In this loyalty, however, the man reveals his whole nature, Goering has been described in the press as a late Renaissance type; and there is something in this. Although of high intelligence, he allowed himself to be guided in his actions loss by considerations of common-sense than by the feelings of his impetuous heart. primarily subjective. He not only sees his surroundings and other people impassionately as immovable quantities he has to reckon with, but he, rather and above all, is sensitive to the effect they have on him and how they call for his approval or disapproval so that he finally makes his personal reaction to them the basis of his judgment as a whole. Supreme Staff Judge Dr. Lehmann, he always showed himself at pains to remain just and to lend an ear to considerations of sentiment. He always kept himself free from doctrinal prejudices. As a soldier, he always endeavored to hit on the right factor in the individual case. His judicial decisions and his social attitude, which General Bodenschatz testified to amongst other things, show his serious moral feeling of responsibility. His attitude towards all criminal acts directed against the honor of women are proof of his chivalry. But he takes no dogmas for his standards in this, only the spontaneous judgment of his feelings, not only intellect, therefore, but life. From this, he derives his ideas and the values which determine his actions. to him meant everything to him and was the substance of his life. Ambassador Henderson had already judged Goering correctly, when he wrote about him: seen greater loyalty and devotion than he maintains toward Hitler. He was recognized as the second power in the country, and always gave me to understand that he was Hitler's natural successor as loader.
Men in secondary places often tend to emphasize their own importance. In all the open discussions in which I engaged with Goering, he never spoke of himself or the great part which he had played in the Nazi revolution; Hitler had done everything, all confidence was confidence in Hitler, every decision was Hitler, and he himself was nothing."
This judgment still applies today. But his loyalty became his disaster, and the world, for him, sank into ruins. He certainly recognized many a mistake of the past, but he never showed the regret, which many would like to see with him. He thereby remains true to himself, as well. With this the picture of his character ends. again searching for a firm foundation for life, the positive value of such loyalty too should not be ignored.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Seidl, I understand that you have not had your speech translated into any of the languages. Is that so?
DR. SEIDL: Mr. President, yesterday I told the General Secretary the reasons which made it impossible to have the speech translated. However, I have given the interpreters the text in German, and I was told that the German text is a big help to them in making the translation as quickly and as accurately as possible.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, the Tribunal has already pointed out to you, many days ago, that it is very inconvenient to them not to have a copy of the speech before them. If you propose to make a speech, they will do the best they can to appreciate it. It makes it very much more difficult and very much more inconvenient not to have the speech translated.
DR. SEIDL: I shall have the translation made as quickly as possible for the case of the defendant Funk.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well; go on.
DR. SEIDL: Mr. President, and Judges, when in 1918 the German Army, after more than four years of heroic struggle, laid down its arms, this was done in confidence in the assurances of President Wilson which he had repeatedly given in 1918.
In the victory speech of 8 January 1918, the President of the United States of America, in 14 points, had demanded among ether things open -
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Seidl, the Tribunal has already intimated, as you must know, that the question of the 14 points, and the question of the justice of the Treaty of Versailles, is irrelevant. They do not propose to listen to it. You have been told that before, and many documents have been rejected which dealt with this subject.
DR. SEIDL: Mr. President, I do not intend to comment on the question of whether the Versailles Treaty is just or not. The point is this. The prosecution submitted the Versailles Treaty in evidence. They left the Versailles Treaty the main point of the indictment as far as Point 1 is concerned.
My investigation aims at the following: First,was the Versailles Treaty formed legally? Second, -
THE PRESIDENT (Interposing): I spoke only of the injustice of the Versailles Treaty. But it is even more irrelevant to question whether the Versailles Treaty is a legal document or not. We do not propose to listen to your contending that the Versailles Treaty is not a legal document. There are plenty of matters which are of material moment for your client which you have to discuss before us, and that is not one of them.
DR. SEIDL: Mr. President, I cannot leave the Court in the dark on the fact that the Versailles Treaty and its consequences, especially the original connection between the seizure of power by National Socialism as a result of the consequences of the Versailles Treaty are a considerable part of my speech.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Seidl, I have told you that the Tribunal will not listen to your contending either that the Versailles Treaty was not a legal document or that it was in any way unjust. On those topics, we do not propose to hear you.
