BY DR. SAUTER:
Q. Professor Rose, do you believe that a scientific journal of the significance and wide-spread importance of this Philippine journal had considerable influence on the development of the conception of the medical profession in regard to such experiments on human beings and still exercises such influence today, and that the things printed in such serious journals, if they are written by internationally recognized scientists, are given special acknowledgment and recognition by the medical world?
A. It is, of course, clear that important scientific journals, in part, reproduce the ethics of the profession and also influence it. That is true.
Q. Professor Rose, you know the publications of the professor whom you just mentioned. You read these publications, and what can you tell us about what this man writes about the quality of the experimental subjects?
A. In the first paper on plague vaccines, he says that he began with criminals condemned to death and that he continued the experiments on other persons. It is not indicated exactly what these other persons were, but according to the whole discussion of the experiments one can assume that they were also prisoners from Billibit and that is likely also because from other works by him one can see it repeated that he worked on prisoners in Billibit. And I have some knowledge of my own on the subject because discussed this whole matter with Filipino doctors when I was in the Netherland Indies to study plague control. I was with two Filipino doctors and, of course, we discussed the foundation of this whole work which came from the Philippines.
Q. Professor Rose, you spoke of Billibit. That is a penitentiary, I believe isn't it?
A. Yes, a penitentiary near Manila.
Q. Does the author, this highly respected Professor Strong, say anything about these experimental subjects being volunteers, or is he silent on that subject?
A. The work on plague says nothing about it and even if it said so, no one would have believe it at that tine, because to inject living plague baccilli, even if it went off well, was criticized by experts and it was said that it was too dangerous. Of course, a layman would not volunteer for such things.
Q. Does Dr. Strong - I believe that this Professor Strong is the same man whom you mentioned a few days ago?
A. Yes.
Q. And you told the Tribunal that you knew him personally, I believe?
A. Yes.
Q. That you knew him as a man of specially high conception Of his duty as a doctor. That is the same man?
A. Yes.
Q. Does Professor Strong write anything about deaths resulting from his experiments on prisoners?
A. Not in the case of the plague experiments, but in his Beri-Beri experiments he does.
Q. Those were also experiments which Professor Strong carried out?
A. Yes, also in Billibit.
Q. And how great was the percentage of deaths? Do you know anything about that?
A. In the beri-beri experiments, one out of twentynine.
Q. Professor Rose, we had this Philippine journal here. We still have it here. We have looked through it thoroughly and we have established - and I should like to know whether you can confirm this - that this report of Professor Strong, which you just told us about, in not the only report of this type but that in almost every issue of this journal there is a report on similar experiments on human beings. Is that true?
A. That is correct. That is one of the reasons why the magazine had such great significance because there were very many fundamental discoveries which were announced in it.
Q. Do you remember, professor, how great the number of experimental subjects in Strong's experiments was? how many people that he said himself he used?
A. In the plague experiments, there wore nine hundred, and I don't remember the other things well enough to be able to give you figures. I, of course, was primarily interested in the plague work. If you still look at the German medical weekly of 1937, there in the Berlin Medical Society, in the discussion, I referred specifically to this plague work of Strong's.
Q. Do you also know from this journal, professor, that for these experiments the Governor of the Philippines expressly gave his permission?
A. That is said in the paper, and that is to be assumed because Strong was not the prison doctor.
Q. You say Strong was a prison doctor?
A. No, I said he was not.
Q. Do you believe, professor, that if Strong - that even if Strong does not go into the question of Volunteering, one can assume that the large number of nine hundred experimental subjects in the plague experiments alone allowed the conclusion that these were all criminals condemned to death, in the first place, and second, that they had all volunteered?
MR. HARDY: May it please Your Honor, this material concerning the experiments of Professor Strong Falls right in the category of other material and experiments in other countries. The Tribunal has ruled that this may be introduced at a later time in the trial and, at that time, the Tribunal will rule as to the admissibility of such evidence. It seems that the publication is available in the Philippine journal and he is merely questioning the defendant on what exists in this publication. I think that may well be introduced at a later date and can be ruled on at that time and not take up the time of the Tribunal now.
