Chapter I: N T H E (27)

GÖRING: I do not know the particulars of the organization for inspection of prisoner-of-war camps, nor the leaders, nor what positions they held. At least not by heart. I would like to emphasize again, so that there will be no confusion, that when I said I knew about this matter, I mean that I knew how the order was issued and that the people were shot, that I came to know all about this; but not as far as this was related to inspections, possibilities of flight, _et cetera_.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: And did General Grosch, as head of Inspectorate 17, have to report to General Fōrster, your director of operations at the Luftwaffe Ministerium?

GÖRING: That I cannot tell you without having the diagram of the subordinate posts before me. General Fōrster was, I believe at that time, head of the Luftwehr, or a similar designation, in the ministry. I concerned myself less with these matters, because they were not directly of a tactical, strategic, or of an armament nature. But it is quite possible and certain that he belonged to this department.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I put it to you quite shortly, and if you don’t know I will leave it for the moment. Did you know Major General Von Graevenitz was head of the Defendant Keitel’s department, the Kriegsgefangenenwesen, that dealt with prisoners of war?

GÖRING: I first heard about General Graevenitz here, for this department did not directly concern me. I could not know all of these military subordinate commanders in their hundreds and thousands of departments.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: So I take it that you did not know Colonel, now General Westhoff, of the department under Von Graevenitz?

GÖRING: Westhoff I never saw at all, and he did not belong to the Luftwaffe.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I am not suggesting that Von Graevenitz and Westhoff belonged to the Luftwaffe. I wanted to make it clear that I was suggesting they belonged to General Keitel’s organization.

GÖRING: I did not know either; and I did not know what posts they occupied.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Up to that time you still had a considerable influence in the Reich, didn’t you?

GÖRING: At this time no longer. This no longer concerns 1944.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: But you were still head of the Luftwaffe and head of the Air Ministry, weren’t you?

GÖRING: Yes, I was.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: And you had, as head of the Luftwaffe and head of the Air Ministry, been responsible for six prisoner-of-war camps for the whole of the war up to that time, hadn’t you?

GÖRING: How many prisoner-of-war camps I do not know. But of course I bear the responsibility for those which belonged to my ministry.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: To the Air Force?

GÖRING: Yes, those which were subordinate to the Air Force.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You knew about the general plan for treatment of prisoners of war, which we have had in evidence as the “Aktion Kugel” plan, didn’t you?

GÖRING: No. I knew nothing of this action. I was not advised of it.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You were never advised of Aktion Kugel?

GÖRING: I first heard of Aktion Kugel here; saw the document and heard the expression for the first time. Moreover no officer of the Luftwaffe ever informed me of such a thing; and I do not believe that a single officer was ever taken away from the Luftwaffe camps. A report to this effect was never presented to me, in any case.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You know what Aktion Kugel was: That escaped officers and noncommissioned officers, other than British and American, were to be handed over to the police and taken to Mauthausen, where they were shot by the device of having a gun concealed in the measuring equipment when they thought they were getting their prison clothes. You know what Aktion Kugel is, don’t you?

GÖRING: I heard of it here.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Are you telling the Tribunal that you did not know that escaped prisoners of war who were picked up by the police were retained by the police and taken to Mauthausen?

GÖRING: No, I did not know that. On the contrary, various prisoners who escaped from my camps were caught again by the police; and they were all brought back to the camps; this was the first case where this to some extent did not take place.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: But didn’t you know that Colonel Welder, as second in command of your ministry’s inspectorate, issued a written order a month before this, in February 1944, that prisoners of war picked up by the Luftwaffe should be delivered back to their camp, and prisoners of war picked up by the police should be held by them and no longer counted as being under the protection of the Luftwaffe; didn’t you know that?

GÖRING: No. Please summon this colonel to testify if he ever made a report of that nature to me, or addressed such a letter to me.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, of course I cannot tell whether your ministry was well run or not. But he certainly issued the order, because he says so himself.

GÖRING: Then he must say from whom he received this order.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I see. Well, he says that he issued this order, and you know as well as I do that prisoners of war is a thing that you have got to be careful about, because you have got a protecting power that investigates any complaint; and you never denounced the Convention and you had the protecting power in these matters all through the war, had you not? That is right, isn’t it?

GÖRING: That is correct, but I take the liberty to ask who gave him this order, whether he received this order from me.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, he would not get it direct from you. I do not think you had ever met him, had you? He would get it from Lieutenant General Grosch, wouldn’t he?

GÖRING: Then Grosch should say whether he received such an order from me. I never gave such an order.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I see. So you say that you had never heard—this was 3½ years after the beginning of the war—and you had never heard that any escaped prisoners of war were to be handed over to the police. Is that what you ask the Tribunal to believe?

