He will certainly be ably represented, and a member of the court is there.
DR. BERGOLD: Quite true. I quite understand Mr. Denny's point of view. However, if we were heard here during the intermission, he could exchange remarks with the defendant as to what other questions should be put, which if he is to be interrogated as we now have it planned, he cannot do.
MR. DENNY: He can, certainly. Judge Musmanno had a recess the other day and if Dr. Bergold plans to take all morning as is indicated, he will have such time at noon, and certainly Judge Musmanno would be willing to give him a little time at the end to go out and clear anything up.
DR. BERGOLD: That is quite agreeable to me.
THE PRESIDENT: I think opportunity will be given Dr. Bergold to consult his client during the taking of the testimony and that will be sufficient. The defendant will not be present.
DR. BERGOLD: Then I should like to have it arranged that I might be able to speak with my defendant briefly during the noon pause because as it is according to the regulations of Major Tiech, I cannot do so without special permission. Perhaps Major Tiech would be so kind as to permit that, that at noon I might speak briefly with the defendant.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, if the Major isn't so inclined, the Court will direct him to afford you that opportunity. The Court will recess until the day after tomorrow, February fifth at nine-thirty.
(The Tribunal recessed until 5 February 1947, at 0930 hours.)
Official Transcript of the American Military Tribunal in the matter of the United States of American, against Erhard Milch, defendant sitting at Nurnberg, Germany, on 5 February 1947, 0930-1700, Justice Toms, presiding.
THE MARSHAL: The Honorable Judges of Military Tribunal No. 2. This Tribunal is again in session. God save the United States of America and this Honorable Tribunal. There will be order in the Court.
DR. BERGOLD: (Attorney for defendant Erhard Milch).
May it please the Tribunal, the day before yesterday I read from Exhibit No. 54, of Document Book II C, Document NOKW 017. This is a long speech by the defendant which he held in front of the Fleet Engineer and Quartermasters General. It was shown from the various passages which I have read were difficult to find for the interpreters. I have now succeeded to trace the speeches in the English document book. I shall, therefore, offer the number of pages, in the English document book, of the passages which I have read.
The first passage was from page 115 of the English document book, and it started: "There are unfortunately exceptions," up to the end of that paragraph.
The next passage was on page 118 of the English Document Book and it begins: "Gentlemen: The most urgent and important question is the following:" It went to the point of "millions of substitute spare parts."
I shall now read from page 120 of the English document book, from the passage which says: "It is certain that in the whole period up to now, too many spare parts have been requested just in order to gather such hoards. And this in spite of the fact that not everything has been reached by far, but only very large stocks. I should like to say, with the material that you have, 20 to 30,000 could be newly built or newly equipped without further ado." This is as far as it goes.
Page 122 of the English document book, it begins: "Gentlemen:
In this connection I may call your attention to another important point. If I visit an office and find out that something is being hidden there, then I ask for the death penalty for such a crime today. That is a fraud. That is sabotage of the German armament industry." I shall show later through testimony of General Roeter that he had absolutely no authority to do this.
I shall continue on page 124; it begins: "It is a story in itself anyway, how idiotic the experts at the front are; in what an idiotic manner the work is often carried on in the entire military machine." On the same page, after the prosecution has read the sentence, it begins: "The soldiers are not in a position, as experience has shown, to cope with those fellows who know all the answers. I shall take very strict measures here and shall put such a prisoner of war before my court martial. If he has committed sabotage or refused to work, I will have him hanged right in his own factory. I am convinced that will not be without effect." It will be confirmed by General Roeter that this, too, was impossible.
I shall continue: "Anyhow, the strangest things occur in the treatment of workers. It is said that the people collapse and then one has to find out that they have a furlough of three or four days every eight weeks. That is dirty business of the first order and treason to the country. Then perhaps a construction battalion arrives and is supposed to be put to work. The commanding officer, perhaps some over-fed grade school teacher, declares that the man must drill and must take part in sports. Damn it, the fellows are there to work so that the maximum amount of work will result. One has to act very strictly here. There was a construction battalion ordered to Regensburg. The Commanding officer was one of those scholars who said he could not billet the men in peace-time conditions; therefore, he refused to start work. Such a guy should be convicted by a court martial and hanged."
Then I continue on page 126; which begins:
"Gentlemen: How stupidly we act and how much we harm our own cause is evident not only in the field of spare parts but also in that of machine tools."
