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Shofar FTP Archive File: people/e/eichmann.adolf/transcripts/Sessions/Session-093-01


Archive/File: people/e/eichmann.adolf/transcripts/Sessions/Session-093-01
Last-Modified: 1999/06/13

Session No. 93
28 Tammuz 5721 (12 July 1961)

Presiding Judge: I declare the ninety-third Session of the
trial open. The Accused will continue his testimony under
cross-examination. I remind the Accused that he is still
testifying under oath.

Accused:    I am aware of the fact.

Presiding Judge: Please proceed, Mr. Hausner.

Attorney General: In the statement by Dr. Rudolf Mildner
submitted by your Defence Counsel, document N/97, there
appears a definition of your powers in the Head Office for
Reich Security. Before I ask you about the substance, please
tell me whether it is true that Mildner was never hostile to
you, and that after the War you met in a friendly way.

Accused:    I was never on bad terms with Mildner.

Q.  Mildner, who must have known how things stood in the
Head Office for Reich Security, says here in two passages
that you were the Adviser on all Jewish matters of Himmler,
Kaltenbrunner and Mueller, and he says here that you were
the plenipotentiary - he uses the term Beauftragter -for
implementing all the measures which involved deportations to
camps, contacts with various governments and with Higher SS
and Police Leaders. I assume that you do not intend to
repudiate a document submitted by your own Counsel in your
defence?

A.  When my Counsel introduced this matter, I immediately
interrupted at this point - at this very point, and I
reacted to this, and I also replied to His Honour who
examined me more closely about this, that on this point
Mildner is mistaken, and this error can be demonstrated and
refuted by the actual documents.

Q.  It is not just one point - there are three or four
passages where this point appears.

A.  I would like to say the following on this - I am
referring only to those passages underlined by the
Prosecution. The first passage says: "Section IVBA, SS
Obersturmbannfuehrer Eichmann, a member of the Security
Service, from Department III, but for those duties seconded
to Department IV." I am not from Department III: I am
originally from Department II, which was Department VII, and
I was also not seconded, but transferred.

The next marked passage: "Advisor to Reichsfuehrer-SS
Himmler, the Chief of the Security Police and the Security
Service, Obergruppenfuehrer Kaltenbrunner, and also to
Department Chief IV, Gruppenfuehrer Mueller, on all Jewish
matters." I believe that this is the passage on which I
reacted when the document was submitted or discussed, by my
Counsel. I would state on this that I was neither advisor
nor a specialist officer to Himmler, nor to the Chief of the
Security Police for the Head Office for Reich Security as a
whole; but I was that for Department IV, for Gruppenfuehrer
Mueller, as can also be seen clearly from the organization
chart.

Next page:

     "The orders for deporting Jews in the Reich and in the
     areas occupied by Germany to labour and concentration
     camps were given by Reichsfuehrer-SS Himmler. The
     orders were signed by him and designated 'Secret State
     Matter'." Not all orders were signed by Himmler,
     although I do not know everything, as I received these
     orders from Mueller, but I believe that Heydrich
     himself issued orders as well; for example deportation
     orders. "They went through the Chief of the Security
     Police and the Security Service, Dr. Kaltenbrunner,
     previously Heydrich, to the Chief of Department IV of
     the Head Office for Reich Security, Gruppenfuehrer
     Mueller, and he discussed matters of implementation
     orally with the Chief of Group IVA, SS
     Obersturmbannfuehrer Eichmann, who was a member of the
     Security Service and was transferred from Department
     III to Department IV."

I would like to refer here to what I have already said about
III and IV, and I must also object to the word "discussion,"
because Mueller normally did not discuss, but issued
instructions.

Q.  I think there is here a misunderstanding of my question.
I did not ask you to analyze the document and indicate what
is correct or not correct in it. What I wanted from you is a
comment on Mildner's statement that you had a special
position in the Head Office for Reich Security, a position
which was not the same as that of the other Section Heads.

A.  No, that is not true, because here it says that I...

Q.  Then say "that is not true," that is the answer I want
from you. Say whether it is true or not true.

A.  It is not true.

Q.  Very well, not true.

A.  And I can prove it.

Dr. Servatius:  Your Honour, the Accused must be allowed to
explain his answer.

Presiding Judge: Dr. Servatius, it is not possible to lay
down rules here, as to when he is to give an explanation and
when not. These are very delicate matters. I believe it
would be perfectly sufficient in reply to this question for
him to say "not true," and he can provide any requisite
explanation in re-examination. Would you therefore please
take note of such points, and then you can raise the matter
of any explanation in the re-examination. That does not mean
that he will not be allowed to give explanations from time
to time, but obviously this must be kept within limits.

