A. That question was much discussed but it is divided in two parts. On the one hand, the soldier who is responsible for the security of the troops or even who is as an advisor co-responsible for the security of the troops has to solve certain problems and tasks. He has to prevent and reject attacks and he has to prepare military operations, That is another sphere. The solution of the different conflicts in the area are something which occupied General Foertsch day and night. At least, I did not make the acquaintance of any officer in the Balkans who so intensely strove for the solution of these conflicts which were based on history and on present conditions. I want to recall that General Foertsch again and again raised the question how one can disentangle these religious and historic problems, but I would like to say these questions which General Foertsch put to himself and which we discussed -- there was never any answer that there was a certain way by which it could be achieved. The result was almost always that it was such a chaos that we as occupation forces have no possibility to create order, bring order in to conditions which have developed through centuries.
Q. Now, witness, you did not only discuss those matters with General Foertsch but you also saw and studied the extensive files of the Southeast. Out of both those things, from the discussions as well as from the files, did you gain any impression concerning how General Foertsch wanted to solve these problems of the area and of the mere existence of his troops. Those were two tasks, as you said.
A. The most important doing for the military leader is always to do what is demanded for the security of troops.
Q. What, then, was General Foertsch's attitude towards measures which had to be taken for the security of the troops?
A. Will you please explain the meaning of that question?
Q. I want to make it quite clear: if it had become necessary in the country to take measures in order to secure the troops against the attacks of the bands what then was General Foertsch's attitude in his discussions with you concerning the question how that could be achieved?
A. The attitude of the officer who in employing his military means exhausts these means into orders achieve the greatest possible success in fighting the opponent.
Q. And to what extent aid he consider the interests of the population?
A. The consideration of the interests of the population, especially on the part of General Foertsch, I cannot testify to because what he thought about those things I can only gather from General orders by the Armed Forces Commander Southeast. My own commission had to do with the military history. It had more to do with political military matters so that I did not concern myself with the intentions of operations or with the behavior of the troops towards the population, at least not as far as specific orders of this kind were concerned.
Court No. V, Case No. VII.
Q. Did at any time General Foertsch voice any opinion to you whether security measures finally are not to the advantage of the population?
A. I cannot remember any specific discussion regarding this point.
Q. Witness, you have already indicated that General Foertsch was by no means agreed to the policy of the Reich government. Well, we can then ask ourselves why, then, did he stay in the Southeast for such a long time? Did you make any experiences in that connection?
A. Yes, I remember that General Foertsch in one talk told me, by the way, that repeatedly he had requested other employment but when these requests were not approved he as an officer couldn't do anything but remain at his post.
Q. Now, something entirely different: Witness, at the very beginning you mentioned that General Foertsch can be called to be familiar with the Balkans. Now, what about his inclinations? Was he not only familiar with the area or did he also have special sympathies for the area and population?
A. If on the basis of a discussion of four whole days with General Foertsch regarding the situation in the Balkans, if I may draw a conclusion regarding his innermost honest attitude to the problems which confronted him, I would say General Foertsch with his unusual mental intensity tried to find out the problems of the Balkans and their causes -- I don't want to use too high sounding a word -- he gained something like love for that country. He got involved in the problems to an extent where his own heart did not remain impartial.
Q. Now, witness, in order to make this quite clear, is is possible, for instance, that somebody can have a love for a certain district but not for the population.
You have heard it said that General Foertsch wanted to find a solution by pacification. Was that a pacification by means of good treatment of the population or a pacification by extermination; that is a kind of cemetery peace that can always be achieved.
A. My impression is that General Foertsch took military measures quite decisively when they were necessary for the good of the troops but that at the same time during the whole time of his office there was simultaneously the endeavor to create order in another manner and just in that direction General Foertsch practically endeavored to achieve something and I think we find that confirmed in the fact that he supported the Nedie system which we have previously mentioned.