And now I continue on page 129, where it begins: "Because between our people and the people of the troops there are certain difficulties which are apparent to everybody and which could give rise to discord. Perhaps some over-fed boy comes from the troops. He leaves already at four o'clock in the afternoon to visit a girl which he has somewhere in the vicinity, and to whom he makes love. He may have all kinds of decorations on his belly, and has a rather arrogant air at the workshop. There the civilians are standing; the civilians would have been on the shift since five o'clock in the morning and would get away only after eight or nine o'clock in the evening; in addition to this, there is also the lower pay. Here it is possible, if one does not put matters right immediately, to produce a bad morale permanently. One has to iron out these differences as quickly and as smoothly as possible. The quartermaster general and GL have already agreed that we are to balance the personnel. Also above all, it is necessary that the members of the troops be treated in exactly the same way as the industrial workers. It is an inadmissible situation when such a young fellow, hale and healthy, stands around idly and does not have any real work."
I continue on page 140 of the English document book. It begins: "There are no laws of bureaucracy, there are no regulations, there is nothing at all as important as the task of winning the war. The Jaegerstab is charge with the coordination of all the possibilities which lie in the Speer Ministry in order to aid the Luftwaffe armament industry. At the moment the one big aim of all these efforts is to banish the one big weapon, the one threat which is before us from the air and to bring it into line. The second is the question of the front, first of the Eastern Front, Southern Front, and possibly, if an invasion comes, another front.
All of the work in Germany, even for the land front, is futile if Germany is forced to her knees from the air in the next few weeks."
DR. BERGOLD: Page 152, the address by Mr. Von Seidel: "Field Marshal, I am very grateful that today's meeting took place, because, as far as I know, it is the first time during the war that all of the Chief Quartermasters and all of the air force engineers have met with the Gentlemen of the GL and with the only recently created Jaegerstab. I put high hopes in this meeting inasmuch as the offices which are not directly subordinate to me now realize what is at stake. I am convinced that the field offices, too, the commanding authorities, will co-operate in the same way in which the offices immediately subordinate to me have co-operated earlier and since the beginning of the Jaegerstab with industry, and that they will accomplish whatever is humanly possible, for the importance of the entire operation. Defense of the Reich has now become apparent to every child. That difficulties occur with the troops, especially in the subordinate offices, is just as obvious as difficulties in subordinate industry with one of the other little men. I ask you to be convinced that we, for our part, shall do everything that is at all humanly possible in order to help the troops in such a case.
"Milch: My dear Seidel, I thank you very much. I also thank all of the gentlemen from the auxiliary airfields. We are slowly turning into roughnecks. I can say that quite openly. I personally am happy that for once we can do that. For sometimes we were foaming at the mouth with rage, because everything could not be done and was not allowed, and that at a time when history is weighing us, whether we were up to the job or not. I hope that you personally will take enthusiasm, which we have now away with you, and that you can free yourselves from this terrible foggy atmosphere, this bureaucracy which surrounds us all. That you, too, will now say: all right, if those fellows now act crazy, we shall play along with them, not in order to do something stupid, but in order to set up something sensible. Gentlemen, the pleasure alone of punching the bureaucrats in the nose incites me to work twice as hard as before, and I believe, the way you are built, you will do the same.
"We do not want to overlook one thing; holy bureaucracy, represented by the mass of all the civil servants, is a burden which is so soft --you can **ess into it wherever you want, you never meet any resistance -- but also it ***o tough it is absolutely unbelievable; it always spreads out again, just when you think it has disappeared and release the pressure.
There are only a few governments and a few people in the history of the world, that we know of, where one of them once succeeded in tackling this gang. One has to attack them, in a united group, however. Their only strength is their stupidity, laziness, smugness, imbecility, which they all have in common. But we, as leaders, will have to teach them that now. We shall pinch them in the body till it hurts.
DR. BERGOLD: So far as this speech is concerned, you can see the purpose of this meeting. He wanted to expose these shirkers with these words, which he himself calls tough phrases. That's what he wanted to do. Now, Document Book 3-B of the Prosecution. I can't find it in the English Document Book. In Document Book, which is also not quite clear, it's on page 98. It seems to be an extract from the 21st meeting of the Central Planning Board, R-124. Perhaps I can help you by giving you the number of the page. It's page 1059. It's a speech by Speer on the question of Shirkers. It's page 1059 of Document R-124. In the index it's indexed as the 21st meeting.
