dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
DR. EGON KUBUSCHOK (Counsel for the Reich Cabinet): Altogether I have four affidavits. They have been submitted to the Commission. They are being translated. However, the translations are not yet ready. I shall submit them at a later stage, and I shall confine myself today to reading into the record a few very important passages from these affidavits. The first affidavit, which is Number 1, was given by State Secretary Dr. Otto Meissner, who later became Minister. I shall read the following passages from this affidavit: First of all, Meissner deals with the work of the Cabinet, particularly during the first period after Hitler had formed his Government; and he states in this connection: "It"-that is the Reich Government-"worked according to previous custom; that is to say, draft laws were decided upon at meetings of the Cabinet, during which procedure objections could be raised. Right from the beginning the supreme and uncontested leader of that Government was Hitler, who likewise based his actions, formally speaking, on the Reich Constitution, according to which the guiding principles of policy should be decided by the Reich Chancellor. These guiding principles did not differ from those which he publicly proclaimed in the many speeches which he made during that period." A little further on he says: "All the important political decisions, such as the annexation of Austria, the march into the Sudetenland, the signing of the pact with Italy, the march into Bohemia and Moravia, and the attack against Poland and the neutral countries, took place without previous resolutions being passed by the Cabinet, and even without the members of the Government being informed of them beforehand. Except where they had been informed by Hitler personally, they learned of these events just like every other citizen through the radio and the press. The members of the Cabinet were thus forced out of any political activity, against their will and without any guilt on their part, and they were limited to the management of their department. They were merely leading civil servants in their department.
DR. EGON KUBUSCHOK (Counsel for the Reich Cabinet): Therefore these ministers could not know that Hitler had any intention to begin a war or that he intended to misuse his power to commit acts of violence and make attacks in violation of international law." The affidavit further deals with the law of 3 July after the end of the Rohm Putsch. Finally, the affidavit goes on to state as follows: "The fact that the members of the Reich Cabinet, in spite of the increasing brutality of the course pursued, remained in their offices, was, according to my own observation-apart from the fact that the Fuehrer as a matter of principle would not accept resignations and particularly in wartime considered them as acts which undermined the country's defense-due to the fact that they, at least the nonradical ministers, believed that if they resigned, their posts would only be filled by more radical and unexperienced men. Thus they would not only have abandoned the intrinsic interests of their departments, but also the personal interests of their employees." Affidavit Number 2 originates with the former Reich Minister Darr6; and I quote: "Basic questions of foreign policy were not, as far as I remember, discussed in the Cabinet. Never during any Cabinet meetings were there any utterances or even hints from which it could be inferred that an aggressive war was contemplated." In another part of the affidavit he says: "I emphasize that no aggressive plans against Poland were known to me, and that to this end no tasks were given to me in my capacity as Minister of Agriculture." Darr6 then goes on to describe his differences with Hitler, and he states: "During a discussion with Hitler about this subject, which took place before the actual passing of the law-there had been arguments about a law which was to be introduced in the occupied territories-there occurred a very serious clash, in the course of which I resigned.
DR. EGON KUBUSCHOK (Counsel for the Reich Cabinet): Hitler thereupon replied that I was under martial law, and that I would leave my post when it suited him, Hitler, and not when it suited me." How Darre was finally eliminated from his position is shown in the last part of the affidavit. Hitler had given orders to Darre ... I quote: "I was to give illness as an excuse to the outside world, and it was desired that the public should get the impression that I was temporarily resigning my office for reasons of health. I refused to pretend that I was ill, and I was told to leave Berlin. Since then I have lived in a remote log-house in the Schorfheide. Nominally, I remained a minister up to the collapse of the German Reich, although I asked Lammers repeatedly to relieve me of the office, and Lammers reported to Hitler on this point." The third affidavit comes from the former Reich Minister, Count Schwerin-Krosigk. Schwerin-Krosigk describes in one part of the affidavit a meeting with the former Reich Chancellor Bruning in 1932. 1 quote: "I was to this extent in agreement with Bruning, who a few weeks before his resignation had told me at Badenweiler, where we were both taking a cure, that the time had now come to place some responsibility on the National Socialists. One could not continue to govern by means of the emergency laws published by the Reich President, and the strongest party could not permanently be left in the opposition. The only effective way of combating the unbridled agitation of the National Socialists was to force them to accept responsibility." In another part of the affidavit, Schwerin-Krosigk points out that he saw Hitler for the first time in his life on the 30 January 1933. 1 quote: "My reason for joining Hitler's Cabinet was that I, together with the other non-radical ministers, wanted to form a counter-balance in the Cabinet to the totalitarian. claims for power put up by the Party." The affidavit deals at great length with the initial period of this Government.
