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.
THE PRESIDENT: "Camp" instead of what?
MR. WALTON: I should like the privilege of asking that question over again, sir. I think it was totally misunderstood.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, all right, go ahead.
Q.- (by Mr. Walton) I notice that your department, B-I/2 handled supplies allocated from OKH and the army supply officer. I would like to know if your statement of the word "supplies" in your affidavit referred only to food supplies or to other supplies?
A.- It only refers to food and post-exchange goods, because they were of a similar nature.
Q.- Then what was the flow of quartermaster material to the troop economic camps, was that also food and past-exchange supplies?
A.- You mean clothing and accommodation requirements?
Q.- I can only state what the translation of your affidavit shows in Document Book 1, aid it is No. 1564 on Page 39. The affidavit which you signed states that Office B-I/2 had four separate fields of action. It handled supplies allocated from the OKH and the army supply officer. Second, it handled the flow of quartermaster material to the troop economic depots.
A.- Yes. The expression "quartermaster material" perhaps differs from the German meaning of that word. In the German army by "Quartermeister" we understood a general staff officer who was competent for the general supply of the troops. That is to say, besides food ho was also responsible for the clothing, accommodation requirements, fuel for motor vehicles, equipment of vehicles, the equipments of horse-drawn vehicles, and he was also responsible for the ammunition. These were the tasks of the "Quartiermeister" in the German meaning. However, this translation does not cover the activity of an administrative officer, which, according to the german concept, went much more into detail and it was little to do with my activities as the man in charge of B-I. In my field of of tasks I only had to take care of food, and as I have already stated, post exchange goods.
Among them there were cigarettes, chocolates, and small toilet articles, soap, and those goods which can be purchased at a post exchange.
Q.- Then the third function which your office performed was that of depot balancing. Now, that means an equalization, according to your affidavit, of shortages and surpluses. Did that depot balancing extend, so far as this section of your office was concerned, down to the individual Waffen-SS troop installation, or did that extend only so far as your office was concerned, down to these food depots?
A.- That only went down to the food depots. May I give a short example in this connection?
Q.- That answers my question. Now, at my time you knew the status and you knew when you had a shortage, is that correct?
A.- I found it out by the demands of the man in charge of the depot when he received new units which he had to supply. If he did not have enough food at his disposal in order to supply them, then, of course, he immediately telephoned to my office, or he sent a telegram.
Q.- However, you knew by the same way when you had accumulated a surplus, or too large a surplus, is that correct?
A.- Yes, that is correct.
Q.- Where did you report an excessive amount of surplus?
A.- First of all, if I had a surplus in a certain depot then it remained there unless it was needed elsewhere, and if within a short period of time we dad not think that this surplus would be used up again through supplies to new 14 arrived units, then I had to return this food to the army again, because the army was much larger, and it was always able to have this food consumed. We could not afford, to have food spoiled.
Q.- If at that time you received a normal informal request for food from a concentration camp, could you have turned it over to the concentration camp rather than the army?
A.- No. way I point out that these cases occurred very rarely, and secondly, I was not entitled to this anyway, I did it in this one particular case where I saw that an emergency prevailed in a concentration camp.
Q.- Now, your office B-I/3, which in your affidavit you state handled personnel matters of your troop economic depots and handled other matters, does that mean that this office supplied the various economic depots with personnel which exclusively handled food?
A.- Yes, that is correct.
Q.- That means then that your liaison between the economic camps and your office was close at all times?
A.- I was the direct superior of these depots.
Q.- What were the other matters, which your affidavit does not state in detail, about which Office B-I/3 was concerned?
A.- Well, it had the utmost variety of tasks which has accumulated accidentally. However, I cannot describe that any more in detail today. The experts of this Department 3 had orders to sometimes keep unwelcome visitors away from me. They had to take care of some of the antechamber tasks in my office, because it was natural that with the prevailing food shortage many requests were submitted to me for some improvements or additional rations, perhaps for the troops, or sometimes these requests were even of a personal nature.
