He was also responsible to the divisional commander for the supply of the division. For this purpose the Ib was at his disposal, who was the second staff officer in the division.
Q. You, as Ia, did you have the authority to issue your own orders?
A. No, I did not have such an authority. If I had to issue any orders this was done by order, or rather as a deputy in the absence of the divisional commander.
Q. If I understand you correctly, witness, these were always orders of the divisional commander.
A. Yes, that is right. This can be seen from the form in which these orders were signed, and this whole matter can easily be made clear from our regulations for the General Staff Service.
Q. Witness, these regulations for the General Staff Service, is that the so-called "Red Donkey"?
A. Yes, that's the first part of it.
Q. You, as Ia, did you have anything in particular to do with questions of jurisdiction?
A. I had nothing to do with this. The Court Martial advisor of the division was immediately subordinate to the divisional commander as the jurisdictional authority.
Q. Now, to the proper commitment of your division. Will you please tell the Tribunal the exact designation which your division had?
A. My division was called the 392nd (Croatian Infantry Division).
Q. If I understand you correctly just before you said that this division was newly created on the maneuvering field Doellersheim hear Vienna?
A. Yes.
Q. When end where was this division committed?
A. The division, as of the 2nd of January 1944, was sent by train to Zagreb, and from there it was given the task to occupy the area which for sometime had not been occupied. This was in the area between the Croatian Frontier near Fiume and Karlovac.
That is further south, along the Adriatic Coast. This area was to be liberated and held.
Q. To whom was your division subordinate during that commitment?
A. The division was subordinate to the XVth Mountain Corps.
Q. And who was, at the time, Commanding General of the XVth Mountain Corps?
A. General von Leyser.
Q. What was the personnel of this division, witness?
A. The division consisted of one-third Germans, who were mostly officers or non-commissioned officers, and the remaining two-thirds were Croatians. They were the men. All officers were Germans.
Q. Was this division a Croatian Army unit, or was it a German unit, Herr Kobe?
A. No, it was a German unit. That can be seen from the number -392nd Division.
Q. Now, another question as to the constellation of your division. You said that, for the most part, the men were Croatians, if I understood you correctly. How did your division get replacements for their men? Were you entitled to recruit Croatian inhabitants for the armed service, or how was this done?
A. Our replacements were sent to us via the replacement depot for all German Croatian divisions, which also was situated neav Vienna. It was rather far to get there and it was dangerous and we would rather have got our replacements from the area where we were fighting, in order to be able to commit these people in their own home areas and then it would hot have been necessary for us to cope with the problem of this long distance.
Q. From what agency, witness, were the Croatians recruited for military service and sent to the replacement depot near Vienna?
A. That was purely a Croatian matter. The Croatians had their own military districts who dealt with this, together with the responsible German authorities in Zagreb.
Q. You said just now that the division would have found it better to get their replacements from the areas where the division was committed. I suppose by this you mean that the division would have liked to train its men itself, is that correct?
A. Yes, you understood me correctly, and I would like to add that many people volunteered in our area.
Q. Did you at any time take steps to get permission to commit, directly, those Croatian inhabitants with the division? In order to clarify this question I would like to add something, Herr Kobe. When I say "you", I do not mean you, personally, as the 1-A of the DivisionI mean the division, generally, or, rather, in particular you divisional commander. Just so you know what I mean.
A. Yes, of course.
Q. My question, then, was whether at any time the division at tempted to get permission to recruit and train their own men?
A. Yes, I believe at one time we made such a request. That was after we had discussed the matter properly with our Croatian liaison officer.
Q. To what agency did you address this request, or this paper?
A. We could only do this through official channels to the 15th Corps.
Q. Could the 15th Corps, on their own, decide about this request, Herr Kobe?
A. I do not know but I do not suppose so.
Q. Do you remember what decision was made as an answer to your request?
A. No, I do not know that any longer. In any case, I do not know that at a later time we actually did carry out recruitments or training.
Q. I beg your pardon, your answer was not quite clear. Do you mean that at a later time you did make any recruitments, or that you didn't?