DR. EGON KUBUSCHOK (Counsel for the Reich Cabinet): I quote only one sentence: "Moreover, the course that was followed at that time appeared to be a moderate one and objections raised by the non-radical ministers did, in fact, lead to less drastic measures, and in some cases certain legal rulings which had been proposed by him were even withdrawn." Regarding the amalgamation of the office of the Reich Chancellor and that of the Reich President, the affidavit states among other things: "Hitler's demand to unite both offices in his person and thus complete the last step in forming a totalitarian regime could not be opposed by the non-radical ministers, because it was perfectly clear even at that time that such power in the hands of Hitler was completely in accordance with the will of the German people." The affidavit goes on to say with reference to this same question: "I should like to remark in this connection that Hitler himself made his demand for uniting both these positions acceptable to the Cabinet by stating that he did not consider that to be the final solution, but made it quite clear that these two offices might again be separated later on." In a summary the affidavit says: "The Reich Cabinet as such had no political tasks as far as giving orders or leadership was concerned. It did not even serve as adviser to Hitler, but a circle of persons chosen by him personally served in this capacity." At the end of the affidavit Schwerin-Krosigk states; "Upon retrospective reflection I must maintain that Hitler deceived his ministers no less than he deceived the German, people and, what is more, the World. The statements he used to make to us as his ministers regarding his intentions were no different basically from those he made 'publicly. We could not suspect that he had other quite different intentions, so great was the persuasive power of his words." This applies in particular to his will for peace, stressed by him so often.
DR. EGON KUBUSCHOK (Counsel for the Reich Cabinet): "If I am told today that as early as November 1937 Hitler was thinking of war as a means of achieving his foreign policy aims, then this is diametrically opposed to what he, at the beginning of 1939, had expressly communicated to me through State Secretary Reinhardt, namely, that 'I need no longer worry about armament expenditure since we had now before us a long period of peace, and therefore a reduction of these expenses would follow."' Finally, under Number 4, 1 submit an affidavit from the former Ministerial Director in the Ministry of Food, Rudolf Harmening. Harmening describes the instruction given by Hitler to State Secretary Backe regarding preparations for war with Russia. These contained explicit instructions from Hitler that the Minister himself, Darre, was to be kept in the dark regarding these preparations. And concerning that, I quote: "A few months before the outbreak of the war with Russia, measures were taken in the Reich Ministry of Food, such as, for instance, the getting ready of agricultural machinery and agricultural workers for a special purpose. What this purpose was became apparent after the beginning of the Russian campaign-these things were intended for use in Russia. State Secretary Backe received the order for this directly from Hitler or Goering, over the head of the Reich Food Minister, Darre. In fact, according to the instructions, it had to be kept strictly secret from the Minister." Those are the affidavits which I have to submit. Then I have submitted a document book with altogether 68 documents. I refer to this document book. In the main, the documents submitted set forth the official reasons and official points of view with reference to the draft laws of that particular period. These official reasons together with the dossiers were circulated among the individual ministers when the laws were drafted. Thus, all they learned about the reasons for the proposed laws was what was contained in these papers. The examination of these reasons will show how these laws were actually justified.
DR. EGON KUBUSCHOK (Counsel for the Reich Cabinet): From among the remaining documents submitted by me, I should like to refer in particular to Document Number 3. This is a proclamation by the Reich Government of 1 February 1933, containing the directives for the policy of the Cabinet. Document Number 9 consists of official pronouncements of the leaders of those political parties which dissolved in 1933 on their own accord. In these statements the party leaders back the new Government policy and call upon their followers to let themselves be guided by and to give their adherence to this policy. Finally I refer to Document Number 63, an essay by the then War Minister Von Blomberg, dealing with the problems in connection with the introduction of universal military service in Germany. The other questions which concern us in this connection, particularly the work and the organization of the Cabinet, have been dealt with in detail during the interrogations of the witnesses Lammers and Weizsbcker, as well as of G6ring and Von Neurath. I ask to take these testimonies into consideration when judging the case against the Reich Government. That is all I have to say.
THE PRESIDENT: The Court will adjourn. [A recess was taken.]
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Pelckmann.
