THe PRESIDENT: In this Pohl indicates he wishes to have experiments made in two groups, first, such as cover the examination of poisonous ingredients of our food, or such as are slowly growing poisonous. That, to my mind, now speaking for the Tribunal, does not all suggest the feeding of poisonous food to prisoners but does refer to the growth of poisons in food by fermentation, by contamination, or in some such method as that. If that is all the poison there is in this clause of the indictment, I think we can find an antidote.
THE WITNESS: In another affidavit, of course, mention was made, I don't know where it was, that inmates were given wooden sausate. We discussed that this morning.
Q. (By Dr. Pribilla) Witness, your knowledge about these things does not seem to go too far. Who among your subordinates was the one who had more knowledge? Did you have a specialist in your department?
A. We did not have a specialist in that sense. We had somebody but we did not use him as such. One of my colleagues was the former ministerial councellor in the Ministry of the Interior, and with the Reich Health Leader, one called Obersturmfuehrer Ertl, who, it so happened, knew Schenk from the old days and worked together with Schenk in a civilian capacity. As he knew his ideas and methods of work for a much longer time and more thoroughly than I did, Ertl would therefore by in a position to give more reason and to tell you more about this.
DR. PRIBILLA: Oberministerial Councillor Ertl was permitted by the Tribunal to appear as a witness here, and if this should become necessary after the cross-examination by the Prosecution, to speak more about Schenk's experiments with poisonous foods, then we have perhaps in Ertl the antidote which the president has deferred to.
A. (By Dr. Pribilla) How we can leave this subject, and I would like to ask you now what you knew of the so-called euthanasia program?
A. As far as the carrying out of that program was concerned and above all using that program for the committing of crimes, I did not know at all. That crime, as many other crimes, I heard about only here in prison.
Euthanasia as a problem of a general nature I knew something about in the old days. I knew as much as any interested layman with an average degree of education, because that problem was discussed a great deal a long time before the war, long even before National Socialism came into power. Quite probably both at home and abroad people expressed their opinions against or for it, and beyond that I heard nothing about it. Particularly I never knew that the final opinion was in governmental or expert circles, and looking back I can only say it world have been somewhat difficult for me to notice anything about that, because at that time, when this program was used, I was not in Germany, not at home.
Q. Did you not hear anything abut the fact that Jews, Poles, and other members of so-called inferior races were systematically sent to extermination camps?
A. Shortly after 1933, Doctor, when one of the first laws issued by the National Socialist Government came out, we had the law which forbade vivisection, and that saw was being explained too. Even had I known anything about these things, I would not have believed it, that a Government which so expressly had fought the cause of animals would have done anything go barbaric and insane on human beings. Even had somebody told me about this, I think I would not have reported this man to the Gestapo as you might assume, I think probably I might have called a psychiatrist, because I think this would have been so insane that I only could have believed it if I could have seen it with my own eyes, because I worked in a field which did not bring me into the remotest contact with that sort of problem.
Q. But did you not, for example, hear the speech made by the Reichsfuenrer SS Himmler on 14 October 1943 at Posen, and which we have mentioned before here in this trial?
A. It has been said before that this speech was addressed to a small circle of higher leaders to which I did not belong then or later. Also I saw Himmler for the last time and heard him in the autumn of 1940 in Holland.
Therefore, I heard nothing of the so-called Posen speech at the time nor later on.
Q. But the speech which you heard in Holland in 1940, what did he say there, what principles did he mention?
A. On that occasion Himmler spoke at Atten Doorm in Holland, addressing the Leader Corps of our division. I cannot recall too many details of that speech. All I know now, which seems to me the most remarkable thing, at the time he demanded from us who were in the occupied foreign countries, exemplary behavior. We were, as he put it, to win over the population of those countries to our cause. These were expressions and golden words which had nothing criminal to them and were entirely on an ideal basis. What I feel today is that whatever circle he was addressing he spoke to in accordance with the effect he wished to make.
Q. The Posen speech never reached you, nor was it the basis of your action ever?
A. No, I heard nothing of the speech at the time, and my immediate superior, Georg Loerner, had not been to Posen. Pohl, who was present, did not tell us anything about it because we did not have that close contact with the head director there. The ideas were not the basis of our actions, because I , and other of my friends, always believed in acting as decent human beings and soldiers.