A. No, we did not make any recruitments.
Q. One further question. For the first time just now you mentioned the Croatian liaison officer, that is your liaison officer. May I ask you, Herr Kobe, whether such a liaison officer was constantly with the staff of your division? I would also like to make it clear to us what the connection was between your division and the Croatian civilian and military authorities.
A. Yes. We had to deal with several liaison officers. There was the military liaison officer; he was constantly with us; and he was the Croatian Domobran Colonel Saska, the representative of the Croatian Armed Forces. Then we had constantly with us a representative of the Croatian Armed Forces. Then we had constantly with us a representative of the Croatian government, a plenipotentiary. The first one of those State Secretary Markovic, who later on played an important part in the public life of Croatia.
The second one of these was a Croatian Colonel, whose name I no longer recall; and the third one, who stayed with us for the longest period, was the Croatian Lieutenant Colonel Vilhar. He was......
Q. Just a moment, witness. Could you please spell the name, if you can do it?
A. V-i-l-h-a-r. He was an old Austro-Hungarian officer, a Croatian of course, and was a shoolfriend and close friend of my divisional commander who also was an Austrian. Then, for church affairs, we had a Croatian Divisional Chaplain, a Catholic priest, and a Noslem priest. And, finally, we had constantly close contacts with the Grossgespans chaft, this would about compare with our county and the Grossgespansor Veliky Zupan, as the Croatian expression goes, was, so to speak, the Croatian district commissioner.
Q. If I understood you correctly, Herr Kobe, then you had constantly with your staff, two liaison men of the Croatian staff one officer for the military sector and a representative for the civilian interests of the Croatian State, is that correct?
A. Yes, it is.
Q. You talked, just now, about the Grossgespanschaft. Can you, from your memory, tell us briefly how the Croatian civilian administration was sub-divided in your divisional area?
A. Yes. When we occupied the area, throughout this district including the islands of Rab and Tab, an orderly Croatian administration was established. In our area we had the Grossgespanschaft Lika Backa, whose headquarters was in Gospic; the Grossgespan, which could be compared with the German District Commissioner, was a Croatian chaplain. Then we had the Grossgespanschaft or Province Vinodol, whose headquarters were in Sinja and before that in Fiume-Sisak; and then we had the Grossgespanschaft or province Modrusch, whose seat was in Obolin.
The District Commissioner of Sinie was known to me personally and I saw a lot of him.
Q. Now we will return to the two Croatian liaison officers. Was the collaboration between the divisional staff and these liaison men close, or was it just a loose contact?
A. No. It was a very close contact and I can say that it was a very good, friendly relationship, which can be seen even from our constellation. Sometimes we ourselves did not know any longer whether we were Croatians or Germans.
Q. Initially, on examination, you said that you were 1-A of your division from December 1943 - January 1944, until March 1945. Was the division committed in the same Croatian area during the whole time ?
A. Yes, it was.
Q. You personally, then, stayed for quite some time in that area and I can therefore assume that you have gained particular knowledge about the conditions and the method of fighting in the Croatia area, is that correct?
A. Yes, my divisional commander and I were alternately almost all the time on trips throughout the area. We wanted to keep up a constant connection with the troops in spite of the large distances and we believed that this could be achieved only by consistently visiting the troops. Furthermore, we wanted to and had to keep up the contact with the population and with the country, because in the final analysis that was the only way in which we could gain a clear picture about our enemy.
Q. You have repeatedly talked of your divisional commander. Perhaps you would give the Tribunal the name of your divisional commander and his service rank and perhaps you would tell us whether he had any particular knowledge or any particular capabilities which made him especially suitable as a leader of such a division?
A. His name was General Lieutenant (Major General) Mickl-M-i-c-k-l, and he was an old active Austrian officer. In my opinion he had extraordinary capabilities. After the World War he had defended Styria his home province against the attacking Yugoslavs and even in those days there was a memorial erected to him in his home country. He spoke the Croatian language and he, as well as I, myself, was particularly interested in the country, in the inhabitants, and particularly in our own Croatian soldiers and we were very fond of them. He was an extremely brave man - I hardly ever encountered a soldier of such extraordinary bravery.