GÖRING: To the extent that escaped prisoners of war committed any offenses or crimes, they were of course turned over to the police, I believe. But I wish to testify before the Court that I never gave any order that they should be handed over to the police or sent to concentration camps merely because they had attempted to break out or escape, nor did I ever know that such measures were taken.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: This is my last question: I want to make it quite clear, Witness, that I am referring to those who had escaped, who had got away from the confines of the camp and were recaptured by the police. Didn’t you know that they were handed over to the police?

GÖRING: No. Only if they had committed crimes while fleeing, such as murder and so on. Such things occurred.

[_The Tribunal adjourned until 21 March 1946 at 1000 hours._]

EIGHTY-SEVENTH DAY
Thursday, 21 March 1946

_Morning Session_

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Witness, do you remember telling me last night that the only prisoners of war handed over to the police were those guilty of crimes or misdemeanors?

GÖRING: I did not express myself that way. I said if the police apprehended prisoners of war, those who had committed a crime during the escape, as far as I know, were detained by the police and were not returned to the camp. To what extent the police kept prisoners of war, without returning them to a camp, I was able to gather from interrogations and explanations here.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Would you look at Document D-569? Would you look first at the top left-hand corner, which shows that it is a document published by the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht?

GÖRING: The document which I have before me has the following heading at the top left-hand corner: “The Reichsführer SS,” and the subheading: “Inspector of Concentration Camps.”

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: It is a document dated the 22d of November 1941. Have you got it?

GÖRING: Yes, I have it now.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Now, look at the left-hand bottom corner, as to distribution. The second person to whom it is distributed is the Air Ministry and Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force on 22 November 1941. That would be you.

GÖRING: That’s correct. I would like to make the following statement in connection with this . . .

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Just for a moment. I would like you to appreciate the document and then make your statement upon it. I shall not stop you. I want you to look at the third sentence in Paragraph 1. This deals with Soviet prisoners of war, you understand. The third sentence says:

“If escaped Soviet prisoners of war are returned to the camp in
accordance with this order, they have to be handed over to the
nearest post of the Secret State Police, in any case.”

And then Paragraph 2 deals with the special position—if they commit crimes, owing to the fact that:

“. . . at present these misdemeanors on the part of Soviet
prisoners of war are particularly frequent, due most likely to
living conditions still being somewhat unsettled, the following
temporary regulations come into force. They may be amended
later. If a Soviet prisoner of war commits any other punishable
offense then the commandant of the camp must hand the guilty man
over to the head of the Security Police.”

Do I understand this document to say that a man who escapes will be handed over to the Security Police? You understand this document says a man who escapes will be handed over to the Secret Police, a man who commits a crime, as you mentioned, will be handed over to the Security Police. Wasn’t that the condition that obtained from 1941 up to the date we are dealing with in March 1944?

GÖRING: I would like to read the few preceding paragraphs so that no sentences are separated from their context.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: My Lord, while the witness is reading the document, might I go over the technical matter of the arrangement of exhibits? When I cross-examined Field Marshal Kesselring I put in three documents, UK-66, which becomes Exhibit GB-274; D-39, which becomes GB-275; TC-91, which becomes GB-276; so this document will become GB-277.

[_Turning to the witness._] Have you had an opportunity of reading it, Witness?

GÖRING: Yes, I have.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Then I am right, am I not, that the Soviet prisoners of war who escaped were to be, after their return to the camp, handed over to the Secret State Police. If they committed a crime, they were to be handed over to the Security Police, isn’t that right?

GÖRING: Not exactly correct. I would like to point to the third sentence in the first paragraph. There it says, “If a prisoner-of-war camp is in the vicinity, then the man who is recaptured is to be transported there.”

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: But read the next sentence, “If a Soviet prisoner of war is returned to the camp”—that is in accordance with this order which you have just read—“he has to be handed to the nearest service station of the Secret State Police.” Your own sentence.

GÖRING: Yes, but the second paragraph which follows gives an explanation of frequent criminal acts of Soviet prisoners of war, _et cetera_, committed at that time. You read that yourself; that is also connected with this Paragraph Number 1. But this order was given by itself and it was distributed to the Army, the Air Force and the Navy. And I would like to give the explanation of its distribution. In this war there were not only hundreds, but thousands of current orders which were issued by superiors to subordinate officers and were transmitted to various departments. That does not mean that each of these thousands of orders was submitted to the Commander-in-Chief; only the most decisive and most important were shown to him. The others went from department to department. Thus it is that this order from the Chief of the High Command was signed by a subordinate department, and not by the Chief of the High Command himself.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: This order would be dealt with by your prisoner-of-war department in your ministry, wouldn’t it?

GÖRING: This department, according to the procedure adopted for these orders, received the order, but no other department received it.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I think the answer to my question must be “yes.” It would be dealt with by the prisoner-of-war department—your ministry. Isn’t that so?

GÖRING: I would say yes.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: It is quicker, you see, if you say “yes” in the beginning; do you understand?

GÖRING: No; it depends upon whether I personally have read the order or not, and I will then determine as to my responsibility.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well now, the escape . . .

