AFTERNOON SESSION (The Tribunal reconvened at 1345 hours, 15 October 1947).
THE MARSHAL:The Tribunal is again in session.
THE-PRESIDENT: You may proceed.
OTTO OHLENDORF - Resumed CROSS EXAMINATION (Continued) BY MR. WALTON:
QGeneral, just-prior to the lunch hour, I would like to redirect your attention to the document which we were discussing at that time, and it is contained in Document Book II-C, Page 16 of the English, Page 18 of the German, and it is Document NO-2952, Prosecution's Exhibit 71. I should like to call your particular attention to Paragraph 5 headed "Jews". In your comments last Thursday you stated that these forty-five Jews were executed as a counter-measure. By this do you mean that they were executed - I am sorry.
AI beg your pardon. I only stated my argument following the document.
QLet me ask you, do you have before you Paragraph 5 headed as a subject "Jews"?
AYes.
QBy your comments do you mean that they were executed in retaliation for attacks on German military personnel?
AIt can be seen from the document, yes.
QNow, was some of the Security Police directives, disobedience to which could bring death, failure to register as a Jew?
AI should think that in this connection it might mean one had not stayed at home in the evening. They are precaution-measures in order to avoid attacks by the military, which is a presumption which cannot be taken from the document.
QDid a summary court or other court act on the cases of these forty-five Jews in that document? Would you state as a matter of general knowledge that they would?
AI cannot imagine at all.
QIs it a matter of general policy that no court of any kind acted on cases where Jews were to be shot in reprisal?
AI think here you have to follow the argument as I started it, that on principle there was an order that regular courts were to he excluded.
QNow, let us consider next Document Book II-D, Page 41 in the English and the German Page 43, Document NO-4135, being Prosecution's Exhibit 91, and in this same document book, Page 45 of the English, Page 48 of the German, which is Document NOKW-587 and is Prosecution's Exhibit 92.
MR. WALTON:May it please the Tribunal, Document NO-4135 shows at the top of Page 41 the date 10 July 1941. The photostat copy of the original shows this date to be 14th of July, 1941, and the German document books so give it. I now ask your Honors to make correction of this typographical error.
THE PRESIDENT:It will be corrected. BY MR. WALTON:
QNow, General, in your direct examination you stated that these two documents offer strong contradiction. I invite your close attention once more to these two documents. In NOKW-587 it was reported to the I-C of Army Group South that Einsatzkommando 10-B shot 500 Jews, among whom was the Jewish leadership. Now, when we consider Page 41 of the English, Page 43 of this same document book, where you found Document NO-4135, it shows the situation which prevailed about the same time in Czernowitz as the report to I-C of the Army Group South shows, does it not?
AIt seems to cover the same period of report.
QYes. At one-point in your testimony you stated that the SD had no prisons as you were immediately behind the fighting front, did you not?
AI beg your pardon; because?
QAt one point in your testimony you stated that the SD had no prisons as you were immediately behind the fighting front, did you not?
ANo, not for that reason. That must be said in another connection. In Czernowitz not the SD but the Einsatzkomnando there did not have any prisons but the Rumanians had them because the Rumanians were in charge of that city.
QAnd did Einsatzgruppe D ever take any prisoners?
AOf course, but only temporarily.
QYes.
AThat is not prisons.
QDid your gruppe ever interrogate prisoners of war and civilian prisoners?
AI do not want to deny that, although I cannot remember any individual case, but surely there would have been P.W.'s as well as certainly civilian prisoners because if they were suspected of a crime they had to be examined.
QNow, how were these persons incarcerated while the series of interrogations were in progress?
AFor example, in Czernowitz there was a house which was a prison.
QWas it ever possible to keep those prisoners that you had not finished interrogating in Army prisoner-of-war cages or Rumanian prisoner-of-war cages or prisons, take them out for interrogation and put them back?
AIn one document and only one document I read of a similar occurrence from Feodosia. These occurrences were new to me, that civilian prisoners were sent to POW camps. When I read it I could only explain it to myself that it concerned persons of military age who were sent to the POW camp for that reason.
QNow, did the Einsatzkommando ever decide that a person should not be killed but should be punished by a prison term?
