Q. Were you also using prisoners condemned to death here under the condition they would be pardoned?
A. The other conditions were exactly the same as I said with this exception regarding reducing pain. I was not thinking of nercosis at that time, but as I told Holzloehner, I was thinking of easing pain with medicents which did not affect the heart or breathing as a wrong experimental result would have occured otherwise.
Q. In this discussion with Rascher was Dr. Jarish of Innsbruck University also proposed?
A. On this occasion I did not mention Professor Jarish. He was a Pharmacologist. In his case there was only a question of how far the medicants would go in regard to the heart action. It turned out from the very beginning, however, that this was not an important question because the animal experiments had already demonstrated that the application of drugs was uncertain and that would also be the case in experimenting with human beings. That is why we did not place any particular weight on that particular problem, or at least, why I did not.
Q. Did you also suggest Professor Dr. Singer for this work?
A. I remember that the name singer did come up. Singer was, in my opinion, the pathologist in Munich who worked on our research. That included the entire Munich area as a pathologist for the Luftgau. This man was the closest one to deal with pathological problems should they arise, but this work, too, was not of perticular importance to me; that is, that aspect of the work.
Q. Witness, I shall show you that in a report of Rascher, he asked Himmler whether the Gestapo was satisfied with Jarish, Singer and Holzloehner.
A. No. The Gestapo was never discussed with me.
Q. In other words Rascher told an untruth here?
A. I believe that it is the case here, particularly since I have seen other later letters where he frequently very serious lies in his letters.
Q. Witness, after this discussion with Rascher, when did you hear something farther about the experiments?
A. Professor Holzloehner was appointed for these experiments by directives from my personnel office. Whether it was from there or through some other way, I cannot say precisely, but Holzloehner was assigned to the region 799a of Gau 7. He worked there in the Dachau vicinity.
Consequently, orders for this man had to be issued by the Luftgau. Singer never visited me personally. I do not know him personally nor can I recollect what he looks like. In any event it was an appointment on the part of the Luftwaffe. They wanted to be assured orders were carried out allng the lines they wished. Holzloenher received this task from me in writting.
Q. Repeat the sentence in which you mentioned Dachau.
A. I do not know if I can remember. Holzloehner did not belong to the Luftgau 7 so far as I know, but he belonged to another Luftgau. Consequently he had to be expecially assigned to Luftgau 7 in order to be able to work in Dachau. He was to carry on supervisory activities in Dachau and these activities must be approved by us.
Q. Witness, after all of this happened, when did you again hear something about these experiments?
A. I did not hear about the beginning of the freezing experiments in Dachau. No report about it came to me so I do not know whether these experiments began at a certain time. I know when they ended because Holzloehner was then assigned to other jobs.
Q. Witness, did you then in August, the end of August, hear something about the experiments as a whole, those altitude and freezing experiments?
A. Yes, sir. At the end of August, finally, the report on high altitude experiments came in. They came from Himmler to Milch and from Milch to me. It was to be worked on by us. I went to see him.
Q. Then did you read this report which is of the 28th of July?
DR. BERGOLD: Your Honors, you will find it in your Document Book. It is Exhibit No. 114. It is appended to the letter of the 26th of September. It is addressed to Himmler. You will see that the page is dated 28th July 1942.
Q. Did you read this report when it was sent to you?
A. If it is the report signed by Rascher, Ruff and Bromberg I did read it; yes. The State Secretary Milch sent it to me. I worked over it because it was of greatest importance to me.
800a
Q. It can be seen from this report, which is in a special document book of its own --
MR DENNEY: It is page 155 of Document Book 5.
DR. BERGOLD: I have just been informed your Honor that the copy you have is unfortunately not complete. We can copy the pages I shall present to the witness and submit them to you later. I regret that this important part was not submitted to the Court in total.
MR DENNEY: If Your Honor please, Dr. Bergold is misinformed. I think He was looking to see if we had a photostat of it. Obviously we do not have a photostat because the photostat is in German.
DR. BERGOLD: I understand.
MR. DENNEY: The copy we have is complete. I am informed we do have a complete copy.
THE PRESIDENT: The Court has complete copy.
MR. DENNEY: Yes, Your Honor.
DR. BERGOLD: That is good. Then everything is in order.
