Archive/File: imt/tgmwc/tgmwc-07/tgmwc-07-66.04
Last-Modified: 1999/11/20

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: He seems to be, my Lord, in exactly
the same position as Dr. Lohse, and I do not think I need
repeat what I said.

THE PRESIDENT: Except that he may be located. I do not know
where he is.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: I think this is the first reference
to Dr. Bunjes and therefore we have not been able to find
out whether he can be located or not.

THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps Dr. Stahmer knows.

DR. STAHMER: I am told just now that Dr. Lohse is in the
camp at Hersbruck.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: I will have inquiries made about
him.

THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, do you know where he can be
located ?

DR. STAHMER: No his home is in Treves, but whether he is
there, I do not know.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well; that concludes your witnesses,
does it not?

DR. STAHMER: Yes Sir.

THE PRESIDENT : Are those all the witnesses that you are
applying for?

DR. STAHMER: Yes.

THE PRESIDENT: As far as you know, is that your final list?

DR. STAHMER: I cannot yet foresee how far the prosecution,
which has not finished the presentation of its case, will
make it necessary for me to make further applications.

THE PRESIDENT: Before we consider your documents the
Tribunal will adjourn.

(A recess was taken.)

                                                  [Page 256]

THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps we can deal with the documents more
as a whole. Have you anything to say about them?

DR. STAHMER: Mr. President, may I make a statement
concerning the two witnesses, Koller and Korner? I have just
been told that Koller was Chief of Staff of the Air Force,
and Korner a lower Staff Officer. Both were repeatedly
questioned by the occupying forces. This indication may make
it easier to locate the witnesses.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: I will note that point and, of
course, we will do our best to help in locating them.

THE PRESIDENT: Which two witnesses are those?

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: Koller and Korner. They are both
witnesses to whom I made no objection.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, very well.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: It might be convenient, if the
Tribunal pleases, if I were to explain the general position
of the prosecution with regard to the documents, and then
Dr. Stahmer could deal with these points because they fall
into certain groups which I can indicate quite shortly.
There are three documents which are not in evidence, but to
which there is no objection:

No. 19. The Anglo-German Naval Agreement. That is a treaty,
of course, and the Court can take judicial cognizance of it.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: And the Constitution of the German
Reich, the Weimar Constitution, of 11 August, 1919. Again I
shall assume the Court will take judicial cognizance of it.

THE PRESIDENT: Certainly.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: And Hitler's speech of 21 May, 1935.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: Then there is a number which are
already in evidence as far as I know.

No. 4. The Rhine Pact of Locarno.

No. 5. The Memorandum to the Locarno Powers of 25 May, 1935.

No. 6. Memorandum to the Locarno Powers of 7 March, 1936.

No. 9. The Treaty of Versailles.

No. 17. The Speech by the defendant von Neurath of 16
October, 1935.

No. 18. The Proclamation by the Reich Government of 16
March, 1935.

And then No. 7 was referred to but not read. That is the
speech by the defendant von Ribbentrop before the League of
Nations on 19 March, 1936.

All these are in or have been referred to and, therefore,
there is no objection as far as they are concerned.

Then we come to a series of books. Dr Stahmer has at the
moment referred to the books en bloc.

No. 1. The late Lord Rothermere's book, "Warnings and
Prophecies".

No. 2. The late Sir Nevile Henderson's "Failure of a
Mission".

No. 3. The references to a number of years of the "Dokumente
der Deutschen Politik".

THE PRESIDENT: Those appear to be repeated, don't they, in
the ones that follow, or some of them? Nos. 6 and 7, for
instance, are taken from those volumes, aren't they, of the
"Deutschen Politik"?

SIR DAVID MAXWELL FYFE: Yes, apparently they are, my Lord.

If I might just give your Lordship the others so that you
have the group together.

No. 8. Mr. Fay's book on the "Origin of the World War ", the
first World War.

No. 20. Mr. Winston Churchill's book, "Step by Step".

No. 24. The defendant Goering's book "Building up a Nation".

No. 26 to which I have already referred, is Dahlerus's book,
"The Last Attempt".

                                                  [Page 257]

With regard to these, there are two points: First of all, it
is mechanically impossible to translate the whole of these
books into Russian and French. I think most of them are in
English already; secondly, the relevancy of the book cannot
be decided until we see the extract which Dr. Stahmer is
going to use. So the prosecution submits that Dr. Stahmer
should at the earliest opportunity let us know what are the
extracts on which he relies, so that they can be translated
and we can decide as to whether they are relevant or not.
Now the fourth category of books or documents, where either
the issue is not clear or in so far as it is clear, it is
obviously irrelevant. One to which I have already referred
comes into this:

No. 8. Fay on "The Origin of the First World War".

No. 10. Speech by President Wilson of 8 January, 1918. That
is the "Fourteen Point Speech".

No. 11. The Note of President Wilson of 5 November, 1918.
That is the "Armistice Note".

No. 12. A Speech by M. Paul Boncour of 8 April, 1927.