Q. Did you come across the term "action Reinhard" ever?
A. Only in this trial. In the old days I never saw, experienced or read anything, for instance, the expression itself or something similar to it, which could be connected with it.
Q. Did you know of any special task "G" within the framework of the WVHA?
A. No, that term again is completely new and strange to me, and I can only say the same thing about Action Reinhard. I made no observations which in any way could be connected with it.
Q. Were you not concerned with the evaluation or listing of the valuables, moneys, etc., which came from the Action Reinhard?
A. No. after all I was a food expert, and we were--Here we did not have the food items, but other valuables which did not touch upon my field of task at all, I never had anything to do with it.
Q. Did you not have anything to do with it by the fact that you were known as deputy, Georg Loerner's deputy from time to time?
A. No, I need not modify what I said at all.
Q. Did you not obtain any knowledge that the Reichsbank had gold, gold from teeth, valuables, jewels, which had come from the Action Reinhard, and which was deposited there for the WVHA?
A. Not at any time did I hear of this, and on the basis of files and documents it is my impression that this things happened sometime before I joined the WVHA. Therefore it was quite impossible for me to have any practical contact with it.
Q. But a document has been submitted here in Document Book 18, Page 135 of the English text and 142 of the German, which is Document NO-2003, Exhibit 480 by the prosecution. That is a report addressed to Himmler, presumably from Pohl, and it says that thousands of watches fountain pons, billfolds and things having been repaired were sent to the SS Division to their post exchange places, etc. Now, you were competent for the troop storage camps. In that capacity, perhaps as the expert in that respect did you take part in the distributing of these items to the troops perhaps?
A. First of all, I never read that report. At the time when that letter was drawn up I was not with the WVHA yet, but I was with a division in Russia. Also, that letter was a top secret. It was therefore subject to the utmost secrecy, and therefore it was quite impossible for me to obtain any knowledge about it. But speaking quite generally I may say that neither in the field nor later on when I was chief of B-I did I come across anything which had anything to do with these things.
If reference is made, for instance, that these watches were distributed to the divisions, as the administrative official I would have had to notice this, even though it need not have meant that I would have had to draw conclusions where these watches come from. But all the same it would have had to appear somewhat peculiar when five hundred watches appeared out of nowhere, so to speak, which were did derent in their make and despite any repairs one could have seen that they were not brand new. I know also that for the PX places at the front we had watches forwarded. They were brand new watches, however, all of which looked alike and came from Switzerland where they had been bought. I could think only of one thing. The letter was written in March, 1943 and in July, 1943, I was transferred away from the field division. All that might have happened was that these watches were distributed later on.
Then there was a second method in which watches of that sort could be distributed among the troops. That was through what was called the Officer for Ammunition and Arms, who was also responsible for a certain amount of technical equipment. I know that that officer once sent somebody to Berlin in Summer 1943 in order to receive watches; but I also know that these watches which he brought back with him were exactly the same watches which we had sold in our PX, i.e. new watches from Switzerland. The watch was called "Silvana."
Q May I interrupt you here? You had never heard anything of these things?
A No.
Q Now, what about clothing? Defendant Georg Loerner in his affidavit NO-1911, Prosecution Exhibit Number 5, Document Book I, Page 19 of the English version, Page 27 of the German text, and Page 126, said this: that large quantities of clothing and second-hand clothing had arrived from the East and dispositions were made of them. Did Georg Loerner, if only conversationally, inform you about that fact? Were you responsible in the matter of how this clothing was disposed of?
A No, Loerner never said a word about this to me? and this process seems to have taken place in 1942 or 1943 on the whole, again at a time when I was not yet in the WVHA. Therefore, again as a matter of course it was impossible for me to hear anything about it; and therefore it should be clear that if later on anything touched on B II casually of these things, that would never have reached me because this process was done purely by letters from one desk to another, so to speak. If they amounted to anything bigger at all, they had lost the charm of novelty, if I may put it that way. So I was never concerned with these things, nor have I been told about them.
Q Now, what were your relations with the various W offices?
A Hardly any relations at all. Today we have the situation that everybody makes frantic efforts to be put at a distance from everybody else? but it is obvious that the W offices were civilian enterprises and the people working there were on the whole civilian workers and employees.
