding rings?
A. Yes, we had wedding rings also.
Q. What about earrings?
Q. And when you were down there with Puhl didn’t you, at
that time, open suitcases full of that stuff?
A. Yes, Puhl showed them to me.
Q. Can you recall any particular suitcase in which certain
individual things were contained?
A. Yes, he showed me especially valuable rings which had
already been assorted.
Q. Now we want to reconstruct the whole thing as
realistically as possible. You were down there at the
Reichsbank.
A. Yes.
Q. With whom?
A. From my group there were with me Gruppenfuehrer Loerner,
Frank, my adjutant, certainly, and several others.
Q. Then Puhl was there?
A. Yes, Puhl was there, and Waldheeker was there, because I
know him personally.
Q. Who else?
A. Puhl and Waldheeker. I believe they were the two from the
Reichsbank. Afterwards I was together with Funk.
Q. That is exactly what I want to know. Now why didn’t you
come out with that right at the beginning? That is what I
wanted to know.
A. How could I know that you wanted to find out that sort of
thing?
Q. All right, very good. Afterwards you were together with
Funk. All right.
A. Afterwards we went upstairs and funk invited us to have
dinner with him. There was a huge, round table. In my
opinion there were approximately a dozen people present.
Q. And whom did you sit next to?
A. I sat next to Funk.
Q. Now, what did you talk about concerning the beautiful
things that you had seen downstairs? Please tell us
truthfully and openly.
A. I cannot remember the details exactly, but I think I said
that I had seen the Reichsbank for the first time.
[Page 1586]
Q. Did you say anything about the things which had arrived?
What did he say and what did you say?
A. I cannot tell you exactly now what he told me.
Q. Did he tell you anything to the effect that you had
delivered the material well and that what had arrived was
valuable?
A. That is possible; it is probable that he said such a
thing. It is impossible for me to recall in detail the exact
words he used when he spoke to me.
Q. But it was in that sense?
A. Yes, I think the conversation was conducted in that
sense.
Q. How many of the Reichsbank people were present, and how
many of yours? How many people were present at the round
table?
A. I estimate about twelve people.
Q. Half your people and half Reichsbank people?
A. Yes, approximately. We had been invited in general by the
Reichsbank.
Q. I would like to come back once more to the Reichsbank,
downstairs. You were standing around with Puhl. You opened a
few of the cases from the SS, and those beautiful jewels
were in there. What else was in there among all those
things?
A. Foreign currency had also been delivered to the
Reichsbank.
Q. Did he also show you a case full of earrings and wedding
rings?
A. Yes, I had seen cases with rings, especially the more
valuable things.
Q. Did he also show you some of those gold bars?
A. I assume so.
Q. Did he make any remark about the fact that you had
contributed to the delivery of those gold bars?
A. How do you mean that?
Q. Did he tell you that those gold bars had arrived from the
camps?
A. Yes.
Q. Later on, at the meal, was there anything discussed
concerning those gold bars?
A. Between my neighbor and myself? Not that I recall.
Perhaps, in the beginning, there were a few words exchanged,
but during the table conversation nothing further was
mentioned along that line.
Q. Funk knew that you had been downstairs, and he told them
"bring those people upstairs"?
[Page 1587]
A. Yes, Funk knew that we had visited the entire Reichsbank.
He knew that.
Q. How did Puhl introduce you to Funk at that time?
A. Funk knew me already.
Q. How long had Funk known you, approximately?
A. Previous to that time I had been at Funk’s once. That was
the only time that I had to do with Funk.
Q. What business was that?
A. I recall that by order of Himmler I had to visit him in
connection with textiles; that was in his capacity as
Minister of Economy.
Q. What sort of textiles did that concern?
A. Those were the textiles which were concerned with those
actions.
Q. Where did those textiles come from?
A. The textiles remained in the camps, and were then given
to the textile industry. Subsequently Himmler sent me to
Funk to tell him that he, Himmler, hoped that a greater
allotment of clothing material would be sent to the SS, that
is, that a higher allotment of clothing would be delivered
to the SS.
Q. Let me express myself very clearly, in simple German:
From the clothing of the dead Jews, the SS were to receive a
greater clothing allotment. That is the meaning, in simple
German, is it not?
A. That is probably the way it was meant.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Himmler Dresses SS Men in Clothes of Dead Jews
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 4 June 1946, 1010-1100, by Dr.
Robert Kempner, and Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart,
Jr., IGD. Also present: Bert Stein, Interpreter;
Piilani A. Ahuna, Court Reporter.
Q. Will you put yourself back to the time of your first
conversation with Funk?
A. Yes.
Q. What was the approximate date of that conversation?
A. I believe it was the summer of 1944. 1943 or 1944, I
don’t know exactly, but it was in the summer. It was good
weather.
The reason why Himmler sent me there was the ever-increas-
[Page 1588]
ing scarcity of uniforms, and the small contingent that we
received from the textile industry, I believe it was
President Kehrl who always declared it was not sufficient.
Q. Thereupon you received the order from Himmler to get in
contact with Funk?
A. Yes.
Q. Where did you visit Funk?
A. I visited Funk in the Economics Ministry.
Q. What did you tell him at that time in brief?
A. That Himmler sent me to him and wanted to tell him that
he hoped the Waffen SS, at the distribution of the textile
contingents, would receive preferential treatment, for
Himmler was giving the clothing from the Jews to the Economy
during the action against the Jews.
Q. Which Jewish actions are in question?
A. That was the liquidation of the Jews.
Q. What quantities of clothing from dead Jews came into
consideration?
A. We really did not talk about quantities in detailed
figures.
Q. Did one mean great, large quantities which justified
preferential treatment?
A. Yes, that is to be supposed.
Q. From where was the clothing of the dead Jews taken, and
where was it delivered?
A. They were stored in Auschwitz, and they were delivered,
but where they were delivered I do not know. I do know that
Gruppenfuehrer Loerner should know about that. He was in
charge of the whole utilization of textiles.
Q. How was that? Did the procedure change or vary in a
certain period?
A. The procedure did not change much, I don’t believe so.
Q. The affair started already in 1941, did it not?
A. Yes. What do you mean?
Q. So that the Economy had always something to do with it.
The things were always turned over to the Economy.
A. The Economy had always something to do with it. The
things were always turned over to the Economy.
Q. When speaking of the Economy, which agency do you mean?
A. Our textile contingent was always negotiating with
President Kehrl.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Funk’s Implication in Looting of Concentration Camp Victims
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 4 June 1946, 1400-1630, by Dr.
Robert Kempner, and Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart,
Jr., IGD. Also present: Bert Stein, Interpreter;
Piilani A. Ahuna, Court Reporter.
[Page 1589]
Q. I should like to refer to a matter about which I have
just checked. The transfer of gold from concentration camps
started in the summer of 1942, did it not?
A. Yes.
Q. Is that correct?
A. After I heard that Himmler had a conversation with Funk
in the summer of 1942, it must have been the starting point
of this matter.
Q. You received your orders from above?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you still think that the textile matter was in 1943 or
1944, or do you say it was earlier?
A. That must, of course, have fallen into the same period.
Q. You have said yesterday, or this morning, that Funk knew
what this was all about. Is that correct?
A. Yes, that was so. I said that.
Q. You stated that these were things coming from the actions
against the Jews?
A. I told him that those were things which came from the
actions against the Jews which were handed over to the
textile industries.
Q. Which actions against the Jews are you speaking of and
where did they take place? I mean, was it in western or
eastern Germany?
A. I do not believe that I explained it any further, because
Funk knew.
Q. What did Funk know?
A. Where it came from, otherwise he would have asked me, but
I don’t remember that he ever asked me and I don’t doubt
that Himmler has told him about it.
Q. Was it a self-evident matter?
A. Yes, for me it was quite self-evident.
Q. Was it self-evident for him also, that it was not from
living Jews?
[Page 1590]
A. That, I suppose so.
Q. You stated yesterday that the Jewish affair was generally
known?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you include Funk in that?
A. Yes.
Q. And what are the two details which you especially know
that Funk knew about these happenings?
Q. First, from his conversation with Himmler, secondly from
the conversation with me.
Q. About what?
A. About the textiles.
Extermination of Mental Patients
Q. Do you know that Frick and Conti emptied the institutes
for the mentally sick and other sick by simply killing the
patients? [See documents 615-PS, vol. III, p. 449; 621-PS,
vol. III, p. 451.]
A. Yes, that was told.
Q. Do you know whether one sent their old clothing and other
things to the SS also and other agencies?
A. No, I don’t know that.
Q. What do you know about the whole action?
A. I don’t know anything about this action, except that it
has taken place.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Execution of Concentration Camp Inmates Needed for Labor
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 4 June 1946, 1400-1630, by Dr.
Robert Kempner, and Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart,
Jr., IGD. Also present: Bert Stein, Interpreter;
Piilani A. Ahuna, Court Reporter.
[Page 1590]
Q. Hoess had told us that you reprimanded him repeatedly
because not enough workers were being salvaged out of the
shipments to Auschwitz. At the same time, Mueller or someone
in the RSHA was ordering more executions.
A. Yes, that’s quite possible. It is quite possible that I
told Hoess and Gluecks that I have these requests for
laborers and I had to have more inmates.
Q. Whom, in the RSHA, did you take it up with? You knew they
were causing the executions.
A. I have really not negotiated with the RSHA. Gluecks did
that. I have never been there.
Q. You and Gluecks conferred about it.
A. Yes, I have spoken to Gluecks about the fact that I must
have more inmates for work. If my request would have been
fulfilled, not so many would have been executed. Of course I
was interested in getting as much manpower as possible.
Q. It wasn’t because you were interested in saving anybody's
[Page 1591]
life, but only because you wanted more labor, wasn’t it?
A. Yes, at first I only thought of getting more labor. I
knew that I had to have more inmates.
Use of Concentration Camp Labor in I.G. Farben Plants
Q. I would like to take up the case of labor in the I.G.
Farben industries.
A. You mean the concentration camp inmates?
Q. Yes. When did you first have anything to do with inmates
who worked for I.G. Farben?
A. I really cannot tell you that. Once per week Gluecks came
to me, usually in Berlin, or when I was out in the plants I
went to his office; then he told me that such and such
requests are here and we discussed them. The requests that
had been granted were then dealt with by Gluecks. He gave
instructions to the camp commanders which had to furnish the
inmates. The camp commanders which had to furnish the
inmates. The camp commanders were permitted to furnish these
inmates only if the armament industries had available
lodgings, food supplies, and medical care for them.
Q. Let me refresh you a little on these specified remarks.
Commandant of Auschwitz, Hoess, attended at least one
conference which dealt with labor for I.G. Farben, and
present at this conference were Pohl, yourself, Frank of
your office, Gluecks, and Hoess.
A. When Hoess was in Berlin later on — he was a deputy of
Gluecks — he was present also, of course. I have always
seen him there.
Q. And you had already ordered that a preference be given
to I.G. Farben industries over all other plants of the
armament industry in furnishing concentration camp labor;
this was on the order of Himmler.
A. No, for the time being I do not remember. Perhaps if you
will tell me where these inmates were to be employed. Do you
mean the large Buna Werke near Auschwitz?
Q. Yes, tell me about that.
A. The large Buna Werke in Auschwitz — Himmler was present
there himself. It was a giant plant with 40,000 foreign
workers and inmates employed there. That is true. Himmler
had repeatedly inquired about it, and asked me how things
were there, and said that we were to see to it that enough
inmates were furnished so that the job got finished.
Previously, I had thought of I.G. Farben as a whole, but now
I remember this particular plant in Auschwitz.
[Page 1592]
Q. But what I have stated is correct, they did have a
preference?
A. No, only this one plant was involved.
Q. And how many inmates did you furnish these Buna Werke?
A. I cannot say. I cannot give an exact figure of how many
were employed there, there were thousands of them, but how
many exactly I don’t know. I have told you already that I
have seen this construction site repeatedly. The engineers
told me that there were at least 30,000 to 40,000 people
employed there but how many of this total included inmates I
don’t know.
Q. If Hoess says that as many as 20,000 were furnished, what
would you say?
A. That is quite possible. I told you there were about
40,000 altogether.
Q. When I.G. Farben sent a commission of its representatives
to visit Auschwitz, did they first come to you?
A. No. Hoess knew the managers too. I believe they were in
frequent contact. I have visited that construction site
twice.
But these were all the I.G. Farben officials I knew. They
were all there when I visited the site, and I believe they
were all from I.G. Farben.
Q. And what is your best estimate as to the number of
inmates furnished I.G. Farben as laborers from these camps?
A. that is very hard for me to say. I have to remember the
11 main concentration camps which were later on — every one
of these camps had approximately 50 to 80 labor camps,
outside labor camps. That means that there were 800 outside
labor camps, and how many I.G. Farben had I just don’t know.
Q. Approaching it from another angle, what instructions or
requests did you get from Speer’s office in this connection?
A. You mean concerning this construction site?
Q. Yes, and about the priority that was to be given I.G.
Farben.
A. Nothing from Speer personally or his office, but I do
remember those from Himmler. I can say with certainty that I
did not receive any instructions from Speer, just as certain
as I can say that I did get instructions from Himmler.
Q. What was Speer’s attitude in regard to the armament
industries running in high gear and I noticed Speer mostly
in the year of 1944. His work was more noticeable in 1944.
At that time, the transfer of armament industries
underground was
[page 1593]
organized in a big way, and at that time Obergruppenfuehrer
Kammler received a giant order from Speer. 15 large
construction sites were involved to get industries
underground. That was negotiated between Kammler and Speer.
Just because of that, I remember Speer and his office,
otherwise I did not have much to do with him.
Q. Of the inmates who were employed in the armament
industries, for instance the assignment for I.G. Farben, who
received the benefit of such labor? Were the inmates paid
wages, was the SS paid anything, or who benefited?
A. These plants had to take upon themselves the obligation
to feed, lodge, and give them medical care. Then the plants
had to give the inmates the additional food ration for heavy
workers, and also they had to give them premiums for doing
good work — no money but the most industrious one got chits
which could be used for purchases in the canteen. Then they
got special food at times, such as potato salad. The plants
had to pay their wages, which were equivalent to the wages
of a normal worker, to the Reich.
Q. To the Reich Treasury of the SS?
A. To the Reich Treasury, not to the SS.
Q. What was the channel for these payments?
A. The payments were made in this manner. The armament
plants paid the money. I have only seen the statistics which
Maurer kept in the Amtsgruppe D. The monthly amounts were
listed, and the plants paid the amounts to the AMT IV, of
which Gluecks was the administrative agency. From there they
were paid to the Reich Treasury. The last statistics which I
saw were kept for one budget year, and they began on 1 April
1944 until February 1945. The statistics showed the amount
of 120,000,000 RM.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
German Firms Which Used Concentration Camp Labor
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 7 June 1946, 1400-1615, by Lt.
Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., IGD. Also present:
Joseph Maier, Interpreter; Mabel A. Lesser,
Reporter.
[Page 1593]
Q. After your first meeting with Speer in 1943 on the labor
problems how often would you see him thereafter?
A. Perhaps two or three times, on which occasions I
discussed other matters with him, for instance, the
providing of wood for the construction of barracks.
[Page 1594]
Q. How often did you communicate with him by phone or
letter?
A. I had very, very little to do with Speer altogether.
Q. Were you always able to meet his demands for labor?
A. We never received any requests from the office of Speer
directly because we received them from the individual firms.
But it did happen that his subordinate, Saur, called up and
suggested that more inmates be sent to this or that firm.
Q. What were the names of the firms?
A. There were thousands of firms. All the armament firms
that were in Germany came with their requests to us. Whether
it was the Steel Works down to the last factories, they came
with requests to us.
Q. I want the names of the principal firms.
A. The names of the main firms, as far as I recall them,
were: Heinkel, Messerschmitt, Salzgitter, Brabag-A.G., but
there were many, many more.
Q. How about Siemens-Schuchert?
A. I do not recall, that question I wish to leave open.
Q. I.G. Farben?
A. Yes, the I.G. Farben people had the Buna works in
Auschwitz.
Q. Krupp?
A. Yes, the Krupps had the Berta works in Breslau.
Q. Hermann Goering Werke?
A. The Salzgitter firm is a part of the Hermann Goering
Werke.
Q. What about Hermann Goering Werke Coal Mines?
A. I do not recall anything about that. I recall that I saw
the Salzgitter Werke and I saw the Berta Werke of Krupp's.
Q. Perhaps it will help you to recall if I mention Dr. Henie
of the Hermann Goering Coal Works at Brescze, who, with
permission, visited Auschwitz every year and who worked
2,000 inmates from that camp.
A. Yes, I recall him, that is quite true. Yes, there was a
labor camp.
Q. Perhaps you will recall more about Siemens-Schuchert if I
ask you about an agreement between yourself and Maurer of
your Division D(II).
A. Where should that have been?
Q. I am not sure of the location but it was an arrangement
made with your agreement.
A. It is entirely possible but I cannot say anything
definite at
[Page 1595]
this moment. Perhaps it will come to me later. The SS was a
tremendous organization and I do not recall the details at
this moment. It is entirely possible, however, that an
agreement was made.
Q. Then on a more general basis can you tell us about the
problem in 1944 which arose after 100,000 inmates had been
promised for labor in Landsberg and Muehldorf and their
complex of camps in southern areas and about which Speer
complained to you that your Division D was unwilling to
furnish these workers?
A. They could not have delivered so many inmates. Where
should they take these 100,000 inmates from? I know about
Landsberg and Muehldorf; I was once in Muehldorf myself.
There were two huge subterranean warehouses which Speer had
established there and in both places there were labor camps
which had been filled by inmates from Dachau, I believe. but
I do not know about sending 100,000 inmates to these places
because there were only 30,000 inmates in Dachau. I do not
know how large the labor camps there were actually. The
labor camp in Muehldorf was rather large. I do not know
anything about the one in Landsberg. I was not there.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Himmler’s Desire to Save Jews for Bargaining in Peace
Negotiations
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 7 June 1946, 1400-1615, by Lt.
Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., IGD. Also present:
Joseph Maier, Interpreter; Mabel A. Lesser,
Reporter.
[Page 1595]
Q. Do you know what caused Himmler to issue the order, late
in 1944, to cease the exterminations? [Document referred to
did not form part of prosecution case as finally prepared
and hence is not published in this series.]
A. I do not know anything about an order that Himmler was
said to have issued to cease the extermination action. I had
an order from Himmler to appear with Gluecks at his office
but that was on a different matter altogether.
Q. When and on what matter?
A. That was in March 1945; that was the last time I saw
Himmler. He asked Gluecks and me on that occasion how many
Jews were still left in concentration camps. We figured out
there must have been about 7,000 still left, I do not recall
the exact figure. It was then that he gave me the order to
visit all the concentration camp commandants to tell them
that they were not to touch any Jews any longer. This order
I executed but I never received any general order about
ceasing the extermination action.
Q. Do you mean that you were able to visit every
concentration camp after March 1945?
A. This was my order and as far as I could I visited every
camp. It was my instruction to tell every commandant
personally about this order that Himmler gave me.
[page 1596]
Q. What you mean to say is, every camp that had not been
liberated or overrun?
A. When I am referring to concentration camps I mean the 11
concentration camps that were under my jurisdiction. Of
course I did not visit all the concentration camps. They
were too numerous.