Q. Witness, General Foertsch was Chief of Staff and do you know what duties and what powers he had in that position?
A. A Chief of Staff in the German Armed Forces has the part of an expert worker without having the legal responsibility nor the power of decision of the Armed Forces Commander at the same time.
Q. Now, in order to give an example, was it, for instance, possible for General Foertsch, when he heard about a surprise attack and when he was probably excited about such an attack -- could he then order that for the two killed German soldiers two hundred slaves had to be executed?
A. No, he couldn't do that.
Q. Now, could he in a positive sense make his weight felt -- could he exert influence on the treatment of the population in a good sense?
A. For four years he advised a responsible armed forces commander. He helped and supported him. Of course, he has a possibility to make his own attitude known in either direction.
The decision has to be made by the military commander, by the Commander in Chief, inasmuch as he on his part is not defendant on other orders.
Q. Do you know anything about whether General Foertsch was active as an adviser, as a kind of trouble maker, or did he rather carry out his activities in the sense of his attitude as he described it to you?
A. If I may concentrate my answer on the word "trouble maker", I can only say I believe that the measures which were taken were not accompanied by sentimental feelings on the part of General Foertsch out on the consideration of the actual necessities and the political essentials.
Q. In order to make it quite clear, did General Foertsch himself take measures?
A. He couldn't do that.
Q. What impression did you gain of the personality of General Foertsch as a soldier, generally speaking?
A. A man who was able to do an enormous amount of work and who demanded almost the impossible from his subordinates concerning work. One day of work in the Staff of the Armed Forces Commander Southeast under General Foertsch's direction -- that was a full day of work.
Q. Witness, concerning the activities with the Armed Forces Commander Southeast I mean the following: during this trial we once heard the word "spiritus rector" and General Foertsch has also been designated at the "evil spirit of the Balkans." Was he now that "spiritus rector" in the Southeast?
A. Without doubt, he was an officer of a strong natural activeness. To that extent one can talk about "spiritus" as a man who was mentally and scientifically endeavoring to find out the causes of problems; to be "rector" -- that is to be guiding -- was not possible for him in his position.
Q. Now, one more question: from your studies of the documentary material and from your studies of the Southeastern areas could you conclude whether General Foertsch took influence on the military commander subordinate to the armed forces commander?
A. From personal discussions I could not gain that impression because General Foertsch would certainly not tell me whether he had more or less influence on the Commanderin-Chief.
Q. In order to make that quite clear, the subordinate military commander -- I do not mean his commander in chief.
A. I cannot purely technically deduce that from the documentary material.
Q. Thank you. I have no further questions.
PRESIDING JUDGE CARTER: We will take our morning recess at this time.
(A recess was taken).
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.
PRESIDING JUDGE CARTER: Is there any further examination of this witness by the Defense? If not, you may cross-examine.
CROSS-EXAMINATION BY MR. FENSTERMACHER:
Q Dr. Ibbeken, had you over lived in the Balkans prior to the time you went down there at the end of 1943?
A No.
Q When did you first begin to lecture at the University of Berlin?
A I started lecturing at the University of Berlin in 1942, during home leave from the Front.
Q Had you ever taught history before that time?
A No, I didn't teach.
Q And how long did you lecture at the University of Berlin in history?
A Since 1929. I did scientific work first of all for the Reich Historical Commission. I had to publish a document on the Prussian Foreign policy from 1862 to 1866. And I had on hand material from the archives of all the European capitals, the development of Rome, Copenhagen, Stockholm, etc.
Q Had you ever given a course in Balkan history?
AAt the Munich University I attended to lectures on European history by my chief Herman Omken, especially in connection with the history of the Southeast, especially dealing with the development of Serbia.
Q But you yourself never instructed in Balkan history?
A No, I never instructed.
Q Were you a member of the Party?
A Yes.
Q Are you familiar with the works of the Nazi historian Alfred Rosenberg?
A Which works?
Q Well, his works, generally speaking.
A The only thing I read by Alfred Rosenberg was the "Mythos," at least the main part of it, which was for me, as an historian, the most confusing book which I had ever read from a National Socialist authority.