Even the inmates working there were fed by the civilian sector. Therefore, there were no natural points of contact between those offices and my own. Otherwise, the W offices were located -- at least most of them -- not in Berlin nor in the Main Office Building in Berlin -- Lichterfelde. I may have known the chiefs of the W offices from seeing them twice or three times; and I knew that this or that person was a chief of a W office. But any more close conversations or conversations about secret matters of a special nature were quite impossible in view of the casualness of this contact.
Q Did you have any influence on labor allocation of inmates?
A The answer should be obvious from what I have said before. I had nothing to do with it. It did not touch on my field at all nor did I know that there was a special agency to regulate this field.
Q Were you never a shareholder or manager or anything of that sort in one of the W enterprises?
A Never in my life was I a participant in any enterprise; neither a private one nor a WVHA one.
Q Did you know that Himmler was the sole shareholder of the German economic enterprises?
Or did you know that Pohl and Loerner were managers?
AAs to Himmler's legal position in those enterprises, I never heard anything. That Pohl and Loerner were at least formally in commercial law, were managers, I had heard, it is true; but what that involved in detail I never knew. I didn't even know that Loerner had been a trained expert in that field and that he was a diploma merchant. We didn't even discuss that.
Q You heard here what co-defendant Georg Loerner said in this respect when he was asked about participating in founding or managing W enterprises. As his deputy were you not concerned with anything of that sort? Did you go there perhaps instead of Georg Loerner when something had to be founded in a hurry?
A I said quite clearly that when I acted as deputy for Loerner, it concerned only the field of Office Group B. I was never in a position to observe that Goerg Loerner was particularly busy in Group B. As Loerner did not play a very important part in that field any more, we never discussed it.
Q Did you not have any financial advantages in your position as a Standartenfuehrer in the Waffen SS, the General SS or did you have other material advantages?
A Of course I received my salary in accordance with my rank. When in 1943 I joined the Allgemeine, General, SS, I received loss at the beginning than I did with the Reichsbank. My salary went up slowly. When I became a Standartenfuehrer of the General SS I received roughly the same pay as a captain of the armed forces. A Standartenfuehrer in the Allgemcine SS, to put that quite clearly, is not the same thing as Standartenfuehrer in the Waffen SS or a colonel because it was only in 1944. that I became a Standartenfuehrer in the Waffen SS and received the pay of a colonel, which was about eight hundred or nine hundred marks. These were the only advantages, if I can call them advantages. At any rate it was my only income. After I had lost everything in the inflation, I never acquired anything particularly important in the way of property.
I must say until the end of the war the question of my pension wasn't even settled. During the war I did not think it worthy of myself to put my private interests into the foreground and insist on these things being fixed. But anyway it would have been for nothing as it was.
Q This brings us to the end of the evidence on your own behalf. But I should like to put one final question to you. Witness, you have heard the indictment; you have seen the documents which the prosecution has submitted; you have heard the witnesses; and you have heard what has been going on in concentration camps. What today is your position about these things?
A I said it before. I joined the NSDAP for political reasons, from my political conviction. This is also true of the SS. I regarded the NSDAP at that time as the only bulwark against Communism.
I might say perhaps that I regarded it as the lesser evil. I joined it from the purest idealism, I may say, and I did not derive any particular advantages from doing so. Today I am horrified at the crimes which have occurred in the concentration camps; and I feel after my blind faith and confidence deeply disappointed and betrayed.
In order to case my own conscience, I am bound to say that my tasks and my work in the WVHA did not bring me into contact with all these things and bound to say that personally I am sitting here with clean hands. In the one case, the case of the Dora works, where I heard about these bad conditions, I had to regard it as a terrific exception. I believe I have proved that I helped there as a matter of course, as you would help every human being when you come across a catastrophe.
I would be grateful if one thing would be believed. Had I even remotely thought or been in a position to think that the dogmas of the Party program and the system would lead to these crimes, I would then somehow or other have taken the final step. That is all I have to say about that.
DR. PRIBILLA: I have no further questions.
EXAMINATION THE TRIBUNAL (JUDGE MUSMANNO):
Q Witness, after you observed these horrible conditions at Dora, the Dora Labor Camp, and you went back to your work with WVHA, having done what you could to ameliorate conditions, did it not occur to you that similar conditions might be true of other labor camps?
