dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
SCHACHT: Oh, what I told Hitler? I told Hitler we should try to get back a part of the colonies which belonged to us and the administration of which was taken away from us, so that we could work there.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: What colonies?
SCHACHT: I was thinking especially of the African colonies.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And those African colonies you would regard as essential to your plan for the future of Germany?
SCHACHT: Not those, but generally any colonial activity; and of course, at first, I could only limit my colonial desires to our own property.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And your property, as you call it, was the African colonies?
SCHACHT: Not I personally called them that. That is what the Treaty of Versailles calls them-"our property."
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Any way you wish it, you wanted the colonies you are talking about.
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: You considered that the possession and exploitation of colonies was necessary to the sort of Germany that you had in mind creating?
SCHACHT: If you would replace the word "exploitation" by "development," I believe there will be no misunderstanding, and to that extent I agree with you completely.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well1 by "development" you mean trading, and I suppose you expected to make a profit out of trade?
SCHACHT: No, not only "trade" but "developing the natural resources" or the economic possibilities of the colonies.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And it was your proposal that Germany should become reliant upon those colonies instead of relying on expansion to the East?
SCHACHT: I considered every kind of expansion within the European continent as sheer folly.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: But you agreed with Hitler that expansion, either colonial or to the East, was a necessary condition of the kind of Germany you wanted to create.
SCHACHT: No, that I never said. I told him it was nonsense to undertake anything toward the East. Only colonial development could be considered.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you proposed as a matter of policy that Germany's development should depend on colonies with which there was no overland trade route to Germany and which, as you knew, would require a naval power to protect them.
SCHACHT: I do not think that at all-how do you get that idea?
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, you do not get to Africa overland, do you? You have to go by water at some point, do you not?
SCHACHT: You can go by air.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: What was your trade route? You were thinking only of air developments?
SCHACHT: No, no. I thought of ships also.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Yes. And Germany was not then a naval power?
SCHACHT: I believe we had a merchant marine which was quite considerable.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Did your colonial plan involve rearmament by way of making Germany a naval power to protect the trade routes to the colonies that you were proposing?
SCHACHT: Not in the least.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: Then your plan was to leave the trade route unprotected?
SCHACHT: Oh, no. I believed that international law would be sufficient protection.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, that is what you disagreed with Hitler about.
SCHACHT: We never spoke about that.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, in any event he rejected your plan for colonial developments?
SCHACHT: Oh, no. I have explained here that upon my urgent request he gave me the order in summer 1936 to take up these colonial matters.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Did you not give these answers in your interrogation, Dr. Schacht? "Question: 'In other words, at the time of your talks with Hitler in 1931 and 1932 concerning colonial policy, you did not find him, shall we say, enthusiastic about the possibility?' "Answer: 'Neither enthusiastic nor very much interested.' "Question: 'But he expressed to you what his views were alternatively to the possibility of obtaining colonies?' "Answer: 'No, we did not go into other alternatives.' " Did you give those answers?
SCHACHT: Certainly.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, after the Fritsch affair, at least, you knew that Hitler was not intent upon preserving the peace of Europe by all possible means.
SCHACHT: Yes, I had my doubts.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And after the Austrian Anschluss you knew that the Wehrmacht was an important factor in his Eastern policy?
SCHACHT: Well, you may express it that way. I do not know exactly what you mean by it.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, do not answer anything if you do not know what I mean, because we will make it clear as we go along. Except for the suggestion of colonies you proposed no other alternative to his plan of expansion to the East?
SCHACHT: No.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Never at any Cabinet meeting or elsewhere did you propose any other alternative?
SCHACHT: No.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, as to the move into Austria, I think you gave these answers: "Question: 'Actually Hitler did not use the precise method that you say you favored?' "Answer: 'Not at all.' "Question: 'Did you favor the method that he did employ?' "Answer: 'Not at all, Sir.' "Question: 'What was there in his method that you did not like?' "Answer: 'Oh, it was simply overrunning, just taking the Austrians over the head-or what do you call it? It was force, and I have never been in favor of such force.' " Did you give those answers?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, you have made considerable complaint here that foreigners did not come to your support at various times in your efforts to block Hitler, have you not?
SCHACHT: Certainly.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: You knew at the time of the Austrian Anschluss the attitude of the United States towards the Nazi regime, as expressed by President Roosevelt, did you not?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you knew of his speech suggesting that the Nazi menace ought to be quarantined to prevent its spread?
SCHACHT: I do not remember; but I certainly must have read it at that time, if it was published in Germany, as I assume it was.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Goebbels let loose a campaign of attack on the President as a result of it, did he not?
