His fears in this respect were finally born out, according to a defense witness, when the Reich Minister of Economics ordered that the DWB was thereafter to be audited by an independent auditor. This completely exploded Hohberg's contention that he left his position because he disapproved of the WVHA's activities, just as one of his own witnesses had punctured his defense that he had joined the WVHA to collect material against the SS, by letting the cat out of the bag that Hohberg was trying to dodge the draft and that he preferred to work for the SS rather than to go to the Wehrmacht.
The defendants Volk and Baier, as well as a witness for Baier, all from Staff W, testified that Hohberg was Chief of Staff and Pohl testified that the designation was correct. Hohberg should not have relied so heavily upon the SS covering up for a non-member. There was some justification for his reliance, however, because when he and Volk were in prison in the British Zone, Hohberg, according to Volk's testimony, became worried about the position he had held and asked Volk to give him an affidavit. Volk obliged and even went to the extreme of saying in it that there was never such an office in existence, nor did it have that name, nor did it perform any functions for the Party or the SS or the Reich. But the ties of blood-brotherhood did not exist for Hohberg, and he was thrown overboard here in Nurnberg. On the stand, Volk testified that the Chief of Staff W was a position just as real as the positions of any other office chief from W-I to W-VIII and that Hohberg held it.
Perhaps the most ridiculous defense asserted here is Hohberg's claim that, while he was working for the SS, he was sabotaging the SS by secretly transferring its industries away from it. This he was doing, he says, by financing them from funds of the Reich, rather than using Party funds. There are three answers. First, he could not have been so stupid as to think that Himmler, Reichsfuehrer-SS, would pay any attention to Hohberg's bookkeeping entries if an issue were ever raised.
Second, it could be of no possible concern to the SS whether the industries were technically owned by the Party or the Reich: they would still be under Himmler and the SS. Himmler was a Reich official as well as a party official and the Waffen-SS was his agency in Reich matters. Third, Hohberg knew that the Reich was just as criminal in its activities as the party. The concentration camps were Reich concentration camps; loot from the Reinhardt Action became Reich profits; and the extermination program was a Reich program. And for the inmates it could make no difference whether they were dying in Reich industries or Party industries. The defendant Volk, the third member in the dock from Amtsgruppe W, also attempts today to reduce his position in Staff W to that of an office boy or messenger. At most, he would, have us believe, he was just the attorney for the industries. Actually he was much more than that. He held positions in so many SS industries that that was given as the reason for his lapse of memory regarding some of them. In addition he was Procurist of DWB, the head of the legal office in Staff W, deputy to the Chief of Staff W, and Pohl's personal legal assistant. In this latter position he claims that he dealt only with Pohl's personal matters, but this is contradicted by his testimony that in many cases it was impossible to determine in which of his capacities he was acting. Even his secretary, he said, could not tell.
It is of course inevitable that by reason of their positions the defendants in Staff W, Hohberg, Baier, and Volk would have intimate contacts with the use of inmate labor in tire SS industries. Even if documents were not available to prove individual instances, that much would have been clear from the Table of Organization. But the documentation fully bears out their continuous participation.
Only a few examples need be recalled - negotiations by Hohberg when the workshops in Dachau Concentration Camp were reorganized and incorporated into the DAW; negotiations establishing the amount the Reich was to receive for the rental of inmates to the SS industries; settlement of claims against the central insurance account under Staff W for business losses caused to SS industries by insufficient supplies of inmates; negotiations by Baier with Maurer and Klein for inmate labor used by Amt W-VIII; negotiations by Baier and Vogt for guards and barracks for inmate laborers to be used on the slate oil project, and the reports sent to Staff W by the German Slate Oil Company, of which Vogt was a partner, on the appalling death rates of the inmates; negotiations by Baier with the Auschwitz Concentration Camp for barracks for inmates to be used by the Gentellent firm; supervision of OSTI; participation by Hohberg, Volk, and Baier in loans from the Reinhardt fund; the part Staff W played in converting Stutthof into a concentration camp; and Baier and Volk's trip to the Litzmannstadt Ghetto to recommend to Pohl whether it should be converted into a concentration camp.
