In order to enable that at all, Herr Pohl, decided to create or establish a company for that particular purpose and to incorporate those Globocnik enterprises into that company. That was the beginning of the Osti.
Q What did you have to do with the Osti?
A I can recall these two conferences, particularly the one which I just mentioned. In the meantime Herr Dr. Horn had had further contacts with Herr Pohl and he had dealt with the preparation of the establishment of the company. He had worked out a questionnaire and he had asked Herr Pohl for a conference. And in order to be backed by Herr Pohl within the framework of those conferences a few more people were asked to join the conference. As can be seen from the documents I believe Herr Loerner, Dr. Volk, and myself were present.
Q Was Dr. Horn still under your subordination at the time?
A Dr. Horn was subordinated to me until that moment when he was transferred to Warsaw. That must have been, therefore, approximately on the 17th of 18th of January, because that letter by Himmler is dated the 15th. By a circular by Herr Pohl, dated 20 January 1943, all auditors were taken away from me and amongst them those who had gone along with Dr. Horn to Warsaw and who after that went to Lublin with him.
Q Was the Osti part of Staff W?
A Yes, it was. Herr Pohl ordered that the Osti be incorporated into Staff W on the organizational chart, because according to branches there was no possibility open to incorporate that company in some other box of the organizational chart. The organizational conception of Staff W was all the time a recipient for everything that could not be represented in another manner on the organizational chart.
Q Did any of the collaborators of the DWB have an influence on the Osti?
A No, none of them. The Osti was immediately subordinated to Herr Pohl. I am sure that the Tribunal will understand that at that particular moment when I say that it is impossible that a man like Globocnik who was the first manager of the Osti could possibly be subordinated to one, who was of a lower rank than he was.
He could not have been subordinated to me as I was an auditor. I could only audit, and yet I didn't audit. Somebody else did the auditing work there.
Q The documents introduced by the prosecution in this connection give the impression that you participated in the establishment and further development of the Osti. The first document the prosecution in this connection introduced is in Document Book No. III. I refer to page 67 of the German and page 66 of the English Document Book. It is Document NO-1270, Exhibit No. 67 -- I am sorry -- Exhibit No. 1. This is the questionnaire of Dr. Horn which has repeatedly been referred to here concerning the Osti. On the last page of that document, page 73 of the German and page 71 of the English text; there is a file note concerning a conference at Pohl's on the 13th of February, 1943, where this questionnaire was to be discussed. According to that document you did participate in that conference. Who was it that set up that questionnaire? Did you have anything to do with that?
A Herr Dr. Horn, who in the meantime had been in Warsaw, submitted this fragebogen to Herr Pohl and, as far as I can recall, he gave a copy to everyone of us.
Q Did you know at that time anything further about the Osti?
A Yes, I knew about the principal and fundamental plans by the first conference which took place in January. During it the three following fundamental points of view were decisive: The first one being the inventory and utilization of machines and stocks in the empty factories in Warsaw for the use of the German Reich. The second one was that the Globocnik factories, which had not been given any commercial legal form hitherto, should be incorporated into the Osti, and the third one was a plan on the part of Himmler. Himmler had become aggravated when he visited Warsaw by seeing a large number of factories which were under German supervision and management where Jews were working and where the owners of the factories had become very rich. In the conference it was shown that Himmler wanted to transfer some of those factories, together with the machines and stocks, somewhere else and manage the enterprise himself within the framework of the Osti.
At that time in order not to forget that fact I made the following marginal note on the questionnaire, or the minutes: Ponjatowa near Lublin. I could recall that Herr Pohl had used that name when he informed us that Himmler wanted to transfer various Warsaw enterprises to Ponjatowa. It was not a suggestion really, Ponjatowa was not discussed. I just put those notes down because the word was used.
Q You stated that you had nothing to do with the Osti? Why was it that you were invited to that conference on the 13th of February 1943 then?
A Dr. Volk and myself were asked to participate in the conference upon Dr. Horn's suggestion. That could only be understood if one knows the mentality of both Herr Pohl and Dr. Horn. Dr. Horn apparently did not want to go and see Herr Pohl all by himself and he wanted to have a few people with him to back him up.
