dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
DR. KAUFFMANN: At this Trial the most varied points of view with regard to the "Putsch," especially the killing of the tyrant, have been proffered by witnesses and defendants. I cannot recognize the duty, but the right is certainly not contestable. If the oppression of human freedom occurs by means of a clearly unjust order based on misanthropy, the scales in the now ensuing conflict between obedience and freedom of conscience will be weighted on the side of the latter. Even the so-called oath of allegiance could not justify a different point of view because, as everybody feels, the obligation to allegiance presupposes duties of both partners, so that he who treads under foot the obligation to respect human conscience in the person of his subordinates loses at the same moment the right to expect obedience. The tortured conscience is freed and breaks the ties which the oath had created. Perhaps some people will not agree with my point of view on this problem and will point out the necessity of orderliness in the community, and the salutary effects of obedience in the very interest of this orderly state, or they will point to the wisdom of those in command and at the impossibility of understanding and evaluating all such orders as well as the person in command does; they will point to patriotism and other aspects. And though all that may be correct, there yet remains an absolute obligation to resist an order the purport of which, clearly recognizable to a subordinate, amounts to the materialization of evil and obviously violates the healthy sentiments which aim at humanity and peace among people and individuals. The phrase "in a life-and-death struggle of a nation there can be no legality" is an untrue thesis not thought out to the end, no matter who expresses it. Even immediate danger to the life of the person receiving the order could not induce me to change my conviction. Dr.
DR. KAUFFMANN: Kaltenbrunner would not deny that he who stands at the head of an office of great importance to the community is obliged to sacrifice his life under the above-mentioned conditions. Whereas even direct and imminent danger to his own life and that of his family cannot excuse him, it does diminish his guilt, and Kaltenbrunner only means to point to this moral and legal evaluation of his position. Thus he emphasizes a fact, historically proven, which was one of the deeper reasons for the collapse of the Reich; for no living man can bring to a community liberty, peace, and welfare, who himself bears his chains reluctantly and has lost that freedom which is the decisive characteristic of all human beings. I believe Kaltenbrunner would like to be reborn, and I know that he would fight for that freedom with his life's blood. Kaltenbrunner is guilty; but he is less guilty than he appears in the eyes of the Prosecution. As the last representative of an ominous power of the darkest and most anguish-laden period of the Reich's history he will await your judgment, and yet he was a man whom one could not meet without a feeling of tragedy.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will adjourn now. [A recess was taken.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, Dr. Thomas.
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): May it please the Tribunal, Mr. President, the documentary film which was shown in this room and which was to illustrate the "Rise and Fall of National Socialism," begins with a speech delivered by Rosenberg concerning the development of the Party up to the assumption of power. He also describes the Munich insurrection and says that on the morning of 9 November 1923 he saw police cars with machine-guns assembling in the Ludwigstrasse in Munich and he knew what the march to the Feldherrnhalle implied. Nevertheless he marched in the first lines. Today also, my client takes the some position in face of the Indictment formulated by the prosecutors of the United Nations. He does not want to be pictured as though nobody paid any attention to his books, his speeches, and his publications. Even today he does not want to appear as a person other than what he was once before, a fighter for Germany's strong position in the world, namely, a German Reich in which national freedom should be linked to social justice. Rosenberg is a German, born in the Baltic provinces, who learned to speak Russian as a young boy, passed his examination in Moscow after the Technical College in Riga moved to Moscow during the first World War, took an interest in Russian literature and art, had Russian friends, and was puzzled by the fact that the Russian nation, defined by Dostoievsky as "the nation with God in its heart," was overcome by the spirit of materialistic Marxism. He considered it inconceivable and unjust that the right of self-determination had indeed often been promised but never voluntarily granted to many nations of Eastern Europe which had been conquered by Czarism even in the nineteenth century. Rosenberg became convinced that the Bolshevik revolution was not directed against certain temporary political phenomena only but against the whole national tradition, against the religious faith, against the old rural foundations of the Eastern European nations, and generally against the idea of personal property.
