dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
THE PRESIDENT: You see, Dr. Sauter, it is not as though you had to cross-examine witnesses immediately after the evidence is given. The documents are put in and it is not for you then to get up and argue upon the interpretation of those documents. You  have, I regret to say, a considerable time before you will have to get up and call your own evidence and ultimately to argue upon the documents which are now being put in. Therefore, it is not a question of hours, it is a question of days and weeks before you will have to deal with these documents which are now being put in. And I really do not see that there is any hardship upon defendants' counsel in the system which is being adopted. And you will not forget that the rule, which, in a sense, penalizes the Prosecution, is that every document which is put in evidence and every part of the document which is put in evidence, has to be read in open court, in order that it should be translated over the earphones and then shall get into the shorthand notes. I am told that the shorthand notes are not available in German the next morning but are available only some days afterwards. But they are ultimately available in German. And therefore every defendant's counsel must have a complete copy of the shorthand notes, at any rate up to the recess; and that contains all the evidence given against the defendants, and it contains it in German.
DR. SAUTER: Yes, Mr. President, what we are most anxious to have done and what we have been asking for many weeks is that the documents, or at least those parts of the document which come into question, should be given to us in German translation. It is very difficult for us, even if we know English, to translate the documents in the time which is at our disposal. It is practicably impossible for any of us to do this. It is for this reason that we regret that our wish to get the documents in German is not being taken into consideration. We are conscious of the difficulties and we are very grateful for any assistance given. We assure you we are very sorry to have to make such requests, but the conditions are really very difficult for us. The last word I wish to say is that the conditions are really very difficult for us.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Sauter, I am most anxious and the other members of the Tribunal are most anxious that every reasonable facility should be afforded to the defendants and their counsel But, as I have pointed out to you, it is not necessary for you, for any of you, at the present moment, to get up and argue upon these documents which are now being put in. By the time that you have to get up and argue upon the documents which are now being put in, you will have had ample time in which to consider them in German.
DR. SAUTER: Thank you, Sir.
HERR GEORG BOEHM (Counsel for the SA): I have repeatedly asked to receive copies of everything presented in English. The accusation against the SA was presented on the 19th or 18th of December, and at the same time a document book was presented. Today I received a few photostats, but I have not received the greater part of the photostats or other pertinent translations. This shows that we do not receive the German translations immediately after the presentation. Nor are we ever able to read the transcript of the proceedings on the next day or on the day after that. The minutes of the session...
THE PRESIDENT: We are not dealing with the SA or the organizations at the present moment. If you have any motion to make, you will kindly make it in writing, and we will now proceed with the part of the Trial with which we are dealing.
HERR BOEHM: Mr. President, will you permit me one more remark? The minutes of December 17 and 18, 1945 1 have received today.
THE PRESIDENT: Do you mean the transcript of it?
HERR BOEHM: I received today the German transcript for the 18th and 19th of December 1945. You see, it is not a fact that we receive the transcript the day after or a few days after the session. I received it weeks later, after I asked for it repeatedly. I have asked the appropriate offices repeatedly to give me a copy of the document book in German, and I have still not received it.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, we will inquire into that. One moment. [There was a pause in the proceedings while the Judges conferred.]
THE PRESIDENT: Will the last counsel who was speaking stand up? I am told that the reason for the delay in the case you have mentioned was that there had been an error in the paging and therefore the transcripts of those shorthand notes had to be recopied. I understand that the delay ordinarily is not anything like so long as that delay.
HERR BOEHM: But I hardly believe that in the case of the translation of the document book the delay is due to those reasons. But even if the delay in this particular case should be justified, it means that week after week I am hampered in my defense. I do not know the day before what is going to be presented, and I do not know until weeks afterwards what has been presented. I am therefore not in a position to study the evidence from the standpoint of a Defense Counsel. I do not even know what is contained in the document book. I am thus obviously handicapped in my defense in every way. The Prosecution keeps saying that it will furnish the documents on time. This is apparently not the case.
THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps you will kindly make your complaint in writing and give the particulars of it. Do you understand that?
HERR BOEHM: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well.