Q. You told us before, Herr Kobe, that your division was a German Army unit and that the personnel of this unit consisted, for the most part, of Croatian inhabitants. A very important question has been touched upon during these proceedings - that is, the question of the indigenous units. We have taken a lot of trouble to clarify the problem of these indigenous units. Since you have been in that district for such a long time, perhaps you could give us an explanation of what one understands, under indigenous units?
A. Croatia was an independent State. It was called Independent Croatian State. This state had its own War Ministry and it had its own armed forces, consisting of Army, Navy and Air Force. Furthermore, it had an independent formation of armed forces, the Ustasha Units. As far as I could gauge it from my area, the Ministry had subdivided the armed forces into divisions and these divisions, according to the service age of the Croatian officers, were either led by a Ustasha officer or by a Domobran officer who was a member of the regular armed forces of Croatia. We had the 13th Croatian division in Karlovac but only a part of this division took part in the fighting in our area. The 15th Croatian division was stationed in Gospic and we were particularly in constant touch with the 15th Croatian division and collaborated with this division. Under these divisions there were Croatian Rifle Brigades, artillery detachments and signal detachments. The rifle brigades were subdivided into regiments, battalions and companies, exactly the same as with the German armed forces. The Ustasha was subdivided into brigades; below the brigade there were battalions and companies, just exactly the same as with the German armed forces.
Q. May I say something, witness: In order to have the whole thing quite clear, when you are talking about Ustasha I believe you mean the Ustasha fighting units, these Ustasha battalions as they are called here in the documents?
A. Yes, they are the ones I mean.
A. I would then like you to continue.
A. Well, I had more or less concluded.
A. All right. If I understood you correctly then, Herr Kobe, you described to us the Croatian Armed Forces that one had to gain the impression that those were properly organized Armed Forces such as every other State has them?
A. Yes, that is exactly how it is.
Q. You were talking about the Croatian Divisional Commanders who were in your area and you talked about the collaboration between you and those divisional commanders.
I would like to ask you whether these divisional commanders were, on principle, and for all times, subordinate to your divisional commander?
A. No. They were under the Croatian General Staff.
Q. Witness, what about the tactical commitment of Croatian units? how were matters regulated there?
A. Can you put your question a little more precisely?
Q. Perhaps I can give you an example of how I mean this. Your division intended to carry out an operation and the commitment of a Croatian unit, a Croatian battalion or even a Croatian regiment seemed necessary to your divisional commander for military reasons. Did your divisional commander, in such a case, have the authority to order directly the commitment of this Croatian regiment or battalion? If not, what was the procedure in such cases?
A. In such cases, as was proper, we would take up contact with the Croatian Divisional Commander and would discuss a plan of commitment with him and ask him how he intended to participate in such a commitment. After such a discussion, the operation would be carried out. For this purpose we had our own liaison officer with the division in Gospic who, when we were not in a position to get there, carried out, these discussions with the divisional commander for us.
Q. In every individual case, as you say, an agreement always had to be reached between your divisional commander and the Croatian divisional commander so that the German division could use any Croatian units for a tactical purpose?
A. Did you say force? There can be no talk about force.
Q. No, you misunderstood me. I said an agreement was necessary so that your division could use Croatian units for the commitment?
A, Yes, of course, out I have to make one reservation here. Of course, if in the depth of night an enemy brigade would appear and attack a garrison, then it was a matter of course that everybody would take up arms and that there would be no discussion of spheres of com petency in such an emergency.
Q. This exception, which is militarily a matter of course, can be omitted in our further observations. There is one question which I would like clarified and I believe you have already answered it, and that is the following: That not on principle and for all times there was a tactical subordination of Croatian units under the German Armed Forces.
A. No, on the contrary. For all times, and on principle, these units were subordinate to the Croatian General Staff. They were, after all, Croatian units.
Q. One more question. You just told us that after your divisional commander and the leader of the Croatian division had reached an agreement, then your division could use Croatian units for a tactical commitment. During the tactical commitment would these units, in a disciplinary and judicial respect, be subordinate to your unit, or how was this question regulated?