Dr. Servatius:  Your Honour, I believe it would be more
expedient for the explanation to be given immediately,
rather than this matter having to be dealt with again later,
which is very time-consuming.

Presiding Judge: You are right, I agree with your point, but
if we take this particular case, it would have been quite
sufficient for the Accused to say "yes" or "no" - in other
words, if he replies that he rejects the assertion, as he
did in this case.

Mr. Hausner, please proceed.

Attorney General: Would you please look at another document,
also submitted by your Counsel, N/5, statement by Karl Heinz
Hoffmann. He, too, was in a position to know what went on in
the Head Office for Reich Security, as he was one of its
employees. And he says that you always dealt with special
assignments, which came from the highest authorities. Is
that not true, either?

Accused:    No, because they wanted to clear themselves at
Nuremberg, and because both Mildner and Hoffmann too were
marginally involved with Jewish affairs, and because they
tried to shift all the blame from themselves. That is the
reason why all these testimonies sound the same.

Q.  If that is the case, let us take your Defence Witness,
Professor Six, who has only testified now and who no longer
has any blame to shift from himself. He said, "Eichmann's
Section occupied a special position," and on page 5 he says
that it is not possible to say that you were subordinate to
Mueller, but that rather your position was that you were
close to Mueller, that you were "somewhat on the same level"
as he. That is what it says here. Is what is said by the
witness whom you have called in your defence also not true?

A.  No, what he says here is also not true, because
otherwise the other witnesses would not have said one after
the other that I always obtained my instructions on every
petty matter, something which they themselves found very
strange...

Q.  I know that you always ensured that you were covered,
and Wisliceny who ascribed to you just as much as other
witnesses did, said that you had a special position and
special powers and were in a specially powerful position,
but that for formal reasons you always ensured you were
covered.

Presiding Judge: Very well, what is the question?

Attorney General: And is it not therefore true that you had
a special position, that in Jewish affairs you were the
Reichsfuehrung SS (the SS Reich leadership)?

Accused:    That is in no way true. What is true is what
appears in black and white in the organization chart. I was
not even directly subordinate to the Chief of the Security
Police and the Security Service, because on one or two pages
appear the persons who were directly subordinate to him. I
am not one of them.

Q.  And someone like Professor Six, your Defence Witness,
did not know this?

A.  I have no idea what Professor Six has been thinking for
the last fifteen years. But in any case this was shown then
and is still shown by the organization chart. An
organization chart is not an artificially erected structure:
it is a clear-cut fact.

Q.  Yesterday we ascertained, and we shall not return to
this today, that the Final Solution is not listed and
referred to as a special assignment in the organization
chart. I am interested in the actual situation, not the
formal one.

In the eyes of the Reich authorities and your associates you
were the person responsible for Jewish affairs, so much so
that in Jewish affairs you were the Reichsfuehrung SS.
Correct or not correct?

A.  That is not correct. It is possible that due to lack of
familiarity with the many organizations, one person may have
talked about the SS Main Office instead of the Head Office
for Reich Security, while someone else said "Reichsfuehrer-
SS" instead of the Chief of the Security Police and the
Security Service - a frequent error. Document No. 446 shows
very clearly that I am right when I say that I was not the
only person dealing with Jewish affairs in the Head Office
for Reich Security, because there the Head Office for Reich
Security was represented by the Group Leader in Department
II, Dr. Bilfinger.

Q.  We have already heard about that.

An official document from the German Foreign Ministry,
submitted by Ribbentrop - T/991, document No. 685 - with
reference to the position to be adopted on Germany's demands
to Mussolini on Jewish matters, opens with the words: "In
the opinion of the Reich SS Leadership - SS
OSbersturmbannfuehrer Eichmann" - that is to say, even in
the eyes of the German Foreign Ministry you were the Reich
SS Leadership on Jewish Affairs.

A.  No, this can also be readily refuted, Mr. Attorney
General, it is simply a question of considering the entire
process, and not just an isolated part of it as it is here.
The issue here is that the Foreign Ministry wanted to see a
concrete expression of the wishes of the Reich SS Leadership
- this was sent directly to the office of the then
Reichsfuehrer, Himmler, and since apparently the matter was
an urgent one, a representative of the Foreign Ministry made
a routine call to me.  I then checked back with my superiors
and telephoned the Foreign Ministry with the intermediate
reply.  Subsequently, as can be seen from the entire
procedure, I was assigned the task of drafting a document to
the Foreign Ministry, which was signed by my superior,
Mueller, and in this I had to cite extracts from letters
which I had not even received, which Ribbentrop had written
to Himmler directly.

That is the actual state of affairs, and that is also why it
says here "Reich SS Leadership," because it was not my will
as regards to implementing the wishes, it was Himmler's will
as to how to implement his wishes.  That is why it took so
long, and that is why the Foreign Ministry kept reminding me
impatiently that the Reich Minister for Foreign Affairs
should already have the decision in his possession.