Q. Let us have the names of the 11 camps in your
jurisdiction.
A. To be exact, I visited the commandants of the following
nine concentration camps: Neuengamme, Oranienburg, Gross-
Rosen, Auschwitz, Flossenburg, Buchenwald, Dachau,
Mauthausen, and Bergen-Belsen. The other two, Stuffhof and
Schirmeck, had been overrun by Allied Forces and I could not
visit their commandants any longer.
Q. How many Jews did you find in the nine camps you visited?
A. I did not walk about and count the Jews there. The figure
referred to was mentioned by Gluecks, who seemed to know
about the figures better than anyone else. It seemed too
small but that was the one that was mentioned as far as I
recall.
Q. You just told us that you visited the nine camps. You
certainly didn’t go there and not find out how many Jews
there were that were to be affected by this order. What did
you find?
A. All I did was to deliver the order of Himmler.
Q. You just played postman, was that it?
A. Yes, that is true in this case. I played postman in that
instance because that seemed very important to Himmler at
the time, since Himmler was conducting certain negotiations
with Count Bernadotte of Sweden and he wanted to have things
fixed in that manner.
Q. He wanted a few Jews as pawns for bargaining purposes,
wasn’t that it?
A. Yes, that is true. That was my impression as well as
Gluecks, — that he wanted to have them for bargaining
purposes in the peace negotiations.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Composition and Activities of “Himmler’s Friends”
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 8 June 1946, 1030-1230, by Lt.
Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., IGD. Also present:
Dr. Joseph Maier, Interpreter; Charles J.
Gallagher, Reporter.
Q. You have mentioned dealings with Ohlendorf. Will you
elaborate on what particulars you dealt with Ohlendorf, or
had contact with him?
[Page 1597]
A. Whenever I met Ohlendorf it was only within that special
circle of Friends of Himmler's. I never looked him up in an
official capacity.
Q. What were the occasions when you met with Ohlendorf?
A. Every month the circle of Friends of Himmler’s got
together. There were about thirty persons present and
Ohlendorf was among them. I say, these were the occasions on
which I got together with him.
Q. Where were these meetings?
A. Usually in the House of Aviators in Berlin.
Q. When were these meetings? What time of the day, and how
long would they last?
A. They usually started at 7:30 in the evening and would
last until about ten or ten-thirty, when people began to go
away.
Q. How large was the average attendance?
A. The average attendance was twenty persons. Sometimes
thirty persons. I don’t know all the people that belonged to
that particular circle of Friends of Himmler's. I just saw
the people that happened to be there.
Q. Did the same people attend every month?
A. That varied. At one meeting one fellow would not appear,
and another fellow would appear at another meeting. That
varied, and I was not there either every time.
Q. You mentioned before that economic and business leaders
often attended these monthly dinners for the friends of
Himmler's. Who, for instance?
A. The majority of people who attended were economic and
business leaders. Among them were Baron von Schroeder,
Lindemann who I beleive was the president of the German
Economic Chamber, Emil Helfferich from Hamburg, Ritter von
Halt, the successor of the Reichsport Leader Tschammer-
Osten, Professor Meyer of the Dresdener Bank in Berlin, and
Herr Flick, the noted central German industrialist.
Q. Were there other industrial or business leaders at these
dinners who you can now recall?
A. Dr. Binge, who was a representative of a large concern. I
am not sure whether that was Siemens. Yes, I seem to recall
that he was the Director General of Siemens. Then there was
one Rosterig of Kastel --Harthein, but which firm he
represented I don’t know. One Herr Loscher, formerly of the
Reich Finance Ministry, and subsequently a leader of an
economic concern either subsidized or established by the
Reich Government.
Q. Then you can think about those and give us other names
[Page 1598]
later. Now as you talked to Ohlendorf what did you usually
discuss?
A. It was usually the case that we of the SS would spread
among the group, and talk to the other guests. We would not
sit together, you see. Thus it happened that Ohlendorf and I
did not talk very much to each other.
Q. Was this habit of spreading SS representatives among the
other guests a prearranged matter?
A. Yes, it was. We were told not to sit together. The
seating arrangement at the table was such that the SS was
spread among the other guests. Himmler had his personal
guests sit near him, and we were supposed to entertain them.
Q. What were you told to discuss with the guests?
A. We did not have any definite instructions as to what to
talk to them about. We were simply asked to entertain them.
Q. Who among the SS approached these leaders for financial
support?
A. The manager of this affair was Brigadefuehrer Kranefuss.
He issued the invitations on behalf of the Reichsfuehrer SS
Himmler, and even I received an invitation every time. He
arranged the seating order around the table, and it was he
who discussed all the internal matters with the economic
leaders there. They were not restricted to these gatherings
for their talks or discussions. That is, the economic
leaders were not restricted to these social gatherings.
These activities must have taken place outside as well.
Q. I am concerned with the manner in which these industrial
and business leaders were approached for financial aid. What
do you know about that?
A. I would not know anything about this. All of this was
attended to by Kranefuss. How he did it I do not know.
Q. When did you learn about it, after the money came into
the treasury of the SS?
A. I never received the money; that was received by the
personal staff, that is Wolff.
Q. You mean to tell us you knew how the money was spent, and
not where it came from?
A. I have no idea.
Q. Yes, you do.
A. I am telling you the truth. They never came through my
hands. Everything was attended to by Obergruppenfuehrer
Wolff, who had his own treasurer.
Q. You are not stupid, and you were well informed in these
[Page 1599]
matters. You probably had a better insight of the SS
organization’s financial problems and its financial reserves
than any other man.
A. That is true.
Q. Now tell us what were the amounts in a general way that
were received from these industrial leaders, and what was
done with them?
A. I must say under oath I do not know anything about the
amount of money given by these industrial leaders. All I
know is that Brigadefuehrer Kranefuss, and
Obergruppenfuehrer Wolff, and Baron von Schroeder, that
among these three men all things were discussed. One could
observe from the whole discussion that developed between
Kranefuss and Schroeder, that they were on very good terms
with each other, and they settled these matters among each
other.
Q. How much money was turned over to Hitler out of this
fund?
A. I have no idea. I do not believe that Hitler received any
money from these funs connected with the personnel
administration of Obergruppenfuehrer Wolff, who did not
permit anybody to take any look at it.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Disposition of Concentration Camp Inmates as Allied Armies
Pushed into Germany
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 10 June 1946, 1400-1700, by Lt.
Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., IGD. Also present:
Richard Sonnenfeldt, Interpreter; Charles J.
Gallagher, Reporter.
[Page 1599]
Q. Was there any special order given by Himmler to you as to
the disposition of the inmates of concentration camps that
were not as yet overrun by the Allied Armies?
A. In the Fall of 1944 Himmler gave a written order that in
case a concentration camp was threatened by the approaching
enemy, the particular concentration camp should come under
the jurisdiction of the local Higher SS and Police Leader,
and that then the Higher SS and Police Leader of that region
should decide at his own discretion what disposition should
be made of the inmates.
A. And then what happened?
A. I do not know whether Himmler gave the directives to
Kaltenbrunner beyond that.
Q. What was done under that order?
A. According to the provisions of this order the Higher SS
and
[Page 1600]
Police Leader took all measures necessary in the evacuation
of these camps, and for the treatment of the inmates.
Q. You mean they were to do that, didn’t you?
A. They were to do that, and I give my opinion that they did
it.
Q. How long did Himmler’s order to this effect remain in
force?
A. I never heard that it was rescinded. I remember that
Gruppenfuehrer Katzmann evacuated his camps up in the north,
and later Obergruppenfuehrer Schmauser evacuated Auschwitz,
and Gross-Rosen. I remember particularly towards the end I
still received teletypes from Martin, who was Higher SS and
Police Leader of this region, what to do with the
concentration camp in Flossenburg, and I was still in
Berlin, I remember that.
Q. What did he do?
A I not know. I left Berlin shortly after that, and all
further connections ceased.
Q. What did you tell him to do.
A. I told him that in accordance with the orders of Himmler,
he himself would have to know what to do, because I in
Berlin could not possibly judge what the conditions were
down there.
Q. You say you do not recall any rescission of this Himmler
order.
A. No.
Q. Is that what you want to swear to?
A. Yes, I swear to that. I never heard of Himmler either
altering or rescinding this order.
Q. You know it was recalled at least twice, don’t you?
A. No, I do not know that.
Q. How do you account for the order from Himmler to you for
extermination of all prisoners in the concentration camps,
which order you attempted to destroy, but failed to do so?
A. I do not remember any such order.
Q. You do not deny it existed?
A. Well, I do not remember having seen such an order.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement
B XVIII. Gottlieb Berger*
The Fate of Red Cross Parcels for War Prisoners
Excerpts from Testimony of Gottlieb Berger, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 19 October 1945, 1450-1615, by Lt.
Col. Smith Brookhart, IGD. Captain Mark Priceman,
Interpreter; Todd Mitchell, Reporter.
* Gottlieb Berger was Chief of Central Office of SS; SS
Obergruppenfuehrer and General of Waffen-SS; Inspector
General of Prisoners of War; Head of Policy Division of
Reich Ministry for Eastern Territories. See also Document
3723-PS, vol. VI, p. 460.]
Q. Will you tell us the circumstances under which you were
ordered on or about the first of October 1944, to take
charge of prisoners of war affairs under the Reichsfuehrer
SS Himmler?
A. On the 29th of September 1944, I was ordered to the
general headquarters in East Prussia. This surprised me,
for the last time I had been there on the 19th of
September Himmler explained to me that he had taken charge
of the administration of the POW's, and that he would put
me in charge of this activity. On that evening of the 29th
I had to go with him to see Hitler in order to be
introduced to him. I asked him then why I should be
selected for this task as I did not feel qualified for the
job of a guardian of prisoners, and he told me that it was
essential that the prisoner of war organization be kept
separate from the concentration camps and that no
confusion be permitted to take place. He did not want to
go into detail as he did not have a clear picture himself
at that time, and he said he would have to discuss it with
Field Marshal Keitel.
Q. Then what happened?
A. And so that evening I went over to Hitler’s place.
Himmler came along and, finally, sometime between midnight
and one in the morning I was received by Hitler, who
immediately began by reprimanding me because he had been
under the impression that I had been in charge of this
administration for some time.
Q. What did he say, and what did you say?
A. Hitler was then suffering from the effects of the
attempt against his life. He was in poor physical
condition, could hardly get up by himself, pus was coming
out of his right ear, and he was extremely irritable. I
could not possibly repeat now the exact wording of the
conversation that took place.
Q. State it in substance.
A. As I said, he was extremely irritable. He said that
scandalous
[Page 1534]
conditions prevailed in some of the camps for prisoners of
war, that up to fifteen tons of food products had
accumulated in some of those camps, and that he had
information from officials who had been captured in the
uprising in Czechoslovakia to the effect that airborne
landings were impending, and we were taking the risk of
permitting the landing troops to gain control over those
stores of food supplies — food reserves. At this point
Himmler intervened, and he suggested that if these food
reserves were to be removed expeditiously that the best we
could do would be to assign them to the NSV, the National
Socialist Welfare organization. Hitler said that he would
go along if this was in compliance with international
commitments — he used some such term — and in any case,
he told me, that by the second of October I would have to
issue instructions according to which these food reserves
were to be moved within fourteen days, and that whatever
remained after that period would be lost to the prisoners
of war organization. He also told me that I had been the
one who had always been in favor of fair treatment for the
eastern prisoners of war, and he said now was the time for
me to accept the more unpleasant side of my task of
handling them, and, in any case, he wanted to see a copy
of the order that I was to issue. As I said, this whole
field was entirely new to me, and I didn’t know at that
time what sort of food products were concerned. When
riding back with Himmler I asked him about them and only
then I learned from him that these were mercy parcels for
prisoners of war which had been transmitted through the
Red Cross.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Who Was Responsible for the Concentration Camps
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 10 June 1946, 1400-1700, by Lt.
Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., IGD. Also present:
Richard Sonnenfeldt, Interpreter; Charles J.
Gallagher, Reporter.
[Page 1600]
Q. Let me read some of Kaltenbrunner’s testimony. He was
being questioned about the deaths that occurred in
concentration camps, and this question was put: “Because
they continued to be done through 1943, 1944, and 1945, and
until the Allied Armies overran the concentration camps, and
through those years Kaltenbrunner was Chief of the RSHA
which had them in charge.
"A. No, I was never in charge of any such, but orders were
generally like such in my statement in London, that Himmler
[Page 1601]
or Pohl, and no commander of any concentration camp on the
part of Germany can ever say he ever received the slightest
order from me.”
A. I can give you exactly the same answer. No concentration
camp commandant ever received the slightest order from me,
either written or oral. The WVHA [Economics and
Administration Main Office (of SS), in charge of
concentration camps and headed by Pohl.] did not have the
slightest jurisdiction over the prisoners. Any such order
could only come from Himmler, or from the RSHA, [Reich
Security Main Office, headed by Kaltenbrunner.] from
Mueller, head of Amt IV. I do not know whether Kaltenbrunner
knew about it in every case, but at any rate any such orders
never emanated from the WVHA, or from me.
Q. You and Kaltenbrunner contradict each other at almost
every turn.
A. Well, I am telling you the truth.
Q. Kaltenbrunner says that in all his dealings with you he
never referred to the concentration camps.
A. That is an error. I already testified to this fact, and I
am insisting on it that I wrote quite a number of letters to
Kaltenbrunner to release several prisoners and that cannot
be changed. Those letters would be entirely surplusage if I
myself ever had the power to take them out, because would
have simply to say, “Take them out.”
Q. You stand on your oral testimony that when you wanted to
deal with any one about taking a prisoner out of a camp, you
took it up with Kaltenbrunner, is that right?
A. Yes, I insist on that absolutely, and I will not change
it. The whole thing is so clear that any error is absolutely
out of the question. Some of my collaborators, no doubt,
would be in a position to testify whether or not I had
authority to release prisoners. Loerner would know that, and
Hoess perhaps.
Q. Here you make out Kaltenbrunner as a liar when he is on
trial for his life when he gave this testimony?
A. It is not true insofar as he refers to me. That is
absolutely not true.
Q. Kaltenbrunner says if he can be confronted by you he will
say that you are the responsible person always.
A. Please confront me with him.
Q. In connection with the Jewish extermination program,
Kaltenbrunner said this: “During my time” — meaning his
time with the RSHA — “I have repeatedly opposed such
persecution of the Jews; particularly in view of those
reasons I have declined to take charge of this office.” What
do you know about that? He said further, “The responsibility
rests with Himmler, Mueller, and Pohl.”
[Page 1602]
A. In this Kaltenbrunner makes only one mistake. He put in
the name of Pohl instead of Kaltenbrunner, and I will tell
you why. If I oppose anything, that means that I have
something to do with it; how can I possible oppose something
I did not have anything to do with?
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Widespread Knowledge of Conditions in Concentration Camps
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 13 June 1946, 1400-1600, by Lt.
Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., IGD. Also present:
Richard Sonnenfeldt, Interpreter; Rose W. Cook,
Reporter.
Q. Kaltenbrunner has told the Tribunal that there were only
a handful of people in the WVHA who had any control and knew
anything about concentration camps. These are his exact
words as they appear at page 7617 of the English transcript
of the trial:
[Page 1604]
"A. there were just a few people in the WVHA who knew how
things really were in concentration camps.
"Q. Now as far as my question is concerned, you were
speaking about a handful of men who did not belong to this
group?
"A. No, I did not. This handful was Himmler, Pohl, Gluecks,
and Mueller and the camp commanders.”
A. Well, that is complete nonsense. I described to you how
these were handled in the WHVA. As for instance, in the case
of the use of textiles and turning-in of valuables, from
Gluecks and Loerner right on down to the last little clerk
they all must have known what went on in the concentration
camps, and it is complete nonsense for him to speak of just
a handful of men; and if it was like that in my department,
naturally, it was exactly the same in his. Just to
illustrate to you what I mean, when I went around to the
different camps in March as the representative of Himmler, I
came to Bergen-Belsen and found terrible conditions there.
An epidemic of typhus had broken out, and there were
mountains of dead people all over the camp, and I tried to
institute emergency measures in order to stop the epidemic,
and although I really couldn’t do that, I told the Camp
Commandant, “Don’t let anybody else come to this camp.” then
there were seven or eight thousand Jews there, and I wanted
them to be sent to Theresienstadt to get them out of there,
and I dispatched a telegram at once to the RSHA, asking them
to have these Jews transferred. Later when I got to Berlin I
got on the telephone and I remember I called there three or
four times every day, and I don’t remember any more whether
it was Mueller or Eichmann that I talked to in order to have
these people moved. That really shows that I, for instance,
had no authority to move people and that this was a matter
for the RSHA. Now these things happened and they are facts
and there is no use to deny them or lie about them. They
just are there and there is nothing you can do about that.
Q. All right, why didn’t you tell us about this before when
I asked you what conditions you found when you were making
your trips in early March, and when you denied finding any
such conditions? I asked you about nine camps you told us
you visited, and you said you didn’t observe anything. What
did you see at the other camps, dead people also?
A. Well it is not that I tried to hide this from you, but I
didn’t think you asked me about it. Well, in Bergen-Belsen,
you couldn’t help noticing it, it was very evident, and if I
didn’t tell you about it, it is because I thought you didn’t
ask me about it, or maybe I
[Page 1605]
didn’t understand it. I have no interest in not telling you
everything I know. It may be I forgot it for the moment, but
I will gladly admit it. The only other things I remember
about this trip were in Mauthausen. When I arrived there, I
saw many sick people there and many of them limping around
and I asked Ziereis what medical facilities he had in the
camp because these people were not very well cared for.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Number of Concentration Camp Inmates Available as Laborers
Excerpts from Testimony of Oswald Pohl, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 13 June 1946, 1400-1600, by Lt.
Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., IGD. Also present:
Richard Sonnenfeldt, Interpreter; Rose W. Cook,
Reporter.
[Page 1605]
Q. Let’s turn now to the figure you gave us previously as
to the number of inmates of concentration camps who were
available and capable of being used as laborers. You have
estimated that some two hundred to two hundred fifty
thousand were used by the armament industry?
A. Yes, this figure is not complete by any means because it
refers only to those that were loaned out to the armament
industry but does not refer to those who were used in our
own armament factories. This number of two hundred to two
hundred fifty thousand refers only to those who were used
for purposes of armament in the labor camps and in the
"Aussenlager,” which were run exclusively for labor
purposes, and does not include those who may have been used
for the same purpose inside of the concentration camps where
industries may have had their own small establishments.
Q. How many were there in this latter group?
A. Perhaps it will be easier if I do it another way. The
next thing I would like to talk about are construction
brigades. In all construction brigades and armament projects
inside the concentration camps a further maximum number of
one hundred thousand were used, so that I would be inclined
to believe that the total was somewhere around 250,000, but
not more than that number.
Q. How were the others out of the total of 470 thousand,
which would make 120,000, unemployed?
A. The remainder of 120,000 I cannot specify in exact
percentages, but I believe that it would be a fair
assumption to make that roughly 40,000 of them were used for
the upkeep of the camps, and for necessary work inside the
camps to keep them running. A further 40,000 of them
probably were in quarantine at any one time and at least
40,000 of them upon the sick list at any one time, and
probably the number of the people on the sick list was
higher than that but I can only give you this approximation.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
XXIII. Hermann Reinecke*
Branding and Other Inhumane Treatment of Russian Prisoners
of War
Excerpts from Testimony of Hermann Reinecke, taken
at Nurnberg, Germany, 23 October 1945, 1045-1235,
by Col. John H. Amen, IGD. Also present: Lt.
