dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
PROFESSOR DR. HERMANN JAHRREISS (Counsel for Defendant Jodl): Mr. President, I have learned that the son of Dr. Bergold returned yesterday unexpectedly and suddenly from a prisoner-of-war camp. Therefore, Dr. Bergold went to his home, a short distance from Nuremberg. I asked his secretary to go to Dr. Bergold's home and to bring him here and I assume he will be here within approximately half an hour.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, you have some interrogatories, I think, which you want to offer in evidence, have you not?
DR. STAHMER: Yes, Sir. At the end of my presentation I still had some interrogatories which I had been permitted to present but which had not arrived. First of all, I shall turn to the interrogatory of Kammhuber, who was a general in the Air Force. He submitted an organizational study for 1950, which was completed on 2 May 1938. He was questioned about the purpose and significance of this study and he stated-I will give a short summary-that a part of it' which came under the heading of "long term objective" was a tentative sketch based on theoretical assumptions.- Then there was a second part which gave the deadline of 1942, and the interim solution for 1 October 1938. This was a positive proposal for the organization of the Luftwaffe.. This study was compiled by the author on his own initiative. The witness does not know whether it was actually submitted to Goering. He considers it improbable, but he does assume that he did suggest the positive proposal for the organization of the Luftwaffe to Goering. That is the substance of this interrogatory which will be called Exhibit Number Goering-54. I have another interrogatory which I should like to submit, which originates from General Kurt Student. This deals with the air attack on Rotterdam in May of 1940. It is an explanation...
THE PRESIDENT: Have you got copies of these affidavits, I mean these interrogatories? We have got this one you are now offering of Student, but we have not got the one of Kammhuber.
DR. STAHMER: Mr. President, I submitted this material to the Translation Division and I asked that the translations should be ready. I shall look into the matter and see what has become of it. At any rate, I did submit the originals to the Translation Division.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes; the General Secretary will look into it. And this one of Student, has that been applied for and granted? It is not on my list.
DR. STAHMER: Yes, Mr. President, it has been granted, and the Prosecution has submitted a counter-interrogatory to this one. I believe . . .
THE PRESIDENT: Very well.
DR. STAHMER: If I am not mistaken, this interrogatory of Student's was granted on 14 February, if I remember rightly. Student deals with the air attack on Rotterdam in May 1940. He gives the necessary explanation as to how it came about that during capitulation negotiations bombs were still being dropped on Rotterdam. Here, too, I believe, I can refer to this interrogatory. The facts were that capitulation negotiations were in progress when an air attack had been planned and the squadron which was being employed could not be advised in time by wireless. Then the ground troops gave signals, which were misunderstood by one group. . .
THE PRESIDENT: It appears that it covers the same ground that has already been in evidence; does it not?
DR. STAHMER: It has been dealt with in the examination; yes, that is correct, Mr. President.
THE PRESIDENT: Then it should not be read under any circumstances note
DR. STAHMER: Then I shall submit this document. . .
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, offer it in evidence. But I mean, you need not read it in detail.
DR. STAHMER: Very well, Mr. President. This will be Exhibit Number Goering-53. Then, Mr. President, I have another interrogatory by a general of the Air Force, Koller, which, I should like to submit. This will be submitted as Exhibit Number Goering-55. Mr. President, I ask the permission of the High Tribunal to read these questions, for there is a special significance connected with the testimony given by this witness in relation to the defendant in this proceeding: "Question 1: Did the former Reich Marshal Goering at any time issue an order that enemy airmen who had been shot down should be handed over to the Police, the SD, or that they should be shot without a trial? "Answer: As far as I know, no. In any case, I know of no such order issued by the Reich Marshal. "Question 2: Did the former Reich Marshal Goering help to formulate an order on the strength of which the British flying officers who escaped from Stalag III at Sagan in March 1944 were shot by the Police or SD? "Answer: General Korten told me that the Luftwaffe, the Air Force-meaning the Reich Marshal and he, Korten, himself- had no part in the issuing of this order. "Question 3: Did the former Reich Marshal Goering learn of the fact contained in Question 2 only after the order given by Hitler had been carried out? "Answer: General Korten told me that he and the Reich Marshal did not get to know of it until later. "Question 4: On what day was this order issued by Hitler? "Answer: I do not know. "Question 5: On what day, or on what days, was this order carried out? "Answer: I do not know. "Question 6: Do you know whether the former Reich Marshal - Goering very strongly condemned the shooting of these 50 British Air Force officers? "Answer: General Korten told me that the Reich Marshal was very angry about this shooting. "Question 7: Have you any knowledge as to whether the former Reich Marshal Goering and his deputy for the Air Force, the Chief of the General Staff, repeatedly remonstrated with Hitler about the measures which Hitler had ordered to be taken against the enemy terror fliers who had been shot down?
