radiance of omnipotence, who get their sustenance from it and who
arrogantly carry out its mandates and crush any resistance to it? Are
they not the hands and limbs of the monster, carrying out the orders of
the head? Surely, they cannot be allowed to detach themselves from the
corpus by saying, “These arms and legs are innocent—only the head is
guilty?”
In an authoritarian state, the head becomes the supreme authority for
woe as well as weal. Those who subscribe to such a state submit to that
principle. If they abjectly place all the power in the hands of one man,
with no right reserved to check or limit or repudiate, they must accept
the bitter with the sweet. This is especially true of those in high
places in the state—those who choose to enjoy the honor, the emoluments
and the power of such high stations. By accepting such attractive and
lucrative posts under a head whose power they know to be unlimited, they
ratify in advance his every act, good or bad. They cannot say at the
beginning, “The Fuehrer’s decisions are final; we will have no voice in
them; it is not for us to reason why; his will is law,” and then, when
the Fuehrer decrees aggressive war or barbarous inhumanities or broken
covenants, to attempt to exculpate themselves by saying, “Oh, we were
never in favor of _those_ things.”
One cannot escape the conviction that, had the war terminated in victory
for Germany, all of the acts of Hitler, including those related to the
charges in this indictment, would have been hailed as strokes of genius,
and that this defendant would now be elbowing his way into the front row
of those claiming to have successfully and victoriously carried out
Hitler’s orders and policies—in fact, claiming co-authorship in many.
But with Germany defeated and Hitler dead, it becomes naively convenient
to take refuge in the flimsy claim that no one except Hitler was in
favor of the invasion of Poland and Russia and France and the rape of
Holland and Belgium and Norway and Denmark.
The defendant insists that he knew nothing of the atrocities and
violence which were cumulating day by day throughout Europe. Being a
good German, he says, he supinely obeyed the decree which forbade
listening to foreign broadcasts or reading foreign periodicals. He
surrendered to a political philosophy which outlawed the ordinary means
of knowledge and which prevented the formation of rationalized opinion
or judgment. No one might read or listen or talk except in predetermined
channels. Ignorance was prescribed by law. The first weapon of tyranny
is to keep its victims in darkness. The Germans were an intelligent,
cultured people; they were not ignorant serfs. What a travesty to say
that a people which has produced some of the greatest intellects in
human history is not fit to be told the truth.
Desperate and discouraged peoples, distraught with the crushing problems
of hunger and insecurity, have always cried out for a miracle worker to
lead them out of the wilderness. Then is the golden opportunity for the
mountebank with bland promises and soothing phrases to provide a
poisonous panacea for their distress. In their desperation they fail to
realize that despotism has a way of beginning with benevolence and ends
by being merely despotic. Masquerading in the mantle of a messiah, the
wily opportunist lulls them into subscribing to some glib Fuehrerprinzip
which means, “Ask no questions; leave everything to me.” And when the
debacle comes, they realize that they _have_ left everything to
him—honor, dignity, self-respect, liberty, even life itself—and they
end up degraded, ashamed, impoverished, and hopeless. But have they
ended up wiser? The universal fear today is that in their desperation
they will repeat the vicious process by saying, “Last time we picked the
wrong man. Let us seek a new messiah. He will save us.” The lessons of
one generation are quickly forgotten by the next, but the inexorable
laws of nature are immutable. The tragic fruits of tyranny and
intolerance will always be the moral decay of peoples and the
degradation of human dignity.
Over the heavy gates which shut in the hapless victims at Dachau is a
legend reading, “Work will set you free.” The toil of slaves cannot set
them free; it only serves to further enslave them. Some day an
enlightened German people will storm those gates and all others like
them and recast them into an image of Truth—an imperishable figure with
eyes open and unbandaged. So long as Truth stands free and untarnished,
no future Hitler will ever arise to deceive and degrade the German
nation. Then there will never be another Dachau.
[Signed] ROBERT M. TOMS
PRESIDING JUDGE
FITZROY D. PHILLIPS
JUDGE
MICHAEL A. MUSMANNO
JUDGE
SENTENCE
This Tribunal takes no pleasures in performing the duty which confronts
it, but the deliberate enslavement of millions must not go unexpiated.
The barbarous acts which have been revealed here originated in the lust
and ambition of comparatively few men, but all Germans are paying and
will pay for the degradation of their souls and the debasement of the
German honor, caused by following the false prophets who led them to
disaster.
It would be a travesty on justice to permit those false leaders,
including this defendant, to escape responsibility for the deception and
betrayal of their people. It would be even a greater injustice to view
with complacence the mass graves of millions of men, women, and children
whose only crime was that they stood in Hitler’s way. Retribution for
such crimes against humanity must be swift and certain. Future would-be
dictators and their subservient satellites must know what follows their
defilement of international law and of every type of decency and fair
dealing with their fellow men. Civilization will be satisfied with
nothing less.
It is the sentence of this Tribunal that the defendant Erhard Milch be
confined to the Rebdorf Prison for the remainder of his natural life.
-----
[157] Concurring opinions were filed by Judge Musmanno, see pp. 797-859,
and by Judge Phillips, see pp. 860-878.
[158] Trial of the Major War Criminals, vol. I, pp. 243-47, Nuremberg,
1947.
[159] Ibid., pp. 381-83.
B. Concurring Opinion by Judge Michael A. Musmanno
The defendant is Erhard Milch, Field Marshal in the German Luftwaffe,
Inspector General of the Luftwaffe, State Secretary in the Air Ministry,
Generalluftzeugmeister, representative of the Wehrmacht on the Central
Planning Board, Chief of the Jaegerstab and member of the Nazi Party. He
stands indicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity as defined in
Control Council Law No. 10, enacted by Allied Control Council on 20
December 1945.
The indictment contains three counts which may be briefly summarized as
follows:
COUNT ONE
Erhard Milch is charged with having knowingly committed war crimes as
principal and accessory in enterprises involving slave labor and having
also willingly and knowingly participated in enterprises involving the
use of prisoners of war in war operations contrary to international
convention and the laws and customs of war.
COUNT TWO
The defendant is accused of having knowingly and willfully participated
in enterprises involving fatal medical experiments upon subjects without
their consent.
COUNT THREE
In the third count the defendant is charged with responsibility for
slave labor and fatal medical experiments, in the same manner as
indicated in the first two counts, except that here the alleged victims
are declared to be German nationals and nationals of other countries.
The defendant has entered a general denial of Not Guilty to all counts.
To the charges of slave labor he has answered in effect—
1. That the term slave labor is a misnomer and that all foreign
workmen in Germany during the war were there of their own free
will.
2. That if they did not come voluntarily they were treated
humanely, considerately, and were not subjected to any
ill-treatment either in transportation or while actively
employed for the Reich.
3. That if ill-treatment, fatal or otherwise, of foreign workmen
occurred, the defendant was in no way responsible for such
ill-treatment.
To the charges of responsibility for fatal medical experiments inflicted
on involuntary subjects, the defendant replies substantially—
1. That the high-altitude and freezing experiments were not
painful to the subjects, nor did any illegal deaths result
therefrom.
2. That if fatalities did occur, they were suffered by those
already condemned to death, or were caused by persons over whom
the defendant had no control.
3. That in any event, Milch was in no way officially connected
with the illegal and fatal experiments.
I. SLAVE LABOR
(a) Methods of Recruitment
The defense has affirmatively asserted that there was no slave labor in
Germany during the war, or that if it did exist, its scope was
negligible. The Tribunal finds that this assertion is not supported by
the testimony in the case. It concludes, on the contrary, from the
evidence presented at this trial that the German Reich during World War
II did actively and plenarily employ slave labor. It further is of the
opinion that the Third Reich used and abused slave labor to an extent
and in a manner hitherto unknown in either modern or ancient history.
The exploitation of human beings by Germany during the years of the war
must take its place, in point of cruelty and inhumaneness, with the most
iniquitous slave practices of the ancient Egyptians, Babylonians,
Assyrians, and Persians. The building of the Pyramids, the Hanging
Gardens of Babylon, and other ancient landmarks under whip and lash have
their modern counterpart in the German building of the Western Wall, the
Gothic Line, military fortifications, concentration camps, and munitions
factories. The guilt of the German Reich is greater than that of the
ancient empires because in that area of antiquity the immorality of
human bondage was not universally accepted, whereas in 1939 no country
in the sisterhood of civilized nations had failed to condemn and outlaw
involuntary servitude in its every form.
It is submitted in behalf of the defendant that foreign workers came to
Germany of their own will. It is true that in the early stages of the
European conflict, Germany offered such inducements in foreign countries
as to persuade numbers of their subjects voluntarily to proceed to that
country for remunerative employment. In those first days of Blitzkrieg
when nation after nation fell helplessly under the invincible Nazi war
machine, workers accepted employment in Germany not only because of
promises made, but because exterior evidence to their bewildered minds
seemed to portend that soon the frontiers of Germany would be
coterminous with the boundaries of Europe itself. Thus, but small choice
remained to them; whether they worked at home or in Germany the master
was destined to be the same.
However, when the subjugated peoples perceived at Stalingrad that the
unbeatable German army could be beaten, when they heard the roar of
American propellers in the sky and the clank of British tanks returned
once more to the battle, a light of hope gleamed that it might not be
true, as Hitler had said, that his rule and order were to endure a
thousand years, and then these people refused the coin and currency of
the German Reich. From then on the feet of foreign workers were not
turned willingly toward Germany. And in the face of this defiance,
Sauckel, German Plenipotentiary for Labor, declared, “Should we not
succeed in obtaining the necessary amount of labor on a voluntary basis,
we must immediately institute conscription or forced labor.”
(_T-58._)[160]
There is no adding machine tape to which one can turn to determine the
exact total number of foreign workers impressed into German industry,
but Fritz Sauckel, Plenipotentiary General for Labor, declared, “Out of
5,000,000 workers who arrived in Germany, not even 200,000 came
voluntarily.” (_T-149._) Heinrich Himmler placed the number of foreign
workers at from 6,000,000 to 7,000,000. (_IMT 243_)[161].
On 9 November 1941, Hitler declared in a speech—
“The territory which now works for us contains more than
250,000,000 men, but the territory which works indirectly for us
includes now more than 350,000,000. In the measure in which it
concerns German territory, the domain which we have taken under
our administration, it is not doubtful that we shall succeed in
harnessing the very last man to this work.”
Hitler was never quite able to achieve the fullness of this ambitious
program, but it was not due to any relinquishment of efforts in that
direction by himself or his criminal coadjutors. Of course, this program
was in direct violation of Article 52 of the Hague Convention which
declares—
“Requisition in kind and services shall not be demanded from
municipalities or inhabitants, except for the needs of the army
of occupation. They shall be in proportion to the resources of
the country, and of such a nature as not to involve the
inhabitants in the obligation of taking part in military
operations against their own country.”
In the very initial stages of the German invasions, the officiating
agents phrased their demands for labor in language which gave the
recruitment an aspect of voluntary action on the part of the workers.
Thus, when the German forces entered Lithuania, male and female farm
workers were called upon by the military administration to sign up for
six months’ employment on large estates, but after the signatures were
obtained the promises were not kept. (_T-97._) And it was not long until
all pretense at voluntary recruitment was abandoned and then
Lithuanians, ordered to official agencies “only for registration”, were
held there and taken away under military guards to the local barracks
where they had neither the opportunity to bid their families good-by nor
to put their most personal affairs in order. (_T-97-98._)
There were other pacific methods to “persuade” foreign workers into
employment for the Reich. Thus, Governor General Frank of Poland
recommended that one way to force Polish workers into Germany was to
withhold their unemployment insurance. (_T-112._)
However, these genteel methods in Poland soon gave way to means more
direct. Recruitment now degenerated into a fierce manhunt with
unsuspecting victims being seized on the streets, in railroad stations,
from their homes, even in churches. (_T-83._)
“Everybody is exposed to the danger of being seized anywhere and
at any time by members of the police, suddenly and unexpectedly,
and being brought into an assembly camp. None of his relatives
knows what has happened to him; only weeks or months later, one
or the other gives news of his fate by a postcard.” (_T-83._)
In Ukrainia skilled workers whose names had been furnished to the police
by corrupted village elders were “dragged from their beds at night to be
locked up in cellars until shipped.” (_T-67._) As neither the male nor
the female workers were given time to gather up their belongings they
often arrived at the collecting center without shoes or other adequate
clothing for the long and torturing journey ahead. (_T-67._)
A directive applying to recruitment in White Ruthenia declared—
“All permissible means shall be used to obtain manpower from
White Ruthenia. Do not hesitate to apply extraordinary
measures.” (_T-91._)
In the same directive “the recruiters” are told, “Everything you do for
Germany is right, everything else is wrong.” (_T-93._) So wide-sweeping
was this recruitment drive waged by the SS and police in one area of
White Ruthenia that 115,000 hectares of farm land became useless because
the whole population had been removed. (_T-93._)
Goering bluntly declared in a speech at the Reich Ministry of Air on 7
November 1941, in connection with the Four Year Plan that Poles,
Dutchmen, etc., were to be taken, “if necessary as prisoners of war and
employ them as such, if work through free contract cannot be obtained.
