A. Mr. President, those vouchers were given to the Administration by the District Commissioner for Coordination and Construction matters.
THE PRESIDENT: Now wait a minute, that is what we are trying to get, the District what?
A. The District Commissioner for the Coordination of Construction matters, that was the Regional Office of the Speer Ministry.
DR. STEIN: Now, once the-
THE PRESIDENT: Just a second. Were those the same Regional Offices that the witness Kiefer was talking about yesterday; one in Berlin, one in Munich, one in Westbaden, and so on?
A. Yes, Your Honor, these are the same Commissioners.
THE PRESIDENT: All right.
BY DR. STEIN:
Q. Once the vouchers had been requested, the raw material was supplied by whom?
A. By the administration concerned which had purchased the stuff.
Q. What agency was it which paid for these things?
A. The payment was done by the administrative office concerned.
Q. What office audited the bills?
A. The bills were audited by the administrative officer himself. These were simple bills for material for which you did not have any expert knowledge.
Q. Did these bills ever be checked again by your office?
A. No.
Q. Who financed the Garrison Building Administration?
A. I believe we already heard about that from the former witness who stated how these Garrison offices received their money, according to the war budget.
Q. They had nothing to do with your office?
A. No.
Q. What was the activity carried out by you and C-6 in connection with the maintenance work?
A. AS I said before, very timid officials who wanted material wanted to have some backing, and, therefore, wanted to have formal permission for their annual expenditure; a large part however did not bother about this permission.
Q. How strong in personnel matter was this department in the course of a year?
A. That Main Department in 1942 had two technical assistants. In 1943 I believe only one, and in '44 it had been dissolved. The tasks were joined up in 1944 to the Building Inspectorates, because the Building Inspector had the right to dispose up 100,000 marks, The maintenance sums concerned were usually in a garrison of medium size to about forty to fifty-thousand marks, per year. In most cases they were even under the limit about which the Inspectorate could decide.
Q. The time as you have mentioned when this Main Department existed, the maintenance was transferred to the local agency. Before then did you yourself, or later your colleagues supervise these activities in any way?
A. No, I don't remember any such case. It would be extremely difficult in the case of about four-hundred or four-hundred and fifty building sites in the Reich to carry out any supervision throughout the Reich with two men.
Q. Did you ever see a report about maintenance work which was given to you by any local agency there?
A. No, nothing was presented to me about that.
Q. Were you able to in any way by chance obtain any knowledge of these things? That is, through written report, or otherwise?
A. That might have happened once. However, I don't recall any such account.
Q. In that connection--
THE PRESIDENT: In that connection we will take a recess.
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is in recess until 1:45.
(Recess taken until 1345 hours, 26 June 1947).
AFTERNOON SESSION
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.
DEFENDANT EIRENSCHMALZ -- Resumed DIRECT EXAMINATION -- Continued BY DR. STEIN:
Q We were talking about the expenses for the maintenance of buildings when we stopped. In order to clarify a misunderstanding, I would like to ask you once more who allotted the building material for the maintenance of the buildings.
A I believe that my answer has been misunderstood in the course of this morning's session. I pointed out that the allotment for the maintenance work was done by the district commissioners for the coordination of construction matters, and that was not an agency of Amtsgruppe C; that was an agency of the Speer Ministry. The Construction Inspectorate, that is to say, the agencies on the medium level of Amtsgruppe C on matters of new construction of buildings, also had to turn to the agency of the district commissioners for the co-ordination of the construction economy. These allotments in their entirety were negotiated by the Speer Ministry in Berlin. Just how these negotiations were carried out in detail I do not know.
Q Witness, in this morning's session you made some statements about the maintenance of the buildings, and you stated that the maintenance of the construction was carried out by the local agencies. You further stated that the material was not ordered by your office and was not allotted by your office, and you have come to the result that your office did not participate at all and did not play any part in the maintenance of construction work. However, the affidavit of Krone in Volume III does not agree with that statement. I now submit Document NO 2197. It is contained in Document Book III, and it is Exhibit 53. In this affidavit on Page 3, Krone has stated and I quote:
"The maintenance of all constructions and buildings and their repair, particularly with regard to the concentration camps, was subordinated to Standartenfuehrer Eirenschmalz. Whenever repairs had to be carried out in a concentration camp, the SS garrison administration had to contact Eirenschmalz, and he then would give the order to carry out this repair work.