Dr. SEIDL: Must I understand the statement of the Court to the effect that I will not be permitted to speak of the consequences of the Versailles Treaty, and particularly the connection of these consequences with the rise of the National Socialist Party and with the seizure of power by Adolf Hitler and the co-defendants?
THE PRESIDENT: Look. The Versailles Treaty is, of course, an historical fact, and the Tribunal cannot prevent you from referring to it as an historical fact. But as to its justice or as to its being a legal treaty, the treaty which Germany signed, you will not be heard. are going to say. But we will not listen to that sort ofargument.
DR. SEIDL: Then I shall begin on Page 6 of the German manuscript, in the second paragraph. Versailles at the moment when it was signed. In the program of the National Socialist Labor Party of Adolf Hitler, this struggle against the Versailles peace dictate and for its revision assumed a please far surpassing all other demands. It was the leading forts from which the whole inner political activity of the Party developed, and which, after the seizure of power, was to form the basis for all foreign political considerations and decisions. Rudolf Hess. Like Hitler, he, Rudolf Hess, was also a front-line soldier in the First World War. As a volunteer, he joined at the outbreak of the war, and until he was wounded in Rumania, he had risen to lieutenant of infantry. When this wound made further service with the infantry impossible, he reported to the air corps. in 1919, after the conclusion of the Versailles Peace Treaty, he had to recognize that the victors had not wanted a peace of justice and the adjustment of interests, for, as could not be expected otherwise, the peace conditions of Versailles, and especially the burden of the reparations, had to have a devastating effect.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Seidl, it may be difficult for you to cut out of your speech the various references to the topics which I have referred to, but you must kindly try to do it. For if you continue to refer to the topics to which I have referred, namely the justice or the legality of theTreaty of Versailles, the Tribunal will have to stop your speech and go on with some of the other defendants.
DR. SEIDL: Mr. President, what I was speaking of just now is not a matter of justice or legality, but it is a question of the consequences, and refers to an investigation of the original connection. If the Prosecution, in weeks of presenting evidence, showed how the rise of the National Socialist Party came about, and how the numbers of it s mandates increased-
THE PRESIDENT (Interposing): Dr. Seidl, th ose are all facts which the prosecution is perfectly entitled to prove. What you are now referring to is an argument that certain clauses of the Versailles Treaty were unjust. And that is an argument which the Tribunal is not prepared to listen to. It is not a statement of fact; it is an argument.
DR. SEIDL: Of course, it is an argument.
THE PRESIDENT: I have said that it is an argument we are not going to listen to. If you do not understand what I mean, you will have to stop continuing your speech. Do you understand that?
DR. SEIDL: Page 8, then. more one of the first -
It is impossible, Mr. President, to continue my speech, because all the following statements are concerned with the question of what the defendant Hess did up to the seizure of power, and I must say that the essential part of his activity was to work within the Party and among the German people towards a revision of the Versailles Treaty and its most unbearable terms. This is the question of the whole National Socialist movement to 1933.
THE PRESIDENT: If you confine yourself to statements of fact as to what the defendant Hess did, there will be no objection to it at all. But as I said, If you make arguments that the Treaty of Versailles is illegal or unjust, the Tribunal will not hear you.
DR. SEIDL: I shall continue. And I ask the President, sinceI do not know the limit exactly, to interrupt me if I should choose a subject which refers to -
THE PRESIDENT (Interposing): Dr. Seidl, you knew perfectly will the limits which have been laid down by the Tribunal many weeks ago as to the question of the justice or the injustice of the Treaty of Versailles.
There has been a great number of documents rejected on the ground that they dealt with the justice or theinjustice of the Treaty of Versailles, and you must have known that perfectly well.
DR. SEIDL: Then I ask the Court to tell me whether I am permitted to make statements to the effec t that the economic conditions, especially the great unemployment, resulted from the reparation terms of the Versailles Treaty and the refusal of the victorious powers of 1919 to change the policy or reparations accordingly.
THE PRESIDENT: You may certainly state what the condition of Germany was. That is a matter of fact.
DR. SEIDL: Then I shall begin on Page 8.
