Q Was he concerned with the actual tasks of the Jaegerstab, or only with the order he had with Hitler?
A Well, of course, only with that task. I know that he had been talking to Goering, too, on one occasion. It became apparent from some sort of correspondence, I think.
Then follow the three main committees for Aircraft: Aircraft Engines and Aircraft Equipment. They were, as far as they were, main committees under Speer's jurisdiction. And as far as these men: Frydag, Werner and Heyne, who are listed are concerned, they, as persons, were advisors to the so-called Industrial Committees. They were advisors of the GL. In other words, they had to give tasks. As far as they were advisors, they were independent, on the same level with the GL. They were not under his command as far as they were main committees; they were part of the administration of the industry, and were in that capacity under Speer's command.
Then follows Anti-Air Raid Protection: Schnauder. He was under our -the Air Forces -- command, the so-called Thirteenth Inspectorate for Civilian Air Raid Protection. Then the liaison officer listed, the liaison officer of the Air Force: He was a member of the general staff of the Air Force and had been detailed with them. And then there was a liaison officer with the Chief of Army Armament and OKW. He was under the command of the commander of the Home Forces, and through that directly under Keitel.
Q Witness, who composed this list of persons? Who worked that?
A That was Saur's job. The bulk of these people he had to decide upon in any case.
Q Were you previously asked as to who was to be taken in?
A No. Considering the type of collaboration, this is neither necessary nor possible.
DR. BERGOLD: Your Honors, I should like to make a pause now since it is ten to eleven.
THE PRESIDENT: We will make a pause.
THE MARSHALL: This Tribunal will be in recess for fifteen minutes.
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal II is again in session.
Q. Witness, I'm still speaking of the construction. Not so long ago it was mentioned that you gave a report to Hitler with reference to the general concession situation. That was during a meeting of the Jaegerstab. What did you tell him? That does not mean that the Jaegerstab in spite of everything had the constructions under it.
A. My speech on the 6th of April 1944, at Hitler's was a reference to construction and had nothing whatsoever to do with the Jaegerstab. Actually, it was a construction quota, a distribution; in other words, the distribution of cement, stones, tiles, and wood for construction purposes, namely, the distribution on the various contingent bearers. That is a task of the Central Planning Board. With reference to this construction material, when the final drawing up came, no cement for a single stone was distributed; but that was expressed in construction quotas. As Speer at the time was sick, I had to get Hitler's permission for the Central Planning Board. It was a day which I mentioned before, namely, when I drew Hitler's attention to the fact that for Hitler's new headquarters just as many contingent construction quota were distributed as for the civilian airraid precaution program of the entire population. Altogether there were 28,000 tons of cement. They were all included in that figure.
Q. Witness, in some other passage the point is discussed that the construction quota of the Jaegerstab amounted to 550 millions; and here the Jaegerstab is the one that is the contingent or quota bearer. How can we understand that?
A. Before the Jaegerstab existed they had for the constructions the air ministry, which was the quota bearer. In other words, in Germany we called that the person or the ministry for whom the construction was to take place, that person for which purpose or for whose purpose constructions were to be carried out. If a man wanted to build himself a house, then he instructed or ordered an engineer or architect to build it. The man himself was the construction orderer, that is, the man who was going to own the house, and the architect was the "Bauunternehmer" or the man taking over the construction.
In this particular case the air ministry was the ministry to own the construction because the constructions were being built for the air benefit; and the organization Todt or the construction organization in Speer's group were the architects.
When the Jaegerstab came and there were orders from both Hitler and Goering for construction work, then somebody had to be the person to own the construction afterwards on whose account the constructions quotas went, if this man did not want the construction and knew nothing about the construction questions.
I cannot tell if I have been explicit enough.
Q. Witness, the construction work which was stated by Hitler which had to be constructed either by Kammler or Dorsch, was that all for the purpose of the Jaegerstab or also for other armament purposes?
A. I know that also for many other purposes or, rather, these constructions were meant for many other purposes because if these questions were discussed in the Jaegerstab I repeatedly heard Sauer or some of his representatives saying, "We wish to change this; we want to use concrete, reinforced concrete here; or here, for instance, we will use V-2 rockets."
That is how it fluctuated. In any case I know that the subterranean constructions or tunnels were meant for other ministries and purposes.
Q Witness, did you ever near about the fact that for the construction of the surface concrete factories concentration camp inmates were to be used?