Strong action.” * * * “Foreigners not to be treated like German
workers.” (_T-53._)
One Leyser in making a report to Rosenberg on the situation in his
district of Zhitomir gives the answer to the assertion of voluntary
labor when he says—
“It is certain that a recruitment of labor, in the sense of the
word, can hardly be spoken of. In most cases, it is nowadays a
matter of actual conscription by force. The population has been
stirred up to a large extent and views the transports to the
Reich as a measure which does in no way differ from the former
exile to Siberia during the Czarist and Bolshevist system.”
(_T-94._)
A report on recruitment measures taken in Holland reveals—
“All Jewish Netherlanders, whom the Germans could lay their
hands on, with the exception of a small group of exempted
persons, were brought together here; hospitals, old age homes,
institutions for the blind and other disabled persons were
emptied in order to concentrate the inmates in Westerbork for
deportation. Even the inmates of lunatic asylums did not escape
deportation.” (_T-125._)
On the subject of workers from the Netherlands, Goering said on 28
October 1943, in the presence of the defendant—
“After that has been done once, one has to modify the system for
the second blow. Then the Dutch people will be no longer out in
the streets on Sunday for pleasure promenades * * *. First, all
the people must be brought together in a pen. Then they will be
asked individually who works where. Then the men will be
selected accordingly.” (_T-2094._)
And on the subject of foreign exchange at that same meeting, Goering
contributed this bit of wisdom in finance—
“All we need to do is to fix the rate of exchange * * * today
the German mark equals 20 francs, tomorrow 23, then 27, then 40,
and so forth, up to one million, or one billion. We have had all
that. The same holds true for the guilder. One cigarette now
costs in Holland 1.50 guilders; formerly it cost 10 cents. I
merely have to say, 1.50 guilders equal 10 pfennigs or one mark
equals 15 guilders.” (_T-2095._)
It may be well to note at once that all quotations from the transcript
represent excerpts from records and documents located in the official
files of the German Reich. The evidence advanced by the prosecution in
this case was almost exclusively documentary. Thus, if any observation
in this opinion seems overly emphatic and appears to go beyond the
restraint usually found in judicial pronouncements, it will still fall
short of the force of language employed in some of the original reports
made by German officials to their own superiors at the time of the
events described. A top secret memorandum on conditions in occupied
Russian territory declared—
“It is no longer a secret from friend or foe that hundreds of
thousands of them literally have died of hunger or cold in our
camps * * *. We now experience the grotesque picture of having
to recruit millions of laborers from the occupied eastern
territories, after prisoners of war have died of hunger like
flies, in order to fill the gaps that are formed within Germany.
Now the food question no longer existed. In the prevailing
limitless abuse of the Slavic humanity, _recruiting methods were
used which probably had their origin only in the blackest
periods of the slave trade_.” (_T-121._)
Even Rosenberg acknowledged the severity and harshness of the
recruitment program and protested, not, to be sure, on humanitarian
grounds, but because “endangered persons prefer to escape their fate” by
going over to guerilla bands. (_T-78._)
The fury with which the manhunt for workers was prosecuted reached such
extremes that in many instances villages were burned down as
“retribution for failure to comply with the demand for the appropriation
of labor forces directed to the communities.” (_T-80._)
And it was not only where large numbers were demanded that savage
reprisals occurred. In a little village where 25 workers had been
ordered but none reported, the German militia set fire to the houses of
those who had fled. Then—
“The people who had hurried to the scene were forbidden to
extinguish the flames, beaten and arrested, so that seven
homesteads burned down. The policemen meanwhile ignited other
houses. The people fell on their knees and kissed their hands,
but the policemen beat them with rubber truncheons.”
(_T-80-81._)
All because the mighty Reich needed 25 men to throw into its vast
workshop of millions turning out the steel teeth of war.
In the same instance the German militia continued into other villages
and where they did not find the workers they seized the parents. “The
workers who had not appeared until then were shot.” Then, in the report
we are quoting from, appears the damning phrase which shows more than
anything else to what a low ebb the dignity of man had been reduced and
degraded by the German Reich. “_They are now catching humans like the
dog catchers used to catch dogs._” (_T-81._) The report closes on a
statement which must needs bring a blush of shame to the cheek of every
member of the civilized human race—
“People from many villages went on a certain day to a pilgrimage
to the monastery Potschaew. They were all arrested, locked in,
and will be sent to work. Among them there are lame, blind, and
aged people.” (_T-81._)
It has been asserted that the defendant and others holding high office
cannot and should not be held responsible for the acts of subordinate
officers in far away places, and of whose activities they could have no
knowledge. But these smaller officers were only putting into effect the
policies publicly declared over and over by the chieftains. Thus, when a
certain Koch spoke in Kiev and declared—
“I will draw the very last out of this country. I did not come
to spread bliss. I have come to help the Fuehrer. The population
must work, work, and work again * * * for some people are
getting excited that the population may not get enough to eat.
The population cannot demand that. One has only to remember what
our heroes were deprived of in Stalingrad * * *. We definitely
did not come here to give out manna; we have come here to create
the basis for Victory.” (_T-86._)
He was only repeating what had been said by Hitler, Himmler, Goering,
and Milch, in varying forms. The defendant claims that he did not
literally mean the blood and thunder declarations admittedly authored by
him, and that phase of the case will be discussed in detail later. But
underlings who heard these wild, inflammatory utterances did not know
that Milch was only barking, if in fact we are to assume that his
ferocious words were only purposeless growlings. The men in the field
did not stop at words, because they were in a position to act and did
act—directly on the people. Koch was not voicing a concept original
with him when he said in that same speech—
“We are a master race which must remember that the lowliest
German worker is racially and biologically a thousand times more
valuable than the population here.” (_T-86._)
Unfortunately, however, his utterances were not confined to rhetoric,
but being in a position to put them into flesh and blood effect, he did
so.
Quotations from documents furnishing further proof of involuntary
foreign labor in Germany are too numerous to repeat in the judgment.
Reference, however, will be made to but one more before proceeding to
the next item for discussion. In the recruitment of 1 million workers
demanded in the Ukraine, SS Major Christensen, in charge of operations,
declared that whatever harsh treatment was required should be
controlled. He thus orders that in arresting communist functionaries it
is no longer necessary to arrest all the close relatives of a member of
the communist party. He decrees further that in searching for workers
“when it becomes necessary to burn down a village, the whole population
will be put at the disposal of the commissioner by force.” (_T-129._)
This is regarded as a concession, and then comes what must be classified
as the most heart-rending utterance which has come out of this war—
“_As a rule, no more children will be shot._”
Not an out-and-out prohibition against shooting children; not that more
care should be exercised in the handling of children; but only a
general, vague suggestion that this SS battalion of murderers must not
fire at children on sight just as one might mow down sparrows or
rabbits. However, if the situation requires, then of course, children
will be shot with everybody else, for the order goes on to say, “Slavs
will interpret all soft treatment on our part as weakness.” “The most
important thing,” the directive concludes, “is the recruitment of
workers.” (_T-129-130._)
(b) Treatment of Workers
On 20 April 1942, Fritz Sauckel announced his labor mobilization program
which contained the one supremely cruel proposition regarding treatment
of foreign workers—
“All the men must be fed, sheltered, and treated in such a way
as to exploit them to the highest possible extent at the lowest
conceivable degree of expenditure.” (_T-58._)
After the announcement of this inhuman decree of maximum work with
minimum sustenance, Sauckel followed with—
“It has always been natural for us Germans to refrain from
cruelty and mean chicaneries towards the beaten enemy, even if
he has proved himself the most bestial and most implacable
adversary, and to treat him correctly and humanly, even when we
expect useful work of him.” (_T-58-59._)
It can be imagined with what kindness an underling of Sauckel’s would
treat a worker whom Sauckel has already characterized as a “bestial and
most implacable adversary”.
As a result of the minimum sustenance directive it is not difficult to
understand the report of a Dr. Hupe who stated—
“During the last few days we have established that the food for
the Russians employed here is so miserable that the people are
getting weaker from day to day. Investigations showed that
single Russians are not able to place a piece of metal for
turning into position, for instance, because of lack of physical
strength. The same conditions exist at all places of work where
Russians are employed.” (_T-55._)
Wilhelm Jager, senior camp director at the Krupp Works, reported that
diet prescribed for eastern workers was 1,000 calories less per day than
the minimum prescribed for any Germans. Further, that while German heavy
workers received 5,000 calories a day, eastern workers in comparable
jobs received only 2,000 calories. Such meat as was allowed the foreign
workers was that which had been “rejected by the veterinary, such as
horse meat or tuberculin infested”. (_T-103._) The clothing allowed the
eastern workers was likewise entirely inadequate. They had no overcoats
and, because of the shortage of shoes, many were forced to go to work
barefoot even in winter. In the work camps tuberculosis was widespread
among the eastern workers, caused by bad housing, insufficient and poor
food, overwork and insufficient rest—
“These workers were likewise afflicted with spotted fever. Lice,
the carrier of this disease, together with countless fleas,
bugs, and other vermin tortured the inhabitants of these camps.
As a result of the filthy conditions of the camps nearly all
eastern workers were afflicted with skin disease. The shortage
of food also caused many cases of Hunher-Oedem, Nephritis, and
Shighakruse.” (_T-103._)
These conditions became infinitely worse, of course, during the time of
air raids—
“The French prisoner-of-war camp in Nogerratstrasse had been
destroyed in an air raid attack and its inhabitants were kept
for nearly half a year in dog kennels, urinals, and in old
baking houses. The dog kennels were three feet high, nine feet
long, and six feet wide. Five men slept in each of them. The
prisoners had to crawl into these kennels on all fours.”
(_T-105._)
A Dr. Stinnesbeck reports on 12 June 1944—
“The PW camp at Nogerratstrasse was in most deplorable
condition. The people live in ashcans, doghouses, old baking
stoves, and self-made huts.” (_T-106._)
Visiting camp Humboldtstrasse, Dr. Stinnesbeck found 600 Jewish women
who worked at the Krupp factory. They suffered from festering wounds and
other diseases. They had no shoes and went about in their bare feet!
“The sole clothing of each consisted of a sack with holes for
their arms and head. Their hair was shorn. The camp was
surrounded by barbed wire and closely guarded by SS guards.”
(_T-106._)
Concentration camp inmates were made to work, to which there can be no
objection on the grounds of inhumanity. In fact, some useful toil is
preferable to idleness in prison. But camp commanders were instructed
that the “employment must be, in the true meaning of the word,
exhaustive, in order to obtain the greatest measure of performance.”
(_T-61._)
“There is no limit to working hours. Their duration depends on
the kind of working establishments in the camps and the kind of
work to be done. They are fixed by the camp commanders alone.”
(_T-62._)
Certain “antisocial elements” were by special order “to be worked to
death”. In the literal Gestapo language “death” was never used
rhetorically or figuratively. Those who were to be killed through work
were listed as “under protective arrest”. This included Jews, gypsies,
Russians, and Ukrainians; Poles with more than three-year sentences;
Czechs and Germans with more than eight-year sentences. (_T-63._)
In these work camps frequently children of tender age were forced to
toil.
“An indication of the awful conditions this may lead to is given
by the fact that in the camps for eastern workers, camp for
eastern workers ‘Waldlust’, Post Office Lauf, Pegnitz, there are
cases of eight-year old, delicate and undernourished children
put to forced labor and perishing from such treatment.”
(_T-99._)
Those who were imported for farm work fared no better than their factory
brothers. A directive issued by the Ministry of Finance and Economy at
Baden on the control of Polish farm workers in Stuttgart and Baden
directed that farm workers were to be quartered in stables, and the
employer was urged that “no remorse should restrict such action.”
(_T-47._) “Fundamentally”, this extraordinary document proclaims, “farm
workers of Polish nationality no longer have the right to complain, and
thus no complaints may be accepted any more by any official agency.”
(_T-46._)
To deprive a human being of the right to complain is in effect to
classify him lower than an animal because even a beast of burden is
privileged to announce his objections to harsh and cruel treatment. Nor
were the Polish workers permitted the consolation and comfort in
adversity which religion affords. “The visiting of churches, regardless
of faith, is strictly prohibited.” The edict of the Ministry of Finance
said further that this prohibition against attendance at churches even
excluded the visiting of churches when no service was in progress. The
visiting of theatres, motion picture shows, or other cultural
entertainment also was prohibited. (_T-46._)
“Gathering of farm workers of Polish nationality after work is
prohibited, whether it is on other farms, in the stables, or in
the living quarters of the Poles. The use of railroads, buses,
or other public conveyances by farm workers of Polish
nationality is prohibited.” (_T-47._)
The difference between slave labor of this type and outright slavery is
a margin faint and indistinguishable. There was no limit to the hours of
work, and the employer was invested with the right, bestially inherent
in the proprietorship of slave owners, to inflict corporal punishment on
the worker “_if_ instruction and good words failed”. Nor was there any
one to determine whether good words had failed because the “employer may
not be held accountable in any such cases by an official agency.”
