Do you agree with His Holiness that that is a correct description of the action of the German Reich against the Catholic Church? "Mit Brennender Sorge", which is Document 3280 PS.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: Your Lordship will find it at Page 40 of Document Book 11 -- I am sorry, My Lord, it is Page 47. I said 40. It is 40 of the German text. BY SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: of March, 1937, four years after the Concordate, and he says in the second sentence -- well, at the beginning: "It discloses intrigues which from the beginning had no other aim than a war of extermination. In the furrows in which we had laboured to sow the seeds of true peace, others - like the enemy in Holy Scripture - sowed the tares of suspicion, discord, hatred, calumny, of secret and open fundamental hostility to Christ and His Church, fed from a thousand different sources and making use of every available means. On then and on them alone and on their silent and vocal protectors rests the responsibility that now on the horizon of Germany there is to be soon not the rainbow of peace but the threatening storm-clouds of destructive religious wars." you agree with that?
Church, how could you possibly write to Hitler, two years after the Concordate, in July, 35, that he had "eliminated political Catholicism without touching the Christian foundations of Germany. It was absolutely wrong, wasn't it, that Hitler and the Nazis had not touched the Christian foundations of Germany? They had uprooted them and were in process of destroying them?
A. Sir David, you are confusing two completely different things, political Catholicism -
Q. Defendant, I don't want to interrupt you, but I have made that point quite clear. The point I am putting to you is not the elimination of political Catholicism. I am not, for the moment, dealing with the relation between you and Msgr. Kaas. What I am dealing with is your other statement, that it had been done without touching the Christian foundations of Germany. What I am putting to you is what His Holiness is saying that the Christian foundations of Germany were being destroyed.
I don't mind, for the moment about the views that Msgr. Kaas had of you or you had of Msgr. Kaas. I know what they are.
A. Perhaps I can explain these things to you. First the struggle against the Church and its institutions, against which His Holiness the Pope, in the years 1937 and 45 turns in his encyclical, and recognizing the intensification of the situation which obtained during the war, all of these things were an attack on the Christian foundations of Germany, an attack which I rejected most strongly all the time; but this has no connection at all with the elimination of the so-called political Catholicism, something which I hoped for and desired. These are two completely different things. Perhaps it is hard for you to understand, since you are not at home in Germany circumstances and in German situations -
Q. Please believe me, Defendant, that I have spent a great deal of time in pursuing the troubles between you and Msgr. Kaas. I am not going to bring them out before the Tribunal because they are not important. I appreciate and agree -- not as well as you do -- but I appreciate the position of political Catholicism and I am not asking you about that. I am asking you about your statement. Why did you say to Hitler that he had not touched the Christian foundations of Germany ? That is what I want to know. You must have known in 35 that that wasn't true ?
A. But, Sir David, you are distorting the things that are set down in this report. I am telling Hitler that the Christian foundations of Germany may not be touched and that is what is set down in this report : that the political Catholicism should be eliminated without touching the Christian foundations of Germany.
Q. Well, you appreciate how it begins. You say that "clever hand which eliminates it without touching --". Just let me remind you. Didn't you say, in your interrogation, that your trouble -- part of your trouble in the summer of 1934, before you made the Marburg speech, was due to the nonfulfillment of the Concordate, that after it had been signed of paper and I couldn't do anything". Then there was the persecution of the churches and the Jews at the same time. That was late in 1933 and 34. Your view was, in 1934, "that there had not only been treating of the Concordate as a scrap of paper but persecution of both the churches and the Jews "?
A. I do not know which document you are quoting from, Sir David.
Q. This is your interrogation on the morning of the 19th September 1945.
A. Yes, of course. It was my opinion when I delivered the Marburg speech that the State was violating all of these matters. Otherwise, I would not have made this speech; but in this speech, Sir David, I expressly emphasized that no European state can exist without a Christian foundation and that we werethliminating ourselves from the group of Christian peoples and that we were dispensing with or foregoing our Christian foundation. I couldn't have been more specific, could I ? And perhaps I can tell you something else which concerns Political Catholicism. Referring to political Catholicism -
Q Do as you want to. I especially want to avoid burdening the Tribunal with the exchanges between you and Msgr. Kaas, because both of you used harsh language and it might not sound very good if I repeated it now. If you want to go into it, do, but don't open it up unless you must. of the most tremendous, for it violates all of my opinions. adjournment that you had introduced Cardinal Innitzer to Hitler when you went into Austria. You remember the statement to which Dr. Kubuschok has referred, that Cardinal Innitzer in a broadcast from Rome made clear that he was only accepting the Nazi rule of Austria on certain conditions. Do you remember that?
