dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
HOEPPNER: In answer to this question I have to start with my own observations which I made when I entered the Security Service in the beginning of 1934 and with what I learned from my comrades then and later about the preceding period. Before 30 January 1933 the Security Service represented a very small organization which had hardly more than 20 or 30 regular members and not many more honorary members, so that one cannot assume central direction and professional training, that is a real espionage network.
DR. GAWLIK: You spoke of 20 to 2 5 regular members-for what area?
HOEPPNER: For the area of the entire Reich.
DR. GAWLIK: Were there other members-honorary members?
HOEPPNER: The number of honorary members was not much larger.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the members of the SD make a general agreement among themselves to participate in crimes against peace, against the laws of war and against humanity?
HOEPPNER: No. If you speak of any agreement at all-since they hardly knew one another-they merely had the intention of helping the Party which was legally contending for power by defending it against rival opposition parties.
DR. GAWLIK: During the years 1933 and 1934 did the members of the Security Service pursue the aim of supporting any persons whatsoever who had undertaken a general and common plan to commit crimes against peace, against the laws of war, or humanity?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: During the years 1931 to 1934, did the members of the SD know anything at all about such a plan?
HOEPPNER: I believe the case of the members of the SD was not very different to that of the overwhelming majority of the German people. Nothing was known.
DR. GAWLIK: Now I come to the second phase. What was the aim and task of the SD during the period from 1934 until the creation of the Reich Security Main Office in the year 1939?
HOEPPNER: After a legal opposition party was no longer in existence, and there was merely an illegal political opponent, the combating of which, as I have already mentioned, was the task of the State Police which had been evolved from the Political Police department, the task of the Security Service had to change. First, it changed in this way, that other ideological and political forms and other ideological groups ...
DR. GAWLIK: Witness, can you perhaps state the tasks and aims more briefly?
HOEPPNER: Well, to name a few examples, Freemasons, Marxists, Jews-all these groups were classified in a more scientific and statistical way so that the Party would have material for training and other tasks. The ultimate aim was to become the Party's sole political intelligence and counterintelligence service, from about July 1934 onward, something which, by the way, was never achieved, since there continued to be an enormous number of information services and sources of information, up to the end. Even this task of scientific research work with regard to other political groups or other ideological organizations was not permanent either, for after a short time it became obvious that this research work, too, belonged to the sphere of activity of the Secret State Police because in the long run such an investigation of opponents could not be separated from the executive branch, from the information acquired in the daily interrogations, and so forth.  Therefore, these tasks were changed when a very clear division of duties was made between the Security Service and the State Police, a division which, starting in the middle of 1938, was carried through especially in the year 1939 and practically ended with the creation of the Reich Security Main Office in September of 1939. After this division of duties the task of the Security Service would have been quite superfluous if it had not been for the fact that out of this Security Service, beginning with the so-called intellectual SD in 1933 and 1934, through a special advisory section for "culture" and a central department for "spheres of life, intelligence service" -- I said that out of this Security Service there developed a specific task for the domestic intelligence service, namely, the task of investigating the spheres of life of the German people according to developments and informing the executive offices about these developments as a whole.
THE PRESIDENT: As I said to the other counsel, we do not want these witnesses to go over exactly the same ground that they have gone through before the Commission. We have got that evidence. We only want you to present them here in order that we may see what credibility is to be attached to their evidence and to deal with any particularly important or new subject which has not been dealt with before the Commission. Now this witness seems to be going over exactly the same ground which he has gone over before the Commission and at great length. It is simply doing the same thing twice over.
DR. GAWLIK: My understanding, Mr. President, was that I would briefly summarize once more the results of everything which had been taken up in the Commission for longer than 2 days. And that is what I am doing. I am now bringing-the witness has been examined before the Commission for 2 days and now perhaps I shall present that material in 1 to 11h, or 2 hours. But I thought that it was precisely these various objectives of the Security Service for each year that would be of interest to the High Tribunal.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, will you try to present the summary within reasonable limits?
DR. GAWLIK: Yes, indeed, Mr. President. [Turning to the witness.] What can you say about the significance of the work of the SD during this period?
HOEPPNER: The work of the SD during this period was of almost no importance. It was primarily concerned with finding its own proper task, with establishing an intelligence network, and with locating the necessary, basic material. Particularly important is the fact that during this time the Security Service hardly appeared in public.
DR. GAVVLIK: The Prosecution has declared that the SS and likewise the SD were elite groups of the Party, the most fanatical adherents of the Nazi cause, who assumed the obligation of blind loyalty to the Nazi principles and were ready to carry them out unswervingly, at any cost. In this connection I should like to refer to the trial brief against the SS, Page 7, A and B. I ask you, Witness, were the regular and honorary workers in the SD selected according to those principles?
