dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
DR.VON LUDINGHAUSEN: But just as their sense of responsibility and duty to their own people had driven other respectable and patriotic Germans to the decision to remove Hitler and the Nazi regime by force, so it was with the defendant, whose sense of responsibility and duty, not only toward himself but also toward his people, forced him to set aside his personal abhorrence of the immorality of this regime and, by remaining in office and continuing to conduct its affairs according to his own principles, to fight actively against this immorality, and thus at least keep it away from the department under his control and protect his German people from this immorality of the Nazi regime and its consequences-namely, war-as long as he was able to do this. And then, a year and a half after his resignation, when the call came to him again to accept a position-this time as Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia-and Hitler declared to him that he had expressly selected him for this position because he considered him the only suitable person to carry out his intended policy of real reconciliation between the Czech people and the new conditions and the German people, the very same sense of duty and responsibility forced him to follow this call. For was it not natural for him to deduce from the fact that Hitler-in spite of knowing his opposition to the National Socialist regime, its policies and methods-desired to entrust him with this task, that Hitler really and honestly meant to effect a reconciliation and appeasement with the Czech people? Here he was confronted with a task, the achievement of which would not only be of the highest benefit to his own but also a foreign people, a task which not only served for the reconciliation of two nations but also for the ideal of humanity and Christian brotherly love, as well as for the protection of the Czech people from the pernicious methods of the Nazi regime.
DR.VON LUDINGHAUSEN: And now I ask: Is it not at least just as moral and ethical to pledge one's self and one's person for such a goal, to work actively- if only to a limited extent-against this regime which one has recognized and repudiated as immoral and corrupt through an apparent collaboration, if only outwardly appearing as such, to prevent the use of the methods of this system and thereby save innocent people from misery and death, as it is to withdraw grumbling out of personal aversion and look on inactively while this regime rages against humanity without restraint? Not everyone has an aggressive character, is a revolutionary who can use violence against the hated system and its leaders. And do not forget, Your Honors, that at that time under Hitler's autocratic regime there were only these two possibilities to work really actively and positively against the Nazi regime and its terror. Under this regime there were not the thousand and one possibilities of fighting a hated and accursed government, as is the case in free democratic countries with free and independently elected parliaments. In Hitler Germany any form of active or even public opposition only meant a completely useless sacrifice. And therefore I beg you, Your Honors, in judging these matters and in answering my question, to free yourselves from the democratic conditions and circumstances which you take so much for granted, but which are completely incomparable with the conditions in Germany under Hitler at that time-the lack of consideration of which fact has already caused much disaster up to very recent times.
DR.VON LUDINGHAUSEN: And did not the Defendant Von Neurath save the freedom and lives of thousands of people, whose freedom and lives would have been irretrievably lost without him, by his very acceptance of the office of the Reich Protector, and by remaining in it despite the fact that he had to realize that through no fault of his, he could not fulfill the task connected with this office, that he did not have at his disposal the necessary means for its accomplishment, but yet, in spite of all this, continuing his fight against the terror of the Nazi regime? Is this not worth a thousand times more; is it not much more moral and ethical than if he had retired immediately, full of abhorrence and moral indignation? I do not hesitate to answer this question, just as my first question, in the affirmative, and to express my conviction that no one can condemn me for this. Or shall a Sophoclean tragedy be unfolded before us here in the fate of the defendant, in which a man becomes guilty, due to no fault of his own, because he obeyed his conscience and his sense of responsibility? Your Honors, I believe I have shown and proved by my preceding statements that not a single one of the actions with which the Prosecution have accused my client is criminal within the meaning of the Charter, and that not one of these actions by the defendant was aimed intentionally at committing a crime within the meaning of the Charter of this High Tribunal, so that no criminal action exists, either objectively or subjectively. But I believe I have shown also, over and above this, that all my client's actions as a whole had just the opposite purpose of what the Prosecution claim they did-namely, nut the perpetration, but the prevention of just such actions as the Charter defines as punishable crimes, whether crimes of planning, preparation, or the waging of aggressive wars, be they crimes of war or crimes against humanity.