(_T-47._)
Heinrich Himmler took a very active part in the slave labor program.
Concerning commitment of manpower from the East, he laid down strict
rules which, if violated, brought severe punishment. He decreed that—
“In severe cases, that is in such cases where the measures at
the disposal of the leader of the guard do not suffice, the
state police office has to act with its means. Accordingly, they
will be treated, as a rule, only with strict measure, that is
with transfer to a concentration camp or with special
treatment.” (_T-53._)
We learn further on in the directive that the “special treatment” so
casually referred to as if it were some slight deprivation of comfort or
convenience means nothing less than hanging!
“Special treatment is hanging. Hanging should not take place in
the immediate vicinity of the camp. A certain number of the
manpower from the original Soviet Russian territory should
attend the special treatment; at that time they are to be warned
about the circumstances which led to this special treatment.”
(_T-53._)
If workers sought to escape, search measures were to be decreed locally,
and when caught the fugitive must receive special treatment. (_T-54._)
Heinrich Himmler was one of the most relentless pursuers of slave labor,
as, of course, he was the most notorious executant of all that was
inhuman, indecent, cruel, and vulgar in the entire Nazi program. Himmler
does not defy description, he invites it. He stands out in the whole
hideous camp of Hitler barbarians as the most savage of them all. A
fiend in human shape, a monster in the clothing of man; there is no wild
beast, bound only by jungle code, which, in point of honor, was not his
superior; there is no slimy, maggoty larva, wriggling in the stagnancy
and stench of the foulest cesspool which could be regarded his inferior.
His creed was murder, his religion massacre, his belief kidnapping, his
faith treachery, and his dogma oppression in every form. Only one thing
mattered and that was German blood—
“What happens to a Russian, to a Czech, does not interest me in
the slightest. What the nation can offer in the way of good
blood of our type, we will take, if necessary by kidnapping
their children and raising them here with us. Whether nations
live in prosperity or starve to death interests me only insofar
as we need them as slaves for our Kultur; otherwise, it is of no
interest to me. Whether 10,000 Russian females fall down from
exhaustion while digging an antitank ditch interests me only
insofar as the antitank ditch for Germany is finished * * *.
When somebody comes to me and says, ‘I cannot dig the antitank
ditch with women and children, it is inhuman, for it would kill
them,’ then I have to say, ‘You are a murderer of your own blood
because if the antitank ditch is not dug, German soldiers will
die, and they are sons of German mothers. They are our own
blood.’ That is what I want to instill into this SS and what I
believe I have instilled into them as one of the most sacred
laws of the future. Our concern, our duty, is our people and our
blood. It is for them that we must provide and plan, work and
fight, nothing else. We can be indifferent to everything else.”
(_T-145._)
When hundreds of thousands of Russian prisoners of war died from
exhaustion and hunger, his regret was not that they died, but that it
was deplorable “by reason of the loss of labor.” (_T-144._)
The defense in this case denied that foreign workers and prisoners of
war were maltreated, and produced some evidence to dispute the
prosecution’s contentions in this regard, we quote from the affidavit of
one Albin Schirmer, a resident of Nuernberg—
“From the year 1929 onwards, I was employed by the Hercules
Works, Ltd. at Nuernberg (Nuernberger Herkuleswerke G.m.b.H.),
and worked there in the capacity of foreman throughout the war.
The necessary workers were requested by the firm from the Labor
Office. The Labor Office allocated French prisoners of war, free
French, and Czech workers to the firm. The free foreign workers,
who also cooperated in executing the commissions of the
Luftwaffe, were treated in every respect in exactly the same way
as the German workers. Some lived in furnished rooms. Some lived
in a camp as it was cheaper there. Working hours, wages, ration
cards, and the supplementary ration cards for workers, whose
hours were long, were the same as for any German. Equally,
freedom of movement during leisure hours, permission to attend
theaters, churches, and cinemas, the protection of the Labor
Front and of strength-through-joy, permission to visit public
houses and German families were available to free foreign
workers as well as to German workers. Intercourse with German
girls was also permitted to free foreign workers. This, however,
did not apply to prisoners of war. The sanitary installations of
the firm were good, and were available for the use of foreign
workers, as well as of the German workers. The prisoners of war
had fixed times for taking showers whereas the free foreign
workers had their showers at the same time as the Germans. The
free French workers were allowed free postal communication with
France, and they also went there on leave. I know of only two
cases in which free French workers did not return from their
leave in France.
Many French prisoners of war volunteered as free workers, in
order to be eligible for the resultant advantages. Even the
prisoners of war had beer sent to them every day.
During air raids, the free foreign workers played their part
with devotion, a thing which they would certainly not have done
if they had not considered that they were well-treated.
After the arrival of the American troops most of the French
workers said good-by to me in a friendly fashion, shaking hands
with me, and wishing me luck. The female workers from the
Ukraine too liked it here according to their statements.”
Why should one doubt that in the vast German workshop which employed a
score of millions, here and there some foreign workers were not abused
but in the long run fared well? It would need to be someone wearing
spectacles of pitch and groping in a Cimmerian night of prejudice and
pique to assert that the German people are incapable of hospitality and
generosity. The very fact that there were concentration camps in the
land attests to the fact that not everybody accepted Hitler’s and
Himmler’s crackpot master race ideology. However, even accepting Albin
Schirmer’s affidavit at face value, it is but one little flower in a
jungle of evidence establishing that only a very few foreign workers
were so fortunate as to be showered with the care and comforts and
allowed to revel and luxuriate in the liberties vouchsafed those who
were so lucky as to be employed in the Hercules Works, Limited, at
Nuernberg.
As against this idyllic picture of happiness in a powder plant or
strength-through-joy in Nuernberg, there is recalled the image of the
last witness at this trial. He also was a German, Joseph Krysiak, and he
too worked in a war factory. In December 1940, he remarked in a
conversation to some friends that if America entered the European
conflict, Germany could not win. The ubiquitous Gestapo learned of his
observation and he was committed to a concentration camp, from which he
went daily to work at the Me [ssersmitt] 109 plant at Gusen I. His
living conditions were a trifle less felicitous than those described by
Schirmer. Krysiak worked twelve hours a day, he had coffee for
breakfast, watery soup for lunch, and at night seven men shared a loaf
of bread. If he did not reach the quota of work assigned him for the
day, he was beaten. Later he was sent to another factory, and of working
conditions there he said—
“We were working at Saint George, Gusen II, for twelve hours.
Also, the transport to and from work and back to this camp
occupied two to three hours as well, so that these people
altogether had only four to five hours sleep under the worst
imaginable conditions. Four people had to sleep in one bed.
“Q. Did you work seven days a week?
“A. Yes, and the day and night shift, and Sundays, too.”
(_T-2366._)
When asked what effect these conditions had on the health of the
workers, he replied—
“The most dreadful effect, the majority died in Mauthausen and
Gusen II. It was a rule no one was released, but transports
which were filled were where detainees would die.”
And as to his own particular condition, he stated—
“All I can say now is that I suffer from TB and I am medically
being treated, and this is what those five years did to me.
“Q. What was your condition before going to the concentration
camp?
“A. I was active in sports, and I was a long distance runner. I
can say my lungs were not blemished at all.”
The shattering of this man’s health is perhaps only a small part of the
disaster which has befallen him. From the witness stand he gave the
impression of one who had been spiritually crushed by his five years’
ordeal. His voice faltered, his shoulders drooped, his eyes looked out
into distance. He was alive, but something within him had perished.
Perhaps he reflected on the tragedy that this awful thing which had
happened to him had been inflicted by his own countrymen, not for
opposing his country but for speaking a truth which, if listened to,
could have averted not only his own ruin but the misery of millions of
his brethren.
II. PRISONERS OF WAR
Article 31 of the Geneva Convention provides—
“Work done by prisoners of war shall have no direct connection
with the operations of the war. In particular it is forbidden to
employ prisoners in the manufacture or transport of arms or
munitions of any kind, or on the transport of material destined
for the combatant units.”
The Hague Convention of 1907, Article 6 provides—
“The State may utilize the labor of prisoners of war according
to their rank and aptitude, officers excepted. The tasks shall
not be excessive and shall have no connection with the
operations of the war.” (_T-155._)
These prohibitions on the use of prisoners of war were flagrantly
violated by the Germans in World War II. On 7 November 1941, Hermann
Goering, speaking at the meeting in the Reich Ministry of Air, already
referred to, declared that “it would be ideal if entire factories could
be manned by Russian prisoners of war.” (_T-52._) Then, insofar as
feeding these prisoners was concerned the notes of the speech report:
“Food is a matter of the Four Year Plan. Supply their own food (cats,
horses, etc.).” (_T-52._)
On 20 April 1942, Fritz Sauckel, Plenipotentiary General for Labor
Mobilization, proclaimed that—
“All prisoners of war, from the territories of the West as well
as of the East, actually in Germany, must be completely
incorporated into the German armament and nutrition industries.”
(_T-58._)
On 26 August 1941, the Reich Labor Ministry directed the presidents of
the Regional Labor Offices as follows:
“Upon personal order of the Reich Marshal, 100,000 men are to be
taken from among the French prisoners of war not yet employed in
armament industry, and are to be assigned to the armament
industry (airplane industry). Gaps in manpower supply resulting
therefrom will be filled by Soviet prisoners of war. The
transfer of the above-named French prisoners of war can be
utilized only in quite large concentrated groups under the
well-known tougher employment conditions.” (_T-49-50._)
In a discussion with Sauckel, the defendant, and others on the subject
of manpower available for the armament industry, Goering stated on 28
October 1943, that out of 2,200,000 in armament production, 770,000 were
prisoners of war. (_T-2093._)
On 14 April 1943, Sauckel reported to Hitler that “1,622,829 prisoners
of war are employed in the German economy.” (_T-90._)
Noting that the utilization of prisoners of war in the war program was a
very profitable enterprise for the Reich, Goering regretted that any had
ever been released. However, it was a mistake easily rectified.
“I should like to see that the prisoners of war who have been
released, Norwegians and so forth, be taken again. Insofar as
officers are concerned, this has been done to a certain extent.
It was the greatest nonsense ever committed by us and for which
nobody thanks us. We have made prisoners of entire armies and we
let them go again. We do not get anything from Norway.”
(_T-2096._)
At a Jaegerstab meeting on 19 June 1944, it developed that 300 American
prisoners of war were assigned to work at the Dornier airplane factory
at Oberpfaffenhofen, but with good Yankee obstinacy, knowing their
rights, they refused to work. Lange, of the Speer Ministry, complaining
about this said—
“They simply sat down, drank coffee, and ate corned beef, and
could not be persuaded to work in spite of threats of shooting.
Now, the question has been asked if we should not start a
shooting action.” (_T-2102._)
And the only reason they were not shot is that the Fuehrer feared
reprisals.
III. PARTICIPATION OF MILCH IN THE SLAVE LABOR PROGRAM
It was not contended by the prosecution at the trial that the defendant
was aware, nor would it have been physically possible for him to have
had knowledge, of all the excesses, inhumanities, and illegalities
encompassed in the far-flung slave labor program which spread its
cruelties into practically every part of Europe. However, its very
bigness and the great production power which it generated in every
department of the German war plant negates the defendant’s position that
he was utterly ignorant of its existence. This opinion has gone to some
length in pointing out the numbers involved in the compulsory work
program, and the heinousness of some of its operations, and has quoted
from official decrees promulgated in its unfoldment, not only for the
purpose of demonstrating the basis for condemning the whole illegal
enterprise, but also for the purpose of laying the foundation for
consideration of Milch’s responsibility in this phase of German war
guilt.
On 23 May 1939, Hitler outlined his plans for war to his fourteen most
trusted and important military chieftains. Milch attended that then
secret, and now notorious, conference. Hitler there said, “The
population of non-German areas will perform no military service and will
be available as source of labor.” (_T-37._) This statement is taken from
the memorandum made by adjutant Lieutenant Colonel Schmundt, who was
present and preserved a drastically condensed record of the speech for
the Reich files. The accuracy of the Schmundt record was attacked in the
IMT trial and came under fire here. The defendant goes so far as to
conjecture that the Schmundt statement was prepared months, perhaps even
a year, after Hitler’s speech, and was intended to demonstrate Hitler’s
uncanny and possibly supernatural powers of prophecy by the undeniably
sure method of writing up the prophecy subsequent to the happening of
the event predicted. The memorandum obviously is not definitely precise
because it consists of only ten pages whereas the speech lasted four and
one-half hours. As the memorandum manifestly cannot be complete, neither
can human recollection (unaided by notes) be infallible. Milch, who made
no notes at all, testified that labor was not mentioned in the speech,
but Admiral Schniewind, also present, and who testified in court, stated
that he did not exclude the possibility that labor was discussed.
