dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
JUETTNER: In my testimony yesterday and the day before yesterday, I pointed out several times that in the course of the years anyone who wore a brown shirt was always taken for an SA man. That seems to be the case here too, although those concerned had nothing to do with the SA.
HERR BOEHM: The same is true of the affidavit of Mr. Leib Kibart who also terms some of the people whom he mentions SA men and identifies them as such because they wore brown uniforms with a swastika armband. Were not the swastika armband and the brown uniform worn by all the other people, and primarily by those who worked in the Eastern Ministry and were engaged on duties connected with it? There was an East uniform, was there not? Was this uniform worn by the SA, and could it be confused with the-uniform of the SA?
JUETTNER: The East uniform was worn by those who were employed in this task, and they were employed not by the SA but by the Eastern Ministry. It was brown, and I believe that it had the swastika armband and, without doubt, like any other brown uniform, it could be confused with the SA uniform.
HERR BOEHM: Document R-135 was submitted yesterday. It is a letter from the Reichskommissar for the Ostland, written on 18 June 1943. What I wanted to ask you was: was the Reichskommissar for the Ostland ever subordinate to you or to the SA Föhrung at any time?
JUETTNER: No. No Reichskommissare in Ostland were under the SA Leadership. They were under the Eastern Administration. The SA Leadership had no influence on them,'nor was that its function.
HERR BOEHM: Now I should like to show you the paragraph which yesterday formed the subject of statements by the prosecutor, which, however, in my opinion was torn from the context. It reads: "On orders of the chief..."
THE PRESIDENT: What is the reference?
HERR BOEHM: That is Number R-135, Mr. President. It is the second paragraph from the end in this document. "On orders of the chief of anti-partisan activity, SS Obergruppenfuehrer Von dem Bach, units of the Wehrmannschaften took part in the undertaking. SA Standartenfuehrer Kunze led the Wehrmannschaften, which included 90 members of my group and of the District Kommissariat of Minsk. Our men returned yesterday from the undertaking without losses. "I refuse to assign to such missions officials and Reich employees of the Generalkommissariat in the rear area. The men employed by me have not been deferred in order to combat partisans in the place of the Wehrmacht and the Police. One railroad Wehrmannschafter was wounded (shot through the lung)." Does this not show clearly that these were railroad men and officials formed into fighting commandos to combat partisans, created as a result of the Soviet Russian order? Could this have been an SA commando?
JUETTNER: No, under no circumstances. They were called Wehrmannschaften under an SA Fuehrer named Kunzo, who had for some time been out of the active Leadership Corps of the SA. He was a leader for a special purpose. He was in the East. I know him, but I have only now learned that he was employed in the East. He was employed within the Eastern Administration, but not as an SA Fuehrer. If he trained Wehrmannschaften, they were not SA Wehrmannschaften. There were none there, and they were not organized, trained, or influenced by us in any way. .
HERR BOEHM: Then it is probably correct if I assume that Kunze was an official of the District Kommissariat of the city of Minsk and that he had nothing to do with the Supreme SA Leadership?
JGTTNER: That is correct.
HERR BOEHM: Through an affidavit of...
THE PRESIDENT: Will you ask the witness, Dr. BOEHM, what "Wehrmannschaften" means literally?
HERR BOEHM: The witness already commented on that yesterday by distinguishing between "SA Wehrmannschaften" and "Wehrmannschaften" of the type mentioned here. Herr JUETTNER, would you please...
THE PRESIDENT: I asked what the word meant literally.
HERR BOEHM: Witness, please explain-to the President what you understand by the term "Wehrmannschaften."
JUETTNER: Your Lordship, I should like to distinguish between "SA Wehrmannschaften" and "Wehrmannschaften" of the type mentioned here. The "SA Wehrmannschaften," according to the decree of Adolf Hitler of January, 1939, were to be set up by the SA in the Reich consisting of released soldiers so that they could be kept ready for defense physically and mentally. The "Wehrmannschaften" mentioned here were given this designation without our having anything to do with it and I imagine that these "Wehrmanschaften" were men who formed themselves into groups to combat partisans in occupied territory.