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): At the end of 1918 he came to Germany and saw the danger of a Bolshevistic revolution in Germany too; he saw the whole spiritual and material civilization of the Occident endangered and believed to have found his 1ife\vork in the struggle against this danger as a follower of Hitler. It was a political struggle against fanatical and well-organized opponents who had at their disposal international resources and international backing and who acted according to the principle: "Strike the Fascists wherever you can." But as little as one can deduce from that slogan that the Soviets entertained intentions of military aggression against Fascist Italy, just as little can one say that the struggle of the National Socialists against Bolshevism meant a preparation for a war of aggression against the U.S.S.R. To the Defendant Rosenberg a military conflict with the Soviet Union, especially a war of aggression against the latter, seemed as likely or as unlikely as to any German or foreign politician who had read the book Mein Kampf. It is not correct to maintain that he was initiated in any way into plans of aggression against the Soviet Union; on the contrary, he publicly advocated proper relations with Moscow (Document Rosenberg-7b, Page 147). Rosenberg never spoke in favor of military intervention against the Soviet Union. However, he did fear the entry of the Red Army into the border states and then into Germany. When, in August 1939, Rosenberg learned about the conclusion of the Non-Aggression Pact between the Reich and the Soviet Union-he was as little informed about the preliminary discussions as he was about the other foreign political measures taken by the Fuehrer-he might have gone to see the Fuehrer and protested against it. He did not do it, and he did not object to it with a single word, which the witness Goering confirmed as being a statement of Hitler's.
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): In the witness box Rosenberg himself described (session of 16 April 1946) how he was then suddenly called to Hitler, at the beginning of April 1941, who told him that he considered a military clash with the Soviet Union inevitable. Hitler offered two reasons for it: . (1) The military occupation of Romanian territory, namely, Bessarabia and North Bubovina. (2) The tremendous increase of the Red Army, along the line of demarcation and on Soviet Russian territory in general, which had been going on for a long time. These facts were so striking, he said, that he had already issued the appropriate military and other orders, and he said that he would appoint Rosenberg in some form as a political adviser. As he further stated in the witness box, he thus found himself confronted with an accomplished fact, and the very attempt to discuss it was cut short by the Fuehrer with the remark that the orders had been issued and that hardly anything could be changed in this matter. Thereupon Rosenberg called some of his closest collaborators together, because he did not know whether the military events would take place very soon or later on; and he made, or had made, some plans concerning the treatment of political problems. On 20 April 1941 Rosenberg received from Hitler a preliminary order to establish a central office to deal with questions concerning the East and to contact the competent highest Reich authorities with respect to these matters (Document Number 865-PS, USA-143).
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): If this statement made by Rosenberg is not in itself sufficient to refute the assertion made by the Prosecution, according to which Rosenberg is "personally responsible for the planning and execution of the war of aggression against Russia" (Brudno, in the session of 9 January 1946) and was aware of the "aggressive predatory character of the imminent war" (Rudenko, in the session of 17 April 1946)-if, above all, it is not accepted that Rosenberg was convinced of an imminent aggressive war to be waged by the Soviet Union against Germany, then I would like to bring up four more points in order to prove the correctness of the statements made by the defendant. (1) Rosenberg was not called to the well-known conference at the Reich Chancellery on 5 November 1937 ("Hossbach Document," Document Number 386-PS, USA-25), when Hitler disclosed for the first time his intentions of waging war. This was at the time when Rosenberg still had political influence, or at least seemed to have it. If ever, he should have played the part of the intimate political "inspirator" then. (2) Lammers, as a witness, stated before this Tribunal that Hitler made all important decisions quite alone; thus also the decision concerning war against Russia. (3) To my question about Rosenberg's influence on Hitler's decisions concerning foreign policy, Goering replied before this Tribunal on 16 March 1946: "I think that after the accession to power, the Fuehrer did not consult the Party Of lice of Foreign Affairs a single time about questions concerning foreign policy and that it was created only as a center for dealing with certain questions concerning foreign policy which came up within the Party. As far as I know, Rosenberg was certainly not consulted about political decisions after the accession to power." This was also confirmed by the witness Von Neurath on 26 June 1946 in this courtroom. (4) Finally I would further like to refer to the "brief report concerning the activity of the Office of Foreign Affairs of the NSDAP" (Document Number 003-PS, USA-603).
