dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
KEITEL: I can say only for myself and for the Chief of the Armed Forces Operations Staff, that we were not authorized to do it and that we never did it. If the Reich Foreign Minister was informed about such questions, that information could have come only from Hitler himself. I doubt that he made an exception here.
DR. HORN: The Prosecution have submitted a letter of 3 April 1940, concerning theimpending occupation of Denmark and Norway which you sent to the then Reich Foreign Minister. In that letter you informed the Reich Foreign Minister of the impending occupation and requested him to take the necessary political steps. Had you already instructed Von Ribbentrop before that date about the intended occupation of Norway and Denmark?
KEITEL: No, I would not have been allowed to do that, according to the way in which the Fuehrer worked with us. That letter was an unusual method of giving information about this, by the Fuehrer's order, to the Reich Foreign Minister, who knew nothing about these things. I was ordered to write it to him.
DR. HORN: In connection with the testimony by General Lahousen, I want to ask you one question. At the time of the Polish campaign, was there a directive or an order by Hitler to exterminate the Jews in the Polish Ukraine?
KEITEL: I cannot recall any such things. I know only that during the occupation of Poland -- that is after the occupation -- the problem of the Polish Jews played a part. In that connection I also put a question once to Hitler to which, I believe, he answered that that area was well suited for settling the Jews there. I do not know or remember anything else.
DR. HORN: At the time of the Polish campaign, was there any plan to instigate a revolt in the Polish Ukraine in the rear of the Poles?
KEITEL: I cannot answer that question, although I have heard such things said here by Lahousen. I do not know or remember anything about it.
DR. HORN: Thank you.
HERR GEORG BOHM (Counsel for the SA): Field Marshal, you were Chief of the OKW and thereby also the Chief of the KGF, that is, Prisoners of War Organization. Did you ever issue orders or have orders issued on the basis of which members of the SA or units of the SA were detailed to guard prisoners of war or prisoner-of-war camps, or were to be used for that purpose?
KEITEL: I cannot remember that any such directive had been issued by the OKW. I believe that certainly was not the case.
HERR BOHM: In that respect, was a report ever made to you that any such guard duty was performed?
KEITEL: I cannot remember but I do not mean to deny that some units of the army in some particular place may have used SA men temporarily to assist in guard duty, which I would not know.
HERR BOHM: Thank you.
THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps we had better adjourn now for 10 minutes. [A recess was taken.]
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will sit in open session tomorrow morning at 10 o'clock. At 1230 it will take the supplementary applications for witnesses and documents, and after that at a quarter to 1 it will adjourn into a closed session.
GEN. RUDENKO: Defendant Keitel, I would like you to tell me exactly when you received your first commission as an officer?
KEITEL: On 18 August 1902.
GEN. RUDENKO: What military training did you receive?
KEITEL: I came into the army as an officer candidate. Starting as a simple private I advanced through the various ranks of private first class, corporal and ensign to lieutenant.
GEN. RUDENKO: I asked you about your military training.
KEITEL: I was an army officer until 1909, and then for almost 6 years regimental adjutant; then during the World War I, battery commander, and then after the spring of 1915 I served on the general staff.
GEN. RUDENKO: You were evidently not given a correct translation. Did you pass the Staff College or any other college, that is to say, did you receive preliminary training?
KEITEL: I never attended the War Academy. Twice I participated in so-called Great General Staff trips as regimental adjutant and in the summer of 1914 I was detailed to the Great General Staff and returned to my regiment later when the war broke out in 1914.
GEN. RUDENKO: What military training and military rank did Hitler possess?
KEITEL: Only a few years ago I found out from Hitler himself that after the end of World War I, he had been a lieutenant in a Bavarian infantry regiment. During the war he was a private, then private first class and maybe corporal during the last period.
GEN. RUDENKO: Should we not, therefore, conclude that you, with your thorough military training and great experience, could have had an opportunity of influencing Hitler, very considerably, in solving questions of a strategic and military nature, as well as other matters pertaining to the Armed Forces?
KEITEL: No. I have to declare in that respect that, to a degree which is almost incomprehensible to the layman and the professional officer, Hitler had studied general staff publications, military literature, essays on tactics, operations, and strategy and that he had a knowledge in the military fields which can only be called amazing. May I give an example of that which can be confirmed by the other officers of the Wehrmacht. Hitler was so well informed concerning organization, armament, leadership, and equipment of all armies, and what is more remarkable, of all navies of the globe, that it was impossible to prove any error on his part; and I have to add that also during the war, while I was at his headquarters and in his close proximity, Hitler studied at night all the big general staff books by Moltke, Schlieffen, and Clausewitz and from them acquired his vast knowledge by himself. Therefore we had the impression: Only a genius can do that.
GEN. RUDENKO: You will not deny that by reason of your military training and experience you were Hitler's adviser in a number of highly important matters?