A I heard that in the Jaegerstab, I believe; and that is how we can explain Kammler's task.
Q Witness, in any of your capacities as GL, as member of the Central Planning Board, or member of the Jaegerstab, what did you have to do with the concentration camp inmates? Did you apply for those?
A No, we had nothing whatsoever to do with it. But they were requisitioned in a manner which I did not know at the time, or, rather, they were assigned to the industry. At that time I knew from a conference that In Oranienburg, near Heinkel, or East Heinkel the people were being used for the concentration camps which were near there and that laborers had been withdrawn from there and sent to Heinkel's. I heard there that one of my men said that the work that was being done over there was good work, I did not myself see these inmates while working. However, at that time I was convinced of the fact on the basis of my visit to the concentration camp of Dachau in 1935 that these were in the main only German criminals.
Q Witness, I shall submit to you now a document, Number 1584-PS, Exhibit Number 71, from Book Number IV of the prosecution, with reference to the Jaegerstab. This is the fourth document from the beginning.
I wish you to take a look at the telegram of the 14th of February 1944 sent by Goering to Himmler. Do you remember this telegram and what did you have to do with it?
A No, I only saw this here for the first time at these trials, for I myself did not send this request. It seems to deal with laborers for the transfer of the industry to subterranean sanctuaries. We had nothing to do with that question, not even indirectly. As Goering himself was the man who requested the subterranean construction works, it could possibly be in connection with his wish. That ZBV squadron is mentioned here which had been set up at Himmler's. I did not know that myself. I had heard from Speer, however, that the SS required some counterpart for whatever services they furnished. At Speer's they had asked for a certain percentage of the armament so that I con understand that here they applied for an air formation from Goering for some purpose which is unknown to me.
Q Witness, I want you to go through the pages. You'll see here a letter of Himmler's in which there are reports to Goering as to what purposes concentration camp inmates were used for. Do you know of Himmler's latter here and the charge, which is a little bit farther on? And did you know anything about those things?
A No, I cannot recall anything at all about this matter.
Q The whole number of factories are mentioned here in which concentration camp inmates were used. Didn't you know anything at all about all these factories?
A May I go through the document? It says here, "Construction of ack ack positions, and than manufacture of ack ack guns." We had nothing to do with that.
Then as to the construction or the completion of the plants at Siemens-Schuckert Auschwitz, we had nothing to do with them. When later an airplane parts production at Erla-Leipsiz, we did have something to do with this.
Q. Witness, I don't want to go through the single items here in detail, as the witness Haertl has already done so. What I want to know from you is, is it the truth you did not know anything about these factories except the Heinkel in Oranienburg?
A. No, all I knew was the Heinkel-Oranienburg factory, that is all. I went over this, and I find that a great part of these factories here which were mentioned had nothing to do with the air industry.
Q. Witness -
THE PRESIDENT: Just a minute. With the plant in Butschowitz, which was making rear control apparatus for the M-101, for the Messerschmidt, did you have anything to do with that?
THE WITNESS: Your Honor, what page is this?
Q. It is on the second page of Himmler's letter.
A. Yes, the second page of Himmler's letter, yes, it seems. This is the last aircraft plant at Butschowitz making of certain parts of planes, Your Honor.
Q. All right.
A. I did not know of a factory by the name of Zwedau. I did not know what it was all about.
Q. Zwedau?
A. Sledau, Your Honor. I did not know where it is supposed to be.
Q. Are we looking at the same document? I am looking at a letter from Himmler to Goering, Document No. 1584-PS, dated 9 March 1944?
A. Yes.
Q. Is that the one you are looking at?
A. Yes, Your Honor.
Q. Now, near the end of the letter, which is the second paragraph from the end a reference is made about manufacturing fourteen-thousand wooden rear control apparatuses for Messerschmidts.
A. Yes, I do, Your Honor.
Q. You mean to tell us that you did not know this was being done. das not this done for the Luftwaffe?
A. I am certain of them, that this was being built for the Luftwaffe, however, there were sub-orders which were given them by the industry, that directly the G-L has been informed about it, and in these singular instances.
Q. You mean to say you did not know about this particular factory, or what it was doing for the Luftwaffe?
A. Your Honor, we from the G1 gave out orders to the industry, namely, to the main factory where these people had their parts made, or their single parts; that happened in the main factory, or in a subsidiary branch, or with foreign factories with sub-orders. It was not our task to know that, therefore, we did not know which factory they were given to.
