During the period of their activity they were actually under the command of the commander-in-chief of the army groups or the armies, and in the case of the Einsatzkommandos, under the command of the armies, corps or divisions. The basic order for killing was given by the Fuehrer to the Einsatzgruppen by way of Himmler and Heydrich, but the army had the same order with the special directive to support the Einsatzgruppen and the Einsatzkommandos in carrying out this order. And this actually happened. Beyond this, however, it was the sole responsibility the commander-in-chief of the army, if, where, and when the basic order for killing waste be carried out by the Einsatzkommandos. Moreover, the command situation resulted in the fact that the Einsatzgruppen regularly received orders from the army units and carried then out, which includes the orders for massexecutions. The position of the chief of the Einsatzgruppen was not an independent one but it was part of the machinery of the army hierarchy and its rank was below the position of the G-2 or G-2/A0 of the army of army group. defendants, especially the defendant Ohlendorf in the machinery of the Army Units, the only thing that must be grasped is the "power", the "authority to give orders" and the "freedom of personal opinion" and therefore the actual responsibility of the defendant.
The defendant Ohlendorf was subject to a dual command. First to the basic order of the German Chief of State and Supreme Commander of the German Armed Forces, the so frequently mentioned Fuehrer Order given to him via Himmler and Heydrich. Additional and individual orders were received from the Commander in Chief of the Army to whose Staff he was assigned. He was a soldier, an Officer in the service rank of a Battalion Commander at the front in the war. Prosecution accuses him of having contributed to, contained the instruct ion to kill, so as to maintain security in his sphere of operations, the Jews, Gipsies, Communistic Functionaries and active Communists, as well as all persons who represented a danger to the security for German forces.
was given once and for all to the Chiefs of Einsatzgruppen and Kommando Chiefs in Pretsch and was not cancelled during the tine of Ohlendorf's Einsatz. Without, in this connection, going into the individual problems posed by this Order, the question of legality of such an Order with the authority of a law or its relation to International Law or Morality here, the only thing to be grasped is that Ohlendorf received it as a soldier in a subordinate position and with the knowledge that his highest Disciplinary Superiors Himmler and Heydrich were inexorably behind this Order. material, including the sketch of his career submitted by the Prosecution as a Document, that he did not get into this Order situation voluntarily, guiltily, frivelously, or for his own ends, but that he was sent to the Einsatzgruppe on Himmler's Order after having twice refused. It is all the more astonishing thatthe prosecution now in its final statement makes assertions against Otto Ohlendorf of which they know, according to the contents of their own presentation of evidence, that the pre-requisites, of th*se assertions do not apply to Ohlendorf. Referring to promotion regulations of Himmler for members of the Security Police and SD it reads in the above-mentioned place, on page 15a to 16, and I quote: "All Germans in this trial insist that they are drafted for service with the Einsatzgruppen and that they had no option other than to obey. It may be remarked most respectfully that all these defendants including Ohlendorf were highly trained Police Officers, who wanted to rise in the profession of their own choice. Therefore, there aversion to serve with the Einsatzgruppen which they have sworn on oath now, cannot be recognised as true where everyone was trying so eagerly to advance in the career he had chosen for himself."
prosecution that Ohlendorf prior to or at the time of the assignment in Russia was a "highly placed Police Officer". The career submitted by the Prosecution as a Document proves the contrary. So that he cannot have wished either to rise in this "profession of his choice". His profession at this time was undisputedly Business Manager of the Reich Group Trade.
the position of "possibility for advancement" through HIMMLER. It is just as undisputed that at this time he had no material income in the SD nor did he expect it.
If therefore from these arguments is to be gathered the "implied" consent or consent of OHLENDORF, inferred at the close of the letter of the Prosecution, to the activities of the Einsatzgruppen in question in this trial, then these arguments, to begin with, must prove the contrary since the opposite of what they state is an established fact. consequences, not even tacitly, the hearing of witnesses has shown unequivocally. OHLENDORF's statement that at the issuing of orders in Pretsch he protested loudly and clearly against the Fuehrer Order was confirmed by the defendant BLUME in Cross Examination by the Prosecution. The Prosecution has not disputed the fact either that in Nikolajew in October 1941 he tried personally with HIMMLER to undermine the execution of the Order. The defendants BRAUNE, SEIBERT and SCHUBERT have repeatedly demonstrated in the Cross Examination that 0, never agreed to the Fuehrer Order. OHLENDORF himself gave neither a general nor an individual order for killing nor over killed anyone himself.