Daniel F. Margolies; General Erwin Lahousen
(German P/W); Richard W. Sonnenfeldt, Interpreter;
Anne Daniels, Court Reporter.
* Hermann Reinecke was a General of Infantry (Lt. Gen.);
Chief of the General Office of OKW; Chief of the NS
Political Guidance Staff, OKW; Honorary member of the
Special Senate of the People’s Tribunal. Reinecke was known
as one of the most Nazified of the General generals. In
August 1944 he was one of the judges in the trial of
participants in the 20 June 1944 attempt on Hitler’s life.
BY LT. MARGOLIES:
Q. I have here document R-94. The order deals with the
marking of Russian prisoners of war. [Document referred to
did not form part of prosecution case as finally prepared
and hence is not published in this series.]
A. Yes. (The witness examined the document.) I know this
order, and, as I said yesterday, it deals with tattooing. It
was issued by General Graevenitz at the time, and as soon as
we learned about it, it was recalled.
Q. Who is the order signed by?
A. It is signed by the Chief of the Prisoner of War
Department, General Graevenitz.
Q. On the order it states --
A. (Interposing) It was always signed “By Order of the Chief
of the Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht.”
I know this exactly. Graevenitz issued this in July of 1942,
and either the Chief of the Department, the Chief of the
Section, or the Chief of the Prisoner of War Department
would sign it.
He personally had to recall this order; he had to issue
another order to cancel this one.
Q. When an order is signed by the Chief of the OKW, does he
know about the order before it is issued?
A. Normally, an order is signed by the Chief of the OKW --
such an order would have to be previously approved and
concurred in by the Chief of the OKW. However, I remember
exactly that this order here was issued without either his
or my approval, and thus it had to be recalled later.
I don’t know any more exactly; you would have to ask
Graevenitz about it. I believe that this order was issued
after a general directive had been issued by Keitel that
prisoners of war would have to be marked in some way.
Q. Well, do you remember when the order was recalled?
[Page 1607]
A. Yes; I know that exactly because all of us insisted on
that as soon as we heard about it. I can swear to that.
Q. Well, do you remember discussing this order with Field
Marshal Keitel?
A. If I remember correctly, a general order was given by
Keitel that they would have to be marked or identified in
some way, and that, of course, was because of the many
escapes that took place. Those people would get away from
the camps and then put on civilian clothes, and it would be
impossible to identify them.
I think this suggestion was made at the instigation of the
police. I believe that this is the order that resulted.
(Referring to the document) — Yes, that is it.
BY COLONEL AMEN:
Q. Your recollection has been refreshed about the meeting
with Lahousen?
A. Yes. I was very much moved and very much stirred
yesterday that some of my answers were doubted. I can only
repeat again that I had nine departments under me, and one
can’t remember all these things after four years.
Q. Well, you can certainly remember that there were many
conferences concerning the orders for the mistreatment of
Russian prisoners of war.
A. Of course, most of those conferences or discussions took
place with the Prisoner of War Department.
Q. No, but you personally attended many conferences where
those orders were discussed?
A. Of course, that is difficult to say, but it is possible.
Q. Well, I will refresh your recollection about it, I think,
in a very little while. Meanwhile, here is document 1519-PS.
[Circular regarding treatment of Soviet Prisoners of War.
See Vol. IV, p. 58.] I ask you to read it and see if that
helps to refresh your recollection on any of these points.
(The document was submitted to the witness.)
A. Of September 1941? Oh, yes. This, then, must have been of
consequence. I mean, the meeting must have taken place
shortly before this. I guess that must have been in
connection with the trip that I took to the front in August
of that year. I noted all those things, and then I must have
said, “Now listen, we can’t work things like that,” because
the commandants of the camps were complaining.
[Page 1608]
Q. What were the commandants of the camps complaining about?
A. Well, just about this. Those were camps that were under
the authority of the Army; they were not under us. I didn’t
have any camps there. They complained about the attitude of
the Police, and they wanted the same thing that we wanted,
namely, they wanted to have all these things done outside
the camps.
Q. Who is “they"?
A. By “they” I mean the commandants of the camps, and of
course us too. If I remember correctly, in August we had not
received any Russian prisoners of war in the home area.
Q. Where were they?
A. They were all with the Army, and that is where the orders
were sent. I believe the order that I was shown yesterday
had the initials of Warlimont on it and I believe it was
sent to the Army.
Q. So what?
A. What I mean to say about that is that these orders were
sent from the Leadership Staff of the Armed Forces to the
Army, and then we only saw it much later. Otherwise, we
would have issued this order on the 8th of September 1941
very much earlier.
Q. Well, the first order was issued on 16 June, was it not?
A. But not about this subject, I don’t believe. There is one
mention here of the 26th of June 1941 and — oh, yes, there
is one up here of the 16th of June addressed to the
Commander of the District. Only Breier could answer this. I
was in the sanitarium at Dresden at that time, and therefore
it is impossible for me to answer these questions.
This is also an order that was issued without my
collaboration, because otherwise it would have to say “AWA”
[General Office of the Armed Forces].
Q. That is a lot of nonsense. Now, do you remember document
number 502-PS [Vol. III, p. 422] which had to do with the
killing of the prisoners outside of the camp? Do you
remember that order?
A. You mean an order from us?
Q. Never mind who it was from. I said do you remember the
order that I showed you yesterday, dated 17 July 1941, about
killing prisoners outside of the camp? This order right
here. (The document was submitted to the witness.)
A. You mean what I saw yesterday?
Q. I say do you remember it, yes or no?
[Page 1609]
A. I don’t remember it; it was not issued by us.
Q. That isn’t true either. Read the first line. Read it out
loud. (Whereupon the witness read as instructed.) Doesn’t
that say that the activation of commandos will take place in
accordance with the agreement of the Chief of the Security
Police and Security Service, and the Supreme Command of the
Armed Forces?
A. Yes, that is possible; yes.
Q. Is that what it says, “possible"? That is what it says,
isn’t it. Read it again.
A. Yes, of course.
Q. Then don’t sit there and tell me that the OKW didn’t have
anything to do with it.
A. I didn’t say that. I said that I myself didn’t have
anything to do with it.
Q. Of course you yourself did. What position did you occupy
at that time?
A. I was always Chief of the General Office of the Armed
Forces.
Q. Yes, don’t tell me you didn’t have anything to do with
it.
A. Well, as far as this agreement is concerned, it is
possible — well, maybe Colonel Breier made it. That is
possible, he was competent. Or perhaps the Abwehr, they were
also competent in these matters. However, we all protested.
Q. Don’t you know that you are responsible for everything
which they did?
A. Of course, yes.
Q. Well then, why do you keep sitting there telling me that
you didn’t have anything to do with that?
A. I don’t say that. All that I say that I can remember
today is that this agreement with the Police was made by the
OKW or my department.
Q. Do you remember taking 160 officers down to Dachau at
Hitler’s request?
A. Oh yes. You mean German officers?
Q. Yes.
A. Yes.
Q. And that was when?
A. Well, that was in the nature of a course, and it must
have been in the spring of 1939, or just about at that time.
Q. And how did you come to make that trip?
A. That was a course, and I believe that it was a course
which took place in Munich. The regimental commanders of the
Army,
[Page 1610]
the commandants of the large ships of the Navy, and the
commandants of the Air Force were sent there for a course.
Well, I put in a day there because at that time there were
already rumors among the German people that everything was
not all right in the concentration camps, and I made the
suggestion to Keitel to ask Himmler to let us see one of
those camps. He then arranged this trip to Dachau, which he
conducted personally.
Q. Who conducted personally?
A. Himmler.
Q. Was Hitler there?
A. No. And then, after that, in the afternoon, we inspected
a china factory which belonged to the camp. Then later we
saw an SS regiment in Munich performing combat exercises.
Q. How were the 160 officers selected?
A. The different branches of the armed forces selected them
for this detail.
Q. Were they General Staff officers?
A. No; everything was mixed up. They were with the troops,
and as far as I remember the Army sent regimental
commanders.
Q. And then after the inspection you made a speech, didn’t
you?
A. Well, this is very difficult. I really don’t know any
more what I said. He spoke as our host, and I believe I then
replied.
Q. And did you state that the results of the inspection were
good or bad?
A. It was good, and we all were very much astonished that it
was so good.
Q. And that is not true either, according to all of the
officers who were there that we have been able to locate.
A. Well, I can only remember that we found it in such shape
that all of us were astonished.
Q. Why were you astonished?
A. Because there was a general rumor among the people that
these concentration camps were terrible. That was the reason
why we went there; that is, to look at it ourselves.
Q. Did you see any gas chambers there?
A. No; no.
Q. You found everything was fine; is that right?
A. Well, I remember everything we say was all right anyway.
I remember that we started out by seeing a relief map of the
[Page 1611]
whole thing, and then we started out to visit the barracks.
Everything was nice and clean, and also the prisoners.
Q. And that is what you said in your speech afterwards?
A. That it was good?
Q. Yes
A. Yes
Q. Is that what you said in the speech?
A. Yes; we were content at that time.
Q. And that is what you said in the speech?
A. It is possible.
Q. Anything is possible. Is that what you want to sear to?
Is that what you said in your speech?
A. I remember that he was our host and we were all together
in the officers' quarters. He greeted us, and then I got up
and answered him. I really can’t remember what I said, but I
do know that we found that those rumors that were going
around among the German people were not true.
Q. You understand that you are still under oath?
A. Yes. I remember that I praised very much the exercises of
that SS regiment that we watched. They were actually
shooting with live ammunition.
Q. I am not at all interested in that.
A. Well, of course, it is terribly difficult to say today
what I said in a speech then. I can’t do that.
Q. Well, lots of other people can. I don’t know why you
shouldn’t. What do you want to swear to about what you said?
A. As far as I remember, I thanked him because he had
conducted us around and shown us all those things.
Q. All what things?
A. That we had seen the camp and this manufacturing of china
in Allach.
Q. Never mind the china; I am only interested in the camp.
A. But I am certain that I did not talk about details.
Q. Conditions in the camp? Do you want to swear that you
said that you found those conditions to be good?
A. It is terribly difficult to say now what I said then. The
only thing that I can remember is that we were very
astonished how good everything was and that it was in order.
(Erwin Lahousen entered the Interrogation Room at this
point. [Maj. Gen. Erwin Lahousen, who had served as an
assistant to Admiral Canaris in the Abwehr (Intelligence
Service), was one of several Abwehr officers who opposed the
Nazi designs. At the trial he testified for the prosecution.
See Affidavit A, vol. VIII. p. 587.])
Q. Are you acquainted with this gentleman who has just come
in?
A. Yes; I remember that this must be Lahousen — Colonel
Lahousen, yes.
[Page 1612]
Q. I will ask him to see if he can’t help to refresh your
memory about this conference which took place, at which you
were both present, and at which the Russian prisoner of war
situation was discussed.
A. Yes.
General Lahousen: Reinecke, we are concerned here with the
conference which, according to my memory — and as I also
stated here — took place very shortly after the beginning
of the Russian campaign. You were presiding over it.
According to my memory, the following men were present:
Outside of myself there was Obergruppenfuehrer Mueller of
the Reich Security Main Office; the representative of that
section, or rather, of the Prisoner of War Department — I
can’t remember his name any more, but it was not General
Graevenitz.
Colonel Amen: Colonel Breier?
General Lahousen: Right. And perhaps there were one or two
more officers, whom I can’t remember. The subject of the
conference was the command concerning the order as to the
treatment of Russian prisoners of war. That is, as far as I
can remember it.
General Reinecke: Yes.
General Lahousen: In this conference you explained and also
gave the reasons for the measures which had led to the
extremely harsh treatment of this question. At that time I
heard, by order of my department and my superior, Admiral
Canaris — I had to present the misgivings and reservations
which the office had against this decree, or rather, against
the orders, which were in contradiction to all international
customs. [See documents 1519-PS, vol. IV, p. 58; EC-338,
vol. VII, p. 411.] I don’t mean agreement, because there was
no agreement with Russia on that subject.
As far as I remember, these reservations or this protest had
the following contents in the main:
First, the repercussions of these measures upon the morale
of the troops, which were especially and most unfavorably
influences because it happened that those executions were
carried out within sight of the troops.
Second, the unfavorable effects as far as the CIC Service
was concerned. That was because these measures violated the
most elementary confidence as far as the ranks of the
prisoners of war were concerned, and that was especially so
for certain Russian peoples as, for instance, the
Caucasians. They were horrified and put out by this.
[Page 1613]
Third, I pointed out the lunacy of the execution of these
orders or these methods, and I put this question. This
question, in the main, was addressed to Obergruppenfuehrer
Mueller, according to what opinions and what points these
executions were being carried out. That was because it was
reported to me that, for instance, prisoners who came from
the Crimea, who were Tartars, who had been circumcised
because they were Mohammedans, had been killed by the SD
commanders, who were competent in these things. That was
because they had been regarded as Jews; that is, they had
been killed because they had been regarded as Jews.
The fourth point is that because of these methods all
desertions or inclination towards desertion had been
destroyed.
Lastly, thus the will of resistance of the members of the
Read Army itself had only been increased and therefore the
opposite effect had been achieved of what had apparently
been intended, namely, that by the extermination of certain
elements regarded as the promulgators of Bolshevism, it
would kill Bolshevism.
In the discussion which started about this, Mueller told me
he only granted that the executions were not to take place
within sight of the troops, but out of their sight. He made
this compromise in a certain cynical manner. Furthermore, he
granted a certain and more defined limitation as far as the
term “contaminated by Bolshevism” was concerned. That is, a
new limitation on that term should be imposed. Outside of
that, or as far as the further course of the discussion was
concerned, Mueller addressed himself very sharply against
any relaxation of this order. He declared that we were in a
war of life and death with Bolshevism, and that the soldier
of the Red Army was not to be regarded as a soldier like the
soldiers of the Allies, but as an ideological enemy to the
death, and should be treated accordingly.
You, Mr. Reinecke, agreed with this opinion of
Obergruppenfuehrer Mueller in the main, in your conclusions,
and you again described this whole problem which I recalled
to you in very hot words when we left the conference; that
is, after the session had broken up, I mentioned the
negative result as far as my protest was concerned, and I
regretted it very much. I mentioned this to Colonel Breier -
- the Colonel Breier that you mentioned. He only shrugged
his shoulders and said, “What do you want to do? You know
Reinecke very well.”
What I pictured here from my memory is, moreover, contained
in a document which I had made for the orientation of my
chief, Admiral Canaris. I made this notation at once, and
thus everything is documented. The document is in a
collection which I
[Page 1614]
have called my collection of rarities. I have marked many of
my papers thus.
That is all.
To General Reinecke by Col. Amen:
Q. Now, do you remember the conference?
A. Yes, it must have happened something like that.
Q. Well now, don’t say “It must have happened something like
that.” Did it happen like that or didn’t it?
A. It is very difficult for me to remember particulars, but
if General Lahousen has made a notation in a document about
it --
General Lahousen: Yes.
A. — then it must have happened just as he set forth.
Q. Do you deny anything which Lahousen has just said? Answer
yes or no.
A. The only thing that I can imagine — because of my own
position I can’t imagine that I could have taken such a
radical point of view. I must have received an order from
Keitel as to that.
Q. Do you deny anything which Lahousen has just said?
A. I can’t deny it because if he noted it down at that time
-- I have nothing in writing that I can remember about that.
Q. Do you deny anything which Lahousen said? And if so,
what?
A. I say again that if he made those notations then they
must be right. However, I cannot remember that I myself took
such a radical position.
Q. But you don’t deny anything that Lahousen said or wrote
in his book? Is that correct?
A. None other than my own radical opinion. I don’t know, but
I must have said they were not my orders at the time; they
must have been there and have come from the Leadership Staff
of the Armed Forces.
Q. I don’t care whose orders they were, at the moment. I am
asking you whether you deny anything that Lahousen said, and
if so, what?
A. I can only say that I cannot agree that I should have
manifested such a radical attitude as to those things
personally.
Q. What part of it do you deny, if any?
A. I personally — and I believe General Lahousen mentioned
that I had supported Obergruppenfuehrer Mueller’s point of
view very strongly.
General Lahousen: Yes.
[Page 1615]
Q. Right. Now, do you deny that or do you admit it?
A. As I said before, it is clear that the thing happened
later, that the order was issued like that. The sentence
here, that the officers of the CIC were to participate in
it, proves that.
Q. There was never an occasion when you opposed anything
that Obergruppenfuehrer Mueller said; isn’t that a fact?
Never?
A. That I don’t really know.
Q. Well, can you remember any time when you ever opposed
anything that Mueller said?
A. I can only say again that all of us were very distressed
about this thing and how it was working out. However, it was
ordered and thus it had to be carried out.
Q. You weren’t distressed about it.
A. Yes.
Q. What did you do about it?
A. I couldn’t do anything against it.
Q. You didn’t try to do anything, did you? You have just
heard Lahousen say what you did about it, which was to
support Mueller.
A. If two different departments did not agree, then the
normal thing would have been that Admiral Canaris, as the
representative of his office, would have gone to Keitel and
told him, “It doesn’t work out like that.” And then Keitel
would have settled the difficulty.
Q. Now we will ask Lahousen about that.
General Lahousen: I want to make a statement here. That is
just what happened. Admiral Canaris had been to see Keitel
to make representations about just what had happened; that
is, about the contents of these orders: (a) as far as
international law was concerned — that is, about the
customs of international law; and (b) about the lunacy of
this order. He made very strong representations about it.
I received directives from Canaris before I went to this
conference. The purpose of that was to provide you, Mr.
Reinecke, with a golden bridge, so to speak. I was to give
you all the facts upon which to build, and I was going to
give you all the material support possible. Instead of
taking this opportunity, you relied upon Mueller.
General Reinecke: Well, the way I look at it, I must have
already received Keitel’s opinion, because I can’t imagine
anything else.
General Lahousen: Your personal position was very harsh, in
particular; it came out in the expressions which were used
at the
[Page 1616]
time and which I don’t remember exactly any more, and
therefore I can’t repeat them. However, they are in that
notation that I made in the document; that is, your personal
expressions about these questions.
To General Reinecke by Col Amen:
Q. Do you deny anything which Lahousen says?
A. It is difficult to deny it.
Q. I don’t care whether it is easy or difficult; do you or
don’t you?
A. If he remembers those things, then it must have been like
that.
General Lahousen: I can only tell the truth as to just how
it happened.
A. If he put it down in a document — at nay rate, I can’t
remember it.
Q. Then you don’t dispute it; is that right?
A. Well, if he noted it down like that, then what can I --
well, I remembered it differently.
Q. Do you dispute it or don’t you?
(Witness shrugs his shoulders.)
Don’t just shrug your shoulders; do you dispute it or don’t
you?
A. If he says it happened like that and he noted it down on
paper, then it must be correct. I myself could not fix it as
positively as all that.