THE PRESIDENT: The suggestion of counsel for the prosecution is well-taken. The matter of the contents of this publication in the Philippine journal may be gone into at some later date during, the trial when the copies may be produced and all such publications can be considered at one time.
DR. SAUTER: Mr. President, I ask permission to complete my questions about the Philippine journal. I believe I have only one or two more questions and then I will be finished with the subject and then, Mr. President, I do not want these questions about the Philippine journal to be thrown into the whole group of things that are to be eliminated or the one at the end of the trial. I'm not asking about general experiments in the whole world, I'm asking specifically about plague experiments, and that is because the defendant Blome is the only one who is specifically charged with plague experiments, and because I am interested in determining whether Professor Blome can be declared a criminal for plague experiments which he did not conduct while some foreigner, who had conducted experiments, is not a criminal but is glorified.
I believe this question has to be settled and therefore I ask permission to deal with the one or two questions which are still necessary to settle this matter.
JUDGE SEBRING: Do you contend that this witness knows anything about these experiments other than is written in this journal? If it is simply a question of what is contained in the journal, the Tribunal mast read it for itself. You have been asking him whether he knows what is contained in the journal and if, in his opinion, the language is such as to justify the belief concerning whether these were or were not volunteers. Whether in the last essential if they are written I apprehend that perhaps it is the function of this Tribunal to determine, in the last analysis, whether or not the language is susceptible of the interpretation that they were or were not volunteers.
DR. SAUTER: The situation precisely inconnection with these plague experiments, the witness having talked about is different, because on the one hand Professor Rose knows the author, and the scientist who conducted these experiments personally. He was in the Netherlands -- India and in China himself and studied these questions, that is, he is an expert of the very first language in this field, and the second point is that Professor Strong, who actually did perform such experiments that Blome is accused, of, although he did not perform them, Professor Strong is an internationally recognized scientist who acquired special respect in the medical world for these plague experiments. I am of the opinion that we jurists must be grateful if an internationally recognized authority like Professor Rose can give us information about these medical questions, because he had nothing whatever to do with these plague experiments. For this question he is merely an impartial expert, but I believe I have only two more questions on that subject, and then the chapter will be finished.
BY THE PRESIDENT:
Q. Professor Rose, do you know of your own knowledge whether or not the men used for the plague experiments were or were not volunteers?
A. I was not present myself at the experiments, but during my investigation of plague in Java when I cooperated and collaborated with a number of Asiatic doctors, among them Siamese, Chinese and two Phillipines. Since we were interested in plague and since we were studying the problem of living plague vaccine, of course we discussed the foundations of the whole business very thoroughly and two of the Philippine doctors were present, and I remember one conversation when the other Asiatic gentlemen attacked these experiments rather violently and said that was a typical example of the white race misusing the natives, and the two Phillipines who were most interested in this question they observed, they said that even if the experimental subjects had not all been volunteers, and of course there were different opinions on that subject in Manilla, that they as Phillippine doctors who had known Strong, on the basis of this personal knowledge, were perfectly convinced that this was not a misuse of natives but a very reliable work in the interests of the peoples of Asia; not only the Phillippines but the Indians and Siamese as well, who were cursing Mr. Strong.
From this conversation I know what Phillippine doctors thought about these experiments. That is the source of my knowledge, but since we were working on nothing else but plague at the time, we of course discussed these matters in groat detail. Strong's work was the basis on which we did all our work. That was in 1935 in Bandong on Java.
Q. Then it is generally understood in your profession that Strong used prison inmates, is that correct?
A. Yes.
Q. And the opinion is divided in your profession as to whether those prisoners were or were not volunteers, is that correct?
A. Yes, that was expressly said by the Phillippine doctors, that they did not believe that they were volunteers. Professor Strong did not always say so. Many of his papers say nothing about it, but in others he does maintain it, but on the spot the people did net believe it. It is often the case in medical works it says "these are volunteers and ---"
THE PRESIDENT: Counsel, was the matter of the proposed interrogation covered by the answers by the witness to the questions propounded by the Tribunal?
DR. SAUTER: I have only one more brief question on this matter of plague, one single question on plague.