THE PRESIDENT: (Interposing) Dr. Seidl, the Tribunal is perfectly familiar with this type of argument; I mean, we are not going to lose sight of the argument. We knew all about the argument; we do not want to hear it. We think it is entirely irrelevant.
Can't you go on to other passages of your speech which are important for the defendant Hess? As I have said, there are a great many matters which have been proved by the prosecution and which have been answered by the defense; and upon those matters we desire to hear you.
DR. SEIDL: I shall begin on page ten, with the second paragraph. Therefore, in the Reichstag elections of the 14th of September 1930, the new Reichstag with no less than one hundred and seven delegates. That is in part and the result of the economic crisis of the time --- the great unemployment and thus, indirectly also of the adjustment of reparations contrary to all common sense by the Versailles Treaty and the refusal of the victorious States, in spite, of urgent warnings to improve the readjustments. It is ture --
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Seidl, you know that is again an argumentative statement, that the Treaty of Versailles was unfair and that the victorious powers had failed to recognize the essential justice of Germany's case or something of that sort. If you can't adjust your speech to what I have laid down, we shall have to ask you to recast the whole speech.
DR. SEIDL: Then I shall go over to page 11, second paragraph. I shall go to page 12. We, the German people, in referring to the Peace Treaty of Versailles had disarmed and they could expect with justification that the victorious powers would also --
THE PRESIDENT: One moment, Dr. Seidl. Dr. Seidl, as you don't appear to be capable of recasting your speech as you go along to accord to the Tribunal's ruling, the Tribunal will not hear you further at this stage. It will go on with the next defendant's case. You will then have the opportunity of recasting your speech and you will submit your speech for translation before it is presented and I would explain that this is the reason why the Tribunal does not propose to hear you upon these matters. They are irrelevant to the issues that the Tribunal has to try. If they were in any way relevant to the charges which are made against the defendant in the Indictment, they would of course hear them but they are, in the considered opinion of the Tribunal in no way relevant to the charges upon which the defendants are being tried and therefore the Tribunal do not propose to hear them. The justice of the Treaty of Versailles has nothing to do with whether or not the war which was made by Geramny was aggressive. It has nothing to do with the war crimes with which the defendants are charged and therefore it is irrelevant and for that reason we don't propose to hear it. Now, as I say, as you are unable apparently to recast your speech, you will be given an opportunity of recasting it in private and you will then submit it for translation and you can then deliver it; and now we will go on with the case against the defendant Ribbentrop.
DR. HORN: Mr. President, I have just heard that the translations are being brought up. Perhaps I may wait until the translation gets here ?
THE PRESIDENT: I think you might go on. We can hear what you say and take it down.
DR. HORN: Yes, sir. Mr. President and Judges :
" All great upheavals of history of the world and especially in modern Europe have at the same time been wars and revolutions."
We are standing in the midst of such a upheaval. It absolutely is not concluded as yet. To select single events in order to render judicial judgment is not only almost impossible, but entails the danger of too early a verdict. Make no mistake about it. tain part of Europe. We have to form a judgment about a catastrophe which touches the deepest roots of our civilisation. tional and international events. Germany is much interested in the development of the idea of the law if its use leads to a betterment of international morals. This court has the high task, not only to decide about certain defendants, and uncover the causes of the present catastrophe, but at the same time it will create norms which are expected to be adopted universally. No law should be created that is only applied to the weak. Otherwise we ability for total resistance and thereby make war still more pitiless than the case which I represent.
H. von Ribbentrop is being considered among the conspirators as the man mainly responsible for the foreign policy and diplomatic side of an alleged conspiracy, which is supposed to have had as its goal the preparation and execution of aggressive wars.
It is my task to find out from the evidence when an attack in the meaning of international law is prevalent, and in which cases aggressive wars were conducted. nition by the American and British prosecutors, but has, beyond all a basis in realities.
Only the knowledge of those promises permits the adoption of 5 July A LJG 15-1a an attitude which will serve as a basis for the decision of the court.
I am therefore deferring the discussion of the problematic aspects of aggression and aggressive wars till I have presented to the court the evidence for the valuation of German foreign policy and the participation in it by H. von Ribbentrop. of criminal law, I shall examine especially, to what extent H. von Ribbentrop checked or promoted the decisions concerning foreign policy during the time of his political activity.
