Q Witness, before I refer to your time working in the GL, I would like to put one more question to you. What did you think when on 22 December 1941 Hitler took over the chief command of the Wehrmacht?
A I thought that that was a most regrettable fact. The head of a state ought to confine himself to that work, for such a position is not a question of the hours of work he puts in; it is a question of quality, so you have to have peace of mind and tine for thought, and it entails being free of any subordinate responsibility for any special purposes. The leadership of any army is a very comprehensive task, which will take up the entire tine of even the best man. It is not something you can deal with nonchalantly on the side, particularly if you have not learned the business. I thought it an impossibility, considering Hitler's personality, and I thought it was unfortunate as far as the army was concerned and even more unfortunate for the German nation, which, after all, could demand a fully capable supreme commander for every branch of the armed forces, because after all, the war was serious enough at that point.
Q Did you express your doubts on that to anybody?
A I talked to Goering and my comrades about this question quite often, and there was only one opinion. They all thought that it was wrong, but we did not have the possibility, of course, of stopping it.
Q Fitness, what was the position at the beginning when you took over the duties of GL? What measures did you take, and what was your aim?
A I can be brief in this connection, at least in regard to the first point. General Vorwald yesterday spoke at length about it. No development in the immediate future took place that was useful. No bomber aircraft of a new type was in existence, and in mass production we stood, as I previously described it to you.
Painstakingly we had reorganized on I September, and it was only because of the extreme devotion of our industry and because of the faithful service rendered by cur German workers and those who helped them that it was possible to, shall we say, bring about a miracle.
The number of bombers was achieved one more in the shortest of time in the spring of 1942. There was not a single individual instance where our program as we had made it for ourselves was not kept, but this is something extraordinary. In the case of fighters, there was a good type of fighter aircraft, or even two; namely, the Focke-Wulf and the Messerschmitt, but there were no engines for those fighters. We had to use incomplete engines to equip these aircraft, and on the strength of my experience collected in my capacity as director of the Lufthansa, I had to have tests carried out. My testing department in Rechlin was excellently staffed, the commander being an excellent pilot and technician, and it was due to their devotion that in a few months we managed to get even these new engines ready, although, according to hi.nan estimate, we could not expect it. It was more through luck than intelligence that we got that.
Now that was the situation as I found it. The now organization, of course, had not been started up, and I had to collect a few new, extremely good experts. The men who were working there independently were rather downhearted for a long time. As experts they had lost any doubt in the outcome of the war, and they did not believe that it would be possible once again to start up our armament program.
The total number of aircraft in production was something in the neighborhood of 800. That included trainer aircraft, transports, liaison aircraft, such as the Storch; it even included towing aircraft which were to be used for parachutists. As far as fighters were concerned, production of those, when it was removed from under my care, had increased by only about ten per cent, although '37, '38, '39, '40, '41--four years--five years-had elapsed.
The saddest fact was that in those 800 there were only 200 fighter aircraft, although both on tho British front and in the East, fighter planes were necessary. The Russians had at their disposal a very large number of bombers, and even if they were an elderly type, after all, we did have to have fighters to keep them in check, and since the transport extended from the North to the South over 2,000 kilometers, a large number of fighter units had to be used in that campaign. This army could not be supported with 200 fighters. We needed more.
The demand which I found from the General Staff, which of course made all demands and had them confirmed by Goering, amounted to a total of 360 fighters which were to be obtained in 1942. It was said yesterday that immediately I ordered a considerable increase. Several figures have been mentioned by various witnesses. Actually, these increases were not decided upon in one day. To begin with, it was to be doubled and a few days later I said, "Let's make it 1000; that's a round number," and later, in fact, there were 3,000 and later even we planned 5,000. We knew about that time just what we had to expect from our enemies. We knew the types they had.
A (Cont'd.) America, in the initial period, still published their production figures correctly subdivided according to types, and we also had an excellent intelligence, and from analyzing aircraft that had been shot down and from the numbers which were coded, and which could be deciphered by an expert right away, we could discover right to the very last number what they had produced. That was production that had been actually carried out, and the figures found in the United States weren't fictitious. Industry, although with a certain amount of reticence and difficulty, but certainly afterwards quite clearly fulfilled these figures. I still know exactly that the plan ran to about 8,000 aircraft, and was achieved, and that figure included four-engine bombers. Production by Britain's rearmaments too was learned in detail, and I remember at the time Great Britain was either already producing 800 fourengine bombers a month or was just about to produce that number.