And so controversy surrounds the "duty" of the defendant, which he in his position, as I have described above, had regarding actions of which his Einsatzgruppe is accused in this trial. It is to be examined whether on account of this "duty" as he performed it, according to legal and reasonable opinion he can be accused of "guilty patronage" as the Prosecution would like to impute at the end of their final statement. We have now won the ground to enable us to see how wide the general assertions of the Prosecution are of the reality of conditions with the Einsatzgruppen.
each of the defendants had a position of responsibility or a command post in an Extermination Unit. By virtue of this position the defendants, in this case OHLENDORF, had had at all time the competency to order executions independently. The defendants were bound by law if not by their consciences to refrain from such activities and in so far as they had had power, to prevent crimeson the part of those subordinate to them. It is a legal and moral duty to prevent the execution of innocent people, to limit it, and condemn it, a duty which all the defendants had obviously violated. The rank and position of these defendants had conferred the competency and the duty to exercise a control over their subordinates and they had violated this duty.
The "duty" of the defendant was to obey as a soldier to see to it that ordersgiven by his supreme superior and the undisputed supreme representative of his State, with their contents, were carried out, in doing which the inexorable will behind them was supposed to have been the motive of his own action.
"The"competency" of the defendant was to carry through this order with all available means. That alone was the extent of his scope in deciding and judging. Anyone who should state otherwise, struggles consciously or unconsciously against the reality of the situation. Carrying out this duty laid down and observance of this competency ordered could never be made the subject of an accusation directed against the defendant in his subordinate position.
What, then, has the defendant actually done? Has he actually reaped the consequences of his inner and outward attitude to the HITLER Order? in Document No. NO 5866 (Interrogation of Dr. Roman LOOS) submitted in their Document Book 5 D: In how far do possibilities exist for avoiding a military order in general.
This Document refers, it is true, to the possibility of avoiding, that one of the highest Officers with rank of Field Marshal or General is supposed to have. If however in spite of that I consider briefly the result of interrogation of Dr. Roman LOOS undertaken by the Prosecution through Herr RAPP then the witness says, in substance the following:
1.) Possibility, and I quote: "If the scrutiny (of the order) revealed that it concerned an order of an illegal and immoral character then the possibility existed to achieve the revocation or alteration of the order by the higher office by stating all considerations. If his point of view was not shared by his superiors the military leader was placed in a position either of being elevated to historical greatness by his refusal to comply with the order or else of becoming the instrument of a criminal clique by complying with the given order." I quote further: "He would have had the possibility to reject the order. The consequence would have been self- annihilation and indirectly a certain historical rise. It was obvious that for refusing a fundamental order he would have been tried by a Court or as we know today would have been sent to a concentration camp. But if someone after having recognized the immorality and illegality of an order, rejects, and takes the consequences upon himself, he is to be regarded as a hero from a historical point of view".
2.) Possibility - I quote: (p. 27).
"It is reasonable to expect from an Army Commander who solved the conflict in his favour by passing on the order recognized as illegal and immoral that he will at least do everything to cut down to a minimum the stringency, of the order thus restricting its disastrous consequences to a minimum".
I quote further: (p. 28).
"1.) Corresponding formulation of the executory orders, especially accurate definitions and exact limitations with regard to subordinate units.
"2.) Corresponding verbal instructions during official meetings or tours of inspection to the junior commanders who have to execute the order. In particular to inform subordinates confidentially about one's own interpretation of the order.
3.) Corresponding directives to the G-2 to supervise the execution of the order which was passed on, especially not to insist on its strict execution and to inform the subordinate G-2 of this.
4.) Report to the High Command of the Armed Forces.
a) References to previous unfavorable experiences after execution of the order, with the aim of achieving the revocation or amendment of the order.
b) Faked reports about measures taken.
A comparison between OHLENDORF's method of acting and the Prosecution's discussion shows that O. although he did not hold the rank of a Field Marshal or General but that of a Battalion Commander subordinated to the Army, did everything, after failing to achieve the revocation of the order in spite of his protest in Pretsch and his later attempt in Nikolajew, to exhaust the second possibility completely, without support of the Army or other authoritative circles. possibility. The defendant OHLENDORF did everything in his power to limit the effects of the orders issued to his Einsatzgruppe and the Einsatzkommandos under him. It has been established by his own statement and the statement of those co-defendants who worked in his Einsatzgruppe that O. issued supplementary orders the sole purpose of which was to limit the scope for judgment in interpretation of the fundamental orders for the Kommando chiefs and to exclude their extensive effect; thus he prevented by prohibiting the pogrom ordered, the wild and uncontrollable killing and ordered strictly that the killing arranged for might only be undertaken according to military principles in an orderly and con trolled manner.