THE WITNESS: In the excitement which was caused by these conditions and when Gruppenfuehrer Pohl and Kammler were in this state of excitement I was confirmed in my view that here they were concerned with something special and exceptional because those two high leaders otherwise would not have shown themselves to be so concerned. That was my impression. The other impression which Gruppenfuehrer Gluecks made on me was somewhat strange, but at that time, I believed that this was jealousy because somebody else, that is Kammler and I, interfered in his concentration camp and wanted to show him how things should be done properly. You frequently come across such jealously with troop commanders or managers of enterprises. They will not allow any one to put matters right in their own enterprises. That is a false ambition, but sometimes quite understandable and not entirely strange.
JUDGE MUSSMANO: All right.
THE PRESIDENT: Any cross examination by Defense Counsel? I have one question, please. You mentioned that your office was not in Berlin, but was in a small town of about 2,500 people.
THE WITNESS: Mr. President, that was my agency before the war, up to 1939. It was a small town of 2,500 inhabitants.
THE PRESIDENT: Tut upon joining the WVHA you, of course, went to Berlin?
THE WITNESS: Yes. I was in Berlin.
THE PRESIDENT: What particular task did you have with the WaffenSS when you were at the front? Were you a supply officer, a food supply officer?
THE WITNESS: I was the divisional administrative officer. I was in charge of the administration of a combat division. My work consisted of supplying the troops with food, clothing, accommodations, their pay and some smaller items.
THE PRESIDENT: That was a very responsible position. You were general supply officer there?
THE WITNESS: Yes, supply officer.
THE PRESIDENT: If there is no cross-examination by defense counsel the Prosecution may cross-examine unless you wish to wait after the recess.
MR. WALTON: Your Honor, if we can take our 15 minutes now, then I will start right after the recess.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well.
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is in recess for 15 minutes.
( A recess was taken)
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again session.
CROSS EXAMINATION BY MR. WALTON:
Q. Witness, when you gave your direct testimony, I'll ask you whether or not you ever mentioned your Party number. If not, do you now know what it was?
A. My Party number was 102549.
Did you at the same time mention your SS number?
A. My SS number was 2447
Q. I direct your attention to the affidavit which is a part of the record in this case and which was signed by you on or about 14 January of this year. In that affidavit you say that your department was composed at first of three sections and later a fourth section was added.
A. It is correct that my office originally consisted of three departments and that later on, after Office B-IV was dissolved, a fourth department was added. That was the so-called transfer of assignments. That was from the spring of 1944 on.
Q. Now, in this affidavit to which I refer you state that your subsection B-1/1 -- you state these words: "Rations were worked out and tables drawn up." Will you explain a little further what is meant by the duties as outlined by those words of Office B-1/1?
A. In the department B-1 the ration allowances were set; that is to say, we made tables of these allotments, and we used them for the research purposes of the administrative officer of the troops. They were constantly issued in the form of tables. The list which contained this information was called the "Ration and Quantity List of the waffen. SS and the Police". This list was printed as a manuscript and it was constantly kept up to date by subsequent additions. This was done because of the constant changes in the supply situation and the allotment of rations.
Q Then, in effect, these tables were an estimate of your needs for a stated period of time, so that these rations needed could be procured? Is that correct?
A. For each ration period we could figure out what the individual soldier was entitled to in the form of food.
Q. Now, were food menus for troop messes ever worked out by this department over a stated period of time?
A. I beg your pardon; I have not quite understood the question.
Q. Were menus, were sample menus to be distributed to the individual messes where the Waffen SS troops ate worked out by this department --menus that would cover a month, a three month period or a six month period?
A. No. In these lists only total quantities were included and it was stated there what the individual was to obtain. For example, in this list it was stated that a man could receive 500 grams of bread, 1,000 grams of potatoes, and if potatoes were not available, then 100 grams of yeast products, or 100 grams of beans and peas, 100 grams of meat, 50 grams of sausage, and so on. It did not have to be one or the other of the foodstuffs, but that was the food which was available in each case. No certain menus were established for a certain period of time, but they depended on what the administrative officer was able to obtain. He would compose his menu according to his own judgment.
