going to be given to the press; whereas the speeches in the Reichstag, he always dictated personally, and then he read through them and he redrafted them two or three times, and then presented them in final form and read them off the manuscripts. And then finally there was a third form, and that was when he spoke before the officers, that is, before the generals; and then, well, he naturally spoke to the generals in smaller groups, but occasionally also in a very large group. It was at least twice or three times that he addressed a very large body of officers in the building where the Reichstag convened, that is, the theater, the Kroil Opera, and he worded his speech in such a way that the officers in the end would always leave quite impressed and satisfied with his oratory; and into all these speeches he would always bring his main ideology. He would always find a way of getting his ideology into these speeches, saying "Where would the company be if everybody had a voice and said 'Well, let's vote on how we are going to do that'; and the gentlemen of the officer corps will certainly confirm this, that that would be an impossible situation." And then came the famous slogan: "A criticism from bottom to top doesn't exist. There is only one criticism, and it goes from the top down. The regimental commander can criticize his officers and his men, but his men can never criticize the commander." And he said, "I am a soldier. I have gone through the World War, and I look at my political life from a military point of view, and I maintain that there is no criticizing from the bottom towards the top. There is only one, from the top down." Hitler's Relations with Eva Braun Q. I have wondered about Eva Braun; did you ever meet Eva Braun, Field Marshal? A. I have seen her, yes. She wasn't very tall; she was between small and medium; very slender and very elegant appearing. At the Berghof, I probably did meet her in the corridors, for naturally when there were soldiers, you didn't see anybody of the environs; they were all gone. Q. We heard that Hitler had two children by Eva Braun. Have you ever heard that story? Do you think there is anything to it? A. I don't believe it. I don't think that is true. I never knew of that. She was, as I said, very slender, elegant appearance, quite nice legs-one could see that-but I never got to know her very much-she seemed to be very, not shy, but reticent and retiring, and a very, very nice person, dark blonde. She stood very much in the background, and one saw her very rarely. It was merely by chance that one saw her. Excerpts from Testimony of Ernst Kaltenbrunner, taken Kaltenbrunner's Opinion of Ribbentrop and His Diplomacy Q. You mentioned the name Ribbentrop. What sort of person is Ribbentrop? A. He is an exceptionally industrious man and he is very concerned about every material factor in his work. I think that any work that he has taken over he will carry out with the utmost devotion to duty. A different form of his nature is his exceptional conceit and ambition, even more conceited than ambitious, externally and in all his activities as Foreign Minister. This has shown itself especially in the following way, namely, that he has never allowed anybody to take a hand in any part of his field or allowed anybody to mix up in it. He especially pointed out that he, according to the list of rank, is the highest and the most important minister of the Reich. In his relation to Hitler, he was exceptionally obedient, and I do not believe that he ever dared to carry out anything against the will of Hitler. He was very anxious to find out the opinion of Hitler about any specific thing, and very often, as it seemed to many lookers-on, he took this for his own opinion and then presented it to Hitler, partly because he wanted the favor of the Fuehrer. In regard to his ways of life, his forms of discussion, his mannerisms, his relations to his subordinates, and to people outside, he behaved in a very peculiar manner. At times, he gave the impression of being a very dignified, quiet, well-informed man. Then he could be very polite and even amiable. On the other hand, he was at times very nervous and sometimes even rude, and he sometimes even went to the point of insulting people. In the first place, it has to be said that he was a very intolerant man. It was never possible to teach him or to advise him. At the very best, he would respond, "Oh, yes, I have thought so, too, and this is my opinion, too." Q. Did you have any official relations with him? A. Yes. Q. In what regard? A. I was in no way his subordinate, but I wanted to bring to him those results of work which belonged to his ministry, namely, *Kaltenbrunner's capacity for evasion and denial reached the point at the trial where he even refused to acknowledge his own signature. A caveat is therefore entered as to the veracity of Kaltenbrunner's statements in these interrogations on matters touching his personal responsibility. starting from the beginning of 1944. In this respect, he was very deaf and he tried to refuse the accepting of any information that did not belong strictly to his ministry, because he had a point of view that only professional diplomats would understand foreign political affairs, whereas he quite overlooked the fact that he himself did not come under this classification either. He believed that his information should come from two sources, firstly, from the different legations-that is, from the foreign representations that he had-and from an information service of the Foreign Office, which was subordinate to different people, at one time to a certain Henke. He only relied upon a few people that he named. It was very difficult to get in personal touch with him, in order to prove to him the correctness of one's own opinion and the necessity for obtaining advice from different other sources. Not only was there no subordinate relation with him, but it was also difficult to receive an invitation to him. If such