Dr. Servatius: For all of them appear to be very neat, one on top of the other, and they do not at all create the impression that they have undergone the processing of paper work. Also, it appears from the statement, at the top, in English, "Summary", and which has been submitted as a supplement, that there are certain items here which do not correspond, such as, for example, the date of the consignment which was allegedly supplied in April 1945, and the invoice is for 1944. It is desirable that such matters be examined in the original.

And now, with regard to the evaluation of the documents. Here we have something very important. For Guenther appears here, in these documents. This concerns the subject of the doctors, it is connected with the doctors. This belongs to the "Ahnenerbe" (ncestral Heritage), the institution set up by Himmler for medical experiments, for so-called research, for such matters. At the head of this institution was a doctor named Sievers. Guenther appears here in another context, in matters which have a medical aspect in other documents as well - also elsewhere. And here, too, it says that it was the "Ahnenerbe," the Ancestral Heritage Institute established by Himmler, and which had a direct link with Guenther.

Also, from the document which Dr. Gerstein wrote in English - and it should be observed here, in parenthesis, that his wife declared, in fact, that he was not fluent in the English language but somehow found a way, nevertheless, of writing in English - he writes here as follows: "Many of responsables (sic) of Belsen, Buchenwald, Dachau" - he was there, and there were people "men of my service, daily I have seen them," and they were "from the Head Office of the SS, 'D', the Sanitary Service," the public health service. He was in contact with them by virtue of his authority as a Reich Physician of the SS and the police in Berlin. This explains, to some extent, the mutual relationships, the service channels.

It likewise says so in the summary which is in document No. 185, the English summary, in sections four and five. There, too, appear statements that explain a great deal. It says there that Dr. Gerstein was at the head of office D, the office for hygiene, since 1942, had dealt also with materials for disinfection and liquid cyanic acid - that was one of the disinfectant materials that were at his disposal. He was required to supply the concentration camp with liquid cyanic acid, so that they could use this acid there as disinfectant material. Subsequently came a long episode of his visit to Lublin with the commandant of the camp named Globocnik - although in the document it says Globocnek; it is specifically indicated that the man received his orders directly from Hitler and Himmler, and so forth. This is a most important detail for us and, therefore, I have no objection to the submission of this document.

Presiding Judge: That is to say, your argument will apparently be that whatever Guenther carried out here, he was not acting within the scope of IVB4?

Dr. Servatius: It also says there that Hitler and Himmler had direct contact with Guenther concerning all these medical matters; the line of communication in medical matters, medical experiments, and so on was directly between Hitler-Himmler and Guenther; and here, too, we have a direct contact.

Judge Halevi: But that is already a matter of weighing evidence, is it not?

Dr. Servatius: Yes, that is correct.

Attorney General: I think there is no objection to the admissibility of the document, but there are arguments concerning its weight and its evaluation.

Presiding Judge: We have heard both aspects, I believe. Dr. Servatius, what about these Swedish documents, Prosectution No. 1391?

Dr. Servatius: In this case, I have no objection to the submission of the document.

Presiding Judge:

Decision No. 71

By virtue of our authority under Section 15 of the Nazis and Nazi Collaborators (Punishment) Law 5710-1950, we admit in evidence the documents which include prima facie the statements of Dr. Gerstein, who is deceased, and also the documents which appear to have originated from him, and also the evidence of his widow. We shall deal with the probative value of these documents at the appropriate time.

Prosecution Exhibit No. 185 will be marked T/1309.

Prosecution Exhibit No. 1565 will be marked T/1310.

Prosecution Exhibit No. 1564 will be marked T/1311.

Prosecution Exhibit No. 1391 will be marked T/1312.

Attorney General: Now there remains only the inclusive document, containing a number of statements by Gerstein, authenticated together by the United States War Archives.

Presiding Judge: We have already marked that - is it not No. 185?

Attorney General: Document No. 185 is the first which contains the French statement, but after that...I beg your pardon, it has already been submitted and marked.

Presiding Judge: Is that the one you submitted as the affidavits of the two officers - in that form?

Attorney General: No, no, it has not yet been marked, Your Honour; the document is still before the Court.

Judge Halevi: What number?

Attorney General: I submitted it in one copy only.

Presiding Judge: You mean these authentications?

