Archive/File: imt/tgmwc/tgmwc-13/tgmwc-13-120.12
Last-Modified: 2000/02/14

DR. DIX: May I begin with my documents? I can make the
presentation of documents very brief and I am sure that I
will conclude it before the end of the session, because I
had an opportunity to submit a large portion of my documents
during the interrogation of witnesses. May I make the
general request to take judicial notice of everything I have
not read and everything I do not propose to read. In this
connection, I should like to point out that the entire
contents of my document book have, with one exception,
either been submitted or will be submitted now as exhibits.
The exception, the document which has not been submitted, is
Exhibit 32. That is the frequently mentioned article of the
Basler Nachrichten of 14th January, 1946. Exhibit 32, which
for the reasons mentioned yesterday, has not been and will
not be submitted by me.

I come now to volume one of my document book, to the
exhibits which have not been submitted yet; that is, first
Exhibit No. 5, Adolf Hitler's Reichstag speech, 23rd May,
1933. That exhibit was read by Schacht in the course of his
interrogation and is now being submitted.

                                                   [Page 94]

I further submit Exhibit 23, the letter from Schacht to
Goering, of 30th November, 1942. Although that letter has
been submitted by the prosecution, we submit it again, and
for the following reasons: In the copy which was submitted
by the prosecution, the date and the year was left out and,
of course, as it has been translated literally, also in our
copy. However, a confirmatory note by Professor Kraus based
on the testimony given by Schacht has enabled us to make a
note on it to the effect that it must be the letter of 30th
November, 1942, because it was that letter which caused the
dismissal in January, 1943- It is only submitted in order to
make it easier for the Tribunal to ascertain the date. That
was Exhibit 23.

Then I wish to submit Exhibit 27. I am not going to read it.
I only ask you to take judicial notice of it. That is the
address given by Dr. Schacht at the celebration meeting of
the Reich Economic Chamber of January, 1937.

Then I submit Exhibit 29, excerpts from the book by
Gisevius, which we want to put in evidence and I ask you to
take judicial notice. I will not read anything.

Exhibit No. 33, in my Document Book is a letter from a
certain Morton, a former citizen of Frankfurt on Main, who
emigrated to England, a man who was highly respected in
Frankfurt. The letter is directed to the Treasury Solicitor
in England and we have received it here from the
prosecution. I also ask that judicial notice be taken of its
contents and want to read only one sentence on the last
page. I quote:

  "I last heard from Schacht indirectly. Lord Norman, who
  was then Mr. Montagu Norman, Governor of the Bank of
  England, told me confidentially in 1939, shortly before
  the outbreak of the war, that he had just come back from
  Basle where he had seen Schacht, who sent me his
  greetings. Lord Norman also told me that Schacht, who bad
  returned to Germany from Basle, was in great personal
  danger as he was very much in disgrace with the Nazis."

That concludes Volume I of my Document Book and I pass on to
Volume II, which begins with the affidavits. I must go
through the individual affidavits, but I shall not read any.

The first is Exhibit No. 34, which has frequently been
quoted, the affidavit of the Banker and Swedish Consul
General, Schniewind, who is at present in Munich. It is a
very instructive and very exhaustive affidavit and in order
to save time - there are eight pages which would take up a
lot of time - I will confine myself to what I have read from
this affidavit; I ask the Tribunal to take judicial notice
of the remainder. It has already been submitted. However, I
still have to submit Exhibit 35, which has not yet been
submitted. I beg your pardon, but it has been submitted
before. It is the affidavit of Dr. Franz Reuter. I submitted
it when I spoke here about the tendentious nature of this
biography. I ask you to take judicial notice of the rest of
this affidavit.

The next Exhibit 36, is an affidavit by Oberregierungsrat,
Dr. von Scherpenberg, formerly Embassy Counsellor at the
Embassy in London, afterwards departmental chief at the
Foreign Office and now at the Ministry of Justice in Munich,
the son-in-law of Dr. Schacht. I have read a passage and I
ask that judicial notice be taken of the unread portion.

The next Exhibit 37-A. It has been submitted. Here also a
passage on Page 154 of the German text has been read, about
the warning signal given abroad when Schacht resigned as
Reichsbank President. I ask that judicial notice be taken of
the remainder.

The next affidavit is by the same gentleman, who was also a
colleague of Dr. Schacht in the Reichsbank Directorate at
the same date as the witness Vocke, whom we have just heard.
I submit it. There is no need to read anything. I only ask
you to take judicial notice of its contents.

                                                   [Page 95]

The next affidavit, 37-C, is by the same gentleman, and has
already been submitted. I ask you to take judicial notice of
its contents. There is no need to read anything.