It begins:
"SPEER The question of shirkers is another point which we must deal with. Ley has stated ---
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Bergold, what you are reading does not appear in the English Document Book. We have the minutes of the 21st Conference and we have page 1059 of the document, but in our document book Milch is speaking, not Speer.
DR. BERGOLD: That must be a mistake in writing. I am not 100% certain, but I examined that passage and it was a speech by Speer. There is also a speech by Milch on the same point, but this was said by Speer, and he testified to that fact as a witness.
THE PRESIDENT: The point is, we want to have a copy of what you are now reading furnished to us later to put into the document book.
DR. BERGOLD: I understand that, but I think that you have the passage. May I see the English document book?
I have received it from the Prosecution, and I shall bring it as I brought the other passages the day before yesterday, from the document book of the Prosecution and shall submit it to the court.
THE PRESIDENT? You will see that we get a copy of what you are about to read.
DR. BERGOLD: Yes, sir.
"Speer: The question of slackers is another point which we must deal with. Ley has stated that, where there were factory doctors and people are examined by these doctors, the figure of illness lowers by 1/4 or 1/5. SS and police could easily be rough here and arrest the people who are known to be slackers and send them to concentration camps. There is no other way. It need only happen a few times and everybody talks about it. 10,000 --"
This is Page 1062 in the German Document Book. "10,000 men fluctuate. You may suppose that half of them fluctuate with justification. The other half may be slackers. These slackers he have exactly the same way in the Army, the Navy, etc. They go from one office to the next. These anti-social elements should be given heavy work, and whoever runs away from that, will be sent to the concentration camp. That the police can do with its present force."
I shall now read Sauckel's speech which follows. I will read one sentence which begins, "The Fuehrer said this." The tenth line.
"This is what the Fuehrer said. If the French are not inclined to do so willingly, I shall recall the 800,000 prisoners of war. If they are well disposed, the French women may join their husbands in Germany and 649 work there."
That points out, Your Honors, that first of all at least 800,000 Frenchmen volunteered to go to the Reich because it was agreed that for every French volunteer they were given, one prisoner of war was to be released. At least 800,000 Frenchmen went voluntarily to work in the Reich in order to take over from there prisoners of war, and the figure of Sauckel of 200,000 has been proved to be incorrect.
Secondly, if Hitler later ordered forced labor, this happened because the prisoners of war were released conditionally. That is to say, in case of an emergency in France they could be recalled. Likewise from France German prisoners of War are also released conditionally by the French.
I shall now turn to the last book from which I shall read today. This is Prosecution Book 4. It is Exhibit No. 48D, R124, Hitler conference of 7 April 1944, and I shall read from Page 75 of the English document book the passage which begins -- it is after the figure 17 -"suggested to the Fuehrer."
"Suggested to the Fuehrer that, due to lack of builders and equipment, the second big building project should not be set up in German territory, but in close vicinity to the border on suitable soil, preferably on gravel base and with transport facilities, on French, Belgian or Dutch territory. The Fuehrer agrees to this suggestion if the works could be set up behind a fortified zone. For the suggestion of setting this plant up in French territory speaks mainly the fact that it would be much easier to procure the necessary workers. Nevertheless, the Fuehrer asks that an attempt be made to set up the second works in a safer area, namely in the Protectorate. If it should prove impossible there, too, to get hold of the necessary workers, the Fuehrer himself will contact the Reichsfuehrer SS and will give an order that the required 100,000 men are to be made available by bringing in Jews from Hungary. Stressing the fact that the building organization of the Industriegemeinschaft Schlesien-Silesia was a failure, the Fuehrer demands that these works must be built by the O.T. exclusively and that the workers should be made available by the Reichsfuehrer SS.
He wants to hold a meeting shortly in order to discuss details with all the men concerned."
That is the conclusion of my reading from the document books. I have quite a few documents which I shall submit for the record later on. Nor will I now read from book 5 of the Prosecution, which is the whole complex of the Dachau experiments, because I want to deal with that in connection with the witnesses I shall call in. I hope I shall have the Court's permission to do so. I would then, if I may, call the witness Koerner.
THE PRESIDENT: The witness may be produced.