DR.VON LUDINGHAUSEN: But there still remains one thing for me to do: to draw the conclusion from all that as to how impossible, indeed, how paradoxical it would be to apply the principles of the conspiracy with regard to my client-his participation in it from the very outset, which sanctions or will sanction the preparatory or any other actions in this respect by the remaining members for attaining this criminal aim. But when, as the Prosecution are deliberately doing, one regards approval of the criminal objective, and all preparatory actions for its achievement by each one of the other members in their official capacity, as proved in international law, merely by the fact of the assumption of or remaining in an office in spite of knowing the criminal aims, and from this fact alone deduces a criminal coresponsibility on the part of each individual, the consequence inexorably follows with compelling logic that the application of the principle of coresponsibility due to the assumption of an office or simply remaining in it, without consideration of whatever decent and ethical reasons may have caused one to do so, calls for the punishment of one who not only disapproves of these criminal intentions, plans, and actions of the others but even opposed them actively, and who only accepted his appointment or remained in his position for this reason, as was the case with the Defendant Von Neurath. In a court which not only represents justice-the legal and ethical conscience of all civilized nations on earth-but is also going to show the way to universal peace to the coming generations, I need not prove to you, Your Honors, that such a result is contrary to not only every natural but also to every legal sense of justice and ideas of justice; that it is contrary to that which this High Tribunal have to strive for and are striving for; that it is contrary to every moral and ethical postulate.
DR.VON LUDINGHAUSEN: This task can only be fulfilled if you show mankind once more that any generalization, and leveling, any treatment, and thus also any judgment and conviction of people and of their activities only on the basis of corporative-I could say, gregarious-concepts, and not on the personality, the will, and the designs of the individual, is evil. Such treatment denies the holiness of the individual and in the long run leads inevitably to the adoration of mere force. But this adoration of force, this belief in force, was precisely the underlying cause of the terrible events which once more have been unfolded before us here. You can only then do justice to and fulfill your double task-to punish where chastisement should be applied according to divine and human law, and, at the same time, to show mankind the way to international peace-if by your sentence you take away from mankind the belief in force and give back, instead of this belief, to all nations on earth, and not least of all to the German nation, the belief in and the respect for the holiness of the individual, whom the Lord once created in his image. Fully convinced of the truth of this conception, I now confidently place the fate of my client, the Defendant Baron van Neurath, in your hands!
THE PRESIDENT: I now call on Dr. Fritz on behalf of the Defendant Fritzsche.
DR. HEINZ FRITZ (Counsel for Defendant Fritzsche): Mr. President, the result of the evidence in the case of Fritzsche is a relatively clear one. Although I am one of the last to plead, a close examination of legal problems cannot be avoided. Above all, these problems arise from the fact that Fritzsche was characterized by the Prosecution, in a particularly striking manner, as an accomplice. However, at first I must examine what position Fritzsche had in the Propaganda Ministry, and what part he played in the German propaganda in general. It is these facts which ought to be conclusive in deter-mining what part he supposedly played in the alleged conspiracy. At the beginning of the Trial, Mr. Albrecht submitted as evidence the organizational structure of the Government of the Third Reich, as of March 1945, in the form of a diagram. Mr. Albrecht admitted himself that Fritzsche's name did not appear in it in the position of one of the main leaders of the Propaganda Ministry. It is true, he added, that his importance had been greater than one would be led to think from his position as shown on this diagram. He closed his statement by saying that evidence to this effect would be submitted to the Tribunal (Session of 21 November 1945). Has this been done, and was the hearing of evidence really able to prove that Fritzsche had greater importance? At the session of 28 February 1946, Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe introduced as evidence a "compilation of the elements of guilt" which, in a particularly impressive manner, demonstrates in how far the individual defendants are connected with the facts of which they are supposed to be guilty in the opinion of the Prosecution. The classification of the individual defendants follows from the table which is attached to this compilation as Appendix A. The Tribunal will have noticed that the Defendant Fritzsche is the only one not to appear on this table at all. This follows from the fact that he does not belong to any of the organizations which are to be declared criminal here.