Q. Now, I ask you was the distribution list for the food allowance also in the office of B-1/1?
A. No. Only the total quantity was established, buthe the disposition within these quantities was up to the troop units. It depended on what food could be procured in the particular area. For example, the situation in Bavaria could vary from that in East Prussia. Bavaria was an area where, for example, fewer potatoes were raised and consumed. Perhaps they received more bread, while in East Prussia or Brandenburg, instead of bread, the people there would receive more potatoes. That depended on the area, and it sometimes depended on the taste of the particular unit which received the food.
Q. Were you, through this office or through another department in your section, ever interested in whether or not these schedules were carried out?
A. No. As I have already explained, that was not my duty. I only had to prepare the maximum quantities. If for instance, the administrative officer was very negligent and did not care what the latest ration allowances were or whether he really received what he was entitled to, then, of course, his troops would go without food, and if the commander did not worry about that, then the men under his command suffered the damage. The right of supervision over that was not within my field of responsibility.
Q. Then you were not interested in, for example, the 20,000 concentration camp guards--you were not interested to see if the food which you allocated to them ever reached them, is that correct?
A. No; even with these 20,000 guards I was unable to see whether they really received the food.
Q. As an administrative expert and as a man in charge of food, how could you be sure that the food which went out of your depots went through the proper channels unless you made a check to see where it went?
A. I have already stated before that this supervision was a task of the troop commander, at least according to the regulations for the German Army. The superior agency did not have the duty nor did it have the authority to gain an insight into conditions there. I further explained that as administrative officer of a division I did not even have the right to go to a troop mess and to carry out an inspection, there, whether the food was cooked properly and whether it was distributed fairly. I further know that my predecessor in the Police Division was reprimanded be the Divisional Commander because he had done that. He was told that this was none of his business and he had no right to do that.
Q. Let us be sure that we are talking about the same periods. I am now speaking of the time when you were Office Chief of Office B-I in the WVHA. At this time, unless I am mistaken, you stated that ration tables were worked out in your office of B-I/I. Where would these ration tables go once they wore completed, or to whom would they go once they were completed?
A. These tables were sent to all troop units, to the SS as well as to the Police units. I can't say exactly anymore how this distribution took place through the mail and so on. I believe that for the entire Waffen-SS within Germany proper the lists were distributed through the Operational Main Office and for the units of the Police they were sent to the main office of the Regular Police. It was not done in such a way that my office sent these lists to every company within the Reich but these tables first went to the central agencies and then they were distributed to the subordinate units.
Q. Then in your Office B-I/I there must have been a distribution list for mailing these ration tables to the central agencies, was there not?
A. Well, there was a so-called key of distribution, as we called it, where we could see approximately that, for example, 5,000 agencies had to receive a copy of the distribution; 3,000 of then were located in the police sector and 1,800 were included in the Waffen-SS. It is possible that perhaps the distribution was carried out also, to 50 offices in the concentration camps. That could have been routed through Office D-IV, that is to say , Office D-IV would receive 50 such lists for the concentration camps and D-IV would send those lists to the individual concentration camp commanders because each one of the SS administrative leaders had to take care of a certain number of troops.
Q. Did your office then make distribution direct to the 1,800 Waffen-SS units on this list?
A. No. I have already said that 1 package would have been sent to the Operational Main Office and there it would have gone to Amt IV; that was the central troop administration in the Waffen-SS for all units within the Reich territory.
Q. Would, by chance, the different food depots under your command be on this distribution list?
A. I beg your pardon, do you mean the concentration camps which are individually listed?
Q. You stated in your direct testimony that a certain number of food depots or ware-houses --places where food was stored and strategically located in the Reich, were directly under your office. I ask you now if these food tables would also be distributed, in addition to other distribution, to these main food depots or warehouses?
A. To troop main depots, of course. The man in charge of a troop economic depot had to know what the men should receive so that the administrative officers would not make too high demands on him.
To the contrary, the administrative officers of the units usually were less oriented than the men in charge of the troop economic depot, who was better informed and who was able to figure out what was due to the soldiers on the strength of this table.
Q. All right. Now, did you ever inspect these food depots yourself?
A. A large number of these depots I visited personally but I did not see all of them. I mainly visited the six or seven main economic depots and I saw some of the smaller troop economic depots. However, I was unable to see all of them.
