dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
DR. SERVATIUS: What instruction did you receive on the Church question, Point 24 of the Party program? Did you receive instructions to eliminate the Church as an enemy of war?
KAUFMANN: I never received such instructions based on such reasoning, nor did my political leaders. In spite of the interpretation which the different personalities of the Party gave this point, the program point acknowledging positive Christianity remained binding until the end for my political leaders. That is proved by the fact that the majority of the political leaders were and remained members of the Church.
DR. SERVATIUS: What instructions did you receive on Point 25 of the Party program on the dissolution of labor unions? Were they to be removed as opponents of war?
KAUFMANN: No. We, and that includes my political leaders, saw in the dissolution of the labor unions only a demonstrative act of an organic development which was taking place. The mass of union members, even before the dissolution of the unions, were members of the NSBO, and thus members of the National Socialist Labor Organization.
DR. SERVATIUS: I would like to break off here. The witness Hupfauer will be questioned more closely on this subject. Did not the Anschluss of Austria take place with the entry of German troops? Did the political leaders approve of this?
KAUFMANN: I have already mentioned that the political leaders were neither informed nor questioned on the entry of German troops into Austria and that they welcomed the Anschluss all the more because it is a historical fact that the Austrian people desired it.
DR. SERVATIUS: Was not Alsace-Lorraine again incorporated into the German Reich, and did the political leaders approve of it?
KAUFMANN: The question of the incorporation of disputed areas is a question of peace treaties. The political leaders were of the opinion that Alsace-Lorraine, for the duration of the war, was under special German civil administration, and after the victorious end of the war it was very possible that the incorporation of this territory into the German Reich could and would be a German demand, just as it was a French one after the first World War.
DR. SERVATIUS: Were not the occupied territories in the East claimed as Lebensraum and did the political leaders approve of this?
KAUFMANN: The war against Russia was described to the political leaders by the political leadership as a preventive war. And so this information for the benefit of the political leaders did not-at least at the beginning of this war-contain anything concerning intentions of annexation.
DR. SERVATIUS: Were not the churches in fact persecuted and did the political leaders approve this?
KAUFMANN: It is quite possible that, in spite of the Party program to acknowledge positive Christianity, deviation from this particular point occurred in some Gaue and the Church was exposed to some persecution in these Gaue. The Fuehrer himself never deviated from this point of the program in his statements.
DR. SERVATIUS: Then you did not approve of this persecution?
KAUFMANN: Not only did I disapprove of the persecution, but I prohibited it in my Gau.
DR. SERVATIUS: Were not the unions actually abolished and did not the political leaders approve of it?
KAUFMANN: The political leaders and I saw in the German Labor Front the development toward a great unified labor organization. If there were any doubts, the social achievements for the German worker caused them to disappear.
DR. SERVATIUS: Were the political aims thus realized not contained as aims in the book Mein Kampf, and thus generally known and approved by the leaders?
KAUFMANN: The book Mein Kampf was certainly known to part of the political leaders, and so was the Party program. The opinion about both in the Nazi Party was like in any other party. Some points are approved and they are the reasons for joining. Other points do not seem to interest anybody, and the third group of program points can even be rejected. In every party, and in the NSDAP as well, much thinking and discussing centered around the final aims of the Party, and this process was by no means completed.
DR. SERVATIUS: Were there then various tendencies in the Party?
KAUFMANN: In important questions of interpretation of the program points, yes.
DR. SERVATIUS: What groups were they?
KAUFMANN: I should like to differentiate between three large groups-the socialistic group, which in my opinion included most of the members and followers, a more nationalistic group, and a negative anti-Semitic group.
DR. SERVATIUS: What do you mean by a negative anti-Semitic group? Is that the Streicher tendency?
KAUFMANN: If you ask me, yes.
DR. SERVATIUS: To what party tendency did you belong in the Party?
KAUFMANN: I was and am a socialist.
DR. SERVATIUS: To what group did the majority of the Reichsleiter belong?
KAUFMANN: That is very difficult to say.
DR. SERVATIUS: The Gauleiter?
KAUFMANN: The Gauleiter from the industrial areas were for the most part socialists.
DR. SERVATIUS: How about the Kreisleiter?
KAUFMANN: That depended essentially on their home district.
DR. SERVATIUS: The same is true of the Ortsgruppenleiter, Block-, and Zellenleiter?
KAUFMANN: That is true of most of the political leaders and for the mass of Party members.
DR. SERVATIUS: What was the political influence of the various groups and where was the emphasis put?
KAUFMANN: That is very difficult to say. If you speak about influence, I -presume that most of the Party members like me believed in the socialistic ideals of the Fuehrer. But that there were men in his entourage who were less interested in socialism than in other aims seems to me probable.