SCHACHT: I assume I read that.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: As a matter of fact, you joined in the attack on foreigners who were criticizing the methods, did you not?
SCHACHT: When and where? What attacks?
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: All right. After the Austrian Anschluss, when force was used, with your disapproval, you immediately went in and took over the Austrian National Bank, did you not?
SCHACHT: That was my duty.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Yes. Well, you did it.
SCHACHT: Of course.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you liquidated it for the account of the Reich.
SCHACHT: Not liquidated; I merged it, amalgamated it.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: I beg your pardon?
SCHACHT: Amalgamated.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Amalgamated it. And you took over the personnel?
SCHACHT: Everything.
MR.JITSTICE JACKSON: Yes. And the decree doing so was signed by you.
SCHACHT: Certainly.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Yes. And you called the employees together on 21 March 1938.
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And made a speech to them.
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And did you say the following among other things...
SCHACHT: Certainly.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, you have not heard it yet.
SCHACHT: Yes, I heard it during the case of the Prosecution.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, I would like to quote some of it to you and remind you of it. "I think it is quite useful if we recall these things to our mind in order to expose all the sanctimonious hypocrisy exuding from the foreign press. Thank God, these things could after all not hinder the great German people on their way, for Adolf Hitler has created a communion of German will and German thought. He has bolstered it up with the newly strengthened Wehrmacht, and he has thereby given the external aspect to the inner union between Germany and Austria. "I am known for sometimes expressing thoughts which give offense; nor would I care to depart from this custom today." "Hilarity" is noted at this point in your speech. "I know that there are even here in this country a few people -I believe they are not too numerous-who find fault with - the events of the last few days. But nobody, I believe, doubts the goal; and it should be said to all hecklers that you cannot satisfy everybody. There are those who say they would have done it in some other way, perhaps, but strange to say they did not do it"-and in parentheses the word "hilarity" appears again. Continuing with your speech-"it was done by our Adolf Hitler (Long, continued applause); and if there is still something left to be improved, then those hecklers should try to bring about these improvements from within the German Reich and the German community and not disturb it from without." (Document EC-297) Did you use that language?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: In other words, you publicly ridiculed those who were complaining of the methods, did you not?
SCHACHT: If that is the way you see it.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Then you also, in addressing the personnel of the Austrian National Bank, which you were taking over, said this: "I consider it completely impossible that even a single person will find a future with us who is not wholeheartedly for Adolf Hitler. (Loud, continued applause; shouts of 'Sieg Heil')." Continuing with the speech: "Whoever does not do so had better withdraw from our circle of his own accord. (Loud applause)." Is that what happened?
SCHACHT: Yes, they all agreed, surprisingly.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, had the Reichsbank before 1933 and 1934 been a political institution?
SCHACHT: No.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Had politics been in the Reichsbank?
SCHACHT: Never.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, on this day, speaking to its employees, you said this, did you not? "The Reichsbank will always be nothing but National Socialist, or I shall cease to be its manager. (Heavy, protracted applause)." Did that happen?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, Sir, you have said that you never took the oath to Hitler.
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: I ask you if this is what you, as head of the Reichsbank, required of the employees whom you were taking over in Austria; and I quote: "Now I shall ask you to rise. (The audience rises.) Today we pledge allegiance to the great Reichsbank family, to the great German community; we pledge allegiance to our newly arisen, powerful Greater German Reich, and we sum up all these sentiments in the allegiance to the man who has brought about all this transformation. I ask you to raise your hands and to repeat after me: "I swear that I will be faithful and obedient to the Fuehrer of the German Reich and the German people, Adolf Hitler, and will perform my duties conscientiously and selflessly. (The audience takes the pledge with uplifted hands.) "You have taken this pledge. A bad fellow he who breaks it. To our Fuehrer a triple 'Sieg Hell'." Is that a correct representation of what took place?
SCHACHT: The oath is the prescribed civil service oath and it is quite in accordance with what I said here yesterday, that the oath is made to the head of the state just as I have stated before too: "We stand united before the German people"-I do not know exactly what the German expression is. I hear your English version here. That oath is exactly the same.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: I have referred to Document EC-297, Exhibit USA-632, in the course of this. That is the exhibit I have been using. So you say that was to an impersonal head of state and not to Adolf Hitler?
SCHACHT: Yes. One obviously cannot take an oath to an idea. Therefore, one has to use a person. But I said yesterday that I did not take an oath to Herr Ebert or to Herr Hindenburg or to the Kaiser, but to the head of State as representative of the people.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: You told your employees that all of the sentiments of this oath were summed up in the allegiance to the man, did you not?