He forbade all killings in fulfilment of the Fuehrer Order on foreign sovereign territory (Roumanian Sovereign Territory), (compare statements of BRAUNE, RUEHL, OHLENDORF), he saw to it that in the case of the Jewish Group comprising several thousands of people who had been driven by the Roumanians into German sovereign territory everything was done to get these people back to Roumanian territory on their way home. From the same motives he had agreed with his subordinates not to pick out Jewish children. His only partially successful effort to save the Carmanians and Crimtschaks too, the order to sort out the non-partisans in the case of the retaliatory action of the Army in Eupatoria and protect them against the shooting, prove likewise that OHLENDORF exhausted every possibility of limiting the scope of the Fuehrer Order. By supplementary orders concerning registration and transport he tried to curtail inso far aspossible and eliminate the mental and physical agencies and sufferings of the unfortunate victims; the prohibition of the undressing of the victim served the same purpose too. O. issued instructions to prevent all possibility of enrichment from the estates of these killed, so as to afford no incentive to killing. Also the directive to individual Kommandos to keep secret the number of executions reported to avoid the inciting of false ambition in other Kommandos, not to give rise to the impression that Einsatzgruppe D placed any value on the greatness of the reported numbers, served the sane end. filled the requirements of the Prosecution doing all in his power to prevent, limit and condemn the effect of the orders issued. In many respects even he exceeded his authority, took upon himself, as shown by HIMMLER's personal intervention in October, 1941, obviously limiting and delaying contravention of the orders given. OHLENDORF's activity as guilty, that is, intentional favoring of crimes I must leave to the court to decide.
At all events in considering his method of acting the fact must not be overlooked that all this interference on the part of OHLENDORF in the course of the events was not an activity which furthered the deeds but as demonstrated a restrictive activity which limited, delayed, and, insofar as possible, prevented the ffect of the actions ordered.
This kind of aiding and abetting is however in accordance with general legal principles not genuinely in the sense of a punishable action. This kind of activity refeals rather the distinct desire and clear intention to obstruct the course of the actions ordered in so far as that is possible. In this sense Ohlendorf's approach to Himmler himself in the end must be valuated too, when the latter inspected him in October 1941 in Nikolajew. He knew Himmler, and had heard scarcely an hour before his speech to all men assembled in which Himmler renewed the Fuehrer Order and ordered its strictest execution. Ohlendorf approached Himmler inspite of that. The fact that no answer was ever vouchsafed by Himmler was an indication of the dangerous way in which he had ventured forward and exposed himself. It is obvious that Ohlendorf's so doing had already exceeded the limits of his possibilities. Amendment of the Fuehrer Order was not within his power and still much less in his sphere of command. He was given no scope for judgment either, not to carry out this order. immediately clearly recognisable if one followed his activity as Head of Office III SD after he returned from the Einsatz. Here he was not in a military machine under military command but was relatively independent in his work, that is, the tactical situation within the German heirarchy made relatively independent action through circumvention of his highest superiors possible for him. In the chapter concerning Ohlendorf's membership of the SD I have adequately proved this fact. And with this his behavior, the attested inner attitude of Ohlendor and his behavior concerning the Fuehrer Order and the compulsory events of the Einsatzgruppe must always be compared. An unbiased consideration of Ohlendorf's behavior and activity during the Russian Einsatz can only result in showing that he acted from the same sentiment which characterized him both before and after the Russian campaign. accuses the defendants, I must now ask the Tribunal to listen for a few minutes to the consideration of the probative value of the Documents submitted by the Prosecution to support its accusations.