DR. SERVATIUS: Did you as a socialist agree with the Party leadership?
KAUFMANN: I absolutely agreed with the socialistic aims of the Milirer. On the other hand I did not agree with some men in leading positions and their ideas.
DR. SERVATIUS: Why did -you and other political leaders who did not agree with these aims remain in office when you saw that the main policy was deviating from socialist fields, and the persecution of the Church and Jews started?
KAUFMANN: To begin with, at no time up to the collapse did I or my associates have the impression that the socialist aims had been given up. I have already emphasized that if an old National Socialist has worked almost 25 years for his Party, -it is his duty to fight as long as possible for the realization of the aims as he understands them, and that is not possible outside the Party but only within the Party. That is one of the essential reasons why I remained in the Party.
DR.SERVATIUS: How were the subordinate Kreis- and Ortsgruppenleiter instructed?
KAUFMANN: To answer this question one must make a distinction between the city Gaue on the one hand and the provincial Gaue, on the other. In the city Gau of Hamburg the political leaders were frequently called together and received their instructions and directions orally. For the provincial Gaue this was mostly done, because of the distance, in writing, that is, their instructions were issued orally and in writing.
DR. SERVATIUS: Were the Kreisleiter instructed to the same extent as the Gauleiter or did they receive knowledge of only less important matters?
KAUFMANN: Up to the beginning of the war I do not recall any case in which my Kreisleiter-and I assume it was similar in the other Gaue-did not learn of everything that I knew about. During the war that did not hold entirely true for reasons of secrecy.
DR. SERVATIUS: Did the political leaders receive instructions to commit war crimes or to permit them? How about the lynching of low-level flyers?
KAUFMANN: Such orders as you mention were not known to me in a direct form, that is as a direct demand. I assume you are speaking, first, of the newspaper article by the former Reichsminister Dr. Goebbels; second, of the well-known decree of the Reichsfuehrer SS to the Police; and third, of the repeatedly mentioned circular letter of Reichsleiter Bormann.
DR. SERVATIUS: Yes.
KAUFMANN: These orders were not clearly formulated in the sense of your question. I admit that their interpretation could lead to a development which then did lead in individual cases to the events described here. These orders came through the Gaustabsamt and were then sent from there to the competent Kreisleiter. The order, that is, the circular letter by Bormann, was stopped by me in my Gau-as I assume that it was done in other Gaue too-in view of the fact that, because of the intensity of air warfare and its results, I wanted to keep my political leaders from giving a dangerous interpretation to this order. In addition, in view of the Goebbels article and in view of Himmler's decree, I sent the Kreisleiter and Police presidents distinct counterorders. I hope that similar steps were taken in other Gaue.
DR. SERVATIUS: What about the treatment of foreign workers? Did you receive instructions tending toward war crimes in that regard?
KAUFMANN: All instructions which I know of in this field refer exclusively to a demand for support of the social welfare work. For me, as a socialist, it was a matter of course that my agents-that is in this case the Labor Front and the Kreisleiterwere instructed to take care of foreigners also, and I visited the camps to ascertain whether this was done.
DR. SERVATIUS: What about the concentration camps with regard to foreigners? Did you have instructions to put or help put foreigners in concentration camps? Did you know of what happened in the concentration camps?
KAUFMANN: I assume that the question of competence for the concentration camps is known to the T ribunal. As the supreme political leader of the Gau ...
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Servatius, I do not know what the witness means by that, that the question of competence with reference to the concentration camps is known to the Tribunal.
DR. SERVATIUS: He did not want to say that he, as a Gauleiter, was not responsible for the concentration camps themselves. He only wanted to explain that he will immediately discuss his responsibility and will not give a long explanation on competency. For that reason he said that he assumed the Tribunal was informed on that matter.
THE PRESIDENT: Then, are you saying that you were in charge of the concentration camps or responsible for them?
KAUFMANN: No, by no means.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, what do you mean by the competency for the concentration camps?
KAUFMANN: I wanted to indicate or say that I might assume that the Tribunal knows of this competency. If not, I am prepared to explain it briefly.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, will you explain it briefly?
KAUFMANN: Yes. The concentration camps, during the whole period of their formation and their management, were completely outside any knowledge or influence of the political leaders, who consequently had no authority as far as concentration camps were concerned and no idea of what actually happened in them. I myself, if I wanted to enter a camp, had to have a special written approval from the Reich Security Main Office. I believe that that is sufficient explanation.
DR. SERVATIUS: Were not flyers actually lynched and was that not so well known that every political leader knew about it and approved it by remaining in office?