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: This is a new document, My Lord, D-903, which becomes GB-508. My Lord, this is a statement in the form of an affidavit from a priest Dr. Weisbacher, which I only got from Vienna on the 7th of June.
Q (Continuing): You will see that this priest -- well, at any rate I take it he is a priest; he is the Archbishop's secretary in the Cathedral chapter.
Let's just look at it.
"On the 8th of October 1938" -- that is a little over six months after you had arranged for Cardinal Innitzer to meet Hitler -- a serious attack by young demonstrators took place in the Archbishop's palace in Vienna. I was present during it and can therefore describe it from my own experience. The priests took the nuns into an inner room and hid them there. They took behind him, and "Then we two priests, who saw ourselves opposed to a crowd of invaders, took up post at the door of the Cardinal's house chapel in order to prevent any destruction there at least."
"Shortly after we had reached the chapel, the first invaders stormed into the Cardinal's rooms which the chapel adjoins. Right at the door we warded them off. pieces of wood were flung into the chapel; I received a push that caused me to fall, but we managed to prevent any entry into the chapel. The demonstrators were youths aged from 14 to 25, about a hundred of them. After we had warded off the first troop, we opened up the tabernacle and consumed the consecrated wafers so as to prevent the most holy from being descrated. But new invaders stormed up already, whom we warded off. In the meantime, in the remaining rooms an orgy of destruction that cannot be described took place against all the fittings. With the brass rods that held the carpet in place on the staircase the youths destroyed tables and chairs, candelabras and valuable paintings , particularly all crucifixes." alarm when the Cardinal was discovered. This priest himself was dragged from the chapel by about six people and dragged across the anteroom to the window with shouts of "We'll throw the dog out of the window." what was proper reparation.
"Then there came a police lieutenant colonel and apologised; then there appeared a representative of the Gestapo and expressed his regret, stating, however, that the police had not had much desire to intervene."
Then there was a further demonstration against the cathedral rector's house in 3 Stefansplatz, where they threw the cathedral curate Krawatik out of the window into the yard. This priest lay in the hospital until February with a fracture of both thighs.
Now I ask you to look at the penultimate paragraph:
"That the demonstration was not the result of youthful wantonness or the embitterment, but a well thought out plan known to official quarters is obvious from the speech of Gauleiter Buerckel who, on the 13th October in the Heldenplatz, represented the Cardinal as the guilty one in the nearest possible manner." Cardinal Innitzer, had you not? You had introduced him to Hitler. You must have learned from the ramifications and communications of the Catholic church of this attack on the Cardinal's house six months after the Anschluss, did you not?
You must have learned of this. on the principles of the church, the throwing of the cathedral curate out of the window and breaking both his thighs, the desecration of the chapel, the breaking of crucifixes? What protest did you make about it? months I had left my office, that I had nothing whatsoever to do with these matters. This incident was regrettable and was a criminal attack, but the details were not in the press, and I can tell you that I am seeing them for the first time here. But permit me to say the following as well -
THE PRESIDENT (Interposing): But, Defendant, you haven't answered the question. The question was: What complaint did you make about it?
THE WITNESS: No protest at all, My Lord, for I was in no official position at the time. I was just a private citizen at that time, and obviously all I learned about these things was what the German papers were permitted to publish at that time about these things. BY SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: leading Catholic laymen in Germany. You are not going to tell the Tribunal that in the Catholic Church it wasn't known to every bishop in Germany and probably to every parish priest that this abominable and sacrilegious insult had been offered to a Prince of the Church in his own house in Vienna. Surely it would permeate through the Church in a few days.
of me, a private citizen, to do anything special? What should I have done? The Tribunal perhaps is not cognizant of the fact that there was a discussion which I brought about between Cardinal Innitzer and Hitler, that I was responsible for that. You mentioned that fact for the first time here today. that you were responsible for bringing about the meeting between Cardinal Innitzer and Hitler in March of 1938. When His Eminence was attacked in October, I should have thought -- it is not for me to express my thoughts -- that you might have taken the trouble to protest to Hitler, and all that you do is to take another job under Hitler within six months, in April 1939.
What I am asking you is why you didn't make a protest. You could have written to Hitler. The defendant Goering has expresses his great religious interests. A number of the other defendants have said that they had great religious sympathies. Why couldn't you have got in touch with them? matters, I was living in seclusion in the country and did not concern myself with political matters at all. But perhaps I may be permitted to state just why I was responsible for bringing about a meeting with Cardinal Innitzer. the moment, the meeting on the 15th of March. I am interested in the fact that this took place, you knew of it and made no protest.