SCHACHT: No.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Is that not what you said? 3 May 46 -
SCHACHT: No, that is not correct. If you read it again, it does not say to the man but to the leader as the head of State.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, no matter what you took the oath to...
SCHACHT: [Interposing.] Excuse me. There is a very great difference.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, we will get to that. Whatever you took the oath to, you were breaking it at the very time, were you not? .
SCHACHT: No. I never broke the oath to this man as representative of the German people, but I broke my oath when I found out that that man was a criminal.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: When you plotted to cause his death?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Do you want to explain to the Tribunal how you could cause the death of Adolf Hitler without also causing the death of the head of the German State?
SCHACHT: There is no difference because unfortunately that man was the head of the German nation.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: You say you never broke the oath?
SCHACHT: I do not know what you want to express by that. Certainly I did not keep the oath which I took to Hitler because Hitler unfortunately was a criminal, a perjurer, and there was no true head of State. I do not know what you mean by "breaking the oath," but I did not keep my oath to him and I am proud of it.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: So you were administering to your employees an oath which you at that moment were breaking and intended to break?
SCHACHT: Again you confuse different periods of time, Mr. Justice. That was in March 1938 when as you have heard me say before, I still was in doubt, and therefore it was not clear to me yet what kind of a man Hitler was. Only when in the course of 1938 I observed that Hitler was possibly walking into a war, did I break the oath.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: When did you find him walking into a wa r?
SCHACHT: In the course of 1938 when, judging from the events, I gradually became convinced that Hitler might steer into a war, that is to say, intentionally. Then only did I break my oath.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, you stated yesterday that you started to sabotage the government in 1936 and 1937.
SCHACHT: Yes, because I did not want excessive armament.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And we find you administering an oath to the employees to be faithful and obedient. Now, I ask you if you did not make this statement in interrogation: "Question: 'But you make this statement at the end of the oath, after everybody has raised his hand and made his oath. Did you say the following, "You have taken this pledge. A bad fellow he who breaks it"?' "Answer: 'Yes, I agree to that and I must say that I myself broke it.' "Question: 'Do you also say that at the time that you urged this upon the audience, that you already were breaking it?' "Answer: 'I am sorry to say that within my soul I felt very shaken in my loyalty already at that' time, but I hoped that things would turn out well at the end.' "
SCHACHT: I am glad that you quote this because it confirms exactly what I have just said; that I was in a state of doubt and that I still had hope that everything would come out all right; that is to say, that Hitler would develop in the right direction. So it confirms exactly what I have just said.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, I am sure we want to be helpful to each other, Dr. Schacht.
SCHACHT: I am convinced that both of us are trying to find the truth, Mr. Justice.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, you remained in the Reichsbank after this Anschluss, of course?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you remained there until later- until January 1939, if that is the date?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, after this Anschluss, the mefo bills which had been issued began to become due, did they not, in 1938 and 1939?
SCHACHT: No, the maturity date of the first mefo bills must have been at the earliest in the spring of 1939. They had all been issued for 5 years and I assume that the first mefo bills were issued in the spring of 1934, so that the first mefo bills became due in the spring of 1939.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, this is the question and the answer. Correct me if I am wrong. "Question: 'Well, did you in the Reichsbank utilize funds which were available? Let me put it this way: As these mefo bills became due, what did you do about them?' "Answer: 'I asked the Minister of Finance whether he could repay them, because after 5 years he had to repay them, some in 1938 or 1939, I think. The first mefo bills would have become due for repayment and of course he said, "I cannot." ' " You had that conversation with the Finance Minister while you were still President of the Reichsbank?
SCHACHT: Mr. Justice, I said that throughout our financial dealings we became somewhat worried as to whether we would get our bills paid back or not. I have already explained to the Tribunal that in the second half of 1938 the Finance Minister got into difficulties and he came to me in order again to borrow money. Thereupon I said to him, "Listen, in what kind of a situation are you anyway for you will soon have to repay the first mefo bills to us. Are you not prepared for that?" And now it turned out, that was in the fall of 1938, that the Reich Finance Minister had done nothing whatever to fulfill his obligation to meet payment of the mefo bills; and that, of course, in the fall of 1938, made for exceedingly strained relations with the Reich Finance Minister, that is, between the Reichsbank and the Reich Finance Minister.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, taxes did not yield any sufficient revenue to discharge those bills, did they?
SCHACHT: Yes; I explained already yesterday that the risk which was taken in the mefo bills, which I have admitted from the very beginning, was not really a risk if a reasonable financial policy were followed; that is, if from 1938 on, further armament had not continued and additional foolish expenditures not been made, but if instead, the money accruing from taxes and bonds had been used for meeting the payment of the mefo bills.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: All I am asking you at the present moment, Dr. Schacht, is whether these bills could not have been paid out of the revenue from taxes.