DR. HEINZ FRITZ (Counsel for Defendant Fritzsche): A look at the organizational plan of the Propaganda Ministry, which was submitted in Brief E by the Prosecution (Session of 23 January 1946), also shows clearly that Fritzsche, even in his last position as Ministerial Director and Chief of the Broadcasting Division, was only one of 12 officials of the same rank. Such a position in itself excludes a priori the assumption that he could have determined the principles of policy, the principles of news presentation, and the principles of what may or may not become known to Germany and the world. It is true, Captain Sprecher pointed out- evidently in order to increase Fritzsche's importance-that the Chief of the German Press Division held a unique position, but also did not pass over the fact in silence that he had predecessors and successors in this allegedly unique office. When, in November 1942, Fritzsche was appointed Chief of the Broadcasting Division by Goebbels, he did not obtain a higher position in the civil service hierarchy as a result. His activity was purely administrative. It concerned technical organizational questions. In his affidavit of 7 January 1946 my client describes the administrative work connected with it. He also lists his numerous predecessors. Did it occur to anybody to indict these other persons also as major war criminals, or to call them supreme commanders of a propaganda instrument? Since this is not the case, the conclusion must probably be drawn that it was not Fritzsche's official position which formed the basis for the Indictment. Justice Jackson, too, pointed out (Session of 28 February 1946) that within the framework of the organizations under indictment here not all administrative civil service employees and division chiefs or state officials have been included as a whole, only the Reich Cabinet was named.
DR. HEINZ FRITZ (Counsel for Defendant Fritzsche): Therefore, it can also not be imputed to Fritzsche-as is allegedly possible in the case of the members of the organizations-that from his position alone, and from the close connection of the individual members of the organizations they must necessarily have known, and fully and clearly understood the plans of the alleged conspiracy by virtue of their membership alone. During Fritzsche's cross-examination, an attempt was also made by the Russian Prosecution to magnify Fritzsche's position. They introduced three protocols as evidence-namely, the interrogatories of the witnesses Schorner (Document USSR-472), Voss (USSR-471), and Stahel (USSR-473). But these documents cannot be considered as evidence. These depositions were used only to confront the defendant with isolated passages from them. Because of this limitation, I was able to dispense with the cross-examination of the three persons who signed these protocols. But Fritzsche did not fail to express his opinion on these passages, which were held up to him while he was being questioned on the witness stand. In this connection I have to point to only one more thing: Not one of these three persons has even claimed to have had any insight into the internal organization of the Propaganda Ministry. None of the three depositions contains any definite statement of Fritzsche. On the contrary, these depositions contain mere judgments, judgments which we do not want to have from witnesses, especially not in a case where they cannot furnish any kind of substantial facts. For this reason alone, any value as evidence must be denied them. But aside from that aspect, they represent completely wrong judgments. They can by no means be derived from Fritzsche's own statements which were submitted in this Trial by the Prosecution- namely from his radio addresses.
DR. HEINZ FRITZ (Counsel for Defendant Fritzsche): If evidence against the Defendant Fritzsche bearing out these judgments could have been submitted, then, in view of the fact that the Prosecution could have obtained all of his radio addresses it would have been more to the point to submit here these statements made by him which would have enabled the Tribunal to form their own judgment. The transcripts of the interrogations contain only the summarizing statement that Fritzsche was Goebbels' "deputy." I confronted the witness Von Schirrmeister with this assertion, and he termed it as pure nonsense. Fritzsche had to say the same on the witness stand. There can be no doubt that the concurring testimony of both witnesses is correct. Finally, there are still hundreds of others who formerly worked in this Ministry who could verify the truthfulness of these; statements from their own knowledge. I can state, therefore, that the attempt at magnifying Fritzsche's positions, contrary to the facts given in the organizational chart of the Propaganda Ministry as submitted by Mr. Albrecht, is a complete failure. Beyond that, the hearing of evidence had shown that Fritzsche was not thy creator of the great control apparatus for the German press, as was furthermore claimed by the Prosecution (Session of 23 January 1946). On the contrary, it was Dr. Goebbels and other associates of his. Fritzsche could not have been the creator because of the time element alone. In the first place, for years he had merely been an employee. Then he became a consultant-Referent-and it was only since the winter of 1938-39 that he was one of the 12 division chiefs of the Ministry. When he became Chief of the German Press Division, the policy of the press was determined by Reich Press Chief Dr. Dietrich. As has been said already, he became Chief of the Broadcasting Division only in November 1942 and did not create anything fundamentally new there. Neither Goebbels nor Dietrich ever allowed the control of the German press and radio to be taken out of his hands.