The evidence of the Prosecution is documentary. In the course of the examinations of the defendants on the witness stand mistakes and inconsistencies were continually mentioned in connection with the discussion of the documents submitted by the Prosecution not only in the "Operational Situation Reports from the USSR" and in the "Reports from the Occupied Eastern Territories" which replaced them after 1 May 1942, but also in the discussion of the affidavits and personnel records of the defendants submitted by the Prosecution. I shall limit myself to the "Operational Situation Reports from the USSR" and the "Reports from the Occupied Eastern Territories", since the defendants' affidavits and the personnel records have been discussed in detail during the interrogations and, on each occasion have been subject to sufficient individual elucidation to give the Tribunal a thorough insight into their probative value. Moreover, they are discussed in the individual final pleas for the defendants. Regarded as individual cases the mistakes and inconsistencies in the "Operational Situation Reports from the USSR" and the "Reports from the Occupied Eastern Territories" might often appear unimportant, as for example, confusion in places, wrong dates, cases of the same figures being counted twice, and other accounting errors concerning liquidation figures mentioned in the reports. Nevertheless, as a whole they are of considerable importance for the question of probative value. In view of the serious nature of the charges brought against the defendants in the indictment there is not only a well-founded reason but also a need and a duty to subject the probative value of the reports submitted by the Prosecution to a careful, objective examination, for in the case of such all-inclusive charges, which as a rule the Prosecution did not advance against the separate defendants in an individual and well substantiated way, shades of meaning and individual wordings in the documents can be regarded as relevant evidence for the mental attitude or individual conduct of the defendants.
Here the examination must not only concern itself with the general probative value of the reports, but especially with the question of to what extent individual sentences or phrases can be regarded beyond any reasonable doubt as indentical with the reports originally issued by the defendants. Only by such an examination can be decided as to what extent the documents give a real impression of the actual happenings in Russia from which relevant evidence can be derived incriminating the individual defendants even in its individual findings. The greater part of the documents submitted by the Prosecution are not eye-witness reports or original operational and situation reports. Of the total number of about 200 documents which have been submitted there are only about 10 items which can be described as original reports, namely, scattered reports to or from offices of the army. Apart from these original documents, which numerically are hardly of any importance and the contents of which are dubious at least, -although even they are not free from errors of carelessness and deliberate misrepresentations -- they consist mainly of operational situation reports by the Chief of the Security Police and the SD, that is, reports which were prepared and summarized from various other reports. document books of the Prosecution only in extracts and excerpts. In preparing them those parts which were not relevant for the Prosecution were left out; it has been the general experience that such excerpts have always have a distorting effect in some way or other; they give a false impression of the nature of the document and disconnect Concrete statements contained in it -- even if they are true -from the context. operational situation report executions are shown as an insolated phenomenon, that is, taken out of the context of the actual events 4 Feb 1948_A_MSD_23_4_Hoxsie (Lea) and situations which were the reasons behind them and magnified into the sole basis of the activity of theEinsatzgruppen.
This fails to show the background conditions, what was happening at the front, the constant danger to which the members of the Kommandos, the German army and the peaceful Russian population were exposed by partisans, terrorists and sabotuers, the observation made on repeated occasions of the dominant part played by Jews among Soviet leaders and the partisan organization, the knowledge, constantly passed on by the members of the Kommandos, of the dominant part of the Jews in the ruthless establishment of Communism in Russia and in the mass liquidations of kulaks, property owners and members of the intelligentsia. It likewise fails to show the actual picture of the over_all activity of the Einsatzkommandos which, predominantly directed toward an enlightened pacification of the Russian areas, included constructive and progressive measures for the benefit of the population. Thus, these documents, which are presented in excerpt from, therefore frequently distort the basic subject in the original report and also prevent one from recognizing mistakes in details from the total context. In an affidavit presented by the Prosecution of the former Criminal Director Kurt Lindow, for a time Special Section Chief in RSHA, IV A 1, has confirmed the fact that the USSR Operational Situation Reports, which were published by the Chief of the Security Police and the SD under the file mark IV A 1, were, as a whole, compiled from the original reports of the Einsatzgruppen "which, were received in my Special Section by radio or written message." Einsatz reports were made; on the contrary, it only confirms their authenticity, which, besides, nobody has doubted. The way in which they were prepared, however, has been established with sufficient clarity by various statements made by witnesses for the defendants, but has also been especially shown in the affidavit submitted in Ohlendorf Document Book la as Document 32, Exh. No. 53, which was given by former Police Councillor Rudolf Fumy.