THE PRESIDENT: The witness still has not told me what the word means. It is a German word. All we want is the translation. Is it possible to translate it?
HERR BOEHM: If I may explain it, I would say that it is a group of persons determined to ward off an attack from any side.
THE PRESIDENT: Do you agree with what your counsel has said, or what the Organization counsel has said, as to the meaning of the word?
JUETTNER: I could give it another definition. It is a unit under a leader, set up in this case for dealing with enemy action in occupied territory that is behind the front, a defense organization.
HERR BOEHM: I believe that it is necessary, Mr. President, for me to demonstrate to you with the aid of Document 4011-PS the difference between "Wehrmannschaften" and "SA Wehrmannschaften." In Document 4011-PS, on Page 9, the Deputy Generalkommando IV. A.K. says in the 3d paragraph, last line but one ...
THE PRESIDENT: Page 9 of what?
HERR BOEHM: I thought I said 4011-PS, Mr. President. It is the third paragraph. The Deputy Generalkommando IV. A.K. speaks of "SA Wehrmannschaften" and the same term is used on the same page in the same document in Paragraph 5. It is the view taken by the Deputy Generalkommando IV. A.K. There it also states: "While I was on duty with the 'SA Wehrmannschaften' on 2 June 1940." Whenever he refers to the Wehrmannschaften of the SA, then they are SA Wehrmannschaften and were explicitly designated as SA Wehrmannschaften.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. BOEHM, the translation we have got said: "On the occasion of my presence at the training of the SA Wehrmannschaften on the 2d of June, 1940, 1 established that the primary military physical training of the SA Mannschaften, especially under difficult conditions brought about by the present time, was practiced by all concerned with great zeal."
HERR BOEHM: Yes, of course, Mr. President; I want to make a distinction, between the term "SA Wehrmannschaften" if any such were concerned, and the term "Wehrinannschaften" if no SA was involved.
THE PRESIDENT: I do not think it is any good arguing the point. I was only asking what the meaning of the word was. The witness has now explained to me that according to the Hitler decree of January 1939, certain men called "Wehrmannschaften" were to be set up in the Reich, as he says, ready for defense. If you can confirm that, it would be useful perhaps.
HERR BOEHM: If the explanation of this term is sufficient, I can continue.
THE PRESIDENT: Certainly.
HERR BOEHM: An affidavit of Rudolf Schönberger is suppo sed to show that according to orders the Supreme SA Leadership was in charge of the guarding of forced labor camps. This is the first affidavit given in this connection. I should like to ask you under whom the forced labor camps operated. Can you clarify this point, Herr Jöttner? Did you ever detail men as SA Mannschaften or as SA units to the Auxiliary Police or to any other authority to be employed or used in these labor camps?
JUETTNER: At no time did the duties of the SA include police tasks. The guarding and supervision of forced laborers is always a police task. If SA men were used for this, they were enrolled for this on a legal basis and were no longer under the authority of the SA as regards orders. They fulfilled their police tasks there, the same as anyone else fulfilled his task in some other profession. He remained an SA man, but during the time he was occupied in police tasks, he was on leave from the SA and was no longer under the authority of the SA Leadership.
HERR BOEHM: Not for orders either?
JUETTNER: Not for orders either.
HERR BOEHM: Another document which I should like to show you is Number 3661-PS. The Prosecution wishes to use this document, which is signed by a certain Gewecke, to show the part of the Supreme SA Leadership or the organization in attacks on Jews in Ostland. Therefore I should like to ask you, does not the letter heading of the District Kommissar in Schaulen show that this was the affair of the Reichskommissariat -Ostland? This letter was written on 8 September 1941, and the letter heading reads "The District Kommissar in Schaulen." Was the District Kommissar in Schaulen ever in any way subordinate to you?
JUETTNER: I have repeatedly said that the Kommissare in the Occupied Eastern Territories as well as the forces allocated and employed in the occupied territories were in no way under the SA Leadership, and as a result did not receive and could not receive any instructions from the SA Leadership. This District Kommissar was not under the authority of the SA either.