All the repair work in all the concentration camps had to be reported to Eirenschmalz by the SS garrison administration. He also had to be informed when gas chambers or crematoria were not functioning and when they had to be repaired. Then it was his task to see that these repairs were carried out, and he had to take the necessary measures."
This witness, Krone, had been approved for me by the Tribunal as a witness, and I wanted to call him for cross examination. The witness was in Nurnberg, as I stated earlier this morning, and, in agreement with the Prosecution, I have examined the witness once more in the presence of a member of the Prosecution.
In the course of this new examination Krone has repudiated his previous statement. I shall present this affidavit as Eirenschmalz Exhibit No. 1 However, even at this time I want to tell the Tribunal about the contents of this affidavit. I want to read part of it, so that the Tribunal will be able to gain an insight into the testimony of Eirenschmalz, as to his veracity.
Krone has stated in his affidavit of 13 June 1947, amongst other things:
Court No. II, Case No. 4.
"I can only make the following statement about the construction maintenance:
"1. From my own experience I do not have any knowledge about it, and I do not know whether repairs on gas chambers or crematoria were carried out.
"2. I did not obtain any knowledge on that through hearsay.
"3. About the procedure and the progress of repair work in the concentration camps I can only say that the local construction enterprise agencies or the accommodation administrations carried out small repair work whenever it was required, and they did not have to obtain any further approval. They were able to carry out this repair work directly on the spot. The local construction agencies or the accommodation administrations also had workshops at their disposal which had material at their disposal.
"If I am charged that in my affidavit of the 25th of February, 1947, Document NO-2197, Exhibit 53, I had stated there that reports by the garrison administratives had to be submitted to Eirenschmalz about all the repair work, and in particular that he had to be informed when gas chambers or crematoria were out of order, and they had to be repaired, and that Eirenschmalz then had to take the necessary steps, then my statement is not correct in that sense. I only wanted to say that the local construction agencies were informed about all repair work which had to be done, and they had this repair work actually carried out."
Although Krone has made some further correction, however, since here we are not dealing with the minor matters in the indictment against the defendant, and no evidence has been presented on this one point by the prosecution, I only included them in the affidavit, and I shall submit this affidavit to the Tribunal.
Witness, I ask you now to make a statement with regard to the two affidavits by Krone.
A This I have already said with regard to the field of con Court No. II, Case No. 4.struction maintenance.
The Office C-VI/1 only had ministerial functions, and in individual cases it issued the allotment of material. About the extent of the medium size allocation of material, I cannot make any statements. The statements of Krone that I or my agency had to be informed about the repair work which was carried out on gas chambers and crematoria is not correct. In any case, I have never received a report of that kind. Krone further states in his new affidavit that the construction agencies were responsible for the execution of such repair work, and that these agencies were exactly informed, and then he continues to say that these construction agencies were part of the Amt C-VI. In this connection I want to point out that early in 1942 Kammler ordered me to establish such concentration agencies at all the bigger garrisons. This establishment, however, was not carried out with the exception of two such construction agencies, because we did not have the personnel at our disposal to do that. Construction agencies were only established, as far as I can recall today, at the troop training center at Debitscha in the General Government in Poland, and the construction agency in the Banat where the Witness Krone himself was stationed from '43 to '44. For all the remaining garrisons all the repair work was carried out by the garrison administration.
Q Therefore you maintain with regard to these two affidavits that the statements which you have made this morning with regard to the maintenance of construction and buildings in the concentration camps were correct as you have described them?
A Yes.
Q About the further counts of the indictment with regard to gas chambers and crematoria I shall refer later on in today's examination. I am now referring again to Office VI, and I want to ask you whether this office also had branch agencies?