THE PRESIDENT: Proceed to propound your question to the witness.
BY DR. SAUTER:
Q. Professor Rose, one final question on the problem of plague, did you ever hear that any authority in the whole World, whether the church or the Government or the medical professional organizations or any one, objected to these reports of Strong and similar scientists, for example in the Phillippine Journal, and called these experiments criminal, specifically whether the church, Christian or non-Christian, protestant or Catholic, took this point of view.
THE PRESIDENT: The witness may answer that question yes or no.
A. I beg your pardon, unfortunately it is impossible. Very exceptionally there were criticisms, not of Strong specifically but of other work which I know of, but on the whole I never heard such criticism, such criticism was always an exception, I am very sorry that I could not observe your instruction.
Q. One brief final question on another subject, only a correction. It is some thing which the Tribunal asked -- a very brief question, Professor. In the examination of Professor Rostock the Tribunal asked whether immunity can be ascertained by blood test, that is whether an experiment with human beings is absolutely necessary: did you understand the question?
A. Yes.
Q. Is that correct?
A. In the direct examination by Dr. Fritz I have already answered this question. I don't know whether it escaped your notice, Dr. Sauter. I know you have a document, I believe it is No. 24, which you wanted tosubmit on the subject.
DR. SAUTER: Then I have no more questions, Mr. President. Thank you.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will be in recess for a few minutes.
(Thereupon a recess was taken)
THE MARSHALL: The Tribunal is again in session.
THE PRESIDENT: Any other questions to the witness on the part of any defense counsel?
BY DR. WEISGERBER: (Counsel for Defendant Sievers.)
Q. Professor, Document NO. 123, Exhibit 303 of the Prosecution, was the object of discussion yesterday between you and your counsel. This is tho letter from Professor Haagen to Professor Hirt of 9 May 1944, regarding experiments with a dry typhus vaccine; I shall have it put to you in case you don't have it infront of you?
A. Thank you, I have the entire Document Book No. 12 and have it open to the correct page.
Q. The contents of this letter were literally the contents that Sievers sent on 19 May 1944 to the Chief of the SS - W.V.H.A. and this letter was put in by the Prosecution as Exhibit 304. Yesterday you concerned yourself only with the medical importance of this letter; now I ask you, since my client is not a doctor and has no medical knowledge; can a lay-man see from this letter that the vaccinations with tho vaccine developed by Haagen, except for a fever reaction that lasts some time, could have any fatal or infectious effects on the person innoculated; can alay-man see that from this letter?
A. Let me correct this one error first of all, I did not discuss this Document yesterday with Dr. Fritz, the Document discussed yesterday was Document No. 127. The whole question to which this letter refers, however, I went into at great length with Dr. Fritz.
Now, to answer your specific questions. A lay-man can, in my opinion, not deduce such matters as you brought forth from this letter for the simple reason that there is nothing to that effect in the letter; how then could a lay-nan find anything in there if the expert could not.
Q The defendant Sievers drew only the conclusion, from what Haagen said, that this was a testing of the vaccine, a protective vaccination such as are given millions of times in protecting against all sorts of diseases. Can any objection be raised to that point of view or could one say he also had to take something else into account?
A No, that is also my conviction, and I am today still firmly convinced that Haagen worked in a completely irreproachable way, and neither from witnesses nor from documents have I been able to find anything that contradicts that. I stated specifically yesterday that only this document 127 -- if I had received this document, I should have become suspicious and would have asked questions, but that is the only one from which it could be deduced that he intended anything that was incorrect.
Q Then no layman who was not an expert could have seen that?
A I don't oven know whether Sievers saw this letter, document 127; and, of course, it is very difficult for a specialist to judge what a layman might deduce from something like this. As a specialist one is always inclined to see matters much mere simply, and to believe that because one understands one's self that others must also understand; but we often find out that is a very considerable error. I consider it quite possible that oven if Sievers had seen this document 127, nothing particularly would have struck him in it.
Q And if he only saw document 123 -
A There is nothing in it at all. There is only mention of vaccines.
DR. EISGERBER: No further questions.