The result of the Litzmannstadt investigation was that the Ghetto was destroyed, and thousands of Jews were killed. Greiser wrote to Pohl, sending a copy to Baier and Volk, that "The Ghetto Litzmannstadt is not to be transferred into a concentration camp, as was emphasized by SS Oberfuehrer Baier and SS Hauptsturmfuehrer Dr. Volk". He went on to report that the personnel of the Ghetto would therefore be reduced through the action of a Sonderkomnando. Both Baier and Volk claim to know nothing about this matter, although the memorandum was addressed to them. Another memorandum which Dr. Horn of OSTI said he was forwarding to Baier and Volk reported that Eichmann and Kaltenbrunner were interested in the matter, and that before Baier and Volk went to Litzmannstadt, there were five hundred "reductions by death" per month in the Ghetto.
The infamous OSTI was under the supervision of Staff W and Hohberg and Volk were present at the conference at which OSTI's aims were fixed - the utilization of Jewish property and Jewish labor.
We have already referred to the essential part which Amtsgruppe C, the construction department of the WVHA, played in the concentration camp system, the extermination of Jews, and in the demolition of the Warsaw Ghetto. Kiefer was the senior office chief and deputy chief of the whole Amtsgruppe while this latter assignment was being carried out.
During the war, Amtsgruppe C undertook large scale construction of buildings and plants used in the munitions industries. This project became the largest user of concentration camp labor. The office within Amtsgruppe C which was competent for the drafting of construction plans for armament installations was under the defendant Kiefer.
The construction office from its beginning was an integral part of the concentration camp system. It built and maintained the concentration camps, and used inmate labor in all of its building projects The history of the supervision of concentration camp construction by the WVHA goes back to the first concentration camp, at Dachau. In November 1933, building matters for the Dachau camp were taken over by the Vorwaltungsamt-SS from Eicke. Eirenschmalz became chief of the construction office in the Administrative Office in 1935 and a letter written by Pohl to the SS Main Office in 1937 states that Eirenschmalz was responsible for the numerous construction projects carried out by that agency. The blue prints and documents prove that one of the projects for which he was responsible was the construction of the Buchenwald crematorium. In the WVHA both Kiefer and Eirenschmalz were concerned with construction projects in the concentration camps. The table or organization and the blue prints show that Kiefer drew the plans for sick barracks for the inmates and troops in the concentration camp. Blue prints bearing Kiefer's signature for such construction projects in the Auschwitz concentration camp are in evidence. The documents show that Pohl's office retained control over the construction of crematorium and gas chambers to the end. The famous gas chambers and crematorium known as "Barracks X" at Dachau was ordered, checked and approved by the WVHA.
Amt C-I and C-III planned and supervised the construction, and the job of making a preliminary examination of the expenses of such projects.
There is positive proof that Eirenschmalz, Chief of C-VI, made such preliminary examination of the accounts in the building of the gas chamber Auschwitz. Eirenschmalz also checked and approved applications for maintenance work in the concentration camps. These were Eirenschmalz's contribution to the solution of the problem of the interior races - the Jews, Poles and Russians.
Amtsgruppe B of the WVHA was the supply department for the concentration camps. Its chief was the defendant Georg Loerner, its deputy chief was the defendant Tschentscher (who was also in charge of the food office) and the defendant Scheide was the chief of the transportation office. The many diversified functions of Georg Loerner illustrate the complete integration of the various Amtsgruppe of the WVHA. In the first of the SS administrative organizations which preceded the WVHA, the Verwaltungsamt-SS, Georg Loerner was Chief of the Main Department V-3, responsible for clothing the inmates and for supply of clothing for the Death Head units. When this bureau was reorganized, Georg Loerner became the budget chief of the Main Office. One of his sub-offices, I-5, was in charge of labor allocation of inmates. In the WVHA, he was Chief of Amtsgruppe B, responsible for food and clothing for concentration camps, Deputy Chief of Amtsgruppe W and second manager of the holding company of the SS industries, and Deputy Chief of the entire Main Office.
In these various offices Georg Loerner was successively responsible for supply, finance, for labor allocation, and for the SS industries.
THE PRESIDENT: We will suspend, Mr. Higgins, until a quarter to two.
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is in recess until 1345 hours.
(Noon recess until 1345 hours, 17 September 1947)
AFTERNOON SESSION (The hearing reconvened at 1400 hours)
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.
MR. HIGGINS: If the Tribunal please, I should like to continue the reading of the Prosecution's closing statement.
In the previously mentioned W offices subordinated to Georg Loerner his responsibility for supply, for finance, for labor allocation and for the SS industries was definitely established. When anyone talked to Goerg Loerner, they were talking with an expert in every aspect of the WVHA.