A Office C-VI, from 1941 or before, until 1942, and perhaps until three-quarters of 1942, it had a branch office, and that branch Court No. II, Case No. 4.office was located with the garrison administration at Dachau.
This branch office, however, was not competent for construction maintenance, but it had to supervise the supply depots there. It had to supervise the water supply, and the heating facilities, etc. Such a department was an experiment. In 1942 this branch office was incorporated into the garrison administration at Dachau.
Q You have already mentioned one branch office here, namely, Dachau. Were there any other branch offices at places where a concentration camp was located?
A No.
Q In your office, C-VI/1 there was also a department for expert opinions of properties. Will you please describe its tasks to us?
A This department for the judging of properties consisted of one collaborator. Since the Waffen-SS needed a large number of accommodations, and other building sites, as a result of the Reich Compensation Law many buildings had to be rented. In these cases an expert opinion first had to be given with the technical aspects. This opinion was mainly carried out in order to determine the compensation for rent. In individual cases an opinion was given sometimes of properties, which as Reich properties were then rented to the enterprises.
Q Did you or your office also give an expert opinion of Jewish properties?
A No, such a case did not occur.
Q Whenever you purchased properties for concentration camps, did you also have to give an opinion on that?
A No.
Q I am now coming to your Main Department 2. That is your plant economy. What task did this department have?
A This also was a very small department. It mainly worked on directives with regard to the operation of the public utilities Court No. II, Case No. 4.with the garrison administrations.
It issued and compiled directives and instructions just how big heating plants should be operated and how the electric supply was to be taken care of, and how water supply was to be installed, and things of that nature. They also dealt with sewer facilities. These directives were then passed on to the administrative agencies, and they described just how these very complicated facilities were to be operated. In individual cases the technical officials of my department also supervised certain very large facilities on the spot. This was done, for example, at the extended barracks at Munich, at the Junker School at Bad Toelz, and various other large barracks which had special technical facilities.
Q Did this main department have anything to do with the concentration camps?
A No, this department could not interfere with matters which pertained to concentration camps because members of that office were not allowed to enter the concentration camps for that purpose.
Q How much personnel did this office have? I am referring to the Main Department.
A In 1942 it was the Main Department had two collaborators, and in 1943 it had five or six collaborators, on a temporary basis. Then again the number decreased to two or three collaborators. At the end of 1944 this department was completely discontinued.
In 1943 and 1944 the two technical collaborators were mainly used as economizing engineers.
Q How were the expenditures of these public utilities carried out from the local garrison administration? The maintenance of the facilities?
A The maintenance of the facilities there took place exactly as the maintenance of construction.
Q In your opinion, who in the concentration camps had to constantly supervise the facilities? Let us say laundry facilities, sewers and so on; the supply of water and disinfection facilities? Who had to deal with it?
A In hygienic respect the troop physician had to take care of that, or the concentration camp medical officer. The commander was also responsible in these matters. The man in charge of the Administration had to see that repairs were carried out.
Q What, in your opinion, caused the sanitary facilities to be utterly insufficient in the concentration camps, as we have already heard by the witness Kogon in his examination?
A These bad conditions resulted solely from the over-crowding in the camps.
Q Did your office have the task to regularly inspect the building sites with regard to their hygienic condition, and so on?
A No, that was not the task of the ministerial level. I would not have been able to do that with my two or three colleagues. I have already pointed out that approximately 400 or 450 building sites had to be taken care of.
be taken care of.
Q I am now coming to your Main Department, C-6-3-. That is the preliminary auditing of the bills. Why was this department established and what were its tasks?
AAs I have already mentioned, the construction work for the SS, in part, began already as early as 1934; up to the year 1939, when the war broke out, the construction was carried out on a peacetime basis. The bag constructions in peacetime already, in normal times, needed one, two, three or more years until the construction would have been completed. The accounting for the construction, of course, could only have been worked on after the last payment for this construction had been carried out. The Auditing Court of the German Reich, until the year 1939, did not carry out any auditing of bills for construction work. In the year 1939, it began to carry out its first auditing of the expenses. However, it discontinued that work a short time later because it only had one official at its disposal, and this was Amtsrat Frey. This official, besides the SS also had to take care of the construction done by General Construction Inspector Speer, and he had to audits the bills there. In the year 1940 the auditing court ordered the establishment of a preliminary construction auditing agency-
THE PRESIDENT: This has been going on for about a half hour, and we are trying to get the first inkling of what it is about. Let me ask a couple of pertinent questions.