KEITEL: I belonged to his closest military entourage and I heard a lot from him; but I pointed out yesterday to the question of my counsel that even in the simple, every-day questions concerning organization and equipment of the Wehrmacht, I must admit openly that I was the pupil and not the master.
GEN. RUDENKO: From what date do you consider that your co-operation with Hitler began?
KEITEL: Exactly from the day when I was called into that position, 4 February 1938.
GEN. RUDENKO: That means that you were working with Hitler during the entire period of preparation for and realization of aggressive warfare?
KEITEL: Yes. I have already given all the necessary explanations as to how, after I entered my new position in the beginning of February, events followed in quick succession, often in a very surprising manner.
GEN. RUDENKO: Who, besides you, among the military leaders of the OKW and the OKH had the rank of Reich Minister?
KEITEL: The rank of Reich Minister was given to the three commanders-in-chief of the sections of the Armed Forces, and among these the Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force, Reich Marshal Goering, was also Reich Minister of Aviation; likewise I received, as I said yesterday, the rank but not the authority and title of a minister.
GEN. RUDENKO: Who, besides you, among the military collaborators of the OKH and the OKW, signed decrees together with Hitler and the other Reich Ministers?
KEITEL: In the ministerial sector of the Reich Government, there was the method of the signatures of the Fuehrer and Reich Chancellor and the Ministers immediately involved, and, finally of the Chief of the Reich Chancellery. This did not hold good for the military sector, for according to the traditions of the German Army and the Wehrmacht the signatures were given by the principal experts who had worked on the matter, by the Chief of Staff, or by whoever had given or at least drafted the order, and an initial was added on the margin.
GEN. RUDENKO: Yesterday you said that you signed such decrees together with other Ministers of the Reich.
KEITEL: Yes, yesterday I mentioned individual decrees and also gave the reasons why I signed them, and that in so doing I was not Reich Minister and did not receive the function of a minister in office.
GEN. RUDENKO: What organization exercised the function of the War Ministry from February 1938 on?
KEITEL: Until the last days of January, or the first days of February, it was the former Reich Minister for War, Von Blomberg. Beginning with 4 February there was neither a Minister for War nor a War Ministry.
GEN. RUDENKO: That is precisely why I asked you what government organization had replaced the War Ministry and exercised its function, since I knew that this Ministry did not exist.
KEITEL: I, myself, with the Wehrmachtsamt, the former Staff of the War Ministry, whose chief I was, carried on the work and distributed it, as I described in detail yesterday, that is, I transferred all command functions to the commanders-in-chief of the branches of the Wehrmacht. But this was not an order of mine but an order of Hitler's.
GEN. RUDENKO: From the diagram you have submitted to the Tribunal it would appear that the OKW was the central, coordinating, and supreme military authority of the Reich and that it was directly under Hitler's control. Would this conclusion be correct?
KEITEL: Yes, that was the military staff of Hitler.
GEN. RUDENKO: Who, in the OKW, directly supervised the drafting of military and strategic plans? I am referring specifically to the plans for the attack on Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Belgium, Holland, France, Norway, Yugoslavia, and the Soviet Union.
KEITEL: I believe that yesterday I stated that very precisely, saying that the operational and strategic planning, after an order had been given by Hitler, was prepared and then submitted to Hitler by the commanders-in-chief of the branches of the Wehrmacht; that is to say, for the Army, by the High Command of the Army and the General Staff of the Army, and then further decisions were made with respect to it.
GEN. RUDENKO: With regard to Yugoslavia I should like to ask you the following question: Do you admit that a directive issued under your signature, for the preliminary partition of Yugoslavia, is per se a document of great political and international importance, providing for the actual abolition of Yugoslavia as a sovereign state?
KEITEL: I did nothing more or less than to write down a decree by the Fuehrer and forward it to those offices which were interested and concerned. I did not have any personal or political influence whatsoever in these questions.
GEN. RUDENKO: Under your own signature?
KEITEL: As to the signatures which I have given, I made a complete explanation yesterday, as to how they came about and what their significance is.
GEN. RUDENKO: Yes, we did talk about it, we did hear about it, and I shall ask some more questions on the subject later on. I should now like to determine with greater precision your own position in the question of Yugoslavia. Do you agree that you, with the direct participation of the OKW, organized acts of provocation in order to find a reason for aggression against Yugoslavia and a justification for this aggression in the eyes of the world?
KEITEL: This morning, in response to questions of the counsel of other defendants, I answered clearly that I did not participate in any preparation of an incident and that Hitler did not wish either that any military offices should ever participate in the discussion, preparation, deliberation, or the execution of incidents. I use "incident" here in the sense of provocation.
GEN. RUDENKO: Undoubtedly. What part did the OKW take to insure the arming of the Free Corps in the Sudetenland?