The proof establishes his responsibility and that of his Deputy and Chief of Office B I for inadequate clothing and for insufficient food. The contention that the food office was not responsible for food is not credible. Specific instances are proven by witnesses win which Tschentscher did handle concentration camp food. The repudiated pretrial statement of Pohl and the repudiated affidavits of Frank, Vogt, Fanslau and of Goerg Loerner himself all show that Amtsgruppe B was was the highest authority for concentration camp food and since these statements are corroborated by established fact, they should be accepted as true.
That Tschentscher had large supplies of food on hand while inmates were starving to death is not disputed. The evidence shows that inmates died during the winter months from insufficient clothing. Clothing factories under Loerner used inmate labor. Loerner, and Tschentscher as his deputy, have special responsibility for Action Reinhardt.
Georg Loerner, Frank and Pohl visited the Reichbank and were shown the contents by of the vaults by Emil Puhl. Puhl told them that their things were among the loot there. Loerner prepared a report on the 825 carloads of textiles which came from the concentration Camps Auschwitz and Lublin. Burger of Amtsgruppe D reported to him that clothing was coming from "Aktionen in Auchwitz and other camps." The same report refers to arrivals in concentration camps from the "Hungary Program" (Judenaktion), from the Litzmannstadt Ghetto, and to the arrival of 400,000 Poles from Warsaw.
Loerner as Deputy Chief of Amtsgruppe W could have done something about conditions in the SS industries, but he preferred to abdicate his authority to members of Staff W.
The defendant Scheide, Chief of Amt B-V, was in charge of the entire transport system of all the Amtsgruppen of the WVHA. He supplied trucks and other motorized equipment and arms and ammunition to Amtsgruppe D.
But one word now, before we leave the defendants of Amtsgruppe B. There is a mass of evidence concerning the activities of Tschentscher while he was with the SS Viking Division during the Russian campaign in 1941. This will be briefly discussed in a moment, along with the activities of his fellow-officer Fanslau.
If the Tribunal please, Mr. Fulkerson will conclude the presentation of the closing statement.
MR. FULKERSON: Office A-1 through A-5 of Amtsgruppe A were under the supervision of the defendant August Frank, until September , 1943. Sometime after that date, Fanslau, who had been Frank's deputy, became his successor. Each office in Amtsgruppe A played an essential part in the administration of concentration camps. Hans Loerner, as Chief of A-1 was the chief budget officer for them. Here, close coordination between Amtsgruppe A and D was required. D-4 put together the various items of the budget for all concentration camps, according to Pohl "and then passed it on s part of the whole budget of the Waffen SS to Amtsgruppe A which then reviewed the budget for the concentration camp." In May 1942, Hans Loerner and Frank negotiated the budget for 13 concentration camps, including one for women and one for youths. Hana Loerner's report to the Auditing Court concerning Stutthof shows that the Chief of A-1 was required to have extensive knowledge of concentration camp fiscal affairs and negotiations there emphasize the close cooperation of all the WVHA offices in managing them.
Hans Loerner in the Budget Office and later, after April 1944, as chief of A-2 and as Deputy Chief of Amtsgruppe A, is implicated in the Reinhardt Action. It is of course unthinkable that those tremendous sums of moneys were handled without the assistance of Pohl's chief fiscal officers. The secret directive by Pohl , in July 1944 concerning the utilization "of all movable and immovable Jewish belongings" and instructing " that the entire Jewish property is to be incorporated into the Reich property" was sent to Hans Loerner. Pohl admitted on cross-examination that the reason this basic directive was sent to him was because "A-I was the part of the WVHA which dealt with the central regulations of this matter". Over 6,800,000 Rm from the Reinhardt Action was credited to the SS Savings Association, another of Hans Loerner's projects, so that the German Red Cross could be repaid the money which it had lent various SS industries through the Savings Association. This whole transaction is very complicated: one of the wheels within wheels was that Pohl was one of the directors of the German Red Cross.
The second office in Amtsgruppe A, under Hans Loerner after April 1944, was the treasury Office. It was this Amt which physically received the gold and jewelry from the murdered inmates and passed the watches on to Sommer in D-II. Since Mellmer, one of the subordinates of A-II, was not able to join the reunion here, owing to a previous engagement, most of the criminality for this project has been blamed upon him. A-III under Frank himself was the legal office. It's function was to handle the legal details in the purchase of concentration camp sites. A-IV under the defendant Vogt audited the books of the concentration camps and checked the proceeds of the Action Reinhardt.