Now I am going to come to another point. Dr. Kubuschok can raise it later on, if he wants. ing evidence and saying that they didn't know of the terrible repressive measures that were taking place in Germany. You knew very well about these repressive measures, did you not? You knew about the action of the Gestapo, the concentration camps, and late you knew about the elimination of the Jews, did you not?
1934 political opponents were interned in the concentration comps and very frequently I protested against the methods of concentration camps. In various cases I was successful in liberating people from these concentration camps. But at that time it was not known to me that even murders had been committed in these concentration camps.
Q Well now, just let me take that up. It is good to get down to a concrete instance. tary Herr von Tschirschky was ordered to return from Vienna to Berlin for examination by the Gestapo. Do you remember that? a detailed report of his reasons for not going? Do you remember that?
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: My Lord, that is Document D-635, which would become Exhibit GB-509, and your Lordship will find it at page 87 of Document Book 11 A, and it is at page 60 of the German version.
BY SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE:
Q Now, at page 87 there is Herr von Tschirschky's own letter to you in which he says at the end of the second paragraph:
"I am not in a position to comply with the Gestapo demand to report to Berlin for interrogation." influenced only by the "human, understandable desire to live" and then he sends a report, he encloses a report to you of what had happened to him on the 30th of June which got him into the bad books of the Gestapo.
Do you remember that? humorous if it did not show such a dreadful state of affairs, your secretary, Herr von Tschirschky, was arrested simultaneously by two competing groups of Reich policemen, I think the criminal police and the Gestapo and there was a severe danger of Herr von Tschirschky and some of the police being shot before they could decide who was to take him into custody.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: My Lord, it is at page 89 and it is at the end of page 65 of the German version, defendant. necine struggle and it got possession of the body of Herr von Tschirschky and then he says, just toward the end--My Lord, it is the middle of page 89.
He is told the other police are following the Gestapo and he says:
"This was finally done and the journey took us to the Gestapo building in the Prince Albertstrasse, through a courtyard to a back entrance. There another exchange of words took place between the two groups of criminal police officials. I again joined in this debate and suggested as a way of clearing up the misunderstanding that a man from each group should see someone in the building of higher authority, and let him decide what should be done. To guard myself and the other two gentlemen, there were still three criminal police officer and four SS men available. This way out was accepted. The men eventually came back and explained that the misunderstanding was now cleared up, we could be taken away. Whereupon we were taken by three SS men, not accompanied by the criminal police officials, on a longish trip through the building into the basement.
There wewere handed over without any comment and received the order from the SS men there, on duty, to go ever and sit on a bench against the wall, in the passage. We were then forbidden to talk to each other and so we spent a few hours sitting on the bench. It would go too far to give further details about the events which took place during this time. I will therefore only limit myself to the case of the she ting of a well-known person publicly stated to have committed suicide.
"The person was brought in and taken past us into a cell running parallel to our corridor, escorted by three SS men; the leader of the detachment was an SS Sturmhauptfuehrer, short, dark, and with an army pistol in his hands. I heard the command guard the door'. The door from our corridor to the other was shut. Five shots were fired and immediately after the shots, the Sturmhauptfuehrer came out of the door with the still smoking pistol in his hand, saying under his breath, 'that swine is finished.' Feverish excitement reigned round about; one heard frightened calls and shrieks from the cells. One of the SS men on duty, a comparative youngster, was so excited that he apparently forgot the situation as a whole and informed me, illustrating with his fingers, that the person concerned had been liquidated through three shots in the temple and two in the back of the head." BY SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: von Tschirschky had given you that report, hadn't you? read, who was the well-known person who was supposed to have committed suicide and who was shot with three shots in the temple and two in the back of the head. Who was it? for several months afterwards and he never told you who this was? Of course, I may have forgotten it, it is quite possible. In any event one of the -
Q Just pause. You say you might have forgotten. Do you mean that dreadful occurrences like this were so familiar to you that you cannot remember the account of the actual shooting of a supposed suicide who was a prominent person?
Have another think. Cannot you tellthe Tribunal who this unfortunate man was?
A If I do recall I would be glad to tell you. I have no reason to conceal this information. Hitler. You believed, did you not, that Herr von Tschirschky was telling the truth? You said so. You believed he was telling the truth, didn't you?
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: My Lord, it is page 86 of the English version and defendant, it is 58 of the German book, page 58.
THE PRESIDENT: Sir David, are you going to investigate the facts as to what happened to the man who made this report?
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: My Lord yes, I will clear that up, I am so sorry. BY SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: report Herr von Tschirschky himself was---I think he went to a concentration camp and had his head shaved and then eventually after a certain period he was released and rejoined your service and was in your service up until February of 1935.