THE PRESIDENT: You were not asked about responsibility; you were asked whether it would be dealt with by your prisoner-of-war department.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Now, the escape about which I am asking you took place on the night of the 24th to the 25th of March. I want you to have that date in mind. The decision to murder these young officers must have been taken very quickly, because the first murder which actually took place was on the 26th of March. Do you agree with that? It must have been taken quickly?

GÖRING: I assume that this order, as I was informed later, was given immediately, but it had no connection with this document.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: No, no; we are finished with that document; we are going into the murder of these young men. The Grossfahndung—a general hue and cry, I think, would be the British translation—was also issued at once in order that these men should be arrested; isn’t that so?

GÖRING: That is correct. Whenever there was an escape, and such a large number of prisoners escaped, automatically in the whole Reich, a hue and cry was raised, that is, all authorities had to be on the lookout to recapture the prisoners.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: So that in order to give this order to murder these men, and for the Grossfahndung, there must have been a meeting of Hitler, at any rate with Himmler or Kaltenbrunner, in order that that order would be put into effect; isn’t that so?

GÖRING: That is correct. According to what I heard, Himmler was the first to report this escape to the Führer.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Now, General Westhoff, who was in Defendant Keitel’s Kriegsgefangenenwesen, in his prisoner-of-war set-up, says this, that

“On a date, which I think was the 26th, Keitel said to him,
‘This morning Göring reproached me in the presence of Himmler
for having let some more prisoners of war escape. It was unheard
of.’”

Do you say that General Westhoff is wrong?

GÖRING: Yes. This is not in accordance with the facts. General Westhoff is referring to a statement of Field Marshal Keitel. This utterance in itself is illogical, for I could not accuse Keitel because he would not draw my attention to it, as the guarding was his responsibility and not mine.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: One of the Defendant Keitel’s officers dealing with this matter was a general inspector, General Röttich. I do not know if you know him.

GÖRING: No.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, General Westhoff, as one could understand, is very anxious to assure everyone that his senior officer had nothing to do with it, and he goes on to say this about General Röttich:

“He was completely excluded from it by the fact that these
matters were taken out of his hands. Apparently at that
conference with the Führer in the morning, that is to say, the
conference between Himmler, Field Marshal Keitel, and Göring,
which took place in the Führer’s presence, the Führer himself
always took a hand in these affairs when officers escaped.”

You say that is wrong? You were at no such conference?

GÖRING: I was not present at this conference, neither was General Westhoff; he is giving a purely subjective view, not the facts of the case.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: So that we find that—you think that—Westhoff is wrong? You see, Westhoff, he was a colonel at this time, I think, and now he finishes as a major general, and he asks that the senior officers be asked about it; he says this: “It should be possible to find out that Himmler made the suggestion to the Führer—to find that out from Göring who was present at the conference.” Again and again Westhoff, who after all is a comparatively junior officer, is saying that the truth about this matter can be discovered from his seniors. You say that it cannot.

GÖRING: I would not say that. I would like just to say that General Westhoff was never present for even a moment, therefore he cannot say, I know or I saw that Reich Marshal Göring was present. He is assuming it is so, or he may have heard it.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: What he says is, you know, that Keitel blamed him, as I have read to you; that Keitel went on to say to him at General Von Graevenitz’, “Gentlemen, the escapes must stop. We must set an example. We shall take very severe measures. I am only telling you that, that the men who have escaped will be shot; probably the majority of them are dead already.” You never heard anything of that?

GÖRING: I was neither present at the Keitel-Westhoff-Graevenitz conversation nor at the Führer-Himmler conversation. As far as I know General Westhoff will be testifying here. Moreover, Field Marshal Keitel will be able to say whether I was there or not.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well then, I am bound to put this to you. I come on to your own ministry. I suppose in general you take responsibility for the actions of the officers of your ministry from the rank of field officer and above—colonels and major generals and lieutenant generals?

GÖRING: If they acted according to my directives and my instructions, yes; if they acted against my directives and instructions, no.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well now, just let us see what happened in your own ministry. You know that—do you know, that Colonel Walde made a personal investigation of this matter at the camp? Did you know that?

GÖRING: The particulars about this investigation, as I explained yesterday, are unknown to me; I know only that investigations did take place.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Now, on the 27th of March, that was a Monday, did you know that there was a meeting in Berlin about this matter? Just let me tell you who were there before you apply your mind to it, so you will know. Your ministry was represented by Colonel Walde, because Lieutenant General Grosch had another meeting, so he ordered his deputy to attend; the Defendant Keitel’s organization was represented by Colonel Von Reurmont; the Gestapo was represented by Gruppenführer Müller; the Kripo was represented by Gruppenführer Nebe. Now, all these officers were of course not on the policy level, but they were high executive officers who had to deal with the actual facts that were carried out, were they not?