Q As a member of the Party, you are no doubt familiar with Nazi ideology, and I take it you're sympathetic to the teachings of Nazism. Is that correct?
AAs a scientist my attitude towards Nazi ideology was confronted from the very beginning by the one great difficulty that Nazi ideology sort of looked at the world as if it had been created by God in 1933; and a historian with a knowledge of about a thousand years of European history at least has some knowledge which enables him to know that the world existed before 1933.
Q But in spite of this you joined the Party?
A I entered into the National Socialist Party in 1937. For me it was based on no decision from fundamental principles about the necessity and not of the whole National Socialist idealogy, but in 1937 the so-called Third Reich seemed to be the State which was going to be the sort of government Germany was going to have for a long time and if one had any inclination at all to continue independently one had to consider that outside the organization of the Party there was no chance of working at all, unless he wanted to limit his activities to fruitless criticism behind closed walls. But as an active man, one tried to go in to it and do whatever one could from inside and tried to bring to bear whatever different ideas one had.
Q Did you approve of Hitler's policy toward the Jews in Germany? You will recall that in 1935 the Nurnberg Laws were passed discriminating against the Jews.
A The Jewish question for a German who was also a human being was, at that time, at least one of the most doubtful ideas of Nazi ideology, and I'm convinced that not only I but millions of Germans, if they had even dreamed what these abstractions of Nazi ideology could result in for the Jews, they Would never have entered into National Socialism.
But, for myself, I would like to say that directly on this point I possessed the courage of open opposition. At the end of 1943 in a lecture to officers in Jueterbog, although no discussion had been envisaged, I tried to oppose SS Standartenfueher Sottke from Rosenberg's office when he developed racial theories. I was in opposition to this, and by one single question I ruined the whole lecture by a scientific rejection of the arguments presented by the SS Standartenfueher Sottke.
Q Dr. Ibbeken, I don't want to limit you, even necessarily, in your answers, but I will try to phrase my questions so that you can give a "yes" or "no" answer, and, if you feel necessary, a brief explanation. I'm just interested now in Hitler's attitude towards the Jews, and I take it you were in opposition. You were no doubt also familiar, as a historian, with Hitler's and Rosenberg's attitude toward the Slavic race and towards the Balkan peoples. He considered them an inferior race did he not? Are you in agreement?
A I think not, insofar as the question concerns the person of Hitler and insofar as it concerns the main participation of the Slavic people in the Servo-Croat area, that is the Serbians and the Croats, but I do not think that Hitler regarded Serbs as an especially inferior people. I believe that the attitude of rejection toward the Serbian people, was more the affair of Ribbentropp of the Foreign Office than that of the Fuehrer.
Q Well, the Serbs and the Croats were Slavic peoples were they not?
A This is an old scientific dispute, and it cannot be clearly answered. That the Serbs are Slavs is a fact, the Croats arc such a mixed people that it is very difficult to say, Slavs or not Slavs.
Q Isn't it true, Dr. Ibbeken, that the only reason you were allowed to teach or lecture at the University of Berlin was because you were a Party member and were considered safe to instruct the youth COURT, V, CASE VII of Germany so far as Nazi ideology is concerned?
A. No, that isn't correct. The scientists at German universities, during the whole National Socialist period, had a comparatively strong, isolated life. The direct influence of the National Socialist ideology on the universities was slight, as far as the teaching of history was concerned. I am easily in a position to give proof of this by mentioning a discussion between an American professor who entered Germany with the intention of studying exactly this influence of nazi ideology on the university teachings, and the professor for German history at the University of Berlin, Arnold Oscar Meyer, showed this American professor the basis for his lecture on German history and told him: "Colleague, I read from exactly the same manuscript which I used before the year 1933 as a basis for my historical lectures."