DR. STAHMER: "Answer: According to statements which General Korten made to me in June of 1944, that is correct. I remember too that some time afterward it was reported to me that the Reich Marshal had complained to the Fuehrer about the action taken by Party organizations and individuals among the population against so-called terror-fliers, for the reason that some of our own air crews had come to harm. "In March of 1945 he flatly turned down the order given by the Fuehrer that all enemy crews which had been shot down and which would be shot down in the future should be turned over to the SD. "Replying to Questions 1 to 7, I should like to state in explanation and in supplement: During the period which is covered by the report I was Chief of the Luftwaffe Operations Staff. In February 1944 the Fuehrer's headquarters transferred to Berchtesgaden the High Command of the Armed Forces, the Reich Marshal with his personal entourage and the Chief of the General Staff of the Air Force, General Korten, together with two or three ordnance officers. I had to stay with the High Command of the Luftwaffe, that is, with the whole working staff known as Robinson, in East Prussia, as it was expected that the Fuehrer's headquarters would have to be moved back quickly. The whole signal apparatus and the apparatus for the issuing of orders for Luftwaffe supplies was to be under the control of Robinson. "Due to the separation of the High Command of the Luftwaffe on the one hand and the Commander-in-Chief and Chief of General Staff on the other hand, a separation which was prolonged 3 July 4G from week to week, we in East Prussia did not have knowledge about many things which were being handled directly in Berchtesgaden. Often we received no knowledge at all of important Fuehrer directives, or if we did, we received the information very late. It was not until the beginning of June- I believe it was the week after Whitsun-that I, together with some assistant officers, was transferred to Berchtesgaden.
DR. STAHMER: From February until that time, I think I had attended only one conference at Berchtesgaden. "As to Questions 2 to 6, which deal with Sagan, it was from General Korten that I learned, and I believe Colonel Christian informed me almost at the same time, that the airmen who had escaped from Sagan had been shot by order of the Fuehrer. I rather think I heard about it first from General Korten, who, if I remember rightly, told me about it during one of the rather long telephone conversations which we had every evening. Korten made it quite clear that he disapproved of this, for the reasons which I mentioned in reply to Questions 2, 3, and 6. The conversation must have taken place at the end of March or the beginning of April. However, I cannot give the exact date. "In reply to Questions 1 and 7, concerning the terror-fliers, it was approximately the beginning of June 1944-at first I thought that it was in July, but I think now that it must have been June-when General Korten advised me that the Fuehrer intended to order that terror-fliers be left to the fury of the people. "We discussed this matter repeatedly and we all agreed in our opposition. We had always considered the direct attacks by low-flying enemy aircraft on the civilian population, on women and children, gatherings of civilians, civilian passenger trains, hospitals, school children who were out for a walk, our own crews who were parachuting to earth, and farmers who were tilling their fields, cruel and contrary to international law, but we did not consider the decree which the Fuehrer intended to issue to be the proper way to solve this very difficult problem. Our reasons for this refusal were articles of war, international law, it was against fundamental soldierly principles, and it would lead to many misunderstandings inflicting harm not only to enemy fliers, but also to our own men and affecting the morale of our own crews . . .
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, is this not really going into argument and not dealing with facts? It really is not necessary for you to read all this witness' arguments about it. He is not really dealing with facts at all now and it is in detail . . .
DR. STAHMER: Mr. President, these are the facts which he discussed with General Korten, the facts which decided them to reject the Fuehrer's order. These were the reasons which he and Korten discussed...
THE PRESIDENT: Some of what you have read no doubt is a matter of fact, but what you are now reading is a matter of argument.
DR. STAHMER: No, Mr. President.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, surely you can summarize the rest of this.
DR. STAHMER: Mr. President, this document is of great importance to the defendant because it deals with just those points with which he is accused and which distress him most and. . .
THE PRESIDENT: I heard you say it is of great importance and therefore you have been reading it and insofar as it is statement of fact, it seems to me that there is some excuse for reading it in detail. But when you come to matters of argument, it seems to me there is no excuse for reading it, because argument by a particular witness is not really relevant for the Tribunal's consideration at all. Summarize the argument, if you like. I mean, you have read the factual part. Summarize the rest which-maybe you can tell us, if you like, what the argument is.