(_T-1326._)
In any event, whether Hitler did or did not mention labor in his
utterances of that day is not so important as it is that Milch was
present when Hitler made crystal clear his intentions to attack Poland,
and, if it became necessary or expedient, to fight other countries as
well, with the inevitable subjugation of the conquered peoples. Slave
labor was an inescapable concomitant of the type of total war Hitler
intended to wage, and the character of which Milch could not fail to
appreciate.
As a field marshal in the German Reich, Milch could not ignore the
existence of Sauckel’s proclamation on 20 April 1942 that “the raw
materials as well as the fertility of the conquered territories and
their human labor power are to be used completely and conscientiously to
the profit of Germany and her allies.” (_T-57._)
But in the evaluation of Milch’s criminal responsibility for Germany’s
use of slave labor something more is needed in a court of law than
presumptions of his assumed general knowledge of what was taking place.
It must be established that he, himself, participated in the slave labor
enterprises, or knowing that such illegal practices were being
committed, he, having the power to do so, made no effort to curb or halt
them. The prosecution contends that the defendant, as a member of the
Central Planning Board and of the Jaegerstab, and as
Generalluftzeugmeister (Aircraft Master General), was thoroughly
cognizant of Sauckel’s program and that he, Milch, actively participated
in slave labor practices.
(a) Central Planning Board
The Central Planning Board was made up of three members, Speer, Milch,
and Koerner, each having equal authority, although, as it developed,
Speer and Milch dominated the proceedings. The function of the Central
Planning Board in the main was the distribution and allocation of raw
materials necessary for the entire conduct of the German war economy,
the planning of intended construction or enlargement, and the
systematization of transportation industry independent of the shortage
of raw materials. During the war this Board had 60 meetings and much
time was given to consideration of the manpower problem confronting the
various departments in the huge German war workshop. Sauckel often
appeared before the Central Planning Board to report on the foreign
labor situation. Various other officials came before the Board to
express their needs in connection with foreign workers. Milch often
presided at these meetings. He was absent on several occasions but all
quotations from the minutes of the Central Planning Board meetings,
cited in this opinion, are from meetings where he was present, and he is
therefore chargeable with knowledge of their contents.
Wehrmacht representatives were often in attendance at the Central
Planning Board meetings, and on 25 July 1944, Field Marshal von Kluge,
Commander in Chief West, issued an order on labor recruitment—
“As the only limitation, the Fuehrer has ordered that no
forcible means shall be employed against the population in the
actual combat area as long as it shows itself prepared to assist
the German Armed Forces. However, recruiting of volunteers from
among refugees from the combat zone is to be carried out
vigorously. Moreover, every means is justified to seize as much
labor as possible, apart from the powers granted to the armed
forces.” (_T-271._)
It will be noted that the Fuehrer orders that forcible means shall not
be used if the population assists. This is comparable to saying that the
armed robber is thoroughly peaceful in his intentions because he will
not shoot if the victim surrenders his valuables voluntarily.
The proof in this case that foreign workers were brought into Germany
against their will generally does not come from them, but almost
exclusively from their abductors. At one of the meetings of the Central
Planning Board, Mr. Timm, representing the Plenipotentiary General for
Labor, reports that they are encountering resistance to recruitment—
“In all countries we have to change over more or less to
registering the men by age groups and to conscripting them in
age groups. They do appear for registering as such, but as soon
as transport is available, they do not come back so that the
dispatch of the men has become more or less a question for the
police. Especially in Poland the situation at the moment is
extraordinarily serious. It is well known that vehement battles
occurred just because of these actions.” (_T-197-198._)
The word “recruitment” will be used in this opinion not in its literal
sense of voluntary enlistment, but in the broad sense of both voluntary
and involuntary gathering up of workers.
It is the contention of the defense that Milch had nothing to do with
the actual recruitment. It is, of course, true that he did not go into
France, Italy, Hungary, Russia, and other countries, to physically rope
the workers and drag them into Germany, but is the guilt any less if one
sits back in his office and signs the order which casts the uncoiling
rope for the far-reaching lasso?
Goering, in an interrogation conducted 6 September 1946, stated that
after the death of Udet it was Milch, as Chief of Supply for the air
forces, who put forward the needs of the Luftwaffe for workers. The
requests were forwarded to Speer, and Speer would ask Sauckel for the
workers for the entire armament branch. Sauckel, on 24 September 1946,
made a very important declaration in an affidavit on the part Milch
played in the matter of obtaining workers—
“Milch produced the figures for aviation. The same was done by
Speer in his sphere of activity. Speer and Milch, however, also
exerted influence on the allocation of workers. How far this
came within their capacity as members of the Central Planning
Board I cannot say; in any case they did this in their
ministerial capacity.” (_T-281._)
Thus, if Milch knew how workers were actually being recruited, how they
were being transported, and to what they were being transported, he
cannot claim exoneration in the assertion that he did not take them in
hand personally. And, if this knowledge is established, then he, when he
asked for workers, was, in effect, consigning foreign workers to the
suffering and torture of which he had cognizance. Behind each
requisition for foreign labor there shone the inevitable backdrop of the
lurid scenes of labor camps with their “special treatment,” disease,
vermin, starvation, whipping, illness, and death.
On 8 April 1943, Milch wrote Sauckel and Goering, announcing that in
certain sections he had proclaimed an 84-hour week in the air force
industry. (_T-196._) The defendant has explained that this applied only
to those engaged in guard work. Witness Krysiak testified that he worked
84 hours a week.
At the 1 March 1944 meeting of the Central Planning Board, Sauckel
particularly addressed himself to Milch who was presiding, and said—
“Thereupon I even proceeded to employ and train a whole batch of
French male and female agents who for good pay, just as was done
in olden times for ‘shanghaiing’, went hunting men and made them
drunk by using liquor as well as words, in order to dispatch
them to Germany.” (_T-228._)
As evidence that he was encountering difficulty in obtaining foreign
workers, Sauckel pointed out that several dozen of his very able labor
executive officers were shot. (_T-228._) In France he wrung from Laval
the concession “that the death penalty be threatened for officials who
tried to sabotage the labor supply.” And then he adds that “if the
Frenchmen despite all their promises do not act, then we Germans must
make an example of one case, and by reason of this law, if necessary put
Prefect or Burgomaster against the wall.” (_T-232._)
It is a long speech which Sauckel makes, and then Milch replies,
analyzing in his turn the foreign labor question. He complains bitterly
that more men have not been called up from France—
“Four whole age groups have grown up in France; men between 18
and 23 years of age, who are therefore at that age when young
people moved by patriotism or seduced by other people are ready
to do anything which satisfies their personal hatred against
us—and of course they hate us. These men ought to have been
called up in age groups and dispatched to Germany; for they
present the greatest danger which threatens us in case of
invasion.” (_T-236._)
“If one had shown the mailed fist and a clear executive
intention, a churchyard peace would reign in the rear of the
front at the moment the uproar starts. This I have emphasized so
frequently, but still nothing is happening, I am afraid.”
(_T-237._)
When Sauckel complains about the trouble he is having in getting workers
from Italy, Milch recommends—
“We could take under German administration the entire food
supply for the Italians and tell them, only he gets any food who
either works in a protected factory or goes to Germany.”
(_T-240-241._)
When on another occasion one Kehrl declared that it would be difficult
to control the food situation in France because food was delivered by
parcel post, Milch made the extraordinary pronouncement, “I personally
as military commander would confiscate all goods sent by parcel post.”
(_T-295._)
The Tribunal has not been shown any statement wherein the defendant
advocated that foreign workers be induced to come to Germany by offering
them good wages, good working conditions, pensions, security, and the
usual attractions held out to prospective employees. When he speaks on
the importation of foreign workers it is invariably in an aggressive and
domineering manner. At the 54th meeting of the Central Planning Board,
held on 1 March 1944, he explained that force had to be exercised
because there was nothing to attract the workers to Germany since they
believed that Germany would soon be defeated, and furthermore they were
attached to their families and their own countries. A very cogent
observation indeed.
Speaking on the French situation, he said—
“Even if Bichelonne and Laval have the best intentions there
will be resistance from the mayors, the gendarmes, and the
prefects, just because these people are afraid that firstly,
they will be called to account afterwards for this affair, and
secondly, because of their national point of view, which makes
them say, ‘We must not work for the enemy of our country.’
Therefore I would like to have an authority in our
administration which would force these people to do it, because
then the French could say, ‘If you force us, we will do it, but
voluntarily we will not do it.’ The same applies to Italy.”
(_T-292-293._)
Once the transportation of workers got under way it was not always
certain that they would all arrive. Aside from the unsanitary conditions
under which they travelled, frequently without food and in the
wintertime without heat, many in desperation escaped. To offset these
defections en route, Milch recommended—
“If a transport has left a town and has not arrived, 500 to 600
persons from this place must be arrested and sent to Germany as
prisoners of war.” (_T-294._)
The defense has asserted many times that the foreign workers were not
all treated as badly as the prosecution’s evidence might indicate. It is
unquestionably true that not all foreign workers were starved and
tortured, because if this were so they could not have worked at all, and
the German war machine would have ground to a stop long before the
spring of 1945. Thus, there is no reason to disbelieve the statement
made at one of the Central Planning Board meetings—
“The performance of the Soviet Russians so employed is to be
raised by a premium system. For this purpose, the ban on pay
restrictions is to be lifted and the manager be allowed to
distribute among the workmen, according to his duty and
discretion, RM 1 per head per day as premium for particular
services rendered. Furthermore, care will be taken, that workmen
can exchange these premiums, which will be paid out in camp
money for goods. It is intended to put at their disposal various
provisions—beer, tobacco, cigarettes and cigars, small items
for daily use, etc.” (_T-219._)
If the defendant has much to explain in this case it is principally
because of declarations made by himself. On 16 February 1944 at a
meeting of the Central Planning Board, he announced that the armament
industry employed foreign workmen to the extent of 40 percent, and that
in maximum production the foreign workers prevailed to the extent of 95
percent and higher. He said further that the Germans’ best new engine
was made 88 percent by Russian prisoners of war and the other 12 percent
by German men and women. “Only 6 to 8 German men are working on this
machine. The rest are Ukrainian women who have beaten all the records of
trained workers.” And yet, despite this apparently creditable
performance on the part of foreign workers, he complains bitterly—
“The list of the shirkers should be entrusted to Himmler’s
trustworthy hands who will make them work all right. This is
very important for educating people and has also a deterrent
effect on such others who would likewise feel inclined to
shirk.” (_T-223._)
When Milch recommends entrusting anyone to Himmler’s “trustworthy
hands”, the world well knows how bloody and homicidal those hands were.
The charges of maltreatment of foreign workers leveled against Milch
could be taken almost literally from his own words—
“It is, therefore, not possible to exploit fully all the
foreigners unless we compel them by piece work or we have the
possibility of taking measures against foreigners who are not
doing their bit. But, if the foreman lays hands on a prisoner of
war or smacks him there is at once a terrible row, the man is
put into prison, etc. There are sufficient officials in Germany
who think it their most important duty to stand up for human
rights instead of war production. I am also for human rights.
But if a Frenchman says, ‘You fellows will all be hanged and the
chief of the factory will be beheaded first,’ and if then the
chief says, ‘I am going to hit him’, then he is in a mess. He is
not protected. I have told my engineers, ‘I am going to punish
you if you don’t hit such a man; the more you do in this respect
the more I shall praise you. I shall see to it that nothing
happens to you.’ This is not yet sufficiently known. I cannot
talk to all factory leaders. I should like to see the man who
stays my arm because I can settle accounts with everybody who
stays my arm. If the little factory leader does that he is put
into a concentration camp and runs the risk of losing the
prisoners of war. In one case two Russian officers took off with
an airplane but crashed. I ordered that these two men be hanged
at once. They were hanged or shot yesterday. I left that to the
SS. I expressed the wish to leave them hanged in the factory for
the others to see.” (_T-223-224._)
On the stand Milch denied that he had anything to do with the fate of
the two Russian prisoners of war mentioned above. He further claimed
that his reference to this episode was made at another meeting (a GL
meeting), and that possibly the two stenographers got their notes
confused. The defense also introduced affidavits to the effect that
Milch was in no way implicated in this happening and that if the two
Russians were executed, the execution was performed by shooting and not
by hanging. It is probably true that Milch did not order the hanging of
these men, but did author the remarks attributed to him because they are
in keeping with his many other admitted and proved statements.
Did Milch know that prisoners of war were being used in violation of
international convention, and the laws and customs of war?