The next Exhibit 38, an affidavit by General Thomas. It has
not been submitted yet, and I submit it now and ask to be
permitted to read one passage, beginning on the first page,
that is, Page 172 of the English text and Page 164 of the
German text.

  "Question: Schacht claims to have influenced Blomberg to
  delay rearmament. Can you give any information on this
  matter? When was it?
  
  "Answer: I was Chief of the Army Economic Staff, that is
  the Army Economic and Armament Office at the Supreme
  Command of the Wehrmacht (OKW), from 1934 to the time of
  my dismissal in January, 1943. In this capacity I had
  connection with the Reich Minister of Economic Affairs
  and Reichsbank President Hjalmar Schacht. Up till 1936
  Schacht undoubtedly promoted rearmament by making
  available the necessary means. From 1936 on he used every
  opportunity to influence Blomberg to reduce the tempo and
  extent of rearmament. His reasons were as follows :
     1. Danger to the currency.
     
     2. Insufficient production of consumer goods.
     
     3. Danger to foreign relations, which Schacht saw in
     the excessive armament of Germany.
  
  Concerning the last point he frequently spoke to Blomberg
  and me and said that on no account must rearmament be
  allowed to lead to a new war. These were also the reasons
  which led him to hold out to Blomberg in 1936 and again
  in 1937 the threat that he would resign. On both of these
  occasions I was delegated by Blomberg to dissuade Schacht
  from carrying out his threat to resign. I was present
  during the conference between Blomberg and Schacht in
  1937."

I ask you to take judicial notice of the remainder of that
affidavit by General Thomas.

The next Exhibit is 39, and parts of it have been read, that
is to say, the part Schacht played in the incident of 2oth
July together with General Lindemann, the affidavit by
Colonel Gronau. I ask the Tribunal to take judicial notice
of the remainder.

The same applies to the next Exhibit 40. That is a sworn
statement, also by a colleague of Schacht in the Finance
Ministry, Dr. Asmis, now in retirement. I have also read
parts of this already, namely the passages concerning the
happenings at the time of the dismissal as Minister of
Economics; and I ask you to take judicial notice of the
remainder.

Then we come to Exhibit 41, which is the affidavit by State
Secretary in retirement, Karl Christian Schmidt. I have not
yet read anything and I ask to be permitted to read two
passages.

The first one is on Page 182 of the German text; Page i go
of the English text:

  "When the Bruning Cabinet, which had been arranged by
  General von Schleicher" - That is not legible. I think
  that should be different, but that is not legible - "When
  that was torpedoed by Schleicher himself, Schacht
  considered the early appointment of Hitler as head of the
  Government to be unavoidable. He pointed out that the
  great mass of the German people said 'Yes' to National
  Socialism, and that the left as well as the centre had
  come to a state of complete, passive resignation. The
  short life of the transition Cabinets of Papen and
  Schleicher was clear to him from the very beginning.

  "Schacht decisively advocated the co-operation in
  National Socialism of men experienced in their respective
  fields, without acceptance of its programme as a whole,
  which he always referred to ironically - later frequently
  called it a really bestial ideology in conversation with
  me; but he held that the influencing of developments from
  important inner-power positions was an

                                                   [Page 96]

  absolute patriotic duty, and he strongly condemned
  emigration and the resort to easy armchair criticism."

And then on Page 184 of the German text, 192 of the English
text, two very short passages:

  "I recall numerous talks with Dr. Schacht in which he
  stated that war was an economic impossibility and simply
  a crazy idea, as, for instance, when he was in Mulheim at
  the house of Dr. Fritz Thyssen, who was, closely
  associated with Goering and Hitler before 1933, but was
  in strong opposition from 1934 on, and who also opposed
  any idea of war as madness."

And then, further down on the same page, only one sentence:

  "When Schacht spoke to me he used to refer ironically to
  the Himmler-Rosenberg Lebensraum plans against Russia as
  an example of the mad presumption of extremist circles.
  Schacht's special fad was an understanding with England."

and so on; and I ask you to take judicial notice of the
remainder of the document. The same applies to the whole of
Exhibit 42, an affidavit by the director of the Upper
Silesian Coke Works, Berkenmeyer.

I come now to Exhibit 43. That has already been submitted
and read in part. It is the correspondence between the
publisher of Ambassador Dodd's Diary and Sir Neville
Henderson. I ask you to take judicial notice of the part not
yet read, and whatever comes after Exhibit 44 has been
submitted. I ask you to take judicial notice of its
contents, and I forgo the reading of it.

That brings me to the end of my presentation in the case of
Schacht.