SCHACHT: Surely. Yes.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: They could have?
SCHACHT: Of course, but that was the surprising thing, they were not repaid; the Honey was used to continue rearming. May I add something in order to give you further information?
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: No, I am really not concerned with the financing; I am merely concerned with what kind of a mess you were in at the time you resigned.
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: The mefo bills were due and could not be paid?
SCHACHT: Shortly.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: They were shortly to mature?
SCHACHT: Yes, but they could be paid. That is a mistake if you say that they could not be paid.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, they could not be paid out of the current year's taxes, could they?
SCHACHT: Yes, indeed. You are not interested and do not want me to tell you, but I am quite ready to explain it.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, you have explained it pretty well to us.
SCHACHT: You have just told me you were not interested.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Your subscriptions to the Fourth Reich Loan of 1938 had produced unsatisfactory results, had they not?
SCHACHT: They were hardly pleasing. The capital market was not good.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: And you have reported on the loan that there had been a shortage in the public subscription? And the result had been unsatisfactory?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, did you not make this answer to the interrogator's question: "Question: 'But I am asking you whether during that period from 1 April 1938 to January 1939 you did not continue to finance armaments?' "Answer: 'Sir, otherwise these mefo bills had to be refunded by the Reich, which they could not be, because the Reich had no money to do it; and I could not procure any money for refunding because that would have had to come from taxes or loans. So I had to continue to carry these mefo bills and that, of course, I did.' " Did you give that answer?
SCHACHT: Yes, that was quite in order-kindly let me speak, would you not-because the Finance Minister did not make his funds available for the repayment of the mefo bills, but instead gave them for armaments. If he had used these funds to pay the mefo bills, everything would have been all right.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you carried the mefo bills which let him use current revenues to continue the plans of rearmament after 1938, did you not?
SCHACHT: Mr. Justice, this was the situation. A large part of the mefo bills was already on the financial and capital market. Now, when that market was too heavily burdened by the government, then the people brought in the mefo bills to the Reichsbank, for the Reichsbank had promised to accept them. That, precisely, was the great obstruction to my policy. The Reich Finance Minister financed the armament instead of honoring the mefo bills as he had promised.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now, it was under those circumstances that you took a position which would result in your retirement from the Reichsbank?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now we come to Czechoslovakia. Did you favor the policy of acquiring the Sudetenland by threat of resort to arms?
SCHACHT: Not at all.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: I think you characterized the manner in which the Sudetenland was acquired as wrong and reprehensible.
SCHACHT: I do not know when I could have done that. I said that the Allies, by their policy, gave the Sudetenland to Hitler, whereas I always had expected only that the Sudeten Germans would be given autonomy.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Then you approved of Hitler's policy in handling the Sudetenland situation? Is that what you want to be understood as saying?
SCHACHT: I never knew that Hitler, beyond autonomy, demanded anything else.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Your only criticism of the Czechoslovakian situation relates to the Allies, as I understand you?
SCHACHT: Well, it also applies to the Czechs, maybe to the Germans too; for goodness sake, I do not want to play the judge here.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, now on 16 October 1945, in Exhibit USA-636, Document 3728-PS, I ask if you did not make these replies to questions: "Question: 'Now, I am coming back to the march against Czechoslovakia which resulted in the appeasement policy, Munich, and the cession of the Sudetenland to the Reich.' "Answer: 'Yes.' "Question: 'Did you at that time favor the policy of acquiring the Sudetenland?' "Answer: 'No.' "Question: 'Did you favor at that time the policy of threatening or menacing the Czechs by force of arms so as to acquire the Sudetenland?' "Answer: 'No, certainly not.' "Question: 'Then I ask you, did it strike you at that time, did it come to your consciousness, that the means which Hitler was using for threatening the Czechs was the Wehrmacht and the armament industry?' "Answer: 'He could not have done it without the Wehrmacht."' Did you give those answers?
SCHACHT: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Continuing: "Question: 'Did you consider the manner in which he handled the Sudeten question wrong or reprehensible?' "Answer: 'Yes.' "Question: 'You did?' "Answer: 'Yes, Sir,' "Question: 'And did you have a feeling at that time, looking back on the events that had proceeded and in your own participation in them, that this army which he was using as a threat against Czechoslovakia was at least in part an army of your own creation? Did that ever strike you?' "Answer: 'I cannot deny that, Sir.' "
SCHACHT: Certainly not.
MR.JUSTICE JACKSON: But here again, you turned in to help Hitler, once he had been successful with it, did you not?