On 6 March 1944, Milch, Speer, General Bodenschatz, and Colonel von
Below conferred with Hitler. Hitler was informed of the Reich Marshal’s
wishes for the further utilization of the production power of prisoners
of war, by giving the direction of the Stalags to the SS. The Fuehrer
considered the proposal good, and asked Colonel von Below to arrange
matters accordingly. (_R-124, p. 168._)
At the 42d meeting of the Central Planning Board, held on 23 June 1943,
the intensive discussion on labor needs seemed to settle on the use of
Russian prisoners of war as the solution to the problem. It was
recommended that the Fuehrer be advised that 200,000 Russian prisoners
of war, fit for the heaviest work, should be made available from the
Wehrmacht and Waffen SS through the intermediary of the Chiefs of the
Army Groups (_T-218._)
However, Milch’s participation in the illegal use of prisoners of war is
not confined to his knowledge that it was being done. At the meeting on
30 October 1942, Sauckel suggested that as soon as the army took
prisoners in operational territories they should be immediately turned
over to him as Plenipotentiary for Labor. Instead of objecting to this
procedure as contrary to international law, Milch added—
“The correct thing to do would be to have all Stalags
transferred to you by order of the Fuehrer. The Wehrmacht takes
prisoners and as soon as it relinquishes them, the first
delivery goes to your organization. Then everything will be in
order.” (_T-176._)
Nothing can be more precise and definitive in international law than
that prisoners of war may not be compelled to fight against their own
country. But Milch treats this matter rather lightly at one of the
meetings of the Central Planning Board—
“We have made a request for an order that a certain percentage
of men in the antiaircraft artillery must be Russians. Fifty
thousand will be taken altogether; 30,000 are already employed
as gunners. This is an amusing thing that Russians must work the
guns.” (_T-192._)
On this statement the defendant has various explanations. One, that the
German word which has been translated into “amusing”, should really have
been rendered “mad”. Thus, it is a mad thing to make Russian prisoners
work guns against their own allies. In support of this interpretation
Milch argues that since he needed these prisoners in his armament
program, he could not have approved their use as gunners. He then also
denies that they were in fact used as gunners, and if they were, he was
not responsible for the deed. But other witnesses called by the defense
clearly established that the Russian prisoners were stationed at the
guns, either for servicing the pieces, hauling ammunition to them, or
actually firing them. It is clear that the Russian prisoners were
utilized at the guns and that this type of use of prisoners of war
represents an extreme violation of the laws and customs of war.
It has been argued by the defense that since Russia had denounced
adherence to the Geneva Convention, Germany was not compelled to treat
Russian prisoners with the limitations laid down in that convention.
German Admiral Canaris on 15 September 1941, in a memorandum of counsel
to the German High Command, declared that despite Russia’s attitude on
the Geneva Convention her prisoners were yet entitled to immunities
guaranteed under the rules and customs of war—
“The Geneva Convention for the treatment of prisoners of war is
not binding in the relationship between Germany and the U.S.S.R.
Therefore, only the principles of general international law on
the treatment of prisoners of war apply. Since the 18th century
these have gradually been established along the lines that war
captivity is neither revenge nor punishment, but solely
protective custody, the only purpose of which is to prevent the
prisoners of war from further participation in the war. This
principle was developed in accordance with the view held by all
armies that it is contrary to military tradition to kill or
injure helpless people * * *. The decrees for the treatment of
Soviet prisoners of war enclosed are based on a fundamentally
different viewpoint.” (_IMT 222._)
Admiral Canaris’ position was entirely correct and in accordance with
accepted international law. In the episode of the Russian gunners
adverted to by Milch, he could not help but know the physical facts and
could not escape being aware that such use of prisoners of war violated
international law. His responsibility here is unequivocal.
On 25 March 1944, the defendant complained that prisoners of war were
not being treated with sufficient severity—
“If a decent foreman would sock one of those unruly guys because
the fellow won’t work, then the situation would soon change.
_International law cannot be observed here._ I have asserted
myself very strongly, and with the help of Saur I have
represented the point of view very strongly that the prisoners,
with the exception of the English and the Americans, should be
taken away from the military authorities. The soldiers are not
in a position, as experience has shown, to cope with these
fellows who know all the answers. I shall take very strict
measures here and shall put such a prisoner of war before my
court martial. If he has committed sabotage or refused to work,
I will have him hanged, right in his own factory. I am convinced
that that will not be without effect.” (_T-249._)
When a German field marshal, speaking to men subordinate in rank,
declares that “international law cannot be observed here”, it can only
mean to those under his command that in the execution of their duties,
international law should go overboard and, thus being unlimited in their
treatment of prisoners of war, the rights of the prisoners of war must
sink also.
Defense counsel insists that Milch had, as a matter of fact, a mild and
lenient disposition. Testimony was introduced to show that on several
occasions when he sat on courts martial, his judgments were tempered
with mercy. Note will be taken of this occasional yielding of an
apparently implacable and unyielding spirit, but one must also remark
the incongruity that one who, in his references to foreign workers and
prisoners of war, had constant harshness on his lips, could have
possessed in his make-up no harshness at all. In one of his speeches he
complains because the workers collapsed, and that they receive a
furlough of three or four days every eight weeks. This he calls “dirty
business of the first order, and treason to the country!” (_T-249._)
Then he adds—
“I further ask for support by the Luftwaffe physicians. With all
the rabble that we have among the foreign workers, there is of
course a lot of shirking. At the moment the Russians—that is,
the Russian prisoners of war—are feigning a lot of fatigue and
illness. The incidence of sickness of one and a half to two
percent which we have had up to now has at least doubled and in
some factories it has been increased to eight, nine, and ten
percent. That is, of course, done by previous agreement. There
the official physicians, who have to be very strict, find out
that it is not true, and then we return the fellows to work by
means of the whip. Then the whip serves as a cure.” (_T-250._)
Recommending the employment of so merciless an instrument as a whip can
hardly be regarded as evidence of a mild disposition. Then he says—
“Let everyone consider that if he does not do his duty, we do
not ask whether there is a law; we ask only whether he is the
responsible one and then we will seize him no matter who he is *
* *. Please go wherever you are going and knock everybody down
who blocks your way! We cover up everything here. We do not ask
whether he is allowed to or whether he is not allowed to. For
us, there is nothing but this one task. We are fanatics in this
sphere. We do not even consider letting anything at all distract
us from that task. No order exists which could prevent me from
fulfilling this task.” (_T-251._)
Then comes the outburst which is an out and out defiance of all law—
“Gentlemen, I know that not every subordinate can say, ‘For me,
the law no longer exists,’ but he has to have someone who covers
up for him, not out of cowardice. But if you act according to
the spirit of the old field service regulation, ‘Abstaining from
doing something hurts us more than erring in the choice of the
means,’ and if, moreover, you keep in touch and immediately
clarify difficult points, so that something can be done, then we
are willing to accept the responsibility, whether this is the
law or not. I see only two possibilities for me and for Germany.
Either we succeed and thereby save Germany, or we continue these
slipshod methods and then get the fate that we deserve. I prefer
to fall while I am doing something that is against the rules but
that is right and sensible, and be called to account for it, and
if you like, hanged, rather than be hanged because Papa Stalin
is here in Berlin, or the Englishmen. I have no desire for that.
I would rather die in a different way. But I think we can
accomplish this task, too. We are in the fifth year of war. I
repeat, the decision will come during the next six weeks!”
(_T-251-252._)
(b) Jaegerstab
We now come to a consideration of the Jaegerstab, formed on 1 March
1944, for the purpose of increasing production of fighter aircraft to
meet the incessant and ever increasingly effective bomber attacks of the
Americans and British which had seriously damaged the entire airplane
industry in Germany. Every airplane factory with the accessory workshops
had been hit at least three times. The Jaegerstab became essentially a
concentration of experts drawn from various ministries. Its programs
envisaged a decentralization of plane factories by transferring them in
part to above-surface localities and in part to subterranean localities.
Milch and Speer were joint chiefs of the Jaegerstab, and Karl Adolph
[Otto] Saur functioned as Chief of Staff. SS Obergruppenfuehrer Kammler
had supervision of the construction program. So far as this trial is
concerned, we are interested in the work of the Jaegerstab only to the
extent that it involves employment of foreign labor and prisoners of
war. Did the Jaegerstab employ labor prohibited under international law,
and if so, can Milch be held responsible for such illegal use?
In order to resolve this question we must review the documents submitted
in evidence.
On 6-7 April 1944, Milch and Saur reported to Hitler on the
achievements, up to that time, of the Jaegerstab and discussed with him
the plans for further construction on a second work project. Hitler
declared that he desired this project be set up in the Protectorate and,
at this point, the minutes read, “If it should prove impossible there
too to get hold of the necessary workers, the Fuehrer, himself, will
contact the Reichsfuehrer SS and will give an order that the required
100,000 men are to be made available by bringing in Jews from Hungary.”
(_T-318._) Here Milch is put directly on notice that forced labor is
being contemplated.
Fritz Schmelter, director of the Central Department for Employment and
Distribution of Labor, and because of that a member of the Jaegerstab,
declared in an affidavit on 9 December 1946, that Kammler utilized
concentration camp prisoners placed at his disposal by the SS in order
to carry out his share of the Jaegerstab construction program. Also,
that Xaver Dorsch of the Todt Organization used foreign workers, part of
whom were Hungarian Jews, to accomplish his part of the Jaegerstab
construction program. Then Schmelter states, “Milch, as one of the two
responsible chiefs of the Jaegerstab, personally directed, ordered or
approved decisions made in the interests of Jaegerstab undertakings.”
(_T-322._)
On 13 November 1946, Saur, Chief of Staff of the Jaegerstab, declared in
an interrogation that in the decentralization program Kammler divided 30
factories into 700 individual workshops, and that the workers used in
the project were concentration camp prisoners. (_T-323._)
Speer, in an interrogation made shortly after his capture, declared that
Hungarian Jews were used in the building program. (_T-325._)
At one of the Jaegerstab meetings, presided over by Milch,
Stobbe-Dethleffsen, in discussing the matter of labor needed for the
Jaegerstab program, requests a few German key personnel to supervise the
concentration camp inmates “with the other _subjugated people_.”
(_T-328._)
At a Jaegerstab meeting on 6 March 1944, a Sturmbannfuehrer of the SS
declared he had 5,000 prisoners in readiness for work, but needed 750
guard personnel. To this statement Milch commented, “We must distribute
our German people as key personnel. That is, out of three construction
companies we can probably make ten complete ones by introducing 70
percent foreigners.” (_T-331._)
At a meeting on 2 May 1944, Kammler, in Milch’s presence declares he had
30 men hanged—
“As usual it is because the people have noticed that they are no
longer treated severely enough. I had 30 people hanged as a
special measure. Since they were hanged, everything has been to
some extent in order again. It is the same old story, whenever
people notice that they are not being treated so severely as
before, they take all sorts of liberties. It is not surprising
that a normal soldier, standing guard on people who were
previously always harmless, does not suspect anything of the
kind. They are not, however, harmless people.” (_T-333-34._)
The minutes of the meeting do not indicate that Milch in any way
protested Kammler’s deeds and utterance, although at the trial he
doubted that Kammler had actually hanged 30 people as he had stated.
Although Milch was not present at the meeting on 25 May 1944 of the
Jaegerstab, he approved the minutes of that meeting which revealed a
discussion among Schmelter (labor expert for Jaegerstab), Schlempp
(deputy of Jaegerstab) and Lange, in charge of machinery for Jaegerstab.
Schmelter said—
“The Hungarian Jews are expected now, and they will require some
kind of key personnel. Altogether I need about 250,000
construction workers for the large bunkers and for Schlett’s
installations.” (_T-334._)
To this Lange remarked—
“You can get them all in Hungary. There are still Jews running
about Budapest.” (_T-334._)
It is to be noted that Lange uses phraseology that one would employ in
speaking of dogs or other animals. There are still dogs running around
Budapest. There are still Jews running about Budapest.
At the meeting on 26 May 1944, Schmelter reported that two transports of
Hungarian Jews had arrived at the SS in Auschwitz, but that they
consisted primarily of children, women, and old men. Kammler then
declared that he had conscripted his own men by taking 50,000 people
into protective custody.
Schlempp, in outlining Dorsch’s needs for labor, states—
“Dorsch said yesterday that he wanted to bring 100,000 Jews from
Hungary, 500,000 Italians,[162] 10,000 men from bomb damage
repair, also 1,000 from Waldbrohl; then he wanted to get
something from Greiser’s zone by negotiation, then 4,000 Italian
officers, 10,000 men from south Russia, and 20,000 from north
Russia. That would be 220,000 altogether.” (_T-335-36._)
As early as 20 March 1944, we find Chief of Staff Saur asking Milch to
inform Sauckel that the group mobilization in Hungary must be placed
primarily at the disposal of the Jaegerstab. “Large, heavy labor
companies must be formed. The people have to be treated like the
prisoners. Otherwise it won’t work.” (_T-342._)
In the face of all these uncontradicted documents and stenographic
records of meetings, it would be fatuous for anyone to say that Milch
was unaware that forced labor and prisoners of war were being used in
the Jaegerstab construction program.