The defendant Fanslau was in charge of the personnel office of the WVHA which was the fifth office in Amtsgruppe A.
He was Frank's deputy and after Franks' departure he was the senior officer there. In May or June 1944 he was charged with the direction of the entire Amtsgruppe. The proof shows that Office A-5 under Fanslau was the personnel office within the WVHA, and that all appointments of commandants and administrative officers were cleared through it. Frank and Fanslau deny this, but captured documents prove that it is true. The official chart drawn up in the WVHA describes one of the departments under Fanslau as follows:
"Concentration Camps: replacements, releases, promotions, assignments, transfers, training" (attached to Amtsgruppe D).
In addition, actual transfers of concentration camp commanders, signed by Fanslau have been introduced as part of the Prosecution's rebuttal evidence. In this connection , the proof also shows that personnel from the WVHA was transferred to the East and placed at Globocnik's disposal for use in Action Reinhardt and the Osti operations. Fanslau's denials in this respect are contradicted by these official reports.
A few remarks on the participation of Fanslau and Tschentscher in the campaign of frightfulness conducted by the SS Viking Division in Poland and Russia will have to be interpolated parenthetically here. Fanslau, as administrative officer of the Viking Division, was one of its highest ranking officers. Tschentscher was his deputy. They were in command of the Supply Battalion of the Viking Division.
On direct examination, when Fanslau was asked about the mistreatment of Jews, he made the following statement:
"I may say that during my whole time of service at the front with the WaffenSS , and also with the police, I saw nothing which indicated in any sense of the word from a human soldier, or any international point of view anything that would have been illegal.
Individual offenses which happen in all armies of the World after all, so far as I could see at the time, were prosecuted legally whereby justice was done."
We will refer to the testimony of Otto only for the purpose of corroborating the testimony of other witnesses. The testimony of Fanslau, Tschentscher, Sauer, Jollek, Goldstein and Otto all place the Supply Battalion at Tarnopol and Zclozow at the very time when wholesale massacres of the Jewish population were taking place. These massacres are proved by the Einsatzgruppen as well as by the testimony of Sauer, Goldstein, Jollek and Otto. That Jews were rounded up and forced to work in the slaughter houses at Tarnopol by the men of the Supply Battalion is proved by the testimony of Sauer, Goldstein and Otto. That they were killed there was known by Goldstein, who helped to bury them, and by Otto, who heard of it. Sauer saw them mistreated there by members of the Supply Battalion. He positively identified not only the trucks but also the personnel of that unit.
That the Supply Battalion participated in the killing of Jews at Zclozow was seen by Jollek and Otto. Jollek know that the men from the Viking division, particularly the personnel which was engaged in hauling food, were among those carrying out these murders.
Sauer saw a non-commissioned officer of the Supply Battalion kill six Jews with a Tommy gun at another place and witnessed numerous mistreatments of Jews by members of that unit.
One of the most significant points of Sauer's testimony was that after Tschentscher was transferred , he never saw another incident of this kind. In considering Tschentscher's credibility in this matter, it should be remembered that he testified that he left the Supply Battalion in November 1941, whereas his own affidavit, his official transfer and his personal service record all fixed the date of his detachment from the Viking Division as December 31.
If General Yamashita could be executed for being the commanding general in charge of troops who committed atrocities several provinces away from his headquarters in Manila, Fanslau and Tschentscher should be made to bear their responsibility for what was done all around them by men whom they knew by name.
Such then in brief is the responsibility of these defendants for the crimes with which they have been charged. Few of these men committed murder with their own hands, but all are as guilty of murder as the operators of the gas chambers in Auschwitz. The concentration camps were one of the cornerstones of the Third Reich. The enormity of the crimes committed in those lawless jungles has been amply proved , and indeed has not been disputed by the defendants * The weary months of defense testimony have rather been devoted to a denial of knowledge of that which was known to the whole world and a relegation of responsibility to dead men. If these men are not responsible for the concentration-camp crimes then no one is guilty. In the absence of Hitler and Himmler responsibility for the concentration camps can be pushed no higher than these surviving members of the WVHA. Theirs was the power to establish and operate concentration camps. Theirs was the function to exploit the labor of the subjected peoples who were incarcerated behind the electric fences of the camps. Theirs was the task to make profitable the destruction of human lives on a mass basis . These things they did and gloried in them.