Q.- Then you added the additional section B-I/4. -I believe that you state that that was an order-storage department where back orders were kept, and after it was discovered that those orders could be filled on a foreign market, this department handled the placing of orders on the foreign market for food stuffs, is that correct?
A.- It was done in this way: When we had such a request approved by the Reich Ministry of Economy and if we realized that we could not meet our requirements in Germany, and if we discovered that these goods were on hand in some foreign countries, then again with the permission of the Reich Ministry of Economics these orders were transferred abroad.
That is why we called this department the "transfer of orders." It was a purchasing department abroad.
Q.- Now, did you deal with these foreign agencies, or rather did this section deal with these foreign agents directly, or through an intermediate agency?
We had purchasing agencies abroad. They were located in Paris, in Brussels, in the Hague, at Prague, Czechoslovakia----
THE TRIBUNAL (JUDGE MUSMANNO): Mr. Walton, how is this relevant the fact that he communicated with Brussels and the Hague?
MR. WALTON: I want to show, sir, that he handled foreign currency; and I want to see if I can ask him whether he knows where this foreign currency came from and who delivered it to him. I'm trying to make a connection with some of the matters which have been brought out here.
A. Whenever a purchase abroad became necessary, this foreign exchange was furnished by the Reichsbank.
Q. You had no other connection than that you drew the funds from the Reichsbank and paid it over to these agents, who made the purchases in the foreign countries; is that correct?
A. No.
Q. Now, there is before the Court a chart which covers the same period about which you testified and which shows a slightly different function of your office. In this chart there is a designation known as Control Staff B. What was the function of this Control Staff B?
A. I have explained that before. In the case of the troop economic depots we had the so-called examining Staff B which was with Loerner the Chief of Amtsgruppe B. It consisted of the three SS officers whom I have mentioned before, and they would inspect the troop economic depots. They exercised the supervision there which actually only Loerner, I or Lechler could have carried out personally.
Q. Was the office of the food sector of the Waffen SS under this Control Staff B?
A. No, it had absolutely nothing to do with it. One cannot even speak of a coordination in this case. It dealt with completely different tasks.
Q. Now, I believe that you have gone into detail concerning your relationship with Dr. Schenk. Would you say that the information which Dr. Schenk gave to you was for the most part formal or official information, or was it given to you through friendship and given to you informally?
A. I can call my relationship with Dr. Schenk a good professional relationship. He did not have to submit any reports to me. But whenever he had made a new discovery, he would come and see me. He asked me to come into his laboratory, and then we gave a mutual diagnosis on the things which he had discovered. Then we would discuss them.
Q. Did he ever according to your recollection file any written reports of his activities with you as a matter for your attention and interest since it pertained to your field?
A. Schenk never submitted any written reports to me, nor did he ever report to me about his trips. Occasionally he would tell me some of the interesting details; but that was not a report of the kind which he would submit to a superior. It only depended on his good-will what he told me and what he considered worth-while telling me.
Q. Did you ever discuss with him his food experiments which were carried out by him at Oranienburg, Dachau, and Beneschau?
A. As I have already said before, no -----
THE PRESIDENT: You answered it; you said, "No."
Q. Did you ever see a report made by Dr. Schenk on his food studies that he made during his campaigns in the West, the South-east, Norway, and Russia, which he compiled, and which were printed in three separate pamphlet forms?
A. On one occasion I saw several little pamphlets by Schenk. I cannot even recall the title of these book anymore. I must confess honestly I did not even have enough time to read these matters. I know that by virtue of his travels he wrote several ---
THE PRESIDENT: Wait a minute. You've answered the question. You have answered it; now stop. Next question.