MR. DENNEY: Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Denney.
MR. DENNEY: If Your Honors please, I just got the advice this morning from the Secretary-General this witness is going to be called. My understanding is that we are supposed to be advised twenty-four hours in advance. We certainly are willing to waive the notice in this case, but I would appreciate it if Dr. Bergold would advise the Secretary-General in writing in the approved manner, and the Secretary-General will advise me twenty-four hours prior to the time the witness is to be called. Dr. Bergold told me that he will tell me, but I don't want to rely on that. The prescribed procedure is that he will notify the Secretary-General in writing, so we can be advised, twenty-four hours prior to the time the witness is going to take the stand. I would rather rely on the usual channels.
DR. BERGOLD: May I say something about this. I was given the list, and asked to write into the list, on which day and which hour I shall call the witness. I have done so. I thought that this would have been the information desired. I believe that that was the understanding. I thought that came from the Secretary-General. It must have been a misunderstanding.
MR. DENNEY: The Secretary-General may have sent something to Dr. Bergold but nothing to me. I am just asking that he advise me when he is going to call his witnesses and in accordance with the rules.
DR. BERGOLD: I will do so in the future.
THE PRESIDENT: The Court wishes to say to the Secretary-General that he must insist on this regulation.
PAUL KOERNER, a witness, took the stand and testified as follows:
THE PRESIDENT: The witness will raise his right hand, please, and repeat 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 BY DR. BERGOLD:
Q. Witness, will you please give the Court your full name, Christian end second name, your date of birth, and your former occupation?
A. My name is Paul Koerner. I was born on 2 October 1893. My position was Undersecretary of State of the Prussian Ministry of State, and, from October 1936 onward I was, in addition, the Secretary of the Four Year Plan.
Q. Witness, do you know the defendant Milch?
A. Yes.
Q. Is he present in this court?
A. Yes.
Q. Will you point him out to me?
DR. BERGOLD: Now I would like to ask to show in the record that the witness had identified the defendant.
THE PRESIDENT: The record will indicate that the witness has identified the defendant.
BY DR. BERGOLD:
Q. Witness, since when do you know Mr. Milch?
A. I know for certain that I met him first in 1928.
Q. Do you know what Milch was doing at the time?
A. Milch was the director of the German Lufthansa.
Q. Did you have connections with him officially, or how did you meet him?
A. I met him in 1928 when I saw Hermann Goering in his work, and helped him in that work. Hermann Goering was then the Deputy of the Reichstag, and furthered, as a special task, the interests of aviation.
Q. Did he meet the defendant for that purpose?
A. He occasionally met Goering.
Q. What purpose did these meetings serve?
A. As Goering presided over the Reichstag Committees on aviation on behalf of the Party, he informed himself, whenever it was necessary, on these questions.
Q. What was the purpose of these conversations?
A. In this conversation he merely discussed German civil aviation, and the work of German aviation in the International field.
Q. In these talks was secret armament discussed at all?
A. Never.
Q. Were these talks prior to 1933?
A. As I said before, occasional conversations took place after 1928, and only when it was necessary to do so.
Q. After 1933 did you have connections with the defendant in your official capacity before the war broke out?
A. We did not meet in our official capacities. Our field and the work were completely separated from one another.
Q. Did there at that time exist official connections between tho Four Year. Plan and the General Inspector of the Lufthansa, as well as the other Secretary of State for Aviation?
A. There was no official contact between those authorities.
Q. When did you and the defendant Milch contact each other officially again?
A. Only when I was called to the Central Planning Special Board in the Spring of '42.
Q. By whom was tho Central Planning Board created, and who ordered it?
A. The Central Planning Board was created in the Spring of 1942 on order by Speer, who had conferred with Hitler on this issue previously.
Q. Why was the defendant Milch taken into the Central Planning Board?
A. As far as I can remember the Fuehrer wished that Milch should join this committee.
Q. Who issued the decrees?
A. As far as I Can remember, the legal decree has not been issued at all. All that happened was that Goering's consent for the creation of this committee was secured, and it was the natural course of that because the basic task of the Central Planning Board was a distribution of raw material, which up to that time was managed by the Four Year Plan in collaboration with the Reichsministry of Economics.