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): Brief mention is made in it of the "Near East" in such a harmless manner that no word need be said about it. In the confidential reports 004-PS and 007-PS nothing is said either about any preparations against the Soviet Union. Administration in the East. It would be an easy, too superficial, and therefore, unjust procedure if one were to say that firstly the Eastern Territories were occupied in a war of aggression, and therefore anything the German administration did there was criminal; and secondly, that as Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories, Rosenberg was the responsible minister, and therefore he must be punished for all crimes which have occurred there, at least for what happened within the scope of the jurisdiction and authority of the administrative bodies. I will have to demonstrate that this conception is not correct for legal and factual reasons. Rosenberg was the organizer and the highest authority of the administration in the East. On 17 July 1941 he was appointed Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories. Acting on instructions, he had performed preparatory work before that time on questions concerning Eastern Europe by contacting the Reich agencies concerned (Document Number 1039-PS; US-146). He planned and set up his office for dealing centrally with questions concerning Eastern Europe (Document Number 1024-PS; US-278). He had provisional instructions for the Reich Commissioners drawn up (Document Number 1030-PS; US-144); he delivered the programmatical speech of 20 June 1941 (Document Number 1068-PS; US-143); above all, he took part in the Fuehrer conference of 16 July 1941 (Document Number L-221; US-317).
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): In the presence of Rosenberg, Lammers, Keitel, and Bormann, Hitler said at that time that the real aims of the war against Russia should not be made known to the whole world, that those present should understand clearly that "we will never withdraw from the new Eastern Territories; whatever opposition appears will be exterminated; never again must a military power develop west of the Urals; nobody but a German shall ever bear a weapon." Hitler proclaimed the subjection and the exploitation of the Eastern Territories, and in making these statements he placed himself in opposition to what Rosenberg had told him before-without being contradicted by Hitler-concerning his own plans for the East. Thus Hitler probably had a program of enslavement and exploitation. Nothing is so natural, and nothing easier than to say: Even before Rosenberg took over his ministry he knew Hitler's aims for the East; namely, to rule it, to administer it, to exploit it. Therefore he is not only an accomplice in a crime of conspiracy against peace; he is also jointly responsible for the Crimes against Humanity perpetrated in the Eastern Territories, since Rosenberg held the complete power, the highest authority in the East. I shall deal later, de jure and de facto, with the question of Rosenberg's automatic responsibility in his capacity as supreme chief of the Eastern Territories. First I would like to consider the question of his individual responsibility. One might deduce it from two reasons: First, because he allegedly participated in the preparation of the war of aggression against the Soviet Union; I have already July 46 stated that this assertion is not correct; Rosenberg has neither ideologically nor actually participated in the preparations of the war of aggression. Secondly, because he supported Hitler's plan of conquest by making plans, delivering speeches, and organizing the administration.
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): When a minister or general, following the instructions of the head of the State, elaborates plans or takes preparatory measures of an organizational nature, for later eventualities, this activity cannot be considered as criminal even when the interests of other countries are affected thereby and even when the plans, preparations, and measures are intended for war. Only when the minister or general in question directs his activity toward things which have to be considered as criminal according to sound common sense and an international sense of decency and justice can he be held individually responsible. Rosenberg has consistently proved by word and deed that the traditional conceptions of right are his conceptions also and that he desired to enforce them. But his position was particularly difficult since his supreme chief finally exceeded all limits in his ideas, aims, and intentions and since other strong forces like Bormann, Himmler, and Gauleiter Erich Koch were also involved, who frustrated and sabotaged Rosenberg's good and fair intentions. Thus we witness the strange spectacle of a minister in office who partly cannot understand or approve, partly is totally unaware of the intentions of the head of the State; and on the other hand that of the head of a state who appoints a minister to take office, who is certainly an old and loyal political fellow combatant, but with whom he has no longer any spiritual contact whatsoever. It would be wrong to judge such a situation simply according to democratic conceptions of the responsibility of a minister. Rosenberg could not simply resign, yet he felt inwardly the duty of fighting for the point of view which appeared to him right and decent. In his speech of 20 June 1941 Rosenberg said that it was the duty of the Germans to consider that Germany should not have to fight every 25 years for her existence in the East.