A. No, they received their tactical commitment orders from us because, technically, it was not possible to do it in any other way; but, as I have said, they were in no instance subordinate to us in a disciplinary and judicial respect, not even when they were tactically committed with us. That is never the case with allies and it is really never the case in any instance.
Q. Now, to refer back to the question of tactical commitment, Herr Kobe. After that particular tactical commitment had been concluded, what would then be the relationship of subordination of the Croatian unit which had been subordinate to the German unit for that particular commitment?
A. That relationship ceased automatically with the conclusion of the operation but these matters were never put down in writing in any way. These units would return to their garrison and would then receive their orders from their own Croatian superiors.
Q. Did the Croatian Armed Forces carry out their own operations, on their own initiative?
A. Yes, all the time.
Q. And what was the agency who gave the orders to the Croatian units for their own operations.
A. Those were the leaders of the Croatian units.
Q. In order not to make this examination too long, if you talk here about the Croatian Armed Forces and about tactical subordination for certain purposes, (under omission of disciplinary and judicial subordination) does your testimony apply to the Croatian Army Domobran units only or may we also apply it to the Waffen units of the Ustasha?
A. Yes, they are concerned in the same way.
Q. You told us that those Ustasha units were part of the Croatian Armed Forces and were, as such, subordinated to the leadership of the Croatian Armed Forces. Were there, in addition, other Ustasha units bearing arms who did not represent a part of the Croatian Armed Forces?
A. Yes, there were local home guard organizations which were organized by the Croatian administrative officials and were taken care of by them.
Q. What kind of units do we have to imagine when we talk about these Ustasha units?
A. There was a voluntary joining together of the male inhabitants of a certain area and these men wanted to defend this particular area against an attacking enemy; in actual fact they did this.
Q. Was there any authority on the part of the German agencies over these home guard units?
A. No.
Q. Were these units ever committed tactically?
A. No, not by us. These units remained only in their own home areas. If the enemy threatened their homes, then they would take up arms, join up together and present a kind of local defense and defend against the attacking enemy. If we had our own forces in such an area, then we would immediately go to such a threatened area, defeat the enemy, and then these people would just go home.
Q. But there can then be no talk of a proper tactical commitment of these units, there was nothing like that, was there?
A. No, they were only people who would join up in emergency cases.
Q. And these units, if I understood you correctly, carried out such defensive operations sometimes without the German Armed Forces gaining knowledge of this?
A. Yes, quite frequently.
PRESIDING JUDGE CARTER: We will take our usual morning recess at this time.
(A recess was taken. )
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.
MR. FULKERSON: If the Court please, I'd like to make one brief statement before Dr. Tipp proceeds. I am afraid that Dr. Tipp feels that, in asking the witness von Besser for his notes this morning, I took unfair advantage of him; and I would simply like to say that it has been, at least in my experience, the exception rather than the rule when a defendant or a defense witness goes to the stand without being loaded down with notes of one kind or another. And it is the practice of reaching questions and answers rather than a question of personalities involved here and I certainly meant no reflection on Dr. Tipp personally, nor did I think that he is to be criticized for following the practice that has been followed so many times before by his colleagues. That is all.
BY DR. TIPP (CONTINUED)
Q. Witness, we concluded, before the recess, with the question whether units of the Croatian Wehrmacht and also Croatian Berne Guards, without order or knowledge of the German Wehrmacht, carried out large or small operations and you answered this question in the affirmative and I would like to ask you an additional question about this.
If the German troops found out about such an operation by the Croatian Wehrmacht or by a Croatian Rome Guard organization later on was this included in the reports of the German troops to the superior office?
A. Yes, of course, as far as that was important for the evaluation of the whole position to the superior office.
Q. You have explained rather in detail, witness, the organization of the Croatian Wehrmacht and its command. Furthermore, you talked about the Croatian Rome Guard units. But another kind of formation played a large part in this and they have cropped up here under the most various names, I mean the so-called Chetniks. And now what can you tell us, basically, about the system of these Chetniks?
A. Of course, I can only give information about this as far as it concerned my units during operations, with us we had two kinds of these peoples.