Q. I understand the system of sub-contracts. I merely asked whether you know about this one. I understand that contracts are lot out to the sub-contractors. I merely asked whether you know about this particular one?
A. I know nothing whatsoever about this special case. Your Honor.
Q. All right. You did know about the Heinkel works at Oranienburg?
A. Yes, I learned that, Your Honor. I learned that an agreement had been reached either immediately between the Heinkel factory and the concentration camp of Oranienburg; however, we only learned about these things much later. Probably it was during the end of my activity where.
BY DR. BERGOLD:
Q. Witness, you just told us that the SS always received some sort of payment for the services which they gave by putting concentration camp inmates at somebody's disposal. Did you as GL ever pay or give anything to the SS for those activities for the use of concentration camp inmates?
A. I can not speak of gifts; we had nothing whatsoever we could give away to these SS. Whatever we had to give away we gave away to Goering. We gave for instance portable typewriters -- Goering gave them planes.
Q. How did you say that, say it again?
A. Goering gave an order to give Himmler two YU-52's. They of course, were built in our industry, and we had to carry out those orders. Here they discussed a whole squadron. These orders were probably given out by the Quartermaster General. This is a transport passenger plane, and was not given out by us directly, but we only built it. I gave them all to the Quartermaster General, and from there they were sent down. With reference to these passenger planes, I knew they were or had been sent to Himmler. I knew nothing of this squadron here.
Q. Did you know what Himmler wanted them for?
A. No. That is, as I said before, I did not give them to Himmler myself. I have an idea what Himmler used to do with them, as he used to do a lot of flying, and he only wanted a plane for his own purpose, and one for his staff. I think that is what they were used for.
Q. Witness, otherwise you had nothing to do with the concentration camp, or the concentration camp directly, did you?
A. I believe a letter was submitted to me once. I did not know whom it was sent to, that letter which said we had to thank somebody immediately. We had not done so, and, therefore, the help which the SS wanted to give us would have been withdrawn if we would not thank them. The man concerned came to our planning office for Speer. That man came to see me, and I told him to show this to Goering for his signature. However, he said at the same time that he was a technical officer of Goering's at the planning office, and Goering had said I was to sign it. It was then the only case which I can think of right now which I am accounting for while I was with the GL, namely, where I thanked somebody for something; however, I have no exact reaction with reference to this letter.
Q. Witness, did you hear in connection with service for concrete construction work, that Hitler gave orders then for the use of onehundred thousand Jews, or did the Fighter Staff request this?
A. I aim sure that the Jaegerstab did not do that. I can not tell exactly for sure if before the collapse I knew anything at all about this matter. I know from the record that Hitler had a discussion, or was to have a discussion on 4 January 1944 about this question. How ever, I know that these discussions lasted for quite a few days, I believe, from the 4th of January I participated for a very short time in these conversations. I did not know, or remember, or I can not recall if during the time I was in office they had discussed that point.
Q. Did you later on find out that the concentration camp inmates, or rather Jewish concentration camp inmates, were used in this construction?
A. I never found out for sure.
Q. However, in the sessions of the Jaegerstab they had discussed that point?
A. Yes, however, I can not remember anything about it. Many things were discussed there every day, so that it is not quite possible to remember every detail that they discussed.
Q. During these conferences or meetings, the number of which you had mentioned, did you always or permanently participate in these conferences?
A. No, I was called out several times, or very often. I left on my own sometimes in order to make certain arrangements in connection with my other field of tasks, otherwise, I would not be able to do any work whatsoever in my other field of tasks. At that time I had the whole work of General Foorster under my orders, and also the entire training of the Luftwaffe; on top of that were the questions of the Inspectorate General and his problems.
Q. Witness, I shall come now to your speech of 25 March 1944, which has been repeatedly mentioned here. Document NOKW 017, Exhibit 54. It is your speech to the Chief Engineers of the Luftwaffe and the Chief Quartermasters. It says here at one point that for the construction a few hundred thousand laborers were being used who were withdrawn from other places. By that don't you mean these 100,000 Jews we just mentioned?
A. No, under no circumstances, but at that time from many other constructions which were already operating workers had been transferred here for those purposes.