Q. But you don’t dispute it?
A. No.
To General Lahousen by Col. Amen:
Q. Now, I want to ask Lahousen if it isn’t a fact that these
orders for the treatment of Russian prisoners of war were
the subject of constant discussion in the General Staff?
A. I believe yes. I don’t happen to know of any concrete
instances, but I must suppose that this subject — which had
created a terrific reaction within the armed forces — was
discussed many times at various places.
Q. And is there any question but what the reaction was a
very strong one?
A. No. I know that the reaction was especially strong from
the front; that is, especially the commanders and those in a
position of command at the front.
I have already stated in my first interrogations that
several of these commanders refused to transmit these orders
any further,
[Page 1617]
but I am sorry that I cannot name them. I remember very well
that Canaris undertook a trip at once, or at least a very
short time after this order had been issued, to see the
Supreme Commanders and to ascertain their opinions as to
this order. Then Canaris told me about this, and that is
where I derived the foundation for what I just told you.
Q. Now, what was Reinecke’s position at the time of this
conference?
A. He was the Chief of the General Office of the Armed
Forces.
Q. And what was his responsibility at that time insofar as
the prisoners of war were concerned?
A. I can’t say that positively, but I can only deduce
something from the presence of Colonel Breier, who belonged
to your Department.
General Reinecke: Yes, he did.
A. And from the fact that you presided over this conference,
I had to conclude thus, that you were concerned very much
with this question — that is, the responsibility — without
being able to say concretely just how the organization was
at that time.
Q. Well, how did Reinecke happen to be at the conference, so
far as you know?
A. He was presiding over it, and I even believe that he
called it. He called it in order to comment on and explain
these orders.
Q. So that if he suggests that he did not know anything
about these orders first-hand, that does not conform with
the facts as they appeared at the conference?
A. That is absolutely out of the question.
To General Reinecke by Col. Amen:
Q. Do you agree with that?
A. No, I don’t agree. Perhaps I may explain this again
clearly. As I said before, as far as I remember, when I came
back from the front I called this conference. All these
orders for the treatment of Russian prisoners were not given
by me, but they all came from the Leadership Staff of the
Armed Forces without my participation.
This also appears in this order — and this was after we had
issued the outlines. It says here: “The outlines given by
the OKW for the occupied areas.” That proves quite clearly
that the original order came from Keitel and the Fuehrer,
and was signed by Warlimont to the General Staff of the
Army, because all the camps were under their jurisdiction
and the measures had to be taken their. Then gradually,
after the prisoners of war came un-
[Page 1618]
der our jurisdiction, we were forced to take a certain
position on that problem.
To General Lahousen by Col. Amen:
Q. What do you say about that?
A. I can only say that this order, as soon as it appeared,
quite independent of the official conferences that took
place about that --
General Reinecke: May I ask you again, what order?
A. The order went out for the first time that the Russian
prisoners of war were not to be regarded according to the
points of international law, but entirely new, cruel, and
brutal methods were to be applied to them. You know that
this order was discussed everywhere, in the offices, in the
quarters, and everywhere, and also the reaction against this
order. Therefore, I can’t imagine that anyone in the
position where I was, for instance, as a chief of a
section, much less some one superior to me in the
organization of the office, could not know about this order
or its principle contents. I think it is impossible that you
don’t know about it.
To General Reinecke by Col. Amen:
Q. Now, you did know all about that order at the time,
didn’t you?
A. No. I want to say this again. I knew that the
functionaries were to be shot.
Q. Well, everybody knew that.
A. I never denied that.
Q. I knew that myself.
A. Yes, that is cleared. I never received the original
order, or the particulars about that.
Q. Who cares whether you saw the original order or not?
A. At any rate, I did not work it out, I did not participate
in it, and I did not make any suggestions in the formulation
of this order. I was only involved by this trip that I took
to the front.
Q. You did nothing to oppose it; right?
A. You mean against this order?
Q. Yes, or any of the orders with regard to the treatment of
Russian prisoners of war.
A. It is impossible for me to say. Afterwards the order --
well, of course, we constantly worked against that.
Q. But you never accomplished anything?
[Page 1619]
A. No. That is quite clear; it was ordered and what could we
do?
Q. And therefore the responsibility of it was yours?
A. You mean for these orders when they came out?
Q. Yes. Now, have you recollected about the order for the
branding of Russian prisoners of war? [See second footnote,
p. 1606 of this volume.]
A. You mean the one that was shown to me a little while ago?
Q. Yes.
A. I did not give this order. General Graevenitz gave that
order, and as soon as we learned about it, why it was
recalled at once.
Q. That doesn’t correspond with the facts either.
A. Well, that is certainly so.
Q. No, it isn’t so. I show you a photostatic copy of an
order dated 20 July 1942, and ask you if you can identify
that as an official order. (The document was submitted to
the witness.) [document referred to did not form part of
prosecution case as finally prepared and hence is not
published in this series.]
A. Yes. I have already read this; I read it before.
Q. What is the date of it?
A. The 20th of July. It is quite clear that it was not
issued by me, but by the Chief of the Prisoner of War
Department; and it does not say “AWA” up here.
Q. I don’t care whether you issued it or not. I didn’t ask
you anything about that. It is your responsibility, whether
you issued it or not. What I want to know is, what date did
you claim that order was withdrawn?
A. That I don’t know any more. Just as soon as we learned
about this order --
Q. I am sure you don’t know it any more, and you never did
know it.
A. Yes, I knew it, because we ourselves put it into effect.
Q. I know you put it into effect, but you didn’t get it
withdrawn.
A. Yes, it was recalled, and as far as I know it was never
carried out.
Q. That isn’t true.
A. As far as I know, it never was applied.
Q. Are you trying to say that you personally withdrew it?
A. As far as I know and as far as I remember I gave the
order to Graevenitz to recall it, and that was with the
consent of Keitel. That is, after we had learned that
Graevenitz had issued such an order.
Q. Why would you give an order to withdraw an order which
you say you had nothing to do with?
[Page 1620]
A. I didn’t say I had nothing to do with it; I merely said I
didn’t sign it.
Q. You said you caused it to be withdrawn.
A. Yes, I said that.
Q. I say, why would you cause to be withdrawn an order which
you had nothing to do with issuing?
A. Graevenitz was my subordinate.
Q. Sure.
A. Well, as far as my powers of command were concerned, I
had to do this.
Q. Well, then, you knew all about the issuance of this
order.
A. As soon as we learned about it, we had it recalled at
once.
Q. How did you find out about it?
A. that I don’t know any more today, but it is very probable
that somebody told me about it.
Q. I don’t care what is probable; if you don’t know it,
don’t try to tell me about it.
Now, did Speer tell you that he wanted you to stop killing
off so many Russian prisoners of war so that he would have
more to do work?
A. That was discussed yesterday, but as far as I know Speer
was not even the Minister for Armaments at that time.
Q. Well, you saw the reference to Speer in the order which I
showed you yesterday, didn’t you?
A. Yes.
Q. What do you think it was there for?
A. As far as I know, he always received copies so that he
could commit labor.
Q. So he could do that?
A. For labor commitments.
Q. Did you have any personal conversations with Speer with
regard to Russian prisoners of war?
A. Oh God, that is very difficult to say. I talked to Speer
so many times.
Q. And if Speer says he discussed the whole problem with
you, would you say he was not telling the truth?
A. I discussed this problem with many people, and it may
well be that I discussed it with Speer.
Q. Then you don’t deny having discussed it with Speer?
A. It is possible.
Q. Anything is possible. I say do you deny it or do you
admit it?
A. Well, what I mean to say is that we discussed these
things with so many people because we were so much involved
in them
[Page 1621]
that it is difficult to say whether or not I discussed them
with Speer.
Q. I am glad to hear you say you were involved in them.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Ribbentrop’s Position on the Extermination of the Jews
[Page 1239]
Testimony of Joachim von Ribbentrop taken at Nurnberg, Germany, on 5
October 1945, by Mr. Justice Robert H. Jackson, OUSCC.
Also present: Colonel John H. Amen, IGD; OUSCC Colonel Howard A.
Brundage, JAGD; OUSCC Pfc Richard Sonnenfeldt, Interpreter; WOJG Jack
Rund, Court Reporter.
Q. You knew that the policy advocated by the Nazi Party was
to exterminate the Jews, didn’t you?
A. I did not.
Q. Was that a secret from you?
A. Yes. Absolutely.
Q. Did you hear the speeches of Goering and Streicher?
A. Yes, but I may say this. I was personally convinced — I
may say that — I knew it was considered a long time before
entering the party. I know I discussed it with my father who
didn’t enter until 1933 because of the Jewish question. He
was convinced, and I was also convinced, there would be an
evolution in the direction of adjustment, after some very
evident factors of the Jewish problem in Germany would be
done away with — which as a matter of fact certain
important Jews told me, and I remember one telling me
himself, that he did not like this development in Germany. I
remember that.
[Page 1240]
Q. How could you have expected a change for the better on
the Jewish question when you yourself say that Hitler was so
violent on the subject that you couldn’t even discuss it
with him, and that he was the man everybody had to bow down
to without question? What source did you expect improvement
to come from?
A. You see, in 1933 and `34 I think there were probably
quite a number of people living still, and even in 1935 I
think, continuously some old Jewish friends in my house. I
knew that quite well.
Q. I know, but you are not answering the question I am
asking you, and perhaps my difficulty is that you are a man
of experience in the world, and it is no good for me to
assume that you knew so little as you tried to make out you
knew. How could you have expected any improvement in the lot
of Jews in Germany, when you say that you as foreign
minister could not even discuss the problem with him because
he was so violent on the subject?
A. That was in 1938. In 1933 and 1935 ---
Q. But it was in 1938 that you became foreign minister and
were a part of this outfit?
A. I can say this, in 1935 — I remember one incident when
suddenly it turned out that my chief adjutant was quarter
Jew or half — he had Jewish blood, quarter Jew I think. I
went to the Fuehrer, and the Fuehrer made him even in 1935 a
member of the National Socialist Party. So the Fuehrer was
not at all uncompromising in those years, and I thought he
would go in that direction. He saw himself — and I can name
you quite a number of Jews and half-Jews the Fuehrer saw
with me occasionally in those years on foreign policy
matters, for instance. Later on, of course, things became
very uncompromising.
Q. You stayed with him after that became more
uncompromising?
A. Yes.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Reason for Harsh Treatment of Eastern Peoples
Testimony of Alfred Rosenberg, taken at Nurnberg,
Germany, on 29 September 1945, 1022-1152, by Lt.
Col. Thomas A. Hinkel, IGD. Also present: Bernard
Reymon, Interpreter; S/Sgt. William A. Weigel,
Court Reporter
[Page 1347]
Q. Why were the occupied countries of the West treated
differently from the occupied countries of the East?
A. Because those whom we considered as our adversaries or
opponents from the point of view of our conception of the
world are different in the West from what they are in the
East. In the West there were certain Jewish organizations
and Masonic lodges, and in the East there was nothing more
than the Communist Party.
Q. Well, I am not speaking now so much with reference to
organizations, but to racial groups. Why was the treatment
accorded the racial groups in the East different from that
accorded the racial groups in the West?
A. I don’t understand your question.
Q. Well, the question is very simple. You know and I know
that the treatment accorded the peoples of the eastern
occupied territories was quite different from that accorded
the peoples of the Western occupied territories, and I want
to know why.
A. Inasmuch as I could in my capacity as Reichsminister for
the East bring about a fairer treatment of the population
compatible with a state of war, I did it.
Q. You don’t really mean that, do you?
A. Well, I used to see those reports about those collisions
and certain struggles between the mutineers and the police.
As I already told you once, all the confidential people of
those racial groups were represented in my department, so as
to centralize in my department all of their claims and
complaints, in order that they may be remedied as far as
possible.
Q. Well, wasn’t there a policy in existence in the German
Reich will called for much more harsh treatment of the
peoples of the East than accorded the peoples of the West?
A. Yes, that is indeed correct.
Q. I am not speaking of that. I am speaking of the situation
where people in the occupied territories of the West were
treated in one way, and the people in the occupied
territories of the East were treated in another way. Now, I
want to know why the difference in treatment.
A. Well, on the whole we had to face the actual Bolshevik
[Page 1348]
danger, and when large numbers of those eastern elements had
been sent to Germany we had reason to believe that there may
emanate from those masses a certain danger to Germany.
Q. What about the situation of the Poles? You know and I
know that the Poles were not favorable to the Russians, that
they were anti-Bolshevik too. Why were they treated in the
manner in which they were treated?
A. Well, I have never had anything to do with the Polish
question, but the persecution of the German Nationals in
Poland for the last 20 years would certainly have been a
reason for it.
Q. Didn’t you discuss that question with the Fuehrer on
several occasions?
A. I submitted to the Fuehrer the various instructions which
I had issued to the commissars, and he approved of them.
Q. I am not speaking of that. I am speaking of the Polish
situation. Isn’t it a fact that you held several discussions
with the Fuehrer regarding your theories of racial
superiority and racial inferiority?
A. Well, of course, we spoke about these various peoples.
Q. And isn’t it a further fact that the Poles were decided
to be one of the inferior peoples from your viewpoint and
that of the Fuehrer?
A. The Poles were considered in such a way that they had a
certain layer of cultured, educated people, but that the
masses had been left sadly behind and in a low state.
Q. Wasn’t it decided that the best way of dealing with the
problem was to dispose of the masses of the Poles?
A. Well, I didn’t speak to the Fuehrer about the Polish
policy.
Q. You knew the Polish policy, didn’t you?
A. Well, I saw it on the exterior.
Q. Yes, but you were familiar with what was happening, isn’t
that so?
A. Well, yes. At the first Polish campaign I heard of the
slaughter of 50,000 German Nationals.
Q. I am not talking about the slaughter of German Nationals.
I am talking about the treatment accorded the Polish
population, and you know what I am talking about, so why
don’t you answer my questions? Now, my question is, did you
not know of the policy regarding the treatment to be
accorded the Polish people?
A. Well, I did know that in the course of these rather
difficult events, the Poles were treated in a harsher way.
Q. Yes, not only a harsher way---
A. But as far as I know, the Governor General Frank was
always endeavoring to bring about a better state of things.
[Page 1349]
Q. I am not talking about Governor General Frank. I am
talking about the situation where the Polish people, whether
in the General Gouvernement Poland or in occupied Poland,
were accorded treatment along a particular line and with a
particular aim in view, and my question is, did you not know
of the policy regarding this treatment?
A. Well, I did know that the policy there was rather harsh.
Q. From whom did you learn that?
A. Well, there was talk about it.
Q. Talk by whom?
A. No, I never meddled into this business.
Q. It isn’t a question of meddling. You stated you had
talked about it, and I want to know from whom you heard that
talk.
A. No, I can’t. I once made a speech in Poznan.
Q. My question is, from whom did you hear regarding the
treatment accorded the Poles?
A. Well, I can’t say.
Q. As a matter of fact, it was a matter of common knowledge
throughout Germany, wasn’t it?
A. Yes. Of course, there was quite a great deal of talk
about it.
Q. And the German people knew that Polish people were being
killed, didn’t they?
A. Yes. Killed why?
Q. I am asking you why.
A. Well, what we did know what that in the course of the
war, and those things had been found out after the war, a
certain number of executions did take place. That much I do
know.
Q. You knew during the war that executions were taking
place, didn’t you?
A. Well, I had no certain information.
Q. Never mind about that. Just answer my questions. Did you
or did you not know that these executions were taking place?
A. Well, I can’t give any specific answer to this question.
Q. Why can’t you? You know.
A. Because I can’t remember whether I received any reports
on such things.
Q. It is not a question of receiving reports, formal
reports. You had all kinds of discussions with various
people regarding this policy.
A. Well, I didn’t discuss the matter, but, of course, those
were things about which people did hear.
Q. Yes. As a matter of fact, the activities which were
carried out were along the lines of your ideology, isn’t
that right?
[Page 1350]
A. Just a moment. An ideology has nothing in common with
executions. Those are special cases of emergency which may
arise in cases of war or revolution.
Q. And didn’t you also advocate the theory of racial
superiority?
A. I simply voiced the theory that certain peoples have
certain superiorities for certain tasks, while other peoples
are gifted for other tasks.
Q. Isn’t it a fact that in your discussion and even in your
writings, you advocated an expansion of the German Reich to
the East?
A. That is correct.
Q. And isn’t the easiest way to expand, territorially
speaking, to remove the people who are already occupying the
land into which you wish to expand?
A. Well, this is a matter which had been debated within the
Party, and it was agreed upon that those territories which
had been separated or torn away from Germany had to reenter
the German realm.
Q. Those weren’t the only territories that were to be
reincorporated or to be taken into the German Reich, were
they?
A. That is something which one could behold practically. All
of the Polish revolutionary units of Upper Silesia ---
Q. I wish you would just answer the questions that I ask. It
seems to me that this morning every time I have asked you a
question, you go off on a tangent and do not give a direct
response. Now, my question is, wasn’t it contemplated that
territories other than those which have formerly been part
of the German Reich be made a part thereof by conquest or by
other means?
A. Well, yes. Through the creation of the province of
Wartheland, a certain portion of that territory was to be
incorporated into Germany.
Q. So, it didn’t surprise you, did it, when you heard that
Polish people were being killed, as that would be a very
logical way to make room for Germans to move into that
territory?
A. Well, such a policy of murdering Poles, such a policy was
not expected.
Q. Not expected by whom?
A. Well, in the previous 20 years, about one million Germans
had also been expelled from Poland.
Q. I am not asking about that. Why don’t you answer the
questions as I ask them? Will you read the question?
(The question was read by the reporter as set forth above.)
The question is: You stated that the policy of murdering
Poles was not expressed and I want to know the people who
would
[Page 1351]
make an expression thereof if they were going to. In other
words, who created the policy?
A. Well, if there was anybody at all who had to determine
the German policy in Poland, then that was the Fuehrer
himself. I can’t intervene into things which officially
don’t concern me.
Q. Do you recall conferring with Himmler regarding the
policy in the East?
A. In the occupied Eastern territories?
Q. Yes.
A. I had a conference with Himmler regarding the relations
between the ministry and the police.
Q. Do you recall any other conferences, particularly one on
the 16th of November 1943, at which, among other things,
questions concerning Estonia and Lithuania were discussed?
A. Yes. The problem of an autonomy for Estonia, Latvia, and
Lithuania was discussed in that year several times.
Q. What about this conference that I just asked you about?
Do you recall it?
A. Yes. Now I remember the 16th and 17th of November `43. It
was the last time when I was in the headquarters to report
to Hitler, and there I met Himmler.
Q. What was the subject of the conversation between you and
Himmler?
A. Well, the subject which brought us to the Fuehrer was to
discuss the autonomy, whether in a larger measure or a
smaller measure, of these countries.
Q. That is not all you talked about either, is it?
A. The outcome of this conference was a proclamation to be
issued to those three peoples.
Q. My question is: That is not all you talked about with
Himmler, is it?
A. I also discussed with him a rather ugly incident which
had taken place between an official of the administration at
Minsk and the organizations to fight the partisans, which
belonged also to the police.
Q. What was the nature of this incident?
A. Apparently in a state of inebriety, a few officers, after
threatening, eventually killed the Commissar.
Q. That is not the incident I am concerned about. Think some
more and see if you can’t remember what else you talked to
Himmler about.