ANo, but I want to explain this because else you might get the wrong impression. I believe that the Proportion of released prisoners to these condemned was ninety to ten, or even a ratio of ninety-five percent to five percent, and a number of documents, which the Prosecution has submitted here itself reveal that fact, that a number of persons were arrested who were suspected of being partisans and the rest were released.
QNov in the second topic under the heading, "Einsatzkommando 10-B" in Document NO-4135 before you, which is Page 42 of the English, it states that a great number of Jews of the poorer class are in the Rumania, prisons and nearly no intelligentsia. Doesn't this document confirm the fact that executions had nearly wiped out the leadership or the intelligentsia class in this area, as reported in NOKW-587to the Army Group South?
AI read the contrary from it, and perhaps I understood the contrary because I actually knew the condition, because in Czernowitz there were two scandals. One was the very rotten way in which Jews were killed by the Rumanian Army, and the second was the dirty business the Rumanians did with the rich Jews, and from my knowledge I can comment on this sentence, that the rich Jews actually were not arrested.
THE PRESIDENT:What methods did the Rumanians employ in liquidating Jews that you disapproved of in the language which you have just used?
THE WITNESS:With the kommando leader from Czernowitz I wanted to leave Czernowitz, and I found some of the Jews as they had been shot by the Rumanians, or they had been shot at, and they had been lying there shot although not dead, although the kommando leader had asked the Rumanian Army to stop this. One group of Jews had been sent there and they had shot at them and left the victims lying just as they were. Some were not dead, and only forceful, interference by Pesterer finally stopped it or put it in order end that was when he was responsible for excesses against Rumanians. BY MR. MALTON:
QGeneral, can we assume that most of the time there was close cooperation between the Rumanian troops and the Einsatzgruppen insofar as the solution of the Jewish problem was concerned in your respective areas?
AUnfortunately I must contradict you immediately, Mr. Prosecutor. This cooperation was not possible and for that reason did not exist.
QAnd, General, if you would be so kind, please return to Document Book II-D, Page 41 in the German, 43 in the English, the same document, NO-4135, Prosecution's Exhibit 91. We agree, do we not, that this Operational Situation Report No. 22 is one of the reports that was consolidated in Berlin?
AYes.
QDid not the RSHA have to get this information contained in this report from the four Einsatzgruppen, A, B, C and D?
AThe RSHA got reports from A, B, C and D.
QNow, did not the information under the heading, "Results of the Conference between General von Schobert and Ohlendorf," come from your headquarters before Berlin could consolidate it in its report?
AOf course.
QNow, I have a Question of Document Book I, one Question which is on Page 72 of the English, Page 97 of the German, and is Document NO-3422, and it is Prosecution's Exhibit 19. This document contains directives for the commanders of the chief of the Security Police and the SD which were to be assigned to the prisoner of war camps and the transient camps and the date of this document is 29 October 1941. Were you on the date shown on this document the commanding officer of Einsatzgruppe D?
AYes.
QCan you turn, please, to Document Book III-D, Page 14 of the English, German Page 16, to Document NOKW 641, which is Prosecution Exhibit 151, and this document is, as you will recognize, your signed report to Army headquarters, under date of 12 February, 1942, You gave the Tribunal your comments on this last week, but I would like to ask you what is meant by the phrase under, and I quote, Paragraph I, "Watches confiscated".
AI beg your pardon, may I have this page number again?
QIt is Page 16 of the German. Do you find paragraph headed "I. Watches confiscated"?
APage 16?
QThe document begins on Page 16.
AYes.
QNow, I should like you to explain to the Court what is meant by the term, and I quote, "Anti-Jewish actions" which appears in the first sentence of that paragraph?
A "The watches confiscated during the anti-Jewish actions", do you mean this?
QNo, just what the torn "anti-Jewish action" means.
AThat is not written here, "anti-Jewish action".
QDoesn't the sane phrase in Paragraph II under "Confiscated rubles" appear?
AI believe, unfortunately, I must quote the translation because in the German text it says "Jewish actions," and not "anti-Jewish actions."
QDoes that phrase then mean an action against the Jews?
A Yes.
QAnd the same phrase as it appears in Paragraph II under "Confiscated rubles" also means the same thing?