HERR HORST PELCKMANN (Counsel for the SS): Your Lordship, High Tribunal. First of all I refer to the transcript of the testimonies of the witnesses before the Commission which are, no doubt, known to the Tribunal. There are 29 witnesses. I then begin by dealing with the documents. I have broken them down into different groups and hope that the presentation will thus take very little time. First, Documents Numbers 1, 2, 3, 5, and 84 in one group. The first three documents deal with the so-called "ideals" of the SS; they state the ideals of the fraternity. Something is said about kinship (SippengemeinWiaft) and such like, and proof is given that this was the basis of the training. Document 5 says that the members of the General SS carried out their normal civil occupations, and that the SS Service was only supplementary. Document 84 makes it clear once more that the General SS was a branch of the Party and in contrast to the other SS formations, which I shall present later, was represented by the NSDAP in case of complaints. In Document Number 6, USA-441, which I submit once more, the principles of the SS are again referred to and for the individual man these were quite decent requirements: sanctity of property, the precept of thrift, et cetera. I must present that briefly because it is important for my final plea. Documents 4 and 103 belong together. Document 4 shows that the, SS men swore an oath which did not differ from that of the civil servants, although it did differ from that of a soldier, for strangely enough the soldier swears absolute obedience, while the SS man does not. Document 103 deals with the fact that this oath was made in God's name, and Himmler says in reference to that: "I look upon person who does not believe in God as being presumptuous,  megolomaniac, and stupid. Such a person is not suitable for us." Document SS-84, which I just quoted, shows once more that the SS Verfugungstruppe (Special Units) and the SS Totenkopfverb4nde (Death's Head Units) did not belong to the General SS.
HERR HORST PELCKMANN (Counsel for the SS): They did not have any civil occupation, but were state employees, and in case of complaints against these members or these formations, that is, the SS Verfugungstruppe or the Totenkopfverbande, the complaint had to be made against the Ministry of the Interior; this is very important for the concentration camp question. Then there follow Documents 8, 9, 10, 11, and 42. The Waffen-SS was created during the war. Its members were instructed to fight decently and chivalrously and not make themselves guilty of punishable actions against the civilian population in enemy countries, and to respect the prisoners of war and the fallen. For the members of the Waffen-SS-this is shown especially by Document 42-the basic rules of the SS apply only when the individual Waffen-SS men were at the same time members of the General SS. For example, that is true even for the so-called marriage order. This ideology is not applicable to the Waffen-SS men, so that even the voluntary Waffen-SS men were not subject to the special laws of the SS. Documents 13, 14, 15: The SS is accused of the legal plundering of the Occupied Eastern Territories. These documents show that the laws in this respect were issued by the Delegate for the Four Year Plan, Goering, or the Minister of the Interior, Frick. The Reich-Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood and the Office for Racial Germans (Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle) were entrusted with the resettlement and bringing back of Germans. This is shown by Documents 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 22, and 23. Documents 25, 26, 30, 33, 34, 40, and USA-674 I submit as evidence that the civil service law, the emergency labor regulation, the constitution for German students, the agreements between the Reichsfuehrer SS and the Reich Youth Leader, the Reich Labor Leader, and the Reich Finance Minister, were coercive measures which made it possible for Germans to be allocated to the General SS, the Waffen-SS, SS Verfugungstruppe and the SS Totenkopf units.
HERR HORST PELCKMANN (Counsel for the SS): Even the woifien police staff assistants were forcibly placed in the SS Women's Auxiliary Corps. Documents 28, 30, 31, and 32 can be lumped together. They give a number of examples of the kind of compulsory service just mentioned, or of men being drafted into the General SS, the Waffen-SS, and the SS Verfugungstruppe. Documents 29, 36, 38, and 39 show that citizens of foreign states, in so far as they were of German descent, were not forcibly drafted into the army of their respective countries, but into the Waffen-SS. This was on the strength of state agreements. The documents show further how whole groups were forcibly placed under SS jurisdiction without being SS members. They continued under the name of their old occupation but with the addition of  "SS". Document Number 3 treats the question of the so-called patron members, which has still not been settled by the Prosecution. These patron members were only linked with the SS from the financial standpoint. Their subscriptions flowed into the coffers of the General SS. Membership as a so-called patron member in no case meant that a person belonged to the active SS. Documents 48, 53, 54, 57, 59, and 60 deal with the more or less pronounced pressure exerted on police officials to join the SS. The request to join was worded: "I therefore expect that the person whom this concerns ... will join." Continuous inquiries followed as to whether the person had joined. Even members of the Order Police, the Ordnungspolizei, were more or less forced to join. Court officials, doctors, all young officers and constables were also pressed to join the SS. On the other hand, Documents 52 to 55, and 56, show that the members of the Police who joined the SS in this way did not perform any SS service. They were not obliged to attend SS training either. The only sign that they were members of the SS was that when they were promoted they were also promoted in the SS. Finally, in Documents 65, 66, 67, and 68, 1 have to deal with purely external SS designations in police units.