A. I cannot recollect.
Q. Do you recall writing a memorandum regarding the meeting
on 16-17 November 1943? [Document referred to did not form
part of prosecution case as finally prepared and hence is
not published in this series.]
[Page 1352]
A. I do not believe so.
Q. Do you remember making a statement therein to the effect
that you had had a heart-to-heart talk with Himmler?
A. No.
Q. Do you recall in the course of this conversation or this
heart-to-heart talk that you impressed upon Himmler that it
was quite impossible that he should repeat certain remarks
of the Fuehrer? Do you recall that?
A. No, I don’t.
Q. Now, these remarks were made in connection with the
policy in the East and purportedly had been made to
outsiders and to representatives of foreign nations. Does
that help you to remember?
A. With my best recollection I don’t remember what it was.
Q. Does it help you to remember if I tell you that these
remarks had created what you described as an awful mess?
A. It can only be that Hitler will have spoken to Himmler
about a larger autonomy to be granted to Estonia, Latvia,
and so on, and Himmler will have repeated such remarks, and
this will have created a certain mess. It was not his duty
to comment on any political matters.
Q. What else could it have been besides the theory that you
just advanced?
A. Those two points were the actual kernel or the gist of
those conferences.
Q. Well, was it not a fact that Himmler had repeated certain
remarks made by the Fuehrer with reference to the treatment
to be accorded the peoples in the Eastern occupied
territories, including Estonia and Lithuania, and that
Himmler’s repetition of these remarks had a bad impression?
A. With my best will, I cannot recall this.
Q. You think about it and I will ask you about it at some
future time.
A. Well, I usually jot down certain recollections of years
past. Otherwise, they just fall into oblivion.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Treatment of Jews in Government General of Poland
Excerpts from Testimony of Hans Frank, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 6 September 1945, 1430-1700, by
Lt. Col. Thomas S. Hinkel, IGD. Also present:
Herbert Sherman, Interpreter; Pvt. Clair van
Vleck, Court Reporter.
[Page 1367]
Q. What was your job in September 1939?
A. I was drafted and I was a lieutenant in the Army.
Q. What was your job in October 1939?
A. I was nominated by the Fuehrer as Governor General at
Cracow.
Q. Why did he give you that job?
A. There were many who say that he liked to see me in such
an exposed place.
Q. Never mind what many of them say. What do you think? Why
do you think you got that job?
A. I sincerely believe at that time that Hitler wanted to
give me a chance to prove to him what I was able to do, as a
man of administration, but I lost his confidence already
after one week when I saw what kind of responsibility Hitler
gave to Himmler and to Goering in the same area I was
supposed to be the responsible man. My first action was
that I resigned.
Q. It is pretty hard to believe, isn’t it, that you had all
this opposition to Hitler from 1933 to 1939, and that he
would give you such a nice job? You don’t think that is
odd, do you?
[Page 1368]
A. I was a member of the Party. I was known as a man of
law. I was known on an international basis. I visited Poland
twice. The same way he made von Neurath Protector in Prague,
he nominated myself a Governor for Poland.
He told me that this was not a situation for me to be a
lieutenant in the Army during the war. I was the only
minister and Party leader who was active in the military
force. I told him, “I am an officer in a very proud regiment
and now we are at war, and now we have to give an example
with a gun in the hand.” Hitler said, “I don’t care about
that. You will have a special war task and you just have to
take your assignments.” Hitler said, “I promise you I will
help you to overcome all difficulties, and you may see me
any day you want to discuss anything with me.”
Q. What did he tell you he wanted you to do in Poland?
A. For Hitler the most necessary thing was to get order in
economy and travel. It was general administration and to
take care that all troubles we found in Poland would be
erased.
Q. What special instructions did he give you with reference
to the treatment of the Polish population?
A. He only said that the situation in Poland was especially
difficult right then. He said I must understand that,
therefore, he would have to give special jurisdiction to
Himmler and to the Army to guarantee that order will be
reestablished as soon as possible.
Q. What was your first official action when you were
appointed Governor?
A. After my entry into Cracow, on November 1st or November
7th, a proclamation to the inhabitants of Cracow.
Q. What did you do about getting labor?
A. It was a voluntary demand to the population.
Q. As a matter of fact, your first official action really
was on the 26th of October 1939. Isn’t that right?
A. No.
Q. And it wasn’t on entering into Cracow, was it?
A. I was nominated on the 26th of October.
Q. You were appointed that day, weren’t you?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you remember a decree introducing forced labor for all
Polish nationals of Jewish descent?
A. If I signed it, it came from me. I don’t know if it was
the 26th of October.
Q. Was it the 27th?
A. That I don’t know.
[Page 1369]
Q. Do you remember the decree?
A. Yes, I remember.
Q. What else do you remember about it?
A. It was not forced labor; it was an obligation to work.
Q. Did you order that all Jews be brought together in
special places for this voluntary work, as you describe it?
A. I would like to see the decree, if it was a general
order, or if I have signed this special order.
Q. You will be shown it soon enough. In the meanwhile, I
want to test this memory you spoke about this morning.
A. At the very beginning, Buehler (nominated by Frank as
chief of his office) and some other representatives of
different ministries handed to me decrees I had to sign.
Q. Did you read these decrees?
A. I did not only read the decrees, but I studied them. I
agreed entirely, that during a war, it was quite all right
to use this kind of labor the way we did, naturally, in the
interests of the Reich.
Q. I am not talking about that right now; I am just talking
about whether you did, or did not, on or about the 26th day
of October 1939, issue the kind of decree I just told you
about. [Document referred to did not form part of
prosecution case as finally prepared and hence is not
published in this series.] Did you or didn’t you?
A. If that is my signature, then I did.
Q. Don’t you remember?
A. Yes; it was a special wish of Adolf Hitler that under any
condition we had to start at once with the work.
Q. So you did issue those decrees, didn’t you?
A. Yes.
Q. Of course you did, and it was your first official act,
too, wasn’t it?
A. No.
Q. It was the second decree you signed. Is that it?
A. It seems that all those decrees were together on the
first number, where different laws were passed.
Q. When did Hitler tell you to issue this decree?
A. Already during the conversation I mentioned before.
Q. Why didn’t you mention this decree when you told me about
that conversation?
A. I told you that it was Hitler’s special wish, to
reconstruct as soon as possible, Poland, and to get order
into this country.
Q. How about the Polish Jews, did they like you?
A. I was not responsible for the Polish Jews. It was Himmler
who was charged with all the rules referring to the
treatment of Jews in Poland. In a case where the Poles were
part of a resist-
[Page 1370]
ance movement, even those Poles were under the jurisdiction
of Himmler. As a result, the Polish Jews worked under police
supervision, and you must find it in one of these decrees.
Q. You had something to do with the Polish Jews though,
didn’t you?
A. Yes, I tried to save some of them at my residence.
Q. Did you save many of them?
A. During the time I went to the Reich, they took them away
from me. I had a possession near Cracow. I was living on a
summer residence near Cracow, and there a Jewish couple were
in charge of my stable, and I tried to save them, too, but
during the time I had to leave for Germany they were taken
away from me.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
“The Final Solution of the Jewish Problem”
Testimony of Alfred Rosenberg, taken at Nurnberg,
Germany, on 4 October 1945, 1030-1215, by Lt. Col.
Thomas A. Hinkel, IGD. Also present: 1st Lt.
Joachim Stenzel, Interpreter; Pvt. Clair Van
Vleck, Court Reporter.
Q. I show you a photostatic reproduction of a six-page docu-
[Page 1353]
ment, which is undated, and I ask you if you recall
receiving the original of this document? For the record, it
is identified as 212-PS.
A. I cannot imagine who could have sent in this report.
Q. Do you recall receiving it?
A. And I do not recall having read it.
Q. Were the ideas expressed therein in accordance with the
ideas that you had expressed at various times?
A. The entire handling of the Jewish problem was very
definitely in the sphere of the chief of the German Police.
On the other hand, I myself was in strict accord with the
idea of curbing the individual activities of the population,
to limit the Jews to certain districts, to put them to work,
and so forth, and I have expressed that at various times.
Q. Isn’t it a fact that the things set forth in this
document were things which actually happened to the Jews in
Russia?
A. I have not read that thoroughly. I did not read the
report and there have been attacks and outrages on Jews,
that were committed during the advance of the Wehrmacht,
particularly, on Jews that were in any way identified with
the Soviet government.
Q. Were not Jews required, for example, to wear the Star of
David in Russia?
A. I don’t remember whether that was ever put through,
because in Russia the Jews were living in separate districts
in the villages and towns anyhow.
Q. They were segregated, were they not, into ghettos?
A. That was done gradually. At the very beginning, it was
not done yet, but then as things developed they were
segregated.
Q. Wasn’t an effort made to remove Jewish influence from
political, economic, cultural, and social fields?
A. To me, the important thing was to remove the influence of
the Jews from the work of the Ukrainian population. What
they did internally I do not know, and I never received any
reports on that anyway.
Q. You have a report before you that indicates what was
contemplated would happen to the Jews, is that right?
A. Well, I don’t know whether those things were ever put
into practice.
Q. Did you ever try to find out if they were?
A. I remember discussing the business of the Jewish life
within Germany with Himmler once, and he said that in the
camps, within 10 days, they had created their own social
life, and I got
[Page 1354]
the impression that the entire internal living conditions or
social life of these people was more or less left to their
own devices.
Q. You will note, in the first part of that document, that a
statement is made to the effect that the whole Jewish
question could be solved in general for all of Europe after
the war, at the latest?
A. I have never participated in any discussions on the
Jewish problem at all.
Q. You never have, at any time?
A. No, I have never taken part in any sessions or
conversation on the solution of the Jewish problem, but I
had my own views on that particular subject. I always felt
that gradually it would be possible to increase the
influence of Zionism and reduce the number of Jews in
Germany by creating a place where they would be all by
themselves in their Jewish homeland.
Q. Did you know the responsibility that was to be assigned
to the SD and the Gestapo in the final solution of the
European Jewish problem?
A. There was a very definite and very clear decree, in which
it was stated that the entire administration and solution of
the Jewish problem was the responsibility of the Secret
State Police, and of the Security Service, and that no other
agency was supposed to take part or mix themselves into
these affairs.
Q. Don’t you identify that document, that you have before
you, as being a report on the manner in which Jews were to
be handled in the areas that were under your jurisdiction,
even though you did not have jurisdiction over the police
functions?
A. This evidently was a sort of memorandum that was sent in
to me, and which, I have no doubt, was filed like so many
other memoranda and circulars and bulletins of a similar
sort on various subjects, but I have no recollection of this
particular document.
Q. Isn’t it a fact, that the Jews were treated in the areas
under your jurisdiction, as indicated in that memorandum?
A. I cannot say that, because as I said before, they were
kept separate, and I had no reports on the internal
conditions in these separate areas.
Q. As a matter of fact, wasn’t it part of your problem to
feed these people?
A. Well, the matter was no doubt handled like this, that the
[Page 1355]
police reported to the Food Administrator the number of
persons that were to be fed.
Q. Didn’t you have representatives in all the larger towns
and cities of the areas which had been assigned to you, and
didn’t those representatives make reports from time to time
of their activities?
A. Well, I wish to emphasize again that I was sitting in
Berlin, and I was responsible only for the entire policy in
its greater lines. For the territories, separately, the
Reichcommissars were responsible, who had been placed into
their positions by the Fuehrer. Under the Reichcommissars
were the general commissars. The only reports I received
were from the Reichcommissars and from the general
commissars, and I had no other separate system of reporting.
I did not have a board that would travel and give me any
special reports besides those that I received through the
normal channels, from these Reichcommissars and general
commissars.
Q. That may be, but you not only received written reports,
but you had numerous people come to Berlin to tell you about
these things that were happening in these areas, isn’t that
right?
A. Oh, yes, there have been people who were sent, for
instance, from the staff of the ministry to have discussions
with members of the territorial administration, or maybe one
of the commissars was coming by, or maybe other officers,
that had lived in the area, would come and report to me
informally.
Q. Yes, and many of them talked to you, didn’t they?
A. Very frequently I would say, but certainly I do remember
a few with whom I talked.
Q. You have been interested in the Jewish question for
years, haven’t you?
A. But I was so overburdened with the work of establishing
my own Ministry, and the entire Jewish problem was so neatly
separate from any of my responsibilities, that I did not
spend any time on that, and concerned myself exclusively
with the responsibility that actually lay with me.
Q. You mean you never discussed the Jewish problem with
anybody from the time you were appointed Minister for the
Eastern Occupied Territories, is that your statement?
A. Well, it is correct that I have not spent any more time
on those details, that is right.
Q. You have been interested in the Jewish problem for years
and during the time that you were editor of the Voelkischer
Beobachter you wrote numerous articles regarding it, isn’t
that right?
A. Yes.
[Page 1356]
Q. I find it a little difficult to believe, that with all
the interest you have had in this problem for so many years,
that you would drop it so suddenly when you became Minister
for Occupied Eastern Territories, and wouldn’t have enough
curiosity regarding the treatment of the people under your
own jurisdiction, that you wouldn’t ask anybody or receive
any reports about it.
A. It was always our habit that, once an assignment was
given to a man, nobody else meddled with the man that had
the assignment.
Q. That may be, that it wasn’t your responsibility. I will
go along with you to that extent, regarding the treatment of
these Jews, but you were certainly informed of the treatment
that they received, and you knew about it.
A. Well, in great lines I naturally had to assume that they
were being housed fairly well, and that they were fed, and
that they had work to do like, for instance, in the city of
Lodz.
Q. You know that isn’t the report you received, as to what
was happening to these people, in the areas, over which you
had jurisdiction. You know that the reports you received
indicated that they were being treated, just as the
memorandum you have just read indicates they were going to
be treated, isn’t that right?
A. That they were separated, that they had working
assignments, that they were making coats and shoes and
things like that, like they did in the city of Lodz, that I
knew, but that the conditions were naturally somewhat
difficult, I fully realized.
Q. Yes, and you knew that they were being treated very much
in the manner set forth in this memorandum.
A. That I cannot state in detail, because I was not informed
in detail.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
XI. Fritz Sauckel*
Hitler Legalizes the Slave Labor Program
Excerpts from Testimony of Fritz Sauckel, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 12 September 1945, 1015-1215,
by Major John J. Monigan, Jr., CAC. Also present:
Capt. Jesse F. Landrum, AGD, Court Reporter; Mr.
Bernard Reymon, Interpreter.
* See also Document 3721-PS, Vol. VI, p. 428; 3722-
PS, Vol. VI, p. 459.
[Page 1441]
A. I was then [1942] told by the Fuehrer and by various
Government agencies that the use of foreign workers within
the occupied territories would not go counter to the
conventions of The Hague. The Fuehrer set forth that those
countries had
[Page 1442]
surrendered unconditionally and had governments which had
been shaped according to his desire. I then received a
definite order to mobilize workers in those countries and,
inasmuch as this could not be carried out through voluntary
methods, to use the same methods of compulsory conscription
which was enforced in Germany. The Fuehrer added that Soviet
Russia was not a party at all to the Hague Convention;
furthermore, that in the countries which had surrendered he
had left millions of war prisoners who had been immediately
released. If too great difficulties were created for him he
(Hitler) would be compelled to take back again those
prisoners of war. I had to satisfy myself with those
explanations of the Fuehrer and to carry out my task. I then
received the necessary powers and was placed under the
authority of Reichsmarshall Hermann Goering, in his capacity
as the head of the Four-year Plan. To carry out the
prescribed task, I received from the Labor Ministry two
departments: namely, Abteilung 3, which was the department
of salaries; and Abteilung 5, which was the department of
manpower. I was not entitled to set up new agencies, but was
to be in touch with and to apply to those new government
departments which were already in existence in the various
ministries and in the Wehrmacht. I could be assisted by
various other organizations. This could only be possible in
communicating with them, not in issuing to them any orders,
as I had no right to do so.
The first principle was that the foreign workers were to be
treated and paid in the same manner as the German workers.
The second principle was fair, just, and humane treatment.
This I have been able to carry out with all the people from
the West, South, and Southeast. These people were treated
and nourished and dealt with in the same manner as the
German working people. Restrictions, however, were placed on
me with regard to the Russian workers and partly the Polish
workers. The Russian workers by virtue of orders from the
Reichsfuehrer SS, which were approved by the Fuehrer and by
the Party itself, received, up to 1940, less than the other
foreign workers. This was justified on the following
grounds: The so-called Ostarbeiter (workers from the East)
contrary to what was the case with the foreign workers from
the West and South, and so on, had to pay no taxes and no
fees, no insurance, and no contributions to the DAF
[Deutsche Arbeitsfront (German Labor Front), headed by Dr.
Robert Ley.] Upon my representation and those of other
persons, we were told that if the Eastern workers, which
actually meant only the Russian workers, were paid at the
same rate as the other workers, they would actually enjoy
better treatment as
[Page 1443]
they had less expense. With regard to food, they were placed
(the Eastern workers) on the same level as the German
civilians.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
XXIV. Walter Schellenberg*
Negotiations for Evacuation of Jews in Return for Asylum for
High Nazis
Excerpts from Testimony of Walter Schellenberg,
taken at Nurnberg, Germany, 13 November 1945, 1030-
1215, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., IGD.
Also present: Gladys Picklesimer, Reporter; John
Albert, Interpreter.
* Walter Schellenberg was Chief of Amt VI (Foreign Political
Intelligence Service) and Amt Mil (Military Bureau) of the
RSHA, with the rank of Brigadefuehrer (Brig. Gen.). He also
held the title of General of Police and Waffen SS. See
Affidavit D, vol. VIII, p. 622.]
[Page 1622]
A. On the 10th of April 1945 when a certain Mr. Musy visited
me in Berlin, he told me that the concentration camp
Buchenwald had actually been evacuated, which was contrary
to assurances given him by Himmler. Thereupon I phoned on
the one hand Himmler, and on the other hand I discussed this
matter at lunch with Kaltenbrunner. Kaltenbrunner stated,
however, that this was done on a directive of Hitler, and
that this camp had to be evacuated on his order, and Group
Leader Mueller added “You, Kaltenbrunner, told me already
three or four days earlier that I should evacuate the Jews
from this camp to the south.” then Kaltenbrunner said, “Yes,
yes, that’s correct. Besides, there is a general directive
of Hitler to the effect that all camps should be evacuated,
and that especially Jews should be regarded as hostages and
brought to the south.” Then he said, turning towards me,
"There are still enough people remaining in the camp so that
you can console Mr. Musy with that.”
Q. Musy was the former President of Switzerland?
A. No. He was the son of the former President of
Switzerland.
Q. And his mission was to have as many Jews evacuated to
Switzerland as possible?
A. Yes.
Q. And what had been the arrangement or agreement that
Himmler was interested in?
A. Himmler first gave the assurance that in February 1,200
Jews would be sent to Switzerland by train, and that from
then on every two weeks another train should be sent to
Switzerland.
I had to organize the whole thing, but suddenly a stop
occurred, and we were threatened with the death penalty for
every Jew who crossed the Reich frontier, and this was done
on the basis of an order by Hitler.
This order was given after a code message of the deGaulle
office in Spain to an office in Paris was intercepted and
decoded, which said that Mr. Musy and a representative of
Himmler were in negotiations with a Jewish organization for
the purpose of evacuating all Jews living in Germany, and
that the price for it, so to speak, would be the right of
asylum for about 250 Nazi leaders.