Fumy is to be adjudged the best specialist for this question, since as an official in special Section IV A 1 he collaborated personally from the very beginning in the compilation of the Einsatz reports and possesses a far more accurate knowledge than Lindow of the way and manner in which the reports were made. That the Operational Situation Reports "were compiled from the original reports of the Einsatzgruppen" must, therefore, be supplemented by the Fumy affidavit to the effect that, to be sure, the detailed original reports of the Einsatzkommandos etc. necessarily proveded the foundation, but that the Einsatz reports are not "moreover only to be regarded to a limited extent as a literal repetition of the original reports". According to Fumy's statement the Einsatz reports were free revisions of the original material received in Special Section IV A 1 of the RSHA. ly the case that the separate Einsatzkommandos and Sonderkommandos reported to the authorized Einsatzgruppen and that the latter then, in entirely different ways, summarized the reports and forwarded them to the Berlin central office. It is to be gathered from the various statements made by witnesses before this Tribunal that these original reports offered the first opportunity for errors to arise. When one of the defendants testified on the witness Stand concerning cessively high figures for the executions which had been carried out, in order to please Heydrich and "was not very exact with his zeros", this fact does not represent an isolated case, but was also applicable to Stahlegger, the chief of Einsatzgruppe A, and Thomas, the leader of Einsatzgruppe C. The defendant Ohlendorf has already called attention to this in his interrogation before the IMT.
(During this trial the uncontested statement was also made that this incorrect reporting originated already with the Kommandos in their reports to the Einsatzgruppen. Therefore, with respect to the figures in the documents submitted the defendant Ohlendorf, judging from his own experience has doubted if even half of the figures cited there come near to the truth. stand and by comparing reports to or from various offices concerning the same period of time (for example, from an Einsatzkommando to the army) that "tactical reports" were constantly made, that is, deliberately false reports which a unit made to protect itself against some other government office. or in the Einsatzgruppen either intentionally or unintentionally for personal or tactical reasons, which are considerable and therefore can in no way be ignored or belittled, were forwarded along the regular message chanel by radio, courier, or military mail to the office in Berlin which rewrote these reports, lacking any possibility of correcting them, or desiring to do so. In the very channelling of the report further errors would occur in radio transmission, which must also be taken into account. Anybody who is familiar with radio procedure knows well enough that mutilations or distortions which are not readily apparent are constantly creeping in. In many cases,then, inquiries are made concerning the correct text. However, wherever, apart from technical deficiencies, there is no compelling need to investigate the correct text or there is not enough time to do this, the receiving office will be satisfied if it can make the text understandable to some extent.
This latter situation actually existed in the RSHA. As must also be explained, they were always pressed for time and there was no authority for checking such things. Here, therefore, is one of the possibilities of explaining why obviously false place names and figures have been repeatedly pointed out in the Operational Situation Reports by witnesses. rewritten with a downright frivolous disregard for the facts, as has been explained and proved with sufficient clarity in the Fumy affidavit already mentioned. The RSHA received collective reports from the Einsatzgruppen, as well as from the agencies of the Wehrmacht, the Higher SS and Police Leaders, for revision. At the same time, however, it also received reports about individual occurrences. By reason of their varied natures and varied purpose these reports naturally covered periods of time, but in spite of over-lapping time periods, place and subject matter they had to be rewritten immediately as Einsatz reports in order to prevent an over-accumulation of material. The working apparatus for this purpose was improvised; an inadequate number of employees with insufficient technical training were swamped by a mass of material which had to be digested in a few hours almost every day in reports of up to 50 pages in length. Fumy employs the expression "nerve-racking" for this. The material could not be compared, there was no time for any further inquiries about it. The fact that it was not possible to do any reliable work in this way was known not only to those directly concerned in it but also to the superior offices in the department. The rewrite men became increasingly reconciled to this and let things slide. The desire for accuracy, as Fumy testifies, was still further decreased by the fact that Mueller, the Chief of Office IV, taking into account the political tensions at any given time, undertook to make changes which were not unimportant", and added or deleted things as he saw fit.
In summing up, therefore, concerning the probative value of the "Opera tional Situation Reports from the USSR" and the "Reports from the Occupied Eastern Territories," which have been submitted by the Prosecution as incriminating documents.
I can state that their probative value with respect to individual conditions and figures listed has not been proved. Insofar as the individual defendants are said to be directly incriminated by the reports, the Prosecution must offer more than merely a reference to an individual statement or an individual quotation from the reports which have been submitted.
DR. ASCHENAUER: Your Honor, I think this would be an appropriate place to adjourn.
PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will be in recess until tomorrow morning at 9:30.