Is not that so, defendant?
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: I am sorry my Lord. That takes up the story until we come to February 1935. He is then asked to report to the Gestapo and then this correspondence takes place. BY SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: which is document D-684, GB Exhibit 510, you say:
"As already reported yesterday by telegraph, I have conveyed to Herr von Tschirschky the order of the 2nd of this month repeating the demand that he appear on the date fixed by the Gestapo, 5th February.
"He then announced to me officially that he would not comply with this order as he was convinced that he would be killed in one way or another. He will marshal the reasons for this refusal in a report which I will submit as soon as I receive it.
"I yesterday finally relieved Herr von Tschirschky, whom I had already suspended for the course of the proceedings, of his post.
It goes without saying that I shall break off all connections of an official nature as soon as tha handing over of files, etc. has taken place tomorrow." given von Tschirschky leave. Then just look at the last paragraph.
"After I had repeatedly asked that Herr von Tschirschky should be given a chance to clear himself for a regular judge of the charges laid against him. I am naturally exceedingly sorry that the affair is now ending thus. I left nothing undone to induce Herr von Tschirschky to take the course designated to him of letting himself be examined by the Gestapo." in your staff sent to his death to be murdered by the Gestapo? High Tribunal to the other letters which show that I repeatedly, not only once, but repeatedly asked Hitler to have the matter of Tschirschky investigated through a regular judge.
ten to me to have a regular court proceeding. Hitler let me know that he personally would use his influence and that he would assume the personal responsibility that nothing would happen to Mr. von Tschirschky if he was investigated by the Gestapo and that also you will find in this letter. The Fuehrergave him impunity if he were to put himself at the disposal of the Gestapo and be investigated by them. Therefore, after regular court proceedings had been turned down or rejected and Hither had promised that nothing would happen to Mr. von Tschirsch ky I asked Mr. von Tschirschky to submit to the investigation for the charges made against him had to be cleared up in some way. But I believe -will find -
THE PRESIDENT: Sir David, I think you should read the whole of this letter which you have just been on, the 5th of February, at some stage.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: My Lord, I will. My Lord, I am sorry. My Lord, I do not want to omit anything but I am of course, trying to shorten the matter, but I will read anything your Lordship wants.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal ought to be in possession of the whole letter. You stopped at the word "courier", in the middle with reference to reporting.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: Yes, My Lord. With reference to reporting his dismissal to the Austrian Government:
"I am afraid that if I report it abruptly tomorrow, the matter will attract public discussion. I believe that this scandal should be avoided and thave, therefore, given Herr von Tschirschky sick leave for the time being, for the benefit of the public, and shall report his dismissal later.
"I shall return to the Tschirschky affair and its connections with other current Gestapo question in Vienna later in a detailed report."
THE PRESIDENT: You left off after the word "Gestapo" in the next paragraph.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: Yes, I will read the whole thing again. "After I bad repeatedly asked--"
THE PRESIDENT: No, you had read that down to "Gestapo", but you did not go on with it.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: "But if he remains firm in his resolve to avoid this examination, even though he knows that this means the ruin of his social and material position for himself and his family, and if he has declared to me that, while an emigre he will do nothing which would be harmful to the Fuehrer and the country, I have nothing to add but the wish that everything should be avoided that could make this affair am open scandal." BY SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: which was five days before, -- page 84 My Lord and the foot of page 55 and the beginning of 56 of the German book -
"Herr Tschirschky, whom incidentally I have, for the time being, relieved of his duties, has not learned from several sources which he and I also, unfortunately, regard as authentic, that sore persons belonging to the Gestapo have for a considerable time been planning to neutralize him."
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: My Lord, that will be D-683, GB 511.
BY SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE:
Q. You believed that it was authentic on 31 January that the Gestapo wished to neutralize him. On 5 February, in the part that the Tribunal just asked me to read, you say that it will be the ruination of his social and material position for himself and his family, but if the thing is kept quiet, your wish is that everything be done to avoid a scandal.
A. My wish was first of all that everything should be done in order to have the matter cleared in a public and in a regular court proceedings.
Q. That was your first wish, but you very soon gave that up.
A. Just a moment please. After Hitler did not agree to my wish, and after he had determined that von Tschirschky in an investigation by the Gestapo would enjoy the personal protection of Hitler, and after Hitler had agreed to that -- If the head of the State will tell me, "I will be responsible for the fact that nothing will happen to Mr. von Tschirschky," then, naturally, you will grant me that I can not act differently than to tell Mr. von Tschirschky, "Take this course and let yourself be examined, for after all you have to clear yourself of the suspicion which is a shadow on you."