Mr. von Ribbentrop's first stop into the world of the balancing of interests and therefore of the international game of power was successfully taken when he in 1935 concluded the naval agreement between Germany and England. The circumstances under which this treaty came to life are as significant for the political problems of those years as they are characteristic for judging the personality von Ribbentrop's and his further political development. This treaty - as it is known in informed quarters - came about under exclusion of the official German diplomacy. The then German very sceptical toward this project. Both Hoesch and the Wilhelmstrasse did not believe that England was inclined to concluding such a treaty, which contradicted the terms of part V of the the different disarmament conferences. Furthermore they did not believe that such an agreement could materialize a few weeks after the Council of the League of Nations had declared the restoration of German military sovereignty as a broach of German obligations, and England, France and Italy had met at Stresa in order to counteract this German stop. They did by no moans believe that a successful conclusion of such a far reaching treaty with its fundamental significance could be achieved by an outsider like Mr. von Ribbentrop. icant as far reaching. The authority of Mr. von Ribbentrop who came from the party rose in Hitler's eyes.
However, the relation-
5 July A LJG 15-2a ship between Mr. von Ribbentrop and the conservative diplomatic corps became more and more difficult. This acting ambassador (Titularbotschafter) who had managed to acquire Hitler's confidence was distrusted because his activity could not be controlled by the Foreign Office. to see in Mr. von Ribbentrop the man who could help him in the fulfillment of his pot wish - and, we may say, of that of the German people - to bring about a general political alliance with England. The tendency to realizing those intentions originated in real as well as ideal motives. that it is the bad luck of our nation and of all of Europe that Germany and England were never able to understand each other, in spite of serious attempts of both countries during the last 50 years.
The ideal motives rested in Hitler's undisputable preference for many approved internal institutions of the empire. with the Versailles policy which was sanctioned by England with the final approval by France. And thus the first practically useful armament limitations were accomplished after many years of fruitless negotiations. created at the same time. The naval agreement and its effects may also have been the reason for Hitler to appoint Herr von Ribbentrop Ambassador to the court of St. James the following year, after the death of Hoesch. naval agreement, as little success had he in offering a general alliance to England. Was it the fault of Herr von Ribbentrop's diplomacy or the basic difference of interests? attack these people at once with proposals and requests. If at the first moment one may, especially from the German side, recognize many mutual characteristics in the British, still on close contact one will note profound differences. Both root in a different soil. Their spiritual field is watered by various streams. The deeper the Germans and the British go, the greater will be the proof of the difference of their faith and their intellect. The deeper the British and the French penetrate into the nature of the other, the more mutual features they will find. Common political interests in the past 50 years have deepened those mutual features between the British and the French. alliance with a continental military power and has searched for and found satisfaction of this interest, according to the standpoint of British aims, sometimes in Vienna sometimes in Berlin and from the beginning of the 20th century in Paris.
Even at the time of Herr von Ribbentrop's activity as an ambassador, England's interest did not require a deviation from this line. To this was added the basic British attitude that Great Britain did not wish to commit herself on the continent.
Added to this was the fact that authoritative men in the Foreign Officethought still too much in the political terms of the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, and this attitude was still, now as then, governed by leaning towards France. were negligible, their political power inferior to that of the opposition. To this were added the difficulties which resulted for Herr von Ribbentrop from Germany's participation in the non-interference committee, which at that time met in London in order to keep the powers out of the Spanish civil war. the German-British relationship on his departure as an Ambassador from London. The answer to this will best be furnished by document RC 75, which contains the view of Herr von Ribbentrop about the then prevailing situation of Germany with regard to foreign politics and the future possibility for shaping German-British relations. by the status-quo in Central Europe. He entertains the conviction that the implementation of these objectives of foreign politics will by force lead Germany and England "into different camps". loose at first, with powers of equal interests (Italy and Japan). Through this policy he hopes to bind England at the danger points of her Empire, and still to keep open the possibility of a understanding with Germany. Sudetenland. According to his conviction then prevailing, England will not in both these questions give her consent to a modification of the status-quo but might be forced through the power of circumstances to tolerate a solution of these questions. East will , however, cause England always to become an opponent of Germany in arguments of such nature. Herr von Ribbentrop upheld this interpretation not only in 1938 when this document was penned, but contrary to the assertions of the prosecution warned Hitler of this dsnger even before and at the outbreak of the second World War.
as was asserted here, represent the British toward Hitler as a degenerate nation, but he says in this document quite clearly that England would be a hard and keen opponent to the pursuance of German interests in central Europe.