Himmler furthermore gave the assurance to Mr. Musy, after
Hitler had forbidden further transfers of Jews, that no
concentration camp would be evacuated, and Musy was
instructed by Himmler to inform the Allied Western Powers
officially of this second agreement. And with this official
instruction Mr. Musy left Berlin on April 7.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Use of Russian P/W’s Behind the Russian Lines
Excerpts from Testimony of Walter Schellenberg,
taken at Nurnberg, Germany, 13 November 1945, 1445-
1710, by Lt. Col. Smith W. Brookhart, Jr., IGD.
Also present: George A. Sakheim, Interpreter;
S/Sgt. William A. Weigel, Reporter.
[Page 1623]
Q. You have mentioned the operation Zeppelin. Will you tell
us about your participation in this?
A. The operation Zeppelin was initiated in 1942. The purpose
of this organization was to choose from a selection of
Russian prisoners intelligent and suitable men to be
deployed on the eastern front behind the Russian lines. This
work was done by our own Commandos of the operation
Zeppelin. The PW’s thus selected were turned over to
Commandos in the rear, who trained the prisoners. They were
trained in assignments of the secret messenger service and
in wireless communications. In order to furnish these
prisoners with a motive for work, they were treated
extremely well. They were shown the best possible kind of
Germany. This was accomplished by trips around Germany where
they were shown industry and farms, and super-highways.
Q. What was your particular function in connection with the
training of these units?
A. I laid down the policy for the training, but did not
myself participate in the execution of the plan. I remember
only that one time in 1943 I called a meeting of the
Commando leaders at Breslau. This was necessary because
after Stalingrad and the general withdrawal in Russia, the
influencing of the Russian prisoners had become increasingly
difficult. Therefore, it became necessary to change from a
mass deployment of Russian prisoners, such as dropping them
by parachute, to using a few highly skilled, intelligent
Russians who were with us because of thier conviction.
A. At approximately what period of time was this change
noticeable?
A. That was in January 1943.
Q. Thereafter, you were confined to the very limited group
that you have just described?
A. Yes. Thereafter we attempted to select prisoners from the
larger PW camps where every kind of category had been thrown
together. We tried to select those who would be valuable to
us and confine them to one special camp.
[Page 1624]
Q. Are you still speaking about Russian prisoners for use on
the Eastern front?
A. Yes.
Q. As far as the operation Zeppelin is concerned, that was
limited entirely to the Eastern front?
A. Yes, only to the Eastern front. From the wireless reports
of these Commandos behind the Russian lines and the special
reports of those Russian prisoners confined to the highly
selected camps, we made reports.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Origin and Development of Streicher’s Anti-Semitism
Excerpts from Testimony of Julius Streicher, taken
at Nurnberg, Germany, 1 September 1945, at 1415,
by Col. Howard A. Brundage, JAGD. Also present:
S/Sgt. Howard M. Levy, Court Reporter; Rudolph
Pressburger, Interpreter.
[Page 1420]
Q. What about the teaching of the preservation of blood
lines of the master race?
A. Yes, I wish I could express myself openly.
Q. Well, go ahead.
A. Before the first World War, I belonged to the Young
Democratic Party. The leader of the Young Social Democratic
Party was a Mr. Kramer, who worked at Kohn’s bank in
Nurnberg. I have talked very often at the evening meetings
of the Young Democratic Party. I didn’t know any racial
questions at that time. During those discussions, I received
opposition from young lawyers who were talking against me.
This holds true especially
[Page 1421]
when I talked about nationalistic matters. On my way to
Rome, I was warned by this Mr. Kramer that I should express
myself in those meetings more carefully, since all those
young lawyers were Jewish, and I asked him what the word
"Jewish” means.
This Mr. Kramer told me: “Streicher, be careful, the Jews
are very mighty.” This was the first time that I was
conscious of the fact that the Jews are no religion but a
race. Between Catholics and Protestants you cannot
differentiate, but you can differentiate between Protestants
and Catholics, and Jews, according to race. After the first
World War I came as an officer from the front, and desired
to work again at my old trade. I was a school teacher. Then
I saw for the first time the red posters saying that the
public should attend the revolutionary meetings. Time and
time again I went to those revolutionary meetings, and I was
astounded to see that all the speakers were members of the
Jewish race. The speakers were inciting the working class
and telling them of the good things of former times. I
volunteered, one time, for a discussion and took opposition
to one of those Jewish speakers. I told the workers that it
was unnatural to be led by members of the Jewish race. I
told them that it would be unnatural if a member of the
Jewish race would go to Palestine and dare speak in a Jewish
meeting against their own nation.
Q. Go ahead with your story.
A. This takes place in the spring of 1919. After this speech
and this discussion, the whole room applauded me. I went to
the next revolutionary assembly of the Communist Party.
Everything was prepared so I didn’t have to talk any more. I
again reported for the discussion. At this time I was thrown
off the speaker’s platform. They spit at me and threw me out
of the assembly hall. At that time I decided to hold my own
meetings and enlighten the public. At that time, no one had
heard anything about Adolf Hitler. Destiny brought me into
this, not the hate for the Jewish race. Destiny told me to
fight for my people, my race. My first assembly meeting in
the Hercules Velodrome was crowded. Ten thousand people were
standing in front of the assembly hall, and it had to be
kept in order by the police. I spoke at this assembly for
three hours. I told how the German people were enslaved by
the Treaty of Versailles, and I said that it is impossible
that in all states in Germany, Jews were made ministers. I
also declared in this assembly that it is up to the German
people to govern themselves. I declared that the Jews as a
nation by itself would refuse to be governed by ministers of
English, French, or German nationality.
[Page 1422]
Q. You said “English, French or German"?
A. Nationality. I also declared that if Germany wanted to be
free again the Treaty of Versailles has got to be broker,
and also the reign of the Jews in Germany. Until the year
1921, I had a big mass meeting in Nurnberg every week.
Besides that, I participated several evenings during the
week in discussions, in smaller groups. That is how the mass
movement of German workers got together in Nurnberg. In the
year 1921, a wholesale man from Nurnberg asked me if I had
heard speeches by Adolf Hitler. I got interested and went to
Munich, to an assembly in the Buergerbrau of Adolf Hitler.
At that time I did not know Adolf Hitler. At that time I
heard him for the first time at Munich. He spoke for almost
three hours. The enthusiasm was enormous. I myself was very
enthusiastic. After Adolf Hitler was finished with his
speech, I arose and forced myself through the crowd to the
speakers' desk. I went towards him and introduced myself. I
spoke to him: “Heil Hitler! I heard your speech. I can only
be the helper but you are the born leader. Here is my
movement in Nurnberg.” On that evening I have the movement
which I created in Nurnberg to Adolf Hitler. It carried the
name of “National Socialist German Workers' Party.” I
carried on my business in the movement in Nurnberg. The name
of “Gauleiter” did not exist at that time. The movement of
Hitler called itself “Partei” at that time, but it was not
an organized movement. At that time, everything was a
movement at the beginning. With the handing over of my
movement to Adolf Hitler, the bridge was built between
southern Germany and northern Germany. For myself, I left
Nurnberg and in the next few years made a lot of speeches,
in all the larger cities of Germany.
The terror against the National Socialist movement was
organized in all Germany. Many assemblies were interrupted
by the Marxists, but we succeeded in getting the working
people on our side. I again and again told the workers at
the meetings that Marxism is the creation of world Jewry. I
again told the workers that the creation of Marxism was to
keep the power of the workers down. I also told the workers
that Marxism would not bring about world revolution but
would help world capitalism. I also told the workers that
the destination of the Jewish world regime meant the
enslaving of the workers.
Q. Now, following that, you then joined with the Party and
continued to preach these things; is that right?
A. Yes, since 1921, as I remember.
[Page 1423]
Q. Well, as a leader of the Party and the leading exponent
of anti-Semitism, didn’t you know that over two million Jews
were killed in concentration camps?
A. No.
Q. Well, when these Jews were put into concentration camps,
and never appeared again, what did you think happened to
them?
A. After the taking over of the power, all Jewish leaders in
political life were put into concentration camps, but a lot
of Jews emigrated to other countries. Whatever happened
thereafter, I don’t know.
Q. Well, when a Jew was put into a concentration camp, and
you never heard from him again, don’t you believe it was
your duty to make inquiries?
A. No.
Q. As you sit here now, and see the result of the Party's
program, with respect to the race question, do you still
believe that these theories were right?
A. The program as it was laid down in the Fuehrer’s book
"Mein Kampf,” in the year 1920, all the world knows is
right, but as a human being, the execution of the program,
as it is known today, is not right.
Q. Well, isn’t it a normal result from the preaching of race
hatred?
A. Anti-Semitism is all over the world. There are about 12
anti-Semitic newspapers in the United States. Mr. Ford
published an article in one of his papers. Radio Priest
Coughlin can speak openly in the States. Mosley in England
pronounced anti-Semitism in the open, and if the declaration
about race hatred which I preached would lead to mass
murder, we would have had a mass murder right in this town
of Nurnberg. This is the most anti-Semitic city in Germany.
There are millions of people in Germany who heard my
speeches in which I declared: “The question of the Jewish
race has got to be taken care of the legal, international
way.” I openly and repeatedly declared that “Who hits the
Jews or one Jew, helps them,” and I openly declared that it
does not solve the problem of the Jewish question.
Q. Well, the fact is that there was mass murder of the Jews
in Germany. Now, was that a result of this Party program or
not?
A. It was never a part of the Party program. Whatever
happened here was the result of a superhuman being, and it
was not a Party program.
Q. Do you mean the “Super Race” theory?
A. Madison Grant, an American writer, published a book in
[Page 1424]
1913, in which he writes: “The most active race is the
Nordic race,” and he declares that through the mixing of
races, the Nordic race will go down into a race of swamps.
Q. How many Jews did you put into the concentration camp?
A. I hereby declare — you might believe it or not — I do
not know how many Jews were put into concentration camps in
my Gau, as this was done through the Political Police of Mr.
Himmler.
Q. I am asking how many Jews you put into the concentration
camp?
A. I have not brought any into the concentration camp, and
how many were brought in, I don’t know.
Q. How many Jews did you turn over to the Gestapo to be put
into the concentration camp?
A. I myself did not give any Jews into concentration camps,
though the police had the list of those Jews and they took
care of that.
Q. Who gave the police the list?
A. The police got those lists themselves, and the housing
office got all those lists and gave the police the
responsibility, most likely, to put up their own lists.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Streicher Summarizes His Jewish Policy: Zionism
Excerpts from Testimony of Julius Streicher, taken
at Nurnberg, Germany, 7 October 1945, 1545-1555,
by col. Howard A. Brundage, JAGD. Also present:
Lord Wright, head of the United Nations War Crimes
Commission; Pfc. Richard W. Sonnenfeldt,
Interpreter; WOJG Jack Rund, Court Reporter.
Q. What action did you take with respect to the formulation
and the enactment of the Nurnberg laws?
A. Unfortunately I had nothing to do with the Nurnberg laws.
Unfortunately I had nothing to do with them, but the Fuehrer
once mentioned the matter to me and he said that there was a
Jewish law by Ezra, in the Old Testament. He said that an
old Jewish law existed, which had been brought out by Moses,
which said that Jews were not to marry any non-Jewish women.
Then at a later time, Jews had married quite a few non-
Jewish women, and Ezra acted against this.
Q. How many times did you talk with Hitler about your
beliefs regarding the anti-Semitic program?
A. Well, Hitler published his book, “Mein Kampf,” and thus
he manifested his opinions about this subject for the
public.
Q. Didn’t that pretty accurately reflect your opinions?
[Page 1425]
A. Yes, of course.
Q. Where did he get his opinion from?
A. The Fuehrer tells in his book “Mein Kampf” that he
mentioned a man by the name of — I believe his name was
Leugel, and also another man by the name of Soureil. He says
his anti-Semitic views stem from that time.
Q. In your opinion, were not the Nurnberg laws a
crystallization of the beliefs that you had been teaching in
Germany?
A. The Fuehrer did not tolerate any influences in matters of
an ideological nature. You could not counsel him in such
things.
Q. No, but you had been teaching, and writing articles on
the question of blood and race.
A. I wrote those things already before I made the
acquaintance of the Fuehrer.
Q. Yes, and before the enactment of the Nurnberg laws.
A. Yes. A long time before that.
Q. How many years?
A. I made my first speech in November of 1918, when I
returned from the front.
Q. The first time you met Hitler you claimed that you had a
following larger than his, is that correct?
A. I was talking of the number in Nurnberg, and that was a
labor movement.
BY LORD WRIGHT:
Q. What did you advocate, in those days, as the proper
treatment of the Jews?
A. I always stood for the Zionist opinion. I will only
mention here Theodore Herzl, who was one of the most famous
leaders of the Jews, and he wrote in his diary that you will
find anti-Semitism everywhere. That is, you will find it in
all those countries where Jews were present; and wherever
Jews were settling to, anti-Semitism would rise there.
Q. But what were you going to do?
A. Like him, I advocated a National State for the Jews. It
is interesting here that Herzl does not object to the racial
question. He recognized the Jews as a separate state. The
English Government was petitioned in the last war, and again
in this war, and Mr. Churchill knows all that, that a
certain part of Palestine was to be set apart, as an area
for the Jews. Who was that English statesman in the last war
-- it was not Lloyd-George — oh, yes, I remember, it was
Balfour. He made a declaration wherein he promised at the
end of the war negotiations should be started, and the aim
of these negotiations should be that the Jews were to
[Page 1426]
receive an autonomous state in Palestine. Thus it was to be
assured that they would have a political home in the world.
Q. Do you know how large Palestine is?
A. Palestine itself is not very large. I believe that I read
some Jewish books which claimed there were 16 million Jews
in the world, and thus the land in Palestine would not be
enough for them. However, their demands were to found a
state of their own.
Q. You knew, then, that you couldn’t get them all into
Palestine?
A. Yes? Whether I knew that?
Q. Yes.
A. Well, I thought about it a great deal, and I thought that
if they were to be given just Palestine itself, it would not
be enough. Then people say that the Arabs were not at all in
favor of this idea. I was thinking of Transjordan, and also
Syria, that might be given to them.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
What Streicher Meant by “Extermination”
Excerpts from Testimony of Julius Streicher, taken
at Nurnberg, Germany, 17 October 1945, 1050-1250,
by Col. Howard A. Brundage, JAGD. Also present:
Siegfried Ramler, Interpreter; S/Sgt. William A.
Wiegel, Court Reporter.
[Page 1427]
Q. So, summarizing your testimony, there was a change in the
basic teaching, merely because you read a book written by a
man named Kaufmann?
A. Yes. One only has to read the edition of Der Stuermer
that related to that and one can see that a tendency has
been adopted which was far more radical.
Q. Just briefly, what was the teaching prior to that time?
A. Always the same. I have been asked before whether it was
my point of view that I thought it right that a Jewish
national state should be established. I can say now that
between 1941 and 1943 — I don’t know exactly at what period
-- we wrote an article in our paper, where we asked that
Madagascar should be given to the Jews. The German
Censorship Department in Berlin sent back the finished
article — I think it was already printed — and did not
accept it. This can be certified by my chief editor, Ernst
Hiemer.
Q. Did you approve everything that Hiemer wrote?
A. I have had different journalists. Naturally, I did not
approve everything, not every single sentence; that is
clear.
Q. Did you approve the articles as published in your paper?
[Page 1427]
A. Yes, certainly, mainly, yes. I want to amplify something
in the question of Madagascar. There was an International
Anti-Semite League. On every Reichsparteitag in Nurnberg,
anti-Semites gathered in Nurnberg from America, from
England, from South America, from everywhere. It happened
every year. There, repeatedly the question came up regarding
a Jewish National State. I want you to ask Mr. Rosenberg.
Rosenberg, who was in charge of the ideological education,
can certify that he has spoken about this question of
Madagascar.
Q. What about Palestine?
A. Palestine is a request of the Zionist Jews. Theodore
Herzl has been one of the most famous and greatest Jewish
leaders. It was Herzl who caused the Balfour Declaration.
Balfour, after the request of the Jews, has given a written
declaration where he stated that Palestine should be given
for the creation of the Jewish State. At the beginning of
this war, discussions in this respect have taken place.
Q. If I understand you correctly, you have at all times
advocated the removal of Jews from Germany?
A. Yes. Always on an international basis. I have always
propagated in my paper that the Jewish question should be
solved by the Jews forming a national state, just like any
other nation, and should create a home there.
Q. What mechanics did you advocate that should be used for
moving Jews out of Germany?
A. Whatever I have advocated publicly is here written down
in my paper. I can declare under oath that there is nobody,
not here in the prison or anywhere else, who can say that at
any time I have been asked by the Fuehrer to discuss with
him the question of the Jews. I can declare here that my
paper was the only one which was not recognized by the
Party. My paper did not bear the Party stamp of approval.
All the other papers did. I have not been asked to take part
in the discussions of the Nurnberg laws. Everybody can
certify to that. Frick has been taking part in it, but I
have not.
Q. Now will you direct your attention to my question. How
did you preach that the Jews were to be moved out of
Germany?
A. I have made no public suggestions.
Q. Did you ever use the word “exterminate"?
A. I think my chief editor used it once, and in this article
he also cited Kaufmann. This must have been one of his last
articles, of February or March — I don’t know exactly. He
pointed out Kaufmann’s request. I don’t know exactly, but I
do not believe that
[Page 1428]
I myself have ever used the expression “extermination.” Had
I only used the expression “extermination” now, the
extermination would have happened already anyway, as I found
out here in Mondorf. [See footnote, p. 1193 of this volume.]
May I say something about that? It is quite a general
explanation.
I want to declare under oath that there might be gentlemen
present here, I don’t want to defend them, of whom it is
supposed that they know about this question. I declare that
they did not know about it. In Mondorf a Jewish officer came
to me and presented to me an illustrated paper which had
been published by Eisenhower. I declare here, I was
terrified myself. I did not think it was possible. I want
to give another explanation. The Fuehrer is dead. I respect
the majesty of the dead. I am not the defense counsel of the
Fuehrer. In December 1938, when I visited the prison in
Landsberg, [sic] I spoke to the Fuehrer for the last time. I
declare here that up to the year 1938 I have not heard the
Fuehrer express the opinion that the Jews should be
exterminated, either in an unofficial talk or in a Party
official talk.
Q. Did you ever use the word “liquidate"?
A. No.
Q. Did you approve the article that was written by Hiemer
where he used the word “exterminate"?
A. “Exterminate” and “destroy” are two different words in
the German language. At the moment I am speaking about
destruction. This word “destruction” was used by the
Fuehrer. A report might have come from the Fuehrer, “The
English or American company has been destroyed. There were
so many prisoners and so many dead.” In the German language,
when I say that somebody’s life should be taken, I would use
either “killed” or “murdered,” but I think “kill” would be
the right expression. Extermination can result by
sterilization, as Kaufmann wrote. The word “extermination”
does not necessarily mean killing.
Q. Now will you answer my question: Did you approve the
article that was written by Hiemer?
A. I believe yes. I have approved it, because he was my
chief editor. He stated what different Jews had said, and
referring to what Kaufmann, this Jew, has said, he also used
the word “extermination.” He just used it in one article.
