"By using a platoon of Waffen-SS at Brussilov, 29 Communists and five agents of the NKWD were located, and liquidated on the very spot."
Q. Now continue. There is another passage marked on that same page.
A. "Furthermore, an inhabitant could be located who had deported racial German and Ukrainian families. Finally, Jews were also taken into custody who openly had taken a hostile attitude toward the German army and who had refused to work with the Organization Todt, and so on. In the course of this action, altogether 113 people were shot."
May I make a statement on that subject?
Q. Yes, Surely.
A. I have heard and read of Brussilov here for the first time.
Q. But you actually were in Shitomir, I believe?
A. Yes.
Q. And you never heard that any Jews were being mistreated there?
A. No.
Q. And this story that the witness Sauer tells about seeing this man Surth shoot six Jews there is another aberration?
A. In my opinion; yes, because, strangely enough, Sauer emphasized that was known in all units and by all men, but of this story Otto did not know anything beforehand. And the story of which Otto had knowledge, Sauer did not know anything, and both of them, I believe, were with the same unit, which had the smallest number of men.
Q. Well, you say you are laboring under a disadvantage because you haven't got the transcript. If you read the transcript, I believe you will find that both Otto and Sauer remember this story about Surth.
A. Such a mistake can happen. It is quite possible because I have not read the transcript yet, and, of course, it is impossible for me to remember everything quite clearly.
Q. But this is, in your opinion, strictly a fabrication -this story about Surth killing the Jews?
A. Yes. After all, something of that sort could not be kept secret. With that I agree.
Q. And you still want to tell this Court that the whole time you were in Russia, you did not know there were any SD there?
A. I am not trying to tell that to the Tribunal, but I want only to tell about facts here.
Q. Well, then you state it as a fact that you never heard of the SD while you were in Russia?
A. Yes, that is my claim.
Q. Now, I believe you testified while you were on the stand before that you never heard of the persecution of the Jews until this trial began.
A. Of the persecution of the Jews? Well, I knew whatever was public knowledge. That I also heard, and that is what I said. About the exaggerated racial policy, I talked myself quite openly. I believe that I also said that I talked about this racial policy to Jews who were my acquaintances and also to some half-Jews.
Q. But you never heard about any Jews being shot? You never heard of any extermination program?
A. No, I did not hear anything about an extermination program. Otherwise, I would have been much much afraid for my own brotherin-law. I did not consider that possible at all.
Q. You never heard of any brutalities being committed against Jess?
A. No.
Q. Well, now....
A. That somebody may have beaven a Jew or that on the 9th of November excesses and brutalities occurred, that I heard also.
That was common knowledge.
Q. Well, where did you hear about these things for the first time?
A. I can not recall that anymore, now that nine years have passed. However, I heard about that in general. I also heard about the fact that persons who committed such violations were subjected to trials and that a number of them were indicted before a court. However, today I am unable to give any details to you.
Q. Did you hear about that sort of thing happening before you went to Russia in 1941?
A. Yes.
Q. Well, did you hear about it after you got to Russia?
A. Well, I knew these things already at that time. After all, this happened in 1938.
Q. Well, did you hear about any mishandling or mistreatment of Jews while you were in Russia?
A. No. That, of course, a local garrison , or a field garrison, would use Jews in order to clear roads and to clear the debris, or that by agreement with the city mayor or any other official of the village, would use working detachments and that amongst these working detachments there were Jews -- that probably was quite a normal procedure. That happens in every war. The same thing applied in the campaign in the West. A local headquarters would be established, and some sort of military government, and this military government detachment would establish contact with the local enemy authorities in the same locality. However, I emphasize that here we were dealing with local commanders and army headquarters which had been normally appointed. They had been established by the corps, by the army.