HERR BOEHM: That makes the matter clear. The letter was signed by a certain Gewecke. He was actually an SA man, but it is interesting to point out in this connection that the contents of this document show that this Gewecke complains about attacks on Jews committed by the SS Leadership. The next document was submitted under Number D-970 and refers to the commander of the Security Police and the SD in the Government General. In connection with this Prosecution document I should first like to state that Kattowitz, or the outpost, Ilkenau, is not in the Government General, but in Upper Silesia. Now I should like to ask you, if you will pay attention to the following sentence which I will quote: "Therefore, the construction staff at Kattowitz detailed a special detachment of 12 SA men to round up workers in the villages." Does this not show that the office giving the order was not an SA office but an official agency, namely, the construction staff Kattowitz, which by coincidence chose SA members amongst others? Did you understand, me, Witness?
JUETTNER: Yes. Which question should I answer first?
HERR BOEHM: Was a construction staff at Kattowitz ever under your jurisdiction?
JUETTNER: No, construction staffs-presumably by these is meant construction staffs of the Organization Todt-were never under the SA Leadership. If a construction staff employed SA men for such tasks, it no doubt took from its own personnel those that were SA members. If they employed SA men who were not directly under their orders, that was outside the powers of the SA Leadership. If such men have been guilty of illegal actions in this connection they deserve proper punishment. In any case, the SA Leadership, as the document shows, had no power over such employment. They were employed by the construction staff which was not subordinate to the SA Leadership.
HERR BOEHM: Might it have escaped you that in Kattowitz; there were SA Einsatzkommandos of which you knew nothing? Would that have been possible?
JUETTNER: I said emphatically yesterday, and I repeat today, that the term "Einsatzkommando" was completely foreign to the SA, as we never formed Einsatzkommandos for such purposes. If Einsatzkommandos existed and there were SA members in their ranks, then that was not due to any instructions of the SA and did not mean that it was approved by the SA.
HERR BOEHM: The Prosecution submitted a letter yesterday from the Reichsfuehrer SS, Inspector of Concentration Camps, to the Reichsfflhrer SS and Chief of the German Police in Berlin, dated 21 February 1940. Unfortunately I do not remember the exhibit number given yesterday, but there can be no doubt about this letter because I have a photostatic copy of it here. I should like to ask you, Herr Jöttner, whether the Supreme SA Leadership had a labor camp for drunkards and s1iirkers, as was asserted yesterday by the Prosecution and as this document might be interpreted to indicate. Regarding the camp Frauenberg near Admont, it says: "About 20 men of the SA guarded the camp." What do you have to say about the document submitted by the Prosecution about the labor camp Frauenberg in Styria, concerning the labor camp in which 20 SA men are said to have been used as guards? Would you like to see the document? Have you seen the document?
JUETTNER: No. [The witness was handed a document.]
HERR BOEHM: You will find this statement on the second page of the document, in the last third.
JUETTNER: I must say, Your Lordship, that after the Reichsfuehrer SS took over the concentration camps, which as far as I know was at the end of 1933, the SA as an organization had nothing to do with concentration camps and the guarding of concentration camps. If SA men were in fact used as guards, then, they were drafted by the authorities as Auxiliary Police or something similar in order to carry out this task. But in that case they were completely removed from the responsibility and the authority of the SA.
HERR BOEHM: Another document which was submitted is Number 4013-PS, which says: "This morning I had an inquiry from very reliable English quarters whether it would be possible for Austrians in Germany behind the backs of Hitler and Habicht to break into Austria. My informant added that so far the Austrian attacks had been ignored, but this information had come from such a reliable source that they simply had to contact us. I am afraid of a possible provocation by hired elements which, if announced to the world just at that time, could produce conflicts." I should only like to ask you, is this one of the usual cock-and-bull stories which in the past have been very frequent? Do you know the document?