Q. Defendant, let me remind you that there is not a word in your letter of 5 February about any promise from Hitler to give an indemnity to Herr von Tschirschky. All that you are saying is that he will disappear into disgrace. There is nothing in any other letter either.
A. Yes. You can find it in a letter of Tschirscky's, and I will find it. I don't find it at the moment.
Q. Well, if you can find anything about an indemnity, I can only tell you that I have not been able to find it in any of your letters.
A. Yes, there is.
THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps the defendant could look for this document at the recess, at one o'clock.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: Yes, very well. My Lord, if there is such a document, I am very sorry; I don't know about it.
Yes, My Lord; I am sorry. I think I have got the reference.
On page 91, My Lord. It is not in the defendant's letter, but there is a reference in Herr von Tschirschky's report. On page 91, My Lord. Page 69. It says:
"In conclusion, the reason why I do not feel obliged either to appear before the Gestapo or to return to the Reich at all, in spite of the extraordinary protection promised me by the Fuehrer and Chancellor, I make the following declaration:
"Already during my activities in Berlin, information has often reached me that there existed in the Reich a Terror organization which has sworn the oath of mutual allegiance until death. The men who are or who may be accepted in this brotherhood are expressly warned and given the obligation that they belong to the F.E.M.E. and that they are in duty bound when carrying out their tasks to feel that they belong in a far greater degree to the brotherhood and are only bound to Adolf Hitler in a smaller degree. I could not have believed this monstrous thing, had the information not been given no about six months previously by a man in the Reich -- I wish to emphasize this explicitly -- who is not opposed to the Third Reich, but quite the opposite, a man who in his innermost convictions believes in Adolf Hitler's mission, a Reich German National Socialist of many years standing, who himself at one time was to be won over into this brotherhood but who was able to withdraw from it cleverly. This man has assured me of his willingness to expose publicly the names mentioned to me of the members of this brotherhood, or to w* swear an affidavit to this effect in case these people should already be dead. He must only be assured that this Terrorist brotherhood can no longer be effective, especially as there are persons belonging to this brotherhood who are among the people who count as being the most trusted of the Fuehrer and the Reichschancellor."
I am sorry; I knew there was nothing in the letters from the defendant, but I had forgotten that there was this passage in the letter. BY SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE:
Q Now, that was von Tschirschky. You have told us that Baron von Ketteler was murdered at the end of your time in Vienna. Baron von Ketteler's father was murdered, if my memory is right, and that caused the German expedition against the Boxers in China. That is the family the gentleman belonged to, is it not?
after the experience with von Tschirschky was that you were ready to take new employment under the Nazi government in Turkey.
A May I perhaps make just a few remarks on this point? other reference to Marchionini's affidavit, and then you can make all the other remarks you like.
Why didn't you after this series of murders which had gone on over a period of four years, why didn't you break with those people and stand up like General York or any other people that you may think of from history, stand up for your own views and oppose these murderers? Why didn't you do it?
A Very well. You can see from this report by von Tschirschky about these murders that I submitted this report to Hitler, and I submitted this report in all its details, but what you do not know is the fact that I frequently told Hitler personally that such a regime could not possibly last in the long run, and if you ask me, Sir David, why despite everything I remained in the service of the Reich, then I can say only that on 30 June I personally broke the relations and the agreement which I had entered into on 30 January. From that day onward I did my duty, my duty to Germany, if that matter interests you. the things that we know today about the millions of murders which have taken place, that you consider the German people a nation of criminals, and that you cannot see, that you cannot understand that among these people there are patriots as well. I did these things so I could serve my country, and I should like to add, Sir David, that up until the time of the Munich Agreement, and even up until the Polish campaign, even the major powers tried, even though they know everything that was going on in Germany, they tried to work with this Germany. Why do you wish to hold it against a patriotic German that he did the same thing and that he hoped the same thing -- the same thing that the major powers expected and hoped for?
other, and were not close to Hitler like you. What I am putting to you is that the only reason that could have kept you in the service of the Nazi government when you knew of all these crimes was that you sympathized and wanted to carry on with the Nazis' work. That is what I am putting to you -- that you had this express knowledge; you had seen your own friends, your own servants, murdered around you. You had the detailed knowledge of it, and the only reason that could have taken you on and made you take one job after another from the Nazis was that you sympathized with their work. That is what I am putting against you, Herr von Papen.
A But, Sir David, that perhaps is your opinion; My opinion is that I am responsible only to my conscience and to the German people for the desire to remain, and I shall accept that responsibility.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: My Lord, I have finished.
(A recess was taken until 1400 hours) (The Tribunal reconvened at 1400 hours, 19 June 1946)