BY THE PRESIDENT:
Q If you needed a new roof on the laundry house ... Let us suppose you needed a new roof on the laundry building at Buchenwald. Let us say there was a fire, and the roof burned, and we got to repair it. Now, you start and repair the roof. Tell me who does it; who gets the material; who gets the labor; who pays for it. And keep right on that line. Don't get off into some foreign field.
You have got a repair job to do now on a roof at Buchenwald. Tell me how do you do it?
A For this purpose the administration had to make a request to the competent construction agency of the Amtsgruppe C. In this case, that was the Central Construction Management at Buchenwald. Since we are not dealing with repairs here in that sense, these--we are dealing with maintenance here, this was repair work which was beyond maintenance, and since technical knowledge was required in this case, the Central Building Agency then for this purpose would compile a project. It would try to compile and estimate the expenses -
Q Wait a minute. Where is the Central Agency? What is the Central Agency for this purpose? Was it your department, C-6?
A No, that was not my department.
Q Well where was it, and who was in it?
A The central construction management at Buchenwald--that was the lower construction level of the Amtsgruppe C-
Q Well, it was in Amtsgruppe C of the WVHA?
A That was the lower construction agency of Amtsgruppe C.
Q Well, where was the lower construction agency? Who was in it? What was the number of it?
A The central Construction Management, on its part, was subordinated to the Construction Inspectorate, and the Construction Inspectorate was subordinated to Amtsgruppe C--that is, Office C-5.
Q All right, now we are in C-5, are we?
A Yes.
Q Go on from there now.
A If the expenses for this repair work of the roof which had burned down did not exceed the amount of 100,000 marks, then the Construction Inspectorate itself was competent in this case, and it would make the decision.
Q All right, it only cost 20,000 marks. It was a small fire.
A Your Honor, I don't know what the limit was up to which the central construction management was entitled to make decision. It may be that the amount of 20,000 Marks was within the competency of the central construction management.
Q Well, I don't care how much it costs. Take one or the other. Take a million marks or take forty pfennings--whichever you like, but go ahead and put on the roof, for Heaven' sake.
A If the repair was of a small nature, then the administration which was competent could have the repairs carried out in its own competence.
Q Who did you say was competent?
A The garrison administration itself.
Q All right. That is at Buchenwald.
A Yes, at Buchenwald.
Q All right. Now, if it costs more than that, so that they had to get somebody's permission or authority, what did the garrison construction agency do?
A The central construction management at the garrison would pass on this request to the construction inspectorate in Wiesbaden.
Q And that takes us into C-5, does it?
A Yes. And they passed it on in turn to C-5. If the amount of 5,000 Marks had been exceeded.
Q All right, now. What does C-5 do with it?
A C-5 would appropriate the funds and it approved the execution of that work, and then the inspectorate received the order to take the further steps.
Q C-5 said "go ahead" and it will cost so much money?
A I haven't quite understood your question, Your Honor.
Q It was the business of C-5 to say the new roof will cost 10,000 Marks, "go ahead and put it on!"
A If the amount exceeded 100,000 Marks, Your Honor-
Q All right, we will get a better roof, this one costs 200,000 Marks. C-5 would say, "Okay, go ahead and build the roof", is that right?
A Yes, that is correct, Your Honor.
Q Now, who takes up the job from there?
Court No. II, Case No. 4.
WITNESS: C-5 would pass the matter on to the Construction Inspectorate. The Construction Inspectorate would issue the necessary guiding regulations in that matter and, if necessary, it determines the details to be carried out and then it passes the matter on to the lower construction agency.
THE PRESIDENT: No, no. Don't give me that "lower construction agency" without naming it. Who is the lower construction agency?
WITNESS: I want to mention the name. This is the Central Construction Management.