HOEPPNER: The regular and honorary workers were selected on the basis of being capable in some professional capacity and were men of decent character.
DR. GAWLIK: Please answer the question first of all with "yes" or ("no.")
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: And now please give your reasons.
HOEPPNER: I have already said that the regular and honorary members were selected because they were capable in some professional capacity and were of good professional character.  It was not a prerequisite for either regular or honorary cooperation that anyone had to be a Party member or a member of the SS.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the SD do things for which no government office or political party, not even the Nazi Party, was willing to bear the full responsibility in public? I should like to call the attention of the High Tribunal to the trial brief against the SS, Page 7, second paragraph.
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the SD work secretly behind the scenes in the period which you described, from its establishment until 1939?
HOEPPNER: No. One could give a whole list of examples. First of all, the regular members wore uniforms. They had the SD insignia on their sleeves. The offices had signs and were listed in the telephone directory, et cetera.
DR. GAWLIK: During the period from 1934 to 1939 did the members of the SD make a common and general agreement to participate in crimes against peace, against the laws of war, or against humanity?
HOEPPNER: No.
THE PRESIDENT: Would that be a convenient time to break off? [A recess was taken.]
DR. GAWLIK: During the period from 1934 until 1939 did the members of the SD pursue the aim and task of supporting any individuals who had made a general and common plan for committing crimes against peace, the laws of warfare, and against humanity?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: Did not the SD also support this sort of thing by obtaining information on actual or possible opponents of the Nazi leaders and so contribute to the destruction and neutralization of the opposition?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: Can you give reasons for your answer to the question?
HOEPPNER: Yes.
DR. GAWLIK: But please be brief.
HOEPPNER: It was the task of the Security Service to investigate failures in all spheres of life. Individual cases were examples. It was not its task to institute proceedings with any other offices against individuals.
DR. GAWLIK: Should not the members of the SD have been convinced by the reports on public opinion and the reports on the different spheres of life, especially after the occupation of the Rhineland until the beginning of the second World War, that everybody in Germany was expecting war?
HOEPPNER: On the contrary ...
DR. GAWLIK: Please, will you first answer the question with "yes" or "no"?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: Now give the reasons please.
HOEPPNER: I said already, quite on the contrary. During that period there was hardly anybody in Germany who expected a war, and it was precisely these reports on the situation in different spheres of life, in the spheres, perhaps, of food production, economy, and industry, which showed that we were going to have armament to a limited extent, but not to an extent-but in no way gave any indications that we were working toward a war of aggression.
DR. GAWLIK: Now I come to the relation between the SD and the SS. Was the SD always an inseparable and important part of the SS? I refer in this connection to the German transcript of 9 December where this has been alleged by the Prosecution. Please answer my question.
HOEPPNER: No. I should like to give the following reasons for that: After the duty of the SS to help guard the speakers at meetings and to protect the Fuehrer had ended, the new task was conceived and further developed by the staff of the SD, completely independent of the-SS and the Reichsfuehrer SS.
DR. GAWLIK: The Prosecution has furthermore stated "the General SS was the basis, the root from which the various branches grew." Will you comment on that with regard to the domestic intelligence service?
HOEPPNER: That could not be true for the domestic intelligence service because only about 10 percent of the regular workers had come from the General SS, and because at least 90 percent of all the honorary workers and confidential agents of the SD were neither members of the SS nor wanted to be members of the SS, nor, viewed from the standpoint of the organization, were they desired for membership in the SS.
DR. GAWLIK: Was there in the SS a uniform high command under which the individual main offices operated jointly, or worked together automatically in such a way that each branch of the SS fulfilled a special task within the scope of the whole? I refer to the transcript of 19 December 1945. State your opinion on this.
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: Give me your reasons.
HOEPPNER: The only institution embodying the SS as a whole was the Reichsfillirer SS. The main offices which were under him were in no way high commands. Outwardly they represented various points of view on the same questions. They competed with each other, they were frequently jealous of each other. It was not even true that each of these main offices represented a branch which was necessary for the whole, as their duties, their jurisdictions overlapped. For instance, four or five offices shared the responsibility in questions of folkdom, and it was not possible, although this very suggestion was made by the Reich Security Main Office, to grant jurisdiction to one office only. Among these different main offices there was no directing office. The so-called main directing office had only to perform functions of the Waffen-SS. If any office had claimed that leadership, all the others would have rebelled against it immediately.
DR. GAWLIK: What was the influence of Himmler on the development of the tasks of the domestic intelligence service?