Attorney General: No, no. There are before the Court two affidavits by the two officers, and apart from that there is a consular authentication of the certificate of the War Archives - that is a completely different document; this is what I wish to submit as an exhibit, and I shall submit its various parts as separate exhibits.

Presiding Judge: Either you submit the parts, and then we shall mark them as you have submitted them...

Attorney General: That is our system of authentication, according to the parts.

Presiding Judge: Is it not No. 185?

Attorney General: No, it is not No. 185.

Presiding Judge: I think it is. Only the certificate of the counsellor of the Israel embassy is missing.

Attorney General: Perhaps the Court would allow me to approach your table. [Points out to the Presiding Judge.] This is what I am talking about - it is No. 185.

Presiding Judge: Where is this photostat?

Attorney General: Of No. 185?

Presiding Judge: [after examining it] Ah, that is in T/37; now we are going back to T/37.

Attorney General: Hence this is the original that I am asking you to admit and to allow me to submit its parts separately. It is T/37(184).

Presiding Judge: Where is the photostat of No. 185?

Attorney General: That is T/37(184) which has already been submitted, together with the statement [of the Accused to the police]. It has not yet been submitted [separately].

Presiding Judge: T/1309 was T/37(184), and what is this?

Attorney General: This is a document which does not contains any part in French, but consists entirely of an interrogation in English.

Presiding Judge: Must this receive a separate number?

Attorney General: This is my request, Your Honour.

Presiding Judge: What is your number for this document?

Attorney General: We have three numbers for this document: 1628, 1629, 1630, for it comprises three separate interrogations of Dr. Gerstein.

Presiding Judge: And you have not yet submitted copies of them?

Attorney General: We are ready to submit them immediately.

Presiding Judge: We shall mark the whole batch T/1313, and what you will submit from it will be given subsidiary numbers.

Attorney General: Thank you.

Presiding Judge: Are these also only statements by Dr. Gerstein?

Attorney General: Yes. All these three that I am submitting. I have already submitted No. 1628. Now I submit No. 1629.

Presiding Judge: Do you have another copy of No. 1628?

Attorney General: Are there not four copies before the Court?

Presiding Judge: Yes, that is right.

Attorney General: There is a photostat and three copies.

Presiding Judge: We have received a photostat and two copies.

Attorney General: There should have been three. I shall submit it immediately after I shall refer to it.

Judge Raveh: There are several pages here which it is almost impossible to read.

Attorney General: I know. The photocopy is a very bad one. One can rely only on the photostat. That is all that we were able to do.

Presiding Judge: No. 1628 will be marked T/1313(a).

No. 1629 will be marked T/1313(b). No. 1630 will be marked T/1313(c).

Attorney General: And now, would the Court permit me to draw its attention to a number of excerpts?

In T/1313(a), I have already drawn attention to what appears on page 12, where there is reference to Guenther's activity. In T/1313(b), it says that Guenther and his superior, Eichmann, were in charge of the extermination of the Jewish race.

Presiding Judge: Where is that?

Attorney General: On the third page - in the middle.

In T/1313(c) - this, too, I have already mentioned - on the last page, dealing with Gerstein's journey and with the order by Guenther to work out methods of poisoning in Belzec, using cyanide instead of a diesel engine.

Presiding Judge: That is in T/1313(c) - on what page?

Attorney General: On page 4.

Now I pass on to 1309. On page 2 Gerstein says: "On 8 June 1942, Sturmbannfuehrer Guenther came into my office..." He spoke of a journey to Lublin. The journey took place in August. And he relates what he discovered. "Globocnik said that on 17 August 1942 there were three installations in existence: one was at Belzec, on the Lublin-Lemberg line, in the area of the Russian demarcation line. The maximum number was fifteen thousand persons per day..."

Presiding Judge: On what page?

Attorney General: It is in French, on the first page at the bottom and at the top of the second page.