THE PRESIDENT: That's the Construction Management?
WITNESS: Yes, that's the lower construction agency.
THE PRESIDENT: The lower construction agency is the Construction Management. Now that means the agency that gets the lumber, the nails, and the men together and makes the roof, is that right?
WITNESS: Yes, Your Honor, that is correct.
THE PRESIDENT: Was that an official agency or was it a private contractor?
WITNESS: That was an official agency.
THE PRESIDENT: Now, the Construction Management had to get material and labor to put the roof on, didn't it?
WITNESS: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Where did it get the material, the lumber and the nails?
WITNESS: It would procure the material on the open market. Partly it would receive allotments in that matter, as far as allotments were necessary.
THE PRESIDENT: It had to get priorities from the Minister of Economics or some agency which gave priorities for material?
WITNESS: I didn't understand the question.
THE PRESIDENT: Did Construction Management have to get an order or priority in order to get material -- to get lumber?
WITNESS: From the District Commissioner for the Coordination Court No. II, Case No. 4.of the Construction Economy it would receive a certificate for that purpose and with these certificates it went to the dealer and it would obtain the necessary material.
THE PRESIDENT: That was merely a permission to buy material -a certificate giving them permission to buy material?
WITNESS: Yes, that is correct.
THE PRESIDENT: All right, now, we've got all the material on the ground at Buchenwald. Now we need labor, don't we? We have got to have men. Where would they come from and who got them?
WITNESS: If this was work in a concentration camp then the Construction Management would request inmate workers from the camp commander.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well, now. The Construction Management would ask for help, ask for labor from the camp commandant and then inmates would be assigned to build the new roof?
WITNESS: Yes, that's correct.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, all of this time what was happening in C-VI?
WITNESS: No, that didn't happen with C-VI.
THE PRESIDENT: C-VI had nothing to do with this? Why not?
WITNESS: No, Your Honor, I have already mentioned before that this procedure was carried out by Office C-V, not C-VI.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, C-VI, which was Building Maintenance, had nothing to do with this?
WITNESS: Your Honor, I have already stated that the maintenance was carried out by the administrations themselves, while larger construction repairs were carried out by the construction agency, as far as any building police matters were concerned.
THE PRESIDENT: All right, now to the point. What in the world did C-VI do?
WITNESS: It didn't do anything in that matter at all.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, in what matter did it do something? Tell Court No. II, Case No. 4.me what it was that C-VI was organized for and what it did.
WITNESS: I have already stated that C-VI/1 -
THE PRESIDENT: I know. Say it again.
WITNESS: Once a year it appropriated certain funds and that not exclusively.
THE PRESIDENT: Once a year you appropriated certain funds? Is that what you did in C-VI?
WITNESS: Once a year funds were appropriated. That was through the maintenance -- through the garrison administration. However, I mentioned before that this was done in peace time and in war time, of course, the procedure was not followed so closely.
THE PRESIDENT: I suppose not. Well, all right. We are now in Buchenwald with a roof burned off in 1943. Would C-VI have anything to do with that?
WITNESS: No, Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, tell me something that C-VI would have something to do with. It had some purpose, didn't it?
WITNESS: Your Honor, Office C-VI had several tasks. Construction matters only made up a very small part of the tasks with which C-VI dealt. That was the smallest task of Amt C-VI.
THE PRESIDENT: Tell me the big part.
WITNESS: I am just about to say that, Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: Excuse me. Go ahead.
DR. VON STEIN: May I ask some further questions, Your Honor. I was just referring to the Main Office C-VI/3. That is the office which Your Honor has mentioned in the question what the main tasks of Office C-VI were -- and in particular this question we were dealing with -- I was just about to explain to the Tribunal what tasks it dealt with, the extent of these tasks and what knowledge the defendant could obtain from all these fields of tasks with regard to the concentration camps and all the other crimes which were committed I was just about to ask these questions of the witness, so that he Court No. II, Case No. 4.could explain to the Tribunal just what he did.
THE PRESIDENT: You mean, you haven't asked him anything about that up to now?