GÖRING: They were not executive officers, insofar as it has not been definitely established that executive powers are within an officer’s province. To the first question, whether I knew about this meeting, I would say no. Colonel Walde I do not even know personally.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You mean to say, you are telling the Tribunal, that you were never told about this meeting at any time?

GÖRING: Yes, I am saying that.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I just want you to look at—let him have Walde’s statement—I want you to look at the statement of one of the officers of your own ministry on this point. This is a statement made by Colonel Ernst Walde, and—I am sorry I have not another German copy, but I will get one in due course—and in my copy, Witness, it is at the foot of Page 2, the beginning of the paragraph which I want you to look at, is: “As recaptured prisoners were not to be taken back to their camp, according to an order issued several weeks previously . . .”—can you find it?

GÖRING: Where is it?

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, in the English version it is at the middle of the second page, and I want to ask you about the—the middle of that paragraph; I do not know if you see a name—it stands out in my copy—Major Dr. Hühnemörder; do you see that?

GÖRING: Yes, I have found it.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, it is the sentence after the name Major Dr. Hühnemörder appears: “On this Monday”—have you got this?

GÖRING: Yes.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Thank you.

“On this Monday a conference took place at the Reich Security
Main Office at Berlin, Albrechtstrasse. As far as I remember
this conference had been called by the Chief of the
Prisoner-of-War Organization OKW, and I attended as
representative of Luftwaffe Inspektion 17, since General Grosch
was unable to attend in person, for reasons which I cannot
remember; the Chief of the Prisoner-of-War Organization, as far
as I know, was represented by Colonel Von Reurmont, while the
Security Office was represented by Gruppenführer Müller and
Gruppenführer Nebe, the Chief of the Criminal Police at that
time. I find it impossible to give a verbatim account of the
conversation or to state what was said by every single person.
But I remember this much: That we were informed about a
conference which had taken place on the previous day, that is
Sunday, at the Führer’s headquarters in connection with the mass
escape from Sagan, in the course of which heated discussions had
taken place between the participants. In this connection the
names of Himmler, Göring, and Keitel were mentioned. Whether
Ribbentrop’s name was also mentioned I do not remember. The
Führer was not mentioned. At this conference appropriate
measures were said to have been discussed, or taken, to check
any such mass escapes in the future. The nature of these
measures was not disclosed. Later, and more or less in
conclusion, Gruppenführer Müller declared that requisite orders
had already been given and put into effect the previous morning.
Regarding the search for escaped prisoners, he could or would
not make any statement; he merely declared that according to
reports so far received, shootings had taken place at some
points for attempted escapes. I think he said that the number
was 10 or 15.

“After these remarks by Gruppenführer Müller, which unmistakably
caused a shattering effect, it became clear to me that a
decision had been made by the highest authority, and that
therefore any intervention by subordinate departments was
impossible and pointless.”

Now, this was announced at a meeting of persons that I would call executives, that the shooting had already begun. Are you telling this Tribunal that this matter was made clear to these executives, including one of your own officers, and was never told to you? Are you still saying that?

GÖRING: I am still saying that. Firstly, that I have never heard anything about this conference. Secondly, that the officer in question is only surmising when he mentions the names, he makes no assertion. And thirdly, I would like to ask you also to mention the beginning of this statement, which begins as follows:

“In this matter of the mass escape of British Air Force officers
from Prisoner-of-War Camp Number III, at Sagan on 24 or 25 March
1944, I make the following statement:

“I have to point out that in view of the absence of any
documents, I am forced to reconstruct completely from memory
events which happened almost a year and 9 months ago; I
therefore ask that this fact and the possibility thus arising of
my making a mistake be taken into consideration, and that due
allowances be made.”

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: That is a perfectly fair point, and the answer to it is that I will show you what this officer reported at the time to his general.

Give the witness General Grosch’s statement.

[_The document was submitted to the witness._] We are getting reasonably high up. This officer, General Grosch, signs it as a Lieutenant General. Now, would you like, if you can, to help me again—you were most helpful last time—to try to find the place? This is a statement by Lieutenant General Grosch.

GÖRING: I request to have permission to read this document first, to see whether similar modifications apply here also.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Will you read the first sentence? I do not want to take up time to read an account of the general matter. It says: “During my interrogation on 7 December 1945 I was told to write down all I knew about the Sagan case.” And then he wrote it down. But I would like you to look at Number 1, the first page. Do you see at the foot of the page an account of the pyramid in your ministry of administration? Do you see that at the foot of Page 1?

[_There was no response._]

SIR DAVID. MAXWELL-FYFE: Witness, do you see at the foot of Page 1 the pyramid?

GÖRING: I see it but—I am now at the place.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: It comes in about the fourth paragraph.

GÖRING: I can see it, but I should like to read the other first.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Then, if you will look about four small paragraphs on, it begins: “A few days after the day of the escape—I cannot remember the date any more—Colonel Walde informed me that OKW had called a conference in Berlin.”

Do you see that?