THE PRESIDENT: Are there any other questions of this witness by defense counsel?
If not, the Prosecution may cross-examine the witness.
CROSS EXAMINATION BY MR. McHANEY:
Q Professor, as an officer in the medical service of the Luftwaffe, were you not ultimately subordinated to the defendant Handloser as Chief of the Medical Services of the Wehrmacht?
A I was subordinate to the medical office of the Luftwaffe. The Chief of the Medical Service of the Wehrmacht I did not regard as my superior officer, in the same way as I did regard my superior in the Luftwaffe.
A I don't care whether you regarded him as your superior in the same way. My question was whether he was not ultimately your superior as Chief of the Medical Service of the Wehrmacht?
A No.
Q You did not state such a thing to me on the 31 October 1946?
A No, I certainly didn't say that. He could ask me for professional expert opinion, but that does not mean he was my superior officer by any means.
Q Well was either Hippke or Schroeder your superior officer?
A Hippke and Schroeder were my superiors.
Q And was Handloser the superior of Hippke and Schroeder?
A I am a scientist but not an expert in matters of military organization, and after Generalarzt Hartleben testified on these questions, I as a scientist should prefer not to enter upon this field. I believe that my answers would only cause confusion to the whole question and would not add to the discovery of the truth.
Q We will leave that up to the Tribunal to decide. Did Handloser have any consulting physicians attached to his staff as Chief of the Medical Service of the Wehrmacht?
A No, he had no consultants of his own; so far as I know, there was an agreement between the chief of the Medical Service of the Wehrmacht and the Medical Inspectorate of the three branches of the Wehrmacht to the effect that Professor Handlossr could call upon for scientific consultations the consulting medical officers of the three Wehrmacht branches.
Q. If Handloser issued any general instructions as Chief of the Medical Services of the Wehrmacht, you would have been bound to follow those instructions, would you not?
A. For instance, he issued a directive on the inception of the malaria prophylaxis. But here again I cannot testify whether that was a binding order or whether that was simply a proposal. That is a question of military subordination, regarding which I really cannot give you any information. I know only that the date was fixed when the malaria prophylaxis should begin in the Luftwaffe in agreement with this proposal by Professor Handloser. But that took place so that all branches of the Wehrmacht should be working simultaneously on this matter and I do know that is what happened. Now, whether that happened on the basis of an order or a voluntary agreement, that I cannot tell you. As a scientist I never concerned myself with these things and since they are of importance in this trial I would consider it careless to say anything about it.
Q. You also know that Handloser as Chief of the Medical Services of the Wehrmacht controlled typhus vaccine production for all the branches of the Wehrmacht, don't you?
A. I do not know that he controlled the production but I do know that he had charge of the distribution of the vaccines to various branches of the Wehrmacht. But, before that, the Army Medical Inspectorate had had charge of that because before a chief of the Medical Services of the Wehrmacht existed the three medical chiefs agreed voluntarily that the Army, as the largest branch of the Wehrmacht, should undertake this distribution because, since the vaccine was very scarce, all the branches of the Wehrmacht were trying to get special rights for themselves with various factories that produced vaccines. Thus the danger arose that someone who was particularly clever at this would get a large amount and the branch that needed it most of all, perhaps, but was not quite so clever, would get the short end of the stick. Therefore, at the beginning of 1943 the three medical inspectorates voluntari ly agreed that the Army Medical Inspectorate was to do the distributing.
And, so far as I know, the Chief of the Medical Services of the Wehrmacht carried on the same policy.
Q. As I recall, in one of the letters to Haagen from the Medical Service of the Luftwaffe, I think it was the letter written by Kant and which you admit having some knowledge of, mention was made that the production of typhus vaccine by Haagen would have to be taken up with Handloser. Isn't that right?
A. Yes, that is in the letter and that may be traced back to that old agreement of the year 1942, because at that time it was also agreed, so far as I remember, that in case any branch of the Wehrmacht set up its own production facilities the Army Medical Inspectorate should be informed of this. The reason for this measure was to prevent one branch from producing for itself one hundred thousand doses and still receiving its entire quota as if it had no production of its own at all. But, as I said, these are rather administrative matters, of which I heard incidentally. For instance, I knew that there were individual agreements but I unfortunately do not know the precise text.