Q. Who became radical first? Hitler or you?
A. I only know about myself.
Q. When did you become radical?
A. As soon as the book was published by Kaufmann, but we did
not write anything about killing or murdering.
[Page 1429]
Q. Basically, what was the change that took place after you
read the Kaufmann book?
A. I think I have written that if the Jews want to
exterminate us they should be exterminated, too. I think
these articles should be presented to me. I cannot remember
them in detail.
Q. They will be presented to you in due time.
A. Yes.
Q. Is that the only time you ever made such a statement?
A. I believe, yes. No letter and no correspondence exists in
my file where I said or I suggested to anybody that Jews
ought to be killed.
Q. Do you accept any responsibility for the killing of Jews
in concentration camps as a result of your teachings?
A. Only such a person can testify to a thing like that, who
is paid to falsify the truth. This is impossible. Here are
the documents. The killings have been ordered from Berlin.
Nobody in Germany would have carried through any killings
without having received orders.
Q. Do you remember on the 11th day of August 1938, that you
gave the signal for the destruction of the main synagogue of
Nurnberg? [See documents 1724-PS, vol. IV, p.224; 2711-PS,
vol. V, p. 376.]
A. No. No. I have not done that.
Q. Do you remember that the issue of the Fraenkische
Tageszeitung of 11 August 1938 came out with a banner
headline “Julius Streicher Gave the Signal for the
Destruction of the Main Synagogue of Nurnberg.”
A. I have not read this article, but I have already said
that the main synagogue of Nurnberg has been removed by the
Oberbuergermeister.
Q. Do you remember seeing that edition where the entire four
pages were taken up with pictures of yourself officiating at
the ceremony and giving the text of your address, giving the
order for the destruction of the synagogue?
A. Even before the acquisition of power of Hitler in 1933, I
have already made speeches and said that, in Nurnberg, “An
oriental building in the middle of the town is a shame and
it is high time that it disappeared.”
Q. Then you were there, and you did participate in that
ceremony?
A. Yes. We have also removed a Protestant church in Munich,
[Page 1430]
because it did not fit into the street. However, that has
nothing to do with the 9th of November, with the burning of
synagogues.
Q. I didn’t say it had anything to do with it. I asked you
if you gave the signal for the destruction of the synagogue.
A. Yes, for this synagogue, yes.
Q. You then want the record to be changed where you said
"No” the first time?
A. At that time I thought you were referring to the burning
of the synagogues. I mixed it up.
Q. This article in substance says that “Many people are
quite smug because the Jewish question in Germany is solved.
The Jew is barred from civil life and politics. German blood
is protected by the Nurnberg laws,” and so forth. “Such
persons,” according to you, “are taking only a superficial
view of the Jewish question. The German people will not be
free of danger from the Jewish plague until the Jewish
question is liquidated in its entirety. The danger of the
plague infecting the German people will continue to exist as
long as there is a seat of this pestilence anywhere in the
world.”
A. This has nothing to do with killing. With that is meant
that as long as a Jew anywhere in the world has the
possibility either to mix sexually or acquire the power in
the individual country. I beg to point to some other of my
similar articles where I wrote, “as long as the power of the
Jews is not broken,” and these articles referred back to
this time.
Q. What do you mean by the word “liquidate"?
A. I have not used the word “liquidate.”
Q. What is meant by that?
A. No more sexual intercourse. No more political influence.
No more possibilities for them to play off peoples against
one another.
Q. If you were proposing a safe haven for Jews, how do you
consider that any seat of pestilence, as you say, can be
cleared up?
A. All this belongs to the solution of the whole Jewish
question.
Q. If you say there is a danger of the German people
becoming infected so long as there is any place where Jews
are in control, how did you propose to solve that question?
A. The Jews are the only people that are distributed among
all countries, and in spite of that, they have remained a
people, a race, a unified religion, and a nation. There is
only one solution, and this solution can only be arrived at
in an international way by a conference of the big powers.
In this state, they would be under their king or president,
citizens of the state, and just like
[Page 1431]
any Chinese or Japanese, they could come into another
country as members of their own country. This state would
have the same international rights as every other state,
with their ambassadors and delegations but the Jew would not
have the right to make politics in another country as a
member of a Jewish state.
Q. Then you say that in connection with that particular
article, that you didn’t mean that the solution of the
Jewish question would be the liquidation of the Jews?
A. No.
Q. Do you admit that the reading of that article permits
that interpretation?
A. Whoever knows all my writings and articles during my 25
years of journalism cannot have such an impression.
Q. Why did you permit Hiemer to use the word “exterminate"?
In view of this article of yours, that permits of some wrong
interpretation.
A. This is a way of expression which does not mean killing,
but merely means exterminate them; get them out. At that
time the article was read to me, but of course, I do not
remember every detailed word.
Q. I will now show you the issue of Der Stuermer of the 19th
of March 1942, and call your special attention to the
editorial appearing on the first page, which runs over to
the second page over your signature, and ask you to pay
particular attention to that part which is marked with a red
pencil, and I will ask you to explain what you meant by
those passages. This article has to do with the prophecy of
the Fuehrer. It goes on to say that the “Jewish penetration
of Europe, especially of Germany, began under the protection
of the Roman Empire, and that the solution of the Jewish
problem became a question of life for Europe.”
A. Yes, that is my conviction.
Q. “There are two ways which might have led to the
redemption of Europe from the Jews, expulsion or
extermination.”
A. Yes. I have written that purposely, but it is not stated
here that killing should be the way.
Q. What do you mean by “extermination"?
A. This is the most radical and an impossible solution. Had
I wanted the solution of extermination, I wouldn’t have
mentioned both of these ways.
Q. But you go on to say, “Just as the expulsion of Jews had
led to temporary and partial results by virtue of the
disunity in action of the European peoples, so also the
attempt at extermination
[Page 1432]
could not attain the desired purpose, as extermination was
only carried out on a petty scale and within a few nations.”
A. Yes, this is a historical fact. This is the reason why I
say that extermination is not the way to the solution of the
Jewish problem.
Q. But later on in the article, you say, “Fate has decreed
that the 20th century would see the total solution of the
Jewish question. In a proclamation of 24 February 1942, to
the peoples of Europe, the Fuehrer of the German Reich has
indicated how this solution will be achieved.”
A. At that time I did not know that the Fuehrer had Jews
killed in camps. The Fuehrer has repeatedly said --
unfortunately, I was not able to quote it word for word — he
said that finally the Jews will approach an extermination in
England and America, internationally in every country, and I
think that then he referred to the political power of the
Jews.
Q. Don’t you point out in this article that expulsion in
itself is ineffective?
A. Expulsion alone would not be sufficient. There has to be
some order. They must have to have some place to go to.
Q. How do you explain the part in this article that reads,
"My prophecy will find its fulfillment that the Aryan race
is not annihilated by this war. On the contrary, the Jew
will be exterminated. Whatever else this struggle leads to
or however long it may endure, this will be the final
result, and then for the first time after the elimination of
these parasites, a true peace will arise in a suffering
world, and thereby mutual understanding between peoples will
remain for a long time.”
A. The elimination of the parasites means taking them out of
the people.
Q. I know it means that, but what do you mean by the
statement that “the Aryan race is not annihilated by this
war. On the contrary, the Jew will be exterminated"?
A. I meant that the power of the Jews was being broken.
Q. Show me any place in that article where it says that.
A. The word is not said right here, but I have written it in
other articles. If extermination was to be understood by
that, I would have written the word “extermination.”
Q. When you wrote that “the Aryan race is not annihilated by
this war,” what did you mean by that?
A. What I meant was that if it is managed to take the Jews
out of the different countries and place them into a state
of their own, then the Aryan peoples can continue to live.
If, however,
[Page 1433]
the condition carries on as it was up to then, that the Jews
were allowed to mix freely sexually with other nations, then
the whole world will go down to destruction.
Q. Why didn’t you say that?
A. There were a number of editions of “Der Stuermer” where I
wrote that the peoples are going towards their destruction
by sexual intercourse.
Q. Do you want the record to be changed that you have never
used the word “extermination"?
A. Extermination has not the meaning, as I said before, of
killing, but merely excluding. As I said before, during
wartime, in the German wartime language, it was often used
that such and such a company was exterminated with so many
people dead and so many people wounded.
Q. I will now quote to you an article that appeared in Der
Stuermer on the 7th day of May 1942, [Document referred to
did not form part of the prosecution case as finally
prepared and hence is not published in this series.]
appearing over the signature of Ernst Hiemer, and which you
say was printed with your approval. This article reads as
follows, as it appears in the last three or four paragraphs:
"today Europe is about to carry out the final solution of
the Jewish question. Precisely on that account, it is well
to learn from past errors and to recall again in this matter
what history teaches; and what does history teach? It
teaches, “the Jewish question is not only a German affair.
It is also not only a European problem. The Jewish question
is a world question. Not only is Germany not safe in face of
the Jews as long as one Jew lives in Europe, but also the
Jewish question is hardly solved in Europe so long as Jews
live in the rest of the world. Jewry is organized
criminality. The Jewish menace will thus only be eliminated
if Jewry in the whole world has ceased to exist.” Give me
your explanation of that.
A. I explain this, as I explained it before, that this
question has to be internationally solved; that is, the Jews
have to be taken out of all countries and an international
solution created. It is proof that we always wanted the
international solution of the Jewish problem by always being
against any individual proceedings in Germany.
Q. How do you explain the following: “but also the Jewish
question is hardly solved in Europe as long as Jews live in
the rest of the world"?
A. Did I write this article?
Q. Hiemer wrote it.
A. This has been written rather illogically: This can happen
very often; if you just take one sentence out of an article,
it
[Page 1434]
might happen. You have to read the article as a whole. May I
hear it again? I want to be sure.
Q. “Not only is Germany not safe in face of the Jews as long
as one Jew lives in Europe, but also the Jewish question is
hardly solved in Europe so long as Jews live in the rest of
the world.”
A. This has not been expressed very cleverly, but what he
wanted to say --
Q. Never mind what he wanted to say. We are only interested
in what was said.
Now, when you consider that and also consider the following:
"Jewry is organized criminality,” what do you say to that?
A. We can prove that. With organized criminality we mean
that the Jews were organized among all peoples in order to
get all the wealth into their hands. The Old Testament is
still looked upon as the whole history of Jews. In the Old
Testament it is written, “The gates of the world are open
for you and you should devour the people.” The Jews are
living in all the countries as Jews. For instance, the Jews
in England are living there as English citizens, but they
remain Jews. It says at the association between God and
Abraham, it is said that God has made an association with
Abraham, and the sign of this association is the
circumcision, and this is how every Jew is part of this big
organization by this mark of circumcision.
Q. If you believe that it is organized criminality, how
could you honestly advocate the erection of a national
state?
A. Why not?
Q. How could such a state exist without having some
relations with other nations?
A. I have said that it should have relations with other
nations, with ambassadors.
Q. Had you considered whether or not other nations would
have any relations with an organized criminal nation?
A. If you take apart every one of my sentences that I have
written during my past 25 years, of course.
Q. Of course what?
A. Of course, if you take out every single word, take it out
of the substance, of course you can weigh it one way or the
other, but what I meant by “world criminality of Jews” I
made reference to the political side of it.
Q. I am not trying to trap you with any of my questions. I
am merely trying to get the basic philosophy that you have
been teaching. Now you say that you at all times advocated a
peaceful solution of this question?
A. Yes.
[Page 1435]
Q. And that your peaceful solution was to move the Jews out
of Germany and out of Europe, and to create a national
state?
A. The Zionist leader, Theodore Herzl, requested that.
Q. Now you have advocated that you are able to prove that
Jewry is organized criminality?
A. Yes, that I can prove.
Q. I want to put those two things together and want you to
tell me what your solution is for the existence of such a
national state.
A. Let us remain with the word “criminals.” In France,
criminals are being sent to Devil’s Island. If I know that
people are distributed in every country with the aim of the
acquisition of the wealth that is in every country, and have
as their aim to spoil every country racially, I have the
right to speak about criminality.
Q. Do you take the position that every individual Jew
belongs to that class?
A. No. Politically, yes. As a member of the whole community
that has as their aim to enslave other nations.
Q. Did you advocate a selection?
A. International solution of the Jewish problem by the
elimination of the Jews into other countries.
Q. And by that you mean all Jews?
A. With that I mean all Jews in all the countries.
Q. Without any selection as to whether they are criminals or
not?
A. Yes.
Q. then you had in mind the creation of a national state
that would be something similar to Devil’s Island?
A. I have said already before that Theodore Herzl and most
of the Jews wanted a creation of the Jewish state. When I
said “Devil’s Island,” I merely meant it in an illustrative
fashion. I wanted to say that in France, criminals are not
being killed by merely being sent to Devil’s Island.
Q. What do you mean by the word “Jewry"?
A. Jewry is the conception for the whole of the Jews. You
say, for instance, the world Jewry. The political aims of
the Jews in the world is world Jewry.
Q. Well, would you consider that Jewry would be eliminated
if this national state was created?
A. Yes. This program has started already. Cities have been
built in Palestine. Agricultural schools have been set up in
Switzerland, and many people have emigrated to Palestine and
worked on the land.
[Page 1436]
Q. In this article you state, “The Jewish menace will thus
only be eliminated if Jewry in the whole world has ceased to
exist.”
A. That means as soon as they have stopped to exercise any
influence among the peoples.
Q. But you call it a Jewish menace.
A. I meant it as a menace when people in different countries
cannot assimilate themselves to the countries, but remain a
united block, economically and politically.
Q. In the last few questions, I made a mistake by referring
to you as the author of this article, but the article we
have been discussing is the one by Ernst Hiemer.
A. I am ready to answer the question just the same.
Q. Well, I just didn’t want to mislead you with those
questions. However, do you accept this article as if it was
your own?
A. Being as a whole, yes.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Streicher Disowns the Fruits of His Policy
Excerpt from Testimony of Julius Streicher, taken
at Nurnberg, Germany, 6 November 1945, by Lt. Col.
S.W. Brookhart, JAGD. Also present: Gladys
Picklesimer, Court Reporter, Martha Gronefeld,
Interpreter.
[Page 1436]
Q. Let’s talk about the extermination policy.
A. Well, all I can say on this question is that I was as
surprised as most of the people. The first time I learned of
it was by a Swiss paper.
Q. How did it suit you?
A. What could I say? I would not be able to kill anybody or
have somebody killed. I wouldn’t be able to take the
leadership in such a question on account of my whole
attitude.
Q. You were one of the principle leaders in fomenting
measures against the Jews. You must have been proud when
they found a man strong enough and bloody enough to go in
and wipe them off the earth.
A. If I had been the leader of the State, I would surely not
have thought of doing such a thing in the moment when it was
certain that we could not win the war.
Q. I am speaking of measures that were taken, starting with
the Russian campaign. You remember the Einsatz groups. [The
activities of one of the Einsatz groups are described in
document L-180, vol. VII, p. 978.]
A. I stayed on my farm, and there was no one who would ever
have visited me. I didn’t know anything about what the Party
was doing or intended to do.
[Page 1437]
Q. You certainly remember the operations of the Einsatz
groups on the Eastern front.
A. I repeat under oath — you can ask everybody — there is
no one who can say that I have spoken with anyone about
these questions during the war.
I read in the Swiss papers — it must have been the end of
1944 or the beginning of 1945, and I couldn’t believe it at
the time — that they talked about a camp which they found
near Cracow where many people had been killed, and I
couldn’t believe it.
Q. What about this decree of October 26th?
A. This decree on October 26th mentions the fact that the
Jewish forced labor had to work under police supervision.
Q. That is all the dealings that you had with the Polish
Jews, just that one decree?
A. Yes. It must be the only thing. I don’t remember anything
else. It might be possible that I had another decree. I made
another decree concerning the ghetto in Cracow, but I am not
sure about it. It might be that even the order for the
construction of the ghetto was a part of the police
administration, not of mine.
Q. Do you remember now any other decrees that you signed
dealing with Polish Jews?
A. I don’t know if you mean by that one of the decrees where
the Polish Jews were obliged to have the Star of David on an
armband.
Q. Do you remember that one?
A. I don’t remember if I made the decree.
Q. You know very well that you signed that decree, don’t
you?
A. Did I sign that? If I did, then it is all right. I don’t
want you to believe that I want to deny anything I signed. I
have been in prison for four months, and you must realize it
is very hard for me to concentrate myself. I don’t want you
to have the impression that I want to deny anything I did.
Q. Didn’t you on the 23d day of November 1939 issue, above
your own signature, a decree calling for the segregation of
Jews in the General Government of Poland, and compelling all
Polish nationals of the Jewish race, above the age of ten,
to wear a white armband with the Star of David? [See
document 2672-PS, Vol. V, p. 368.] This decree threatened
imprisonment and a heavy fine on all who failed to comply.
A. Yes. In my subconscious mind I remember that.
Q. What about your conscious mind?
[Page 1371]
A. During this time, it was a rule in the whole German Reich
that the Jews had to wear the yellow star on their breast. I
didn’t want to have the same thing and thought it would be a
good idea to have something else, because I judged it much
better than to have this yellow star; so I suggested the
white armband with a star, because all the German workers
anyhow had some kind of an armband. I thought it was not so
discriminating for the Jews to wear an armband, something
similar to those of the German workers. It was a rule in the
Reich, and I considered it much better than those the Reich
had now in order. It was much less discriminating. Besides
that, those were all general orders coming from the Reich.
Q. where was it intended to concentrate the Jews?
A. In the East.
Q. Whose intention was that?
A. From Hitler and those men, Himmler, and those men around
him.
Q. Did you ever get any written directives or instructions
with reference to that?
A. No. Never.
Q. then how did you know it was Himmler’s plan to do that?
A. Somebody told me in Cracow, that all the Jews were to be
sent to Theresienstadt and the East. At this time we
considered the East as containing all of Russia.
Q. Do you remember stating, during that speech, that it had
been decided that instead of concentrating all the Jews in
Poland, that Poland was to serve merely as a transmission
camp and that the Jews actually were to go further East?
A. That is a question of the policy concerning the Jews that
was only in the hands of Himmler. He was so much in charge
of this question that he even was not obliged to make it
known to the countries concerned about what kind of action
he was about to take.
Q. You don’t remember then making the statement about which
I have just told you?
A. I don’t want to deny that on some occasions I did mention
something about the solution of the Jewish question, because
this question at this time had to be brought to its end.
Q. Do you mean the solution of sending them East?
A. No. We were waiting for a solution from Berlin, to know
exactly what we could do about these poor men.
Q. What was your suggestion for the solution?
A. I never was supposed to make any solution. We worked
[Page 1372]
quite well together with the Jews. They were distributed
through the country, and without the Jews there would never
have been any commerce. The Jews in Poland are specialists,
like tailors or shoemakers. Without those little Jewish
commercial men, it would have been very hard to get along.
My government had always the intention to keep those Jews in
their places because we needed them in their work. We proved
that. We had to shut down the factories after the moment
Jews were deported from Poland.
Q. Who established the ghettos in Poland?
A. The police started with it. They concentrated them
together in certain living quarters.
Q. What was your connection with that?
A. I tried to get a certain law into all of these decrees,
and I remember now, that I made a decree about the
construction of Jewish living quarters.