I do not mind you running through it quickly, but you may take it that the first two pages are what I said were there, the pyramid of your ministry.

GÖRING: Yes, I have found it. Which paragraph, please?

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: It is Part C, the fourth paragraph, the Sagan case. “A few days after the escape. . . .” Do you find that?

GÖRING: Yes, I have the place.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Thank you.

“A few days after the day of the escape—I cannot remember the
date any more—Colonel Walde informed me that the OKW had called
a conference in Berlin—I believe on the premises of a high SS
and police authority, and that the Inspectorate Number 17 was to
send representatives. I should have liked to have gone myself,
but had to attend another conference in Berlin, and asked
Colonel Walde to attend as representative. After his return
Colonel Walde informed me that the spokesman of the OKW had
informed them that there was a decision by the Führer to the
effect that, on recapture, the escaped British airmen were not
to be handed back to the Luftwaffe but were to be shot.”

Then missing a paragraph and taking the last line of the next paragraph:

“It is, however, certain that the danger of their being shot was
even then clearly recognizable. I asked Colonel Walde whether
such a far-reaching decision would be notified in writing to the
High Command of the Luftwaffe or the Reich Air Ministry or
whether he had been given anything in writing. Colonel Walde
gave me to understand that the assembly were told by the
spokesman of the OKW, that they would receive nothing in
writing, nor was there to be any correspondence on this subject.
The circle of those in the know was to be kept as small as
possible. I asked Colonel Walde whether the spokesman of the OKW
had said anything to the effect that the Reich Marshal or the
High Command of the Luftwaffe had been informed about the
matter. Colonel Walde assured me that the OKW spokesman had told
them that the Reich Marshal was informed.”

I will not ask you about that for the moment. I want you to look at what your general did. It says:

“Up to the time of Colonel Walde’s report I had not received
even so much as a hint anywhere that escaped prisoners of war
should be treated in any other way than according to the
provisions of the Geneva Convention.

“The same afternoon I rang up my superior officer, the Chief of
Air Defense, to ask time for an interview with General der
Flieger Förster. This was fixed for the next morning.

“When I came there to report I found General Förster together
with his chief of staff. I asked General Förster for permission
to speak to him alone and put the facts before him. In
conclusion, I expressed the opinion that if the British airmen
were to be shot, (a) there would be a breach of the Geneva
Convention, (b) reprisal measures endangering the lives of
German airmen held by the British as prisoners of war would have
to be expected. I asked General Förster to bring the matter to
the notice of the Reich Marshal even at this very late stage,
and to stress those two points.

“General Förster was immediately prepared to do this. When it
came to the choice of the way in which the matter could be
brought to the attention of the Reich Marshal, it was decided to
report to State Secretary Field Marshal Milch.

“In my presence General Förster rang up the office of the state
secretary and obtained the interview at once. General Förster
left the room, and while doing so he instructed me to wait for
his return in his study. After some time General Förster came
back and told me that he had reported the matter to the state
secretary and that Field Marshal Milch had made the necessary
notes.”

Look at the last paragraph:

“I gave Colonel Walde the order, despite the ban by the OKW, to
incorporate a detailed written statement about the conference in
our records. So far as I know, this was done.”

DR. STAHMER: Counsel Stahmer on behalf of the Defendant Göring.

We have had submitted here a series of affidavits given by witnesses who are in Nuremberg and who, in my opinion, could be brought as witnesses in person. Because of the importance of this matter, not only for Göring but for other defendants, I object to this procedure, on the assumption that the same rules apply for cross-examination as examination in chief. By that I mean that we should not be satisfied with an affidavit and depend on an affidavit, if the Prosecution can, without difficulty, summon the witness in order to have him testify before the Tribunal, so that the Defense may be in position to cross-examine these witnesses.

THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, what you have said is entirely inaccurate. The rules with reference to cross-examination are not the same as rules with reference to examination in chief, and what is being done at the present moment is that the Defendant Göring is being cross-examined as to his credit. He has said that he knew nothing about this matter, and he has been cross-examined to prove that he has lied when he said that.

DR. STAHMER: Mr. President, according to my opinion the procedure should be that the witness be brought here in person. The fact remains that, in our estimation, a reference to an affidavit is a less desirable means than the personal testimony of a witness, which affords the Defense the possibility of adducing evidence.

THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, as I have already pointed out to you, you are quite in error in thinking that the rules for cross-examination are the same as for examination in chief. The witness at the present moment is being cross-examined and is being cross-examined as to credit; that is to say, to prove whether or not he is telling the truth.

As to the calling of this witness—I think his name is Grosch—you can apply to call him if you want to do so. That is an entirely different matter.