You could calculate from that the number, the quantity of bombs which could be brought to Germany, and regarding the function and size of the bombs, of course we knew about that too. This was, of course, the reason that previously as general inspector we demanded that the entire force should be built to defend our home country, this being the fundamental principle of warfare, since without armaments and life at home battles at the front were unthinkable. I shall later have to come to this question in more detail because I am probably the man who remembers this most accurately, and as long as I am still about I would like to state this clearly once again, because this is one of the most important questions which probably existed in every war. This was the biggest struggle that went on, and as I look back on it today I am surprised that I did not despair over that struggle myself.
Q Witness, those measures taken by you which you planned, were they enforced, but thought that after this starting of the campaign against Russia the situation in Germany would be desperate?
AAs I said earlier, the fight on two fronts was the stab in the back of this war as far as I was concerned, that I thought excluded victory once and for all, and the only remaining question now was just how badly fleeced we might escape from this whole affair.
It was no longer possible in my mind to end this war with arms in your hand. It was only possible by means of arms to attain a somewhat satisfactory final position on the strength of which political and diplomatic steps would have to takeplace. In order to achieve such a final position it was necessary in the first place that Germany should be protected against destruction, because once the war potential was destroyed it was immaterial whether the fronts collapsed a little earlier or a little later. They couldn't be held any longer. This thought, unfortunately, was not understood by our leaders, or respectively they did not agree with it and turned it down and just didn't come to it. The end did not come until there was hardly one stone left intact.
Q Witness, in this connection I should like to ask you to prove of the directness of your present report and the truth, which you already mentioned before, and to submit this to the Tribunal, which remark you had made in your diary when the Russian campaign started.
A I wrote in it, "The attack against Russia, the first day 1,800 aircraft destroyed mostly on the ground. The Russians left them there. He didn't expect that we would attack. He overestimated our intelligence."
Q What did you want to say by these words, "He overestimated our intelligence?"
A Well, the Russians could have thought that no opponent would be so dumb and so stupid to attack him now and create the war on two fronts.
Q Witness, the leadership of the air fleet, was it connected with your plans, or did they agree to your work in the G.L.?
A They were agreeable to one affair, that is that I succeed in increasing production very rapidly. In spite of the smaller allocation figures of most materials and the questions of the reduction of our laborers all the time, as I said we had a total of 800 aircraft at the time when I took over, including 200 fighters. One year later, just over one year later in February, 1943, that is to say one year and two months or three months after my taking over we were producing 2,400 new aircraft.
But February has only twenty-eight days. If it had more days than that then we would have produced 150 or 250 aircraft more, if we had thirty-one days, I mean. I recall that in July I only took down the number of fighters? but we produced 1,050 modern fighter aircraft. That, of course, had been accurately planned in tho program. We were in that program, but it meant that the increase from November, was 200, to July went up to 1,050 which meant that under normal circumstances three months later would obtain 2,000, and two months after that we would get 3,000 fighters per month. Since preparations and the production of a now fighter takes five to six months, at about that time there were two months which contained more than 2,000 fighters already.
The question whether those fighters would be used for the home defense or not is something which I shall have to answer at a later stage.
Q You said at tho time, at this point, the leadership of the Luftwaffe was agreeable?
A Yes, quite. Of course, the figures demanded by Hitler included bombers and transport aircraft, which were always his main demands, and we pushed that too, but anything that we could possibly use and we could possibly got was used for fighter production. We also had bomber factories. Bomber factories were subdivided in ours, as well as any other country, some only making fighters, others only making bombers. These bomber factories were also used by mo to build fighter aircraft. As that applies to the factory at the Junker works, it was making scats for tho fighters, for instance. Others were producing fusilagos, so in addition to tho actual fighter factories we were actually producing higher factory figures.
Q All right, Witness, soon after you had taken over your duties as G.L. in connection with Speer, did you work with him together, how did you know him and how did you assume collaboration?