AYes.
QNow, isn't it true that this property was confiscated simply because it was Jewish property and because Jews were enemies of the Reich and they had no right to property whatever?
AThe text clearly reveals that it says that the property which came, which we got after the Jews were killed was confiscate by the Reich.
QWas this a war-emergency Measure or self-defense Measure, this action?
AI don't think it has ever been maintained. There was an instruction to confiscate.
QNow, I think, General, we will leave the document books. I want to ask you some questions on other information. In your direct examination you stated that between March and July 1942 you were frequently absent from your post as commander of Einsatzgruppe D, did you not?
AYes,
QWho was the acting commander of your group while you were away?
AMy co-defendant, Seibert was acting commander.
QNow, Seiberg, did he occupy this post because of his rank or because of your confidence in him?
AI beg your pardon; because
QDid he occupy this post of acting commander of Einsatzgruppe D because of his rank or because of your confidence in him?
ABecause he was in my staff, that is in the staff of the group, and he was the senior officer there.
QThen because of his rank as senior officer?
ABecause of his rank in the staff, yes.
QIsn't it true that you had confidence in Seibert, that he would be a man that would see that all orders and directives both from Berlin and from the Army would be carried out with the same degree of care that you would have used if present and in actual command?
AUnfortunately I cannot confirm that to you. He did not have the qualification to do that. I trusted Seibert but that independently from what you say, I think we discussed it this morning.
QGeneral, don't misunderstand me. This is not merely confined to executions by the actual daily activities. Didn't you have confidence that Seibert would see that they were carried out just as completely and just as militarily as you would have had you been there?
AUnfortunately he could not do that because I did not have the authority to do so. He could not act for me as authority towards kommando leaders who were senior in rank to him like Standartenfuehrer Seezen, for example, the kommando leader of 10-A; Standartenfuehrer Mueller of Kommando 12. Zapp also held the same rank as he did at least, if not a higher rank. These factors alone show that he had no power to command these kommandos. As you hill remember from the direct examination, as an acting chief it was, Standartenfuehrer Seezen who had been assigned to no by the RSHA. That has never been clanged, only that I did not use him. In this connection Seibert never acted, for me, but he acted for no in the staff, and saw to it that the affairs were running out properly.
QDid you yourself ever leave specific orders with Seibert about the activities of the group to be transmitted to the different Kommandos?
ANo. Although I don't like saying it, in this connection I must say again that such orders were never given by me at all, and Seibert neither had the possibility nor the opportunity to give such orders.
QOn your return from your first absence and subsequent absences in which Seibert was left there, did you have any cause for complaint against his actions that he had performed while you were gone?
AUnfortunately he could not prevent altogether that within the groups differences arose. However, I could not blame him for this because in that connection he did not have the moral authority to prevent this.
QDid he make any attempt to settle these differences?
AI am afraid I don't know that any more.
QGeneral, do you recall any conversations with Seibert concerning the solution of the Jewish problem in the areas occupied by Einsatzgruppe D?
ANo definite discussions, no, but surely such discussions took place, of course,
QDid Seibert over object to the liquidation of Jews, gypsies, Communists, etc?
AMr. Prosecutor, such an immediate possibility he did not have and he had no reason for it because he was not immediately connected, with it. Such discussions usually Were conducted, in a comradely manner because he knewmy position just as well, that is my situation with regard to Himmler and Heydrich. He knew the situation of Himmler and Heydrich regards the Fuehrer. In other words, he knew all the circumstances, and he could not anticipate that nowadays it would, be useful, apart from useless conversations a bout these matters, to have made formal objections.
Q:Did he over ask to be relieved of duty permanently with you?
A:No.
Q:Did he ever ask to be relieved of the duty of inspector of executions?
A:I do not know whether Seibert over inspected any executions. For that reason he could not have asked me to be relieved of that duty. The military inspections in the companies, he certainly very much enjoyed, because that was what he liked to do.
Q:He accompanied you on inspection trips you have stated?
A:Yes.
Q:And on these inspection trips you have at least three times inspected executions. Was Seibert with you then?