Q. Well, you would really have been shocked if you had heard that Jews were being shot or mistreated?
A. Yes, it would have shocked me. My opinion about the atrocities which I have seen and my attitude toward them -- I hope that I will be able to bring testimony of the civilians to whom I reported about that in 1942. I want to emphasize that those were Russian atrocities, and I said at the time that it was impossible from a humane point of view that people like that could exist in Germany. If I wished today if we still have many communists, that they could have a look at these atrocities. Then I think they, if they were to look at these animal atrocities, then, of course, I think that this would cure them of any ideas about their Russian paradise. I am repeating the words here according to the sense as I told them to civilians in 1942.
Q. Well, now, if anybody had told you that Einsatzkommando 6 had killed 6,000 Jews in Dnjepopetrowsk alone, that would really have been a startling revelation to you?
A. I would have considered that 100 percent enemy propaganda.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: Mr. Fulkerson, you were not in Court at the time, but on June 11 and June 12, this defendant testified at length about knowing nothing of extermination of Jews, knowing nothing of the racial persecution of the Jews, so, if he has already denied this, it seems to me to go into it again ---
MR. FULKERSON: All right, then; I have no further questions.
THE WITNESS: May it please the Tribunal, may I make another statement on this subject?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
THE WITNESS: This racial persecution and this racial policy I also discussed at the time, and I also repeated that discussion, only I did not state myself to be in favor of these things.
JUDGE PHILLIPS: Let me ask him a question, Doctor.
EXAMINATION BY JUDGE PHILLIPS:
A. At any time during the campaign, and especially near Zloczow, were any members of the First Mountain Division there?
A. I can recall that I saw members of the Mountain Division for the first time at Tarnopol. I did not see them before. I may have seen one, tow, three or four of them. However, I can not recall these precisely. However, I was as a unit able to recognize the Mountain Division for the first time at Tarnopol.
Q. When was that? About when did you recognize the members of the Mountain Division at Tarnopol?
A. When I passed through Tarnopol, and when we were fighting between Tarnopol and Boskirow. Then I saw the First Mountain unit at Tarnopol. In the combat sector in which we were engaged, I did not see any members of the Mountain Division. I saw them again only after we passed Shitomir.
Q. Please try to answer my question. You haven't answered it yet. I asked you when it was. About what date was it?
A. I beg your pardon, Your Honor. That must have been between the 2nd and 5th of July.
Q. Did you know Oberscharfuehrer Sell--S-E-L-L?
A. Oberscharfuehrer Sell? Yes, he was a technical noncommissioned officer, a technician who had been assigned to us.
Q. And what company was he assigned to?
A. He was with the food column.
Q. You did not know Otto?
A. I can not recall Otto at all.
Q. You did not know Sauer?
A. I can not remember him either.
Q. Did you know of Oberscharfuehrer Senn--S-E-N-N?
A. I just stated that I knew him. That is how the translation came through--Senn-S-E-N-N.
Q. I first asked about S-E-L-L.
A. I don't know any man by the name of SELL.
Q. You don't, Did you know Rottenfuehrer Schmidt?
A. No. However, I know a man by the name of Schmidtbauer.
Q. You did know a Standartenfuehrer Weckerle?
A. I know a man by the name of Weckerle.
Q. And you described how he was killed, on yesterday.
A. yes.
Q. Did you know a town and were you in a town during this campaign of Bodganowska, B O D G A N O W S K A?
A. I can not recall any city by that name. I would also like to say in this connection, Your Honor, that this Bodganowska is alleged to be located between Tarnopol and Zloczow, according to the testimony of the witness. However, I can not recall any city at all between Zloczow and Tarnopol, and during that period of time and in that area, I myself was not with the food column anymore, but I met up with them again at Tarnopol.
Q. It was described as the next town to Tarnopol on your may to Tarnopol, not a city, but a town.
A. I can't recall it at all. Up to now I have not been able to consult any maps. Your Honor.
Q. Did you know Hauptsturmfuehrer Meister?
A. Yes.
Q. What company was he in?
A. He was with the food column. He was with the First Company.
Q. Did you know Haupsturmfuehrer Schinkol?
A. Yes.
A. What company was he in?
A. He was also a member of the First Company in the food column.
Q. And these two men were with those outfits during the campaign that you have described here around Tarnopol and those other towns in July 1941?