Q. Dr. Ibbeken, I am under the impression that one of the main things the nezis tried to do was to influence the youth of Germany and to teach them and instruct them very carefully in nazi ideology. I have also been under the impression that Rosenberg, as one of Hitler's closest advisers, tried very hard to find out what was being taught to the youth and, as a pseudo historical himself, I should think he would have been very alert to ascertain what was being taught in the University of Berlin.
A. This opinion prevailing in foreign countries is erroneous. The party has comparatively a very slight influence on university teachings because the party had at in disposal the very large organizations of the SS and the SA, Hitler Youth, Labor Front, and they were able to disseminate the nazi ideology, and the universities, on the other hand, were regarded more and more as unimportant because these universities only had a very small chance of dissemination.
Q. You are saying that somehow or other in spite of the nazi emphasis on education, German historians and German universities were somehow exempt from nazi supervision?
A. Yes.
Q. Now, Dr. Ibberken, I wonder if you can very briefly tell us what your attitude towards four aspects of naziism were?
I think you can answer them either yes or no with perhaps a very short explanation. Did you agree or not with nazi ideology with respect to these four points: nazi ideology regarding the Germans as a superior race?
A. I would like to point here to my paper on Johann Fichte in which he set down the assertion that the German people were a specially selected people and were superior to all other nations, had a special task to fulfill, to this I said in writing some years ago that this was spiritual chauvinism and such qualities could not be applied only one-sidedly to the German people.
Q. I take it you disagreed then with nazi ideology on that point?
A. No.
Q. Let me just clarify this, Dr. Ibberken. You did not agree with nazi ideology regarding the Germans as a superior race and other races as inferior? You did not agree with that?
A. No.
Q. I believe you earlier stated on the second point that you disagreed with nazi ideology regarding the Jews?
A. Only quite under limited circumstances.
Q. I wonder if you can explain that? How much were you in favor and how much were you not in favor of the nazi attitude toward the Jews?
A. The numerous writings of National Socialism on the Jewish question contain amongst other things statistical statements about the participation of the Jews in certain key positions of German economic life, capital, legal life, etc. Under the impression of the high percentage of Jews in these key positions or which they at least were supposed to have in these key positions, we had the impression that this participation of the Jews with regard to the total German population was enormously high, and the reaction was of course that such one-sided occupation of so many key positions by one type had to be guarded against, and therefore I would have had no objection against a numerical clause which would limit the participation of the Jewish population compared with the normal population.
Q. Were you in favor of the Nurnberg Laws of 1935?
A. In ignorance of the possibilities of such laws, I accepted them without as I admit sufficient consideration of these possibilities, a quite suitable form of solving the problem, and I accepted them without expressly agreeing with them. I admit that in this whole Jewish problem, I always had a rather uncomfortable feeling.
Q. Are you familiar, Dr. Ibbeken, with some of the consequences of the Nurnberg Laws and of nazi preachings against the Jews? You know, no doubt, of the acts of 1938 against the Jews, the breaking of shops and the beatings and the torturings. Were you in favor of those?
A. On the day this action was carried out, I walked through a street in Berlin and saw the broken windows and the plundered shops and I remember that the impression I had at that time was that this action could only be regarded as an appeal to the most evil instincts of a people. I reject the idea that I ever welcomed such incidents or that I ever agreed to them.
Q. Did you renounce your membership in the party out of distaste for what you saw?
A. That would have been professional suicide.
Q. Dr. Ibbeken, you arc no doubt familiar with "Mein Kampf" and some of the other nazi writings and especially as a historian of Hitler's speeches. Did you endorse Hitler's idea of Lebensraum and of the whole emphasis upon militarism in Germany after 1933? Did you accept that plank of the nazi platform?
A. My endorsement of Hitler's idea of Lebensraum went as far as the thought of the unification of all Germans in one Reich. I agree to the belonging-together of all German citizens with the Germans of Austria, of the Sudetenland, and as far as there are any Germans of the Baltic.
I find a fundamental and disastrous discrepancy in Nationalist idea of exterminating other nations. This is a contradiction of terms.