DR. HEINZ FRITZ (Counsel for Defendant Fritzsche): With regard to the details I wish to refer to the testimony of the witness Von Schirrmeister. The fact that Fritzsche could have been neither the creator of the Press Division nor a leader of the German propaganda, as far as it emanated officially from the Ministry, is also shown by the other numerous statements both by Fritzsche, when questioned about it on the witness stand, and by the witness Von Schirrmeister. During his entire activity, Fritzsche actually never possessed any authority to give orders in these fields and could not have had it, owing to his rank in civil service, which would justify his being called the creator or leader of the press and radio in the Third Reich. On the contrary, between Dr. Goebbels, Dr. Dietrich, and himself, there were quite a number of other higher intermediary of fires. In this connection I can also refer to what Lieutenant Meltzer stated in general about the importance of a state secretary in the Reich Propaganda Ministry and that of the Reich Press Chief, when he referred to an affidavit by Amann of 19 December 1945. He pointed out that the holders of these positions exercised complete control over the news service in Germany (Session of 11 January 1946; Document 3501-PS). Fritzsche never held either one of those positions. Incidentally, the Propaganda Ministry did not have only one, but three state secretaries. Besides, Dr. Goebbels had surrounded himself with a ministerial staff (Ministeramt). I believe it is appropriate to point here to this low rank because the Prosecution thought, as they did in other cases-for instance, in the case of the Defendant Goring- that they could conclude a special responsibility from a high rank; that is, from a defendant's outward position alone. Therefore, one can by no means start from the assumption that Fritzsche exerted any decisive influence upon the conduct of propaganda in general and upon the policies which were pursued by the press and radio.
DR. HEINZ FRITZ (Counsel for Defendant Fritzsche): The tasks which Fritzsche accomplished on the technical side of the news system involved him only as a journalist and expert. They had nothing to do with the contents of the propaganda which was pursued by the state leadership. In this respect, too, he was only a person who carried out directives. It is true that he set up the technical organization of the journalist news agencies; he thereby modernized and perfected them. It is also true that this news system played a very important part later in the war. In that respect, Fritzsche's work extended only over the period from 1933 to 1938. But it is a fact that in those years he did not have the least influence upon the contents and political trend of the news, particularly in view of the fact that he was a mere employee at that time. I make these references to Fritzsche's official position within the Propaganda Ministry also for another reason. In admitting what he did and said, and wanting to assume full responsibility for it- Fritzsche had an opportunity to explain in detail the cause for and contents of all the excerpts from his radio addresses submitted to him-he cannot, on the other hand, answer for theses which were championed by other offices of the state propaganda apparatus and also within his own Ministry. Still less can he answer for the unorganized propaganda of the Party. Fritzsche described the various controlled and uncontrolled kinds of propaganda of the Third Reich and pointed out their effects. . May I remind the High Tribunal that the witness Von Schirrmeister testified to the effect that even Goebbels could not do anything with the "Party doctrines" and the "myth" in the field of propaganda. According to the witness, Goebbels did not regard them as things with which to lure the masses. When the Defendant Speer mentioned the secret agitation about the miracle weapons, he was able to point to other sources of unorganized Party propaganda. Fritzsche does not bear any responsibility for all that.
DR. HEINZ FRITZ (Counsel for Defendant Fritzsche): His official position was not influential enough to be able to fight effectively against all faulty conditions and abuses. Therefore, his repeated attempts to have Der Sturmer banned-he considered this paper an excellent means of antiGerman propaganda-remained without success. The Party propaganda with all its practical consequences played a much more important part than that which Fritzsche with his comparatively very limited functions could ever have played. I recall the fact that, according to Fritzsche's testimony, even Dr. Goebbels was afraid of Bormann. This was explained by the portentous sentence according to which it was not the State which had to give orders to the Party, but inversely the Party to the State. The hearing of evidence-especially the examination of the witness Von Schirrmeister-has thus shown, without any doubt, that the decisive directives for the propaganda of the Third Reich came from other agencies. Goebbels, from whom Fritzsche kept his distance personally, did not allow any of the subordinate officials in his Ministry to interfere with his plans. It has become evident that he carried out his plans with the authority of his position, with the adroitness of his arguments-which the world knows-and, if necessary, by means of fraud. The leadership of the German press policy-let us consider only this limited sphere-was and remained in the hands of Dr. Goebbels and Dr. Dietrich. The same thing happened with the radio, as the witness Von Schirrmeister has stated, when Fritzsche took over its direction in November 1942. Dr. Goebbels, one of the oldest and closest of Hitler's collaborators, and Dr. Dietrich, Hitler's permanent escort-during the war he was present almost uninterruptedly in his headquarters-never allowed the leadership of the press and radio to be taken out of their hands, especially by a man who, like Fritzsche had no connections of any kind with Hitler and had not even had a single conference with him. Ultimately, Hitler's will was decisive here, too.