KEITEL: Which Free Corps, General? I do not know to which Free Corps you refer.
GEN. RUDENKO: The free Corps of the Sudetenland.
KEITEL: I am not informed as to whether any military office did any gun-running, if I may say so, or secretly sent arms there. I have no knowledge concerning that. An order to that effect was not given, or at any rate did not pass through my hands. I cannot remember that.
GEN. RUDENKO: By whom and for what reason was the order issued to occupy Ostrau in Moravia and Witkovitz by German troops, on 14 March 1939, in the afternoon, while President Hacha was still on the way to Berlin for negotiations with Hitler?
KEITEL: The order was eventually released and decided by the Fuehrer. There had been breparations to occupy by a coup de main that area where the well-known big and modern steel works were located near Mahrisch Ostrau -- I cannot remember the name now -- before the date of the march into Czechoslovakia as originally set. As a justification for that decision, Hitler had told me that it was done in order to prevent the Poles from making a surprise attack from the north, and thereby perhaps taking possession of the most modem rolling mill in the world. This he gave as a reason, and the operation, that is, the occupation, actually took place in the late hours of 14 March.
GEN. RUDENKO: Yes, but during the same time, President Hacha was on the way to Berlin to negotiate which Hitler?
KEITEL: Yes, that is correct.
GEN. RUDENKO: This is treachery!
KEITEL: I do not believe that I need to add my judgement to the facts. It is true that the occupation was carried out on that evening. I have given the reasons, and President Hacha learned about it only after he arrived in Berlin. Now I remember the name. The rolling mill was Witkovitz.
GEN. RUDENKO: I have a few more questions to ask you in connection with the aggression against the Soviet Union. You testified to the Tribunal yesterday on the subject. You explained your position with regard to the attack on the Soviet Union. But you informed the Tribunal that the orders for preparing Plan Barbarossa were given at the beginning of December 1940. Is that right?
KEITEL: Yes.
GEN. RUDENKO: Do you definitely remember and confirm this?
KEITEL: I do not know of, or do not remember, any specific order by the High Command of the Wehrmacht which called for the drawing up of this plan called Barbarossa any earlier than that. I explained yesterday, however, that some order had been issued, probably in September, concerning transport and railway facilities and similar matters. I cannot recall whether I signed that order, but yesterday I mentioned such a preparatory order to improve transport conditions from the West to the East.
GEN.RUDENKO: In September?
KEITEL: It may have been in September or October, but I cannot commit myself as to the exact time.
GEN.RUDENKO: I wish to know the exact time.
KEITEL: More accurate information may probably be obtained at a later stage from General Jodl, who ought to know it better.
GEN. RUDENKO: Of course we shall ask him about it during the course of his interrogation. I should like you to recollect the following briefly: Did you first learn of Hitler's schemes to attack the Soviet Union in the summer of 1940?
KEITEL: No. In the summer of 1940 this conversation which is mentioned in Jodl's diary -- I believe that is what you are referring to, you mean the conversation from Jodl's diary -- I was not present at this obviously very casual and brief conversation and did not hear it. My recollections concerning that period also justify my belief that I was not present, because I was on the move almost every day by airplane and was not present at the discussions of the situation at that time.
GEN. RUDENKO: And when did your conversation with Ribbentrop take place?
KEITEL: That may have been during the last days of August; I believe, it was in the beginning of September, but I cannot give the exact date any more. I reconstruct the date by the fact that I did not return to Berchtesgaden until 10 August, and that I wrote the memorandum which I mentioned yesterday at a later date.
GEN. RUDENKO: And so you assure the Tribunal that you first heard about Hitler's schemes to attack the Soviet Union from the conversation with Ribbentrop?
KEITEL: No, no. After having been absent from Berchtesgaden for about two weeks, partly on leave and partly on duty in Berlin, I returned to headquarters at Berchtesgaden; and then on one of the subsequent days, probably during the middle of August, I heard for the first time ideas of that kind from Hitler. That was the basis for my deliberation and my memorandum.
GEN. RUDENKO: In that case, have I put my question correctly in asking whether you learned of Hitler's schemes in the summer of 1940?
KEITEL: Yes. The middle of August, after all, is still summer.
GEN. RUDENKO: August is still summer, we will not quibble about that. Further, I should like to remind you of the evidence of the witness Paulus, which he gave here before the Tribunal, on 11 February of this year. Paulus, as you will remember, informed the Tribunal that when he entered the OKH on 3 September 1940, he found among other plans an unfinished preliminary operational draft of a plan for attacking the Soviet Union, known under the name of Barbarossa. Do you remember that part of Paulus' testimony?