JUETTNER: No. I do not know the document. [The witness was handed a document.] I may say that until yesterday I knew nothing about this affair. I could not have helped hearing about it. The collecting-point for refugee or expelled Austrians, the so-called Austrian Legion, which was later Aid Campaign Camp North West, was purposely located a long way from the Austrian border, several hundred kilometers, on the Rhine. This alone should indicate that any border incidents or whatever the author of this report anticipated was quite out of the question. In any case, I knew nothing about the affair until now.
HERR BOEHM: Then the Prosecution submitted another document yesterday, Number D-951. On the second page of the document it says: "According to the report of the Military District Headquarters VI, the SA Brigadefuehrer are also said to be considering forming such a staff guard and to be engaging SA men for one or one and a half year's service for this purpose ... Numerically this would amount to 6 or 8,000 SA men permanently armed with rifles and machine guns in the area of the Military District VI alone." The letter is dated 6'March 1934, or 2 March 1934. The second letter says: "The training is to be carried out with rifle Model 98." Have you seen this document?
JUETTNER: No, but I heard of it yesterday. [The witness was handed a document.]
HERR BOEHM: Do not these documents refer to the people's militia which Röhmintended to set up and in which he failed? Please describe R6hm's plans for the people's militia in its political connection, and please be brief.
JUETTNER: First, as to the staff guard: there were staff guards, in part armed, to protect the offices and to post, quite publicly, guards of honor and other guards.' That 6,000 men should have formed the staff guard in H6chst on the Main is quite out of the question. Herr Von Blomberg repeatedly made mistakes and apparently he did so in this case too. These mistakes are especially clear from an exchange of correspondence after the death of R6hm, in which he attacked me personally because of an order of 8 May 1934, and where he presented the facts quite wrongly. When the Chief of Staff, Lutze, and I objected, he excused himself with the explanation that in such turbulent times such mistakes could occur. If the Tribunal wishes I can go into more detail. Chief of Staff R6hm, as he repeatedly said at Fuehrer discussions, wanted to create, in addition to the Reichswehr, a militia from the ranks of the SA amounting to 300,000 men. He repeatedly emphasized that the State leadership had to keep the pledge they had given to the old gentleman, meaning Hindenburg, that is, that the Reichswehr should not be touched. He spoke quite openly with the Military Attaches of the Western Powers about his militia plans. I myself was twice a witness, and gained the unequivocal impression that particularly the French Military Attach6 in no way objected to these plans.
THE PRESIDENT: I don't believe that we need to prolong this discussion. The witness says, as I understand it, that this document refers to a militia which Röhmwanted to set up. Is that right?
HERR BOEHM: Yes, those were the plans of Röhm.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that's all we need there.
HERR BOEHM: Then I should like to add a short question: with the death of Röhm were not these plans completely shelved, that is, did they not fall through?
JUETTNER: To my knowledge these plans were not followed up in any way. On the contrary, the comparatively few arms which the staff guards possessed were collected and delivered after the 30th of June, 1934.
HERR BOEHM: Now I come to the next document, Number 3050-PS, the first page, A. This document was submitted in cross-examination yesterday and contains a collection of articles from the SA Mann. This was commented on widely in the Commission and it was made sufficiently clear just what the SA Mann meant to the individual members of the SA and what the influence of the Supreme SA Leadership was upon this paper. However, since these things have been brought up again, it is necessary to comment on them again, even if only briefly. It is fundamentally wrong, if one quotes articles, to quote only excerpts.
THE PRESIDENT: You don't seem to have understood that you are not here to comment; you are here to ask questions of the witness. If you want to ask, questions of the witness, ask them.