(The Tribunal adjourned until 5 February 1948 at 0930 hours.)
* * * * A. Musmanno, presiding.
THE MARSHAL: Persons in the Courtroom will please find their seats.
Military Tribunal II is now in session. God save the United States of America and this Honorable Tribunal.
THE PRESIDENT: You may proceed.
DR. ASCHENAUER: The questions which are circumscribed by the term "order" belong to the most difficult problems of jurisprudence. This has also been acknowledged by the Allied side. Professor Sheldon Glueck of Harvard University, defines this complex of questions in his book "War Criminals, Their Prosecution and Punishment", as definitely controversial and nebulous. "One of the most intricate technical problems which occurs at the trial of war criminals of the Axis, is contained in the protective assertion that the defendant in committing the prohibited action did so only in carrying out orders of his military superiors." The man who makes this statement is not a run-of-the-mill author, but the foremost American authority in the field of criminal law and criminology and the book in which he makes this judgment has prepared the theoretical basis for all the war crimes trials which we witness today in Germany and in Japan. The book by Professor Glueck has its counterpart in British literature in the essay from the pen of Professor Lauterpacht of the University of Cambridge regarding "The law of Nations and the Punishment of War Crimes" in the British Year Bookof International Law, 1944, page 58 ff. Professor Lauterpacht writes there in quite a similar manner. He defines the problem as opaque, intricate and contradictory in itself and states that the question to what degree consideration should be given to the claim of having acted upon superior orders, represents practically the most significant problem of the war criminal trials.
He writes: "The problem which has been raised by the claim of having acted upon superior orders is, as commonly admitted, a problem of great difficulties, not only in view of international but also of national law. How confused it is may be inferred from the fact that the solution accepted by British and American Military handbooks concerning war crimes are contradictory to those valid in both countries in the field of the constitutional and penal law. Beyond this, the law concerning this subject in those and in other countries in the field of national law is not free of ambiguities and apparent inconsistencies." tribunal in deciding such questions and advise urgently, to act with prudence. Therefore, the following question has to be examined in an especially calm, dispassionate and politically unbiased manner. Can the claim, of haying acted upon superior orders, in the case in question exclude the liability or only mitigate it?
Paragraph II 4 b of Control Council Law no. 10 implies that a total exclusion of responsibility cannot be considered under any circumstances. Because this regulation states: "The fact that any person acted pursuant to the order of his Government or of a superior does not free him from responsibility for a crime but may be considered in mitigation." This regulation must surprise everyone familiar with the pertinent American and British Military Jurisdiction. To wit, it is diametrically opposed to it. A universal exclusion of a claim of having acted upon superior orders was never considered legal in the Anglo-Saxon countries and is not considered to be legal even today with regard to its own citizens. the stipulation of such a strikingly biased point of view against the former adversaries of the Allies. I do not think that I err if I consider Professor Sheldon Glueck to be the spiritual originator.
Referring to section 347 of the American Rules of Land Warfare, Glueck states on page 157 of his book: "The complete and absolute protection of those below the status of 'Commander' in section 347 of the American Rules was probably adopted because the farmers had primarily in mind our own soldiers and the aim was to relieve them entirely of liability in war time in order to encourage greater discipline and obedience.
However, the principle in the rules applies also to any enemy soldiers it may be desirable to prosecute; and in that respect the Anglo-American standard may prove to be troublesome. The matter thus boils down to a question of policy, whether it is more desirable, all around, to retain the principle now in the military manuals or to modify it along the lined suggested. So far as it concerns proceedings in American military commissions the President as Commander-in-Chief can clarify the matter by revision of the American Rules of Warfare through the War Department. In the convention or executive agreement for establishing an International Criminal Court to try certain serious classes of war crimes, a rule of the kind proposed, if Implemented by a sound sentencing policy ought to furnish a satisfactory solution of the superior orders problem." a far-reaching and decisive legal effect. Professor Glueck's intentions are to bring about the unilateral sentencing of merely groups of persons, former war enemies, whom he considers to be punishable, in contrast to the former administration of law of his country.
He states verbatim: "Since the application of the principle of absolute non-liability found in the English and American Rules would render impossible many convictions of Axis war criminals, and since there are differences among the various member States of the United Nations in respect to the regulations and decisions governing the subject of superior orders, a new and realistic rule is necessary both for prosecutions in domestic courts (especially English and American) and those in the proposed International Criminal Court."