Q. Witness, in this report, on page 13 of the original, a descendence experiment at 15 kilometers is described. The prosecution read this passage into the record. In regard to this description of 15 kilometers height, did you get the idea that the experimental people were tortured?
A. No. By no means. There can be no talk of torture, nor can you find any evidence of it in this report. As it is stated here, it is a perfectly ordinary one. They show the reactions of a person after there is lack of oxygen and the way the brain progessively improves.
From the remarks "screams loudly", "keeps on screaming", yells spasmodically", you cannot decide the person felt pain.
When you are confused, you often shout or scream without having pain. It can be compared to what people do when they are drunk. There is no question of pain. It connects with what I previously said. Also the trembling of muscles is painless.
801a CORRECTION SHEET The following portion on page 802 is corrected to read as follows:
THE PRESIDENT: May the Court interrupt. Will you have this witness to explain what is clonic convulsion?
THE WITNESS: Tonic convulsions are rigid convulsions, in counter distinction, clonic convulsions are twitchings. May I show you by demonstrating with my hand, that is a clonic convulsion (demonstrating with his hand a motion). That is a very typical symptom of lack of oxygen, This we even may find out as a controlling sympton in order to recognize whether there was an actual lack of oxygen.
Q Will you also explain the word "Opisthotonus"?
A "Opisthotonus" is the bending backward of the head to a firm position. It is a result of a clonic or rigid contraction of the back of the neck which pulls the head back.
Q Then does this convulsion, that is, when convulsive and clonic, biting the tongue, or convulsive yelling, does that indicate pain?
Q. I wish to show now another page.
THE PRESIDENT: May the Court interrupt. Will you have this witness to explain what is a clonic convulsion?
THE WITNESS: Tonic convulsions are rigid convulsions, in distinction, Clonic convulsions are twitchings. May I show you by demonstrating with my hand, that is a clonic convulsion (demonstrating with his hand a motion). That is a very tipical symptom of lack of oxygen. This we even may find out as a controlling symptom in order to recognize whether there was an actual lack of oxygen.
Q. Will you also explain the words "Opisthotonus."
A. Opisthotonus is the bending backward of the head to a firm position. It is a result of a tonic or rigid contraction of the back of the neck which pulls the head back.
THE PRESIDENT: Then its your contention that neigher convulsions nor biting of the tongue nor convulsive yelling indicate pain?
A. Yes, this is muscular twitching, and convulsions are not painful, but they take place without the possesion of pain in the skin where they are an exercise of pain but using an expression of muscular function which is not the same thing as a stomach convulsion, which is associated with pain. This is a muscular cramp without pain. Thousands of researchers have proved this again and again. I also know from my personal experience on my own body that there are no pain in association with this muscular convulsion as a result of lack of oxygen. That we have had so many examinations, and we have had so many experiments by air experts here, that they could tell you of their own experience and I need not report of my own experience. This was generally known, and it is also known from medical literature and from reports.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: Dr. Bergold, as the original plan does the witness have the report which we are considering?
THE WITNESS: I have it.
Q. I would like to draw his attention to the bottom of the page 169 that is the English report, and to have him explain-- that was 24 802a of the original, and have him explain it.
Witness, you have stated several times that the subject, they had no pain. Will you explain to the Court what is meant by the entry "Reacts to pain stimuli?"
A. Let me first find it, I have not as yet found it.
Q. Page 164 here, at the bottom, under grafic account of the subject, and "reaction" shown there.
A. I believe I can explain without having that before me. I can say this means that they are taking the examination of the person whether he is in full possession of his faculties, and they are conducting the examination by either pricking him with a pin, or by touching him in some other way, and attempting to find whether he reacts to it, in other words, it is another way of proving whether or not he is in control of his faculties. This is a test in order to find out whether he can judge his envirements correctly, or whether that is not the case. A little pain is put to him for this purpose. That probably was doing the sort of thing we do in our pathological tests, otherwise, to account whether they react to sharpness or bluntness, or, hardness, or softness, and in order to find that out it was done.
Q. When you say he reacts to pain stimuli, you necessarily mean that he feels pain, do you not?
A. Please repeat the question Your Honor.
Q. Yes I shall. I have this here, that the subject reacts to pain stimuli. Do you mean that he feels pain, do you not?
A. To be sure that is not what we would call pain. We take a needle and touch his skin with it to see whether he reacts to it as a conscious person would, in removing it with his hand, that is not pain, but that is positively a touch to discover whether he is fully conscious or not.