A. Yes, at that period of time. In this connection, I would like to make the following statement: Haupsturmfuehrer Meister, who has been mentioned here, from one kilometer before Tarnopol at the base there, if I am not mistaken, he was sent back to his homeland by plane because he became very ill, and he died here at Nurnberg.
JUDGE PHILLIPS: That is all.
THE PRESIDENT: Well take the recess now.
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal will recess for fifteen minutes.
(A recess was taken)
THE MARSHALL: The Tribunal is again in session.
MR. WOLFE: If it please the Tribunal, I would like to put a few more questions to the witness.
BY MR. WOLFE:
Q Witness, you saw some documents this morning, and you read some out aloud in which it is described and proved that atrocities in the Bast and murders occurred, is that correct?
A Yes.
A Who, in your opinion, must have known about those atrocities?
A Those who have ordered then and executed then.
Q Do you mean thereby the SD and the Security Police?
AAs it appears from those paragraphs which I have read, yes.
Q And isn't it also true that the commanders of the rear army must have known about it?
A I don't know because I was never active in the rear Army territory.
Q Witness, did you know Obergruppenfuehrer and Police General von dem Barzilowski?
A Yes.
Q Would you please tell the Court who General von dem Barzilowski
A He was chief of the combatting bands.
Q Where?
THE PRESIDENT: Chief of what?
THE INTERPRETER: Chief of fighting, in charge of fighting guerrillas.
THE PRESIDENT: Which officer?
MR WOLFE: He was an SS-General
THE PRESIDENT: Polish guerrillas?
Q (By Mr. Wolfe) Were they Polish guerrillas or Russian guerillas?
A I don't know. I just know he was chief in charge of fighting guerrillas.
Q In what area?
A Wherever he was assigned, I don't know, at least in the eastern campaign, but I don't know whether he was also in the southeast. That I don't know.
Q Well, that doesn't matter here. At any rate he was also in the East?
A Yes.
Q In case General Barzilowski would be called up as a witness here and would describe to the Court that all these atrocities were well known, not only among the SS but also among the Wehrmacht in the East, what would you say to that?
A I don't know how he could judge that. He was chief of antipartisan warfare and he was in that region, but I was not there. Therefore I cannot say. I never was in the rear army areas.
Q If I were to tell you that General Barzilowski told me on the 22nd of August, 1947, that though no direct order from the highest command existed, after the Jews had been outlawed but that every member of the SS or Wehrmacht knew that-it was approved that Jews were executed and killed, employed in labor, and that such cases if they happened, as far as he recalls, were never tried by a court martial, that on the contrary, if it was tried to be in proceedings this was suppressed by the highest authority.
THE PRESIDENT: Wait a minute.
MR. WOLFE: Your Honor?
THE PRESIDENT: You haven't finished your question. You said to him, "If I were to tell you that General Barzilowski told me those things." Then what?
MR. WOLFE: Excuse me. I thought Dr. Von Stakelberg was interrupting here.
THE PRESIDENT: He was, but finish your question.
(By Mr. Wolfe) Would you say that this is correct?
THE PRESIDENT: Now.
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Your Honor, I would like to object to this question. The question already contains claims from a third party. If such claims are made, I would like to question that person who has made it in cross-examination.
THE PRESIDENT: I think the form of your question should be, "Is it a fact that so and so occurred," without saying "If General Barzilowski should tell me and should tell you, what would you say?"
THE WITNESS: May I add shortly that, when I said , Barzilowski was known to me as a chief of anti-partisan warfare, I must add, but at a time when I wasn't in the East at all anymore, and I believe also that he was only committed after I had been in the East, and we did not come across any guerrillas at the front. The Political leaders forced these guerrillas on our necks.
THE PRESIDENT: We are not talking about the guerrillas. Will you answer this question? Was it true while you were in Poland and the Ukraine that although there was no special order, nevertheless, it was understood by all SS men that if Jews were exterminated no one would be held accountable for it?