Q. Witness-
A. May I add to that this: I could not possibly imagine why Jews would be used as construction workers. Therefore, I am sure that it would be strictly untrue. Jews are not known as carpenters and bricklayers. They are mostly people who work in offices. I don't believe that one could possibly expect construction work from them. I myself as a man who has never done that kind of work, I don't believe that I would qualify for this type of work.
Q. Witness, explain to us now the purpose of this speech of yours, which uses rather strong words.
A. During the strong air raids we had, many material stocks, mainly of parts, had been lost -- through those air raids, that is. The new output of these parts could not possibly keep pace with the destruction. There was only one way left, namely, to take these parts from troop stocks. The troops had large stocks which the GL himself had no power of disposal over whatsoever. He just gave the orders for the manufacture of them. The requests of the troops in my opinion were always too high. Four point two billions worth of parts were being ordered at that time. That goes to show you clearly my part. If we wanted to have these planes which were half ready in time, then it was possible only if the troops would give us small single parts. Prior to this conference many tests to that effect had been made.
We had tried several times. However, the Quartermaster general on the basis of the vote of 2004 a his Chief Quartermasters and Chief Engineers, had refused my wishes; in other words, he had not complied with them.
I was very indignant about that. Saur came to see me and stressed once more that the output of planes or their completion was impossible. He thought that the army would have taken care of this long ago. However, in the Luftwaffe there does not seem to be a definite power of giving orders, and he would have certain discussions with reference to this matter with the higherups. That, for the second time, annoyed me, and when this conference took place immediately after these things, I used very strong words. I was harsh with the purpose of seeing to it that the Quartermastergeneral with his staff would give me the parts that were needed. That was the purpose and the aim of the whole thing and in contradiction with what I mentioned before -- namely that they had refused me these parts, the harsh military speech I held there was crowned with success.
Q. Witness, in this speech there are certain passage which in themselves have nothing to do with those aims you just mentioned. I would like to show you these passages. At one spot you come to the question concerning human beings, and you say that the part of the Luftwaffe with reference to labor assignments had been assigning foreigners, that the foreigners were running away and not keeping their contracts, and that if a foreman reprimands or beats one of these young laborers who is doing sabotage, he, the foreman, gets into trouble, and that the international right could not be used here and that you would see to it yourself that the prisoners, with the exception of the Americans and British, would be removed from the power of the military organization and then, with inference to a man who does sabotage, that he ought to be hanged in his own factory or workshop. What does that have to do with these aims that you mentioned?
A. As far as the prisoners of war were concerned, as far as they were working with the Luftwaffe itself, the Quartermaster general and the Chief Quartermaster had something to with it.
This was to be a threat to that department namely, that certain rights would be withdrawn from their jurisdiction. Of course, I could not do that. I don't believe.
2005a that Goering would have complied or followed this suggestion of mine if I had made one.
I have no excuse whatsoever for these words which I used, although I did have excuses for other passages. Now I have had the time to read this passage in peace, and I could not understand myself. I can only repeat that I myself was in a complete desperate position. I could see what was coming, and I could no longer help my people. At that time -- I do not wish to say this as an excuse, but just in order to explain something -- I was under the impression of my accident that I could not quite heal my concussion, because at that time I could not possibly leave my office for one minute. I knew that, therefore, my doctor was worried about me, and he tried to help me with all sorts of drugs and medicines.
Q. Witness, a number of witnesses who were here have stated that very often you used such expressions of indignation, that you had outbursts of rage. At that time when you made that statement, did you have the sincere wish to get through with these measures?
A. No; I can say that with a good consciance. Never, never in my life did I do such a thing, and I believe that he who really knows me knows exactly that, on the contrary, I was different. However, at that time I simply had to use strong words, and could not use strong words on the people I wanted to use them on. That you could not do because of the discipline which you have in an army. I also have to say that immediately after such a discussion I myself did no longer know what I had said during one of those outbursts of rage. Even today I could not say for sure that I said that. However, I cannot deny it.
Q. Witness, did you at that time use such wild expressions with reference to these Luftwaffe gentlemen, and did you threaten them as well?
A. Yes, I did. I read right now that I did so. I am very sorry even today that I used such strong words against my comrads.
Q. Later on you heard a different passage to the effect that the people who acted as if they were sick ought to be sent to work or whipped 2006a to work and that the whip should be used as a medicine.
That is a similar statement?
A. That was just silly talk, so to speak, and I also used strong words on myself and called myself an idiot once in a while.