A:During these inspection trips no executions were inspected at all, but I merely remember one trip we had together when by chance at the Kommando 10-A we happened to come across the shooting of several plunderers.
Q:He did not ask to be relieved from viewing this incident, did he?
A:It was on the street. He could not have been relieved, because he was approaching this place.
Q:When you sent Seibert on an inspection trip, did he, as your representative have the power to see that the execution squads carried out your orders for humane executions?
A:I have just said that I do not remember that he was sent by me to inspect any executions. If I sent him on any inspection trips, for example, to inspect the Tartar companies, of course he had the special authority to stop bad conditions there. That was the purpose of the trip.
Q:Was Seibert's service in Einsatzgruppe D satisfactory to you at all times?
A:That would be saying too much. In general, I managed to get along with him.
Q:Would you consider that Seibert was one of the few close friends you had in Einsatzgruppe D when you commanded it?
A:I do net consider military connections as friendly connections.
Q:General, let us turn for a moment to Co-Defendant Heinz Schubert. When he reported to you in Nikolaev in October 1941 -- this was some three months after the Einsatzgruppe D had taken the field, was it not?
A:Yes.
Q: who informed Schubert of his field of tasks?
A:That was very simple, relatively speaking. He went to the office and looked at how the files were kept and took care of these files, and, apart from that, I told him what I wanted concerning visitors, terms, order, and so forth. That was all and it was not very difficult to make this clean to him, because he had previous experiences about such things.
Q:Now, was he also informed officially of the main tasks of Einsatzgruppe D in its own operational areas? I specifically refer to the Himmler order and the order to Keep the supply lines moving to the Wehrmacht. Was he informed of that officially?
A:Whether he knew about that, I don't know; I presume so. In any case, I had no reason to inform him about it officially, because officially it was no concern of his
Q:Do you happen to know where he first acquired the knowledge that Einsatzgruppe D was engaged in liquidation of the Jews and Communists, etc?
A:I don't know that. I presume that he only heard that in the Crimea.
Q:When Schubert returned from his inspection trip to Simferopol in September 1941, did he report to you in person?
A:That was not an inspection trip in Simferopol. That was in the same place. He was sent out by me to the same place, because I went there in the morning and in the afternoon and he went there in between. When he returned of course he reported to me.
Q:Did he tell you that he had seen to it that this execution by Braune's Commando II B was carried out according to your orders?
A:He could not have reported that to me, because that was not his task. He merely had to watch and listen but had no authority of command.
Q:Then you would make this same answer to the next question: Did he tell you that he saw to it that those condemned persons were not beaten and that there were no disturbances among the civilian population?
A:It was not his task.
Q:General, isn't it a strange coincidence that all your efforts from 1938 to 1941 to have Braune assigned to you for duty were of no avail, and then suddenly he turns up in your Einsatzgruppe in the fall of 1941, by the merest chance?
A:I don't know whether he had good connections with Amt I and if he wanted to come to me, but I don't think so. I think actually he was surprised by his transfer and it was a mere coincidence that he came to me, but I don't want to maintain that definetely.
Q:You were glad to have him when it so happened he did report to you?
A:I was very glad that he was with me, of course.
Q:And the reason you were glad was because you valued his services, isn't that true?
A:Yes.
Q:Now did Browne ever ask you to be relieved of his command?
A:He never talked about that.
Q:Yesterday -
A :One moment, please. There would have been no chance to do so either, because he knew, like everybody else, that a soldier cannot ask to be relieved from the Army, but unfortunately, he is under the war legislation, where no special application can be made. Such an application would be of no avail.
Q:Yesterday, you testified that many of your officers and men could not stand the mental strain of executions, is that correct?
A:Yes.
Q: you described Browne yesterday as a soft and sensitive man. How did it happen that he was able to stand this strain and there was no necessity to relieve him of his command?
A:As far as I know, Browne only saw one single execution in his life. That does not seem to be a very great strain.
Q:Let us turn our attention once more to Sonderkommando 10 B. Who was the highest ranking officer next to Pesterer in this Kommando?
A:It was Hautsturmfuehere Finger.
Q:Do you consider it impossible for Ruehl ever to have been the deputy Pesterer?
A:Yes, definitely.