A I know Speer as inspector general for the reconstruction of the capitol, Berlin. On one occasion he showed me all his plans and models for Berlin. Those, of course, I was interested in. Then, in addition, I know that after the beginning of the war he was guiding some industrial construction work for Udet. Earlier this had been handled by private 1801a firms and arranged between tho factories and private enterprise, but, of course everything was somehow controlled in one department and restricted so that smaller private firms and bigger private firms could no longer act on their own initiative.
It had all been drawn together, either Todt's or Speer's offices, both offices running side by side, and Speer was responsible for this construction for the air force program for the army. That is how I knew him, although comparatively slightly, but I always had a very excellent expression of him, and I hold him in a high esteem as a man, inasmuch as I could at the time. Speer came after Todt's death, Todt having boon on ammunition and armament since the beginning of the war and was working for rearmament, on the 8th of February, 1942 Todt died in an accident, and on tho twelfth of February Spoor, on Hitler's orders now, took over tho rearmament ministry with a simultaneous task going both those assignments.
Todt felt that the head of the entire armament should be chosen. After that time air force rearmament had a curtain amount of greater independence. For instance, they had direct contacts with tool industries, with cast iron works, with firms making crankshafts for aircraft engines and all that sort of thing, and this entire affair now came under Speer's jurisdiction, particularly during the previous days, because no clearcut leadership existed in our sphere; that is to say, the Chief of the Ordnance Department and the man from the Navy and I, following a suggestion of mine, we all had met a few times in order to create such a head position in the armament program.
I wasn't going to put any particular person into the program. There was going to be a joint program on a voluntary basis for the three of us. We had not informed Todt. We intended to have him faced with the fair accomplishment. Unfortunately, it was at that time that his death occurred. When Speer arrived on the scene we had just formed this joint committee and we had just asked Funk of the Economy Ministry to come along because he still held coal and iron production in his hands at that point.
Speer had also been invited, and he now stated that this type of leadership had been ordered for him by Hitler, and since the others had previously asked me that I should be the head I got up and told Speer that God had sent him to us because we had just been looking for the leading man to take on this task and that we were happy and very pleased for him to take it, and ho did, and during all these years we collaborated with him excellently.
Gradually Speer took over more and more tasks in order to round off his armament program, not so much because he was looking for extra work, because he was overburdened considerably, but it was easier for him to have all these questions put under his own jurisdiction than to have to sit in the ante chambers of others. Thus, before ho took over air armament he had the entire armament program for the Army under him, Navy rearmament, all semi-manufactured parts, all raw materials, every part of the construction program, and all current and energy supplies.
1803a Thus and to myself it was particularly a natter of course that we should see him through thick and thin, and in ay air armament program I suffered fewer restrictions than I would have under someone also, because Speer collaborated with me loyally.
Naturally, ho couldn't avoid any restrictions which occurred in his very big house, but when I did go to him and when I did hear of such setbacks, then he always interfered and assisted me. I know the amount of raw materials which we were receiving, because I collaborated in their distribution in the Central Manning Board, but it was, of course, not possible for me to discover the sequence and the level of priority of raw materials which were assigned by Hitler; in other words, tho sequence of the program, or to alter it. That was something even Speer could not do.
Air rearmament during my period always occupied seventh place, whereas submarines occupied first place; tanks occupied second; ammunition for the Army occupied third; the fourth place was occupied by anti-aircraft artillery, then followed further supplies for the Army. I think anti-tank defenses, and then something else which belonged t o the Army, and then we came in seventh place, but within air armament the sequence was incidentally also decided upon by Hitler. One - bombers; two - transport aircraft; and three - fighters On the strength of that position it was extremely difficult for the fighter or rather, for the entire Air Force to increase armament and keep it up.
It is abundantly clear that in this matter, in order to do something for the Air Force. I would have to introduce very strict and severe measures. I suffered under tho conditions, something which I may be able to refer to tomorrow, to a horrible degree. I could sec the decline and collapse of my country drastically before my eyes. I knew how help could come; I tried it, and I didn't get there. I was stopped. That was something which we used to call in the German Army a paper war victory.
I think anyone can understand that who has ever been in such a war in any responsible position. I fought for this to tho limit of my strength and I must recognize here that all my collaborators, only very few of whom we have had here as witnesses, they were all chaps who helped mo. Not one of these people know any personal factors in this war and for months they didn't even see their families.