DR. STAHMER: Yes. I quite understand, Mr. President; but I had to have the possibility of calling the people who are mentioned in this affidavit, in case I consider it necessary.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, you can apply to do that.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: [_Turning to the witness._] You understand, what I am suggesting to you is that here was a matter which was not only known in the OKW, not only known in the Gestapo and the Kripo, but was known to your own director of operations, General Förster, who told General Grosch that he had informed Field Marshal Milch. I am suggesting to you, that it is absolutely impossible and untrue that in these circumstances you knew nothing about it.

GÖRING: I would like first to establish an entirely different point. In the German interpretation regarding the first objection by Dr. Stahmer, the following came through:

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: The Tribunal does not want you to discuss legal objections.

THE PRESIDENT: Will you please answer the question that is put to you? You have already been told that you must answer a question directly and make any explanation afterwards, and shorten it.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Do you still say, in view of that evidence, in view of these statements from the officers of your own ministry, that you knew nothing about this?

GÖRING: Precisely these statements confirm this, and I would like to make a short explanation. You determined a date. You said it was the 27th. But in this statement by Grosch this date is not determined. It says: “A few days after the escape, I do not recall the date, Colonel Walde informed me.”

Secondly, it says here that General Förster, who was not chief of my operational branch but chief of another branch of the ministry, mentioned this matter to State Secretary Field Marshal Milch, without referring to the date. General Field Marshal Milch was here as a witness, but unfortunately, he was never questioned as to whether he gave me this report, and at what time, and whether to me direct.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Oh yes, he was, and General Field Marshal Milch took the same line as you, that he knew nothing about it, that Förster had never spoken to him. It was asked by my friend, Mr. Roberts, “Didn’t General Förster speak to you about it?”.

What I am suggesting is that both you and Field Marshal Milch are saying you knew nothing about it, when you did, and are leaving the responsibility on the shoulders of your junior officers. That is what I am suggesting and I want you to understand it.

GÖRING: No, I do not wish to push responsibility on to the shoulders of my subordinates, and I want to make it clear—that is the only thing that is important to me—that Field Marshal Milch did not say that he reported this matter to me. And, secondly, that the date when Förster told Milch about this is not established. It could have been quite possible that on the date when this actually happened, the Chief of the General Staff of the Luftwaffe might already have conferred with me about it. The important factor is—and I want to maintain it—that I was not present at the time when the command was given by the Führer. When I heard about it, I vehemently opposed it. But at the time I heard of it, it was already too late. That a few were shot later, was not yet known at the time, neither was the exact time of the event. Most of them had been shot already.

Thirdly, those who escaped, and were captured in the direct vicinity of the camp by our guards were returned to the camp and were not handed over. Those prisoners who were captured by the police and the Grossfahndung, and returned to the camp before the Führer had issued the decree, were likewise not handed over and shot.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You know that, according to Wielen, who is going to give evidence, the selection of the officers to be shot—a list as regards the selection of officers to be shot—a list had been prepared by the camp authorities at the request of Department 5, that is of the RSHA Kripo Department, in which those officers were regarded as disturbing elements—plotters and escape leaders, having been specifically mentioned. The names were selected either by the commandant or by one of these officers. Thereupon, the shooting of the officers mentioned by name was accordingly ordered by Department 4 of the RSHA and corresponding instructions sent to the Staatspolizei.

Are you telling the Tribunal you did not know that your own officers were selecting the men to be shot on the ground that they were plotters and escape leaders? In any other service in the world, attempt to escape is regarded as a duty of an officer, isn’t it, when he is a prisoner of war? Isn’t that so?

GÖRING: That is correct, and I have emphasized that. To your first question, I would like to put on record very definitely that we are dealing with the utterances of a man who will be testifying as a witness. As to whether he actually asked for a list and saw a list, his utterance is illogical. There was no selection made for shooting. Those who were captured by the police were shot without exception, and those who had not been returned to the camp. No officers were selected as representing disturbing elements, but those who had returned to the camp were not shot. Those who were recaptured by the police outside the camp were shot without exception, on the orders of the Führer. Therefore, the utterance is entirely illogical and not in accordance with the facts.

I know nothing about such a list being asked for, nor about the carrying out of such a wish. I personally pointed out to the Führer repeatedly that it is the duty of these officers to escape, and that on their return after the war, they would have to give an account of such attempts, which as far as I can remember should be repeated three times, according to English rules.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You remember that the Government of Germany sent an official note about this matter, saying that they had been shot while resisting arrest while trying to escape? Do you remember that?

GÖRING: I heard for the first time that there had been a note to this effect when the reply to it was sent. I had no part in the drawing up of the note. I know of its contents only through the reply, for I happened to be there when the reply came in.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I am not at the moment on the point that everyone now admits that the note was a complete and utter lie. I am on the point of the seriousness of this matter. Do you know that General Westhoff says in his statement: “Then, when we read this note to England in the newspaper, we were all absolutely taken aback. We all clutched our heads, mad.” According to Mr. Wielen, who will be here, it was a contributory cause for General Nebe of the Kripo, for nights on end, not going to bed but passing the night on his office settee. You will agree, won’t you, Witness, that this was a serious and difficult matter? All these officers that had to deal with it found it a serious and difficult matter, isn’t that so?