A. It is true, is it not, that after the war with Russia began the typhus problem became very acute?
A. Yes.
Q. Typhus was not common in Germany, was it?
A. Before the war there was no typhus in Germany at all.
Q. And to meet this typhus problem you could do two things, couldn't you? One was combat lice with disinfectants such as Zyklon B, and the other was to produce protective vaccines.
A. Yes.
Q. This Committee which you were on with Dr. Peters was very much interested in Zyklon B, was it not?
A. It concerned itself with disinfectants in toto and that included also the interest in Zyklon B. But Zyklon B, namely, prussic acid, was not a very serious problem in this matter. At any rate, from my point of view, I was representative of the civilian consumers and the civilian consumers received no prussic acid at all.
There were only eight firms that were permitted. They had to present their requests for disinfectants and then received their quota. So that prussic acid was the thing that could be settled most easily in this whole matter. It therefore did not Play such a large role. Of course, it did play an important role purely in the production question, but this was not settled by the committee because the committee simply had to distribute those disinfectants and chemicals which were made available by Main Group Chemicals for distribution. And prussic acid is used not only as in insecticide but is also very important in manufacture. For example, in the production of unbreakable glass prussic acid is used and etching and tanning procedures make use of prussic acid. And prussic acid is used in agriculture as an insecticide, and all these matters were decided higher up. This working committee for insecticides received from the whole total available amount of prussic acid that amount of prussic acid that was made available for combatting of insect pests dangerous to human health. The agriculture insect pests were taken care of by another committee and they received amounts of prussic acid from somewhere else; in other words, not prussic acid that we controlled. And industry in its turn received its share.
Q. Was the same type of prussic acid used in insecticide control as in agriculture or manufacturing uses?
A. Regarding the agriculture Insect pests I am not well informed. But, I should like to assume that this is so because the main characteristic of Zyklon B is that it contains an agent that smells. Prussic acid has no smell itself and when we deal with the insect pests dangerous to human lives we added this agent that smelled as a warning that this was prussic acid. Then this, of course, was the same point of view the people fighting agriculture insect pests had, because they were just as interested in being warned by the smell as the disinfectors, but I can't say that for sure because I had nothing to do with combatting of agriculture insect pests.
Q. Now the disinfectors, that is, the insect control people, had to obtain their prussic acid from your committee or through your committee, did they not?
A. The prussic acid was assigned to these eight firms by the committee.
Q. Now, would the extreme necessity for the large scale production of typhus vaccines and the resultant experiments on human beings in concentration camps have arisen had not Germany been engaged in a war?
A. That question cannot simply be answered with "yes" or "no". It is, on the whole, not very probably that without the war typhus would have been introduced in the German camps,but it is not altogether without bounds of possibility because also, in times of peace, typhus has been introduced in individual cases from time to time and the primary danger in the camps is the louse danger, and infections with lice take place also in times of peace. Then, if typhus is introduced into such a camp that is infected with lice, a typhus epidemic can arise in peacetime also, of course.
Q. But Germany had never experienced any difficulty with typhus before the war. Isn't that right?
A. Not for many decades, no?
Q. You stated that nine hundred persons were used in Dr. Strong's plague experiments?
A. Yes, I know that number from the literature on the subject.
Q. What is the usual mortality in plague?
A. That depends on whether it is bubonic plague or lung pest. In one, namely, bubonic plague, the mortality can be as high as sixty or seventy per cent. It also can be lower. In lung pest, the mortality is just about one hundred.
Q. How many people died in Dr. Strong's plague experiments?
A. According to what his reports say, none of them died, but this result could not have been anticipated because this was the first time that anyone had attempted to innoculate living plague virus into human beings, and Strong said in his first publication in 1905 that he himself was surprised that no unpleasant incidents occurred and that there was only this severe fever reaction. That despite this unexpectedly favorable outcome of Strong's experiments the specialists had considerable misgivings about this procedure can be seen first of all from literature where that is explicitly stated; for example, two Englishmen say that, contrary to expectations, these experiments went off well but nevertheless this prodess cannot be used for general vaccination because there is always the danger that, through some unexpected event, this strain again becomes virulent.