MR. ROBERTS: May it please the Tribunal, it is my duty to present the evidence against Keitel and also against the Defendant Jodl and I would ask the Tribunal for permission, if it is thought right, that those two cases should be presented together in the interest of saving time, a matter which I know we all have at heart. The story with regard to Keitel and Jodl runs on parallel lines. For the years in question they marched down the same road together. Most of the documents affect them both, and in those circumstances, I submit, it might result in a substantial saving of time if I were permitted to present the cases against both of them together.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
MR. ROBERTS: Then I shall proceed, if I may, on that basis. My Lords, may I say that I fully recognize that the activities of both these defendants have been referred to in detail many times and quite recently by Colonel Telford Taylor, and my earnest desire is to avoid repetition as far as I possibly can. And may I say I welcome any suggestions, as I travel the road, which the Tribunal have to make, to make my presentation still shorter. There is a substantial document book, Document Book Number 7, which is a joint document book dealing with both the defendants. Practically all the documents in that book have already been referred to. They nearly all, of course, have a German origin. I propose to read passages from only nine new documents and those nine documents, I think, are shown in Your Lordship's bundle and in the bundles of your colleagues. May I commence by referring, as shortly as may be, to the part of the Indictment which deals with the two defendants. That will be found on Page 33 (Volume I, Page 77) of the English translation. It begins with "Keitel" in the middle of the page, and it says, "The Defendant Keitel between 1938 and 1945" was the holder of various offices. I only want to point out there that although the commencing date is 1938 the Prosecution rely on certain activities of the Defendant Keitel before 1938, and we submit that we are entitled so to do because of the general words appearing on Page 28 of the Indictment (Volume I, Page 68) at the head of the appendix: "The statements hereinafter set forth following the name of each individual defendant constitute matters upon which the Prosecution will rely inter alia as establishing the individual responsibility ...." And then the Tribunal will see: ". . .
MR. ROBERTS: Keitel used the foregoing positions, his personal influence, and his intimate connection with the Fuehrer in such a manner that: He promoted the military preparations for war set forth in Count One ...." If I may read it shortly the participated in the planning and preparation for wars of aggression and in violation of treaties, he executed the plans for wars of aggression and wars in violation of treaties, and he authorized and participated in War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity. Then, " The Defendant Jodl between 1932 and 1945 was" the holder of various positions. He "used the foregoing positions, his personal influence, and his close connection with the Fuehrer in such a manner" and this is not to be found in the text relating to Keitel "that: He promoted the accession to power of the Nazi conspirators and the consolidation of their control over Germany ...." May I say, My Lords, here, that I know of no evidence at the moment to support that allegation that he promoted the Nazi rise to power before 1933. There is plenty of evidence that he was a devoted, almost a fanatical admirer of the Fuehrer, but that, I apprehend, would not be enough. And then it is alleged against Jodl that he promoted the preparations for war, that he participated in the planning and preparation of the war, and that he authorized and participated in War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity. My Lords, with regard to the position of the Defendant Keitel, it is well- known that in February of 1938 he became Chief of the OKW, Supreme Commander of all the Armed Forces, and that Jodl became Chief of the Operations Staff; and that is copiously proved in the shorthand notes and in the documents. Perhaps I ought to refer to his position in 1935, at the time when the reoccupation of the Rhineland was first envisaged. Keitel was head of the Wehrmachtsamt in the Reich War Ministry, and that is proved by a Document 3019-PS, which is to be found in Das Archiv; and I ask the Court to take judicial notice of that. It is not in the bundle.
MR. ROBERTS: Jodl's positions have been proved by his own statement, Document 2865- PS, which is also Exhibit USA-16; and in 1935 he held the rank of lieutenant colonel, Chief of the Operations Department of the Landesverteidigung. May I just refer to the pre-1938 period - that is, the pre-OKW period - to two documents, one of which is new. The first document I desire to mention without reading is EC-177. I do not want to read it. It is Exhibit USA-390. My Lords, those are the minutes, shortly after the Nazi rise to power, of the working committee of the Delegates for Reich Defense. The date is the 22d of May 1933. Keitel presided at that meeting. The minutes have been read. There is a long discussion as to the preliminary steps for putting Germany on a war footing. Keitel regarded the task as most urgent, as so little had been done in previous years; and perhaps the Tribunal will remember the most striking passage where Keitel impressed the need for secrecy: Documents must not be lost; oral statements can be denied at Geneva. And I submit, if I may be allowed to make this short comment, it is interesting to see in those very early days of 1933 that the heads of the Armed Forces of Germany contemplated using lying as a weapon. My Lord, the next document I desire to refer to is a new one, and it is EC-405, Exhibit GB-160. I desire to refer to this shortly because, in my submission, it fixes Jodl with knowledge of, and complicity in, the plan to reoccupy the Rhineland country, contrary to the Versailles Treaty . The Tribunal will see that these are the minutes of the working committee of the Reich Defense Council, dated the 26th of June 1935. The Court will see that, a quarter of the way down the page, Subparagraph F. Lieutenant Colonel Jodl gives a dissertation on mobilization preparation; and it is only the fourth and fifth paragraphs on that same page, the last paragraph but one from the bottom, that I desire to read: "The demilitarized zone requires special treatment.