This question is of more practical importance to us, and for this reason we look into it because it is only after a person is fully competent after he comes to whether he or they can open the parachute, in that case we must be able to know whether he can do it. If he is not in a condition to do it, then we have to develop 803a an automatic way of releasing the parachute.
That is the point in that remark.
BY DR. BERGOLD:
Q. With such a little demonstration by pin, is that not the custom of all countries of the world, a customary test?
A. It is a daily form of test and is used everywhere, not only on account for the usual effect in our tests, Your Honor, but by all the countries in their tests.
Q. I ask you now to look or rather did you ascertain in this report that both Dr. Romberg and Rascher had undertaken experiments on themselves.
A. I recall that out of the one passage, it can be seen that this was so, that they carried on experiments on themselves.
Q. Please look at pages 15 to 18, and tell me whether this is the passage to which you refer? I have marked them in pencil,
A. Yes, it can be clearly from this page that these are experiments on themselves within the framework of experiments on human beings, because even there in the text these names are mentioned, one abbreviated as RO and one abbreviated as R. That is, the two names Romberg and Rascher who carried on these experiments, or proved these experiments of themselves.
Q. Not look at page 18, this is an experiment on the part of Romberg, will you explain that, now? I believe it is page 18.
A. This is here. These are experiments on whether or not in the case of Romberg --- in this experiment of Romberg it was an experiment under particularly difficult circumstances, not under normal circumstances.
Q. At what height of altitude did these experiments take place?
A. At 15 kilometers. Now wait, I am not quite through. This Romberg experiment at the particularly high altitude, as I see here, and under particularly difficult circumstances it is being carried out. It is higher than Rascher's. It was between 12 and 12 and a 1/2 kilometers high and I assume it must have been about 15 804a
Q. Will you please return the report to me.
A. They were self experimenting in this, it can not be doubted.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Kippke, does it occur to you that possibly "RO" means Romberg's "patient" if I may use that term or Rascher's "patient" rather than these two men themselves?
A That is very improbable since they were the two conductors of the experiments and that was certainly explained by the experiment itself, because if that had been the case, everyone would have to assume from this report that they were in parson the experimental subjects. I consider it out of the question that should mean that it is their patients and not Romberg and Rascher themselves.
THE PRESIDENT: I would suggest to you that they would find it a little inconvenient to be both the patient and the subject.
THE WITNESS: Nevertheless, that was our basic principle in all these experiments, to use ourselves with no regard for our comfort. That is asked of a physician that he expose himself to the same conditions as those to which he exposes his patients. That is part of medical ethics.
DR. BERGOLD: Your Honors, in this question, I ask you to look at Page 17 of the original, which is on Page 164 and read there in the middle what is there stated. There is stated verbatim: "When he recovered consciousness..." That proves indisputably that it is a question of Romberg himself. The German reads in such a way as to prove that it is an experiment that Romberg carried on himself.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: While you're on Page 17, Dr. Bergold, I'd like to draw to your attention, and of course I mean by "your attention" the witness' attention, these items in the report which seem to be at variance with what the witness states, that the subject felt no pain. "Only the usual pains attendant with bends occurred. There developed very gradually a condition of weakness, combined with a peculiar headache. After ten minutes..."
DR. BERGOLD: The apparatus if faulty, apparently. I can only hear the English.
THE WITNESS: Please tell me that again.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: I have understood you to say that the subject experienced no pain in these altitude tests.
THE WITNESS: In these experiments, there is no pain. One of the experiments here described -
JUDGE MUSMANNO: Please let me finish the question, witness. I direct your attention to these items in the report on which you have been commenting. The first item is on Page 17 of the original: "Only the usual pains attendant with bends occurred." Second item: "There developed very gradually a condition of weakness combined with a peculiar headache." Further down on the same page, the third item: "After ten minutes stay at this altitude, pains began on the right side with a spasticparalytic condition of the right leg which increased continually as though RA's whole right side were being crushed between two presses. At the same time, there were most severe headaches as though the skull were being burst apart. The pains became continually more severe so that at last the discontinuation of the experiment became necessary." Now, what is meant by the word "pain" in that report?