[Continues reading from the document ]

"Belzec - a capacity of 15,000 persons per day. Sobibor - I do not know exactly where, but I have seen it - 20,000 persons per day; Treblinka, 120 kilometres to the north-east of Warsaw, 25,000 per day. I have seen it! Majdanek, adjoining Lublin, seen in the stage of preparation. Globocnik said: `You will have to disinfect huge quantities of clothing, ten or twenty times the amount that was collected in the Textile Materials Collection; this must be done solely for the purpose of obliterating the sources of the clothing of the Jews, the Poles, the Czechs and so on.' "My second task would be to replace our installations of gas chambers - at present operated by the exhaust of an old diesel engine - to something more lethal and working more rapidly, namely cyanic acid. The Fuehrer and Himmler, who were here on 15 August - that was the day before yesterday - obliged me to accompany personally all those who had to see the installations.

"Professor Pfannenstiel said: `What actually did the Fuehrer say?' Globocnik, who is now the commanding officer of the police on the Adriatic Sea coast at Trieste, said: `This operation must be implemented more swiftly!' Dr. Herbert Lindner, of the Ministry of the Interior, said: `Would it not be more desirable to burn all these bodies instead of burying them? Maybe the next generation might have other ideas.' Globocnik: `Gentlemen, if indeed we are going to be succeeded by such a cowardly and weakling generation that will not understand the great task we are fulfilling, then, gentlemen, the whole of our National Socialism will have been in vain. On the contrary, together with the bodies we should have buried bronze tablets bearing the engraved inscription that we - we had the strength of purpose to carry out this tremendous assignment.' Hitler: 'Yes, my dear Globocnik, that is the right word - I am of exactly the same opinion!'

"On the following morning, we left for Belzec. A small special railway station, with two platforms at the foot of a yellow limestone hill, immediately north of the road and the Lublin-Lemberg railway line. To the south, near the road, there are a number of service buildings bearing the sign: 'Local Branch of the Armed SS, Belzec'...no dead were seen that day, but in the air all around, even on the road, there was a nauseating smell.

"Near the small railway station, there was a large hut marked 'Cloakroom,' with a wicket marked 'Valuables'. There was also a room with a hundred barber chairs, and then a passage a hundred and fifty metres long in the open, fenced with barbed wire on both sides, with signs: 'To the Showers' and 'Inhalation Establishments.' We come to a house, the bath-house, which is flanked at the right and left by large concrete flower pots with geraniums and other flowers. After going up some steps, we come to three rooms to our right and three to our left, like garages, 5x4 metres in area, 1.90 metres high. At the back, not visible, there are piles of wood. A brass Star of David is on the roof. At the front of the building there was a sign which read: 'The Heckenholt Foundation.' This is all I saw that afternoon.

"The following morning, a few minutes before seven, I am told that the first train will arrive in ten minutes. And, indeed, the first train from Lemberg did come a few minutes later. It was a train with forty- five cars, carrying 6,700 people, of whom 1,450 were already dead when they arrived. Behind the small openings with barbed-wire netting, we saw children, yellow, scared children, and men and women. The train reaches the platform. Two hundred Ukrainians serving as forced labourers, push the doors open and lash the people with whips off the train.

"Then orders are given over a large loudspeaker. They must undress completely in the open, some also in a hut, and also remove artificial limbs and spectacles. Shoes are to be tied together with a small piece of string, handed to them by a Jewish boy of four. All valuable objects and money must be handed in at the 'Valuables' counter. No confirmations or receipts are given in exchange. Later, the women and young girls must go to the barber's, where their hair is cut off in two or three strokes. The hair disappears into large potato sacks 'to be used for something special, for submarines as insulation, etc.' This is the explanation given by the Unterscharfuehrer on duty.

"The march begins. Barbed wire to the right and to the left, and, at the end, two dozen Ukrainians with rifles. Heading the marchers is an unusually pretty girl - thus they approach. I am standing in front of the death chambers with Police Captain Wirth. Men, women, young girls, children, babies, amputees missing a leg - all naked, stark naked - they pass near us. A SS man stands in the corner telling the miserable people in the voice of a preacher: `Nothing will happen to you. All you have to do is to breathe deeply. This inhalation is necessary because of infectious diseases. It is a good disinfectant.' When they ask about their fate, he explains: `Of course, the men will have to work, to build roads and houses, but the women do not have to work. At most, if they wish, they may help around the house or in the kitchen.' In the heart of some of these doomed people, there is once again a spark of hope, enough to make them walk into the gas chambers without resistance. But most of them know: the smell carries the tidings of their fate.

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