THE WITNESS: Such an order was never make in our service either verbally or written, at least not to my knowledge.
THE PRESIDENT: But was it generally understood among the SS, even without an order, that Jews could be killed and no one would be court-martialled or punished?
THE WITNESS: No, Your Honor. I hope my division commander will come to the witness stand. During the Polish campaign such acts were supposed to have occurred, and the judgment against one or two SS men reads as follows: "Penitentiary for about 8 or 12 years," and the divisional commander, Steiner, asked for the death penalty. May I say, Your Honor, I didn't hear this only after the end of the war.
THE PRESIDENT: What was that punishment for?
THE WITNESS: Because the two SS men---I think they were SS men --- permitted themselves excesses during house to house fighting, during which civilians participated and they took justice into their own hands then. This is the way it was told to me. I only mention it, because I assume that the Division Commander Steiner will appear here in person.
Q. (By Mr. Wolf) How many court-martial proceedings for such deeds by Steiner are known to you which have been taken against SS members?
A. I never was active in court-martial affairs.
Q. How many of these judicial proceedings are known to you have occurred in your own division?
A. I don't know any such occurrences in our division, or even in the first division with which I was.
Q. Am I to take it from that that in your division no courtmartial proceedings took place on account of murders of Jews or other atrocities on the part of the SS?
A. I cannot answer that, either with yes or with no. I don't know.
Q. But you were a division administrative officer?
A. Yes, but not a division judge advocate.
Q. Didn't such proceedings, files, papers, have to go through your hands before they would come before the SS tribunal?
A. This conclusion is not comprehensible to me. I was in charge of the supply battalion. I never had anything to do with such affairs.
Q. You said that you did not know anything about any guerrilla fighting during your time?
A. No, we never heard anything about that at that time.
Q. But you told us very vividly about the death of SS Standartenfuehrer Weckerle.
A. I also mentioned that this was in the course of combat and that this took place in an area which was designated as front area.
Q. And there were guerrillas?
A. It wasn't known by whom he was shot. When enemies face each other no one can say who fired the individual shot.
MR. WOLFE: I have no further questions.
THE PRESIDENT: Just a moment please.
EXAMINATION BY THE COURT BY THE PRESIDENT:
Q. How long altogether were you in the Polish and Ukraine campaign? How long were you in the field?
A. I was in the field from the beginning of the war, or, that is, pardon me, four weeks after the beginning of the war until the end of September, 1941.
Q. Well, you weren't on the Eastern Front all that time, were you?
A. No, as I have stated, Your Honor, from the beginning of the Eastern Campaign until the 29th or 30th of September.
Q. Well, when was the beginning of the Eastern Campaign?
A. On the 21st or 22nd of June, 1941.
Q. And then you were in the Polish and Ukrainian Campaign about three months from late in June until the end of September?
A. Yes, the Russian Campaign included the Ukraine.
THE PRESIDENT: Will you get those two documents that were shown to the witness, please? Give them to the witness.
Q. These are the two documents that were shown to you earlier in the session?
A. Yes.
Q. How many Jews are mentioned as having been shot in these documents?
A. May I first look at it, Your Honor? I don't know the number of the page. Once 100 Jews and afterwards it says the number of liquidated Jews amounts to from 300 to 500.
Q. In another place it says 113.
MR. FULKERSON: I'd like to make an explanation to the court. These extracts that he read were picked out by me merely because they referred to the same places that he was talking about at approximately the same time.
These documents actually contain reports on the operations of the Einsatzgruppen in the entire USSR and there are thousands of such incidents listed in them, but for that reason I only abstracted a part and that is the part that he read.
THE PRESIDENT: That is what I am interested in, it is the number of casualties in the same area and at approximately the same time.
A. May I continue please? Then the next number is 600; then in one place, Schorostoka, which I don't know and have never mentioned; 110; then 400.
Q. Well, then, just from these documents it appears that about 2,600 Jews were shot by the EinsatzCommandos in this general area where your battalion was and during the time that you were there?