These interpretations of Germany's attitude in foreign politics at that time, as expressed in TC 75, evidently agreed with Hitler's idea inasmuch as in the course of the Fritsche crisis Herr von Ribbentrop took over the foreign ministry in place of the resigning Herr von Neurath.
According to Herr von Ribbentrop's testimony, Hitler asked him upon entering his office, to assist him in solving 4 problems. These consisted in the Austrian, the Sudeten German, the Memel as well as the Danzig and Corridor question.
As shown by the evidence this 5 July LJG 16-1a was not a secretive understanding which was arrived at by the two statesmen.
The Party program contains, in point 3, the demand for revision of the peace treaties of 1919. In a number of speeches Hitler repeatedly pointed out the necessity of fulfilling these German demands. Reich Marshal Goering testified here that, in November 1937, he explained to Lord Halifax the necessity of solving these questions and said that they were an integral part of German foreign politics. These goals he also presented openly to the French Minister Bonnet. Herr von Ribbentrop therefore gave his principle support to goals which were known and which resulted, of necessity, from the dynamics at that time prevailing in central Europe on account of the recuperation of the Reich. bentrop as a Minister reached in the solution of these questions, I shall explain in connection with my remarks on the participation in the conspiracy of which the defendant is accused. Only this much may be said here, that, as was proven by evidence, with the dismissal of Freiherr von Neurath the concentration in Hitler's hands of the decisive authority also in the field of foreign politics had found its conclusion. Herr von Neurath was the last Foreign Minister who, at first as a Foreign Minister, had managed to maintain a decisive influence on foreign politics under the regime of National Socialism, which in time, with the increasing power of the regime, he had to surrender to Hitler's striving totality, more and more. whom Hitler had selected after his own taste. without a doubt has a strong component in the purely personal relations among the rulers. Seen from this point of view, it is necessary for the understanding of certain actions and history to look into the relations between Hitler and Herr von Ribbentrop.
Herr von Ribbentrop, as a well to do man from the nationalistic 5 July LJG 16-2a camp, saw in Hitler and in his party efforts which corresponded with his own ideas and feelings.
Herr von Ribbentrop's ideas about the foreign countries visited by him aroused Hitler's interest. Hitler's personality and political convictions formed in Herr von Ribbentrop a form of loyalty, the final explanation of which one can perhaps find in the effects of the power of suggestion and hypnosis. but also an enormous number of people on this side as well as on the other side of the border foil victim to this power. law, will find its final explanation only from the point of view of the effect on the masses and in the psycholoty, to say nothing of the pathological form of these phenomena. This task may be left to the sciences concerned. results of the evidence - I nay, with the permission of the tribunal, present, after clarifying those facts, the role of Herr von Ribbentrop within the alleged conspiracy for the plotting of wars and acts of aggression with breach of contracts. 10 days when he was called upon by Hitler to participate in the conference with the Austrian Bundeskanzler and his Foreign Minister on 12 and 13 February 1938 in Berchtesgaden. Evidence presented in court has confirmed the fact that questions especially involving Austria were exclusively within the domain of Hitler. The then Ambassador von Papen reported directly to the Head of the State. Herr von Ribbentrop had no influence whatever upon activities of the party in Austria as well as in the southeastern territory. My client alleges to have been informed only rarely and not officially about its activities there.
The former Austrian Foreign Minister Dr. Guido Schmitt deposed that Herr von Ribbentrop did not participate in the decisive conference between Hitler and Schuschnigg. During the rest of the conference he did not conduct himself in the Hitlerian style 5 July LJG 16-3a and created the impression of not being informed on the subject, which was probably due to his late activity in London and his being appointed Foreign Minister only recently.