conferences did result, at times he was amiable. At times, he was curt and rude. In this direction he was a man whose nature was not adjusted to any certain form. He never made it possible for anybody to be present at any conference between him and Hitler. Q. Wherein can you place any responsibility on Ribbentrop for the disaster that overtook Germany? A. This is a huge question. Perhaps for an introduction to all these questions, it should be said that one generally spoke about the fact that Herr von Ribbentrop was very much subject to the influence and to the thoughts of his wife. In foreign political things, I think I have only got to know Ribbentrop at the end of 1943. This was a time when the war had progressed so far that an end of war would have to come about not by military means, but by a diplomatic means, which had not occurred so far. This was a time where the wide public and naturally also higher placed persons looked around in vain for some activity of Ribbentrop. For me personally, it was then not clear whether there was a lack of activity on Ribbentrop's side or whether it was so that Ribbentrop could not dare to proceed against the wish of Hitler. In this time I had practically never been with Hitler and did not know his own opinions about it. I first remarked on the mistakes of Ribbentrop in the southeastern province. A very important thing in the southeastern politics of the Reich was that one delivered Croatia to the Italian influence, and, certainly, that one looked upon Bulgaria as a power which was a friendly power to Germany in the Balkans. While, according to my opinion, which was not only my opinion but this was in the first place the opinion and basis of activities of the envoy Neubacher, not Bulgaria but Serbia should be looked upon as a friend of Germany in the Balkan States. It seemed to me, according to reports, that the Balkan affairs were handled in the following manner: The Reich had favored Bulgaria, which in its whole interior structure had already leaned towards Bolshevism. This one could especially notice by the economical construction of Bulgaria, namely, in the agricultural communities. This was partly due to the activities of the agricultural unions that wanted to go away from the patriotic ideas of the farmers and go over to a more union form of a system, meaning that they wanted the farmer to act independently and only be influenced by his family and not be led by a union. This system of unions opened the doors to all sorts of Communistic propaganda in Bulgaria, and one could almost see when Bulgaria was going to be ripe for Communism. Serbia, on the other hand, had just as before kept up all this individual structure, their land structure and their structure on the farms. It was influenced by way of religion through the Serbian Orthodox Church. All Serbian farmers, that is, all Serbian agricultural people, were of an anti-Communistic opinion. In a war between an anti-Soviet Germany and a Communistic Russia, Germany selected, through the Foreign Minister Ribbentrop, Bulgaria and not Serbia. Hitler's "Inner Circle" Q. Now that you have a chance to look back, who do you say were the men that made up the inner circle around Hitler? A. Hitler was so sure of himself that influence on his person would have been very difficult. Despite all this, the surrounding people should have brought about a certain influence on him, and of those who surrounded him, there are in the first instance Bormann. Bormann has been with Hitler daily ever since Hess had flown away. Then Goebbels was in his close circle. These are the two people who have the greatest possibilities of exercising an influence on Hitler. Then we come to the second group of people who had regular access to Hitler and could have exercised a certain amount of influence and of whose judgment Hitler thought something. He didn't always think a lot of them, but he listened to them. They are Ribbentrop, Goering, and Himmler; from the time of Todt's death and Speer becoming Minister of Armament, also he was in the closer circle of Hitler. But Hitler always cut off any reports by his people and expressed his own opinion regardless of what the others wanted to say. Only people like Bormann and Goebbels, who were for years in his close surroundings, should have exercised a larger influence on him. Goering's influence was relatively very small. I could show proof of this by a few examples quite easily. Q. You mean towards the end it was small? A. I think that Goering lost his influence already two years prior to the end. Goering's influence ceased to exist virtually completely from the moment it was evident that the German air force was inferior technically to the air force of the allies. Hitler did not hold Goering responsible for the failure as regards technical developments of the air force, because he said that "It is my own fault. I knew that Goering was no technical expert, and yet I have made him Chief of the air force." He was of the opinion that he had only appointed Goering as head of the aircraft personnel. Responsibility for Concentration Camps Q. Can you explain why the SS has gained its reputation as a gang of criminals? A. I should think that they have to thank Hitler for that reputation, because of his order to Himmler. They were ordered to conduct the concentration camps. Though the concentration camps were instituted before Himmler by Goering, they were not in that form. Q. Do you know that to be a fact of your knowledge, the fact that these concentration camps were being operated by Himmler through Hitler? A. I know that Hitler said to Himmler that "I take the full responsibility of what takes place in concentration camps." Whereupon Himmler said, "I will take that responsibility." Q. Well, do you believe Hitler knew to what extent people were being gassed and tortured and killed in concentration camps? A. Besides Himmler, nobody would have known that. Up to a certain extent he must have known. |