Q Did you find out anything further in connection with the Osti at that conference, that is to say, what questions were discussed during that conference?
A Herr Dr. Horn tried to discuss the questions, contained in his questionnaire piece by piece. The questions were not known to anyone there and I would like to tell the Tribunal that even to this date I haven't looked through the entire fragebogen. Herr Pohl thought that he didn't like it very well that a young SS leader, so to say, was to ask him questions as if he were a school kid, and already in the middle of the second question he told him the following which is contained in this form of Dr. Horn, namely, that he was old enough to be able to be a manager in Lublin together with Globocnik and he also knew what was to be done. Nothing else was discussed concerning fundamental things.
Q In the document book introduced by the prosecution, which is Document Book No. XVIII, page 106 of the German and page 83 of the English text is Document NO-2182, Exhibit No. 471.
This is the personnel sheet for Dr. Horn. On that personnel chart the 1st of April 1943 is contained as a transfer date to the SS and Police Leader. You stated that Dr. Horn since the 20th of January, 1943, was no longer subordinated to you. Who was it that Dr. Horn was subordinated between the 20th of January, 1943, and the 1st of April, 1943?
A I had no influence whatsoever on any military conditions. It seems indubitable that Dr. Horn was later on transferred. Prior to that he had been detached. I assume that the Tribunal knows this differentiation of the military transfer method. In other words, he was still subordinated to the WVHA in Berlin, but, as far as his service was concerned, he had been transferred on duty to the SS and Police Leader in Lublin. This is some sort of a double disciplinary subordination and that detachment was probably later on changed to a permanent transfer. However, Dr. Horn had nothing to do with any particular office in the WVHA or Staff W from that particular moment on when his detachment to Warsaw and Lublin took place.
Q The prosecution introduced a letter by Bobermin to you, by which it could be assumed that Dr. Horn in February 1943 was still subordinated to you. This is contained in Document Book No. 14 introduced by the prosecution, page 49 of the German, page 50 of the English Document Book. This is Document NO-1005, Exhibit 390. What is your comment on this document?
A. In this document it is proved that Herr Pohl's circular letter had informed us of the transfer of the individual auditors to other enterprises. It is contained literally in this document. I myself had no influence personally on where the auditors went to. Several of those auditors before had been transferred for good to the OSTI, and from that moment on they had nothing to do with that so-called Staff W. Others again were working in different enterprises. For that particular reason I had to answer to Dr. Bobermin that I could not place any auditors at his disposal because they had all been taken away from me on 20 January 1943.
Q. In this letter to Bobermin of 9 February 1943 you are speaking of a special task. What do you mean by that, and why was it you did not express yourself more clearly towards Dr. Bobermin?
A. By that I meant Dr. Horn's task for OSTI. That is to say, the tasks in Warsaw and Lublin. If I wanted to be more clear about the whole thing towards Dr. Bobermin, then I would have to explain the entire thing. There was no reason to do so. On the other hand I could not possibly suspect that the expression "special task" a few years later would be used in such a connection. If I had known that, I probably would not have used those words.
Q. According to your statement so far, at that time, therefore, you knew nothing more precise about the OSTI, did you? In Document Book No. 19, introduced by the prosecution, on page 8 of the German and page 7 of the English texts, there is a letter by Dr. Horn sent you from Lublin. This is NO-1265, Prosecution's Exhibit No. 482. This letter is dated 26 February 1943. Dr. Horn in that letter states that until that moment he had written to you daily. On the basis of those letters is it possible that you were not informed of the OSTI more precisely?
A. Yes, I was informed very well about the OSTI just insofar as I said before, that is to say, so far as the three special aims were concerned. Dr. Horn was in Warsaw from the beginning, and he came to that conference on 13 February to Berlin, and that letter is dated 26 February, and actually it took him two or three days to come back to Lublin.