THE PRESIDENT: Now the Tribunal will continue the case
against the defendant Funk.

DR. SAUTER (Counsel for Funk): Mr. President, with your
permission, I call first the defendant Dr. Funk himself to
the witness box.

WALTER EMANUEL FUNK, a witness, took the stand and testified
as follows:

BY THE PRESIDENT:

Q. Will you state your full name, please?

A. Walter Emanuel Funk.

Q. Will you repeat this oath after me:

I swear by God, the Almighty and Omniscient, that I will
speak the pure truth and will withhold and add nothing.

(The witness repeated the oath.)

THE PRESIDENT: You may sit down.

DIRECT EXAMINATION

DR. SAUTER: Mr. President, may I begin with one observation:
The defendant Funk has been a sick man for many years now,
and before he came into the prison he had been in hospital
for some time. He was supposed to undergo an operation,
which, however, due to conditions at the time, could not be
carried out. He still is under medical treatment. In
consideration of that fact and because the defendant is
extremely anxious to make his own defence as short as
possible, I shall put only those questions to the defendant
which are absolutely necessary to give you a clear picture
about his person and his activities.

BY DR. SAUTER:

Q. Witness, when were you born?

A. On the 18th of August, 1890.

Q. So you are now 56?

A. Yes.

                                                   [Page 97]

Q. First, I want to put to you the most important
particulars of your life, and to simplify matters you can
answer only with yes or no.

You are 56 years old. You were born in East Prussia?

A. Yes.

Q. You come from a merchant's family in Konigsberg?

A. Yes.

Q. Then you studied in Berlin at the University, law and
political science, literature and music. You also come from
a family which has produced a number of artists?

A. Yes.

Q. During the first World War you were first in the
Infantry, and in 1916, because of a bladder ailment you
became unfit for service?

A. Yes.

Q. Then you became an editor of several large newspapers,
and you told me that for a long time you could not make up
your mind whether to become a musician or a journalist. Then
you decided in favour of the latter, and in 1922, I believe,
you became editor-in-chief of the Berliner Boersenzeitung Is
that all correct?

A. Yes.

Q. Now perhaps you will tell us what were the political
tendencies of that paper on which you worked for about ten
years as editor-in-chief.

A. The tendency of the paper was somewhere between the
centre and the right. The newspaper was not tied to any
Party. It was owned by an old Berlin family of publishers.

Q. What was the attitude of that paper to the Jewish
question before you took on the editorship and during the
time when you were editor-in-chief?

A. Absolutely neutral. It did not deal in any way with the
Jewish question.

Q. From an affidavit by Dr. Schacht, I have seen that at
that time - that is to say, during the twenties - you moved
in circles which were also frequented by Jews, and where
economic and political matters, such as gold currency, etc.,
were often discussed. Is that correct?

A. I do not know anything about that.

Q. Dr. Schacht has asserted that in an affidavit of 7th
July, 1945, Document PS-1936?

A. I had a lot to do with Jews. That was in the nature of my
profession. Every day at the Stock Exchange I was amongst
about 4,000 Jews.

Q. Then in 1931 you resigned your post as editor-in-chief?

A. Yes.

Q. What were the reasons for that?

A. I was convinced that the National Socialist Party would
come to power in the Government, and I felt called upon to
make my own political and economic opinions heard in the
Party.

Q. Would you like to explain a little more in detail what
kind of opinions you had, Dr. Funk, especially concerning
the clashes between parties, between classes at that time?

A. The German nation at that time was in sore distress;
spiritually as well as materially. The people were torn by
Party and class struggle. The Government, or rather the
Governments, had no authority. The parliamentary system was
played out, and I myself, for ten or twelve years before
that, bad protested and fought publicly against the burden
of the Versailles reparations, because I was convinced that
those reparations were the chief cause of the economic
bankruptcy of Germany. I, myself, have fought all my life
for private enterprise, because I was convinced that the
idea of private enterprise is indissolubly bound up with the
idea of the efficiency and worth of individual human beings.
I have fought

                                                   [Page 98]

for the free initiative of the entrepreneur, free
competition, and, at that time in particular, for putting an
end to the mad class struggle and for the establishment of a
social national community on the basis of the industrial
community.

All those were ideas to which I found a ready response in my
conversations, particularly, with Gregor Strasser.

Q. Who was Gregor Strasser, would you tell the Tribunal
briefly?

A. Gregor Strasser at that time was leader of the Reich
Organization Bureau of the National Socialist Party and was
generally considered to be the second man after Adolf
Hitler.

THE PRESIDENT: This is the time to break off.

(The Tribunal adjourned until 4th May, 1946, at 1000 hours.)

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