KAUFMANN: I have already stated that in the Gau Hamburg such things did not take place and since I myself learned of such cases only as a prisoner, I must assume that my political leaders, like myself, learned of these things only in captivity.
DR. SERVATIUS: Was not the ill-treatment of foreign workers throughout the Reich so well known that every political leader must have known about it and approved it by remaining in office?
KAUFMANN: The political leaders were bound to their own districts, especially during the war. They could supervise only their sphere of activity and what I and my political leaders in Hamburg saw of these camps only made a favorable impression. The Kreisleiter had the obligation, where there were deficiencies and poor conditions, to take steps together with the Labor Front and industrial leaders to remedy them immediately.
DR. SERVATIUS: What was the relationship of the political leaders to the State organizations, administrations, and other institutions?
KAUFMANN: The functions were completely varied and separate, except in those cases in which one person held two or more positions.
DR. SERVATIUS: And what relationship did the political leaders have to the SA and General SS?
KAUFMANN: The SA and the General SS were independent organizations with their own chain of command. The political leaders could ask them to support their work.
DR. SERVATIUS: Did the political leaders have any executive powers?
KAUFMANN: None at all. If they had no state function, as I said, they were exclusively limited to their Party sphere.
DR. SERVATIUS: Could the political leaders give instructions to the Gestapo or the SD?
KAUFMANN: That is shown from the answer to the previous question. However, the fact that in the State Police and the SD the vigilance over their own organizations was even more severe than in other formations was a matter of course.
DR. SERVATIUS: Witness, what was your relationship to the Fuehrer?
KAUFMANN: In the first years I venerated the Fuehrer. Later on I still venerated him but did not understand him on many points, and the measures which are now ascribed to the Fi1hrer I would formerly not have considered possible.
DR. SERVATIUS: Can the political leaders, who believed Hitler an idealist and who had no knowledge of the extermination of the Jews and other events, essentially be considered of good faith?
KAUFATANN: In the correct judgment of their functions and their attitude and what they had to know or could know, this good faith must, in my opinion, be granted to the political leaders without reservation.
DR. SERVATIUS: I have no more questions to put to this witness.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will adjourn. [The Tribunal recessed until 1400 hours.] Afternoon Session
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Witness, do you remember Hitler saying in his Reichstag speech on 20 February 1938: "National Socialism possesses Germany entirely and completely. There is no institution in this State which is not National Socialist.'? Do you remember these words, or if you do not remember the exact words do you remember the sense of these words being stated by Hitler?
KAUFMANN: I remember the sense of the words, but not the words themselves.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: My Lord, the extract from the speech is in Document Book 5, in Document 2715-PS. [Turning to the witness.] Do you agree with the sense of these words?
KAUFMANN: No.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Do you think it was an exaggeration?
KAUFMANN: I am convinced that not all institutions were at that time National Socialist.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: But you would agree that the vast majority of institutions were National Socialist?
KAUFMANN: They were in the process of becoming National Socialist, but that process had not been completed.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: So you would agree that what Hitler states as a fact was the aim for which he was working?
KAUFMANN: Yes.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: And the method by which he was working for that aim was through the system of political leadership conducted by the Leadership Corps?
KAUFMANN: By that means the aim could be reached only in part.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: It was one essential method of possessing Germany in the sense of getting complete control of the minds and hearts and feelings of the population of Germany, was it not?
KAUFMANN: , No, in my opinion only at the beginning.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Only at the beginning? But that was the work which had gone on from 1933 up to 1938, when these words were spoken by Hitler?
KAUFMANN: It was part of the success of the Party before the seizure of power and after the seizure of power.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Let me just put a few more words of Hitler's to show you how he expresses it: "But above all, the National Socialist Party"-it is the same speech-"has not only made the nation National Socialist but has also made of itself that perfect organization..." Is Hitler correct in giving that description of the leadership?
KAUFMANN: Yes; I would say "yes."
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, now I just want to take the matters which Dr. Servatius has referred to and ask you about the share of the Leadership Corps in them. Let us take the question of the Jews first. Speaking generally and not with sole reference to your own Gau of Hamburg, did the Political Leaders take an active part in the demonstration of November 1938?
KAUFMANN: The information I received about that action from other Gaue gave me the impression that such actions had indeed taken place, but that, with exceptions, the men responsible for these actions had in no case been Political Leaders.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Now, if you say that, will you look at Heydrich's order of 10 November. My Lord, Your Lordship will find that on Page 79 of the Document Book 14.
THE PRESIDENT: What page?