Now if a letter allegedly was sent daily, then this was practically within a period of eight days. However, I do know for sure that Dr. Horn wrote quite frequently. He wanted office personnel and office equipment; he wanted rubber stamps, and all of those various things you could not get very easily in Lublin; and, apart from that, Dr. Horn thought it important to incorporate those so-called DAW factories in Lublin into his factories, and he tried to involve me in this plan.
Q. In this letter Dr. Horn is also speaking of the incorporation of the OSTI contract. This one was the one that Dr. Horn in this particular connection referred to you?
A. It is stated in the letter that Dr. Volk was absent, and the preparation of the various contracts carried out on a notary basis was up to the legal department of the DWB, and, so far as I know, Dr. Hoffmann, deputizing for Dr. Volk, had prepared the matter. I personally had no telephone conversation with a notary public, nor did I do anything else about it, and I was not present at the establishment of it, either.
BY JUDGE MUSMANNO: Witness, were any of these properties taken over by the OSTI operation paid for by the Reich to the former Jewish proprietors?
A. Your Honor, you mean those ones which had been incorporated into the factories? You mean the factories themselves, or of what existed in machines and stocks, or did you mean the stocks which were not incorporated, or what?
Q. No, these factories that at one time were owned by Jews. That is true, isn't it?
A. I don't know that. The way it worked was this way, Your Honor. Herr Globocnik had taken over some factories. I don't know if those were Polish factories or Jewish factories, or if he set up those factories himself, as was done in the DAW works in Lublin. Really, I don't know, because I did not see the factories, but factories did exist at that time, but I simply don't know.
Then, of course, there were a certain number of confiscated factories among them. I assume, however, that they were established by him.
Q. You say they were confiscated. Confiscated from whom?
A. I don't know.
Q. You don't know who owned these factories before?
A. No, I don't know.
Q. That is all.
A. It could have been Poles. It could have been Jews. I really don't know.
Q. Well then, coming back to the original question - regardless of the identity of the original owners, was payment made to those owners for the factories and the machinery which were confiscated by the Reich?
A. No, I am sure of that; I can guarantee you that now. No, they did not get that. Let's assume, for instance, it was mainly Jewish property; they did not even get a nickel for that.
BY DR. HEIM:
Q. Witness, do you know that from your experience, or just an assumption on your part?
A. That is just an assumption on my part.
Q. Witness, before you stated that you did not deal in the preparation of the OSTI contract. Did I understand you correctly?
A. Yes, the contract was set up by Dr. Hoffmann, deputizing for Dr. Volk.
Q. I shall now refer to Document Book No. 14, introduced by the prosecution, page 15 of the German and page 12 of the English document books, which is Document NO-1266, Exhibit No. 483. It contains your file notes concerning your visit at Frank's office on 26 June 1943. What was the purpose of your visit at Frank's?
A. The DWB had a bank of their own. That bank did not receive the official license because there was a certain regulation blocking the establishment of new banks.
That was the reason why the bank worked the following way: The Dresdner Bank was the bank in charge and kept a special account for these intern banks of the DWB, and that account of DWB was separated into various accounts. The name of the bank of the DWB was "ZV", Central Clearing Treasury. In order to increase the business transactions of that ZV, Dr. Horn also established an account for the OSTI there. Lublin as seen from the German Reich lay outside Germany from the point of view of currency. And every bank at the end of every month had to give a list of the foreign exchange to the Reich bank. The idea of Dr. Wenner and my own visit at Frank's office was the following: Frank was to state whether the ZV also had to turn in the monthly foreign exchange report also for the OSTI. Frank said no, because the money contained in the OSTI account with the ZV Bank was Reich money, which was to be turned in to the Reich. I assume that it originated with the sale of machines and stocks, which had been sold by Dr. Horn on behalf of the German Reich in Warsaw.
Q. During the conference were any questions discussed concerning the OSTI, or the Reinhardt Action?
A. No, nothing was said about the Reinhardt Action.
Q. I shall now speak about the documents concerning the Reinhardt Action, and the Reinhardt fund. What did you know about the Reinhardt Action when you were still working for the DWB as an auditor?