However, there is more than this passive evidence. Milch, himself,
contributes the positive evidence of his full knowledge of and
unrestrained participation in the Jaegerstab slave labor activities.
On 25 April 1944, he said—
“It will only work if we put these workers into barracks. We
cannot exactly treat them as prisoners. It must appear
otherwise, but it must be so in practice. * * * I am personally
convinced after talking to the Fuehrer that he will agree as
soon as it is made reasonable. The people should not be able to
mingle with the population and to conspire. Nor should they be
allowed to run around free, so that they can cross the frontier
every day. Both practices must be stopped. * * * I am of the
opinion that that must be done at once. It’s all the same to me
if individual people do object. Protest does not interest me at
all, whether from the Chief of Prisoners of War Affairs or from
our side. Kleber, would you be so good as to take care of this?”
KLEBER: “As far as prisoners of war are concerned I can take
care of it, but not where it concerns the air force. That must
be handled separately.”
MILCH: “Naturally. This must be handled by us. There was, in
fact, another proposal but we do not want it. Otherwise someone
else will come complaining.”
KLEBER: “I should like to transfer the prisoners further off to
Brunswick.”
MILCH: “I think it is an excellent idea for the prisoners to go
there if Brunswick continues to be attacked.” (_T-356-57._)
Article 9 of the Geneva Convention of 1929 provides—
“No prisoner of war may be sent to an area where he would be
exposed to the fire of the fighting zone.”
At the 4 May 1944 meeting, Saur reported that the Jaegerstab itself,
independent of Sauckel, had organized an expedition for the procuring of
workers in Italy. On 5 May 1944, Schmelter reported that the Jaegerstab
transport from Italy had been delayed because of the lack of guards,
whereupon the defendant said—
“Is there someone at the escort detachment headquarters in Italy
responsible for seeing that people do not get out and run away
during the journey? That is what the escorting personnel is
there for. Someone of standing? Dr. Wendt is responsible for the
whole undertaking. I am of the opinion that, if anyone jumps
out, he should be shot; otherwise a thousand will get on and
only twenty will arrive there. The gendarmerie and all military
posts must look out for those who abscond on the journey. They
will be arrested at once and will appear before a court
martial.” (_T-349-50._)
At a conference held on 22 February 1944, one Rautenbach says—
“That refers to Wernigerode. In Solingen we had the best results
with Frenchmen and the worst with Italians, meaning the Italian
workers and not the prisoners of war. For that reason we do not
employ any Italians here in Wernigerode. They are only 50 to 60
percent efficient.” (_T-2180._)
And the defendant then remarks—
“Could not the following be done; give the Italians in principle
only half of their food rations, letting them earn the other
half when they do their work well?” (_T-2181._)
It is obvious that, as one of the chiefs of the Jaegerstab, the
defendant actively, willingly, and knowingly countenanced, ordered, and
participated in slave labor practices and the use of prisoners of war in
activities prohibited by international law. Aside from his other
statements, the one made on 13 June 1944, where he advocates the
exportation from France of machinery and men would, in itself, be enough
to convict him of such participation.
“We must write off these areas in France completely, and above
all the factories which are situated further into the country
towards the south and west. For when the invasion begins, the
guarding neither of a stretch of land, nor of a line will be
possible, nor will anything function because of sabotage * * *.
No Frenchman will work when the invasion begins. I am of the
opinion that the French should be brought over again by force,
as prisoners.”
SAUR: “I should prefer to do it sooner.”
LANGE: “We have machines there too, in particular the presses.”
MILCH: “Everything must come out; machines and men.” (_T-358._)
The Jaegerstab functioned from 1 March 1944 to 1 August 1944 and then it
expanded into the Ruestungsstab. When the Jaegerstab concluded its
efforts a report was made to the Fuehrer, which declared that Jaegerstab
had, in spite of air attacks, doubled its aircraft production.
(_T-360._)
(c) Generalluftzeugmeister
In his capacity as Generalluftzeugmeister, Milch held periodical
meetings and conferences in connection with the Luftwaffe armament
production. Labor, its procurement, disposition, and treatment, was
inevitably a subject for frequent discussion, and in these discussions
Milch portrayed himself an intransigent, implacable taskmaster,
uninhibited neither by law nor custom, and unrestrained by moderation or
regard for the helpless vanquished.
At one of these meetings on 5 May 1942, presided over by the defendant,
one Fridag reported—
“The French become worse and worse. I threw out 80 of them who
will be sent to concentration camps in Russia. They refused to
work. The French say at 4 o’clock: ‘I won’t work another hour’,
and you cannot make them work another hour. This happened four
weeks ago all of a sudden when the first bombing attack on Paris
took place, while before that the French were the best people.”
(_T-2106._)
The fact that the bombardment of the beloved Paris of these Frenchmen
would naturally emotionally disturb them was not weighed or considered
by the defendant in spite of the fact that Frydag had reported that
prior to the bombardment they had been excellent workers. Implacable and
unyielding as some story book pagan god, the defendant turns to von
Gablenz, Chief of the Planning Office, and declares—
“I demand if the people refuse to work they immediately be
placed against the wall and shot before all the other workers.”
(_T-2107._)
Further—
“I ask you to get in touch with the Reich Fuehrer SS [Himmler]
and to ask him to discuss the matter with the Fuehrer. Now is
the right time; unless we do something effective now, the others
will become bothersome. I ask that their being sent to
concentration camps be taken into consideration too. I will tell
you afterwards how you should act in such a matter.” (_T-2107._)
Later, on 7 July 1942, he indicated a willingness to try more peaceable
methods, but if they did not succeed, then—
“I intend to fill the new Heinkel Plant in the East entirely
with Frenchmen brought down there by force. If they don’t work
in France, they may work as prisoners in Poland. After all, we
have to remember that it is we and not the French who have won
the war.” (_T-2116._)
On 28 July 1942 we find him again complaining about French production—
“At the present time we receive six to nine planes from the
French. I could well imagine that they would get out 45 for
themselves. I shall close up the shop with a single stroke and
have the workers and the machines come to Germany. If it does
not work on a voluntary basis, then we do it by compulsory
contracts. Perhaps I shall first give them a week to think it
over. It is a fact that, on the whole, these people work in
silent opposition. One cannot blame them for it either, it is
true, but they should not have started the war.” (_T-2117._)
In this outburst we discover two strange utterances. One, “compulsory
contracts”, and the other the statement that the French started the war.
Since the word “contract” means a willing agreement between two or more
people, a “compulsory contract” is, of course, meaningless because one
cannot be forced into a contract. If there is any compulsion, then the
operation becomes a matter of outright coercion. With regard to the
French starting the war, the defendant had the grace to state during the
trial that he now knows that France did not initiate hostilities,
although he believed to the contrary at the time.
The defendant has declared repeatedly that he had no connection with, or
even knowledge of, concentration camps. He only visited one of them
(Dachau) in 1935. At the end of the war he was aware of the existence of
but two concentration camps, although 200 were flourishing in all their
ghastliness at the time. Yet despite this blissful ignorance of
concentration camps the phrase rippled easily from his tongue. At the
same meeting above-mentioned he stated that if two certain individuals,
Schneider and Bergen, “make difficulties” he would put them into a
concentration camp for the duration of the war (_T-2118._)
When one Petersen, on 30 November 1942, spoke of obtaining 500 men from
a concentration camp, Milch said, “For this purpose we should come to an
agreement with Himmler.” (_T-2148._)
On 27 April 1943, when one Stahms indicated that concentration camp
inmates are almost 3,000 strong, Milch declares that against a
withdrawal of 3,000 foreign workers from the Luftwaffe industry, he
attached importance to the assignment of these 3,000 concentration camp
inmates to the Luftwaffe. (_NOKW-413._)
At the GL meeting of 4 August 1942, someone reported that the French
might strike in the event of a British attack. This provoked Milch into
the thunderous outburst—
“In such a case I would ask to be appointed military commander
myself. I would band the workers together and have fifty percent
of them shot; I would then publish this fact and compel the
other fifty percent to work by beating if necessary. If they
don’t work, then they, too, will be shot. I would get the
necessary replacement somehow. But I hope the military commander
will do his duty. I’m not worried about it. The word ‘strike’
must never be used. For us there is only ‘living or dying’ but
not ‘striking’. That goes for the educated man as well as for
the worker, for the German as well as for the foreigner. The
word ‘strike’ means death for the man who uses it.”
(_T-2121-2122._)
On this quotation in court the following colloquy occurred between a
member of the Tribunal and the witness [Milch]:
JUDGE MUSMANNO: Curiosity consumes me as to what would happen if
an officer inferior in rank to yourself took you at your word
and actually executed a number of these workers or prisoners of
war. Would that officer then be punished?
THE WITNESS: No one was there who would have been in a position
to do so. Apart from that, all those who were under my orders
knew me and my way of handling things. They knew exactly that I
didn’t mean it the way I said it, and apart from that they
always laughed about my remarks when I used such strong words.
JUDGE MUSMANNO: In other words, the comment of a field marshal
in a matter of this seriousness was really of no value?
THE WITNESS: Because the people knew that I got excited very
easily about certain things, and these incidents here have been
selected and submitted of course. From every one of these
meetings, which took place twice a month, there was a
report—about this thick—and perhaps, at some time or another,
sometimes once, sometimes twice, due to the many reports which I
received, there was a certain outburst, and then I would lose my
temper as we soldiers used to. However, I didn’t intend to do
anything about it and I spoke to those under my orders once in a
while. They pointed out to me that I used such strong words, and
they knew exactly that this was not meant seriously. They knew
exactly that no such order had been given and that I myself
would never cause anybody to be punished, not even when it would
have been justified, for the very simple reason that I did not
have the power to give punishments. (_T-2124-2125._)
Then Judge Phillips inquired—
JUDGE PHILLIPS: Well, now, whether you meant it or not, you
would say these things, and by so doing you counselled and
advised others under you at a meeting which you presided over to
do such things. Whether you meant it or not, you did that,
didn’t you?
THE WITNESS: No. I never gave the order by using these words,
because my people spoke with me, and after all they knew from my
words that I never meant it earnestly.
JUDGE PHILLIPS: Didn’t you say, ‘I would band the workers
together and have fifty percent of them shot? I would then
publish this fact and compel the other fifty percent to work by
beating if necessary.’ Did you say that or not?
THE WITNESS: I do not remember to have said that. However, three
days ago I believe I said that I never knew afterwards when I
had such outbursts of rage because I had that rush of blood to
my skull due to that injury I had, and I couldn’t remember what
I said at that particular moment. I just burst out in rage.
(_T-2125-2126._)
The defendant has constantly denied that he was a moving factor in the
foreign workers program. But at the GL meeting on 18 August 1942, we
find him asking for a complete report on the labor question, how it has
developed, what nationalities are involved, how great is the
fluctuation—
“What real requests we now have to make in the different sectors
in order to cover the needs for specialists and for skilled and
unskilled labor, how many of them are foreigners, etc. What
happens to those who leave the industry? Are they compelled to
work elsewhere? Are they, _as I proposed, under control in the
camps supervised by the SS_ and considered as being in mild
concentration camps or are these gentlemen allowed to remain
outside and do as they please?” (_T-2127._)
When questioned as to the significance of “mild” concentration camps, he
explained that these were camps to which people were sent for a short
time for “education”.
Complaining about “antisocial elements” who “moved from one factory to
another,” Milch rejected the suggestion that the armed forces should
take care of these people in camps. This could not be done because “they
have not been condemned and in no way violated the existing laws.”
“That is why Himmler should get these people into his clutches
because he can treat them _outside the law_.” (_T-2134._)
At the GL meeting on 19 October 1943, the defendant spoke on the subject
of a possible foreign workers’ uprising. He said that he had discussed
this eventuality with Himmler, and that he, Milch, had already given
orders to the Chief AW[163] and to the training stations to get military
training in this field.
“If for instance in the locality X, an uprising is started, then
a sergeant with a few men, or else a lieutenant with 30 men is
to turn up in the plant, and first of all shoot into the crowd
with a machine gun. What he should do after is to shoot down as
many people as possible in cases of revolt. I have given orders
to that effect even if our foreign workers are involved. But
first of all he must succeed in getting them all laid out flat
on the ground. And then every tenth man is to be singled out and
shot, while the others are lined up and see it. If our machines
are being wrecked, etc., then such measures have to be applied.
I said to Himmler: ‘I’ll go along with you in your efforts.’”
(_T-2153._)
Milch denied at the trial that he had talked to Himmler about this
matter and endeavored to argue incorrectness in the minutes. But the
weakness of his attempted exculpation here lies in the fact that he
could well have argued the necessity for drastic action in such an
emergency, without excesses of course. In fact, he had explained, “If
our planes are destroyed in the workshops, an energetic measure should
be taken.” But in the desire to extricate himself completely from the
situation, he challenges the record, he refutes the Himmler conference,
and then adds the usual explanation that he was excited at the time.