KEITEL: I remember it only insofar as he stated that it was a study or a draft for a maneuver, and that he found a document on the occasion of his transfer to the OKH, to the General Staff of the Army. This is not known to me, and it could not be known to me because the documents, files, and other reports of the General Staff of the Army were never at my disposal; and I never had an opportunity to look at them.
GEN. RUDENKO: I wish to establish one fact. Do you deny that the OKH, in September 1940, was elaborating plans in connection with Plan Barbarossa?
KEITEL: If we go by the testimony of Meld Marshal Paulus, then I could not say that it is not true, since I cannot know whether it actually was true. I can neither deny nor affirm it.
GEN. RUDENKO: All right. You informed the Tribunal that you were opposed to the war with the Soviet Union.
KEITEL: Yes.
GEN. RUDENKO: You also stated that you went to Hitler with the suggestion that he should change his plans with regard to the Soviet Union. Is that correct?
KEITEL: Yes, not only to change them, but to drop this plan and not to wage war against the Soviet Union. That was the content of my memorandum.
GEN. RUDENKO: That is precisely what I asked you. I would like to ask you now about a conference, evidently known to you, which was held 3 weeks after Germany had attacked the Soviet Union, the conference of 16 July 1941. Do you remember that conference, which dealt with the tasks for the conduct of the war against the Soviet Union?
KEITEL: No, at the moment I do not know what you mean. I do not know.
GEN. RUDENKO: I do not intend to submit that document to you at this particular minute. You may remember that I submitted it to the Defendant Goering, when the question of the dismemberment and of the annexation of the Soviet Union arose. Do you remember?
KEITEL: That is a document which I know. I believe it is marked on top "BO-FU," and during my interrogation here I have identified it as a memorandum from Reichsleiter Bormann.
GEN. RUDENKO: That is correct.
KEITEL: I made that statement. At that time I also testified that I was called in only during the second part of the conference and that I had not been present during the first part of it. I also testified that it was not the minutes but a free summary made by Reichsleiter Bormann, dictated by him.
GEN. RUDENKO: But you do remember that even then, on 16 July, the question was already being advanced about the annexation by Germany of the Crimea, the Baltic States, the regions of the Volga, the Ukraine, Bielorussia and other territories?
KEITEL: No, I believe that was discussed at the first part of the conference. I can remember the conference, from that stage on where questions of personnel were discussed, that is, certain personalities who were to be appointed. That I remembered. I have seen the document here for the first time and did not know of it before; and did not attend the first half of the conference.
GEN. RUDENKO: In that case may I put the question differently: What were the final aims pursued by Hitler and his entourage at that time, against the Soviet Union?
KEITEL: According to the explanations which Hitler had given me, I saw the more profound reasons for this war in the fact that he was convinced that a war would break out some way or other within the next years between the Greater Slav Empire of Communism and the German Reich of National Socialism. The reasons which were given to me were something like this: If I believe or rather if I am convinced that such a conflict between these two nations will take place, then it would be better now than later. That is how I can put it. But I do not remember, at least not at the moment, the questions which are in this document about the dismemberment of several areas. Perhaps they were constructions of fantasy.
GEN. RUDENKO: And you tell the Tribunal under oath that you did not know of the Hitlerite plans to seize and colonize the territories of the Soviet Union?
KEITEL: That has not been expressed in that form. It is true that I believed that the Baltic provinces should be made dependents of the Reich, and that the Ukraine should come into a closer connection from the point of view of food supply or economy, but concrete plans for conquest are not known to me and if they were ever touched upon I never considered them to be serious problems. That is the way I looked at it at that time. I must not explain how I see it today, but only how I saw it at that time.
GEN. RUDENKO: Did you know that at this conference of 16 July Hitler announced the necessity of razing the city of Leningrad to the ground?
KEITEL: I do not believe that during that conference -- I have read that document here again. That it is contained in the document I cannot remember now. But I have had this document here in my hands; I have read it in the presence of the American Prosecutor; and if it is stated therein, then the question of whether or not I have heard it depends entirely on the moment at which I was called to that conference.
GEN. RUDENKO: I do not intend to hand you the document now, because it has already been submitted several times. But in the minutes previously quoted to the Defendant Goering, who read them himself, it is said, "The Leningrad region is claimed by the Finns. The Fuehrer wants to raze Leningrad to the ground and then cede it to the Finns."
KEITEL: I can only say that it is necessary to establish from what moment on I attended that conference. Whatever was said before that moment I did not hear, and I can indicate that only if I am given the document or if one reads the record of my preliminary interrogation. That is what I told the interrogating officer at that time.
GEN. RUDENKO: Very well. We shall give you the minutes of the conference of 16 July immediately. While the passages required are being found, I shall ask you a few more questions, and by that time the passages will have been found. With regard to the destruction of Leningrad, did you not know about it from other documents?
KEITEL: I have been asked about that by the Russian Delegation and the general who is present here in this courtroom. He has called my attention to a document.