A. Of all those things which are understood now by the words "Reinhardt Action" I knew nothing. If I would have had a certain point of departure, then I am sure I would have noticed all of those things and realized it, because most of the time I took notes, and I just refer to my note concerning Poniatowa.
Q. Didn't you endeavor actually to clarify that term when you heard it for the first time, namely "Reinhardt Action"?
A. The term "Reinhardt Action" I had never heard consciously. I only heard the term "Reinhardt" in connection with the Reinhardt Fund.
Q. When did you hear the word "Reinhardt Action" for the first time and realize what its real meaning was?
A. As it is understood here in Nurnberg you mean? I have to draw your attention to the fact that in the letter which was just discussed by Dr. Bobermin addressed to me dated the 20th of April, 1943, the term "Reinhardt Action" appears. The time after the 20th of January 1943, until I left the DWB as an auditor is a period of time during which I was not too intensely interested in all those matters. I am convinced that term left no lasting impression in my brain. Otherwise I would have recalled it when I arrived in Nurnberg.
DR. HEIM: May it please your Honors, this is Document NO-1015, Prosecution's Exhibit 451 in Document Book No. XVI, on Page 92 of the German and Page 93 of the English text.
Q. (By Dr. Heim) In this letter you are informed that the funds which were placed at the disposal of the Klinker cement works were to be transferred for the benefit of the Reinhardt Action. Didn't you, on that occasion, try to inform yourself, as to what the Reinhardt Action stood for?
A. No, I didn't. The word "action" in Germany is a word that is used very commonly, and particularly during the war there were hundreds of actions. I would like to point out that from January 1943 on I was working once in a while for the DWB. Then there was an additional factor that I wasn't too interested in the sources of Dr. Bobermin's money because so far he hadn't discussed anything at all about this matter with me and the entire financial transaction which were carried out for Dr. Bobermin's enterprises were done without my being consulted and without any discussion with me.
What happened upon Dr. Bobermin's letter, whether we called Melmer, that is Wenner or Dr. Volk or somebody else, that Melmer was still to give us a certain time to pay that money, I really don't know. But I am convinced that some sort of negative answer was given. That should be seen from the files, because the files of the DWB had been turned over to the American Military Authorities in their entirety.
Q. The Prosecution in its opening speech stated that in June 1943 assets of various enterprises of Amtsgruppe W were covered from the amounts of the Reinhardt Fund amounting to approximately eight million Reichsmarks. The Prosecution asserts that among other people you knew about it. The Prosecution believes to prove its contention by introducing Document NO-554, Prosecution's Exhibit 448-A in Document Book No. 17. It is contained on Page 33 of the German and Page 32 of the English document book. That document consists of a series of letters which all deal with the paying back of loans. The second page of that document is a letter of the DWB to the co-defendant Frank dated the 7th of June, 1943. Now, I am asking you, was this letter by you, or did it originate with you?
A. Yes, this letter comes from me, and as I go through the other pages I can tell you that all the other letters were dictated by me, to be sure with a few exceptions.
Q. You refer in this letter to various oral discussions you had with Frank. What was it that you discussed during those conferences with Frank? In particular did you speak about the source of the Reinhardt Fund?
A. The negotiations ordered by Herr Pohl with the Reichpost concerning a credit of twenty-five million Reichsmarks which Dr. Volk and I had led, had failed because Herr Pohl did not want to turn in the shares of the DWB as a security. All of a sudden there was possibility of working with another Reich agency which could give us credit. Dr. Wenner and myself immediately worked on it, and it was for two reasons that we tried to get that credit.
The first reason was; by utilizing Reich funds as capital of the economic enterprises the German Reich had become the one who held the majority shares of the DWB, holding approximately one million majority. Now, if Herr Pohl succeeded in compensative that million Reich majority from the Party sector by another increase of capital, the the entire idea of our transfer of the shares of the company to the Reich would have been without success. That is why we appreciated that new credit that could be given by the Reich to the DWB which amounted to thirty million Reichsmarks. Personally, I only worked for the DWB for an additional month, and therefore I tried my very best to see to it that those amounts came in before I left. That was one of the reasons.