At a GL conference on 2 March 1943, the defendant was commenting on the
fact that foreign workers were becoming hostile.
“On principle I have to be informed of every case of
swinishness. I do not understand at all why Germany should put
up with it when Poles and Frenchmen explain to the
people—today, indeed, you are still sitting in this work; but
later we shall be the owners; and if you treat us properly we
shall see to it then that you are shot dead immediately and not
tortured first. In all these matters energetic interference must
be made. I am of the opinion that there should be only two types
of punishment in such cases; firstly, concentration camps for
foreigners, and secondly, capital punishment. If a certain
number of such hostile elements are removed and the others are
informed, they will then work better. Their love for us
certainly won’t become any greater; but neither will their hate,
for it is already strong enough. In this respect, too, energetic
interference must be made and in no case must the works put up
with it. The best method is to give one blow with a sledge
hammer to the person concerned; and I shall treat with
distinction every man who does something like that whenever he
hears such stupid nonsense. We are living in total war; and the
workers must be told that they don’t have to put up with
anything.” (_T-2169._)
When the above was read to the defendant in court, he stated that he did
not recall the utterance and explained, “that once again it is my
well-known rage. I simply let go.” However, upon further
cross-examination he seemed to recall what it was all about and said,
“Yes, and I was enraged here through the report which had been submitted
to me as to the fact that our people were being threatened with death.
That enraged me considerably; and I blew up.” This is an interesting
observation. This man, from whose lips death threats fell like acorns
from an oak, asks that all his fulminations be ignored. Although he sat
on the victors’ bench at the time, yet because a worker who had been
dragged from his home hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of miles away,
blurted from the depth of his misery, that if he got the opportunity he
would kill his captor, the captor felt morally justified in recommending
the use of a sledge hammer on the head of the defenseless captive. The
sledge hammer blow was to be delivered not for a deed committed, but
merely for the use of words. To fortify this point, defense introduced
an affidavit which declared that the servant girl in the Milch household
repeated certain statements as to what her people (she was a Ukrainian)
would do in the event they became victorious. On this subject they were
so sensitive that even the gossip and chatter of a maid servant threw
fear into their hearts, but it is solemnly averred in court that the
imprecations of a field marshal were always ignored.
At the same meeting above indicated the defendant said—
“But in the abstract, I see no difficulties in the way of
getting 100,000 or 200,000 French workers to Germany, nor do I
see any difficulties in the way of keeping them in order. If a
case of sabotage occurs in one area, every tenth man in the area
will be shot. Then such acts of sabotage would cease of
themselves. The western peoples are very much afraid of death,
while it is quite different matter with the Russians.”
(_T-2172._)
In explanation of this remark the defendant said that he did not recall
making it. “That was still part of my madness.”
On 4 November 1943, Milch conferred with Goering at the Junkers Works at
Dessau. Discussing the Italian workers, the defendant said—
“We have to let certain plants go on working in Italy, such as
ball bearings, steel castings, and others, and we cannot take
the people from there. The same applies to the technical sphere.
The people there are working for us. All depends on our policy
toward the Italians. I have ordered that they can be beaten up
if they do not work. I have also given permission that Italians
caught sabotaging be sentenced to death. If this measure is not
desired by the higher authorities, which seems to be the case,
we are powerless. Then the Italians in the Reich will not be of
any use to us.” Further, “We could count on millions all
together, if we let them starve if they do not work!”
(_T-2193-2194._)
The defendant denies that he ever gave the order specifically mentioned
here, and since he was talking to Goering, he places himself in the
position of having lied to his superior officer, something of which,
considering his vehement professions of soldier’s loyalty to military
hierarchy, it would never be expected he could be guilty.
On the subject of French prisoners of war, the defendant said—
“Don’t forget that not even 1,000,000 Frenchmen are here as PW’s
while we have 7 to 8 million soldiers. Therefore, the French are
still in a very favorable position. But they must realize that
they will be brought to Germany all together if they don’t work
hard enough at home.” (_T-2198._)
As Vichy was working hand in glove with Berlin at the time, the
defendant contends that coercion was not involved since it was the
French Government who had issued the orders for this movement.
Addressing himself on another occasion to the subject of French workers,
the defendant stated, “There is no good will in France, and you can
really not expect it from these fellows. But we will force them to work
by not feeding them.” Goering then said, “I can do this here much
better.” And Milch replied, “That will get us nowhere. We shall then
have to shut down the plants in France.” (_NOKW-245._)
At the GL meeting of 27 May 1942, von Gablenz reported, “Yesterday, the
first[164] has exploded in France, at the Arado plant, an explosive, a
float, but no damage has been done.” Milch commented, “What measures
have been taken in consequence? I want to have a report on what has been
done—How many people have been shot and how many hanged. If that guy
cannot be found today, fifty men should be selected and if I were you I
would hang three or four of them whether they are guilty or not. It is
the only way!” (_NOKW-407._)
IV. MEDICAL EXPERIMENTS
(a) High-Altitude Tests
On 15 May 1941, Dr. Rascher, medical officer in the Luftwaffe and member
of the SS stationed at Munich, wrote Heinrich Himmler asking that
Himmler furnish to him two or three professional criminals to be used as
subjects in high-altitude experiments. He stated that tests had been
made with monkeys, but since their reactions differed from those of
human beings, he preferred to work with live men, it being understood
that these individuals could, of course, die in the experiment. Himmler
replied through his adjutant, Rudolf Brandt, that he would gladly make
prisoners available for such high-altitude research, and authorized that
the experiments be carried out by Dr. Rascher, a Dr. Kottenhoff, and Dr.
G. A. Weltz, who was Chief of the Institute for Aviation Medicine in
Munich.
In March 1942, with a low-pressure chamber furnished by the Luftwaffe,
the experiments began at Dachau. The apparatus used for these tests was
simply a wood and metal cabinet in which air pressure could be increased
and decreased, the purpose of the tests being to ascertain the subject’s
capacity and ability to take large amounts of pure oxygen, and to
observe his reaction to a gradual decrease of oxygen approaching
infinity. In this manner high-altitude atmospheric pressure would be
simulated, and from the results the experimenters were to be able to
determine methods and means of maintaining and saving lives among
aviators compelled to rise to extreme altitudes, and at times because of
war hazards obliged to parachute to the earth. The subjects for these
experiments were to be individuals already sentenced to death.
Stated in strictly academic fashion, one could without too much
difficulty be persuaded that these experiments were not entirely
irrational or inhuman. The subjects were to die anyway, and if in dying
they could furnish scientific data not obtainable otherwise, data which
would save the lives of others, the project would not seem as criminally
homicidal as it might appear when stated bluntly that experimenters
would kill experimentees.
Whether the project was criminal and inhumane depends upon answers to
the inevitable questions:
1. Were the prisoners actually condemned to death previously?
2. If so, for what reasons were they condemned to capital punishment?
3. Were the experiments painful to the subjects?
4. What scientific benefits resulted from the experiments?
If any prisoner used in the experiments was condemned to death merely
for opposing the Nazi Regime without actually having committed any
physical crime, it does not answer the criminal charge to say that the
subject was already doomed to die, because by using that argument the
experimenter or his SS superior could easily take any concentration camp
inmate and, by merely pointing a finger at him, condemn him to death.
Obviously in such a case the slayer could not, after the death, plead
innocence on the grounds that the victim was to die anyway. Exculpation
from the charge of criminal homicide can possibly be based only upon
bona fide proof that the subject had committed murder or any other
legally recognized capital offense; and, not even then, unless the
sentencing Tribunal with authority granted by the State in the
constitution of the Court, declared that the execution would be
accomplished by means of a low-pressure chamber.
It has been asserted by the defense in this case that pardons were
promised the subjects of these experiments in the event they survived.
But the whole record reveals but one such shadowy case. It was also
stated by one of the witnesses for the defense (General Wolff of the SS)
that the subjects of these experiments were men who, because of their
criminal records, had been denied the honor of fighting for the
Fatherland, but that by submitting to these experiments they would be
allowed, if they survived, to join combat forces at the front. General
Wolff furnished no names or specific instances in this connection, nor
does it appear that he, at any time, was in attendance upon the
experiments at Dachau.
Dr. Romberg, under indictment for these same and kindred offenses, said
on 1 November 1946, that he personally witnessed the death of three of
Dr. Rascher’s subjects, and that he knows that other experimental
subjects were killed while he was not present. He estimated that the
fatalities totaled between five and ten. He was silent on the character
of the victims.
Rudolf Brandt, who is currently on trial in Tribunal I, declared in an
affidavit dated 30 August 1946, that Rascher wrote Himmler asking for
concentration camp subjects for his high-altitude experiments.
“Volunteers could not very well be expected, as the experiments could be
fatal under the circumstances.” (_T-475._) Also “many experiments ended
with the death of the experimental subject.” (_T-477._)
Brandt declared further that after Rascher submitted a report on his
first experiments, Himmler ordered him to continue the experiments and
authorized the commutation to life imprisonment of those subjects,
previously condemned to death, who survived the experiments. However,
Poles and Russians were excluded from this declared clemency. For
Himmler, to be a Russian or a Pole or a Jew was an offense that could be
expiated only with death. Both Romberg and Brandt are interested
witnesses since they are defendants in another trial on similar charges.
The testimony of one Anton Pacheleff, however, is not burdened with this
possible defect as he is not answering to any charges. An Austrian
patent lawyer, he was an inmate of Dachau, and while his testimony must
still be carefully scrutinized, it does not need to be evaluated on the
basis that the affiant has something to gain in exaggerating the nature,
extent, and effect of the medical experiments. He declared under oath
that Dr. Rascher chose the victims for his researches from the
punishment company at Dachau, a group made up of political prisoners
marked for extermination. “A few convicts were among the political
prisoners, having been placed there merely to depress the morale of the
political prisoners, and so a few convicts were killed along with the
others.” (_T-408._)
The most complete account of this entire operation was contributed by
Walter Neff, an Austrian who had been committed to Dachau because, prior
to the Anschluss, he had testified in an Austrian court against certain
Nazi terrorists. Only by coincidence were the experiments enacted in a
ward to which he had been assigned as an untrained nurse, and thus he
became an unofficial observer. He testified that from 180 to 200
concentration camp inmates were subjected to the high-altitude
experiments, and of these, 10 were volunteers. Of all these subjects
only one man was ever released, and that was an individual called
Zopota.
It was Neff’s conclusion that over a period of three months from 70 to
80 persons were killed in the high-altitude experiments. He declared
further that approximately 40 of the persons killed were persons not
previously condemned to death. One man, according to Neff, was
deliberately killed in the low-pressure chamber by Dr. Rascher so that
he could perform an autopsy on him after his death at the atmospheric
pressure of 10,000 meters altitude. During one autopsy it was discovered
after the breast had been opened that the heart was still beating. “This
experiment,” Neff said, “caused many cases of death because many more
experiments were made in order to see how long the heart of a man could
beat thus autopsied.” (_T-419._)
In this connection, reference must be made to one of the most cruel and
fiendish decrees scratched by the claw of Himmler on the horror-filled
parchment of his diabolic ingenuity. On 13 April 1942 he wrote Dr.
Rascher, “these experiments should above all be evaluated for the
purpose of seeing whether it is not possible, through this long
functioning of the heart, to bring such people back to life. Should such
an experiment of bringing back to life succeed, then it is understood
that the person condemned to death will be commuted to lifelong
imprisonment in a concentration camp.” (_1971-B-PS._) Thus, if the
lifeless and mutilated body of one of these tortured victims of
cold-blooded homicide should be made to function again, its owner would
receive from the benevolent Heinrich Himmler the assurance of the
luxuries of a lifelong imprisonment in an SS concentration camp!
But this is not the end of the hilarious game of these two death-head
players, as they toss human life back and forth. On 20 October 1942,
Rascher queries Himmler’s adjutant on this subject. He desires to know
if, amongst the mythical survivors of his lethal experiments, there
should be any Poles or Russians, whether they were also to receive the
boon of lifelong imprisonment in a concentration camp. Incidentally,
Rascher adds, the only ones he has experimented with have been Poles and
Russians. And the reply comes back from Himmler’s adjutant that Dr.
Rascher, “please,” is to be informed that “the decree of the
Reichsfuehrer SS Himmler concerning pardoning (they called it
pardoning!) of experimental subjects does not apply to Poles and
Russians.” (!!!)