It is no use to say, as some have done, that they could not have prohibited the slaughter of Jews and the enslavement and degradation of uncounted millions. Even if it is true it is no defense. It may be that Hitler and Himmler could have found other men, other Pohls and Franks and Learners, but these defendants are the men who eagerly did his bidding.
They performed essential, functions and held responsible positions in the administration of a system of murder, torture and enslavement. They knew of the aims and practices of that system, and knowing that, devoted their best efforts to the promotion of that system. They participated in crimes of unprecedented magnitude and horror.
Justice can only be served by capital, punishment.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Seidl, we will hear your argument.
DR. SEIDL: (Attorney for Defendant POHL): Your Honors, before I turn to my defense of Oswald Pohl I would like to make a few remarks concerning the sequence in which the defense will introduce their final pleas for their respective clients.
The Tribunal has informed us that at the latest on Saturday night all final pleas will have to have been introduced. In order to distribute the time at our disposal in a fair manner, the defense has written up a schedule and I have been appointed to show this schedule to the Tribunal. I take the liberty of asking the Tribunal whether it agrees with my proposal or not. This is nothing but a proposal on the part of the defense, and, as far as the recesses are concerned, of course, this is up to the Tribunal.
As we have figured out so far, the defense counsel for August Frank, apart from myself, and also the defense counsel for Hans Loerner will introduce their final pleas to-day. Tomorrow defense counsel for Fanslau, Vogt, Georg Loerner, Tschentscher, Scheide, and Kiefer will introduce their pleas. According to my opinion, it will be a quarter to nine before we can finish tomorrow.
On Friday we propose to have the defense counsel for Eirenschmalz, Sommer, Pook and Hohberg give their final pleas, and that will probably require time until a quarter to five.
On Saturday, according to this proposal, the foliowing defendants will be able to speak, namely, the defense counsel for Volk, Bobermin, Mummenthey, Klein, and the last one, Baier. According to our schedule, I believe we will be able to finish by 7:15 p.m.
The defense has agreed to propose this sequence in which the final pleas will be introduced because that is how it introduced its evidence, namely, in the same manner as the defendants are sitting, and it is to be assumed that defense counsel will refer to certain things which have been mentioned before.
THE PRESIDENT: How late do you propose to stay in session tomorrow?
DR. SEIDL: For tomorrow? Well, from 9 o'clock on until a quarter to nine.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, we would be perfectly willing to sit tonight from 7:30 to 9:30.
DR. SEIDL: Yes. That is fine. That is just about what we thought it would be, Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, will that make any change in tomorrow night, if we do that, if we sit tonight?
DR. SEIDL: No, it wouldn't Your Honor, it wouldn't. According to our schedule, we would probably work until 8:30 or 9:00. However, I don't doubt that defense counsel for Fanslau, who is right after me, will also be ready to start with his final plea.
THE PRESIDENT: All right, we will be in session then from now until 5:30 or until you have finished, Dr.Seidl, and then we will come back at 7:30 and sit until 9:30. Now does your schedule contemplate sitting tomorrow night, Thursday, Friday night, and Saturday night?
DR. SEIDL: Yes, indeed, Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: How late tomorrow night? You said nine o'clock?
DR. SEIDL: Tomorrow night until a quarter to nine p.m.
THE PRESIDENT: And Friday night?
DR. SEIDL: And on Friday until approximately a quarter to six. Of course, Your Honor, we could also take in some defense counsel who would normally speak on Saturday. They could speak on Friday.
THE PRESIDENT: What about Saturday?
DR. SEIDL: On Saturday I propose that we start at nine o'clock in the morning as usual and if the five defense counsels can finish by then, I imagine we will be working until 7:15 p.m.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, on Monday we will have to give some time for the statements of each defendant. That will take about three hours, assuming ten minutes for each man. That would be 180 minutes, or three hours, but we can use the rest of Monday.
We can use Monday forenoon for arguments. I think we will do it this way, Dr. Seidl. We will sit tonight, 7:30 to 9:30, tomorrow night until 5:30, Friday until 5:30, Saturday night all night, if necessary, until we are all asleep, and then finish up, if necessary, Monday morning. Will that be agreeable?
DR. SEIEL: Yes, indeed, Your Honor. I believe that all defense counsels agree with this proposal.
THE PRESIDENT: That still leaves us Sunday, if we have to, Heaven forbid. All right, that will be the program them. That is, we come back at 7:30 to 9:30, tomorrow night 5:30, Friday night 5:30, Saturday night forever, and Monday morning.