DR. STAHMER: Very well, Mr. President. General Korten further stated that all the documents which are relevant to the question of terror-fliers and the shooting of the Royal Air Force officers have been submitted to him and after perusing them he arrived at the conclusion that the contents of these documents is proof of the fact that the High Command of the Armed Forces as well as the Reich Marshal opposed this action and did everything in their power to prevent the measure intended by Hitler from being put into effect. He particularly points out that in one of these letters there is a marginal note to the effect that it was not possible to get a reply from the Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force, and he concludes from that that the Reich Marshal personally opposed any final decision of this matter. Then there is a further incident dealt with in: "Question 8: Did the Fuehrer, for the reason stated under Figure 5, on the occasion of a situation discussion and in the presence of all who attended it, excitedly accuse the German Luftwaffe of having made a mutual coward's agreement with the Allied Air Forces? "Answer: During the first half of March 1945, Bormann showed the Fuehrer a note taken from a correspondent's report in the Allied press. The gist of this note was: The crew of an American fighter plane, which shortly before had been shot down over Germany, had been picked up by advancing American troops. The crew had testified that the enraged civilians had mishandled them, had threatened them with death, and in all probability they would have been lynched if it had not been for the German soldiers who had liberated them and protected them.
DR. STAHMER: Bormann pointed out to Hitler in a few words that this confirmed the fact that German soldiers, in instances such as this, were going against their own countrymen; and he concluded his remarks somewhat as follows: 'My Fuehrer, that is the way your orders are being carried out.' Thereupon in the presence of all who attended the situation discussion the Fuehrer made some very excited statements and among other things the Fuehrer said 'to me, 'If my orders are not being carried out it is due to the cowardice of the Luftwaffe because the men in the Luftwaffe are cowards and they are afraid that something might happen to them, too, some day. The whole business is nothing but a cowards' agreement between the German Luftwaffe and the English and American airmen.' I reported this to the Reich Marshal. "Whether Hitler made the same remark to the Reich Marshal personally, that I am not able to say; but I consider it quite probable, because when making reproaches of this kind, especially if they applied to the Luftwaffe, he often repeated himself and used the same expressions. "Question 9: On what day did this discussion take place? "Answer: I cannot give the date." Now we come to: "Question 10: Did the Fuehrer repeatedly order the former Reich Marshal to divulge the name of the officer of the Luftwaffe who, in May of 1944, protected an Allied airman who had been shot down in Munich from being lynched by the population? But despite repeated inquiries on the part of the Fuehrer, the Reich Marshal gave no instructions to find out the name of this officer and to make it known to the Fuehrer?" I can summarize the answer. He says he cannot state this from his own experience; it had only been reported to him that an officer of the Luftwaffe and an Ortsgruppenleiter had interfered on behalf of this American crew; that the Ortsgruppenleiter, who was known, was shot on Hitler's order; that Hitler then demanded to have the name of the Luftwaffe officer given to him and that he had not been told the name.
DR. STAHMER: He, said further that if the Reich Marshal had actually wanted to find out the name of this Luftwaffe officer, he could easily have done so. "Question 11: At the end of the war did the Luftwaffe ever receive orders to destroy Dachau Concentration Camp with bombs at the approach of the enemy? In particular, was an order to that effect given by the Gauleiter in Munich under the code word 'Wolke'? Could a Gauleiter give such instructions to the Luftwaffe?" Here again I can summarize the answer. The witness says, "I do not recall any order to that effect," and especially he does not know whether the Gauleiter in Munich gave such an order. The Gauleiter was not competent to give an order of this kind and he does not believe that a senior officer of the Luftwaffe would have been willing to carry out such an order. "Question 12: What do you know about the attitude of the Reich Marshal and his Luftwaffe to enemy airmen who had been shot down? "Answer: Notwithstanding occasional expressions of displeasure, the attitude of the Reich Marshal was always correct and chivalrous, which was in line with the Air Force tradition which he learned in the first World War and to which he frequently referred. "Of course, in his anxiety about the great difficulties of air defense and pressed by the Fuehrer, perhaps on occasion he used harsh words. These words, however, were soon forgotten and I do not know of a single case where the Reich Marshal followed up these spontaneous utterances by incorrect or harsh measures or orders against members of foreign air forces. The conduct of the entire Luftwaffe was always correct and humane. To fight in a chivalrous manner was a matter of honor with the German airmen. To quote only a few examples of many: Although the enemy crews shot at German airmen who were parachuting to earth, and these practices were bitterly resented by our airmen and some..."
THE PRESIDENT: Well, Dr. Stahmer. Again, what you are now reading is all comment; it is not statement of facts, it is comment and argument.
DR. STAHMER: Now Mr. President, he is coming to an example in which he reports about those things.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, let us come to it.
DR. STAHMER: Yes. The sea rescue services of the Luftwaffe from the Bay of Helgoland through the English Channel as far as Brest, in the Bay of Biscay, in the Atlantic, and in the Mediterranean, was put into use for the enemy in the same way as for the Germans. The rescue service fliers and the rescue service boats made untiring efforts and showed exemplary self-sacrifice in going to the rescue of friend and foe in distress. Even when... . .