Q. Did you agree with the methods by which Hitler incorporated the Sudeten Germans into Germany?
A. If by methods I understand that this annexation took place without loss of lives, then this seems to me the most human way of joining a separated area with a German population to the Reich.
Q Dr. Ibbeken, I believe as historian you are probably very familiar with how the incorporation of Sudetenland into Germany was accomplished. It was accomplished by duress and by threat of war by Hitler, wasn't it? Do you endorse war as a means of national policy?
A Why should I not regard the Anschluss of the Sudetenland as something good and the methods used as corresponding, if the British government in negotiations had declared itself ready for the Sudetenland to be joined to Germany?
Q You don't agree that the Munich agreement of 1938 was accomplished by Hitler's placing a gun in the back of Franco and England?
A I am not in a position to answer this question off hand.
Q Hitler's war against Poland in 1939 -- did you as a historian consider that a justified war?
A No. We received very little material in the German press in order to find out the exact connections of the diplomatic actions just before the outbreak of war with Poland. I know -- that must have been about six months after the beginning of the Polish campaign -- that I found sufficient material in order to say to myself that this is a broach of low on the part of the Germans.
Q Did you at that time renounce your membership in the party?
A During the war, I was an officer and the membership in the party was not taken into account any rate.
Q That is, you did not renounce your party membership? It simply lapsed because you joined the army?
A I would ask that it be understood that to me party membership and also to many other Germans was not at all an important thing. It was merely that one paid a contribution to an association without having to constantly confess to the membership to the NSDAP.
Q When was it, Dr. Ibbeken, when you were considered politically unreliable?
A In 1943, about in the summer, I held a lecture to officers and made the following statement: "Gentlemen, I think that this war cannot be won for Germany with military means alone if foreign political solutions load us out of the present situation." I would like to state that such a statement in 1943 in a public lecture usually led one into the hands of the Gestapo.
Q And in your case it did not lead to that? In your case, it led to a new job?
A The Reich Organization leader Dr. Ley learned about this statement, presumably by one of the officers present, and at once asked that a party trial should be opened against me, and general headquarters then took up negotiations with party officers and managed that my statement which had not boon taken down in writing was interpreted in a way which made a party trial unnecessary, -- the immediate effect of this statement at that time was that party agencies were forbidden to take part in any kind of lecture given by me. As a result in Frankfurtam-Main, during a lecture, the parties who were invited did not appear. The actual term "politically unreliable" arises from the conflict with SS Standartenfuehrer Sottke and led to the telephonic request from Rosenberg's office to my office that I should be immediately removed from my office as lecturer and this request was followed.
I was told that I should ask for a transfer on account of my war wounds. I refused and I wrote down a few lines to the effect: "since obviously the party asks for prerequisites of a political nature which I cannot fullfill I ask to be released from my activity. I assume -- I think almost certainly -- that my superior Col. Langhaeuser threw this piece of paper in the wastebasket as quickly as possible in order that I shouldn't got into difficulties with the party, and that he got in touch with the General Commander East and arranged I disappeared as quickly as possible to the East.
Q Prior to that time, you hadn't had any trouble with the party. You were considered quite safe enough to instruct German youth? This was your first difference with the party, was it not?
A Yes, because my appearance in public only took place by lectures which I had given inside the Wehrmacht and because before then, apart from my first lecture, I had not done any lecturing, but only carried on research work which didn't interest the party at all.
Q And the nazis never spied inside the Wehrmacht, did they?
A I would like to answer it in this way. Until 1943, the end of 1943, not later than the beginning of 1933, supervision by the party of the Wehrmacht, especially the influence by the Gestapo, SS, etc. on individual members of the Wehrmacht was very precautionary, while since 1944 and then decisively after the 20th of July, the Gestapo and the party wont all out in order to remove anything which seemed to be dangerous from the Wehrmacht.
Q Do you know whether anybody in the Southeast Command asked to have you sent down to work with them?
A I didn't understand the question.