Once the former Yugoslav Major Eremic with a few hundred men from the so-called Eighth land division came over to us out of conviction in order to protect his own home land, which was in the territory occupied by us against the partisans; and further in our area there were also several small local home guard units, in Serbian areas inside the Croatian territory. That is, just as local Ustasha units arose, local Chetnik units also arose to protect their home land, but they were in no way subordinate to us. They only wanted to achieve peace and order in their own home land.
Q. Might I perhaps place another question with regard to these troops of Major Eremic about whom you just spoke? Did this group remain as a closed, fighting unit or was this group also a local home guard unit, as you called them previously?
A. No; this group remained on one group. It wore uniform, olivegreen uniform with a standard cap. This was the so-called Serbian cap. In the front they wore the big Serbian double eagle which could be seen from a great distance as a shining silver emblem.
Q And then, with regard to Major Eremic's troops, can one speak about them as regular troops?
A. Yes, certainly.
Q And now, could this Eremic unit be placed into operation by your division?
A. We could take up contact with Major Eremic and then we could discuss matters with him and if he agreed he would cooperate--however, I remember only one or two occasions in which such operations were carried out under such an agreement, but, of course, these operations only took place in his area.
Q. You said if it were agreeable to him he cooperated with you. what do you mean? Was there any kind of possibility from a military point of view that any pressure was exerted on him?
A. No, not at all. You see, it was like this: Major Eremic and his men never surrendered to us in that sense.
He came with his entire detachment, with arms and munitions away from the partisans in his area. He sent us a negotiator who was also armed and said that he wanted to fight together with us because he had found out that we wanted to bring peace and order into his home land and on this b***s we fought together for the common aim of creating peace and order in this area.
If, for instance, I drove over there all was very strange and peculiar because suddenly one was surrounded by a group of rather wild figures, and then one was escorted to Major Eremic, well, one really had to rely on these people.
Q. You said, Herr Kobe, if I understand you correctly, that this group was independent from you and only participated in the fighting when it was agreeable to them. Now did this group carry out independent operations themselves?
A. Yes. Currently inside their area and mainly towards the north they carried our operations completely independently and informed us of what they thought was important to us.
Q And you talked about the other Chetnik groups which just as the Ustasha units you described as local home guard organizations. With regard to these troops can one really talk about actual closed units or what was tho condition here?
A. No. As I have already described, this was a pure local joining together of the able-bodied members of the population in order to protect their own homeland. As one example, south of Ototac there was a valley which was called Lipovopolje.
Q. Herr Kobe, would you please spell the name for the record?
A. LIPOVOPOLJE, Lipovopolje. Here the people, as I said joined together and blocked the entrance to their area; one had to pass over a river and they removed all the bridges. We found out about the existence of this home guard only after we had been there for sometime. We tried to get into contact with them but first of all this was only possible by shouting across the river and we found out about their aims and thereupon they themselves took up contact with us and the bridges were put up again and things progressed quite nicely after that.
Q. Compared to central European conditions and also to conditions in the U.S.A. these local home guards units are rather difficult to understand Herr Kobe. Could you please tell us from you knowledge of the area how from a historical point of view these home guard units actually arose?
A. Well, through our area there ran about 200 years ago the Austro-Hungarian frontier. A long this military frontier there were then six positions which were held permanently by troops. In order to make this quite clear that was the frontier against the Turks.
MR. FULKERSON: I don't believe the witness has qualified himself on Balkan history and politics so I, therefore, object to this line of testimony.
BY DR. TIPP:
Q. If there is any doubt I would like to ask the witness first of all where he got this knowledge from, which he wishes to communicated to the Tribunal here. Herr Kobe, before telling us about the conditions may I ask you to tell the Tribunal where you got this knowledge about the historical conditions in this area.
A. I found it out from my Divisional Commander who was an Austrian and then I found this out from the population with whom I was in close contact all the time.
MR. FULKERSON: I think that only bears out that he is not qualified as an expert, if Your Honor please, and I reiterate my objection.
JUDGE CARTER: I think the witness can testify as to what knowledge he may have and on cross-examination if you can show that his sources were not reliable you may proceed.
BY DR. TIPP:
Q. Herr Kobe, then please continue with your brief historical outline. You said last that the old Austro-Hungarian military frontier ran through your area.