HERR HORST PELCKMANN (Counsel for the SS): The battalions and regiments, as well as fire-fighting police units, that is, units of the fire service, all received the designation SS as an external sign of recognition, as it says in the decrees. As an example, I refer in this document to the Second Gendarmerie Battalion which became the Second SS Gendarmerie Battalion; or the Police Regiment "Alpenland," which becam6 the SS Police Regiment, and so forth. The documents show further that, in spite of all this, these SS police regiments remained with the Ordnungspolizei, that they received their equipment from the Ordnungspolizei, and everything else was attended to by the Ordnungspolizei. The individual policeman of these regiments did not become a member of the General SS or a member of the Waffen-SS, even though his unit had this SS designation. Finally, the following documents deal with the question: to what extent did the members of the SS know of and desire the crimes with which the Prosecution charges them? Documents 70, 71, 73, 75, 76, and 79 are lumped together. Hitler was constantly making speeches in which he simulated a firm will for peace. The Reich Government also stated that they wanted to preserve peace at all costs. The paper Das Schwarze Korps, believing these statements, wrote that the SS did not like war, a statement made in January 1937; and it goes on to explain this antipathy to war. Documents 77 and 78 show that in this connection even outsiders like the Austrian bishops and the British Government were deceived in 1938. The German-British Peace Declaration of 30 September 1938 is well known. It expresses the will of both peoples never again to wage war against each other. In Document 80, containing some official statements on the nature and character of the SA and the SS, it is shown that neither the SA nor the SS was armed, neither were they given any training with arms or otherwise trained for military purposes. I am asserting this only for the case of the SS.
HERR HORST PELCKMANN (Counsel for the SS): The supplement to Document 81 says that on 16 April 1934 the German Government offered to prove to the British Government that the SS and the SA had no arms and were not trained for any military purposes. This was not only maintained outwardly; it was actually the case within the SS. This is shown by Document SS-82, which is the secret Fuehrer Decree of 17 August 1938, stating that the SS as a political organization of the NSDAP is not a military organization, and that it needs no training and is unarmed. It says further in this decree that the members of the General SS, being unarmed, in case of war, in accordance with the provisions of the National Defense Law, are at the disposal of the Wehrmacht, not of the Waffen-SS. Document SS-92 is a small example of how the masses were deceived about peace aims. According to this-it is a law of the Reich Cabinet-any participation in the Spanish Civil War in any form whatever is subject to punishment by imprisonment, although at the time thousands were fighting in Spain on Hitler's orders. Documents 87, 88, 90, and 99 show the following: , Through the various laws against subversive activities and defeatism, and the prohibition to listen in to 'the foreign radio, any spreading of the truth-and I take as a single example the spreading of rumors on concentration camps-became in fact impossible. This policy was rigorously applied during the war. That is proved by Document SS-98. It is the well-known speech of Himmler in Posen in 1943, Document 1919-PS. I refer only to one sentence of Himmler which says that whoever is disloyal, be it even in thought, will be dismissed from the SS; also that care will be taken that he will disappear from among the living, On the Jewish question there are Documents 93 and 95. In February 1934 the Reich Minister of the Interior, Dr. Frick, declared before the Diplomatic Corps that the only intention was to reduce the activity of the Germans of Jewish faith in proportion to other Germans. It was expressly denied that these citizens would be forced to emigrate.
HERR HORST PELCKMANN (Counsel for the SS): The other document, Number SS-95, proves that even in the year 1942, when the mass destruction of Jews was under way, a law provided for the creation of a settlement in Theresienstadt for Jewish citizens. This, consciously or unconsciously, served to deceive the public about this extermination, and it deceived the SS members too. The events of 30 June 1934 are dealt with in Documents 83, 100, 74, 105, and 106. The public did not learn the truth. Hitler was thanked for dealing with the situation in telegrams sent by Reich President Von Hindenburg to Hitler and G6ring. These telegrams were published in all papers. In his speech of 13 July 1934, Hitler described in great detail the preparations R61im had made to overthrow the Government, how he had been in contact with foreign countries, and how an SS Fuehrer, who was mentioned by name, had prepared an attack on his life. The situation was presented as so urgent that only immediate action, without judicial proceedings, could do any good. Moreover, this speech gave assurance that illegal excesses committed during this action would be punished by law. Document 104 provides a sketch to supplement the testimony of the witness Von Eberstein. It clarifies the actual position of the Higher SS and Police Leader. Then I have another document, SS-107, which unfortunately I was able to hand to the Prosecution only this morning, as I have only just found it in the collection of decrees. I ask that it be accepted. It is a decree of the Reichsfuehrer SS of 27 August 1942. This decree expressly states that the main office of the Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood (Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle) is not an SS Main Office, but a State organization. This question is important for the responsibility of the SS in the so-called Germanization program. This document has not yet been translated. I shall endeavor to have translations made as quickly as possible. That is my presentation of documents, Your Lordship. Now I come to the affidavits.