GÖRING: Not only these officers found this matter serious and difficult, but I myself considered it the most serious incident of the whole war and expressed myself unequivocally and clearly on this point, and later, when I learned the contents of the note, I knew that this note was not in accordance with the truth. I gave expression to my indignation, inasmuch as I immediately told my Quartermaster General to direct a letter to the OKW to the effect that we wished to give up the camps for prisoners of war, because under these circumstances, we no longer wished to have anything to do with them.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: And according to your evidence in chief, what you did was to turn to Himmler, asking him if he had received the order, and then you said,

“I told him what excitement would result in my branch, because
we could not understand such measures; and if he had received
such orders, he would please inform me before carrying them
through so that I would have the possibility to prevent such
orders from being carried out, if possible”—and then you said
that you—“talked to the Führer and that he confirmed that he
had given the order and told me why.”

You, according to that evidence, still had enough influence in Germany, in your opinion, to stop even Himmler issuing such orders or carrying—I am sorry, I said “issuing”—carrying out such orders.

GÖRING: You are giving my statement a completely wrong meaning. I told Himmler plainly that it was his duty to telephone me before the execution of this matter, to give me the possibility, even at this period of my much diminished influence, to prevent the Führer from carrying out this decree. I did not mean to say that I would have been completely successful, but it was a matter of course that I, as Chief of the Luftwaffe, should make it clear to Himmler that it was his duty to telephone me first of all, because it was I who was most concerned with this matter. I told the Führer in very clear terms just how I felt, and I saw from his answers that, even if I had known of it before, I could not have prevented this decree, and we must keep in mind that two different methods of procedure are in question. The order was not given to the Luftwaffe, that these people were to be shot by the Luftwaffe personnel, but to the police. If the Führer had said to me, “I will persist in this decree which I gave the police,” I would not have been able to order the police not to carry through the Führer’s decree. Only if this decree had had to be carried out by my men, would it have been possible for me perhaps to circumvent the decree, and I would like to emphasize this point strongly.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, that may be your view that you could not have got anywhere with the Führer; but I suggested to you that when all these officers that I mentioned knew about it, you knew about it, and that you did nothing to prevent these men from being shot, but co-operated in this foul series of murders.

THE PRESIDENT: Sir David, are you passing from that now?

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Yes.

THE PRESIDENT: You are putting in evidence these two documents?

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I am putting them in. I put them to the witness. D-731 will be GB-278, and D-730 will be GB-279.

THE PRESIDENT: And should you not refer perhaps to the second paragraph in 731?

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Yes.

THE PRESIDENT: It shows that apparently, in the early hours of the 25th of March the matter was communicated to the office of the adjutant of the Reich Marshal—the second paragraph beginning with “the escape.”

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Yes.

“The escape of about 30 to 40 prisoners, the exact number having
to be ascertained by roll call, was reported by telephone from
the Sagan Camp to the inspectorate in the early hours of the
25th of March, Saturday morning, and duly passed on in the same
way by this office to the higher authorities which were to be
informed in case of mass escapes. These were: 1.) the Office of
the Adjutant of the Reich Marshal; 2.) the OKW, for directors of
these prisoners of war; 3.) the Inspector General of Prisoners
of War; and 4.) Director of Operations, Air Ministry.”

I am much obliged. You must remember that the witness did not admit yesterday afternoon that the news of the escape had been given to the office of his adjutant.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I am much obliged to you.

GÖRING: The escape was communicated to us every time relatively quickly. I should now like to give my view of the statement made by you before that—it concerns assertions made by you—but I still maintain that I did not hear about this incident until after it had occurred.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I have put my questions on the incident. I pass to another point. I want to ask you two or three questions about the evidence that you gave 2 days ago, dealing with the evidence of your own witness, Herr Dahlerus, who made his first visit to London on the 25th of August 1939, after an interview and a telephone conversation with you on the 24th. I just want you to fix the date because it is sometimes difficult to remember what these dates are. At that time, you were anxious that he should persuade the British Government to arrange a meeting of plenipotentiaries who would deal with the questions of Danzig and the Corridor. Is that right?

GÖRING: That is correct.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You knew perfectly well, did you not, that as far as the Führer was concerned, Danzig and the Corridor was not the real matter that was operating in his mind at all. Will you let me remind you what he said on the 23rd of May:

“Danzig is not the subject of the dispute at all; it is a
question of expanding our living space in the East, of securing
our food supplies, and of the settlement of the Baltic problem.”

You knew that, didn’t you?

GÖRING: I knew that he had said these things at that time, but I have already pointed out repeatedly that such discussions can only be assessed, if considered in conjunction with the whole political situation. At the moment of these negotiations with England, we were solely concerned with Danzig and the Corridor.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, you say that despite what Hitler said on the 23rd of May, that at that moment Hitler was only concerned with Danzig and the Corridor? Do you say that seriously?