DR. RAUSCHENBACH (Attorney for Defendants August Frank and Hans Loerner):
Your Honors, I would appreciate it if this evening the Court could possibly begin at seven o'clock or then finish at 10 o'clock, because I shall need two hours for my two defendants and then I believe I will be interrupted right in the middle of my final plea.
THE PRESIDENT: That is all right. We will start at 7 and we will stay until you finish.
DR. RAUSCHENBACH: Thank you very much, Your Honor.
DR. SEIDL: Dr. Seidl for the defendant Oswald Pohl. Your Honor, the final plea for the Defendant Oswald Pohl, which is before you now, is, as can be seen by the index, divided into 12 parts. Considering the time at my disposal, I will not read everything I have in the index and I shall limit myself to quoting certain excerpts. In order to give you a clear picture of what is contained in here, I would like to read the index into the record.
No. 1 deals with Control Council Law No. 10, and particularly with the Crime against Humanity clause.
No. 2 deals with the structure and development of the SS-Administration from 1 February 1934 until 3 March 1942.
No. 3 deals with the development and position of the Inspectorate of the Concentration Camps.
No. 4 deals with the incorporation of the Inspectorate of the Concentration camps into the Main Economic and Administrative Office.
No. 5 deals with the labor allocation of the inmates of concentration camps.
No. 6 deals With the lotting and sequestration of property in the occupied countries.
No. 7 deals with the medical experiments.
No. 8 deals with Operation 14 F 13, Euthanasia.
No. 9 deals with the Operation Reinhardt.
No. 10 deals with the Warsaw Ghetto.
No. 11, "Acting Under Orders", and all the main questions in that connection.
And finally, No. 12, the limitations of the Legal Responsibility of the Defendant Oswald Pohl in his capacity as Head of the Main Economic and Administrative Office.
Your Honors, in paragraph No. 1, I have a short legal argument which is in connection with Control Counsel Law No, 10 and that particularly refers to the crime against humanity. I did that in order to prevent the other defense counsel from repeating these points. I would appreciate it if the Tribunal would take judicial notice of these articles and I believe I will not read it into the records.
No. 2, which deals with the development of the SS Administration from 1 February 1934 until 3 March 1942 I shall not read. The defendant Pohl while on the witness stand describe this development in great detail to the Tribunal and I direct your attention to his testimony.
I would like to turn to Article 3. I am reading that. That is on page 24 of this draft.
Title: Development and Position of the Inspectorate Concentration Camps.
The creation of further concentration camps in the years 1933 to 1936, beside the Dachau concentration camp, resulted in the commander of the Dachau camp, the later SS-Obergruppenfuehrer Eicke, being commissioned with the personal leadership and administration of all existing concentration camps, acting as their highest authority.
The office which was appointed for this purpose as supreme governing and supervising organ was called "Inspectorate of Concentration Camps". Eicke himself was appointed "Inspector of Concentration Camps". His official residence was first in Berlin later in Cranienburg.
The Inspectorate of Concentration Camps was the highest Supervising authority for these camps. The camp commanders were exclusively and directly subordinated to and responsible to the Inspector. They received all the orders and directions which referred to administrative matters of the concentration camps from the Inspector alone and via him personally.
As far as police measures and executive measures were concerned, the Inspector was bound by the directions and decrees of the Reich Security Main Office (RSHA) and, above all, of the Secret State Police (Office IV of the Reich Security Main Office). The Inspector had only to receive these directions, decrees, and orders and to pass them on to the camp commanders. The Inspector did not have any executive authority of his own. Moreover, at each concentration camp there was established a political department (Department VI), which received its directions straight from the competent offices of the Reich Security Main Office. In this connection I refer to the Law on the Secret State Police of 10 February 1936, excerpts of which I have submitted as evidence to the Tribunal. According to this law, the Secret State Police administered the state concentration camps through the Inspector of Concentration Camps, who was attached to the Secret State Police Office.
The Reichsfuehrer-SS, too, as chief of the German Police, issued his orders either to the Reich Security Main Office, and thus to the Secret State Police Office (Office IV of the Reich Security Main Office), or to the Inspector of Concentration Camps, in exceptional cases even directly to the camp commanders themselves.
All internal administrative matters, in particular problems of food supply, clothing, and lodging of the inmates, were dealt with by the Inspector on his own authority. For the administrative offices of the concentration camps the Inspectorate of Concentration Camps was the highest supervising authority.