The second reason was that the SS enterprises had borrowed eight million Reichsmarks from the Red Cross, since several years, and we-when I say "we" I mean Dr. Volk, Dr. Wenner and myself -- thought it rather important that those loans of the Red Cross should be paid back as quickly as possible. That was the second reason why we were so highly interested in this Reinhardt loan. As far as the source of the Reinhardt Fund was concerned, nothing was spoken about it, but on the other hand, certain inquiries were made in that respect. As far as I can recall Herr Frank Frank answered that those were amounts which came from the east and that he, together with the Reich Finance Ministry was the one who had the right to take it over.
May it please your Honors, while looking through those documents you will see that the word "Reinhardt" is mostly written with "dt" at the end. Staatssekretaer Reinhardt was practically speaking the deputy of the Reichs Finance Ministry. We thought that that was the reason for the name of that fund.
Q. Where was it the name actually came from?
A. Well, here in Nurnberg I must assume that it means Reinhardt Heydrich, and Reinhardt stands for the first name of Heydrich.
Q. What did Frank tell you at the time concerning the terms of the loan?
A. Herr Frank stated that as far as the interests were concerned he had to fix them first, but that the interest could be very low, two and a half to three percent, and that a security in contrast to the loan that the post office had wanted to give us, was not necessary. That was one of the reasons among other things why we actually insisted on the expediting of the flow of money because in the Reich Budget Regulations, a Reich economy regulation it is explicitly stated, that a credit on the part of the Reich, with the exception of small exceptions, could only be given against security.
Q. From this series of letters compiled into a document it can also be seen that the repayment of a credit of eight million marks from the Red Cross was done through the Reinhardt Fund. Most of the letters are signed by Dr. Wenner. Does your previous statement also refer to these documents, namely, that that letter was dictated by you?
A. Yes, the signatures are by Dr. Wenner and by somebody else and not by myself, but I dictated most of the letters myself. I couldn't sign because I didn't have the authority to sign.
Q. Why was it that you as an auditor dealt with the question of the re-payment of the Red Cross credit?
A. The reasons were rather moral ones, because I knew how the money had been collected for the Red Cross, namely by making collections in the street at twenty pfennigs at a time, and I thought for quite a while that it was quite shameful that those amounts which had actually been destined for the wounded were in the enterprises for years and years as loans, and also that for quite a while they were endangered, up to the moment when the factories of the enterprises were safe again through the new taxation law.
Q. Why was it that you did not press prior to that the repayment of the credit because, after all, you worked as an auditor for the DWB for years and years?
A. During my auditing work I could not find out that the Red Cross was the one that gave the credit. The SSSaving Union was an intermediate contractor. The Red Cross, therefore, had given the money to the SS-Saving Union, and the SS-Spargemeinschaft distributed the money to various SS enterprises. The SS-Spargemeinschaft also set up certain plants for the ammortization of that money; and those were exactly the same plans concerning the amortization as had been issued by the Red Cross, with the only difference that one-eight percent of interest had been included in the computation for the Saving Union. At the same moment when I found out by accident that that money came from the Red Cross I immediately endeavored for the repayment of those amounts.
Q. Why was it then that the credit wasn't paid back immediately?
A. As an economic auditor I was not a business manager. I could only make suggestions. Money, in order to repay those loans, was not available at the beginning. When I knew, on the other hand, that the money came from the Reinhardt Fund, of which we undubitably assumed that it was a fund which was part of the property of the Reich, I went to see Frank and asked him to speak to Pohl about the repayment of that credit. Frank did so. I also went to see Pohl and Pohl approved it. I knew very well that due to the lack of funds of the subsidiary companies of the DWB, no repayment to the Red Cross of the credit would have taken place, if one would not have exerted a very heavy pressure. And that, Your Honors, is the reason why I adapted myself of the particular mentality of the WVHA where, generally speaking, mainly soldiers were being employed, and I daresay that at the last moment of my activity there I signed Pohl's order concerning the repayment of the loan with the title "Chief of Office W." If I hadn't done that I would have received no answer at all within that short period of time.