From this unobjectionable conduct of v. Ribbentrop the prosecution has deduced that Hitler and Ribbentrop had agreed upon a premeditated maneuver. It sees in H. v. Ribbentrop's conduct that which is typically characterised as "double talk". .Must not the undisputable data and facts as regards H. v. Ribbentrop, the impression of the witness Schmidt, hence resulting, my portrayal of Ribbentrop's position as minister, his lack of information on the long planned preparations with respect to Norway and Denmark, and other undeniably prooved facts, raise the question whether H.v. Ribbentrop participated in decisions of foreign policy to a far lesser degree than is contended by the prosecution? far as Austria's annotation is concerned, he played no important part. For him Austria remained a country mutilated by "St. Germain," a country which, according to healthy principles could hardly exist and which once shared a common destiny in history with Greater Germany. The National Socialists were not the first to awaken Austria to the thought of a union with Germany. This thought had ripened,in the German element of the Hapsburg Monarchy since the revolution of 1848 aimed at a democratic and Greater Germany. It was fought for by the Social-Democrats for ideological and realistic reasons after the downfall of this Monarchy. It was this very democracy that saw in the Weimar state their spiritual offspring. The economic distress resulting from the destruction of the Danube area as an economic entity nurtured the thought of a union with the Reich, which was economically better off.
fostering soil. In any event, presuppositions for a union with Germany existed, when assistance of Austria by Italy ceased, through closer relations of the former towards Germany by reason of the Abyssinian conflict. Further reasons that contributed to and justified the union will be specifically stated by my colleague Dr. Steinbauer. preted in the narrow sense of the law of reunion of 13 March 1938, which was signed also by H. V. Ribbentrop, the union did not even correspond with the intentions of Hitler but was put through by him. the violation of Article 80 of the Treaty of Versailles and the corresponding article of the Treaty of St. Germain as well as the violation of the treaty between Austria and Germany of 11 July 193
THE PRESIDENT: The translation came through to me, I think, as though you had said,"...the union did not even correspond with the intentions of Hitler, but was arrived at" -- it should have been "by Goering himself".
DR. HORN: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Go on.
DR. HORN: In justification of these violations one could point out that the provisions concerned constitute a violation of the basic right of self-determination. The outcome of the vote after the annexation at any rate clearly confirms the Austrian attitude of that time. a further justification of violation. One could refer to the statement of Under Secretary Butler in the House of Commons who, upon questioning after the union assorted that England had given no special guarantee for the independence of Austria as undertaken in the Treaty of St. Germain.
facts. Positive law always lags behind the ideal state of justice Such is the case not only in laws governing internal relations but also in International Law. provisions are contained for change of circumstances, history shatters them by revolution in order to rebuild them upon a new base. evaluated is questionable. To general principles of the adaptability of justice to the might of facts I shall refer later on.
An Englishman asserted:
"We have to face the stubborn fact that Central Europe is populated by an almost solid block of 80 million people who are highly gifted, highly organized and who are conscious of these achievements in the highest degree. The majority of these people have the strong and evidently unexterminable desire to be united in one state". of 1919 was put in motion by the annexation of Austria and the racial theories of National Socialism. No attentive observer could fail to notice the effect of the annexation upon the neighboring states. with the particulars of the then proceeding efforts by the various groups of Germans in the neighboring states for incorporation into the Reich. The facts which have now become history are only too well known. My task here is to examine whether these events are the results of a premeditated plan of on individual person or of a group of persons, or whether a long and artificially stored up force assisted in accomplishing the objectives which were assigned to Herr von Ribbentrop by Hitler at the time of his appointment. German Party to force the Anschluss now on their part too.
in his capacity as Foreign Minister he engaged in the creating of difficulties under the Sudeten German Henlein. It further accuses him of having induced the Sudeten German Party to increase their demands step by step,instead of entering the Czeckoslovak government, and in that way of having prevented a solution of the whole problem without having made the German Government appear as pace maker. the contrary. It is true that Herr von Ribbentrop know that the Anschluss efforts of the Sudeten Germans received help from the party, but he had no influence on this party policy nor any therough knowledge of it. With regard to the difficulties which had arisen with the Czech Government caused by the separation efforts of the Sudeten Germans and their partly uncontrollable policy, Herr von Ribbentrop found it necessary to take care of the realization of the Sudeten German aims within the limits of a responsible policy.