Q. Did you ever issue orders to send people to work with the whip?
A. Never, and I am sure that I myself would have intervened in such a case.
Q. Did you ever have anybody hanged because of sabotage at any time?
A. No. Number 1, I did not do it. Number 2, I could not do it. I never had anybody punished for sabotage in any way because that was not within my field of tasks, not even in these single instances where actual sabotage had taken place.
Q. Witness, weren't you afraid, however, that such words that you used before this circle of men, that those people would actually act according to your words?
A. In this circle there was nobody who could possibly have the power to carry out my statements, and secondly, I believe that everybody knew me, because my friends already at that time had told me that I had lost my control over myself, and that it was very good that quite a few people did not take me seriously, for hardly anybody took me serious ly. Then I also promised myself that I would not burst into rage again. However, at that time I did not have full control over myself because the situation was becoming more serious everyday now, and also the knowledge that all this could have been avoided, it would never have been necessary to wage a war, and if so that the war could have been terminated long ago, and that apart from all this that if nothing else the destruction of - Germany could have been avoided. That the thought did not leave me alone day or night, and that actually contributed to these explosions. When everything was over, from that day I became more quiet.
Q. Witness, those people you spoke to were soldiers, right?
A. Yes.
Q. Those soldiers, according to your knowledge, could they possibly have been led to carry out these orders which were against the international law?
A. No, never. What they thought and said show that. They were right, that people thought I was crazy during such outbursts. I myself was in no position to judge that, however.
Q. Witness, however, a certain number of measures in contradiction to international rights were carried out in Germany. Did you know anything about that, couldn't you have thought then that "maybe I am also causing such measures against international right?"
A. No, I did not know that, with the very few exceptions that were discussed here. However, I never brought them into direct connection with myself, and there was no connection whatsoever at any time.
Q. That is sufficient, Witness. Witness, I shall come now to the Fuehrer conferences which have been submitted in this book, that is Exhibit No. 48.D, from document No. R-124. At one point it says, namely at the conference of the 6th and 7th of April, 1944, that the Fuehrer demands the transfer or does not think the transfer of French workers into Alsace possible, and you will remember that during Jaegerstab sessions you had proposed that these French laborers be put into barracks. Would you make a statement to that?
A. May I ask you for the date of that conference?
Q. Just a moment, it was on the 6th and 7th of April, 1944.
A. The question was that an engine factory from near Munich which had been bombed out there was to be transferred to the tunnel in Markirch. Markirch, as far as I knew, is between Baden and Alsace, but never on Alsace territory. The workers who were to be assigned there, as far as I knew, were Russians, and these in charge of them were Frenchmen. Now, according to what I knew Hitler was to have given an order that Frenchmen could not be used in Alsace. These two hundred Frenchmen, however, had already worked together with the Russians for a long time, and they knew them therefore, and they know their whole sphere of tasks. In other words, it was useless to put those workers there without their supervision, or rather their technical supervision. I tried, by making use of my words, to bypass Hitler's orders somehow. I know, however, that there were a few people in this conference who, with reference to my contradicting Hitler's order, would have reported that to Hitler immediately.
In other words, I had to be very careful of the words I chose. My only aim at that time was to help this industry factory, to the effect that it could resume its manufacture, and that was only possible with the French supervisory forces. All those words with reference to putting them in barracks, etc., were only to induce Hitler to cease his resistance, that they were not to be put in barracks practically speaking, and that it was intended either there can be seen from the local conditions there. I hope thus to be able to get Hitler's permission.
Q. You also proposed that these people not be damaged somehow, or that they should be compensated by additional bonuses, and to put this on a friendly basis?
A. As far as I know these two hundred people were people of high quality. In other words, there were masters or controllers or engineers, foremen. They had come voluntarily, and even at that time they were entirely on our side, and I myself was far from mistreating these people, but all we would have to do was arrange with them how to do or take care of the whole thing in such a manner that Hitler would not interfere.
Q. Witness, Thinks. That is sufficient. Witness, then I have the Hitler conference of the third to the fifth of June, 1944 I wish to discuss here. It is also document R-124 Exhibit 48-D. First of all a different question, during those Fuehrer conferences, were you always present there?
A. Those are the Speer records?
Q. Yes.
A. No. During all those years of war I have seen Hitler nine times altogether during which time Speer was there, and Speer was there once, a week. May I ask you again for the date?
Q. That was the third to the fifth of June, 1944.