Q.  Would you please look at the document - this does not
refer to any concrete expression of wishes - this document
also starts "Dear Party Comrade Eichmann...," but I shall
ask you about this later. Here an entirely different matter
is referred to - here the reference is to Greece.

A.  Well, that is true - I thought that it was the Italian
matter, but whether it is Greece or Italy - in principle it
is the same. I would point out that for Greece there is
further evidence available...

Q.  You have misunderstood the point of my question. In an
official document, which dates from the War, at a time when
no one could have intended to shift any blame on to you, an
official body describes you in a document submitted to
Ribbentrop as the Reich SS Leadership in Jewish Affairs. How
can you contest this?

A.  I do not need to contest this at all: I state that this
matter is a mistake and erroneous, because it does not fit
the facts. If it did fit the facts, I would have the courage
to admit it.

Presiding Judge: I want to understand this. If things are
not as the Attorney General has said, then how and why does
your name appear in this document? You will please answer
extremely briefly, because the more concisely you answer,
the better I will be able to understand you.

Accused:    Your Honour, I do not know how this form of
words came to be in these documents, and I would also point
out, Your Honour, that van Thadden, with whom I had constant
dealings, knew perfectly well - he always wrote to the Head
Office for Reich Security, Kurfuerstenstrasse 116, and in
special matters he did not even call me for information, but
contacted my superior, Mueller, directly. It must have been
ignorance of the real facts or some bureaucratic sloppiness,
which led to this reference to the Reich SS Leadership,
without giving the proper, correct term and referring to the
actual circumstances in due form.

Q.  The question is not why does it say here Reichsfuehrung
SS instead of Reichssicherheitshauptamt. The question is:
How does your name come to appear here in brackets?

A.  Because I definitely provided the information, Your
Honour.

Q.  In other words, you mean as someone who passed on
information.

A.  That is what I mean, Your Honour.

Presiding Judge: You could have said that more concisely.

Accused:    But I was not the person who passed on
information on behalf of the Reich SS Leadership, Your
Honour, that is what I was trying to say, to make things
clearer.

Presiding Judge: Very well, that will do.

Attorney General: And you really expect someone to believe
you when you maintain that you passed on information, that
you were a messenger boy, a megaphone, when the Foreign
Ministry called you "Reichsfuehrung SS"?

Accused:    There are 1600 documents here -

Q.  No, no - answer me.  Do you believe that anyone will
believe that?

A.  Yes, if people read the documents, they would believe
me.

Presiding Judge: I wish to say to the public that I cannot
and will not tolerate disturbances. There must be total
silence, and that must be quite clear. I do not wish to make
this point again.

Attorney General: Take just one of the 1,600 documents...

Judge Halevi:  I wish to draw the Accused's attention to
just one word. It does not say here "According to
information from the Reich SS Leadership"; it says "In the
opinion of the Reich SS Leadership - SS Obersturmbannfuehrer
Eichmann." How do you explain this?

Accused:    First of all, Your Honour, I did not indicate
any of my opinions, nor was I authorized to do so, and in
these cases I had to obtain the instructions of my
superiors. Secondly, I have just noticed that this was
dictated by Rademacher. Rademacher is known as a very
slipshod bureaucrat, who just wrote things down off the
cuff, as various documents have already shown.

Attorney General: Well, if Rademacher is so slovenly, take
another document. For example, let us take T/588, document
No. 1078, on Denmark.

At the beginning of the document it says, "Head Office for
Reich Security, SS Obersturmbannfuehrer Eichmann promised to
implement these proposals." In other words, for the person
who sent this telegram, and that is someone in an important
position, you were the Head Office for Reich Security on
Jewish Affairs.

Accused:    This should be understood in the following
fashion. If someone came to see me, or someone else from the
Reich Ministry of Economics and Finance, from whatever
section or department, the usual form of speech was: "He is
from - he represents the Reich Ministry of Economics and
Finance." And obviously if I was sent to Denmark, I was sent
by my Department Chief, with the approval and possibly also
by order of the Chief of the Security Police and the
Security Service, in other words by order of the Head Office
for Reich Security. I cannot find...I cannot find anything
at all in this in any way that does not fit in with this.

Q.  In other words, at that time Dr. Best in Denmark could
see you as the Head Office for Reich Security on Jewish
Affairs.

A.  Yes, he could hardly write that I was from Department
IV, that I was a Department IV man. The whole thing taken
together is the Head Office for Reich Security.

Q.  He does not refer at all to IV. For him you are the Head
Office for Reich Security as such.

A.  That is correct, and I did not criticize this either.
This is absolutely right, quite correct.


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