THE PRESIDENT: But, Dr. Stahmer, these were not particular instances. These were not particular facts. They are just general statements which are really comments and argument about the chivalry of the German Air Force; that is all.
DR. STAHMER: Mr. President, by this he is trying to prove the chivalry of the German Air Force.
THE PRESIDENT: But he does not prove it by making a general statement.
DR. STAHMER: No. Later on he comes-he will go on to say how many they have rescued, how many of those were enemies and how many were their own people. I believe these facts, Mr. President, are important when judging the attitude of the Luftwaffe.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, as I said just now, if you will get down to the facts, if you have got the numbers, well then, no doubt that will be a matter of fact.
DR. STAHMER: Of the thousands who were rescued from the sea by the German Luftwaffe Rescue Service the great majority belonged to the enemy-members of enemy air crews, crews of enemy ships. Without being able to give exact figures at the moment, I would estimate-according to my memory I would say that the proportion of enemy rescued was from 70 to 80 percent. And he continues: "If, when we went out to rescue our own people or to make reconnaissance flights for them or were engaged on other work, we saw that crews, also enemy crews, were in distress off the enemy coast or beyond the range of our own rescue services, we immediately signaled to the enemy and called upon him to go to the rescue." Then there are several questions put by the Prosecution. The first question is: "What had Kaltenbrunner to do with. . ."
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, it is for the Prosecution to read their questions if they want to read them.
DR. STAHMER: I am not interested in these questions, Mr. President.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: The Prosecution do not want the questions read.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will read them. Do you mean you want to put them in-put them in evidence?
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: We will put them in, but we do not want them read.
THE PRESIDENT: Right.
DR. STAHMER: I have already stated that this is Exhibit Goering-55. Then I have one more interrogatory, Mr. President.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, you realize that the Tribunal proposes to read all the evidence and therefore these interrogatories will be read and considered even though they are not read now in open court. You have offered them in evidence, so the Tribunal will be grateful if you will cut short the reading of these affidavits and interrogatories as far as possible.
DR. STAHMER: I shall proceed accordingly, Mr. President. Now, we turn to the interrogatory of Hammerstein which I shall submit as Exhibit Number Goering-52. Mr. President, this interrogatory is not at my disposal in the original. I can only submit an attested copy. It has been submitted to the Prosecution; it has been translated but it cannot be found at the moment. But I assume I shall find the original very soon; I have advised Sir David of this. The British Prosecution has already had it and this document has been translated.
THE PRESIDENT: You mean the original has been mislaid or something.
DR. STAHMER: It has been mislaid, Mr. President, and I am unable to find it at the moment. Anyhow, it has been submitted.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: My Lord, there is no objection to this affidavit. I have a copy in front of me. It is general in its terms and, if I may say so' I thought it would serve its purpose admirably if Dr. Stahmer put it in and the Tribunal consider it in due course.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
DR. STAHMER: The original will be submitted in the next few days. It is an interrogatory of the Judge Advocate of the Air Force, Dr. Von Hammerstein. For several years he was the Supreme Judge of the Air Force and in that capacity he reported once a month to the Defendant Goering. Thus he was in a position to judge the attitude of Goering as supreme legal authority and he now describes in detail how seriously the Defendant Goering took his duties as supreme legal authority. He further describes how the Reich Marshal Goering reserved to himself the right to decide the more important matters; how he took great care in dealing with all matters, how he insisted that the soldiers under his command must maintain strict discipline. He particularly saw to it that the soldiers under his command were punished most severely if they committed illegal acts against the civilian population and especially against the civilian population in the occupied countries. Then he further describes how Reich Marshal Goering demanded severe punishment particularly when it Divas a question of violating the honor of women and how in the many decrees he always insisted that due respect to the honor of women was the first duty of a soldier; how in serious cases of rape, he always demanded the death penalty, no matter what the nationality of the woman was. In two cases, for instance, he rescinded the sentences because they were too lenient and he confirmed the sentence only after the death penalty had been pronounced.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, surely, what you have said, Dr. Stahmer, has given us the substance of the affidavit. You said that this man was the Judge Advocate for the Air Force and that the law with reference to offenses in the Air Force was strictly carried out. I am sure that is all you want to say in summarizing it.
DR. STAHMER: Yes, Mr. President. What I wanted to bring out was that it did not matter what the nationality of the woman involved was. In one case against a Russian woman, he . . .
THE PRESIDENT: That is exactly what I have said, that the law was strictly carried out. It is only an illustration of how the law was strictly carried out.
DR. STAHMER: Very well, Mr. President, I have given the substance. I shall dispense with all further explanation and submit this document.