Q. What purpose was there in taking you into the Central Planning Board.
A. It was obvious that Goering demanded that I should join the Central Planning Board, because up to that time I supervised the distribution of raw material as Undersecretary of State in the Four Year Plan. Particularly I was to look after the interests -- the actual interest of the Four Year Plan.
Q I would now ask you to describe carefully what tasks the Central Planning Board had to execute.
AAs I said before, the Central Planning Board was created in order to supervise the distribution of raw materials. That means that the Central Planning Board generally met every three months, in order to arrange the distribution for the next quarter and to establish it.
Q Did the Central Planning Board also have the task of distributing labor?
A Never. I have been asked this quite often before, and. I have always spoken about this in detail. Once it was before the Tribunal, and in repeated interrogations.
Q But, witness, there were meetings within the Central Planning Board on the question of the distribution of labor. Why were these called together, and what purpose did they serve?
A These talks took place, yes. As far as I remember, in 1943 and particularly in 1944, the Central Planning did deal with those questions, because Speer had now become responsible for the whole German economic system, and he wanted to be informed on this particularly vital question, especially in reference to his armament industry.
Q Did Sauckel attend these meetings?
AAs far as I can recall, Sauckel was present.
Q Did the Central Planning Board have the right to give orders to Sauckel concerning the distribution of labor?
A The Central Planning Board had not the right to give Sauckel any orders or rules. Such orders were never given. As I said before, these meetings were held purely for purposes of information and particularly, because Speer wanted to be informed on the particularly urgent questions and wanted to form an opinion and impression on the whole position. As is well known, there did not exist a very good relationship between Speer and Sauckel. Speer wished in these talks to be informed on the whole complex of these matters in order, if and when necessary, to call attention to mistakes.
Q Did Speer attempt to be able to give Sauckel orders?
A This attempt was made by Speer in 1942, but he never succeeded. For that reason, there was once a conversation in Hitler's presence between Speer and Sauckel. Hitler took Sauckel's part, and that settled the question once and for all.
Q The Central Planning Board, however, did discuss matters of small numbers of labor. Can you recall that once you discussed French smelting workers?
A If such questions were brought up in Central Planning Board, it was only in order to find a solution in particularly difficult cases of bottlenecks. As far as I can recall, this case that you just mentioned, was as I have described it just now.
Q Witness, I shall now give you a so-called business order of the Central Planning Board which comes from the document book of the Prosecution. I would ask you -
MR. DENNEY: May we know what the witness is being shown?
DR. BERGOLD: Yes, certainly. It is a letter from Schieber, dated 20 October 1942, page 3044 of the document book R-124. It is in document book 3-B.
THE PRESIDENT: Did you give us the page number, Mr. Denney?
MR. DENNEY: It is page 1 of document book 3-B.
BY DR. BERGOLD:
Q Witness, did you read those documents?
A I have read them for the first time now. I certainly did not know up until this moment this letter which I am alleged to have signed, and I may say that I certainly did not sign this letter.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Bergold, the document that we are looking at does not purport to be signed by this witness, but by Walter Schieber.
DR. BERGOLD: Would you go a few pages further, your Honor? There is an accompanying letter. The statute is attached to this letter, and it says Milch, Speer, Koerner. I don't know in what sequence they are.
THE PRESIDENT: All right, we have it on page 3.
BY DR. BERGOLD :
Q Witness, what do you think was the history of this document, if you have not signed it?
A I could well imagine that Speer ordered Schieber, who worked on these things for him, to draw up such a letter, such statutes, and after Speer had taken notice of it and a proved it, he gave permission to circularize it. I must assume that the signatures of the three members of the Central Planning Board were noted on the letter, and that Speer as certain to have intended later to obtain our signatures, but it is definite that this never happened, for I would certainly recall such a letter, without a doubt.
Q Witness, would you have signed these statutes because you agreed with the purposes and aims of Central Planning?
AAs I can see the statutes now, I would never have been able to sign them without Goering's consent, as it represents a very essential change in our original tasks. The Central Planning Board, as I said before, was there only to distribute raw materials, and if it had ever been given such an important task as is contained in those statutes here, Goering would have had to give his consent first.
Q Within the Central Planning Board, was the extension of powers ever discussed?
A Never. Should it have been discussed, I would certainly recall this whole business now, and surely these statutes would have been submitted to me.
Q Was the question of statutes ever discussed in the Central Planning Board?