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): He by no means, however, desired the extermination of the Slave, but the advancement of all the nations of Eastern Europe and the advancement, not the annihilation, of their national independence. He demanded (Document Number 1058-PS; Exhibit USA-147) "friendly sentiments" toward the Ukrainians, a guarantee of "national and cultural existence" for the Caucasians; he emphasized that, even with a war on, we were "not enemies of the Russian people, whose great achievements we fully recognize." He advocated "the right of self-determination of people"-one of the first points of the whole Soviet revolution. This was his idea, tenaciously defended till the end. The speech in question also contains the passage which the Prosecution holds against him in particular, that the feeding of the German people during these years will be placed at the top of German demands in the East and that the southern territories and the North Caucasus would have to make up the balance in feeding the German people. Then, Rosenberg continues literally: "We do not see at all why we should be compelled to feed the Russian people also from these regions of surplus. We know that this is a bitter necessity which lies beyond any sentiment. Without a doubt extensive evacuation will be necessary, and there are very hard years ahead for the Russians. To what extent industries are to be kept up there is a question reserved for future decision." This passage comes quite suddenly and all by itself in the long speech. One feels distinctly that it has been squeezed in; it is not Rosenberg's voice; Rosenberg does not proclaim here a program of his own but only states facts which lie beyond his will. In the directives of the eastern ministry (Document Number 1056-PS) the feeding of the population, as well as supplying it with medical necessities, is described as being especially urgent.
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): On the contrary, the true Rosenberg emerges in the conference of 16 July 1941 when, regarding Hitler's plans, he called attention to the University of Kiev and to the independence and cultural advancement of the Ukraine and when he took a stand against the intended full power of the Police and above all against the appointment of Gauleiter Erich Koch in the Ukraine (Document Number L-221). One will contend: What is the use of opposition and protests, what is the use of secret reservations and of feigned agreement with Hitler's intentions-Rosenberg did co-operate all the same. Therefore he is responsible too. Later on I will outline in detail how and to what extent Rosenberg took part in the policy in the East, what things he did not do and how he opposed them, what he planned and desired himself in order to defend himself against the grave charge of being responsible for the alleged exploitation and enslavement of the East. Here I would only like to point out the following: It was in no way a hopeless task to begin by accepting even Hitler's most passionate statements without contradiction in the hope and with the intention of nevertheless attaining a different result later on. In opposition to Hitler's statement: "No other than a German may ever bear weapons in the East," it was not long, for example, before, on Rosenberg's recommendation, legions of volunteers were formed from the peoples of the East; and in opposition to Hitler's wish, an edict of tolerance was issued at the end of 1941 for the churches of the East (Document Number 1517-PS). If, at first, Rosenberg could achieve nothing for the autonomy of the eastern nations, he still adhered to his plans for the future in this respect too. First he took care of the urgent agrarian question. An agrarian program was drawn up, which it was possible to present to the Fuehrer on 15 February 1942, and which was authorized by him in unchanged form.
DR.ALFRED THOMA (Counsel for the Defendant Rosenberg): It was not an instrument of exploitation, but an act of liberal formation of the agrarian constitution in the midst of the most terrible of wars. Right in the middle of the wet the eastern countries not only received a new agrarian constitution but also agricultural machinery. The witness Professor Dencker, in his affidavit, has borne witness to the following deliveries to the occupied Soviet territories, including the former border states: Tractors, 40-50 HPabout 7,000 Threshing machinesabout 5,000 Agricultural implementsabout 200,000 Gas generators for German and Russian tractorsabout 24,000 Harvestersabout 35,000 Total Cost: about 180,000,000 marks. I do not think one can say that these deliveries were made with a view to exploitation. So in this, too, Rosenberg accomplished a piece of constructive work that was really a blessing. In the following I will first treat the question of Rosenberg's automatic responsibility as minister for the Eastern Territories; that is, the question of his criminal liability on the grounds of his official position. On 17 July 1941, Rosenberg was appointed Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories. Two Reich Commissariats were set up as supreme territorial authorities: "Ostland" (Esthonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and White Ruthenia) under Reich Commissioner Lohse, and "Ukraine" under Reich Commissioner Koch. The Reich Commissariats were divided into general districts and regions. Right from the beginning the eastern ministry was not conceived as an administrative authority built on a large scale but as a central office, a supreme authority which was to confine itself to over-all instructions and fundamental directives and in addition was to insure the supply of material and personnel. The actual governing was the duty of the Reich Commissioner; he was the sovereign in his territory. Moreover, it is of special importance that Rosenberg, as minister for the East, was not at the head of the whole eastern administration, but that several supreme authorities existed at the same time.