Q. You established the ghettos, didn’t you?
A. I only made those decrees lawful. It was not the task of
the police to consider the question of sewage, water, and
labor and taxes for these ghettos. That was my task.
Q. My question is this: Did you or did you not, by decree,
legalize the setting up of ghettos?
A. I only tried, when these ghettos were erected by the
police, to get a legal background and foundation for those
things.
Q. You did that by issuing a decree, didn’t you?
A. In the interests of everybody, and especially, in the
interests of the Jews.
Q. All I am saying is that it was your ultimate
responsibility, as Governor General of Poland, to administer
these ghettos. Now, you did it by one means or another, but
the fact of the matter is that it was your responsibility;
isn’t that so?
A. Originally, these ghettos were erected by the police. I
later had two decrees to legalize those facts. Furthermore,
I was charged with administration, but we had terrific
difficulties with the police who did interfere daily in our
administration measures. The idea of my decree was only to
protect these Jews, who, without any special decree and law,
would have been diminished or eliminated. There was always
the talk about the elimination of the Jews, and I tried, by
these decrees, to save them. It was entirely wrong. I know
that you will always want to put me in a position where I
will be accused as the originator of these ghettos, but that
is not the truth. They were already erected, and it was only
my task to legalize these things.
Q. Did you ever visit the ghettos?
[Page 1373]
A. No. Once I went to the ghetto in Warsaw.
Q. What did you find there? What were the conditions?
A. The conditions, in the long range, were absolutely
impossible. Under any conditions, a change was necessary,
and then necessary foodstuffs for these 100,000 poor men. We
did what we could, but the land was very poor. The country
was poor, and all around was the police. We really had to
smuggle in food. I ask you to hear Governor Fischer who was
at Warsaw, who is able to give you a detailed report
confirming what I just told you. For a certain time,
conditions in the ghettos were better. The Jewish inmates in
the ghetto made treaties with German industries for
deliveries of uniforms and other things.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
“Frank’s View of the Jewish Problem”
Excerpts from Testimony of Hans Frank, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 6 September 1945, 1430-1700, by
Lt. Col. Thomas S. Hinkel, IGD. Also present:
Herbert Sherman, Interpreter; Pvt. Clair van
Vleck, Court Reporter.
[Page 1373]
Q. I haven’t any impressions at all regarding your Jewish
activities, but I want to find out from you just what your
opinion is with respect to that.
A. We had to solve the Jewish problem in Germany. My idea of
the solution was to get the Jewish population out of Germany
through emigration. That means to go into other countries
who would like to have them. It was very difficult in the
years after the revolution for the German population to live
together with the Jews, and it was originally Hitler's
program to emigrate all the Jews from Germany.
Q. What was your opinion of the laws which were enacted
depriving Jews of their full rights as German citizens? Did
you agree or disagree with these laws?
A. Basically, I agreed with these laws. The Jews are a
special people, and they should have their own state. The
best thing would have been if they would have been given a
state and they would have lived over there and would have
been happy. This Jewish problem is not a specific German
problem, it is an international problem, and starts to be a
problem in every country all over the world. It is not only
a problem of this time we are living in, but it is a
thousand-year-old problem.
Q. How do you reconcile your professed desire to have the
German state operate on a legal basis and, therefore, your
opposition to Hitler because of some of the things that he
did, and your statement that you agreed with these laws that
made Jews less than German citizens?
A. That at that time was my opinion about the Jewish
problem. That really at that time was my opinion. I was at
that time a very
[Page 1373]
poor man. I saw the Jews had all very rich positions and
fortunes, and out of this youthful criticism, I came to my
judgment about the Jews.
Q. As a lawyer, did you consider it right and proper, and in
keeping with fundamental concepts of German law, that by
decree Jews of German nationality were deprived of certain
citizenship rights?
A. If the Communists would have gained power, the way Hitler
gained power in Germany, they would have deprived all the
Germans of their rights, fortunes, and so on.
Q. Never mind about that. Just answer my question. How do
you reconcile these opinions?
A. I didn’t have at this time any reluctance to these laws
against the Jews. Today, naturally, I am more awake. Today I
naturally realize that you cannot solve the problem this
way. You have to have a big international conference or you
have to make provisions where to put the Jews in a normal
way. Besides that, I think we should have made a difference
between the Jews, those Jews who were citizens a long time,
and those who came after the revolution in the east into
Germany.
Q. Did you, in any of your writings, point out that it was
contrary to the fundamental German law to deprive one part
of the population of citizen’s rights on a racial basis?
A. I never wrote against this question, but I did agree with
the development of the Jewish question in Germany.
Q. Did you agree with the Nurnberg laws?
A. Yes, I did, because I considered it as a very necessary law.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Persecution of the Jews in Poland
Excerpts from Testimony of Hans Frank, taken in
Nurnberg, Germany, 7 September 1945, 1030-1215, by
Lt. Col. Thomas S. Hinkel, IGD. Also present:
Siegfried Ramler, Interpreter; T/4 R.R. Kerry,
Reporter.
Q. Do you remember the removal from Warsaw of a large number
of Jews in 1942?
A. When should that have been?
Q. During the period 22 July to 3 October 1942.
A. This might have been reported to me later on. Was this
during the time of the ghetto rising?
Q. You know whether or not it was reported to you that a
large number of Jews had been removed from Warsaw during a
period in 1942?
[Page 1375]
A. I have understood the question. State Secretary Buehler
would know it. I know that a conference had taken place
between the City and the State Secretary, but I had not
taken part in this conference.
Q. Well, wasn’t the result of the conference reported to
you?
A. No. The competent authority was in Warsaw.
Q. Is it your statement that as Governor-General of Poland,
you didn’t know that a large part of the population of
Warsaw had been removed therefrom?
A. Certainly I got to know it. That’s quite clear.
Q. That is my question to you. Wasn’t it reported?
A. It certainly was not told me by State Secretary Buehler,
to whom the report was directed. If a report had been
issued, perhaps it was by Governor Fischer, who was
personally in Cracow.
Q. I am not trying to quibble with you on words. When I say
report, I don’t mean necessarily that a formal written
document was presented to you concerning these matters. What
I mean generally is, were you not informed by one means or
another whether orally or in writing of these events?
A. The question about the transportation of Jews has
certainly been reported to me not only from Warsaw but other
sources.
Q. What other sources?
A. Out of the whole Reich.
Q. Didn’t Buehler tell you who told him about these things?
A. Not only Buehler spoke about it, but also Secretary
Boepple spoke about it, and besides that, this was a general
plan where always the names were mentioned because this was
a problem that affected the administration all over Germany;
but what we did know was that Himmler was the Reich
Commissioner for Jews. Only once a written document came
into my hands from Lammers in which was written that all
affairs in the Reich and all occupied territories of the
Reich are under the jurisdiction of the Reich SS Commissar
Himmler. This document has been repeated in various forms.
Once it came to a connection where the police alone could
dispose of the property of the Jews: that all the property
that belonged to Jews who were being evacuated came under
the charge of Reich Commissar Himmler and not in the charge
of State authorities, and this also applied to the General
Government.
Q. I still say that as Governor-General of Poland, when
reports were made to you by your subordinates regarding
instructions that they had received from Berlin while they
were in Berlin, that they must have told you from whom these
instructions were
[Page 1376]
received and who these people were that gave the
instructions that you refer to.
A. I think the best man who would know about this is SS
Gruppenfuehrer Krueger.
Q. That may be, but I am asking what you know about it.
A. I know what has been reported to me.
Q. And what was reported to you?
A. That the Jews on the order of the Fuehrer should be
transported towards the east in stages, that this plan was
not discussed very often because we often administered those
things ourselves and there was also a different town,
Theresienstadt, which was also taken into consideration, but
that had not been notified to us in writing.
Q. Now, you said that your subordinates, including Buehler,
on occasion told you about instructions which had been
received concerning the treatment to be accorded the Jews or
other matters in connection with the Jews, and I want to
know from whom your subordinates received these
instructions.
A. First the word “instruction” is far too grand a word. It
was not really an instruction. It was just the result of
conversations and rumors. Himmler had never expressed his
plans so clearly, and what I have said and done then was
just the result of beliefs which were quite clear to me.
Q. The question is this: Did you or did you not take action
in response to the message that you received from one of
your subordinates as to what the people in Berlin wanted you
to do with the Jews?
A. In no case have I had anything to do with the
transportation of Jews from Warsaw, which was a clear
internal affair of the SS.
Q. What connection did you have with the Jews?
A. I had no competent authority on this particular field. I
had a few Jews in the castle with me as workers, but I
personally had nothing to do with the Jews.
Q. You stated that after you talked with Buehler that you
took action with reference to the suggestion that Buehler
told you about as coming from Berlin. What were these
actions to which you refer?
A. I have not said that I took action.
Q. What did you do?
A. I don’t know what you mean by action, but I often talked
to Dr. Fischer, and it is a fact that the transportation of
Jews from Poland to different places was very bad for the
economy. We have gotten in touch with the Chief of the Ss,
with the Ober-
[Page 1377]
kommando of the Wehrmacht Keitel, and the Reich Minister to
prevent Jews who worked so well producing uniforms from
being transported away from Warsaw. My point of view was
that it was crazy to do such a thing in the middle of the
war when one must have every button of every uniform. We had
armament officials that came to us and begged us to leave
the Jews because their factories would have to stop.
Q. What did you tell Hitler about the Jews?
A. I told him in 1940 that the special thing about the Jews
in Poland was that they were a different class of people
from what we had in Germany. In Germany the Jews are the
rich ones. In Germany they are not manual workers; they are
not people who stand in factories and work. In Germany they
have been bankers, doctors, merchants. In Poland, on the
other hand, the Jews are the small manual workers. They are
the bootmakers, the tailors, and not only that, they are
also semi-skilled workers in industry.
Q. What else was said?
A. And then I also told him that they are really quite well
off, that they are very industrious and behave well, and
that we cannot dispense with them in Poland because the Pole
has not the nature that the German Jew has. The Jew in
Poland was the man that brought the trade into the village
because the transportation of the country was so very bad.
There were no railways, and that was terribly important.
Q. What did Hitler say to all this?
A. That interested him but he did not talk about it further.
Q. Did you tell him about how the Jews were being treated?
A. That I could not tell him because nothing special had
happened to the Jews.
Q. What happened after that?
A. The Colonel must remember that I came with very few men
into a completely alien country. From the 7th of November it
took me a quarter of a year until I occupied all my service
posts, until all these posts were able to communicate with
the central post or orders from the central post could be
given to the different administrative sections. Besides, I
had in the country the Wehrmacht commander, who had nothing
to do with me, who was not under me at all, and who was not
responsible to me for any reports, and they had already been
in the country since the 1st of September. The SS and police
had already been in the country, as I said before. It is my
personal opinion, although Adolf Hitler never told me in the
course of all this time, that Himmler in-
[Page 1378]
fluenced Hitler to make a very great anti-Jewish campaign,
using the reason that the Jews were guilty of the war
against Germany. This of course contributed in ever-
increasing measure to the more difficult problem of the
Jews. The SS never allowed any of my workers to get involved
in their Jewish campaigns. At first they started to gather
together the Jews, saying that anyway the Jews had their own
parts of the town in every town they lived, and it was then
we tried through the formation of ghettos to keep things in
order at least in the bigger cities. In these ghettos all
Jews were to be rounded up together; they were to be under
the protection of the police; they were to have their own
administration there. I want to point out that the order we
talked about yesterday about the forced labor of Jews, that
those orders had actually never gone into effect, that the
SS acted under their own orders and declared that the
General-Governor had nothing to order.
Q. What happened to the Jews?
A. We already talked about the fact that these ghettos came
into their greatest difficulties, especially Warsaw, where
food was concerned. And then in accordance with the general
plan, the general transportation of Jews towards the east
was carried out.
Q. What was your participation in that?
A. That I fought against that until the very last moment, as
I said before.
Q. Then what did you do at the last moment?
A. I went to the highest authorities of the different
departments in order to interest them in my opinion, but I
got the decision of the Fuehrer from the Oberkommando of the
Wehrmacht Keitel, who told me himself that the Fuehrer
wanted the transportation of the Jews to the East carried
out under any circumstances.
Q. After your opinion was overruled, what did you do?
A. I have already told the Colonel before that eight times I
offered my resignation.
Q. How many Jews were killed or liquidated during that 1943
period?
A. In the rising?
Q. Yes.
A. The number has never been told to me. I once asked
Himmler to show me the photos of the ghetto but that was not
shown to me. Nobody could enter this territory. It was shut
tightly. It had been declared a military wartime
restriction, and the civilian administration was kept
outside completely. I just had a very superficial report
with no exact information, and whenever I
[Page 1379]
had a question, I just received the answer that the question
hadn’t been cleared up. It was always very difficult to ask
questions because the police and the Wehrmacht said, “Mr.
Governor-General what have you to do with that question? You
should sit in the castle and be a representative.”
Q. Did you hear that more than 50,000 Jews had been killed
or captured or liquidated one way or the other?
A. This number I am hearing for the first time. I have not
heard any numbers but I heard it was in the thousands. I was
also told that the losses of the German police and Wehrmacht
had been very substantial.
Q. What action, if any, did you take in connection with the
destruction of the Warsaw ghetto in 1943?
A. I asked for reports from the Wehrmacht and the police,
and it was reported to me that there was really a big rising
with weapons, with cannons, machine guns of all kinds, that
it was an internal civil war.
Nazi Conspiracy & Aggression, Supplement B
Administration and Exploitation of Poland
Excerpts from Testimony of Hans Frank, taken at
Nurnberg, Germany, 10 September 1945, 1440-1720,
by Lt. Col. Thomas S. Hinkel, IGD. Also present:
Capt. Jesse F. Landrum, Reporter; Bernard Reymon,
Interpreter.
Q. My question is, what was your principal duty?
A. My principle duty was in a country completely liquidate
by war to establish an administration. The administration
placed under my authority was in charge of the following
departments: in the administration firstly, the division was
the following-- under the Governor General were governors
and under each governor of the district there was a
Kreishauptmann a title coined by me, and under the authority
of the Kreishauptmann was the Polish voit (a Polish word)
and each Polish voit had 10 to 20 communities under his
administration. That was according to the number of the
population, and all the Polish voits of one district formed,
so to speak, the staff of the Kreishauptmann. The task of
the Polish voits was to apply beneath them the orders coming
from above and to transmit the claims from below to
authorities above. That was the inner administration.
For the cities, there was instead of a Kreishauptmann a
Stadthauptmann and under the Stadthauptmann there was a
Polish Beurgermeister. Also, I had the seat of my General
Government in Cracow, and each governor in his turn had his
own admins-
[Page 1380]
tration. That is what I call the backbone of the
administration; and then come the Departments of Education,
of Finance, Agriculture, Health. There were about 12 or 13
departments in all. And besides this administration, as
outlined by me, there were in the country the following
administrations which were entirely independent of and from
me: the most important there were the Police and the SS. It
had been said officially that the Chief of the Police was
under my authority; but that was simply a personal way of
emphasizing his rank was not above mine; and subsequently,
by an order of the Fuehrer (which was published in a general
order), the Police was entirely removed from my jurisdiction
to such an extent that it had its own State Secretary, which
State Secretary received his orders directly from Himmler.
To mark the complete separation and distinction of the
Police and the SS from my administration, no member of the
Police force or SS was a member of my administration;
whereas, all the officials of all departments under the
order of the Governor General were being paid out of my
treasury, while the personnel of the police and SS were
being paid directly from and by the cash of Himmler and
Berlin. So that I had not even any disciplinary authority
over the Police as any chief is supposed to have. Any
attempt to manage the Police had to go in the shape of a
request, not in the form of an order. On the top of all
this, the Chief of Police was not only a direct
representative of Himmler as Chief Commissar of the General
Police, but also “fuer die Festigung des Volkstums,” and
besides, in the question of the Jews, this system was quite
impossible and I had continually to envisage my resignation
as I was in continual conflict. I wish only to say that my
fight with or against the Police and the SS was known
throughout the whole country. It was only the Polish Emigre-
government in London which did not see the picture as it
was; whereas, the native Poles at home, with whom I
collaborated, they saw the things as they were. It is only
after three years of struggle that the head of the police,
Krueger, was finally recalled. This recall of Krueger was,
to a certain extent, a triumph for me as it was a symbolical
proof that my policy had got the upper hand; so that the
successor to Krueger, Koppe, was a rather decent person. It
is evident that the reports sent by Krueger to Himmler at
Berlin and Himmler being my enemy, are for me today the most
glamorous justification because in those reports I was
depicted as a regular formalist, as a weakling, as a man who
was not in good standing with the Poles and who did not
carry out the very policy for which Himmler stood.
[Page 1381]
Q. How do you know that?
A. In my continual visits to Berlin this was told me by
Minister Lammers and in one of the few interviews I had
personally with Hitler — it was in 1943 in the presence of
Bormann — Hitler himself made reference to those reports by
and from Himmler. This conference probably took place
sometime in May 1943. I again offered to resign, saying that
I could not keep on in that manner. Buehler is well aware of
these facts and I wish you could give him a hearing.
The economic life in Poland was in three directions: in the
first place, all matters of agriculture were taken care of
by the agricultural representative of my government;
secondly, departments non-agricultural and non-important
from the war point of view were attended to by the heads of
the departments, also within my government. But while the
most important part of the economy was continued by the
Chief of the 4-Year-Plan, Hermann Goering, or by and from
the Minister for Armaments, Goering even had the right to
issue orders, which had legal force in the General
Government, without consulting me.
Q. Did he ever do that?
A. This is printed in the legal publications.
Q. Did he ever issue any such orders?
A. Unfortunately, more than once. The worst of it was
regarding the furnishing of foodstuff in the first two years
of the war. Thus, once he asked for 500,000 tons of cereal
(corn) from the General Government.
Q. Did you furnish it?
A. I did not furnish it. I had a very grave conflict with
him. Goering said he didn’t care whether anybody starves in
Europe, but the German people ought not to starve. I
furnished only a part which went to the Wehrmacht. From that
time on, Goering called me “King Stanislas.”
Q. Do you recall receiving an order from Goering regarding
the exploitation of Polish natural resources?
A. This order was some time around December 1939, and
thereupon, I went to see Adolf Hitler and I told him it
can’t go on. Goering wanted, at that time, that we break off
every second track of the double railway lines.
Q. What did you do, in response to this order that was
received from Goering, besides complain to the Fuehrer?
A. We didn’t carry it out.
Q. You didn’t? You didn’t do anything at all?
A. We didn’t do anything and what he did do, he did it with
his own personnel.
[Page 1382]
Q. What did the Fuehrer tell you when you complained to him
about this order?
A. Hitler sided absolutely with me. He said it was madness.
Q. Was the order ever withdrawn?
A. I don’t know whether it was formally withdrawn.
Q. Isn’t it a fact that Poland was exploited?
A. I should remind you that I came into the country in
November 1939. At that time, there was a delegate of the
OKW, Buehrmann, and he was especially in charge of
transportation of the most precious machinery to Germany;
and as soon as I took up my duties as Governor-General, I
received from all the governors a complaint to the effect
that the situation was getting impossible. Things reached a
climax where we in the General Government had not a single
ton of copper because all the copper had been taken away.
The machinery from Polish factories had been, long before my
arrival, carried off by Buermann.