A I can recall very well that, when the Central Planning Board was created, I was the man who pointed out to Speer and asked Speer whether it would be right to draw up some statutes for the Central Planning Board. Speer declined and pointed out that this would not be necessary, as the task of distributing raw materials was quite clearly defined.
Q Witness, you said that you represented the interests of the Four Year Plan?
A Yes.
Q What did Milch have to do with the Four Year Plan?
AAs I said before, nothing at all. The tasks of the Four Year Plan were in a completely different field from those of Milch, and thus, we could not have had anything to do with each other.
Q I shall now talk about Sauckel. Who gave Sauckel the order to be Plenipotentiary for Labor?
A In the spring of 1942 Sauckel was appointed as Plenipotentiary for the Distribution of labor.
Q Would you speak a little more slowly, witness.
A Sauckel, in the spring of 1942, by the Fuehrer's decree, was appointed Plenipotentiary for the Distribution of Labor. Formally, Sauckel was, on the basis of this decree, under the Four Year Plan. In reality, however, Sauckel had nothing to do with the Four Year Plan, as he received his orders directly from Hitler.
Q This formal subordination of Sauckel to the Four Year Plan, did that lead to a connection with the Central Planning Board?
A No, in no respect.
Q Who was responsible for the hiring of workers?
A Only Sauckel.
Q Who was responsible for the recruitment?
A Only Sauckel.
Q Transport?
A Only Sauckel.
Q Billetting?
AAs far as I know, there existed between Sauckel and the German Labor Front an agreement which was responsible for the social care of foreign workers. I cannot give any more precise information, because the details are not known to me.
Q Was the German Labor Front to be responsible for billeting, feeding, health services, payment, clothing, leisure, and recreation?
A. As I said before, I am not aware of the details of that agreement, but in any case I know that the whole of the social care was looked after by the German Labor Front.
Q. Was this to the advantage or disadvantage of the foreign workers?
A. As far as I know, it was only to their advantage.
Q. What did you hear about the treatment of foreign workers in Germany?
A. I know nothing of any complaints. I never received any complaint.
Q. In what way did Sauckel bring the workers to the Reich? Were they brought on the basis of force or on the basis of volunteers?
A. As far as I knew, these workers came completely voluntarily to the Reich.
Q. Were there agreements with the French Government?
A. I do not know the details of such agreements. I only know what is known generally and what was published in the press.
Q. Did you hear that between French prisoners of war and French workers who volunteered to go to Germany there was an exchange arranged and carried out?
A. As far as I can remember there was between Sauckel and the French Government an agreement which arranged for an exchange between prisoners of war and French workers.
Q. Witness, I have just been asked to have a half-minute interval between question and answer and vice versa so that the interpreters can manage better. Will you please observe this.
Q Witness, do you recall that, in the meeting of 1 March 1944, Sauckel said that from among the 5,000,COO foreign workers, hardly 200,000 came voluntarily to the Reich? Do you know that?
A That question has been put to me in various interrogations, and therefore I knew it. I do not doubt that Sauckel, in a meeting, has said such a thing. If he said so, he based himself, without doubt, not on facts.
Q Is it known to you that before Sauckel, a bigger number of foreign workers came, in bigger numbers, to the Reich?
A Yes, I know that.
Q Can you tell the Court what figures were approximately involved?
A I can't give figures at this point very precisely, but in any case, in the German distribution of labor, even before Sauckel took over that assignment, there were always a considerable number of foreign workers. These workers were -- all of them -- recruited on the voluntary basis and brought to Germany.
Q Witness, the term "considerable" is a bit vague. It is quite understandable that you can't be speaking in terms of exact numbers, but are the figures about 200,000, or much bigger?
A If my memory serves no right, it is a very much bigger figure. It may have, as far as I can remember, gone beyond the million limit.
DR. BERGOLD: May it please the Court, I would like to ask something. I should like to give the witness a passage of the 54th meeting of the Central Planning Board of 1 March 1944, which is not yet in the document books of the prosecution, and which I will submit in my new document book. This passage I was given only on Saturday. It hasn't been possible since Monday to obtain copies from the department concerned. The Secretary General and I have made every effort, but there was another, more urgent, work to be done at the American authorities. For that reason the translation is not ready yet. I would like to ask permission to be allowed to read this passage to the witness, so that it may be in on the records, and perhaps tomorrow or in a very few days, I shall submit the original.