THE WITNESS: I explained it as an exceptional case because this was not purely a sinking experiment. It was a so-called high altitude experiment where people stayed at high altitudes. People stay at a certain altitude for a certain length of time and then at this altitude have certain symptoms which in a normal experiment they wouldn't have. The symptoms that result from falling are quite different from this and here this is an exception. The technician for these matters should be namely Dr. Ruff, the man who had charge of this whole experimentation. He should be asked on this matter. He could give you a much better explanation of it than I can.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: Very well. In some instances, you will admit that the subject did experience pain? Yes or no?
THE WITNESS: Yes, but not in the experiments that were carried on here with the criminals.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: It was only the innocent ones who experienced pain?
THE WITNESS: This experiment has been carried on with a -
THE PRESIDENT: At the request of the Interpreting Department, we are going to modify the time at which we recess to ten minutes of the hour until five or ten minutes after. This is in order to split up the work of the two interpreters more evenly so that the recess doesn't come entirely out of one interpreter's time and the other works a little more than that. Hereafter, then, at eleven and three, we will recess at ten minutes to eleven and ten minutes to three, thereabouts; but right now, in any event.
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is in recess for 15 minutes.
AFTERNOON SESSION
THE MARSHALL: All persons in the court room will please find a seat. Tribunal No. 2 is again in session.
MR. KING: I would like to correct the record with reference to this morning's session so far as the testimony of this witness is concerned. On several occasions he used the term "Staatssekretaer im Luftfahrt Ministerium", which was translated as "Under-Secretary of State", as your honor will recall. That was improperly translated and should have been translated as "State Secretary in the Air Ministry", I spoke to Dr. Bergold about this and he agreed with me that of course when he used the term he was referring to the Defendant. As the records read one might be led to believe that there was some undersecretary that is not the case.
DR. BERGOLD: Witness, I now come back once more to the experiment of Romberg which was put to you by the Court. Is it correct that this was a different type of experiment from the one on oxygen?
A. I had the impression that this is a special type of experiment, outside of the scheme of the usual experiments, therefore you can not compare this with the other experiments. It should be assumed that in the case of the doctor who is making experiments on himself that other and more severe conditions were included in this experiment. As far as I can see, there are symptoms concerning the joints. In special circumstances, this can occur as I said before, and can hurt, but only under different conditions than those, which I had intended in my experiments. To say in detail on this system, I would like Dr. Ruff to make statements about that who is particularly well informed about that, or Dr. Romberg as well.
Q. Witness, the fact that oxygen is being used, do you mean that the experimental person Romberg retained his consciousness throughout?
A. No, that is not to be concluded from that. Because in altitudes above 12 to 13 kilometers, you lost consciousness even if you use oxygen.
Q. Could one deduct from these reports that during all of these experiments no fatalities and no permanent lasting injury occurred?
A. It was expressed in a sentence that no fatality occurred and no permanent injury.
809a
Q. Is that expressed in the second paragraph of page 25 of the original?
A. Yes, it is the last paragraph in from of Roman Numeral 4. It says: "In conclusion, we must make it particularly clear that, in view of the extreme experimental conditions in this whole experimental series, no fatality and no lasting injury due to oxygen lack occurred."
Q. What did you do after you studied this report?
A. In order to answer this report I went to Milch with a draft of of a reply to Milch. I would like to be told whether I should now refer to the contents of that conversation with Milch, or whether you are putting single questions to me?
Q. Please tell us about this, but tell us first when this conversation took place?
A. It was at the end of August.
Q. Witness, tell us about the conversation with the Defendant?
A. I went to the Defendant Milch and took to him my reply which was considered essentially a letter of thanks to the sender, Reichsfuehrer SS Himmler, and I told him about this: "I have with me the draft of the reply for the high altitude experiments which were carried out by the SS under collaboration of our Luftwaffe doctors." Thereupon, he Milch put a question to me: "What interest does the SS have in these experiments?" and I replied, "The main interest it seems to me is founded on VANITY on the part of the SS --- I thought of Rascher and Himmler --- in order to make a good impression on Hitler in carrying out of such experiments, by so doing showing what the SS had done for the prosecution of such matters, also the SS wished to express by this that the Luftwaffe doctors were a little bit slow and old fashioned in the way they carried out their tasks, and that they had to be stepped up as it where.