Q. On your inspection tour would you ever inspect the receipts and disbursements of food supplies as maintained in each one of these main depots?
A. No, I did not do that. We had a special examining staff which carried out this task. It was directly subordinated to Loerner in Amtsgruppe B. There were 2 or 3 SS officers who had been especially assigned by Loerner to exercise the supervision in our branch depots. They carried out an exact control over the books. They were also interested in the appropriate storage of the food and occasionally they made on-the-spot checks and they wanted to see that food was issued properly. However, I want to state in advance that these were not regular inspections and examinations which always covered a certain period of time when the examination was made. They only made a spotcheck once in a while. Whenever I went there I only took a general look at the state of affairs in the depot. I looked at the quality of the food and I wanted to see whether the storage rooms were appropriate; also with regard to the air-raid precautions which became a very important factor. Of course I also observed the morale and the work done by the personnel.
Q. Witness, if you please, will you answer the question and then if you want to make further explanation your counsel, on re-direct examination, can allow you an opportunity. Now I would appreciate if you would answer the question as friefly as you could possibly do so and still completely answer the question. Explanation can be reserved for questions which your own counsel will put to you. Then, as I understand it, you were able, through this examining board, at any time to determine whether or not food was going to a certain troop or was not going to a certain troop -- is that correct?
A. If I had wanted to, of course I could have gained an insight. However, I do not think it would have been of much use to me to know that a ceryain Battalion, let us say Battalion 3/35, did not get sufficient food. I only wanted to see the total number of soldiers who were fed. I did not want to see who drew the food. Only the WaffenSS or the police were authorized to draw food from the depot. But I wanted to see how much food was obtained.
Q. Then you could have seen whether or not the Waffen-SS units engaged in concentration camp guard activity were supplied if you had wanted to, could you not?
A. Yes, I could have seen that. I even knew that.
Q. Was it necessary on your staff to have diet and nutrition experts to obtain the best possible food and the largest quantity under the circumstances?
A. The men in charge of the main economic depots usually were auditors and before that they had dealt in groceries. Apart from that the food was furnished by the reserve food stocks of the army and by the German Food Industry and it was always furnished in a very good condition. It also was of a good quality. Therefore we did not need any special expert knowledge.
Q. To what organization or department did you turn for advice on matters of food nutrition?
A. I did not need any advice but if I really did need some, then I had the competent agency. Therefore if it had happened that my main economics depots and troop economic depots did not receive any additional deliveries because something had been halted, or if they had received a large quantity of bad and inferior goods, then the agency to which I would have complained would have been the Army Administrative Office-and that would have been the General Administrative Office of the Army.
Q. In the matter of food substitutes, this policy was dictated by the army food experts, is that correct?
A. Yes, that is correct.
Q.- What duties did Hauptsturmfuehrer Bomann in Amt B-I/1?
A.- Hauptsturmfuehrer Bomann had to exercise the activity which I have previously described, that is to say, he had to read the subsequent food bulleting of the Army, and by means of these bulletins he had to keep our lists up to date.
Q.- In this same affidavit you outline briefly the duties of subsection B-I/2, and you state in that affidavit that supplies were allocated from OKH and the army supply officer. Does the term "supplies" mean anything else except food supplies?
A.- I beg your pardon. I believe that this is a mistake in the translation. I did not supply food to the army, but the army informed us of our contingents. That is to say, they informed us of the total ration allowances for, let us say, one million men. In the so-called enclosure information was given, which was for agencies of the army about their food, so that we would know where we would be able to procure the food for the one million men. The task of my department, too, was to obtain the necessary food and to see that the troop economic depots were filled with the necessary stocks of food. That is to say, there was a standard procedure of deliveries to the troop economic depots, in order to make corrections and in order to have a coordination between the various depots if this was necessary as a result of units being transferred. The third task was that if we were unable to consume the food ourselves because the number of troops had decreased as a result of the fact that many units were sent to the front, then I was obliged to again return these amounts to the army since they had not been consumed.
DR. PRIBILLA: Your Honor, we are referring here to the troop economic depots, and I have understood the question of the Prosecutor this way. However, I believe I have heard in the translation that the word "lager" has been translated as camp instead of depot, and I request that this mistake be corrected.