Q. Did you ever see reports made by Dr. Schenk on food experiments at the concentration camp Mauthausen?
A. No, I have never seen them.
Q. Did your department maintain and supervise training kitchens at Oranienburg, Dachau, and Beneschau?
A. We had three training kitchens, one at Dachau, one at Oranienburg, and a third one located at Beneschau, near Prague. These three training kitchens were also subordinated to me. I was the immediate superior; and I visited these three kitchens. I supervised and directed the training curriculum there. That was the special task of my collaborator, Drey. I just remembered that.
Q. In this connection, since you supervised the training, you still state that the expression "the house of bad troop feeding" in the letter which was referred to today is still an exaggeration?
A. Yes.
Q. Did this course include instruction as to how not to prepare food?
A. Yes.
Q. A house of bad feeding then would be a good example for your student cooks to have as the lesson how not to feed the troops, would it not?
A. Yes, that was the idea. The idea was the expression of the will of the Reichsfuehrer that troop commanders or cooks who cooked very badly and who did not care for the troops sufficiently were to be locked up there for six weeks.
For three weeks they were to be given bad food. They were to be given burned, salty food, and spoiled food. The other three weeks the counter-demonstration was to take place so that they were given good food then. Then they themselves were to stand at the cooking pot and learn how to cook and how to prepare food. That was one of Himmler's ideas.
Q. Now, a chemical laboratory for food research was also located at Oranienburg, was it not?
A. No, the food chemical laboratory of the Waffen SS also belonged to my office. However, at my time it had been transferred to Baden-Baden because of the danger of air attacks. Baden-Baden is a well-known resort town.
Q. Did you exercise direct supervision and control over this food laboratory?
A. Yes, as far as the distance between our agencies permitted it. I constantly received diagnoses about the food which had been submitted there for examination. These tests were constantly taken from the troop depots; the food was tested in the laboratories with regard to its storage and its calorie value.
Q. Did Dr. Schenk, who has been mentioned here, have access to your laboratory in Baden-Baden?
A. Yes. He was able to go there; but actually he was not allowed to give instructions in the laboratory. I was its superior. However, since he was a scientist and since the chemists who worked there were also considered scientists, they frequently came into contact and discussed various matters.
Q. They then exchanged information, Dr. Schenk and your chemists, in this laboratory; is that correct?
A. I beg your pardon? Not experiments, but tests.
Q. The question was whether the chemical laboratory or the staff of the chemical laboratory for food exchanged information with Dr. Schenk. Is that correct?
A. No, they did not do that. Well, to express myself more correctly, Dr. Schenk perhaps told the scientists the result of his research, perhaps about this biosyn-mycel product which we have referred to repeatedly; and perhaps he also had it tested in the laboratory by a chemist; for example, perhaps he had it examined as to its contents of albumin or as to its contents of acids, or whatever may have been contained in it. I therefore am of the opinion that Schenk did not even have to test the harmful effects of such a drug on human beings. Every chemist could do that much better with much less of a risk.
Q. Did these chemists make experiments in food and diet on human beings to your knowledge?
A. That is completely out of the question. Otherwise I would have known about it. They did not even have the opportunity of doing that.
Q. Now, I'd like to direct your mind again to the Mauthausen or Dora incident. I believe that you stated in your testimony and in your affidavit that in the winter of 1943 to 1944 this occasion was the one upon which you visited Mauthausen. Is that correct?
A. I beg your pardon; that was at Dora, near Buchenwald.
Q. At Dora, yes. Do you know Barnewald, a former SS Sturmbannfuehrer?
A. Yes, I know Barnewald.
Q. Would you believe his testimony under oath?
A. No, not completely. I have already stated before that Barnewald made a mistake in saying that upon his representations or the representations of Dr. Kahr, I was---
Q. Witness, allow me to interrupt you. I asked you, "Would you believe his testimony under oath?" and you answered "Not completely." That was the complete answer that I wanted. You will be given an opportunity later. I am sure the Court will allow you then to make whatever explanation you desire. I would like to proceed to the next question without such a detailed explanation at this time.