If you take a look at the dates contained in the documents you will see that the answer came in a very short period of time, otherwise it would not have worked out. It was thus that I succeeded in seeing to it that an unpleasant loan was paid back at exactly that period of time, when I still had a certain possibility to exert a small influence on it. The prosecution has marked this particular deal as not being a very clean one. I don't believe that the repayment of that credit can be considered as a dirty deal.
Q. On page 14 of that document, page 46 of the German Document Book, it should be page 45 in the English Document Book, there is a letter which was written by you upon the DWB's orders to the chinaware manufacture works, Allach. What does this transfer of liabilities to the DWB, concerning the Heinrich Fund, have to do with the Reinhardt Fund?
A. Nothing at all. This letter apparently was introduced by mistake by the prosecution in this series of documents. The name "Heinrich Fund" does not come from Heinrich Himmler, but rather from Heinrich Mattoni. When purchasing the shares of the Heinrich Mattoni A.G., which purchase was carried out before the time when I was working as economic auditor for the DWB, not only the shares had been purchased but also a certain amount that was owed by the Mattoni A. G. to the German Bank in Karlsbad.
The price for the purchase for these claims of the bank was lower than the normal price. In order to clarify I give an example: the amount due would have been, for instance, one million marks, it was purchased for two hundred thousand marks only. These are not actual figures but I just use them to explain the whole thing. When paying back the amount owed to the bank by the Mattoni A. G. to the purchasers of the original bank claim, a considerable profit would appear. Here Pohl, through an official order as Chief of the WVHA, transferred that book profit to the Reich. The idea was to establish a fund for social purposes, which was property of the Reich. I reported all those things to the expert of the Reich Finance Minister, Regierungsrat Dr. Assayer, whom I knew from my former activities there, and he said that he had no misgivings whatsoever about it because, after all, the money was transferred into the hands of the Reich. With the further development of the war, however, Herr Pohl did not carry out those social purposes which he wanted to at the beginning, and he used the money in order to increase the capital of the DWB. Personally I was very pleased about it. I knew very well that the way this had bean handled was incorrect, but it was only thus that we succeeded in making the DWB become a Reich company. If that had not occurred it would have remained a Party company. Therefore, the Heinrich Fund has nothing to do with the Reinhardt Fund.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will now recess for fifteen minutes.
(A recess was taken.)
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.
BY DR. HEIM: (Counsel for defendant Hohberg):
Q. Witness, before the recess we stopped discussing the Document NO-554, Exhibit 448, in Prosecution Document Book 17, on page 46 of both the English and German texts.
You didn't complete answering the question: That was, who transferred the debts to the DWB, and how the Heinrich fund was connected with the Reinhardt Fund?
A. The Reinhardt Fund has nothing to do with the Heinrich fund, and I only wanted to discuss the question of the correctness of the transfer of These funds from the Heinrich Fund to the DWB. We contacted the Reich Minister of Finance, Schwerin von Krosigk, and he maintained the following point of view. With the large funds which had accumulated in the course of the war which were not included in the budget as income, it did not make any difference under what budgetary statement they were contained. He made the following statement: What statio fisci receives these funds? If the DWB was an enterprise of the Reich, then the transfer of the funds from the Heinrich Fund to the DWB is correct, and if the DWB is an enterprise of the Party--then the transfer is contrary to the law. In fact, however, that funds first would have had to be included in the Reich fund, and then they would have had to be taken out again. In any case, we wanted the Reich to have the majority of the shares in the DWB.
Q. What does the question of the credits of the concern between the Allach and the DWB mean, which is mentioned in this document?
A. At my suggestion, Pohl had ordered that within the scope of the payment of the loan from the Red Cross the remaining credits of the affiliated companies, as far as possible, and as far as it was appropriate, were to be transferred from the affiliated branches to the DWB.
As a result of this, the DWB, on its balance sheet became the debtor as far as this credit was concerned, with regard to the creditors. This was a purely internal transfer of funds within the concern. However, nothing changed in the legal status of the debtor. This had nothing to do with the Action Reinhardt, and no funds were needed for this purpose. Therefore, only the conditions of the debt which were listed in the accounts changed. Therefore instead of an affiliated branch transferring a debt to a bank, then the DWB now had to keep these debts in its balance, and the affiliated branch then owed money to the DWB-- and that was the whole procedure.