HOEPPNER: Himmler did not have a positive influence on the development of the specific tasks of the domestic intelligence service in the ordinary spheres of life. That task grew out of the work of the office, and it could have developed equally well in some other office. There were even a large number of cases in which the work suffered because it was entrusted to a man who was one leader among several, and, therefore, it was not always possible to send reports to the competent office via the Reichsfuehrer.
DR. GAWLIK: In order to prove a uniform will and a planned collaboration of the SD and SS the Prosecution referred particularly to the book by Dr. Best, The German Police, and the speech by Himmler about the organization and objectives of the SS and the Police. This concerns Documents 1852-PS and 1992-PS.  Do you know the book by Dr. Best and do you know that speech by Himmler concerning the organization and objectives of the SS and Police?
HOEPPNER: On broad lines, yes.
DR. GAWLIK: Please give your opinion as to whether the relation between the SS and SD is described correctly in that book by Dr. Best and in the speech by Himmler?
HOEPPNER: This question essentially involves the clarification of the concept which in many speeches and publications was designated as a corps for the protection of the State, (Staatsschutzkorps), and this idea of a corps for protection of the State was expressed by Himmler and Heydrich very early, a little after 1936. Its contents changed, but although it appeared again and again in speeches, it was never really carried out. However, the individual parts of this so-called corps for protection of the State of Himmler's grew independently, developed independently; they were not a unit, so that we can say here that although it was indeed Himmler's wish to create this corps for the protection of the State, this idea never materialized.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the Higher SS and Police Leaders also have authority to issue orders to the SD, and did they have to supervise the activity of the SD? In this connection I refer to the trial brief against the Gestapo and SD, Page 12 of the English edition, and the trial brief against the SS, also Page 12 of the English edition.
HOEPPNER: The Higher SS and Police Leaders had neither authority to issue orders nor did they have to supervise the SD. They were merely representatives of the Reichsfuehrer within their territories without having any actual or disciplinary jurisdiction over the Security Service. Attempts made in that direction, in connection with the above-mentioned corps for protection of the State, were particularly averted by the domestic intelligence service.
DR. GAWLIK: Now I come to the relation between the SD and the Party. What was the organizational relationship between the domestic intelligence service and the political leadership of 'the NSDAP?
HOEPPNER: The domestic intelligence service was an institution of the Party, but it did not belong to the organization of the political leadership. Therefore, no organizational connection existed.  The proper and definite duties of the domestic intelligence service were not given to it by the Party either. The task assigned to it by the Party, as I have already mentioned, had already been essentially completed in the years 1938-39.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the SD have the task of maintaining the Nazi leaders in power?
HOEPPNER: The Security Service had the task of ...
DR. GAWLIK: Can you first answer the question with "yes" or "no"?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: Now please give me your reasons.
HOEPPNER: The Security Service had a different task. It had the assignment of observing the effects of the measures taken by the leaders of the State, the Party, the economy and the autonomous corporations, to determine what the people were saying about these measures, whether their results were positive or negative, and then to inform the leaders about its findings.
DR. GAWLIK: Was the domestic intelligence service the espionage system of the NSDAP? Here I refer to the trial brief against the SS, Pages 8a and 8b of the English edition.
HOEPPNER: No. First, the Security Service was not an espionage service at all. Secondly, it sent its reports to all principal offices, not only to those of the Party, bu t also to the leading offices of the State.
DR.GAWLIK: Now I come to the next topic of evidence, the relation between the SD and the Gestapo. Were the Gestapo and the SD a uniform police system which became constantly more closely connected? I refer to the trial brief against the Gestapo and SD. What was the connection between the Gestapo and SD organizations with respect to aims, tasks, activities, and methods?
HOEPPNER: First, in answer to the first question: it was not a question of a uniform police system, since the Security Service and a police system have absolutely nothing to do with each other. The Security Service and the Secret State Police were two entirely different organizations. While the Security Service had developed from an organization of the Party, the Secret State Police was a continuation of an already existing institution of the State. While the task of the Security Service was to get a general view of the various spheres of life or the specific forms of activity of other ideological groups, and regarded the individual cases merely as examples, it was the task of the Secret State Police on the basis of existing laws, ordinances, decrees, and so on, to deal particularly with individual cases and to take preventive or prosecuting measures in an executive police capacity in continuation of an already existing State institution. While the Secret State Police worked with executive means, such as interrogations, confiscations, and so on, the Security Service never had executive powers.