No. 13. A Speech by General Bliss in Philadelphia, which is
before 1921, because it is quoted in "What Really Happened
at Paris", published in 1921.

No. 14. A Speech by the late Lord Lloyd George of 7
November, 1927.

No. 15. An Article by Lord Cecil on 1 March, 1924, and
another on 18 November, 1926.

No. 16. Lord Lloyd George's Memorandum for the Peace
Conference of 25 March, 1919.

May I pause here? As far as the prosecution can judge, the
only relevancy of these books and documents is to the issue
of whether the Treaty of Versailles accorded with the
Fourteen Points of President Wilson. The prosecution submits
that that is poles removed from the issues of this trial and
is just one of the matters against which the whole
intendment of the Charter proceeds and which should not be
gone into by this Court. It may be that I am wrong ; it
seems difficult, in view of the collection of documents, to
suppose that there is another issue, but it may be, and I
put it in this way, that Dr Stahmer ought to indicate quite
clearly what is the issue to which these documents are
directed and, where the document is long, to indicate to
what extract he refers. But if the issue be the one to which
I have referred, then, in the submission of the prosecution
- I speak for all my colleagues - we submit that it is a
completely irrelevant matter.

I am sorry; I should have included in that same category
Nos. 21 and 22, which are two letters of General Smuts in
1919. They ought to be added.

Then I have already dealt with No. 20, Mr. Churchill's book.
Apart from the question of extracts, again the prosecution
submits that it ought to be made clear what is the issue for
which that book has been quoted.

No. 23 is a missive of M. Tchitcherin, stated to be the
Foreign Commissar of the USSR, to Professor Ludwig Stein.
Again the prosecution has not the slightest idea as to what
is the issue to which that is directed.

The defendant Goering's book I have already dealt with, and
I ask that we should get extracts.

No. 28. General Fuller's book on "Total War" or an essay on
"Total War". Again the prosecution does not know the issue
to which it is directed.

Then my fifth category, No. 27, which is the "White Books of
the German Foreign Office".

I draw attention also to No. 4, document to the Anglo-French
policy of extending the war; No. 5, further document as to
the Western policy of extending the war; No. 6, secret files
of the French General Staff; No. 29, documentations and
reports of the German Foreign Office regarding breaches of
the Hague regulations for land warfare and crimes against
humanity committed by the powers at war with the German
Reich. These last documents seem to raise quite clearly the
issues of "tu quoque":  if the Reich committed breaches of
the laws and usages of war, other people did the same thing.
The submission of the prosecution is

                                                  [Page 258]

that that is entirely irrelevant. The standard is laid down
by the conventions and it is no answer, even if it were
true, that someone else had committed breaches. But, of
course, there is the additional reason, that it would be
quite impracticable and intolerable if this Tribunal were to
embark on the further task of investigating every
allegation, however tenuously founded, that some one else
had not maintained these conventions.

It is, in the submission of the prosecution - again I speak
for all my colleagues - a matter which is completely
irrelevant, and therefore we object to any evidence, whether
oral or documentary, intended on that point. Of course, we
all along have taken the view that we haven't any objection
to the defence counsel having access to these documents in
order to use them for refreshing their memory as to the
background, but we object to their introduction in evidence,
for the reasons that I have given.

THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, perhaps you could say in the
first instance whether you agree that, so far as the books
are concerned, you would be willing to provide the extracts
upon which you rely? You cannot expect the prosecution or
the Tribunal to get the whole books translated.

DR. STAHMER: This was not my intention either, and I believe
that I prefaced my list of documents with a remark to the
effect that I was willing to specify the quotations. To that
extent, of course, the objection in itself is in order.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I see. Very well.

DR. STAHMER: Another point the prosecution has attacked
concerns the books which I have cited which refer to the
Treaty of Versailles. Here also I will state specifically to
what extent I wish to use quotations from these books. As a
matter of principle, however, the defence must be granted
the right to present its point of view in this matter, since
after all -

THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Stahmer, as regards all these books which
Sir David referred to, of which the Tribunal will take
judicial notice, of course you can make comment upon them if
you wish, as on any document of which the Tribunal takes
judicial notice.

(The President confers with members of the bench.)

THE PRESIDENT: Oh, I thought you were referring to the
Treaty of Versailles.

DR. STAHMER: No, with the literature concerning the Treaty
of Versailles.

THE PRESIDENT: You are now dealing with the ones which Sir
David itemised as follows : 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16,
21 and 22?

DR. STAHMER: Yes.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well.

DR. STAHMER: Since an essential accusation made by the
prosecution is that the defendants violated the Treaty of
Versailles, the defence naturally has to take a stand
relative to the question as to whether and to what extent
the breach of the Treaty took place, and whether and to what
extent that Treaty was still valid. To that extent, at
least, the books and dissertations which deal with these
questions are important. I believe that an understanding of
this question in detail can be reached only after I have
submitted the quotations, and that will take place at the
beginning of the presentation of testimony. I have not been
able to finish the work involved.

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