DR. VON STEIN: I didn't understand, Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: Haven't you asked him anything about the tasks of C-VI/I, 2 and 3 before -- up to now?
DR. VON STEIN: Your Honor, I was trying to clarify the entire Office C-VI. Office C had 3 departments.
THE PRESIDENT: Do that. If you can do that, go ahead. We have been waiting a long time for somebody to clear up Office C-VI. Now maybe you can do it. Go ahead.
DR. VON STEIN: I have tried, first of all, to explain Office C-VI/1 with regard to construction maintenance and asked the defendant what tasks he did with regard to construction maintenance. I don't have any further questions with regard to construction maintenance now that the Tribunal has already asked the witness just how the construction maintenance was carried out in detail. I am now coming to Office C-VI/3, the auditing of bills.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: May I ask just one question, please? In the affidavit of the defendant, NO-2613, paragraph 60 begins "My office dealt among other things -- with the following tasks." Can we accept what is in the affidavit as a resume of what his office did?
DR. VON STEIN: May I ask the defendant a question in this connection?
Q Witness, your affidavit is in Document Book I on page 72 of the German text. In your affidavit you have described your activities in detail. Other statements which you have made in this affidavit are very much in detail. Are they correct or do you want to make any corrections of these statements in this?
A These statements about the activities of my office -- that is, it referred to the end of 1944; before 1944 -- instead of Main Department 3 Audit, we had the Construction Maintenance. That has Court No. II, Case No. 4.been added by inserting the word among others.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: You mean that this is correct up to 1944?
WITNESS: The statement in the affidavit is for the time from 1944 on.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: 1944 on?
WITNESS: 1944.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: Do you not have in the affidavit what you did before, that is, referring particularly to C-VI?
WITNESS: They appear under the words "Amongst other things."
JUDGE MUSMANNO: Do you remember what you wrote in the affidavit? Do you have it before you? Well, do you stand on what is in the affidavit?
WITNESS: Yes, from 1944 on. At that time a change took place in the field of tasks in my office and it is to that period from that time on, that the affidavit refers to.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: Well, if we don't get anything else from what is being given to us from the witness stand, at any rate, you do affirm what is in the affidavit?
WITNESS: Yes.
DR. STEIN:
Q Witness, now you have explained to us how in case some damage has taken place, the repair work was carried out, I am now coming to the end of this matter. After all, expenses arose out of repair work. What treasury paid it? What agency paid it?
A Well, the garrison treasury paid it.
Q I am referring to the bills for the expenses which were paid; the examination afterwards, what agency carried out the preliminary auditing of the bills?
A. The bills were passed on from the garrison treasury administration, and they were included in the total of the three months expenditures and then were turned over to Amt A IV as the witness Vogt has already told us on the witness stand.
Q. I am now coming to the preliminary auditing of the bills which you carried out. By virtue of what legal regulation did your preliminary auditing of the bills take place, and what bills were included in this auditing?
A. The preliminary auditing of the construction bills followed a different procedure in the administration than the general technical expenses. I have already mentioned that construction projects took years to complete; and therefore we could not audit the expenses from the construction projects within certain periods of time. The construction agency which had completed a construction project could only give the accounts from that moment on. I believe that I shall have to give you an example for that. Let us assume that a barracks has been constructed by the constructing management. The barracks itself consists of fourteen, fifteen, or twenty individual buildings, that is, the whold of the complex. Every individual building renders its own accounts. After the entire construction project has been completed and the last payments have been made to the contractors and the construction enterprises, then the construction manager readers his accounts. That is, he compiles the individual bills. He for the individual buildings. Then he adds up the expenditure books and then compiles the total balance of the bills. He then adds the necessary papers, for example, the order for the construction to be carried out, and gives the other orders which were made during the time of the construction. Then the total account is sent to the next higher agency, the Construction Inspectorate.
The Construction Inspectorate where the treasury and the payoffice were also located. Add a chash book to this entire complex, tho so-called title book, in which the accounts have been closed out, and then the total accounts, after some time has passed, will end up with the Main Department C VI/3, for the preliminary auditing by the Court of Audit to be carried out.