MR. ROBERTS: In his speech of the 21st of May and other utterances, the Fuehrer has stated that the stipulations of the Versailles Treaty and the Locarno Pact regarding the demilitarized zone are being observed. To the aide-memoire of the French charge d'affaires on recruiting offices in the demilitarized zone, the Reich Government has replied that neither civilian recruiting authorities nor other offices in the demilitarized zone have been entrusted with mobilization tasks, such as the raising, equipping, and arming of any kind of formations for the event of war or in preparation therefor. "Since political complications abroad must be avoided at present" I stress the "at present" "under all circumstances, only those preparatory measures that are urgently necessary may be carried out. The existence of such preparations or the intention of making such preparations must be kept in strictest secrecy in the zone itself as well as in the rest of the Reich." My Lord, I need not read more. I submit that fixes Jodl clearly with knowledge of the forthcoming breach of Versailles . My Lord, the day before the Rhineland was reoccupied on the 7th of March 1936, the Defendant Keitel issued the directive which has been read before, Document C-194, Exhibit USA-55, ordering an air reconnaissance and certain U-boat movements in case any other nation attempted to interfere with that reoccupation. My Lords, I pass now to the 4th of February 1938, when the OKW was formed. My Lords, shortly after its formation there was issued a handbook, which is a new exhibit, from which I want to read short passages. The number of the exhibit is L-211. It is Document GB-161.
MR. ROBERTS: How, this is dated 19 April 1938; "top secret; Direction of War as a Problem of Organization." I read only from the appendix which is entitled, "What is the War of the Future?"; and if the Court will kindly turn over to the second page, I am going to read, 12 lines from the bottom of the page, the line beginning "Surprise": "Surprise as the requisite for quick initial success will often require hostilities to begin before mobilization has been completed or the armies are fully in position. "A declaration of war is no longer necessarily the first step at the start of a war. "According to whether the application of the rules of warfare create greater advantages or disadvantages for the warring nations, will the latter consider themselves at war or not at war with the neutral states." It may, of course, be said that those were only theoretical words and they might apply to any other nation which might be minded to make war on Germany. The Court can use its judicial notice of the conditions of things in Europe in 1938 and ask itself whether Germany had any potential aggressor against her. But, My Lord, I emphasize that passage because I submit it so clearly envisages exactly the way in which Germany did make war in 1939 and in the subsequent years. My Lord, I now start to tread the road which has been trodden so many times and which will be trodden so many times again, the road from 1938 to 1941: the final act of aggression. My Lord, I believe that I can treat this, so far as Keitel and Jodl are concerned, in a very few sentences, because I submit that the documents which are already in, which have been read and reread into the record, demonstrate quite clearly that Keitel, as would only be expected, he being Chief of the Supreme Command of all the Armed Forces, and Jodl, as only would be expected also, he being Chief of the Operations Staff, were vitally and intimately concerned with every single act of aggression which took place successively against the various victims of Nazi aggression.
MR. ROBERTS: My Lord, Your Lordship has in front of you the document book and perhaps the trial brief in which those documents are set out under the heading. If I might take first the aggression against Austria, Your Lordship will remember, in Jodl's diary on the 12th of February 1938, how Keitel, who was something more than a mere soldier, put heavy pressure upon Schuschnigg - that is Document 1780-PS, Jodl's diary - how on the following day Keitel writes to Hitler - Document 1775-PS, Exhibit USA- 75 suggesting the shamming of military action and the spreading of false but quite credible news. Then the actual operation orders for "Operation Otto," Exhibits USA-74, 75, and 77, all of the 11th of March 1938, are OKW orders for which Keitel is responsible.
THE PRESIDENT: What are the numbers of them?
MR. ROBERTS: My Lord, Documents C-102, C-103, and C-182. One of them is actually signed or initialed by Keitel, and two are initialed by Jodl. Those are the operation orders for the advance into Austria, the injunction, if the Tribunal remembers, to treat Czech soldiers as hostile and to treat the Italians as friends. My Lord, that is the first milestone on the road, the occupation of Austria. My Lord, the second is, is it not. . .