Q. Please look at Document Book 14 of the Prosecution and look at Document NO-1039, Exhibit 384; in the German text it is on page 23, and in the English text it must be on page 26 or 27. This is the document about the unfinished work of the Staff W. We have already discussed this subject before. In paragraph 17 of this document, the following is stated, and I quote:
"The agreement between the Reich and the DWB with regard to the loan from the Reinhardt Fund must be put down in writing."
Doesn't this show that you had to have some knowledge about the Reinhardt Fund, and also that you took care of this agreement?
A. Yes, that is shown by this document. I knew the name "Reinhardt Fund" and according to the statements which Frank made; the moneys of the Reinhardt fund were funds which had now become the property of the Reich. Frank, together with the Reich Minister of Finance, was entitled to dispose of these funds, so that now if the loan was to be became liquid an agreement had to be concluded between the Reich Department and the DWB. I took it for granted that the Reich Minister of Finance would sign the agreement on behalf of the German Reich and that Frank would sign it as his deputy and Pohl would sign it on behalf of the DWB. However, these things happened after I had left the office. What happened in this matter I don't know.
Q. Witness, before we discussed the documents, we talked about the time when you left your work as an auditor of the DWB. That was on the 30th of June 1943. I have to ask you some more questions with reference to the time from July 1943 until the end of the war. From August 1943 on you were a soldier, isn't that right? After that, did you have any further business contact with Pohl?
A. No, Dr. May, who had been released from the confinement by the Gestapo in the meantime by order of the Research Department of the Reich Ministry of Aviation, which was General Engineer Hermann, had received an assignment for the construction of various samples of a new type of aircraft. These were wing planes, so to speak. They did not have any fusilage. He did this work as a civilian. Then he had me transferred from Belgium to Berlin so that I could collaborate in this program. The timber factories who also participated in this program -- there were approximately 70 of them -- all consisted of enterprises where no inmate labor was employed. We had a central enterprises in order to coordinate everything. This was the wood and metal Construction, G.M.B.H., which was located at Stuttgart. This group of firms and the company which I have named in connection with the so-called Horten Program whose development took too long, they began the construction of wooden parts for the jet fighter 162.
THE PRESIDENT: I don't think we are interested in this part of his testimony. This has nothing to do with the indictment.
DR. HEIM: Your Honor, I only wanted the defendant to tell us whether and to what extent after he had completed his activity as an auditor in the DWB, he had further contact with Pohl.
THE PRESIDENT: He said, "no", and then he went on to tell all the things that he did after leaving the WVHA. The answer was completed when he said "no".
Q. Witness, therefore, you did not have any further contact with Pohl?
A. You asked me whether I had any business contacts with Pohl and I answered in the negative.
Q. Did you have any other contacts with Pohl?
A. Yes. Should I go into detail in this question?
Q. Please do.
THE PRESIDENT: Not too much detail. Can't you just indicate what contact you did have. It wasn't a business contact. What was it-social?
THE WITNESS: Your Honor, I can say it very briefly.
THE PRESIDENT: Very good.
A. Dr. May had the ambition to again rejoin the SS. The plant at Buczowicz had been taken away from him. He therefore sent me to Pohl in order that he could resume his influence on the plant, Buczowicz and I was to request Pohl that he should make the plant at Buczowicz available for the program 162. Pohl refused to do so and then May went to see Obergruppenfuehrer Berger and Berger sent a technician who was working for him to see Himmler, together with a report about the 162 and Himmler at that time ordered Pohl to intervene with all his authority on behalf of the Program 162. Pohl, after he had told me to come and see him, appointed me his liaison officer to General Commissioner Kessler, who was in charge of the so-called Gewalt Aktion and I did not take any notice at all of this appointment and practically immediately I was replaced when Dr. May had succeeded as a result of his work in again being admitted into the SS.