GÖRING: I maintain in all seriousness that, in the situation as it was at that time, this was really the case. Otherwise it would be impossible to understand any of Hitler’s acts. You might just as well take his book _Mein Kampf_ as a basis and explain all his acts by it.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I am interested in the last week of August at the moment. I want you now just to remember two points on what you said, with regard to Dahlerus, during the morning of the 25th. Do you remember, you had a telephone conversation with him at 11:30 on the 24th? On the 25th, were you sufficiently in Hitler’s confidence to know that he was going to proffer the _note verbale_ to Sir Nevile Henderson, the British Ambassador, on the 25th? Did you know that?

GÖRING: Yes, of course.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: At that time, when you were sending Dahlerus, and the _note verbale_ was being given to the British Ambassador, the arrangement and order was that you were going to attack Poland on the morning of the 26th, wasn’t it?

GÖRING: There seems to be a disturbance on the line.

THE PRESIDENT: I think there is some mechanical difficulty. Perhaps it would be a good thing to adjourn for a few minutes.

[_A recess was taken._]

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You told me, Witness, that the arrangements to attack Poland on the morning of the 26th were changed on the evening of the 25th. Before I come to that, I will ask you one or two questions about that.

GÖRING: No, I did not say that.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Wait a minute. I am sorry, but that is what I understood you to say.

GÖRING: No. I said explicitly that already on the 25th the attack for the morning of the 26th was cancelled. It is a technical and military impossibility to cancel a large-scale attack of a whole army the evening before an attack. The shortest time required would be from 24 hours to 48 hours.

I expressly mentioned that on the 25th the situation was clear.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: At the time, you had asked Dahlerus to go to England on the 24th. It was still the plan that the attack would take place on the 26th. Was not your object in sending Dahlerus to have the British Government discussing their next move when the attack took place, in order to make it more difficult for the British Government?

GÖRING: No, I want to emphasize that—and perhaps I should have the documents for the date—that when I sent Dahlerus at that time, and when at that moment Sir Nevile had been handed a note on behalf of the Führer, the attack for the 26th had been cancelled and postponed.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Let me remind you of what you said yourself on the 29th of August:

“On the day when England gave her official guarantee to Poland,
it was 5:30 on 25 August, the Führer called me on the telephone
and told me he had stopped the planned invasion of Poland. I
asked him then whether it was just temporary or for good. He
said, ‘No, I will have to see whether we can eliminate British
intervention.’ I asked him, ‘Do you think that it will be
definite within 4 or 5 days?’”

Isn’t that right?

GÖRING: That was what I said, but I did not say that this occurred on the 25th, but when the Führer was clear about the guarantee that was given. I emphasize that once more . . .

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: That was what I was quoting to you. When the official guarantee was given, the treaty was signed at 5:30 on the evening of the 25th of August. I am putting your own words to you. It was after that that the Führer telephoned you and told you the invasion was off. Do you wish to withdraw your statement that it was after the official guarantee was given to Poland?

GÖRING: I emphasized once more—after we knew that the guarantee would be given. It must be clear to you too that if the signing took place at 5:30 p.m. on the 25th, the Führer could know about it only shortly afterwards. Not till then would the Führer have called a conference, and in that case an attack for the 26th could have been called off only during the night of the 25th to 26th. Every military expert must know that that is an absolute impossibility. I meant to say in my statement, “. . . when it was clear to the Führer that a guarantee was given.”

I emphasize once more that I have not seen this record nor sworn to it.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I admit that I do not know anything about that. I do not know whether you were still in Hitler’s confidence at the time or not. But, wasn’t it a fact that Signor Attolico came on the 25th and told Hitler that the Italian Army and Air Force were not ready for a campaign? Were you told that?

GÖRING: Yes, of course I was told that.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: That was why the orders for the attack were cancelled on the 26th, wasn’t it?

GÖRING: No, that is absolutely wrong, because when the question of Italian assistance came up, the fact was that its value was doubted in many quarters. During the tension of the preceding days it became evident that the demands made by the Italians which could not be fulfilled by us were formulated in order to keep Italy out of the war. The Führer was convinced that England had only given such a clear-cut guarantee to Poland, because in the meantime the British Government had learned that it was not the intention of Italy to come into the war as a partner of the Axis.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I will put to you your own account of what the Führer said. “I will have to see whether we can eliminate British intervention.” Isn’t it correct that you tried, through Mr. Dahlerus, in every way, to try and eliminate British intervention?

GÖRING: I have never denied that. It was my whole endeavor to avoid war with England. If it had been possible to avoid this war by coming to an agreement with Poland, then that would have been accepted. If the war with England could have been avoided in spite of a war with Poland, then that was my task also. This is clear from the fact that, even after the Polish campaign had started on 1 September 1939 I still made every attempt to avoid a war with England and to keep the war from spreading.