DR. GAWLIK: Was it the task of the SD to support the Security Police as has been stated in decrees and other announcements, particularly in the circular letter released on 11 November 1938; in this- connection I refer to Document 1638-PS,
HOEPPMER: No, that was incorrectly expressed. Perhaps I may comment briefly on that circular letter of 11 November 1938. We are concerned here with the fact that for the first time an agreement had been made between the Security Service and an office of the State. The chief purpose of this agreement was that the Security Service was thereby officially and publicly recognized by an office of the State and that officials who worked in it could not, on account of this collaboration, be prosecuted for breaking their oath of silence, as had happened repeatedly up to then. At that time the agreement was made dependent on the fact that any State duty could be referred to.  As, first of all, the Security Service hardly appeared in the public eye at that time in 1938, and the work in the field of public life had not yet been officially recognized by the Party and could, therefore, not be mentioned in the decree, Heydrich quoted the support of the Security Police, because no one outside could check that.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the SD have the task of watching the members of the Gestapo?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR.GAWLIK: Can we conclude from the fact that inspectors of the Security Police and SD were established that there was a connection between these two organizations?
HOEPPNER: No, the inspectors had a certain power of supervision over the organization in particular cases only. All directives, task assignments, and so forth, came from Berlin.
DR. GAWLIK: What was the relation of the Departments III with the offices of the commanders-in-chief and with the commanders of the Security Police and the SD?
HOEPPNER: I do not quite understand that question. Relation with whom?
DR. GAWLIK: With the Security Police. HOEPPN'ER: The Departments III of the offices of the commanders and commanders-in-chief were departments in the same way as the Department IV. They worked on Security Service tasks, whereas Department IV worked on State Police tasks. They were departments of the office of the commander-in-chief, and not parts or establishments of Amt III of the Reich Security Main Office any more than the Department 4 were establishments of Amt IV of the Reich Security Main Office.
DR. GAWLIK: Now I come to a short discussion of the individual war crimes with which the SD is charged. First, the Einsatzgruppen. I refer to VI A among the facts offered in evidence in the trial brief. Were the Einsatzgruppen and Einsatzkommandos which were used in the East a part of the SD?
HOEPPNER: No; these Einsatzgruppen and Einsatzkommandos were establishments of an entirely original type.
DR. GAWLIK: Was the organization of the domestic SD used for the activities of the Einsatzgruppen and Einsatzkommandos? That is something important.
HOEPPNER: That question, in the way it has been put, must be answered by "no." It is not true that any units of that organization were transferred to the Einsatzgruppen. If individual members of the SD entered the Einsatzgrupppn or Einsatzkommandos, then it is comparable to military induction. Just as a civil servant who is drafted is assigned different tasks, or at least can be assigned them, this was likewise the case with the members of the SD. If the Einsatzgruppen had to perform Security Service tasks, such as making reports, the directives came to the Einsatzgruppen from Amt III.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the members of the SD and its subordinate offices obtain any knowledge about mass shootings and other crimes-war crimes or crimes against humanity-through the reports from the East, or by reports from the Einsatzgruppen?
HOEPPNER: Such reports from Einsatzgruppen were never forwarded to the subordinate offices in the Reich, so that the members of these offices could not have any knowledge, of these incidents, either.
DR. GAWLIK: Was the SD responsible for the establishment, arrangement, guarding, and administration of concentration camps?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: Could you give me any reason for that answer?
HOEPPNER: There are no reasons for it. The Security Service never had anything to do with these matters because it lacked jurisdiction there.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the SD establish any concentration camps?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR.GAWLIK: Did the SD organize any concentration camps?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR.GAWLIK: Was the organization of the SD used for the guarding of concentration camps?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR.GAWLIK: Did the SD have authority for the commitment and treatment of concentration camp inmates?
HOEPPNER: No.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the domestic intelligence service receive an order from Himmler not to intervene in the case of clashes between Germans, and English and American fliers?
HOEPPNER: No, the Security Service could not have had any order, because it had no Police functions and there could have been absolutely no question of any intervention.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the domestic intelligence service set up summary courts martial in order to pass judgment on persons in special short proceedings? This question refers to Item VI H of the trial brief.
HOEPPNER: Holding summary courts martial was not one of the functions of the SD at all, therefore not courts martial of this kind either, because that again would have been an executive measure which had nothing to do with the Security Service.
DR.GAWLIK: Did the domestic intelligence service, Amt III, execute people in concentration camps or keep them prisoners only on account of crimes which allegedly had been committed by their relatives? This question refers to Item VI J of the trial brief.
HOEPPNER: The Security Service had nothing to do with. that.
DR. GAWLIK: Did the SD hold any third-degree interrogations? This question refers to Item VI L.
HOEPPNER: The Security Service did not carry out any interrogations at all, consequently not any with the third degree.
DR. GAWLIK: Will you briefly describe the aims, tasks, activities, and methods of the Group III A of the Reich Security Main Office, of which you were in charge at times?