We, in our Ministry, slept in our offices for months and. months. I was so tired at night that I didn't even go into the shelter when there were air attacks, apart from which, of course, that didn't help very much; it wasn't the proper shelter. But in Speer's case there were many matters which he couldn't alter either, and he couldn't alleviate the situations.
When workers were taken away from mo, from my factories for instance, then there w s something I didn't even know and didn't over learn. When I arrived in one of the factories and they said, "So many people have now boon taken a.way from me", and I asked, "Who has taken thorn away?" Then I was told, "tho Labor Office." "Well, where did they go?" "Well, we don't know. I can't do anything either."
Then I would talk to Speer and he would say that ho would follow up tho matter, but ho had more work in his comprehensive machinery than to follow up little matters like that. The people who had actually done it didn't, of course, tell him about it. They quieted him down and told him it was all untrue and it was just another bit of stupid talk on tho part of the Air Force. We never got these people back. I am mentioning this case which is probably going to be important later. We could not tell who the workers were that our fact cries received, nor did we know which workers were taken away, but I think that this is something which we shall have to comic to later.
DR. BERGOLD: Your Honors, I shall now come to the foundation of the Central Planning Board. This is once again a comprehensive subject. We are just before the and of the session and I therefore beg to adjourn, but I have one other request. If, tomorrow, we deal in detail with the Contrail Planning Board it will be necessary for me to have the original records or the photostat copies which are in tho hands of the prosecution, and to have them here before us. At this moment they are in the Information Center. I shall be grateful if this High Tribunal would instruct the Information Center of tho Defense that tho entire records and minutes, inasmuch as they exist and their photostat copies, should be brought to this room for tomorrow morning.
THE PRESIDENT: If those records are available and are in the Defense Information Center, of course you nay have then. The proper parties will be notified to have then available for you tomorrow morning.
We shall recess until tomorrow morning at 9:30.
THE MARSHAL: This Tribunal is in recess until 0930 hours tomorrow morning.
(The Tribunal adjourned until 13 March 1947 at 0930 hours.)
Official transcript of the American Military Tribunal in the matter of the United States of America against Erhard Milch, defendant, sitting at Nuernberg, Germany, on 13 March, 0930, Justice Toms presiding.
THE MARSHALL: All persons in the courtroom please take your seats.
The Honorable, the Judges of Military Tribunal No. 2. Military Tribunal No. 2 is new in session.
God save the United States of America and this honorable Tribunal.
There will be order in the Court.
BY DR. BERGOLD:
Q. Witness, do you know at what point the Central Planning Board was ordered and how did the creation of this institute come about?
A. Its employment must have taken place during the last days of March 1942. It originated from a discussion which Speer had with Hitler in the latter's headquarters. At the time when Speer had taken over the armament, I spoke with him about the fact that there was no higher authority which was acting according to clear-cut points of view when distributing raw material. Until then we had been receiving raw material through a certain department of the OKW. This department in turn had been getting it from the four-year plan. The OKW was distributing to the Army, Navy and Air-force but this department had no expert knowledge. Then subsequently the continuity of armament work suffered under this. Speer rather early recognized the state of affairs and without my having previous knowledge of it he tackled this question when talking to Hitler. As a result Hitler employed --- Hitler appointed Speer as the central planner for this subject.
Subsequently Speer made the request that I should take on this task together with him. Since Speer had been in the armament business rather briefly and since he said I would be able to help him -- at least this was the way how Speer discussed the matter with me shortly afterwards because I, myself, hadn't been at that conference. Following this, on the 2nd of April 1942, Speer and I together went to see Goering since Speer considered this task, which, after all, was in touch with the four-Year plan, should be discussed with Goering. Goering expressed agreement 1807 (a) but he demanded that a representative of the Secretary of State or his representative State Secretary Koerner, who was in official contact with the Four-Year plan should enter into tho Central Planning Board.
I know that Speer said at this point: "It seems to me three are rather too many for this job", and I said, "Well, I am only too willing to drop out. I have enough work as it is," and Speer interfered and said that was out of tho question. Goering said: "No, it is my view that there can be three." That is how the composition of Central Planning was realized. I can add that very much later Minister Funk joined Central Planning Board as a force which was done at the instance when the socalled "War-Production" -- and in this case we weren't talking about the armament business and civilian requirements and that matter when this had been transferred from Funk's Ministry to Speer's Ministry.