A. No, not during the time that I was there, Your Honors.
Q. Oh, yes, this is in July and August, 1941.
A. But then we were about 300 to 400 kilometres further forward.
Q. Well, all right, I am not trying to pin it down to the place where you were standing, but in the Ukraine and in Eastern Poland, while you were going through there, and after you had gone through, about 2,600 Jews were killed?
A. About when I passed through, Your Honor? Is that correct? Was that translated correctly?
Q. Yes, either While you were going through or after you had passed through with your battalion.
A. Yes.
Q. That's right, of course, this only just ore little spot. It has nothing to do with the thousands of others in Russia and Northern Poland and you never witnessed or hear about any one of these murders?
A. No.
Q. And you didn't even know that Einsatzkommandos were there?
A. No.
THE PRESIDENT: I have no further question.
REDIRECT EXAMINATION BY DR. VON STAKELBERG:
Q. Witness, we must determine the dates more closely once more. The report about the incident at Zcloozow, if you will look at that once more, say that what happened there was on what date?
A. On the 7th of July, 1941.
Q. Where were you on the 7th of July?
A. In the area east of Tarnopol. It must have been Brossilow. One moment please I think Stara Konstantino is the place. About and around tha arra of Brossilow. That is about 100 Kilometres east of Tarnopol.
Q. And how far is Tarnopol from Zcloozow.
A. I can just roughly estimate that. I assume about 80 to 100 kilometres.
Q. And how was you contact with the rear area. Did you have continuous communications?
A. No, we only had content from the division to our supply unit. We had on other chain of command or communications.
Q. So, as far as what happened behind the rear area, that supply unit, you had no contact?
A. 0, just merely a few vehicles which belonged to some kind of a corps supply unit. The corps supply unit was located south or north of us. That was different in every case.
Q. What does it say on the report -- what is the secrecy designation on the front page on the other document?
A. On every one of them it reads, "Top Secret"
Q. Which grade of secrecy is this?
A. That is the highest grade of secrecy
THE PRESIDENT: That means the report is top secret.
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: But the event wasn't.
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Your Honor, I believe that the incident in any case was kept as secret as possible.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, it is pretty hard to keep a secret when you shoot 113 jews out in an open field, isn't it?
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Your Honor, during war, when communications are interrupted, only the neighborhood knows about it. I don't think that this would be communicated very quickly in the war.
THE PRESIDENT: It's fairly public, wouldn't you say to stand 113 Jews up and shoot them out in the open country. There's nothing much secret about that, to anybody that was in the neighborhood.
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Yes, that's right. Yes, Your Honor, but only in the immediate proximity. I believe if one were to ask people from neighboring towns for example, from the neighboring town of Zcloozow, that you would find that the neighboring villages got news of this only very much later. I assume that the communications of news are interrupted and that only military communications are kept up.
THE PRESIDENT: But the best communication system in the world is the mouth-to-car system. That never breaks down.
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Your Honor, but this system only goes as far mouth and ear get together. During the war the villages are separated and can only be limited to the village where people are gathered together, but it cannot go on to the next village, and to the next village where the defendant was and to add it this, Your Honor, on must not forget in what position the defendant found himself.
It could easily be that something like that would become known more quickly among the population than in the military.
THE PRESIDENT: Why do you say that? The Einsatzkommandoes were composes of SS and police personnel were they not?
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: SS and police leaders were in charge of the Einsatzkommandos and the witness was an SS man.
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Your Honor, but he was a member of a combat unit which was subordinated to the Army.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I know , he was Waffen SS.
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Waffen SS, yes.
THE PRESIDENT: You think he be the last person in the world to hear about these things.
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Not in the world, Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: In the Ukraine?
DR. VON STAKELBERG: Not even in the Ukraine, Your Honor, but, Your Honor, I really consider it doubtful, according to my own conviction that the things which happened behind the front were disseminated to the front. Rather it was disseminated to the rear.