HERR BOEHM: Yes, Mr. President. I should like to quote an article which has not yet been read, Document Number 3050-A. This article must be quoted by me, Mr. President, because I should like to ask a question about it, since-and I ask that this be officially recognized-the article from the SA Mann as submitted by the Prosecution does not read as it appears here. The article reads: "Since marching is in the last analysis a form of sport, the same principles are true of it as of any other sport. Health and hardening of the body are conditions for successful march training. This includes foot care which is especially important for those marching." The article then goes on to describe foot care. I will not take up your time with that. Then it points out that marching is not only important for the soldier in the Army, but also for the political soldiers, the SA men. A completely unmilitary matter in my opinion. In Document 3050-C, I see there is an article, also from the SA Mann of 94 March 1934, with the heading "cross-country." This is the third article submitted to the Court in Document 3050-PS, and it is supposed to prove that the SA had a military attitude. Therefore the article should be submitted.
THE PRESIDENT: I've already told you that what you are doing is making an argument on the Document 3050-PS; and what you ought to do is to ask the witness a question as to the document.
HERR BOEHM: Herr JUETTNER, the document which I read to you, now that I have pointed out the mistakes, should, according to the Prosecution, prove the military character of the SA, because it speaks of foot care and because this article appeared in the SA Mann. Did you order this article?
JUETTNER: The Supreme SA Leadership did not order the articles in the SA Mann. The editors were responsible for them. The SA was not military in character and never attempted to be. If, as was said yesterday, the paper SA Mann was to be used to help in the education and training of the SA, that was because ...
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. BOEHM, we don't want that argument over and over again. We know perfectly well that you say these documents about training were simply for sports; and the witness has said it at least twenty times in the course of the examination.
HERR BOEHM: Very well, Mr. President. Since these documents' were submitted yesterday, the witness must in some way comment on this matter; and I must ask him about it and inform him of the contents of these documents if he is to comment on them in giving evidence. There is no other opportunity.
THE PRESIDENT: He had ample opportunity to get familiar with the documents. The documents were put to him yesterday.
HERR BOEHM: They were not put to him, Mr. President. No questions were asked.
THE PRESIDENT: He stated yesterday that that was a lecture by Lutze.
HERR BOEHM: No, not this document, Mr. President, the whole series of documents ...
THE PRESIDENT: If you'll ask the witness questions instead of arguing, we shall get on better; and if you won't ask questions, you'll have to stop the examination.
HERR BOEHM: Very well, Mr. President. [Turning to the witness.] In another article in Document 3050 of 24 March 1934, with the heading "cross-country," it says: "The most effective means in the hands of the clever leader is to implant in the hearts of the youth now growing up a love of nature, and to steel them physically and mentally." Do you conclude from this article, which was not written by you or on your instructions any more than the others, that it denotes a military attitude or military training?
JUETTNER: No.
HERR BOEHM: In Document 3050-E it states in the third line: "For the SA man there is no tiring, no slothful resting, whether in the political struggle or in the maintaining and saving of valuable goods for German political economy. The SA is always ready." Do you take that to imply a military attitude? I do not know who wrote this article; it was not ordered by you in any case; but can one take the attitude expressed here to mean a military training or a militaristic attitude?
JUETTNER: No one would take it to mean a militaristic attitude or an attempt to adopt one.
HERR BOEHM: Document 3050-F is called militaristic because it contains a service plan according to which 6 hours of drill, 3 hours of shooting practice and 3 hours of field exercises per month are demanded of the SA members. I should like to ask you in the first place, what did the drill consist of?
JUETTNER: As the name implies, it consisted of exercises for the public appearance of the SA at demonstrations, parades, and so forth. That was a matter of course and a necessity. For example, if, as was my responsibility, one had to move 120,000 men in big parades at the Party Rally, they had to be prepared for this by drill if the spectacle was to be at all presentable. It is for these things that the men were drilled, to teach the men proper bearing, as is the case in other countries too.
HERR BOEHM: And what was the shooting practice?
JUETTNER: We had only small-bore rifles, the sports model. We could, therefore, practice only with small-bore. That was sport shooting.
HERR BOEHM: What did the field exercise consist of?
JUETTNER: An attempt was made to train the men mentally and to awaken in them a love of nature. By the various exercises the men were to be forced to think; it was to train their courage and to give them initiative, the same as in the motor exercises in the NSKK, where motorcyclists were trained in -cross-country riding and had to overcome difficult terrain.