Q Do you know whether anyone at the headquarters of Army Group F or the Supreme Command Southeast asked to have you sent down to work with them?
A No, it was the initiative of Brig. Gen. von Ross from Berlin which brought me into another area, but then the Commander-in-Chief Southeast found out about what happened to me in Berlin and declared himself ready to accept me there.
Q Who was that?
A The first telephone conversation about that took place between Brig. General von Ross and General Winter.
Q What was General Winter's position at that time -- the time of the telephone call?
A Chief of Staff Commander-in-Chief Southeast.
Q What was the date of that?
A January-February 1944.
Q Where was General Foertsch at that time?
A I think that was during the days or the weeks in which General Winter was already in Belgrade in order to take over the position of General Foertsch who was leaving at this time. He was still in Belgrade when I arrived.
Q You don't know that General Foertsch at that time was Chief of Staff of Army Group F and General Winter was down in Greece as Chief of Staff of Army Group E?
A In January-February?
Q Yes.
A Then it can only be a mistake on my part that my journey to Belgrade took place perhaps four weeks later.
Q Were you sent to the Southeast because you were an expert on the Balkans? Or simply because you were out of a job?
Q Were you sent to the southeast because you were an expert on the Balkans or simply because you were out of a job?
A I think that Brigadier General von Ross, took into account the fact that I was an historian. I asked Brigadier General von Ross to employ me as a kind of 1-C, that is a part of the staff which had tasks for which perhaps a historian could be used.
Q You didn't consider yourself an expert on the Balkans in January or February 1944, did you, you had been in the Army for sometime and had never even lived in the Balkans?
A My knowledge of the Balkans as a historian was that of a generally well and fundamentally educated German historian.
Q Did you consider yourself an expert in all the intricacies and complexities of Balkan life?
A I think I am in a position to cope with every historical problem, as far as I knew the language, necessary for the important literature -during the course of 6 months or 9 months or a year, and in this way I could judge the problem scientifically.
Q Do you believe after 6 or 9 months you could become export on the Balkans and know all about the various problems involved religious, social and economic, in only 6 or 9 months, and then be able to give a scientific judgment about that problem?
A In 6 to 9 months, I know something, in a year I know more, and today, since this time three years have passed and I have never stopped thinking about this problem. In addition I was in the favorable position in the Balkans to study history, not only theoretically but practically, and that was an enormous help for getting the feel of an area.
Q Dr. Tebecken, you didn't study Balkan history as a scientific historian, you studied it from the German side only; all you had at your disposal was German documents, you didn't make an objective study of the Balkans?
A I did everything possible in order to obtain the objective literature, export literature which was not founded on the research of German historians, but was only founded in a very small part on German research, since this land, the darker Eastern World, was primarily know to us from Slav literature, which was then entered into the manuals and into world literature. I would even like to say that the judgment of German historian's about people of countries in the Balkans, if it has been seen as a one-sided problem at all, was seen rather through the spectacles of Slav literature, than through the spectacles of German literature, so if one speaks about tendencies, perhaps it could be contained in these scientific documents, then there were rather more tendencies in favor of these people, -- since this record came from the sources of their own people.
Q Doctor, tho sources and information at your disposal in order to prepare this manual were German orders and reports and captured photographs, and things of that sort. Were you familiar with the other side, were you familiar for example with what the Germans did to the Balkan people, were you familiar with orders, regulations and reports of the Partisans who were opposing the German forces?
A The information service of the German Wehrmacht frequently intercepted radio messages from which one could learn a lot about the Partisans ideas, Partisans activities and intentions, etc. This is perhaps a good supplement of the one-sided opinion which was obtained from tho German material.
Q Do you speak Serbror Croat?
A No.
Q Then you weren't able to talk to the people and find out their ideas, -- your information was from the German orders and reports?
A No, there were very many people who know about the country and who spoke German, and therefore in this way I had the possibility of speaking frequently to one or the other educated and intelligent men, so that I could check whether their statements corresponded in detail with the information which I received from the documents.