THE PRESIDENT: I see. Well, I didn't mean to put you on the witness stand, DR. Von Stakelberg.
Q. Witness, you also spoke of the Jewish progrom in Tarnopol, which according to the statements there took place between the 29th of July and the 14th of August, 1941, is that correct? That is the time the report shows. Where were you at that time?
A. Just from my memory I think it must have been in the area of BialaZierkew and still further east. The Biala-Zierkew exactly at the time and them even further on by Taraschka at Bugoslw. That is to say, at that time on the 29th of July, as the report begins here, we were fighting east of Biala-Zierkew.
Q. And then the village which was mentioned, Brossilow, was that known to you?
A. No, I never heard of it until today.
Q. Don't you know where it is?
A. No, I have no idea.
Q. Is it stated where the incidents took place in Brossilow?
A. In what document was this mention. I can't ever find Brossilow in here.
Q. It was in the third document which was submitted to you.
A. Yes, her they speak of 29 communists and 5 agents.
Q. When?
A. One moment please. The only date that is mentioned-there is the date on which the report was made out, the 20th of August, 1941.
Q. Witness, what was your contact with the civilian population? Did you have any chance to exchange you ideas with the civilian population or any news?
A. No.
Q. Did you learn anything from the civilian population?
A. Personally for example never had any contact with the civilian population.
Only one time when my vehicle gave out on the read I had today in a village. We were--there were only two single vehicles.
Q. And with the rear area agencies, did you have any contact with them, any communications?
A. We didn't have any other rear area agencies as we ourselves were our own supply units for our immediate combat units.
Q. No, I mean with these agencies who committed these atrocities.
A. No, I never heard anything about them. It was completely out of the question.
Q. But I want to hear, I want to have a clarification of this. Did you have any contact with these agencies?
A. No, I never saw any SD agency, office group or staff.
Q. Were men from these groups or detachments or staffs, did anyone of them come to pass through your units?
A. No, I would like to add here there were the field police who were responsible for all the police measures in the combat units. We never had directly or indirectly anything to do with the SD. We were soldiers of the Army in combat. These, the field police, were recognizable by insignia, breast plates.
Q. Officially or unofficially did you have anything to do with members of the rear area services, or did you have any contact with them?
A. Unofficially not at all, and officially I only had anything to do with the corps whenever they was moved further back with the Army corps.
Q. That is a combat unit. I mean with the noncombat units.
A. I didn't want to give anything wrong, any wrong data, because these Army corps had something to do with these supply units. The Army provides us with the supply.
Q. But you know I am asking in a different direction. I would like to know if you had anything to do with those agencies who committed those atrocities?
A. No, in no way.
Q. How do you explain the fact that you had no knowledge whatever of these incidents even though you were always within a radius of three hundred kilometers from the places where the incidents took place?
A. I would like to mention very briefly the following about the eastern campaign. As rapidly as we progressed during combat, it happened that fifty kilometers behind the front, then two hundred to three hundred kilometers, there were only very few occasional soldiers to be met there, since all rear area troops, or occupation troops could not follow that quickly into the empty regions. That is that the field command the true commands of the Army, came into this vacant space of two hundred to two hundred fifty kilometers. They could not even come there that quickly. There was, in other words, a fighting front, German soldiers, then it happened that the next supply units or occupation troops of two of three days before were already two to three hundred kilometers behind us. I would like to state once more clearly the tasks of the immediate combat troops, troop units, which were fighting, and the immediate supply units. That is one group in itself, and then after the front progressed about two hundred to three hundred kilometers in the space, which is four to six days behind us, this was then taken up by the so-called occupation Army. There was always a large empty space between the fighting units and the occupation units.
Q. And this vacant region, is that true also for the communicating troops? Isn't there any contact, any communications between these two groups?
A. I would like to also say we got our most important military communications is such a difficult manner from the rear courriers alone needed several days until they could reach us, the official courriers.
Q. Let us have this quite clearly now. We have got the advancing combat units as one whole conception.