Moreover, from other works that Strong later published it can be seen that Guinea pigs and monkeys that he vaccinated with this vaccine, died, not of the plague but of the toxic affects of the vaccine. All these difficulties are the reason why this enormously important discovery which Koller and Otto made in 1903, and Strong in 1905, has only been generally applied, for all practical purposes, since 1926. That is an indication of the care and fear with which this whole matter was first approached, and Strong could not know ahead of time that his experiments would turn out well. I described here the enormous concern that Strong felt during all these months regarding the fact that that might happen which every specialist feared, viz. that the virus would become virulent again. what is an enormous responsibility.
Q. Be that as it may, nobody died. That is a fact, isn't it?
A. If anyone did die, the literature says nothing about it. There were mortalities only among the monkeys and Guinea pigs that are mentioned in the publication. If human beings died, there is no mention in the publication. It is generally known, if there are serious accidents in such experiments as this, they are most reluctant in making them public.
Q. Now, Professor,I have no wish to limit you but, as I understand it, you have explained these things in considerable detail during the four days in which you have already testified. If you can give a short answer to my question that is all I want. If I want any further explanation I'll ask you for it.
Now, what is the normal death rate in beri-beri?
A. That depends on the medical care given. If the care is good, the mortality is zero, and if they have no medical care at all, then a lot of them die.
Q. Sixty to eighty per cent would probably die if they were not treated. Is that right?
A. Beri-beri lasts for many, many months before a person dies and you don't die in sixty days of beri-beri, that has to be a severe case.
Q. How many people did Strong use in his beri-beri experiments? Is twenty-nine all you know about?
A. So far as I know from the literature, the number was twentynine.
Q. Well, it says in the literature that he used only twentynine. Is that right?
A. So far as I know, yes.
Q. And one of those died?
A. According to what the literature says, one of them died.
Q. What is the mortality in typhus?
A. That varies enormously. It depends on the epidemic. In some epidemics the mortality is five per cent. In general, you count on a mortality of twenty per cent. In the Serbian-Albanian epidemic in 1915, there was a mortality of seventy per cent, but that mortality rate is so extraordinarily high that it is generally assumed that probably, in reality, there were more cases of typhus than were actually reported on.
Q. Well, we could take roughly five to thirty per cent as the mortality. Is that right?
A. Yes, that is what the text books generally say.
Q. What was the mortality in the Buchenwald experiments, Professor?
A. In the controlled cases in the experiments that I knew of, the mortality was thirty per cent.
Q. Among the controls, you figured thirty per cent?
A. Yes. There were ten control persons in the first group of experiments, and of them, three died.
Q. Three died? Well, but I assume that you have read through the Ding Diary and let us assume for the moment that it is correct. Didn't you say that they also used control persons in the four or five other series of experiments.
A. In the controlled cases where they were testing the vaccine, the general mortality was thirty per cent. But then there were these therapeutic experiments in which, according to the Diary, blood infections were undertaken and, in this case, the Diary does mention an unusually high mortality rate.
Q. Well, professor,for your information - we have figured out five control series in the Ding Diary, and I mean by controls those that were not treated with anything. The mortality ranges between fifty-four to one hundred per cent and averaged eighty-one per cent. Do you accept those figures as correct? I mean, do you think that's right?
Q. No, that does not correspond with the impression I got from the numbers in the Diary, but I didn't calculate it so precisely as all that. I looked at the individual experiments and it is true that, for instance, in these therapeutic experiments Ding's work mentions a mortality of something like fifty to fifty-five per cent, and then there is one series that deals with blood infection where of twenty people I believe nineteen died.
Q. Let me put it to you, Professor. Isn't it a fact that they weren't dealing with epidemic typhus in Buchenwald, but with a supertyphus, developed from man to man passage, which was much more virulent and much more deadly than any typhus you could expect in an epidemic?
A. That I cannot judge because I have no knowledge of the work done in Buchenwald and can only refer to what Ding's Diary says, which I regard as unreliable.