THE PRESIDENT: Well, perhaps if you are going to pass on to another, we had better adjourn now until 2 o'clock. [The Tribunal recessed until 1400 hours.] Afternoon Session
MR. ROBERTS: May it please the Tribunal, I had got to the commencement of the alleged aggression against Czechoslovakia; and the Tribunal will remember that the leading exhibit on that matter is the file 388-PS, Exhibit Number USA-26, the "Fall Grun" file. My Lords, that file, in my submission, contains copious evidence against both Keitel and Jodl, showing that they were taking the natural part of the Chief of the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces and the head of the Operations Staff. May I remind the Tribunal of Item 2. I do not want to read any of these. I might just refer to the notes of a meeting on the 21st of April 1938. The important thing to notice is that Keitel and the Fuehrer met alone, showing the intimate connection between Keitel and the Fuehrer. And it was at that meeting that preliminary plans were discussed, including the possibility of an incident, namely, the murder of the German Ambassador at Prague. Item 5 in that file, dated the 20th of May 1938, shows the plans for the political and the military campaign against Czechoslovakia, issued by Keitel. Item 11, dated the 30th of May 1938, is the directive signed by Keitel for the invasion of Czechoslovakia, with the date given as the 1st of October 1938. There are many items which are initialed by Jodl - Item 14 and Item 17, to mention only two. Perhaps, for the purpose of the note, I should mention the others: Items 24, 36, and 37. There is the directive, Items 31 and 32, dated the 27th of September 1938, signed by Keitel, enclosing orders for secret mobilization. Jodl's diary, Document 1780-PS, contains many references to the forthcoming aggression, particularly the 13th of May and the 8th of September; and there is a very revealing entry on the 11th of September in Jodl's diary, 1780-PS, in which he says. . .
THE PRESIDENT: Will you give us the date?
MR. ROBERTS: I beg Your Lordship's pardon; 11th of September 1938. "In the afternoon conference with Secretary of State Hahnke, from the Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, on the imminent common tasks. The joint preparations for refutation of our own violations of international law and the exploitation of its violations by the enemy were considered particularly important." I emphasize those words, "our own violations of international law." My Lords, as a result of that conference the Document C-2, which was referred to by my learned leader, Sir David, was prepared, which the Tribunal will remember has in parallel columns the possible breach of international law and the excuse which is then going to be given for it. It was referred to so recently that I need not refer to it again. My Lords, I respectfully submit on that branch of the case that there is an overwhelming case that Keitel and Jodl played an important, indeed a vital part, in the aggression against Czechoslovakia which led up to the Pact of Munich. My Lords, after the Pact of Munich was signed, as has been pointed out many times, the Nazi conspirators at once set about preparations for annexing the remainder of Czechoslovakia. My Lords, at this point Jodl disappears from the scene for a time, because he goes to do some regimental soldiering as artillery general in Austria artillery general of the 44th Division - and so it cannot be said that there is any evidence against him from the Munich Pact until the 23rd of August 1939, when he is recalled on the eve of the Polish invasion to take up his duties once more as chief of the operational staff of OKW. So far as Keitel is concerned, on the 21st of October 1938, less than a month after the Munich Pact , he countersigned Hitler's order to liquidate the rest of Czechoslovakia and to occupy Memel - Document C-136, Exhibit Number USA-104. On the 24th of November 1938, Document C-137, Exhibit Number GB-33, Keitel issues a memorandum about the surprise occupation of Danzig.
MR. ROBERTS: On the 17th of December 1938, Document C-138, Exhibit Number USA-105, he signs an order to the lower formations: "Prepare for the liquidation of the rest of Czechoslovakia." Those preparations were made. On the 15th of March 1939 Keitel, who - I again repeat - was more than a mere soldier, was present at the midnight conference between the Fuehrer and Hacha, President of Czechoslovakia, when, under a threat of bombing Prague, Hacha surrendered the rest of his country to the Germans. I refrain from referring to the contents of the minutes, which have been read many times already. My Lords, so that milestone is past. And again I submit, in all that aggression it is clear that Keitel was playing a vital part as Hitler's right-hand man, commanding all the armed forces under him. I now pass to the Polish aggression. Keitel was present at the meeting at the chancellery on the 23rd of May 1939, Document L-79, Exhibit Number USA-27, when it was said - just a few words so familiar: Danzig was not the subject of the dispute; Poland was to be attacked at the first suitable opportunity; Dutch and Belgian air bases must be occupied; declarations of neutrality were to be ignored. The directive for "Fall Weiss", the invasion of Poland, is Document C-120(a), Exhibit GB-41. The date is the 3rd of April 1939. The Tribunal will remember the plans were to be submitted to OKW by the 1st of May, and the forces were to be ready for invasion by the 1st of September. And that directive is signed by Keitel. Document C-126, Exhibit GB-45, is a follow-up of that previous directive. It is dated the 22d of June 1939. The need for camouflage is emphasized; and it is stated, "Do not disquiet the population." That is signed by Keitel. On the 17th of August 1939, Document 795-PS, Exhibit GB-54, Keitel has a conference with Admiral Canaris about the supplying of Polish uniforms to Heydrich; and it wit be noticed in the last paragraph of the note that Admiral Canaris is against the war, and Keitel argues in favor of it.