A. Yes, and I also said that there were certain strong points along this frontier. Now the able bodied men in this district went about their work under normal circumstances. If an enemy attack was threatened then they took up their weapons and fought together with the permanent units in order to prevent the enemy entering their area. We, ourselves, up to a certain degree, experienced that kind of fighting by the Croatians and we also adapted it to our needs. These people were called at that time Frontiermen and that clears up their attitude and their task at least as far as Germany is concerned.
Q. Witness, I think you have clarified the conditions in the area in order to make the next question understandable. In order to get a little more clarification I would like to ask you this question. Did your division have any kind of possibility of command over these Cetnik home guard organizations; could you give the Cetnik organizations any kind of directives and were you in any way responsible from a military point of view for these units?
A. No, we were not, and we also didn't give them any orders but from case to case we contacted Major Eremic as the highest Serbian authority in this area/.
Q. And now let's go back to the units of the Croatian Wehrmacht, the units of the Waffen Ustascha and the Domobran, you said that these could from time to time be used by you tactically after agree ment of your divisional Commander with the Croatian Divisional or Battalion Commanders.
Could you undertake any operation if the Croatian Divisional Commanders in reply to such a request from your Divisional Commanders stated that the regiments or battalions applied for could not be made available and what possibility did you have to exert pressure on this high Croatian officer?
A. We couldn't force him at all and this can be seen from what I have already said. We could report this to the corps headquarters for them to pass it on to the Croatian War Ministry.
Q. And did it happen, witness, do you remember, that a Croatian Divisional Commander ever refused to make any kind of unit available for a common operation?
A. Yes, that was very frequently the case.
Q. And now another question. Let's assume for a certain case a Croatian Regiment was placed at your disposal and then they received a tactical order and did not carry out the order properly, what could your Divisional Commander do then?
A. We only had to do with battalions; there weren't any regiments with us in general. We could complain to the Croatian Divisional Commander and directly to our Liaison officer and then as I have already said we could report to the corps to be passed on by them to the Croatian government and also we could ask for the relief of Croatian officers from his post and I remember one case in which this actually happened.
Q. But if I understand you correctly Herr Kobe, you did not have the possibility to insist directly for your order to be carried out?
A. No, we did not have this possibility and also apart from the purely legal point of view in actual fact we couldn't do this.
You must remember in the whole area we were only, I think, 3,500 Germans and then with two divisions we had about 6,500 Croatians. The The Ustascha and the Domobran units in our area were altogether perhaps 8,000 to 9,000 men.
That meant 15,000 Croatians as against only 3,000 Germans and if we wanted to use any force at all then it could have happened that out own soldiers would have joined up with the Ustascha and Croats and then that would have been a rather difficult situation.
Q. And now another question. Let us assume that such a home guard unit was temporarily made subordinate to you for an operation and this unit committed an excess. What possibility had the division to take action about this excess if you found out about it subsequently?
A. Exactly the same possibility as we have just talked about.
Q. Well then let us assume, witness, that some officer of the Ustascha. unit had committed some kind of offense. Did the corps then have the right or possibility to proceed against this Ustascha officer personally?
A. Which do you mean the division or the corps?
Q. The Division.
A. No, I said if necessary we could ask for him to be relieved from his position and we actually did this in one or two cases.
Q. You mention one or two cases, witness. Can you explain a little more in detail your theoretical statements, by an example, perhaps.
A. Yes, first of all the following example: East of Ototac a Ustascha officer had been murdered by Serbs, an ensign of the same Ustascha unit then burned down a small village and shot part of the population. We requested at once a judicial investigation of the case and a judicial judgment; and that we could be absolutely certain about it we wanted a copy of this judgment. All this was promised by the Croatian authorities. The ensign was brought by the Croatians to Zagreb allegedly to be sentenced there. But, we found out nothing else about the matter at all from the Croatians although from funda mental consideration we kept on asking, what about this sentence and after a long time a Croatian soldier of our own division reported to us that the ensign concerned had been seen by him in a Ustascha unit in quite another district East of Zagreb and therefore all our representations were completely without success.