The manner in which some of the victims were selected is material fit
for an Edgar Allen Poe story or a horror magazine. One day after 16
Russian prisoners had been used as experiments, two Jews were scheduled
to be killed. Curious as to the identity of the two scheduled for
extermination, Neff watched the first victim being placed in the
experimental chamber. Something in the man’s features forcibly brought
to his mind the image of the prison tailor. Hurrying to the tailor shop
he learned that indeed it was the tailor, and that he had not been
condemned to death, but that an SS-man, one Endres, had placed him among
the list of those scheduled to be killed because this tailor had refused
to make a civilian suit for Endres!
Neff further testified that at one time the chamber became damaged, but
after being repaired more deaths occurred, and on the last day Rascher
killed five persons. (_T-421._)
On 16 April 1942, Rascher wrote Himmler describing an experiment which
he repeated four times “with the same results.”
“When Wagner, the last VP (experimental subject) had stopped
breathing, I let him come back to life by increasing pressure.
Since the VP was assigned for a terminal (‘Terminal’ meaning
‘death-resulting’ in this case) experiment, since a repeated
experiment held no prospect for new results, and since I had not
been in possession of your letter at that time, I subsequently
started another experiment through which VP Wagner did not live.
Also in this case the results obtained by electrocardiographic
registration (Herzstromabschreibung) were extraordinary.”
(_T-431-32._)
Here Rascher, in a macabre demonstration worthy of his record, repeated
an experiment four times knowing what the result would be, and then
finally killed the subject because he had been marked for extermination
anyway.
(b) Were the Experiments Painful to the Subjects
The defense contends that the experiments, even though often fatal, were
not accompanied with actual pain to the subjects, and therefore the
experiments could not be characterized cruel or inhuman. Anton Pacheleff
often stood by the apparatus during the experiments and looked through
the observation window of the chamber. He testified—
“I have personally seen through the observation window of the
chamber when a prisoner inside would stand a vacuum until his
lungs ruptured. Some experiments gave men such pressure in their
heads that they would go mad, and pull out their hair in an
effort to relieve the pressure. They would tear their heads and
face with their fingers and fingernails in an attempt to maim
themselves in their madness. They would beat the walls with
their hands and head, and scream in an effort to relieve
pressure on their eardrums. These cases of extreme vacuums
generally ended in the death of the subject. An extreme
experiment was so certain to result in death that in many
instances the chamber was used for routine execution purposes
rather than an experiment.” (_T-409._)
One report made up by Doctors Ruff, Romberg, and Rascher graphically
described the reactions of the subject as he fell from a height of
47,000 feet. Some of the more unusual reactions are noted:
47,200 ft. Lets the mask fall, severe altitude sickness, spasmodic
(klonische) convulsions.
45,580 ft. Opisthotonus.
44,950 ft. Suspended in opisthotonus.
44,920 ft. Arms stretched stiffly forward; sits up like a dog,
legs spread stiffly apart.
43,310 ft. Agonal convulsive breathing.
40,030 ft. Dyspnea, hangs limp.
23,620 ft. Uncoordinated movements with the extremities.
19,690 ft. Clonic convulsions, groaning.
18,080 ft. Yells aloud.
9,520 ft. Still yells, convulses arms and legs, head sinks
forward.
6,560 ft. Yells spasmodically, grimaces, bites his tongue, does
not respond to speech, gives the impression of
someone who is completely out of his mind.
5 minutes (after reaching ground level) Reacts for the first time
to vocal stimulation.
11 minutes Holds his head turned convulsively to the right; tries
repeatedly to answer the first question concerning
his birth date.
28 minutes Sees nothing; runs against open window sash upon which
the sun is shining, so that large lump is formed on
his forehead; says “Excuse me, please.” No expression
of pain.
37 minutes Reacts to pain stimuli.
75 minutes Still disoriented in time; retrogressive amnesia over
three days.
24 hours Normal condition again attained; has no recollection of
the experiment itself. (_T-455-56._)
(c) Results Achieved
On 11 May 1942, Rascher made his first report to Himmler on the
high-altitude experiments—
“As practical result of the more than 200 experiments conducted
at Dachau the following can be assumed. Flying in altitudes
higher than 12 kilometers without pressure-cabin or
pressure-suit is impossible even while breathing pure oxygen. If
the airplane pressure machine is damaged at altitudes of 13
kilometers and higher the crew will not be able to bail out of
the damaged plane themselves since at that height the bends
appear rather suddenly. It must be requested that the crew
should be removed automatically from the plane, for instance, by
catapulting the seats by means of compressed air. Descending
with opened parachute without oxygen would cause severe injuries
due to the lack of oxygen besides causing severe freezing;
consciousness would not be regained until the ground was
reached. Therefore, the following is to be requested: (1) A
parachute with barometrically controlled opening. (2) A portable
oxygen apparatus for the jump. For the following experiments
Jewish professional criminals who had committed ‘Rassenschande’
(race pollution) were used; the question of the formation of
embolism was investigated in ten cases. Some of the VP’s died
during a continued high-altitude experiment; for instance, after
one-half hour at a height of 12 kilometers. * * * To find out
whether the severe psychical and physical effects, as mentioned
under No. 3, are due to the formation of embolism, the following
was done: After relative recuperation from such a parachute
descending test had taken place, however before regaining of
consciousness, some VP’s were kept under water until they died.
* * * One VP was made to breathe pure oxygen for two and
one-half hours before the experiment started. After six minutes
at a height of 20 kilometers he died and at dissection also
showed ample air embolism as was the case in all other
experiments.” (_T-384-385._)
Dr. Romberg declared in an interrogation conducted on 29 October 1946,
that he and other doctors had conducted experiments on themselves
reaching altitudes of 17,000 meters (17 kilometers). Beyond that, he
said, death was probable. This seems to contradict the report made by
Rascher, above referred to, in which he speaks of the impossibility of
flight at 12 kilometers (12,000 meters).
But the whole fallacy of the experiments and their sheer futility are
revealed in a letter which Dr. Hippke, Chief of the Medical Section of
the Luftwaffe, wrote to Himmler under date of 8 October 1942—
“It is true that no conclusions as to the practice of
parachuting can be drawn for the time being, as a very important
factor, viz., cold, has so far not yet been taken into
consideration; it places an extraordinary excess burden on the
entire body and its vital movements, so that the results in
actual practice will very likely prove to be far more
unfavorable than in the present experiments.” (_T-404._)
If it was impossible perfectly to simulate flying conditions in the
low-pressure chamber—and this, if they were scientists at all worthy of
the name, they should have known and must have known—then the tests
were only the wildest kind of experimenting. And if the experimenting
was done with human lives, as it was, the recklessness and the wanton
handling of these human lives, resulting from 60 to 70 times in death,
can only be characterized by what it was,—murder.
(d) Freezing Experiments
On 20 May 1942, [Field] Marshal Milch wrote General Wolff recommending
experiments “in regard to perils at high seas.” (_T-393._) As German
aviators from time to time were being forced to parachute into the North
Seas, and consequently being subject to extreme cold for extended
periods of time, the purpose of the freezing experiments was to
ascertain the most effective way of rewarming such aviators and thereby
saving their lives. (_T-480._)
The cold water experiments were performed between August and October
1942; the dry-cold experiments from February to April 1943. Walter Neff,
already identified, described the experimental basin as being made of
wood, two meters long, two meters high, and 50 centimeters above the
floor. He stated that 280 to 300 prisoners were used in the tests, many
of them undergoing as high as three experiments, and that out of the
number indicated 80 to 90 died. The selection of the subjects was left
to the political department of the camp after Rascher had made requests
for a certain number. The eventual victims were made up of political
prisoners, foreigners, prisoners of war, and inmates condemned to death.
According to Neff, none of the subjects were volunteers. (_T-423._)
The experiment was conducted in the following manner. The basin was
filled with water and then ice was added until the temperature measured
3° [centigrade]. Now the subject, either naked or dressed in a flying
suit, was forced into the freezing liquid. When two certain doctors,
Holzloehner and Finke, were performing the experiment, the subjects had
narcotics administered to them, but when Rascher took over he refused
narcotics because he maintained that “you cannot find the exact
condition of the blood, and that you would exclude the willpower of the
subject if he was under an anaesthetic.” When the subject was
experimented on in a conscious state, a much longer time elapsed before
the so-called freezing narcosis set in. (_T-424._)
Neff, describing the operation, declared that the “sinking down of the
temperature until 32° [centigrade] was a terrible plight for the
experimental subject.” At 32° the subject lost consciousness, but these
persons “were frozen down to 25° body temperature.” When Rascher was
handling the experiments “a large number of the persons involved were
kept in the water so long a time until they were dead.” (_T-425._)
Many others died during the reviving or during the re-warming procedure.
The utterly heartless and fiendish manner in which some of the
experiments were conducted can be gathered from the graphic description
by Neff of the episode of the two Russians—
“It was the worst experiment which was ever carried out. From
the bunker two Russian officers were carried out. We were
forbidden to speak to them. They arrived in the afternoon at
approximately 4 o’clock. Rascher had them undressed and they had
to go into the basin in a naked state. Hour after hour passed
and when usually after a short time, 60 minutes, the freezing
would have set in, these two Russians were still conscious even
after two hours. All of our appeals to Rascher, asking him to
give them an injection was without purpose. Approximately in the
third hour one Russian said to the other: ‘Comrade, tell that
officer that he may shoot us.’ Then the other one replied,
‘Don’t expect any mercy from this Fascist dog.’ And how can one
imagine that we inmates also had to be witnesses of such a death
and could do nothing against it, then you can really estimate
how terrible it is to be condemned to work in such an
experimental station. After these words, which were translated
to the Germans by a young Pole in a somewhat different form,
Rascher went back into his office. The young Pole immediately
tried to give them an anaesthetic with chloroform, but Rascher
returned immediately. He threatened us with a pistol, and he
said, ‘Don’t dare interfere and approach these victims.’ The
experiment lasted at least five hours until death set in. Both
corpses were sent to Munich for autopsy in the Schwabisches
Hospital there. Q. Witness, how long did it normally take to
kill a person in these freezing experiments? A. The length of
the experiment varied according to the individual case. It
always varied according to whether the subject was clothed or
unclothed. If his physical construction was weak and if in
addition to that he was naked, death often set in already after
80 minutes. But there were a number of cases where the
experimental subject lived up to three hours and remained that
way in the water until finally death set in.” (_T-426._)
On 20 September 1942, Rascher made an intermediary report on these
experiments—
“The experimental subjects (VP’s) were placed in the water
dressed in complete flying uniform, winter or summer
combination, and with an aviator’s helmet. A life jacket made of
rubber or kapok was to prevent submerging. The experiments were
carried out at water temperatures varying from 2.5° to 12°
[centigrade]. In one experimental series, the occiput, the brain
stem, protruded above the water, while in another series, the
brain stem and back of the head were submerged in water * * *.
Fatalities occurred only when the brain stem and back of the
head were also chilled. Autopsies of such fatal cases always
revealed large amounts of free blood, up to one-half liter, in
the cranial cavity. The heart invariably showed extreme dilation
of the right chamber. As soon as the temperature in these
experiments reached 28° the experimental subjects died
invariably, despite all attempts at resuscitation. The
above-discussed autopsy findings conclusively proved the
importance of a warming protective device for the occiput when
designing the planned protective clothing of foam type.”
(_T-398-399._)
The sheer monstrousness of this type of experiment reveals itself in the
last sentence of the report which states with the flourish of a great
scientific discovery that if the back of the head, the occiput is to be
submerged in freezing water, there should be a warm, protective device
to cover the occiput. If one is to have his feet in icy water, he should
wear warm, waterproof boots. If he is to dip his head in the icy water,
then his head should also be protected! This, then, is the weighty
conclusion of so-called scientists sacrificing human lives for an
observation that is obvious to a ten-year-old child.
“During attempts to save severely chilled persons (Unterkuehlte)
it was shown that rapid re-warming was in all cases preferable
to slow re-warming, because after removed from the cold water,
the body temperature continued to sink rapidly. I think that for
this reason, we can dispense with the attempt to save intensely
chilled subjects by means of animal heat. Rewarming by animal
warmth, animal bodies or women’s bodies, would be too slow. As
auxiliary measures for the prevention of intense chilling,
improvements in the clothing of aviators come alone into
consideration. The foam suit with suitable neck protector which
is being prepared by the German Institution for Textile Research
(Deutsches Textilforschungsinstitut), Muenchen-Gladbach,
deserves first priority in this connection. The experiments have
shown that pharmaceutical measures are probably necessary if the
flier _is still alive_ at the time of rescue.” (_T-399-400._)
Here other amazing, fantastic discoveries were made.
1. That something should be done at once to re-warm a body that
has been floating about in icy water.
2. That aviator suits be made up with suitable neck protectors.
3. And that if the flier is still alive when rescued, medicine
should be prescribed for him. If dead, no pharmaceutical
measures are recommended!
In the year 1942, in the name of science, in the name of progress, men
trained in medicine calmly and deliberately froze the blood in the
arteries and veins of human beings to the point of death to proclaim
warm clothing for low temperatures and re-warming and medicine for those
who have succumbed to coldness.