To carry out these tasks of administration and supervision, the Inspector of Concentration Camps had at his disposal the Inspectorate with all the necessary technical organs, namely:
a) The Central Office (later Office C-I) which acted as agent for communication with the competent offices of the Reich Security Main Office. The personnel office was also a part of this office.
b) The Office for Medical Matters (later Office D-III), which supervised all health matters in the Concentration camps. It received its professional instructions directly from the Reich Physician SS.
c) The Administration Office (later Office D-IV), which was in charge of all problems of food supply, clothing, and lodging. In this respect it acted independently and war only bound by the general legal administrative instructions or by the administrative orders issued for all administrative offices of the Waffen-SS by the ministerial authority, namely, the Economic and Administrative Office (WVHA).
d) Up to the year 1939/40 there was a Construction Department in addition to these regular supervising organs, which carried out all construction measures taken by the Inspector on his exclusive responsibility, including also the construction of all the concentration camps up to 1939/40.
e) A further office, the Office for Labor Allocation of Inmates (Office D-II), was established in March 1942.
This office got its orders direct from the chief of the Economic and Administrative Main Office and was competent and responsible for the execution of these orders.
After Eicke had been replaced as Inspector in spring 1940, Obergruppenfuehrer Heissmeyer was appointed "Inspector General of Concentration Camps and of SS-Death's Head Units". After a short time he was succeeded, however, by Brigadefuehrer Gluecks as "Inspector of Concentration Camps", while the Inspectorate of Concentration Camps was simultaneously incorporated in the SS Operational Main Office.
With regard to the object of the indictment and to the result of the evidence it does not seem necessary to examine in detail all the legal problems connected with the concentration camps. To supplement the statement of the defendant Oswald Pohl in this trial only a few aspects are referred to:
When on 30 January 1933 Adolf Hitler was commissioned by the Reich President von Hindenberg to form a national government, Germany was confronted by a complete economic breakdown and was on the verge of a civil war. Only the decided concentration of all the forces of the nation could open up a way one of this difficult situation. The government of the Reich believed the elimination of enemies of the state from public life to be indispensable. In the few state concentration camps established before the outbreak of World War II, leading members of the Communist Party in particular were imprisoned, beside criminal elements and other public enemies (anti-social subjects, persons in preventive police detention, and others). People were sent to a concentration camp - if political reasons were decisive for this fact - as the result of an "order for protective custody" by the Secret State Police. The estab lishment of the protective custody as well as the concentration camps themselves had as a legal bases the "Decree of the Reich President for the Protection of the People and the State, dated 28 February 1933". This decree was a so-called emergency decree in the sense of Article 48, paragraph 2, of the Weimar Reich Constitution.
It was issued by Reich President von Hindenburg. The so-called fundamental laws of the Reich constitution were cancelled by this decree with the object of making it possible for the state authorities, in particular the Security Police, to make the necessary encroachments upon personal liberty, property, freedom of association and assembly, freedom of speech, etc. etc.
There can be no doubt that by the decree of the Reich President for the Protection of the People and the State dated 28 February 1933 the foundations of the so-called "constitutional state" were removed to a large extent. However, it is just as certain that the suppression of the fundamental laws of the constitution and the establishment of state concentration camps in themselves cannot be regarded as constituting any kind of punishable action. Germany as a sovereign state was at liberty to regulate her internal affairs. The measures taken by the Reich Government through the State Police can be condemned from the point of view of penal law all the less as at that time Germany was doubtless in a difficult position, and as the conservation of a formal constitutional security in itself cannot be considered as having any absolute value, however desirable it may be.
The weaknesses of the so-called free society are too obvious to be overlooked for a long time. The experience of recent history has shown that the institutions of the constitutional state can only be considered as safe when, beside the allegiance of the state and its organs to the law, a minimum of social security and material justice are guaranteed by means of suitable measures.
It is also known that formerly as well as nowadays both outside and within the borders of the German Reich there existed and exist camps in which prisoners were detained and are being detained for their political convictions alone. In this connection attention is drawn to the Law of 5 March 1946 for the Liberation from National Socialism and Militarism, promulgated in the Laender of the U.S. Zone, which provides for an imposition of "labor camp" up to 10 years. This is a political measure which is carried into effect against persons solely on account of their former political convictions, regardless of an offense against any penal law.