Q:When asked by counsel for the Defendant Biberstein about the time when the activities of the Einsatzsgruppen ceased completely, you answered, that that was a result of the retreat of the German forces from Russia and you said, further that the activities of the Einsatzgruppen stopped, when they had to retreat into areas under the German civilian administration, did you not?
A:Yes, but concerning the actual tasks of the Einsatzgruppen, because previously in interrogations I said that on this occasion the Einsatzgruppen were usually reorganized. Their tasks were changed and they were converted into fighting units to help fight the partisans. That was the fate of Einsatzgruppe D, for example.
Q:Approximately when did this change in the activities of the Einsatzgruppe in general take place? What year?
A:In general, one could say after Stalingrad. That is in January, 1943, that is, with the year of 1943.
Q:Are you in a position to state specifically when the activities of Einsatzgruppe C ceased entirely?
A:Unfortunately not.
Q:Were you at that time active in the conquered territories of the East or had you already returned to Berlin?
A:In July 1942 I returned and never went back to the East.
Q:So you were in Berlin at this particular time?
A:Yes.
Q:Now, General, you have told us that the Einsatzgruppe D was broken down into Kommandos. What was the average strength of a Kommando in personnel?
A:That varied. There was only one complete kommando. That was Kommando 12, while the other Einsatzkommandos were broken down and on an average they consisted of 70 to 80 people.
Q:Was there any further breadkown? Were there platoons, or squads in each Kommando?
A:Yes, as required, part kommandos were found.
Q:Now a Teilkommando, is this a permanent organization; or was it organized to perform a cert in mission and then return to its parent group, which is correct?
A:Yes.
Q:Which is correct?
A:As required by necessity the Army could require that a corps or a division could be given such a sub-unit.
Q:Now, it was necessary to have on your staff and certainly distributed through the kommandos, interpreters, was it not?
A:Yes.
Q:What was the usual rank off interpreters in Einsatzgruppe D?
A:That varied. I, for example, had a hauptsturmfuehrer who acted as interpreter. Mostly these interpreters were not from our own ranks, but had been sent to us to help out and mostly they did not join the SS, but were only given a uniform usually according to their former position, that is, an assessor, for example, as a rule would have the uniform of a hauptsturmfuehrer, a regierangsrat, a counsellor, would get a uniform of a sturmbannfuehrer. That is, the interpreters did not no Id a rank as such, but his rank changed according to his former position. He could have been an unterfuehrer, or a hauptsturmfuehrer, or some higher rank.
Q:In the event that it was a sturmbanfuehrer or a hauptsturmfuehrer, did he have interpreting duties?
A:If he was employed as an interpreter, he was an interpreter.
Q:Nothing else?
A:It is possible, of course, that he may have been used for other jobs if necessary of course. Of course, I did not leave anyone in my office without doing anything.
Q:In Einsatzgruppe D, did you have a kommando for the purpose of collecting archives or intelligence material?
A:No.
Q:Do you know if any other Einsatzgruope had a kommando for the purpose of collecting archives?
A:No.
Q:Was there attached to the Einsatzgruppen headquarters any units whose purpose was not the protection of the rear are as by insuring the security of the area?
A:I think this document which you showed me previously reveals that. Here it says first, "Securing, before the commencement of operations, of certain objectives (material, archives, files, pertaining to organizations, associations, groups, etc. hostile to the Reich or State)" It was, of course important to secure such archives. It was necessary and of great importance to know about conditions in the Soviet Union.
QCertainly their own personnel were instructed to preserve such material, were they not?
AYes, in particular, it was the task of the so-called Vorkommandos or Sonderkommandos, because they marched into a city with the fighting troops and had to secure such objects.
QNow General, as head of an Einsatzgruppe did you ever have any contact with the officials of the Reichskommissar for the strengthening of German Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle, the Race and Resettlement Office?
ANot as Einsatzgruppe Chief, only with the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle. Kommando 12, during the month of August, September, until the middle of October, moved up to the Ethnic German Regions in Transistrien, which were dlosed regions and these areas were then handed over to a representative Volksduetsche Mittelstelle and during that time the Chief of that organization, Obergruppenfuehrer Lorenz, was in this area and I also talked to him.