Q. Witness, did you, within the framework of Central Planning become the Armed Forces or Air Forces representative?
A. No, right at the very beginning that had been decided upon Hitler that, namely, that in no way I should look after my own interest there, that is to say, the interest of the Airforce, that I should be above the party. Later on there were demands from the Navy, which I had not known about this arrangement. They, too, wanted to have a representative in the Central Planning Board. But the emphatic answer, coming from Hitler himself, was given immediately to the effect that I was not in the Control Planning Board in my capacity which I was holding in the Airforce. It was not my task either to appear there on behalf of the entire Armed Forces, but on everybody's behalf, since distribution of raw materials for the whole of Germany and for all purposes was being dealt with.
Q. Witness, what were the actual tasks of this Control Planning Board?
A. The tasks had been communicated to me by Speer and had been confirmed through Goering. There was only distribution of raw materials 1808(a) to all holders of priority permits, holders of the contingent.
Q. Witness, what is what you call the "holder of a contingent"?
A. Well, the armed forces are such priority holders, and within the armed forces the Navy, Army, and Airforce are holders of those priorities. The coal industry holds these priorities; the stool Industry; the textile industry; the German cities and municipalities, for their municipal requirements, energy supplying industry.
Q. What about agriculture?
A. Most certainly agriculture, for agricultural machinery requires stool, requires coal, requires all sorts of things. Altogether, the forms according to which we used to distribute, and which contained the word "armament" on the list, contained, on the right, all the civilian purchasers, all the buyers. There were approximately 40 to 45 civilian holders of these priorities.
Q But then what did the Central Planning Board have to do with the Four Year Plan, to which there seemed to be some sort of formality through Speer?
A The Central Planning Board as such had nothing to do with the Four Year Plan; only Speer in his capacity as Armament Minister.
Q Did you ever report to Goering about the Central Planning Board?
A No, with the exception of that first meeting, when the matter was reported to him, it having taken place on the 2nd of April, 1942. Apart from that meeting, I have never talked to him or with him about the Central Planning Board.
Q According to your opinion, would Goering have called you in to the Central Planning Board if he, Goering, had founded it?
A No, I don't believe so. It only happened because Speer expressed his special wish to Hitler. Hitler, on his own initiative, would not have hit upon this idea either, because, generally speaking, such tasks were only handed over to one man, according to the so-called Fuehrer principle. Might I remind you in this connection of the General Plenipotentiary for Labor? There was only one man on that occasion too.
Q From whom did the Central Planning Board nave instructions?
A Directly from Hitler.
Q Through which channels were they given?
A Speer was with Hitler practically every week, for tne reason of army supplies, or other questions, sometimes staying with Hitler for several days. On such occasions hitler would mention his most important problems. For instance, he would mention the sequence of priorities of the various armament branches, which I explained to you yesterday.
Quite automatically, through this, the approximate priority ratings were laid down. However, within the individual spheres, because of the events of the war, there were current changes: At one moment one type of tank, and then at another moment another type of tank; or first one type of gun, and then another type of gun would be more important. That, of course, necessitated considerable rapid changes in the allotment of raw materials. That was the case, and to an even stronger degree, in the case of ammunitions, so that currently, probably during every such conference which took place in his office, Hitler used to express special wishes, which of course meant orders for us.
I personally took part in such conferences on nine occasions. Occasionally Speer would take me along to have me appear on the stage there, as he would put it. However, that ceased almost completely during the last years. Anyway, I know for certain, according to my documents, that I was there nine times.
Let me add at this point that State Secretary Koerner has never been there. Speer did not think that it was necessary for him to be taken along, and Koerner would not impose his presence either.
Q So that during such an order group of the Central Planning Board, Koerner was never there?
A No, he was not there, and he did not know about it either. He didn't know, therefore, how strongly Hitler inter fered in this sphere by giving orders.
Q But didn't you always report to him, either you or Speer, in the case of the meetings of Central Planning?
A It might have come as an aside during the meetings; one of us might have said, usually speer, "Hitler has given this or that order," but that wasn't anything very noticeable to Koerner.