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: 79, My Lord. Witness, you will find it on Page 96 of the German document book. If it is not 96, it is 97. Have you found it? You see, this was an order from Heydrich issued at 1:20 in the morning of the 10th, and I just want you to look at Paragraph 1: "The chiefs of the local State Police offices or their deputies must get in contact by telephone with the Political Leaders (Gauleitung or Kreisleitung) who have jurisdiction over their districts and have to arrange a joint meeting with the appropriate inspector or commander of the Order Police to discuss the organization of the demonstrations. At these discussions the Political Leadership has to be informed that the German Police has received from the ReichsFuehrer SS and Chief of the German Police the following instructions in accordance with which the Political Leaders should adjust their own measures." Now, you remember the general instructions were as to the burning of synagogues, the arrest of 20,000 Jews to be taken to concentration camps, and the destructions or appropriation of Jewish property. What were "their own measures" which the Political Leadership were to take with regard to that?
KAUFMANN: First, may I point out that in the German text of that document the passage which says that the Gauleiter had jurisdiction is not included. I do not find it.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: The point I am asking you about-we will deal with that in a moment, but what I want to know from you is, what were "their own measures" which the Political Leaders were to take with regard to this attack on the Jews?
KAUFMANN: I can only say the following: I myself did not take part in the meeting of 9 November 1938. 1 was not informed from Munich about the proposed action, but in the evening of 9 November I heard from the chief of the Hamburg State Police that an action of that kind was imminent.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: That is, the leader of the Hamburg State Police was carrying out the instructions of this paragraph after getting in touch with you. I thought you were able to speak for Gauleiter generally, apart from Gau Hamburg, and I want you to tell the Tribunal what were their own measures which the leadership of the Party were to carry out? I mean, you must have heard it discussed afterwards. Tell us what they were. What were the leaders of the Party to do?
KAUFMANN: You asked me in your previous question about my personal experiences. I had to answer that I myself was informed by the chief of the State Police that it was proposed to carry out this action. For the Gau Hamburg-that is what I was asked about just now-I gave the order that officials of the State and Criminal Police were immediately to safeguard the business streets and residential districts of Jews in Hamburg. This measure was in the hands of Commissioner Winke of the Criminal Police, to whom I sent a Gau inspector to assist him. After receiving the information through the State Police I immediately called up all the Kreisleiter and made them responsible for the prevention of this action in their districts.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Did you, in your Gau, burn the synagogues?
KAUFMANN: No, I ...
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I want to be exact. Were the synagogues burned in Hamburg? That is what I should have asked you.
KAUFMANN: As a result of my measures, no excesses took place during the first night, that is the night from the 9th to the 10th. There were minor, insignificant disturbances in the night from the 10th to the 11th, and in spite of my measures, one synagogue was set on fire, I assume by elements from outside.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: All over Germany generally, if my memory is right, there were at least 75 synagogues burned. In general, apart from your own Gau, is it not right that following this order of Heydrich the Leadership Corps co-operated with the Police to see that synagogues were burned, Jews were arrested, and Jewish property affected, and that non-Jewish property was left secure?
KAUFMANN: I know of no order and no directive which commanded the Corps of Political Leaders, even outside the Gau Hamburg, to take part in that action. I was only informed that after the meeting of the 9th of November, Reichsn-dnister Dr. Goebbels made a request which then in practice led to excesses in individual Gaue, or in many Gaue. I also know that the Delegate for the Four Year Plan at that time said, a few days after that action, at a meeting in Berlin, that this measure, which he condemned in the strongest terms, was not in conformity with the intentions of the Fuehrer and his own intentions, and he mentioned the Gau Hamburg as an exception.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You remember that you said a few moments ago to me that this was an occurrence which only took place in individual instances. Here is the order of Heydrich, telling the Police generally to get in touch with the Leadership Corps so that they could co-operate with the Police to carry out his orders, which were, broadly: Attack the Jews and see that you do not do any harm to non-Jews while you are doing it. It is quite wrong what you said a few moments ago, that this was an individual matter. The Leadership Corps were brought into this through the order of Heydrich, who was then Himmler's lieutenant-chief of the Secret Police, is that not so?
KAUFMANN: No, that is not correct, the Corps of Political Leaders was not required to accept orders from Heydrich. Orders to the Political Leaders could be issued solely by the Gauleiter, who received his directives from the Fuehrer or from the Deputy of the Fuehrer, or from the Party Chancellery.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, do you remember what took place after that occurrence? Do you remember a meeting of the Party Court?
KAUFMANN: No.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Let me remind you about the Party Court. You will find that in Document 3063-PS at Pages 81 to 88 of the same document book. Witness, it is Page 105.
KAUFMANN: Yes, I have found the page.