QThat was your only contact, according to your best recollection?
ADuring my time with the Einsatzgruppe, yes.
QYes, Did you ever know anything about Aussenstelle Litzmannstadt?
ANo.
QDid you know of the Lidice incident?
AI heard about it later, not in detail.
QCertainly not in official capacity as the head of an Einsatzgruppe?
ANo.
QDid you ever have any contact with Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle Einsatzkommandos?
AI believe that Einsatzkommandos is not the right expression.
The Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle, the Repatriation Office for Ethnic Germans, had Kommandos that had to look after those areas which I described and these kommandos took over the work from me and in that respect I was in contact with them.
QDid you continue to work together with this group?
AYes, because they were interested in all Ethnic Germans, and if we heard about the fate of those as for example of the 50,000 Ethnic Germans in the Crimea, we informed these groups about it.
QThis then was a regular contact with this group on the Race and Resettlement questions?
ANo, this was not the Race and Resettlement Office. This was the Repatriation Office for Ethnic Germans. I don't know whether these people belonged immediately to the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle or to the Higher SS and Police Leader who had special officers for these tasks. In any case, I wish to add immediately that the actual task of the Einsatzgruppe had nothing to do with these kommandos and that they did not help us either.
QGeneral, did you have any contact with the Higher SS and Police Leader Hildebrandt in the Crimea?
ANo.
QA few more questions and then I am done. May I assume that it was your opinion that you had to obey an order of the Fuehrer whether you personally would agree or disagree with such an order?
AYes.
QWhether you personally considered the order to be human or inhuman?
AYes
QDid you believe that you must obey such an order even unto death?
AUnto my own death? Of course. Of course, in winter, for example, we thought that our lives had come to an end.
QWas it known to you during your time as an Einsatzgruppe Chief that Germany had signed a defense treaty with the Soviet Russia in the summer of 1939?
AYes.
QWas this treaty still in force when Germany and Russia went to war?
AI don't know that. Probably.
MR. WALTON:General, I want to thank you for your cooperation and your prompt answers in this examination.
THE PRESIDENT:Do you have any questions, Mr. Heath?
MR. HEATH:If Your Honors please, yesterday I had begun to ask a question. I think I did not make the relevancy of it clear to the court. Mr. Walton has just touched on it and it is this the plea of the Defendant here obviously is the coercion of a superior order that under the law -
THE PRESIDENT:Mr. Heath, I don't think it is necessary to make any argument.
MR. HEATH:Very well.
THE PRESIDENT:Put the question and then if it seems irrelevant, we will rule on it.
MR. HEATH:Yes, sir. BY MR. HEATH:
Q.Mr. Ohlendorf, you have just said that you felt that you must respect this order unto your own death.
AYes.
QYou have asked the Court to accept that coercion. Will you now tell the Court what your present judgment is of the order. Do you think it was a moral order or do you think it was a wrong order which you received from the head of the German state?
DR.ASCHENAUER (Attorney for the Defendant Ohlendorf): I object to this question, Your Honor. Only facts can be asked about and not opinions.
MR. HEATH:May I answer, if Your Honor please. who claims mitigation because of superior orders is putting himself in the position of saying, morally I had no choice. If, in fact, he morally approved of a superior order and therefore would have acted without the coercion of it, if in fact he did not object to the coercion but merely lent himself to the course of action which he would have to follow without coercion, then a plea of mitigation fails entirely, and so here, if the Defendant did these killings because of the coersive effect of an order, with which he disagreed, that is one thing, but if Ohlendorf was himself in full agreement or in partial agreement with the purpose which Hitler had, then the mitigating effect of the coercion oder is fully or almost fully lost.
THE PRESIDENT:Dr. Aschenauer, do you follow that argument?
MR. HEATH:The plea is bad, if it is done willingly.
DR. ASCHENAUER:I wish to point out that these are merely argumentations which have nothing to do with testimony by the witness.
THE PRESIDENT:The Tribunal has indicated that this is not the time for argument, but it would appear that the purpose behind the question is not in the nature of argumentation, but for the purpose of determining whether there can be any mitiation in the offense as charged by the prosecution in the indictment and for that purpose the question will be permitted.